Hume and Away

Out latest lecture concerned David Hume, considered to be the cleverest person to ever come out of the British Isles ( I haven't left yet), he has had a huge influence on  journalism and the way in which journalists think, and write.

Hume, most likely an atheist, though it would not have been prudent to say openly as self confessed atheists in those days often came down with a bad case of death, usually fatal; was an empiricist who believed that there are no innate ideas, and that ideas are gained through experience, and more complex ideas are synthesised from simpler 'atoms' of understanding. Hume opposed rationalism - the belief that ideas are independent from consciousness - claiming more that consciousness is ideas.

His logical positivism has become the philosophy of science, and the underpinning of social sciences. According to logical positivism, there are no truths or absolutes, There is only probability i.e. You cannot be sure the sun will rise tomorrow, but there is a very good chance it will.

His thoughts on causation were that it is an illusion. The thought that one thing causes another is only in our heads, a way of putting meaning to how and why things work. Astrologers talk about the planets aligning. This is bollocks. They are just big hunks of rock hurtling through space. Without humans to look at them, they would not be aligning, they would just be rocks in space. We just happen to have given them significance. Hume's example was that of playing billiards: a white ball hits a red ball causing it to move. Hume argues that there is no evidence for this, that causation cannot be proved. Russell, in 'History of Western Philosophy', writes that "we can perceive, by mere observation of A and B, that A is above, or to the right of B, but not that A causes B". It is only that we have observed B following A so often that we assume B is caused by A. The basic thing that to take from Hume on causation is don't come to conclusions.
Induction is the drawing of an inference using synthetic logic. Logic is a specific scientific analysis of claims and must be internally consistent to be correct. There are two types of logic:

• Analytic logic is that in which conclusions are derived from the subject, for example: all bachelors are unmarried men. We know that being a bachelor means you're single, therefore they are unmarried. Analytic logic is fairly simple and is used to programme computers, 'when 'A' button is pressed, write an A' etc. It is also always true.

• Synthetic logic adds knowledge. Synthetic logic only works if the axiomatic statement (the beginning statement in a chain of logic) is true e.g. "all men are mortal", we know this to be true, "socrates is a man" this is an analytic statement, so it is true, "therefore, Socrates is mortal". Hume disagrees with induction from synthetic knowledge as it can be causal, and there is too much room for error. A particularly current example of an induction error would be someone saying, "my grandad smoked 40 cigarettes a day his whole life, and lived to be 100, therefore smoking does not damage your health". The problem with this statement is obvious as it is only one case among thousands, and while it is not necessarily true, it cannot be called false.

The verification principle helps to deal with these problems as it works on the principle that any true statement must be open to independent verification. According to Freddy Ayer, if a statement is neither true nor false, it has no scientific value unless it is verifiable. It is as useful as the quacking of a duck (I assume it also won't echo). Aristotle's logic uses the principle of non-contradiction. Something cannot be something else as it is; the moon is not the sun, and the sun isn't the moon.
Statements can be classed:
•    Verified as provisionally 'true' (non-contradictory)
•    Verified as definitely false (contradictory)
•    Non-verifiable (gibberish)
e.g. Life on another planet is non contradictory (as there is nothing that says there is no other life in the universe), however it cannot be verified, therefore it is provisionally true.

Karl Popper, a kind of follower of Hume's disagrees with the verification principle as he considers it to be a metaphysical pseudo-science, and science can only deal with facts. He said that statements must be falsifiable as well as verifiable, and must show how it could be wrong in certain circumstances. It is using this principle that scientists work with today. It is why criticism of scientific discoveries is so important. If something cannot be falsified, it is true.


This could lead to talk about why certain groups in America are trying to get creationism to be taught in science classes. as far as being able to falsify creationism goes. They wouldn't even start spelling muster.