Hume isn't laying out a rejection of external objects, knowledge or philosophy. — TheWillowOfDarkness

I did not claim that Hume was rejecting external objects. I'm saying the Treatise Book 1 lays out Hume's argument as to why we do not have a proof of external objects and Hume's argument that it is irrational to believe in the continued existence of objects not seen.

I see that you have not read all of my comments. I can't say I blame you. It's a lot to read. But in my comments above I quote Hume bewildered by the fact the porter was able to reach his room on the second floor as he was under the belief the stairs would be annihilated if he was not looking at them. That seems ridiculous to us, right? But that is where Hume's doctrines lead him. His philosophy is irrational and unlivable. He attempts to make his philosophy livable by changing to a "mitigated scepticism." This mitigated scepticism is just an unprincipled "on-again, off-again" scepticism. He will be sceptical when philosophising but will not be sceptical when he gets hungry! Hume says a "true sceptic" doesn't deny himself these comforts.

Come on, admit it. That's dishonest on Hume's part!

OK, I see now that you were referring to a different idea of potential energy with your "mass rest energy" than the usual idea of potential energy being due to gravity of objects at rest. Your idea here seems to be the idea of the energy that could theoretically be derived by converting the total mass into energy.

Your inertial energy seems more akin, kind of an inverse, to the ordinary conception of potential energy. You seem to understand the inertial energy of an object as being the idea of how much energy would be required to move it.

I've read it very closely and can find absolutely nothing of value in it. His idea that our observations are just in our mind and that we cannot know if objects external to our mind exist or if they exist when we are not looking at them is completely irrational and leads to absurdities. — Ron Cram

If you're not convinced there's nothing of value in one's philosophy that claims our understanding based on our observation cannot be justified, then that's your opinion. But Hume had made a statement that's deceptively simple it freaked the heck out of the entire caboodle of philosophers.

Kinetic energy is implied in the the movement of the pool balls. We grasp its truth, but never the thing "kinetic". It's not separable from the other things in the room, like the balls. Yet you speak of it like you could literally hold it in your hand, with or without the balls.

What do you mean when you say we can observe kinetic energy being transferred? We can observe the first ball strike the second ball followed by the second ball moving. But you'd observe the same thing if you were watching an animation of pool balls. We can only observe phenomena, but not the reasons behind phenomena. Reasons are not available to our senses, only to our intellects. So I think proving that one pool ball causes the second to move would require a logical proof and not just an appeal to experience. — Dusty of Sky

Correct.

We need to unpack this one a bit. Why does Hume makes this move? He's answering a question about a certain kind of "proof." Do we have experience of these unseen objects at the given time? We do not. Clearly, they do not meet a standard of observation. Beyond this, I don't know for sure (beyond all other possibilities) whether the stairs are present. All sorts of stuff could happen to the stairs, including the stairs ceasing to be.

Hume is really just sticking to a certain demand justification. A demand, which we might add, applies both ways.

If the letter reaches him without the stairs, he will have a world without stairs (whatever that might be) which brought him the letter. The stairs have just been replaced by something else. He will be confronted by the need for an unseen object in an absence of stairs too. Bewilderment in either case. We cannot make the accusation Hume believes their are no stairs.

For the same reason he cannot accept there are stairs, he cannot accept there aren't any. He cannot see the occurrence of either.

What's driving this juxtaposition is not the existence/non-existence of any particular object or not, but rather the distinction between one's own experience and everything else in the world. Whenever we encounter information or a proposal about something beyond are immediate experience, we are put in this situation.

In making this point, Hume isn't trying to pose some kind of universe without external objects or even without external objects which we know, but laying out what is demanded by a certain kind of justification. The true sceptic doesn't deny himself the comforts of knowledge because they understand this scepticism isn't strictly a measure of what is known. It's a measure of whether a claim has been justified to a certain standard.

Yes.

:cool:

If you're not convinced there's nothing of value in one's philosophy that claims our understanding based on our observation cannot be justified, then that's your opinion. But Hume had made a statement that's deceptively simple it freaked the heck out of the entire caboodle of philosophers. — Caldwell

Yes, it did freak out a bunch of philosophers and no one knew how to refute him. But Hume's idea was still completely irrational. He did not add to our philosophical knowledge because he was wrong and I can prove it.

Kinetic energy is implied in the the movement of the pool balls. We grasp its truth, but never the thing "kinetic". It's not separable from the other things in the room, like the balls. Yet you speak of it like you could literally hold it in your hand, with or without the balls. — Caldwell

I think you are trying to draw too fine a distinction here. When you see motion, you are looking at kinetic energy. That's all you really need to think about. When you see an object at rest, then you are looking at inertial energy.

For the same reason he cannot accept there are stairs, he cannot accept there aren't any. He cannot see the occurrence of either. — TheWillowOfDarkness

Yes, this is the essence of Pyrrhonism - the suspension of judgment. But this suspension of judgment is entirely irrational.

In making this point, Hume isn't trying to pose some kind of universe without external objects or even without external objects which we know, but laying out what is demanded by a certain kind of justification. The true sceptic doesn't deny himself the comforts of knowledge because they understand this scepticism isn't strictly a measure of what is known. It's a measure of whether a claim has been justified to a certain standard. — TheWillowOfDarkness

Yes, this is correct. Hume's irrational scepticism isn't trying to prove the non-existence of an external world; it is trying to establish suspension of judgment. In Book 1, Hume speaks in a very dogmatical way but his goal is not to establish knowledge but to establish suspension of judgment. This even applies to the continued existence of objects when they are not being observed such as the stairs. This leads to all kinds of absurdities and inability to reason properly in Treatise 1.4.7. Hume then goes for, and leads his followers to go for, a totally unprincipled "mitigated scepticism" which is "on-again, off-again." Hume was forced to give up his goal of living a life that was philosophically consistent. Why? Because he was unwilling to give up his irrational scepticism.

Once you read the proof of an external world, the suspension of judgment about an external world goes away. And so do all of the absurdities and inconsistencies. It is possible to live a life that is philosophically consistent. Hume failed to show the way.

read section 119 closely) — Ron Cram

By what argument can it be proved, that the perceptions of the mind must be caused by external objects, entirely different from them, though resembling them (if that be possible) and could not arise either from the energy of the mind itself, or from the suggestion of some invisible and unknown spirit, or from some other cause still more unknown to us? It is acknowledged, that, in fact, many of these perceptions arise not from anything external, as in dreams, madness, and other diseases. And nothing can be more inexplicable than the manner, in which body should so operate upon mind as ever to convey an image of itself to a substance, supposed of so different, and even contrary a nature.

It is a question of fact, whether the perceptions of the senses be produced by external objects, resembling them: how shall this question be determined? By experience surely; as all other questions of a like nature. But here experience is, and must be entirely silent. The mind has never anything present to it but the perceptions, and cannot possibly reach any experience of their connexion with objects. The supposition of such a connexion is, therefore, without any foundation in reasoning.
— Hume

I agree with Hume that no argument can prove that there is an external world. I also agree that no argument can prove that the sun will rise tomorrow. For me the point is about the limits of deduction. We aren't essentially deductive creatures. Custom, habit, experience rule. If we think of rationality in terms of mathematical proofs, then we just aren't (primarily) rational creatures. Our most important knowledge has no deductive foundation. If B follows A with regularity, we like to say that A causes B. But we can't prove the necessity. And indeed we human beings are often fooled.

But even though Hume convinced himself and me of this, we both kept on believing 'irrationally' that the sun wasn't a dream and that yes indeed it would rise tomorrow. I say 'irrationally' and yet acting on patterns in our experience for our benefit is also rationality itself. The point is that we can't get by on pure reason. If we can't find proofs for external world or the uniformity of nature, that's OK. We don't need them. We can't help believing in such things. Its what we are.

That said, I'd still like to hear any proof you have that there is an external world. Since I never doubted that there was, I'm really interested in how you navigate around Hume's suspicion that there can be no such proof.

Circling back to the OP, I think the 'problem of induction' was the kind of advance you were asking about. And that's just one great idea. You mention Kant being inspired by Hume. Indeed. Assuming that you like Kant, that also evidence of Hume's significance.

Anyway, I'll stop here with one more great quote, one with which I completely agree.

It is confessed, that the utmost effort of human reason is to reduce the principles, productive of natural phenomena, to a greater simplicity, and to resolve the many particular effects into a few general causes, by means of reasonings from analogy, experience, and observation. But as to the causes of these general causes, we should in vain attempt their discovery; nor shall we ever be able to satisfy ourselves, by any particular explication of them. These ultimate springs and principles are totally shut up from human curiosity and enquiry. Elasticity, gravity, cohesion of parts, communication of motion by impulse; these are probably the ultimate causes and principles which we shall ever discover in nature; and we may esteem ourselves sufficiently happy, if, by accurate enquiry and reasoning, we can trace up the particular phenomena to, or near to, these general principles. The most perfect philosophy of the natural kind only staves off our ignorance a little longer: as perhaps the most perfect philosophy of the moral or metaphysical kind serves only to discover larger portions of it. Thus the observation of human blindness and weakness is the result of all philosophy, and meets us at every turn, in spite of our endeavours to elude or avoid it. — Hume

Rather than get lost in details, I'll try to focus the issue. I don't think Hume doubted the existence of the external world. — joshua

This is a quote from an earlier comment you made. The Treatise Book 1 explains Hume's doubt of the external and his shock the porter was able to rise to the second floor if the stairs were annihilated by Hume's absence. If your only exposure to Hume is his first Enquiry, then you would not be aware of Hume's extreme and pernicious doubt.

I agree with Hume that no argument can prove that there is an external world. — joshua

A rational person would not request a proof. The request is irrational. I explain this in my forthcoming paper which I hope will be published next year.

You provide a quote from Hume:

It is a question of fact, whether the perceptions of the senses be produced by external objects, resembling them: how shall this question be determined? — Hume

I will give a few hints about my paper. Hume doesn't like sense data. He says sensations are only impressions in the mind and arise from "unknown causes." He says our senses are founded upon our imagination. And Hume tries to distort the meaning of these sensations. For example, Hume likes to pretend that we cannot see depth and distance. As a result, he makes some odd comments about space. Hume really dislikes the sense of touch because it gives a sense of reality. With sense of touch you can discern hardness and softness, heat and cold, pain and pleasure. Hume's dislike of sense data makes him the very opposite of an empiricist. He is the anti-empiricist.

But here is the real key. Hume seems to know absolutely nothing beyond the five senses commonly discussed during his lifetime. Now we know the human body has many other senses under the category interoceptive senses.

The interoceptive senses are those we use to sense the internal condition of our bodies. We can sense whether we are cold or hot. We can sense whether our heart is beating fast or slow. We can sense if we are hungry or full. We can sense if we are thirsty or well-hydrated. We can sense if we are getting enough oxygen or if the air is thin. We can sense if we are losing our balance or if we experience sudden muscle weakness and in some cases we can even sense if we are about to lose consciousness.

Proprioception is among the interoceptive senses. Our bodies have little sensors, called proprioceptors, under our skin and in very high density in our hands, feet and major joints. These sensors tell our brain where our body parts are in space. For example, if you put your hand behind you, you no longer see your hand but the proprioceptors tell you that your hand is behind you. Proprioceptors can tell you if your hand is low to the ground or high over your head. And they can tell you the orientation, whether your palm is facing forward or facing backward. Try it right now.

That is all the hint I'm going to give you regarding my upcoming paper. Perhaps you can figure out the proof of the external world from this.

You mention Kant being inspired by Hume. Indeed. Assuming that you like Kant, that also evidence of Hume's significance. — joshua

I'm not a fan of Kant. Philosophy would have been much better off if Kant had provided a real refutation of Hume as I am about to do.

You provided another lengthy quote from Hume. I would like to comment on a portion of that quote:

These ultimate springs and principles are totally shut up from human curiosity and enquiry. Elasticity, gravity, cohesion of parts, communication of motion by impulse; these are probably the ultimate causes and principles which we shall ever discover in nature; and we may esteem ourselves sufficiently happy, if, by accurate enquiry and reasoning, we can trace up the particular phenomena to, or near to, these general principles. The most perfect philosophy of the natural kind only staves off our ignorance a little longer — Hume

This is absurd. The quote certainly hasn't aged well. If Hume was a decent student of natural philosophy, he would know how silly this is. Why is Hume not openly mocked in philosophy texts for saying "these are probably the ultimate causes and principles which we shall ever discover in nature?" He was certainly no futurist. He had no clue about the discoveries yet to be made relating to electromagnetic forces, radiation, strong and weak nuclear reactions, fluid dynamics, quantum mechanics, atmospheric science, geology, chemistry and biology. Hume was enamored with the skeptical philosophy, not with the advance of science.

Hume concludes:

Thus the observation of human blindness and weakness is the result of all philosophy, and meets us at every turn, in spite of our endeavours to elude or avoid it. — Hume

Do you see what nonsense this is? There is currently strong tension between the disciplines of science and philosophy at the university. This tension, I believe, is largely the result of Hume's followers being irrationally skeptical and anti-science. Philosophy will never progress out of its current darkness until Hume is seen as entirely refuted.

Reality [...] is "what you run into when you are wrong." — Ron Cram

I greatly like this statement. But I so far also don’t find anything in Hume that would at all contradict its stance. Hume was about prioritizing our experience, rather than our rationality. Yet, by establishing via non-deductive reasoning that all our reasoning is liable to some degree of error, his position to me seems to stand in firm agreement with the quoted statement. It is most often via our experiences that we discover “what we run into when we are wrong”. And even when it is via reasoning that this is discovered, to be so discovered, it will need to conform to our experiences.

Hume's idea that causation cannot be observed is counter to our everyday experience and completely irrational. — Ron Cram

Causation is an abstract concept or reasoning and, as such, is not directly observable via the physiological senses. To Hume, we form understandings of causation as abstract concept via an accumulation of experiences that hold uniformity. Yet Hume never denied that we hold instincts (in the broader, non-genotypic sense) via which we interact causally:

If constant conjunctions were all that is involved, my thoughts about aspirin and headaches would only be hypothetical. For belief, one of the conjoined objects must be present to my senses or memories; I must be taking, or just have taken, an aspirin. In these circumstances, believing that my headache will soon be relieved is as unavoidable as feeling affection for a close friend, or anger when someone harms us. “All these operations are species of natural instincts, which no reasoning … is able either to produce or prevent” (EHU 5.1.8/46–47). — SEP - David Hume - 5.3 Belief

For example, Aristotle's physics are terrible. He was wrong about many things. But he is also the author of deductive logic. — Ron Cram

Am I correct in presuming that you dislike Hume's, here paraphrased, affirmation that all logically sound arguments are founded upon non-deductively obtained premises? Premises that thereby hold a possibility of error?

That there are no infallible premises and, thereby, infallible conclusions is not to me irrational - though it might offend many a rationalist, granted. Instead, this conclusion, to me seems to be what honest reasoning is about.

As just one implication of such reasoning, Hume is basically saying (without name calling): "Hey guys, think twice about Cartesian philosophy, for our reasoning cannot ever be infallible, as Descartes claims it can be; also, yes, Berkley said this and that, but Berkley's reasoning by no means establishes the absence of an external world and, in fact, we can't help but live with beliefs (instinctive or otherwise) that an external world exists - which makes the external world as solid as anything else, given that nothing is infallible."

A rational person would not request a proof. The request is irrational. — Ron Cram

I agree, using 'rational' in the ordinary way. We are radically embedded in a world that we share with others. Only philosophers in love with a strange game pretend otherwise, and yet they do so to impress one another. Perhaps most 'high-level' human behavior is other-directed. I want to impress people, get paid by people. I think in the language of my tribe. If my private journal is discovered, it is mostly intelligible by others in the tribe.

If we let ourselves see this embeddedness in the world (which is painful in the context of our fantasies of autonomy), then many 'problems' of philosophy just dissolve. They are like chess problems, but less pure and beautiful given the 'organic' nature of language.

Why is Hume not openly mocked in philosophy texts for saying "these are probably the ultimate causes and principles which we shall ever discover in nature?" — Ron Cram

I agree that science has progressed, but I think you are missing the point. There's a tendency to explain things in terms of basic principles which themselves remain unexplained. Sometimes we find a more general theory or set of concepts that offer an explanation, but now this more general theory is true for no reason (or seems true enough for now for no reason.)

The most perfect philosophy of the natural kind only staves off our ignorance a little longer — Hume

Do you see what nonsense this is? There is currently strong tension between the disciplines of science and philosophy at the university. This tension, I believe, is largely the result of Hume's followers being irrationally skeptical and anti-science — Ron Cram

I find it implausible that 'Hume's followers' are anti-science. Instead I see Hume as a scientist's philosopher. I read him as anti-religious and anti-dogmatic. Consider the part you left out:

..as perhaps the most perfect philosophy of the moral or metaphysical kind serves only to discover larger portions of [our ignorance] — Hume

To me this is the ghost of Socrates.

I dare say, Athenians, that someone among you will reply, "Why is this, Socrates, and what is the origin of these accusations of you: for there must have been something strange which you have been doing? All this great fame and talk about you would never have arisen if you had been like other men: tell us, then, why this is, as we should be sorry to judge hastily of you." Now I regard this as a fair challenge, and I will endeavor to explain to you the origin of this name of "wise," and of this evil fame. Please to attend then. And although some of you may think I am joking, I declare that I will tell you the entire truth. Men of Athens, this reputation of mine has come of a certain sort of wisdom which I possess. If you ask me what kind of wisdom, I reply, such wisdom as is attainable by man, for to that extent I am inclined to believe that I am wise; whereas the persons of whom I was speaking have a superhuman wisdom, which I may fail to describe, because I have it not myself; and he who says that I have, speaks falsely, and is taking away my character. And here, O men of Athens, I must beg you not to interrupt me, even if I seem to say something extravagant. For the word which I will speak is not mine. I will refer you to a witness who is worthy of credit, and will tell you about my wisdom - whether I have any, and of what sort - and that witness shall be the god of Delphi. You must have known Chaerephon; he was early a friend of mine, and also a friend of yours, for he shared in the exile of the people, and returned with you. Well, Chaerephon, as you know, was very impetuous in all his doings, and he went to Delphi and boldly asked the oracle to tell him whether - as I was saying, I must beg you not to interrupt - he asked the oracle to tell him whether there was anyone wiser than I was, and the Pythian prophetess answered that there was no man wiser. Chaerephon is dead himself, but his brother, who is in court, will confirm the truth of this story.

Why do I mention this? Because I am going to explain to you why I have such an evil name. When I heard the answer, I said to myself, What can the god mean? and what is the interpretation of this riddle? for I know that I have no wisdom, small or great. What can he mean when he says that I am the wisest of men? And yet he is a god and cannot lie; that would be against his nature. After a long consideration, I at last thought of a method of trying the question. I reflected that if I could only find a man wiser than myself, then I might go to the god with a refutation in my hand. I should say to him, "Here is a man who is wiser than I am; but you said that I was the wisest." Accordingly I went to one who had the reputation of wisdom, and observed to him - his name I need not mention; he was a politician whom I selected for examination - and the result was as follows: When I began to talk with him, I could not help thinking that he was not really wise, although he was thought wise by many, and wiser still by himself; and I went and tried to explain to him that he thought himself wise, but was not really wise; and the consequence was that he hated me, and his enmity was shared by several who were present and heard me. So I left him, saying to myself, as I went away: Well, although I do not suppose that either of us knows anything really beautiful and good, I am better off than he is - for he knows nothing, and thinks that he knows. I neither know nor think that I know. In this latter particular, then, I seem to have slightly the advantage of him. Then I went to another, who had still higher philosophical pretensions, and my conclusion was exactly the same. I made another enemy of him, and of many others besides him. — Socrates/Plato

Anyway, Hume goes with science like ketchup with hamburgers. Yet he also sees that science has no deductive justification, which is fascinating. We are 'irrationally rational' Pavlovian dogs. Skepticism is not our problem. Instead human beings are eager to sit at the feet of this or that guru with a few big words in his mouth --because those words tickle their bellies right.

Philosophy will never progress out of its current darkness until Hume is seen as entirely refuted. — Ron Cram

A line like this helps me understand why you dislike Hume so much. I get the impression that you think philosophy is...still important. Yet I think you agree that nobody needs an OCD proof of the external world. To be sure our modern isolated personalities will look for gurus from Deepak Chopra to Dr. Phil to Jordan Peterson to Zizek. More creative (and arrogant?) personalities will present themselves as new and improved gurus, offering some homebrew of traditional religion and philosophy proper and quantum woo and psychoanalysis and pop culture and the left-wing, right-wing, broken-wing buzzwords of the twitter-verse.

Philosophy forums are both fun and sad that way. The modern atomized personality with its minimal shared culture wanders in a smoky maze with ten thousand prophets for profit who don't agree.

You had such a vision of the street
As the street hardly understands — Eliot

This vision or my own morose perspective is one more option that can be packaged and sold as tomorrow's post-spiritual-but-spiritual bestseller. I suspect that there are lots of people out there who don't make much noise (what's the point?) and yet take science for a useful best guess and philosophy as a bag of tricks that might be good for this or that situation. And as an amusing zoo of vivid personalities who think they've finally got it right.

Regarding Dallas Willard's description of reality, you write:

I greatly like this statement. But I so far also don’t find anything in Hume that would at all contradict its stance. — javra

Yes, I very much like Dallas Willard. I even had the pleasure of meeting him once. To find where Hume runs into reality, read Hume's Treatise, especially the sections 1.4.2 and 1.4.7. No one can read those passages without seeing the absurdities that Hume has run into and the doubts about his philosophy this causes him. Instead of mending his philosophy, he decides on what he calls "mitigated skepticism" a kind of on-again, off-again skepticism.

Causation is an abstract concept or reasoning and, as such, is not directly observable via the physiological senses. — javra

Not true. We can and do observe causation. We observe the transfer of kinetic energy when one pool ball strikes another. We observe causation when we observe the flame consume the match. We observe causation when we observe a brick shatter a window. There is nearly an endless supply of these simple examples.

I agree that science has progressed, but I think you are missing the point. There's a tendency to explain things in terms of basic principles which themselves remain unexplained. Sometimes we find a more general theory or set of concepts that offer an explanation, but now this more general theory is true for no reason (or seems true enough for now for no reason.) — joshua

You are absolutely correct that we sometimes find a more general or deeper theory that fits the data better. One example of this was Einstein's theory of gravitation known as his general theory of relativity. Newton's had noticed what he called the universal law of gravitation, which is mathematically an inverse square law. Newton used g as his symbol gravitation. Einstein continued using the symbol g. He continued to recognize the inverse square law. The difference in the theory was the Newton could not explain what caused gravitation and Einstein's theory says it results from the warping of the spacetime continuum. Why do massive objects cause the spacetime continuum to warp? We don't know and so there is room for a deeper theory than Einstein's. But I think you are missing Hume's attitude in this passage. Because he is a skeptic, he is saying "Guys, we really haven't learned that much. There are still lots of things we don't know and we will never find out." Hume was clearly wrong. His skepticism is irrational, unwarranted. I'm thankful that scientists did not listen to him. If they had, I would not be able to book international airline tickets from my smart phone while riding in the back of an Uber.

I find it implausible that 'Hume's followers' are anti-science. Instead I see Hume as a scientist's philosopher. I read him as anti-religious and anti-dogmatic. Consider the part you left out: — joshua

My scientist friends consider Hume anti-science. I don't see how the portion I left out helps make the case that he would applaud the advance of science. His Treatise Book 1 was a frontal attack on Isaac Newton, observation, Newton's law of cause and effect, mathematics (especially geometry which Newton used in the Principia), etc. I know that for a long time the Hume followers taught that Hume was a follower of Newton, but this demonstrably untrue. Hume praised Newton with faint praise but attacked everything he accomplished. See https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hume-newton/

I agree with you that your Socrates quote is real Socrates and not Plato. But Socrates had reason to be skeptical that Hume did not have. Hume lived after Grosseteste, Galileo, Kepler, Bacon, Boyle, Huygens, Hooke, s'Gravesande and Newton. Hume lived after the great burst of the Scientific Revolution and then attempted to deny and fight against the advances these great men made.

Yet he also sees that science has no deductive justification, which is fascinating. — joshua

Science doesn't need deductive justification. Let that sink in.

Yet I think you agree that nobody needs an OCD proof of the external world. — joshua

I would say that nobody needed a proof before Hume asked for one. Once people were stumped, the proof became necessary which is why I'm publishing one next year.

I suspect that there are lots of people out there who don't make much noise (what's the point?) and yet take science for a useful best guess and philosophy as a bag of tricks that might be good for this or that situation. And as an amusing zoo of vivid personalities who think they've finally got it right. — joshua

Science is much more than a "useful best guess" because it results in useful products and medicines that improve and lengthen our lives and also gives us new facts about which we can philosophize. Philosophy is important for a vast number of reasons, but so much bad philosophy has been published that is weighing people down and holding them back. Philosophy can be a terrific store of epistemological and logical tools and metaphysical facts. Philosophy can provide a platform from which new researches are conducted and new sciences are developed. Right now, philosophy is in a dark place. I think the best service I can provide philosophy is to remove the hindrances to good philosophy by refuting some of the worst philosophers. I'm starting with Hume.

Yes, it did freak out a bunch of philosophers and no one knew how to refute him. — Ron Cram

Refute what? That induction is unjustified? They all joined him on this!

The question [that you should address to Hume yourself] is "So what?". So what if induction is not justified understanding. Can we live with this? Yes! I'm not at all bothered by this.

But Hume's idea was still completely irrational. He did not add to our philosophical knowledge because he was wrong and I can prove it. — Ron Cram

Irrational in what way? And why would a philosopher add to our knowledge all the time instead of just invalidating what we're accustomed to already? Skeptics do this and we take it for granted! And yes they are philosophers, just so you know.

I think you are trying to draw too fine a distinction here. When you see motion, you are looking at kinetic energy. — Ron Cram

No you're not. But your teachers must have told you so.
What you see is movement of objects that may or may not have the property of kinetic energy. Talk to magicians or illusionists.

Science is much more than a "useful best guess" because it results in useful products and medicines that improve and lengthen our lives and also gives us new facts about which we can philosophize. — Ron Cram

I love science, just to be clear. We agree on 'useful.' I say 'best guess' because I trust the products of science, without experiencing these products as final or beyond revision.

Philosophy is important for a vast number of reasons, — Ron Cram

I'd say that philosophy was important. I mean certain classic texts in the genre had real impact. I don't think philosophy proper continues to be all that important to the culture as a whole. Of course people are hot and bothered about politics (understandably), and philosophy appears within those heated discussions in a cruder form. But careful thought at the level of the good philosophy texts doesn't move the masses.

Offer the average person a proof that the world exists and they might think you are crazy. While I think philosophy at its best is about as good as it gets, bad philosophy is sub-normal. Thanks to the internet, I've seen how often the manic street preacher wears the robes of the philosopher. There's usually no way to put some magic world-saving system of philosophical words to the test. If there were, that'd pretty much be science. So philosophy attracts self-important Thinkers who don't need funding for equipment and can't be pinned down enough to be refuted (in their own eyes.) Personally I think we all do this to some degree when it comes to 'spiritual' issues. It's occasionally depressing to be 'realistic,' and I sometimes envy those with a mission and a message. ' The problem is X, and the solution is Y.'

For me the problems are X,Y, and Z, and no grand solution is apparent. I can offer trivialities like eat healthy food, don't waste your money on stupid sh*t, try not to need so much, seek employment that's fulfilling, blah blah blah. I think this is good advice for those who generally want to survive, but I see no master plan that makes that comfortable survival important to strangers. And I see no grand purpose for the species. And the problems I see in the world are (to me) manifestations of the opposed forces in my own 'soul', while for a different type of personality the world's problems are the result of a conspiracy of the bads, who of course are other-than the diagnostician.

I confess, that was quite a digression. But I think it gets to the issue behind the issue --the evangelist versus the morose (critical) philosopher -- who is also the laughing philosopher when the brain chemistry is right.

I would say that nobody needed a proof before Hume asked for one. Once people were stumped, the proof became necessary which is why I'm publishing one next year. — Ron Cram

Is 'need' the right word here? Such a proof would be the clever solution of a chess problem. Except chess problems are more beautiful, since they are posed in a exact language. Philosophical 'proofs' can't be the 'math' they hope to emulate. Language is a slimy, smoking beast. The 'solution' to all such philosophical chess problems is perhaps to face this ugly beast and suffer the resulting paradigm change. Because language is a slimy, smoking beast, I can't pseudo-mathematically prove to you that it's like that. I can hint at an 'experience of language,' but that is misleadingly mystical sounding.

As long as someone is locked into 'the game' on a gut-level, they're dead to the examples (which other famous philosophers have already provided.) So I won't go into it. What I'm talking about isn't science, but it's the kind of realization that increases a persons respect for engineering at least.

Why do massive objects cause the spacetime continuum to warp? We don't know and so there is room for a deeper theory than Einstein's. — Ron Cram

I agree. And then after we have that deeper theory there will still be room for a yet deeper theory. I think we agree that the most general patterns we have must therefore be true for no reason. The alternative seems to be 'because God,' which only draws a smiley face on the issue.

Science doesn't need deductive justification. Let that sink in. — Ron Cram

You are preaching to the choir. And isn't it you who are concerned with a proof of the external world? A deductive enterprise which you claim is somehow needed? What convinces human beings is the power that gives them what they want. I think we are fundamentally empirical beings. Deduction is an elite taste. I like mathematical proofs personally, but I don't think the proofs are what convince most people. Show them lots of examples and they will generalize (often ignoring counterexamples.)

But this is why I suggest that Hume is (counter-intuitively perhaps) pro-science. If the knowledge we use all of the time in the real world has no deductive foundation, that's a demotion of deduction and not an impossible demotion of our wordly knowledge. The bookish philosopher is shown in a new, unflattering light when we realize that deduction is secondary tool. We have to go outside and try things to see how the world works. And all of our theories are works-so-far conjectures.

Not true. We can and do observe causation. We observe the transfer of kinetic energy when one pool ball strikes another. We observe causation when we observe the flame consume the match. We observe causation when we observe a brick shatter a window. There is nearly an endless supply of these simple examples. — Ron Cram

I think you are missing something important here. It is conceivable that the brick will bounce off the window. Of course we don't expect that to happen, but we can't prove that because bricks usually smash through windows that they will always do so. Yet we can't help expecting them to do so. So the question is whether and how causality is anything more than such expectations.

Or we can think of the half-life of some radioactive element. We fit curves to data points and calculate parameters again and again until we decide that the element has a 'nature' that we can count on in the future. But the silent assumption is that nature is uniform, that the past determines the future. I know of no non-circular and therefore genuine proof of this. Yet I can't help expecting the future to be like the past, all other things being equal. I'm just that kind of monkey, it seems. (Which is again applying the principle, which is implicit perhaps in the concepts of human nature and nature itself.)

Refute what? That induction is unjustified? They all joined him on this! — Caldwell

No, philosophers were unable to refute Hume's claim that the external world cannot be demonstrated. Thomas Reid tried a "common sense" approach. Kant tried. GE Moore tried. A great number of philosophers tried. My paper next year will provide an unassailable proof that an external world exists.

Offer the average person a proof that the world exists and they might think you are crazy. — joshua

I agree. The goal of publishing my proof is not to stir the masses to get a job or change their life. My goal is to change the way philosophers think and to change the way philosophers teach philosophy. The greatest philosophers, in my opinion, are not the skeptics. Skepticism is important in both philosophy and in science. Skepticism is the motivation for testing your conclusions and gaining a greater confidence in them when they pass the test. But irrational skepticism, the kind of skepticism that Hume had, is unwarranted and slows progress. The greatest philosophers are those who put the irrational skeptics aside, totally ignore them, and go about their work.

For me the problems are X,Y, and Z, and no grand solution is apparent. I can offer trivialities like eat healthy food, don't waste your money on stupid sh*t, try not to need so much, seek employment that's fulfilling, blah blah blah. I think this is good advice for those who generally want to survive, but I see no master plan that makes that comfortable survival important to strangers. And I see no grand purpose for the species. And the problems I see in the world are (to me) manifestations of the opposed forces in my own 'soul', while for a different type of personality the world's problems are the result of a conspiracy of the bads, who of course are other-than the diagnostician. — joshua

This is not a bad digression at all. Philosophy, at least originally, was about life. It was about gaining wisdom to live a better life, accomplish the right things, and be a good citizen. My philosophical interests are very much in this direction. In addition to being interested in philosophy of life, I'm also interested in epistemology, metaphysics, philosophy of science and philosophy of religion. I believe all of these areas of study can help me build a better philosophy of life.

What I do NOT want, as I am developing my philosophy of life, is for some follower of Hume to pop his head up and say "But you can't even prove an external world exists!" That's what Hume was preemptively doing in Section 119 of his first Enquiry. It's annoying. His only purpose is to distract someone from making philosophical progress. That's why it's essential I publish my paper. Once it is done, we can put that bit of irrational skepticism behind us and move on. I consider that real progress.

And isn't it you who are concerned with a proof of the external world? A deductive enterprise which you claim is somehow needed? — joshua

My demonstration of an external world is not deductive.

I think you are missing something important here. It is conceivable that the brick will bounce off the window. Of course we don't expect that to happen, but we can't prove that because bricks usually smash through windows that they will always do so. — joshua

You are correct that bricks will not always break windows. In some cases, the window may be made of bullet proof glass. But that doesn't change the fact that when we see a brick go through a window, we are observing the glass break the window. We are observing causation. A sold object cannot pass through a solid object without breaking it. In the case of the bullet proof glass, the brick doesn't go through the window. It simply bounces off.

But the silent assumption is that nature is uniform, that the past determines the future. I know of no non-circular and therefore genuine proof of this. — joshua

This is a very interesting topic. If you are interested, I will provide you with some book titles.

1. Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Science by Burtt
https://www.amazon.com/Metaphysical-Foundations-Modern-Science/dp/0486425517/

2. The Foundations of Scientific Inference by Salmon
https://www.amazon.com/Foundations-Scientific-Inference-50th-Anniversary/dp/0822964562/

3. Natural Laws in Scientific Practice by Lange
https://www.amazon.com/Natural-Laws-Scientific-Practice-Lange/dp/0195131487/

I don't agree with everything the authors have written but there are a great many helpful insights in each book. Of course, if you are not interested, then the suggestions.

The question I'm asking is specifically relating to Book 1 of Hume's Treatise. I've read it very closely and can find absolutely nothing of value in it. — Ron Cram

I wouldn't even say that about those philosophers I really can't stand. This is surely a personal problem for you, rather than a problem generally speaking.

I wouldn't even say that about those philosophers I really can't stand. This is surely a personal problem for you, rather than a problem generally speaking. — S

That isn't an answer. Can you think of anything at all in the Treatise Book 1 that advanced our philosophical knowledge, being original, true and beneficial? So far, no one else has either.

But that doesn't change the fact that when we see a brick go through a window, we are observing the glass break the window. — Ron Cram

It is however conceivable that a normal brick would just pass through a normal window without damaging it. Afterwards, we would no longer consider the brick and the window normal, and we would scramble for some kind of explanation. But the point is that we can't 'rationalistically' deduce that the brick will damage the window. Pure reason is helpless here.

We will of course expect it. We'll have 'laws' of physics that assure us of it. But these 'laws' are themselves the same kind of expectation codified in an exacter quantitative language. In short, there seems to be no 'pure' reason that we should even expect the glass to be damaged. Our expectation is 'irrational' in this specific sense. From what you've written so far, I have the sense that you aren't seeing the strange problem of induction as I do. Yet this is one of the reasons Hume is great.

This is a very interesting topic. If you are interested, I will provide you with some book titles. — Ron Cram

Thanks for the links, but I'd prefer to hear your thoughts on topic, or paraphrases from those sources. After all, I think Hume destroyed the metaphysical foundations of science. Or showed that science never had one. Which revealed that science never needed one, though it's natural for philosophers to step in and try to invent one.

What Hume did or rather simply revealed was radical. Our sanity itself is without a metaphysical foundation. Pure reason on its own can tell me nothing about the world. Not even that its bad to step off of cliffs. Nor that all men are mortal. It's true that deduction can help us use a more general pattern in a concrete case, but our trust that that general pattern will persist is 'blind' human prejudice --and yet sanity itself.

I like Popper, but is Popper really any help here?

The best we can say of a hypothesis is that up to now it has been able to show its worth, and that it has been more successful than other hypotheses although, in principle, it can never be justified, verified, or even shown to be probable. — Popper

What matter that a hypothesis has shown its worth up to now? How do we infer that it is therefore more likely to show its worth in the future? Why shouldn't a falsified hypothesis become valuable again?

To be clear, I believe in my heart like we all must that nature is uniform. And the falsifiability as a criterion has a value independent of this one issue. My point is that I haven't seen the problem of induction solved metaphysically. And I can't imagine a solution. Obviously the problem of induction is not a practical problem in the sense that we actually need a solution. Though I can imagine a rationalistic souls being tormented by it. The rest of us can be delighted and shocked by it. And do as we have done, after all.

Philosophy, at least originally, was about life. It was about gaining wisdom to live a better life, accomplish the right things, and be a good citizen. My philosophical interests are very much in this direction. In addition to being interested in philosophy of life, I'm also interested in epistemology, metaphysics, philosophy of science and philosophy of religion. I believe all of these areas of study can help me build a better philosophy of life. — Ron Cram

I very much relate and agree.

For better or worse, though, I do think that existence as a whole is absurd. I think the times we live in are part of that. I imagine the philosophers from centuries who expected technology and the ideology of freedom to transform the world into a paradise.
That's harder to imagine now. It's pretty clear that personal freedom, plenty of food, and working toilets isn't enough to make us wise- at least as a species. Individually we can get better at life (or go completely to hell). I don't claim to be wise myself, though I feel less unwise than I was at 25 (which isn't saying much). I look at the problems of the world and see my own contradictions writ large. I think that seeings one's own greed-fear-vanity-sloth-lust-superstition helps with something like realism. But it's an expensive point of honor. It's more fun to melt into a group of righteous fixers and blamers. To oversimplify the problem so that it's just one political issue. And so on.

I think ancient philosophers could see the world as a immortal system of wheels. They could take pleasure in feeling outside of time and its disasters. Different types of government would come and go, but the earth and humanity would abide forever.

These days we feel the finitude and fragility of the world itself. Our pop culture is suffused with disaster and surreal conspiracies. We live in our screens, a society of the spectacle indeed. Many of our careers are absurd. We make things we don't believe in, if we make anything at all. We go into debt to buy things we can't afford to live up to impossible images of glamour. We can sort-of squint at find a system of wheels, but this is just human nature. And human nature is so dymamic and technological that it's hard to believe we've grasped eternal human nature.

Indeed, we can now mess with our own genetic code. I don't know if their are serious, radical efforts in this direction. Such efforts could lead to disaster and misery. But it's pretty much the only thing I can imagine that would really change the game. We could make ourselves semi-immortal, change our character, etc., which would change the world. I doubt it will happen in my lifetime. It will likely enough never happen.

Anyway, that leaves me with some blend of stoicism, epicureanism, cynicism, existenialism, humanism, etc., etc. Eat well, exercise, maybe buy some land and build a tiny house, work at something I believe in. Die well at a good moment if possible. Tho more likely by being run over by an Amazon Prime truck.

It is however conceivable that a normal brick would just pass through a normal window without damaging it. — joshua

No, that isn't conceivable. We know that solid objects cannot pass through solid objects without breaking them. In the old days, people looked to philosophy to discover the nature of material things. The speculations of philosophers, included Hume, have been disproven. Now we look to condensed matter physics. Our advances in knowledge in this area and others have led to our technologically advanced society. There is no way society is going to accept a retreat from the knowledge gained since Hume. Instead, we have to bring philosophy into the modern age. The only way to do that is to accept that everything Hume said about material objects, epistemology and metaphysics was wrong.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condensed_matter_physics

From what you've written so far, I have the sense that you aren't seeing the strange problem of induction as I do. Yet this is one of the reasons Hume is great. — joshua

Many philosophers had written about the problem of induction prior to Hume, but none of these had doubted the existence of an external world. Hume was the first to attack induction from the viewpoint that we cannot prove the existence of external objects. Once my paper is published and the external world is proven, the problem of induction will remain but it will be the original problem of induction as before Hume. I have two more papers in development contra Hume. One of these deals with Hume's failed attack on Isaac Newton and his law of cause and effect and the other deals with the problem of induction after Hume is refuted. The second paper will, of course, deal with laws of nature.

Thanks for the links, but I'd prefer to hear your thoughts on topic, or paraphrases from those sources. After all, I think Hume destroyed the metaphysical foundations of science. Or showed that science never had one. Which revealed that science never needed one, though it's natural for philosophers to step in and try to invent one. — joshua

No, science did have metaphysical foundations prior to Hume. Or, at least Burtt would claim so. His book is fascinating from a history of philosophy of science perspective. He explained the difference between primary and secondary qualities (in the writings of Galileo, Kepler and Newton) in a way that was clear and concise. Then when I read Hume, it was clear that Hume had never read Galileo and Kepler and so Hume was ill-prepared to understand Newton. Hume never grasped this important distinction and Hume admitted that he never understood motion, force, power and energy. Indeed, these things cannot be understood until you understand the difference between primary and secondary qualities. The problem persists among the followers of Hume. None of them seem the slightest bit interested in understanding Hume's failures.

I very much relate and agree.

For better or worse, though, I do think that existence as a whole is absurd. I think the times we live in are part of that. I imagine the philosophers from centuries who expected technology and the ideology of freedom to transform the world into a paradise. — joshua

I cannot agree that existence is absurd. I believe the empirical evidence clearly shows that life has purpose and meaning. I can't go into the reasons for this yet. I must finish my contra Hume papers first.

Anyway, that leaves me with some blend of stoicism, epicureanism, cynicism, existenialism, humanism, etc., etc. Eat well, exercise, maybe buy some land and build a tiny house, work at something I believe in. Die well at a good moment if possible. Tho more likely by being run over by an Amazon Prime truck. — joshua

You are an amusing conversationalist. I certainly hope the Amazon truck that runs you over is not delivering another load of books to my house.