David Hume
Life
David Hume David Hume was born 7 May 1711 in Edinburgh, Scotland. His post secondary education started at age 12, when he entered the University of Edinburgh. He drop out of Edinburgh prior to graduating, to pursue his writing career in writing.
Works
His authorship started in 1738 with his “A Treatise of Human Nature,” and “An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding” in 1748. His next work “An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals” in 1751 bring us the famous “is-ought problem.” His is-ought problem comes a result of his rejecting the idea of universal ideals or standard. As was the case with Aristotle who argued that:
Death
Following and in between his two most influential works, would publish over a dozen other works. The most notable of his lesser know work are perhaps his volumes on The History of England, from the Invasion of Julius Cæsar to the Revolution in 1688 (1754-1762), and his The Life of David Hume.” The former is notable simple based on the comparative scope of the work, and second because it contains a record of correspondence with Adam Smith.
David Hume was himself a nobleman by birth, which helped him to secure several high ranking positions within the British Empire’s regime. Between 1763 and his death in 1776, he held positions as, Secretary to the British embassy in Paris, British Chargé d'affaires, and Under Secretary of State for the Northern Department.
is-ought problem?
With the idea of tending toward the good or toward lawfulness mystified by Aristotle, David Hume’s is-ought problem arises. It arise from the fact that once you assume that standards are arbitrary, you open the door for everything to be qualified as a standard.
Since opinions are generated are more quickly and easily then the truth, overtime they overcome and overwhelm the truth, by virtue of their numbers. In this chaos speculation and opinion, virtually all observable option for standards are of the domain of flattery.
Flattery has no relation to lawful change, in understanding or in practice. In fact, flattery, like in the case of “cosmetics,” seeks not to act lawfully to generate positive changes but instead to mask or disguise the change with illusions.
Flatterers cannot understand lawful change so they must blind the rest of humanity to it. The world is a static place to the flatterer because his power depends on it. And though society decays under his reign, he is unmoved.
With no means or methodology other then carrots or stick to maintain a fixed stable order, they are left with only one seemingly lawful standard; the past. Which begs the question, what happens when you encounter something that has never happened before? Or more precisely, what use is some past mode of action, when faced with unprecedented circumstances?
Because unprecedented circumstances often require unprecedented actions, lack of understanding leads us to a paradox that the is-ought problem aims to solve. Without having any understanding of Ideal Judgment, the is ought problem leads you to a very rational conclusion; just because something is some way doesn’t mean that it ought to be that way.
Seems reasonable enough until you remember that the “is” refers to the standard and that the “ought” refers to lawful change. Recall that all lawful change must reflect the form or the standard, which in turn reflect the universes lawfulness.
The flatterer rejects lawful change and the standard or ideal, as result he creates for himself a static universe where there is no need to measure or understand change because change is disguised or degeneration is masked with flattery.
The universe he creates for himself is a lie that he tries to up hold with another lie, saying since no universal standard can be found in the chaos of flattery’s reign, the standard must be the past, because that is all that we are left with.
We are left with a world and a society that must alternate between chaos and tyrannically enforced peace. Into these condition comes David Hume to free us from the bondage of flatterers standards. This is the prototypical case of throwing the baby out with the bath water, in so far as accepting the conclusions of the is-ought problem forces the victim to abandon the system of ideal judgement altogether.
By accepting the conclusions of the is-ought problem, you are also saying that the first principle cannot survive without the other two. Under such conditions it is easy to contrive an is-ought problem based simply on the futility of trying to derive any lawful measurement from within the chaos.
David Hume Reflecting Gorgias
significant Quotes
Very much like his forefather Gorgias expressed in his book “On Non-Being,” David Hume did not think very highly of the human capacity to make creative discoveries. Much to the contrary he believed that:
Hume is hero to both atheists and skeptics, perhaps in part because he took a stance against everything considered sacred or holy. He coined the phrase costume and habit. A phrase that builds on the work of Gorgias and Aristotle before him by adding his own twist.
When the principle of ideal judgement was destroyed by way of eliminating universal standards, and laws relating to processes of change, Aristotle replaced the principle with what Gorgias believed that orator could control more effectively that reason could - pleasure and pain - but as David Hume was an innovator, he would replace Aristotle’s pleasure and pain with his own “custom of habit.”