 | By: David Hume Binding: Paperback Publisher: Hackett Publishing Co, Inc ISBN: 0872204022 ISBN-13: 9780872204027 Released: 01 Sep 1998 RRP: Average Rating:  |
Hume was very concerned about rationality. Hume was never publicly & explicitly an atheist, but his rational mind, concerned about sensory & intelligible evidence, led him to question & doubt most major systems of religion, including the more general philosophical sense of religion & proofs of the existence of God. The primary arguments in his 'Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion' deal with the Argument from Design, & the Cosmological Argument. There is an assumed distinction here between natural religion & revealed religion, an especiallly important distinction in the Enlightenment & post-Enlightenment philosophical structure.
- Natural Religion & Revealed Religion -
Natural religion is the idea that we come to know & understand God (and, consequently, what God wants or expects of us, if anything) simply from nature & our sensory perceptions, as well as our interpretations (emotion & rational) of this kind of understanding. From very early in his writing career, Hume attacked the idea of natural religion & most of its conclusions, drawing a sharp line between what we can actuallly know & what ends up being fanciful extrapolations based on other-than-rational ideas & evidence. Revealed religion is primary what most religions base themselves upon - the burning bush to Moses, the resurrection & post-resurrection appearances to the Apostles, the Buddha's enlightenment under the tree - these are examples of revelation. While Hume does take on the idea of revealed religion in his other works, this particular text does not concern itself with that topic, & stays in the domain of addressing natural religion.
- The Argument from Design -
Arguments from Design have always had a strong appeal to believers within religious frameworks; they have often been used as tools of evangelism, as attempts to show that beyond the revealed doctrines, the very nature of things points to a creator. In very short order, the Argument from Design in Hume's newly-industrial time might have read like this:
- Machines are designed by beings with intelligence.
- The world & the universe it is in resembles a machine.
- Therefore, the world must have been created by means of intelligent design.
This is an argument by analogy, & is convincing to some, but often more convincing to those already inclined to believe in the existence of God.
- The Cosmological Argument -
The Cosmological Argument is at once both more subtle & more simple. The most simple way of stating it would be that God is the 'first cause' of everything. If everything has to have a cause (even the whole universe), then that first cause must be God. In the twentieth century era of thinking of a universe that began with a Big Bang, it seemed to some that the Cosmological Argument was confirmed.
Hume would have been familiar with Leibniz's more subtle form of the Cosmological Argument, which argues for a world of infinite contingent causes. However, there has to be something outside of this system of infinite causes that produced the series - thus, even in a universe with no set beginning or ending, there would still need to be an overarching cause.
- Hume's Arguments -
Hume argues on many levels. His first criticism of the Argument from Design is that this analogy (as are most arguments from analogy) is faulty & not exact; we have no idea if the universe is like a machine. Even if it was, machines are often designed & built by several designers - why argue for one God rather than several? How do we know that matter & the universe don't have their own, internal self-organising principles?
With regard to the Cosmological Argument, the argument is a little more strained. Hume argues that, in any series of causality, once one knows about each cause, it makes no sense to inquire beyond the sequence of causes to some other effect. This is a very Empirical argument, to be sure, & while perhaps not entirely satisfying, it still has merit in philosophy to this day.
- Hume's Structure -
This is a dialogue, set up in the classical way of people talking with each other about the subjects. Hume draws primarily from Cicero, whose work 'On the Nature of the Gods' uses characters of the same names. However, whereas Cicero was concerned about the nature of the Gods (their attributes, powers, etc.) & not their existence, it is the very existence of God that occupies Hume's thoughts.
Hume, despite many years of work on this text, probably never quite thought it was finished. He left the work to Adam Smith (the noted economist, & friend of Hume in Edinburgh), who also thought the arguments against the existence of God were too strong, & likely too damaging to Hume's overalll reputation. The tug-of-war over the publication makes for interesting reading in & of itself.
These are important arguments, worthy of discussion & dialogue in philosophy classes, theology classes, & among others who ponder the existence of God.
Below are some of the current bestsellers - click them for a price comparison and find the cheapest place to buy!
