"David Hume"

David Hume (7 May 1711 – 25 August 1776) was a Scottish philosopher,

historian, economist, and essayist, known especially for his philosophical
empiricism and scepticism. He is regarded as one of the most important figures
in the history of Western philosophy and the Scottish Enlightenment. Hume is
often grouped with John Locke, George Berkeley, and a handful of others as a
British Empiricist.

20 Interesting And Awesome Facts About David Hume

David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist who
is best known today for his highly influential system of philosophical empiricism,
skepticism and naturalism. Hume’s empiricist approach to philosophy places him
with John Locke, Francis Bacon, and Thomas Hobbes as a British Empiricist.
Take a look below for 30 more interesting and awesome facts about David Hume.

1. Beginning with his A Treatise of Human Nature, Hume strove to create a total
naturalistic science of man that examined the psychological basis of human
nature.

2. Against philosophical rationalists, Hume held that passion rather than reason
governs human behavior.

3. Hume argued against the existence of innate ideas, positing that all human
knowledge is founded solely in experience.

4. Hume’s opposition to the teleological argument for God’s existence, the

argument from design, is generally seen as the most intellectually significant
attempt to rebut the argument prior to Darwinism.
5. He was also a sentimentalist who held that ethics are based on emotion or
sentiment rather than abstract moral principle, famously proclaiming that,
“Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions.”

6. His compatibilist theory of free will takes casual determinism as fully

compatible with human freedom.

7. Hume influenced utilitarianism, logical positivism, Immanuel Kant, the

philosophy of science, early analytic philosophy, cognitive science, theology, and
other movements and thinkers.

8. Kant himself credited Hume as the spur to his philosophical thought who had
awakened him from his “dogmatic slumbers.”

9. Hume was born on May 7, 1711, to Joseph Home and Katherine Falconer in
Edinburgh.

10. When he was 12 years old, Hume began attending the University of
Edinburgh, where he initially pursued an education in law but later, his interests
were piqued by philosophy.

11. Hume didn’t believe that his professors could teach him anything, therefore,
he didn’t regard them with the respect required by their station.

12. He took a job in a merchant’s office in Bristol, but after a few months, in 1734,
he decided to move to La Fleche in Anjou, France.

13. In La Fleche, he devoted the next four years of his life composing one of his
remarkable discourses, “A Treatise of Human Nature.” He managed to finish it at
the age of 26.

14. In 1745, Hume served for some time, as a private tutor to the Marquis of
Annandale, who was popularly known as the “lunatic.”

15. In 1746, he began working on his innovative compilation, titled “The History of
England.” It took him 15 years to complete this work, and the book provided
events dating from the invasion of Julius Caesar till the 1688 revolution and it
was published in six volumes between 1754 and 1762.

16. In 1746, Hume was appointed as Secretary to Lieutenant-General St. Clair.

He served this post for the next three years.

17. In 1752, he returned to his native Edinburg and, began composing his
autobiography titled “My Own Life.”

18. In 1763, he was appointed as a secretary to Lord Hertford in Paris. He served

him for the next two years.

19. In 1767, he accepted the position of Under Secretary of State for the Northern
Department, however, he served this station for only a year.

20. In 1768, he decided to move back to his birth place, Edinburgh, where he
remained till his death. He passed away on August 25, 1776, after a prolonged
suffrage with liver cancer.
 Facts: David Hume

David Hume (26 April, 1711 – 25 August, 1776) was a Scottish philosopher and
historian, known for A Treatise on Human Nature (1739-40), Essays Moral and
Political (1741-42), Political Discourses (1752), and an exhaustive History of
England (1754-62), as well as many others.

Works by David Hume

Born as David Home in Edinburgh. His father died when he was about two years
old and he was raised by his mother who never married.

He changed his last name to Hume because that’s the way “Home” was
supposed to be pronounced, but was not known in England as that.

At age 12, or maybe even 10, Mr. Hume started to attend the University of
Edinburgh.

He told friends that “there is nothing to be learnt from a Professor, which is not to
be met with in Books”. Mr. Hume did not graduate.

At age 25 Mr. Hume found himself with no source of income, despite being of
noble ancestry. He took a job as a merchant’s assistant and was forced to leave
to France.

Mr. Hume did not do well in his forced on profession, but did manage to get a job
as a career as a librarian at the University of Edinburgh. There, with time and
access to research material, he wrote his six-volume The History of England.

It took Mr. Hume 15 years to write The History of England.

Today it is generally agreed upon that Mr. Hume’s most important arguments and
philosophical doctrines can be found in A Treatise of Human Nature: Being an
Attempt to Introduce the Experimental Method of Reasoning into Moral Subjects,
as his greatest literary and philosophical achievement.

Mr. Hume started to the Treatise when he was 23 years old.

“Humean” is the name given to Mr. Hume’s influence on philosophy.

Mr. Hume passed away form of abdominal cancer. On his tomb he wanted just
his name, date of birth and date of death – “leaving it to Posterity to add the
Rest”

FAMOUS SAYING

Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend
to any other office than to serve and obey them.

Beauty in things exists in the mind which contemplates them.

A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence.

Truth springs from argument amongst friends.

Custom is the great guide to human life.

Be a philosopher but, amid all your philosophy be still a man.

It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once.

Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only
ridiculous.

The life of man is of no greater importance to the universe than that of an oyster.

He is happy whom circumstances suit his temper; but he Is more excellent who
suits his temper to any circumstance.

CAUSE OF DEATH

CANCER

Diarist and biographer James Boswell saw Hume a few weeks before his death
from a form of abdominal cancer. Hume told him he sincerely believed it a "most
unreasonable fancy" that there might be life after death.

BIOGRAPHY

Birthday: April 26, 1711

Nationality: Scottish

Famous: Quotes By David Hume Historians

Died At Age: 65

Sun Sign: Taurus

Born In: Edinburgh, Scotland, Great Britain

Famous As: Philosopher & Historian

Family:

Father: Joseph Hume Mother: Katherine Falconer

Died On: August 25, 1776

Place Of Death: Edinburgh, Scotland, Great Britain

City: Edinburgh, Scotland

BACKGROUND ABOUT HIS FAMILY:

David Hume was born on April 26, 1711 in Edinburgh, Scotland to Joseph Home
and The Honorable Katherine Falconer. He was the second of the two sons born
to the couple. Young Home's father died when he was barely two years old. He
was single-handedly raised by his mother.

Childhood & Early Life

David Hume was born on April 26, 1711 in Edinburgh, Scotland to Joseph Home
and The Honorable Katherine Falconer. He was the second of the two sons born
to the couple.

Young Home’s father died when he was barely two years old. He was single-
handedly raised by his mother. In 1734, Home changed his surname to Hume as
Home was little known in England.

At the age of 12, Hume attended University of Edinburgh. This was unusual
considering the standard age for admission during those days was 14. Hume
considered a career in law but found his real calling in philosophy and general
learning. As a result, he never graduated.

Career

At the age of 18, Hume made a philosophical discovery that opened ‘a new
scene of thought’ for him. Such was the influence of the thought over him that he
gave up everything, to pursue it. Though no one actually knows what the new
scene of thought was, many have interpreted their own variations.

Inspired by the new thought, Hume spent more than 10 years reading and writing
on the subject. He reached a stage wherein he was on the verge of mental
breakdown. Just as when he decided to come out of his shell and have an active
social, Hume was afflicted with a ravenous appetite and palpitations of the heart.
It took him some time to become sturdy and robust.

Despite having a noble background, Hume had very limited means for livelihood
and no formal education as well. As such, he set forth to Bristol wherein he
apprenticed as an assistant to a rich merchant.Hume’s apprenticeship did not
last long as he soon retired to La Fleche in Anjou, France.

Major Works

Given the fact that Hume was one of the most controversial writers of his age, his
works were greatly scrutinized and inspected. He achieved literary success with
his massive six-volume literary work, ‘The History of England’, which became a
bestseller and remained the standard history of England in its time.

Personal Life & Legacy

Hume never married in his lifetime. He spent considerable time with his family in
Ninewells, Berkwickshire.
In 1775, Hume was diagnosed with intestinal cancer. He breathed his last on
August 25, 1776. As desired by him, his body was interred in a simple Roman
tomb on the south-western slope of Calton Hill in the Old Calton Cemetery. He
requested in his will that his tomb be inscribed only with his name and year of
birth and death.

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