The Ancients, the Vulgar, and Hume's Skepticism

Abstract

Section III of part IV of Book I of Hume's Treatise entitled “Of ancient philosophy” has been virtually ignored by most Hume scholars. Although philosophers seem to concentrate on sections II and VI of part IV and pay little or no attention to section III, latter section is paramount in showing how serious Hume's skepticism is, and how Hume's philosophy, contrary to his intention, is far removed from the sentiments of vulgar. In this paper I shall first explore Hume's view on ancient philosophy as it is presented in section III, and I shall particularly focus on his discussion of identity and simplicity of bodies. Second, I shall argue that Hume's account of identity and simplicity in terms of qualities is at best unsatisfactory. Finally, I shall try to show that Hume's advice to hold a moderate skepticism cannot be taken seriously. On contrary, Hume seems to hold an extravagant skepticism, since he claims that there is a contradiction between our most fundamental natural beliefs, as well as between our natural beliefs and philosophical reasoning. Hume’s Account of Identity The section “Of Ancient Philosophy” is just another application of Hume's naturalistic approach to birth of ancient philosophical theories. According to Hume, our ideas of bodies are nothing but collections form'd by mind of ideas of several distinct sensible qualities, of which objects are compos'd, and which we find to have a constant union with each other(Hume, p. 219). However, in our everyday experience we regard, mistakenly, these distinct sensible qualities as One thing, and as continuing Same under very considerable alterations(Hume, p. 219). We therefore attribute (falsely) to acknowledged composition of perceptions simplicity and to variation of them identity. But this is a contradiction, Hume tells us, since on one hand our senses perceive totally distinct and different qualities, and on other hand, we believe that combination of these discrete parts possesses a unity and simplicity which endure over time. This is main reason, according to Hume, that ancients resorted to notions of substance or prime matter. They merely wanted to provide a philosophical system that would salvage us, vulgar, from our contradictions. Although