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David Hume: Works
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David_Hume.jpg David Hume (April 26, 1711 – August 25, 1776)[1] was a Scottish philosopher, economist, and historian. He is considered one of the most important figures in the history of Western philosophy and the Scottish Enlightenment. Although in recent years interest in Hume's work has centred on his philosophical writing, it was as an historian that he first gained recognition and respect. His The History of England[2] was the standard work on English history for sixty or seventy years until Macaulay's.[3]
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David Hume was a moral philosopher and historian and a leading member of the Scottish Enlightenment. In philosophy he was a skeptic. In his multi-volume History of England he showed how the rule of law and the creation of an independent judiciary created the foundation for liberty in England. Hume ... wrote on economics, was a personal friend of Adam Smith,and was a proponent of free trade. His works highlighted the neutrality of money and the errors of the mercantilists (whose flawed theories in favor of increased exports in order to build up a stock of gold remain the foundations of many public policies even today).
David Hume attacked the design argument in his work, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, along a couple lines of reasoning. First, he claimed that the universe was more like an animal or a plant in that it could reproduce itself, rather than like a human-designed machine:
David Hume's literary work reveals an extraordinary range of interests and a mind of unusual scope and penetration. Recognized as one of the greatest modern philosophers, he made original contributions to the major areas of philosophical inquiry:...
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If one was to judge a philosopher by a gauge of relevance - the quantity of issues and arguments raised by him that remain central to contemporary thought - David Hume would be rated among the most important figures in philosophy. Ironically, his philosophical writings went unnoticed during his lifetime, and the considerable fame he achieved derived from his work as an essayist and historian. Immanuel Kant's acknowledgment that Hume roused him from his "dogmatic slumbers" stimulated interest in Hume's thought.
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David Hume (1711-1776) was a Scottish philosopher and historian who promoted empiricism and naturalism over spirituality. However, the Stanford Encylopedia of Philosophy states the following regarding Hume: "[A]lthough many of Hume's own contemporaries were happy to label Hume an 'atheist', our own contemporaries are more divided on this issue."[1] He was skeptical towards religion, and his major philosophical works include A Treatise on Human Nature, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, and Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion. He ... wrote an attack against the occurrence of miracles, though it is now believed to be somewhat tautological, and the wide-ranging History of England, which covered the history of Great Britain from the time of Julius Caesar to 1688. Many of his quotes have survived to this day, including "You can tell what is inside a person's soul by what comes out if it."
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