Hume in 90 Minutes (Philosophers in 90 Minutes - Their Lives & Work) - Softcover

PAUL STRATHERN

Softcover

ISBN 10: 009475960X ISBN 13: 9780094759602

Publisher: CONSTABLE AND ROBINSON, 1996

Synopsis

Hume reduced philosophy to ruins: he denied the existence of everything--except our actual perceptions themselves. I alone exist, he argued, and the world is nothing more than part of my consciousness. Yet we know that the world remains, and we go on as before. What Hume expressed was the status of our knowledge about the world, a world in which neither religion nor science is certain. In Hume in 90 Minutes, Paul Strathern offers a concise, expert account of Hume's life and ideas and explains their influence on man's struggle to understand his existence in the world. The book also includes selections from Hume's work, a brief list of suggested readings for those who wish to delve deeper, and chronologies that place Hume within his own age and in the broader scheme of philosophy.

About this title

Review:

David Hume (1711-1776), writes Paul Strathern, is "the only philosopher whose ideas remain plausible to us today." Hume's most substantial contribution to philosophy could be simplified as the denial of the existence of anything but our own perceptions--or it could be more subtly described as a realization of the contingency of our knowledge of the world, where any explanation for phenomena--be it rooted in religion, science, or some other discipline--is uncertain. Strathern's short volume puts Hume's "extreme empiricism" and the rest of his career into perspective with the author's usual dry wit--as when he summarizes Hume's positions on miracles and suicide as "no such thing" and "up to you."

About the Author:

Paul Strathern earned a degree in philosophy at Trinity College, Dublin, and has lectured in philosophy and mathematics. The author of many nonfiction books and of articles for numerous publications, he has also written several novels and has won the Somerset Maugham Prize. He lives and writes in London.

Simon Vance is an award-winning actor and an AudioFile Golden Voice with over forty Earphones Awards. He has won thirteen prestigious Audie Awards and was Booklist's very first Voice of Choice in 2008. He has narrated more than eight hundred audiobooks over almost thirty years, beginning when he was a radio newsreader for the BBC in London.

About this edition

• Publisher: CONSTABLE AND ROBINSON
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 009475960X
• ISBN 13: 9780094759602
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 80