This important new monograph presents a non-sceptical outlook on Hume's "Treatise" by analysing the hitherto neglected role of the belief in other minds. The problem of other minds has widely been considered as a special problem within the debate about scepticism. If one cannot be sure that there is a world existing independently of one's mind, how can we be sure that there are minds - minds which we cannot even experience the way we experience material objects? This book shows, through a detailed examination of David Hume's "A Treatise of Human Nature", that these concerns are unfounded. By focusing on Hume's discussion of sympathy - the ability to connect with the mental contents of other persons - Anik Waldow demonstrates that belief in other minds can be justified by the same means as belief in material objects. The book thus not only provides the first large-scale treatment of the function of the belief in other minds within the "Treatise", thereby adding a new dimension to Hume's realism, but also serves as an invaluable guide to the complexity of the problem of other minds and its various responses in contemporary debate.
ISBN: | 9780826433046 |
Publication date: | 15th June 2009 |
Author: | Dr Anik Waldow |
Publisher: | Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd. an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing PLC |
Format: | Hardback |
Pagination: | 218 pages |
Series: | Continuum Studies in British Philosophy |
Genres: |
Philosophy: epistemology and theory of knowledge Philosophical traditions and schools of thought Philosophy of mind |