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Professor Pike on Part III of Hume's Dialogues

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2008

Pheroze S. Wadia
Pheroze S. Wadia
Affiliation:
Associate Professor of Philosophy, Rutgers State University of New jersey
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Extract

My attention in this paper will be focused almost exclusively on the interpretation of Part III of Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion suggested by Professor Nelson Pike at the very close of his excellent recent commentary on that enduring classic.1 As I will show briefly in Section II below, Pike's interpretation of Part III emerges from the wider context of his quarrel with Kemp Smith in regard to the final outcome of these Dialogues. I find much in Pike's commentary to applaud and to agree with, especially in its earlier sections, but on this whole question of Hume's final position in the Dialogues, I find his views less than convincing. But in this paper I will confine myself to showing what I think is wrong with his reading of Part III, and no more.2 In particular, I will make no effort to challenge Pike's disagreement with Kemp Smith in regard to the final dialogue. Though Pike himself regards Part III as crucial, I am well aware that to make anything like a successful case against the kind of interpretation he favours of the upshot of the Dialogues much more would have to be done than I attempt in this paper. I submit this attempt, then, in partial fulfillment of a larger task to be completed at some future time.

Type
Articles
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 14 , Issue 3 , September 1978 , pp. 325 - 342
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1978

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References

page 325 note 1 Pike, Nelson (ed.), Hume: Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1970), pp. 222–8.Google Scholar References to page numbers in the Dialogues in Pike's edition will be followed by page numbers in the standard Kemp Smith edition (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1947). When a reference to Pike is not followed by a reference to Kemp Smith, this means that the reference is to Pike's commentary.

page 325 note 2 In this paper I will be concentrating on the question how not to read Part III. My suggestions on how it should be read are given in ‘Philo Confounded’, McGill Hume Studies, eds. Norton, , Robison, and Capaldi, (San Diego: Austin Hill Press, 1978).Google Scholar

page 326 note 1 Not all those who sympathise with the ‘two arguments’ view would be prepared to extend their sympathy to Pike's turning of Philo into a traditionalist. But they would all agree that there is at least a verbal inconsistency between Philo's earlier stance and his final views. See, for example, the excellent discussion in Professor Terence Penelhum's recent book on Hume (London: Macmillan, 1975), chapter 8, and his paper entitled ‘Hume's Scepticism And The Dialogues’ read to the McGill Bicentennial Congress.Google Scholar Another good example is an earlier paper by Professor Butler, R. J. entitled ‘Natural Belief and the Enigma of Hume’ in Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie (1960), pp. 73–100.Google Scholar

page 327 note 1 Gaskin, J. C. A., ‘God, Hume and Natural Belief’, Philosophy, vol. 49 (1974), pp. 281–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 327 note 2 Pike, , p. 227.Google Scholar

page 328 note 1 Pike, , p. 228.Google Scholar

page 328 note 2 Pike, , p. 229.Google Scholar

page 328 note 3 Pike, , p. 36Google Scholar; Smith, Kemp, p. 154.Google Scholar

page 328 note 4 Pike, , p. 36Google Scholar; Smith, Kemp, p. 155.Google Scholar

page 328 note 5 Pike, , p. 230.Google Scholar Despite some squeamishness, I have decided to follow Pike's usage and drop the quotation marks around the terms ‘science’ and ‘scientific’ appearing in this paper.

page 329 note 1 Pike, , p. 33Google Scholar; Smith, Kemp, p. 152.Google Scholar

page 329 note 2 Pike, , p. 218.Google Scholar

page 330 note 1 Pike, , p. 34Google Scholar; Smith, Kemp, pp. 152–3.Google Scholar

page 331 note 1 Hume, David, A Treatise of Human Nature, ed. by Selby-Bigge, L. A. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1888), p. 97. Hereinafter, Treatise.Google Scholar

page 331 note 2 Treatise, p. 576.Google Scholar

page 331 note 3 Treatise, p. 103.Google Scholar

page 332 note 1 Noxon, James, ‘Hume's Agnosticism’, The Philosophical Review (1964)Google Scholar; reprinted in Hume: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. by Chappell, V. C. (New York: Doubleday, 1966).CrossRefGoogle Scholar Noxon makes two important claims in his paper. One, that ‘Cleanthes’ belief in deity, in an intelligent creator… is…an example of…a natural belief which no candid mind can reject whatever the difficulties involved in attempting to vindicate it.…’ And, two, that Kemp Smith is not successful in his attempt to show that it is Philo who in the Dialogues mainly speaks for Hume. For a refutation especially of Noxon's second claim see Professor Gaskins' recent ‘Hume's Critique of Religion’, Journal of the History of Philosophy, XIV (07 1976), 301–11.Google Scholar

page 332 note 2 Pike, , pp. 11–12Google Scholar; Smith, Kemp, p. 134.Google Scholar

page 333 note 1 Hume, David, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, ed. by Hendel, C. W. (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1955), pp. 169–73. Hereinafter, Enquiry.Google Scholar

page 334 note 1 Treatise, pp. 103–4.Google Scholar

page 334 note 2 Enquiry, p. 60.Google Scholar

page 334 note 3 Enquiry, p. 62.Google Scholar

page 334 note 4 Enquiry, p. 61.Google Scholar

page 335 note 1 Enquiry, p. 67.Google Scholar

page 335 note 2 Smith, Norman Kemp, The Philosophy of Davie Hume (London: Macmillan, 1941), p. 386.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 335 note 3 Enquiry, p. 115.Google Scholar

page 336 note 1 Treatise, pp. 173–6.Google Scholar

page 336 note 2 Treatise, p. 150.Google Scholar

page 336 note 3 Treatise, p. 149.Google Scholar

page 337 note 1 Smith, Kemp has some interesting remarks to make on this point. See especially pp. 96–9 in his book on Hume's philosophy cited above.Google Scholar

page 338 note 1 Pike, , p. 64Google Scholar; Smith, Kemp, p. 178.Google Scholar

page 338 note 2 Pike, , pp. 110–11Google Scholar; Smith, Kemp, pp. 216–17.Google Scholar

page 338 note 3 Pike, , p. 33Google Scholar; Smith, Kemp, p. 152.Google Scholar

page 338 note 4 Pike, , p. 37Google Scholar; Smith, Kemp, p. 155.Google Scholar

page 340 note 1 See note on bottom of p. 155 in Smith's, Kemp edition. Greig, J. Y. T. (ed.), The Letters of David Hume (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1923), 1, 153–7.Google Scholar

page 341 note 1 example, For, in the footnote on ‘the dispute between the sceptics and the dogmatists’ appearing in Part XII, the difficulties associated with ‘the senses and… all sciences’ are said to be ‘in a regular, logical method, absolutely insolvable’.Google Scholar

page 342 note 1 Malcolm, Norman, ‘Knowledge of Other Minds’, in Wittgenstein, The Philosophical Investigations, ed. by Pitcher, George, p. 381.Google Scholar

page 342 note 2 Pike, , p. 228.Google Scholar

page 342 note 3 I am thankful to the Rutgers' Research Council for a grant that assisted me in completing this article.