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Treatise of Human Nature
Was originally ignored, then Hume rewrote it as an Enquiry concerning the Principle of Morals
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History of Philosophy is Reason vs Passion
- Reason - eternal, constant, divine and what you should follow
- Passions/Sentiment/Emtion - blind, inconsistent, deceitful, what you shouldn't follow
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Hume's viewpoint on reason vs passion
- They are NOT at conflict with each other!
- 1. Reason cannot cause us to act (no motive)
- 2. Reason cannot oppose passion
Reason is the slave of passion, goal is to serve and obey passion.
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Reason's Function
- 1. Demonstration and Probability
- 2. Relations between Ideas
- 3. Judges Cause and Effect
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Passion cannot be true or false, just is
Thus reason never opposes a passion but in itself does not motivate you to act
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Why have we made this mistake (combat between reason and passion)?
- We have violent passions and calm passions.
- We have mistaken the two conflicts
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Reason compares relationships
Scenario: Child tree kills a parent tree, no moral action. Human child kills a parent, it's considered wrong/immoral
Reason should say they are both the same, but they are different. Difference comes from feeling and sentiment.
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Why is incest wrong though may not be in say plants
Answer is based on feeling/sentiment NOT reason
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The Source of Moral Distinctions is based on Moral Sense
- Morality is felt, not thought
- Feeling tells you if its right or wrong (agreeable vs disagreeable feeling)
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Is morality (in Hume's sense) objective or relativistic?
Objective, we should feel the same things unless we are "sick" or "crazy"
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Morality is like beauty
Though it is felt, there is an objectiveness to it (ie symmetry is beautiful)
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