An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding - 9781542436755

This book by the Scottish empiricist philosopher David Hume was published in English in 1748. It was a revision of an earlier effort, Hume's A Treatise of Human Nature, published anonymously in London in 1739-40. Hume was disappointed with the reception of the Treatise, which "fell dead-born from the press," as he put it, and so tried again to disseminate his more developed ideas to the public by writing a shorter and more polemical work. The end product of his labours was the Enquiry. The Enquiry dispensed with much of the material from the Treatise, in favor of clarifying and emphasizing its most important aspects. For example, Hume's views on personal identity do not appear. However, more vital propositions, such as Hume's argument for the role of habit in a theory of knowledge, are retained. This book has proven highly influential, both in the years that would immediately follow and today. Immanuel Kant points to it as the book which woke him from his self-described "dogmatic slumber." The Enquiry is widely regarded as a classic in modern philosophical literature.

Author: David Hume

Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

Publication Date: Jan 09, 2017

Number of Pages: 140 pages

Language: English

Binding: Paperback

ISBN-10: 1542436753

ISBN-13: 9781542436755