Hume’s Empiricism and My Personal View of Knowledge.

Hume’s Empiricism and my Personal View of Knowledge.

As time goes on, human beings have tried to explain the nature of things and where knowledge comes from. Within the explanation of the human knowledge spectrum, we see empiricism and materialism on opposite sides. Throughout this paper I will support my belief that states that all knowledge comes through sense experience; and I will do so by giving daily examples and using my own words based on portions of Hume’s work.

I consider myself as an empiricist and I believe that the Hume’s impressions idea is a perfect consolidated concept on how all knowledge begins. Hume states that all knowledge starts with basic units of sensory experience. I agree with Hume and this is one of the key points why I define myself as an empiricist. I believe that when humans are born they start shaping their own world through experiencing. A baby learns that people eat soup with spoons and not with forks or knives because they see (experience through the sense of sight) individuals eating soup with spoons. A baby also learns that biting cause pain because they experience by sight and hearing the reactions such as screaming and making faces in others when they bite them.

Additionally, I think that we don’t possess innate ideas. Ideas such as God or infinity are shaped by experience as well. We become aware of the existence of a god and infinity by hearing (sense experience) people around us. “Let’s go to church son,” “have you ever felt God?” “Do you know that the universe is infinite?” are common questions that people ask people. In my opinion, if those kinds of questions were never asked in the first place, human being would’ve never desired to answer them. Imagine that no one around you praises, prays, or talks about a god; do you think you would wake up one day saying “I believe there is a god”?  

I think that each person may trust their senses because they will be accurate to understand and shape reality for each one of them. Envision this, there is a deaf boy that based upon his sense experience, he says that the definition of sound is a vibration that he feels with his body, not with his eardrums. On this boy’s reality, he is perfectly correct. One could argue that he is not right, but I believe that he is right based on his sense experience.

Hume’s philosophy points out three remarkable beliefs, which I find very relevant and absolute truths. First, the idea of causation states that every event has its cause. In my opinion, this is true. If you do not wake up at 5 am, you will not catch the 6 am bus, you will not get on time to work, your boss will get mad at you for being late, and your boss will give you extra-work for being late, and so on. We experience the idea of causation every day in our lives.