Hume Reading and Class Discussion Questions
Vocabulary note: Disapprobation means disapproval. Turpitude means moral depravity more or less.
1. What is the point of the oak tree and incest examples? Why is it not sufficient, according to Hume, to say that parricide is immoral in people but not in trees because humans possess reason and can make choices? Are there counter-examples to those Hume offers?
2. What is the point of the willful murder example?
3. Why cannot statements of ought or ought not be derived from statements of is or is not strictly through reason? What is the difference between a fact and a value?
4. Do you agree with Hume that "Morality, therefore, is more properly felt than judged of; ... " (Hume in Solomon and Martin, 212) ? Do you think there is an internal moral sense?
5. Be able to explain Hume’s examples of surgery and wound strings.
6. Do you think that there is such a thing as natural human sympathy?