Death and character : further reflections on Hume / Annette C. Baier.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Baier, Annette, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Hume, David, 1711-1776. Treatise of human nature.

Hume, David.

Hume, David, 1711-1776.

Skepticism.

Reason.

Philosophical anthropology.

Knowledge, Theory of.

Character.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (303 pages)

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Massachusetts ; London, England : Harvard University Press, [2008]

Summary:

Reviewing Annette Baier’s 1995 work Moral Prejudices in the London Review of Books, Richard Rorty predicted that her work would be read hundreds of years hence; Baier’s subsequent work has borne out such expectations, and this new book further extends her reach. Here she goes beyond her earlier work on David Hume to reflect on a topic that links his philosophy to questions of immediate relevance—in particular, questions about what character is and how it shapes our lives. Ranging widely in Hume’s works, Baier considers his views on character, desirable character traits, his treatment of historical characters, and his own character as shown not just by his cheerful death—and what he chose to read shortly before it—but also by changes in his writings, especially his repudiation of the celebrated A Treatise on Human Nature. She offers new insight into the Treatise and its relation to the works in which Hume “cast anew” the material in its three books. Her reading radically revises the received interpretation of Hume’s epistemology and, in particular, philosophy of mind.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Preface

Abbreviations

I EASY AND OBVIOUS

1 Acting in Character

2 Impersonation, the Very Idea

3 Hume’s Excellent Hypocrites

4 Hume’s Treatment of Oliver Cromwell

5 Hume and the Conformity of Bishop Tunstal

6 Hume’s Deathbed Reading: A Tale of Three Letters

II MORE DIFFICULT AND ABSTRUSE

7 Hume’s Impressions and His Other Metaphors

8 The Life and Mortality of the Mind

9 Hume’s Labyrinth

10 A Voice, as from the Next Room

11 The Energy in the Cause

12 Hume’s Post-Impressionism

13 Why Hume Asked Us Not to Read the Treatise

Conclusion Hume’s Curriculum Vitae: His “Own Life,” Written by Himself

Index of Persons

Subject Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780674268920

067426892X

9780674268913

0674268911

OCLC:

1252626060