Abstract
My contention is to understand in what manner Hume’s Treatise of Human Nature should be considered: is it a Traité de l’homme or is it a major contribution to modern historical anthropology? I shall emphasize the fact that from Descartes to Hume the problem of what “human nature” is contrasts very strongly. Such contrasts are to be based (1) on the very specific dimension of Hume’s scepticism; (2) on the fact that human nature should be now considered as basically historical.
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- 1.
David Hume, 2002: A Treatise of Human Nature, Ed. David Fate Norton & Mary J. Norton, Oxford, 2002, Oxford University Press, Col. « Oxford Philosophical Texts », I.4.7.:177.
- 2.
David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, Op. cit.: 4; Emphasises Hume.
- 3.
René Descartes, Méditations métaphysiques, Méditation Seconde, in Œuvres de Descartes, Adam & Tannery eds, Paris, Vrin Librairie Philosophique, Volume IX: 20.
- 4.
John Locke 1998: An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Penguin Classics, Book III « Of Words », Section VI « Of the Names of Substances »: 580-s.
- 5.
For Aristotle, the soul had levels: it is nutritive, has sensibility, is imaginative, and finally rational: it is only at this last level that it is human. With Descartes, the soul is one and undividable, and sensibility, imagination and reason are only modes of its essential attribute which is thought. And it only envisaged as human as much as it has sensibility and is affective. Therefore this is not a simple change in the doctrine of man, but a real and total turnaround.
- 6.
A Treatise of Human Nature, Op. cit.: 7-s.
- 7.
A Treatise of Human Nature, Op. cit.: 181-s.
- 8.
A Treatise of Human Nature, Op. cit.: 293-s.
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Gautier, C. (2016). A Treatise of Human Nature, a Treatise of the World?. In: Antoine-Mahut, D., Gaukroger, S. (eds) Descartes’ Treatise on Man and its Reception. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, vol 43. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-46989-8_13
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