David Hume

1
David Hume

• David Hume (April 26, 1711 August 25, 1776) was
  a Scottish philosopher, economist, and historian,
  as well as an important figure of Western
  philosophy and of the Scottish Enlightenment

2
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding

• By the term impression, then, I mean all our
  more lively perceptions, when we hear, or see, or
  feel, or love, or hate, or desire, or will. And
  impressions are distinguished from ideas, which
  are the less lively perceptions, of which we are
  conscious, when we reflect on any of those
  sensations or movements above mentioned.
• It seems a proposition, which will not admit of
  much dispute, that all our ideas are nothing but
  copies of our impressions, or, in other words,
  that it is impossible for us to think of
  anything, which we have not antecedently felt,
  either by our external or internal senses.

3
Utilitarianism

• It was probably Hume who, along with his fellow
  members of the Scottish Enlightenment, first
  advanced the idea that the explanation of moral
  principles is to be sought in the utility they
  tend to promote. On the contrary, Hume was a
  moral sentimentalist and, as such, thought that
  moral principles could not be intellectually
  justified. Some principles simply appeal to us
  and others don't and the reason why utilitarian
  moral principles do appeal to us is that they
  promote our interests and those of our fellows,
  with whom we sympathize. Humans are hard-wired to
  approve of things that help society public
  utility. Hume used this insight to explain how we
  evaluate a wide array of phenomena, ranging from
  social institutions and government policies to
  character traits and talents

4
Adam Smith (1723 1790)

• It is not from the benevolence of the butcher,
  the brewer, or the baker that we expect our
  dinner, but from their regard to their own
  interest. We address ourselves, not to their
  humanity but to their self-love, and never talk
  to them of our own necessities but of their
  advantages.
• (Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth
  of Nations, 1776)

5
Isaac Newton (1643-1727)

• Enlightenment philosophers chose a short history
  of scientific predecessorsGalileo, Boyle, and
  Newton principallyas the guides and guarantors
  of their applications of the singular concept of
  Nature and Natural Law to every physical and
  social field of the day. In this respect, the
  lessons of history and the social structures
  built upon it could be discarded.
• It was Newtons conception of the universe based
  upon Natural and rationally understandable laws
  that became the seed for Enlightenment ideology.
  Locke and Voltaire applied concepts of Natural
  Law to political systems advocating intrinsic
  rights the physiocrats and Adam Smith applied
  Natural conceptions of psychology and
  self-interest to economic systems and the
  sociologists criticised the current social order
  for trying to fit history into Natural models of
  progress

6
Classicism / Neoclassicism

• Ancient Greeks
• Art is an imitation of nature.
• Nature exists outside the artists mind, so the
  primary concern is external reality.
• How do we judge an imitation ?

7
Classical/neoclassical view on art

• Art should seek to be objective.
• The aim of art to know.
• What is imagination, then, to the Classical
  writer ?

8
Aristotles Poetica

• The artist is creative according to a true
  idea.
• The character of art is governed by ones
  conception of what it imitates.
• The ancient Greeks succeedeed in creating
  philosophy as we know it the essential character
  of nature is made up of universal forms and
  principles.

9
Art vs. Nature

• Art, as an imitation of what is essential in
  nature, is therefore concerned with persisting,
  objective forms.
• Art focuses on what is permanent and ordered
  rather than isolated and particular.
• Hence, poetry is more philosophical than
  history.
• Poetry is concerned with the ideal. What is the
  ideal ?

10
Poetry in Classicism

• Poetry is concerned with what ought to be.
• The ideal, in most classical writing, refers to
  the way things would be if the form, the
  principle, that is operating through them were
  carried out to its completion or logical
  fulfillment.
• Poetry, says Aristotle, rests upon two instincts
  in manthe instinct for imitation, and the
  instinct for harmony.

11
Classicism and Neoclassicism

• Art attempts to duplicate nature, within the
  particular medium into which it is transposing
  its subject.
• The classical term "imitation" is thus to be
  viewed in a flexible, imaginative way. In the
  middle and late eighteenth century, the meaning
  of the word "imitation" became narrower, and it
  was then set up in opposition to words like
  "creativity" and "originality."

12
Alexander Pope, Essay on Criticism (1711)

• I.General qualities needed by the critic (1-200)
• A.Awareness of his own limitations (46-67).
• B.Knowledge of Nature in its general forms
  (68-87).
• 1.Nature defined (70-79).
• 2.Need of both wit and judgment to conceive it
  (80-87).
• C.Imitation of the Ancients, and the use of rules
  (88-200).
• 1.Value of ancient poetry and criticism as models
  (88-103).
• 2.Censure of slavish imitation and codified rules
  (104-117).
• 3.Need to study the general aims and qualities of
  the Ancients (118-140).
• 4.Exceptions to the rules (141-168).

13
Alexander Pope, Essay on Criticism (1711)

• II.Particular laws for the critic (201-559)
• Digression on the need for humility (201-232).
• A.Consider the work as a total unit (233-252).
• B.Seek the author's aim (253-266).
• C.Examples of false critics who mistake the part
  for the whole (267-383).
• 1.The pedant who forgets the end and judges by
  rules (267-288).
• 2.The critic who judges by imagery and metaphor
  alone (289-304).
• 3.The rhetorician who judges by the pomp and
  color of the diction (305-336).
• 4.Critics who judge by versification only
  (337-343).Pope's digression to exemplify
  "representative meter" (344-383).
• D.Need for tolerance and for aloofness from
  extremes of fashion and personal mood (384-559).
• 1.The fashionable critic the cults, as ends in
  themselves, of the foreign (398-405), the new
  (406-423), and the esoteric (424-451).
• 2.Personal subjectivity and its pitfalls
  (452-559).

14
Alexander Pope, Essay on Criticism (1711)

• III.The ideal character of the critic (560-744)
• A.Qualities needed integrity (562-565), modesty
  (566-571), tact (572-577), courage (578-583).
• B.Their opposites (584-630).
• C.Concluding eulogy of ancient critics as models
  (643-744).