Abstract

I understand the title of this book, Hume's True Scepticism,1 not as a promise to identify some thesis, or doctrine, that is a statement of Hume's scepticism and is true, but rather to explain what Hume's scepticism really amounts to, what it truly is—the real thing. That is what I too would like to discuss. And I applaud Ainslie's concentration on the concluding section of Book 1 of the Treatise as the best place to look for an expression of that Humean scepticism. I have long regarded that section, with the corresponding parts of the first Enquiry, as essential to the proper understanding of Hume as a philosopher.Hume set out to investigate empirically the general character of all human experience, thought...