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Psychological Research and Humean Problems

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2022

Siri Naess
Affiliation:
Norwegian Research Council for Science and the Humanities
Arne Naess
Affiliation:
University of Oslo

Abstract

In this article the question is raised whether philosophers, studying Humean problems, might profit from the empirical findings of contemporary psychology. A text from Hume's Treatise of Human Nature is analyzed in an attempt to find out (1) whether his problems are open to empirical testing. Each sentence in the text is classified into normative, declarative, analytic and synthetic. A prevalence of declarative, synthetic sentences is found. Further, the question is examined (2) whether contemporary empirical psychology has contributed to the testing of Hume's hypotheses. The answer is affirmative for some of the statements, and it is suggested that philosophical discussions around these problems should not be carried out as if psychological research were irrelevant.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © 1959 by Philosophy of Science Association

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