Hume Versus Kant Essay - 1491 Words

Hume and Kant offered two differing views on morality. Humes philosophy regarding moral theory came from the belief that reason alone can never cause action. Desire or thoughts cause action. Because reason alone can never cause action, morality is rooted in us and our perception of the world and what we want to gain from it. Virtue arises from acting on a desire to help others. Humes moral theory is therefore a virtue-centered morality rather than the natural-law morality, which saw morality as coming from God. Kants notion of morality stems from his notion of one universal moral law. This law is pertinent to all people and can be used at all times before carrying our actions According to Kant, you ought to act according to the maxim†¦show more content†¦If humans were not selfish than justice would not even come to mind in these types of situations because the transaction would be totally dominated by one individual, and that would not be justice. Humes view poses the quest ion, which is better social peace or economic prosperity? Hume states that human beings are an animal whose life consists of worldly pleasures, and this is what leads them to a happy life. Again we see a clear contradiction to what traditional philosophers believe to be a happy life. As you can see Hume leaves out the spiritual, reasoning, and thinking part of human nature. Leaving all these factors out he comes up with his contributions to the well being of society. He believes that chastity, confidentiality, avoiding gossip, avoiding spying, being well mannered, and loyal are what can lead you to becoming prosperous. Hume looks at this from being prosperous only from a business-orientated point of view. People do like to become prosperous and have economic growth, but is that all that matters to us as humans? For Hume these feelings are justified because he says that we naturally care about other people and if we do not suffer from something we have a natural inclination to help o thers out. Hume finally comes a conclusion to his ethical theory in which he states that there are only four reasons in which to do morally good: useful to society, useful to oneself, agreeable to oneself, agreeable to others. ActionsShow MoreRelatedPhysics: Is It Really Genuine Knowledge? Essay1244 Words   |  5 PagesIn a present day conference on whether physics can provide valuable, genuine knowledge of the world, two people sit, listening attentively. Both people are deep in thought about their own theories on the subject. One, David Hume, shakes his head in outright denial. While most those in the conference are in agreement that physics can, indeed, provide genuine knowledge, he contends that physics and mathematics provide nothing at all. 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