Drawing on our readings and other class materials, write a two page summary of Hume’s problem of induction. In writing your summary, you should focus on explaining how Hume’s argument works and why it is important to philosophy of science. When you explain Hume’s argument, make sure to use your own novel example to illustrate induction and the problem Hume is raising about induction.
Advice about How to Structure Your Paper
Here are some questions to help guide you: First, what does the overall structure of Hume’s argument look like? That is, what is the central claim (or thesis) that he defends? What sub-claims, definitions, counterarguments, etc. does he make use of and how do they work to support his main claim? Second, how are the various claims of the essay supported—that is, what reasons are given to defend these claims? Finally, why does Hume’s problem matter—what’s significant about the claim he is making?
Here are some suggestions about how you might structure your essay.
First, you can just start with your statement of Hume’s main claim and why you think it’s significant:
David Hume defends the claim that _____. This claim is significant because it…
Having done this, you might then move to a general statement of what your see as the basic structure of his argument. I’m just giving an example where the basic structure has 3 parts. Hume’s argument might have fewer or more big parts:
Hume’s defense of this claim has [three] basic steps: ____, ____, and ____.
Now you could turn to some details about what these basic steps are and how they’re supported/defended:
In defending _____, Hume starts by…. He then…. In order to substantiate this, Cohen points to … and …. This evidence helps support ____ because…
Turning to ____…
Finally, there’s ____…
Formatting
Do not include your name at the top of the paper, or in the name of the file you upload.
So the first line of your paper should be the first sentence of your intro paragraph.
This will allow me to grade your paper anonymously.
12pt Times New Roman font, double-spaced, with no additional space between paragraphs, and 1-inch margins.
Include a list of References/Works Cited at the end of your paper. This list will not count toward your page/word count.
You use the reference style of your choice (e.g., MLA, APA, Chicago Manual of Style)
This is not a research paper. Only use assigned texts and videos, unless you get explicit permission from the instructor.
Sources, Citations and Quotations
This is not a research paper. Only use assigned texts and videos, unless you get explicit permission from the instructor.
You must acknowledge the source of all ideas you use which are not your own, whether you directly quote or paraphrase another source. Do so by providing a parenthetical citation containing the author name and page number of the cited material.
These are websites explaining how to format parenthetical citations in MLA format (Links to an external site.) and APA format (Links to an external site.).
If you cite material posted to Canvas, include the author’s name, the name of the page on Canvas, the date it was posted, and a URL to that page.
You may choose MLA, APA or Chicago style
Remember as a general rule that quotations should reserved for cases where the author says something in words that you cannot explain yourself. Either because there is technical language, or they have put the point in a particularly distinctive way and you are trying to draw attention to the way they say something and not just what they say.
