Abstract
AT a time when the extraordinary wealth of our knowledge in all directions threatens our sense of values with conflicting conclusions and assumptions, Hume's scepticism finds a renewed actuality. Dr. Laing's able monograph gives the right historical and philosophical setting of Hume's doctrines, and will no doubt encourage his readers to a closer study of Hume's writings. They will thus find out for themselves that Hume's influence on scientific investigation, or on the theory of it, is strongest where the experimental method and its presuppositions are stressed. But the important part played by mathematics in physical science has set limits to his influence in this direction because of doubts concerning the adequacy of his theory in this respect.
David Hume.
Dr.
B. M.
Laing
By. (Leaders of Philosophy Series.) Pp. xi + 273. (London: Ernest Benn, Ltd., 1932.) 12s. 6d. net
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G., T. Philosophy and Psychology. Nature 131, 321 (1933). https://doi.org/10.1038/131321d0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/131321d0