Hume’s Science of Human Nature

This book updates our understanding of Hume’s scientific methodology by using a more sophisticated picture of science as a model. Landy argues that Hume is a kind of scientific realist who holds that science can and must employ theoretical representations of unobservable entities to explain the observed regularities of experience, and that we are justified in believing in the existence of such entities solely on the basis of their explanatory power. Given the long-standing tradition of interpreting Hume as eschewing such forms of explanation, Landy’s close and original reading of the Treatise has significant consequences for understanding many of his most famous arguments.