The Bible and Western Culture - Hume, Swift, and the Collapse of Deism

You can find Swift's work here amzn.to/3phXMxU and Hume's work here amzn.to/3bVZYs6
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Dr. Michael Sugrue earned his BA at the University of Chicago and PhD at Columbia University.

[@PollyMatthew]

Sugrue’s ability to articulate a subject, put it in its contemporary context, AND cross reference it to virtually any historical and intellectual tradition is inspiring and mind boggling.

[@jlwcarroll]

Quick qqq

[@donmilland7606]

That nerd is brilliant!

[@robertb1138]

He said in one lecture he tends to be Gadamerian in his outlook, and that encyclopedic referencing and criss-crossing of time is very much Gadamerian.

[@cheri238]

I want to thank Dr. Sugre again. I have enjoyed all his videos.

[@alfredogomez4714]

He died amigo😢! Heard about it yesterday

[@Noxshus]

If I had had philosophy profs like this, I would have a master's right now.

[@peterlemmonjello6799]

same

[@cinnamon4605]

I would've been one of the person: that they would've studied about me in the future. Just we are listening to Socrates, Kant, Kierkegaard, Neichtze.

[@eliajahrenteria322]

Master's in Sass

[@andrewocampos3203]

Forreal

[@JamieEHILLS]

Thank you for uploading these Mr. Sugrue, they are absolute gold!

[@enlightenedanalysis1071]

Thank you Dr. Sugrue. This was excellent.

[@steveschramko2386]

Hume has always been the great mountain of western philosophy....old and new roads begin and end here. No one has been better able to articulate the fundamental paradoxes of life than Hume. Not all 'miracles' involve suspension of natural laws, but may be perfectly natural events (a military victory, seagulls eating locusts) whose timing and context make them 'miraculous' to a people. The Conclusion of Book I of the Treatise of Human Nature contains some of the most lyrical, poetic passages in all of philosophy....itself a kind of irony. It's a tour de force of ironic writing.

[@Vgallo]

Sone of his explanations for miracles, namely that they require extraordinary proofs for extraordinary claims has since been shown to be erroneous though, still an intellectual giant though.

[@michaelkingsbury4305]

Hume is one of the most readable of all the great philosophers.

[@danielgrotz6599]

I don't believe this phrase "extraordinary proofs for extraordinary claims" is anywhere in Hume. He says that the unlikelihood of the miracle not occurring has to outweigh the unlikelihood of it occurring. I.e. the resurrection should be doubted because the unlikelihood of a resurrection so greatly outweighs the testimonies for it.

[@englishbiblereadings6036]

@@danielgrotz6599 Yet one of the arguments against the originality of the Christ's Resurrection is that it appeared in forms and shadows in pre-Christian religions.

[@nanashi7779]

​@@englishbiblereadings6036 What is this supposition meant to refute?

[@pendejo6466]

I learned that Romanticism is the counter response to the Enlightenment.

[@biedl86]

The pathos of your speech at the end of the lecture was amazing. No wonder, the whole lecture was exceedingly interesting.

[@Jake_Funk]

40:35 "Irony always means that a cultural tendancy is dying."

[@shaunkerr8721]

It amazes me that Socrates & Plato are so influential in the canons of Western history then given they're possibly the most ironic ppl in Western literature.

[@Bruh_moment01]

Based Sugrue 🙌🐐🙌 r.i.p🌹✨💫

[@jorgecastaneda6639]

This guy is absolutely brilliant.

[@fightingwords8955]

Excellent Lecture as Always. I Hope your Health is WELL.

[@andytaylor3462]

Wonderful lecture as usual thanks 😊

[@chrishughes7991]

Rollercoaster for the mind and soul. ❤️‍🔥

[@MyRealName148]

My favorite man and professor on the interwebs. Rather an intellectual target I can work towards.

[@truthisaquestion]

All your lectures are excellent, but this is one of my faves. Thank you for posting!

[@christopherheijjer5942]

This channel is fantastic! Thanks for all the knowledge and free learning!!

[@cheri238]

Thank you again, Dr. Sugrue. I have enjoyed your lectures.

[@taniasara7558]

Thank u so much for the lecture 🙏

[@kevinrombouts3027]

Tremendous lecture.Loved it.

[@CornellD.Cavendish]

Hesitated to click this one for a while but this is classic Sugrue. I would rate it with his Nietzsche and Aurelius lectures.

[@dhieuayuen1467]

The best lecture about Hume.

[@LethalBubbles]

13:30 - Gibbon adapted this amazing quote from Lucretius' De rerum natura, an Epicurean work.

[@a.t.3168]

You're a remarkable teacher.

[@slorbitify]

Great lecture! Does mr Sugrue plan on uploading his presentations on the Platonic dialouges?

[@dr.michaelsugrue]

They should be uploaded sometime in the near future.

[@davidrogers4917]

I think this is an interesting lecture considering civic religion has so much prominence in the foundation of this country, and that at least a few of the founders were deist. Idk

[@pearz420]

"For the whole history of the West, irony always means that a cultural tendency is dying."

[@ryans3001]

Thank you!

[@blairhakamies4132]

Brilliant 🌹

[@drbonesshow1]

Jonathan Swift could have been the editor of Mad Magazine.

[@cheri238]

Thanks!

[@emadr5780]

Could you talk about Freud?

[@davidfost5777]

I'm always looking for new interesting lectures on Psychology/Philosophy, please let me know if you guys have any recommendations, would be highly appreciated

[@josephwinnard6666]

John Vervaeke!!!

[@yipekiyay1]

this guy top 5 that are a live

[@shakespearaamina9117]

Fascinating 😊😊

[@Rico-Suave_]

Watched all of it 42:47

[@cheri238]

I love Jonathan Swifts novel, "Gulliver's Travel." Travels Into Several Remote Nations, In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver 1. A Letter Capt. Gulliver to his Cousin Simpson 2.The Publisher to the Reader 3. The Contents PART I: A Voyage to Lilliput Part II: A Voyage to Brobdingnag Part III: A Voyage to Luputa, Balnibarbl.,Glubdubdrib, and Japan Part IV: A Voyage to the counrt of Houyhnbnms David Hume-(1711- 1776) at the age of twenty- six shocked all Christendom with is "Trieatise of Human Nature." We only know the mind only as we know matter: by perception though it may be case intrenal. No wit. could get himself in more trouble when he said: No matter, no mind" Hallucinations of philosophy ad science. Mathematics Hume and Swift diesim is split into. Philosophers how ironic we still have them. Thank god, whichever one chooses. What is the soul? Or is there one? William Blake is my favorite poet among many. Thank you, Dr. Sugrue again. Please be well and remain courageous. Sending you many blessing of joy.

[@joekopsick1540]

He mentions felicity in every lecture, and veneers in like a quarter of them. I'm still playing the "take a shot when you hear veneer" game from Frasier, I'm a wreck

[@tianac.6730]

Thank you so much for this video! My questions are, what is the ultimate collapse of pantheism/deism within a post-civilizational context, and why is philosophy's bedrock embedded within Hume's notions of perceptual reality? Also, why does modernism entail the notion of a hyper-idealistic civilization in the first place? Also, what leap of faith does it take to become a Hume-inspired deist/pan-psychic campaigner? Also, why do the fruits of civilization blossom often only within the context of Westernization? Also, why is the collapse of Christianity considered an Epicurean heraldic movement in spite of the crown of civilization's rapturous fluidity? Finally, what does it take to re-bedrock the Christian-inspired reins of the chariot of deism/pantheism within an Absolute ideally inspired politic of society, so to speak?

[@IvanTheHeathen]

Perhaps the greatest irony of Hume’s philosophy is the fact that his account of miracles actually contradicts the rest of his philosophy. Hume says that a miracle is any contravention of a law of nature. But if we see a law of nature contravened, then that gives us empirical evidence that that alleged law of nature isn’t really a law of nature. And so, he rejects miracles on the grounds that they’re inconsistent with the idea of a lawlike universe. The problem with this argument is that _it’s only persuasive if you believe that laws of nature are objective facts about reality. But Hume clearly doesn’t believe that!_ He says that our ideas about causality only come from the fact that we happen to have repeatedly observed that event A tends to be followed by event B, not because there’s anything about events A and B in themselves that account for why they are connected. Bread that has nourished us whenever we have eaten it could, for all we know, end up poisoning us the next time we eat it. The irony here is that, if you take Hume’s account of causality seriously, you should be _more_ inclined to believe claims that a miracle has occurred, not less.

[@danielgrotz6599]

If you think these things you mentioned didn't occur to him you are underestimating him, I think.. He fully acknowledges that a new observation can change our understanding of the laws of nature. He gives the example of hypothetical global darkness in 1600. He doesn't "reject miracles" like you say but rather says we should only believe them if the unlikelihood of them not occurring outweighs the unlikelihood of them occurring. He personally thinks no miracle has occurred which meets this criterion.

[@IvanTheHeathen]

@@danielgrotz6599 - I think the problem with Hume's approach runs deeper than you appreciate. On Hume's view, we really don't have any reason to believe that there are such things as "laws of nature" at all (there are contemporary philosophers who agree with Hume's account of causality and accordingly do not believe that laws of nature exist). Yes, we inductively observe regularities in nature, but as Hume stresses, induction is not deduction. In his view, just because we happen to repeatedly observe event B following event A many times does not mean that there is anything in the nature of things that connects events A and B. For all we know, event C might suddenly start following event A tomorrow instead of event B. The regularities that we happen to observe are just that - happenstantial. They're pure coincidences. There's no deeper reason that explains their connection - or at least, none that we have access to. As Hume puts it, the connections between events are "loose and separate." The irony of this account of the metaphysics of causality is that not only does it mean that miracles are possible, _it actually means that literally every event whatsoever is, in some sense, a miracle,_ because each event is causally disconnected from every other event.

[@noobieexplorer4697]

@@IvanTheHeathen last paragraph was great.

[@Anon-jr7or]

@@IvanTheHeathen That’s certainly true if you regard induction as invalid, which Hume concluded. However Hume also concluded that it is simply a fundamental part of human nature to believe in induction. Therefore what Hume says about miracles is from the position that induction is reliable which makes his position consistent.

[@sp22m3]

It's interesting thinking about gnostic traditions and meister Eckhart's "God has no name" quote at the same time. It's reminiscent of the undescribable form of God that Sophia and the demiurge descended.

[@PooyanDoozandeh]

Good, thank you. However, I wish Hume’s main contribution to philosophy was discussed which had lasting implications on ethics: the destruction of empiricism which led to the rise of belief! Yes, Hume was empiricist, but towards the end of the first book of his main Treatise, he questioned the foundations of empiricism and observation. I would argue that Nietzsche is a continuation of Hume’s conclusions.

[@benquinneyiii7941]

The meaning of meaning

[@Tadesan]

"REAL baby-back ribs! Meat falling off the bone!" - Jonathan Swift

[@beartime9728]

“Irony always means that a cultural tendency is dying”

[@yeezystreetteam]

I haven't read Hume, but I estimate he might ask what is the point of sense organs if we cannot rely on them? And why are we asked to rely on them just enough to comprehend and ingest revelation, but not a scintilla more? Perhaps the only practical answer is metaphor, using a hammer to pound a nail too hard may cause the surface to fracture. The surface being our unique human conscious experience, or soul, which is as real as the oakwood table Hume is pointing to. Playing a little god's advocate.

[@because_the_internet]

David Hume could out-consume, Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

[@nightoftheworld]

34:39 No it isn’t intellectually dishonest, it’s just communicating through another _register_

[@tangerinesarebetterthanora7060]

Swift inverted postmodern critiques before they existed.

[@englishbiblereadings6036]

To divide miracles into Christian ones and Hindu ones is absurd. Moses was confronted by Jannes and Jambres and scripture clearly speaks of lying signs and wonders and the idolatry behind them. For Hume to have had such a detached view of the miraculous indicates he lived in spiritual deadness. Symptomatic of the Deistic wasteland he was born into perhaps? Little wonder that the Wesleyan revival had such an impact on that barren land.

[@anthenehbeze.]

RIP😢

[@gustavderkits8433]

Terry Pratchett assures us that there is almost certainly a monster in the closet or under the bed, but right nanny can deal with effectively.

[@36cmbr]

Teach seems to be rewriting critical “humanists” & “Swifties”. Why would he do such a thing?

[@jeffmarcuse6450]

The problem with abandoning dogma is we can do a lot of stupid things and just say it's good or bad even if it's completely unreasonable.

[@danielgrotz6599]

If you are defending dogma , which maybe you aren't, then it should be pointed out that dogma can also lead people to believe that seemingly evil things are good (flying planes into towers/slavery/persecuting lgbtq people/a global flood/hell) and that seemingly silly things are reasonable (celibacy for all priests/Balaam's talking donkey/scriptural inerrancy)

[@noobieexplorer4697]

@@danielgrotz6599 if you dont have dogma then you have no ground to say that those are evil or unreasonable. Cause then you have your own dogma

[@danielgrotz6599]

@@noobieexplorer4697 if you are trying to scare me into dogma by arguing that there is no good or evil without it then I'm sorry, I'm not falling for it. I defy you to explain why a God demanding child sacrifice is more moral than a human who lives by love. Job teaches correctly that humans have limited understanding of the physical universe but it says nothing about our moral conscience. Now maybe there is no true morality and that's fine. We shouldn't say that the world can't be that way just because some of us are afraid. Our fear has no bearing on the truth. In the meantime you can continue to teach the morality of murder and persecution and war that your dogma teaches and we will continue to love.

[@nightoftheworld]

11:56 This is what necessitates Hegel’s journey through madness! To become something more than a Machiavellian hypocrite you must “fall into” the world and traverse the fantasy. To have faith is thus a constitutive aspect of becoming more fully human.

[@TheRaveJunkie]

Yeah no, this is incredibly debatable.

[@nightoftheworld]

@@TheRaveJunkie maybe, but faith is a hard thing to hold, it’s not a system that offers certainty and satisfaction but is a mode of living free from these desires. It allows us to look at ourselves and what we are more seriously, to put aside the fantasy of who I _feel_ I am. It is a stumbling block for the self, a naked confrontation with others, a practice which dims our constellations to let in new light from other stars in order to expand our universe. This ability to intervene into ourselves, to cut against our own worlds, I believe makes us more human, more capable of opening up, of listening to others and finding common ground despite certain ideological differences.

[@TheRaveJunkie]

@@nightoftheworld Just another load of empty phrases, devoid of any logic or meaning. You're simply doubling down on your deeply ideological claim of faith being a "constitutive aspect".

[@nightoftheworld]

@@TheRaveJunkie faith in my view is an anti-ideological in practice, it is a direct challenge to our sense of certainty/righteousness. Faith is a disruptive/reflexive mindset which can help us expand beyond the rigidity of our beliefs and into deeper engagement with others in the world. This is a critical/progressive orientation to truth, it certainly isn’t empty or meaningless or illogical-in the natural sciences it is the philosophical perspective of _fallibilism._

[@benbell9170]

It turns out that the Romanticism was even more devastating to the progress of human thinking than the religions itself... Thank you again Prof. Sugrue for as always exceptional lecture of you!

[@noobieexplorer4697]

But what are we progressing to? Is there any goal?

[@acropolisnow9466]

@@noobieexplorer4697 Progress is a myth because nature is perennial.

[@user-vg7zv5us5r]

31:20 Only in Bioshock:Infinite 😉

[@tupiguarani240]

Scotland/Scottish and England/English are not interchangeable terms - you make the same mistake in your lecture on Adam Smith

[@Zsswimmer1]

Speaking of irony as a signal of an eras degradation and on the decline.... We have meta levels of irony now lol. I suppose every generation thinks something like this to some degree. BTW This channel is fucking awesome for us that are on the road for our jobs. Love listening to these going to bed too, you can really feel the passion this man has for the subjects he teaches

[@sapientum8]

Hume's argument about miracles is kind of lame. As a Christian, I wouldn't deny Hindu miracles, but rather ascribe them to the devil. With that, his argument kind of falls apart.

[@danielgrotz6599]

You have good company in thinkers like augustine, but if you really believe all or many of these other miracles are legitimate, then you have a couple of problems. How do you know your miracles didn't come from the devil? Why have miracles from demons become so much rarer? And if you are a Christian, your opinion seems to contradict Deuteronomy 18:21-22. I'm fairly sure Hume read Augustine so I doubt your belief didn't occur to him. I guess he didn't think it worthwhile to engage with so he needed stops like me

[@sapientum8]

​@@danielgrotz6599 Contradict the Deuteronomy 18 ? In what way? It only provides negative confirmation. If something prophesied didn't happen, it was definitely not from God, that's all. Nothing more, nothing less. Hume was a rationalist who didn't believe in any miracles, and his assumption was that anything that can be labeled "supernatural" simply doesn't exist. Apparently he never had any experience in his life with that, so his point of view is understandable. Nor did he believe in demons, or for that matter, in God (even though he had to hide this fact because of obvious reasons). I am sure he read Augustin, and many others, but his argument on miracles is still quite lame.

[@casteretpollux]

Oh come on, both are codolgy but good stories.

[@jasonavant7470]

My devoutly Christian mother could only sit in silence when I mentioned to her what Hume said about miracles - minutes 32:55 - 36:35

[@englishbiblereadings6036]

She should consider the miracles of Pharaoh's magicians in Exodus 7:11

[@jasonavant7470]

@@englishbiblereadings6036 That's right. I forgot about that. Thank you

[@kenoohki]

Gibbon was on point with that statement. 😂

[@EuropeanQoheleth]

40:31 Sounds like the new atheism.

[@christinemartin63]

Thank God ... for atheism. 😉

[@Phoenix0F8]

"May I suggest, not just for the enlightenment but for the whole history of the west: Irony always means that a cultural tendency is dying." well, at least the culture of the last few generations here in the states isn't almost entirely based on irony . . . . .

[@optimusprimum]

a = A

[@Tadesan]

[ ]

[@donmilland7606]

Well , , , if one would wear an ill-fitting Republican suit with those glasses and that (ahem) haircut, then to through out "censorious." That dude would be called a NERD!!!!

[@donmilland7606]

throw out

[@saleens]

ok big guy on campus

[@bbHoodski]

"irony is a sign that the dominant ideology is dying" Goodbye late stage capitalism! 🥳🎉🎉

[@benbell9170]

Considering that it was the Romanticism that rose after the death of the Enlightenment, I'm very pessimistic about whatever would eventually rise after the death of this "late stage Capitalism" and its consequences...

[@colincoulter1257]

Does Foster Wallace pick up on this?

[@kevinrombouts3027]

The miracle of Jesus' resurrection was reportedly seen by several hundred people Take note Hume.

[@suatustel746]

Reportedly????

[@TheRaveJunkie]

hahaha, you utter fool do not even realize the ridiculousness of your supposed gotcha

[@BenJehovah6969]

It's hearsay through the grapevine, which is even more unreliable than actual eyewitness testimony. Nobody knows what they saw, some author spoke what they saw for them. I like to imagine a magician like Chris Angel doing magic tricks in front of those same people. I wonder what they would say they saw. We will never know.

[@danielgrotz6599]

We do not in fact have hundreds of first person accounts. We have just a couple second hand accounts that appear to be written decades after said resurrection and whose oldest complete copies come centuries later. But even with hundreds of first person accounts the evidence would be insufficient as I think Hume clearly shows. I recommend you read him if you haven't, especially his passage on miracles. He knew full well about the supposed witnesses and he addresses it.

[@casteretpollux]

​@@danielgrotz6599I saw Prighozin in my local cafe this morning.