Your corn is ripe today; mine will be so tomorrow. 'Tis profitable for us both, that I should labour with you today, and that you should aid me tomorrow.
David HumeRead
Tho' there be no such Thing as Chance in the World; our Ignorance of the real Ccause of any Event has the same Influence on the Understanding, and begets a like Species of Belief or Opinion.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote suggests that our lack of understanding about events leads us to believe in chance, despite there being no actual randomness.
David Hume emphasizes the idea that while true chance may not exist in the world, our ignorance regarding the causes of events makes us attribute outcomes to chance. This highlights the limitations of human understanding and how it shapes our beliefs and opinions about the occurrences in life.
Themes
ChanceIgnoranceBeliefUnderstandingEvent
In practice
Example use cases
When discussing the unpredictability of life events during a speech.
More from David Hume
All quotes →Eloquence, at its highest pitch, leaves little room for reason or reflection, but addresses itself entirely to the desires and affections, captivating the willing hearers, and subduing their understanding.
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All that belongs to human understanding, in this deep ignorance and obscurity, is to be sceptical, or at least cautious, and not to admit of any hypothesis whatever, much less of any which is supported by no appearance of probability.
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The great end of all human industry is the attainment of happiness
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There is a very remarkable inclination in human nature to bestow on external objects the same emotions which it observes in itself, and to find every where those ideas which are most present to it.
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To have recourse to the veracity of the supreme Being, in order to prove the veracity of our senses, is surely making a very unexpected circuit.
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