How do you evaluate those qualitative terms you have used? Such as 'succeeded' and 'failed'?

I use the terms in the usual way. For example, logical positivism has been shown to be false. Even philosophers who were influential in it gave it up. It is recognized in the history of philosophy as an idea that was wrong.

Well, what you are asking here is about the utility or function (at accomplishing a certain goal or purpose) of believing in a certain philosophy. Correct?

Not at all. I'm asking about a quest for truth. That's what philosophy is all about, right? It is a quest for truth, reality, wisdom and how to live best.

Philosophers have attempted to show that it is reasonable to believe the state of affairs is that God does not exist but objective moral good and evil do exist and that it's possible for one's life to be lived in a way that is objectively good and so has purpose.

What philosophers have attempted to show this? Has anyone succeeded? Who has failed and why?

That isn't an answer to my questions. I'm asking for the names of philosophers who have shown that the two are not mutually exclusive.

I understand that some people have followed Nietzsche into nihilism, but most people are not willing to do so. I knew I would get some answers like this.

Do you see any philosophers who have attempted to embrace atheism while avoiding nihilism? Has anyone been successful?

What philosopher do you think has been most successful in embracing atheism and avoiding nihilism? If you have some book you can recommend, I would be happy to read it.

My philosophical interests are in epistemology, logic, philosophy of science, philosophy of life with a minor interest in political philosophy. So, the issue does fit within my areas of interest but I just haven't read much on this particular topic.

What is the crisis of philosophy in his view? I understood that it was the question of how to embrace atheism while avoiding nihilism. I haven't done any reading in this area, but I was told that the history of philosophy since Nietzsche has been a search for a way to reject God while avoiding nihilism. I have been told that no philosopher has yet been successful in this search.

I'm trying to determine exactly what portion of my explanation you are having trouble with. What claim are you denying?

Let's take the Mike Trout home run example I used early on. When a pitcher throws the ball, do you agree that the ball has kinetic energy? Do you agree that you can observe the fact the ball has kinetic energy without the need of special instruments? When Mike Trout hits the ball, the ball changes directions and increases in velocity. We may not be able to see the increase in velocity with the naked eye, but we can certainly see the change in direction, correct? And we have radar guns that will confirm the increase in velocity. Do you doubt that the contact of Mike's bat with the ball is the cause of the change of direction and velocity? And do you agree that our observation of the bat hitting the ball is confirmed by the sound of the bat hitting the ball? Where exactly are you having trouble?

Perhaps this science paper explaining how momentum from the bat transfers kinetic energy to the ball would be helpful to you.

No, I'm not equivocating. Movement of a body is kinetic energy. When you look at a body that is moving, then you are seeing a body with kinetic energy. Can you see movement? If so, then you can see kinetic energy. See the Newton quote I provided.

Let's look at it a couple of different ways. Is the speed of the moving body accelerating? Then its kinetic energy is increasing. You can literally observe the kinetic energy increasing. Is the speed of the moving body slowing? Then the kinetic energy is dissipating. You can literally watch the kinetic energy increase, decrease, start, stop and transfer to another body. This is all perfectly well understood by anyone who understands kinetic energy.

Why is this hard for you? Perhaps you are confusing observing kinetic energy with measuring kinetic energy. Measuring kinetic energy is a different task. But observing the presence of kinetic energy or change in the kinetic energy or the transfer of kinetic energy is very easy with the unaided eye.

It looks like a body in motion. If you see a body in motion, then you are looking at a body that has kinetic energy. it really is that simple.

To quote Newton: "... it is plain that the absolute forces of those bodies are as the bodies themselves." Page 153 of the Principia

Your welcome.

The kinetic energy of an object is the energy that it possesses due to its motion. This is rather standard definition. If you see an object in motion, you can see that it has kinetic energy. When you see that object strike another object, it slows down or stops and the other object (if its inertial energy is small enough to be overcome by the transfer of kinetic energy) will begin to move.

Well, all I can say is that your hypothesis is falsified

I said "if" someone understands kinetic energy, they will see it when they see billiard balls moving.

I would say instead that the idea of the energy of the balls is conveyed in the speed of their movement and the sound of their striking one another, and is not directly seen at all but felt in the body. In other words it is misleading to speak of it as a visual phenomenon when it is equally an auditory phenomenon and it consists mostly in an associative somatic response.

This is proof you do not understand kinetic energy.

How could principles of natural science be applied for study of mental workings of human nature?

They cannot. Natural science is possible only because nature always repeats itself. If the same conditions apply, nature will do exactly the same thing. The mental workings of humans are not so. In the exact situation different humans will respond differently. In fact, in the same situation even the same human will react different if he is in a different mood.

The only way to conclude that humans would all react in the same way would be if you believed in determinism and that humans do not have, at the very least, a limited free will. But this is an idea that is testable with a simple thought experiment. If you are convicted of a crime and locked in prison, would you feel like your will has been limited? Of course, the answer is yes. You recognize that you have lost something important to you - your freedom.

Hume and Adam Smith should probably be credited as the founder of psychology, but it is wrong to think of this discipline as a natural science. Many fields, political science, psychology, sociology, are given a status as a "science" but this is only through a misunderstanding of what science actually is or an honorary title bestowed because the field attempts a systematic and thorough examination of the data. Only the hard sciences are science. The soft sciences are just studies of human behavior.

Sorry but the link wouldn't let me download the document because my ipad had no MS Word.

Can you read PDFs? This link is to Schliesser's dissertation.

If Hume had been arguing against Newton, he would have been written off as a loony, rather than being as respected as he was in his time.

Hume was not respected in his time. His books didn't sell well and the people who understood Hume well, such as Thomas Reid, criticized him sharply. Kant also wrote against Hume. Kant's biggest problem is that he also was not a good student of Newton and he gave Hume too much credit. Hume's fame didn't really show up until after he died.

I read someone in the previous posts said that Hume opposed to Newtonian Science?

Yes, it's justified. Hume wrote some complimentary things about Newton, but he didn't really understand Newton's science and so he wrote things that were previously refuted by Newton but Hume didn't know it. Read the philosophy paper by Schliesser here. I've quoted several paragraphs from the paper that discuss Hume's philosophical opposition to Newton.

Also, this article on Hume and Newton. This article mentions that Hume's writings show evidence he had read Berkeley's criticism of Newton, but there's little evidence Hume really understood Principia:

"Barfoot is correct to suggest that Hume's treatment of mathematics shows debts to Berkeley's criticism of Newton. There is less evidence for Barfoot's claim that Hume would have had working knowledge of the most technical parts of the Principia."

I also recommend this paper. The abstract begins: "In this paper, I analyze Hume's missing shade of blue example from a Newtonian point of view. I argue that an analysis of the missing shade of blue example reveals considerable ignorance of Newton's achievements in optics."

Schliesser also wrote his dissertation on Hume and his "lack of knowledge" about Newton's accomplishments.

Do you think someone prior to understanding the notion of kinetic energy would see kinetic energy when they looked at moving objects?

No, I don't. But once someone understands kinetic energy, they must see it when they see a moving billiard ball. If they don't see it, they don't understand kinetic energy. It's that simple.

And another quote from Schliesser:

"Hume’s anti-reductionism is made evident by the important assumption in his account of causation that all matters of fact are, in an important sense, alike. In the Treatise, he writes, ‘there is but one kind of necessity, as there is but one kind of cause, and that the common distinction betwixt moral and physical necessity is without any foundation in nature.’ Moreover, ‘Passions are connected with their objects and with one another; no less than external bodies are connected together. The same relation, then, of cause and effect, which belongs to one, must be common to all of them.’ Hume thinks that we apply the same type of inference about matters of fact, and that all facts have the same causal structure. In causal explanations there is, thus, no reason to privilege the motion of small bodies or any ‘lower level’ causes. Further evidence for his anti-reductionism comes from Hume’s eight ‘rules by which to judge of causes and effects’ because it is ‘possible for all objects to become causes or effects to each other.’ Thus, the relative neglect by scholars of Hume’s historical, economic, and political works is odd because these should reveal as much about his views on causation as do those on more ‘philosophic’ topics."

As you read Schliesser quoting Hume, are you not struck with the absurdity of Hume's comments?

He is saying there is only one kind of cause, so if you are looking at a cause of a moral necessity it is exactly the same as a cause of a physical necessity. Really?

Here is another quote from Schliesser regarding Hume's view of Newton's philosophy:

"The full extent of Hume’s indebtedness to pre-Newtonian mechanical philosophy becomes evident once we realize that he accepts the mechanists’ view of what counts as a proper explanation. Hume writes about the nature of Newton’s achievements: ‘While Newton seemed to draw off the veil from some of the mysteries of nature, he shewed at the same time the imperfections of the mechanical philosophy; and thereby restored her ultimate secrets to that obscurity, in which they ever did and ever will remain’ (emphasis added). Hume treats Newton’s refutation of the mechanical philosophy not as a decisive advance in knowledge but, instead, as decisive evidence for the claim that nature will remain unknowable in principle. The way to make sense of Hume’s remark is to see that it reveals that he implicitly accepts the mechanists’ insistence that theirs was the only program that offered the possibility of intelligible explanation, even if it only offered hope of post-facto rational reconstruction."

It makes no sense to me to think that we see the kinetic energy; we see the ball moving is all.

When you see a moving billiard ball, you are looking at its kinetic energy. When you see a stationary billiard ball, you are looking at its inertial energy.

Some here seem to think that I'm the first person to accuse Hume of attacking Newton's Principia. I submit this quote from a paper by Eric Schliesser called "Hume's Attack on Newton's Philosophy."

"This essay consists of five sections in addition to this introduction. First, I discuss Hume’s attitude toward Newton. Newton claims that natural philosophy should be the foundation for other sciences, while in the ‘Introduction’ to the Treatise Hume asserts the supremacy of the ‘science of man’. For Hume the human sciences can attain the high epistemic status of ‘proof’, while much of the physical sciences must do with lower forms of ‘probability’. Furthermore, Hume’s ‘rules by which to judge of causes and effects’ do not replicate Newton’s fourth Rule; this opens a gap between the ontologies and methodologies of Newton and Hume. Moreover, Hume’s account of causation is designed to undercut the reductionist bias of natural philosophy. According to Hume the parts of natural sciences that go beyond common life can be evaluated from the point of view of the science of man. I end with remarks on the philosophic origins and significance of Hume’s attack on Newton’s natural philosophy."
http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/5382/

I may word things a little differently than Schliesser, but I'm not the first to notice Hume's attack on Newton.

Again here, Hume is not doubting the science of kinetic energy that we observe. He is doubting that we have any basis for how observation comes about in the first place, as you can only use past observations to justify the future which is using inductive reasoning itself to justify itself. There is no basis for why our observations should hold consistently true each new instance except by custom.

Doubting "how our observations come about" is "doubting the science of kinetic energy." We are not talking about past observations or future observations. Those topics have to do with induction. As I have already demonstrated, Hume's attack on induction depends upon his attack on the law of cause and effect, not the reverse. The law of cause and effect can be shown in one demonstration.

If you want to know the nature and properties of solid objects, you don't ask a speculative metaphysician - which is exactly what Hume is in this argument. It is ironic to me that Hume has become exactly what he despises.

If you want to know the nature and properties of solid objects, you ask a condensed matter physicist. They can explain to you why classically sized solid objects cannot pass through classically sized solid objects and why kinetic energy from the first billiard ball will always be transferred to the second billiard ball.

Why would anyone believe Hume over Newton on this topic? Why would someone believe Hume over a modern condensed matter physicist?

Your debate about causation is unwittingly just a debate about realism (laws of nature real and "out there") vs. idealism (laws of nature are in our heads).

This is an interesting thought. Clearly, I am a realist. I've never considered Hume's position on this point. Is he considered an idealist?

The usual argument here is that we presume nature to be uniform, but we cannot possibly prove that. Thus laws such as those you refer to have everything to do with human habit and custom, just as Hume claims.

It is a presumption if one has limited evidence. Most people understand that proof is not absolute. Even in capital criminal cases, the prosecutor doesn't have to prove absolutely that the defendant is guilty. All that is required is proof beyond a reasonable doubt. We have that level of proof in this case. When a solid object is moving and hits another solid object, kinetic energy will be transferred. There is no reasonable basis from which to doubt that proposition.

This is not a purely mental exercise nor is it limited to our vision. We can feel the transfer of kinetic energy when our bodies are hit or when we hit a solid object. In another example I've used here, one can feel electricity move through his body and light the light bulb. The question of knowing cause and effect is not in doubt. And knowing that it will always happen that way is also not in doubt.

Hume's statement that our opinion here is based on habit and custom is simply false. We are talking about a situation in which we know the nature and properties of solid objects. If you want to know the nature of solid objects, you talk to a condensed matter physicist. It is not possible for a solid object of classical size to pass through a solid object of classical size. The kinetic energy of the first object MUST BE transferred to the second. There is no reasonable doubt.

Hume's point in the 'billiard ball' example is that the cause (kinetic energy) is not actually observed,

If the ball is moving, then you are observing its kinetic energy. Evidently, this is the point Hume doesn't understand. I agree with your second paragraph.

When billiard ball A strikes billiard ball B, must (some of) A's kinetic energy be transferred to B?

Yes. We can see the stationary ball move and we can hear the energy transfer. Also, if you observe a baseball bat striking a softball in a slow motion video, you can observe that transfer of energy also. The observation of transfer of kinetic energy is well established. And it must happen.

I appreciate that you are making an attempt to explain your thinking. It would improve your responses greatly if you could actually quote from Hume to support your point of view, as I have done.

I'm not here criticizing Hume's attack on induction, which has more merit than his attack on cause and effect and deserves a more detailed and nuanced response. I'm just criticizing Hume's attack on Newton's Law of Cause and Effect and his Laws of Motion.

Hume writes:
“There are no ideas which occur in metaphysics more obscure and uncertain than those of power, force, energy or necessary connexion, of which it is every moment necessary for us to treat in all our disquisitions. We shall, therefore, endeavor in this section to fix, if possible, the precise meaning of these terms, and thereby remove some part of that obscurity which is so much complained of in this species of philosophy.”

First of all, I disagree with Hume calling this 'metaphysics.' Even during the days of Aristotle, concepts of power, force and energy relate to physics and not metaphysics. Hume refers to 'necessary connexion' because it is impossible to establish cause and effect without a connexion between the two actions or events. This is what makes it necessary.

Hume again writes:
“When we look about us towards external objects, and consider the operations of causes, we are never able, in a single instance, to discover any power or necessary connexion; [that is] any quality which binds the effect to the cause and renders the one an infallible consequence of the other. We only find that the one does actually, in fact, follow the other. The impulse of one billiard ball is attended with motion in the second. This is the whole that attends to the outward senses. The mind feels no sentiment or inward impression from this succession of objects: Consequently, there is not, in any single, particular instance of cause and effect, any thing which can suggest the idea of power or necessary connexion."

Let me state it again. Hume is wrong here. We are able "in a single instance, to discover any power or necessary connexion... that binds the effect to the cause." Hume's statement is demonstrably false. Once a person has learned the nature and properties of kinetic energy and how the transfer of kinetic energy works, then one can recognize a new instance of that power at work even though they have never seen it in that setting before. A child can learn about the transfer of kinetic energy in school and will immediately recognize that cause and effect on the billiard table. Similarly, if someone has never seen electricity before, with a proper experiment he can immediately grasp that electricity is the cause of the light bulb coming on.

Our understanding of kinetic energy and electricity has nothing to do with human habit. It has to do with understanding how these forces work, the results they cause and the ability to observe this connection.

Hume does not argue that our powers of observation are so poor and untrustworthy that we cannot make observations that are true and reliable. When Hume argues against induction, he is arguing against our ability to infallibly infer the future or past based on what we observe. Hume's attack on cause and effect does not depend on his attack on induction. Rather, Hume's attack on induction depends on his attack on cause and effect.

Hume writes:
“All reasonings on matters of fact seem to be founded on the relation of Cause and Effect. By means of that relation alone we can go beyond the evidence of our memory and senses." Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Section iv point 22.

By 'reasonings' Hume includes inferences or inductions. So, clearly, his attack on induction depends on his attack on cause and effect, not the other way around as you suppose.

You do realize, I hope, that if Hume was correct then Newton's Laws of Motion would be completely unwarranted. His Laws of Motion describe forces, causes and effects which Hume denies is possible to know.

By this time in history, philosophers should have rejected Hume. I believe the fact Hume is held in high esteem by philosophers to be the biggest cause of scientists' dislike of philosophers.

Perhaps you would like to quote some passage of Hume where he writes that it is possible to observe or know causes and effects? If you cannot do that, I will continue to hold my opinion which comes from the plain reading of Hume.

In other words, he is looking for a justification of certainty between cause and effect, and he sees that it is lacking DESPITE the fact that indeed every time we observe certain "constant conjunctions" it does appear to us to be some sort of immutable law of cause-and-effect going on.

I understand what Hume is saying. I understand that he is not denying the existence of causes and effects. Hume is denying that they are observable or ascertainable in any way. I'm just pointing out that he's wrong. Kinetic energy is well understood and the transfer of kinetic energy can be observed. Hume's billiard ball example is a perfect example of observing cause and effect even though Hume claims he cannot see it. I also gave you the example of electricity flowing through your body as a way to determine cause and effect. Did you read that? Care to respond?

Hume's argument is a frontal attack on Newton's Law of Cause and Effect which states that causes and effects are observable and knowable. Indeed, if they were not observable and knowable, science would have no foundation.

Hello all. I'm Ron. Today's my birthday but gifts are not necessary.

I'm married to a wonderful lady who loves me in spite of my faults, which we won't go into here. I'm the father of three adults who are all married and successful and have their own children. My greatest success in life is as a father.

I consider myself a budding philosopher of science, although at my age it may be too late to bloom. I'm working on a new approach to epistemology that I call Livable Epistemology. It doesn't depend on presuppositions and so is not circular. If I ever get it into publishable shape, I will let you know.

My philosophical interests are epistemology, logic, philosophy of science, philosophy of life and a minor interest in political philosophy.

Some of my favorite philosophers are Aristotle (yes, his physics are terrible but he's right about many things), Augustine (quite impressive in a number of areas even though he read Plato), Thomas Aquinas (I tend to agree with him more often than not), Blaise Pascal, John Locke, Isaac Newton, Karl Popper, Thomas Kuhn and C.S. Lewis.

Philosophers I dislike include Plato (for thinking it's a good thing for government to take children from their parents), David Hume (for his attack on Newton's Law of Cause and Effect), George Hegel and Karl Marx (obvious reasons), Nietzsche (he's so depressing), Wittgenstein (he never explained why he couldn't find the hippopotamus in the room), and Jacques Derrida (pseudo-philosophy - I've never seen obit writers so overjoyed at someone's death).

I hope we can learn from each other!

I changed the wording in my comment for clarification, but my point stands.

Cause and effect, is just a habit we have to get by in the world. We see something in constant conjunction and tend to use this to conclude that they will always be conjoined. However, we are using past experiences to justify this connection, something we cannot justify without using past experience itself (i.e. circular reasoning).

It seems to me that you understand Hume's point of view correctly, but don't see that he is demonstrably wrong. Hume's POV is contrary to Newton's Law of Cause and Effect. Cause and effect can be known. It can be observed and it can experienced through other senses as well. I don't know if you have read the entire discussion here or not. One of the examples I gave was that the flow of electricity and interrupting that flow by turning the switch on and off is a cause for the light bulb going on and off. One way to know this is to cut and expose the wire, hold both exposed wires and then feel the flow of electricity go through your body as the light bulb lights up.

Alternatively, you can also observe the transfer of kinetic energy when one billiard ball strikes another billiard ball and causes it to move. Hume seems to be completely ignorant of the existence of kinetic energy. But this is an observation any child can make once the existence of kinetic energy is understood.

There is no circular reasoning involved.

I'm saying that you are adding meaning to the bolded words that Hume himself never intended. You are literally reading into the text that which is not there. Not only that, but you completely ignored the word 'power' which was not modified by 'necessary.' This destroys the meaning you want to impose on Hume's text.

My mention of 'kinetic energy' was never intended to be in Hume's mouth. Rather, i commented because I was shocked that he did not use or understand that term. Hume says we cannot see cause and effect in the billiard balls. I'm agreeing with Newton that we can see a transfer of kinetic energy from one billiard ball to the other. This is plainly observable. So, I am not reading into Hume as you complain. Rather, I'm shocked that he is so ignorant and that other philosophers have not pointed this out.

And the point isn't just that some people disagree with Hume. The point is that other people disagree with Hume in exactly the same way I do. You had accused me of not understanding Hume or science. Since Whitehead and these other philosophers agree with me, then you are accusing them of being philosophical and scientific dunces as well. It should be plain to you that is not true.

I had two purposes in starting this discussion. One was to learn of other philosophers who had criticized Hume regarding his attack on Newton's Law of Cause and Effect. This discussion has not helped me at all in that regard. It seems no one here has realized and tried to resolve this obvious conflict.

My other purpose was to learn why some people think Hume and and Newton agree on cause and effect when they so obviously do not. So far, I've gotten two different attempts to explain these variant views can be resolved. One is that Hume is writing in terms of metaphysics and not physics. That simply isn't true as I've shown. The second is your attempt to show that I don't understand Hume correctly because I don't see the modality in his argument. Even with the quoted text with the bolded words, I still can't read into the text what you see there. I think it is clear that you ignored the phrase 'power or' which shows that the term 'necessary connexion' is not really 'necessary' in the sense you are trying to impose on the text. If it was, then Hume would have said 'necessary power'. I can't help but think that smart people must have some other way of misunderstanding Hume so they can reasonably think he agrees with Newton. So, my second purpose also seems rather unfulfilled.

I just read a book review on a book by TERENCE PENELHUM. Themes in Hume: The Self; the Will, Religion. Oxford:Clarendon Press, 2000. The reviewer writes that the author is critical of Hume in a few places:

" He believes that Hume has failed to distinguish adequately talents and virtues (148ff, 174ff), is mistaken in contending that only judgments or beliefs can properly be deemed unreasonable (150), and argues against libertarianism by somewhat dogmatically holding that every event has a cause (165ff)." http://humesociety.org/hs/issues/v27n2/steinberg/steinberg-v27n2.pdf

Here again is another philosopher who agrees that Hume is crazy to argue that cause and effect are unknowable.

I think you are reading into the text that which is not there. Notice the words "power or necessary connexion." Hume is describing straight physics. The power that Hume is denying in the billiard example is the transfer of kinetic force. The movement of the second ball is the infallible consequence of being struck by the first ball.

Are you also claiming that Alfred Lord Whitehead was too dense to understand Hume correctly?

I'm happy to report that I'm finding other philosophers who are calling BS on Hume. Evidently, one was Whitehead. Here's a quote from James Gould:

"In contrast to Hume, Whitehead claims that we have many daily experiences in which we are directly aware of caused connection. He uses the famous example of the reflex action in which an electric light is suddenly turned on and a person's eyes blink. The person is directly aware that the flash caused the blink; a necessary relationship exists between the light and the blink. With this doctrine, Whitehead directly attacks Hume's influential theory of causation." - James Gould

Here's what you wrote in your initial post.

Hume's significance is missed entirely if it is not recognized that the argument against induction ultimately resolves into in question of modality - that is, necessity and contingency. What Hume questioned was not 'cause and effect' (whatever that would even mean), but the modality of the connection between both: he denied - and rightly so - that the connection between cause and effect has the status of logical necessity. This is why Hume is rightly regarded as an empiricist: any connection between cause and effect must be 'extra-logical', it cannot rely on (formal) logic alone, but must be grounded in something 'wordly'.

You discuss modality, necessity, contingency and logic. It certainly looks to me like you are discussing modal logic. Since you are not discussing modal logic. Please elaborate. Please provide a quote from Hume where mentions modality or describes what you are referring to because I don't see any of that in the passage I quoted. I see a simple denial of being able to observe or ascertain the cause of any effect, a claim which is contrary to Newton and demonstrably false.

But please quote Hume discussing modality and causality and explain how you understand the passage.

Okay, I'm not a huge fan of Descartes either but I do agree with that argument. But we can save that for another time.

As I said previously, if you are unable to address the question of modality, then you are unable to address Hume. That is just the case with your reading. To the flames it goes.

Please explain because it seems to me that Hume is talking of straight physics with no appeal to modal logic at all. Hume is saying that we cannot observe causation. I'm saying that's ridiculous. Of course, we can see it and we can point to it in many cases. Hume's view is contrary to Newton's law of cause and effect. If you think you can prove me wrong, then do so.

Again, just to be clear. I do not care about Hume's attack on metaphysics. That issue can be discussed at another time. The issue before us is Hume's attack on Newton's law of cause and effect published in the Principia in 1687. There is no way to resolved Hume's comments and Newton's law of cause and effect.

No one here has even attempted to show that Hume and Newton agree. Yet, it seems that everyone holds that belief and wants to pretend that Hume is an empiricist in the same way that Newton is. It isn't true and I cannot find any reason why so many people would hold such a clearly erroneous view.

But Hume was not wrong. You've all but admitted that short of begging the question, you can't even address Hume's problem.

No, I have addressed Hume's problem repeatedly. Hume says that cause and effect cannot be observed or ascertained by any method. Hume writes that if we think we see cause and effect, we are mistaken - that what we see is really only two things that are associated in spatial and temporal conditions. Hume believes real cause and effect may exist but cannot be known.

I've been told that Hume was discussing the issue of cause and effect from the perspective of metaphysics and not physics. I've shown that claim to be false. I've been told Hume is only making the limited claim that the cause and effect cannot be learned by conceptual idealism (as if anyone claimed it could be determined by conceptual idealism). I've shown that claim to be false because Hume spoke of "looking" at billiard balls and saying that cause and effect cannot be determined by means used by scientists.

This entire conversation is almost surreal. It's like people cannot read Hume for what he is saying because they were previously told what he said and they can't get passed these previous ideas.