RA051: Hume the Atheist? A Humean Case against Theism with Paul Russell

In this episode, Ben Watkins sits down with Professor Paul Russell to discuss David Hume, philosophy of religion, and Dialogues concerning Natural Religion.

Professor Russell is a leading Hume scholar and author of “The Riddle of Hume’s Treatise” which argues irreligion is central to understanding the naturalism and skepticism at the heart of Hume’s philosophy, specially, that expressed in his “A Treatise of Human Nature.” These irreligious themes culminate in Hume’s masterpiece: “Dialogues of concerning Natural Religion.”

Professor Russell walks us through different models of god, the argument for design, the argument from evil, and what has been called “Hume’s strange inversion” at the end of the Dialogues.

Paul Russell's Website:

https://sites.google.com/site/paulrussellubc/paul-russell

Philpapers:

https://philpeople.org/profiles/paul-russell

Hume’s Skepticism and the Problem of Atheism:

https://philarchive.org/archive/RUSHSA-4#:~:text=theist%20nor%20an%20atheist%20but,%2F%20186%E2%80%93%2087%3B%20cp.