Hume's Regulative Epistemology in the Enquiry

This article argues that Hume's epistemology changes in an important respect between the Treatise and the Enquiry: the degree to which these epistemologies are practical epistemologies. This article focuses on one particular aspect of this latter comparison, that is, Hume's responses to skepticism in the Treatise and Enquiry. It argues that the Enquiry's response to skepticism offers a practical epistemology that teaches us, in relatively concrete terms, how we can be wise. By contrast, the Treatise's response to skepticism does not seem to share this aim, or at least realizes it to a diminished extent compared with its later counterpart.