Russell (1961: 591-2):
This difficulty [the problem of showing how we have knowledge of other things than ourself and the operations of our own mind] has troubled empiricism down to the present day. Hume got rid of it by dropping the assumption that sensations have external causes, but even he retained this assumption whenever he forgot his own principles, which was very often. His fundamental maxim, 'no idea without an antecedent impression', which he takes over from Locke, is only plausible so long as we think of impressions as having outside causes, which the very word 'impression' irresistibly suggests.
Blogger Comments:
In terms of Systemic Functional Linguistics, Hume's fundamental maxim can be rephrased as 'no meaning without an antecedent impact of experience'.
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