David Hume's 'Enquiry concerning Human Understanding', published in 1748, has attracted at least as much attention and notoriety in recent times as it did during his own and most of this is focused on the essay, 'Of Miracles', which appears as Section 10 of 'Enquiry'.

One of the primary reasons that it has proved controversial, both now and in the past, is because there exists significant disagreement over what, precisely, was the intended scope of 'Of Miracles'. Many of Hume's critics have alleged that he seemed to believe himself to be in possession of a 'silver bullet' argument against any and every allegation of the miraculous, i.e. ruling out the very possibility of the miraculous, merely David Johnson and John Earman - of Hume's, in order to illustrate these relatively common readings and purports to show how each is flawed. On the former, whom Fogelin considers a 'gross misreader', relatively little time is wasted, before moving on to the more sophisticated criticisms of his 'subtle misreader', John Earman. What Fogelin's 'misreaders' have in common, is that they charge Hume with trying to make an a priori argument and Fogelin sets out to rehabilitate Hume against such critiques. As to whether or not Fogelin fully succeeds, others will need to make up their own minds but, Fogelin endeavors to show, moreover, not only why the interpretation of Hume as offering an a priori argument is implausible but why "Hume's treatment of miracles, when properly understood, exhibits a level of richness, subtlety, coherence, and force not generally appreciated." (p.3)

My own conclusion is that Fogelin has certainly succeeded in offering a closer, more nuanced interpretation of Hume than many of Hume's critics have done. His is an account that will require critics of Hume to go beyond their own preconceptions and knee jerk accusations, and engage fully with 'Of Miracles' on its own terms. He offers an account of Hume's argument that steers clear of tedious efforts to hector the reader into agreement, one that seeks to persuade through force of reason, rather than through force of rhetoric. For these reasons I recommend 'A Defense of Hume on Miracles' to anyone interested in, for example, the demarcation between science and religion, the use of probability, the 'problem of induction', or just the idea of 'miracles' in general, with the sole caveat that I borrowed this copy from my local library without having paid the relatively high price tag commonly attaching to academic works of this kind.

A Defense of Hume on Miracles is a short book divided into three parts:

1. a clear interpretation of Hume's famous argument against miracles;

2. a look at two supposed refutations, that is Johnson's "Hume, Holism and Miracles" and Earman's "Hume's Abject Failure";

3. a look at how Hume's stance on miracles fits into his philosophy as a whole.

Hume's argument basically consists of two methods of measuring the reliability of testimony: the "direct method", ie. showing the witness is reliable, unbiased, noncontradictory, etc. The more important second method is the "reverse method" in which the probability of the event that is being testified is assessed and then applied to judge the reliability of the testimony.

That is the first part of Hume's essay. The second part applies the reverse test to testimonies of religious miracles and argues that these have continuously failed, and as such has created an enormous barrier for future testimony of religious miracles.

Fogelin argues strongly against two common misinterpretations of Hume, namely that he is using an a-priori argument against miracles, and that Hume's argument is circular because it assumes "uniform experience" to discredit miracles (an argument used Hume nowhere says reports of miracles are false because we know they never happened. Fogelin explains with a clear example:

"Hume begins with a claim about testimony. On one side we have wide and unproblematic testimony to the effect that when people step into water they do not remain on its surface. On the other side we have isolated reports of people walking across the surface of water. Given testimony of the first kind, how should we evaluate the testimony of the second sort? The testimony of the first sort does not show that the testimony of the second sort is false; it does, however, create a strong presumption - unless countered, a decisively strong presumption - in favor of its falsehood. That is Hume's argument, and there is nothing circular or question-begging about it."

Fogelin shows in part 2 that Johnson commits both misinterpretations, that is, he both says that Hume's argument is circular and that Hume's argument is a-priori. Earman's approach is more subtle, but still flawed. Based on a couple of strong statements of Hume against miracles, Earman thinks Hume thought the probability of miracles was roughly zero. But, as noted earlier, this is incorrect because Hume provided an example of when a miracle could be established by testimony; moreover, it contradicts his epistemic fallibility, as well as a statement elsewhere that "the course of nature may change". So Earman's treatment too is based upon a misreading.

The third part is good too. Overall, Fogelin's book is written in clear style, offers excellent insights and provides a thorough defense against some more vocal critics of Hume. This all more than compensates for the short length of the book. Highly recommended for people interested in Hume's argument against miracles, or interested in miracles in general.