It is fairly well known that Hume added a footnote to his essay ‘Of National Characters’ in which he asserts that all non-white peoples are naturally inferior to white people. Subsequently, he revised the note to assert only that black people are naturally inferior to white people. But while the view expressed in this footnote has been described as ‘shockingly bigoted’, and even as his ‘racial law,’ it is still commonly thought that in Hume's voluminous writings it is apparently just (...) this single passage which is definitely racist in its import. My aim in this paper is to show how American Indians are thought to be naturally inferior to white people in An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals. There are, therefore, passages in Hume's second Enquiry which are also definitely racist in their import. (shrink)

Whether Kant’s late legal theory and his theory of race are contradictory in their account of colonialism has been a much-debated question that is also of highest importance for the evaluation of the Enlightenment’s contribution to Europe’s colonial expansion and the dispossession and enslavement of native and black peoples. This article discusses the problem by introducing the discourse on barbarism. This neglected discourse is the original and traditional European colonial vocabulary and served the justification of colonialism from ancient Greece throughout (...) the Renaissance to the eighteenth century. Kant’s explicit rejection of this discourse and its prejudices reveals his early critical stance toward colonial judgements of native peoples even before he developed his legal theory. This development of his critical position can be traced in his writings on race: although he makes racist statements in these texts, his theory of race is not meant to ground moral judgements on ‘races’ or a racial hierarchy but to defend the unity of mankind under the given empirical reality of colonial hierarchies. (shrink)

This article introduces several aspects of eighteenth-century discussions of slavery that may be unfamiliar or surprising to present-day readers. First, even eighteenth-century philosophers who were opponents of slavery often exhibited marked racism and helped develop racial concepts that would later serve pro-slavery theorists. Such thinkers include Hume, Voltaire, and Kant. Second, we must see slavery debates in the context of larger scientific and political debates, including those about climate and character, just political systems, the superiority or inferiority of the moderns (...) to the ancients, and the status of women. This section of the paper discusses the views of Montesquieu, Edmund Burke, Adam Smith, Sarah Chapone, and Mary Astell. Finally, many anti-slavery arguments of the time may seem too ‘soft’ to contemporary readers, as they appeal to negative effects or aspects of slavery rather than arguing for its absolute injustice. The last section of the paper compares Rousseau's arguments against slavery in The Social Contract with such arguments and concludes with a discussion of how Hume's understanding of humanity as a virtue may serve as a bridge between the two. (shrink)

James Burnett, Lord Monboddo’s (1714–1799) contribution to Scottish Enlightenment thinking on race is regularly held to be twofold. As a Lord of Session, he supposedly defended slavery on Aristotelian grounds, infamously voting against Joseph Knight’s freedom in Knight v. Wedderburn (1778). In his philosophical writings, Monboddo is known for his arguments in favour of the humanity of orangutangs, which scholars have claimed informed both his own views on slavery and also wider apologetics for the trade. At the same time, Monboddo (...) is frequently cited as providing a fulsome defence of the achievements of black Africans against Hume’s footnote in ‘Of Natural Characters’ (added in 1753). The full significance of Monboddo’s counterexample to Hume’s claims, the civilization of black ancient Egypt, has not been adequately understood. In this article I undertake a deep dive into Monboddo’s views on race, slavery, and the black origins of civilization present in his largely ignored six-volume Antient Metaphysics (1779–1799). The arguments that emerge show that Monboddo was not quite the apologist for enslaving black Africans as he is sometimes presented as being, but also that his thought was far from the enlightened Scottish mainstream. (shrink)

The views on race expressed by Hume in a footnote appended to his essay ‘Of National Characters’ seem so egregiously misguided that the suspicion has developed among some commentators that his fundamental philosophical outlook may be inextricably intertwined with a host of deeply pejorative racist assumptions that serve to encourage a pervasive pattern of exploitative and oppressive actions directed against people of colour. This paper, in contrast, argues that predominant thrust of Hume’s account of human nature is towards emphasizing the (...) psychological similarities manifest by all healthy human beings, irrespective of biological sex or alleged racial affiliations: from Hume’s perspective, white Europeans and people of colour are separated by much less than they have in common. It is, moreover, Hume’s acknowledgement of the characteristics that all human beings have in common that motivates his forceful criticisms of the practice of chattel slavery. Basing his judgement on his appreciation of our shared humanity, Hume condemns slavery as a practice that cannot be reconciled with any legitimate set of moral sentiments. (shrink)

Diversity and the concept of race are, or should be, central concerns both for the history of philosophy and for our current political reality. Within academic philosophy, these concerns are expressed in the growing demand for minority representation within the canon, which is overwhelmingly white and male, especially in early modern philosophy. Furthermore, until now, historians of philosophy have not spent the time necessary to uncover various designations such as “Negro”, “Moor”, “Ethiopian”, etc., in early modern Europe, and from there (...) to understand how these shaped philosophical reflections on human diversity. In my research, I relate Anton Wilhelm Amo, Europe’s first African Ph.D. in philosophy, to philosophy and religion together with the treatment of human difference in the work of Robert Boyle and his contemporaries. My project aids in addressing the lack of diversity in the philosophical canon and the insufficient historical analysis of various designations of human difference. Human difference, i.e., the early modern interpretation of race, and Amo scholarship are interrelated subjects, as Amo is both a philosopher in Europe and an African native. The one cannot be researched without the other. Thus, my research attempts to elucidate Amo’s philosophical significance and its relation to race and human difference. I begin by give a biographical sketch of Amo, which addresses goals and, where I discuss Amo in relation to religious ideologies, philosophical positions, and the surrounding early modern context. In the following chapter, which also address goals and, I untangle Amo’s critique of Descartes. For Amo, there is an impasse between the mind and sensation because the mind is immaterial, and sensations necessarily need to occur upon something passive and material, which means sensations could only ever be cognized by the mind and through the body. The final chapter, which addresses goal, investigates how the Royal Society, driven by financial incentives and England’s economy, as well as the burgeoning slave trade, played a large role in advancing “scientific” theories of human difference, especially in relation to Africa. That is, the Royal Society essentially propelled natural philosophy into the proto-racist landscape experienced in the early 18th Century, culminating in the application of the ad hoc and non sequitur racist claims given by 18th Century philosophers, e.g., Immanuel Kant and David Hume, and the ousting of Anton Wilhelm Amo. My project contributes to philosophy and the academic community in three ways: philosophical inclusion and diversity, Black history, and the historical ontology of race. It is this intersectional approach to philosophy that, I believe, allows me to contribute to my field in new and interesting ways. Many people believe that philosophy is dying. I believe diverse individuals, like Amo, and diverse ideologies offer breath and life to philosophy. This is because, as Michel de Montaigne explains in the Essays, we learn from the unfamiliar. (shrink)