David Hume, an empiricist philosopher, takes on perhaps one of the most challenging of conceivable problems in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. Moving beyond Descartes classic statement, “I think, therefore I am,” Hume addresses issues of knowing that fall outside the realms of active thought or incremental learning. While innumerable philosophers discuss various aspects of experience, Hume stands alone in his successful treatise on the nature of experience itself.

This book has proven highly influential, both in the years that would immediately follow and today. Immanuel Kant points to it as the book which woke him from his self-described "dogmatic slumber". The Enquiry is widely regarded as a classic in modern philosophical literature.

David Hume (7 May 1711 NS (26 April 1711 OS) – 25 August 1776) was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, who is best known today for his highly influential system of radical philosophical empiricism, skepticism, and naturalism.