Hume

American  

[hyoom, yoom] / hjum, jum /

noun

1. David, 1711–76, Scottish philosopher and historian.

2. John, 1937–2020, Northern Ireland politician: Nobel Peace Prize 1998.

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Hume British  

/ hjuːm /

noun

1. ( George ) Basil. 1923–99, English Roman Catholic Benedictine monk and cardinal; archbishop of Westminster (1976–99)

2. David. 1711–76, Scottish empiricist philosopher, economist, and historian, whose sceptic philosophy restricted human knowledge to that which can be perceived by the senses. His works include A Treatise of Human Nature (1740), An Enquiry concerning the Principles of Morals (1751), Political Discourses (1752), and History of England (1754–62)

3. John. born 1937, Northern Ireland politician; leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) (1979–2001). Nobel peace prize jointly with David Trimble in 1998

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Other Word Forms

• Humism
  noun

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Hume

“No truth appears to me more evident,” David Hume declared in 1739, “than that beasts are endowed with thought and reason as well as men.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 2, 2026

Smith and his friend David Hume, the great irreligious Edinburgh philosopher, were among the leading lights in the Scottish Enlightenment of the late 18th century.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026

Hume added that she "wouldn't want to draw anything away from how serious" a blaze in Stourbridge was last week.

From BBC ● Aug. 20, 2026

Hume welcomed government funding to help cover North Yorkshire Fire & Rescue Service's expenses from the wildfire, and £3.2m towards moorland recovery.

From BBC ● Aug. 20, 2026

Don Hume took the stroke up to thirty-five, then to thirty-six, then to thirty- seven.

From "The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics" by Daniel James Brown