Hauptli

As the title page indicates, Hume contends that the book is “an attempt to introduce the experimental [experiential ?] method of reasoning into moral subjects.” The citation on this page from Tacitus says: “rare the happy times when we can think what we like, and say what we think.” In the “Introduction,” Hume maintains that only a “science (or study) of man” can provide a “solid foundation” for our understanding. Moreover, he contends, the only available “foundation” for such a science is “experience and observation.” Finally, however, Hume contends that “ultimate principles” are incapable of being explained, and we can’t have any “certainty” which “goes beyond experience.” Note the fundamental similarity to Locke here. Hume will endeavor to be more consistent in limiting himself to this view, however.

xx “There is no question of importance, whose decision is not compriz’d in the science of man; and there is none, which can be decided with any certainty, before we become acquainted with that science.”

“And as the science of man is the only solid foundation for the other sciences, so the only solid foundation we can give to this science itself must be laid on experience and observation.”

xxi “And ‘tho we must endeavor to render all our principles as universal as possible, by tracing up our experiments to the utmost, and explaining all effects from the simplest and fewest causes, ‘tis still certain we cannot go beyond experience; and any hypothesis, that pretends to discover the ultimate original qualities of human nature, ought at first to be rejected as presumptuous and chimerical.”

xxii “...if this impossibility of explaining ultimate principles should be esteemed a defect in the science of man, I will venture to affirm, that ‘tis a defect common to it with all the sciences, and all the arts, in which we can employ ourselves, whether they be such as are cultivated in the schools of the philosophers, or practiced in the shops of the meanest artisans. None of them can go beyond experience or establish any principles which are not founded on that authority.”

xxiii “When I am at a loss to know the effects of one body upon another in any situation, I need only put them in that situation, and observe what results from it. But should I endeavor to clear up after the same manner any doubt in moral philosophy, by placing myself in the same case with that which I consider, ‘tis evident this reflection and premeditation would so disturb the operation of my natural principles, as must render it impossible to form any just conclusion form the phaenomenon we must therefore glean up our experiments in this science from a cautious observation of human life, and take them as they appear in the common course of the world, by men’s behavior in company, in affairs, and in their pleasures. Were experiments of this kind are judiciously collected and compared, we may hope to establish on them a science, which will not be inferior in certainty, and will be much superior in utility to any other human comprehension.

In this Part, Hume clarifies his distinction between our “impressions” and “ideas,” clarifies how they originate, he discusses the connections between them as well as our alleged ability to abstract, and he discusses “general terms.”

1 Hume contends that “all the perceptions of the human mind” are either impressions or ideas, that the only difference between these “kinds” is “...the degrees of force and liveliness with which they strike upon the mind,[1] and make their way into our thought or consciousness.” As his footnote on p. 2 indicates, Hume wishes to diverge from Locke regarding the meaning of ‘idea’.[2]

-Impressions include all our sensations, passions, and emotions, while ideas are faint images of these.

--Anthony Flew maintains that we must be aware of, and watch out for being caught up in, what he calls “Hume’s Three Cartesian Assumptions:” “first comes the assumption that all arguments must be either deductive or defective, since the only sufficient reasons for believing any proposition are (other) propositions which entail it. Second is the notion that we are (all of us) forever imprisoned behind Veils of Appearance, since we can never be immediately aware of mind-independent realities. Third...it is argued or assumed that we essentially are incorporeal substances of (only) the limited and ingrown sort of experience allowed for under the second of these three principles.”[3] Flew offers a “Wittgensteinian” critique of Hume’s reliance upon “sense data” which emphasizes that we need to recognize that there are both “public” and “private” senses of ‘experience’ and that Hume may not handle these senses correctly:

“...in the ordinary and most useful sense a claim to have had experience of something is a claim to have been in direct contact with mind-independent realities; whereas Hume is supposed to be committed to the contentions that he, and we, are never so privileged....He, therefore, is entitled to employ the word ‘experience’, and all other terms with similar meanings, with reference only to ongoings in his own mind—to his own Internal World, so to speak.

To bring out the enormous and vital difference between these two senses, consider the sad case of the philosophically scrupulous applicant, who responds to the advertisement of a farmer seeking to hire hands with experience of cows. In interview he, or she, has to admit that—despite having both many dreams of cows and abundant cowish sense-data—he, or she, neither is nor ever will be in a position to know that there even are such things as cows. Such an applicant would be lucky simply to be dismissed from the interview, without suffering any penalty for impertinence.[4]

--In his Sense and Sensibilia, J.L. Austin critiques the view that “...we never see or otherwise perceive (or ‘sense’), or anyhow we never directly perceive or sense, material objects (or material things), but only sense-data (or our own ideas, impressions, sensa, sense-perceptions, percepts, &c.).”[5]

-2 According to Hume, we readily perceive the difference between our impressions and ideas.

Hume also draws a distinction between simple and complex impressions and ideas: “simple perceptions or impressions and ideas are such as admit of no distinction nor separation. The complex are the contrary to these, and may be distinguished into parts.”

Hume intends to base all talk of other things on the basis of these two “divisions” [impressions and ideas; simple and complex ideas]: “having by these divisions given an order and arrangement to our objects, we may now apply ourselves to consider with the more accuracy their qualities and relations.”

-The first “relation” he notes is that they are very much alike, except that the ideas are less forceful and vivacious than are the impressions.

-3 Hume notes that many complex ideas have no corresponding impressions (and many complex impressions don’t have corresponding complex ideas), however: “...tho’ there is in general a great resemblance betwix our complex impressions and ideas, yet the rule is not universally true, that they are exact copies of each other....[but] every simple idea has a simple impression, which resembles it; and every simple impression a corresponding idea.”

-“That all our simple ideas in their first appearance are deriv’d from simple impressions, which are correspondent to them, and which they exactly represent.”

-5 Simple impressions take precedence over simple ideas: “the constant conjunction of our resembling perceptions, is a convincing proof, that the one are the cause of the other; and this priority of the impressions is an equal proof, that our impressions are the cause of our ideas, not our ideas of our impressions.”

--In his discussion Hume appeals to our intuition that a person blind from birth would not have visual ideas of colors. Anthony Flew raises a significant objection to this claim: “suppose that we wish to test Hume’s general hypothesis by reference to this particular case. We enlist the cooperation of a team of persons blind from birth. They come trooping into our psychological laboratory, eager to serve as respondents to our questions, or subjects in our experiments. But then what next? Suppose further what we all probably believe to be practically impossible—that some or all of them have in fact enjoyed such visual imagery. Then they will still not be able to tell us anything about its purely visual characteristics.”[6]

-5-6 Hume discusses “one contradictory phaenomenon”—the missing shade of blue: he allows that experience with (impressions of) a number of shades of blue, experience which does not include one, intermediate shade, may nonetheless, lead one to have an idea of that shade of which one does not have an impression.

7 Hume divides impressions into those of sensation and those of reflection: “the first kind arises in the soul originally, from unknown causes. The second is derived in a great measure from our ideas....”

-7-8 In the case of the “impressions of reflection,” what we find is that an impression [of heat, hunger, pleasure, or pain] yields an idea which “remains after the impression ceases” [p. 8]. The idea of pleasure or pain, when it “returns upon the soul, produces the new impressions of desire and aversion, hope and fear, which may properly be called impressions of reflection, because derived from it. These again are copied by the memory or imagination, and become ideas; which perhaps in their turn give rise to other impressions and ideas” [p. 8].

8 He contends that: “the examination of our sensations belongs more to anatomists and natural philosophers than to moral [philosophers]; and therefore shall not at present be enter’d upon. And the impressions of reflection, viz. passions, desires, and emotions which principally deserve our attention, arise mostly from ideas, ‘twill be necessary to reverse that method, which at first sight seems most natural, and in order to explain the nature and principles of the human mind, give a particular account of ideas, before we can proceed to impressions. For this reason I have here chosen to begin with ideas.”

-During Hume’s time, ‘natural philosophy’ referred to what we would now call the “[natural] sciences,” while ‘moral philosophy’ referred to what we would now call “philosophy.”

-One reason he is not concerned to study the impressions of sensation in detail is that, like the other early modern philosophers, he contends that this subject will provide little in the way of knowledge. Impressions are had, and there is little more to say on the matter. No occasion for skepticism arises here, but no real knowledge emerges here either.

As was the case with Locke, the first topic to be discussed in discussing our ideas is to discuss memory and imagination. Memory, according to him, produces the stronger ideas. In the introductory discussion, I replicated Garrett Thomson’s discussion of the difference between the discussions of concepts, judgments, and sensory experience in Hume and Kant. It is a good “idea” to review it at this point.

8 Hume characterizes memory as the faculty which enables us to repeat an impressions in a manner which “...retains a considerable degree of its first vivacity, and is somewhat intermediate betwixt an impression and an idea....”

For him imagination is a faculty which enables us to repeat an impression but not retain such vivacity (leaving it at the level of an idea).

10 For Hume, any two impressions are separable—this is a consequence of his atomism and of his distinction between impressions and ideas. This turns out to be a centrally important claim in his theory.

10 “Were ideas entirely loose and unconnected, chance alone wou’d join them; and ‘tis impossible the same simple ideas should fall regularly into complex ones (as they commonly do) without some bond of union among them, some associating quality, by which one idea naturally introduces another.”

11 “The qualities, from which this association arises, and by which the mind is after this manner convey’d from one idea to another, are three, viz, RESEMBLANCE, CONTIGUITY in time or place, and CAUSE and EFFECT.

I believe it will not be very necessary to prove, that these qualities produce an association among ideas, and upon the appearance of one idea naturally introduce another.”

-Hume points out that these associations may arise between ideas directly or through other, intermediate, ideas.

-12 Hume’s theory is that there is a “kind of attraction” amongst our ideas.” In his “Hume’s Theory of Mental Activity,” Robert Paul Wolff maintains that “...Hume began the Treatise with the assumption that empirical knowledge could be explained by reference to the contents of the mind alone, and then made the profound discovery that it was the activity of the mind, rather than the nature of its contents, which accounted for all the puzzling features of empirical knowledge. This insight, which was so brilliantly exploited by Kant, and has become today a focus of attention through the studies of disposition terms and language habits, was used by Hume to clarify the nature of causal inference and to explain the origin of our concepts of material objects.”[7]

-Wolff also maintains that Hume’s explanation of how the imagination, when subjected to the repeated force of association, develops certain habits and customs is flawed: “this explanation, based on an analogy between gravitation and association, is not satisfactory as it stands. According to Newton, two bodies attract one another without (so far as we know) the intervention of any third thing. This is at least intelligible, for bodies can literally move about, toward or away from each other. But an impression clearly is not a body which approaches or recedes from other impressions. When Hume says that the cause and effect are “associated,” he means that the mind tends to think of one when presented with the other. Thus the metaphor of “gentle force” is misleading. The impressions affect the mind, not one another. The question remains, by what means does the observed contiguity and resemblance become translated into a habit of association?”[8]

13 “Amongst the effects of this union or association of ideas, there are none more remarkable, than those complex ideas which are the common subjects of our thoughts and reasoning, and generally arise from some principle of union among our simple ideas. These complex ideas may be divided into Relations, Modes, and Substances.”

13-14 Hume contends that ‘relation’ is used to indicate either (a) in the “common sense” of the term [“that quality, by which two ideas are connected together in the imagination”], or (b) in the “philosophical sense” [“that particular circumstance, in which, even upon the arbitrary union of two ideas in the fancy, we may think proper to compare them”]. He contends that, in the philosophical sense, we can so relate ideas in almost any way we choose, but, he contends, the philosophical relations all fall under seven headings:

--In the last four pages Hume has given us three different classifications of ideas and their relationships. He will appeal to these differing classifications as he addresses the question “what can we know in the case of relations of ideas,” and as he addresses the possibility of finding knowledge beyond the simplest of relationships amongst our ideas.

15-16 Hume asks “...whether the idea of substance be deriv’d from the impressions of sensation or reflection?”

-16 He contends that it is derived from neither, however, and, thus, he says, “we have therefore no idea of substance distinct from that of a collection of particular qualities, nor have we any other meaning when we either talk or reason concerning it.

The idea of substance as well as that of a mode, is nothing but a collection of simple ideas, that are united by the imagination, and have a particular name assigned them, by which we are able to recall, either to ourselves or others, that collection.”

--Of course, this constitutes a major departure from Locke, Berkeley, the other early modern philosophers, and, indeed, the philosophical tradition since Aristotle! This characteristically Humean statement contends that our “idea” of substance is a “construct of our imagination” (a product of the mind), rather than the product of reality, or the reflection of the fundamental nature of reality.

17 Hume agrees with Berkeley’s rejection of the notion of abstract ideas (claiming that all ideas are particulars), and, praises Berkeley’s talk of the usefulness of general terms.

-As Anthony Flew notes, “...Hume understates Berkeley’s achievement [here]. For Berkeley in fact did more than assert “that all general ideas are nothing but particular ones, annexed to a certain term, which gives them a more extensive signification, and makes them recall upon occasion other individuals, which are similar to them. For he argued, further, that words can be both used and understood without benefit of either the actual or the dispositional occurrence of any mental imagery at all.”[9]

--Hume notes that it is impossible to conceive any quantity or quality without forming a precise idea of the degree of the quantity or quality.

--19 He notes that all impressions which are susceptible to quantity and quality have a specific degree of the quality or quantity.

-20 “Now as ‘tis impossible to form an idea of an object, that is possest of quantity and quality, and yet is possest of no precise degree of either; it follows, that there is an equal impossibility of forming an idea, that is not limited and confin’d in both these particulars. Abstract ideas are therefore in themselves individual, however, they may become general in their representation.”

On the remainder of this page, and in a later passage on p. 637, Hume clarifies his view regarding general terms and how a particular idea may come to stand for other particular ideas through an exercise of our powers, through our readiness to survey the similar ideas, and through custom.

20-21 Hume then offers an account of how general terms arise [cf., p. 637 for his discussion of “resemblance”].

-22 “...some ideas are particular in their nature, but general in their representation. A particular idea becomes general by being annex’d to a general term; that is, to a term, which from a customary conjunction has a relation to many other particular ideas, and readily recalls them in the imagination.”

-25 Hume points out that, by a distinction of reason, we are able to abstract “figure” from “color,” or “figure” from “thing figured:” “when we cou’d consider only the figure of the globe of white marble, we form in reality an idea both of the figure and colour, but tacitly carry our eye to its resemblance with the globe of black marble: And in the same manner, when we wou’d consider its colour only, we turn our view to its resemblance with the cube of white marble. By this means we accompany our ideas with a kind of reflection of which custom and habit renders us in a great measure insensible.”

--Thus, abstractions (a.k.a. “abstract ideas”) are particular ideas used in a particular manner—as representations for a class of particular ideas.

--In his “After Empiricism,” Hilary Putnam maintains that: “according to Berkeley and Hume, I do not have such a thing as an “abstract idea” or a “general idea” of green. When a particular token—be it a green color-patch or a token of the word “green”—occurs in my mind, and is used as a symbol for the whole class of green sense-data, all that happens is that the token is associated with a certain class of other tokens to which it is similar or which are similar to one another. Ayer and Russell depart from Berkeley and Hume on this point—and with good reason. For they see that if I can think of a particular relation of “similarity,” then I am able to recognize at least one universal. Thus universals cannot really be avoided in the way Berkeley and Hume wanted to do.”[10]

In this Part, Hume discusses our ideas of space and time, and elaborates upon how we don’t have abstract ideas. He also clarifies his view of “general terms.” I have only assigned the last four paragraphs of Section 5 and Section 6 here.

28 Hume points out that philosophers frequently embrace paradoxical notions, and, according to him, the doctrine of infinite divisibility (especially of space and/or time) is one such error.

-29 He contends that we cannot distinguish or separate the idea of a grain of sand into 20 (much less 1,000 or 10,000) parts.

-Here Hume, again, concurs with Berkeley. In his Bertrand Russell: The Spirit of Solitude 1872-1921, Ray Monk maintains that in his “...famous polemic against Newton, The Analyst,...[Berkeley] ridiculed Newton’s Calculus for its theory of ‘infinitesimals’, for pretending that a Something could, if it is small enough, be regarded as a Nothing, and yet still be used in calculations. What are these ‘infinitesimals’? More generally...[this sort of critique] might also be seen as a restatement and confirmation of the old idea that analysis is to some degree always a falsification.”[11] In his “Editor’s Introduction” to his edition of Berkeley’s Principles Dialogues, and Philosophical Correspondence, Colin Turbayne notes that: “Berkeley’s criticism of the [Newtonian] calculus was an able logician’s direct exposure of the bad logic of its presentation....He showed how the premises were false and the conclusion true, how to resolve this apparently “unaccountable paradox,” and “how error may bring forth truth, though it cannot bring forth science. The ensuing controversy...did not end until Cauchy’s reformulation of the calculus nearly a century later”[12]

32 ‘Tis an establish’d maxim in metaphysics, That whatever the mind clearly conceives includes the idea of possible existence, or in other words, that nothing we imagine is absolutely impossible. We can form the idea of a golden mountain, and from thence conclude that such a mountain may actually exist. We can form no idea of a mountain without a valley, and therefore regard it as impossible.

-Cf., I I III (p. 10), I II II (p. 32), I III VI (pp. 86-87), and I IV V (p. 233).

34 Hume discusses our “abstract” idea of space noting that: “all abstract ideas are really nothing but particular ones, consider’d in a certain light; but being annexed to general terms, they are able to represent a vast variety, and to comprehend objects, which, as they are alike in some particulars, are in some others vastly wide of each other.”

64 “...my intention never was to penetrate into the nature of bodies or explain the secret causes[13] of their operations. For besides that this belongs not to my present purpose, I am afraid, that such an enterprise is beyond the reach of human understanding, and that we can never pretend to know body otherwise than by those external properties which discover themselves to the senses....But at present I content myself with knowing perfectly the manner in which objects affect my senses, and their connections with each other, as far as experience informs me of them. This suffices for my philosophy, which pretends only to explain the nature and causes of our perceptions, impressions and ideas.”

-This passage may be used to raise what I take to be a fundamental interpretive difficulty regarding Hume. On the one hand, he contends that we can not reach to the secret causes and, in effect, must content ourselves with the appearances. On the other, he offers an explanation of the “nature and causes” of these appearances. But if the “explanation” is to be of interest, it would seem, it will have to involve facts, truths, and so forth, about (given his naturalism) bodies! His positive account seems to tread where his skepticism will not allow him to go. I will make this more clear as we proceed.

67 Similarly, he contends, we have no “distinct idea of external existence:”

-68 The farthest we go towards a conception of external objects, when suppos’d specifically different from our perceptions, is to form a relative idea of them, without pretending to comprehend the related objects. Generally speaking we do not suppose them specifically different; but only attribute to them different relations, connexions and durations. But of this more hereafter.[14]

In this Part, Hume discusses the relations of our ideas which might engender knowledge, our understanding of causation, and belief. A significant portion of this Part (pp. 78-155) is devoted to his answer to the question:

“What is the nature of that inference we draw from a cause to an effect, and of the belief we repose in the causal relation?”

“What is our idea of necessity (when we say that two objects are necessarily connected together)?”

...Hume believed that moral sentiments, passions, and empirical beliefs are all responses of the mind to the presented world rather than given contents of experience. Just as love, hatred, approval, and disapproval are second-level reactions of the mind to experience, so also the beliefs in causal necessity and physical objects result from the mind’s “reflection” upon its sensations.[15]

As we will see, Hume contends that this “second level activity” is not a rational one, and this will lead him to skepticism about all claims which go beyond what is immediately experienced (the immediately experienced relations of impressions and ideas). Part IV will characterize and discuss his skepticism.

69 Hume points out that the seven different kinds of philosophical relations may be divided into those which depend entirely on the ideas which are being compared and which remain the same as long as the ideas are unchanged, and those which may change without change in the ideas or the objects due to change in location, perspective, etc.

-Note that the different kinds of relations are “relations of ideas”—impressions are fleeting, “had,” and not the subject of relation! “

-70 According to Hume, the relations “resemblance,” “contrariety,” and “degrees of quality” are relations (of ideas) about which we can have intuitive, certain knowledge.

-70-71 We can have chain of reasoning, demonstrative, certain knowledge of relations of proportions in quantity and number in the case of algebra and arithmetic. In the case of geometry, however, we can not have such knowledge because its first principles are dependent upon experience.

--72 Hume notes that while some mathematicians and philosophers believe that their [mathematical] ideas are such that they must be “comprehended by a superior intellectual faculty,” all ideas depend upon impressions.

73 All kinds of reasoning consist in nothing but a comparison [of ideas], and a discovery of those relations, either constant or inconstant, which two or more objects bear to each other. This comparison we may make when both the objects are present to the senses, or when neither of them is present, or when only one. When both are present to the senses along with the relation, we call this perception rather than reasoning....

-73-74 Hume contends that the relations of identity, and of time and place are immediate (perceptual) in character, and this means that only the relation of causation which “...produces...[a connection between ideas which goes beyond what is immediately present to the senses] as to give us assurance from the existence or action of one object, that ‘twas follow’d or preceded by any other existence or action....” That is, it is only the relation of causation which reaches beyond what is present to our senses and informs us about objects we don’t immediately perceive.

74 Hume contends that we need to be clear about the nature and origin of this relation, and, he contends that:

-76 succession (priority in time of cause to effect) is necessary for causation, but

-77 “an object may be contiguous and prior to another without being consider’d as its cause—that is, they are not sufficient. There is held to be a “necessary connexion” between the cause and the effect which must to be taken into consideration; and that relation is of much greater importance than any of the other two above-mention’d.”

-77-78 To understand the notion of the missing element of the necessary connection here, Hume poses two questions—he hopes that in answering them we can, eventually, come to understand causation:

--78 A. “First,” he asks, “For what reason [do] we pronounce it necessary, that everything whose existence has a beginning, shou’d also have a cause?”

--B. “Secondly, Why we conclude, that such particular causes must necessarily have such particular effects; and what is the nature of that inference we draw from the one to the other, and of the belief we repose in it?”

The discussion from pp. 78-82 is devoted to answering A above (the question: “For what reason do we pronounce it necessary, that everything whose existence has a beginning, shou’d also have a cause?”). The discussion from pp. 82-155 is devoted to answering B above (the question: “What is the nature of that inference we draw from the cause to the effect, and of the belief we repose in the causal relation?”). The discussion from pp. 155-172 is devoted to answering the more general question: “What is our idea of necessity, when we say that two objects are necessarily connected together?”

78-79 Hume notes that while philosophers accept the maxim or principle that “Whatever begins to exist, must have a cause of existence,” it is neither intuitively nor demonstratively certain:

-79-80 “We can never demonstrate the necessity of a cause to every new existence, or new modification of existence, without shewing at the same time the impossibility there is, that any thing can ever begin to exist without some productive principle; and where the latter proposition cannot be prov’d, we must despair of ever being able to prove the former. Now that later proposition is utterly incapable of a demonstrative proof, we may satisfy ourselves by considering, that as all distinct ideas are separable from each other, and as the ideas of cause and effect are evidently distinct, ‘twill be easy for us to conceive any object to be non-existent this moment, and existent the next, without conjoining to it the distinct idea of a cause or productive principle. The separation, therefore, of the idea of a cause from that of a beginning of existence, is plainly possible for the imagination; and consequently the actual separation of these objects [ideas] is so far possible, that is implies no contradiction nor absurdity; and is therefore incapable of being refuted by any reasoning from mere ideas; without which ‘tis impossible to demonstrate the necessity of a cause.”

--Cf., I I III (p. 10), I II II (p. 32), I III VI (pp. 86-87), and I IV V (p. 233).

--Question: what legitimates the claims regarding separability here? In his Wittgenstein’s Metaphysics, John Cook maintains that: “had Hume noted that we regularly say such things [“You can’t start your car with the battery disconnected,” or “A male cat can’t breed with another male cat”], he would have found this perplexing and in need of explanation. Indeed, he would have declared that we can’t really mean what we say in such cases. Why? Part of the explanation is that he could find no impressions that would give rise to the ideas of necessity and impossibility in nature. There was of course another option here, for it was open to him to regard such examples as showing that he was wrong about the ‘origin of ideas.’ But he had another reason for ignoring examples of the sort I have just given. Early in the Treatise, long before he comes to the topic of causation, he says: “‘Tis an established maxim in metaphysics, That whatever the mind clearly conceives includes the idea of possible existence, or in other words, that nothing we imagine is absolutely false” (I,II,ii). Hume does not tell us how he thinks this can be established, but it is clear that he takes this idea for granted throughout the Treatise, as when we find him saying “Anything may produce anything.” How are we to take this? Does Hume mean to say that two male cats can produce offspring? And does he think that a child’s imagining two male cats producing offspring is enough to show that such a thing is not absolutely impossible?

The answer, of course, is that Hume isn’t talking about things like cats—not real flesh and blood cats. Rather, he is talking about a world of ‘inert sensible qualities.’ For it is also very early in the Treatise that he makes clear that he follows Berkeley in dismissing Locke’s causal theory of perception by dispensing with the material, causal end and retaining the supposed effects, sensible qualities. And given this ontology, Hume is obliged from the outset to think that anything that occurs in the world has no discernible why or wherefore. Whatever happens, just happens. And if something astonishing and inexplicable should occur, then that too just happens. There is no limit on what can happen, since sensible qualities always come into being and pass away causelessly.

So it is Hume’s ontology that leads him to see something fishy in the idea of necessities and impossibilities in nature. Accordingly, if we do not share his ontological views, we have no reason to think that there is anything peculiar, anything we should want to explain away, in the quite ordinary examples given above.[17]

--80-81 Hume briefly considers Hobbes’, Clarke’s, and Locke’s efforts to demonstrate the necessity of a cause for any given effect.[18]

-82 Hume contends that if “the necessity of a cause” can’t be known (or established) by reasoning, then this “idea” must come from experience. Thus the question turns into “how [is it that] experience gives rise to such a principle?” But Hume finds that he can deal with this question by addressing the “second question” above p. 78 (that is: “What is the nature of that inference we draw from the cause to the effect, and of the belief we repose in the causal relation?”).

Having established that the principle or maxim that “everything whose existence has a beginning, should also have a cause” can not be established by either intuition or demonstration, Hume turns his attention to whether experience could give rise to such a principle. He addresses this question by examining the “second question” above (on p. 78): “What is the nature of that inference we draw from the cause to the effect, and of the belief we repose in the causal relation?” This discussion extends from pp. 82-155. Before turning to an examination of his argument here, it is a good idea to turn to an excellent summary passage on pp. 153-154 and see where we are headed.

83 Hume notes that it is impossible for our causal reasonings to go on ad infinitum, we must come to an end in some impressions or ideas (“...without the authority either of the memory or senses our whole reasoning wou’d be chimerical and without foundation”).

84 “...all reasonings concerning causes and effects are originally deriv’d from sense impression; in the same manner, as the assurance of a demonstration proceeds always from a comparison of ideas, tho’ it may continue after the comparison is forgot.”

84 Hume maintains that the “ultimate” cause of our impressions of sense is inexplicable and unknown to us (for all we know it could be ourselves, a deity, or “things”).

85 He contends that the difference between memory and imagination is simply the degree of force and vivacity in the ideas.

86-87 “There is no object, which implies the existence of any other if we consider these objects in themselves, and never look beyond the ideas which we form of them. Such an inference wou’d amount to knowledge, and would imply the absolute contradiction and impossibility of conceiving any thing different. But as all distinct ideas are separable, ‘tis evident there can be no impossibility of that kind.”

87 “‘Tis therefore by EXPERIENCE only, that we can infer the existence of one object from another....We remember to have had frequent instances of the existence of one species of objects; and also remember, that the individuals of another species of objects have always attended them, and have existed in a regular order of contiguity and succession with regard to them. Thus we remember to have seen that species of object we call flame, and to have felt that species of sensation we call heat. We likewise call to mind their constant conjunction in all past instances. Without any further ceremony, we call the one cause and the other effect, and infer the existence of one from that of the other.”

In short, for Hume, constant conjunction is added to contiguity and succession to give us causation.

-88 Hume asks why 100 cases teach us what one case will not, and notes that “from the mere repetition of any past impression, even to infinity, there never will arise any new original idea, such as that of a necessary connexion; and the number of impressions has in this case no more effect that if we confin’d ourselves to one only.”

-89-90 “The idea of cause and effect is deriv’d from experience, which informs us, that such particular objects, in all past instances, have been constantly conjoin’d with each other: And as an object similar to one of these is suppos’d to be immediately present in its impression, we thence presume on the existence of one similar to its usual attendant. According to this account of things, which is, I think, in every point unquestionable, probability is founded on the presumption of a resemblance betwixt those objects of which we have had experience, and those of which we have had none; and therefore ‘tis impossible this presumption can arise from probability. The same principle cannot be both the cause and effect of another; and that is, perhaps, the only proposition concerning that relation, which is either intuitively or demonstratively certain.”

--90 Hume demands that if someone contends that conclusions from causes to effects are based on reasoning, this chain of reasoning should be produced by her or him.

--91 Moreover, he points out, appeal to experience to justify such conclusions will not provide the sort of “ground” required: “your appeal to past experience decides nothing in the present case; and at the utmost can only prove that that very object which produc’d any other, was at that very instant endow’d with such a power; but can never prove, that the same power must continue in the same object or collection of sensible qualities; much less, that a like power is always conjoin’d with like sensible qualities. Shou’d it be said, that we have experience, that the same power continues united with the same object, and that like objects are endow’d with like powers, I wou’d renew my question, why from this experience we form any conclusion beyond those past instances, of which we have had experience. If you answer this question in the same manner as the preceding, your answer gives still occasion to a new question of the same kind, even in infinitum; which clearly proves, that the foregoing reasoning had no just foundation.”

91-92 Thus not only our reason fails us in the discovery of the ultimate connexion of causes and effects, but even after experience has inform’d us of their constant conjunction, ‘tis impossible for us to satisfy ourselves by our reason, why we shou’d extend that experience beyond those particular instances, which have fallen under our observation. We suppose, but are never able to prove, that there must be a resemblance betwixt those objects, of which we have had experience, and those which lie beyond the reach of our discovery.

-92 Thus, when the mind passes from cause to effect, it isn’t “determined” by reason.

-93 Our idea of causation is nothing more than constant conjunction (associated, of course, with contiguity and succession): “we cannot penetrate into the reason of the conjunction. We only observe the thing itself, and always find that from the constant conjunction the objects acquire an union in the imagination. When the impression of one becomes present to us, we immediately form an idea of its usual attendant; and consequently we may establish this as one part of the definition of an opinion or belief, that ‘tis an idea related to or associated with a present impression.” [Cf., p. 96.]

94 “…all reasonings from causes or effects terminate in conclusions concerning matter of fact; that is, concerning the existence of objects ore of their qualities. ‘Tis also evident, that the idea of existence is nothing different from the idea of any object, and that when after the simple conception of any thing we wou’d conceive it as existence, we in reality make no addition or alteration to our first idea.”

94-95 “But as ‘tis certain there is a great difference betwixt the simple conception of the existence of an object, and the belief of it, and as this difference lies not in the parts or composition of the idea, which we conceive: it follows that it must lie in the manner in which we conceive it.”

95 In the case of intuitive and demonstrative propositions, the individual who assents to them is “...necessarily determin’d to conceive them in that particular manner, either immediately or by interposition of other ideas. Whatever is absurd is unintelligible; nor is it possible for the imagination to conceive anything contrary to demonstration.”

“But in reasonings from causation, and concerning matters of fact, this absolute necessity cannot take place, and the imagination is free to conceive both sides of the question. I still ask, Wherein consists the difference betwixt incredulity and belief?”

-96 Hume defines a belief as: “...A LIVELY IDEA RELATED TO OR ASSOCIATED WITH A PRESENT IMPRESSION.”

-97 According to him, reason alone can not justify inferring one object from another—instead, this is a matter of custom and habit.

98 “...when any impression becomes present to us it not only transports the mind to such ideas as are related to it, but likewise communicates to them a share of its force and vivacity.”

-99 “...when the mind is once inliven’d by a present impression, it proceeds to form a more lively idea of the related objects, by a natural transition of the disposition from the one to the other.”

-102 According to him, an impression which at first “suggests” nothing can come to do so once one has experienced its usual consequences.

--104-105 Hume allows that sometimes a single instance is sufficient to produce a causal inference (a custom or habit). In such cases, he says, [105] “...’tho we are here suppos’d to have only one experiment of a particular effect, yet we have many millions to convince us of this principle: that like objects plac’d in like circumstances, will always produce like effects; and as this principle has establish’d itself by sufficient custom, it bestows an evidence and firmness on any opinion, to which it can be apply’d.”

---In regard to Hume’s explanation of the nature of belief, Robert Paul Wolff maintains that “the trouble with Hume’s theory is that it fails to explain why we do not believe vivid and affecting fiction, and yet believe dull history books.”[19]

110 Hume maintains that the relations of contiguity and resemblance have an inferior effect to those of causation, but he believes that they can augment its convictions and opinions.

116 He contends that frequent repetition fixes ideas in the imagination and this sort of process (which he calls “education”) can have the same effect as constant conjunction.

I have assigned only the first four paragraphs of this section! Here Hume argues that belief allows ideas to have an influence equal to impressions in terms of “actuating the will.”

118 “There is implanted in the human mind a perception of pain and pleasure, as the chief spring and moving principle of all its actions. But pain and pleasure have two ways of making their appearance in the mind; of which the one has effects very different from the other. They may either appear in impression to the actual feeling, or only in idea, as at present when I mention them. ‘Tis evident the influence of these upon our actions is far from being equal. Impressions always actuate the soul, and that in the highest degree....”

119 “Did impressions alone influence the will, we should every moment of our lives be subject to the greatest calamities; because, tho’ we foresaw their approach, we should not be provided by nature with any principle of action, which might compel us to avoid them.”

-“Nature has, therefore, chosen a medium, and has neither bestow’d on every idea of good and evil the power of actuating the will, nor yet has entirely excluded them from this influence....The effect, then, of belief is to raise up a simple idea to an equality with our impressions, and bestow on it a like influence on the passions. This effect it can have by making an idea approach an impression in force and vivacity.”

120 Hume notes that belief is necessary for the excitement of our passions, and that the passions are favorable to belief.

-proof (“those arguments which are deriv’d from the relation of cause and effect and which are entirely free from doubt and uncertainty”); and

--124-125 Hume notes that there is a difference between probability “founded on chance” and probability “founded on causes.” The former is merely the negation of causation.

--126 He notes that where there are no limits on chances, everything becomes (equally) possible.

-For him, the, “probability founded on causes,” can not provide demonstration or probability.

127-130 Hume asks how a “superior number of chances” operate upon the mind to produce assent? According to him, [130] “the vivacity of the idea is always proportionable to the degrees of the impulse or tendency to the transition; and belief is the same with the vivacity of the idea....”

130 For Hume, the probabilities of causes are derived from association of ideas with present impressions.

132 He contends that the strength of customs and habits vary in terms of the constancy of the conjunctions.

134 Hume notes that the supposition (better: expectation) that the future will resemble the past is not founded upon argument, instead it is derived entirely from habit.

-135 Moreover, contrary experiments (and experiences) produce imperfect beliefs.

-137-138 “All our reasonings concerning the probability of causes are founded on the transferring of past to future. The transferring of any past experiment to the future is sufficient to give us a view of the object; whether that experiment be single, or combin’d with others of the same kind; whether it be entire, or oppos’d by others of a contrary kind.”

-140 “When the mind forms a reasoning concerning any matter of fact, which is only probable, it casts its eye backward upon past experience, and transferring it to the future, is presented with so many contrary views of its object, of which those that are of the same kind uniting together, and running into one act of the mind serve to fortify and inliven it.”

--Hume notes that custom (and education) can also produce habits: “for tho’ custom and education produce belief by such a repetition, as is not deriv’d from experience, yet this requires a long tract of time, along with a very frequent and undesign’d repetition.”

-142 Experience of constant conjunction, contrary cases, and analogy all rely upon invigoration of the imagination (here resemblance and constant conjunction convey force and vivacity of impressions to related ideas, which we are said to assent to or believe).

143 Hume points out that “diminution of union” weakens the evidence, as does the “age of the experiences in question.”

146 Hume also notes that “general rules” can generate habits (he terms this prejudice).

153-154 Hume offers an excellent summary passage which clarifies the relationship of belief, force and vivacity, memory, cause and effect, and habit. This summary provides a brief statement of his answer to the question posed on p. 78.

-He maintains that knowledge is derived entirely from the force and vivacity of impressions, that these account for memory, and, when there is constant conjunction, the relation of cause and effect, which via habits, generates beliefs.

The discussion from Part III Sections III to XIV (pp. 82-155) has addressed the question: “What is the nature of that inference we draw from the cause to the effect, and of the belief we repose in the causal relation?” In this section Hume offers his answer to the question: “What is our idea of necessity (when we say that two objects are necessarily connected together)?”

...every idea...is a copy of some impression. As the idea of necessary connection is not derived from any quality or relation of objects, it cannot be a copy or an impression of sensation. The only available impression of reflection is the “feeling” attached to the disposition of the mind to pass from an object to the idea associated with it ([cf., Treatise] p. 165). Therefore the idea of necessary connection must be the idea of this mental transition.[20]

“customary transitions” and “propensities” are mental operations or powers, not contents of consciousness. If the idea of necessary connection is a copy of the transition from an impression to its usual attendant, then it is a copy of a mental activity....In these passages we can observe Hume shifting toward explanation in terms of mental activity, while still tied to the [explanatory] language of mental contents.[21]

Wolff is suggesting that Hume’s emphasis upon the activity of the mind places him, in some respects, closer to Kant than to Locke (or, at least, I am using Wolff to suggest this). See the discussion of Wolff above relating to I I IV.

155 Hume notes that since all ideas are derived from impressions, we should ask “From which impression does the idea of necessary connection arise?”

-He notes that all we find when we investigate, however, is contiguity, succession (or precedence), and repetition.

-157 He notes that our idea of power (or efficacy, agency, power, force, energy, necessity, connection, or productive quality) does not arise from reason, so it must come from experience.

--He indicates that talk of “substantial forms,” “accidents and qualities,” “matter and form,” or “virtues and faculties,” does not help explain such ideas.

161 Regarding our idea of power: “we never have any impression of power, therefore we have no idea of such.

-632-633 In the Appendix Hume notes that while some contend that we can “feel” the power of our mind (or the “effect” of our volitions), “…’tis evidently impossible to fix any precise bounds to our authority, where we consult not experience. In short, the actions of the mind are, in this respect, the same with those of matter. We perceive only their constant conjunctions; nor can we ever reason beyond it. No internal impression has an apparent energy, more than external objects.” That is, he contends that we don’t have an impression or idea of “power” from either our sensory impressions for from our impressions of reflection. We have, then, only “succession: or “constant conjunction” (whether in the “actions” of the body, or of the mind).

163 On the other hand, Hume notes, “...suppose we observe several instances, in which the same objects are always conjoin’d together, we immediately conceive a connexion betwixt them, and begin to draw an inference from one to another. This multiplicity of resembling instances, therefore, constitutes the very essence of power or connexion, and is the source, from which the idea of it arises. In order, then, to understand the idea of power, we must consider that multiplicity....The repetition of perfectly similar instances can never alone give rise to an original idea, different from that is to be found in any particular instance....”

-165 “...after we have observ’d the resemblance in a sufficient number of instances, we immediately feel a determination of the mind to pass from one object to its usual attendant and to conceive it in a stronger light upon account of that relation. This determination is the only effect of the resemblance; and therefore must be the same with power or efficacy, whose idea is deriv’d from the resemblance....Necessity, then, is the effect of this observation, and is nothing but an internal impression of the mind, or a determination to carry our thoughts from one object to another.”

--That is, as Anthony Flew notes, “...his account makes it seem that causal necessity is really in the mind of the observer and not, as the uninstructed laity would have it, in whatever ‘objects’ are said to be causally related.”[22]

-166 He offers a summary of his answer to the question (p. 155): “What is our idea of necessity (when we say that two objects are necessarily connected together)?”

170 Hume offers his account of causation: “We may define a CAUSE to be ‘An object precedent and contiguous to another, and where all the objects resembling the former are plac’d in the like relations of precedency and contiguity to those objects, that resemble the latter.’”

-Flew notes that “...when later he came ‘to cast...that work anew’ [in his An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748) and An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals (1751)] there was a very significant addition, but made without explanation or justification. We now have, much as before, ‘an object, followed by another, and where all the objects similar to the first are followed by objects similar to the second.’ But here a second sentence follows: ‘Or in other words where, if the first object had not been, the second never had existed.”

....For that second clause expresses a subjunctive, contrary-to-fact conditional: “if the first object had not been, the second never had existed.” But this conclusion obviously cannot be deduced from any non-nomological generalization [ones making no reference to “laws”] stating only, as a matter of unexplained brute fact, that all objects of the first kind always have been, and will be followed by objects of the second kind. All causal and indeed all nomological propositions, on the other hand, must sustain such inferences. If, for instance, you maintain that the cause of the trouble is a lack of fuel in the tank, this entails that...had there been fuel in the tank then the machine would have operated. While the defining difference between a non-nomological, brute fact generalization and a nomological stating a supposed law of nature precisely is that the one cannot while the other must sustain contrary-to-fact implications.”[23]

172 Hume contends that the “doctrine” that “a cause is necessary for every beginning of existence” (that is, every effect must have a cause”) is not founded on either demonstrative or intuitive knowledge.

In this section Hume offers a number of rules which may be employed to evaluate whether talk of causation is appropriate. I did not assign this section.

In this section Hume contends that “beasts” are endowed with mental abilities similar to those found in human beings. I did not assign this section.

179 “...reason is nothing but a wonderful and unintelligible instinct in our souls, which carries us along a certain train of ideas, and endows them with particular qualities, according to their particular situations and relations.”

In this Part of the Treatise, Hume clarifies the extent of his “skepticism,” indicates why we can not know that bodies continue to exist or know that they exist independently of us, what we can know about personal identity, and he indicates why we are not, ultimately, skeptics.

180 Hume contends that while demonstrative sciences are certain, the application of our fallible faculties yield only “probability” even in such areas. In mathematics and algebra, certainty is not available given our proclivity for error.

-181 Thus, he contends, our knowledge of “relations of ideas” via deduction actually resolves itself into (that is, amounts to) mere probability—since the application of our intuitive and deductive faculties is fallible and uncertain.

-In regard to the extent of our knowledge by intuition, remember what Hume says in I III I (p. 70): we have intuitive, certain knowledge only where we are speaking of the relations of ideas of resemblance, contrariety, and the degree of quality. In these cases the resemblance (for example) will “...strike the eye, or rather the mind; and seldom requires a second examination. No one can once doubt but existence and non-existence destroy each other and are perfectly incompatible and contrary. And ‘tho it be impossible to judge exactly of the degrees of any quality, such as colour, taste, heat, cold, when the difference between them is very small; yet ‘tis easy to decide, that any of them is superior or inferior to another, when their difference is considerable. And this decision we always pronounce at first sight, without any enquiry or reasoning.” (p. 70).

--Note that on p. 212, Hume contends that the only existences we can be certain of are perceptions.

183 Hume maintains, however, that no one is a total skeptic. While the above arguments as to the extent of our certainty are correct, nature has “determined” us to judge (and feel). That is, according to him: “...all our reasonings concerning causes and effects are deriv’d from nothing but custom...belief is more properly an act of the sensitive, than of the cognitive part of our natures.”

-184 “If belief, therefore, were a simple act of thought, without any particular manner of conception, or the addition of force and vivacity, it must infallibly destroy itself, and in every case terminate in a total suspense of judgment [that is, in skepticism]. But as experience will sufficiently convince any one, who thinks it worth while to try, that tho’ he can find no error in the foregoing arguments, yet he still continues to believe, and think, and reason as usual, he may safely conclude, that his reasoning and belief is some sensation or peculiar manner of conception, which ‘tis impossible for mere ideas and reflections to destroy.”

--On the issue of Hume’s view of skepticism, see Richard H. Popkin’s “David Hume: His Pyrrhonism and His Critique of Pyrrhonism,”[24] and Richard H. Popkin’s “Hume and Kierkegaard.”[25]

185 Hume maintains that complex reasoning does not have the same effect as natural belief.

187-188 Hume takes up the question: “What causes our belief in the existence of bodies?” He takes it that there are really two questions here:

-188 He asks whether it is the senses, reason, or the imagination which produces these beliefs (in the continued and independent existence of bodies).

--He notes that it can not be the senses (they produce belief in neither continued nor independent existence).

--193 He contends that reason isn’t able to produce belief in continued or independent existence.

194 According to him, we need to ask what it is about the impressions and ideas here which leads the imagination to produce belief in “continued and independent existence.”

-He contends that it isn’t either the involuntariness or the superior force and vivacity of these impressions or ideas. Instead, he notes that these impressions and ideas have a distinctive constancy [p. 195], and this coherence and constancy is [197] different from that he discussed in regard to causation (and our idea of causes).

-197 Hume notes that “regularity” in the impressions will not be strong enough to legitimate claims regarding regularities in bodies.

-197-199 He offers a sketch of how belief in continued and independent existence arises.

212 Hume maintains that the only existences we can be certain of are perceptions. To go beyond such perceptions, however, we need causation.

-212-218 He notes that his philosophical discussion seems to leave us in an untenable position:

(a) we don’t have any knowledge of matter of fact relations (and, thus, no legitimate beliefs, no understanding of causation, and no knowledge of the continued or independent existence of bodies), yet

(b) at the same time, we are creatures of custom and habit who can not help having beliefs, making “causal inferences,” and believing in the continued and independent existence of bodies.

--That is, the skeptical arguments seem irrefutable, yet our nature is such that they hold no sway over us.

218 Hume contends that skepticism about reason or the senses leaves us with an incurable malady.

232 Hume notes that talk of any of the substances traditionally discussed by philosophers leaves us with the need to be clear as to how ‘substance’ and ‘inhesion’ are used.

233 He notes that we have to ask “from which impression does the idea of the self arise?”

-He notes that what is clearly conceived may exist, and whatever is separable may exist separately.

In this section, Hume claims that he is unable to detect himself when he attempts to find himself in his experience. According to him, then, the idea (or notion) of the self is one for which we have no justification. He goes on to indicate how we come to have this “notion:” we fail to distinguish between the idea of an invariable object and the idea of several distinct yet similar objects existing over time. Failing to think carefully, we are content with superficial similarity and believe this provides us with a mark of identity. Hume believes, however, that strictly speaking change destroys identity. Since we are beguiled into ignoring the change, we believe we are confronted with identity. This leaves him with a “bundle theory” of the self, and leads to some intractable problems with regard to his basic empiricistic principles.

251 Hume contends that some philosophers maintain that we are immediately and certainly aware of the self and of its continuing existence. He asks, however, “from which impression do we receive this idea?” He maintains that there does not exist an impression which causes the idea of personal identity.

-Note that in I I I, Hume maintains that “the difference between these [impressions and ideas] consists in the degrees of force and liveliness with which they strike upon the mind, and make their way into our thought or consciousness” [p. 1]. That is, his whole distinction between impressions and ideas, and his whole orientation of “beginning with the impressions,” is actually premised upon an acceptance of “the self or mind”—and this makes his claim here appear problematic (or, to put the point a different way, it undercuts the attempt to doubt the self on the basis of our “impressions”).

-Hume also contends that there is not a constant impression of the self throughout our lives.

252 He maintains that all of our particular impressions and ideas “...are different, and distinguishable, and separable from each other, and may be separately consider’d, and may exist separately, and have no need of anything to support their existence.”

-Note that this “principle” has been enunciated at I.III.III [pp. 79-80], I.III.VI [pp. 86-87], and I.IV.V. [p. 233]. It is an expression of his “atomistic” view of our impressions and ideas. It is important to keep in mind that there are other models of our consciousness (those which consider it to be a “stream,” for example, do not see experience as a “bundle” of essentially independent atomic moments). In discussing I III III above (pp. 31-32), I mentioned John Cook’s critique of this claim.[26]

-“...when I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I always stumble on some particular perception or other....I never can catch myself at any time without a perception, and never can observe any thing but the perception.”

--Unlike Locke, Hume does not allow that reflection is an original source of ideas—this means that he has to “account for” self-consciousness growing out of a succession of sensations!

--Roderick Chisholm denies the above claim in his “On the Observability of the Self.”[27] Of course, Locke also denies Hume’s claim.

Thus, Hume contends, we are bundles (or collections) of different perceptions. This generates what some call the “Bundle Theory” of the self.

-253 He introduces a “theatre” metaphor which holds that the mind is like a theatre without simplicity or identity.

-“The comparison to the theatre must not mislead us. They are the successive perceptions only that constitute the mind; nor have we the most distant notion of the place where these scenes are represented, or of the materials, of which it is composed.”

Hume asks “Why do we ascribe identity to the self?” “What then gives us so great a propension to ascribe an identity to these successive perceptions, and to suppose ourselves possest of an invariable and uninterrupted existence thro’ the whole course of our lives?”

-253-254 “That action of the imagination, by which we consider the uninterrupted and invariable object, and that by which we reflect on the succession of related objects, are almost the same to the feeling, nor is there much more effort of thought required in the latter case than in the former.”

-254-255 “Our propensity to this mistake [to confuse successive similar perceptions with identity] is so great from the resemblance above-mention’d, that we fall into it before we are aware; and tho’ we incessantly correct ourselves by reflection, and return to a more accurate method of thinking, yet we cannot long sustain our philosophy, or take off this bias from the imagination. Our last resource is to yield to it, and boldly assert that these different related objects are in effect the same, however interrupted and variable....Thus we feign the continu’d existence of perceptions of our senses, to remove the interruption; and run into the notion of a soul, and self, and substance, to disguise the variation. But we may farther observe, that where we do not give rise to such a fiction, our propension to confound identity with relation is so great, that we are apt to imagine something unknown and mysterious, connecting the parts, beside their relation; and this I take to be the case with regard to the identity we ascribe to plants and vegetables.”

255 According to Hume, however, perfect identity requires that any addition or subtraction destroys the identity of the whole. We, on the other hand generally ascribe identity to “a succession of related [but different] objects.”

-256 “A change in any considerable part of a body destroys its identity; but ‘tis remarkable, that where the change is produced gradually and insensibly we are less apt to ascribe to it the same effect. The reason can plainly be no other, than that the mind, in following the successive changes of the body, feels an easy passage from the surveying its condition in one moment to the viewing of it in another, and at no particular time perceives any interruption in its actions. From which continu’d perception, it ascribes a continu’d existence and identity to the object.”

-256-257 He notes that we often speak of the same object where the changes have been substantial—rebuilt ship, growing animals, vegetables, oaks, and children.

259 “We now proceed to explain the nature of personal identity which has become so great a question in philosophy, especially of late years in England....The identity, which we ascribe to the mind of man, is only a fictitious one, and of a like kind with that which we ascribe to vegetables and animal bodies. It cannot, therefore, have a different origin, but must proceed from a like operation of the imagination upon like objects [experiences].”

-In an interesting article, Daniel Dennett argues for the claim that “the self” is a fictional entity.[28] Of course, one should ask Hume and Dennett “who is claiming that the self is fictional?”

-259-260 Hume reminds us that “...the understanding never observes any real connexion among objects, and...even the union of cause and effect, when strictly examin’d, resolves itself into a customary association of ideas.”

260 According to Hume, our notion of personal identity depends on resemblance, contiguity, and causation:

-“‘Tis, therefore, on some of these three relations of resemblance, contiguity and causation, that identity depends; and as the very essence of these relations consists in their producing an easy transition of ideas; it follows, that our notions of personal identity, proceed entirely from the smooth and uninterrupted progress of thought along a train of connected ideas, according to the principles above explain’d.”

-261-262 “As memory alone acquaints us with the continuance and extent of this succession of perceptions, ‘tis to be consider’d upon that account chiefly, as the source of personal identity. Had we no memory, we never shoul’d have any notion of causation, nor consequently of that chain of causes and effects, which constitute our self or person.”

Note: cf., pp. 633-636 in the Appendix for a further discussion of personal identity and the problems it raises for Hume. There he says that he finds that his views involve him

-[633] “...in such a labyrinth, that, I must confess, I neither know how to correct my former opinions, nor how to render them consistent. If this be not a good general reason for scepticism, ‘tis at least a sufficient one (if I were not already abundantly supplied) for me to entertain a diffidence and modesty in all my decisions.”

-In his discussion in the Appendix, Hume briefly rehearses his argument that we can have no idea of the self, and then points to his analysis that we only feel a connection between the distinct perceptions (that our notion of personal identity arises from our psychological nature—our being creatures of custom and habit). This, he recognizes, leaves him in a “contradictory position.”

-636 “in short, there are two principles, which I cannot render consistent; nor is it in my power to renounce either of them, viz. that all our distinct perceptions are distinct existences, and that the mind never perceives any real connexion among distinct existences. Did our perceptions either inhere in something simple and individual, or did the mind perceive some real connexion among them, there wou’d be no difficulty in the case. For my part, I must plead the privilege of a sceptic, and confess that this difficulty is too hard for my understanding.”

-Clearly, the former leaves no basis for the latter, and the latter talks about something over and above the latter.

-Terence Penelhum’s “Hume on Personal Identity” is an excellent essay on Hume’s views on personal identity. Penelhum maintains that Hume’s view is founded upon the claim that it is wrong to call an object which changes “the same.” He contends that Hume is claiming we all make a mistake and postulate a fictitious object:

Hume is not just saying that our common practice of attributing identity in such cases cannot be justified, or has no sound reason in its favor...he is here making the less modest claim that our common practice is wrong, that the evidence points unequivocally at the opposite. We proceed not without, but in the face of, the evidence. But it would seem from the tone of the above passage, as well as from his well-known second thoughts in the Appendix, that even Hume found this odd and paradoxical sometimes.[29]

there is no contradiction in saying “There are six notes in this theme,” or “There are six words in this sentence,” [sic, if self-referential] though there would be in saying “There are six notes but only one,” or “There are six words but only one.” Naturally this would be absurd, but no one ever says it (for that reason).

So, in spite of Hume, there is no contradiction in saying that certain kinds of things are composed of a succession of parts, and yet are each only one thing. Whether a thing can have many parts or not depends entirely on what sort of thing it is. Most things (including people) do.

There is another, closely related, mistake which Hume has made. This is the mistake of thinking that for anything to be entitled to be called “the same” it has to remain unchanged from one period to the next. This is a muddle of two things that he himself distinguishes...viz., the two distinct senses of the word “identical” or “the same”. There are the numerical and the specific senses....To remain unchanged is to remain the same in the specific sense....But I can remain the same in the numerical sense without doing so in the specific sense....In fact I cannot be said to have changed unless I am the same in the numerical sense....[30]

...Hume’s error of supposing that invariance is the standard of identity in all cases, when it is only the standard in a very few...makes him not only misunderstand the import of his own examples, but miss the point of his otherwise very revealing account of the relations between the parts of complex things......the standards for applying the concept of identity depend entirely on the substantives it is joined to.[31]

Having explained the nature of our judgment and understanding, it is time to turn to a close examination of human nature. Before doing so, however, he offers a general discussion of the results of Book I.

264 The “wretched condition” of our faculties and the solitary condition which his philosophy leaves us in leads to a forelorn solitude.

-Cf., p. 4 and note Hume’s “phenomenonalistic” and “subjectivistic” beginning points.

265 Hume wonders, “With what confidence can I proceed?” and “What criterion should I apply as I continue my inquiries?”

-habit which leads to expectation regarding the interrelation of the past and future, and

-imagination (together experience and habit operate upon the imagination to produce intense and lively ideas).

266 He reminds us that imagination is at the core of both our beliefs and, especially of our belief in the continued and independent existence of bodies.

Hume notes that we want to know about causes (how they operate upon effects, the relation between causes and effects, the tie which binds them together), but our desire will remain unmet—the connection lies in us and is nothing but a determination of the mind, acquired by custom.

-269 Reason is incapable of dispelling the skeptical clouds, but nature does so—we are “determined” to live.

-270 “If I must be a fool, as all those who reason or believe anything certainly are, my follies shall at least be natural and agreeable.”

-If we believe that fire warms, or water refreshed, it is only because it costs us too much pain to think otherwise.

272 According to Hume, “...the errors of religion are dangerous; those in philosophy are only ridiculous.”

A. The discussion from pp. 78-82 is devoted to answering negatively the question: “what reason do we pronounce it necessary, that everything whose existence has a beginning, shou’d also have a cause?”. Here is the core argument regarding A in brief:

79-80 “We can never demonstrate the necessity of a cause to every new existence, or new modification of existence, without shewing at the same time the impossibility there is, that any thing can ever begin to exist without some productive principle; and where the latter proposition cannot be prov’d, we must despair of ever being able to prove the former. Now that later proposition is utterly incapable of a demonstrative proof, we may satisfy ourselves by considering, that as all distinct ideas are separable from each other, and as the ideas of cause and effect are evidently distinct, ‘twill be easy for us to conceive any object to be non-existent this moment, and existent the next, without conjoining to it the distinct idea of a cause or productive principle. The separation, therefore, of the idea of a cause from that of a beginning of existence, is plainly possible for the imagination; and consequently the actual separation of these objects is so far possible, that is implies no contradiction nor absurdity; and is therefore incapable of being refuted by any reasoning from mere ideas; without which ‘tis impossible to demonstrate the necessity of a cause.”

-82 Hume contends that if “the necessity of a cause” can’t be known (or established) by reasoning, then this “idea” must come from experience. Thus the question turns into “how [is it that] experience gives rise to such a principle?” But Hume finds that he can deal with this question by addressing the “second question” above p. 78 (that is: “What is the nature of that inference we draw from the cause to the effect, and of the belief we repose in the causal relation?”).

B. The discussion from pp. 82-155 is devoted to answering negatively the question: “What is the nature of that inference we draw from the cause to the effect, and of the belief we repose in the causal relation?” Here is the core argument regarding B in brief:

86-87 “There is no object, which implies the existence of any other if we consider these objects in themselves, and never look beyond the ideas which we form of them. Such an inference wou’d amount to knowledge, and would imply the absolute contradiction and impossibility of conceiving any thing different. But as all distinct ideas are separable, ‘tis evident there can be no impossibility of that kind.”

In short, for Hume, constant conjunction is added to contiguity and succession to give us causation.

96 Hume defines a belief as: “...A LIVELY IDEA RELATED TO OR ASSOCIATED WITH A PRESENT IMPRESSION.”

98 “...when any impression becomes present to us it not only transports the mind to such ideas as are related to it, but likewise communicates to them a share of its force and vivacity.”

C. The discussion from pp. 155-172 is devoted to answering negatively the question: “What is our idea of necessity, when we say that two objects are necessarily connected together?” Here is the core argument regarding C in brief:

155 Hume notes that since all ideas are derived from impressions, we should ask “From which impression does the idea of necessary connection arise?”

-He notes that all we find when we investigate, however, is contiguity, succession (or precedence), and repetition.

Notes: (click on note number to return to the text for the note)

[1] The way he says this is important as we consider his discussion of personal identity below (I IV VI, pp. 251-263, and Appendix 633-636).

[2] Philosophers use single quotes (‘‘) to indicate situations where they are speaking about, or mentioning, a word rather than using it. For example in the sentence “The word ‘short’ is not a long word.”, ‘short’ is mentioned while ‘long’ is used. In the sentence about the example sentence (that is, the previous one), both are mentioned!

[3] Anthony Flew, David Hume: Philosopher of Moral Science (Oxford: Blackwell, 1986), p. 11.

[4] Ibid., p. 31.

[5] J.L. Austin, Sense and Sensibilia, ed. G.J. Warnock (Oxford: Oxford U.P., 1962), p. 2.

[6] Anthony Flew, David Hume: Philosopher of Moral Science, op. cit., pp. 22-23.

[7] Robert Paul Wolff, “Hume’s Theory of Mental Activity,” in Hume, ed. V.C. Chappell (Garden City: Anchor, 1966), pp. 99-128, pp. 99-100. The essay originally appeared in The Philosophical Review v. 69 (1960).

[8] Ibid., pp. 104-105.

[9] Anthony Flew, David Hume: Philosopher of Moral Science, op. cit., p. 20.

[10] Hilary Putnam, “After Empiricism,” in his Realism With A Human Face (Cambridge: Harvard U.P., 1990), pp. 43-53, p. 46.

[11] Ray Monk, Bertrand Russell: The Spirit of Solitude 1872-1921 (N.Y.: Free Press, 1996), p. 109.

[12] Colin Turbayne, “Editor’s Introduction,” in George Berkeley: Principles, Dialogues, and Philosophical Correspondence, ed. Colin Turbayne (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1965), pp. vii-xxxiv, p. xxiii.

[13] Hume, of course, does not mean to refer to some “supernatural” phenomena when he speaks about “secret powers”—he is simply referring to what is “beyond,” “behind,” “outside,” or “underneath” our experience. I believe there was intentional irony in his use of the term, however, and he uses it in other contexts.

[14] Cf., I IV II.

[15] Robert Paul Wolff, “Hume’s Theory of Mental Activity,” op. cit., p. 102.

[16] The distinction between necessary and sufficient conditions may be made in a number of ways. Necessary conditions may be described as “those which must be there for an event to occur, or for a concept to apply” (thus paying your parking fines is necessary for graduation); while sufficient conditions are conditions such that the event must occur, or the concept must apply (thus a direct double shotgun blast to the head is sufficient for death). Note that conditions may be sufficient without being necessary (as in the example), and that necessary conditions need not be sufficient (as in the example). An alternate way of drawing the distinction is to say that “p is a necessary condition for q” means “if q is true, then p is true” (symbolically q ® p), while “p is a sufficient condition for q” means “if p is true, then q is true” (symbolically: p ® q).

[17] John Cook, Wittgenstein’s Metaphysics (Cambridge: Cambridge U.P., 1994), pp. 170-171.

[18] Hume says that Hobbes argues that all space-time points are equal, and that unless a cause exists to “locate” the effect, it would “remain in eternal suspense.” Hume replies that if a cause is not necessary for existence, then it is not necessary for “locating” the existent. According to Hume, Clarke contends that things must have causes, because if they didn’t they would have to produce themselves. Hume replies that this view presupposes the very notion under question (the necessity of causes). Hume contends that Locke concludes that a cause is necessary because otherwise things proceed from nothing, and nothing can not be a cause. Hume replies that this, like Clarke’s argument presupposes what it is trying to prove.

[19] Cf., Robert Paul Wolff, “Hume’s Theory of Mental Activity,” op. cit., p. 113 (footnote).

[20] Robert Paul Wolff, “Hume’s Theory of Mental Activity,” op. cit., p. 110.

[21] Ibid., p. 112. Emphasis added to the passage three times.

[22] Anthony Flew, David Hume: Philosopher of Moral Science, op. cit., p. 71.

[23] Ibid., pp. 74-76.

[24] Richard H. Popkin, “David Hume: His Pyrrhonism and His Critique of Pyrrhonism,” in Hume, ed. V.C. Chappell (Garden City: Anchor, 1996), pp. 53-98. Originally published in the Philosophical Quarterly v. 1 (1951), pp. 385-407.

[25] Richard H. Popkin, “Hume and Kierkegaard,” in his The High Road to Pyrrhonism (San Diego: Austin Hill, 1980), pp. 227-236. Originally published in Journal of Religion v. 31 (1951), pp. 274-281.

[26] Cf., John Cook, Wittgenstein’s Metaphysics, op. cit., pp. 170-171.

[27] Cf., Roderick Chisholm, “On the Observability of the Self,” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research v. 30 (1969), pp. 2-21.

[28] Cf., Daniel Dennett, “Why Everyone Is A Novelist,” The Times Literary Supplement, September 16-22, 1988, pp. 1016, and 1028-1029. The essay is reprinted in The Place of Mind, ed. Brian Coony (Belmont: Wadsworth, 2000), pp. 466-474.

[29] Terence Penelhum, “Hume on Personal Identity,” in Hume, ed. V.C. Chappell, op. cit., pp. 213-239, pp. 223-224. The essay originally appeared in The Philosophical Review v. 64 (1955).

[30] Ibid., p. 231.

[31] Ibid., p. 231.