A Treatise of Human Nature · Chapter
Section XV: Rules by Which to Judge of Causes and Effects explained
Hume establishes general rules for determining causal relationships, emphasizing that causation is not discoverable by mere survey but requires experience.
What happens
Hume establishes general rules for determining causal relationships, emphasizing that causation is not discoverable by mere survey but requires experience. He lists eight rules, including contiguity, priority, constant conjunction, and the principle that like causes produce like effects. He concludes by noting the difficulty of applying these rules and the need for extensive experimentation, especially in moral philosophy.
Themes in this chapter
Custom and General Rules
Hume's rules for causation are derived from experience and custom, guiding judgment in the absence of direct insight.
Foundation of Causal Reasoning
The chapter establishes the principles underlying causal inference, based on constant conjunction and experience.
Characters to notice
- David Hume
Author of the Treatise, presenting rules for causal judgment.
Key passages
“The cause and effect must be contiguous in space and time.”
For an object to be a cause, it must be in spatial and temporal proximity to its effect.
First rule of causation.
“The same cause always produces the same effect, and the same effect never arises but from the same cause.”
Causal relationships are uniform: identical causes yield identical effects, and identical effects stem from identical causes.
Principle of uniformity in causation.
“Here is all the Logic I think proper to employ in my reasoning; and perhaps even this was not very necessary, but might have been supplied by the natural principles of our understanding.”
Hume suggests that these logical rules may be superfluous, as natural understanding already operates on these principles.
Hume's skepticism about the necessity of formal rules.