display all the ideas for this combination of texts
4 ideas
| 20030 | If one event causes another, the two events must be wholly distinct [Hume, by Wilson/Schpall] |
| Full Idea: Hume's maxim is that if one event cause another, then the two events must be wholly distinct. | |
| From: report of David Hume (Treatise of Human Nature [1739]) by Wilson,G/Schpall,S - Action 3 | |
| A reaction: [Anyone know the original reference?] So we are not allowed to say that one part of an event caused another. The charged caused the victory, so they are two events, but in another context the whole battle is one event. |
| 6692 | For Hume, practical reason has little force, because we can always modify our desires [Hume, by Graham] |
| Full Idea: In Hume's account of action, practical reason is not a very forceful guide to conduct, since we can escape its demands by abandoning or modifying our desires. | |
| From: report of David Hume (Treatise of Human Nature [1739]) by Gordon Graham - Eight Theories of Ethics Ch.6 | |
| A reaction: Presumably a desire can be a good reason, and we can passionately desire to be rational, etc., so this is a rather complex issue. 'Pure reason' is not 'all-or-nothing', and neither is pure desire. |
| 8257 | Reason alone can never be a motive to any action of the will [Hume] |
| Full Idea: Reason alone can never be a motive to any action of the will. | |
| From: David Hume (Treatise of Human Nature [1739], II.III.3) | |
| A reaction: This is Hume's notorious total rejection of Socratic intellectualism, a stilleto in the back of the 'age of reason'. Hume thinks desire is the motivator. He's probably right. Why should truth motivate? See Idea 4421. |
| 22374 | You can only hold people responsible for actions which arise out of their character [Hume] |
| Full Idea: Where actions proceed not from some cause in the characters and dispositions of the person who performed them, they infix not themselves upon him, and can neither redound to his honour if good, nor infamy if evil. The action in itself may be blameable. | |
| From: David Hume (Treatise of Human Nature [1739], II.III.2), quoted by Philippa Foot - Free Will as Involving Determinism p.70 | |
| A reaction: I agree with Foot that this is wrong. Uncharacteristic actions still reflect on the person. The last sentence is wrong too. If you ignore the agent of an action, it can't be distinguished from a flash of lightning. |