Coventry, Angela M.  Hume’s Theory of Causation: A Quasi-Realist Interpretation (London: Continuum, 2006).

Cited within this book are the following Hume books:

1. An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. Ed. T.L. Beauchamp, Oxford: Oxford University, 1999.

2. A Treatise of Human Nature. Eds. D. F. Norton and M. J. Norton, Oxford: Oxford University, 2000.

Causation pervades the way we think. Our entire relation to the universe is based upon the notion of causation. The relation, then, of cause and effect, is at every moment on the mind of those who have agency within the world (sentient creatures, i.e.). It is incumbent for philosophers to develop an adequate conception of causation for causation is present within virtually every dimension of philosophy, yet no complete theory has been offered heretofore. Despite the recognized importance of Hume’s view on causation, there is little agreement among commentators regarding the upshot of his theory (Coventry, 3).

Currently, there are two opposing schools of thought re: Hume and causation: causal realists interpretation, and causal anti-realist interpretations (Coventry, 3). And there is both textual evidence for, as well as textual evidence against each of these theories of interpretation. Coventry contends that Hume maintains a position between these two interpretations (Coventry, 4). Coventry contends that Hume offers an explanation of how we end up with the thoughts and sayings of one event necessarily causing another (Coventry, 4).

The purpose of Coventry’s book “is to offer an interpretation of Hume’s theory of causation that is inspired by quasi-realism” (Coventry, 7). According to her interpretation, Hume traces the impression of necessary connection or power between causes and effects to a feeling in the mind, and thereby denies that our discourse about causes implicates the existence of powers or forces linking causes to effects (Coventry, 106). If Coventry’s interpretation is correct, “then Hume thinks that statements about causes are based on psychological mechanisms developed in response to the regularities and not on powers existing in objects” (Coventry, 146).

I realize that I am a realist by having read this book by Coventry, note.

Causal Realism

Causal realists hold that causal statements are true or false due to the existence in the structure of the universe of some type of fundamental causal facts or properties (Coventry, 12). John Locke says that these “powers” or forces are composed of two types: active and passive. Active powers are those that make or produce something, whereas passive powers are those that merely receive (12). More recently, R. Harre and E.H. Madden contend that these causal powers are based on “chemical, physical, or genetic natures of the entities involved.” So then, Harre and Madden assert that these causal powers are stable properties of material objects, and that the effect is released under appropriate conditions. 

Wesley Salmon, however, writes about a process theory of causation in which causal influence is propagated from one space-time to another and thereby constitutes a physical connection between cause and effect. 

Galen Strawson’s version of causal realism involves believing that there is something fundamental within the world that causes the world to be regular in its behavior, which he refers to as the “objective fundamental forces.” 

Realism and Hume:

Realists hold that statements are either true or false. Realists also posit that a mind-independent, or objective, domain of facts make statements either true or false (Coventry, 18). In this line of thinking, Humean causation is either true or false based upon the existence within the universe of some sort of power, or force, that causes have to bring about their effects. John Wright and Galen Strawson are both prominent scholars who defend the causal realist interpretation of Hume’s theory. Wright contends that Hume believes in the existence of objective causal powers in objects, but also that Hume holds that we cannot know anything of them. Wright asserts that one misses the thrust of Hume’s argument unless they realize that “he consistently maintained the point of view that there are real powers and forces in nature which are not directly accessible to our senses.” According to Wright’s Hume, the belief in causal power is a belief in an intelligible or conceptual connection between cause and effect. So then, according to Wright’s Hume, if the idea were available to the mind, the effect could be inferred apriori from the cause. Anti-realists, it is held in this view, are not correct to emphasize that causal statements are based on feelings and not the presence of causal powers.

Anti-Realism and Hume:

In “Realism”, Dummet states that the anti-realist posits that a statement can only be true in virtue of something we could know, and which therefore should count as evidence as its truth. This means, then, that for Dummet the truth value of a statement is not determined by anything exterior of us, nor by that which is independent of us (Michael Dummet, Truth and Other Enigmas [London: Gerald Duckworth and Co., 1978]:146). In this line of thinking, Humean causation is not reducible to some sort of power, or force, that causes have to bring about their effects. Hence, causal statements can be reduced to statements about regularities in nature, or causal statement merely express feelings or sentiments and therefore are not genuine propositions at all. 

Hume’s Theory of Causation:

In the Enq, Hume hopes that his inquiry into “the mental powers and economy, if prosecuted with… caution [will show that] one operation and principle of the mind depends on another; which again, may be resolved into one more general and universal” (EHU 1.15). In fact, he seeks to trace back all effects from the fewest number of causes (ref. Treatise Intro. 8). Hume posits that “all the sciences have a relation, greater or less, to human nature” (Treatise, Intro. 4). According to Hume, impressions are our more lively perceptions, “when we hear, or see, or feel, or love, or hate, or desire, or will” (all of our sensations, i.e.), whereas ideas are the “less lively perceptions, of which we are conscious, when we reflect on any of those sensations or movements above mentioned” (EHU 2.3).

Hume essentially avers that objects that are in the relation of cause and effect are contiguous, and contiguity is essential to causation. Moreover, Hume asserts that the second relation essential to causation is the priority in time of the ‘cause’ from the ‘effect’ (ref. the Treat 1.3.2.6-7). Thirdly, Hume asserts that a necessary connection exits between the cause and its effect. In fact, he write that one would be hard-pressed to “define a cause, without comprehending, as a part of the definition, a necessary connexion with its effect” (EHU 8.25). In the Treatise (1.3.14), Hume treats necessary connection as synonymous with efficacy, agency, and productive quality, BUT I take ISSUE with him here again. I assert, in contrast, that causation does not equal necessary connection. The fourth assertion of Hume regarding the relation of cause and effect is that of constant conjunction. Hume stipulates that “instances, of which we have had no experience, must resemble those, of which we have had experience, and the course of nature continues always uniformly the same” (Treat 1.3.6.4). I think I can legitimately take ISSUE with Hume here, especially working from my panentheistically informed pneumatological position of SDC, NOTE. 

Regarding the general maxim that whatever begins to exist, must have a cause of existence, for he sees that maxim neither to be intuitively nor demonstratively certain (Treat 1.3.3.1). Whereas he does deny that it is intuitively and demonstratively certain, he nonetheless asserts its truth value. Indeed, Hume writes “I never asserted so absurd a Proposition as that anything might arise without a cause: I only maintain’d, that our Certainty of the Falsehood of that Proposition proceeded neither from Intuition nor Demonstration; but from another Source.”

Hume argues that appealing to God’s causality cannot increase our understanding of causation in general, for such conclusions lead us beyond the operations of human reason, and thereby lead us into a sort of fairyland (ref. EHU 7.1.24).

Hume’s Theory of Truth:

Hume is generally seen to advocate a correspondence theory of truth, rather rigidly defined. According to such a theory, a judgment is true insomuch as it corresponds to the facts

¹ Harre, R. and E.H. Madden, Causal Powers: A Theory of Natural Necessity (Oxford: Blackwell, 1975), 5. ² Salmon, Wesley. Scientific Explanation and the Causal Structure of the World (Princeton: Princeton University, 1986), 156. ³ Strawson, Galen. “Realism and Causation”, Philosophical Quarterly 37, 253-277, p. 254 ⁴ Wright, John The Sceptical Realism of David Hume (Manchester: Manchester University, 1983), 129 ⁵ Wright, “Hume’s Causal Realism: Recovering a Traditional Interpretation”, in Reid and Richman [2000: Sections 2 and 3]). FULL CITATION?????? ⁶ Grieg, J., ed. The Letters of David Hume, vol. 1 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1932), 187.