HUME AND THE 'SECRET CONNEXION': WHY CAUSATION IS A SINGULAR AFFAIR. Issue 58 (2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Le Poidevin, Robin
• Is Part Of: Think. Volume 20:Issue 58(2021)
• Page Start: 9
• Page End: 22
• Publication Date: 2021
• Subjects: Philosophy -- Periodicals; 105
• DOI: 10.1017/S1477175621000026
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1477-1756

Abstract

ABSTRACT: The great Scottish Enlightenment man of letters David Hume (1711–76) offered an account of causation in terms of regularities: repeated pairings of certain kinds of events. Anything more than this, a supposed 'secret connexion' binding individual causes and effects, is not something we could ever experience. This, at least, is the view traditionally ascribed to him. Here the account, and its empiricist motivation, is outlined, and a fundamental problem identified: his account of causation is in tension with his account of the way in which we acquire the concept of a distinctive connection between causes and effects. To explain both our experience of causation, and causation's intimate connection with time, we need to appeal to singular causation: the connection between individual events which Hume found so elusive.