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Kantian Tunes on a Humean Instrument: Why Hume is not Really a Skeptic About Practical Reasoning

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Elizabeth S. Radcliffe
Elizabeth S. Radcliffe*
Affiliation:
Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, CA95053, USA
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Extract

The theory that practical reasoning is wholly instrumental says that the only practical function of reason is to tell agents the means to their ends, while their ends are fixed by something other than reason itself. In this essay I argue that Hume has an instrumentalist theory of practical reasoning. This thesis may sound as unexciting as the contention that Kant is a rationalist about morality. For who would have thought otherwise? After all, isn't the ‘instrumentalist’ line in contemporary discussions of this topic descended directly from Hume himself? Contrast the following recent comment from Robert Audi's book on practical reasoning, holding the standard line, with the comment from Christine Korsgaard following it:

Hume's conception of practical reasoning, so far as we can formulate it, can be located within … the foundationalist account of motivation in which reason plays the instrumentalist role … by virtue of arousing and directing our desires.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 27 , Issue 2 , June 1997 , pp. 247 - 269
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 1997

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References

1 A version of this paper was read at the Twenty-second International Hume Conference, Park City, Utah, July 1995. I am grateful to my commentator, Tamar Schapiro, and to my audience on that occasion. I thank Thomas Hill, Jr., for discussing these issues with me and giving me comments on early notes, and Robert Audi, Richard Dees, Richard McCarty, Elijah Millgram, and Calvin Stewart, for written comments on earlier drafts. I am indebted to the following members of the Virtue Ethics Discussion Group at Stanford in March 1996: Rachel Cohon, Rosalind Hursthouse, Philip J. Ivanhoe, Brad Wilburn, and especially William J. Prior.

2 Audi, Robert Practical Reasoning (London: Routledge 1989), 43Google Scholar. See also Smith, Michael ‘The Humean Theory of Motivation,’ Mind 96 (1987) 36–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Smith, The Moral Problem (Oxford, UK: Blackwell 1994)Google Scholar, for discussions taking it for granted that Hume's view is definitive of instrumentalism.

3 Korsgaard, Christine ‘Skepticism about Practical Reasoning,’ Journal of Philosophy 83 (1986) 5–25CrossRefGoogle Scholar; see especially 6.

4 Dahl, Norman Practical Reason, Aristotle, and Weakness of the Will (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press 1984), 23–34Google Scholar

5 Millgram, Elijah ‘Was Hume a Humean?’ Hume Studies 21 (1995) 75–93; see esp. 76, 78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6 Hampton, Jean ‘Does Hume Have an Instrumentalist Conception of Practical Reason?’ Hume Studies 21 (1995) 57–74; see esp. 59CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

7 Christine Korsgaard argued for this view in ‘Does Hume Believe In the Hypothetical Imperative?’ paper delivered to the Twenty-first Hume Conference, University of Rome ‘La Sapienza,’ Rome, Italy, June 1994. Cited with permission of the author. This discussion has since been incorporated into a longer paper entitled ‘The Normativity of Instrumental Reason,’ in Cullity, Garrett and Gaut, Berys eds., Ethics and Practical Reason (Oxford: Oxford University Press, forthcoming).Google Scholar

8 Fred Wilson argues that Hume is not really a skeptic with regard to theoretical reason, either, where ‘skeptic’ is taken in the pyrrhonian sense in which the use of reason leads to suspending one's judgment (‘Is Hume a Skeptic with Regard to Reason?’ Philosophy Research Archives 10 [1985] 275-319; see also Wilson, Fred ‘The Origins of Hume's Sceptical Argument Against Reason,’ History of Philosophy Quarterly 2 [1985] 323–35)Google Scholar. However, discussions of whether Hume is a skeptic about theoretical reasoning do not settle the issues surrounding whether he has a theory of practical reasoning, since the latter debate concerns the possible action-guiding dimension of reasoning.

9 Hume, David A Treatise of Human Nature, Selby-Bigge, L.A. ed., 2nd ed. revised by Nidditch, P.H. (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1978)Google Scholar; references hereafter in the text as ‘T’ followed by page number.

10 This interpretation of Hume is based on his various claims about the powers and limitations of reason, among them most importantly this:

't is obvious, that when we have the prospect of pain or pleasure from any object, we feel a consequent emotion of aversion or propensity, and are carry'd to avoid or embrace what will give us this uneasiness or satisfaction. 't is also obvious, that this emotion rests not here, but making us cast our view on every side, comprehends whatever objects are connected with its original one by the relation of cause and effect. Here then reasoning takes place to discover this relation; and according as our reasoning varies, our actions receive a subsequent variation. But ‘tis evident in this case, that the impulse arises not from reason, but is only directed by it …. Where the objects themselves do not affect us, their connexion can never give them any influence; and ‘tis plain, that as reason is nothing but the discovery of this connexion, it cannot be by its means that objects are able to affect us. (T 414)

11 This line of argument is evident in Hampton, Millgram, and Korsgaard, ‘Does Hume Believe in the Hypothetical Imperative?’

12 I follow Korsgaard closely here, but this line of argument is also found in Hampton.

13 In this paper, I will show that the Hypothetical Imperative view is not the only form instrumentalist theories can take.

14 This argument is developed in both Hampton and Korsgaard.

15 Korsgaard, ‘Does Hume Believe in the Hypothetical Imperative?’ 3; ‘The Normativity of Instrumental Reason’ (draft of summer 1995), 13

16 This is an argument made specifically by Millgram, 77.

17 For an in-depth discussion of the relation between passion and beliefs in Hume's theory, see my ‘Hume on Passion, Pleasure, and the Reasonableness of Ends,’ Southwest Philosophy Review 10 (1994) 1-11.

18 This discussion of the is/ought gap and what it is for a belief to be derived from sentiment is not original to me; I am greatly indebted to Nicholas Sturgeon's interpretation of Hume's moral theory as presented in his ‘Moral Skepticism and Moral Knowledge in Hume's Treatise’ (unpublished).

19 Hume believes that moral judgments are based on our sympathetic feelings, but notices that our feelings may vary depending on our individual situations and perspectives, while our moral judgments don't so vary. He attributes this difference to the fact that we only regard our sympathetic sentiments as indicative of morality when they are experienced from a ‘general’ point of view — from a mutually accessible perspective that compensates for the variation in our sentiments due to spatial and temporal location, degree of resemblance between ourselves and others, and causal (familial) connections. See T 319-20,581-2,591.

20 The cognitivist line holds, of course, that making moral judgments involves more than merely experiencing or expressing certain feelings and says, accordingly, that moral sentiments give us information. This implies that moral feelings yield beliefs about matters of fact and that to form a moral judgment is to accept a proposition or to endorse a truth-claim. The noncognitivist approach, on the other hand, is to treat moral judgments as noninformative; they are construed as perhaps nothing more than assents to imperatives or else emotive responses to the actions or characters being ‘evaluated.’ Variations on a noncognitivist interpretation of Hume come from Blackburn, Simon Spreading the Word (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1984)Google Scholar; Blackburn, Simon ‘Hume on the Mezzanine Level,’ Hume Studies 19 (1993) 273–88Google Scholar; Mackie, J.L. Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong (Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England: Penguin Books 1977)Google Scholar; Mackie, J.L. Hume's Moral Theory (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul 1980), 73–5.Google Scholar

21 For more details on the cognitivist reading, see Sturgeon.

22 The point can be made more clearly with the case of disapprobation, since approbation doesn't necessarily lead me to believe I ought to behave in a certain way, but that I may; disapprobation produces the belief that I ought not to behave in the disapproved way.

23 Hume writes, ‘But may not the sense of morality or duty produce an action, without any other motive? I answer, It may: But this is no objection to the present doctrine. When any virtuous motive or principle is common in human nature, a person, who feels his heart devoid of that principle, may hate himself upon that account, and may perform the action without the motive, from a certain sense of duty, in order to acquire by practice, that virtuous principle, or at least, to disguise to himself, as much as possible, his want of it. A man that really feels no gratitude in his temper, is still pleas’ d to perform grateful actions, and thinks he has, by that means, fulfill'd his duty’ (T 479). My argument for an interpretation of Hume in which motivation by the sense of duty is motivation by the feeling of disapprobation we have through the so-called ‘moral sense’ can be found in ‘How Does the Humean Sense of Duty Motivate?’ (Journal of the History of Philosophy 34 [1996]47-70).

24 Practical reasoning in the moral case fits this description as well: Since the moral sentiments, in Hume's theory, are motivating (a point for which I argue in ‘How Does the Humean Sense of Duty Motivate?’), then practical reasoning in the moral case is initiated by a motivating sentiment and at the conclusion issues in a further one.

25 Kant, Immanuel Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals, Beck, L.W. trans. (London: Macmillan 1990), 33.Google Scholar Since this work is often referred to as the ‘Groundwork’ I will hereafter cite it as ‘G’ followed by the page number in L.W. Beck.

26 Here I am following Hill, Thomas Jr. 's, discussion in ‘The Hypothetical Imperative,’ Dignity and Practical Reason in Kant's Moral Theory (Ithaca: Cornell University Press 1992), 17–37Google Scholar. Hill argues, among other things, that Kant formulates an analytic principle of conduct, The Hypothetical Imperative, from which particular imperatives follow.

27 Kant writes, ‘All imperatives are expressed by an “ought” and thereby indicate the relation of an objective law of reason to a will which is not in its subjective constitution necessarily determined by this law. This relation is that of constraint. Imperatives say that it would be good to do or to refrain from doing something, but they say it to a will which does not always do something simply because the thing is presented to it as good to do’ (G 29).

28 Hume's discussion considers cases where we choose means insufficient to our ends, which means he considers cases where the means we have chosen lack what is necessary to achieve our ends. When we take an interest in something, we are at minimum interested in the necessary means to it, since if there is more than one sufficient means, we may not be interested in all of them. Since Kant's Hypothetical Imperative expresses a rational requirement, it notes only a commitment to necessary means, since we are never logically committed to any particular sufficient means among all the options.

29 Hume, David An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, Selby-Bigge, L.A. ed., 3rd ed. rev. by Nidditch, P.H. (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1975)Google Scholar; hereafter cited in the text by ‘E’ followed by page number.

30 It is Hume's view that what we approve of from the moral (general) point of view are qualities that are useful and/ or agreeable to the agent and/ or to others (T 588-90, 610, 611). Of special interest to this discussion of prudence is Hume's remark in the context of arguing that sympathy is the basis of our moral sensibility:’ … we find … kinds of virtue, which will not admit of any explication except from that hypothesis [that the moral sense depends on sympathy]. Here is a man, who is not remarkably defective in his social qualities; but what principally recommends him is his dexterity in business, by which he has extricated himself from the greatest difficulties, and conducted the most singular affairs with a singular address and prudence. I find an esteem for him to arise immediately in me …. In this case the qualities that please me are all consider'd as useful to the person, and as having a tendency to promote his interest and satisfaction …. But what makes the end agreeable [to me]? … His happiness concerns not me, farther than the happiness of every human being, and indeed of every sensible creature: That is, it affects me only by sympathy (T 588; my emphasis).'

31 Hume writes, ‘ … no truth appears to me more evident, than that beasts are endow’ d with thought and reason as well as men …. We are conscious, that we ourselves, in adapting means to ends, are guided by reason and design, and that ‘tis not ignorantly nor casually we perform those actions, which tend to self-preservation, to the obtaining pleasure, and avoiding pain. When therefore we see other creatures, in millions of instances, perform like actions, and direct then to like ends, all our principles of reason and probability carry us with an invincible force to believe the existence of a like cause’ (T 176).

32 Owen, David (‘Inference, Reason and Reasoning in Hume,’ Southwest Philosophy Review 10 [1994] 17–27)CrossRefGoogle Scholar argues that Hume distinguishes two sorts of causal reasoning: ‘reflective’ (or ‘tropistic’) and ‘unreflective’ reasoning. The latter is illustrated in the example of the person stopping at the river's edge, where no reflection on past experience is necessary to produce the current belief (that one will drown by continuing on into the river). In the second case, once we have experienced multiple instances of associating ideas unreflectively due to past experience of those ideas together, according to Owen, ‘we are capable of reflecting on our past history of making causal judgments, of refining and improving the laws or generalizations we appeal to’ (25), and we then can form the rules Hume describes in the section on ‘Rules by which to judge of causes and effects’ (T I.III.XV). When we have engaged in this self-reflection, we are able to check our causal inferences and (if we are wise) to distinguish accidental associations and prejudices from ‘efficacious causes’ (T 146, 149-50).

Wilson, Fred discusses Hume's notion of reflective reason in ‘Hume's Theory of Mental Activity,’ in Norton, David Fate Capaldi, Nicholas and Robison, Wade L. eds., McGill Hume Studies (San Diego: Austin Hill 1979) 101–120Google Scholar. Wilson argues that this ‘feedback’ process renders the Humean mind active rather than passive. Norton, David F. agrees in David Hume: Common-Sense Moralist, Sceptical Metaphysician (Princeton: Princeton University Press 1982)Google Scholar; see especially 236-37. Annette Baier, however, cautions about Humean reflective reason and its formulation of general rules that such rules do not instruct us in their own application and so we have no rules to guide us in our most important judgments; here Hume says we are left to our own ‘sagacity’ (T 175). So, Baier writes, ‘Judgment, theoretical and practical, has been turned on itself in the Treatise, and the judgment passed on the usefulness of general rules to guide it is guarded.’ See Baier, A Progress of Sentiments (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press 1991), 281.Google Scholar

33 Annette Baier would, I think, be supportive of the conclusion that Hume has a theory of practical reasoning, since one of the points of her book discussion of Hume is, as she puts it, ‘is to enlarge our conception of it [reason], to make it social and passionate’ (ibid., 278). Páll Árdal is less inclined to view Hume as improving on any rationalist scheme and sees Hume as rejecting the attempt to base any fundamental beliefs on reason (Árdal, Páll ‘Depression and Reason,’ Ethics 103 (1993) 540–50Google Scholar. See also Árdal, Páll Passion and Value in Hume's Treatise (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press 1966).Google Scholar