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Hume and Justified Belief

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Michael J. Costa
Michael J. Costa*
Affiliation:
Ohio State University
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Extract

'Some beliefs about the world are justified, others are not.’ This seems to be a plausible, even if not completely uncontroversial, claim. The controversy most likely would center on the meaning given to the term ‘justified'. If one gives extremely strong criteria for justification, one might argue that the claim is false. None of our beliefs about the world are justified. It is possible, perhaps, to interpret Hume as taking such a position.

Whether or not Hume held this, I think that there is a sense of ‘justified’ in which Hume could have argued that some of our beliefs about the world are justified. I will try to show this by developing an analysis of justified belief that is compatible with Hume's theory of the nature of beliefs and belief formation. As a minimum criterion for success such an analysis must be able to provide a plausible basis for distinguishing between justified and unjustified beliefs.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 11 , Issue 2 , June 1981 , pp. 219 - 228
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 1981

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References

1 Hume, David A Treatise of Human Nature, ed. Selby-Bigge, L.A. (Oxford & London: Oxford University Press 1888).Google Scholar References to the Treatise in this paper will cite that book as ‘T’, followed by the appropriate numerals for the relevant Book, Part, and section.

2 Hume, David An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, ed. Hendel, C.W. (lndianapolis-NewYork: Bobbs-Merril Co. Inc. 1955), p. 62.Google Scholar

3 I am using the terms “inference,” “reasoning” and “judgment” in a rather strained sense which I intend the ‘scare’ quotes to acknowledge. My reason for using these terms is because Hume uses them in precisely the same way in many passages. Hume, also, however, claims that beliefs about matters of fact are not based on inference or reasoning. The point that I think Hume is trying to make is that ‘inference’ and ‘reasoning’ (in the ‘scare’ quote sense), while indeed involved in producing beliefs about matters of fact, are not involved in the way that we think of as standard evidence/conclusion reasoning or inference. ‘Reasoning’ and ‘inference’ are species of instinct and imagination. Now, Hume also wants to claim that not all belief derivation from instinct and/or imagination are cases of ‘inference’ or ‘reasoning.’ (See p. 223.) How Hume might make this latter distinction is the subject of this paper. My summation of Hume's theory of belief draws primarily upon Book I, Part Ill of the Treatise.

4 I am indebted to George Pappas both for the idea of this type of interpretation of Hume and for his comments and criticism on an earlier version of this paper.