1. What two claims does Hume endeavor to prove? (Paragraph 1) (2 marks)
Hume is responding to traditional views that right action can and should be determined by reason, arguing two claims in opposition to these views. The first claim is that reason can never motivate action (in isolation from passions or emotions). The second claim is that reason can never oppose or prevent actions motivated by passions or emotions.
2. What two operations of the understanding does Hume distinguish? (Paragraph 2) (2 marks)
Hume identifies two ways understanding (reason) exerts itself: demonstrative and probabilistic. Demonstrative reasoning is deductive; it allows us to draw specific claims from general ideas. Probabilistic (or causal) reasoning is inductive; it allows us to make general claims from specific ones.
3. How does Hume argue that the first operation of the understanding is never the sole cause of our actions? (Paragraph 2) (2 marks)
Hume draws a distinction between the world of ideas and the world of realities. Our motivation to act is concerned with realities, with specific ends and purposes (like wanting to clear a debt). Contrastingly, our reason is concerned with the world of ideas, with means for those ends (like aggregating numerical sums to calculate the total owed). Hume thinks it is generally accepted that the world of ideas and world of realities are so removed from one another no one would argue deductive reasoning could be the sole cause of action.
4. How does Hume argue that the second operation of the understanding is never the sole cause of our actions? (Paragraph 3) (2 marks)
Hume explains that probabilistic reason allows us to discover the relations between cause and effect. We then direct our actions in ways that cause our desired effects (ends). The choice of end arises from our passions; reason does not direct the choice to act, only which means to exercise. If we were emotionally indifferent to any cause or end, reason could never motivate us to be concerned with it.
5. How does Hume then go on to argue that reason alone is incapable of opposing passion in the direction of the will? (Paragraph 4) (3 marks)
Hume argues that if reason has force to generate action, it necessarily has force to counter action. This is consistent with the way we conceive of force in general, that it can initiate as well as oppose. He then draws on his earlier argument that reason alone cannot initiate action; if we accept that argument we should accept that reason cannot obstruct action willed by emotions.
6. What further considerations does Hume advance in support of his two main claims? (Paragraphs 5, 6, and 7) (4 marks)
Hume argues that we cannot use reason to say our desire ends are false or unreasonable, but there are two types of cases when it would appear that reason is showing our desired ends to be wrong. Both cases are factual mistakes about how our desired ends can be achieved. In the first case, we believe that a thing exists, when it does not. In the second case, we believe a certain means will produce a specific end, when it will not.
When our factual misunderstandings are corrected, the originally desired end (born from emotion rather than reason) will persist. What will not persist is the means we desired, the means we had been directed to by our mistakes of reason.The impact of this is Hume can be right that man is driven by his emotions, without being impervious to reason: as emotion dictates ends, reason supplies the means. Reason performs the role of slave or servant to passion.
7. What is the main point of Hume’s discussion of ‘calm passions’? (Paragraphs 8, 9, and 10) (5 marks)
Hume is using the notion of the struggle between calm passions and violent passions to replace the traditional metaphysical conception of a struggle between passion and reason. He explains two types of calm passions that may be commonly mistaken for reason, providing an explanation for human kindness and charity as well as a general propensity to seek goodness.
Violent passions have a powerful influence on the will and may make people act in ways that are threatening to other people - this could seem a problem for Hume seeking to ground a theory of morality in emotions. So Hume also wishes to illustrate that calm passions, those he associates with good and moral behavior, can constrain other more violent passions. Hume argues that these violent passions can actually be sensible (in a self-defense situation) and that when they are not sensible, calm passions can counteract them.
When an agent is observed to have a conflict of will to act in a violent or calm way, and chooses the calm, Hume is arguing that this is the effect of their calm passion rather than reason.
Bibliography
Hume, David (1888) ‘Reason and Passion’ in Peter Singer (ed.) Ethics, Oxford: Oxford University Press p.118-23
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