The mystery of nature’s orderliness : a critical examination of the Humean problem of causation and the Kantian response thereto

Abstract

A pressing question for the history of philosophy concerns whether or not the German philosopher Immanuel Kant can be considered to have offered an adequate response to the Scottish philosopher David Hume’s so-called “predicament of causation”. The present dissertation illustrates that Hume propounds two forms of scepticism concerning the principle of causation. One form pertains to causation in a general sense (commonly considered to be found solely in the first book of Hume’s principal work, A Treatise of Human Nature), which maintains that causality is entirely mind-dependent. Another form expresses scepticism about causation in a particular sense (ordinarily considered to be found solely in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding), according to which it is impossible to know with certainty that one phenomenon is indeed causally connected to another. The study indicates that in spite of the fact that Kant seems to have intended to supply a satisfactory response to Hume’s particular instantiations predicament of causation, he ultimately fails to do so. However, Kant can be considered to have supplied in both the Critique of Pure Reason and the Prolegomena a seemingly fortuitous (for it appears that it was unintended) response to the general reading of Hume’s predicament. The dissertation argues, though, that it also ultimately does not succeed in offering a cogent response to the general predicament. For all that Kant says, Hume’s sceptical challenge is ultimately unmet, such that we cannot know any causal claims for certain.