Free will, determinism, and responsibility[edit]

Hume, along with Thomas Hobbes, is cited as a classical compatibilist about the notions
of freedom and determinism.[83] The thesis of compatibilism seeks to reconcile human freedom
with the mechanist belief that human beings are part of a deterministic universe, whose
happenings are governed by the laws of physics. Hume, to this end, was influenced greatly by
the scientific revolution and by in particular Sir Isaac Newton.[84]
Hume argued that the dispute about the compatibility of freedom and determinism has been
kept afloat by ambiguous terminology:
From this circumstance alone, that a controversy has been long kept on foot... we may
presume, that there is some ambiguity in the expression.[85]
Hume defines the concepts of "necessity" and "liberty" as follows:
Necessity: "the uniformity, observable in the operations of nature; where similar objects are
constantly conjoined together..."[86]
Liberty: "a power of acting or not acting, according to the determinations of the will..."[87]
Hume then argues that, according to these definitions, not only are the two compatible, but
liberty requires necessity. For if our actions were not necessitated in the above sense, they
would "...have so little in connexion with motives, inclinations and circumstances, that one does
not follow with a certain degree of uniformity from the other." But if our actions are not thus
connected to the will, then our actions can never be free: they would be matters of "chance;
which is universally allowed not to exist."[87]
Moreover, Hume goes on to argue that in order to be held morally responsible, it is required that
our behaviour be caused, i.e. necessitated, for
Actions are, by their very nature, temporary and perishing; and where they proceed not from
some cause in the character and disposition of the person who performed them, they can
neither redound to his honour, if good; nor infamy, if evil.[88]
Hume describes the link between causality and our capacity to rationally make a decision from
this an inference of the mind. Human beings assess a situation based upon certain
predetermined events and from that form a choice. Hume believes that this choice is made
spontaneously. Hume calls this form of decision making the liberty of spontaneity.

In all of the above discussions on epistemological topics, Hume performs a balancing act between
making skeptical attacks (step 1) and offering positive theories based on natural beliefs (step 2). In
the conclusion to Book 1, though, he appears to elevate his skepticism to a higher level and exposes
the inherent contradictions in even his best philosophical theories. He notes three such
contradictions. One centers on what we call induction. Our judgments based on past experience all
contain elements of doubt; we are then impelled to make a judgment about that doubt, and since this
judgment is also based on past experience it will in turn produce a new doubt. Once again, though,
we are impelled to make a judgment about this second doubt, and the cycle continues. He concludes
that no finite object can subsist under a decrease repeated in infinitum. A second contradiction
involves a conflict between two theories of external perception, each of which our natural reasoning
process leads us to. One is our natural inclination to believe that we are directly seeing objects as
they really are, and the other is the more philosophical view that we only ever see mental images or
copies of external objects. The third contradiction involves a conflict between causal reasoning and
belief in the continued existence of matter. After listing these contradictions, Hume despairs over the
failure of his metaphysical reasoning:
The intense view of these manifold contradictions and imperfections in human reason has so
wrought upon me, and heated my brain, that I am ready to reject all belief and reasoning, and can
look upon no opinion even as more probable or likely than another [Treatise, 1.4.7.8].
He then pacifies his despair by recognizing that nature forces him to set aside his philosophical
speculations and return to the normal activities of common life. He sees, though, that in time he will
be drawn back into philosophical speculation in order to attack superstition and educate the world.
Humes emphasis on these conceptual contradictions is a unique aspect of his skepticism, and if any
part of his philosophy can be designated Humean skepticism it is this. However, during the course
of his writing the Treatise his view of the nature of these contradictions changed. At first he felt that
these contradictions were restricted to theories about the external world, but theories about the mind
itself would be free from them, as he explains here:
The essence and composition of external bodies are so obscure, that we must necessarily, in our
reasonings, or rather conjectures concerning them, involve ourselves in contradictions and
absurdities. But as the perceptions of the mind are perfectly known, and I have usd all imaginable
caution in forming conclusions concerning them, I have always hopd to keep clear of those
contradictions, which have attended every other system [Treatise, 2.2.6.2].
When composing the Appendix to the Treatise a year later, he changed his mind and felt that
theories about the mind would also have contradictions:
I had entertained some hopes, that however deficient our theory of the intellectual world might be, it
woud be free from those contradictions, and absurdities, which seem to attend every explication,
that human reason can give of the material world. But upon a more strict review of the section
concerning I find myself involvd in such a labyrinth, that, I must confess, I neither know how to
correct my former opinions, nor how to render them consistent. If this be not a good general reason
for scepticism, tis at least a sufficient one (if I were not already abundantly supplied) for me to
entertain a diffidence and modesty in all my decisions [Treatise, Appendix].

Thus, in the Treatise, the skeptical bottom line is that even our best theories about both physical and
mental phenomena will be plagued with contradictions. In the concluding section of his Enquiry,
Hume again addresses the topic of skepticism, but treats the matter somewhat differently: he rejects
extreme skepticism but accepts skepticism in a more moderate form. He associates
extreme Pyrrhonian skepticismwith blanket attacks on all reasoning about the external world,
abstract reasoning about space and time, or causal reasoning about matters of fact. He argues,
though, that we must reject such skepticism since no durable good can ever result from it. Instead,
he recommends a more moderate or Academicskepticism that tones down Pyrrhonism by, first,
exercising caution and modesty in our judgments, and, second, by restricting our speculations to
abstract reasoning and matters of fact.

The self[edit]
According to the standard interpretation of Hume on personal identity, he was a bundle theorist,
who held that the self is nothing but a bundle of experiences ("perceptions") linked by the
relations of causation and resemblance; or, more accurately, that the empirically warranted idea
of the self is just the idea of such a bundle. This view is forwarded by, for example, positivist
interpreters, who saw Hume as suggesting that terms such as "self", "person", or "mind"
referred to collections of "sense-contents".[62] A modern-day version of the bundle theory of the
mind has been advanced by Derek Parfit in his Reasons and Persons[63]
However, some philosophers have criticised Hume's bundle-theory interpretation of personal
identity. They argue that distinct selves can have perceptions that stand in relations of similarity
and causality with one another. Thus perceptions must already come parcelled into distinct
"bundles" before they can be associated according to the relations of similarity and causality. In
other words, the mind must already possess a unity that cannot be generated, or constituted, by
these relations alone. Since the bundle-theory interpretation portrays Hume as answering an
ontological question, philosophers who see Hume as not very concerned with such questions
have queried whether the view is really Hume's,[64] or "only a decoy".[65] Instead, it is suggested
that Hume might have been answering an epistemological question about the causal origin of
our concept of the self. In the Appendix to the Treatise, Hume declares himself dissatisfied with
his account of the self in Book 1 of the Treatise, and the question of why he is dissatisfied has
received a number of different answers.
Another interpretation of Hume's view of the self has been argued for by James Giles.
[66]
According to his view, Hume is not arguing for a bundle theory, which is a form of
reductionism, but rather for an eliminative view of the self. That is, rather than reducing the self
to a bundle of perceptions, Hume is rejecting the idea of the self altogether. On this
interpretation, Hume is proposing a 'No-Self Theory' and thus has much in common with
Buddhist thought.[67] On this point, Alison Gopnik has argued that Hume was in a position to learn
about Buddhist thought during his time in France in the 1730s.[68]