A DEFENSE OF HUMEAN PROPERTY THEORY

The Humean Theory of Reasons

This paper offers a simple and novel motivation for the Humean Theory of Reasons. According to the Humean Theory of Reasons, all reasons must be explained by some psychological state of the agent for whom they are reasons, such as a desire. This view is commonly thought1 to be motivated by a substantive theory about the power of reasons to motivate known as reason internalism, and a substantive...

Humean and an African Causal Theory: A Comparative Study

Weighting for a Plausible Humean Theory of Reasons

This paper addresses the two extensional objections to the Humean Theory of Reasons—that it allows for too many reasons, and that it allows for too few. Although I won’t argue so here, many of the other objections to the Humean Theory of Reasons turn on assuming that it cannot successfully deal with these two objections.1 What I will argue, is that the force of the too many and the too few obje...

Humean metaphysics versus a metaphysics of powers

The paper considers the opposition between Humean metaphysics and the metaphysics of powers, focusing on laws, probabilities and causation. It argues that within Humean metaphysics, everything is a matter of contingency. Consequently, there is no deep metaphysical difference between a deterministic world and a world in which only probabilistic laws hold. This position is contrasted with the fou...

humean and an african causal theory: a comparative study

the concept of causality is fundamental to our understanding of the world. the idea of causality was made popular, in western philosophy, by david hume; one of the best-know british empiricists. this paper examines critically the human idea of causality-that of a necessary/physical connection - in juxtaposition to an africa theory. the thesis that the causal relation, when correctly defined, is...