GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

THE PKOBLBBt OF FREE WILL 24,7
as the philosopher Hume (1711-1776) showed, we can
find no basis in reason for the belief in causation. 1
The notion of causation presupposes the presence of a
bond or tie between the events which are deemed to be
causally related; that is to say, between the so-called
qtuse
and the so-called effect Yet such a tie or bond is
precisely what we are unable to discover. Hume's conclusion
is that, so far as reason and experience go, all that
we are entitled to assume is regularity of sequence. To say
that A causes B, means, in fact, no more than it has been
frequently observed that B follows*A* Various attempts
have been made to answer Hume's criticism of the notion
of causation, but it cannot be said that any of them have
been very convincing. The most elaborate attempt is that
of Kant. Many people would regard Kant's defence of
causation against Hume's criticism as successful, but the
view of the universe which Kant's refutation inplies is
dertainly not compatible with the mechanist conception
which underlies the form of determinism we are considering.
Unless and until Hume is answered in a manner
compatible with mechanism, we cannot, uncritically accept
the scientific scheme ofthe universe with which the postulate
of determinism is so intimately bound up, for this scheme,
although it works well enough for practical purposes, en-
tails an assumption which has no ertablished philosophical
foundation. In this connection it is significant that physics,
the most advanced of the sciences, has abandoned the
notion of force acting from a distance, the notion, that is
to say, that a body A, separated in space from another
body B, can exert an influence over B, and has
the conception of events happening in the
contiguous neighbourhood of B to
formerly thought to be due to the inflj
emanating from body A. Yet the notion ofa
from one body and impinging upon
bound up with what most of us mean by]
* See My 0m* Philosophy, Chapter VIII, for
criticiim of causation.