76 NOTES TO PART ONE. the objects."

Transcription

1 NOTES TO PART ONE 1 C.D. Broad, "Hume's Theory of the Credibility of Miracles," Proceedings oj the Aristotelian Society, NS XVIII ( ), p. 77. The arguments that Broad critiques are in David Hume, Enquiries Concerning Human Understanding, Section X, "Of Miracles," ed., L.A. Selby-Bigge, 3rd ed. (Oxford: Clarendon Pr., 1975). All references to Hume's "Essay on Miracles" (i.e. "Of Miracles") will be to this edition of the Enquiries. I omit section and part numbers and give only page references. 2 Broad, p. 92. This criticism of Hume by Broad is probably the most often repeated criticism of Hume's position in Part I "Of Miracles." Among those that have criticized Hume along these lines are the following: F.R. Tennant, Miracle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1925, p. 82; A.E. Taylor, David Hume and The Miraculous (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1927), pp ; Anthony Flew, Hume's Philosophy oj BelieJ(London: RKP, 1961), p. 17l. 3 David Hume, A Treatise OJ Human Nature, ed., L.A. Selby-Bigge (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1975), p All references to the Treatise are to this edition. I omit book, section and part numbers and give only page references. 4 Even if belief is regarded, in part, as a function of custom and ideally nothing else, it is not clear that we would always say that our belief that B will follow A is, or ideally should be, stronger in cases where A's have always been observed to be followed by B's, than in cases where they have not. The psychological conviction with which a belief is held might, in some circumstances, be regarded as intrinsic to the belief itself. Firmly believing B will follow A, due to past experience, may be a different belief than less firmly believing B will follow A. The propositional content of the beliefs might vary accordingly. "B will follow A" might be an abbreviation for content that includes implicit or explicit reference to the conviction with which the belief is held and so be part of the belief itself. But far more often it is unlikely to suppose that the propositional content of our beliefs contain a self-reflective component concerning the conviction with which the belief is held. So speaking, as Hume does, of the belief "B will follow A" as ideally being stronger in proportion to the degree of one's experience of their conjunction, is not objectionable on the grounds that believing some proposition p strongly, and believing the same proposition p weakly, are two different beliefs. The content of those beliefs may well be the same no matter what the degree of conviction is with which they are held. Where Hume's account is objectionable is in the very strange idea, which rests on his analysis of the causal relation, that there is no justifiable reason for believing that B will follow A. Not even past experience provides justifiable reason. 5 Hume equates this transition with the idea of a necessary connection between cause and effect - a connection that Hume says "exists in the mind, not in 75

2 76 NOTES TO PART ONE the objects." The necessary connection between causes and effects is the foundation of our inference from one to the other. The foundation of our inference is the transition arising from the accustomed union. These are, therefore, the same. The idea of necessity arises from some impression. There is no impression conveyed by our senses, which can give rise to that idea. It must, therefore, be derived from some internal impression, or impression of refiexion. There is no internal impression, which has any relation to the present business, but that propensity, which custom produces, to pass from an object to the idea of its usual attendant. This, therefore, is the essence of necessity... necessity is something that exists in the mind, not in the objects... Either we have no idea of necessity, or necessity is nothing but that determination of the thought to pass from causes to effects and from effects to causes, according to their experienced union [Treatise, pp ]. This is a somewhat stilted way of describing the matter, but one that is is in keeping with Hume's theory of belief. If A's have been followed by B's fifty percent of the time in the past, we would not ordinarily say that our inference that A will be followed by B this time is fifty percent warranted or justified. Rather, we would say that we can justifiably infer that A will be followed by B with a fifty percent probability. (I am referring here only to those cases, if any, in which we assume, with Hume, that inferences can be justified, in some sense, on the basis of past experience and only on such a basis.) J.L. Mackie, The Cement of The Universe (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974), p.15. For Stove's argument see D.C. Stove, "Hume, Probability and Induction," in Hume, ed. V.C. Chappell (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1966), pp Also see D.C. Stove, Probability and Hume's Inductive Skepticism (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1973); Tom L. Beauchamp and Alexander Rosenberg, Hume and the Problem of Causation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981). For a discussion of the sense in which past experience should be understood see Dennis Ahern, "Hume on the Evidential Impossibility of Miracles," in Studies in Epistemology, ed. Nicholas Rescher (Oxford: Blackwell, 1975), pp See pp.4-5. Hume concludes his essay on miracles with a similar sarcastic remark.... upon the whole, we may conclude that the Christian Religion not only was at first attended with miracles, but even at this day cannot be believed by any reasonable person without one. Mere reason is insufficient to convince us of its veracity: And whoever is moved by Faith to assent to it, is conscious ofacontinued miracle in his own person, which subverts all the principles of his understanding, and gives him a determination to believe what is most contrary to custom and experience [po 131]. But as J.L. Mackie says:"... this is only ajoke. What the believer is conscious of in his own person, though it may be a mode of thinking that goes against 'custom and experience', and so is contrary to the ordinary rational principles of the understanding, is not, as an occurrence, a violation of natural law." J.L Mackie, The Miracle of Theism (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982), p. 29. Also see, R.M Burns, The Great Debate On Miracles (Lewisburg: Bucknell University Press, 1981). Burns supports the view that this, and some other

3 NOTES TO PART ONE 77 problematic passages like it in Hume's essay, should be interpreted as ironic or sarcastic (chapters 6-7). He also argues (chapter 7), contrary to Flew, that Hume's argument in Part I is intended as an a priori argument, and contrary to Gaskin, that Hume intended his argument to apply to the case of seeing a miracle for oneself as well as to belief based on testimony (p. 295, note 120). On all of these points I agree. Burn's is the only author I know of who also contends that Hume's argument against miracles is, in a sense, superfluous given his view that divine activity is impossible to know. However, he doesn't see how this position ofhume's, aside from logically preempting Hume's argument in part I, also plays a crucial role in it. If, contrary to Hume's empiricism, it were possible to know divine activity, then it would be possible to justifiably believe that a miracle occurred. Burn's discussion of the historical background to Hume's essay, and of the origin of the essay itself, is extremely useful in helping to understand Hume's essay. Chapters 7 and 8 are valuable in helping to understand both Hume's argument and criticisms of it. Although Burn's discusses the essay in the context of the publication of the Treatise and Enquiries I don't think he sees how integrally related to Hume's philosophy it is. But in his discussion (chapter 8) of various criticism's of Hume's a priori argument in part I, he does argue that Hume's argument cannot be supported apart from his theory of explanation and that this theory is connected to his empiricism. As I argue in part I, this insight is both true, important and has largely been overlooked. Burns cites a passage from one of Hume's letters to George Campbell, author of a Dissertation on Miracles, 1762 which was a reply to Hume. I quote some of it because it shows, I think, that in Hume's view the argument against miracles was integrally connected with the Treatise. Hume writes: It may perhaps amuse you to learn the first hint, which suggested to me that argument which you have so strenuously attacked. I was walking in the cloisters of the Jesuits College at La Fleche... engaged in conversation with a Jesuit of some parts and learning who was relating to me, and urging some nonsensical miracle performed in their convent, when I was tempted to dispute against him; and as my head was full of the topics of my Treatise 'if Human Nature, which I was at that time composing, this argument immediately occurred to me... [Burns, p.1331 Burns thinks that Hume's argument is not especially original (pp.140-1). The same argument occurred in earlier writers that Hume may have read. However, if my overall thesis that Hume's Essay must be interpreted in the context of his theory of a posteriori reasoning is correct, then Hume's position is, of course, highly original. 10 I shall not attempt to further argue the textual issue here because it is not essential to my purposes. Perhaps a clear resolution to the textual problem cannot be found. Richard Swinburne is an example of one who thinks Hume did not intend to argue the stronger (logical) position. See R. Swinburne, The Concept of Miracle (London: Macmillan, 1970). The contrary position is taken by Dennis Ahern in "Hume On The Evidential Impossibility of Miracles," pp See Ahern's discussion of Hume's claim that "there may possibly be

4 78 NOTES TO PART ONE miracles... of such a kind as to admit of proof from human testimony," on pp C.D. Broad supports the stronger interpretation of Hume, though he disagrees with Hume's conclusion Broad says "We have no right to say off-hand with Hume that no possible evidence could make it reasonable to suppose that a miraculous exception to some law of nature had taken place" (Broad, p.94). Also see R.M. Burns, chapter 7. II See Enquiries, pp for part of Hume's explanation of his principles of a posteriori reasoning. This is essential to understanding this quotation in context. Furthermore, the quotation cannot properly be understood out of context - which is how it has been, and continues to be, wrongly interpreted. 12 Dennis Ahern ("The Evidential Impossibility of Miracles," pp.6-7) has shown that "uniformity in experience" is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition of a law of nature, and that Hume does not think it is. But if this is so, then Hume is mistaken when he says that every miracle, being a violation of the laws of nature, must have uniformity in experience to count against it. Ahern has shown that this point is fairly inconsequential to Hume's argument. He says, Hume is concerned with the establishment of an event as miraculous, with whether human testimony may be sufficient to prove a miracle. Events are believed to be miracles because they are believed to be violations of the laws of nature. It is unlikely that an event which violates bona fide but unknown laws will be judged to be miraculous. Hence, it would seem, for the purpose of his argument all Hume needs is the premise that any statement believed to express a law of nature, and not every actual law of nature, has been established by uniform experience [pp.7-8j. Ahern is right, but Hume has a related difficulty. As I later discuss, not everything that we would call a miracle has to have uniformity in experience to count against it. 13 See Robert Hambourger, "Need Miracles Be Extraordinary?," Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. XLVII, No.3 (1987), pp Hambourger never determines what Hume means in context by "extraordinary," and equivocates on Hume's meaning throughout. Hambourger says, Hume wants to argue that a miracle that does violate a law of nature must by that fact alone be so extraordinary that to establish its occurrence is beyond the reach of testimony. But it is quite possible that an event should be a miracle, and really violate natural law, while to all autward appearances it is quite ordinary. And in this case there should be no reason why testimony cannot establish it has occurred [po 440]. But according to Hume, no matter how the event appears outwardly, whether it appears ordinary or not, once it is characterized as a miracle, then by that very fact it is something that no testimony can establish as having occurred. In fact, for Hume, as I shall explain, given its characterization as a miracle, not even first hand experience of the event can establish, or make one justified in believing, that it has occurred. Contrary to Hambourger's interpretation I argue that Hume thinks testimony can establish that a (merely) extraordinary event has occurred, but never a miracle. The fact that Hume does once refer

5 NOTES TO PART ONE 79 to miracles as extraordinary does not undermine his distinction between the miraculous and the merely extraordinary. See R.M Burns, The Great Debate On Miracles, chapter 7 for a discussion of Hume's distinction between the extraordinary and the miraculous. 14 This is Broad's description of Hume's idea of a law of nature as employed by Hume in his argument. If instead, a law of nature is defined nonepistemically as a regularity that allows of no exceptions, then the concept of a miracle, as defined by Hume, becomes contradictory. See Broad, p A regularity, or Humean, theory of lawfulness is one according to which lawfulness is analyzable in terms of quantificational plus psychological or epistemic notions, and in any case without further such sui generis metaphysical modal notion as physical or nomic necessity. This is only a partial definition. It is Ernest Sosa's. 16 See J.L. Mackie's discussion of the coherence of Hume's concept of miracle in The Miracle oj Theism pp He discusses Hume's argument in Chapter I, pp Although Mackie is correct in attempting to explain Hume's argument against justified belief in miracles, in part, by reference to Hume's principles for the rational acceptance of testimony, he fails to explain why Hume thought one never could be justified in believing testimony to the miraculous. He concludes, mistakenly I think, that Hume "seems to allow that the balance of probabilities could be in favor of our accepting the miracle report, though with no very high degree of confidence" (p. 17). Mackie also discusses the application of Hume's argument against justified belief in testimony to the miraculous to the case of the possibility of justified belief in the miraculous on the basis of first hand experience (p. 28). My explanation of Hume's argument will show that the application is much more direct than Mackie thinks it is. According to Hume, one never could be justified in believing a miracle occurred even if one "sees" it for oneself. The reasons why one could not be justified are identical in the case of testimony and that of first hand experience. 17 Part II of Hume's essay is largely an elaboration of this point. Even if his a priori argument fails, his argument from experience is devastating when it is applied to a consideration of the biblical miracles. In the case of those miracles the testimony cannot be judged, objectively, to be very good. This is independent of whether one thinks it likely that God worked such miracles. If Hume's a posteriori argument against the credibility of testimony to the miraculous, in any particular case, is going to be overruled" then the case we have to imagine is one in which the testimony to the event is, objectively speaking, quite overwhelmingly good. No matter what one thinks of the credibility of the biblical miracle stories, surely testimony to their occurrence is not in itself of high evidential value. 18 Hume would not deny that what an individual can justifiably believe is ultimately a function of their own experience. But collective experience is a significant part of one's own experiences and may influence, very strongly, what any individual is justified in believing in certain circumstances. We experience many things indirectly through others and what others have experienced may, according to Hume, be a factor in determining if our beliefs are justified in

6 80 NOTES TO PART ONE certain circumstances. Therefore, there should not as a rule, be too much variation between what any two people living in similar historical periods and circumstances could justifiably believe. At any rate, this point is of little consequence because there are necessary and not merely contingent reasons why an event considered to be a miracle, if it occurred, must be an event for which we can find no events analogous in type in our experience - either individually or collectively. 19 Flew misses the significance of the case of the Indian as does C.D. Broad, "Hume's Theory of The Credibility of Miracles," and most recently, Gaskin. See J.C.A. Gaskin, Hume's Philosophy of Religion (London: Macmillan, 1978), p. 125; Anthony Flew, Hume's Philosophy of Belief (London: RKP, 1961). Richard Fern recognizes the significance for Hume's argument against justified belief in miracles of Hume's contention that even an event's extreme abnormality in relation to what is known about nature can never suffice to justify the belief that the event has no natural explanation. Richard L. Fern, "Hume's Critique of Miracles: An Irrelevant Triumph," Religious Studies, 18 (1982), pp Fern argues that the abnormality of an event combined with its purposefulness and the reasonableness of believing in a miracle-working deity, may provide ajustification for believing the event to be a miracle. The hypothetical argument contrary to Hume's that I recite below is similar in some significant respects to Fern's. 20 Flew argues that Hume's contention that"... a miracle can never be proved so as to be the foundation of a system of religion... depends upon two things: first, an understanding of the methodological presuppositions of critical history; and second, a recognition of the impossibility of supplementing these by appealing to natural theology." Anthony Flew, God and Philosophy (New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1966), p Hume's contention must also, and indeed primarily, be based on the supposition that we can have no good reason, experientially speaking, for identifying an extraordinary event as a miraculous one. Flew does not make it clear how or why this supposition would come under the methodological presuppositions of critical history. It does so for Hume only insofar as such presuppositions can be subsumed, as they are, under his principles of a posteriori reasoning. I shall show that Hume can support this supposition, given certain fundamental (but dubious) principles of his empiricism, though he does not explicitly do so in the "Essay on Miracles." 21 In a footnote Hume suggests that there could be experiential warrant for belief in a miracle, at least if one saw the event for oneself. The following also indicates that, according to Hume, whether or not an event is a miracle depends only on whether or not it is divinely caused and contrary to a genuine law of nature. A miracle is characterized by Hume in wholly non-epistemic terms. Whether or not an event is a miracle does not depend upon anything that we know about it - for example, that it is contrary to a law. Sometimes an event may not, in itsplj, seem to be contrary to the laws of nature, and yet, if it were real, it might, by reason of some circumstances, be denominated a miracle; because, injlu t, it is contrary to these laws. Thus if a person, claiming a divine authority should command a sick person to be well, a healthful man to fall down dead, the clouds to pour rain... should

7 NOTES TO PART ONE 81 order many natural events, which immediately follow upon his command; these might justly be deemed miracles, because they are really, in this case, contrary to the laws of nature. For if any suspicion remain, that the event and command concurred by accident, there is no miracle and no transgression of the laws of nature.. If this suspicion be removed, there is evidently a miracle, and a transgression of these laws [Enquiries, p. I 15n). When Hume says in the above that"... if any suspicion remain, that the event and command concurred by accident, there is no miracle and no transgression of the laws of nature... " I take him to mean that if there is such a suspicion, then one is not justified in believing the event to be a miracle. He does not mean that whether in fact the event is a miracle depends upon such suspicions. Ifhe did mean the latter then he would be characterizing "miracle" in irreducibly epistemic terms. Yet it is clear from his definition of miracle that he does not intend this. In the scenario that Hume sketches above, Humean consistency would demand that we posit only natural causes for these bizarre events. We must assume that some people have quite extraordinary but natural powers that we have not been aware of before. The reason why Humean consistency demands this will be shown. However, that it does demand this should already be clear on the basis of Hume's treatment of the eight day darkness and the alleged resurrection. Hume's footnote is also interesting because it points out that certain things which may not seem to be contrary to the laws of nature, might actually be contrary. Therefore, in keeping with his non-epistemic characterization of "miracle" such events would be miracles if they occurred. 22 C.S. Lewis has argued that experience does not necessitate positing a natural cause for alleged miracles. Lewis says, "The criterion whereby to judge the intrinsic probability of an alleged miracle... is by our 'innate sense of the fitness of things.'" C.S. Lewis, Miracles (New York: Macmillan, 1947, p What he means by "intrinsic probablity" is not clear. However, if such probability does depend upon one's "innate sense of the fitness of things" as Lewis claims, then it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that "intrinsic probability" is subjective and must be subjectively determined. Thus, by "intrinsic probability" he does not mean what Hume does when he determines the probability of an event on the basis of our past experience of similar events. Ideally this Humean probability can be objectively determined. F.R. Tennant also argues that experience does not necessitate positing only natural explanations. Supernatural explanations may also be posited. However, "so long as the constitution of Nature is not exhaustively known... The representative of the one is just as much as the representative of the other the victim of an alogical prepossession [Miracle, pp. 54, 88]. So long as the constitution of nature is not exbaustively known, it is no more possible to assert that a given marvel is beyond the unaided powers of Nature, and that accordingly it evidences... supernatural activity... then it is to affirm that an event indescribable in terms of natural law, as systematized up to date, is forever or intrinsically incapable of being subsumed under natural law... [Miracle, pp. 54, 88). But there are reasons why a Humean must deny that a given marvel could

8 82 NOTES TO PART ONE experientially evidence supernatural activity. 23 For these basic distinctions, see Treatise, pp John Locke, Discourse on Miracles (1702). 25 Treatise, pp is relevant. Also, Enquiries, pp For a discussion of probability and miracles see Robert Hambourger, "Belief in Miracles and Hume's Essay," Nous, 14 (1980), pp ; George Schlesinger, "Miracles and Probabilities," Nous, 21 (1987), pp ; and Roy Sorensen, "Hume's Skepticism Concerning Reports of Miracles," Analysis, 43 (1983). Schlesinger, in part, critiques Hambourger's argument "aimed at showing that regardless of how much smaller the probability of an event may be than the probability of the report of it having happened being false, reason demands that we trust the report" (Hambourger, p. 221). Neither of these essays discusses Hume's view of the probability of miracles in the context of his theory of a posteriori reasoning, which is the context in which Hume's view must be discussed if my interpretation of his argument, thus far, is correct. Whatever the merits of Hambourger's and Schlesinger's views on probability and miracles are, I do not think that they can plausibly be interpreted as giving either an accurate exposition of, or an adequate response to, Hume's argument against justified belief in miracles. However, they are responses to certain interpretations of Hume. But these interpretations have, I think, been soundly refuted in the literature and not, as Hambourger says, accepted as more or less the last word on miracles. 26 Especially relevant is Treatise, p. 170 and Enquiries, pp Of course, if there are logical grounds why we cannot call a series of unique non-repeatable events a causal series and one knows these, then this would undermine any epistemological grounds for doing so as well. For reasons that will become apparent, it is important to consider both the logical and epistemological questions. 27 Dennis Ahern, "Hume on the Evidential Impossibility of Miracles." I discuss Ahern's fine essay in Part II. 28 J.L. Mackie, The Cement oj the Universe, p.4. Mackie suggests that such a series cannot be considered causal on Hume's account. 29 J.L. Mackie leaves open the question as to whether or not Hume's analysis of causation supports what we would call a counterfactual conditional analysis of the causal relation. But as I have implied, the answer to this question does not depend upon a further analysis or better understanding of Hume's views on causation. Instead it depends on contemporary analyses of counterfactuals. I know of no such analysis that allows us to say that Hume's analysis of causation as it is in the objects (Le. objective causation), as opposed say to his account of the meaning of cause, could be expressed in terms of counterfactuals. His analysis could be seen as an attempt to undermine completely the possibility of any such expression. See Mackie, The Cement oj The Universe, chapters 1-3. For a discussion of counterfactuals that I think supports the view that Hume's analysis of causation cannot support a counterfactual conditional analysis, except perhaps in terms of the meaning of cause, see David Lewis, CounterJactuals (Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1973). 30 J.L. Mackie, The Cement oj The Universe, pp Broad, "Hume's Theory of the Credibility of Miracles," p. 92.

9 NOTES TO PART ONE See, Michael P. Levine, "Mackie's Account Of Necessity In Causation," Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Vol. LXXXVII (1986/7); and "Madden's Account of Necessity in Causation," Philosophia, 18 (1988). For a recent defense of a non-logical necessitarian account of causation, especially in connection with Hume's regularity account see, Rom Harre and Edward Madden, Causal Powers: A Theory of Natural Necessity (Oxford: Blackwell, 1975). For a defense of Hume's view see, Tom Beauchamp and Alexander Rosenberg, Hume and The Problem of Causation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981). 33 There are neo-humeans who speak of nomic necessity by which they mean nothing more than lawlike necessity analyzable in terms of regularity and some additional conditions. But when non-logical entailment necessity theorists use "nomic necessity" they distinguish themselves from such regularity theorists by describing it as an irreducible sui generis metaphysical modal notion. Others use nomic necessity interchangeably with physical necessity as a sui generis metaphysical modal concept. It is, of course, important to distinguish between these different senses. 34 Brand Blanshard, Reason and Analysis (La Salle, IL: Open Court, 1962), pp Sections relevant to Blanshard's's analysis of causation are reprinted in Myles Brand, ed., The Nature of Causation (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1976), pp Blanshard does argue that every cause logically entails its effect, but confines his arguments to showing that "in the sequence of our ideas a genuine necessity can often be found, and that it is legitimate to surmise something like it in the sequence of physical events" (Brand, p. 236). But Blanshard equates all genuine necessity with "absolute necessity," including necessities associated with universals of law. (See his critique of Broad's view that distinguishes between these types of necessity (in Brand, pp ).) Blanshard's "objective idealism" and his theory of "internal relations" actually commits him to a good deal more than this. Elsewhere, he suggests that "every fact and event is ultimately connected with all others by internal relations." Brand Blanshard, "Internal Relations and Their Importance in Philosophy," Review of Metaphysics, 1967, p As Alice Lazerowitz points out, "The claim that all relations are internal has as a consequence that every true proposition is necessarily true." Alice Lazerowitz, "Internal Relations," Review of Metaphysics, 1967, p Relevant to the issue of internal relations as it relates to causality is Robert Oakes, "Professor Blanshard, Causality, and Internal Relations: Some Perspectives," Idealist Studies, 1971, pp There is some question as to whether W. Kneale regards causal laws as principles of logical necessitation - principles opaque to us not because of our lack of understanding but because "our experience does not furnish us with the ideas which would be required for an understanding of the connections we assert." W. C. Kneale, Probability and Induction (Oxford: University Press, 1949), p. 71. Mackie describes Kneale's view, a view Kneale attributes to Locke, as follows: Natural laws are 'principles of necessitation,' necessary in the same way in which necessary connections that we are able to comprehend - for example, that redness and greenness are incompatible - are necessary, although we are not able to comprehend the natural laws... The

10 84 NOTES TO PART ONE essential idea is that the things that enter into causal transactions, and hence also the events that are their doings, have insides which we do not and perhaps cannot perceive; the necessary connections hold between these internal features. We cannot in fact comprehend their necessity, but we could if we could perceive the features between which the connections hold, and what we would then comprehend would he something like the incompatihility of redness and greenness. [J.L Mackie, The Cement of the UniveTSe, pp J However, Beauchamp interprets, mistakenly I think, Kneale's view of nomological necessity as "sui generis and not to be confused with logical necessity." Tom L. Beauchamp, ed., Philosophical Problems of Causation (Encino: Dickinson Publishing Co., 1974), p. 37. Milton Fisk argues for the identity of physical with logical necessity and interprets Kneale as doing the same. Milton Fisk, Nature and Identity (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University, 1973), p. 27. The logical entailment theory I consider below is an abstraction of the more complex and (sometimes) qualified logical entailment theories just referred to. 35 The difference between the two deterministic worlds can be symbolized as follows: Second Strictest D (E occurs iff C occurs) Coccurs Eoccurs Strictest D (EiffC) DC DE 3(; am identifying the cause of an event as Mill does. "The cause... philosophically speaking, is the sum total of the conditions positive and negative... " necessary and sufficient, in the circumstances for the occurrence of an event. Mill, System of Logic, Book II, Ch. 5, Sec. 3. Generally even complete causes will not be regarded as all of the conditions necessary and sufficient for the occurrence of an event, but only those in addition to conditions simply assumed to be present as part of the "causal field." As Mackie says; "causal statements are commonly made in some context, against a background which includes the assumption of some causal field... cause and effect are seen as differences within a field... " (Mackie, The Cement of the Universe, pp ). Nothing in my argument depends upon accepting Mill's definition of cause, or the modified definition requiring reference to a causal field. A cause may be seen as what Mackie calls an "inus condition," an insufficient but non-redundant part of an unnecessary but sufficient condition... " (p. 62). Or a cause may be understood to be what Mackie calls a "full cause,... the complete disjunction of conjunctions" of conditions, both positive and negative, that are necessary and sufficient for the effect in the circumstances (pp ). Any concept can be used in place of the one I am using as long as it is conjoined with the assumption that a cause logically entails its effect. (Of course, neither Mill nor Mackie are entailment theorists.) :37 When I say that the entailment theorist wishes to deny that events happen by chance, I do not mean that all entailment theorists would argue (though some happily do) that everything that happens "necessarily happens." However,

11 NOTES TO PART ONE 85 I have argued that they are committed to such a view. 38 Philip Quinn and Ernest Sosa helped me to clarify my views considerably here in asking me to consider the diagram depicting a world that obeys deterministic laws. 39 See Mackie, p C.J. Ducasse distinguishes between the type of necessity involved in the causal relation (i.e., "etiological necessity") and logical necessity. He says that the causal relation is "between events, not between timeless logical entities such as propositions. Therefore, on Ducasse's account the logical entailment theorist must be mistaken. However, Ducasse is merely resolving the issue stipulatively by defining logical necessity so as to rule out its application to the causal relation. But for Blanshard and others, the question of the application of logical necessity to the causal relation is precisely the issue in question. At any rate, Ducasse's stipulation does not resolve the issue but at most suggests an alternative way of stating the entailment view. If there were logically necessary connections between intrinsic descriptions oj events, then even if we could not properly speak of a logically necessary connection between the events themselves, logically necessity would play (substantially) the crucial role that entailment theorists argue it does play in the analysis of causal relations. Some intrinsic description of A would logically entail an intrinsic description of B if A caused B. So if A occurred B would "necessarily" have to occur. See, c.j. Ducasse, "On the Nature and the Observability of the Causal Relation," in Ernest Sosa, ed., Causation and Conditions (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1975), pp Robert Young ("Miracles and Epistemology," Religious Studies, 8, 1972, p. 123), has suggested that certain problems associated with the "violation model" of miracles are avoided if God is seen as "an active agent factor in the set of factors... actually causally operative." Specifically, Young sees his analysis as avoiding 1) having to make intelligible the notion of an occurrence of the physically impossible; and 2) reductionistic accounts of miracles as coincidences. Tan Tai Wei ("Mr. Young On Miracles," Religious Studies, 10, 1974, p. 333) has argued that "if the violation concept of miracles is problematic, so is Young's concept; that his is really of the same sort as the violation model." Though Young's analysis of miracles in terms of causation does implicitly involve the idea of a violation, Wei is mistaken in seeing it as nothing more than a violation model. It is different from a violation model in that its characterization of an event as miraculous concerns divine activity interfering with a naturally caused series of events. God is not seen as suspending laws, but as "an active agent" contributing to "factors... actually causally operative" in the circumstances to produce an occurrence that would not otherwise have happened had God not intervened. Young's approach seems to me to solve, rather than avoid, the problem of making intelligible the idea of the physically impossible. That which is physically impossible is not impossible assuming divine interference. Also see: Dennis Ahern, "Miracles and Physical Impossibility," Canadian Journal oj Philosophy, VII, 1977, pp ; Robert Young, "Miracles and Physical Impossibility," Sophia, 2, 1972, pp For a defense of the coherence of the concept of miracles that avoids other difficulties resulting from their characterization as violations or exceptions to laws of nature see Paul Dietl,

12 86 NOTES TO PART ONE "On Miracles," American Philosophical Quarterly, 5,1968, pp Tom L. Beauchamp, ed., Philosophical Problems of Causation, p.36. The requirement that law must be unrestricted in scope is sometimes expressed in the following way: A statement of a law of nature"... contains only nonlocal empirical predicates apart from logical connectives and quantifiers." George Molnar, "Kneale's Argument Revisited," in Beauchamp, p For a defense of the regularity theory as applied to laws of nature see Norman Swartz, The Concept of Physical Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985). Swartz discusses the application of his theory to miracles in chapter For example, see Edward Madden, "A Third View of Causality," in Beauchamp, pp Actually, I doubt that Beauchamp's claim concerning the lack of significance (from the modern view - or any correct view) of objective necessity for an adequate analysis of the concept of cause is correct. There are many contemporary accounts in which some notion of objective necessity is regarded as crucial to an analysis of the causal relation - and, indeed, I think it is crucial. See my "Mackie's Account of Necessity in Causation." Also see, J.L. Mackie, The Cement of The Universe, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1974). Mackie offers a more complex analysis of laws of nature. He does not agree that a law must be unrestricted in scope. "Not being made true only by what is locally the case is... neither necessary nor sufficient for a contingent universal's having what we intuitively recognize as the status of a law" (Mackie, p. 208). His argument for this conclusion occurs in the context of his discussion of Karl Popper's analysis of laws of nature. He notes his agreement with W. Suchting on this point. W. Suchting, "Popper's Revised Definition of Natural Necessity," British Journal For The Philosophy of Science, xx, (1969), pp Mackie thinks laws of nature (e.g. Newton's laws) account for the direction of causation and that they are to be explained, in part, by reference to a "causal mechanism." His arguments for the plausibility of the presence ofthis mechanism, and his account of what the mechanism is and what it does, moves Mackie away from a regularity account to a necessitarian one, although Mackie apparently does not think so. On Mackie's account it appears to be a sui generis empirical phenomenon requiring some speculation as to its existence and nature. He disassociates this mechanism from some, but not all ideas of necessity. The mechanism itself is contingent according to Mackie. For many regularity theorists, and necessitarians, the postulation of such a mechanism is a capitulation to the necessitarian position. Causation becomes something more that mere regularity on this account. This account is fundamentally antithetical to Hume's position in a way that Mackie, for some reason, doesn't acknowledge. 45 Dennis Ahern, "Miracles and Physical Impossibility," (p.77). 46 Mackie, The Cement of the Universe, p Philip Quinn raised this objection. 48 See Robert Hambourger, "Need Miracles Be Extraordinary?" He says, "... laws of nature should be understood... as principles that govern the operation of nature, not as ones determining what will happen in cases of supernatural intervention" (p. 445n).