Philosophy

According to David Hume, liberty is a power of acting or not acting, according to the determinations of the will (Hume, 1955). In the same vein, he defines necessity as the the uniformity, observable in the operations of nature where similar objects are constantly conjoined together (Hume, 1955).  In his opinion, the two are intertwined. Hume believes that the two concepts are compatible with each other. Also, apart from their compatibility, the concept of liberty cannot be understood without necessity. This essentially makes Hume a compatabilist because of his idea that freedom and determinism are attuned.  Explicating this further, David Hume is of the view that people claim that there is no necessity in human freewill because they focus on only cause and events rather while they fail to see the role of motives and volition in human actions. Another reason he gave in favor of why people think that human actions are caused is that human beings do not seem to notice that their will could have gone the other way.  Thus, motives and volitions account for why humans act. It should be noted that Hume rejected the possibility of a chance event. According to him, chance is not universally allowed to exist.

Furthermore, Hume argues that a miracle is a violation of the laws of nature. Firm and unalterable experience has established these laws. A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence. Therefore, a uniform experience amounts to a proof there is here a direct and full proof, from the nature of the fact, against the existence of any miracle. According to Hume, nothing is beyond the natural universe. Consequently it would be wrong to assert the existence of universal laws and at the same time claim that there are miracles of divine intervention. According to him, miracles are more like testimonies and are believed more in countries that are less civilized. Apart from this, he believes that people can lie about miracles and so should not be taken as an ultimate account. He concluded that nothing then, comes to pass in nature in contravention to her universal laws.