Is Hume A Moral Skeptic?

Abstract

The question of whether Hume is a moral skeptic is difficult to answer, since there seems to be no generally accepted account of exactly what is.' Often the notion of skepticism is little more than an abusive label, and at other times it is taken to mean only that one denies knowledge of some fact which most people accept. To say that Hume is a moral skeptic in either of these senses would, of course, be uninteresting because similar charges could be brought against almost any moral theory. The question is whether he is a moral skeptic in a more interesting sense, and what this sense might be. This is the question I want to address here. I will approach this issue by seeing how Hume's moral theory compares to a contemporary standard of moral skepticism. Using J. L. Mackie's analysis of moral skepticism as a point of reference, I will argue that, as a normative theory, Hume's account of morality is not at all skeptical since he is offering a relatively optimistic consequentialist theory of right and wrong action. As a metaethical theory, however, I will argue that Hume is a weak metaethical skeptic insofar as he denies that morality is independent of the existence and character of human beings. He should not be considered a thorough or strong metaethical skeptic, though, since he advances a moral theory which is firmly grounded in human instinct.