Abstract

Section 6, Internalism and the perplexing premise, is a discussion about whether or not Hume ought to have adopted motivational judgment internalism, that is, the view that moral judgments necessarily motivates an agent to perform an action, to some extent, if she believes it is the right one. Though a bit anachronistic, many Hume commentators think so.

Without an internalistic interpretation of 'morals', Hume’s so-called Motivation Argument (T 3.1.1.6) is invalid, they argue. I discuss their claim and try to understand why they hold it. Since internalism is inconsistent with Hume's view of causation, I make an attempt to rescue the validity of the argument by analyzing the internalism claim as a claim about moral judgments as motivating by necessity and by themselves. After subtracting the necessity I arrive at an interpretation of 'morals' as a sentiment of approval of some virtuous action that motivates by itself, under some conditions, but not necessarily so.