Abstract

There are basically two views about Hume on explanation. One is that Hume was the first methodological monist, that is, the first to believe that subsuming events under covering laws was the proper method for every scientific or simply rigorous empirical enquiry. A second view has it that Hume adopted two approaches to explanation. On the one hand, he is said to apply the covering-law approach in the context of natural philosophy and, on the other hand, he is said to defend a Verstehen or quasi hermeneutical method in moral philosophy.