Can reason alone push us to act?

David Hume

Can reason alone push us to act?

Imagine you're deciding whether to donate to charity. You know it's good and rational to help others, but you don't feel compelled to give.

Hume suggests that our actions are driven more by emotions than cold logic. Even though you think donating is rational, it's your feelings that ultimately push you to act.

Example

You see a homeless person on the street, feel sympathy, and decide to donate money.

Remember this

Reason alone isn't enough to motivate moral actions; our passions play a crucial role.

Text adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Related concepts

Immanuel Kant

Kant separates duty from inclination to determine moral worth

Is–ought problem

Hume's guillotine: ethical conclusions can't follow from facts alone

Human nature

Can we really know what makes us human?

Axiological ethics

Max Scheler's material value ethics opposed Kant's purely formal ethics

Principle of sufficient reason

Every contingent fact has a sufficient reason

Emmanuel Levinas

Levinas argues that ethics precedes knowledge

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