more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
For contingent, men do not mean that which hath no cause, but that which hath not for cause any thing that we perceive, as when a traveller meets a shower, they both had sufficient causes, but they didn't cause one another, so we say it was contingent.
Gist of Idea
'Contingent' means that the cause is unperceived, not that there is no cause
Source
Thomas Hobbes (Of Liberty and Necessity [1654], §95)
Book Ref
'British Moralists 1650-1800 Vol. 1', ed/tr. Raphael,D.D. [Hackett 1991], p.65
A Reaction
Contingent nowadays means 'might not have happened', or 'does not happen in all possible worlds'. Personally I share Hobbes' doubts about the concept of contingency, and this is quite a good account of the misunderstanding.
| 6215 | 'Contingent' means that the cause is unperceived, not that there is no cause [Hobbes] |
| 4299 | Contingency is an illusion, resulting from our inadequate understanding [Spinoza, by Cottingham] |
| 4824 | We only call things 'contingent' in relation to the imperfection of our knowledge [Spinoza] |
| 4839 | Reason naturally regards things as necessary, and only imagination considers them contingent [Spinoza] |
| 5040 | Necessary truths can be analysed into original truths; contingent truths are infinitely analysable [Leibniz] |
| 4307 | A reason must be given why contingent beings should exist rather than not exist [Leibniz] |
| 21533 | Contingency arises from tensed verbs changing the propositions to which they refer [Russell] |
| 17693 | The necessary/contingent distinction may need to recognise possibilities as real [Armstrong] |
| 14895 | 'Superficial' contingency: false in some world; 'Deep' contingency: no obvious verification [Evans, by Macią/Garcia-Carpentiro] |
| 19660 | Possible non-being which must be realised is 'precariousness'; absolute contingency might never not-be [Meillassoux] |