What is David Hume's belief about God and Human Morality?

Answer 1

He thinks they shouldn't have much to do with each other.

Hume concealed his theological views, but he probably thought something like this: There has to be something that caused the universe, and it might have something remotely like human intelligence. But it probably doesn't care about us one way or the other. So he believed in some kind of watered-down amoral 'God'. If it helps you understand his view, note that he thought the difference between atheism and theism wasn't very great, and that no one should have much confidence concerning questions about the origin of the universe and the foundation of all reality.

He thought that religions are bad for morality: they make people care about things that don't matter, they make people ignore basic decency and good character, they make people cruel and terrified, they make people lie to themselves and lie to others, and so on. He sometimes talks of "true religion", which is supposed to be good for morality. But true religion is never found anywhere on earth.

Hume's views on morality are very sophisticated, detailed, and wide-ranging.

He argued (following Hutcheson) that moral thinking is fundamentally driven not by reason, but by sentiment: he discusses the moral emotions in depth, explains the workings of sympathy, and gives a sentimentalist account of how we make moral judgments.

He argued that whether we approve of a person's character is largely a matter of whether they have the sort of character that tends to be useful (to others or to the person himself). This is a sort of early, character-focused utilitarianism (though Hume doesn't quite fit: he never gives a calculus of happiness, or any explicit identification of happiness with pleasure). We might also approve of a person's character because it strikes us as immediately appealing (like finding a work of art aesthetically pleasing). He explains all this with his account of the workings of sympathy.

He also argues that the rules of justice (property rights, promising, etc.) are the result of a social convention that has gradually developed due to the advantage everyone gets from it. We end up caring about justice because of sympathy with others, along with various kinds of social pressure. Hume thinks that without a social convention, no one would care about these rules, since they have no direct connection with basic human concerns (friends, family, food, sex). Also, the specific rules used by societies are sometimes arbitrary. (The same story gets applied to governments and sexual norms.)

These are probably the main points.

Answer 2

Well he was one of the few post christian atheists in his time. And he thought people were fickle, irrational, and despicable