Mind, New Series, Vol. 70, No.

280
(Oct., 1961), pp. 540-543
DRAY ON HISTORICAL EXPLANATION
Robert C. Stover
IN his critical notice (MIND, April 1959) of William Dray's recent
book, Laws and Explanation in History, P. F. Strawson gently takes
the author to task for stopping short "'at crucial points in his own
positive account " of historical explanation, for his being " willing
rather to leave us with a mystery than to uncover grains of truth in
the disputed thesis," i.e. the " covering law theory ". With this
criticism I fully concur. Strawson's subsequent remarks, however,
only partially uncover those " grains of truth " and tend to sustain
rather than to clear up some of the mystery of historical explanation.
The particular mystery I have in mind is the sort of evidence
which guides the historian's judgment when he is trying to ascertain
why an event happened. Suppose that we agree with Strawson that
such judgments are not typically assertions of necessary connection,
i.e. that the historian does not typically assert that between the
event and the circumstances cited to explain it there was a neces-
sary connection. Instead, we agree that the historian's typical claim
is that the event was probable in view of such and such conditions;
that, in Strawson's words, " it is entirely natural that it should have
happened as it did " (p. 267). Suppose we further agree with Straw-
son, as against Dray, that " analogies with other cases " and " tru-
isms about human behaviour " are " at work in guiding the selection
of facts and their arrangement into explanations which satisfy the
judgment " (p. 267). The mystery remains as to how such analogies
and truisms guide the historian. What sort of evidence instructs
the historian as to whether and how these analogies and truisms are
to be applied ?
The " covering law " logicians do have an answer to this question
as to the sort of evidence capable of supporting a claim that " it is
entirely natural " that an event " happened as it did " because of
such and such conditions. This evidence takes the form of correla-
tions between kinds of properties, events, etc., which are " independ-
ently established "(p. 265). It is on the basis of statements in support
of just this view that Gardiner is identified by Dray as holding the
" covering law theory ". Dray is certainly correct in maintaining
that proponents of this theory have never made explicit exactly what
sorts of covering laws were appropriate and exactly what the logic of
their employment is. Indeed, in his view, a characteristic careless-
ness about such details compromises the theory. But is it not rather
the case that for supporters of the theory, these details are relatively
secondary considerations, secondary in the sense that taking note of
them would not affect the status of the essentials of the theory ?
For example, this seems to be Ernest Nagel's position in the following
passages from his paper, " Some Issues in the Logic of Historical
Analysis ", where he is speaking of " the general pattern of explana-
tions in historical inquiry ". He writes:
The explanatory premises in history, as in the natural sciences,
include a number of implicitly assumed laws, as well as many
540
 DRAY ON HISTORICAL EXPLANATION 541
exlicitly (though usually incompletely)formulatedsingularstatements
of initial conditions. The tacitly assumedlaws may be of various kinds.
They may be statements of regularitieswell attested in some special
science, or they may be uncodified assumptions taken from common
experience; they may be universal statements of invariable con-
comitance, or they may be statistical in form; they may assert a
uniformity in temporal sequence, or they may assert some relation
of co-existent dependence.
Doubtless the basic trouble in this area of inquiry is that we do not
possess at present a generally accepted, explicitly formulated, and
fully comprehensive scheme for weighing the evidence for any arbi-
trarily given hypothesis so that thelogicalworthof alternateconclusions
relative to the evidence available for each can be compared...
Fortunately, though the range of possible disagreement concerning
the force of evidence for a given statement is theoretically limitless,
there is substantial agreement among men experienced in relevant
matters on the relative probabilities to be assigned to many hypo-
theses. Such agreement indicates that, despite the absence of an ex-
plicitlyformulatedlogic, many unformulatedhabits of thought embody
factually warrantableprinciples of inference.1
What is Dray's own answer to the question raised above ? As
Strawson observes (p. 266), Dray encourages us to think " that
generality has no place in particular historical explanation ". Ac-
cording to him, no independently established correlations need be
tacitly assumed. How does the historian judge concerning causes ?
The process is shrouded in mystery. Strawson, on the other hand,
contends that analogies and truisms, general knowledge of human
nature and public affairs, guide the historian's judgment. But even
his very brief remarks are misleading and their inadequacies under-
score those of Dray's account.
In terms of the " covering law theory ", as remarked above, the
historian's explanation remains unsupported unless he can invoke
independently established correlations between kinds of properties
or combinations of properties. Strawson speaks of analogies and
truisms as guiding the historian. But in approving Dray's critique
of " covering law theory ", Strawson pointedly remarks that the
historian's explanation could not be established " independently of
the particular case concerned ". To think otherwise is " absurd "
(p. 266). Here, indeed, is the crux of the matter. Just as Strawson
asks Drayhow the historian can judge without anyrecourse to general-
izations, so one is inclined to ask Strawson how the historian can
defend his use of these generalizations (the analogies, truisms or
general knowledge of whatever sort) by reference to the particular
case. Here too is a mystery.
I suggest taking the covering law stress on independently esta-
blished correlations more seriously. Nagel's careful statement about
" unformulated habits of thought " on the part of the historian has
1 In P. Gardiner,Theoriesof History (Glencoe,LI., 1959), pp. 376 and
385.
542 R. a. STOVER:

the virtue of locating these processeswhich resist logical formulation

within a clearly formulated logical pattern. How the historian
weighsthe evidenceremainsunformulated. But we can at least say
that the indispensablewarrant for his judgment is independently
establishedgeneralcorrelationsof some sort.
The failure to preserve this grain of truth in the " covering law
theory " seems to be due to certain undeniableconsiderationsthat
Dray properlyemphasizes. Thehistorianrarely,ifever,findsgeneral-
izationsready at handunderwhichhe can directlysubsumethe event
to be explained. (To explain the French Revolution is not to apply
to it a theory or law of revolutions in general.) He cannot even
readilysubsumethe event undera combinationof such alreadyverified
generalizations. (Dray discusses this in connection with what he
calls the complex version of the " covering law theory ".) Accord-
ingly, when the historian's explanation is formulated as a general
statement, such a statement is highly specific and it seems odd to
think of such a generalizationas independentlyestablishedwhen it
so obviously originatedin an effort to explain one very particular
event. Still perhapsan oddity is preferableto a mystery.
It is at least interesting to try to describe what is involved in
historical judgments of this sort on the assumption that the only
warrantfor them takes the form of independentlyestablishedgeneral
correlations. Let us imagine how one of those odd, highly specific
generalizationscomesabout. The historianhas to workout a general
law coveringthe specificationsof the event he is explaining. Every
aspect of the event which he explains he explains by means of a
judgmentbased on familiaritywith the occurrenceof such properties
in other event-situations. Failing even one other totally similar
event, he looks about for some events similarin some respects, other
events similarin other respects. By means of a processof composite
comparisonhe may reach a stage of inquiry at which he considersit
warrai nted to assert what some or all of the conditions were which
made the occurrence of the event in question " natural ", even
though all of the relevant propertiesof that event are not found in
any of the events utilized in his comparisons.
The resultant explanation, that C1, C2, C3 . .. ., were the deter-
mining factors of the occurrenceof E, is, in principle,supportedby
an exceedinglycomplexlaw, and, ideally,for every componentof this
law, the historiancould cite supportingevidencein the form of signi-
ficantly similar occurrences. Obviously, since he has to construct
a law himself utilizing these data as evidence if he is to offer a
warrantedexplanationin the first place, it will be necessaryfor him,
in defendinghis conclusions,to producethe argumentby which he
concludedthat the evidence supports his explanation. If he is un-
able to convinceus that occurrenceshave taken place which do have
evidential value for purposesof this inquiry, then his proposed ex-
planationis deemed unwarranted. It is a candidate of the sort we
were looking for when we asked " Why did E occur? ", but a candi-
date without warrantingcredentials.
 DRAY ON HISTORICAL EXPLANATION 543
The complexsupportinglaw which is at least implicitin the histor-
ian's reasoning,I shall call a coveringlaw. It shouldnot be confused
with workinggeneralizationsconcerningspecific factors in the situ-
ation underscrutiny. These are often loose and porous,as Gardiner
remindsus, and have to be refinedin the courseof historicalinvesti-
gation and explanation.
Dray insists upon " the peculiarities of the historian's typical
problem-the weighing of a set of miscellaneous'factors', which
cannot be reducedto deductionfrom generallaws .. ." .1 What is
the weighingoperationreally ? It consists, I submit, in considering
whether a certain circumstancewas a necessary condition of the
occurrence of an event. But particular circumstances or facts,
viewed in splendid isolation from any comparablecircumstancesor
facts, reveal nothing at all as to their weight. The expert historian,
like the expert weight-guesserin the circusside-show,can arriveat a
warrantedconclusionconcerning" weight " only by gauging accord-
ing to generalrules or laws. The same considerationsapply to the
utilization of analogies and truisms. If the historian is not sure
which generalknowledgeto apply or how to do so, he must weigh the
alternativesaccordingto generalizationsfrom past experience. The
actual " weighing" is or involves deduction. To say that historical
judgment as a process of weighing " cannot be reduced to deduc-
tion " can only mean that the historianhas often to developor refine
the generalizations(by inductive techniques, however informal the
process) which he uses in weighing. This latter proceduremay be
a peculiarity of the " historian's typical problem" (a questionable
supposition)but does it involve a deviationfromthe logic of explana-
tions as schematizedby tlte covering law logicians? Does it con-
stitute as Dray indicates, reasoningof a differentkind ? It would
seem misleadingto say so.
I would simply urge,in conclusion,that one need not make a fetish
of the unity of science in orderto appreciatethe considerablemerits
of the coveringlaw analysis of historicalexplanations. In stressing
these merits I do not mean to pass a blanket negative judgment on
Dray's book. It remains,in my opinion, an outstandingcontempo-
rary contributionto the philosophyof history.
ROBERT C. STOVER
VassarCollege
1 Laws and Exp}lanationin History (London, 1957), p. 56.