What happens if we take these features and combine them in a social animal?
Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)
Lifetime that spanned the reign of Charles I, The English Civil War, Oliver Cromwell, and the Restoration of the Monarchy under Charles II
Entered Oxford at 14, graduated when he was 19, got a job as a tutor to the Earl of Devonshire, William Cavendish. This association allowed him to travel extensively and meet many influential thinkers of the day.
In 1629 he travels to Europe and finds Euclid’s Elements of Geometry.
He reads one of the proofs and is astounded; has a “eureka” experience
Recognizes the power of deductive methodology
In 1636 he reads and meets Galileo and becomes intrigued with Galileo’s law of inertia and believes that the laws of motion apply to the political world as well as the physical/mechanical world
Begins to write a series of moral/political books, including The Elements of Law (1640), and De Cive (1642) in which he recast the study of physical nature, human nature and society.
For Hobbes, science = sapience, which is certain knowledge
The science which becomes our model is geometry
Let’s look at Hobbes’ geometric politics
Bodies in Motion
1. The world is in flux; i.e., things change and move; two types of movement:
“There be in animals, two sorts of motions peculiar to them: one called vital; begun in generation, and continued without interruption through their whole life; such as are the course of the blood, the pulse, the breathing, the concoction, nutrition, excretion, etc., to which motions there needs no help of imagination…”
“the other is animal motion, otherwise called voluntary motion; as to go, to speak, to move any of our limbs, in such manner as is first fancied in our minds…” (Chap, VI)
If we look at voluntary motion, what motivates us to move? In other words, why do we engage in any of these voluntary acts?
. Some reason exists to explain voluntary motion; something motivates us to move:
“And because going, speaking, and the like voluntary motions, depend always upon a precedent thought of whither, which way, and what; it is evident, that the imagination is the first internal beginning of all voluntary motion…”
3. Some reason exists to prompt the imagination: DESIRE
“These small beginnings of motion, within the body of man, before they appear in walking, speaking, striking, and other visible actions, are commonly called ENDEAVOR…”
“This endeavor, when it is toward something which causes it, is called APPETITE, or DESIRE…”
In other words, desire means some things exist which are good:
“But whatsoever is the object of any man’s appetite or desire, that is it which he for his part calleth good; and the object of his hate and aversion, evil; and of his contempt, vile and inconsiderable”
What is missing in his definition here?
He’s not specifying the things which are good or evil
In other words, he’s not saying that we all will or can agree on what is good or evil
He is saying that every animal and every person has some conception of things it wants
In other words:
Good: things that are desirable
Evil: things that are undesirable
Contemptible: indifferent
All of these are relational and selfishly (self-referentially) defined
Each of us decides on our own what is good, evil, and contemptible
4. If we have desires, then that which allows us to reach those desires is what we call Power.
“The POWER of a man, to take it universally, is his present means, to obtain some future apparent good; and is either original or instrumental” (Chap. X).
We can’t fulfill our desires simply by wishing for them
More power is better than less power
Felicity:
“Continual success in obtaining those things which a man from time to time desireth, that is to say, continual prospering, is that men call FELICITY” (Chap. VI).
Note it is continual success in fulfilling our desires
Temporally extended (the desires exist through time)
Means both that we will continue to desire things and that we will continue to need the means to achieve those desires
We keep desiring things because life exists through time, but…
“[t]here is no such thing as perpetual tranquillity of mind, while we live here; because life is but motion, and can never be without desire, nor without fear, no more than without sense”
In other words happiness, felicity, once achieved is not permanent, but an ongoing process:
Felicity “consisteth not in the repose of a mind satisifed. For there is no such finis ultimus, utmost aim, nor summum bonum, greatest good, as is spoken of in the books of the old moral philosophers. Nor can a man any more live, whose desires are at an end, than he whose sense and imaginations are at a stand” (Chapter XI)
Need to secure means for future happiness and fulfilling future desires
“[T]he object of man’s desire, is not to enjoy once only, and for one instant of time; but to assure for ever, the way of his future desire”
“And therefore the voluntary actions, and inclinations of all men, tend, not only to the procuring, but also to the assuring of a contented life; and differ only in the way: which ariseth partly from the diversity of passions, in divers men; and partly from the difference of the knowledge, or opinion each one has of the causes, which produce the effect desired”
5. Power is a universal drive:
“So that in the first place, I put for a general inclination of all mankind, a perpetual and restless desire for power after power, that ceaseth only in death…”
Why?
“And the cause of this, is not always that a man hopes for a more intensive delight, than he has already attained to; or that he cannot be content with a moderate power: but because he cannot assure the power and means to live well, which he hath present, without the acquisition of more”
In other words, because of the motion and flux of the universe – things change – we need to seek power continually, not necessarily because we want to improve our lot but rather simply to secure what we already have
No one wants to regress
This is no major difficulty if we all lived a Robinson Crusoe-esque solitary existence
What happens if we take these features and
combine them in a social animal?
6. People live near each other such that each of our activities influence those of our neighbors
7. People are by nature equal
“Nature hath made men so equal, in the faculties of the body, and mind; as that though there be found one man sometimes manifestly stronger in body, or of quicker mind than another; yet when all is reckoned together, the difference between man, and man, is not so considerable, as that one man can thereupon claim to himself any benefit, to which another may not pretend, as well as he.”
“For as to strength of body, the weakest has strength enough to kill the strongest, either by secret machination, or by confederacy with others, that are in the same danger with himself” (Chapter XIII).
In other words, we are all equally a threat to each other
What inferences, then, can we make from the preceding?
Let’s take individuals constituted the way we have described and imagine what sort of social relations they would have if left to their own devices (that is, in the absence of political authority).
First condition of the state of nature is scarcity
Not enough of the good things to go around
“From this equality of ability, ariseth equality of hope in the attaining of our ends…”
“And therefore if any two men desire the same thing, which nevertheless they cannot both enjoy, they become enemies; and in the way to their end, which is principally their own conservation, and sometimes their delectation only, endeavour to destroy, or subdue one another”
In other words, the scarcity creates competition since
If we recognize the equality between two people then
A necessary condition of either “A” or “B” getting good “X” is preventing the other party from getting that good
Creates feelings of diffidence (chapter 6)
Rise of pre-emptive strikes
Leads to a “war of each against all”
Where “war” consists:
“not in battle only, or the act of fighting; but in a tract of time, wherein the will to contend by battle is sufficiently known: and therefore the notion of time, is to be considered in the nature of war… so the nature of war consisteth not in actual fighting; but in the known disposition thereto, during all the time there is no assurance to the contrary” (chapter 13).
Consequences?
In the state of nature, then:
“In such condition, there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no instruments of moving, and removing, such things as require much force; no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; no arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death…
and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”
Our Experiment Begins
