Hobbes' Leviathan and the State of Nature

Hobbes' Leviathan and the State of Nature

• Hobbes' Goal: Argue for absolute government power as necessary for legitimate rule.

• Need for a State: Absence of a state leads to a lack of moral obligation, harming well-being.

The State of Nature

• Concept: A philosophical tool, imagining humans outside civil society, not a historical reality.

• Key Characteristics:

  • Relative equality in strength and ability.
  • Absence of stable rules.
  • Equality of hope in achieving goals, leading to competition (diffidence).
  • Scarcity of resources fueling conflict.
  • Enmity and war arising from competition and the pursuit of security and glory.
  • Lack of industry, welfare, culture, and constant threat of violence.
  • No inherent morality.
  • "Homo homini lupus" (man is a wolf to man).
  • Solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short life.

• Hobbes' View: Understand the state of nature by observing "savages," particularly non-European people.

Leaving the State of Nature

• Motivation: Ongoing struggle due to equality; solution is a powerful entity (Leviathan) that no one can defeat.
• Social Contract: Agreement to surrender the right to everything to the Leviathan in exchange for security.
• Moral Obligation: Conditional for self-preservation; moral behavior is rational when the state enforces it.

Human Nature and Rationality

• Instrumental Rationality: Human beings are self-interested, aiming for personal well-being, not altruism.
• Morality in Civil Society: Morality is rational only within a state; it's irrational in a state of nature.
• Conditional Morality: Morality depends on others' compliance; a state is needed to ensure this compliance.

Laws of Nature

• Guidance for Peaceful Existence: Conditional guidelines for cooperation because they depend on others' trust.
• Enforcement: Requires coercive power of a state.
• First Law: Seek peace; use force when necessary for survival.
• Second Law: Be willing to surrender freedom, when others do so too, for peace.

Problems with Hobbes' Philosophy

• Catharine Macaulay's Critique: Challenges Hobbes' view of human nature as inherently selfish.

  • Macaulay argues Hobbes contradicts himself by claiming both that humans are naturally for society but morality is conditional.

• Self-Contradiction:

  • Hobbes' laws of nature (right reason), imply humans are rational and naturally moral, yet he posits they only act morally conditionally.
  • This contradicts the existence of a state of nature because if everyone is rational they would cooperate and therefore there would be no need for a state of nature.

• Hobbes' Reply: Infants lack reason, so initially they aren't moral. Macaulay counters this, suggesting reason can be developed. Hobbes maintains conditions to moral behavior are necessary because individuals are not always rational.