CLASSICAL AND LIBERAL

THEORIES ON HUMAN NATURE

HOBBES, ROUSSEAU, LOCKE

 THEME: STATE OF NATURE

 The state of nature become the

basis or foundation of any theory of
ethics and political philosophy
 The state of nature pertains to the
universal features of the human
being when stripped of all the
attributes granted through social
conventions.
 Hobbes, Locke & Rousseau would
essentially differ with one another
on this account.
 THOMAS HOBBES (1588–1679)

 Hobbes’ main concern is the problem of social and political order:

how human beings can live together in peace and avoid the
danger and fear of civil conflict.
 Dealing with this problem his vision of the world is strikingly original
and still relevant to contemporary politics.
 In philosophy, he defended a range of materialist, nominalist, and
empiricist views against Cartesian and Aristotelian alternatives.
 In physics, his work was influential on Leibniz, and led him into
disputes with Boyle and the experimentalists of the early Royal
Society.
 … THOMAS HOBBES (1588–1679)

 Thomas Hobbes was born in Malmesbury, Wiltshire, England, on 5

April 1588.
 His birth was occasioned by the approach of the Spanish Armada.
His mother panicked and prematurely gave birth to little Thomas.
 “Fear and I were born twins.”
 His father, a clergyman, left the family in 1604 and never returned,
so a wealthy uncle sponsored Hobbes' education at Oxford
University.
 He lived through the era of political revolutions and civil war.
 … THOMAS HOBBES (1588–1679)

Became a tutor to William Cavendish – who will be the

grandfather of Henry Cavendish (1731-1810), the chemist who
discovered the “inflammable air” – Hydrogen
 In 1640’s Hobbes fled to Paris as England was in civil war.
 Hobbes was widely traveled; directly or indirectly connected
with some great men in science: Galileo, Descartes, Gassendi,
Bacon, Harvey)
 He’s often regarded as a brilliant but somewhat unorthodox
and controversial intellectual.
 Works

 De Cive (1642) - Hobbes’s first published book of political

philosophy
 Leviathan (1651)

 These two works sufficiently provide the essentials of ideas

and system of Hobbes.
 Ethics and Politics

 Ethics and Politics are closely linked with each other in

Hobbes ideas
 If distinguished, each one has its specific concern:
o ETHICS - is concerned with human nature,
o POLITICAL philosophy - deals with what happens when
human beings interact.

 Nature & Human Nature

 Hobbes’ view of human nature is materialist and mechanistic.

 The human body is like a machine, programmed to pursue its self-
interest. Nature, in general, simply consists of bodies in motion.
 The universe is one interconnected “macroclock”, humans and
animals are “microclocks.”
 Being also an empiricist, he claims that our ideas come directly or
indirectly from sensations.
 Denied the notion of the soul and spiritual forces.
 Thus, his book, the Leviathan, and his ideas were repugnant to his
generation and the succeeding generations.
 Nature & Human Nature

 Consciousness and feelings are fance, impressions produced

by motions in the machine.
 Mental states are reduced to brain states, physical states.
 Being a materialist, he believes that all reality except God is
material. God alone is spirit.
 Hobbes is also a determinist. Since there is only matter in
motion, the notion of freedom is incoherent.
 Human Nature: egoist

 According to Hobbes, it is in our nature to be selfish.

 Hobbes gave alms to the beggar not because he cares to him
but in order that Hobbes would feel better to see the beggar is
not distressed.
 Human beings always act out of perceived self-interest; they
invariably seek gratification and avoid harm.
 By nature, in pursuing their self-interests they have no qualms
hurting others, or even killing them.
 Humans are basically equal in physical and mental abilities; each
one has the ability to harm and kill the other, if not alone, then in
connivance with others.
 Morality in the state of nature

 Humans are equal in terms of (1) ability to harm and (2) the
desire to satisfy their goals. These lead to unstable state:
o If two or more people desire the same thing, they become
enemies in trying to obtain the thing.
 Hobbes said that:
o If someone has a good crop, others will come prepared
with forces united, to dispossess and deprive him not only of
the fruit of his labor, but also of his life or liberty. And the
invader himself will also be in danger from another.
 State of nature: Bellum omnium contra omnes

 Given this state of insecurity, people have reason to fear one

another.
 This is state of nature for Hobbes because there are no
enforced laws or moral rules; one cannot expect the others to
behave in that respects the rights of others. They will follow
their inclinations for self-preservation which would entail taking
the goods of others, even killing them if they resist or pose as a
threat.
 It is the "the war of all against all."
 Hobbes’ Texts

 Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a

common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that
condition which is called war; and such a war, as is for every
man, against every man. For war consists not in battle only or
in the act of fighting; but in a tract of time, wherein the will to
contend in battle is sufficiently known: the therefore the notion
of time, is to be considered in the nature of war; as it is in the
nature of weather. - Leviathan, ch. 13
 Hobbes’ Texts

 In such a condition, there is no place for industry; because

the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no cultivating
of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the comfortable
buildings; 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 art; no literature; 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. – Leviathan, ch. 13
 No justice, nor injustice, etc.

 In this state of nature, notions of right & wrong, justice and

injustice have no place.
 No common power, no law.
 Force and fraud are the two cardinal virtues.
 The social contract: morality and ruler

 Being rational egoists, humans give up some of their liberty and

agree to a social contract or covenant.
 The rules which people are to obey are set and enforced by a
mighty rule, the state, the ‘leviathan.”
 Only within this contract does morality arise and do justice and
injustice come into being.
 Thus, morality is a form of social control.
 Everybody should obey the ruler for if all of them obey the rules
almost all the time, almost all of them will be better off almost all
the time.
 Why do we need morality?

 We need morality because without it existence would be an

unbearable hell in which life is
“solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short”
 So, within the social contract where everyone should surrender
their power, morality & government are necessary for peace,
security, and happiness.
 A Leviathan is an absolute government that protects us from
external as well as from each other to prevent the state of nature.
 Thus, in Hobbes 3 themes come out clearly: a) Humans are selfish
egoist; b) Life is tragic and c) morality and government are
necessary.
 Leviathan
Book I, Chapter 11, “Of the Difference of Manners,”

So that in the first place, I put for a general inclination of all
mankind a perpetual and restless desire of power after power,
that ceaseth only in death. 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 hath present, without the
acquisition of more. . . Competition of riches, honor,
command, or other power inclineth to contention, enmity,
and war, because the way of one competitor to the attaining
of his desire is to kill, subdue, supplant, or repel the other.
 Leviathan
Book I, Chapter 13, “Of the Natural Condition of Mankind as
Concerning their Felicity and Misery”

 Hereby it is manifest that during the time men live without a

common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition
which is called war; and such a war is of every man against every
man . . . 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.
 John Locke (1632—1704)

 Locke is often regarded as the founder of a school of thought

known as British Empiricism.*
 His contribution to the field of epistemology is great and still
reverberates up to this day.
 He made foundational contributions to modern theories of
limited, liberal government.
 He interacted with the great men in science: Boyle, Hooke,
Huygens, Newton, etc. That’s why his theory of knowledge is
influenced by atomism, materialism, also by Descartes’ ideas.
 Life & Works

 John Locke was born in Wrington, England

(1632). Parents were Puritans.
 In 1647 Locke went to Westminster School in
London.
 Then to Christ Church, Oxford, in 1652 at the age
of twenty.
 It was in Oxford the Royal Society would soon
grow to be led by Boyle, Locke’s scientific
mentor.
 Locke pursued medical study.
Locke’s home during childhood
 Life & Works

 An Essay Concerning Human Understanding

(1689) – wrote it while exiled in Holland, published
when he returned to England in 1688.
 Also published Two Treatises of Government (1688)
 The Reasonableness of Christianity
 In 1696 Locke served in the Board Trade (the
board administered the US before the revolution).
After retiring, Locke’s respiratory ailment (asthma)
worsened and he died in 1704.
 View of human nature

 God created man, and in effect he is God’s property

…by his order and about his business, they are his property whose
workmanship they are, made to last during his, not one another’s
pleasure: and being furnished with like faculties, sharing all in one
community of nature, there cannot be supposed any subordination
among us, that may authorize us to destroy one another, as if we
were made for one another’s uses, as the inferior ranks of creatures
are for our’s. (Treatises> II,2,6)
 “he has no liberty to destroy himself, or so much as any creature in his
possession, yet when some nobler use than its bare possession calls for it”
 View of human nature

 We are a property of God; but we also have ownership of

ourselves.
 However, God’s ownership of us is greater than our ownership
of ourselves.
 God’s creative act is greater than our own. It is greater
because He creates ex nihilo, whereas we work on existing
materials.
 The notion of property is a central idea in Locke.
 View of human nature

 He envisioned the end of the war in England.

There are moral restrictions on behaviour in the state of
nature.
He believed that every person possessed a collection of
natural rights (granted by God) which were recognized by all.
Right to life, right to liberty, right to property
People should respect these rights.
 State of nature & Locke’s Golden rule

 The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which

obliges everyone: and reason which is that law, teaches all
mankind who will but consult it, that being all equal and
independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health,
liberty or possessions…. (Treatises II.2.6)
 Thus, natural rights are negative rights.
 The law of nature is revealed by reason.
 But this law of nature can be violated inasmuch as, in the
state of nature, there’s no police, no rules, no gov’t., etc.
 The law of nature vs the state of war

 In the state of war, person who intends to take life of another

is the unjust aggressor.
 This is not the normal relationship between people enjoined
by the law of nature
 The law of nature obliges everyone to follow the golden rule.
 In Locke’s theory of war, there will always be an innocent
victim on one side and an unjust aggressor on the other.

 Rights of citizen and the state

 State is formed on the basis of the contract

 Democracy rather than monarchy – by the will of the majority, and
separation of power
 The state’s authority is limited by natural rights.
 The citizen can disobey the state if it violates natural rights.
 They have right to defend their rights, and to punish those who
would violate them.
 Minimum government
 “Classical Liberalism”
 Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712—1778)

 Jean-Jacques Rousseau was born in the independent

Calvinist city-state of Geneva in 1712.
 was raised and educated by his father until the age of ten.
 At 16 he left his place and later came under the influence of
Catholic woman, Mme de Warens. Converted to Catholicism
in 1728, in Turin.
 In 1742 he devised a plan for a new numerically-based
system of musical notation and presented it to the Academy
of the Sciences.
 At 20, he was in Paris, and met some prominent philosophers,
including Voltaire and Diderot.
 Married Therese Lavasseur. Had 5 children, all of whom he
turned over to foundling homes.
 It is an unfortunate fact in his life considering that he wrote
Emile, the most revolutionary treatise on childraising or
education in general.
 In 1750 his philosophical and writing career got the attention
of the intellectual circles. (He won the essay writing contest of
the Academy of Dijon)
 Emile was outlawed for its explicit rejection of original sin, a
central doctrine of Christian theology, both Catholic and
Protestant.
In 1762, the French king Louis XV banned Rousseau’s books
and issued a warrant for his arrest. From Switzerland, he fled to
England, received by David Hume.
 Apparently became paranoid, accused Hume of plotting
against him.
 He returned to Parish, where he died in poverty in 1778.
 Works

A Discourse on the Sciences and Arts, his first major

philosophical work, was the winning response to an essay
contest conducted by the Academy of Dijon in 1750.
‘whether the restoration of the sciences and the arts has
contributed to the purification of morals’.
o In this work, Rousseau argues that the progression of the
sciences and arts has caused the corruption of virtue and
morality. This discourse won Rousseau fame and
recognition, and it laid much of the philosophical
groundwork for a second, longer work.
 Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712—1778)

The Discourse on the Origin of Inequality (1755)

o Like the first, it was widely read and further solidified
Rousseau’s place as a significant intellectual figure. The
central claim of the work is that human beings are basically
good by nature, but were corrupted by the complex
historical events that resulted in present day civil society.
o Unlike the first, this 2nd essay failed to win the contest.
o “That men are actually wicked, a sad and continual
experience of them proves beyond doubt: but, all the
same, I think I have shown that man is naturally good.”
 “What then can have depraved him to such an extent, except
the changes that have happened in his constitution, the
advances he has made, and the knowledge he has acquired?
We may admire human society as much as we please; it will be
none the less true that it necessarily leads men to hate each
other in proportion as their interests clash, and to do one
another apparent services, while they are really doing every
imaginable mischief. What can be thought of a relation, in
which the interest of every individual dictates rules directly
opposite to those the public reason dictates to the community in
general—in which every man finds his profit in the misfortunes of
his neighbor?”
 Works
 Emile (1762)
o a work on the philosophy of education
 The Social Contract (1762)
o his major work on political philosophy
o These works caused great controversy in France and were
immediately banned by Paris authorities.
o Rousseau fled France and settled in Switzerland, but he
continued to find difficulties with authorities and quarrel
with friends. The end of Rousseau’s life was marked in large
part by his growing paranoia and his continued attempts
to justify his life and his work.
‘Man is a naturally good creature’

 The fundamental principle of all morality/moral philosophy

[toute morale], one on which I have reasoned in all my
writings…is that man is a being who is naturally good and
who loves justice and order; that there is no original
perversity in the human heart and that the first movements
of nature are always right…I have shown that all the vices
that are imputed to the human heart are not natural to it;…
(Letter to de Beaumont)
Jean-Jacques Rousseau on Human nature & the
State
Human nature is basically good.
State of nature is a utopian condition; people are self-
sufficient, they walk freely over the face of the earth; can
stay and sleep anywhere without fear; can pick any fruit as
much as they need.
Minimal effort to meet their subsistence needs
Strife and conflict are nearly non-existent
Life is wonderful
From state of nature to inequalities

But due to unequal ownership of land (or nature’s goods)

bad things come up: grid and corruption, evil, domination,
etc.
Evil thoughts, feelings, and deeds are produced by society.
Society teaches us to use others, to be against each other,
to calculate our own interests against theirs, to forget
compassion, and to act selfishly instead of altruistically.
 Then comes the inequalities over property rights, which in
turn leads to violence and suffering, eventually to
relationship of master & slave.
This is against the natural law and so must not be allowed.
The state and the Social Contract

 To escape this situation and restore old order, a state is

established on the basis of a social contract.
 “Man is born free but is everywhere in chains.”
 This describes man’s development from state of nature to being
civilized.
 The social contract is a means of “giving the law to ourselves.”
 Constraints on the acquisition of property:
1) The land may not be occupied by anyone; 2) one may not take more than
one need to subsist, 3) one may take possession of it, not be staking a claim
but by “working and cultivating it.”
The will of the majority

 The rulers of the truly democratic state are the people themselves.
 The best society, a true democracy is one where each law is voted
on by each one.
 Next to that ideal gov’t is a democracy where the majority rules.
 The will of the majority and general will
 The will of the majority – what each one considers as good for
him/her.
 General will – is the view of the majority about what each member
should want. It is the perspective taken by society when each
member votes for what is in the common interest, not in his or her
individual interest.