I have a tendency to be a “get to the point” kind of person, getting impatient with a process I perceive as arduous or too long. The first few chapters of Leviathan were a challenge for me. Why the need to start at such a basic level if you’re ramping up to proposing a new way of people being in society together? Hobbes answers that question well in Chapter 5 saying, “For there can be no certainty of the last Conclusion, without a certainty of all those Affirmations and Negations, on which it was grounded, and inferred” (p. 27).
With this guidance, I wanted to understand how Hobbes presents the State of Nature and humanity. For Hobbes, humans are reducible to the kinetics of matter and sense. We are objects with sensing organs which produce an outward reaction to external stimulation. From here, Hobbes develops his conception of “the mind” one might say, which includes sense, imagination, memory, dreams, and ultimately understanding, a type of imagination that is prompted “by words, or other voluntary signes” (p. 16). One’s memories of the past and observations of the present yield prudence, or wise foresight in what may come to pass. By definition, man is a thinking creature, “There is no other act of mans mind, that I can remember, naturally planted in him, so, as to need no other thing, to the exercise of it, but to be born a man, and live with the use of his five Senses” (p. 19).
Are humans only the mechanics of matter and reducible into these small parts? Is there a more innate essence of each of us that is more than the simple, base definition Hobbes suggests? It’s a question I asked myself throughout the readings.
Each person uses their own senses in unique ways to perceive the world. “But no one mans Reason, nor the Reason of any one number of man makes the certaintie” (p. 26). For Hobbes, nature cannot provide a basis of truth because nature can’t be known purely, but is perceived through one’s own senses. And here we begin to see Hobbes explain why an Arbitrator is needed. “And therfore, as when there is a controversy in an account, the parties must by their own accord, set up for right Reason, the Reason of some Arbitrator, or Judge, whose sentence they both will stand” (p. 26). Hobbes criticizes previous philosophies because they don’t adequately define terms so as to prove the final conclusion. Even as he suggests definitions for terms, in Chapters 5 and 6, this discussion of the Arbitrator suggests that the Arbitrator can define terms because all have agreed to consent to the Arbitrator and after consent, cannot be disputed.
The “general inclination of all mankind [is] a perpetuall and restlesse desire of Power after power, that ceaseth onely in Death” (p. 55). And inasmuch as humans seek power relentlessly, according to Hobbes, this also produces a fear of others which are in constant ebb and flow with the desire for power. And so, the state of nature is perpetual war, chaos, violence, fear, and death. This state of nature, according to Hobbes, necessitates the giving up of some liberties for the guarantee of peace and the agreement of a social contract. This contract of unity becomes an artificial person, a Leviathan, which provides peace for those party to the contract.
My questions reflecting on the first 16 chapters, the basis of Hobbes proposal of the social contract are twofold. First, is his description of the state of nature correct? Is violence the natural inclination and outflowing of our struggle for power? And second, if this is the case, can the Arbitrator or Sovereign be trusted with power while the rest “lay down [their] right to all things” (p.73)?
Many scholars of child development today talk about violence as a learned behavior. In my work with vulnerable children, a primary focus is strengthening the network around the child and equipping people in this network to nurture the child. Exposure to violence teaches children that violence is normal, Martin Luther King Jr. said it best, “violence begets violence.” It doesn’t bear out in social science (which Hobbes may have started as a field of study) that humans, without socialization, are violent and selfish. For survival, some interdependence is needed and is possible without being enforced by the Sovereign. I don’t think that I agree with the total chaos and violence in the State of Nature as Hobbes describes, and while patting himself on the back for thinking things through thoroughly, I think he makes some leaps of logic and assumptions to get to this definition.
But, if Hobbes descriptions of the State of Nature is true, why would submitting to a sovereign be the solution to being free from the State of Nature? If it’s true that in our nature, we would freely kill someone to achieve our own ends, and the Sovereign is a person who, according to Hobbes, cannot be questioned, then the Sovereign is not someone who can provide us guarantee of safety and property. The Sovereign will simply do as is human nature and use the monopoly of power given to him to rob and murder to achieve his ends. Because we have consented to give up our power to the Sovereign, there is no way to check this power and take it back. Are we to rely on the grace of the Sovereign and trust them to do what is just? Is it possible for a Sovereign to act justly in accordance with the contract, in light of the fact that the Sovereign is a human with the same base nature as us all? Does this necessitate a countervailing balance to check his power in order to be effective? Or is there more mutual benefit and reciprocity within human nature that enables a Sovereign to rule justly, or for humans to interact justly without an enforcement mechanism?
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