Hobbes

“Hobbes and its contribution to modern society”
The 17th Century English philosopher Thomas Hobbes is widely regarded as one of a handful of truly great political philosophers, whose masterwork Leviathan rivals the political writings of Plato, Aristotle, Locke, Rousseau, etc. Hobbes is famous for his elaborate development of what has come to be known as “social contract theory”, the method ofjustifying political principles by appeal to the agreement that would be made among situated rational, free, and equal persons. He is infamous for having used the social contract method to arrive at the conclusion that we should submit to the authority of an absolute, undivided and unlimited, sovereign power. While his methodological innovation had a profound impact on subsequent work in politicalphilosophy, his conclusions have served mostly for the development of more philosophical positions.
Hobbes's moral philosophy has been less influential than his political philosophy, in part because that theory is too ambiguous to have obtained any general consensus as to its content. Most scholars have taken Hobbes to have affirmed some sort of personal relativism; but views that Hobbes believein the divine command theory, virtue ethics, rule egoism, or a form of projectivism also find support in Hobbes's texts and among scholars. Because Hobbes held that “the true doctrine of the Laws of Nature is the true Moral philosophy”, differences in interpretation of Hobbes's moral philosophy can be traced to differing understandings of the status of Hobbes's “laws of nature”.
Having livedthrough the period of political disintegration culminating in the English Civil War, he came to the view that the burdens of even the most oppressive government are “scarce sensible, in respect of the miseries, and horrible calamities, that accompany a Civill Warre”. (Hobbes, Leviathan)
Because virtually any government would be better than a civil war, and, according to Hobbes's analysis, all butabsolute governments are systematically destined to dissolution into civil war, people ought to submit themselves to an absolute political authority. Continued stability will require that they also refrain from the sorts of actions that might undermine such a regime. For example, subjects should not dispute the sovereign power and under no circumstances should they rebel. In general, Hobbes aimed todemonstrate the reciprocal relationship between political obedience and peace.
To establish these conclusions, Hobbes invites us to consider what life would be like in a state of nature, that is, a condition without government. Perhaps we would imagine that people might fare best in such a state, where each decides for herself how to act, and is judge, jury and executioner in her own casewhenever disputes arise—and that at any rate, this state is the appropriate baseline against which to judge the justifiability of political arrangements. Hobbes terms this situation “the condition of mere nature”, a state of perfectly private judgment, in which there is no agency with recognized authority to arbitrate disputes and effective power to enforce its decisions.
But Hobbes famously arguedthat such a “dissolute condition of masterlesse men, without subjection to Lawes, and a coercive Power to tye their hands from rapine, and revenge” would make impossible all of the basic security upon which comfortable, sociable, civilized life depends. There would be “no place for industry, because the fruit thereof is uncertain; and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use ofthe 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; and which is worst of all, continuall feare, and danger of violent death; And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.” If this is the state of nature, people...