PHIL 348 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: John Locke, Civil Society
17 Sep 2016
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Hobbes: accepts a version of natural law based on universality of the desire for self preservation, but denies the senses of the necessary relation btwn law and morality. Leviathan: written to defend charles ii, to whom hobbes had been a tutor. Laws are the commands of the supreme ruler or sovereign. No moral constraints on what counts as law; we have an obligation to obey because we agreed via social contract to allow the sovereign to command. Civil society is needed because of the disorder that would occur in the state of nature" in a society with no political/legal institutions. In nature, humans are egoistic; self-interested with nothing else to motivate. War would naturally result; no justice/injustice, just wants/desires. Therefore, create artificial/social state (civil society) to give incentive to behave in ways most conducive to self-preservation; not natural. This state = leviathan" has absolute authority; commands = laws.
