WEBVTT 00:01.950 --> 00:03.240 Professor Steven Smith: Where else are we? 00:03.240 --> 00:08.850 Today we're going to continue the state of nature, 00:08.849 --> 00:15.139 Hobbes' most famous discovery, his most famous metaphor, 00:15.144 --> 00:18.354 his most famous concept. 00:18.350 --> 00:22.050 00:22.050 --> 00:26.230 At the end of class last time, I tried to identify Hobbes' 00:26.231 --> 00:29.681 central problem, is the problem of authority, 00:29.680 --> 00:33.180 what makes authority possible, what makes authority 00:33.175 --> 00:36.735 legitimate, and in order to answer that question, 00:36.740 --> 00:40.230 I suggested, he created this idea, 00:40.232 --> 00:44.892 this metaphor again, of a state of nature, 00:44.890 --> 00:48.950 a state in which he says we are naturally in. 00:48.950 --> 00:52.750 Hobbes' state of nature is virtually the opposite of 00:52.747 --> 00:56.837 Aristotle's conception of the natural end or the natural 00:56.842 --> 00:58.632 telos of man. 00:58.630 --> 01:03.150 It does not consist of our perfection, a condition of our 01:03.146 --> 01:05.966 perfection as Aristotle believed, 01:05.969 --> 01:10.699 but for Hobbes the state of nature is something like the 01:10.703 --> 01:15.353 condition of human life in the absence of authority, 01:15.349 --> 01:20.009 in the absence of anyone to impose rules, 01:20.014 --> 01:22.234 order, law on us. 01:22.230 --> 01:26.640 What would human beings be like in such a condition, 01:26.640 --> 01:32.090 a condition of the type that he imagined maintains in periods of 01:32.088 --> 01:36.038 crisis, civil war of the kind that was 01:36.035 --> 01:39.025 true of England in the 1640s? 01:39.030 --> 01:44.290 And I suggested at the end of last time that in many ways 01:44.290 --> 01:49.650 Hobbes' idea of the state of nature can be understood in a 01:49.645 --> 01:55.085 sense as an extension of his scientific methodology set out 01:55.094 --> 01:59.044 in the opening chapters of the book. 01:59.040 --> 02:02.000 Let's imagine, as he says, human beings as if 02:02.002 --> 02:05.102 they were in a sort of laboratory test tube. 02:05.099 --> 02:10.629 Let's strip human beings of all their social ties and customs 02:10.632 --> 02:14.492 and traditions. Let's see what they would be 02:14.488 --> 02:18.978 like in abstraction from all of the social and political 02:18.983 --> 02:23.973 relationships which they enjoy and see how they would interact 02:23.969 --> 02:28.219 with one another almost as chemical properties. 02:28.220 --> 02:33.630 And you can see Hobbes working along that line but I would say 02:33.625 --> 02:38.845 this as it were scientific or proto-scientific conception of 02:38.853 --> 02:43.823 the state of nature is not the whole answer to this story 02:43.815 --> 02:48.415 because underlying Hobbes' conception of the state of 02:48.423 --> 02:52.503 nature is a powerful moral conception, 02:52.500 --> 02:56.350 a moral idea of the human being, and that's what I want to 02:56.349 --> 02:58.509 talk a little bit about today. 02:58.509 --> 03:02.639 Hobbes is a moralist, which seems odd in some ways. 03:02.639 --> 03:08.879 How could grim and dour old Thomas Hobbes be regarded as a 03:08.878 --> 03:15.658 moralist or someone with a moral conception of human nature and 03:15.663 --> 03:18.293 the human condition? 03:18.289 --> 03:21.889 But that's what I want to suggest to you today. 03:21.889 --> 03:28.189 The term, in a sense in which we might better characterize his 03:28.194 --> 03:34.504 conception of the state of nature, is one of individuality. 03:34.500 --> 03:40.300 Hobbes shows us what it is to exercise the qualities of moral 03:40.300 --> 03:43.260 agency; that is, to say to do for 03:43.263 --> 03:48.373 ourselves rather than to have things done for us or for you. 03:48.370 --> 03:54.960 Hobbes introduced into our moral language the idiom of 03:54.960 --> 03:57.930 individuality. And this concept, 03:57.933 --> 04:00.543 the concept of what it is to be an individual, 04:00.536 --> 04:03.616 a moral agent, isn't really--is really not 04:03.617 --> 04:08.047 older than or at least not much older than the seventeenth 04:08.045 --> 04:11.235 century. Until the Renaissance or not 04:11.240 --> 04:15.920 much later, people considered themselves primarily not as 04:15.922 --> 04:20.982 individuals but as members, members of a particular family, 04:20.976 --> 04:24.916 of a caste, of a guild, of a particular religious 04:24.920 --> 04:28.840 order, of a city or so on. 04:28.839 --> 04:34.319 The idea that one is first of all a self with an "I," an ego, 04:34.321 --> 04:39.621 would have been regarded as unintelligible and even as late 04:39.620 --> 04:45.280 as the nineteenth century Alexis de Tocqueville in Democracy 04:45.284 --> 04:50.194 in America says, "individualism is a recent 04:50.189 --> 04:53.789 expression arising from a new idea." 04:53.790 --> 04:56.770 That idea appeared new to Tocqueville as late as the 04:56.771 --> 04:59.871 nineteenth century and this idea of the individual, 04:59.870 --> 05:03.650 I want to suggest, is at least in part and maybe 05:03.651 --> 05:06.951 in large part traceable back to Hobbes. 05:06.950 --> 05:11.380 05:11.380 --> 05:14.960 What is Hobbes' individual? 05:14.959 --> 05:23.239 Hobbes conceived us through a process of abstraction from the 05:23.237 --> 05:29.857 web of attachments in which we find ourselves. 05:29.860 --> 05:33.390 We are beings, he argues again in the opening 05:33.390 --> 05:38.040 chapters, whose fundamental characteristics as human beings 05:38.043 --> 05:40.373 are willing and choosing. 05:40.370 --> 05:44.870 We are beings for whom the exercise of the will is a 05:44.870 --> 05:50.080 preeminent feature and much of our happiness as human beings 05:50.076 --> 05:54.746 depends upon our capacity to exercise our will and our 05:54.753 --> 05:56.963 ability for choice. 05:56.959 --> 06:01.449 Life for Hobbes is an exercise in continual willing and 06:01.449 --> 06:06.519 continual choosing that may be temporarily interrupted but can 06:06.521 --> 06:11.511 never come to an end except with the end of life itself. 06:11.509 --> 06:16.099 Hobbes' individuality or individualism is closely 06:16.104 --> 06:21.184 connected to this conception of a human being or human 06:21.177 --> 06:26.537 well-being as success in the competition for the goods of 06:26.537 --> 06:29.987 life. "Continual success," he writes 06:29.990 --> 06:33.510 in chapter 6, "continual success in obtaining 06:33.509 --> 06:38.389 those things which a man from time to time desireth is what is 06:38.389 --> 06:41.109 called happiness or felicity. 06:41.110 --> 06:47.720 Our well being depends on our ability to achieve the objects 06:47.724 --> 06:51.494 of our desires, the objects of our choices, 06:51.491 --> 06:55.281 for there is no such thing," he continues, "as perpetual 06:55.284 --> 06:58.914 tranquility of mind, no such thing as perpetual 06:58.913 --> 07:03.473 tranquility, while we live here, because life itself is but 07:03.472 --> 07:08.352 motion and can never be without desire nor without fear no more 07:08.345 --> 07:10.305 than without sense." 07:10.310 --> 07:13.930 These are the characteristics of human life, 07:13.931 --> 07:18.391 sense, fear and desire, continual desire for one thing 07:18.394 --> 07:22.644 after another, and for Hobbes this fact is not 07:22.644 --> 07:27.674 simply a physical or factual description of human behavior 07:27.673 --> 07:32.263 but it is a moral condition because we are each of us 07:32.261 --> 07:35.791 bundles of activity and initiative, 07:35.790 --> 07:40.180 of likes and dislikes, of desires and aversions. 07:40.180 --> 07:45.210 Life for Hobbes is competition or struggle not just over scarce 07:45.212 --> 07:49.842 resources, although that might be part of the struggle, 07:49.839 --> 07:53.629 but for honors, for anything else that a person 07:53.631 --> 07:55.611 might value or esteem. 07:55.610 --> 07:59.890 Hobbes is fascinated and, is again like Montaigne and a 07:59.885 --> 08:03.205 number of others, he is fascinated with the 08:03.211 --> 08:05.911 diversity, the sheer diversity, 08:05.912 --> 08:08.382 multiplicity of human desires. 08:08.379 --> 08:12.639 What leads one person to laughter, leads another person 08:12.639 --> 08:16.899 to tears, what leads one person to piety and prayer, 08:16.899 --> 08:20.889 leads another person to ridicule and so on and so on. 08:20.889 --> 08:22.909 Even moral terms, Hobbes says, 08:22.912 --> 08:27.032 terms like "good" and "evil," he says are expressions of our 08:27.028 --> 08:29.398 individual likes and dislikes. 08:29.399 --> 08:33.309 We like something, he says, not because it is good 08:33.313 --> 08:37.873 but we call something good because we like it and the same 08:37.866 --> 08:41.536 with other moral qualities and attributes. 08:41.539 --> 08:46.419 They are expressions for him of our psychological states and 08:46.419 --> 08:51.219 aspirations and it is this individualism that is the ground 08:51.216 --> 08:55.846 of the general competition that we all experience for the 08:55.848 --> 09:00.978 objects of our desires that he says the--or from this he infers 09:00.975 --> 09:05.685 that the natural condition is one of competition, 09:05.690 --> 09:09.110 of struggle, of enmity and of war. 09:09.110 --> 09:12.390 In a famous passage from chapter 11 he posits, 09:12.394 --> 09:15.534 as he puts it, "a general inclination of all 09:15.533 --> 09:19.583 mankind, a perpetual and restless desire 09:19.582 --> 09:24.702 of power after power that ceaseth only in death." 09:24.700 --> 09:28.500 This is, as he puts it, "a general inclination of all 09:28.502 --> 09:32.162 mankind," this constant restlessness and motion and 09:32.158 --> 09:36.468 expression of our individuality and what I have been calling 09:36.472 --> 09:39.472 Hobbes' individualism is connected, 09:39.470 --> 09:45.170 in fact even is underwritten by another attribute that is 09:45.173 --> 09:47.213 central to Hobbes. 09:47.210 --> 09:48.710 It is his skepticism. 09:48.710 --> 09:53.230 Like many of the great early modern philosophers, 09:53.234 --> 09:56.254 Montaigne, Descartes, Spinoza, 09:56.250 --> 10:00.750 Hobbes was obsessed with the question about what can I know 10:00.754 --> 10:05.064 or, maybe put a different way, what am I entitled to believe, 10:05.060 --> 10:08.820 and there are many passages in Leviathan that testify to 10:08.823 --> 10:12.043 Hobbes' fundamentally skeptical view of knowledge. 10:12.040 --> 10:16.030 Right? He is a skeptic not because he 10:16.033 --> 10:21.193 believes that we can have no foundations for our beliefs 10:21.190 --> 10:27.380 whatever but he is a skeptic in the sense that there can be no, 10:27.379 --> 10:30.729 on his view, transcendent or nonhuman 10:30.729 --> 10:33.519 foundations for our beliefs. 10:33.519 --> 10:36.939 We cannot be certain, he thinks, of the ultimate 10:36.942 --> 10:40.512 foundations of our knowledge and this explains, 10:40.509 --> 10:44.199 you may have wondered about this, this explains the 10:44.198 --> 10:48.768 importance he attributes to such things as naming and attaching 10:48.771 --> 10:51.281 correct definitions to things. 10:51.279 --> 10:54.309 For reason, he writes in a famous passage, 10:54.313 --> 10:57.203 "for reason is nothing but reckoning, 10:57.200 --> 11:01.730 that is adding and subtracting the consequences of general 11:01.730 --> 11:03.400 names agreed upon." 11:03.399 --> 11:06.859 Knowledge, in other words, is for Hobbes a human 11:06.857 --> 11:11.337 construction and it is always subject to what human beings can 11:11.344 --> 11:15.764 be made to agree upon and that skeptical view of knowledge or 11:15.757 --> 11:20.237 at least skeptical view of the foundation of knowledge has far 11:20.244 --> 11:23.044 reaching consequences for him. 11:23.039 --> 11:25.789 If all knowledge, according to Hobbes, 11:25.789 --> 11:29.579 ultimately rests on agreement about shared terms, 11:29.580 --> 11:33.620 he infers from that that our reason, our rationality, 11:33.616 --> 11:38.266 has no share in what Plato or Aristotle would have called the 11:38.274 --> 11:42.504 divine Noos, the divine intelligence. 11:42.500 --> 11:47.790 Our reason has within it no spark of divinity. 11:47.789 --> 11:52.279 Our reason does not testify to some kind of inner voice of 11:52.276 --> 11:56.676 conscience or anything that would purport to give it some 11:56.684 --> 11:59.444 kind of indubitable foundation. 11:59.440 --> 12:04.810 Such certainty as we have about anything is for Hobbes always 12:04.810 --> 12:10.270 provisional, discovered on the basis of experience and subject 12:10.270 --> 12:15.730 to continual revision in the light of further experience, 12:15.730 --> 12:20.250 and that again experiential conception of knowledge. 12:20.250 --> 12:24.000 That kind of skepticism about the foundations of knowledge has 12:24.001 --> 12:27.941 further implications for Hobbes' views on such things as religion 12:27.936 --> 12:29.716 and religious toleration. 12:29.720 --> 12:34.620 "There are no signs or fruit of religion," he says, 12:34.617 --> 12:38.827 "but in man only," he says in chapter 12. 12:38.830 --> 12:42.060 That is to say, the causes of religion can be 12:42.058 --> 12:46.318 traced back and are rooted in the restlessness of the human 12:46.315 --> 12:48.805 mind in its search for causes. 12:48.809 --> 12:51.639 And it is because, he says, we are born ignorant 12:51.639 --> 12:54.829 of causes, we are ignorant of the causes of things, 12:54.830 --> 12:58.960 that we are led to search out beginnings and origins and this 12:58.964 --> 13:03.304 leads us ultimately, he says, to posit the existence 13:03.304 --> 13:05.674 of God who is, so to speak, 13:05.673 --> 13:08.683 the first cause of all things. 13:08.679 --> 13:11.439 Hobbes does not, despite this kind of 13:11.443 --> 13:16.053 rationalistic view of religion and his view that religion has 13:16.050 --> 13:20.580 its origin again in the restlessness of the human mind, 13:20.580 --> 13:24.530 Hobbes doesn't deny the possibility of revelation or 13:24.527 --> 13:28.317 some kind of direct communication of God to us. 13:28.320 --> 13:32.980 But what he does deny is that anyone who has claimed to 13:32.975 --> 13:37.815 receive such a revelation, he denies that any such person 13:37.823 --> 13:42.283 has the right to impose that view on anyone else because 13:42.284 --> 13:47.154 nobody else can correctly have the means to verify a person's 13:47.152 --> 13:49.182 claim to revelation. 13:49.179 --> 13:53.599 No one can impose their claim of revealed knowledge on 13:53.596 --> 13:55.826 another. Does this make Hobbes an 13:55.825 --> 13:58.785 atheist, as many would have maintained in his day? 13:58.790 --> 14:04.020 No. It makes him a skeptic about 14:04.023 --> 14:06.893 revealed religion. 14:06.890 --> 14:11.550 14:11.549 --> 14:15.819 So it is because of this individualism and skepticism, 14:15.823 --> 14:19.133 a view of life as willing and choosing, 14:19.129 --> 14:22.969 that there are in the state of nature so to speak no standards 14:22.972 --> 14:26.842 to adjudicate conflicts, that the central issue of 14:26.844 --> 14:30.694 politics arises, namely what makes authority 14:30.687 --> 14:33.737 possible, how are people who are 14:33.736 --> 14:38.226 biologically individually constituted, so to speak, 14:38.228 --> 14:43.708 how can any of them ever--any of us ever be capable of obeying 14:43.709 --> 14:49.189 common rules or having moral obligations to one another? 14:49.190 --> 14:54.190 How is that possible, Hobbes continues to ask in a 14:54.185 --> 14:59.685 manner of speaking on almost every page of the book. 14:59.690 --> 15:03.660 But before answering that question, consider a little 15:03.663 --> 15:08.253 further Hobbes' account of the state of nature and what makes 15:08.248 --> 15:12.218 it seem like a plausible starting point to answer the 15:12.222 --> 15:15.892 question of what makes authority possible. 15:15.890 --> 15:19.410 15:19.409 --> 15:23.559 To say that the state of nature consists primarily of 15:23.558 --> 15:26.668 individuals with again diverse likes, 15:26.669 --> 15:30.349 dislikes, beliefs, opinions and the like is not to 15:30.354 --> 15:34.494 say that the state of nature is a state of isolation, 15:34.490 --> 15:37.090 as it sometimes attributed to him. 15:37.090 --> 15:40.970 People in the state of nature may have regular and continual 15:40.966 --> 15:42.736 contact with one another. 15:42.740 --> 15:46.330 It is just that their relations are unregulated. 15:46.330 --> 15:50.250 They are unregulated by law; they are unregulated by 15:50.253 --> 15:54.683 authority. The state of nature is simply a 15:54.681 --> 16:00.871 kind of condition of maximum insecurity, an unregulated 16:00.868 --> 16:06.938 market with no common laws or rules to sustain it. 16:06.940 --> 16:11.930 The emphasis on the individual is just another way of saying, 16:11.928 --> 16:15.748 again unlike Aristotle, that no one has natural 16:15.752 --> 16:18.332 authority over anyone else. 16:18.330 --> 16:22.920 Relations of authority exist only by, so to speak, 16:22.917 --> 16:26.847 the consent or the will of the governed. 16:26.850 --> 16:31.990 And the fact that relations in the state of nature are 16:31.985 --> 16:37.405 unregulated for him makes it--it's synonymous with making 16:37.410 --> 16:41.810 it a condition of war, of "all against all," in his 16:41.808 --> 16:43.148 famous formulation. 16:43.149 --> 16:47.059 Now, you might look at that formulation, the state of war is 16:47.057 --> 16:51.027 one against--of all against all and you might say that such a 16:51.031 --> 16:54.581 condition of civil war, of maximum insecurity, 16:54.578 --> 16:58.968 of the total breakdown of condition of rules and laws is 16:58.973 --> 17:02.333 if anything the state of the exception. 17:02.330 --> 17:07.990 How often does that really occur in our experience in human 17:07.987 --> 17:11.157 life? But Hobbes, like Machiavelli, 17:11.155 --> 17:16.125 as we saw, likes to take the exceptional situation and turn 17:16.125 --> 17:17.835 it into the norm. 17:17.839 --> 17:21.619 It becomes the normal condition, state of security, 17:21.617 --> 17:24.787 insecurity, fear, conflict and the like. 17:24.789 --> 17:27.719 This is not to say, again, that the state of nature 17:27.719 --> 17:30.179 for Hobbes is one of permanent fighting. 17:30.180 --> 17:33.960 But it is one of permanent fear and distrust and he asks his 17:33.963 --> 17:37.943 readers…there are so many wonderful passages in this book, 17:37.940 --> 17:41.540 this just happens to be one of my particular favorites, 17:41.536 --> 17:44.596 he asks his readers if you don't believe me, 17:44.599 --> 17:48.039 again think of his skepticism, don't believe me, 17:48.040 --> 17:51.850 he says, check your own experience and see if I'm not 17:51.847 --> 17:54.907 right. And this is what he writes. 17:54.910 --> 17:58.450 "Let him, the reader, therefore ask himself," Hobbes 17:58.453 --> 18:02.693 writes, "when taking a journey he arms himself and seeks to go 18:02.691 --> 18:04.151 well accompanied. 18:04.150 --> 18:08.020 When going to sleep, he locks his doors even when in 18:08.021 --> 18:12.581 his house, and even when in his house he locks his chests and 18:12.576 --> 18:14.096 this, when he knows, 18:14.102 --> 18:17.532 he says, there be laws and public officers armed to avenge 18:17.533 --> 18:19.763 all injuries shall be done to him. 18:19.759 --> 18:21.719 What opinion, Hobbes asks, 18:21.721 --> 18:25.801 he has of his fellow subjects when he rides armed? 18:25.799 --> 18:29.859 What does that say about your thinking about your fellow 18:29.860 --> 18:33.700 citizens when you arm yourselves going for a trip, 18:33.700 --> 18:37.570 of his fellow citizens when he locks his doors at night or of 18:37.570 --> 18:40.990 his children and servants when he locks his chests? 18:40.990 --> 18:45.840 Does he not therefore as much accuse mankind by his action as 18:45.842 --> 18:47.462 I do by my words?" 18:47.460 --> 18:51.630 You can see the mischievousness of Hobbes in that delightful 18:51.632 --> 18:53.302 passage. What about you, 18:53.295 --> 18:56.985 he says, and this is not in some kind of state of nature. 18:56.990 --> 19:02.080 This is in a completely fully functioning society when you go 19:02.083 --> 19:08.373 armed, when you lock your doors, when you lock your chests at 19:08.369 --> 19:15.529 night, don't your actions and your experience simply confirm 19:15.533 --> 19:19.423 what I'm saying? And this tells us another thing 19:19.415 --> 19:22.155 about the state of nature which it is easy to forget. 19:22.160 --> 19:25.660 The state of nature, at least for Hobbes, 19:25.657 --> 19:30.727 is not some kind of primitive anthropological datum that we 19:30.729 --> 19:34.139 find by going back in time somehow. 19:34.140 --> 19:36.870 Rousseau will speak about it more this way. 19:36.869 --> 19:40.739 For Hobbes, the state of nature exists, he says, 19:40.741 --> 19:43.791 whenever authority is not enforced. 19:43.789 --> 19:47.489 The state of nature fully continues, in many ways, 19:47.492 --> 19:51.562 oddly even in civil society, he says, whenever we have 19:51.559 --> 19:56.019 reason to believe that our lives or our properties or ourselves 19:56.023 --> 19:57.323 are not secure. 19:57.320 --> 20:02.430 20:02.430 --> 20:09.730 In fact, we can never be fully free of the fear and of the 20:09.727 --> 20:15.997 anxiety and uncertainty of the state of nature, 20:16.000 --> 20:24.040 even within to some degree of fully constituted civil society. 20:24.039 --> 20:27.819 The only exception to this of course in Hobbes' account of the 20:27.824 --> 20:31.364 state of nature when he says "don't you lock your doors at 20:31.360 --> 20:34.770 night" are of course Yale students living here on campus 20:34.771 --> 20:38.491 who are so trusting that they never lock their doors at night 20:38.494 --> 20:41.914 in the entryways and so on and then of course are always 20:41.905 --> 20:45.685 stunned to find when something is stolen from them, 20:45.690 --> 20:48.380 how could this be? 20:48.380 --> 20:54.060 And I tell them lock your doors but they still don't believe me. 20:54.059 --> 20:57.659 Maybe you'll now believe Hobbes if you don't believe me. 20:57.660 --> 21:01.380 So the state of nature, it's a state of insecurity, 21:01.380 --> 21:03.390 it's a state of conflict. 21:03.390 --> 21:05.010 How do we get out of it? 21:05.009 --> 21:09.829 This is of course the huge issue that Hobbes asks for the 21:09.833 --> 21:12.593 rest of--for much of the book. 21:12.589 --> 21:16.669 What do we do to get out of this state of nature to enter a 21:16.671 --> 21:20.051 condition of civil society and civilized life? 21:20.049 --> 21:24.649 How do I give up my right to do whatever is in my power to 21:24.652 --> 21:27.642 secure my person or my possessions, 21:27.640 --> 21:31.100 when I have no expectation, you might say, 21:31.101 --> 21:35.661 that others around me are prepared to do so as well? 21:35.660 --> 21:39.770 This is sort of a classic example of what economists and 21:39.774 --> 21:43.744 other people like them call the prisoner's dilemma. 21:43.740 --> 21:48.920 Why should I act in such a way if I have no expectation or 21:48.917 --> 21:53.187 reasonable expectation that those around me will 21:53.186 --> 21:57.536 reciprocate? Hobbes' members of a state of 21:57.539 --> 22:03.439 nature seem to be in a classic prisoner's dilemma problem. 22:03.440 --> 22:06.840 Maybe we can say, we could say or Hobbes could 22:06.842 --> 22:11.232 say, that laying down our right to do all things in seeking 22:11.227 --> 22:15.077 peace with others is the rational thing to do in the 22:15.084 --> 22:17.054 condition of nature. 22:17.049 --> 22:21.639 We are all rational actors and therefore it is rational for us 22:21.635 --> 22:26.255 to seek and to desire peace, but note that that is exactly 22:26.255 --> 22:30.165 what Hobbes does not say, he does not say this. 22:30.170 --> 22:34.520 Far from having a sort of rational actor model of 22:34.522 --> 22:39.512 politics, he operates with an irrational actor model. 22:39.509 --> 22:43.399 He assumes that it is not reason but our passions that are 22:43.402 --> 22:46.882 the dominant force of human psychology, our desires, 22:46.884 --> 22:49.074 our aversions, our passions. 22:49.069 --> 22:54.009 And although I have said that Hobbes has emphasized the 22:54.013 --> 22:59.783 diversity of our passions there are still two main passions that 22:59.781 --> 23:04.821 he feels universally dominate human nature and these two 23:04.817 --> 23:07.927 passions are pride and fear. 23:07.930 --> 23:14.820 23:14.819 --> 23:17.849 Pride and fear, these are the Hobbesian 23:17.849 --> 23:21.999 equivalents of the two great--what Machiavelli called 23:21.996 --> 23:26.786 humors you remember, the two humors of the two great 23:26.787 --> 23:30.687 social classes, the desires of the rich and 23:30.686 --> 23:36.256 powerful as it were to rule over others and the desire of the 23:36.256 --> 23:38.666 weak not to be ruled. 23:38.670 --> 23:42.040 Machiavelli called those the two umori, 23:42.037 --> 23:45.737 the two humors. And Hobbes similarly works with 23:45.738 --> 23:48.688 a kind of model. He's a great political 23:48.686 --> 23:51.916 psychologist, the two great passions of pride 23:51.918 --> 23:54.328 and fear. Pride, he says, 23:54.332 --> 24:00.672 is the passion for preeminence, the desire to be first and also 24:00.667 --> 24:05.977 to be seen to be first in the great race of life. 24:05.980 --> 24:08.180 Prideful people, he tells us, 24:08.177 --> 24:12.257 are those overflowing with confidence about their own 24:12.258 --> 24:16.808 abilities to succeed and we all know people like this, 24:16.810 --> 24:18.450 don't we, like Yale students? 24:18.450 --> 24:23.030 They're all overflowing with confidence, kind of alpha types. 24:23.029 --> 24:29.089 Machiavelli might call them sort of manly men who are fully 24:29.094 --> 24:32.654 confident about their abilities. 24:32.650 --> 24:36.710 And yet Hobbes is a great debunker of human pride. 24:36.710 --> 24:42.180 Pride is equivalent to what he calls vanity or vainglory. 24:42.180 --> 24:46.890 It is a kind of exaggerated confidence in one's own power 24:46.892 --> 24:49.142 and ability. It is pride, 24:49.135 --> 24:53.575 the desire to lord it over others and to have one's 24:53.575 --> 24:56.945 superiority acknowledged by others, 24:56.950 --> 25:02.300 that is the great problem for Hobbes to be averted. 25:02.299 --> 25:09.039 But if pride for him is one of his great universal passions so 25:09.038 --> 25:11.688 is its opposite, fear. 25:11.690 --> 25:16.020 Hobbes makes the fear of death that may come to us at any time 25:16.016 --> 25:19.536 in the state of nature, perhaps he exaggerates this, 25:19.541 --> 25:23.041 by making it appear that the state of nature is a kind of 25:23.043 --> 25:26.863 existential condition in which death can come to you at almost 25:26.859 --> 25:30.509 any moment. But there is more to fear than 25:30.507 --> 25:35.537 this, simply fear of death, although Hobbes emphasizes and 25:35.537 --> 25:39.417 dramatically perhaps overemphasizes this. 25:39.420 --> 25:46.870 Fear is not just the desire to avoid death but to avoid losing, 25:46.874 --> 25:52.184 you might say again, in the great race of life, 25:52.180 --> 25:56.580 to avoid losing and to be seen as a loser. 25:56.579 --> 26:02.789 It is the desire to avoid the shame of being seen by others as 26:02.791 --> 26:04.931 losing out somehow. 26:04.930 --> 26:08.360 There is a social quality clearly to both of these 26:08.359 --> 26:12.979 passions, pride and fear, one again the desire to have 26:12.980 --> 26:17.080 one's preeminence esteemed by others, fear, 26:17.075 --> 26:21.165 the desire to avoid shame and dishonor. 26:21.170 --> 26:25.430 How we are seen by others is a crucial cardinal part of Hobbes' 26:25.428 --> 26:28.998 moral psychology and each of us, he says, contain. 26:29.000 --> 26:33.250 These do not simply represent two classes of individuals, 26:33.251 --> 26:35.151 two classes of persons. 26:35.150 --> 26:39.750 Each of us contains these two warring, you might say, 26:39.748 --> 26:44.168 elements within us, both self-assertion and fear of 26:44.169 --> 26:47.529 the consequence of self-assertion. 26:47.529 --> 26:56.709 The question is for Hobbes, how do we tame these passions? 26:56.710 --> 27:01.010 It is most of all pride that Hobbes wants to tame and of 27:01.012 --> 27:05.002 course the very title of his book, Leviathan, 27:05.001 --> 27:08.131 he tell us later on comes from what? 27:08.130 --> 27:11.490 Do you remember? Where does it come from? 27:11.490 --> 27:16.110 Who remembers? Passage from what? 27:16.109 --> 27:21.089 Job, Book of Job, where he refers to Leviathan as 27:21.091 --> 27:23.991 king of the children of pride. 27:23.990 --> 27:31.880 The book is based on a biblical metaphor about overcoming or 27:31.877 --> 27:37.197 subduing pride. As the great Marsellus Wallace 27:37.200 --> 27:42.080 says in the film Pulp Fiction, pride never helps, 27:42.081 --> 27:45.541 it only hurts, if you remember that 27:45.539 --> 27:47.979 magnificent speech. 27:47.980 --> 27:51.920 Fear, Hobbes says, is the passion to reckon on, 27:51.915 --> 27:54.905 is the passion to be reckoned on. 27:54.910 --> 27:59.420 It is fear, not reason, that leads us to abandon the 27:59.417 --> 28:02.597 state of nature and sue for peace. 28:02.599 --> 28:06.249 The passions that incline men to peace, Hobbes writes, 28:06.251 --> 28:07.631 are fear of death. 28:07.630 --> 28:11.080 28:11.079 --> 28:14.179 This is not to say that Hobbes believes fear to be the 28:14.181 --> 28:16.581 naturally stronger of the two passions; 28:16.580 --> 28:18.900 in fact, far from it. 28:18.900 --> 28:23.000 There are many people certainly even around us who Hobbes 28:22.999 --> 28:26.219 believes do not fear death as they should, 28:26.220 --> 28:30.660 the proud aristocrat who prefers death before dishonor, 28:30.657 --> 28:35.337 the religious zealot prepared to sacrifice his life and of 28:35.342 --> 28:40.522 course those of others in order to achieve the rewards of heaven 28:40.519 --> 28:45.199 and of course just the risk taking individual who seeks to 28:45.203 --> 28:50.713 climb Mount Everest just for the honor and esteem involved. 28:50.710 --> 28:54.630 And it is part of the broader educational or pedagogic 28:54.628 --> 28:58.028 function of Leviathan to help us see, 28:58.029 --> 29:01.939 Hobbes thinks, the dangers of pride and the 29:01.941 --> 29:03.991 advantages of peace. 29:03.990 --> 29:09.100 Properly directed, fear leads to peace. 29:09.099 --> 29:14.119 Fear is the basis, even of what Hobbes calls the 29:14.119 --> 29:20.099 various laws of nature, that lead us to civil society. 29:20.099 --> 29:24.729 The laws of nature for Hobbes are described as a precept or a 29:24.729 --> 29:28.899 general rule of reason that every man ought to endeavor 29:28.895 --> 29:33.675 peace and it is out of fear that we begin to reason and see the 29:33.679 --> 29:38.269 advantages of society; reason is dependent upon the 29:38.268 --> 29:40.088 passions, upon fear. 29:40.089 --> 29:45.019 The first and most fundamental law of nature, 29:45.016 --> 29:49.716 he says, is to seek peace and follow it. 29:49.720 --> 29:53.300 Not only should one seek peace but we have an obligation, 29:53.302 --> 29:57.232 he says, to lay down our arms, to lay down our right to all 29:57.230 --> 30:01.260 things on the condition that others around us are prepared to 30:01.258 --> 30:04.768 do so as well. And Hobbes goes on to enumerate 30:04.774 --> 30:08.454 19 laws of nature, I won't go into all of them, 30:08.450 --> 30:12.280 19 laws of nature that constitute a kind of framework 30:12.279 --> 30:14.709 for establishing civil society. 30:14.710 --> 30:19.370 These laws he even compares as his equivalent of the Golden 30:19.368 --> 30:24.028 Rule which he states in the negative: Do not do unto others 30:24.026 --> 30:27.636 what you would not have them do unto you. 30:27.640 --> 30:31.810 Here is Hobbes' rewriting of the Golden Rule in terms of 30:31.808 --> 30:36.048 these laws of nature but these raise a question for us as 30:36.052 --> 30:37.722 readers of Hobbes. 30:37.720 --> 30:41.110 30:41.110 --> 30:41.980 Right? Don't they? 30:41.980 --> 30:45.530 What is the status of the laws of nature? 30:45.529 --> 30:49.579 What is the moral status, if any, of these laws? 30:49.579 --> 30:53.379 Hobbes, as we see, sometimes writes as a sort of 30:53.381 --> 30:58.561 scientist or proto-scientist for whom nature and one supposes the 30:58.557 --> 31:03.407 laws of nature operate with the same kind of necessity as the 31:03.410 --> 31:06.160 laws of physical attraction. 31:06.160 --> 31:09.410 That's how he often writes about human behavior, 31:09.410 --> 31:13.420 that we obey the same laws of physical attraction as do any 31:13.421 --> 31:16.881 other bodies that we might choose to describe. 31:16.880 --> 31:21.640 They describe how bodies in motion always and necessarily 31:21.643 --> 31:24.283 behave, these laws of nature. 31:24.279 --> 31:27.939 And yet at the same time, Hobbes writes as a moralist for 31:27.940 --> 31:32.070 whom the laws of nature, he calls "precepts of reason" 31:32.074 --> 31:36.864 or general rules according to which we are forbidden to do 31:36.859 --> 31:39.629 anything destructive of life." 31:39.630 --> 31:41.870 In this sense, the laws of nature, 31:41.871 --> 31:45.201 as he describes them, appear to be moral laws with 31:45.199 --> 31:49.119 moral commands, commands you not to do anything 31:49.121 --> 31:53.961 that is destructive of life, your own or that of others, 31:53.960 --> 31:56.640 and these moral laws, in this sense, 31:56.640 --> 32:01.390 we have presumably the freedom to obey them or disobey them. 32:01.390 --> 32:05.130 If they acted with a kind of mechanical necessity or even 32:05.132 --> 32:08.212 geometric necessity, they could not possibly be 32:08.205 --> 32:10.005 moral laws in that way. 32:10.009 --> 32:14.129 They can only be moral if there is some semblance of human 32:14.128 --> 32:17.308 choice or will expressed in the relationship, 32:17.307 --> 32:19.617 our ability to do otherwise. 32:19.619 --> 32:23.619 So these laws of nature, seek peace and so on, 32:23.619 --> 32:28.239 do not simply seem to be descriptive of how people do 32:28.242 --> 32:31.402 behave. They seem to be prescriptive of 32:31.402 --> 32:35.772 how people ought to behave and this Hobbes even suggests at the 32:35.766 --> 32:40.056 end of chapter 15 when he writes about the laws of nature, 32:40.059 --> 32:44.639 "these dictates of reason men used to call by the name 32:44.642 --> 32:49.742 ‘laws' but improperly for they are conclusions or theorems 32:49.743 --> 32:55.193 according to what conduces to the conversation of mankind." 32:55.190 --> 32:59.560 These used to be called laws of nature, he says, 32:59.559 --> 33:03.389 but improperly. So if they are only improperly 33:03.388 --> 33:07.658 laws of nature why does Hobbes continue to use the term? 33:07.660 --> 33:12.030 Why does he use this terminology of "laws of nature"? 33:12.029 --> 33:16.659 In a sense, this might simply be Hobbes' way of paying homage 33:16.655 --> 33:20.965 to the ancient tradition of natural law going back to the 33:20.972 --> 33:24.332 medieval scholastics, to the stoics, 33:24.328 --> 33:27.388 and perhaps even beyond them. 33:27.390 --> 33:31.910 The natural laws for Hobbes are not divine commands or 33:31.911 --> 33:36.261 ordinances, he says, but they are rules of practical 33:36.261 --> 33:41.381 reason figured out by us as the optimal means of securing our 33:41.379 --> 33:44.439 well-being. These laws of nature, 33:44.435 --> 33:47.875 as he describes them, do not issue categorical 33:47.876 --> 33:51.696 commands so much as sort of hypothetical rules. 33:51.700 --> 33:55.950 If you want X, do Y; if you want peace, 33:55.951 --> 33:58.511 here are the means to it. 33:58.509 --> 34:02.409 And he calls these laws, these 19 laws of nature, 34:02.412 --> 34:05.422 the true and only moral philosophy. 34:05.420 --> 34:09.390 So you can see in that passage Hobbes takes himself to be a 34:09.386 --> 34:12.866 moralist writing within the great tradition of moral 34:12.874 --> 34:16.094 philosophy. These laws of nature are for 34:16.094 --> 34:19.234 him the true and only moral philosophy. 34:19.230 --> 34:23.010 Well, this brings me to some criticisms or at least some 34:23.007 --> 34:26.297 questions about Hobbes' conception of the laws of 34:26.304 --> 34:29.234 nature. What are we to make of these 34:29.230 --> 34:31.400 laws, as I've asked before? 34:31.400 --> 34:34.510 In one sense, there seems to be a genuine 34:34.508 --> 34:39.478 moral content to Hobbes' laws of nature which can be reduced to a 34:39.481 --> 34:42.671 single formula: Seek peace above all other 34:42.667 --> 34:47.227 goods. Hobbes, more than anyone else, 34:47.232 --> 34:52.442 wants us to value the virtues of civility. 34:52.440 --> 34:57.380 Those, you might say, summed up in a word are what 34:57.376 --> 35:00.596 the 19 laws of nature command. 35:00.599 --> 35:04.549 The civility entails the virtues of peace, 35:04.545 --> 35:08.485 equity, fairness, playing by the rules. 35:08.489 --> 35:13.399 Peace is for Hobbes a moral good and the virtues are those 35:13.395 --> 35:18.465 qualities of behavior that tend to peace and vices are those 35:18.472 --> 35:20.282 that lead to war. 35:20.280 --> 35:26.140 Consider the disadvantages of war and the benefits of peace. 35:26.140 --> 35:27.390 Here is what Hobbes writes. 35:27.389 --> 35:30.309 "In such a condition, that is the state of nature, 35:30.305 --> 35:33.755 there is no place for industry because the fruit thereof is 35:33.757 --> 35:37.027 uncertain and consequently no culture of the earth, 35:37.030 --> 35:40.630 no navigation nor building nor instruments of moving and 35:40.625 --> 35:43.235 removing things as require much force, 35:43.239 --> 35:46.869 no knowledge of the face of the earth, no account of time, 35:46.869 --> 35:50.539 no arts, no letters, no society and which is worst 35:50.536 --> 35:54.596 of all continual fear and danger of violent death." 35:54.599 --> 35:57.769 This is again the sort of existential condition in which 35:57.769 --> 36:00.999 Hobbes wants to put us in the state of nature and all the 36:00.996 --> 36:03.576 benefits he lists there, he enumerates, 36:03.582 --> 36:07.962 that are denied to us in such a condition, again no knowledge, 36:07.960 --> 36:10.780 no geography, no cultivation of the earth, 36:10.776 --> 36:12.696 no navigation or building. 36:12.699 --> 36:16.959 All of these things are the fruits of peace, 36:16.962 --> 36:19.862 he tells us. But at this point, 36:19.864 --> 36:24.164 a careful reader such as all of yourselves no doubt, 36:24.156 --> 36:30.226 would no doubt be suggesting, I've gone too far in suggesting 36:30.230 --> 36:36.450 or calling Hobbes a moral philosopher whose motto in a way 36:36.445 --> 36:42.765 could be summed up in the phrase "Give peace a chance." 36:42.770 --> 36:44.550 Is that what Hobbes believed? 36:44.550 --> 36:47.000 Why is the peace the highest good anyway? 36:47.000 --> 36:49.960 Why not justice? Why not honor? 36:49.960 --> 36:54.430 Why not piety? Why not the examined life? 36:54.429 --> 36:57.519 What makes peace so good for Hobbes? 36:57.519 --> 37:02.149 Well, I've given a number of… have quoted him on a number of 37:02.150 --> 37:06.930 reasons but one suggestion might be that it is not so much peace 37:06.933 --> 37:09.973 alone that Hobbes cherishes as life. 37:09.970 --> 37:12.550 Peace is a means to life. 37:12.550 --> 37:15.520 Every creature, he says, has a built-in desire 37:15.517 --> 37:18.287 to preserve itself, to persevere in its own 37:18.286 --> 37:21.446 existence, to continue in its own steady 37:21.445 --> 37:24.915 state you might say, and to resist invasion or 37:24.915 --> 37:26.915 encroachment by others. 37:26.920 --> 37:30.940 We are all endowed, he says, with a kind of natural 37:30.935 --> 37:35.825 right to life and the desire to preserve oneself is not just a 37:35.833 --> 37:39.233 biological fact, although it is also that, 37:39.233 --> 37:43.253 it is for him a moral right, it is a moral entitlement, 37:43.250 --> 37:47.670 every being has a fundamental right to its own life. 37:47.670 --> 37:51.980 We not only have a right to our lives but to do whatever we 37:51.981 --> 37:55.031 regard as needful to protect our lives. 37:55.030 --> 37:58.880 And again, this is not simply a brute fact of nature. 37:58.880 --> 38:02.330 It is a moral entitlement for Hobbes, the source of human 38:02.328 --> 38:03.558 worth and dignity. 38:03.559 --> 38:07.329 But now you will suggest, I've really gone too far, 38:07.325 --> 38:11.315 attributing to Hobbes a doctrine of human dignity that 38:11.317 --> 38:15.907 one might expect to find in a philosopher like Kant or someone 38:15.911 --> 38:19.141 else. Didn't Hobbes cynically write 38:19.136 --> 38:22.856 in chapter 10, "the value or worth of a man is 38:22.855 --> 38:28.015 of all things his price," what price we will fetch in the 38:28.021 --> 38:32.711 marketplace no doubt, the value or worth of a man is 38:32.713 --> 38:36.353 his price, a phrase incidentally quoted by 38:36.349 --> 38:41.309 Karl Marx to indicate the sheer heartlessness of the kind of the 38:41.308 --> 38:46.108 bourgeoisie society that Hobbes was hoping to bring about. 38:46.110 --> 38:50.510 And doesn't Hobbes' materialism and his sort of mechanistic 38:50.505 --> 38:55.195 theory of nature seem to detract from any inherent worth of the 38:55.203 --> 38:58.743 individual? There seems to be something to 38:58.743 --> 39:03.793 that and yet Hobbes certainly regards life as a precious good, 39:03.789 --> 39:08.919 perhaps the most precious good of all, and he writes with a 39:08.915 --> 39:13.595 lively sense of how fragile and endangered life is. 39:13.599 --> 39:18.569 The work as a whole can be seen as an effort to dispel what he 39:18.566 --> 39:23.166 believes to be false beliefs, false doctrines and beliefs, 39:23.171 --> 39:27.341 that disguise the truth from us, truth about the value of 39:27.335 --> 39:28.815 life; for example, 39:28.815 --> 39:33.455 beliefs about the afterlife and all beliefs that detract from an 39:33.462 --> 39:36.932 appreciation for the value of life as it is. 39:36.929 --> 39:42.339 This provides the moral basis of what I would call Hobbes' 39:42.344 --> 39:47.864 humanitarianism and yet that humanitarianism seems to raise 39:47.855 --> 39:49.845 further problems. 39:49.849 --> 39:54.999 Doesn't Hobbes or does Hobbes' attempt to instill in us, 39:55.003 --> 39:59.773 the readers of his book, his attempt to instill in us an 39:59.769 --> 40:03.149 appreciation for life and the value of life, 40:03.150 --> 40:08.160 does this simultaneously create an aversion to risk, 40:08.159 --> 40:13.659 an extreme fear of conflict and challenge or disorder? 40:13.659 --> 40:18.939 You could say is this constant fear that Hobbes harps on fear 40:18.937 --> 40:24.307 of death and the value of life, to put it rather rudely, 40:24.311 --> 40:28.431 is this not another word for cowardice? 40:28.429 --> 40:32.269 Does Hobbes' emphasis on the preservation of life as the 40:32.265 --> 40:35.625 supreme moral value, does this turn his mighty 40:35.626 --> 40:39.786 Leviathan into a kind of commonwealth of cowards? 40:39.789 --> 40:44.809 Where Aristotle made the courage of men in combat a 40:44.810 --> 40:50.730 central virtue of his ethics, Hobbes pointedly omits courage 40:50.734 --> 40:54.654 from his list of the moral virtues. 40:54.650 --> 40:58.210 At one point, he even suggests that courage 40:58.214 --> 41:02.804 is really just a species of rashness and his example of 41:02.797 --> 41:07.887 courage comes from duels and duel fighting which he says will 41:07.890 --> 41:11.540 be always honorable but are unlawful. 41:11.539 --> 41:14.459 "For duels," he says, "are many times effects of 41:14.456 --> 41:17.806 courage and the ground of courage is always strength or 41:17.806 --> 41:22.396 skill though for the most part," he says, "they be effects of 41:22.398 --> 41:27.368 rash speaking and the fear of dishonor in one or both of the 41:27.366 --> 41:29.816 combatants." In other words, 41:29.815 --> 41:33.765 courage for him again is a form of vanity or pride, 41:33.765 --> 41:37.395 the desire not to appear less than another. 41:37.400 --> 41:40.140 It is a form of rashness, he says. 41:40.139 --> 41:44.959 And that suspicion is further carried out in Hobbes' very 41:44.960 --> 41:49.610 interesting treatment of military conscription which he 41:49.607 --> 41:52.187 talks about in chapter 21. 41:52.190 --> 41:57.210 There he describes battle, as he says, "a mutual running 41:57.209 --> 42:02.959 away" to armies confronting one another he describes as a mutual 42:02.958 --> 42:07.738 running away, and furthermore he says when it 42:07.739 --> 42:13.469 comes to conscription there should be allowance made for 42:13.468 --> 42:18.988 those that he calls "men of natural timorousness," 42:18.990 --> 42:20.880 cowards in other words. 42:20.880 --> 42:24.860 A man that has commanded as a soldier, Hobbes writes, 42:24.859 --> 42:28.989 to fight against the enemy though his sovereign has the 42:28.992 --> 42:32.672 right enough to punish his refusal with death may 42:32.665 --> 42:35.175 nevertheless, Hobbes writes, 42:35.177 --> 42:38.797 in many cases refuse without injustice as when he 42:38.803 --> 42:42.583 substituteth a sufficient solider in his place. 42:42.579 --> 42:46.719 In other words, Hobbes' view of this is why do 42:46.723 --> 42:51.513 the fighting yourself, if you can get someone else to 42:51.512 --> 42:55.802 do it for you? There is no intrinsic virtue in 42:55.804 --> 42:59.974 courage or battle, if you can get somebody else to 42:59.969 --> 43:04.349 do the job for you, a sort of perfect description, 43:04.345 --> 43:09.265 I think, of our volunteer army, how we pay people to do this 43:09.272 --> 43:12.532 difficult and dangerous work for us. 43:12.530 --> 43:16.880 43:16.880 --> 43:20.960 But the question is, can even a Hobbesian society, 43:20.955 --> 43:24.195 one which insists on rules and so on, 43:24.199 --> 43:27.749 can a Hobbesian society do entirely without-- Professor 43:27.748 --> 43:29.428 Steven Smith: Anyway, 43:29.430 --> 43:43.010 43:43.010 --> 43:48.710 can a Hobbesian society do without what we might call them 43:48.710 --> 43:52.060 the manly virtues, the civic virtues, 43:52.058 --> 43:55.878 pride, love of honor that Hobbes seems to condemn? 43:55.880 --> 43:57.800 Consider the case of Ralph Esposito. 43:57.800 --> 44:01.230 44:01.230 --> 44:04.880 Who is Ralph Esposito, you ask? 44:04.880 --> 44:09.620 His name is not in the index of Hobbes' book but Mr. 44:09.623 --> 44:14.743 Esposito is a New York City fireman who came to Branford 44:14.737 --> 44:20.317 College to be a Master's Tea guest not long after 9/11 and at 44:20.318 --> 44:25.798 length he discussed there people like himself who daily risk 44:25.804 --> 44:30.364 their lives running into building burning--burning 44:30.362 --> 44:34.642 buildings to rescue total strangers. 44:34.640 --> 44:37.390 Why do people do this? 44:37.389 --> 44:41.449 Is it because some people have a kind of built in sense of 44:41.451 --> 44:44.731 thumos, that wonderful Platonic term, 44:44.730 --> 44:48.360 pride, courage, love of risk that no society, 44:48.361 --> 44:51.911 not even a Hobbesian one, can do without? 44:51.909 --> 44:56.389 Even Hobbes' society presumably cannot do without a fire 44:56.388 --> 44:59.318 department or a police department; 44:59.320 --> 45:04.360 yet, if one were to follow Hobbes' risk averse psychology, 45:04.357 --> 45:09.657 if one were to follow the 19 laws of nature that advise us to 45:09.660 --> 45:12.930 seek peace and to avoid conflict, 45:12.929 --> 45:17.839 why would anyone ever become a fireman, a soldier, 45:17.835 --> 45:21.835 a risk taker, a policeman of any sort? 45:21.840 --> 45:25.860 Why would anyone ever risk one's life for one's country or 45:25.864 --> 45:29.684 a cause just to help other people, people that we don't 45:29.677 --> 45:32.357 know and probably will never know? 45:32.360 --> 45:35.920 Even in the passage that I cited earlier, 45:35.922 --> 45:40.822 where Hobbes describes the benefits of civil society, 45:40.820 --> 45:44.920 he speaks of activities like navigation, exploration and 45:44.920 --> 45:47.400 industry. Presumably, these are 45:47.398 --> 45:52.208 activities that are all engaged in risk taking behavior of one 45:52.214 --> 45:56.794 kind or another that seem not to be able to be explained by 45:56.794 --> 45:59.404 Hobbes' law of nature alone. 45:59.400 --> 46:03.930 So the question I want to leave you with today and that I want 46:03.925 --> 46:07.185 to pick up again on Wednesday is, in the end, 46:07.190 --> 46:10.010 what do societies require more of? 46:10.010 --> 46:15.240 Do they require more of Hobbes' men of natural timorousness or 46:15.237 --> 46:18.577 do they require more Ralph Espositos? 46:18.579 --> 46:22.999 And on that we'll finish up Hobbes on Wednesday.