Rousseau vs Locke vs Hobbes

Dude, fuck nature. The whole reason why humans invented tv, beer and video games is because natures boring as fuck. I'd much rather watch Jersey Shore than freeze in the winter and wipe my ass with pinecones. But, hey, thats just me.

And out of those 3, I like Hobbes the most.

 

I have to ask:

Do you go out every day and hunt your meals with a bow and arrows (which you chipped out of sticks and rocks), skin it, gut it, cook it over a fire? Or is that something you'd like to do, if only you weren't too lazy to.

I'm sorry to say this position looks rather silly posted on the internet.

I'm only familiar with Locke and Hobbes in a social justice context, and I'd have to say in this case I'd put my backing behind the both of them. Society is not our problem, but what we are allowing to be done with it.

A system for organizing is only natural to arise among social beings such as ourselves when we reach sufficient in number that dealing with our differences becomes a sort of chaos. Whatever we do, there are too many of us for there not to be some society.

Locke, of course, gets a lot of the credit for the foundation of the present liberal society. There are aspects of this that I like a great deal. I like Locke on his property ideas, but I think they apply not only one person but to all who enabled the labor. His formulation works well in a Lost island type of setting though.

I agree with Hobbes on the idea that a society should enable success, but that the successful should want to give back to the society to promote the success of others.

We do not properly value the fruits of labor, therefore we are not entitled to a fair portion. Some manage to take advantage of that, but most struggle with it. It's less the fault of the organizing principles of society than with what we as people allow to dictate the content of those principles. The wealthy and powerful reach the top, and place their thumbs upon the scale. I think it is tolerated because the way we communicate is dominated by elements the powerful control and influence.

This is probably what should have been expected from liberalism. The less we ask of those who succeed on the fruits of our labor, the less we will have every day.

 

Rousseau promulgated, people "must be forced to be free"; the social contract is best depicted by Rousseau. A big part of Locke's thought involved private property; private property and public democracy don't mesh... And Hobbes is too atavistic with his beliefs.

 

After meeting so many beasts, I have to say Hobbes.

 

So, you'd go against nature, and relinquish sovereignty over YOUR OWN body in the name of a omnipotent king? Rousseauan and Lockean government's both promise security, for to preserve an individual's liberty is the primary priority of both philosopher's; but, they, Rousseau and Locke, don't believe Man must rescind their natural right's just for parental security...

"Anyone who trades liberty for security, deserves neither liberty nor security."

 

All this really boils down to is... the age old question in politics, does the individual come before the state, or does the state come before the individual?

 

This is a good healthy and lively discussion on western philosophy, but I would like to address some ethnographic assumptions being made in the original post.

You need to understand the the separation between civilization and nature is a social construction -- it varies significantly, and represents a narrative within the very civilization in which we all participate. The very term "nature" is a socialized construction and does not posses a universal definition that crosses cultural boundaries.

I can recommend some reading on the subject,

the term "Native Americans" represent an extremely diverse collection of nations with incredibly variety in cultural expression and modes of production.

The idea of the accumulation of wealth is actually not a purely Western ideal. Various systems of centralized redistribution, bride wealth and dowry are functionally based on the accumulation of material goods and property rights.

Not all aboriginal inhabitants of North America were small corporate tribes and bands. There is a lot of variety in political organization and modes of production.

I would argue that it is fairly similar. It's about the avail of technology.

A Professor of early modern history once posed the question to me: If the technological roles of the Aztecs and Spanish were reversed, do you think the Aztecs would have taken a bite out of western Europe?

I think the answer is quite obvious.