Lone Star College The State of Nature and Socratic Morality Analysis HW The State of Nature and Socratic Morality Required Reading: Thomas Hobbes, Leviath

Lone Star College The State of Nature and Socratic Morality Analysis HW The State of Nature and Socratic Morality

Required Reading: Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan (Selections) – Ch. XIII, XIV, XV, XVII

Prompt: For this discussion board, you will consider a question in two parts. First consider Socrates’s position that a social contract could be sustained by moral virtue (Additionally, recall the recommended readings posted over the past few weeks.) Again, one way to consider Socrates’ position in the work is calling for a ‘tacit social contract’. Second, consider that Hobbesian position, where a social contract develops out of coercion by authority, the immediacy of meeting the basics demands of life, and is not tacit so much as it is explicit.

To answer this discussion board prompt, provide an exposition of the selection from Leviathan, then briefly reiterate the position Socrates advocates in Crito. Compared to the Hobbesian view, does Socrates have expectations of human nature that set the bar for our interaction too high? Explain you position.

Recommended Reading: Hobbes’s Moral and Political Philosophy – Sections 2, 3, 4, & 7 -> http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hobbes-moral/#PhiPro

View youtube video: https://youtu.be/GbPW1V6Rj-A

You will always be required to create a post responding to the discussion prompt (300-600 words) SELECTIONS FROM THOMAS HOBBES, THE LEVIATHAN, 1651
CHAPTER VI
OF THE INTERIOR BEGINNINGS OF VOLUNTARY MOTIONS, COMMONLY
CALLED THE PASSIONS; AND THE SPEECHES BY WHICH THEY ARE
EXPRESSED
THERE be in animals two sorts of motions peculiar to them: One called vital, begun in
generation, and continued without interruption through their whole life; such as are the
course of the blood, the pulse, the breathing, the concoction, nutrition, excretion, etc.; to
which motions there needs no help of imagination: the other is animal motion, otherwise
called voluntary motion; as to go, to speak, to move any of our limbs, in such manner as
is first fancied in our minds. That sense is motion in the organs and interior parts of man’s
body, caused by the action of the things we see, hear, etc., and that fancy is but the relics
of the same motion, remaining after sense, has been already said in the first and second
chapters. And because going, speaking, and the like voluntary motions depend always
upon a precedent thought of whither, which way, and what, it is evident that the
imagination is the first internal beginning of all voluntary motion. And although
unstudied men do not conceive any motion at all to be there, where the thing moved is
invisible, or the space it is moved in is, for the shortness of it, insensible; yet that doth not
hinder but that such motions are. For let a space be never so little, that which is moved
over a greater space, whereof that little one is part, must first be moved over that. These
small beginnings of motion within the body of man, before they appear in walking,
speaking, striking, and other visible actions, are commonly called endeavour.
This endeavour, when it is toward something which causes it, is called appetite, or desire,
the latter being the general name, and the other oftentimes restrained to signify the desire
of food, namely hunger and thirst. And when the endeavour is from ward something, it is
generally called aversion. These words appetite and aversion we have from the Latins;
and they both of them signify the motions, one of approaching, the other of retiring. So
also do the Greek words for the same, which are orme and aphorme. For Nature itself
does often press upon men those truths which afterwards, when they look for somewhat
beyond Nature, they stumble at. For the Schools find in mere appetite to go, or move, no
actual motion at all; but because some motion they must acknowledge, they call it
metaphorical motion, which is but an absurd speech; for though words may be called
metaphorical, bodies and motions cannot.
That which men desire they are said to love, and to hate those things for which they have
aversion. So that desire and love are the same thing; save that by desire, we signify the
absence of the object; by love, most commonly the presence of the same. So also by
aversion, we signify the absence; and by hate, the presence of the object.
Of appetites and aversions, some are born with men; as appetite of food, appetite of
excretion, and exoneration (which may also and more properly be called aversions, from
somewhat they feel in their bodies), and some other appetites, not many. The rest, which
are appetites of particular things, proceed from experience and trial of their effects upon
themselves or other men. For of things we know not at all, or believe not to be, we can
have no further desire than to taste and try. But aversion we have for things, not only
which we know have hurt us, but also that we do not know whether they will hurt us, or
not.
Those things which we neither desire nor hate, we are said to contemn: contempt being
nothing else but an immobility or contumacy of the heart in resisting the action of certain
things; and proceeding from that the heart is already moved otherwise, by other more
potent objects, or from want of experience of them.
And because the constitution of a man’s body is in continual mutation, it is impossible
that all the same things should always cause in him the same appetites and aversions:
much less can all men consent in the desire of almost any one and the same object.
But whatsoever is the object of any man’s appetite or desire, that is it which he for his
part calleth good; and the object of his hate and aversion, evil; and of his contempt, vile
and inconsiderable. For these words of good, evil, and contemptible are ever used with
relation to the person that useth them: there being nothing simply and absolutely so; nor
any common rule of good and evil to be taken from the nature of the objects themselves;
but from the person of the man, where there is no Commonwealth; or, in a
Commonwealth, from the person that representeth it; or from an arbitrator or judge,
whom men disagreeing shall by consent set up and make his sentence the rule thereof.
The Latin tongue has two words whose significations approach to those of good and evil,
but are not precisely the same; and those are pulchrum and turpe. Whereof the former
signifies that which by some apparent signs promiseth good; and the latter, that which
promiseth evil. But in our tongue we have not so general names to express them by. But
for pulchrum we say in some things, fair; in others, beautiful, or handsome, or gallant, or
honourable, or comely, or amiable: and for turpe; foul, deformed, ugly, base, nauseous,
and the like, as the subject shall require; all which words, in their proper places, signify
nothing else but the mien, or countenance, that promiseth good and evil. So that of good
there be three kinds: good in the promise, that is pulchrum; good in effect, as the end
desired, which is called jucundum, delightful; and good as the means, which is called
utile, profitable; and as many of evil: for evil in promise is that they call turpe; evil in
effect and end is molestum, unpleasant, troublesome; and evil in the means, inutile,
unprofitable, hurtful.
As in sense that which is really within us is, as I have said before, only motion, caused by
the action of external objects but in appearance; to the sight, light and colour; to the ear,
sound; to the nostril, odour, etc.: so, when the action of the same object is continued from
the eyes, ears, and other organs to the heart, the real effect there is nothing but motion, or
endeavour; which consisteth in appetite or aversion to or from the object moving. But the
appearance or sense of that motion is that we either call delight or trouble of mind.
This motion, which is called appetite, and for the appearance of it delight and pleasure,
seemeth to be a corroboration of vital motion, and a help thereunto; and therefore such
things as caused delight were not improperly called jucunda (a juvando), from helping or
fortifying; and the contrary, molesta, offensive, from hindering and troubling the motion
vital.
Pleasure therefore, or delight, is the appearance or sense of good; and molestation or
displeasure, the appearance or sense of evil. And consequently all appetite, desire, and
love is accompanied with some delight more or less; and all hatred and aversion with
more or less displeasure and offence.
Of pleasures, or delights, some arise from the sense of an object present; and those may
be called pleasures of sense (the word sensual, as it is used by those only that condemn
them, having no place till there be laws). Of this kind are all onerations and exonerations
of the body; as also all that is pleasant, in the sight, hearing, smell, taste, or touch. Others
arise from the expectation that proceeds from foresight of the end or consequence of
things, whether those things in the sense please or displease: and these are pleasures of
the mind of him that draweth in those consequences, and are generally called joy. In the
like manner, displeasures are some in the sense, and called pain; others, in the
expectation of consequences, and are called grief…
When in the mind of man appetites and aversions, hopes and fears, concerning one and
the same thing, arise alternately; and diverse good and evil consequences of the doing or
omitting the thing propounded come successively into our thoughts; so that sometimes
we have an appetite to it, sometimes an aversion from it; sometimes hope to be able to do
it, sometimes despair, or fear to attempt it; the whole sum of desires, aversions, hopes and
fears, continued till the thing be either done, or thought impossible, is that we call
deliberation.
Therefore of things past there is no deliberation, because manifestly impossible to be
changed; nor of things known to be impossible, or thought so; because men know or
think such deliberation vain. But of things impossible, which we think possible, we may
deliberate, not knowing it is in vain. And it is called deliberation; because it is a putting
an end to the liberty we had of doing, or omitting, according to our own appetite, or
aversion.
This alternate succession of appetites, aversions, hopes and fears is no less in other living
creatures than in man; and therefore beasts also deliberate.
Every deliberation is then said to end when that whereof they deliberate is either done or
thought impossible; because till then we retain the liberty of doing, or omitting, according
to our appetite, or aversion.
In deliberation, the last appetite, or aversion, immediately adhering to the action, or to the
omission thereof, is that we call the will; the act, not the faculty, of willing. And beasts
that have deliberation must necessarily also have will. The definition of the will, given
commonly by the Schools, that it is a rational appetite, is not good. For if it were, then
could there be no voluntary act against reason. For a voluntary act is that which
proceedeth from the will, and no other. But if instead of a rational appetite, we shall say
an appetite resulting from a precedent deliberation, then the definition is the same that I
have given here. Will, therefore, is the last appetite in deliberating. And though we say in
common discourse, a man had a will once to do a thing, that nevertheless he forbore to
do; yet that is properly but an inclination, which makes no action voluntary; because the
action depends not of it, but of the last inclination, or appetite. For if the intervenient
appetites make any action voluntary, then by the same reason all intervenient aversions
should make the same action involuntary; and so one and the same action should be both
voluntary and involuntary.
By this it is manifest that, not only actions that have their beginning from covetousness,
ambition, lust, or other appetites to the thing propounded, but also those that have their
beginning from aversion, or fear of those consequences that follow the omission, are
voluntary actions.
The forms of speech by which the passions are expressed are partly the same and partly
different from those by which we express our thoughts. And first generally all passions
may be expressed indicatively; as, I love, I fear, I joy, I deliberate, I will, I command: but
some of them have particular expressions by themselves, which nevertheless are not
affirmations, unless it be when they serve to make other inferences besides that of the
passion they proceed from. Deliberation is expressed subjunctively; which is a speech
proper to signify suppositions, with their consequences; as, If this be done, then this will
follow; and differs not from the language of reasoning, save that reasoning is in general
words, but deliberation for the most part is of particulars. The language of desire, and
aversion, is imperative; as, Do this, forbear that; which when the party is obliged to do, or
forbear, is command; otherwise prayer; or else counsel. The language of vainglory, of
indignation, pity and revengefulness, optative: but of the desire to know, there is a
peculiar expression called interrogative; as, What is it, when shall it, how is it done, and
why so? Other language of the passions I find none: for cursing, swearing, reviling, and
the like do not signify as speech, but as the actions of a tongue accustomed.
These forms of speech, I say, are expressions or voluntary significations of our passions:
but certain signs they be not; because they may be used arbitrarily, whether they that use
them have such passions or not. The best signs of passions present are either in the
countenance, motions of the body, actions, and ends, or aims, which we otherwise know
the man to have.
And because in deliberation the appetites and aversions are raised by foresight of the
good and evil consequences, and sequels of the action whereof we deliberate, the good or
evil effect thereof dependeth on the foresight of a long chain of consequences, of which
very seldom any man is able to see to the end. But for so far as a man seeth, if the good in
those consequences be greater than the evil, the whole chain is that which writers call
apparent or seeming good. And contrarily, when the evil exceedeth the good, the whole is
apparent or seeming evil: so that he who hath by experience, or reason, the greatest and
surest prospect of consequences, deliberates best himself; and is able, when he will, to
give the best counsel unto others.
Continual success in obtaining those things which a man from time to time desireth, that
is to say, continual prospering, is that men call felicity; I mean the felicity of this life. For
there is no such thing as perpetual tranquillity of mind, while we live here; because life
itself is but motion, and can never be without desire, nor without fear, no more than
without sense. What kind of felicity God hath ordained to them that devoutly honour him,
a man shall no sooner know than enjoy; being joys that now are as incomprehensible as
the word of Schoolmen, beatifical vision, is unintelligible.
The form of speech whereby men signify their opinion of the goodness of anything is
praise. That whereby they signify the power and greatness of anything is magnifying.
And that whereby they signify the opinion they have of a man’s felicity is by the Greeks
called makarismos, for which we have no name in our tongue. And thus much is
sufficient for the present purpose to have been said of the passions.
CHAPTER XI
OF THE DIFFERENCE OF MANNERS
BY MANNERS, I mean not here decency of behaviour; as how one man should salute
another, or how a man should wash his mouth, or pick his teeth before company, and
such other points of the small morals; but those qualities of mankind that concern their
living together in peace and unity. To which end we are to consider that the felicity of
this life consisteth not in the repose of a mind satisfied. For there is no such finis ultimus
(utmost aim) nor summum bonum (greatest good) as is spoken of in the books of the old
moral philosophers. Nor can a man any more live whose desires are at an end than he
whose senses and imaginations are at a stand. Felicity is a continual progress of the desire
from one object to another, the attaining of the former being still but the way to the latter.
The cause whereof is that the object of man’s desire is not to enjoy once only, and for one
instant of time, but to assure forever the way of his future desire. And therefore the
voluntary actions and inclinations of all men tend not only to the procuring, but also to
the assuring of a contented life, and differ only in the way, which ariseth partly from the
diversity of passions in diverse men, and partly from the difference of the knowledge or
opinion each one has of the causes which produce the effect desired.
So that in the first place, I put for a general inclination of all mankind a perpetual and
restless desire of power after power, that ceaseth only in death. And the cause of this is
not always that a man hopes for a more intensive delight than he has already attained to,
or that he cannot be content with a moderate power, but because he cannot assure the
power and means to live well, which he hath present, without the acquisition of more.
And from hence it is that kings, whose power is greatest, turn their endeavours to the
assuring it at home by laws, or abroad by wars: and when that is done, there succeedeth a
new desire; in some, of fame from new conquest; in others, of ease and sensual pleasure;
in others, of admiration, or being flattered for excellence in some art or other ability of
the mind.
Competition of riches, honour, command, or other power inclineth to contention, enmity,
and war, because the way of one competitor to the attaining of his desire is to kill,
subdue, supplant, or repel the other. Particularly, competition of praise inclineth to a
reverence of antiquity. For men contend with the living, not with the dead; to these
ascribing more than due, that they may obscure the glory of the other.
Desire of ease, and sensual delight, disposeth men to obey a common power: because by
such desires a man doth abandon the protection that might be hoped for from his own
industry and labour. Fear of death and wounds disposeth to the same, and for the same
reason. On the contrary, needy men and hardy, not contented with their present condition,
as also all men that are ambitious of military command, are inclined to continue the
causes of war and to stir up trouble and sedition: for there is no honour military but by
war; nor any such hope to mend an ill game as by causing a new shuffle.
Desire of knowledge, and arts of peace, inclineth men to obey a common power: for such
desire containeth a desire of leisure, and consequently protection from some other power
than their own.
Desire of praise disposeth to laudable actions, such as please them whose judgement they
value; for of those men whom we contemn, we contemn also the praises. Desire of fame
after death does the same. And though after death there be no sense of the praise given us
on earth, as being joys that are either swallowed up in the unspeakable joys of heaven or
extinguished in the extreme torments of hell: yet is not such fame vain; because men have
a present delight therein, from the foresight of it, and of the benefit that may redound
thereby to their posterity: which though they now see not, yet they imagine; and anything
that is pleasure in the sense, the same also is pleasure in the imagination…
CHAPTER XIII OF THE NATURAL CONDITION OF MANKIND AS
CONCERNING THEIR FELICITY AND MISERY
NATURE hath made men so equal in the faculties of body and mind as that, though there
be found one man sometimes manifestly stronger in body or of quicker mind than
another, yet when all is reckoned together the difference between man and man is not so
considerable as that one man can thereupon claim to himself any benefit to which another
may not pretend as well as he. For as to the strength of body, the weakest has strength
enough to kill the strongest, either by secret machination or by confederacy with others
that are in the same danger with himself.
And as to the faculties of the mind, setting aside the arts grounded upon words, and
especially that skill of proceeding upon general and infallible rules, called science, which
very few have and but in few things, as being not a native faculty born with us, nor
attained, as prudence, while we look after somewhat else, I find yet a greater equality
amongst men than that of strength. For prudence is but experience, which equal time
equally bestows on all men in those things they equally apply themselves unto. That
which may perhaps make such equality incredible is but a vain conceit of one’s own
wisdom, which almost all men think they have in a greater degree than the vulgar; that is,
than all men but themselves, and a few others, whom by fame, or for concurring with
themselves, they approve. For such is the nature of men that howsoever they may
acknowledge many others to be more witty, or more eloquent or more learned, yet they
will hardly believe there be many so wise as themselves; for they see their own wit at
hand, and other men’s at a distance. But this proveth rather th…
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