History and context lecture 3

History and context lecture 3

The crito

A lot of what Plato writes may be slightly suspect. This is because he took to using Socrates to make his own points appear more valid, and later in his life just used Socrates as a way of delivering his points. None the less there is an important piece by Plato which documents (though it may be entirely fictitious) a conversation between Plato and one of his followers/students/disciples, Crito. This conversation is supposed to take place when Socrates is imprisoned awaiting his execution and Crito comes to him to beg him to try and escape. This is the first example where we see mention, or the idea of a social contract between a person and the state. Socrates introduces the idea by saying that he has lived in, grown up in and been educated in the city [Athens] and the city provided for him. When he came of age he had the option to go but by staying he entered into a contract to obey the rules of the society. By your very existence it means that you have to follow the laws. He even went as far as saying that if he breaks the law he is attempting to destroy the whole city on the basis that if he does refuse to accept his punishment people will follow him and the whole basis for law and order within Athens would collapse.

The social contract

Thomas Hobbes built on the idea put forward by Plato. He brought up the idea of a state of nature that came before the establishment of rules and government. This state of nature wasn’t necessarily an established time in history but it’s easy enough to imagine. Think along the lines of the laws of the jungle, the strong ruling over the weak and primal thoughts ruling. How a philosopher thinks the state of nature would be shows a lot about that philosopher’s opinion on human nature. It certainly reveals that Hobbes had a very negative view of human nature, and believed life in the state of nature as "No arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death: and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.". This opinion was put forward in his book “The Leviathan”, in which he also says that the power of the leviathan is limitless, the people agree to be represented by a sovereign. They agree to hand over their power and the sovereign is then obligated to protect them, both from rebellious subjects and other states. The leviathan that he talks about is the government or ruling body of a state, the people essentially hand over some of their freedom and in return gain protection and purpose. However, the ruling body will ultimately have total power over you. Hobbes does make it clear though, that the sovereign owes his power to the people whom he rules over.

Locke’s treatise of government

Locke almost directly contradicts what Hobbes says, fundamentally with his view of human nature. Whereas Hobbes thought that the state of nature would be terrible Locke had a far more positive view. He thought that it was innate in human beings to come to an understanding of what was morally right and wrong, and once this was decided then people would work together. He contradicted what Hobbes had said about the divine right of kings, and also believed that he went far too far with the amount of power which he gave to the leviathan, saying “you have a problem with foxes so you create a lion”. When Locke thought there would be conflict he believed that the area that would have the most potential for conflict would be property. This potential for conflict brought about the realisation that there would be the need for a higher power. As soon as he admits this he admits that a government is necessary, however, Locke proposed a concept of laws which would limit the power of government. For example, he insisted that taxes could not be levied without the peoples (parliament) consent, and that citizens had the right to rebel if their government ceased to respect the law. By doing this he was essentially writing a manual for the American revolutionaries.

Rousseau

Rousseau was all about conflict between obedience to the state and your freedom. He thought that our freedom is to be guided by our own will – he wants civil freedom, if everyone is involved in the making of law they will only be following their own will, which in turn will be the general will. He believed that the general will would become law because, if we all think and come up with a common agreement over a moral issue, such as theft, whatever is decided by consensus will be morally right and will therefore become law. What is shown by this is that Rousseau believes that the people have to be part of the legislature. This shows, again, how different Rousseau’s belief in human nature was. Hobbes believed that there would be a collapse of society, Locke believed there would be a collaborative state and Rousseau believed there would be a state of freedom.

Plato

Plato had a very interesting take which is known as Plato’s forms. He believed that there are two realities, the one that we are in and the ideal reality, where everything is the same, except that in the ideal reality everything there would be the ultimately perfect version of what is in this reality. He justified this by saying that if you try and think of something perfect in this reality, if you look at it hard enough you will find some small imperfection, this would be the imperfect form but in another reality the perfect form of it will exist. He reasoned that, since we can think of a perfect ideal version of something, we must have some prior knowledge of this, therefore have memories of the perfect version of reality. He went on to say that the human soul should be thought of like a chariot. The rational soul is the charioteer, the spirit soul is one of the horses and the desire soul is the other. The rational soul is constantly trying to dominate the other parts. In a philosopher the charioteer will be in charge of the other parts of his soul, people dominated by spirit will be courageous but they will be focused on fighting, and people dominated by the desirous soul will be like ‘rudderless boats’ drifting between desires. Since there are two states he reasons that in the state we’re in it is ruled by people obedient to their spirit and desire souls. In the perfect reality, it would be ruled over by the philosophers, whose rational soul is in charge.

Machiavelli

Machiavelli talks more about the here and now rather than the future and past; he was concentrated on the present and the trials you may face within your lifetime. He was remarkable because he was a massive humanist, he said “man is the measure of all things”. He wrote the book The Prince which was pretty much a how to guide to stay in power. Within The Prince he is extremely rational, saying things that may be thought, but it would be almost taboo to say them. For example, he says “it is better to be feared than loved, because love is fickle but fear is constant’. This gives a measure of the man because it shows his absolute rationality.