Hobbes

Actualmente vivimos en la Argentina una situación que se asemeja a la de un Estado que se consume en sí mismo y, perdiendo gradualmente su esencia política, asume características pre-naturales. Pareciera que nuestra Nación está recorriendo el camino inverso al que con una precisión magistralmente realista, aunque no necesariamente demasiado optimista ya que se trataba de elegir el mal menor , a mediados del S. XVII, describiera Thomas Hobbes, al presentar su modelo de sociedad y de Estado, ambos de origen contractual, surgiendo a partir de la ficción creada del estado natural del hombre, situación en que éste se hallaba en la condición que Hobbes denomina “de naturaleza”, es decir, de “guerra de todos contra todos”. La antropología de Hobbes parte de una definición del hombre en que éste es malo por naturaleza, por lo tanto será necesario ponerle límites. Textualmente, dice Hobbes, “el hombre es el lobo del hombre (homo homine lupus)”.

U ovom tekstu ću pokušati da pokažem kako se iz prostih priroda, poslednjih entiteta do kojih se u svođenju može ići, konstruiše država kao garant izvesnosti ljudske prakse. Pod prostom prirodom misli se na individuu, čoveka poistovećenog s posednikom prirodnog prava. U tom smislu, ovaj tekst se usredsređuje na Hobsovu koncepciju prirodnog stanja da bi se prikazala njegova svrha u argumentaciji čiji je cilj ustanovljenje države/suverena. Cilj teksta je da pokaže da konstrukcijom individue u prirodnom stanju dolazi do temeljnih promena shvatanja prakse i čoveka kao političkog bića. Polazeći od definicije moći delovanja koja podrazumeva inherentnu moć promene, moć da se konačnim izborom izmeni pretpostavljeni kauzalni tok sveg zbivanja, moć da se uvek učini i drugačije, tvrdim da je politička filozofija Tomasa Hobsa, vođena principom apsolutne izvesnosti, a ne težnjom da se opravda puki apsolutizam vladara, bitno uticala na način na koji se danas misli moć delovanja.

""Hobbes articulates a modern problematic of reason, where the shared rationality of human beings is an integral part of the danger they present to each other, and where reason suggests a solution, the social contract and the laws of nature, enforced and interpreted by absolute sovereign authority.

This solution reflects a tension in modern reason itself, since it requires the alienation of self-determination of the rational human subject precisely to preserve the condition for the possibility of the rationality of the rational human subject, i.e. one’s life, which is threatened by the very rationality of other human subjects.

I discuss interpretations of Hobbes which stress the other motives of conflict, i.e. competition and vanity, and acknowledge that they play a role in the threat subjects present to each other, but argue that the danger presented precisely by shared rationality, which I discuss with some reference to the Hegelian dialectic of consciousness and mutual recognition, has been underplayed by Hobbes’ interpretation""

"The aim of this essay is to demonstrate that the penetration and reception of the theories of natural law were linked to the strategies implemented by a small state, whose survival seemed dependent on the application of a neutrality policy capable of safeguarding commercial activity, and somehow even on the evoked foundation of a federal system with other small states.

Works by Antinori (1711) and Averani (1721-22) in particular and, most especially, those by Buondelmonti (1737, 1741 and 1755) reveal that a process of selecting  natural law theories was under way; balanced as a result of the expected European circulation of these Tuscan works, this selection process was sometimes politically oriented towards dealing with the questions of succession, at other times to drawing an up-to-date picture of civil society, and at still other times to advocating the neutrality option and a specific role for neutral nations in international relations.

An early result that emerged by my research is that different members of the ruling class used Grotius’s teaching relating to international relations to promote and pay tribute to the Grand Duchy within the international political society. The image of the Tuscan Grand Duchy appears to have been founded on the steady public appreciation of the principle stare pactis: thanks to this norm of conduct, the Tuscan ruling class tried to earn their small neutral State a reputation for impartiality and, above all, trustworthiness.
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It seems that not so long ago something happened to the concept 'person' as the result of which it has become difficult for it to connote what was legally and historically one of its most common senses: a corporate person (for instance, that of Hobbes's Leviathan). I shall trace some of the movements of the concept of 'person', from its Greek theatrical beginnings, its Roman law days, its theological developments in Boethius and Thomas Aquinas, Grotius's and Hobbes's dealings with it and up to the present day. This sketch will identify certain ideas and concepts that have been rolled into what we now mean by 'person', as well as where they may have come from.

This paper considers Thomas Hobbes’s educational thought both in its historical context and in the context of his political philosophy as a whole. It begins with Hobbes’s diagnosis of the English Civil War as the product of the miseducation of the commonwealth and shows that education was a central and consistent concern of his political theory from an early stage. For Hobbes, the consensus on civil matters required for peace could be secured only through rigorous and universal civic educa- tion overseen by the sovereign in the universities, the pulpit, and the family alike. While some scholars have condemned Hobbesian education as unacceptably authoritarian, others have cited it approvingly as evidence for a more liberal Hobbes. This essay argues that neither reading adequately grasps the subtle relationship between persuasion and authority that characterises Hobbes’s concep- tion of education and, indeed, his political philosophy more generally.

This paper in history of philosophy covers themes about determinism from Pomponazzi to Cudworth. It deals with Pico della Mirandola, Lipsius and the neo-Stoics, Pietro Pomponazzi's attacks on free will, the English dramatist John Webster, Marin Mersenne, Hobbes's deterministic psychology, and English NeoPlatonism.

The status of the State is much contested in the globalized political context. In light of this, juxtaposing the political thought of Thomas Hobbes and Alain Badiou will facilitate a renewed questioning of the State. Hobbes stands near the beginning of the tradition of those using ‘State’ as term for the impersonal form of political authority between the ruler and the ruled, understanding politics as culminating in the State. Badiou, on the other hand, while assuming the basic conviction of the impersonal nature of the State, theorizes a space for politics at a distance to the State. After showing how Badiou moves through and beyond Hobbes, this essay will explore the theological pathways opened by Badiou.