How does Thomas Hobbes conceive humans (in their “natural condition”)?
Self-interested, driven by needs for personal survival and advantage over others. What would happen, according to Hobbes, if humans lived “without a common power” over them? There would be a war of each against all. No systematic efforts; no cultivation of the earth; no trade by water; no buildings except the most basic; no geographical knowledge; no history; no literature; no polite society; . . . but “continual fear, and danger of violent death, and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” 3. What passions incline people to peace? Fear (of death); desire (for things that contribute to comfortable living); hope (to obtain the latter through effort). How does reason lead people to enter a social contract? (610-11) People, or rather “men,” recognize that if they do not wish to live poor, nasty, brutish and short lives, they must make peace with one another and agree to end mutual aggression. To enforce the agreement they must accept an authority outside themselves th
