Opinion of Thomas Hobbes

[Mad Deadly Worldwide Communist Gangster Computer God]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Hobbes

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Essential to understanding the modern world, for better or worse.

[Mad Deadly Worldwide Communist Gangster Computer God]

Essential to understanding the modern world, for better or worse.

I figured you'd be a huge fan.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Essential to understanding the modern world, for better or worse.

I figured you'd be a huge fan.

Lol. I don’t actually consider my worldview to be very Hobbesian. Thank you. Why do you say so?

[Mad Deadly Worldwide Communist Gangster Computer God]

Essential to understanding the modern world, for better or worse.

I figured you'd be a huge fan.

Lol. I don’t actually consider my worldview to be very Hobbesian. Thank you. Why do you say so?

Eh, I just get the impression that you favor a strong, united government ruled by a set of principles that's rather peculiar.  Plus you would probably agree with Hobbes that the solitary state of nature is "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short" and therefore in need of firm restraint.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Essential to understanding the modern world, for better or worse.

I figured you'd be a huge fan.

Lol. I don’t actually consider my worldview to be very Hobbesian. Thank you. Why do you say so?

Eh, I just get the impression that you favor a strong, undivided government ruled by a set of principles that's rather peculiar.  Plus you would probably agree with Hobbes that the solitary state of nature is "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short" and therefore in need of firm restraint.

I’d have a hard time asserting there ever was s “state of nature”, given the sort of ubiquity of human social organization—pregovernmental institutions still governed. But in a society with near-unlimited technological destructive capabilities and the ability of “social pathogens” of a sort to spread very easily, I would say that a strong state is necessary to allow us to live in our own “states of nature”—ie, the parochial recent past that “conservatives” imagine recreating requires a far greater amount of government involvement than they think. Conservationism is necessary for hunting, morality is needed for markets, lenience is needed for obedience, etc. Ironically, despite this, I’d still probably favor a more “liberal” criminal justice system than we currently have, as I would prefer a strong emphasis on community reintegration.

EDIT: And, obviously, the central irony is that a strong and technologically-advanced security state would be a prerequisite to defending the right to be backwards. (Not that I’m a complete troglodyte—far from it)

[Georg Ebner]

Typically Baroque:

- : advocating absolutism instead of medieval feudalism&hierarchism (cf. LUTHER, BODIN,...)

+: knowledge of human nature (cf. MONTAIGNE, SHAKESPEARE, GRACIAN, FrenchMoralists,...)

[Mr. Smith]

One of my favorites.

[Tartarus Sauce]

A must read in any serious study of social contract theory since he's so foundational to the field, although our modern understanding of human psychology and evolutionary history debunks his ideas on human nature wholesale.

[TDAS04]

Mixed, FF on balance.

[UncleVolodya]

Vital. Insufficient.

[America Needs R'hllor]

Essential to understanding the modern world, for better or worse.