Pub Date : 2023-09-28DOI: 10.1163/18750257-bja10064
Martine Pécharman
Abstract In the free-will discussion between Hobbes and Bramhall, Hobbes’s principle that actions are necessary is not immediately action-theoretic. The fundamental theoretical context of Hobbes’s explanation of action lies in an understanding of causation more generally. However, Hobbes’s action theory is not simply modeled after the account of cause and effect in his First Philosophy. It introduces a temporal qualification which ranks necessitarianism higher than First Philosophy does: not only a voluntary action, but also the determinate moment when the mental act of volition is formed, is necessitated. My paper argues that this strengthening of causal necessity is due to the Hobbesian scheme of deliberation, which must be analyzed in terms of one distinctive kind of ‘mental discourse’ and practical reasoning, not merely in terms of a series of passions. For Hobbes, the impossibility of a direct representation of the future requires the mediation of a mental construction.
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Pub Date : 2023-09-28DOI: 10.1163/18750257-bja10062
Stephanie B. Martens
Abstract Critical approaches to the canon of Western political and legal thought from the point of view of race or gender have developed in recent years, as have studies highlighting the connections between supposedly universalist philosophies and their role in sustaining or legitimizing imperial and colonial conquests. On social contract theory in particular, seminal works include Charles Mills’ The Racial Contract and Carole Pateman’s The Sexual Contract . The importance of this type of work cannot be understated, and Mills is right to insist on the “blinding whiteness of the discipline.” In the case of Hobbes, I argue, the privilege established in his texts is better qualified as “civilizational” rather than “racial.” Hobbes’s texts construct a certain image of civilization, a form of exclusion and domination that eschews biological determinism in favor of social, historical bias. This “civilizational” thinking certainly can work – and will work later on in conjunction with modern racism and white privilege – to exclude many. The racial contract – as per Mills – is only a late installment on a more fundamental one, the civilizing contract.
{"title":"Civilization and Its Others: American Imaginaries, State of Nature, and Civility in Hobbes","authors":"Stephanie B. Martens","doi":"10.1163/18750257-bja10062","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/18750257-bja10062","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Critical approaches to the canon of Western political and legal thought from the point of view of race or gender have developed in recent years, as have studies highlighting the connections between supposedly universalist philosophies and their role in sustaining or legitimizing imperial and colonial conquests. On social contract theory in particular, seminal works include Charles Mills’ The Racial Contract and Carole Pateman’s The Sexual Contract . The importance of this type of work cannot be understated, and Mills is right to insist on the “blinding whiteness of the discipline.” In the case of Hobbes, I argue, the privilege established in his texts is better qualified as “civilizational” rather than “racial.” Hobbes’s texts construct a certain image of civilization, a form of exclusion and domination that eschews biological determinism in favor of social, historical bias. This “civilizational” thinking certainly can work – and will work later on in conjunction with modern racism and white privilege – to exclude many. The racial contract – as per Mills – is only a late installment on a more fundamental one, the civilizing contract.","PeriodicalId":42474,"journal":{"name":"Hobbes Studies","volume":"52 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135425656","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-28DOI: 10.1163/18750257-bja10063
Rosemarie Wagner
{"title":"The Long Arc of Legality: Hobbes, Kelsen, Hart, written by Dyzenhaus, David","authors":"Rosemarie Wagner","doi":"10.1163/18750257-bja10063","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/18750257-bja10063","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42474,"journal":{"name":"Hobbes Studies","volume":"25 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135425810","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-26DOI: 10.1163/18750257-bja10061
Roger Ariew
Abstract Gregorio Baldin’s book, La croisée des savoirs , concerns the intellectual relations among Hobbes, Mersenne, and Descartes. The study is limited to the time between 1634 and 1648, starting when Hobbes first met Mersenne in Paris and ending when Mersenne died. It covers three main topics. Part i is devoted to the relations maintained by Hobbes with the circle of Mersenne during 1634–1636, which Baldin thinks are essential for the development of Hobbes’ scientific thought. Part ii develops the theme of the “hidden” influence of Mersenne on Hobbes’ thought, highlighting points of contact between the two authors, such as mechanism, research in optics, and their approach to epistemology. Part iii concerns Hobbes’ influence on Mersenne’s thought. It addresses several themes, starting with Mersenne’s interest in Hobbes’ system, the attitudes of Mersenne, Gassendi, and Hobbes toward Cartesian metaphysics, and ending with scientific themes debated in Mersenne’s circle during the 1640s.
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Pub Date : 2023-09-15DOI: 10.1163/18750257-bja10060
Cesare Cuttica
{"title":"Hobbes and the Democratic Imaginary, written by Holman, Christopher","authors":"Cesare Cuttica","doi":"10.1163/18750257-bja10060","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/18750257-bja10060","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42474,"journal":{"name":"Hobbes Studies","volume":"25 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135485487","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-03-30DOI: 10.1163/18750257-bja10057
Allan M. Hillani
In this article I argue that Thomas Hobbes’s theory of the “state of nature” should be understood as describing a thoroughly political situation. Hobbes’s exemplification of the state of nature by resorting to the “savages” of America should be taken in its ultimately paradoxical character, one that puts in question the stark opposition between a prepolitical natural state and the properly political state resulting from the “social contract.” Through the lenses of ethnographic studies and anthropological theory, I propose a reinterpretation of Hobbes’s characterization of the state of nature as a state of war. In the first section, I present my interpretation of Hobbes’s understanding of war, arguing that war is characterized not by actual battle but by the uncertainty of conflict, already entailing a social dimension to it. In the second section, I engage with Pierre Clastres’s theory of the society against the State to discuss how, for Amerindian peoples, war not only has a social character but is itself the basis of sociality. In the last section, I discuss Eduardo Viveiros de Castro’s theory of potential affinity to propose that Hobbes’s state of nature is also a form of schematization of alterity as enmity. I conclude by showing how this provides an understanding of peace as a precarious situation, one that is the outcome of ethical practices ultimately independent from the State.
在这篇文章中,我认为托马斯·霍布斯的“自然状态”理论应该被理解为描述一个彻底的政治状况。霍布斯以美国的“野蛮人”作为自然状态的例证,应该被理解为其最终的矛盾特征,它提出了一个问题,即前政治的自然状态与由“社会契约”产生的适当的政治状态之间的鲜明对立。通过民族志研究和人类学理论的镜头,我提议重新解释霍布斯将自然状态描述为战争状态的特征。在第一部分,我阐述了我对霍布斯对战争的理解的解释,认为战争的特点不是实际的战斗,而是冲突的不确定性,已经包含了社会维度。在第二部分,我用Pierre Clastres的社会反对国家的理论来讨论,对于美洲印第安人来说,战争不仅具有社会特征,而且本身就是社会的基础。在最后一节,我讨论了Eduardo Viveiros de Castro的潜在亲和理论,提出霍布斯的自然状态也是一种将另类作为敌意的图式化形式。最后,我要说明这如何使人们理解和平是一种不稳定的局势,是最终独立于国家的道德实践的结果。
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Pub Date : 2023-03-30DOI: 10.1163/18750257-bja10058
A. Blau
Is it anachronistic to talk about racism in Hobbes? After all, racism is usually seen as biological: the disliked group must have innate characteristics which are inherited biologically. This is mostly said to be a modern idea. Yet biological racism can be found in medieval and early modern times, as with the Spanish doctrine of limpieza de sangre (cleanliness/purity of blood). Racism, including biological racism, was much more common in Hobbes’s England than we might think, including in texts he may have read; the language of race was hardly uncommon either. Moreover, someone can be called a racist whether or not their dislike of a group is based on characteristics of a group that are inherited biologically, I argue. Whether Hobbes was a racist remains open to debate; this paper offers evidence both for and against that proposition. But we should not reject the question of Hobbes’s racism as anachronistic.
在霍布斯的著作中讨论种族主义是否不合时宜?毕竟,种族主义通常被认为是生物学上的:不受欢迎的群体一定有先天的特征,这些特征是生物学上遗传下来的。这通常被认为是一个现代的想法。然而,在中世纪和近代早期,就可以发现生物种族主义,比如西班牙的limpieza de sangre(血液的清洁/纯洁)教义。种族主义,包括生物种族主义,在霍布斯的英国比我们想象的要普遍得多,包括在他读过的文本中;种族语言也并不罕见。此外,我认为,无论一个人对一个群体的厌恶是否基于生物遗传的群体特征,他都可以被称为种族主义者。霍布斯是否是个种族主义者仍有争议;本文提供了支持和反对这一观点的证据。但是我们不应该把霍布斯的种族主义问题斥为时代错误。
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Pub Date : 2023-03-24DOI: 10.1163/18750257-bja10059
A. Blau
{"title":"Hobbes and Race: Summary of the Special Issue","authors":"A. Blau","doi":"10.1163/18750257-bja10059","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/18750257-bja10059","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42474,"journal":{"name":"Hobbes Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.2,"publicationDate":"2023-03-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47904648","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-03-20DOI: 10.1163/18750257-bja10055
Susanne Sreedhar
Thomas Hobbes, like other early modern social contract theorists, has been accused of promoting racist views in his philosophy – ideas used to justify European imperialism and the devastation of Indigenous peoples. I argue that his philosophy does not assume or promote a naturalized racial hierarchy. I demonstrate that the logic of Hobbes’s project requires rejecting a racially essentialist conception of human nature. His is a thoroughgoing and unrepentant anti-essentialism; he claims that there are no objective, immutable, necessary differences between ‘civilized’ people and ‘savages.’ Instead, I locate Hobbes’s bias in his reliance on culturally-specific notions of government. Finally, I suggest that the Hobbes’s natural law requirement of ‘acknowledging’ equality can be applied to questions about race. Though this was not its purpose, this requirement might provide a useful – and distinctively Hobbesian – tool to combat the impulse behind the problematic and persistent desire to find ‘real’ differences among racial groups.
{"title":"Is the Hobbesian State of Nature Racialized?","authors":"Susanne Sreedhar","doi":"10.1163/18750257-bja10055","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/18750257-bja10055","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000Thomas Hobbes, like other early modern social contract theorists, has been accused of promoting racist views in his philosophy – ideas used to justify European imperialism and the devastation of Indigenous peoples. I argue that his philosophy does not assume or promote a naturalized racial hierarchy. I demonstrate that the logic of Hobbes’s project requires rejecting a racially essentialist conception of human nature. His is a thoroughgoing and unrepentant anti-essentialism; he claims that there are no objective, immutable, necessary differences between ‘civilized’ people and ‘savages.’ Instead, I locate Hobbes’s bias in his reliance on culturally-specific notions of government. Finally, I suggest that the Hobbes’s natural law requirement of ‘acknowledging’ equality can be applied to questions about race. Though this was not its purpose, this requirement might provide a useful – and distinctively Hobbesian – tool to combat the impulse behind the problematic and persistent desire to find ‘real’ differences among racial groups.","PeriodicalId":42474,"journal":{"name":"Hobbes Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.2,"publicationDate":"2023-03-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48088271","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}