Is Hobbes’ state of nature unduly pessimistic? A short overview (eBook)

Academic Paper from the year 2018 in the subject Philosophy - Philosophy of the 17th and 18th Centuries, grade: A, Lancaster University, course: Politics and International Relations, language: English, abstract: This essay examines the state of nature according to Thomas Hobbes. The state of nature, which has its ancient roots in political philosophy, is also an essential tool that has been used by some political philosophers as a bridge and platform for building a civil society. The state of nature highlights on life without a government, a state or even laws. It also focuses on a society in which humans have their own private judgment in the sense that each individual has the right to act and judge in his or her own case whenever issues such as disputes arise with no authority having to influence the individual’s decisions. It is a subject that has been widely studied by well-known English, Scottish, French philosophers such as John Locke, David Hume, Thomas Hobbes and Montesquieu who talked about the state of nature in some of their works such as the Leviathan (1651), the Second Treatise on Civil Government (1690), a Treatise of Human Nature (1738) and the Spirit of the Laws (1748).