Thomas Hobbes, Misc

Most business ethicists maintain that corporate actors are subject to a variety of moral obligations. However, there is a persistent and underappreciated concern that the competitive pressures of the market somehow provide corporate actors with a far-reaching excuse from meeting these obligations. Here, we assess this concern. Blending resources from the history of philosophy and strategic management, we demonstrate the assumptions required for and limits of this excuse. Applying the idea of ‘the state of nature’ from Thomas Hobbes, we suggest (...) that corporate actors would be excused from duties if complying with them threatened their vital interests. We show how this excuse is not available for most individuals within firms; instead, it is an excuse perhaps available to firms themselves, but only given substantive assumptions about corporate personhood. For those willing to make these assumptions, we apply the competitive advantage construct to delimit the scope of this excuse. We suggest that firms are excused from fulfilling an obligation when complying leads to a competitive disadvantage, as this imperils the firm’s vital interests. After revealing why this excuse does not generalize, we conclude by considering when we should reform the market to avoid the legitimacy of this excuse. (shrink)

This chapter considers Ralph Cudworth as a philosophical critic of Hobbes. Cudworth saw Hobbes as a representative of the three views he was attacking: atheism, determinism, and the denial that morality is eternal and immutable. Moreover, he did not just criticize Hobbes by assuming that a general critique of those views applied to Hobbes’s particular case. Rather, he singled out Hobbes, often by quoting him, and argued against the distinctively Hobbesian positions he had identified. In this chapter I look at (...) Cudworth as a critic of Hobbes in two of the three central areas, atheism and ethics, focusing on passages where we see him explicitly picking out Hobbes. (shrink)

In this review, I discuss the justifications for focussing on Hobbes's On the Citizen (De Cive), the middle recension of his political philosophy, separately from his better known Leviathan. I provide an overview of the collection's chapter contents, and I close by calling for further research regarding the impact of this text on later European political philosophy (such as Spinoza, Rousseau, Kant).

In this article, I consider the standard interpretation of the superiority theory of humor attributed to Plato, Aristotle, and Hobbes, according to which the theory allegedly places feelings of superiority at the center of humor and comic amusement. The view that feelings of superiority are at the heart of all comic amusement is wildly implausible. Therefore textual evidence for the interpretation of Plato, Aristotle, or Hobbes as offering the superiority theory as an essentialist theory of humor is worth careful consideration. (...) Through textual analysis I argue that not one of these three philosophers defends an essentialist theory of comic amusement. I also discuss the way various theories of humor relate to one another and the proper place of a superiority theory in humor theory in light of my analysis. (shrink)

We do not generally take the Hobbesian project to be one that encourages human flourishing. I will argue that it is; indeed, I will propose that Hobbes attempts the first modern project to provide for the possibility of the diversity of human flourishing in the civil state. To do so, I will draw on the recent work of Donald Rutherford, who takes Hobbes to be a eudaimonist in the Aristotelian tradition.

Hobbes’s science of politics rests on a dual analysis of human beings: humans as complex material bodies in a network of mechanical forces, prone to passions and irrationality; and humans as subjects of right and obligation, morally exhortable by appeal to the standards of reason. The science of politics proposes an absolutist model of politics. If this proposal is not to be idle utopianism, the enduring functioning of the model needs to be compatible with the materialist analysis of human behaviour. (...) In this paper, I argue that Hobbes's attempts to render his science of politics compatible with his materialism are only partly successful; a fuller compatibility is achieved in the political writings of Spinoza. -/- Published with reply: Luke O'Sullivan, 'Sovereigns and citizens: a response to Field', ibid., 221-224. Reprinted as: Sandra Field (2015), 'Hobbes and human irrationality', in T. Nardin (ed.) Rationality in Politics and its Limits, Abingdon: Routledge, 31-44. With reply: Luke O'Sullivan, 'Sovereigns and citizens: a response to Field', ibid., 45-48. (shrink)

Hobbes's place in the history of political philosophy is a highly controversial one. An international symposium held at Queen Mary, University of London in February 2009 was devoted to debating his significance and legacy. The event focussed on recent books on Hobbes by Quentin Skinner and Philip Pettit, and was organised around four commentaries on these new works by distinguished scholars. This paper is designed to introduce the subject of the symposium together with the commentaries and subsequent responses from Petit (...) and Skinner. It examines the themes of language and liberty in the philosophy of Hobbes and concludes by highlighting some of the ways in which further research into Hobbes's debt to Aristotle's Politics will prove fruitful and illuminating. (shrink)

"In 'Hobbes and the Social Contract Tradition' Professor Hampton undertakes an "extensive examination" of Hobbes's argument, primarily as stated in Leviathan, for the institutionof an absolute sovereign. Hampton, however, is concerned to accomplish more than "a description or explication" of Hobbes's political philosophy. Rather, it is her intention to develop a "rational reconstruction" of Hobbes's argument.... 'Hobbes and the Social Contract Tradition' is an important and valuable contribution to the study of Hobbes's political philosophy. Throughout this work one acquires new (...) and illuminating insights into Hobbes's argument and its contemporary significance. ... it is essential reading for all those who are seriously concerned to come to grips with Hobbes's social contract theory. Hobbes scholar and political theorist alike will learn a great deal from it.". (shrink)