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The Fool's Heart and Hobbes' Head
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 May 2010
Extract
Chapter fifteen of Leviathan is concerned with what Hobbes calls “the laws of nature”; however, it is evident from the start that justice is the central problem of the chapter. Hobbes demonstrates a rather subtle sensitivity to a possible misunderstanding of his views on the state of nature and the function of natural reason by inventing the character of the fool who purports to use Hobbes' own principle of self-interest to deny the existence of justice. The fool may finally be a “straw man” who proposes precisely that argument which Hobbes can quickly refute, but even if this is so, the straw man has Hobbes' face, or one like it, because the line between the views of the fool and those of Hobbes himself is very fine indeed. This section of Leviathan is more significant than it would seem at first glance because it provides an avenue by means of which one can distinguish the political philosophy of Hobbes from that of classical “individualists” such as Callicles and Thrasymachus. It is all too easy to read Hobbes as an elaborate restatement of the sophistic position of Socrates' famous opponents; the example of the fool belies this facile identity and to a certain extent constitutes a refutation of the classical power theorists.
- Type
- Articles
- Information
- Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 20 , Issue 4 , December 1981 , pp. 674 - 689
- Copyright
- Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 1981
References
Notes
1 Leviathan, p. 130. Page references in my notes are to the Library of Liberal Arts edition of Leviathan I and II (New York: Bobbs-Merrill Inc, 1958)Google Scholar. Further references to Leviathan are to this edition which is abbreviated as LEV.
2 LEV., p. 130.
“For he that should be modest and tractable and perform all he promises in such time and place where no man else should do so should but make himself prey to others.” Also p. 115, “… he which performs first does but betray himself to his enemy, contrary to the right he can never abandon of defending his life and means of living.”
3 LEV., p. 132.
4 LEV., p. 119–20.
5 LEV., p. 120
“… the validity of covenants begins not but with the constitution of a civil power sufficient to compel men to keep them …”
6 LEV., p. 120.
7 LEV., p. 130.
8 LEV., p. 120.
“And whatsoever is not unjust is just.” There is no outright injustice because no covenants are possible, so everything can be construed as self-preserving and therefore just. At the same time justice in the sense of conformity to coercive law is not present. See also p. 108, “To this war of every man against every man, this also is consequent: that nothing can be unjust. The notions of … justice and injustice, have there no place.”
9 LEV., p. 110.
“And consequently it is a precept or general rule of reason that every man ought to endeavour peace, as far as he has hope of obtaining it; and when he cannot obtain it, that he may seek and use all helps and advantages of war.”
10 Cf. Locke, where property is classed as a natural right rather than a consequence of covenants.
11 LEV., p. 120.
12 LEV., p. 139.
13 This is precisely the justification for the actions of Archelaus presented by Polus in the Gorgias (470D–471D). Plato, , Gorgias, trans. Hamilton, Walter (New York: Penguin Books 1960) 55–57Google Scholar. Further page references to Gorgias are to this text. The Stephanus numbers are given in parentheses for both the Gorgias and Republic.
14 Cf. the conversation between Callicles and Socrates, Gorgias, p. 84 (486D).
15 This is not quite precise enough since we will see later, LEV., (122), that the fool's situation seems to be one where the other party to the covenant has performed.
16 The fool is attempting to play convention off against nature; he thinks, like Callicles, that one who realizes this distinction is shrewd enough to manipulate it and consequently can lead a virtually double existence, one face for others, a different one for self.
17 A natural consequence of such a view is to acknowledge Fortune as variable in the framework; such an inclusion leads pretty directly to the view of Machiavelli.
18 The answer of Callicles and Thrasymachus to this question is yes, one can; they claim to be “better” in precisely this sense, i.e., able to take advantage of the predictable errors of others.
19 This raises some problems for Hobbes' theory of sovereignty by acquisition, but these are avoided by considering the sovereignty to be already achieved by the conqueror.
20 Plato, , Republic (340E) trans. Bloom, Allan (New York: Basic Books, 1968), p. 18Google Scholar. For an indication of some of the deeper dimensions of this notion of precision, as well as its centrality in the Platonic quest see Klein, Jacob, “On Precision” in The College XXIII #3, October, 1971.Google Scholar
21 Hobbes gives an almost identical defense of the sovereign's errors by distinguishing between the sovereign as public and private person. LEV., pp. 132–3.
22 This natural-artificial distinction offers a hedge on the fallibility problem and is probably Hobbes' way of handling the “precise speech” demanded by Thrasymachus.
23 The Gyges example posed by Glaucon and Adeimantus in Book II (3590–36OB) is important because it presents a case where error would be less likely to be discovered. Socrates requires the remaining 7 books of the Republic to explain why justice is better given these extreme conditions. Perpetual disguise seems finally impossible.
24 Callicles renders Thrasymachus' precise sense as a distinction between two orders of discourse, natural and conventional.
25 Callicles' view of the natural-conventional distinction is not simply supported by Hobbes because Hobbes has a theory of language which describes names as markers for thought; the addition and subtraction of the consequences of names is identical with reasoning and science. Callicles goes some way to proposing the same view when he describes the science of rule (what was an art, generally speaking, for Thrasymachus) as a kind of rhetoric. In Hobbesian terms, then, Callicles is accusing Socrates of playing with the counters or markers, of shifting their values at will.
26 Gorgias, p. 104 (499C).
27 Gorgias, p. 79. Callicles' example of Heracles taking the oxen of Geryon (484 B–C).
28 This statement of Callicles has a certain ironic overtone in the light of the catamite example which comes later; Socrates may be a boy, but Callicles is the one who attempts to exploit such innocence. Socrates poses in a sort of defenseless innocence so that he can highlight Callicles' aggressive arrogance. Gorgias, p. 81 (486A).
29 Gorgias, p. 85–6 (488 D–E).
30 Gorgias, p. 86 (489B).
31 Gorgias, p. 87 (489E).
32 Gorgias, p. 90(491E–492 A).
33 Gorgias, p. 90 (49ID).
34 Gorgias, p. 94 (494A).
35 Gorgias, p. 93–4 (493D–494A).
36 Gorgias, p. 95 (494 E), Socrates' examples of the catamite and the man who perpetually scratches.
37 Gorgias, p. 104 (499 B).
38 Gorgias, p. 115 (506 D–E), Socrates (p. 115 ff) ultimately identifies Callicles' difficulty as his failure to study geometry or the science of proper proportion. What he thought Polus admitted out of shame (that doing wrong is worse than suffering wrong) turns out to be actually true. The shame Callicles saw masked the fact that the conclusion was bound by a chain of argument; yet this shame becomes more important, because what is initially the emotional surface of the dialogue turns out to be a rational standard — to have no shame at certain things is shown to be irrational.
39 So a central political issue becomes the problem of controlling error. In a strange way, Hobbes almost agrees with Socrates in the Gorgias; it is better (more to one's benefit) to be the victim of someone like the fool, i.e. to suffer wrong, than to be the fool, i.e., to do wrong, because while the victim has confederates, the victimizer cuts himself off by his action and implicitly claims an infallibility that can never be achieved.