Hobbes Vs Rousseau

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Like Hobbes, Rousseau also shared the idea that mankind was naturally violent/barbaric, as well as separate influences that may prompt human beings to act particular ways in their theories and explain the reality of human nature (behavior) without these influences. However, unlike Hobbes, Jean-Jacques Rousseau believed that man’s human nature or natural state is peaceful and that society was the reason for altering that nature. Rousseau gives an example of how mankind had fallen away from morality and virtue, and gives into luxury and leisure by discussing how Greece’s society changed overtime as science and the arts progressed, in addition to explaining the dangers it causes. He also believed that sovereign government only benefited the people’s interest, rather than protecting the people from themselves by enforcing law and order.
Rousseau’s statement, “Man was born free, but everywhere is in chains” is accurate. His statement refers to how people have a certain amount of freedom due to the reason that there are laws and orders we must follow. We all have free will and have the ability to make our own choices and act the way we want to behave, but we still must follow the rules. Our freedom is only limited and varies within different places depending where one lives. Even isolated communities have a system of …show more content…
However, our freedom is limited because not all the choices we make are acceptable. I would say our freedom would be more dependent and not absolute. But given that there are various views on freedom and what it means to be free brings about different beliefs or ideas that mankind is or is not really free. So are we actually “born free”, given that we still have the will to make our own decisions? Maybe at some point in this life humankind was free, but for now it seems that the type of freedom we have is a partial

Hobbes Vs Rousseau

societies? Two philosophers as Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau arrive at the same solution even if intended in a slightly different way: “The Social Contract”. Thomas Hobbes starts his analysis by analyzing the nature of men. Hobbes sustain in his analysis that all men are born into a condition of substantial equality, the differences are so small that they could not be considered relevant into the achievement of their goals. This equality became for Hobbes the cause of differences between men…

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Unlike Rousseau, Hobbes states that if any two men desire the same thing, which only one can have, they turn against each other. This means that people need a common power or need a government to keep them in check. If people fight with each other, the only thing that can stop them is the government or another source of power. To add on, he also mentions that distrust causes people to live in fear and insecurity. As conveyed in his writing, if anyone doubts humans aren’t at war with each other or…

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Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Jean Jacques Rousseau may disagree on which form of supreme power is the most ordered (monarchy vs. democracy), they all claim because an individual’s passions and desires may possibly obstruct the rights of others, some form of government is needed. In order to live successfully, citizens willfully give up their individual freedom for the benefit that a supreme being of power will guarantee their safety and protection through state legislation. The people then can…

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The constituents of living as a human on Earth develop with us both individually and with the rest of civilization. With this, good and evil cannot be simplified into two innate elements of human nature. “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” A quote by Edmund Burke encapsulates the theory and basis of philosophy in the long debated conflict between good and evil. At it’s core, this quote provides the implication that humans can be classified as either strictly…

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