Analysis Of Thomas Hobbes Leviathon

In Leviathon, Hobbes states that he believes everyone to be born equal, that this leads to a “war of all against all.” In this war where everyone seeks power over one another, there are certain things that everyone should agree on in order to keep peace—laws. Hobbes suggests that people are bound to these laws, usually by a sovereign, or else they are to be punished. The problem here is deciding whether people follow these laws so that they may keep peace, so that they do not get punished, or any other reason that could be have some self-interest in it. With everything Hobbes has wrote, he seems to believe that it is impossible to act without self-interest and is very egoistic in this sense. He also says there are natural laws—laws that are determined by reason, rather than created to keep peace that people are bound to. The most important natural laws are the first three. The first states that every man ought to endeavor peace, but if he can’t we may use advantages of war. This is the most important one because Hobbes believes that some rights (in his definition, something a person is at liberty to do) may not be given up, such as self-defense. Going with the first natural law, a man …show more content…
Hobbes would say no and that it is impossible to act without self-interest, Korsgaard would say it is possible to act without self-interest, but it is hard to know for sure if she thinks there are non-self-interested reasons. Going back to the scenario of helping a stranger in danger, someone who disagrees with Korsgaard could say that the person could have helped because they wanted to feel good about themselves, a clearly very self-interested reason. To this Korsgaard would probably respond that the person could have most definitely helped in self-interest, but the person did not have to. It is entirely possible for someone to help because they simply feel it is the right thing to