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I am interested in this book, and will probably get it. It seems to come at a time when the Western governments, despite their gargantuan size, seem totally in

I am interested in this book, and will probably get it. It seems to come at a time when the Western governments, despite their gargantuan size, seem totally incapable of resolving their innumerable, largely self-inflicted crises. Plagued precisely by the questions of meaning which Hobbes ejected from politics, the West seems to be demonstrating that one can have both the Leviathan, and the State of Nature at once. I’ve changed my views about a lot of things in the last decade or so, but seeing Hobbes as something of a villain has been constant. As a secular progressive, it seemed an overly pessimistic take on the possibility of political change. Today, as a (Catholic) Christian, and also a big David Graeber fanboi (these are not as radically incompatible as they may seem), I think that the State of Nature postulate, which forms the basis of Hobbesian thought, is not justified by actual human experience.

slibhb 5y ago
> I think that the State of Nature postulate, which forms the basis of Hobbesian thought, is not justified by actual human experience. Hobbes didn't think that humans had ever actually lived in a state of nature. It's a hypothetical, a thought experiment not unlike Rawls' veil of ignorance.
- huetius 5y ago
  Yes! I reject both of those for exactly the reason I said above.
- ptsneves 5y ago
  It does not need to be true to provide a good model. This happens in most concrete sciences so why not in humanistics? Actually when contrasted with the noble savage of Rousseau, the human as a bestial savage provides a great ground level from human behavior. From that model you can then have a model for the worst case scenarios of behavior and form governance from that. Probably not the optimum or most efficient but probably the model with the broadest applicability. This is what captivated me in Hobbes. Lot's of unanswered needs, but a very stable base for survival and improvements. I think it is also the model most people could understand at a basic level: Do not do that otherwise <the sovereign> will punish you. Even a child understand this with the parents being the sovereign.
wahnfrieden 5y ago
Graeber has a fresh take on Hobbes in his Dawn of Everything https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/31/arts/dawn-of-everything-graeber-wengrow.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/31/arts/dawn-of-everything-g...
- specialist 5y ago
  Graeber's books reprogrammed my brain. But I'm still struggling to connect the dots: What does Iroquois style participatory democracy actually look like? We need movies and soap operas. To tell the stories. Like West Wing, House of Cards, Mr Smith Goes To Washington, The Wire. Show the human drama and machinations. Events, issues, and people. Conflicts and resolutions. Participatory democracy is not all puppies and ice cream. The advocates would be well served to show that it's just another decision making strategy. Hopefully superior to what we have today. Like how Approval Voting is better than Winner Takes All. We'd still run elections. Just more robust with better outcomes, so therefore less drama.
  - throwaway_4ever 5y ago
    > What does Iroquois style participatory democracy actually look like? If it’s anything like California’s direct democracy ballot propositions, I wouldn’t be very enthusiastic. A lot of decisions end up being short sighted “voted X because of a month long ad campaign at the time” things that sound good but lack nuance for the long term repercussions that the citizens themselves face for decades. See prop 13 and ~11% sales tax in some Bay Area counties. (Don’t you want X good thing?! Only 0.5% tax increase [10 times]. Taxes too high? Stop them going up [and distort your real estate market forever]) It ends up being schizophrenic rather than consistent sound public policy, but hey that’s kinda democracy in general.
    - specialist 5y ago
      Direct democracy != participatory democracy. Voting vs deliberation. Someone's really gotta come up with a better term for collaborative decision making. Anarchist, socialist-libertarian, left-libertarian, participatory democracy, citizen juries... all kinda suck.
anigbrowl 5y ago
You have to bear in mind that Hobbes wrote Leviathan in the middle of a civil war when existence was precarious and news consisted of terrifying unverifiable rumors about everything. I too think much of his prescription has turned out to be a Bad Idea but he probably meant well as an individual rather than scheming to lock humanity into its current boring dystopia.
- huetius 5y ago
  I don’t believe he erred for the sake of erring (I don’t think anyone does, finally), but I do think his errors were transparent at the time. See, for example, the refutation in Suarez’ Against the Errors of the Anglican Sect, Book II.
  - anigbrowl 5y ago
    Fascinating though this looks I don't have the semester+ required to study it properly.
throwaway599281 5y ago
>Today, as a (Catholic) Christian, and also a big David Graeber fanboi (these are not as radically incompatible as they may seem) How is a left wing anarchist with Communist sympathies [0] in any way compatible with what any Pope or Doctor of the Church [1] has ever written? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Graeber https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Graeber [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_of_the_Church https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_of_the_Church
- Aidevah 5y ago
  The issue of poverty as espoused by the Franciscan order was a hotly debated theological issue in the 13th and 14th centuries. Eventually the Pope had to get involved to denounce the idea of "Absolute poverty of Christ" as heresy. The Franciscan revolution may have not gone as far as some people have hoped, but it was an important step in the development of Western liberalism (cf. Larry Siedentop's Inventing the Individual, pp. 288-292). Incidentally, this same debate was also featured as the central plot conflict in Umberto Eco's historical fiction "The Name of the Rose".
- huetius 5y ago
  Quiz: who said, “all politics is, at bottom, theological?” St. John Henry Newman, or Proudhon? Trick question! Both! This is radically different from the Marxian/Nietzschian maxim, that all theology is, at bottom, politics. I don’t think anarchism is actually a complete, proper atheism; it tends to propose itself to a kind of negative theology (no false gods). Therefore dialogue is possible, unlike the Marxist, Nietzschian case, where atheism is complete and postulatory. One area of commonality is that we both believe that society is natural. I’ve already mentioned Book II of Suarez’ Against the Errors of the Anglican Sect in this thread. Anarchists who read it will find it, in turns, dazzlingly profound and infuriating, yet astonishingly satisfying as a whole (just as I do with Graeber). A second area of commonality is that we both believe in a horizon beyond politics. Graeber is especially good about this. For him, anarchism is an interior disposition — a mode of being — prior to any political program. He therefore avoids the infallible symptom of political atheism, the absolutization of politics. His books are about human life, and in particular about how politics can take place within life, rather than life taking place within politics. The intellectually fearless anarchist can read Andrew Willard Jones’ Before Church and State, and see the commonalities. As for substantive content of dialogue, the anarchist can help the Catholic to see instances where the Church has, in practice, confused the eternal, Divine order for a particular, temporal order (see Pope Benedict XVI’s discourse on the temptations of Christ and the Kingdom of God in Jesus of Nazareth, Volune I for how to approach this with orthodoxy and openness). This will help the Church more authentically pursue its mission. In turn, the Catholic can help the anarchist to resolve the power-authority distinction, which lies at the heart of the anarchists’ inability to sustain any positive ideal (see various 19th Century failures, Occupy Wall Street, and the more recent corporate co-optation of radical culture). From there, it is not hard to offer the highest authority, the Lord who stands in judgement of all Lords; sin as the universal oppressor, and oneness in the body of Christ as true freedom. Some other texts I think we would all like: St Cyprian of Carthage: On Almsgiving St. Thomas Aquinas on the Universal Destination of Goods (Summa Theologica) St. Thomas Aquinas on Distributive Justice (Summa Theologica) Pope Francis’ Laudito Si Anything by or about Bl. Oscar Romero St. Augustine’s City of God Most of Pope Benedict XVI’s scholarly work, Jesus of Nazareth already mentioned as a highlight.

slibhb 5y ago

> I think that the State of Nature postulate, which forms the basis of Hobbesian thought, is not justified by actual human experience. Hobbes didn't think that humans had ever actually lived in a state of nature. It's a hypothetical, a thought experiment not unlike Rawls' veil of ignorance.

huetius 5y ago
Yes! I reject both of those for exactly the reason I said above.
ptsneves 5y ago
It does not need to be true to provide a good model. This happens in most concrete sciences so why not in humanistics? Actually when contrasted with the noble savage of Rousseau, the human as a bestial savage provides a great ground level from human behavior. From that model you can then have a model for the worst case scenarios of behavior and form governance from that. Probably not the optimum or most efficient but probably the model with the broadest applicability. This is what captivated me in Hobbes. Lot's of unanswered needs, but a very stable base for survival and improvements. I think it is also the model most people could understand at a basic level: Do not do that otherwise <the sovereign> will punish you. Even a child understand this with the parents being the sovereign.

wahnfrieden 5y ago

Graeber has a fresh take on Hobbes in his Dawn of Everything https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/31/arts/dawn-of-everything-graeber-wengrow.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/31/arts/dawn-of-everything-g...

specialist 5y ago
Graeber's books reprogrammed my brain. But I'm still struggling to connect the dots: What does Iroquois style participatory democracy actually look like? We need movies and soap operas. To tell the stories. Like West Wing, House of Cards, Mr Smith Goes To Washington, The Wire. Show the human drama and machinations. Events, issues, and people. Conflicts and resolutions. Participatory democracy is not all puppies and ice cream. The advocates would be well served to show that it's just another decision making strategy. Hopefully superior to what we have today. Like how Approval Voting is better than Winner Takes All. We'd still run elections. Just more robust with better outcomes, so therefore less drama.
- throwaway_4ever 5y ago
  > What does Iroquois style participatory democracy actually look like? If it’s anything like California’s direct democracy ballot propositions, I wouldn’t be very enthusiastic. A lot of decisions end up being short sighted “voted X because of a month long ad campaign at the time” things that sound good but lack nuance for the long term repercussions that the citizens themselves face for decades. See prop 13 and ~11% sales tax in some Bay Area counties. (Don’t you want X good thing?! Only 0.5% tax increase [10 times]. Taxes too high? Stop them going up [and distort your real estate market forever]) It ends up being schizophrenic rather than consistent sound public policy, but hey that’s kinda democracy in general.
  - specialist 5y ago
    Direct democracy != participatory democracy. Voting vs deliberation. Someone's really gotta come up with a better term for collaborative decision making. Anarchist, socialist-libertarian, left-libertarian, participatory democracy, citizen juries... all kinda suck.

anigbrowl 5y ago

You have to bear in mind that Hobbes wrote Leviathan in the middle of a civil war when existence was precarious and news consisted of terrifying unverifiable rumors about everything. I too think much of his prescription has turned out to be a Bad Idea but he probably meant well as an individual rather than scheming to lock humanity into its current boring dystopia.

huetius 5y ago
I don’t believe he erred for the sake of erring (I don’t think anyone does, finally), but I do think his errors were transparent at the time. See, for example, the refutation in Suarez’ Against the Errors of the Anglican Sect, Book II.
- anigbrowl 5y ago
  Fascinating though this looks I don't have the semester+ required to study it properly.

throwaway599281 5y ago

>Today, as a (Catholic) Christian, and also a big David Graeber fanboi (these are not as radically incompatible as they may seem) How is a left wing anarchist with Communist sympathies [0] in any way compatible with what any Pope or Doctor of the Church [1] has ever written? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Graeber https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Graeber [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_of_the_Church https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_of_the_Church

Aidevah 5y ago
The issue of poverty as espoused by the Franciscan order was a hotly debated theological issue in the 13th and 14th centuries. Eventually the Pope had to get involved to denounce the idea of "Absolute poverty of Christ" as heresy. The Franciscan revolution may have not gone as far as some people have hoped, but it was an important step in the development of Western liberalism (cf. Larry Siedentop's Inventing the Individual, pp. 288-292). Incidentally, this same debate was also featured as the central plot conflict in Umberto Eco's historical fiction "The Name of the Rose".
huetius 5y ago
Quiz: who said, “all politics is, at bottom, theological?” St. John Henry Newman, or Proudhon? Trick question! Both! This is radically different from the Marxian/Nietzschian maxim, that all theology is, at bottom, politics. I don’t think anarchism is actually a complete, proper atheism; it tends to propose itself to a kind of negative theology (no false gods). Therefore dialogue is possible, unlike the Marxist, Nietzschian case, where atheism is complete and postulatory. One area of commonality is that we both believe that society is natural. I’ve already mentioned Book II of Suarez’ Against the Errors of the Anglican Sect in this thread. Anarchists who read it will find it, in turns, dazzlingly profound and infuriating, yet astonishingly satisfying as a whole (just as I do with Graeber). A second area of commonality is that we both believe in a horizon beyond politics. Graeber is especially good about this. For him, anarchism is an interior disposition — a mode of being — prior to any political program. He therefore avoids the infallible symptom of political atheism, the absolutization of politics. His books are about human life, and in particular about how politics can take place within life, rather than life taking place within politics. The intellectually fearless anarchist can read Andrew Willard Jones’ Before Church and State, and see the commonalities. As for substantive content of dialogue, the anarchist can help the Catholic to see instances where the Church has, in practice, confused the eternal, Divine order for a particular, temporal order (see Pope Benedict XVI’s discourse on the temptations of Christ and the Kingdom of God in Jesus of Nazareth, Volune I for how to approach this with orthodoxy and openness). This will help the Church more authentically pursue its mission. In turn, the Catholic can help the anarchist to resolve the power-authority distinction, which lies at the heart of the anarchists’ inability to sustain any positive ideal (see various 19th Century failures, Occupy Wall Street, and the more recent corporate co-optation of radical culture). From there, it is not hard to offer the highest authority, the Lord who stands in judgement of all Lords; sin as the universal oppressor, and oneness in the body of Christ as true freedom. Some other texts I think we would all like: St Cyprian of Carthage: On Almsgiving St. Thomas Aquinas on the Universal Destination of Goods (Summa Theologica) St. Thomas Aquinas on Distributive Justice (Summa Theologica) Pope Francis’ Laudito Si Anything by or about Bl. Oscar Romero St. Augustine’s City of God Most of Pope Benedict XVI’s scholarly work, Jesus of Nazareth already mentioned as a highlight.