Thomas Hobbes: biography of this English philosopher

In this article we will see a biography of Thomas Hobbes, English philosopher of the seventeenth century, referring to his origins, his career and some of his most outstanding works.

As we will see, Hobbes, is considered one of the founders of contractualism, and was a conservative philosopher, who traveled a lot and who advocated an absolutist political regime. We will go through his thought through his philosophical and social ideas, which were materialistic and deterministic.

• Related article: "Differences between Psychology and Philosophy"

Summary Biography of Thomas Hobbes

Thomas Hobbes (1588 - 1679), full name Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, and also known as Thomas Hobbs Malmsbury, was an English philosopher, who specialized in political philosophy. Hobbes was born on April 5, 1588, in Westport, near Malmesbury, England, and died on December 4, 1679, in Derbyshire, England.

Hobbes is especially remembered for being considered one of the founders of modern political philosophy. One of his most outstanding works, "Leviathan" (1651), was the basis of Western political philosophy, which focused on the theory of the social contract. Thus, in this work, Hobbes lays the foundations of the contractual theory.

Contractualism

Contractual theory (or contractualism) is a current of modern political and legal philosophy, which states that society enjoys a series of social rights and advantages in exchange for the acceptance that its freedoms are limited by a series of laws that they must follow and comply with.

Thus, regarding Hobbes' political philosophy, he highlights the idea of ​​the social contract on which political communities were based (that is, contractualism).

Law and politics

On the other hand, Hobbes also he developed some of the foundations of European liberal thought, and spoke, for example, of equality as a fundamental right, of rights and of the artificial character of the political order. Thus, although his thinking is absolutist, he also makes some contributions on liberal thought.

Thomas Hobbes believed that legitimate political power should be representative and based on the consent of the people, of the people. He also spoke of laws; In this sense, he believed that everything that has not been explicitly prohibited is allowed.

• You may be interested: "British empiricism: the ideas of Hobbes and Locke"

Source

Thomas Hobbes was the son of a Westport clergyman. The name of his mother is unknown, and in fact, much of his childhood is also unknown.

In 1603, Hobbes studied him at the University of Oxford, in Magdalen Hall. There studies scholastic philosophy and logic, and graduated five years later, in 1608. It is in that same year when he begins to "rub shoulders" with the nobility and the most intellectual social class, as a result of taking charge of the son of the Earl of Devonshire (William Cavendish).

With only twenty-two years old, Thomas Hobbes embarked on his first trip to Europe, in the year 1610; From that trip, Hobbes realized the power that scholasticism (theological and philosophical current) still wields in many of the fields of knowledge.

Intellectual and professional career

Regarding his professional career, Thomas Hobbes published in 1628 a translation of Thucydides, a work that criticizes the democratic system and mentions its dangers, through a frankly conservative perspective.

William Cavendish, the earl mentioned and whose son Hobbes cares for, died in 1629. From there, Hobbes becomes the tutor of the son of Gervase Clinton, with whom he travels through Europe, and discovers geometry. In fact, in geometry Thomas Hobbes also finds one of his passions, and tries to apply it to the social and political principles that he has defended so much.

Travels

As we can see, Thomas Hobbes was a great traveler. In one of his trips, specifically the third through Europe, made in 1637, the English philosopher relates to the circle of Marin Mersenne (an important French priest, mathematician and philosopher of the time).

From there Hobbes establishes contact with two prominent figures: Rene Descartes and Pierre Gassendi. He meets more important authors, such as Galileo, also on one of his trips (this time in Italy, in 1636). Knowing Galileo influences him in the development of his social philosophy, based on geometry and natural sciences.

After several trips, Hobbes finally returned to his homeland, England, in 1637. It is then that the philosopher secretly circulates a manuscript entitled Elements of law; at that time, there are clashes between the king and parliament. In this work, Hobbes he defends the need for absolute sovereignty (versus parliamentarism).

However, after circulating his work, the English philosopher does not feel calm, and fearing the consequences of such dissemination, he goes into exile in November, and voluntarily, to France. But Hobbes continues to write, and in 1642 publishes By cive, which consists of a theory about government. He also begins to write another play, By corpore, which constitutes the first work of a trilogy that deals with “the man, the citizen and the body”.

Hobbes's philosophy

Now delving into the more theoretical part of this author, we ask ourselves how was Hobbes's philosophy? This was based on two currents: materialism and determinism. In fact, Hobbes's philosophy configures the most complete materialist doctrine of the seventeenth century.

According to him, the universe is a great corporeal machine, in which the strict laws of mechanism are followed. Through these laws, any phenomenon can be explained by merely quantitative elements, that is: matter, movement and the collisions of matter in space.

To illustrate all this a bit, we recall one of Hobbes's phrases in his work Leviathan, which goes like this: "The universe is corporeal. Everything that is real is material and what is not material is not real. "

Materialism

In this sentence we see how the philosophy of Thomas Hobbes was materialistic. His vision of his philosophy, moreover, was linked to a deterministic position on the world; namely, for him all the phenomena that occur in the universe are determined, hopelessly, by a causal chain of events.

In other words: "nothing happens by chance", but everything that happens is the necessary result of a series of causes. As a result, it is understood that everything, in a certain way, can be anticipated or anticipated.

Determinism

The determinism of the philosopher It is based on a rationalist method, which has a purely geometric and mathematical character. This method is, in reality, the analytic-synthetic method of Descartes, and part of the hypothesis that “the parts of a whole (the causes of things) must be broken down into smaller parts, in order to be able to explain and understand the whole or the parts in their whole".

Politics

We have seen how in the work of Levitan much of the ideas of Thomas Hobbes in relation to politics are reflected. His political ideas (and in relation to political philosophy) collide with the decentralizing (parliamentary) ideas of the moment.

At that time, the Reformation proposed an ideological and conscience freedom that Hobbes did not support. According to Hobbes, these ideas of the Reformation would lead to anarchy, chaos and revolution.

That is why Hobbes advocates, as we have already seen, absolutism as the ideal political regime; According to him, this regime would combat all these "evils" that would probably originate ideological freedom and parliamentarism.

Bibliographic references:

Jacobson, N. (1987). Review of Thomas Hobbes: Radical in the Service of Reaction. Political Psychology 8 (3): 469-471. Replogle, R. (1987). Personality & Society in Hobbes's "Leviathan". Polity 19 (4): 570-594. Velez, F. (2014). The word and the sword. Back with Hobbes. Madrid: Maia.