Locke made his bachelor of arts , and he has also received the master of arts [11]. In the next years, Locke taught in Oxford [11]. After the death of his father, he inherited land and some Cottages, which made him to a landowner [11]. Locke became interested in medicine, and began to study it [11]. He also worked for a certain time as a doctor [11]. Later, he received from the earl of Shaftesbury a less important job in the government, but with a high reputation [11].
Shaftesbury was — and sent to jail, because of power fights in politics [11] , [14]. After this plot, Locke and Shaftesbury both flew to the Netherlands where Shaftesbury died in the same year [11] , [14]. Locke came into trouble with his beloved university of Oxford [11].
Passwort vergessen?
In this time, he became very popular [11]. John Locke died in Essex, England [11] , [13] , [16]. In this chapter I try to answer my first question: Thomas Hobbes and John Locke both wrote about the social contract, a theory about the origin of society and the legitimacy of the authority of the state over the individual [18]. Thomas Hobbes goes even further: If they were, they might be in a man that were alone in the world, as well as his senses and passions.
They are qualities that relate to men in society, not in solitude. Locke describes in his essay more the needs for a working society, based on the state of nature [20]. But John Locke cites therefore Richard Hooker: From which relation of equality between ourselves and them that are as ourselves, what several rules and canons natural reason hath drawn for direction of life no man is ignorant.
Of the State of Nature, par. But Locke also gives the human in the state of nature a right on self-defence, knowing that there would be people who harm others [20]. But this is only possible, if the people can differ between justice and injustice, which Locke assumes that they can [20] , [21]. Based on those enlightenments about the state of nature, Thomas Hobbes claims: I authorise and give up my right of governing myself to this man, or to this assembly of men, on this condition; that thou give up, thy right to him, and authorise all his actions in like manner.
This done, the multitude so united in one person is called a Commonwealth; in Latin, Civitas. This is the generation of that great Leviathan, or rather, to speak more reverently, of that mortal god to which we owe, under the immortal God, our peace and defence. Of the Causes, Generation, and Definition of a Commonwealth.
In Hobbes theory, all men should do this to obtain peace. Otherwise, they continue living in the state of war [24]. John Locke also assumes that a rational man prefers living in a society and under the rule of a government, then completely free in the state of nature. To which it is obvious to answer, that though in the state of Nature he hath such a right, yet the enjoyment of it is very uncertain and constantly exposed to the invasion of others; for all being kings as much as he, every man his equal, and the greater part no strict observers of equity and justice, the enjoyment of the property he has in this state is very unsafe, very insecure.
This makes him willing to quit this condition which, however free, is full of fears and continual dangers; and it is not without reason that he seeks out and is willing to join in society with others who are already united, or have a mind to unite for the mutual preservation of their lives, liberties and estates, which I call by the general name—property. Of the Ends of Political Society and Government, par.
So according to John Locke, the motivation to be part of a society and submit to a government is to protect your property. Thomas Hobbes already gave us an imagination how such a government should look like. All men should be governed by one absolute power, which can be a single man or an assembly of man [27]. This power, which Hobbes calls a Commonwealth, has all rights to govern, and also to judge [26] , [28] , [17].
Of the State of Nature. Herrschaftsstrukturen und Grundrechtpolitik in der deutschen Verfassungstradition; p. Of Man, chapter XIV: Spuren philosophischer Gewaltrechtfertigung nach Hobbes, p. Kunst - Ikonographie, Motive, Symbole. Politik - Politische Theorie und Ideengeschichte. Politik - Politische Systeme - Allgemeines und Vergleiche. Philosophie - Philosophie des Politik - Internationale Politik - Allgemeines und Theorien. Jura - Rechtsphilosophie, Rechtssoziologie, Rechtsgeschichte.
That is typically the case when public goods national defence, clean air, public transportation etc. The idea is that no market is free of force. That is also one of the characteristics of neo-liberalism: Elinor Ostrom has shown empirically as well as theoretically that Olson was wrong: Neo-liberalism likes both consequences of the free rider problem. There are plenty of examples for this: Hargreaves Heap and Varoufakis This line of reasoning is paralleled by political propagandists like Milton Friedman and by politicians like Margaret Thatcher or Ronald Reagan.
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I do not allege that liberal i. Gordon Gekko as exemplar. Not surprisingly, Homo economicus has received a lot of criticism. Criticism and refinements Since the role-model is derived from a model designed to simulate nothing else than economic conduct, the accusation of one-dimensionality is self-evident. Per definition, Homo economicus is able to measure everything in one dimension, his utility. Utility does not exclusively consist of dollar bills but includes everything that is of use for an individual: For any pair of possible goods he can immediately say which one he prefers over the other, and to what extent.
As a consequence, everything is convertible: So how many bonds do I have to sell to compensate lovesickness? How much to attain Buddhahood? For real people these equations do not make sense, because economic success cannot be converted in love or was tempted to point to the Nobel prize Ostrom has won for her proof: But my argument will have to do without referring to Nobel prizes, since the opponents have won many more of them, e.
Kenneth Arrow, James M. Buchanan, Milton Friedman, Thomas Schelling etc. Humans are complex beings that act in many different and irreducible dimensions. I find two criticisms of one-dimensionality quite fitting to my argument: When we start to recognize not only the one world as it empirically is now, but to also see the possible alternatives to the present state, and when we recognize that nothing is static, that the only constant thing is change, and when we claim our role in realizing the future world, we become aware of being Homines utopici.
Second, Michael Oakeshott Instead, they are to work in a political mode, the mode in which people set the goals for their association through politics—and that is one of my aims too, to re-politicize our image of human. That does not mean that there should be no economy, but that there are social relationships that are fundamentally non-economic. The Homo economicus role-model is also an insult to humans. Imagine a couple of beautiful humans, A and B, who decide to adopt a number of children.
What is the gain of A and B? Maybe they want to erect an image of their charitableness to boost their popularity and thus their economic success. Maybe they want to sell photos of the children to make money. Maybe they like to exert control over smaller and weaker humans and adoption gives them the legal framework for doing so. These considerations are almost accusations and might very well offend A and B.
Maybe they dream of a world where all children get enough food, clothing, shelter, and love—and while they do not have the power to ensure this for all children, they at least can offer it to some. Maybe they dream of a world where all races can live together peacefully—and while they do not have the power to end racism worldwide, they at least can foster a few children of colour together with their own 17 This example is inspired by a questioner at the symposium.
When talking in the Homo economicus mode, many decisions sound immoral in our example, A and B use other humans as means for their own ends. When talking in the Homo utopicus mode, many decisions can be seen as moral, as following a categorical imperative. One and the same empirical action e.
I contend that recognizing our ability to make ethical and political decisions would be more appropriate than restricting descriptions of action to economic lingo. Of course, the economic sphere of human life does exist, too. And it is a very relevant sphere. Between all the utopian dreams and desires that should be recognized when trying to understand human conduct, the economy should not be forgotten. Most literary utopias elaborate on economic models, as do transformative philosophies and revolutionary and even reformist movements.
But even here the Homo economicus model is of limited use. So there are good reasons to refute Homo economicus, not only as a role-model that legitimizes the neo-liberal world order. I could be accused of erecting a straw man that is easy to fight. The picture of Homo economicus I have drawn is not quite up to date—at least for the more sophisticated social scientists. But in many other situations, the model deviates a great deal from the behaviour of real people Camerer and Fehr Most of the time, humans do not only follow rationality, they also follow social norms Elster When faced with the opportunity to fleece another person, Homo economicus does so each and every time, while real people fleece each other only sometimes.
Also, real people seem to have preferences regarding other 20 Of course, Homo utopicus can have immoral motivations, too: A and B might dream of a world where humans are commodities and can be bought at markets. They might use the adoptions to set an example for the benefits everyone has when children are exchanged for money.
As I contended above and will show below: Neo-liberalism is a utopia, too. Real people have a significant aptitude for cooperation and altruism. That does not mean that real people cannot be egoistic, unfair, antisocial jerks. But they do not have to. Interestingly, empirical studies have shown that exposure to self-interest models, e.
Homo economicus is, in fact, a self-fulfilling prophecy!
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- The social contract in "Leviathan" by Thomas Hobbes and "Two Treatises of Government" by John Locke.
Descriptions of humans influence humans. Insofar, it is not only the business of some social scientists how to model some avatars in a simulation; this is a political question we are all concerned with. Not only have empirical tests shown that the simple Homo economicus model does not fit reality.
Refined models can account for long-term goals and so restrict their opportunism. It is possible to incorporate equity considerations in rational actors Bolton and Ockenfels ; Fehr and Schmidt , pointing to an alternative to competitive markets that allows for fair trade-offs: The advanced actors are set in more realistic situations that allow signalling or communication—abilities that are not necessarily socially beneficial, because of the possibility of fraud Dawkins and Krebs and, especially in the case of language, deception Lachmann and Bergstrom But this is not the only mechanism; norms are followed, because they can be internalized, or because the actor wants to establish a reputation, or because the norm is linked to emotions like envy, pride or conformism.
Through evolutionary game theory, both advanced economics and biology have had to acknowledge that egoism or genes of that ilk do not suffice Glassman ; Gould Mainstream political philosophy has yet to arrive at this knowledge—and then to move on. While all these new findings can be and are used to build better models of how humans decide and act, political philosophy needs even more: Like so many utopists22, I aim at an idea of new man—not through eugenics or transhumanistic technologies, but through a new self-description, a new self-understanding.
There is an alternative: Homo utopicus When looking for a philosophical grounding for a supposed utopian motivation for human action, Ernst Bloch seems to be a good starting point—at least at first sight.
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While other authors are mainly concerned with intentional communities and literary texts that describe ideal states or other forms of decidedly political practices and ideologies , Bloch, in the fourth part of his seminal Das Prinzip Hoffnung , includes the fields of medicine, social systems, technology, architecture, geography, arts, and wisdom when considering the construction of a better world. Fittingly, at the Utopia Symposium in Rome, we not only dealt with activists like the Shakers, the World Federalists, and eugenicists or with political philosophers like Plato, Hobbes, and Mannheim, but also with architectural plans for ideal cities, designs for technology and industry, paintings and symbols of good governance, sculptures and science fiction, and more.
A utopist is a person who has dreams and desires about a better society and shares them, e. A utopian is a citizen of a utopian society; Palanese, Anarresti, Kesh, Ecotopians, Icarians are typical utopians. Homo utopicus sees himself as both: Human beings are the only beings that can discern this and act on it. They experience a missing perfection of the world, a missing identity between themselves and the world. And they can bridge that gap, driven by utopian hope. That is unfortunate, because it means that the perfection of the world is actually attainable— and then utopia is not needed anymore!
The idea that a perfect society is possible and, in the end, inevitable , that one day humans would stop to hope for a better future because nothing can be better than perfection, has to be abandoned to recognize utopian desire as something inherent to human beings. Every object ends somewhere in space, has a surface area where everything that constitutes the object is in it, whilst everything else is outside. Living objects do not only end somewhere in space, they have a border that they must realize to stay alive, to remain a living system. While stones remain stones even when smashed to pieces, living objects that fail to maintain their border or to heal when injured are no longer living objects.
Having and realizing a border is a dialectical action, because the border must at the same time ward off change and facilitate change; the border moves the creature beyond itself while simultaneously standing against itself. It is the dialectic of being and becoming. To think dialectically is a crucial step away from a positivistic reductionism that places emphasis on how things are and that diverts our attention away from what they might become or even be transformed into Marcuse Thus no creature can escape dialectics.
The border thus identifies the position of the creature. Living objects are defined by this positional character or, as Plessner calls it, positionality There are different grades of positionality: All creatures position themselves against their surrounding area, but they do this in fundamentally different ways. Plants use an open organization; they surrender themselves to the environment — Animals, on the other hand, are organized in a closed form. They have to live from other living beings, and they are fighters — Unlike plants, animals behave, decide, and act.
Plessner calls the positionality of animals frontality, because animals exist not only in their environment like plants , but against and in opposition to their environment The world is in front of the animal; one could say that the animal looks out of his centre into the world. Humans do that, too; but they know and experience this and thus humans are both in and beyond their centre. That is how Plessner defines humans: Humans are bodies just like all objects, and just like Thomas Hobbes would have them.
Humans are in their bodies just like animals. And humans are outside of their bodies, since they can reflect on their nature. This makes humans broken beings with a double aspect: Every eccentric individual knows that there are other eccentric Is: Consequently, human beings are social individuals. This we-sphere constitutes the eccentric being as a person and presents the world as something that, in spite of being independent from the person, is yet open to her influence — Plessner derives three fundamental anthropological laws from the eccentric positionality.
The first is the law of natural artificiality. Humans cannot just live like animals , they have to lead a life. For humans, the vis a tergo that drives all animals to behaviour i. They are free to break rules, but they are unable to stop creating artificial conventions. Humans do not have a natural social order, but by their very nature they need a social order—so they create an artificial one.
The second fundamental anthropological law is the law of mediated immediacy. Humans are not in direct contact with their environment like animals are. They need their consciousness as mediator; to humans, things outside their consciousness do not exist. Through conscious perception objects feel as if in immediate contact with the human, while they are actually mediated—and through reflection the human becomes aware of his consciousness and thus of the mediated immediacy — Because of this gap, human action is not direct manipulation of the environment, but has the form of expression So humans cannot by an act of will create a society exactly in the wished-for form, but they can express the wished-for form in laws, sermons, plans, literary utopias etc.
Humans need to try and try again, thereby leaving a history behind them and making themselves historical beings. History is consequently not aimed at a telos as Bloch purported , history can never end — All this leads to the third fundamental anthropological law, the law of the utopian standpoint. Eccentric positionality throws the human into a comprehensible incomprehensibleness: This paradoxical situation is unbearable for the human. A commonly tried way out is religiosity, because religion promises something that is soothing but utterly impossible: Humans cannot meet this contingency with indifference; randomness is not feasible.
They must wilfully choose between alternatives, and they can choose an alternative that is not yet realized. There cannot be a last revolution. Even a revolution animal: Humans have to work to eat like cows have to lower their heads to graze and daisies have to raise their heads to photosynthesize. Additionally to that, and other than cows and daisies, humans have to create culture and morals. Up to and including the 19th century, most literary utopias had a somewhat perfectionist tenor: And since these social systems indulge in perfectionism, they must inhibit any aberration.
The attainment of the highest goals turns into the most barbaric inhumanity. This parallels the history of totalitarian regimes: Every attempt ended in the grotesque inversion of its promise—democracy produced despotism, science barbarism, and reason unreason. Society does not turn into utopia in this or any other way, but into a new topia that is a mixture of the old topia and some elements of the utopia. So, on the one hand, utopia is unattainable because it is not a society, but only a wish, a psychological process , but on the other hand, no society is safe from revolution, society is always dynamic and never perfect.
Gustav Landauer, Die Revolution, ed. Martin Buber Die Gesellschaft; Frankfurt a. Bernhard Braun, Die Utopie des Geistes. This is evident since the s, when critical utopias started to appear, utopias that oppose all notions of perfection and stasis, while still embracing the dream of a better society. To be desirable again, literary utopias had to leave behind what made traditional utopias so prone to totalitarianism, while at the same time remain utopian.
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The main characteristic of this structure is the imprisonment of the utopian horizon within a closed and ordered utopian locus, whose description is the central narrative element of traditional utopian fiction. This dialectical transformation of fictional humans and their fictional societies can be illustrated as follows: The Thesis is the classical utopia, a state in stasis whose citizens are completely in agreement with the legitimate order.
The Antithesis is the classical dystopia, which is also a state in stasis, but some of its citizens are not in agreement with the order that is thus shown to be not legitimate. Note that the characters in dystopias seem to be realistic people with comprehensible psychology, whilst descriptions of traditional utopians are mostly flat and implausible. The Synthesis is the critical or open-ended utopia, a state or, more often than not, an anarchic society that is subject to critical scrutiny—by headstrong utopians, by self-deprecating utopists, and by adept readers.
There are several famous examples for this synthesis; Tom Moylan refers to Ursula K. The book is in German, but I refer to many sources in English language. If you would live on the planet Anarres or in Whileaway, or in Mattapoisett, or on Triton , you would still have reason to hope for a better future—while you are already living in a better future!
While humans lack a natural society, they do need a society, they desire a good society, and they even build societies albeit not exactly the desired ones. Society as it is is only one instance of many possibilities. No law determines a certain form of society—on the contrary, human society is characterized by fundamental contingency. Consequently, humans are utopians that can only live in societies made by humans faultily following wishes, plans, and strategies of humans. Humans are also utopists that have the innate propensity to criticize and make anew the social condition they find themselves in.
And they are never finished, they have to question, ask, and wonder all the time. An idea of man that describes human nature in this way is called Homo utopicus. On the other hand, it may sharpen our comprehension of human abilities and motivations in a way that may open multiple paths of constructive criticism of the utopias we encounter or even live in. This section of my paper is therefore the most utopian, speculating on future achievements that seem to be possible, but not guaranteed.
I will draft two projects: In both instances, my attempt will not be to completely abandon the Homo economicus model,28 but to subvert its one-dimensionality by allowing for utopian planning and wishing.
But where he is a poacher, Homo economicus must be attacked. I will not speculate about a replacement, but about a synthesis of the two models, and I am allowed to do so because of the compatibility of them: Both pictures of human talk of an endless strife. For both of them, there is no attainable summum bonum, neither in the Aristotelian nor in the Blochian sense. What do they lust after? Always something different, something new; overthrow, adventure, new shores Plessner What Homo economicus desires money and power is attainable, but it is neither good nor compatible with the desires of his fellow men.
What Homo utopicus desires a good society for him and his fellow men , on the other hand, is very well a summum bonum in the Aristotelian or Blochian sense, but unfortunately, it is unattainable: Every society consists of people desiring multiple variations of even better societies29—and the people know this!
So a synthesis of Homo economicus and Homo utopicus would add preferences about the state of society to the utility function of the most sophistically refined version of Homo economicus, giving rise to political strategies in addition to the well-known economic strategies. For him, society does not consist of humans, but of communications. What he would not deny, though, is that to change social systems, a change in communication has to happen. Niklas Luhmann, Soziale Systeme. Above that, I do not want to change society by ex changing human beings, but by influencing their communications on the topic of human nature.
And Homo utopicus should be able to question the social groundings of his preferences, making him highly self-reflexive. At this stage of my research and mathematical abilities , I can only point to the desirability of these features, without being able to work out how this would be done formally. This should change the dynamics of computer simulations fundamentally. Christoph Hauert and others have shown that cooperation can emerge when there is the possibility of withdrawal from common enterprises, while cooperation is less likely when the common enterprise is compulsory; and they have done this in a very accessible computer simulation.
This leads to evolutionary dynamics: Four strategies have been tested against each other: When Punishment is added, Defection wins, too it may take a little longer, but as soon as Defectors prevail, Punishers have high punishing costs without cooperation gains and therefore cannot invade. When, instead of Punishment, Nonparticipation is the third available strategy, a cycle emerges: In a population of mainly Nonparticipants, Cooperation can emerge between a few individuals and then spreads fast because of the surplus resulting from teamwork.
In a population with prevailing Cooperation, the surplus is an irresistible temptation for a growing group of Defectors. Not stability, but oscillation is the outcome. Finally, when all four strategies are available, Punishment is the 31 The simulation is a Java applet that can be run and manipulated online at http: Cooperators and Punishers go hunting, while Defectors steal from them. Cooperators let this happen, but Punishers punish the Defectors and maybe the Cooperators too, since they fail to punish Defectors and are thus second-order Defectors.
As satisfying as this smack in the face of Hobbesian reasoning might be, it is nowhere near enough utopian. The simulated individuals are strict Homines economici. A Thoreauian Homo utopicus would reject higher monetary pay-offs to stay true to his dreams and thus in the woods—at least to a certain degree. Imagine a political super-villain participant of the simulation whom we will aptly name Caesar2.
This avatar wants to become the king of the others who, to his economic and political benefit, shall fear him and each other. At first he acts like the others, mostly as one Punisher amongst many, adopting the other three strategies whenever useful. But then he starts to recognize certain patterns. He realizes that no king is needed as long as the Punishers prevail—in fact everyone acts as king in these episodes.
In the most probable scenario, where Punishers prevail, Caesar2. Try it yourself and get similar results! So no Homo utopicus can be completely non-economicus. Simulations like the Hauert et al. Instead of in each round consciously imitating good strategies and abandoning bad ones, carriers of the genes for bad strategies could die and carriers of the genes for good strategies could proliferate; and the random experimenting with other strategies could also be unconscious mutation. This biological interpretation does not fit in my utopian i.
In the simulation, only Cooperators can directly invade a population of Punishers. After this first step, Defectors normally turn up without further pushing—but Caesar2. Coordinated Intolerant Defectors that, additionally to exploiting Cooperators, submit to Caesar2. Burning down the wilderness, destroying means of subsistence economies, closing the borders of the territory, and using violence to terrify people are the real-world strategies of Caesar2.