Spinoza, Hume, and the fate of the natural law tradition
This paper explores the common ground in the views on natural law, justice and sociopolitical development in Hume and Spinoza. Spinoza develops a radically revisionary position in the natural law debate, building upon the bold equation of right and power. Hume is best interpreted as offering a skept...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic/Print Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Taylor & Francis
[2015]
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| In: |
International journal of philosophy and theology
Year: 2015, Volume: 76, Issue: 4, Pages: 267-283 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Spinoza, Benedictus de 1632-1677
/ Hume, David 1711-1776
/ Natural law
/ Political theory
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| IxTheo Classification: | NCD Political ethics VA Philosophy VB Hermeneutics; Philosophy |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (doi) |
| Summary: | This paper explores the common ground in the views on natural law, justice and sociopolitical development in Hume and Spinoza. Spinoza develops a radically revisionary position in the natural law debate, building upon the bold equation of right and power. Hume is best interpreted as offering a skeptical–empirical reworking of traditional natural law theories, which maintains much of the practical purport of these theories, while providing it with a new, metaphysically less firm, but also less problematic, foundation. What the two philosophers have in common is that they formulate realist revisions of the natural law tradition in the light of their more general naturalistic, secular philosophical commitments. Both philosophers, moreover, point to the slow development of man’s insight in the laws of nature, arising through a gradual accumulation of experiential insights. These insights are never wholly ‘liberated’ from the historical and imaginative perspective in which they arise. Accordingly, although rational progress brings the systems of justice and politics of different groups of people closer to each other, they necessarily retain, sometimes fundamentally incompatible, divergences. In the tradition of Machiavellian political realism, therefore, both Spinoza and Hume plead for judging political orders according to their own merits: do they, in their own specific ways, bring about a sufficient degree of order and liberty? |
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| ISSN: | 2169-2327 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: International journal of philosophy and theology
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1080/21692327.2015.1136235 |