Thomas Hobbes

To sum up everything, Thomas Hobbes believes that all human's are all selfish, all equal (leading to competition and violence), power hungry, irrational and selfishly motivated. Unfortunately, I would have to disagree with him, on almost all fronts. First off, humans are not, and very far from being equal. People will always be labeled and judged based on their abilities, looks, and personality. Although we all might have equal rights, that does not mean we are all equal. Also, it is unfair and stupid to say that all people are selfish. Is he saying that he is also selfish? Such a strong statement is asking to be attacked.

Hobbes also states that people's selfishness and desire for power, causes wars. This maybe be true in certain situations, however, this does not mean that people should relinquish all their rights to the "leviathan". It is human nature to make mistakes, however, punishment should not be an a government that is in complete control and people who have no rights.

He also goes on and says that the only reason government was created was to protect people from themselves and their selfishness, and evil. I only partially agree. The government does a lot to control its people and make sure they are abiding by all rules to make society as good as possible. However, it is also very strong to say that humans have to be protected from their own evil because I do not believe humans are naturally evil.

I'd love comments :)

Post-Revolution Estate System

After reading Augustine's post, I decided to do a little bit more research about the estate system and the taxing of different social classes: What sparked the revolution, and did the estate system help it, or hold it back? What happened to the estate system after the revolution ended?

I discovered that one of the problems in France (that eventually lead to the Revolution) was that the peasants were over-taxed, and the 1st estate and 2nd was (for the most part) immune from having to pay taxes. This was one of the reasons why France fell into bankruptcy. All of their income was being sucked out of the lower class, until the peasants barely had enough money to even survive. Throughout the 1700s, there were various propositions attempting to fix France's tax system, but none were successful. The attempts by various ministers, including Chrétien de Malesherbes, and Jacques Necker to tax the nobles, were constantly fought against by the courts. The lower class (despite representing 97-98% of the population) simply did not have enough political power to pass these kind of reforms. Attempts to tax the upper two estates continually failed, up until the 1780s when the revolution began.

After the revolution, it seemed like the estate system essentially ceased to exist (at the very least, it lost most of its relevance/significance). in 1789, the feudal system was abolished, and class distinctions (between the three estates) began to fade away.

American Rev. vs French Rev.

The American Revolution, and the French revolution both influenced each other in very good ways, but they did have big differences.

As a brief overview, the American Revolution began because Britain was an oppressive nation toward the colonies, which caused major war. The American won so that is why we are independent from Britain. Even though it seems as if all of the revolution was the war between the american colonies and Britain that is not true. Most of the revolution actually happened inside of the colonies. Social life in the colonies was much more open than in Europe, everyone that was free had the same rights. This made everyone in the colonies happy, so there was no tension between people in the colonies. While the colonies were busy being happy, Britain was having trouble with France , so Britain turned toward the colonies to make up for the debt that they were in as a result of dilemmas with France. Britain started to tighten up its control over the colonies, making them pay heavy taxes which resulted in war. As I said earlier, most people would say that the revolution occurred as the American colonies defeated Britain, but it actually occurred before any problems with Britain at all. It occurred when everyone had the ideas that everyone was equal.

The French Revolution occurred as a result of the French coming over to help the Americans at war. When the French came over to the United Stated, they came back to France full with republican enthusiasm. The French wanted everyone to be equal, much like the Americans, so they started to tax the wealthy class of france to let the poor people have something to eat. This angered all of the wealthy people, so the French imposed even more radical laws. This made everyone revolt even more, and this led to the Terror. During the Terror, numerous people were being killed on the guillotine, even really important people such as Robespierre. After the death of Robespierre France got organized and created a solid army. Eventually the idea of all people being equal was really spread throughout France, and people did actually feel equal.

Baron de Montesquieu

Charles de Secondat, better known as Baron de Montesquieu played a major role in the enlightenment, not only because he was the first French man associated with the enlightenment, but because his ideas about government changed everything that was established back then. His idea about government, was that there should not be only one person with all of the power, like there was everywhere at the time, but instead, there should be a separation of power, like there is now. He thought that by doing this, there would be more of a balance, and there would not be just one group, or even just one person with all of the power. The three groups would balance each other out, and make sure that none of them were taking too much of the power. This was much like the checks and balances that we have today. Another idea that Montesquieu had that was rare in those times was that there should not be slavery, because it did not make sense to have people working for people.

Montesquieu did change a lot of the government for the better of the people, but he also had some ideas that were not fair too a lot of people. His idea of women being weaker than men, made a lot of women mad, and it also made people treat women even worse that they were being treated. Other than this, Montesquieu was a really positive man full with wonderful ideas for the future.

The Difference Between the American Rev and French Rev

I would like to dig deeper into the main differences between the American Revolution and the French Revolution, and for the purpose this blog I will call the American Rev just AR and the French Rev FR. As we know from the reading, the French had a great impact on the AR and without the French, the Americans would likely of lost and we might of still been British. The French sent over hundreds of thousands troops and financial support to help the Americans beat their long time rival the British. Ironically, this helped the Americans a ton, but the French were not ready for the repercussions of this, and that they were then sent into a debt. As we know, history went on and eventually the FR began due to these debts and the taxes that followed. Both the FR and AR were based off of the revolutionary ideas that came out of the Enlightenment. In both cases, the a select group of people were exposed to these ideas, the representatives of the 3rd Estate for the FR and writers of the Declaration of Inp. for the AR. Another common thing I noticed was the result of both revolutions, the general public made documents that gave everyone equal rights and more power with their government. Both of their documents were based off of the ideas of Locke etc. so they shared same common ideas. The biggest difference I noticed between the two rev was they way the citizens went about it. The AR was much more peaceful then the FR. The FR was known for blood in the streets and heads on pikes. I think this indicates the message the French were trying to send to the whole world. On the other side, the AR was violent, but it seemed to have more of a grand feeling to it. The Americans seemed to have more of an "epic" revolution where the FR seemed just a bunch of frustration and years of depression being let out in the course of two years through shedding as much blood as possible. The end results were great for both, because after both of their revolutions, each nation thrived, the French with Napoleon and obtaining the largest empire since the Romans in Europe and the Americans becoming an the elite power in the 20th century of the world. I personally believe the FR followed what example the AR had set and this would set a chain reactions of the common people saying if they can do it, why dont we do it, including the Haiti Rev, Indian, etc.

Social Contract Theory and Presentation Feedback

Hi,

Tomorrow in class (or as soon as time opens up in the class schedule), I will be giving a presentation on Social Contract Theory (as advocated for by Hobbes, Rousseau, and Locke). I know we've already moved onto the French Revolution, but I haven't gotten a chance to talk about these philosophers yet, and since I didn't get a chance to do my previous presentation until Friday, this presentation ended up getting pushed up to this week.

Also, I wanted to get some feedback from you guys about my presentations. Do you think it is excessive for me to be doing 1-2 presentations per week in class? Do you find them interesting? Would you rather have the class time be spent with Ms. Xia discussing more directly relevant material (such as things that will be on the test)? Should I post video blogs on Youtube instead of in-class presentations? How can I improve my presentations as a whole? Feel free just to leave a comment on this blog post. I won't be offended if you think my presentations are boring, or a waste of time, but at least if you are going to comment then take the time to put some thought into what you have to say.

Thanks,

-Cy