1.
Fellow of the Royal Society
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As of 2016, there are around 1600 living Fellows, Foreign and Honorary Members. Fellowship of the Royal Society has been described by The Guardian newspaper as “the equivalent of a lifetime achievement Oscar” with several institutions celebrating their announcement each year. Up to 60 new Fellows, honorary and foreign members are elected annually usually in May, each candidate is considered on their merits and can be proposed from any sector of the scientific community. Fellows are elected for life on the basis of excellence in science and are entitled to use the post-nominal letters FRS, see Category, Fellows of the Royal Society and Category, Female Fellows of the Royal Society. Every year, Fellows elect up to ten new Foreign Members, like Fellows, Foreign Members are elected for life through peer review on the basis of excellence in science. As of 2016 there are around 165 Foreign Members, who are entitled to use the post-nominal ForMemRS, see Category, Foreign Members of the Royal Society. Honorary Fellows include Bill Bryson, Melvyn Bragg, Robin Saxby, David Sainsbury, Baron Sainsbury of Turville, Honorary Fellows are entitled to use the post nominal letters HonFRS. Others including John Maddox, Patrick Moore and Lisa Jardine were elected as honorary fellows, statute 12 is a legacy mechanism for electing members before official honorary membership existed in 1997. Fellows elected under statute 12 include David Attenborough and John Palmer, prime Ministers of the United Kingdom such as Margaret Thatcher, Neville Chamberlain, H. H. Asquith were elected under statute 12, see Category, Fellows of the Royal Society. The Council of the Royal Society can recommend members of the British Royal Family for election as Royal Fellows of the Royal Society. As of 2016 there are five royal fellows, Charles, Prince of Wales, Anne, Princess Royal, Prince Edward, Duke of Kent, Prince William, Duke of Cambridge and Prince Andrew, Duke of York. Her Majesty the Queen, Elizabeth II is not a Royal Fellow, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh was elected under statute 12, not as a Royal Fellow. The election of new fellows is announced annually in May, after their nomination, each candidate for Fellowship or Foreign Membership is nominated by two Fellows of the Royal Society, who sign a certificate of proposal. Previously, nominations required at least five fellows to support each nomination by the proposer, the certificate of election includes a statement of the principal grounds on which the proposal is being made. There is no limit on the number of nominations each year. In 2015, there were 654 candidates for election as Fellows and 106 candidates for Foreign Membership. The final list of up to 52 Fellowship candidates and up to 10 Foreign Membership candidates is confirmed by the Council in April, a candidate is elected if he or she secures two-thirds of votes of those Fellows present and voting. A further maximum of six can be ‘Honorary’, ‘General’ or ‘Royal’ Fellows, nominations for Fellowship are peer reviewed by sectional committees, each with fifteen members and a chair
2.
Godfrey Kneller
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Kneller was born Gottfried Kniller in the Free City of Lübeck, the son of Zacharias Kniller, a portrait painter. Kneller studied in Leiden, but became a pupil of Ferdinand Bol, the brothers came to England in 1676, and won the patronage of the Duke of Monmouth. He was introduced to, and painted a portrait of, Charles II, in England, Kneller concentrated almost entirely on portraiture. His portraits set a pattern that was followed until William Hogarth, nevertheless, he established himself as a leading portrait artist in England. When Sir Peter Lely died in 1680, Kneller was appointed Principal Painter to the Crown by Charles II, in the 1690s, Kneller painted the Hampton Court Beauties depicting the most glamorous ladies-in-waiting of the Royal Court for which he received his knighthood from William III. He produced a series of Kit-cat portraits of 48 leading politicians and his paintings were praised by Whig luminaries such as John Dryden, Joseph Addison, Richard Steele, and Alexander Pope. On the landing in Horsham Museum hang works of art from the Museums extensive painting collection, featuring a large 18th-century portrait of Charles Eversfield and his wife, in the painting Eversfield is giving his wife some violets which signifies fidelity, love and honesty. It is likely that the picture was cut down at some time as it was unusual to stop just below the knee and he married a widow, Susanna Grave, on 23 January 1704 at St Brides Church, London. She was the daughter of the Reverend John Cawley, Archdeacon of Lincoln and Rector of Henley-on-Thames, Kneller died of fever in 1723 at Great Queen Street and his remains were interred at Twickenham. He had been a churchwarden at St Marys, Twickenham when the 14th-century nave collapsed in 1713 and was active in the plans for the reconstruction by John James. His widow was buried at Twickenham on 11 December 1729, a memorial was erected in Westminster Abbey. Knellers will gave a pension of £100 a year to his assistant Edward Byng, Byng also inherited the drawings in Knellers studio. Kneller and his wife had no children together, the site of the house Kneller built in 1709 in Whitton, near Twickenham, became occupied by the mid-19th century Kneller Hall, home of the Royal Military School of Music. As to thinking better or worse of mankind from experience, some cunning people will not be satisfied unless they have put men to the test, there is a very good story told of Sir Godfrey Kneller, in his character of a Justice of the peace. In his hometown Lübeck there are works to be seen in the St. Annen Museum and his former works at St. Marys Church were destroyed by the Bombing of Lübeck 1942. A large oil portrait of James VII of Scotland hangs on the staircase of private members Club, The Caledonian Club, in Belgravia
3.
Wrington
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Wrington is a village and both a civil and an ecclesiastical parish in North Somerset, England. It lies in the valley of the Congresbury Yeo river, about 9 miles east of Weston-super-Mare and 3 miles south-east of Yatton and it has a population of 2,633. Both parishes include the village of Redhill. The village dates back to Roman times and there is evidence of Saxon occupation. Wrington was part of the hundred of Brent-cum-Wrington, Wrington cottage hospital opened in 1864 and had 24 patients admitted in its first year of operation. The first surgeon was Horace Swete who wrote the Habdy Book of Cottage Hospitals and it was also referred to by Florence Nightingale in 1869. The parish council has responsibility for issues, including setting an annual precept to cover the councils operating costs. The parish councils role includes initiating projects for the maintenance and repair of parish facilities, the parish falls within the unitary authority of North Somerset which was created in 1996, as established by the Local Government Act 1992. North Somersets area covers part of the county of Somerset. Its administrative headquarters is in the hall in Weston-super-Mare. Between 1 April 1974 and 1 April 1996, it was the Woodspring district of the county of Avon, before 1974 the parish was part of the Axbridge Rural District. An electoral ward exists with the same name, the ward includes Butcombe in addition to the area covered by the parish. The total ward population taken at the 2011 census was 2,851, the parish is represented in the House of Commons as part of the North Somerset county constituency which was created from the Woodspring constituency for the 2010 General Election. It is also part of the South West England constituency of the European Parliament which elects seven MEPs using the method of party-list proportional representation. The church of All Saints has 13th-century foundations, and was remodelled with the addition of a west tower around 1450 and it includes stone busts to John Locke and Hannah More dating from the early 19th century on either side of the door. The chancel has Gothic reredos by Charles Barry dating from 1832, the rood screen is from the 16th century. It has a tall tower with set-back buttresses which develop into crocketted pinnacles at the top stage. The top displays moulded string courses and a trefoil pierced parapet with gargoyles
4.
Somerset
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Somerset is a county in South West England which borders Gloucestershire and Bristol to the north, Wiltshire to the east, Dorset to the south-east and Devon to the south-west. It is bounded to the north and west by the Severn Estuary and its traditional border with Gloucestershire is the River Avon. Somerset is a county of rolling hills such as the Blackdown Hills, Mendip Hills, Quantock Hills and Exmoor National Park. There is evidence of occupation from Paleolithic times, and of subsequent settlement in the Roman. The county played a significant part in the consolidation of power and rise of King Alfred the Great, and later in the English Civil War, the city of Bath is famous for its substantial Georgian architecture and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Somersets name derives from Old English Sumorsǣte, short for Sumortūnsǣte, an alternative suggestion is the name derives from Seo-mere-saetan meaning settlers by the sea lakes. The Old English name is used in the motto of the county, Sumorsǣte ealle, adopted as the motto in 1911, the phrase is taken from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Somerset settlement names are mostly Anglo-Saxon in origin, but some hill names include Brittonic Celtic elements, for example, an Anglo-Saxon charter of 682 refers to Creechborough Hill as the hill the British call Cructan and we call Crychbeorh. Some modern names are Brythonic in origin, such as Tarnock, the caves of the Mendip Hills were settled during the Palaeolithic period, and contain extensive archaeological sites such as those at Cheddar Gorge. Bones from Goughs Cave have been dated to 12,000 BC, examples of cave art have been found in Avelines Hole. Some caves continued to be occupied until modern times, including Wookey Hole, the Somerset Levels—specifically dry points at Glastonbury and Brent Knoll— also have a long history of settlement, and are known to have been settled by Mesolithic hunters. Travel in the area was facilitated by the construction of one of the worlds oldest known engineered roadways, the Sweet Track, the exact age of the henge monument at Stanton Drew stone circles is unknown, but it is believed to be Neolithic. There are numerous Iron Age hill forts, some of which, like Cadbury Castle, on the authority of the future emperor Vespasian, as part of the ongoing expansion of the Roman presence in Britain, the Second Legion Augusta invaded Somerset from the south-east in AD47. The county remained part of the Roman Empire until around AD409, a variety of Roman remains have been found, including Pagans Hill Roman temple in Chew Stoke, Low Ham Roman Villa and the Roman Baths that gave their name to the city of Bath. After the Romans left, Britain was invaded by Anglo-Saxon peoples, by AD600 they had established control over much of what is now England, but Somerset was still in native British hands. The Saxon royal palace in Cheddar was used several times in the 10th century to host the Witenagemot. After the Norman Conquest, the county was divided into 700 fiefs, Somerset contains HM Prison Shepton Mallet, which was Englands oldest prison still in use prior to its closure in 2013, having opened in 1610. In the English Civil War Somerset was largely Parliamentarian, with key engagements being the Sieges of Taunton, in 1685 the Monmouth Rebellion was played out in Somerset and neighbouring Dorset
5.
High Laver
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High Laver is a village and civil parish in the Epping Forest district of the County of Essex, England. The parish is noted for its association with the philosopher John Locke, High Laver is historically a rural agricultural parish, predominantly arable. In 1086 there were 1428 acres of land, woodland for 200 pigs. The 1881 census data collected indicates that the majority of the population were employed in agriculture. High Laver school was founded 1866 with accommodation for 75 children, at one point the school breached its capacity with a total of 132 pupils attending. Pupils of High Laver today typically attend Magdalen Laver school, west from High Laver, when John Locke, British philosopher, died in 1704, he was buried at High Laver where he had lived in the household of Sir Francis Masham since 1691. In 1887 John Bartholomew, Gazetteer of the British Isles wrote, Laver, High, Essex, in NW. of co.4 m. NW. of Ongar,1891 ac. pop,477, the churchyard contains the grave of John Locke, the philosopher. High Laver village is situated 4 miles east of Harlow and 1.4 miles north-west of Moreton, the land is nearly 300 ft. above sea-level in the south-west, about 250 ft. in the north and 230 ft. in the east. In 1801 the population was 346, by 1851 it had grown to 534. It was a little below this level until the last decade of the century there was a sharp decline to 386. In the first half of the 20th century it gradually to 463 in 1951 According to 2011 census data High Laver had a population of 493 persons across 200 households. Within High Laver 260 persons out of the 493 who participated in the 2011 census aged 16 to 74 are in employment,2011 census data indicates that 260 16- to 74-year-olds are in employment out of the total population of 493. The demographics in High Laver are fairly uneven according to the 2011 census data, all Saints church in High Laver consists of a nave, chancel, west tower, south porch, and North Vestry. Over the years there has been refurbishment and maintenance on the church, in the 15th or 16th century the roofs of the chancel and nave, which are ceiled in except for the plates and tie-beams, were renewed. Within the tower there is a font with a bowl which dates from the 14th century. Outside the south wall of the nave is the altar tomb of John Locke. A mural tablet, originally above the tomb, was moved inside the church for preservation in 1932, the main road from Ongar to Harlow which is a key transport route enters the parish at High Laver Bridge
6.
Essex
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Essex /ˈɛsᵻks/ is a county in England immediately north-east of London. It borders the counties of Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, the county town is Chelmsford, which is the only city in the county. Essex occupies the part of the old Kingdom of Essex, before this. As well as areas, the county also includes London Stansted Airport, the new towns of Basildon and Harlow, Lakeside Shopping Centre, the port of Tilbury. Originally recorded in AD527, Essex occupied territory to the north of the River Thames, incorporating all of what later became Middlesex and its territory was later restricted to lands east of the River Lea. In changes before the Norman conquest the East Saxons were subsumed into the Kingdom of England and, following the Norman conquest, Essex became a county. During the medieval period, much of the area was designated a Royal forest, including the county in a period to 1204. Gradually, the subject to forest law diminished, but at various times included the forests of Becontree, Chelmsford, Epping, Hatfield, Ongar. County-wide administration Essex County Council was formed in 1889, however County Boroughs of West Ham, Southend-on-Sea and East Ham formed part of the county but were unitary authorities. 12 boroughs and districts provide more localised services such as rubbish and recycling collections, leisure and planning, parish-level administration – changes A few Essex parishes have been transferred to other counties. Before 1889, small areas were transferred to Hertfordshire near Bishops Stortford, Essex became part of the East of England Government Office Region in 1994 and was statistically counted as part of that region from 1999, having previously been part of the South East England region. Two unitary authorities In 1998 the boroughs of Southend-on-Sea and Thurrock were granted autonomy from the county of Essex after successful requests to become unitary authorities. Essex Police covers the county and the two unitary authorities. The county council chamber and main headquarters is at the County Hall in Chelmsford, before 1938 the council regularly met in London near Moorgate, which with significant parts closer to that point and the dominance of railways had been more convenient than any place in the county. It currently has 75 elected councillors, before 1965, the number of councillors reached over 100. The highest point of the county of Essex is Chrishall Common near the village of Langley, close to the Hertfordshire border, the pattern of settlement in the county is diverse. Epping Forest also acts as a barrier to the further spread of London. Part of the southeast of the county, already containing the population centres of Basildon, Southend and Thurrock, is within the Thames Gateway
7.
Christ Church, Oxford
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Christ Church is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. The college is associated with Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, which serves as the college chapel and it is the second wealthiest Oxford college by financial endowment with an endowment of £436m as of 2015. Christ Church has produced thirteen British prime ministers, more than any other Oxbridge college, the college was the setting for parts of Evelyn Waughs Brideshead Revisited, as well as a small part of Lewis Carrolls Alices Adventures in Wonderland. More recently it has used in the filming of the movies of J. K. Rowlings Harry Potter series. Distinctive features of the architecture have been used as models by a number of other academic institutions, including the National University of Ireland, Galway. The University of Chicago and Cornell University both have reproductions of Christ Churchs dining hall, christChurch Cathedral in New Zealand, after which the City of Christchurch is named, is itself named after Christ Church, Oxford. Stained glass windows in the cathedral and other buildings are by the Pre-Raphaelite William Morris group with designs by Edward Burne-Jones, Christ Church is also partly responsible for the creation of University College Reading, which later gained its own Royal Charter and became the University of Reading. The first female undergraduates matriculated at Christ Church in 1980 and he planned the establishment on a magnificent scale, but fell from grace in 1529, with the buildings only three-quarters complete, as they were to remain for 140 years. In 1531 the college was suppressed, but it was refounded in 1532 as King Henry VIIIs College by Henry VIII. Since the time of Queen Elizabeth I the college has also associated with Westminster School. The dean remains to this day an ex member of the schools governing body. Major additions have made to the buildings through the centuries. To this day the bell in the tower, Great Tom, is rung 101 times at 9 pm at the former Oxford time every night, in former times this was done at midnight, signalling the close of all college gates throughout Oxford. Since it took 20 minutes to ring the 101, Christ Church gates, unlike those of other colleges, when the ringing was moved back to 9,00 pm, Christ Church gates still remained open until 12.20,20 minutes later than any other college. Although the clock itself now shows GMT/BST, Christ Church still follows Oxford time in the timings of services in the cathedral, King Charles I made the Deanery his palace and held his Parliament in the Great Hall during the English Civil War. In the evening of 29 May 1645, during the siege of Oxford. During the Commonwealth, John Owen attained considerable eminence, the Visitor of Christ Church is the reigning British sovereign, and the Bishop of Oxford is unique among English bishops in not being the Visitor of his own cathedral. The head of the college is the Dean of Christ Church, There are a senior and a junior censor the former of whom is responsible for academic matters, the latter for undergraduate discipline
8.
17th-century philosophy
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17th-century philosophy in the Western world is generally regarded as being the start of modern philosophy, and a departure from the medieval approach, especially Scholasticism. Early 17th-century philosophy is called the Age of Reason or Age of Rationalism and is considered to succeed the Renaissance philosophy era. In the West, 17th-century philosophy is taken to start with the work of René Descartes. The three main rationalists are normally taken to have been René Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, and Gottfried Leibniz, building upon their English predecessor Francis Bacon, the two main empiricists of the 17th-century were Thomas Hobbes and John Locke. Thus the rationalists took mathematics as their model for knowledge, and this emphasis on epistemology is at the root of Kants distinction, looking at the various philosophers in terms of their metaphysical, moral, or linguistic theories, they divide up very differently. This period also saw the birth of some of the classics of political thought, especially Thomas Hobbes Leviathan, and John Lockes Two Treatises of Government
9.
Modern philosophy
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Modern philosophy is philosophy developed in the modern era and associated with modernity. It is not a doctrine or school, although there are certain assumptions common to much of it. The 17th and early 20th centuries roughly mark the beginning and the end of modern philosophy, how much if any of the Renaissance should be included is a matter for dispute, likewise modernity may or may not have ended in the twentieth century and been replaced by postmodernity. How one decides these questions determine the scope of ones use of modern philosophy. The major figures in philosophy of mind, epistemology, and metaphysics during the 17th and 18th centuries are roughly divided into two main groups, the Rationalists, mostly in France and Germany, argued all knowledge must begin from certain innate ideas in the mind. Major rationalists were Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, Gottfried Leibniz, the Empiricists, by contrast, held that knowledge must begin with sensory experience. Other important figures in philosophy include Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In the late eighteenth century Immanuel Kant set forth a philosophical system which claimed to bring unity to rationalism and empiricism. Whether or not he was right, he did not entirely succeed in ending philosophical dispute, Kant sparked a storm of philosophical work in Germany in the early nineteenth century, beginning with German idealism. Hegels work was carried in many directions by his followers and critics, søren Kierkegaard, in contrast, dismissed all systematic philosophy as an inadequate guide to life and meaning. For Kierkegaard, life is meant to be lived, not a mystery to be solved, arthur Schopenhauer took idealism to the conclusion that the world was nothing but the futile endless interplay of images and desires, and advocated atheism and pessimism. Nietzsche found in this not grounds for pessimism, but the possibility of a new kind of freedom, modern philosophy traditionally begins with René Descartes and his dictum I think, therefore I am. In the early seventeenth century the bulk of philosophy was dominated by Scholasticism, written by theologians and drawing upon Plato, Aristotle, Descartes argued that many predominant Scholastic metaphysical doctrines were meaningless or false. In short, he proposed to begin philosophy from scratch, in his most important work, Meditations on First Philosophy, he attempts just this, over six brief essays. He tries to set aside as much as he possibly can of all his beliefs, to determine what if anything he knows for certain. He finds that he can doubt nearly everything, the reality of physical objects, God, his memories, history, science, even mathematics, but he cannot doubt that he is, in fact, doubting. He knows what he is thinking about, even if it is not true, from this basis he builds his knowledge back up again. He finds that some of the ideas he has could not have originated from him alone and he then demonstrates that God would not allow him to be systematically deceived about everything, in essence, he vindicates ordinary methods of science and reasoning, as fallible but not false
10.
Western philosophy
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Western philosophy is the philosophical thought and work of the Western world. The word philosophy itself originated from the Hellenic, philosophia, literally, the scope of philosophy in the ancient understanding, and the writings of the ancient philosophers, were all intellectual endeavors. Western Philosophy is generally said to begin in the Greek cities of western Asia Minor with Thales of Miletus and his most noted students were respectively Anaximander and Anaximenes of Miletus. Pythagoras, from the island of Samos off the coast of Ionia, pythagoreans hold that all is number, giving formal accounts in contrast to the previous material of the Ionians. They also believe in metempsychosis, the transmigration of souls, or reincarnation, Socrates The key figure in Greek philosophy is Socrates. Socrates studied under several Sophists but transformed Greek philosophy into a unified, Socrates used a critical approach called the elenchus or Socratic method to examine peoples views. He aimed to study human things, the life, justice, beauty. Although Socrates wrote nothing himself, some of his many disciples wrote down his conversations and he was tried for corrupting the youth and impiety by the Greek democracy. He was found guilty and sentenced to death, although his friends offered to help him escape from prison, he chose to remain in Athens and abide by his principles. His execution consisting in drinking the poison hemlock and he died in 399 B. C, Plato Socrates most important student was Plato. Plato founded the Academy of Athens and wrote a number of dialogues, some central ideas of Platos dialogues are the immortality of the soul, the benefits of being just, that evil is ignorance, and the Theory of Forms. Forms are universal properties that constitute reality and contrast with the changeable material things he called becoming. Aristotle Platos most outstanding student was Aristotle, Aristotle was perhaps the first truly systematic philosopher and scientist. He wrote books on physics, biology, zoology, metaphysics, aesthetics, poetry, theater, music, rhetoric, politics, Aristotelian logic was the first type of logic to attempt to categorize every valid syllogism. Aristotelian philosophy exercised considerable influence on almost all western philosophers, including Greek, Roman, Christian, Jewish, the Neoplatonic and Christian philosophers of Late Antiquity. Early medieval philosophy was influenced by the likes of Stoicism, neo-Platonism, but, above all, the prominent figure of this period was St. Augustinianism was the preferred starting point for most philosophers up until the 13th century. The foundations of many northern European universities were built in the Middle Ages by waves of Irish, Scottish & English monks from the Celtic Church begun by Columba, see Celtic Christianity. Erigena is said to have been stabbed to death by his students with their pens and his theology would today be called pantheistic, in keeping with Celtic resolutions of pagan and Christian philosophy
11.
Empiricism
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Empiricism is a theory that states that knowledge comes only or primarily from sensory experience. It is one of several views of epistemology, the study of human knowledge, Empiricism in the philosophy of science emphasizes evidence, especially as discovered in experiments. Empiricism, often used by scientists, says that knowledge is based on experience. One of the epistemological tenets is that sensory experience creates knowledge, empirical research, including experiments and validated measurement tools, guides the scientific method. The term was used by the Empiric school of ancient Greek medical practitioners, a central concept in science and the scientific method is that it must be empirically based on the evidence of the senses. Both natural and social sciences use working hypotheses that are testable by observation, philosophical empiricists hold no knowledge to be properly inferred or deduced unless it is derived from ones sense-based experience. This view is contrasted with rationalism, which states that knowledge may be derived from reason independently of the senses. For example, John Locke held that knowledge could be arrived at through intuition. Similarly Robert Boyle, a prominent advocate of the experimental method, the main continental rationalists were also advocates of the empirical scientific method. Vaisheshika darshana, founded by the ancient Indian philosopher Kanada, accepted perception and this is enumerated in his work Vaiśeṣika Sūtra. The notion of tabula rasa connotes a view of mind as a blank or empty recorder on which experience leaves marks. This denies that humans have innate ideas, the image dates back to Aristotle, What the mind thinks must be in it in the same sense as letters are on a tablet which bears no actual writing, this is just what happens in the case of the mind. These notions contrasted with Platonic notions of the mind as an entity that pre-existed somewhere in the heavens. This idea was developed in ancient philosophy by the Stoic school. Stoic epistemology generally emphasized that the mind starts blank, but acquires knowledge as the world is impressed upon it. The doxographer Aetius summarizes this view as When a man is born, later stoics, such as Sextus of Chaeronea, would continue this idea of empiricism in later Stoic writings as well. As Sextus contends For every thought comes from sense-perception or not without sense-perception, so the immaterial active intellect, separate from any individual person, is still essential for understanding to occur. A similar Islamic theological novel, Theologus Autodidactus, was written by the Arab theologian and physician Ibn al-Nafis in the 13th century, during the 13th century Thomas Aquinas adopted the Aristotelian position that the senses are essential to mind into scholasticism
12.
Social contract
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The question of the relation between natural and legal rights, therefore, is often an aspect of social contract theory. The term takes its name from The Social Contract, a 1762 book by Jean-Jacques Rousseau that discussed this concept, the starting point for most social contract theories is an examination of the human condition absent any political order that Thomas Hobbes termed the state of nature. In this condition, individuals actions are only by their personal power. Each solved the problem of authority in a different way. Grotius posited that human beings had natural rights. Thomas Hobbes famously said that in a state of nature, human life would be solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, though the sovereigns edicts may well be arbitrary and tyrannical, Hobbes saw absolute government as the only alternative to the terrifying anarchy of a state of nature. Hobbes asserted that humans consent to abdicate their rights in favor of the authority of government. Pufendorf disputed Hobbess equation of a state of nature with war, the central assertion of social contract approaches is that law and political order are not natural, but are instead human creations. According to Hobbes citizens are not obligated to submit to the government when it is too weak to act effectively to suppress factionalism, the Lockean concept of the social contract was invoked in the United States Declaration of Independence. The concept of the contract is posed by Glaucon, as described by Plato in The Republic. They say that to do injustice is, by nature, good, to suffer injustice, evil, for no man who is worthy to be called a man would ever submit to such an agreement if he were able to resist, he would be mad if he did. Such is the account, Socrates, of the nature. The social contract theory also appears in Crito, another dialogue from Plato, Social contract formulations are preserved in many of the worlds oldest records. The Buddhist text of the second century BCE, Mahāvastu, recounts the legend of Mahasammata, then gradually the process of cosmic decay began its work, and mankind became earthbound, and felt the need of food and shelter. As men lost their glory, distinctions of class arose, and they entered into agreements with one another, accepting the institution of private property. He was called the Great Chosen One, and he received the title of raja because he pleased the people, in his rock edicts, the Buddhist king Asoka was said to have argued for a broad and far-reaching social contract. Natural justice is a pledge of reciprocal benefit, to prevent one man from harming or being harmed by another. There never was such a thing as justice, but only agreements made in mutual dealings among men in whatever places at various times providing against the infliction or suffering of harm
13.
Natural law
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Natural law is a philosophy that certain rights are inherent by virtue of human nature endowed by God or another Divine source, and can be understood universally through human reason. Historically, natural law refers to the use of reason to human nature to deduce binding rules of moral behavior from Gods creation of humans. The law of nature, as determined by nature, is universal, although natural law is often confused with common law, the two are distinct. Natural law is often contrasted with the laws of a given state. In legal theory, the interpretation of a law requires some reference to natural law. On this understanding of law, natural law can be invoked to criticize judicial decisions about what the law says. Some philosophers, jurists and scholars use natural law synonymously with natural justice or natural right, modern natural law theories were further developed during the Era of Enlightenment, while combining inspiration from the Roman law, and alongside philosophies like social contract theory. The use of law, in its various incarnations, has varied widely through history. There are a number of theories of law, that differ from each other with respect to the role that morality plays in determining the authority of legal norms. This article deals with its usages separately rather than attempt to unify them into a single theory, although Plato did not have an explicit theory of natural law, his concept of nature, according to John Wild, contains some of the elements found in many natural law theories. According to Plato, we live in an orderly universe, the basis of this orderly universe or nature are the forms, most fundamentally the Form of the Good, which Plato describes as the brightest region of Being. The Form of the Good is the cause of all things, in the Symposium, the Good is closely identified with the Beautiful. In the Symposium, Plato describes how the experience of the Beautiful by Socrates enabled him to resist the temptations of wealth, in the Republic, the ideal community is. a city which would be established in accordance with nature. Greek philosophy emphasized the distinction between nature on the one hand and law, custom, or convention on the other, what the law commanded would be expected to vary from place to place, but what was by nature should be the same everywhere. A law of nature would therefore have the more of a paradox than something that obviously existed. Of these, Aristotle is often said to be the father of natural law, Aristotles association with natural law may be due to the interpretation given to his works by Thomas Aquinas. But whether Aquinas correctly read Aristotle is in dispute, according to some, Aquinas conflates natural law and natural right, the latter of which Aristotle posits in Book V of the Nicomachean Ethics. Aristotle notes that justice is a species of political justice, viz. Specifically, he quotes Sophocles and Empedocles
14.
Epistemology
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Epistemology is the branch of philosophy concerned with the theory of knowledge. Epistemology studies the nature of knowledge, justification, and the rationality of belief, the term Epistemology was first used by Scottish philosopher James Frederick Ferrier in 1854. However, according to Brett Warren, King James VI of Scotland had previously personified this philosophical concept as the character Epistemon in 1591 and this philosophical approach signified a Philomath seeking to obtain greater knowledge through epistemology with the use of theology. The dialogue was used by King James to educate society on various concepts including the history, the word epistemology is derived from the ancient Greek epistēmē meaning knowledge and the suffix -logy, meaning a logical discourse to. J. F. Ferrier coined epistemology on the model of ontology, to designate that branch of philosophy which aims to discover the meaning of knowledge, and called it the true beginning of philosophy. The word is equivalent to the concept Wissenschaftslehre, which was used by German philosophers Johann Fichte, French philosophers then gave the term épistémologie a narrower meaning as theory of knowledge. Émile Meyerson opened his Identity and Reality, written in 1908, in mathematics, it is known that 2 +2 =4, but there is also knowing how to add two numbers, and knowing a person, place, thing, or activity. Some philosophers think there is an important distinction between knowing that, knowing how, and acquaintance-knowledge, with epistemology being primarily concerned with the first of these, while these distinctions are not explicit in English, they are defined explicitly in other languages. In French, Portuguese, Spanish and Dutch to know is translated using connaître, conhecer, conocer, modern Greek has the verbs γνωρίζω and ξέρω. Italian has the verbs conoscere and sapere and the nouns for knowledge are conoscenza and sapienza, German has the verbs wissen and kennen. The verb itself implies a process, you have to go from one state to another and this verb seems to be the most appropriate in terms of describing the episteme in one of the modern European languages, hence the German name Erkenntnistheorie. The theoretical interpretation and significance of linguistic issues remains controversial. In his paper On Denoting and his later book Problems of Philosophy Bertrand Russell stressed the distinction between knowledge by description and knowledge by acquaintance, gilbert Ryle is also credited with stressing the distinction between knowing how and knowing that in The Concept of Mind. This position is essentially Ryles, who argued that a failure to acknowledge the distinction between knowledge that and knowledge how leads to infinite regress and this includes the truth, and everything else we accept as true for ourselves from a cognitive point of view. Whether someones belief is true is not a prerequisite for belief, on the other hand, if something is actually known, then it categorically cannot be false. It would not be accurate to say that he knew that the bridge was safe, because plainly it was not. By contrast, if the bridge actually supported his weight, then he might say that he had believed that the bridge was safe, whereas now, after proving it to himself, epistemologists argue over whether belief is the proper truth-bearer. Some would rather describe knowledge as a system of justified true propositions, plato, in his Gorgias, argues that belief is the most commonly invoked truth-bearer
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Political philosophy
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In a vernacular sense, the term political philosophy often refers to a general view, or specific ethic, political belief or attitude, about politics, synonymous to the term political ideology. Chinese political philosophy dates back to the Spring and Autumn period, Chinese political philosophy was developed as a response to the social and political breakdown of the country characteristic of the Spring and Autumn period and the Warring States period. The major philosophies during the period, Confucianism, Legalism, Mohism, Agrarianism and Taoism, philosophers such as Confucius, Mencius, and Mozi, focused on political unity and political stability as the basis of their political philosophies. Confucianism advocated a hierarchical, meritocratic government based on empathy, loyalty, Legalism advocated a highly authoritarian government based on draconian punishments and laws. Mohism advocated a communal, decentralized government centered on frugality and ascetism, the Agrarians advocated a peasant utopian communalism and egalitarianism. Legalism was the dominant political philosophy of the Qin Dynasty, but was replaced by State Confucianism in the Han Dynasty, prior to Chinas adoption of communism, State Confucianism remained the dominant political philosophy of China up to the 20th century. Western political philosophy originates in the philosophy of ancient Greece, where political philosophy dates back to at least Plato, ancient Greece was dominated by city-states, which experimented with various forms of political organization, grouped by Plato into four categories, timocracy, tyranny, democracy and oligarchy. One of the first, extremely important classical works of philosophy is Platos Republic. Roman political philosophy was influenced by the Stoics and the Roman statesman Cicero, Indian political philosophy evolved in ancient times and demarcated a clear distinction between nation and state religion and state. The constitutions of Hindu states evolved over time and were based on political and legal treatises, the institutions of state were broadly divided into governance, administration, defense, law and order. Mantranga, the governing body of these states, consisted of the King, Prime Minister, Commander in chief of army. The Prime Minister headed the committee of ministers along with head of executive, chanakya, 4th century BC Indian political philosopher. Another influential extant Indian treatise on philosophy is the Sukra Neeti. An example of a code of law in ancient India is the Manusmṛti or Laws of Manu, the early Christian philosophy of Augustine of Hippo was heavily influenced by Plato. Augustine also preached that one was not a member of his or her city, augustines City of God is an influential work of this period that attacked the thesis, held by many Christian Romans, that the Christian view could be realized on Earth. Thomas Aquinas meticulously dealt with the varieties of law, according to Aquinas, there are four kinds of law, Eternal law Divine positive law Natural law Human law Aquinas never discusses the nature or categorization of canon law. There is scholarly debate surrounding the place of law within the Thomistic jurisprudential framework. Aquinas was an influential thinker in the Natural Law tradition
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Philosophy of mind
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Philosophy of mind is a branch of philosophy that studies the nature of the mind. The mind–body problem is an issue in philosophy of mind, although other issues are addressed, such as the hard problem of consciousness. Dualism and monism are the two schools of thought on the mind–body problem, although nuanced views have arisen that do not fit one or the other category neatly. Dualism is seen even in the Eastern tradition, in the Sankhya and Yoga schools of Hindu philosophy, and Plato, monism is the position that mind and body are not ontologically distinct kinds of entities. This view was first advocated in Western philosophy by Parmenides in the 5th century BC and was later espoused by the 17th century rationalist Baruch Spinoza. Physicalists argue that only entities postulated by physical theory exist, physicalists maintain various positions on the prospects of reducing mental properties to physical properties, and the ontological status of such mental properties remains unclear. Idealists maintain that the mind is all that exists and that the world is either mental itself. The most common monisms in the 20th and 21st centuries have all been variations of physicalism, these positions include behaviorism, most modern philosophers of mind adopt either a reductive or non-reductive physicalist position, maintaining in their different ways that the mind is not something separate from the body. These approaches have been influential in the sciences, especially in the fields of sociobiology, computer science, evolutionary psychology. Reductive physicalists assert that all states and properties will eventually be explained by scientific accounts of physiological processes and states. Continued neuroscientific progress has helped to some of these issues, however. Modern philosophers of mind continue to ask how the subjective qualities, the mind–body problem concerns the explanation of the relationship that exists between minds, or mental processes, and bodily states or processes. The main aim of working in this area is to determine the nature of the mind and mental states/processes. Someones desire for a slice of pizza, for example, will tend to cause that person to move his or her body in a specific manner and in a specific direction to obtain what he or she wants. The question, then, is how it can be possible for conscious experiences to arise out of a lump of gray matter endowed with nothing, a related problem is how someones propositional attitudes cause that individuals neurons to fire and his muscles to contract. These comprise some of the puzzles that have confronted epistemologists and philosophers of mind from at least the time of René Descartes, Dualism is a set of views about the relationship between mind and matter. It begins with the claim that mental phenomena are, in some respects, One of the earliest known formulations of mind–body dualism was expressed in the eastern Sankhya and Yoga schools of Hindu philosophy, which divided the world into purusha and prakriti. Specifically, the Yoga Sutra of Patanjali presents an approach to the nature of the mind
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Economics
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Economics is a social science concerned chiefly with description and analysis of the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interactions of economic agents and how economies work, consistent with this focus, textbooks often distinguish between microeconomics and macroeconomics. Microeconomics examines the behaviour of elements in the economy, including individual agents and markets, their interactions. Individual agents may include, for example, households, firms, buyers, macroeconomics analyzes the entire economy and issues affecting it, including unemployment of resources, inflation, economic growth, and the public policies that address these issues. Economic analysis can be applied throughout society, as in business, finance, health care, Economic analyses may also be applied to such diverse subjects as crime, education, the family, law, politics, religion, social institutions, war, science, and the environment. At the turn of the 21st century, the domain of economics in the social sciences has been described as economic imperialism. The ultimate goal of economics is to improve the conditions of people in their everyday life. There are a variety of definitions of economics. Some of the differences may reflect evolving views of the subject or different views among economists, to supply the state or commonwealth with a revenue for the publick services. Say, distinguishing the subject from its uses, defines it as the science of production, distribution. On the satirical side, Thomas Carlyle coined the dismal science as an epithet for classical economics, in this context and it enquires how he gets his income and how he uses it. Thus, it is on the one side, the study of wealth and on the other and more important side, a part of the study of man. He affirmed that previous economists have usually centred their studies on the analysis of wealth, how wealth is created, distributed, and consumed, but he said that economics can be used to study other things, such as war, that are outside its usual focus. This is because war has as the goal winning it, generates both cost and benefits, and, resources are used to attain the goal. If the war is not winnable or if the costs outweigh the benefits. Some subsequent comments criticized the definition as overly broad in failing to limit its subject matter to analysis of markets, there are other criticisms as well, such as in scarcity not accounting for the macroeconomics of high unemployment. The same source reviews a range of included in principles of economics textbooks. Among economists more generally, it argues that a particular definition presented may reflect the direction toward which the author believes economics is evolving, microeconomics examines how entities, forming a market structure, interact within a market to create a market system
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Natural and legal rights
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Natural and legal rights are two types of rights. Legal rights are those bestowed onto a person by a legal system. Natural rights are those that are not dependent on the laws or customs of any culture or government. The concept of law is closely related to the concept of natural rights. Conversely, the concept of rights is used by others to challenge the legitimacy of all such establishments. Natural rights, in particular, are considered beyond the authority of any government or international body to dismiss, the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights is an important legal instrument enshrining one conception of natural rights into international soft law. Natural rights were traditionally viewed as exclusively negative rights, whereas human rights also comprise positive rights, even on a natural rights conception of human rights, the two terms may not be synonymous. The proposition that animals have natural rights is one that gained the interest of philosophers and legal scholars in the 20th century, the existence of natural rights has been asserted by different individuals on different premises, such as a priori philosophical reasoning or religious principles. For example, Immanuel Kant claimed to derive natural rights through reason alone, the United States Declaration of Independence, meanwhile, is based upon the self-evident truth that all men are. Endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, likewise, different philosophers and statesmen have designed different lists of what they believe to be natural rights, almost all include the right to life and liberty as the two highest priorities. H. L. A. Hart argued that if there are any rights at all, there must be the right to liberty, for all the others would depend upon this. T. H. Green argued that “if there are things as rights at all, then, there must be a right to life and liberty, or, to put it more properly to free life. ”John Locke emphasized life. However, despite Lockes influential defense of the right of revolution, leaders are seen as representative of God on earth, but they deserve allegiance only as long as they have farr, a kind of divine blessing that they must earn by moral behavior. The Stoics held that no one was a slave by nature, of fundamental importance to the development of the idea of natural rights was the emergence of the idea of natural human equality. Carlyle notes, There is no change in theory so startling in its completeness as the change from the theory of Aristotle to the later philosophical view represented by Cicero. We think that this cannot be better exemplified than with regard to the theory of the equality of human nature, charles H. Cicero argues in De Legibus that we are born for Justice, and that right is based, not upon opinions, but upon Nature. Centuries later, the Stoic doctrine that the part cannot be delivered into bondage re-emerged in the Reformation doctrine of liberty of conscience. Martin Luther wrote, Furthermore, every man is responsible for his own faith, preservation of the natural rights to life, liberty, and property was claimed as justification for the rebellion of the American colonies
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Right to life
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The right to life is a moral principle based on the belief that a human being has the right to live and, in particular, should not be killed by another human being. The concept of a right to life arises in debates on issues of capital punishment, war, abortion, euthanasia, justifiable homicide and, by extension, public health care. Human rights activists oppose the death penalty, calling it cruel, inhuman, and degrading punishment, and Amnesty International considers it to be the ultimate, irreversible denial of Human Rights. The United Nations General Assembly has adopted, in 2007,2008,2010,2012 and 2014 non-binding resolutions calling for a moratorium on executions. International law only allows law enforcement officers to take life where absolutely necessary to defend themselves. In 1966 the National Conference of Catholic Bishops asked Fr, james T. McHugh to begin observing trends in abortion reform within the United States. The National Right to Life Committee was funded in 1967 as the Right to Life League to coordinate its state campaigns under the auspices of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops. James T. McHugh and his assistant, Michael Taylor, proposed a different plan. Anti-abortion advocates argue that humans have the same fundamental right to life from the moment of conception that humans have after their birth. Although pro-life advocates accept that women have a right to autonomy, they deny that right entitles the women to violate the prenatal right to life. Generally speaking, those identifying themselves as right to life believe abortion is morally unacceptable, the term right to choose is a rhetorical device used in the abortion debate by abortion-rights proponents. Many abortion rights advocates argue that humans are not human persons. Advocates of the right to choose may take either or both positions, generally speaking, those identifying themselves as pro-choice are advocates for legal elective abortion. At the same time, some advocates for legalized abortion state that they simply do not know for sure where in pregnancy life begins, some biologists however, have determined that the properties of life emerge at the cellular level. Other advocates have stated that they hold personal views against abortion but do not support putting those beliefs into law, some utilitarian ethicists argue that the right to life, where it exists, depends on conditions other than membership of the human species. The philosopher Peter Singer is a proponent of this argument. For Singer, the right to life is grounded in the ability to plan, bioethicists associated with the Disability Rights and Disability Studies communities have argued that Singers epistemology is based on ableist conceptions of disability. In 1444, the Poljica Statute declared right to live -for nothing existed since ever, there are exceptions for lawful executions and self-defense, arresting a fleeing suspect, and suppressing riots and insurrections
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Liberty
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Liberty, in philosophy, involves free will as contrasted with determinism. In politics, liberty consists of the social and political freedoms to all community members are entitled. In theology, liberty is freedom from the effects of sin, spiritual servitude, as such, the exercise of liberty is subject to capability and limited by the rights of others. Philosophers from earliest times have considered the question of liberty, according to Thomas Hobbes, a free man is he that in those things which by his strength and wit he is able to do is not hindered to do what he hath the will to do. John Locke rejected that definition of liberty, while not specifically mentioning Hobbes, he attacks Sir Robert Filmer who had the same definition. According to Locke, In the state of nature, liberty consists of being free from any power on Earth. People are not under the will or lawmaking authority of others but have only the law of nature for their rule, in political society, liberty consists of being under no other lawmaking power except that established by consent in the commonwealth. People are free from the dominion of any will or legal restraint apart from that enacted by their own constituted lawmaking power according to the trust put in it. Thus, freedom is not as Sir Robert Filmer defines it, A liberty for everyone to do what he likes, to live as he pleases, freedom is constrained by laws in both the state of nature and political society. Freedom of nature is to be no other restraint but the law of nature. Freedom of people under government is to be under no restraint apart from standing rules to live by that are common to everyone in the society and made by the lawmaking power established in it. Persons have a right or liberty to follow their own will in all things that the law has not prohibited and not be subject to the inconstant, uncertain, unknown, and arbitrary wills of others. John Stuart Mill, in his work, On Liberty, was the first to recognize the difference between liberty as the freedom to act and liberty as the absence of coercion, the modern concept of political liberty has its origins in the Greek concepts of freedom and slavery. To be free, to the Greeks, was to not have a master and that was the original Greek concept of freedom. It is closely linked with the concept of democracy, as Aristotle put it, This, another is that a man should live as he likes. This, they say, is the privilege of a freeman, since, on the other hand and this applied only to free men. In Athens, for instance, women could not vote or hold office and were legally and socially dependent on a male relative, the populations of the Persian Empire enjoyed some degree of freedom. Citizens of all religions and ethnic groups were given the rights and had the same freedom of religion, women had the same rights as men
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Property
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In the abstract, property is that which belongs to or with something, whether as an attribute or as a component of said thing. In economics and political economy, there are three forms of property, private property, public property, and collective property. Property that jointly belongs to more than one party may be possessed or controlled thereby in very similar or very distinct ways, whether simply or complexly, whether equally or unequally. However, there is an expectation that each partys will with regard to the property be clearly defined and unconditional, so as to distinguish ownership and this mediating relationship between individual, property and state is called a property regime. The distinction between property and private property is regarded as a confusion since different individuals often hold differing rights over a single object. An article of property may have physical and incorporeal parts, a title, or a right of ownership, establishes the relation between the property and other persons, assuring the owner the right to dispose of the property as the owner sees fit. Often property is defined by the code of the sovereignty, and protected wholly or more usually partially by such entity. The standards of proof concerning proofs of ownerships are also addressed by the code of the local sovereignty, some philosophers assert that property rights arise from social convention, while others find justifications for them in morality or in natural law. Property, in the first instance, is a thing-in-itself, when a person finds a thing and takes that thing into that persons possession and control, then that thing becomes a thing-for-you for that person. Generally, the ground and any buildings which are attached are considered real property, while movable goods. Also, property cannot be considered a concept, because in the first instance. Various scholarly disciplines may treat the concept more systematically, but definitions vary, positive law defines such rights, and the judiciary can adjudicate and enforce property rights. According to Adam Smith, the expectation of profit from improving ones stock of capital rests on private property rights, Capitalism has as a central assumption that property rights encourage their holders to develop the property, generate wealth, and efficiently allocate resources based on the operation of markets. From this has evolved the modern conception of property as a right enforced by law, in the expectation that this will produce more wealth. In his text The Common Law, Oliver Wendell Holmes describes property as having two fundamental aspects, the first, possession, can be defined as control over a resource based on the practical inability of another to contradict the ends of the possessor. The second, title, is the expectation that others will recognize rights to control resource and he elaborates the differences between these two concepts, and proposes a history of how they came to be attached to persons, as opposed to families or to entities such as the church. Classical liberalism subscribes to the theory of property. They hold that each own their own life, it follows that one must own the products of that life
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Tabula rasa
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Tabula rasa refers to the epistemological idea that individuals are born without built-in mental content and that therefore all knowledge comes from experience or perception. Proponents of tabula rasa generally disagree with the doctrine of Innatism which holds that the mind is born already in possession of certain knowledge. Tabula rasa is a Latin phrase often translated as blank slate in English and originates from the Roman tabula used for notes and this roughly equates to the English term blank slate which refers to the emptiness of a slate sheet previous to it being written on with chalk. Both may be refreshed repeatedly, by melting the wax or by erasing the chalk, in Western philosophy, the concept of tabula rasa can be traced back to the writings of Aristotle who writes in his treatise Περί Ψυχῆς of the unscribed tablet. What it thinks must be in it just as characters may be said to be on a writing-tablet on which as yet nothing stands written and this idea was further developed in Ancient Greek philosophy by the Stoic school. Stoic epistemology emphasizes that the mind starts blank, but acquires knowledge as the world is impressed upon it. The doxographer Aetius summarizes this view as When a man is born, in the eleventh century, the theory of tabula rasa was developed more clearly by the Persian philosopher Avicenna. He further argued that the intellect itself, in the thirteenth century, St. Thomas Aquinas brought the Aristotelian and Avicennian notions to the forefront of Christian thought. St. Bonaventure was one of the fiercest intellectual opponents of Aquinas, the writings of Avicenna, Ibn Tufail, and Aquinas on the tabula rasa theory stood unprogressed and untested for several centuries. Therefore, Prince, whilst you are young and your mind is as it were a clean slate, impress on it these things, the modern idea of the theory, however, is attributed mostly to John Lockes expression of the idea in Essay Concerning Human Understanding. The notion is central to Lockean empiricism, as understood by Locke, tabula rasa meant that the mind of the individual was born blank, and it also emphasized the freedom of individuals to author their own soul. Individuals are free to define the content of their character—but basic identity as a member of the species cannot be altered. This presumption of a free, self-authored mind combined with a human nature leads to the Lockean doctrine of natural rights. Lockes idea of tabula rasa is frequently compared with Thomas Hobbess viewpoint of human nature, since tabula rasa states that humans are born with a blank-slate, Rousseau uses this to suggest that humans must learn warfare. Tabula rasa also features in Sigmund Freuds psychoanalysis, freud depicted personality traits as being formed by family dynamics. Freuds theories imply that humans lack free will, but also that genetic influences on personality are minimal. In Freudian psychoanalysis, one is determined by ones upbringing. The tabula rasa concept became popular in social sciences during the twentieth century, by the 1970s, scientists such as John Money had come to see gender identity as socially constructed, rather than rooted in genetics
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Hugo Grotius
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Hugo Grotius, also known as Huig de Groot or Hugo de Groot, was a Dutch jurist. Along with the works of Francisco de Vitoria and Alberico Gentili, Grotius laid the foundations for international law. A teenage intellectual prodigy, he was imprisoned for his involvement in the intra-Calvinist disputes of the Dutch Republic and he wrote most of his major works in exile in France. Because of his theological underpinning of free trade, he is considered an economic theologist. Born in Delft during the Dutch Revolt, Hugo was the first child of Jan de Groot, a prodigious learner, Hugo entered the University of Leiden when he was just eleven years old. There he studied some of the most acclaimed intellectuals in northern Europe, including Franciscus Junius, Joseph Justus Scaliger. Omnes, & emendati, & Notis, siue Februis Hug, in Holland, Grotius earned an appointment as advocate to The Hague in 1599 and then as official historiographer for the States of Holland in 1601. The Dutch were at war with Spain and Portugal when the merchant ship Santa Catarina. The scandal led to a judicial hearing and a wider campaign to sway public opinion. It was in this context that representatives of the Company called upon Grotius to draft a polemical defence of the seizure. The result of Grotius efforts in 1604/05 was a long, theory-laden treatise that he provisionally entitled De Indis, Grotius sought to ground his defense of the seizure in terms of the natural principles of justice. In this, he had cast a net much wider than the case at hand, his interest was in the source, the treatise was never published in full during Grotius lifetime, perhaps because the court ruling in favor of the Company preempted the need to garner public support. In The Free Sea Grotius formulated the new principle that the sea was international territory, Grotius, by claiming free seas, provided suitable ideological justification for the Dutch breaking up of various trade monopolies through its formidable naval power. In 1608 he married Maria van Reigersbergen, with whom he would have eight children and who would be invaluable in helping him and the family to weather the storm to come. The domestic dissension resulting over Arminius professorship was overshadowed by the war with Spain. The new peace would move the focus to the controversy. The controversy expanded when the Remonstrant theologian Conrad Vorstius was appointed to replace Jacobus Arminius as the chair at Leiden. Vorstius was soon seen by Counter-Remonstrants as moving beyond the teachings of Arminius into Socinianism, leading the call for Vorstius removal was theology professor Sibrandus Lubbertus
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Samuel von Pufendorf
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FriherreSamuel von Pufendorf was a German jurist, political philosopher, economist, statesman, and historian. His name was just Samuel Pufendorf until he was ennobled in 1684, among his achievements are his commentaries and revisions of the natural law theories of Thomas Hobbes and Hugo Grotius. Pufendorf was familiar to American political writers such as Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and his political concepts are part of the cultural background of the American Revolution. Pufendorf is seen as an important precursor of Enlightenment in Germany and he was born at Dorfchemnitz in the Electorate of Saxony. His father Elias Pufendorf from Glauchau was a Lutheran pastor, educated at the ducal school at Grimma, he was sent to study theology at the University of Leipzig. The narrow and dogmatic teaching was repugnant to Pufendorf, and he abandoned it for the study of public law. Under the influence of Weigel, he started to read Hugo Grotius, Thomas Hobbes, at this time, Charles was endeavoring to impose an unwanted alliance on Denmark. In the middle of the negotiations he opened hostilities and the Danes turned with anger against his envoys, Coyet succeeded in escaping, but the second minister, Sten Bielke, and the rest of the staff were arrested and thrown into prison. Pufendorf shared this misfortune, and was held in captivity for eight months and he occupied himself in meditating upon what he had read in the works of Hugo Grotius and Thomas Hobbes, and mentally constructed a system of universal law. At the end of his captivity, he accompanied his pupils, at Leiden, he was permitted to publish, in 1661, the fruits of his reflections under the title of Elementa jurisprudentiae universalis libri duo. The work was dedicated to Charles Louis, elector palatine, who created for Pufendorf a new chair at the University of Heidelberg and this professorship was first of its kind in the world. Pufendorf married Katharina Elisabeth von Palthen, the widow of a colleague, in 1667 he wrote, with the assent of the elector palatine, a tract De statu imperii germanici liber unus. Published under the cover of a pseudonym at Geneva in 1667, it was supposed to be addressed by a gentleman of Verona, Severinus de Monzambano, to his brother Laelius. Before Pufendorf, Philipp Bogislaw von Chemnitz, publicist and soldier, had written, under the pseudonym of Hippolytus a Lapide, inimical, like Pufendorf, to the Austrian House of Habsburg, Chemnitz had gone so far as to make an appeal to France and Sweden. Pufendorf, on the contrary, rejected all idea of foreign intervention, when Pufendorf went on to criticise a new tax on official documents, he did not get the chair of law and had to leave Heidelberg in 1668. Chances for advancement were few in a Germany that still suffered from the ravages of the Thirty Years War, so Pufendorf went to Sweden where that year he was called to the University of Lund. In 1672 appeared De jure naturae et gentium libri octo, and in 1673 a résumé of it under the title De officio hominis et civis, which, among other topics, gave his analysis of just war theory. In De jure naturae et gentium Pufendorf took up in great measure the theories of Grotius and sought to complete them by means of the doctrines of Hobbes and of his own ideas on jus gentium
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Thomas Hobbes
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Thomas Hobbes, in some older texts Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, was an English philosopher who is considered one of the founders of modern political philosophy. Hobbes is best known for his 1651 book Leviathan, which established the social theory that has served as the foundation for most later Western political philosophy. Thomas Hobbes was born at Westport, now part of Malmesbury in Wiltshire, England, born prematurely when his mother heard of the coming invasion of the Spanish Armada, Hobbes later reported that my mother gave birth to twins, myself and fear. His childhood is almost completely unknown, and his mothers name is unknown and his father, Thomas Sr. was the vicar of Charlton and Westport. Thomas Hobbes, the younger, had a brother Edmund, about two years older, and a sister, Thomas Sr. was involved in a fight with the local clergy outside his church, forcing him to leave London and abandon the family. The family was left in the care of Thomas Sr. s older brother, Francis, Hobbes was a good pupil, and around 1603 he went up to Magdalen Hall, the predecessor college to Hertford College, Oxford. The principal John Wilkinson was a Puritan, and he had influence on Hobbes. At university, Hobbes appears to have followed his own curriculum and he did not complete his B. A. Hobbes became a companion to the younger William and they both took part in a grand tour of Europe in 1610. Hobbes was exposed to European scientific and critical methods during the tour and it has been argued that three of the discourses in the 1620 publication known as Horea Subsecivae, Observations and Discourses, also represent the work of Hobbes from this period. Although he associated with figures like Ben Jonson and briefly worked as Francis Bacons amanuensis. His employer Cavendish, then the Earl of Devonshire, died of the plague in June 1628, the widowed countess dismissed Hobbes but he soon found work, again as a tutor, this time to Gervase Clifton, the son of Sir Gervase Clifton, 1st Baronet. This task, chiefly spent in Paris, ended in 1631 when he found work with the Cavendish family, tutoring William. Over the next seven years, as well as tutoring, he expanded his own knowledge of philosophy and he visited Florence in 1636 and was later a regular debater in philosophic groups in Paris, held together by Marin Mersenne. Hobbess first area of study was an interest in the doctrine of motion. Despite his interest in this phenomenon, he disdained experimental work as in physics and he went on to conceive the system of thought to the elaboration of which he would devote his life. He then singled out Man from the realm of Nature and plants, finally he considered, in his crowning treatise, how Men were moved to enter into society, and argued how this must be regulated if Men were not to fall back into brutishness and misery. Thus he proposed to unite the separate phenomena of Body, Man, Hobbes came home, in 1637, to a country riven with discontent which disrupted him from the orderly execution of his philosophic plan. However, by the end of the Short Parliament in 1640, he had written a treatise called The Elements of Law, Natural
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David Hume
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David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, who is best known today for his highly influential system of radical philosophical empiricism, skepticism, and naturalism. Humes empiricist approach to philosophy places him with John Locke, Francis Bacon, beginning with his A Treatise of Human Nature, Hume strove to create a total naturalistic science of man that examined the psychological basis of human nature. Humes compatibilist theory of free will takes causal determinism as fully compatible with human freedom, Kant himself credited Hume as the spur to his philosophical thought who had awakened him from his dogmatic slumbers. Arthur Schopenhauer once declared there is more to be learned from each page of David Hume than from the collected philosophical works of Hegel, Herbart. Hume is thus regarded as a pivotal figure in the history of philosophical thought. David Hume was the second of two born to Joseph Home of Ninewells, an advocate, and his wife The Hon. Katherine. He was born on 26 April 1711 in a tenement on the side of the Lawnmarket in Edinburgh. Humes father died when Hume was a child, just after his birthday, and he was raised by his mother. He changed the spelling of his name in 1734, because of the fact that his surname Home, throughout his life Hume, who never married, spent time occasionally at his family home at Ninewells in Berwickshire, which had belonged to his family since the sixteenth century. His finances as a man were very slender. His family was not rich and, as a younger son and he was therefore forced to make a living somehow. Hume attended the University of Edinburgh at the early age of twelve at a time when fourteen was normal. He had little respect for the professors of his time, telling a friend in 1735 that there is nothing to be learnt from a Professor, which is not to be met with in Books. Aged around 18, he made a discovery that opened up to him a new Scene of Thought. He did not recount what this scene was, and commentators have offered a variety of speculations, due to this inspiration, Hume set out to spend a minimum of ten years reading and writing. He soon came to the verge of a breakdown, suffering from what a doctor diagnosed as the Disease of the Learned. Hume wrote that it started with a coldness, which he attributed to a Laziness of Temper, later, some scurvy spots broke out on his fingers. This was what persuaded Humes physician to make his diagnosis, Hume wrote that he went under a Course of Bitters and Anti-Hysteric Pills, taken along with a pint of claret every day
27.
Immanuel Kant
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Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher who is considered a central figure in modern philosophy. Kant took himself to have effected a Copernican revolution in philosophy and his beliefs continue to have a major influence on contemporary philosophy, especially the fields of metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, political theory, and aesthetics. Politically, Kant was one of the earliest exponents of the idea that peace could be secured through universal democracy. He believed that this will be the outcome of universal history. Kant wanted to put an end to an era of futile and speculative theories of human experience, Kant argued that our experiences are structured by necessary features of our minds. In his view, the shapes and structures experience so that, on an abstract level. Among other things, Kant believed that the concepts of space and time are integral to all human experience, as are our concepts of cause, Kant published other important works on ethics, religion, law, aesthetics, astronomy, and history. These included the Critique of Practical Reason, the Metaphysics of Morals, which dealt with ethics, and the Critique of Judgment, Immanuel Kant was born in 1724 in Königsberg, Prussia. His mother, Anna Regina Reuter, was born in Königsberg to a father from Nuremberg. His father, Johann Georg Kant, was a German harness maker from Memel, Immanuel Kant believed that his paternal grandfather Hans Kant was of Scottish origin. Kant was the fourth of nine children, baptized Emanuel, he changed his name to Immanuel after learning Hebrew. Young Kant was a solid, albeit unspectacular, student and he was brought up in a Pietist household that stressed religious devotion, humility, and a literal interpretation of the Bible. His education was strict, punitive and disciplinary, and focused on Latin and religious instruction over mathematics, despite his religious upbringing and maintaining a belief in God, Kant was skeptical of religion in later life, various commentators have labelled him agnostic. Common myths about Kants personal mannerisms are listed, explained, and refuted in Goldthwaits introduction to his translation of Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime. It is often held that Kant lived a strict and disciplined life. He never married, but seemed to have a social life — he was a popular teacher. He had a circle of friends whom he met, among them Joseph Green. A common myth is that Kant never traveled more than 16 kilometres from Königsberg his whole life, in fact, between 1750 and 1754 he worked as a tutor in Judtschen and in Groß-Arnsdorf
28.
George Berkeley
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George Berkeley — known as Bishop Berkeley — was an Irish philosopher whose primary achievement was the advancement of a theory he called immaterialism. Berkeley is also known for his critique of abstraction, an important premise in his argument for immaterialism, in this book, Berkeleys views were represented by Philonous, while Hylas embodies the Irish thinkers opponents, in particular John Locke. Berkeley argued against Sir Isaac Newtons doctrine of space, time and motion in De Motu. His arguments were a precursor to the views of Mach and Einstein and his last major philosophical work, Siris, begins by advocating the medicinal use of tar water and then continues to discuss a wide range of topics, including science, philosophy, and theology. Berkeley was born at his home, Dysart Castle, near Thomastown, County Kilkenny, Ireland, the eldest son of William Berkeley. He was educated at Kilkenny College and attended Trinity College, Dublin, earning a degree in 1704. He remained at Trinity College after completion of his degree as a tutor and his earliest publication was on mathematics, but the first that brought him notice was his An Essay towards a New Theory of Vision, first published in 1709. In the essay, Berkeley examines visual distance, magnitude, position and problems of sight, while this work raised much controversy at the time, its conclusions are now accepted as an established part of the theory of optics. For this theory, the Principles gives the exposition and the Dialogues the defence, one of his main objectives was to combat the prevailing materialism of his time. Shortly afterwards, Berkeley visited England and was received into the circle of Addison, Pope and Steele. In 1721, he took Holy Orders in the Church of Ireland, earning his doctorate in divinity, in 1721/2 he was made Dean of Dromore and, in 1724, Dean of Derry. Swift said generously that he did not grudge Berkeley his inheritance, a story that Berkeley and Marshall disregarded a condition of the inheritance that they must publish the correspondence between Swift and Vanessa is probably untrue. In 1725, he began the project of founding a college in Bermuda for training ministers and missionaries in the colony, in 1728, he married Anne Forster, daughter of John Forster, Chief Justice of the Irish Common Pleas. He then went to America on a salary of £100 per annum and he landed near Newport, Rhode Island, where he bought a plantation at Middletown – the famous Whitehall. It has been claimed that he introduced Palladianism into America by borrowing a design from Kents Designs of Inigo Jones for the door-case of his house in Rhode Island, Whitehall. He also brought to New England John Smibert, the British artist he discovered in Italy, meanwhile, he drew up plans for the ideal city he planned to build on Bermuda. He lived at the plantation while he waited for funds for his college to arrive, the funds, however, were not forthcoming, and in 1732 he left America and returned to London. While living in Londons Saville Street, he took part in efforts to create a home for the abandoned children
29.
Voltaire
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Voltaire was a versatile writer, producing works in almost every literary form, including plays, poems, novels, essays, and historical and scientific works. He wrote more than 21,000 letters and over two books and pamphlets. He was an advocate of civil liberties, despite the risk this placed him in under the strict censorship laws of the time. As a satirical polemicist, he made use of his works to criticize intolerance, religious dogma. Some speculation surrounds Voltaires date of birth, because he claimed he was born on 20 February 1694 as the son of a nobleman. Two of his older brothers—Armand-François and Robert—died in infancy and his brother, Armand. Nicknamed Zozo by his family, Voltaire was baptized on 22 November 1694, with François de Castagnère, abbé de Châteauneuf, and Marie Daumard, the wife of his mothers cousin, standing as godparents. He was educated by the Jesuits at the Collège Louis-le-Grand, where he was taught Latin, theology, and rhetoric, later in life he became fluent in Italian, Spanish, and English. By the time he left school, Voltaire had decided he wanted to be a writer, against the wishes of his father, Voltaire, pretending to work in Paris as an assistant to a notary, spent much of his time writing poetry. When his father out, he sent Voltaire to study law. Nevertheless, he continued to write, producing essays and historical studies, Voltaires wit made him popular among some of the aristocratic families with whom he mixed. In 1713, his father obtained a job for him as a secretary to the new French ambassador in the Netherlands, the marquis de Châteauneuf, at The Hague, Voltaire fell in love with a French Protestant refugee named Catherine Olympe Dunoyer. Their scandalous affair was discovered by de Châteauneuf and Voltaire was forced to return to France by the end of the year, Most of Voltaires early life revolved around Paris. From early on, Voltaire had trouble with the authorities for critiques of the government and these activities were to result in two imprisonments and a temporary exile to England. One satirical verse, in which Voltaire accused the Régent of incest with his own daughter, the Comédie-Française had agreed in January 1717 to stage his debut play, Œdipe, and it opened in mid-November 1718, seven months after his release. Its immediate critical and financial success established his reputation, both the Régent and King George I of Great Britain presented Voltaire with medals as a mark of their appreciation. He mainly argued for tolerance and freedom of thought. He campaigned to eradicate priestly and aristo-monarchical authority, and supported a constitutional monarchy that protects peoples rights, the author adopted the name Voltaire in 1718, following his incarceration at the Bastille
30.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
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Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a Francophone Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer of the 18th century. His political philosophy influenced the Enlightenment in France and across Europe, as well as aspects of the French Revolution, Rousseaus novel Emile, or On Education is a treatise on the education of the whole person for citizenship. His sentimental novel Julie, or the New Heloise was of importance to the development of pre-romanticism and romanticism in fiction and his Discourse on Inequality and The Social Contract are cornerstones in modern political and social thought. During the period of the French Revolution, Rousseau was the most popular of the philosophes among members of the Jacobin Club and he was interred as a national hero in the Panthéon in Paris, in 1794,16 years after his death. Rousseau was born in Geneva, which was at the time a city-state, since 1536, Geneva had been a Huguenot republic and the seat of Calvinism. Rousseau was proud that his family, of the order, had voting rights in the city. Throughout his life, he signed his books Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Geneva, in theory, was governed democratically by its male voting citizens, the citizens were a minority of the population when compared to the immigrants, referred to as inhabitants, whose descendants were called natives and continued to lack suffrage. There was much debate within Geneva, extending down to the tradespeople. Much discussion was over the idea of the sovereignty of the people, in 1707, a democratic reformer named Pierre Fatio protested this situation, saying a sovereign that never performs an act of sovereignty is an imaginary being. He was shot by order of the Little Council, Jean-Jacques Rousseaus father, Isaac, was not in the city at this time, but Jean-Jacquess grandfather supported Fatio and was penalized for it. The trade of watchmaking had become a tradition by the time of Rousseaus father. Isaac followed his grandfather, father and brothers into the business, Isaac, notwithstanding his artisan status, was well educated and a lover of music. A Genevan watchmaker, Rousseau wrote, is a man who can be introduced anywhere, in 1699, Isaac ran into political difficulty by entering a quarrel with visiting English officers, who in response drew their swords and threatened him. After local officials stepped in, it was Isaac who was punished, Rousseaus mother, Suzanne Bernard Rousseau, was from an upper-class family. She was raised by her uncle Samuel Bernard, a Calvinist preacher and he cared for Suzanne after her father Jacques died in his early thirties. In 1695, Suzanne had to answer charges that she had attended a street theater disguised as a peasant woman so she could gaze upon M. Vincent Sarrasin, after a hearing, she was ordered by the Genevan Consistory to never interact with him again. She married Rousseaus father at the age of 31, isaacs sister had married Suzannes brother eight years earlier, after she had become pregnant and they had been chastised by the Consistory
31.
Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury
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Anthony Ashley Cooper, 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury Bt was an English politician, philosopher and writer. He was born at Exeter House in London, the grandson of Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury and son of Anthony Ashley-Cooper and his mother was Lady Dorothy Manners, daughter of John Manners, 8th Earl of Rutland. According to a story told by the earl, the marriage was negotiated by John Locke. At the age of three the future Third Earl was made over to the guardianship of his grandfather. Locke, who in his capacity of medical attendant to the Ashley household, had assisted at the childs birth, was now entrusted with the supervision of his education. Birch had moved to Clapham and Ashley spent some years there with her, in November 1683, some months after the death of the first Earl, his father sent him to Winchester College as a wardens boarder. Being shy and mocked because of his grandfather, he appears to have been miserable at school and he left Winchester in 1686 for a course of foreign travel. This brought him contact with artistic and classical associations which would strongly influence his character. On his travels he apparently did not seek the conversation of other young English gentlemen on their travels, in 1689, the year after the Glorious Revolution, Lord Ashley returned to England, and for nearly five years he appears to have led a quiet and studious life. There can be no doubt that the part of his attention was directed to the perusal of classical authors. He had no intention, however, of becoming a recluse and he became parliamentary candidate for the borough of Poole and was returned on 21 May 1695. Although a Whig, Ashley could not be depended on to give a party vote and he was always ready to support propositions from other quarters, if they appeared to him to promote the liberty of the subject and the independence of parliament. His poor health forced him to retire from parliament at the dissolution of July 1698 and he suffered from asthma, a complaint which was aggravated by the London smoke. He sold the property to Narcissus Luttrell in 1710, to Lord Ashley this society was probably far more congenial than his surroundings in England. This liberty was taken, during his absence, by Toland, after an absence of over twelve months, Ashley returned to England, and soon succeeded his father as Earl of Shaftesbury. He took a part, on the Whig side, in the general election of 1700–1701. At this time, he built a structure on the Shaftesbury Estate. This folly sits in a field, clearly visible from the B3078 just south of Cranborne and it is thought that he did a lot of his philosophising in this tower, and from this suggestion it has become known as the Philosophers Tower
32.
Founding Fathers of the United States
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Adams, Jefferson, and Franklin were members of the Committee of Five that drafted the Declaration of Independence. Hamilton, Madison, and Jay were authors of the The Federalist Papers, Jay, Adams and Franklin negotiated the Treaty of Paris that would end the American Revolutionary War. Washington was Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army and was President of the Constitutional Convention, according to the CIA, Washington, Jay and Franklin helped define the powers of the Executive Branch All held additional important roles in the early government of the United States. The term Founding Fathers is sometimes used to refer to the Signers of the version of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. Of the 55 Framers, only 39 were signers of the Constitution, a further subset of Founding Founders includes those who signed the Continental Association or the Articles of Confederation. The phrase Founding Fathers is a twentieth century appellation and was first coined by Warren G. Harding in 1916, the First Continental Congress met briefly in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1774 and consisted of fifty-six delegates from twelve of the Thirteen Colonies that became the United States of America. On the list of attendees was George Washington, who would soon be out of military retirement to command the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. Also in attendance was Patrick Henry, and John Adams, who were elected by their respective colonial assemblies, other notable delegates included Samuel Adams from Massachusetts, John Dickinson from Pennsylvania and New Yorks John Jay. This congress in addition to formulating appeals to the British crown, when the Second Continental Congress came together on May 10,1775, it was, in effect, a reconvening of the First Congress. Many of the same 56 delegates who attended the first meeting participated in the second, notable new arrivals included Benjamin Franklin and Robert Morris of Pennsylvania, John Hancock of Massachusetts, and John Witherspoon of New Jersey. Hancock was elected Congress President two weeks into the session when Peyton Randolph was summoned back to Virginia to preside over the House of Burgesses, Thomas Jefferson replaced Randolph in the Virginia congressional delegation. The second Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, Witherspoon was the only active clergyman to sign the Declaration. He also signed the Articles of Confederation and attended the New Jersey convention that ratified the Federal Constitution, the newly founded country of the United States had to create a new government to replace the British Parliament. The Americans adopted the Articles of Confederation, a declaration that established a government which was made up of a one-house legislature. Its ratification by all thirteen colonies gave the second Congress a new name, the Congress of the Confederation, later, the Constitutional Convention took place during the summer of 1787, in Philadelphia. The delegates elected George Washington to preside over the Convention, the result of the Convention was the United States Constitution. The Founding Fathers represented a cross-section of 18th-century American leadership, almost all of them were well-educated men of means who were leaders in their communities. Many were also prominent in national affairs, virtually every one had taken part in the American Revolution, at least 29 had served in the Continental Army, most of them in positions of command
33.
Right to property
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The right to property or right to own property is often classified as a human right for natural persons regarding their possessions. The right to property is one of the most controversial human rights, controversy centres upon who is deemed to have property rights protected, the type of property which is protected, and the reasons for which property can be restricted. In all human rights instruments, either implicit or express restrictions exist on the extent to which property is protected, the European Court of Human Rights has held that the right to property is not absolute and states have a wide degree of discretion to limit the rights. As such the right to property is regarded as a more right than other human rights. States degree of discretion is defined in Handyside v. United Kingdom, the highest economic compensation, following a judgment of the Strasbourg Court on this matter, was given in case Beyeler v. Italy. When the text of the UDHR was negotiated Latin American states argued that the right to property should be limited to the protection of property necessary for subsistence. Their suggestion was opposed, but was enshrined in the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man, the regional human rights instruments of Europe, Africa and the Americas recognise the right to protection of property to varying degrees. The American Convention on Human Rights recognises the right to protection of property, the ACHR also prohibits usury and other exploitation, which is unique amongst human rights instruments. Article 21 also provides that in case of spoliation the dispossessed people shall have the right to the recovery of its property as well as to adequate compensation. Property rights are enshrined in the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees. These international human rights instruments for minorities do not establish a right to property. The right to property was a crucial demand in early quests for political freedom and equality. Because not everybody is a property owner, the right to work was enshrined to allow everybody to attain a standard of living. The protection of property may come into conflict with economic, social and cultural rights and civil and political rights. To mitigate this the right to property is limited to protect the public interest. Many states also maintain systems of communal and collective ownership, property rights have frequently been regarded as preventing the realisation of human rights for all, through for example slavery and the exploitation of others. Unequal distribution of wealth often follows line of sex, race and minorities, therefore property rights may appear to be part of the problem, in Europe the notion of private property and property rights emerged in the Renaissance as international trade by merchants gave rise to mercantilist ideas. In 16th Century Europe Lutheranism and the Protestant Reformation advanced property rights using biblical terminology, Protestant work ethic and views on mans destiny came to underline social view in emerging capitalist economies in Early modern Europe
34.
Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina
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It replaced the Charter of Carolina and the Concessions and Agreements of the Lords Proprietors of the Province of Carolina. The date March 1,1669 was the date that proprietors confirmed the Constitutions and sent them to the Colony, moreover, the proprietors suspended the Constitutions in 1690. The earliest draft of this version in manuscript is believed to be the one found at Columbia, the Colonists, settlers and the British Crown kept themselves at a distance to the Constitutions from the beginning. In fact, the provisions of the Fundamental Constitutions were neither employed nor recognized. The main concern over the document were its exaltation of proprietors as noblemen at the apex of the hierarchically designed society, second, the Constitutions had rules that were hard to implement by settlers for practical reasons. Thus, the proprietors had to amend the rules five times, for historian David Armitage and political scientist Vicki Hsueh, the Constitutions were co-authored by Locke and his patron Cooper, known also as 1st Earl of Shaftesbury. From the beginning, the involvement of John Locke has brought attention to the Constitutions, particularly for its value in the context of classical liberalism. ”The Constitutions introduced certain safeguards for groups seeking refuge for religious reasons. ”Accordingly, the Constitutions brought right to worship and right to constitute a church to the religious dissenters to Christianity and outsiders such as Jews. They also promised religious tolerance towards idolater Indians and heathens, the notorious article 110 of the Constitutions stated that “Every freeman of Carolina shall have absolute power and authority over his negro slaves, of what opinion or religion soever”. Pursuant to this provision slaveholders were granted absolute power of life, additionally, the Fundamental Constitutions affirmed the fact that being a Christian does not alter the civil dominion of a master over his slaves. Apart from the slavery, the erection of hereditary nobility aside from the proprietors and those nobles were granted privileges such as being tried only in Chief Justice’s Court and being found guilty by a jury of his peers. The Constitutions introduced also a hereditary system, the members of which called leetmen. Like the slaves, the leetmen and leetwomen were under command, through the Constitutions, the Lords Proprietor and the noblemen owned the four-fifths of the Colony’s vast lands. This requirement of ownership has been considered as relatively favorable to the freemen in comparison to the England. Elections were to be held by secret ballot, which was not yet common practice in England in the seventeenth century, laws were to expire automatically after one hundred years, thus preventing outdated regulations from remaining on the books. Colonial South Carolina, A Political History, 1663-1763, chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press,1966. Weir, Robert M. Colonial South Carolina, A History, Columbia, University of South Carolina Press,1997
35.
A Letter Concerning Toleration
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A Letter Concerning Toleration by John Locke was originally published in 1689. Its initial publication was in Latin, though it was translated into other languages. Lockes work appeared amidst a fear that Catholicism might be taking over England and this letter is addressed to an anonymous Honored Sir, this was actually Lockes close friend Philipp van Limborch, who published it without Lockes knowledge. One of the founders of Empiricism, Locke develops a philosophy that is contrary to the one expressed by Thomas Hobbes in Leviathan, unlike Hobbes, who saw uniformity of religion as the key to a well-functioning civil society, Locke argues that more religious groups actually prevent civil unrest. Locke argues that civil unrest results from confrontations caused by any attempt to prevent different religions from being practiced. Lockes primary goal is to exactly the business of civil government from that of religion. e. The two serve separate functions, and so, must be considered to be separate institutions, for Locke, the only way a Church can gain genuine converts is through persuasion and not through violence. This relates to his conclusion, namely, that the government should not involve itself in care of souls. Locke argued that atheists should not be tolerated because Promises, covenants, and oaths, there is, however, a passage added in a later edition of the Essay concerning Human Understanding, where Locke perhaps questions whether atheism was necessarily inimical to political obedience. However, at least one scholar has argued that The combination of Locke’s comments in the Letter suggest that during composition, Toleration is central to Lockes political philosophy. Consequently, only churches that teach toleration are to be allowed in his society, in contrast, Locke’s view on atheism suggests that he was far from considering religion as unimportant. As an empiricist, he took practical considerations into account, such as how the peace of civil society will be affected by religious toleration, a close reading of the text also reveals that Locke relies on Biblical analysis at several key points in his argument. There were immediate responses from the High Church Anglican clergy, published by Thomas Long, Long believed the letter was written by an atheistically disguised Jesuit plot for the Roman Catholic Church to gain dominance by bringing chaos and ruin to church and state. Proast attacked the Letter and defended the view that the government has the right to use force to cause dissenters to reflect on the merits of Anglicanism, Lockes reply to Proast developed into an extended, controversial exchange. Works related to A Letter Concerning Toleration at Wikisource Full text Audio recording of the text in Librivox Contains A Letter Concerning Toleration
36.
Two Treatises of Government
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Two Treatises of Government is a work of political philosophy published anonymously in 1689 by John Locke. This is known as the Glorious Revolution, also called the Revolution of 1688, according to Laslett, Locke was writing his Two Treatises during the Exclusion Crisis, which attempted to prevent James II from ever taking the throne in the first place. Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury, Lockes mentor, patron and friend, introduced the bill, richard Ashcraft, following in Lasletts suggestion that the Two Treatises were written before the Revolution, objected that Shaftesburys party did not advocate revolution during the Exclusion Crisis. He suggests that they are instead associated with the revolutionary conspiracies that swirled around what would come to be known as the Rye House Plot. Locke, Shaftesbury and many others were forced into exile, some, Locke knew his work was dangerous—he never acknowledged his authorship within his lifetime. Two Treatises was first published, anonymously, in December 1689, Locke was unhappy with this edition, complaining to the publisher about its many errors. For the rest of his life, he was intent on republishing the Two Treatises in a form that better reflected his meaning. Peter Laslett, one of the foremost Locke scholars, has suggested that Locke held the printers to a standard of perfection than the technology of the time would permit. Be that as it may, the first edition was indeed replete with errors, the second edition was even worse, and finally printed on cheap paper and sold to the poor. The third edition was much improved, but Locke was still not satisfied and he made corrections to the third edition by hand and entrusted the publication of the fourth to his friends, as he died before it could be brought out. In 1691 Two Treatises was translated into French by David Mazzel and this translation left out Lockes Preface, all of the First Treatise, and the first chapter of the Second Treatise. It was in form that Lockes work was reprinted during the 18th century in France and in this form that Montesquieu, Voltaire. The only American edition from the 18th century was printed in 1773 in Boston, it, too, there were no other American editions until the 20th century. Two Treatises is divided into the First Treatise and the Second Treatise, the original title of the Second Treatise appears to have been simply Book II, corresponding to the title of the First Treatise, Book I. Before publication, however, Locke gave it greater prominence by inserting a separate page, An Essay Concerning the True Original, Extent. The First Treatise is focused on the refutation of Sir Robert Filmer, in particular his Patriarcha, the Second Treatise outlines a theory of civil society. From this, he goes on to explain the rise of property and civilization. Therefore, any government that rules without the consent of the people can, in theory, the First Treatise is an extended attack on Sir Robert Filmers Patriarcha
37.
An Essay Concerning Human Understanding
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An Essay Concerning Human Understanding is a work by John Locke concerning the foundation of human knowledge and understanding. It first appeared in 1689 with the printed title An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding and he describes the mind at birth as a blank slate filled later through experience. The essay was one of the sources of empiricism in modern philosophy. Book I of the Essay is Lockes attempt to refute the rationalist notion of innate ideas and these secondary qualities, Locke claims, are dependent on the primary qualities. He also offers a theory of identity, offering a largely psychological criterion. Book III is concerned with language, and Book IV with knowledge, including intuition, mathematics, moral philosophy, natural philosophy, faith, Book I of the Essay is devoted to an attack on nativism or the doctrine of innate ideas. Locke allowed that some ideas are in the mind from an early age, if we have a universal understanding of a concept like sweetness, it is not because this is an innate idea, but because we are all exposed to sweet tastes at an early age. One of Lockes fundamental arguments against innate ideas is the fact that there is no truth to which all people attest. Chapter ten in this book focuses on Abuse of Words, here, Locke calls out metaphysicians for making up new words that have no clear meaning. He also criticizes the use of words which are not linked to clear ideas, thus he uses a discussion of language to demonstrate sloppy thinking. Locke followed the Port-Royal Logique in numbering among the abuses of language those that he calls affected obscurity in chapter 10, writers may also invent such obfuscation to make themselves appear more educated or their ideas more complicated and nuanced or erudite than they actually are. This book focuses on knowledge in general – that it can be thought of as the sum of ideas, Locke discusses the limit of human knowledge, and whether knowledge can be said to be accurate or truthful. Thus there is a distinction between what an individual might claim to know, as part of a system of knowledge, for example, Locke writes at the beginning of Chap. Knowledge, say you, is only the Perception of the Agreement or Disagreement of our own Ideas, but of what use is all this fine Knowledge of Mans own Imaginations, to a Man that enquires after the reality of things. In the last chapter of the book, Locke introduces the classification of sciences into physics, semiotics. Many of Lockes views were criticized by rationalists and empiricists alike. In 1704 the rationalist Gottfried Leibniz wrote a response to Lockes work in the form of a chapter-by-chapter rebuttal, the empiricist George Berkeley was equally critical of Lockes views in the Essay. Berkeleys most notable criticisms of Locke were first published in A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, Berkeley held that Lockes conception of abstract ideas was incoherent and led to severe contradictions
38.
Some Thoughts Concerning Education
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Some Thoughts Concerning Education is a 1693 treatise on the education of gentlemen written by the English philosopher John Locke. For over a century, it was the most important philosophical work on education in England. In his Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke outlined a new theory of mind, contending that the mind was a tabula rasa or blank slate. As England became increasingly mercantilist and secularist, the humanist educational values of the Renaissance, although Locke revised and expanded the text five times before he died, he never substantially altered the familiar and friendly style of the work. Tarcov claims Locke treated his readers as his friends and they responded in kind, of Lockes major claims in the Essay Concerning Human Understanding and Some Thoughts Concerning Education, two played a defining role in eighteenth-century educational theory. In his Essay Locke posits an empty mind—a tabula rasa—that is filled by experience, in describing the mind in these terms, Locke was drawing on Platos Theatetus, which suggests that the mind is like a wax tablet. Although Locke argued strenuously for the tabula rasa theory of mind, Locke also discusses a theory of the self. He writes, the little and almost insensible impressions on our tender infancies have very important and that is, the associations of ideas made when young are more significant than those made when mature because they are the foundation of the self—they mark the tabula rasa. As both he and Tarcov highlight, Lockes writings are full of directives to actively seek out knowledge and reflect on received opinion, in fact, Locke advises parents to carefully nurture their childrens physical habits before pursuing their academic education. To convince parents that they must attend to the health of their children above all, Locke posited that if children were accustomed to having sodden feet, a sudden shower that wet their feet would not cause them to catch a cold. Such advice was quite popular, it appears throughout John Newberys childrens books in the middle of the century, for example. Locke also offers advice on topics ranging from bed linens to diet to sleeping regimens. Locke dedicates the bulk of Some Thoughts Concerning Education to explaining how to instill virtue in children, future virtuous adults must be able not only to practice self-denial but also to see the rational path. Locke was convinced that children could reason early in life and that parents should address them as reasoning beings, moreover, he argues that parents should, above all, attempt to create a habit of thinking rationally in their children. Locke continually emphasises habit over rule—children should internalise the habit of reasoning rather than memorise a complex set of prohibitions and this focus on rationality and habit corresponds to two of Lockes concerns in the Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Throughout the Essay, Locke bemoans the irrationality of the majority and their inability, because of the authority of custom, to change or forfeit long-held beliefs. His attempt to solve this problem is not only to children as rational beings but also to create a disciplinary system founded on esteem and disgrace rather than on rewards. For Locke, rewards such as sweets and punishments such as beatings turn children into sensualists rather than rationalists and he argues that such a sort of slavish discipline makes a slavish temper
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