Ethics and Values / Unit 3 Ethics 126 short lesson, about 20 seconds
The State of Nature
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The idea
The state of nature is the imagined condition of human life with no government, no law, and no power able to enforce agreements.
In practice
Hobbes drew the picture: without a common power, life runs to "continual fear, and danger of violent death" — "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short."
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
Builds on
- Nothing. This is a starting point.
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