Hobbes: Main is a Machine

[chrisvia]

Philosophical reading is a recent endeavor of mine, and perhaps the most fulfilling choice I've ever made as regards my love of literature.

Anyway, I am currently reading Hobbes's Leviathan. I'm struck by his notion that man is a machine, and life is but a motion of limbs.


For there is no such thing as perpetual Tranquility of mind, while we live here; because Life it selfe is but Motion, and can never be without Desire, nor without Fear, no more than without Sense.

From this he goes on to show that a commonwealth, a state, is but an artificial man; a larger, stronger machine; in short, the Leviathan.

It's a finely composed theory, but I'm struggling with how he explains the myriad thoughts and emotions that occur psychologically, mentally in each of us. Sure, the first book of his opus, "Of Man," is packed with definitions, which are important to him in the manner of the Socratic method; but it is merely a rumination of how he defines imagination, dreams, temperament, etc.

What are your thoughts on Hobbes' theory of man as machine? The Leviathan?

[chrisvia]

Can't figure out how to change the thread title, but, yes, it should say "Hobbes: Man is a Machine."

[cafolini]

Hobbes is a philosopher, and obviously Platonic at that. But I could say that my foot has five toes and I don't need a wise philosopher to confirm that.

That men are machines is not a philosophical issue. It is a fact. That man does not occur in three dimensions is not a philosophical issue. It is a fact. That he does in the two dimensions of imaginary existence is a Platonic piece of cave bologni. Essential at max, and as such a lie.

You see the different machines when you speak about men. When you speak about "man," you have gone nuts over a bridge into nonsense.

[Theunderground]

Man is a 4d animal.

[cafolini]

From the point of view of being and existence, man can be an xd animal just like any other one. But time as the 4th is Einstenian nonsense. Time occurs without being, without existence, and without sense. It occurs as what it takes for any event to take place. The confusion always arrived from it being a variable of motion. But never had any bearing on equations. Of course, if you discover a velocity that's decreasing for whatever motive, you can always fantasize on the interpretation of an equation so as to ascribe the motive to time dilation. Ridiculos.

[Darcy88]

That men are machines is not a philosophical issue. It is a fact.

Yes, because we all know how machines feel love, pain, joy, loneliness, regret. How they have imaginations. How they grieve. How they have mystical experiences. How they possess taste buds and are capable of orgasms. How they can stand before a painting and be moved to tears. Oh yeah, we're just machines.

[cafolini]

Yes, because we all know how machines feel love, pain, joy, loneliness, regret. How they have imaginations. How they grieve. How they have mystical experiences. How they possess taste buds and are capable of orgasms. How they can stand before a painting and be moved to tears. Oh yeah, we're just machines.

Men are not inorganic machines. Sorry about your interpretation.

[Darcy88]

Men are not inorganic machines. Sorry about your interpretation.

Even with the advent of computers and nano-tech a machine as complex as the human brain has not come close to being achieved. What I said in my prior post still stands. Men are not machines.

[cafolini]

Even with the advent of computers and nano-tech a machine as complex as the human brain has not come close to being achieved. What I said in my prior post still stands. Men are not machines.

Every single aspect of a person's body of which we have any knowledge is machinelike in its behaviour; completely predictable and in a precise way. This case is closed as far as I am concerned. It bores me to death.

[OrphanPip]

What Hobbes meant was that human behavior is predictable if you can figure out how to do so. Not that we were automatons with no emotions.

Now the modern neurobiological approach to human psychology would likely agree with Hobbes.

[cafolini]

What Hobbes meant was that human behavior is predictable if you can figure out how to do so. Not that we were automatons with no emotions.

Now the modern neurobiological approach to human psychology would likely agree with Hobbes.

Yes OrphanPip. But the machines have variations and the variations are known. Men and women are not the same in many ways; a major one. The point I was making is that there occur many many different machines in saying "men," while the philosophical "man" doesn't tell us but a philosophy and doesn't occur as machine.

[Darcy88]

Every single aspect of a person's body of which we have any knowledge is machinelike in its behaviour; completely predictable and in a precise way. This case is closed as far as I am concerned. It bores me to death.

Its not completely predictable. The variables are too numerous. Yes, we are physical specimens that function in accordance with cause and effect. But stating that "man is a machine" fails to take into account his rich world of imagination and subjectivity. When machines start forming religions and writing poetry, then I'll agree. And if it bores you to death then don't make categorical claims on the matter being discussed.

Stating that man behaves LIKE a machine is not the same as declaring that he IS a machine.

[cafolini]

Its not completely predictable. The variables are too numerous. Yes, we are physical specimens that function in accordance with cause and effect. But stating that "man is a machine" fails to take into account his rich world of imagination and subjectivity. When machines start forming religions and writing poetry, then I'll agree. And if it bores you to death then don't make categorical claims on the matter being discussed.

Stating that man behaves LIKE a machine is not the same as declaring that he IS a machine.

Ha! How doyou know the variables are too numerous? Your head might burst with so many being considered.

[Darcy88]

Ha! How doyou know the variables are too numerous? Your head might burst with so many being considered.

If they weren't too numerous then you'd be able to sit down now and chart out the course your behaviours and experiences and thoughts will follow tomorrow, next week, and onwards into the indefinite future.

[JuniperWoolf]

What Hobbes meant was that human behavior is predictable if you can figure out how to do so. Not that we were automatons with no emotions.

Now the modern neurobiological approach to human psychology would likely agree with Hobbes.

But that sounds like behaviourism. Isn't behaviourism kind of dead?

[cafolini]

But that sounds like behaviourism. Isn't behaviourism kind of dead?

In a way, yes. But behaviourism probably has its roots in Locke, with his Tabula Rasa, where he postulates an empty child that has to be filled with evrything. Another ridiculous philosopher who discards capacity as separate from possibility, adaptability, environment, etc.

[OrphanPip]

But that sounds like behaviourism. Isn't behaviourism kind of dead?

A bit, but Hobbes' idea is basically tied to an older idea of universal mechanism, the belief that everything in the universe is based on cause and effect of matter. Hobbes goes on to deduce from the assumption that the human mind is mechanistic in this way that there are laws of human nature, just like there are laws of physics, such as his belief that man is basically self-interested. It's more metaphysical than a detailed psychological theory.

It was also a dominant view at the time that animals were mechanistic automatons. So, Hobbes' view is a bit controversial for its time as an attempt to treat humans in the same light as the current scientific ideas about animals.

So, when I said modern cognitivism or neurobiological ideas would agree with Hobbes, I was just speaking of a generally materialistic approach to the question of mind. In opposition to people like DesCartes who thought that the mind had some existence outside of matter.

[cafolini]

A bit, but Hobbes' idea is basically tied to an older idea of universal mechanism, the belief that everything in the universe is based on cause and effect of matter. Hobbes goes on to deduce from the assumption that the human mind is mechanistic in this way that there are laws of human nature, just like there are laws of physics, such as his belief that man is basically self-interested. It's more metaphysical than a detailed psychological theory.

It was also a dominant view at the time that animals were mechanistic automatons. So, Hobbes' view is a bit controversial for its time as an attempt to treat humans in the same light as the current scientific ideas about animals.

So, when I said modern cognitivism or neurobiological ideas would agree with Hobbes, I was just speaking of a generally materialistic approach to the question of mind. In opposition to people like DesCartes who thought that the mind had some existence outside of matter.

Good points because Hobbes was not so simplistic as people like Locke, Descartes, Rousseau or Freud. Some scientific credit should be given there.

[JuniperWoolf]

So, when I said modern cognitivism or neurobiological ideas would agree with Hobbes, I was just speaking of a generally materialistic approach to the question of mind. In opposition to people like DesCartes who thought that the mind had some existence outside of matter.


Ah, okay. I think that there is a very strong likelihood that we are machines, but we can't prove it yet because we can't predict the machines' behaviour and so I'm not willing to fully subscribe to the theory. Then again, what's the alternative, that we have "souls?" *shrug* I don't know, maybe there's something else we haven't thought of yet.

[cafolini]

Ah, okay. I think that there is a very strong likelihood that we are machines, but we can't prove it yet because we can't predict the machines' behaviour and so I'm not willing to fully subscribe to the theory. Then again, what's the alternative, that we have "souls?" *shrug* I don't know, maybe there's something else we haven't thought of yet.

The problem is that we do have biological souls which are the same as the behaviour of the body. There is no separation.
Also, you can also prove this through probability. Today it's pretty high and we have no other tool. But also, I don't understand you argument pretty well, since it is much harder to prove that we are not machines, and in that case we don't even have the tools of probability.

[Darcy88]

Machines don't have subjectivity. Machines don't love. Don't hate. Don't believe. I think free will is an illusion, but even that mere illusion separates us qualitatively from machines. I mean Arnold had some feelings of fondness and friendship for John Connor in Terminator 2, but that's still a far cry from the emotion a father gets holding his new-born son in his arms, that which makes a groom's heart flutter as he stares into the eyes of his beloved bride, or the sense of compassion, of hatred, of fear, of hope, none of which machines know. Our subjectivity ought to be regarded as our most precious quality, one that machines do not have and perhaps never will.

[ralfyman]

Yes, an organic machine with additional features.

[JuniperWoolf]

Machines don't have subjectivity. Machines don't love. Don't hate. Don't believe.

Not yet they don't. Maybe we're just very complex machines, and our endocrine and neurological systems are simply "parts" which enable us to feel emotions and think, and which we humans haven't re-created in metal and silicon yet. Emotions and thoughts are useful; a machine which can think and feel could be very useful. Maybe that's all we are - machines, created by natural selection and evolution. It's a scary thought, but I'm not willing to shrug the theory off just because it makes me uncomfortable, nor am I willing to completely buy the theory just because it's seems most likely with what we currently know about consciousness and the brain. Put me down for "not enough information - undecided."

[Darcy88]

Not yet they don't. Maybe we're just very complex machines, and our endocrine and neurological systems are simply "parts" which enable us to feel emotions and think, and which we humans haven't re-created in metal and silicon yet. Emotions and thoughts are useful; a machine which can think and feel could be very useful. Maybe that's all we are - machines, created by natural selection and evolution. It's a scary thought, but I'm not willing to shrug the theory off just because it makes me uncomfortable, nor am I willing to completely buy the theory just because it's seems most likely with what we currently know about consciousness and the brain. Put me down for "not enough information - undecided."

If we are machines by virtue of our being physical specimens then yes, sure, we are machines. But to me that's like comparing a third grader's paper-mache volcano project to Mount Vesuvius. Man as machine is a useful yet narrow and over-simplistic metaphor that draws connections between the few similarities while entirely missing the many meaningful differences that separate us from machines. We are the result of billions of years of evolution and thousands upon thousands of years of culture. Machines have "evolved" at a tremendous rate in recent centuries, but I believe it will be some time before they reach the level of complexity that's been reached by the human brain. When machines start loving and imagining and praying I'll change my tune.

[cafolini]

Machines don't have subjectivity. Machines don't love. Don't hate. Don't believe. I think free will is an illusion, but even that mere illusion separates us qualitatively from machines. I mean Arnold had some feelings of fondness and friendship for John Connor in Terminator 2, but that's still a far cry from the emotion a father gets holding his new-born son in his arms, that which makes a groom's heart flutter as he stares into the eyes of his beloved bride, or the sense of compassion, of hatred, of fear, of hope, none of which machines know. Our subjectivity ought to be regarded as our most precious quality, one that machines do not have and perhaps never will.

All that shows is that you don't want it because you have a prejudice as to what's a machine. You think the only kind must be inorganic.

[Heteronym]

All that shows is that you don't want it because you have a prejudice as to what's a machine. You think the only kind must be inorganic.

Well, let me invert the question then: what's the appeal of thinking that man is a machine? From where I'm standing, it just smacks of low self-esteem and misanthropy.

[Heteronym]

Mary Midgley, in her excellent book The Myths We Live By, remarks that Hobbes, like many thinkers, philosophers and scientists of his time, was fascinated by the recently discovered clockwork. This imagery in the 17th and 18th century was highly influential in shaping a mechanistic view of everything, from the physical sciences to human sciences, with a scientist like Laplace declaring that the universe was literally a clock.

Man is a machine is just a reductive statement about humans and shouldn't be seen as anything more than that. It's informed by the same principle of reduction at work in statements like, Man is just a machine for reproducing genes, or, Man is just a meme machine, or, All behaviour is driven by Will to Power, or, Life is intrinsically competitive, or, History follows inexorable laws.

Since the Enlightenment, thinkers and scientists have tried to find a few simple laws that can explain everything about humans, much in the same way that Newton discovered a few simple laws that could explain the universe (until the 20th century, that is). One of the most frustrating thing about the human or social sciences, or the humanities, is that humans don't behave like tides, planetary orbits, stones, or the blood in our veins. All study of humans is messy and unscientific, and that annoys those who want their areas of human study to have the same respect that science does. This is what led people like B.F. Skinner, one of the fathers of Behaviourism, to ignore unscientific things like motives and feelings and stick to external behaviour. It's also what made him defend the absurd theory that parents shouldn't create emotional bond with their children. But studying just physical behaviour explains nothing about humans because our behaviour is motivated by our consciousnesses: our ambitions, dreams, hopes, and reactions to the consciousnesses of other individuals.

Those who ignore the complexity and unpredictability of humans have often built complex edifices of concepts and words that collapse once they're tried to be applied to real people, and have only led to suffering and death. Isaiah Berlin has written one excellent essay on that, called "The Sense of Reality," collected in the book of the same name. I recommend it to those who want to continue to define Man in simple terms, like machines.

[YesNo]

Man is a machine is just a reductive statement about humans and shouldn't be seen as anything more than that. It's informed by the same principle of reduction at work in statements like, Man is just a machine for reproducing genes, or, Man is just a meme machine, or, All behaviour is driven by Will to Power, or, Life is intrinsically competitive, or, History follows inexorable laws.
Agreed.

I'm reading Midgley's The Ethical Primate now based on your recommendation in another thread.

[cafolini]

Mary Midgley, in her excellent book The Myths We Live By, remarks that Hobbes, like many thinkers, philosophers and scientists of his time, was fascinated by the recently discovered clockwork. This imagery in the 17th and 18th century was highly influential in shaping a mechanistic view of everything, from the physical sciences to human sciences, with a scientist like Laplace declaring that the universe was literally a clock.

Man is a machine is just a reductive statement about humans and shouldn't be seen as anything more than that. It's informed by the same principle of reduction at work in statements like, Man is just a machine for reproducing genes, or, Man is just a meme machine, or, All behaviour is driven by Will to Power, or, Life is intrinsically competitive, or, History follows inexorable laws.

Since the Enlightenment, thinkers and scientists have tried to find a few simple laws that can explain everything about humans, much in the same way that Newton discovered a few simple laws that could explain the universe (until the 20th century, that is). One of the most frustrating thing about the human or social sciences, or the humanities, is that humans don't behave like tides, planetary orbits, stones, or the blood in our veins. All study of humans is messy and unscientific, and that annoys those who want their areas of human study to have the same respect that science does. This is what led people like B.F. Skinner, one of the fathers of Behaviourism, to ignore unscientific things like motives and feelings and stick to external behaviour. It's also what made him defend the absurd theory that parents shouldn't create emotional bond with their children. But studying just physical behaviour explains nothing about humans because our behaviour is motivated by our consciousnesses: our ambitions, dreams, hopes, and reactions to the consciousnesses of other individuals.

Those who ignore the complexity and unpredictability of humans have often built complex edifices of concepts and words that collapse once they're tried to be applied to real people, and have only led to suffering and death. Isaiah Berlin has written one excellent essay on that, called "The Sense of Reality," collected in the book of the same name. I recommend it to those who want to continue to define Man in simple terms, like machines.

There is indeed the possibility that some might want to reduce men to simple things. In fact, they do. But a machine is not to blame for human simplicity and ignorance. Organic machines have been shown to be highly complicated and complex. A machine is a machine...is a machine...is a machine...

[Heteronym]

Complexity is not the purview of machines. Poems are highly complicated and complex, but it does not follow that they are machines. Man are machines is a metaphor taken too far by some thinkers who, fascinated by 17th century clockworks, applied its imagery to several areas of human inquiry. For me the most interesting question is, what do you gain from thinking men are machines? What new insight does it give you about humans? How does that improve the way you interact with other people? What new pathways of knowledge are opened for you?

I'm very curious to understand that, because for me metaphors are only useful in so far as they provide a framework to understand something in a new light, and I still fail to see how that works in this case.

[YesNo]

What one gains by viewing humans as machines is a framework from which to shock others. Migdley writes:


The reductive party...is positively pleased to sound harsh, strident and paradoxical, since it views these qualities as marks of realism. Its basic project is to unite humans to the rest of the biosphere by following Procrustes, by paring all human peculiarities down to a size which fits easily into the supposedly universal evolutionary pattern. (The Ethical Primate, page 5)

These views provide a justification of Social Darwinism which has its origin in Hobbes' view of self-interest.

I don't think that the current Social Darwinists really see themselves as machines as much as they like to see everyone else as machines. Their self-interest would be to position themselves as that machine that knows it is a machine. Maybe that makes them an upper class machine? However, if they really saw themselves as machines they wouldn't waste their time trying to convince anyone about anything. What's the point of doing that if we are just machines?

[Darcy88]

I am coming more and more to agree with Hobbes. I am warming up to him.

[cafolini]

I'm not going to argue about this with you. It's a matter of motivation and resources. Obviously you don't get much out of it. And it is okay if you preffer to see it that way. Have fun.

[Darcy88]

I've lost faith in the soul. Man is a machine. I don't care how melodramatic and emo this sounds. Man is nothing but a machine. At least I am. I know I have no soul. How do I know? I guess its a kind of faith. I have faith in my own soullessness. Now to enhance this post here is a random Alice Cooper video. Enjoy:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NO2cHJmDkBg

[Heteronym]

I'm not going to argue about this with you.

But aren't we in this forum to debate and exchange ideas?

On the other hand, machines don't argue, so I guess you are on the right path to your metamorphosis.


It's a matter of motivation and resources.

I'm sorry, but this statement is meaningless. Motivation and resources about what? For what?


Obviously you don't get much out of it. And it is okay if you preffer to see it that way.

No I don't, I think if I treated myself and others as machines, communication and interaction would be impossible. But I am curious to understand what others get from this belief.


Have fun.

I certainly do. Only machines can't have fun.