Essays on Philosophers

Much has changed since Adam Smith and Karl Marx first postulated ideas on capitalist economic systems. First, was Smith, interested in groups maximizing self-interests, which ideally maintained that state at an equilibrium indefinitely. Consequential academia comes to both compliment and clash with Smith’s theories and approaches, both directly and indirectly. Nowhere is this more evident...

Why, according to Hobbes, should subjects obey the Sovereign? Prima facie, the reason why subjects should obey the Sovereign according to Thomas Hobbes is a relatively simple one, for protection against their fellow man. Hobbes himself writes in Leviathan that without their Sovereign, the natural state of things is simply ‘warre of every one against...

Marxism is one of the world’s most influential ideologies, having massive social impacts on many areas of the word, including the discipline of geography (Peet,2015). Marxist geography, a perspective of human geography which first came on to the scene in the 1960s, focuses in on the ways in which the production of space and place...

The role of happiness in solving moral problems has been a topic argued by many philosophers. They have sought to understand whether it is the consequences or the motives of actions that truly matter in morality. Jeremy Bentham and Immanuel Kant both have demonstrated their own views in regards to this concept. Each philosopher follows...

The pursuit of happiness has often been tied to thoughtful contemplation. However, thoughtful contemplation is hard to define. Published in 1959 and given as a memorial address for German Composer Conradin Kreutzer, Martin Heidegger’s Discourse on Thinking introduces the difference between meditative thinking and calculative thinking. Meditative thinking is contemplative thinking, which makes humans unique....

I. Introduction Martin Luther King and Niccolò Machiavelli could not be further apart in their ideologies on political violence. King is historically lauded as a nonviolent champion, while Machiavelli is known for his ruthless advocacy for violence if it means achieving political success. While King had large, seemingly-unattainable goals for the future of race relations,...

Exactly what is happiness? To many, happiness is a way of engaging in various activities as an aid to total life satisfaction. Aristotle believed happiness allows people to live the ‘good life’, so is such a life achieved through sole emotion? The following will be examining the ethics behind Aristotle (384-322 BCE) and Plato (428-347...

Descartes was recommended by M. Pollot to Elisabeth assuring her of his goodwill toward everyone and in particularly her. So Elisabeth writes to Descartes in a letter petitioning him to answer something she cannot understand, she asks how the soul of man can determine the spirits of the body to produce voluntary actions. She wants...

In Thomas More’s 1516, socio-political satire, Utopia, he challenges the values of his contemporary world. Through the book, he is able to criticise many of the political, social, and economic ways of his society. In the book Moore explores a perfect island of Utopia through a carefully constructed character of Raphael. The Utopians are a...

Write an essay explaining what you think about the following statement: “Rousseau in ‘Fifth Walk’ describes using nature to help create his own type of happiness, and yet, importantly, he knows that nature cannot be used like something merely convenient, like a set of tools; nature is much more than this to create happiness for...