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What We Make for Ourselves: Interconnections of Geometry, Science, and Politics in Hobbes’ System of Ideas
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- Author / Creator
- Sawatzky, Jackson
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This thesis is an attempt to locate Hobbes’ civil philosophy in the context of his theory of science, which is a theory primarily about how to acquire the knowledge of causes and effects. By working through the reasons why Hobbes praises geometry, this thesis will explain why he believes that philosophy needs to begin with definitions, how the geometers’ use of definitions has brought certainty to their subject, and what other subjects must do in order to have the same certainty. While the first chapter deals with the overt reasons why Hobbes praises geometry, we will see that the proper use of definitions alone is not enough to raise any subject, even geometry, to the rank of a ‘science.’ In the chapter following, I will show, in detail, how Hobbes’ reconceptualization of geometry as the study of motion provides the starting point for his theory of science, which, on the deductive model of Euclidean geometry, aims to demonstrate ‘universal rules about the properties of things’ from the knowledge of their cause and generation—which is to say, from the motions by which they are produced (DCo, IV, 7). The exposition of Hobbes’ geometry in the second chapter will be framed as an investigation into his belief that we can give scientific demonstrations only of subjects that we make for ourselves. The third and final chapter will provide an interpretation of how civil philosophy can be considered as a science within the scope of the motion-based theory of science presented in De Corpore. We will conclude that while Hobbes’ civil philosophy cannot be considered to be a science apart from the idiosyncratic theory of De Corpore, the fittingness of the label does not affect the content of the theory, which, when mapped on to his theory of science, reveals a depth and complexity of thought of which any one of Hobbes’ texts provides only a partial indication.
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- Subjects / Keywords
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- Graduation date
- Fall 2019
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- Type of Item
- Thesis
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- Degree
- Master of Arts
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- License
- Permission is hereby granted to the University of Alberta Libraries to reproduce single copies of this thesis and to lend or sell such copies for private, scholarly or scientific research purposes only. Where the thesis is converted to, or otherwise made available in digital form, the University of Alberta will advise potential users of the thesis of these terms. The author reserves all other publication and other rights in association with the copyright in the thesis and, except as herein before provided, neither the thesis nor any substantial portion thereof may be printed or otherwise reproduced in any material form whatsoever without the author's prior written permission.