required for the correct use of reason, the chief asset of speech being the precision

it enables: ‘Seeing then that

truth consisteth in the right ordering of names in our

affirmations, a man that seeketh precise

truth, had need to remember what every

name he uses stands for; and to place it accordingly; or else he will find himselfe

entangled in words, as a bird in lime-twiggs.’ Speech’s primary use, according

to Hobbes, is to verbalize our thoughts. The utility of mental discourse being to

fulfill one’s desires, the utility of speech is also to fulfill one’s desires, but now

with precision. Speech amounts to the correct use of names and the relations

between them. Hobbes insists that words joined together properly constitute truth;

improperly, falsity. Thus he states that truth and falsity are properties of speech,

not of objects themselves. Hobbes’ materialist starting point leads him to discuss

speech and reason as if they were quantitative processes consisting in mathematical

relations between individual thoughts: ‘

Subject to Names, is whatsoever can enter

into, or be considered in an account; and be added one to another to make a summe;

or subtracted one from another, and leave a remainder’ (Hobbes, pp. 105–).

Names are the individual components of speech, corresponding to individual

thoughts; therefore human beings require education regarding definitions and

names, the correct use of speech being ‘the Acquisition of Science’. For Hobbes,

understanding occurs when a person hears words and as a result has the thoughts to

which those words and their connections correspond. Understanding, for Hobbes,

is caused by speech.

A quantitative process underlies Hobbes’ conception of reason as well. Reason

is the ‘adding’ and ‘subtracting’ of the thoughts implied by the significance of

the names and words employed. While reason is not a source of certainty, it must

begin with precise, unambiguous definitions and follow a clear method if it is to

lead to science. Absurdity is the result of a lack of method and of the improper use

of names. Properly educated, he writes, ‘all men by nature reason alike, and well,

when they have good principles’. These principles are the apt naming of objects

and the proper method of connecting names together, leading to assertions. The

correct connection of assertions, in turn, leads to syllogisms, ‘till we come to a

patterns of animals, the chemical compositions of plants, etc.) So the reward of

trust is life in a society of other human beings, and that is a great reward indeed,

for it is the reward of autos and public transportation, schools and sports, news and

information, consumer goods, movies, operas, and art. However, the price to pay

for trust is great as well. It is our very lives and livelihoods, and those of our loved

ones, which we entrust to others and which, potentially, we can lose.

The good news is that trust can be rational. Hobbes believed that the ills of

humanity could be solved through the correct use and application of reason to

human issues. He had suffered the experience of civil war and the near destruction

of society as he knew it, and his great work

Leviathan is an attempt to show his

contemporaries how such war can be avoided by honoring one’s obligations to one’s

sovereign. Hobbes conceived of a hypothetical covenant in which human beings

agree to relinquish their powers to fulfill their natural desire to take advantage of

others so that they can be free from the harm suffered by the advantage taken by

others. The need for this covenant is a precept of reason, or natural law, as Hobbes

would have it, as is the need to honor the obligations one incurs as a party to it.

But is this enough? A society is created: Drivers agree not to run over pedestrians.

Restaurant owners agree to serve only fresh food. Teachers and day-care workers

agree not to harm our children. Doctors agree to provide us with proper diagnoses

and health care in exchange for their fees. But, can Hobbes ensure that society’s

members will abide by their contractual obligations, therefore making trust

possible? Drivers still drive at inappropriate speeds and often under the influence of

drugs, putting the lives of others in danger. There are still outbreaks of

salmonella

and

e-coli. Teachers molest their students. Doctors perform unnecessary surgery.

The social covenant is yet incomplete, for, according to Hobbes, there is no reason

to expect individuals to live up to their contractual obligations as long as there is

nothing to enforce those obligations.

Unlike many of his contemporaries, Hobbes did not think that the human being

was naturally a social creature. In his natural state man tends to engage in warfare

and this nature does not change under social conditions. Therefore, a social

covenant requires more than the agreement that individuals will refrain from acting

upon their basic impulses. It requires an enforcer. Individuals must relinquish their

power to harm others to a leader—a sovereign capable of enforcing the agreement

as his/her power consists in the total combined power of the individuals who make

up the covenant. This two-stage social covenant makes all other covenants possible:

Individuals agree to relinquish their natural rights and then to transfer those rights

to the sovereign; having transferred their power to a sovereign, individuals,

i.e. citizens, incur obligations to the sovereign, including the obligation not to

hinder the actions of the sovereign and to obey any laws that the sovereign deems

necessary in order to keep the peace. Citizens must obey the laws of the sovereign

or suffer punishment by the sovereign. This makes social interaction possible.

Individual human beings act as if they had in fact entered into this hypothetical

covenant in which they have agreed to give up their natural inclination towards