The Contemporary Value of Rousseau’s Thought Experiment
In Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality Among Men, Jean-Jacques Rousseau begins his investigation into inequality among men by analyzing man’s State of Nature. His version of man’s natural state differs significantly from philosophers’ before him, namely Locke and Hobbes, and these differences lead to vastly different conclusions than the previous philosophers had. Rousseau maintains that the departure from the natural state to civilized society introduced inequality to mankind. Unlike Locke and Hobbes, Rousseau sees no benefit to society and places the natural state above civilized society because the natural state is free of the political and moral inequality that plagues society. Though there are certainly merits to Rousseau’s argument, there is a major flaw in his methodology; his argument seems to assume its desired conclusion and work backwards to find the problem. He singles out a flawed present society, imagines a state of nature and origin story, then entirely operates on his assumptions about how human nature has changed over time. Though it is fairly obvious that advancements in technology, arts, and sciences have taken us further away from the simple state our faculties alone would have afforded us in ancient times, Rousseau’s assumptions about the natural “savage” human leaves his theoretical model open to criticism. Because his model is ahistorical and very far-fetched, one could just as easily postulate that the true root of inequality stemmed from the dinosaurs, or Adam and Eve, or practically anything else. Rousseau’s state of nature serves as the entire basis of his argument, and thus calls into question the value of his model when trying to understand past or present inequality.
We must first start with unpacking Rousseau’s state of nature. In the Discourse on Inequality, Rousseau asserts that previous philosophers attempting to examine the state of nature “all felt the necessity of going back as far as the state of Nature, but none of them has reached it.” (Rousseau 45) Essentially, they had failed to grasp the true state of nature because they assumed human nature to be static throughout history. Rousseau pushes back on this, saying that to truly study mankind one must look at him as nature formed him because analyzing current human nature would not be accurate. The previous philosophers, “continually speaking of need, greed, oppression, desires, and pride transferred to the state of Nature ideas they had taken from society; they spoke of Savage Man and depicted Civil Man.” (Rousseau 46) Here, Rousseau maintains that the Civil Man is so different from the Savage Man that attempting to transfer characteristics from one to the other is impossible and misleading. He paints a picture of the savage man, saying he can often be found,
“wandering in the forests, without skills, without speech, without dwelling, without war, without relationships, with no need for his fellowmen, and correspondingly with no desire to do them harm, perhaps never even recognizing any of them individually, savage man, subject to few passions and self-sufficient, had only the sentiments and enlightenment appropriate to that state…” (Rousseau 66)
In describing the life of the savage man in the pure state of nature, Rousseau crafts an origin story tracking human development: humans were originally starkly primitive, solitary, antisocial creatures that formed no long-term relationships with other humans. Their only two natural inclinations were self-preservation and a “repugnance to seeing any sentient being, especially [their] fellowman, perish or suffer.” (Rousseau 42) Procreation lasted only as long as the deed with no obligations or relations afterward. Rousseau uses human’s solitary nature both to demonstrate that human’s natural state must have been peaceful, and extraneous societal developments or sentiments that other philosophers had perceived as inherent were not naturally present.
Though savage, in Rousseau’s state of nature man is inherently good. Rousseau maintains that as long as men are not acting in self preservation and do not resist the “inner impulse of compassion, he will never harm another man or even another sentient being.” (Rousseau 42) So what eventually led the savage people to inequality? Rousseau names several culprits as contributing towards this phenomenon, but mainly focuses on the introduction of property into society. He says, “the first person who, having enclosed a plot of land, took it into his head to say, “This is mine,” and found people simple enough to believe him, was the true founder of civil society.” (Rousseau 69) Property necessitated abandoning self-sufficiency to ask others for assistance in tending the land, and also implanted the idea that it could be advantageous to own more than others or employ other people. Thus, equality was cheapened and eventually disappeared. This approach is especially interesting because, though Locke and Hobbes disagree on a number of issues, they both agree that the fundamental purpose of society and a state is to protect private property, which serves as a compelling enough reason to exit the state of nature. And, in the Lockean natural state, a society or state that fails to protect the right to property (or any individual that seeks to infringe upon any other individual’s right to property) are punished or overthrown immediately. Studying Rousseau in tandem with Locke is effective because both philosophers begin with the assumption that humans are inherently good, and that the state of nature is not a situation that one must actively attempt to abandoned. But, they end up with vastly different conclusions. So why would Locke include a safeguard against naturally good men in the form of the state while Rousseau simply trusts that men will not resist their “impulse of compassion”? It might have to do with the role of reason in each of their states of nature. In Locke’s Second Treatise on Government, he grounds people’s actions in reason rather than sentiment while Rousseau’s savage men, incapable of such elevated thought, can only operate on base compassion. Faith in humanity is not necessarily a bad thing, but a fundamental flaw in Rousseau’s argument is the lack of precautions he takes against those that might choose to resist their impulse to compassion.
At the beginning of his piece, Rousseau states that its main purpose is to “shed light on the nature of things [rather] than pointing out their true origin.” (Rousseau 46) He then goes on to offer a hypothetical origin story on which he bases the entirety of his argument and conclusion. Not every example in philosophy has to be firmly grounded in history and fact; indeed, there have been several such ahistorical and hypothetical models that were much more successful in conveying their intended message and spurring action in the future. An example would be Plato’s famous Allegory of the Cave. Here, Plato makes a claim about human nature and those that break away from it. The entire whimsical example is very clearly framed as a thought experiment, and supports Plato’s overall argument without serving as its base. Another example is the state of nature laid out in Locke’s Second Treatise on Government. Locke’s argument is very similar in methodology to Rousseau’s, with one very fundamental difference; Locke’s state of nature is exceedingly normal. In the Lockean state of nature, men are inherently good and motivated by reason and self-preservation to enter a state that can protect the things that are meaningful to them; no grunting, animal-like, antisocial and totally unrelatable creatures are proposed. Even if Locke’s state of nature is not correct, it is still useful because one could see how it could have happened. In fact, it would take relatively little effort to potentially re-enter such a state of nature today; there are even areas in some countries that closely resemble Locke’s idea of the state of nature. We can hold our societies up to the standards Locke discussed, reform our governments to model the structure Locke suggests, and enact policy based on his arguments. In terms of contemporary potential and significance, Locke’s argument has the advantage over Rousseau’s. So, thought experiments in and of themselves are not ineffective; Rousseau’s, however, expressly states that a return to the state of nature he is so obsessed with is impossible. And, because it is hypothetical and ahistorical, we can only take interpret its discussion on “the nature of things” as merely a philosopher’s opinion.
In conclusion, as stimulating as Rousseau’s thought experiment might be, it does not groundedly explain the root of inequality or the cure for inequality. Thus, what further insight can we gain from Rousseau’s discussion on inequality? How do we benefit from an idealized ‘state of nature’ that is impossible to return to? It is not sufficient that Rousseau’s model starts from the conclusion and works backwards; a truly effective argument would offer insight into how to correct our current situation if it is unfavorable. Because Rousseau’s argument is ahistorical and essentially based on conjecture, anyone could claim any origin story or state of nature with similar success. To his credit, Rousseau concedes the challenge in attempting to understand “a state that no longer exists, that perhaps never existed, that probably never will exist…” (Rousseau 40) Though several aspects of Rousseau’s condemnation of inequality are sound and valuable, basing his whole discourse on this state of nature weakened his argument, making it relatively useless a guide for future generations looking to expel inequality from their societies.
Note: All page references refer to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality Among Men.