Talk:Leviathan (book)

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Contents

[edit] Comments

Yes, I disagree indeed. I came to this page interested in the book and greatly appreciated these quotes, which give judicious access to the flavor of the language and the thinking of Hobbes. Ten pages of quotes might be too much, but a page or two is not, given the luxury of space in Wikipedia. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.202.89.142 (talk)

I wouldn't want to undermine the original creator, but I think this would be more useful as a source of information if it relied less heavily on quotations from the text. Any disagreement? J.T.

(William M. Connolley 21:39, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)) Filling out the Leviathan page was a project of mine that has fallen by the wayside, sadly. I've now added something to part II - but it by no means covers it all. The problem I find is that Hobbes language is so wonderful I hate to replace it with boring paraphrase. However the section is too long (and there is much more to fit in). Its also almost entirely descriptive, rather than judgemental: perhaps that is a good thing. So what I have written needs to be cut and expanded. One day I will: but in the meantime feel free.

(William M. Connolley 08:23, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)) OK, I've done III and IV now too, rather better I hope. II needs finishing and tidying a lot. Rev+Conc needs doing. There is quite a bit on Lev on the TH page too - not sure if it should be merged in here.

[edit] Summary

I'm going to add a sentence to the introduction that summarizes the modern sense of the word leviathan, as derived from Hobbes. Tobacman 19:03, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)

The article uses way too much original text. It should be paraphrased so people will be able to understand exactly what Hobbes is saying versus illustrating how he is saying it.

(William M. Connolley 09:55, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)) I like Hobbe's language, and it was the fastest way of writing the article,. But it could probably be tidied up.

Hi there! Just to let you know that theres a mistake under "Diverse" it says "A quote from that book dfd;lskfjd;lsfjd;lskfj;salkf jd;lsaf j at one time used in the wikipedia logo."

Just thought i'd let you know, Neil B

[edit] Removed para: why

I removed:

The essence of Hobbes' description is that the state of nature (or God's original creation) is one of war. In this state of nature, man's condition is defined as misery. Man draws upon "passions that incline men to peace and fear of death," as well as some limited form of natural reason to create and agree upon a convent in which there exists articles of peace. These form the "Laws of Nature" which allow for the creation of a Sovereign who has absolute power and essentially solves the problem of the state of nature. The Sovereign is seen as a lesser evil in that it is the only solution to the worse outcome that is the state of nature. The presence of the Sovereign allows for the development and the support of man's higher reason which in turn allows for science. Science plays an important role in Hobbes' discourse, yet science is dependent upon the presence of the Sovereign. It is important to remember that the Sovereign is not defined as one individual, but as one absolute power. This absolute power may be composed of multipe individuals, i.e. in the form of government.

Some of this duplicates what is already there (the SoN bit). man's condition is defined as misery is wrong (or at least defined is wrong). But the quote above has already done that.

But the real mistake is the Sovereign bit - none of that is in part 1. Its in part 2. As the existing article already says :-) William M. Connolley 21:43, 15 February 2006 (UTC).

[edit] spellings

KP "fixed" a couple of spellings [1]. Of those, Naturall should definitely stay "ll" cos its the text. "Civill" is a bit harder: in the frontispiece its Civil; in the subtitle on the title page its Civill. I prefer the ll; and "leave original spelling" hopefully applies William M. Connolley 22:47, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I noticed this myself when I picked up a copy of the book a couple days ago, and then went back to revert it but noticed someone beat me to it. From now on while reading articles on books written in archaic english, I'll try to control my sudden impulses to grammarize and spellify everything I see. Sorry about that. user:knowledgepirate 18:56, 2 March 2006

[edit] This should contain a section on the modern relevance perhaps

Its often stated that leviathan is relevant to modern politics

Yep, it underlies the US foreign policy. But it might prove just a teensy bit controversial to assert that :-) William M. Connolley 21:48, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Etching?

Is the frontispiece for Leviathan really an etching? I can't find any other sources that say so, and I've found a few that say that it's an engraving.

[2], Thomas Hobbes and the Title-Page of "Leviathan", Keith Brown, Philosophy, Vol. 55, No. 213 (Jul., 1980), pp. 410-411

Bosse was an etcher, but he also did engravings (or at least etching/engraving hybrids). Are we sure that this is an etching? I'm taking that out until someone proves otherwise. superlusertc 2007 September 27, 05:38 (UTC)

[edit] 1 title or two?

Re [3]. I think its two titles; after the "or" is a subtitle. Hence the edit should be reverted William M. Connolley (talk) 21:29, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

A fair question. My opinion is, of course, that it is one title, which is why I reverted it. As to why, consider the following.
  • Or is capitalized, suggesting that it's part of the title, not a separate thing connecting two independent titles.
  • Every place that I see has it listed as part of the title.
  • Consider Dr. Strangelove, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb and Twelfth Night, or What You Will. So spelt on the English Wikipedia.
  • The Chicago Manual of Style recommends the following treatments for Old-fashioned titles
    • England's Monitor; or, The History of the Separation
    • England's Monitor, or The History of the Separation
  • It's managed to remain unchanged for over a year. You'd think that the first sentence in a high-profile article like Leviathan would be changed if it were wrong.
I think we might be getting into a WP:LAME area, so I'm really amenable to either decision, but I do note that Wikipedia's style manual does not seem to provide any guidance on this issue. This means that what we decide here may eventually be used to come up with a policy on Wikipedia. superlusertc 2007 December 14, 06:27 (UTC)
Actually, I might just go ahead and add a category for "books with old-fashioned titles," not because I think it's particularly encyclopedic, but because I think that it would help in determining a policy. superlusertc 2007 December 14, 06:30 (UTC)
Hmm, I hadn't noticed yours was a revert, I thought it was a change. Anyway, I still think its called just L, with the rest as subtitle. But that may just be a personal preference; I'm not sure how we could decide this authoritatively William M. Connolley (talk) 21:13, 14 December 2007 (UTC)
I've written a proposal at WP:SUBTITLES. If you have opinions (and it sounds like you do), I'd really like to hear them over there. superlusertc 2007 December 19, 00:51 (UTC)

[edit] Spare text

RJC edited Hobbes for summary style; I've dumped the excess text into the intro here. Perhaps it should be pared down somewhat, I'm not sure William M. Connolley (talk) 12:11, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] More headings

Needs more headings, especially the intro. -- TimNelson (talk) 02:31, 6 February 2008 (UTC)