Week 13 · Readings & resources

Week 13 — Readings & Resources

Introduction to Philosophy Free sample edition

Your primary reading is Chapter 13 (in this module). Everything below is the optional, go-deeper layer — pick what helps, skip the rest.

How to use this page

This page has 11 items (5 readings and 6 videos). Allow 85–107 minutes for everything. Each group points back to the matching chapter section and class-session segment, so use the full menu when you want more depth, or take the quick path below.

Every video here has captions: turn them on with the CC button in the player. The chapter covers the same ideas in text.

Pick-one quick path (18–20 min total)

① Why anyone may rule: the social contract

Chapter 13, Section “Meet Hobbes: the war of every one against every one” · Session 1, Segment 1, “Legitimacy, Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau” · Remember: the state of nature is a thought experiment about life with no government, not a time in history.

Leviathan, by Thomas Hobbes — Project Gutenberg — the whole Leviathan in Hobbes's own English and his own spelling, free to read online. Choose Read online now and search it for the words solitary, poore to find the pinned sentence about the life of man; the lines right before it list what life without a common power would lack, from industry and building to arts and letters. Check the spelling word for word against the course's pinned Q9. Most of this long book goes beyond this week. (reading, 10–15 min)
Contractarianism: Crash Course Philosophy #37 — CrashCourse — an episode that opens on a world with no rules, walks through Hobbes's state of nature, and shows rational people trading some freedom for security, with a trade of avocados for mangoes as a spoken agreement and everyday rules no one signed as an unspoken one. It closes on why a fair agreement must leave each person free and better off. Three slips to catch: it quotes Hobbes's sentence in modern spelling and without its opening words, so check it against the pinned Q9; it calls Hobbes's war one of all against all, which is Dataset J's wording, not Hobbes's; and it says Hobbes was probably right, a verdict the course does not give. Its prisoners' dilemma story goes beyond this week. (video, 10 min) (captions: creator)
John Locke's Social Contract & Liberalism - Explained and Debated — Philosophy Vibe — an animated conversation between two speakers that sets Locke's state of nature beside Hobbes's, names the natural rights to life, liberty, and property, and explains a government of limited power that rests on the consent of the people. It adds that people may remove a government that fails them, and then presses two worries: where natural rights come from, and whether that freedom to remove rulers breeds instability. The automatic captions spell the book's title as two treaties; it is the Two Treatises of Government. Its remarks on later political movements go beyond this week. (video, 6 min) (captions: automatic)
Introduction to Rousseau: The Social Contract — Then & Now — an eight-minute introduction that dates The Social Contract to 1762 and explains why Rousseau rejects natural authority and the right of the strongest as grounds for rule, then sets out the general will as the sovereign, with small states and direct voting. It quotes Rousseau's opening line and his phrase about being forced to be free in a translation the course does not pin, so describe those ideas in your own words. Its account of self-love and comparison, and its claims about Rousseau's later influence, go beyond this week. Stop here before ubuntu's idea that a person is a person through other persons; next week takes that up. (video, 9 min) (captions: automatic)
Social Contract Theory — Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy — a reference article. Read the sections on Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau, then the section on Rawls's A Theory of Justice: together they trace the move from a war of all against all, to a peaceful state of nature with natural law, to the general will, to the veil of ignorance and Rawls's 2 principles with liberty ranked first. The article does not quote Hobbes's pinned sentence, and its section on a later contract theorist and its closing critiques go beyond this week. (reading, 15–20 min)

② Where power has to stop: liberty and pleasure

Chapter 13, Section “Meet Mill: the harm principle” · Session 1, Segment 2, “Mill's harm principle and argument 5” · Remember: the harm principle permits limits that protect other people and forbids limits that protect you only from yourself.

On Liberty, by John Stuart Mill — Project Gutenberg — the whole essay in Mill's own English, free to read online. Choose Read online now and search it for the words prevent harm to others to find Q10, then check it word for word against the course's pinned wording, spelling of civilised included. Right after it, Mill says a person's own good is not enough reason to compel them, though it is a good reason to argue with or persuade them. His later discussion of thought, speech, and individuality goes beyond this week. (reading, 10–15 min)
Nozick's Experience Machine - Philosophical Arguments in a Nutshell — Philosophical Questions — a ninety-second sketch of Nozick's machine as an argument against hedonism, the view that pleasure and the avoidance of pain are the only things of value: scientists could stimulate your brain so that you would feel you were writing a great novel or making a friend while you floated in a tank, so should you plug in for life? Nozick takes the answer to be no, which suggests that we value something besides pleasure, such as living an authentic life. The video names a film that made the idea popular and ends by asking whether you are convinced; it gives no reply from the hedonist's side, so try writing one yourself, the way the course answers every objection. This builds on Week 11's work with Bentham's pain and pleasure. (video, 2 min) (captions: automatic)

③ Choosing from behind the veil

Chapter 13, Section “Step behind the veil of ignorance” · Session 2, Segment 3, “Rawls's veil and Nozick's entitlement theory” · Remember: the veil hides facts about you, such as wealth and talents, and leaves general knowledge about how societies work.

Rawls: Original Position and Veil of Ignorance Explained — Philosophy Vibe — an animated conversation in which one speaker objects that people are too self-interested, and too loyal to their own groups, to bargain fairly, and the other answers with the veil: forget your race, sex, religion, wealth, and what you value, keep your reason, and ask what you would choose. It shows why no one behind the veil would give fewer rights to a group they might turn out to belong to, and why choosers can still bargain for themselves while the veil keeps the result fair. Rawls's 2 principles are not named in this clip, so take them from Chapter 13. Use it while working through the Week-13 module overview. (video, 5 min) (captions: automatic)
What is the Veil of Ignorance? (Philosophical Definition) — Carneades.org — a short definition video that sets Rawls's justice as fairness beside older ideas of justice, then explains the original position and a veil that hides race, gender, income, and personal values while leaving general facts. Its summary of what the choosers would pick does not match Rawls's 2 principles as Chapter 13 states them, so correct it with equal basic liberties and the difference principle. Its closing worry, that choosers who forget history may overlook groups with particular needs, is the speaker's own objection; weigh it the way the course weighs every objection, with a reply from Rawls's side. (video, 5 min) (captions: automatic)
Veil of Ignorance — Ethics Unwrapped — a short glossary entry from a business-ethics explainer series. It explains that our own situations bias our views of fairness, so Rawls asks us to reason without knowing our place, and it names a liberty principle and a difference principle. Its wording folds a point about open opportunity into the difference principle, so compare it with Chapter 13's definitions and keep the course's wording. Its embedded video is optional. (reading, 3–5 min)

Optional one-stop reference (free online reference)

Original Position, section 3: The Veil of Ignorance — online Encyclopedia of Philosophy (reference entry) — read section 3 for what the veil hides and what it leaves the choosers, and why Rawls makes it so thick; the later sections on the arguments for the principles are good extra depth, and the historical background can be skipped. (reading, 10–15 min)

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