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Does anyone have some good sources they could point me to about the origins of the theory of Natural Law? I know the concept originated with the ancients(Socrates, Aristotle, Plato) and was refined by the Philosophes of the Enlightenment. What I am looking for are some specific references from the ancients that point to glimmerings of Natural Law theory.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/natural-law-ethics/http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-politics/ I used some stuff from this book when I wrote my Aristotle paper.Not sure if this can be useful, but do a search on "natural justice" and you'll likely find more stuff by Aristotle. Rhetoric and Politics is where he speaks about natural law/justice the most as well as Nicomachean Ethics, Book V.Within the Stanford links there is more too about Plato.
Check out “Natural Right and Aristotle's Understanding of Justice” by Bernard Yack (available on jstor at AMU) for a somewhat opposing view.
I think the term “Natural Law” may differ depending on the context, so make sure to proceed with caution. My understanding of natural law is rooted in medieval thought, particularly that of Aquinas. I do not think that the Enlightenment philosophers would have borrowed this as a whole, but may have borrowed some components or basic concepts from medieval thought.
I had thought of that and was going to touch on it in my paper. Peoples ideas of what something is evolve over time and ideas are perfect examples of this. What is reasonable in one era may not be reasonable in another.
This is a cry for help. This paper is killing me, I have done plenty of reading on Natural Law theory but I dont have anything more than a vague idea of where to go with this paper. I have a sketched intro and the paper is due in 12 days and i need 15-20 more pages. I am trying to examine how Natural Law theory fed into the political ideals of the French Revolution but I am having a hard time filling in how to structure the paper. What I would like to know is if anyone would be willing to look at my outline and tell me if it makes any sense? I am definitely out of my comfort zone with this one and i want to write a good paper instead of throwing some crap together and calling it good. I could probably get a 50% on this paper and still pass the class but I want to maintain my 4.0 GPA and this class just does not excite me at all. that is why it is one of the last I am taking. After this, I only have to write and defend my theses and I am done with my MA.HELP! ??? ???
Any paper on natural law should have a contrast/comparison between Locke and Hobbes (proponent of arbitrary law). Natural law replaces the divine right of kings in the French Revolution. When comparing to the American Revolution, be careful, as John Philip Reid has argued that natural law had little to do with the American Revolution. Just be mindful of this as I surmise you will have to mention America's revolution too. I would argue that the Enlightenment theories of natural law helped contribute to the formation of modern nation-states where societies based on the rule of law supersede societies previously based on the rule of might (as employed by monarchies). You may take a different direction, but this is usually the way this topic goes.
Sorry, I didn't see this post until just now. I am not terribly familiar how natural law ideas fed into the French Revolution. However, I am familiar how medieval thinkers thought of the natural law and how it could have been used as the basis for social organization. What immediately strikes me is that there must have been some sort of fundamental shift in the understanding of the natural law if it was used as the basis for Catholic theology, and then later what was basically an anti-Catholic push in the Enlightenment era.So, if I were you I would introduce the medieval conception of the natural law and then show it was changed by the 18th century. What is the common elements between the two? What changed? Isn't there some irony involved in all of this? I think you could get into some interesting issues with all of this as you show the transformation of lines of thought.
