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Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) -

British economist is most often associated with his theory of utilitarianism. Bentham's views ran counter to Adam Smith's vision of "natural ." He believed in utilitarianism, or the that all social actions should be evaluated by the "It is the greatest of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong." Unlike Smith, Bentham believed that there were no natural rights to be interfered with.

Trained in law, Bentham never practiced, choosing instead to focus on judicial and legal reform. His reform plans went beyond rewriting legislative acts to include detailed administrative plans to implement his proposals. In his plan for prisons, workhouses, and institutions, Bentham devised compensation schemes, building designs, worker timetables, and even new accounting systems. A guiding of Bentham's schemes was that incentives should be designed "to make it each man's interest to observe on every occasion that conduct which it is his duty to observe." Interestingly, Bentham's thinking led him to the conclusion, one he shared with Smith, that professors should not be salaried.

In his early years Bentham professed a free-market approach. He argued, for example, that interest rates should be free from government control. (See Defence of Usury.) But by the end of his life, he had shifted to a more interventionist stance. He predated Keynes in his advocacy of expansionist monetary policies to achieve full employment and advocated a range of interventions, including the minimum wage and guaranteed employment.

His publications were few, but Bentham influenced many during his lifetime and lived to see some of his political reforms enacted shortly before his death in London at the age of eighty-four.

Selected Works

Defence of Usury. 1787.

• Defence of Usury. Payne and Foss. 1818. (4th edition, last in Bentham's lifetime.)

An Introduction to the of Morals and Legislation. 1789.

• An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation. Clarendon Press. 1907. (Reprint of the 1823 edition, last in Bentham's lifetime, which was corrected and modified by Bentham) • Reprint, edited by J. H. Burns and H. L. A. Hart. 1970.

The Theory of Legislation. 1802.

• Reprint, edited by C. K. Ogden. 1931.

For more works by Jeremy Bentham, see the OLL.

Friedrich Nietzsche - Elitism

Friedrich Nietzsche was born on October 15, 1844, in Rocken, . His father, a Lutheran minister, died when Nietzsche was five, and Nietzsche was raised by his mother in a home that included his grandmother, two aunts, and a sister.

He studied classical philology at the universities of Bonn and and was appointed professor of classical philology at the University of Basel at the age of 24.Ill health (he was plagued throughout his life by poor eyesight and migraine headaches) forced his retirement in 1879. Ten years later he suffered a mental breakdown from which he never recovered. He died in on August 25, 1900.

In addition to the influence of Greek culture, particularly the of and , Nietzsche was influenced by the German Schopenhauer, by the theory of , and by his friendship with the German composer . A prolific writer, he wrote several major works, among them The Birth of (1872; trans. 1966), Thus Spoke Zarathustra 1883-1885; trans. 1954), Beyond and (1886; trans. 1966), On the of Morals (1887; trans. 1966), (1888; trans. 1954), Ecce Homo (1889; trans. 1966), and The to Power (1901; trans. 1910). One of Nietszche's fundamental contentions was that traditional values (represented primarily by Christianity) had lost their power in the lives of . He expressed this in his proclamation "." He was convinced that traditional values represented a "slave ," a morality created by weak and resentful individuals who encouraged such behavior as gentleness and kindness because the behavior served their interests. Nietzsche claimed that new values could be created to replace the traditional ones, and his discussion of the possibility led to his of the overman or superman.

According to Nietzsche, the masses, whom he termed the herd or mob, conform to tradition, whereas his overman is secure, independent, and highly individualistic. The overman feels deeply, but his passions are rationally controlled. Concentrating on , rather than on the rewards of the next world promised by religion, the overman affirms life, including the and pain that accompany human . His overman is a creator of values, a creator of a "master morality," (not "!") that reflects the strength and independence of one who is liberated from all values, except those that he deems valid. Nietzsche maintained that all human behavior is motivated by the . In its positive sense, the will to power is not simply power over others, but the power over oneself that is necessary for . Such power is manifested in the overman's independence, creativity, and originality. Although Nietzsche explicitly denied that any overmen had yet arisen, he mentions several individuals who could serve as models. Among these models he lists , Jesus, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Shakespeare, Goethe, Julius Caesar, and Napoleon. The concept of the overman has often been interpreted as one that postulates a master-slave society and has been identified with totalitarian philosophies. Many scholars deny the connection andattribute it to misinterpretation of Nietzsche's works. –

"John Rawls, was the James Bryant Conant University Professor Emeritus at Harvard University, whose 1971 book, "A Theory of " argued persuasively for a based on equality and rights.

Rawls is considered by many to be the most important political philosopher of the second half of the 20th century and a powerful advocate of the liberal perspective.

In "A Theory of Justice", Rawls sets forth the proposition that "Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override. Therefore, in a just society the rights secured by justice are not to political bargaining or to the calculus of social interests."

Born in Baltimore, Maryland, Rawls attended the Kent School in Kent, Conn., and earned a B.A. degree from Princeton in 1943. He served in the armed forces from 1943 to 1945, returning to Princeton the following year to take up graduate studies. He received his Ph.D. in 1950.

Before joining the Harvard Philosophy Department in 1962, he was an instructor at Princeton (1950-52), assistant and associate professor of philosophy at Cornell (1953-59), and professor of philosophy at M.I.T. (1960-62). He was appointed the Conant University Professor at Harvard in 1979. University professors hold Harvard’s highest professorial posts. These special endowed positions were established in 1935 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College for "individuals of distinction ... working on the frontiers of knowledge, and in such a way as to cross the conventional boundaries of the specialties."

In addition to "A Theory of Justice" (nominated for a National Book Award), his publications include "Political " (1993), "Collected Papers" (1999), "Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy" (2000), and "Justice as Fairness: A Restatement" (2001)." Robert Nozick -

Nozick, known for his wide-ranging and engaging as both writer and teacher, had taught a course on the Russian Revolution during the fall semester and was planning to teach again in the spring. His last major book, "Invariances: The Structure of the Objective World," was published by Harvard University Press in October 2001...

Nozick's controversial and challenging views gained him considerable attention and influence in the world beyond the .

His first book, "Anarchy, State, and Utopia" (1974), transformed him from a young philosophy professor known only within his profession to the reluctant theoretician of a national political movement.

He wrote the book as a critique of "Theory of Justice" (1971), by his Harvard colleague John Rawls, the James Bryant Conant University Professor Emeritus. Rawls' book provided a philosophical underpinning for the bureaucratic welfare state, a methodically reasoned argument for why it was right for the state to redistribute wealth in order to help the poor and disadvantaged.

Nozick's book argued that the rights of the individual are primary and that nothing more than a minimal state - sufficient to protect against violence and theft, and to ensure the enforcement of contracts - is justified. "Anarchy, State, and Utopia" won the National Book Award and was named by The Literary Supplement as one of "The Hundred Most Influential Books Since the War."

A former member of the radical left who was converted to a libertarian perspective as a graduate student, largely through his reading of conservative economists Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman, Nozick was never comfortable with his putative status as an ideologue of the right.

In a 1978 article in The New York Times Magazine he said that "right-wing people like the pro-free-market argument, but don't like the arguments for individual in cases like gay rights - although I view them as an interconnecting whole. ..."

Whether they agreed or disagreed with the political implication of the book, critics were nearly unanimous in their appreciation for Nozick's lively, accessible writing style. In a discipline known for arduous writing, Nozick's approach was hailed as a breath of fresh air.

He explained his approach in the article cited above: "It is as though what want is a way of saying something that will leave the person they're talking to no escape. Well, why should they be bludgeoning people like that? It's not a nice way to behave."

Despite the notoriety and influence that his first book brought him, Nozick moved on to explore very different territory in his second book, "Philosophical Explanations" (1981). This need to be intellectually on the move at all times characterized his career. He once told an interviewer, "I didn't want to spend my life writing 'The Son of Anarchy, State, and Utopia.'"

In "Philosophical Explanations," Nozick took on subjects that many academic philosophers had dismissed as irrelevant or meaningless, such as versus and the of subjective , and why there is something rather than nothing. In dealing with these questions, he rejected the idea of strict philosophical proof, adopting instead a of philosophical pluralism.

"There are various philosophical views, mutually incompatible, which cannot be dismissed or simply rejected," he wrote in "Philosophical Explanations." "Philosophy's output is the basketful of these admissible views, all together." Nozick suggested that this basketful of views could be ordered according to criteria of coherence and adequacy and that even second- and third-ranked views might offer valuable and .

Nozick continued to develop his theory of philosophical pluralism in his next book, "The Examined Life" (1989), an exploration of the individual's relation to that, once again, emphasized explanation rather than proof.

In his book, "The Nature of Rationality" (1995), Nozick asked what function principles serve in our daily life and why we don't simply act on whim or out of self- interest. "Socratic Puzzles" (1997) was a collection of essays, articles, and reviews, plus several examples of Nozick's philosophical short fiction.

His next work, "Invariances: The Structure of the Objective World," (2001) looks at the nature of and objectivity and examines the function of subjective in an objective world. It also scrutinizes truth in and discusses whether truth in general is relative to culture and social factors.

Nozick's teaching followed the same lively, unorthodox, heterogeneous as his writing. With one exception, he never taught the same course twice. The exception was "The Best Things in Life," which he presented in 1982 and '83, attempting to derive from the class discussion a general theory of values. The course description called it an exploration of "the nature and of those things deemed best, such as friendship, love, intellectual understanding, sexual , achievement, adventure, play, luxury, fame, power, enlightenment, and ice cream."

...Nozick, who grew up in Brooklyn and attended public school there, came to philosophy via a paperback version of Plato's "Republic," which he found intellectually thrilling. Nozick described the experience in his 1989 book, "The Examined Life" - "When I was 15 years old, or 16, I carried around on the streets of Brooklyn a paperback copy of Plato's ‘Republic'; front cover facing outward. I had read only some of it and understood less, but I was excited by it and knew it was something wonderful."