What for, Vol. IX No. 18/19, 2010.
Professional paper
Natural Law, Natural Rights and the Mind in John Locke
Hrvoje Ryznar
orcid.org/0000-0003-2457-7843
; Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences Zagreb
Abstract
In this work I will try to offer a position of defending John Locke’s natural rights theory against a growing number of objections in the fields of contemporary philosophy of politics and social philosophy. Based on a circular but rational conception of the rationality of the natural moral law and the possibility of deriving a natural moral principle out of natural law, Locke establishes a universalistic conception of moral law. This conception, as I attempt to show, resists the criticism about the dependence of Locke’s argument on the theological impulse and retains an argumentative value required for a secular liberal conception of moral life in society. It also anticipates the Enlightenment thinkers’ faith in moral perfectibility and tolerance, the two key assumptions which have formed modern age Europe and continue to influence its societies.
Keywords
Locke; morality; natural law; natural rights; self-sustainment; theology; rationality
Hrčak ID:
61635
URI
Publication date:
3.11.2010.
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