Similarities Between Karl Marx And Thomas Paine

Remi Khaghan

Professor Zinkin

Philosophy 147 - A 0

Due: October 10, 2016

David Hume, Karl Marx and Thomas Paine

The "tragedy of the commons" is an economic challenge, where an individual’s pursuit of personal gain outweighs the well-being of the community as a whole. It occurs when everyone tries to reap the greatest benefits from a resource that is common and should be available to all leading. The issue makes the demand for the resource to overwhelm the ability of the resource to supply everyone and in the end; the resource is over-exploited and unable to help anyone. The tragedy of the commons idea was first authored by Garret Hardin, a University of California professor in 1968, who based his arguments on a story about the commons in

Other experts in philosophy such as Karl Max, David Hume, and Thomas Paine also nailed their arguments concerning the tragedy of the commons, with each philosopher stating his point of view towards the same.

According to Karl Max, nature needs extended cycles of birth, growth, and regeneration. Conversely, his perception towards capitalism was different, and he reaffirmed that capitalism required short-term returns. As stated by the philosopher, “the entire spirit of capitalist production, which is oriented towards the most immediate monetary profits, stands in contradiction to agriculture, which has to concern itself with the whole gamut of permanent conditions of life required by the chain of human generations” (Loat and Michael

He concluded that nothing is natural about private property. Hume reaffirmed that the natural transition and looseness from one individual to the other, and the contrariety of our passions mean that any circumstance, where we use or hold resources can always be easily disrupted. Ostensibly, it is evident from his assertions that until social rules stabilize personal possessions, and then there is no security between the relationship of people and things. It would be normal according to this philosopher to think that there is a secure relation between people and nature. For instance, someone might think that he or she holds the moral right to something that he or she has made and that the society ought to have an obligation of giving moral backing to an individual’s morally right (Loat and Michael). Nevertheless, based on Hume’s point of view, the society should not just have the normal perception about what the community should rule, but what it has to set up, before reaching conclusions about the normative significance of the relationship between people and