The overwhelming number of Hobbesians on the right and the rejection of dialectics that comes with this means that we have to be able to identify this ideology in relation to our own and so ill be addressing some of Leviathan here. An overwhelming theme of Hobbes is the rejection
of Aristotle (and the Neoplatonists) and an attempt to place the roots of philosophy firmly in Europe (developing the idea of the West), an ahistorical event that places materialism as being rooted in Western(sic) philosophy. So, the first target that he takes on is sense, which
he correctly says is rooted in experience, no marxist should have an argument at this point. He then moves to chapter 2 where he finds imagination. Here, he says that imagination (and all of its varied forms) as simply a result of exterior experiences. That you have thoughts only
because of stimulus, on the surface this seems correct, that we need external stimulus to have imagination, and to some extent it is. Where we take a turn when he begins to talk about the human ability to foresee events. So, here chapter 2 and 3 begin to blend. He identifies that
we can ONLY imagine that which has been seen, that there is no ability of man to supercede that which he HAS SEEN. In effect this creates a world that is purely material. That your ability to think has absolutely 0 effect and that all thoughts are based on a bourgeois causality
where in one follows the other in a mechanical and deterministic order. That this is an inescapable reality, which if true means that the world isn't malleable; you are in your role because of fate (a concept he claims to oppose but reifies in his opposition to platonic forms).
He then says that the past exists only in memory, the present in nature, and the future not at all (impossible given his premise that all thought is simply a result of the external not under your control). He does contend that outcomes can be predicted (prudence) but in doing so
says that this is only possible based on personal experience (I have never seen a rhinoceros, I am quite certain it is larger than me). And that we can only have a frame of reference by direct knowledge. But all of this is secondary. You see, the goal of this rejection is not to
establish himself as the purveyor of all knowledge, but rather the enforcement of a creation of The West as it were. He takes the place of philosophy from Aristotle and his successors (through a series of arguments based on misreading them) and as a result makes the enlightenment
discreet from the Middle East and African philosophers who advanced human thought in the time since Aristotle. Not only that, he denies the kernel of materialism in all the philosophers before him, again, from Greater Syria and Egypt respectively. The work of Thales, that the
Whole world is water, is in essence a materialist philosophy. It is based on his economic reality as a sailor, but also essentially, it is a result of his interactions with Greater Syria. By removing this history and making these philosophers non-essential, he furthers a project
that is in its not fully developed yet, the expansion of the British Empire. By justifying Europe (especially Western and Northern) as the root of knowledge they can justify the expansion of "civilization".
As a result of this trend, the Spenglerian Decline of the West comes about as the logical conclusion of these projects and the fascist project is born. You see, by positioning the "West" (a non existent creation) as the root of civilization, its fall must mean that its fall is
likewise the fall of civilization, and the rise of the Alien Other. Adornos greatest failing is that his critique of this thought serves eventually to reify it. Likewise with Engels and his fear of the "Slavic Tsars" while the Freikorps had already been formed as a mercenary
troop following the previous German revolution.
