Nava 1

Delanie Nava

Writing 2

Allison Bocchino

Writing Project 1

The theory of law has always been a very controversial topic for people throughout

different societies. Many people have different morals and beliefs which has made it hard for so

many to agree upon laws for their own society. Different academic disciplines have different

ideas and attitudes towards laws and how they should be made. Some disciplines focus more on

natural laws, moral principles regarded as a basis for all human conduct, such as philosophy. The

basis of research for philosophers tends to include many thought experiments and discussions to

define what a law should or shouldn't be. These laws don’t necessarily have a “right” and

‘wrong” to them, as long as ones true intentions to there actions are good there is no serious

repercussion. Other disciplines when studying laws, study man-made laws that have been

conceived throughout our time on Earth. Historians tend to focus on man-made laws and how

they are able to keep different societies under control throughout history. They tend to look at

laws with a more cutthroat view then philosophers do. There is a clear “right” and “wrong” way

to go about following these laws. Those who study history see laws as ​rules that define correct

procedure or behavior and have clear consequences when these rules are broken. This basis of

research typically tends to focus on economic status of a society and how to keep it running

efficiently. Both Historians and Philosophers have different reasoning and thinking behind their

beliefs of what law is and how they address the “correctness” of a law.
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Both disciplines believe that laws are needed in society, however, they disagree in why

the laws are needed. Historians study laws that have been made for efficiency whereas

philosophers study laws that have been discovered by human morals. From the philosophical

point of view, as described in the article “Cultural Evolution, Design and Philosophy”, the

cultural evolution of laws and order changes when “higher levels of information expressed in

knowledge, art and technology” are discovered. (Viniegra 54) In this claim it demonstrates how

in philosophy, natural laws are made when new knowledge is discovered and is the driving

power behind law making for society is knowledge rather than any other reason. This, however,

is not true for the development of laws throughout history. From the historical view laws have

been made with the purpose of achieving “goals of social justice, environmental sustainability,

economic productivity and good governance are interpreted using a sustainability model”.

(Ohlmeier, 5) In this claim it shows how man-made laws are created in order to keep a society

running smoothly and efficiently. These man-made laws created from observing past laws look

for the benefit of society whereas natural laws were created from looking at individuals and

typically only benefiting a smaller group of people.

Another difference between these disciplines in their studies of law is how they gather

information. From a historian’s point of view laws are made with a clear set rule and there is also

a punishment if one breaks that rule. In the article “Civic Education for Sustainable

Development”, laws are made with “the target of social justice” and to “[encompass] social

balance, social services” (Ohlmeier 9). If citizens break laws, they must face repercussion, such

as fines or jailtime, depending on the severity of their actions. Man-made laws gather their

information by implementing rules based on how a society is running and implementing rules
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that will improve the societies standards of living. Using the scientific method, man-made laws

typically start from an observation, then develop from researching and cross referencing past

laws, inorder to create a new law that helps fix the original problem at hand. From a

philosopher’s point of view laws are made from human culture and moral standards. In the

article “Cultural Evolution, Design and Philosophy”, laws are made from “the accumulation and

evolution of results produced by countless design exercises”. (Viniegra 48) There is no direct

repercussion if one were to break a natural law, however, it does show where ones morals are

and could affect how they are viewed within a culture. Natural laws gather their information

from evolution and other knowledge and are applied to ones own set of morals and beliefs. There

is usually no specific problem at hand or situation that needs to be fixed.

Each discipline has a different target when it comes to studying law, whether it is to

improve a problem, protect our safety and many other factors.A big part of looking at laws for

historians is to look at “growth with poverty reduction”. (Ohlmeier 11) When studying laws, it is

important to create them for the benefit of the majority which is typically why man-made laws

are so important. Economic growth has become very important as our society has evolved and it

has become important to create laws that contribute to that factor. There is a direct cause of

man-made laws and when those laws are broken there can be punishments that damage ones life

because the law was created to improve society. When looking at laws from a philosophical

point of view, “there is not a wide consensus on what can happen, or what should be done to

avoid any negative scenario”. (Viniegra 48) This means that natural laws don’t contribute to an

actual cause and effect as there is with man-made laws. This means there is no real punishment
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when breaking natural laws and there is also no real leading factor to the creation of these natural

laws.

Another difference between how different disciplines study the theory of law is that in

natural law, studied by philosophers, there is often religious impact in the laws made because a

lot of people tend to get their morals and beliefs from the faiths they study. In natural law, laws

seem to come from “internal world questions” that we face when learning about the world

around us. (Viniegra 59) As we learn more about ourselves, our natural laws evolve when we

discover more knowledge about our life on Earth and our own morals. In contrast, our man-made

laws that have been made throughout history have been made for “sustainability” and “the

demands that the economy can make”. (Ohlmeier 10) Man-made laws are made in order to grow

an economy. In simple terms, man-made laws are designed for economic growth and natural

laws are designed for self growth.

Some laws may overlap between both disciplines, for example, attempting to preserve

our Earth and reverse the damage created by humans. However, the reasoning behind the beliefs

to do so differ very much. Laws that are man-made to “reduce the ecological footprint” are only

made for the “available biological resources” our Earth has and such laws are only made in order

to get the most out of Earths resources.(Ohlmeier 10) Naturals laws are made to help our

environment for the purpose to keep Earth exactly how it was created. In the article “Cultural

Evolution, Design and Philosophy” it says, “Due to The recurrence of crisis of all types and to

the probable perspective of disasters, such as a global climate change that can create among other

things hunger and massive migration of people, it has become necessary to review the Way in
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which we design human culture.”(Viniegra 48), which demonstrates how natural laws are

created so we can coexist with the Earth and not ruin the environment with our way of living.

We know that philosophy is the study of fundamental nature of knowledge, and it is easy

to see how natural laws are constantly changing because people are always gaining new

knowledge about themselves and the environment around them. The goal of natural laws is to

keep people constantly questioning their intentions and purposes to the world. The study of law

through man-made laws that historians study, tend to follow the scientific theory. History is the

study of past human affairs, which when creating new laws, involves the scientific theory. We

study past laws and see why they were either successful or unsuccessful. Using that data, laws

are either created, abolished or adjusted depending on certain outcomes. Both natural laws and

man-made laws are important when dealing with the problems of different society and even

sometimes have influences on each other. It is important to look at both theories of law when

making decisions about running a society and have a proper implication of each type of law.

Both disciplines look at past studies and research on the same laws, however laws in philosophy

focus on works, such as literature and past human interaction, and laws in history tend to focus

on past “experiments” or laws in order to come up withe the most efficient laws.
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Bibliography

1) Viniegra, C. “CULTURAL EVOLUTION, DESIGN AND PHILOSOPHY.”

International Journal of Sustainable Development and Planning. WIT Press, February 27,

2012. ​https://www.witpress.com/elibrary/sdp-volumes/7/1/572​.

2) Ohlmeier, Bernhard. “Civic Education for Sustainable Development.” Sciendo. Sciendo,

February 2, 2015. https://content.sciendo.com/view/journals/dcse/4/1/article-p5.xml.