This question has haunted me for years.
I remember sitting in my wheelchair on a quiet Tirana evening, staring at the city lights flickering below my apartment window, wondering: are we born with goodness in our hearts, or does something darker lurk beneath the surface? It's the kind of question that keeps philosophers up at night and makes the rest of us uncomfortable at dinner parties.
Two thinkers stand at opposite ends of this debate like boxers in a ring. In one corner, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the romantic Swiss philosopher who believed we enter this world pure and uncorrupted. In the other, Niccolò Machiavelli, the pragmatic Italian who saw humanity as fundamentally flawed, held in check only by fear and force.
Who's right?
I'm going to argue something that might frustrate purists on both sides: they both are. And the key to understanding why lies in something neither philosopher fully accounted for—free will.
Rousseau's Beautiful Vision: The Noble Savage
Let me paint you a picture.
Imagine a human being before cities, before governments, before Instagram. Rousseau called this the "state of nature," and he believed it was "most suitable to mankind" . In this primordial existence, people lived simply. They ate when hungry, slept when tired, and reproduced to continue the species. There was no competition, no jealousy, no burning desire to be better than your neighbor.
Rousseau broke sharply with his contemporaries by arguing that people were good prior to the development of civilization, but have been corrupted by society .
This wasn't naive optimism. Rousseau had a specific psychological theory to back it up. He distinguished between two types of self-love: amour de soi and amour propre. The first is healthy—a simple desire for self-preservation. The second is where things get messy.
Amour propre is comparative. It's not about surviving; it's about standing out. Being noticed. Being admired. And here's the kicker: it's a value that must be had at another's expense—we cannot all be the best dancer .
Sound familiar?
Think about social media for a moment. People constantly post pictures of themselves and update others about their daily activities, mainly expecting a response from others, which is instant gratification . Rousseau, writing in the 1700s, essentially predicted the psychological trap of the 21st century. The man never saw a smartphone, yet he understood the human hunger for validation better than most Silicon Valley executives.
The Corruption Begins
So how did we fall from grace?
Rousseau proposed that the development of society had changed human nature itself, corrupting our natural goodness. As people formed larger groups beyond the family, being noticed and esteemed became valuable. To be the best dancer or the best orator became valuable in the community.
This was the first step towards inequality, and towards vice.
The concern that dominates Rousseau's work is to find a way of preserving human freedom in a world where people are increasingly dependent on one another to satisfy their needs . In the modern world, human beings get their very sense of their identity and value from the opinion of others, which Rousseau sees as corrosive of freedom and destructive of individual authenticity .
I feel this tension every day. As President of Free AstroScience, I navigate a world where recognition matters—for funding, for reach, for impact. Yet I also know that the chase for approval can hollow you out if you're not careful.
Rousseau wasn't saying we should abandon society and return to caves. He acknowledged that modern man has evolved so much from his natural state that he is nearly unrecognizable. There's no going back. But understanding how society warps us? That's the first step toward something better.
Machiavelli's Darker Lens
Now let's shift gears entirely.
Niccolò Machiavelli didn't waste time on romantic notions of human goodness. His view was blunt: man is weak, selfish, and corruptible Where Rousseau saw society as the villain, Machiavelli saw it as a necessary cage for the beast within.
Here's what's interesting about Machiavelli's interpretation of human nature—it was greatly shaped by his belief in God. In his writings, Machiavelli conceives that humans were given free will by God, and the choices made with such freedom established the innate flaws in humans .
Read that again.
Machiavelli didn't think we were programmed to be evil like robots following code. He believed we choose it. We have the capacity for good, but we consistently opt for selfishness, greed, and domination. Only the fear of punishment—whether from the state, from God, or from social consequences—keeps our worst impulses in check.
This is a profoundly different starting point than Rousseau's. For Machiavelli, government isn't the corruptor; it's the corrector. Without authority, without consequences, humans would tear each other apart.
The Hobbes Connection
To understand this debate fully, we need to bring in Thomas Hobbes, who influenced both thinkers in different ways.
Hobbes assumed that life in the state of nature would be intolerable. He argued that without police, courts, and other authorities to protect people's lives and belongings from those who would take them, life would be "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short".
Hobbes believed this violence was a result of human nature: human beings are never content merely to satisfy their own needs because they have "a perpetual and restless desire of power after power, that ceaseth only in death" .
Rousseau rejected this completely. He argued that people in their natural state were motivated by amour de soi—a simple love of self that meant living primarily to eat, sleep and reproduce for the continuation of the species. People with such minimal desires could meet their needs without resorting to violence.
While Rousseau accepts Hobbes's anti-Aristotelian contention that human beings are not by nature political animals, he rejects Hobbes's description of the state of nature, accusing Hobbes and others of projecting back onto natural man the vices and psychological characteristics of man already living in society .
This is a brilliant critique. Hobbes looked at the violence and competition around him and assumed it was eternal. Rousseau said: no, you're just describing what society made us, not what we were.
Where Free Will Changes Everything
Here's where I part ways with both philosophers—or rather, where I try to reconcile them.
Both Rousseau and Machiavelli, in their own ways, acknowledged something profound: humans have free will. Machiavelli said it explicitly—our flaws come from the choices we make with our God-given freedom. Rousseau implied it by suggesting we could reform society and redirect our corrupted impulses toward healthier ends.
If we have free will, then we're not locked into being either naturally good or naturally evil. We're capable of both.
I've seen this in my own life. I've witnessed extraordinary kindness from strangers who had nothing to gain. I've also seen cruelty that made me question everything I believed about humanity. The same person can be generous in the morning and petty by afternoon. Context matters. Circumstances matter. Choices matter.
Rousseau was right that society creates pressures that push us toward vanity, competition, and inauthenticity. Machiavelli was right that without structure and accountability, many people will choose selfishness over solidarity.
The truth isn't either/or. It's both/and.
The Social Media Test
Let me give you a modern example that would have fascinated both philosophers.
Social media is commonly understood to be unhealthy to continually check, but it is often still done compulsively. For many people, they are driven towards presenting themselves in the best light for the sake of people responding positively, even at costs to their own mental health.
This is Rousseau's amour propre on steroids. The platform itself isn't evil—it's a tool. But it amplifies our worst tendencies toward comparison, envy, and performance. Society, in this case the digital society, corrupts.
Yet here's the Machiavellian twist: nobody forces us to scroll. Nobody holds a gun to our heads and demands we post. We choose it. We choose the dopamine hit of likes over the quiet satisfaction of genuine connection. Our free will leads us into the trap, even when we know better.
Both philosophers would nod knowingly at this phenomenon, each seeing confirmation of their worldview.
Rousseau's Solution: The General Will
Rousseau didn't think we could return to the state of nature, as he pictured it. Instead, the path forward was to reform how our society works in light of the dangers posed by amour propre .
His solution was the concept of the "general will"—a representation of the collective interest of the members of the society . If political rulings consider the perspectives of all community members, then individuals will see their own desires represented as part of the community. When this is the case, amour propre is no longer destructive; one need not subjugate others for the sake of one's own well-being .
It's an idealistic vision, I'll admit. But it points toward something important: the structures we build shape the people we become. Design better systems, and you might get better behavior.
What This Means for You and Me
So where does this leave us?
I think the debate between Rousseau and Machiavelli isn't really about who's right. It's about which lens is useful in which situation.
When designing institutions—governments, schools, workplaces—Machiavelli's realism is valuable. Assume people will sometimes act selfishly. Build in checks and balances. Create accountability. Don't rely on goodwill alone.
When raising children or building communities, Rousseau's optimism matters. Believe in people's capacity for goodness. Create environments that nurture authenticity rather than competition. Recognize that many of our worst behaviors are responses to broken systems, not expressions of broken souls.
And in your own life? Remember that you have free will. You're not determined by your nature or your society. Every day, you make choices. Some will be selfish. Some will be generous. The goal isn't perfection—it's awareness.
A Personal Reflection
I spend a lot of time thinking about the stars.
There's something humbling about astronomy. The universe doesn't care about our philosophical debates. It doesn't care whether we're naturally good or evil. It just is—vast, indifferent, beautiful.
But here's what I've learned from studying the cosmos: complexity emerges from simple rules. Stars form from hydrogen. Planets coalesce from dust. Life arises from chemistry. And human nature? It emerges from the interaction between our biology, our choices, and our environment.
We're not angels. We're not demons. We're something far more interesting—creatures capable of both, navigating a world that constantly tests us.
Rousseau gave us hope that we can build better societies. Machiavelli gave us the realism to protect ourselves when we fail. And free will gives us the responsibility to choose, moment by moment, who we want to be.
That's not a comfortable answer. But it's an honest one.
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