The master's thesis delivers both the outline and critique of John Finnis's natural law. Throughout
this paper, term »contemporary natural law« is used interchangeably with term »Finnis's natural
law«.
The content of this paper is divided into three parts. The first part introduces a brief elucidation of
Finnis's natural law theory and Finnis's analysis of the interaction between natural and positive
law. On the top of that, certain common perspectives on the interplay between legal positivism and
natural law theories are pointed out. After all, meticulous dissection of those concepts is a
prerequisite of any profound discussion on natural law.
The second part delivers a comprehensive discussion and critical examination of the selected
postulates of Finnis's natural law. An overwhelming majortity of criticism is directed against
Finnis's ignorance of the empirical scientific data and his uncritical acceptance of certain lines of
reasoning. As a result, his natural law theory is considerably counterfactual. Aditionally, it requires
readers' adoption of rather specific reasoning.
Finally, the third part highlights some of Finnis's writing style shortcomings as well as some
informal fallacies that occur within his opus. Those slipups can be attributed to Finnis's rigour
while following a certain train of thought.
All these perspectives make the acceptance of Finnis's natural law arguments and conclusions a
rather hard task for those whose worldview differs from Finnis's.
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