What is Law?

This chapter was probably the chapter we had the most discussions in class and really all of the things in it can be taken a different way by anyone. The first thing we learned in the class was what was law. You could take the some of the book definitions such as legal documents setting forth rules governing a particular kind of activity or the collection of rules imposed by authority. However, does law have to be controlled by some sort of authority or could it just be something that just exists. If you think about it law is really just a set of rules enforced by someone or something. It doesn't just have to be one person or one group. It could be an entire civilization that enforces the law. Who creates law though? Does it naturally exist or did someone make a book of laws. I believe that some laws naturally exist inside people, but really law doesn't take form until its actually practiced in a society. Now what is a society? If you look at the picture above I would define this as society. These people all have similar beliefs and culture and are all commemorating an idea. Some say society it is a group of people who choose to live together, but really its more than that. I learned from this chapter that a society needs to at least share some similar characteristics, such as beliefs, values, norms, symbols, technology, or language. They don't have to share all of them, but really if they don't share any of them their just a group of people around each other not a society. Personally in my opinion the philosophical part of this chapter shouldn't be taken too literally. All of the theory's that were presented are all just opinions of the people who wrote them. I believe that everyone should just take their own belief on what law is rather than following others. Coming up I will discuss chapter two: law and justice and what they mean to me.