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What was Enlightenment?

What was Enlightenment?. What was the Enlightenment?. A period of Western European history characterized by a modern philosophical movement What time period? What kind of modern philosophical movement? Commitment to critical thought Commitment to systematic thinking

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What was Enlightenment?

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  1. What was Enlightenment?

  2. What was the Enlightenment? • A period of Western European history characterized by a modern philosophical movement • What time period? • What kind of modern philosophical movement? • Commitment to critical thought • Commitment to systematic thinking • Commitment to human equality and natural rights

  3. ‘The Enlightenment’ vs. ‘enlightenment’ • 18th C. texts don’t mention “The Enlightenment” • Kant, Condorcet, and Herder mention ‘enlightenment’, ‘enlightened’ thinking, etc. • Enlightenment is a way of thinking that is becoming widespread in their lifetimes

  4. Nicolas de Condorcet (1743-1794) Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind (1795)

  5. The Ninth Era • ‘enlightenment’: the state of possessing knowledge; the process of acquiring knowledge • Bacon • Galileo • Descartes • Locke • The Science of Morality begins • Rights of human beings become known • Enlightenment is irreversible, and it’s spread inevitable • Popular vs. Official Revolutions

  6. Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) An Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment? (1784)

  7. What is Enlightenment? • ‘enlightenment’: The state of thinking for oneself; the process of learning to think for oneself • The Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785) • We don’t need education or training in order to know how to be good • Being good = having a good will • The Principle of Universalizability • Act only on maxims that can be made universal laws, and are still achievable • Ex) I will lie on a loan application in order to get a loan

  8. What is Enlightenment? • ‘enlightenment’: The state of thinking for oneself; the process of learning to think for oneself • The Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785) • We don’t need education or training in order to know how to be good • Being good = having a good will • The Principle of Universalizability • Act only on maxims that can be made universal laws, and are still achievable • Ex) I will donate blood in order to save lives

  9. What is Enlightenment? • ‘enlightenment’: The state of thinking for oneself; the process of learning to think for oneself • The Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785) • We don’t need education or training in order to know how to be good • Being good = having a good will • The Principle of Universalizability • Act only on maxims that can be made universal laws, and are still achievable • Ex) I will kill an American in order to erase Americans from the Earth

  10. Johann Gottfried Herder (1744-1803) This Too is a Philosophy of History (1774)

  11. This Too is a Philosophy of History (1774) • ‘enlightenment’: a modern, mechanical style of thinking that takes contemporary, European cultural standards as the measure of humanity • With enlightened thinking we lose: • 1) Originality • 2) Critical Thinking • 3) Ethics • 4) History

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