Emergence of Enlightenment
Condorcet
French philosopher (1760's) He advocated for gender equality. Educational reform and women's rights. He was one of the major Revolutionary formulators of the ideas of progress or the indefinite perfectability of humankind. He took active part in preparation of the "Encyclopedia" with d'Alembert. He wrote "Essay on the Application of Analysis to the Probability of majority decisions" an important work which lead to the doctrine of probability.
Enlightened despotism
It is also called benevolent despotism, a form of government in the 18th century in which absolute monarchs pursued legal, social, and educational reforms inspired by the Enlightenment
Skepticism
nothing can ever be known beyond all doubt
natural law and natural rights
"natural rights" according to John Locke meant rights basic to all men because all have the ability to reason. The government should protect the natural rights of life, liberty and property. Under a tyrannical government, people have the natural right to rebellion. Natural law is a philosophy stating that certain rights are inherent by virtue of human nature. A body of unchanging moral principles regarded as a basis for all human conduct
John Locke
(1632-1704) Physician and member of the Royal Society, set forth a new theory about how human beings learn and form their ideas. He believed that all ideas are derived from experience. Human development is therefore determined by education and social institutions. Locke's essay contributed to the theory of sensationalism, the idea that all human ideas and thoughts are produced as a result of sensory impressions. He provided a systematic justification of Bacon's emphasis on the importance of observation and experimentation. His work "Essay Concerning Human Understanding" was one of the dominant intellectual inspirations of the Enlightenment. Locke's political theory insisted on the sovereignty of the elected Parliament against the authority of the Crown.
Pierre Bayle
1647-1706 French Protestant or Huguenot. He took refuge from government persecution in the tolerant Dutch Republic. He critically examined the religious beliefs and persecutions of the past. He concluded that nothing can ever be known beyond all doubt, a view know as skepticism. He wrote an influential book "Dictionary"
Baron de Montesquieu
1689-1755. Brilliantly pioneered Enlightenment approach in the "Persian Letters". Amusing letters supposedly written by two Persian travelers who as outsiders saw European custom in unique ways thereby allowing Montesquieu for criticizing existing practices and beliefs. He used wit as a weapon against cruelty and superstition in Europe. He then turned his attention to study of history and politics. He set out to apply the critical method to the problem of government in "the Spirit of Laws". The result was a complex comparative study of republics, monarchies and despotisms (a country or political system where the ruler holds absolute power). He focused on the conditions that would promote liberty and prevent tyranny. He argued for a separation of powers with political power divided and shared by a variety of classes and legal estates. He admired the English balance of powers. He believed that in France the thirteen high courts (the parlements) were frontline defenders of liberty against royal despotism.
Voltaire (Franquis Marie Arouet)
1694-1778.The most famous and most representative philosophe. He wrote more than 70 witty volumes, socialized with royalty and died a millionaire. In the beginning he was arrested twice for insulting noblemen. He fled to England to escape long prison sentence. When he returned to France he met Madem du Chatelet. She invited him to live in her country house in Cirey in Lorraine. He mixed the glorification of science and reason with an appeal for better individuals and institutions. He was a reformer and not a revolutionary in politics. He pessimistically concluded that the best one could hope for in the way of government was a good monarch. He felt that human beings are very rarely worthy to govern themselves. He praised Louise XIV and admired King Frederick the Great of Prussia. He did not believe in social and economic equality. He was more radical in his view of religion. He challenged the Catholic church and Christin theology at almost every point. He believed in God but he envisioned God as one who set the universe in motion and then ceased to intervene in human affairs. He hated all forms of religious intolerance. Simple piety and human kindness "love God and your neighbors as yourself" was religious enough.
Jean-Jaques Rousseau
1712-1778. Son of a poor Swiss watchmaker. he made his way into the Parisian Enlightenment. He contributed music to the Encyclopedia. He neurotic and started to believe that the philosophes were plotting against him. He broke away from them in mid-1750's. He was passionately committed to individual freedom. Unlike them he attacked rationalism and civilization as destroying rather than liberating the individual. Warm, spontaneous feeling had to complement and correct cold intellect. His ideals greatly influenced the early romantic movement which rebelled against the culture of the Enlightenment in the late 18th century. He also called for a rigid division of gender roles. He felt that women and men were radically different beings. He felt that women should have a subordinate in social life. His criticism led to calls for privileged women to renounce their frivolous ways and stay at home to care for their children. His contribution to political theory in "The Social Contract" was based on 2 fundamental concepts: the general will and popular sovereignty. The general will is sacred and absolute, reflecting the common interests of all the people who have displaced the monarch as the holder of sovereign power. His idea of general will had impact on the political aspirations of the American and French Revolutions. Rousseau was both one of the most influential voices of the Enlightenment and in his rejection of rationalism and social discourse, a harbinger of reaction against Enlightenment ideas.
Denis Diderot
1713-1784 He and Jean le Rond d'Alembert wrote the "Encyclopedia". They examined the rapidly expanding whole of human knowledge. They set out to teach people how to think critically and objectively about all matters. Encyclopedia contained 72,000 articles by leading scientists, writers, skilled workers and progressive priests and it treated every aspect of life and knowledge. Science and the industrial arts were exalted, religious and immorality questions. Intolerance, legal injustice and out of date social institutions were criticized. Greater knowledge would result in greater human happiness. Knowledge made possible economic, social and political progress.
David Hume
1722-1776 Lived in Edinburgh. He emphasized on civic morality and religious skepticism. He built on Locke's teachings on learnings, Hume argued that the human mind is really nothing but a bundle of impressions. These impressions originate only in sensory experiences and our habits of joining these experiences together. He stated that our ideas ultimately reflect only our sensory experiences, our reason cannot tell us anything about questions that cannot be verified by sensory experience. Paradoxically, Hume rationalistic inquiry ended up disrupting the Enlightenment's faith in the power of reason.
Immanuel Kant
1724-1804 Professor of East Prussia was the greatest German philosopher of his day. He published "What is Enlightenment?"Have the courage to use your own understanding is therefore the motto of enlightenment. He argued that if intellectuals were granted the freedom to exercise their reason publicly in print, enlightenment would almost surely follow. He felt that in private lives, individuals must obey all laws no matter how unreasonable and should be punished for impertinent criticism. He tried to reconcile absolute monarchical authority and religious faith with a critical public sphere.
Cesare Beccaria
1738-1794, Northern Italy. A nobleman educated at Jesuit schools and the University of Pavia. His "on Crimes and Punishments" was a passionate plea for reform of the penal system that condemned the use of torture, arbitrary imprisonment and capital punishment and advocated the prevention of crime over the reliance on punishment. This text was translated into French and English and made an impact throughout Europe.
Mary Wollstonecraft
1759-1797. English writer. She wrote "A Vindication of the Rights of Man" in 1790 which attacked the writing of Edmund Burk. Burk defended inherited privileges. He glorified Britain's unrepresentative parliament. She opposed such rights. She also wrote more famous "A vindication of the rights of Woman" in 1792. She demanded equal rights for women and advocated for coeducation of women with men out of the belief that it would make women better wives and mothers, good citizens and economicall independent.
Public Sphere
An idealized intellectual space that emerged in Europe during the Enlightenment, where the public came together to discuss important issues relating to society, economic, and politics. Examples, coffeehouses, book clubs, debating societies, Masonic lodges and newspapers. Public Sphere celebrated open debate informed by critical reason.
Baruch Spinoza (Benedict)
Dutch Jewish philosopher (1632-1677). He borrowed Descartes's emphasis on rationalism and his methods of deductive reasoning and rejected the French thinker's mind-body dualism. He believe that mind and body are united in one substance and that God and nature were merely two names for the same thing. He thought that good and evil were merely relative values and our actions were shaped by outside circumstances, and not free will. He was excommunicated by the large Jewish community for his controversial religious ideas.
Haskalah
Enlightenment movement developed from within the European Jewish community. Led by Prussian philosopher Moses Mendelssohn. This movement tried to provide freedom and civil rights for European Jews. In accordance with the Enlightenment thinking, Christians and Jewish philosopher argued that restrictions on religious grounds would not be allowed. Haskalah lead controversial changes within the Jewish communities such as loosening the rabbi control and increased interaction with Christians.
Why France was the hub of Enlightenment in mid-18th century
First, French was the international language of the educated classes and French was the wealthiest and most populous country in Europe at that time. Second, the rising unpopularity of King Louis XV and his mistresses generated growing discontent and calls for reform among the educated elite. Third, the French philosophes made it their goal to reach a larger audience of elites, many of whom were joined together in a concept inherited from the Renaissance known as the Republic of Letters.
Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibnez
German philosopher and mathematician (1646-1716) who developed calculus independently of Isaac Newton and disagreed with both Cartesian dualism and Spinoza's monism (the idea that there is only one substance in the universe). He adoped the idea of an infinite number of substances or "monads" from which all matter is composed. His "Theodicy" declared that ours must be the best of all possible worlds because it was created by an omnipotent and benevolent God.
Philosophes
Group of French intellectuals who proclaimed that they were bringing the light of knowledge to their fellow humans in the Age of Enlightenment. They were bringing the light of reason to their ignorant fellow humans. In the mid 18th Century, France became a hub of Enlightenment thought.
Moses Mendelssohn
Prussian philosopher who lead the Haskalah movement. He was a Jewish boy who left his parents living in central Germany and lived in Berlin. He traveled to Prussia. He learned German, Latin, Greek, French and English. He studied Jewish laws but he was fascinated by the new ideas of Enlightenment. He studied mathematics and Enlightenment philosophy. He felt that Enlightenment teachings need not be opposed to Jewish thoughts and religion. He concluded that reason could complement and strengthen religion. He wrote "On the Immortality of the Soul" in 1767. He used the philosophical teachings of Socrates and this followers in ancient Greece to argue that the human soul lived forever. He refused to bring religion and critical thinking into conflict. He reflected the German Enlightenment which generally supported established religion. French Enlightenment attacked religion.
Salon
Regular social gathering held by talented and rich Parisians in their homes, where philosophes and their followers met to discuss literature, science and philosophy. Salons were sites in which the philosophes, the French nobility and the prosperous middle classes intermingled and influenced one another while maintaining due deference to social rank. The salon represented an accommodation between the ruling classes and the leaders of Enlightenment thought. Critical thought about almost any question became fashionable and flourished alongside hopes for human progress through greater knowledge and enlightened public opinion.
Enlightenment
Scientific revolution was important factor in the creation of the new worldview of the 18th century Enlightenment. The influential intellectual and cultural movement of the late 17th and 18th centuries that introduced a new worldview based on the use of reason, the scientific method and progress. First concept, the methods of natural science could and should be used to examine and understand all aspects of life. Nothing was to be accepted on faith. Second concept, the scientific method was capable of discovering the laws of human society as well as those of nature. Third key idea was progress. Armed with the proper method of discovering the laws of human existence, Enlightenment thinkers believed it was possible for human beings to create better societies and better people.
Adam Smith
Scottish Enlightenment. He wrote "the theory of Moral Sentiment in 1795. He argued that the thriving commercial life of the 18th Century produced civic virtue through the values of competition, fair lay and individual autonomy. In "An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776) Smith attacked the laws of regulations that prevented commerce from reaching its full capacity.
Rationalism
Secular, critical way of thinking in which nothing was to be accepted on faith and everything was to be submitted to reason.
secularism
Secularism is the principle of the separation of government institutions and persons mandated to represent the state from religious institutions and religious dignitaries. The principle of separation of the state from religious institutions
Madem Du Chatelet
She studied physics and mathematics and published scientific articles and translations including the first and only translation of Newtons' Principia into French. She was excluded from the Royal Academy of Sciences because she was a woman. She had no doubt that woman's limited role in science was due to their unequal education. She wrote that if she was a ruler, she would reform an abuse which cuts off half the human race. She would make women participate in all the rights of humankind and above all in those of the intellect.
State of nature
The state of nature is a concept in moral and political philosophy used in religion, social contract theories and international law to denote the hypothetical conditions of what the lives of people might have been like before societies came into existence. In political theory, the real or hypothetical condition of human beings before or without political association. Many social-contract theorists, such as Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, relied on this notion to examine the limits and justification of political authority or even, as in the case of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the legitimacy of human society itself. Visions of the state of nature differ sharply between theorists, although most associate it with the absence of state sovereignty.
Reading Revolution
The transition in Europe from a society where literacy consisted of patriarchal and communal reading of religious texts to a society where literacy was common place and reading material was broad and diverse.
Social contract
Written in 1762 by Jean-Jacques Rousseau. It was based on two fundamental concepts: the general will and popular sovereignty. The general will is sacred and absolute, reflecting the common interests of all the people, who have displaced the monarch as the holder of sovereign power.
