Honors section question for Feb. 16 (and paper questions)
Here a couple of questions we can talk about that will also be paper questions on "The Portable Enlightenment Reader":
- Based on your reading, what are the 2, 3, or 4 most important central ideas, themes, or values found in Enlightenment thought? One way to think about this is, what adjectives would you use to describe the Enlightenment?
- Since the end of the 18th century, a number of times and places have seen backlashes against the Enlightenment. The period from the 1960s to the present has seen one of the most intense of these backlashes. To what extent are the ideas and values of the Enlightenment reflected in modern American culture, and to what extent (and where) do you see Enlightenment patterns of thought being revised, contradicted, or reversed in modern culture?
- Construct your own critique of the Enlightenment, drawing on the "Portable Enlightenment Reader" and other course materials. [Hint: The "Reader" contains a number of selections the criticize aspects of the Enlightenment, including several from the French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau that differ sharply from the views of his fellow philosophes].
posted by Jeff Pasley at 1:50 PM
1 Comments:
Locke proposes many of the enlightenment central ideas including that every man is born on equal plane. The mind should be viewed as a “white paper, void of all characters.” And since every man is born without any knowledge of the world he must gain it through experience and trust his own reason. Kant suggests that man take a greater role in his own education and not pass the buck on to other or be encumbered by a “self-incurred tutelage”. Practical things should be taught in school such as mathematics and for deference to progress focus on a dead language like Latin should be lessened. Liberty and religious tolerance are great virtues. Society should be egalitarian. The only role of government should be as Locke says “to secure every man’s possession of the things of this life.”
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