The Enlightenment

When thinking about the Enlightenment, the discussion of women’s rights may not be something that comes to mind, but there is a major connection between the two. During the Enlightenment, natural rights were considered very often. There were changes being made to benefit people in terms of freedom, political participation and quality of life in general. Today, and throughout time since the Enlightenment, the topic of women’s rights has come up frequently. Although women have the same rights as…

The enlightenment period focused on reasoning and individualism, as happiness and equality became priorities in society. The era was influenced by philosophers such as Voltaire, Rousseau and Montesquieu, along with artists, most notably Amadeus Mozart. The movie Amadeus demonstrates that enlightenment worldviews were slowly being introduced to society, but they were not completely established by the late 18th century. Amadeus expresses the enlightenment worldview F, claiming the purpose of life…

Before the Enlightenment came the Renaissance, along with the people who contributed to it. The Renaissance was a time of learning and creativity throughout Europe, from this the philosophy of humanism erupted. Humanism is the outlook on the idea that the individual was more important rather than a spiritual force or society. This helped people realize that they themselves were important in other ways than producing heirs and crops yearly. And from this realization came the Scientific Revolution…

The Enlightenment movement influenced the departure from a monarchy and religious government for France and served as a catalyst in the French Revolution. The Enlightenment was the embodiment of criticism of government and society. The ideas of the French Enlightenment were secular, scientific, critical, and skeptical. It promoted reasoning, reform, and freedom. When King Louis XVI agreed to call the Estates General in 1788, one question remained, Would the assembly vote by order or head? Abbé…

Some ways enlightenment thinking has shaped modern colleges and universities affects us even as we walk around Texas State University The biggest example of the enlightenment influence through education is that the early philosophers set up a way for every person to have an education, they wanted to give us a way to study not just one subject, but to give us all an overall education through empiricism, such as science, philosophy, social studies, math, reading, and writing. Through of these…

The Age of Enlightenment and the Romantic Movement The age of enlightenment is commonly understood by historians as a period of seminal change in political, philosophical and spiritual attitudes and ideas in the Western World, specifically in Europe. Changes so drastic that they would come to define the world we live in today. Beginning approximately in 1620 and ending around 1780, the Enlightenment consisted of a change from religious faith to reason as a means of understanding the world, and…

Revolutions took lives, ideas, and countries along for the ride as they took over the western world. From the Enlightenment era, all the way to the age of Imperialism, this modern era of the west took hold of progress and drove it into what I feel was a new page in the story of Western Civilization. The start of the first World War in my eyes can be set apart from the…

The Enlightenment was a movement that started in the 18th century that introduced the use of reason. This use of reason was similarly used in the scientific revolution that had begun in the early renaissance but was now being used in philosophy. The big Enlightenment philosophers were Jean Jacques Rousseau, John Locke and Voltaire. Jean Jacques Rousseau wrote a book titled “The Social Contract” and the ‘Social Contact’ is a political theory that an individual relinquishes some of their rights to…

The 18th century Enlightenment can be defined as the beginning of modern sciences where reason started to trump faith, the previously solid theories and sciences of the past were proven wrong and replaced with new information. This lead to the western part of Europe thinking more towards the future as opposed to the traditional way of thinking: looking into the past for answers in the present. People began to look to the present for answers in the future. Although these mindsets and ideas were…

They’re Not Just Dead People The most influential individuals of the Enlightenment Beccaria, Copernicus, Galilei, Hobbes, Locke, Montesquieu, Newton, Rousseau, Wollstonecraft, and Voltaire are all people you have probably heard of before; but did you know that they all have affected the way you live right now. Authors, philosophers, scientists, and martyrs from the Enlightenment still make an impact on your life hundreds of years after their dead. How you might ask. The…