Philosophes of the Enlightenment

- Some philosophes during the Enlightenment didn't even like to stick with the ideas of the other Enlightenment thinkers, and started to branch out with their own thoughts.

David Hume

• Although he was totally into coming up with one's own thoughts, his ideas were undercutting the whole Enlightenment he was a part of.  

How, then, did David Hume undermine the Enlightenment?
             -- To start, let's look at Hume's basic beliefs :
-  One of Hume's prominent beliefs was that the human mind was made up of a bundle of impressions. These impressions, however, came from sense experience. Therefore, because our mind joins different sense experiences together, it has all these impressions inside it.

              -  I know, this probably isn't helpful in explaining how he undermined the Enlightenment.

So, in other words:  

-  Hume essentially believed that any ideas you have had to have come from senses, or something you've experienced. When you answer a question, you wouldn't be solely using reason, but rather concrete senses. So, because he was  deemphasizing any role reason played in your decisions/thought, Hume undermined the whole "reason over all" idea of the Enlightenment.

                                    - But does that mean that Hume denied reason?

                   -No, Hume didn't deny abstract things like reason, or freedom. He just believed in /emphasized concrete thoughts that could be proven through the senses rather than abstract feelings/ideas.

-One more thing about Hume --> did he believe in miracles?

                - Yes, but not in the same way most considered what miracles are. He weighed if something was a miracle based on testimony and what has happened in nature. If the testimony was more credible than not and the event had never happened in nature, Hume believed it was a miracle.

                   - Hume wasn't the only philosophe though...

Jean-Jacques Rousseau , General Will, and Education

          - Rousseau wrote the Social Contract  where he talks about the general will. The general will reflected all common people.

                   -Idea wasn't the same as Hobb's Leviathan --> because Rousseau believed the people = holders of power as opposed to the monarch. Also, the will of the people was sacred, and any changes could only be made based on what the people  not the monarch was saying

- Also, Rousseau believed that education was needed to teach children how to live--> idea contained in Emile

- Rousseau was also into the idea of being untouched by society as being the best route.  People had to be protected from society because society ruins the person --> have to get back to nature.

            That was a lot about the guys of the Enlightenment, but women played an important role too

Women and the Enlightenment

- They weren't technically allowed to participate in public intellectual settings

- Set up salons (not to be confused with ones for hair ) -->which provided social elites a place to talk about their ideas without leaders knowing

- Women ---helped spur the Enlightenment thinkers to develop their ideas further 

Enlightenment? Enlighten me

• Let's shed some LIGHT on the Enlightenment

• But First! Time for a Blast from the Past

REMEMBER POLITIQUES??

It's okay neither do I

• Quick Recap: Politques were moderates that ended the War fo 3 Henry's by putting state over religion - a famous one was HENRY IV

So now the big question...

• Are philosophes and politiques the same???
• No - but they're SIMILAR
• They both want to protect France and maintain the monarchy & both called RADICAL by their contemporaries

What people contemporaries thought of philosophes & politiques

It's just the HOW that's different:

• 1) Politiques - save France w/ ABSOLUTE monarchy w/ all power in king
• Culturally = Tunnel vision into politics and government

• 2) Philosophes - save France w/ CONSTITUTIONAL monarchy that put more power in parliament and gave monarch residual (leftover) power.

• Culturally = Intellectual group with more broad vision of life

• Now Second! "ARE YOU HAPPY??"

How rich ppl felt during Enlightenment

"Actually I kinda am" -The Rich

• SO were people of Enlightenment pessimistic????
• WELL HOW MUCH MONEY DO YOU HAVE???

• If You Got $$$ - You're part of the PUBLIC
• Enlightened people are upset about your current ignorance BUT have hope you to get smarter & independent

• IF You Broke - You’re a HOI POLLOI (part of the PEOPLE)

• Enlightened people have no hope because you can’t look past your poorness and survival (don't have time to fit into the new world-view)

• Thirdly! What did these PHILOSOPHES promote???

Their views on GOVERNMENT:

• Montesquieu
• Tried finding out how state could promote liberty
• Wanted balance of power between parliament (rich) and king (king wouldn't have too much control)

Balancing vegetables like Montesquieu's gov would balance power

• BUT how is this different from Locke's views (remember him?) ?????

• THEY WERE BOTH INTO LIBERTY

Difference is in HOW they wanted government to protect liberties

• Locke thought liberty could be protected under monarchy as long as people could revolt when government failed to do its job.

• Montesquieu thought monarch couldn’t be trusted to have power alone so wanted it shared w/ electorate → constitutional monarchy

• But constitutional sounds like republic

IS THERE A DIFFERENCE????

• how is it not a republic?

• Constitutional Monarch - Monarch not elected
• Republic - all people in government are elected.

Their (philosophes') view of GOD

• Voltaire
• God = Distant creator
• Earth like clock put in motion by God, and then let go without interference

• Now remember wayyyy back to Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God by Edwards (Puritan)

Is this Voltaire's God?

• No
• Edwards says God saves followers
• Voltaire says God is not present since universe runs like a machine

Edwards dealing with Voltaire's perception of God

The Scientific Revolution

So the first name we should associate with the Scientific Revolution is....
SIR ISAAC NETWON! 
       ayyyy this guy was the greatest. And why, exactly, was he the greatest? Mainly because he built off of other scientists work. Sir Isaac not only made sense of these theories and ideas, but further progressed them, making him one of the most important figures of this time. 




What were the causes of the "Scientific Revolution?"
1. Universities 

what I am assuming Scientific Revolution college parties were like

Science was able to really emerge from these new "liberal arts" programs. Although the Medieval Times did have Universities, the combined vocational training and philosophical thinking/learning proved to make great human beings.



2. Revolution stimulated scientific progress
           There was a rebirth of the classics and people rediscovered humanism.

            Under this second cause, patronage also came up. People essentially used their money to buy   into certain ideas and people. Great times:)

3. Navigational Problems
            The terms longitude (England) and latitude (Portugal King) came about.

4. Better ways of obtaining knowledge of the world

In conclusion, just as Isaac Newton looked at the past and furthered their ideas, so did the Revolution.

Another big topic we discussed today was Empiricism: 

This is basically learning from experience. (John Locke is a prime example)










The Question of the Day: What is the difference between Inductive and Deductive Reasoning? (literally just tell us Yarn we're dumb and don't know anything)

Deductive Reasoning starts with a general theory, statement, or hypothesis and then works its way down to a conclusion based on evidence.

The result must be true

 

Inductive reasoning starts with a small observation or question and works it's way to a theory by examining the related issues.

The result is probably true 

Goes with empiricism

Scientists thinking they and the Church be homies. 

So... was the Church okay with all of this Science-y stuff?     

Fun Fact: Yes, actually. Do not listen to me in class, for I thought they did not :)

The Church was able to find a middle ground with the Scientists...

But then they messed with heaven. SMH.

  As soon as they hear that angels aren't controlling the heavens, church says nuh uh.

What is the difference between the Renaissance and Revolution?

Renaissance: abstract, all about humans and how amazing everyone is

Revolution: scientific, mathematical, breakthroughs by smart people

Basically, the Renaissance tried to imitate the classics. The Revolution, on the other hand, took the knowledge from the classical era and progressed it, furthering the developments and ideas. 

What is enlightenment?

• Not let people influence you

• 

  literally every man at this point
  
  
  
  

  Escaping self-immaturity
• Using your own intelligence
• Challenging yourself to think on your own
• You’ve been trained by the dominant guardians what is believed to be right or wrong
• Women did not even the option to be enlightened
• It's easy for someone to do the thinking for you
• They are cowards
• the most beautiful sex? Men
• SEXISM

Finally... this is at least one of us every day. Shots are a firing. I expect donuts at least once a week.

Yarn, I think you're up for this week. Thanks for volunteering:)

CHAPTER 18: THE SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION 

1.) How was the scientific revolution the origin of both the modern world and modern mentality? 

• So previously, religion and science needed to be connected - or relate to one another as science was a branch of theology
• Aristotelian view suggested a motionless earth that was fixed at the center of the universe 
• BUT NOW  
• Copernicus --> He said the sun, rather than the Earth, was at the center of the universe (Heliocentric System - not Geocentric)
• He theorized that the stars and planets - including Earth - revolved around FIXED SUN

2.) SO HOW/WHY DID RELIGIONS RESPOND?!?!? 

• A.) Protestants:
• Martin Luther WAS MAD! He said "as the Holy Scripture tells us, so did Joshua bid the sun stand still and NOT the Earth." 
• Protestants interpreted their sacred texts LITERALLY so they believed in a Geocentric universe 
• B.) Likewise, John Calvin and his followers condemned Copernicus for his radical hypothesis
• C.) Catholics:
• response was mild at first - they had never fully interpreted the Bible literally - but they still declared his theory false in 1616
•  
• POOR COPERNICUS (BUT HE DID GET SOME FRIENDS TO BACK HIM UP!)  

3.) SO WHO HELPED OUT COPERNICUS TO PROVE HIS HYPOTHESIS?!? 

• Brahe:
• He observed stars and planets w/ the naked eye 
• His greatest contribution = DATA - but he had a limited understanding of MATH 
• he supported Copernicus somewhat in that he stated all the planets revolved around the sun and that the entire group of sun and planets revolved around the earth-moon system 
• Kepler:
• Brahe's assistant 
• brilliant mathematician ==> formulated 3 laws of Planetary Motion 
• He demonstrate that 
• 1.) the orbits of the planets around the sun are elliptical rather than circular 
• 2.) planets do not move at a uniform speed in their orbits 
• 3.) the time a planet takes to make its complete orbit is precisely related to its distance from SUN 
• HIS Contributions were monumental 
• Kepler PROVED THE RELATIONS OF A SUN CENTERED UNIVERSE YAY

(<-- Copernicus)

• Galileo Galilei:
• On a another note --> this MAN Challenged the ideas of MOTION!
• He used the Experimental Method to prove his hypotheses
• He conducted controlled experiments to find out what actually happens rather than speculating
• He formulated the LAW OF INERTIA:
• rest was not the natural state of objects
• and as Lily explained in class --> the objects are forever in motion until they are stopped by an external force
• In addition to motion - he was fascinated by astronomy --> used telescope to discover the first 4 MOONS OF JUPITER 
• unfortunately - Galileo was forced to renounce his scientific beliefs before ecclesiastical judges 

SO BOTTOM LINE: As new scientists/astronomers/ mathematicians made breakthroughs in the laws of the universe --> Critical, modern, scientific method BEGAN TO EMERGE.