“Different interpretations of the Enlightenment by Carl Becker and Peter Gay”



Table of contents

Introduction to the French Enlightenment1

Carl Becker's "The Heavenly City of the Eighteenth Century Philosophers (1932)1

Human Reason2

The eighteenth Century3

Happiness in Europe4

Introduction to the Rise of modern Paganism5

Peter Gay's "The Enlightenment: An Interpretation: The Rise of modern Paganism (1966)5

Holy Roman Empire6

Christian antiquity7

Lights of civilization7

Christian faith8

“Different interpretations of the Enlightenment by Carl Becker and Peter Gay”

Introduction to the French Enlightenment

The ideas of the French Enlightenment Are diverse and multiple elements that shaped the philosophy of the Enlightenment, and continues to be a little foolhardy to try to condense into a few pages what was one of the most vigorous intellectual movements in history. Let us, however, an attempt to approach. The French Revolution had as one of his record to another silent revolution that was not less deep and far-reaching: the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century. Indeed, thanks to the work of Galileo, Descartes, Bacon, Newton and many others an idea of the cosmos set supported by a solid body of laws mathematically demonstrable. The physical world could be explained in quantitative terms. Newtonian mechanics were the most comprehensive scientific synthesis prepared by the man and the perfect way to explain natural phenomena.

Carl Becker's "The Heavenly City of the Eighteenth Century Philosophers (1932)

To understand the reflection of Enlightenment in light of Carl Becker's work, it is essential to see and study the history of time. The ideas of the French Enlightenment are diverse, and have multiple elements that shaped the philosophy of the Enlightenment. They continue to be a little foolhardy to try to condense into a few pages what was one of the most vigorous intellectual movements in history. The French Revolution had as one of their record to another silent revolution that was not shallow and far-reaching: the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century. Thanks to the work of Galileo, Descartes, Bacon, Newton and many others, an idea of the cosmos set supported by a solid body of laws mathematically demonstrable laws of the physical world that could be explained in quantitative terms. Newtonian mechanics were the most comprehensive scientific synthesis prepared by the man and the perfect way to explain natural phenomena.

This great achievement brought mankind to become aware - as in no other time in history, of its potential to dominate nature through scientific knowledge. The physical world could be transformed for the benefit of man. Nature, which in medieval cosmology was the object of contemplation; it might be now, thanks to technology derived from science, an object of domination and exploitation that would allow the man the greater good. The enthronement of scientific knowledge led the scientists and thinkers of the Enlightenment to consider as true only the facts and theories that could be verified or proven by scientific methods increasingly stringent. The core element of this attitude was the confidence in human reason as the sole tool for understanding reality. Rationality is a fact of nature that was the criterion parajuzgar regardless if ...