The spread of new ideas across Europe

1
The Enlightenment
1

• The spread of new ideas across Europe

2
Enlightenment

• ? Also known as The Age of Reason
• ? Individuals began to examine the standards by
  which rulers governed. The principles of
• this time held that everything, including
  government, was worth examination and scrutiny.

3
Divine Right

• The doctrine that kings derive their right to
  rule directly from God and are not accountable to
  their subjects.

4
Natural Rights

• Innate rights of humanity, such as life, liberty,
  equality, and the pursuit of happiness, that
  cannot be denied by society

5
Laissez-Faire

• An economic theory from the 18th century that is
  strongly opposed to any government intervention
  in business affairs.
• Sometimes referred to as "let it be economics.
• People who support a laissez faire system are
  against minimum wages, duties, and any other
  trade restrictions.
• Laissez faire is French for "leave alone."

6
Social Contract

• An agreement among the members of an organized
  society or between the governed and the
  government defining and limiting the rights and
  duties of each.

7
Natural Law

• A law applied to everyone and can be understood
  by reason

8
Absolutism

• A political theory holding that all power should
  be vested in one ruler or other authority.
• A form of government in which all power is vested
  in a single ruler or other authority.

9
Rationalism

• A system of rule in which monarchs held total
  power and claimed to rule by the will of God.

10
Background Age of Exploration
10

• New discoveries around the world aroused
  curiosity
• Exploration meant new scientific discoveries in
  astronomy and mathematics
• New discoveries contradicted common beliefs...who
  was right?

11
Background The Scientific Revolution
11

• A new way of thinking about the world
• Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton made new
  discoveries about the universe
• Conflict with the church
• The Scientific Method
• Allowed people to use reason in understanding
  social problems

12
Background English Civil War
12

• Political turmoil in England
• Rebellion against Monarchy ?beheading of Charles
  I
• Led to new ideas about how the English government
  should be run

13
What effects did the Enlightenment philosophers
have on government and society?
The spread of Enlightenment philosophers ideas
sparked changes in governments and society
throughout Europe. Encouraged by ideas such as
natural law and social contracts, people
challenged the structure of governments and
society in existence since the Middle Ages.
14
By the early 1700s, European thinkers felt that
nothing was beyond the reach of the human mind.
The discoveries of the Scientific Revolution of
the 1500s and 1600s convinced educated Europeans
of the power of human reason.
Natural law governed forces such as gravity and
magnetism.
15
Could human reason be used to better understand
social, economic, and political problems?

• This approach had been used to understand natural
  forces such as gravity and magnetism.
• In this way, the Scientific Revolution led to a
  new revolution in thinking, known as the
  Enlightenment.

16
Different Views on Government Thomas Hobbes
16

• Leviathan
• Surrounded by the English Civil War
• Convinced that all humans were naturally selfish
  and wicked
• People must give up their rights to a strong
  ruler in exchange for law and order (absolute
  monarchy)
• This agreement was called the Social Contract

17
Different Views on Government John Locke
17

• Two Treatises on Government
• More positive view of human nature people could
  learn from experience and improve themselves
• All people are born with natural rights life,
  liberty, property
• Government should only exist to protect these
  rights
• The governments power comes from the consent of
  the people. People have the right to overthrow
  government

18
What is philosophy?

• NOUN 
• 1. examination of basic concepts the branch of
  knowledge or academic study devoted to the
  systematic examination of basic concepts such as
  truth, existence, reality, causality, and freedom
• 2. school of thought a particular system of
  thought or doctrine
• 3. guiding or underlying principles a set of
  basic principles or concepts underlying a
  particular sphere of knowledge
• 4. set of beliefs or aims a precept, or set of
  precepts, beliefs, principles, or aims,
  underlying somebody's practice or conduct
• 5. calm resignation restraint, resignation, or
  calmness and rationality in somebody's behavior
  or response to events

19
New Philosophical Concepts The Big Five
19

• Reason Truth discovered through logical thinking
• Nature What is natural is good
• Happiness A person who lives by natures laws
  will be happy
• Progress Progress society to lead to perfection
• Liberty All men should have the liberties that
  we take for granted

20
New Philosophical Concepts Major Players
20

• Voltaire fought intolerance through his writing
  and exposed government abuse with sarcasm.
• Montesquieu believed in multiple branches of
  government
• Rousseau Government should be formed through
  agreement of free individuals and humans are
  naturally good.

21
Enlightenment Ideas

• Power needed to be separated and balanced so that
  individuals or groups did not become corrupt
  through those powers.
• The people wanted a change from absolutism and
  the divine right of kings to constitutionalism.
• Constitutionalism was the belief that the
  government contract should be written down,
  making clear what powers were given to whom.

22
Enlightenment Ideas

• The philosophers believed that the government
  "contract" and its supporting laws needed to
  reflect the "general will" of the people.
• Laws should be agreed upon by both the ruler and
  those governed.
• Assemblies of citizens should be formed with real
  power to influence the government and judge
  whether rulers acted properly.

23
Enlightenment Ideas

• Rulers and governments that abused their power
  and did not protect the rights of the citizens
  were corrupt and the people had a right to rebel
  and replace the ruler.
• The ruler also had the right to expect that the
  citizens would respect the government and laws
  that were just.

24
Enlightenment Ideas

• Enlightenment thinkers believed that science and
  reason led to progress, that knowledge was
  attainable by man (not just a revelation by God),
  and that man wanted to free himself from the
  existing religious worldview through scientific
  understanding.

25
Women and the Enlightenment
25

• Most enlightenment thinkers still took a
  traditional view towards women
• They thought womens education should focus on
  how to be a wife and mother
• BUT...women came up with their own ideas.

26
Women and the Enlightenment
26

• Mary Astell called used enlightenment arguments
  to criticize unequal relationships between men
  and women If absolute sovereignty be not
  necessary in a state, how comes it to be so in a
  family?
• Mary Wollstonecraft said that women deserved
  equal education, this would help them become
  better wives and mothers.