THREE PRINCIPLE CONCEPTS – THE R.E.D.
ISMS
The Enlightenment was an
intellectual revolution (Shelley, 1995). As such it was an age of isms. Those three letters (i, s, m) do extraordinary things to a
word, concept, or idea. They turn a completely neutral concept into a cemented
mindset. For example, take the word human. Now add our three letters – humanism.
No small difference. Do the same with feminine, commune, particular, pragmatic,
subjective, fanatic, or real.
We now turn our attention to three
of the most prominent isms of the
Enlightenment period. This will be a fly-over, a crash course in “The Philosophical Isms of the Enlightenment
for the Philosophy Rookies of the Postmodern.” But before we press on, an
important point: These three isms are
not presented as though they, for the first time in world history, raised their
we-can-do-better-than-God fists in the 17th and 18th
centuries. To think otherwise would be myopic, not to mention intellectually
irresponsible. All three isms have
been, to one degree or another, part and parcel with being human ever since
that first snake and forbidden fruit picnic.
Given
that generality, it does appear that during the long century, this trio
experienced sizeable spikes in press and prestige in European thinking.
Although the Enlightenment cannot claim exclusive rights on these isms, it can claim to be a major
stockholder in the history of the concepts.
THE
ENLIGHTENMENT
(A
BIRD’S EYE VIEW)
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Leading Up to
the Enlightenment
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Within the
Enlightenment
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Emerging Out
of the Enlightenment
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THREE
HISTORICAL CONTEXTS
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THREE
MONUMENTAL CHARACTERS
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THREE
PRINCIPAL CONCEPTS
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Reformation
Wars
Scientific Revolution
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Rene Descartes
David Hume
Immanuel Kant
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Rationalism
Empiricism
Deism
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Figure 2.3 – The Enlightenment & Three Principle
Concepts
Rationalism
– I Reason Therefore I Know
There is a reason the Enlightenment
sometimes goes by that other name, the
Age of Reason. We have already established, with the help of Hunnex, that rationalism
“can be defined as a theory of knowledge (epistemology) that ‘believes some
ideas or concepts are independent of experience and that some truth is known by
reason alone’” (p. 3).[1]
This mindset holds
(the exact opposite of empiricism) that humans are born with some “innate
knowledge;” that is, we are not born a blank slate; we know some basic things
even at birth. With this presupposition regarding knowledge and reason,
rationalism views human reasoning as the primary source and test of knowledge.
The focus is on the brain – human thinking, reasoning, and logic.
At the very dawn of the Enlightenment, Descartes gave rationalism
its enlightened kick-start with his writings and, of course, his famous “I
think therefore I am” statement. With the thinkers that immediately followed
Descartes this ism became one of the
primary early philosophical movements of the long century. However, whereas
rationalism was in the lead early on in this time period, it turned that lead
over to empiricism in the early 1800’s.
Rational Name-Dropping
Here is a short-list role call for a
Who’s Who of Enlightenment Rationalists (using the analogy of a train):[2]
Rene Descartes was the engine. He “got the ball rolling.” He would likely
qualify as a moderate rationalist, holding that some truths could be attained
by reason alone, other truths required sensory perception with the help of the
scientific method, and still other truths are given by God. Immanuel Kant comes
in as the caboose. He started out as dyed-in-the-wool rationalist, but, after
reading and contemplating Hume’s work, converted to somewhere in the middle of
the rationalism/empiricism continuum. Kant’s seminal work was largely
instrumental in bringing the Enlightenment to a close. In between the engine
and the caboose stand rationalists such as Baruch Spinoza, who essentially followed
Descartes with some modest expansion; Gottfried Leibniz, who revisited
Aristotle in order to solve weaknesses he saw in Descartes founding work;[3]
and Nicolas Malebranche who as a devout Christian, attempted to reconcile his Augustinian
convictions with Descartes rationalism.
These men, and others, ushered in the
greatest emphasis on human reasoning since the Greeks of 600 B.C. For both
these men and their Greek predecessors, human reasoning was viewed as “the
ultimate authority of truth and falsehood, right and wrong...[such] rationalism
always degenerates into irrationalism” (Frame, p. 177).
Empiricism
– I Experience Therefore I Know
I have a hunch this was the camp in
which I spent my formative years. In Montana cattle ranch country during the post-Korean
war and the tumultuous 60’s, there was a preeminent way regarding how we know
and learn about stuff. This way was never discussed as a philosophical
alternative to rationalism around the dinner table after a day of branding. At
breakfast there was no talk of Bacon, and after dinner there were not discussions
around the fireplace concerning how Kant merged rationalism and empiricism. The
way one learned how to bridle and saddle a horse was to “git out there an do
it.” Same for milking a cow, fixing the hay baler, or roping a steer. The
watchword for learning was, “Watch and learn.” We were expected to learn by
experience – touch it, milk it, tighten it, weld it, rope it, brand it, smell
it, and (if need be) taste it. Empiricism is the mindset that experience is the key
to knowledge. Washburn (2007) gets a bit more technical in defining it as “the theory that all of our ideas originate in sensory
experience”[4] (p.
328). He goes on to explain that “people’s environment determines how they
develop their inborn potential, or whether they develop it at all...the most
important part of the environment is probably the social environment...A person
is also molded by the cultural environment” (p. 327). The focus is on the heart
– our experiences, our feelings, and our passions.
Those British Imperial Empiricists
The British philosophers of that day
were not content to merely go along, lock-stock-and-barrel, with European
mainland’s emphasis on rationalism. Rather, they reacted “against the
rationalism of Descartes, Spinoza, and Leibniz...[and] dismissed the idea that
reason is our only reliable source of knowledge and developed the opposing
movement known as empiricism” (Weeks, n.d., p. 212). Once again a word of caution and balance:
history and philosophical debates (and life) are seldom absolutely black and
white. It was not that the two sides of the English Channel were firing flaming
epistemological cannon balls at each other night and day for hundred-plus years.
Despite this conciliatory nod and the fact there exists a sizeable number of
historians that leans toward “no clear distinction” between rationalism and
empiricism, there is also the argument, illustrated by Stephen Priest (2007), that
sees these two approaches, at their core as completely “incompatible” (The British Empiricists, p. 8-10).
Our “Who’s Who” short list of Enlightenment era
empiricists[5] includes:
1) Thomas Hobbes, who “laid the foundations of modern empiricism with his
materialist and mechanistic views – although its roots could be traced back to
Aristotle” (Weeks, 212). 2) John Locke, who built on Hobbes work by fine-tuning
the empiricist arguments in his Essay
Concerning Human Understanding (1689). 3) George Berkeley, who took
empiricism to an extreme, claiming that material substance did not even exist.
Berkeley, a Christian bishop, believed reality existed only in the mind of God,
and as such humans do not experience things at all, but only their qualities
(Weeks, 220). Try explaining that to your grandchildren. 4) And finally, David
Hume, whom we have already met. In addition to what we have already learned
concerning Hume, he believed there were two kinds of truths: those of reasoning
and those of fact. Concerning those truths of fact, Hume concluded that nothing
can be both certain and tell us something about the world. This essentially and
effectively removed all legitimacy for relying on reason to interact with and
interpret the world around us.
The End of Empiricism
There is a direct, paved, no-speed-limit
route from pure empiricism to relativism. R. A. Rausch (2001) puts it this way,
“Since there may be a variety of interpretations of what constitutes an
experience, any appeal to experience as the sole arbiter of meaning and
significance is problematical. Such an appeal is completely dependent on which
interpretation of the experience ones applies” (p. 376). Should this approach
to knowledge be applied to the realm of theology, the result should not be one
of shock. Enter Friedrich Schleiermacher. Given his presuppositions regarding
epistemology, his deductions fall in step with a far-left empiricist party
line: interpretations and theologies are as many as there are universes, cultures,
and individuals.[6]
The phrase, put out to pasture, is based on an old agrarian tradition of
keeping farm animals that are no longer useful, usually because they were too
old to work. Instead of slaughtering them, the farmer would put them out in a
pasture to live out their last days in relative peace. We had several horses on
the ranch that earned this type of retirement. We were too attached to them to
send them to “the big house.” So they grazed in the pasture, not doing any
work; they were just there, something to look at and reminisce about their past
usefulness. The phrase is used of someone who has been forced to stop their
work or responsibilities because they have outlived or outgrown their
usefulness. Metaphorically speaking, the bulk of the Enlightenment philosophers
put God out to pasture. They did not deny his existence, nor his part in
‘getting things going.’ But now, with the progress of reason and science, he
had outgrown his usefulness. God was put out to pasture. He was someone to look
at and reminisce about his past usefulness. (I am writing as a fool.)
With God out to pasture, it was “out
of sight; out of mind.” Or, in the case of deism, “Out of sight; out of this
world.” It is interesting to note that deism would be absolutely impossible to
exist in any form if God were visible. Invisibility is what bolsters deism’s arrogance
(and ignorance). Imagine a world where God were visible. And omnipresent. Think
of what that combination would mean. That would mean we could not see anything
but God all the time. Everything else would be hidden behind the visible God,
who is everywhere, therefore there is no such thing as behind him. In this
present world it is possible to see the handiwork of God all around us. We “see
God,” as it were, in the world he has created. But if he were literally and
completely visible, his omnipresence would block out all handiwork of his
creation. Everywhere we looked, God would be in between us and the created
world beyond. (Oh, and how does one get ‘beyond’ omnipresence?)
But God is invisible. And because of
that characteristic deism is, not only deemed a possibility, but has also gained
great traction at certain times in history. The Enlightenment was one of those
gaining traction eras.
Deism
is the mindset that God created the universe, but then left it to run on its
own. It is the transcendental nature of God gone to seed. At the core deists
are really rationalists who choose to believe in an absentee God and a world
that relies on science to lead us to truth. Technically deism falls in the
category of theism, since it holds to “belief
in the existence of a god or gods and therefore [is] the antithesis of atheism”
(M. H. MacDonald, “Deism,” Evangelical
Dictionary of Theology, ed. by Walter A. Elwell, p. 329). MacDonald goes on
to explain
the
basic doctrines of deism are (1) the belief in a supreme being; (2) the
obligation to worship; (3) the obligation of ethical conduct; (4) the need for
repentance from sins; and (5) divine rewards and punishments in this life and
the next. These five points were stated by Lord Herbert, often called the
father of deism. Deism contradicts orthodox Christianity by denying any direct
intervention in the natural order by God. Although deists profess belief in
personal providence, they deny the Trinity, the incarnation, the divine
authority of the Bible, the atonement, miracles, any particular elect people of
Israel, and any supernatural redemptive act in history. (MacDonald, p. 329)
Pagden (2013) concurs with the general
consensus that during the Enlightenment period not many of the enlightened were
actual atheists, but “the deists were numberless” (The Enlightenment, p. 129). And
so it was, God was put out (in the passive sense). And he, because of his
nature, was also put out (in the active sense).
[1] Mathematics is a leading contender of an area of
knowledge that is independent of experience. We do not know 2 + 2 = 4 because
we have experienced such a thing. We know this because “no world could exist in
which 2 + 2 = 5” (Washburn, 1997, p. 333). It should, therefore, not be a
tremendous shock to learn that Descartes was, not a theologian nor a university
professor, but rather a mathematician.
[2] Find this particular list of prominent Enlightenment
era rationalists at: http://www.philosophybasics.com/movements_rationalism.html
[3] Incidentally, these first three men (Descartes,
Spinoza, and Leibniz) “hold that ‘God exists’ is true since God is the most
perfect conceivable being by definition and so must exist.” Such reasoning is
shown to be contradictory in Robert G. Meyers, Understanding Empiricism, (
[4] A very similar definition is given in Walter A.
Elwell (ed.), Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Empiricism – D. A. Rausch
(Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2001) 375.
[5] See the short list of both rationalists and
empiricists of the Enlightenment period in Janice Thomas, The Minds of the Moderns: Rationalism, Empiricism, and the Philosophy
of the Mind (New York: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2009). Ms. Thomas
sites Descartes, Spinoza, and Leibniz as the main thinkers in the rationalism
camp with Locke, Berkeley, and Hume the main players in the empiricism camp.
Other reliable sources include Hobbes in with the empiricists. See
[6] See Schleiermacher’s emphasis on experience in,
Friedrich Schleiermacher, The Christian
Faith (New York: T & T Clark, 1999). Note especially pages 67-75.
[7] It is interesting to note that both deism and dualism
hold to some type of separation; that is, separation of the natural world (with
no divine intervention) from the supernatural world (with active and current
divine intervention).
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