The enlightenment’s most important idea was the faith on human beings common sense; all human beings are believed to be capable to think for themselves and make their own decisions. That’s why you shouldn’t have to believe what the people in power claims or what the different religions and churches states, we are all humans and we can all believe and make our own judgments. The enlightenment builds on the theory that progress within science and technology will lead to an improvement and growth both when it comes to materialistic needs, and social improvements. It will also lead to larger insight to human needs and desires.
Rousseau had a negative view and opinion towards science and the influence it had on human beings. He thought that science had influenced our lives too much and its influence has turned us to be more artificial. Rousseau thought that science would make us corruptible and make us feel that we accomplished something when we in reality did not, it would bring out the vices and it would make us dependent on things other than ourselves. Science has taken us away more and more from our natural habitat and our ancestry. The result of this has been a society controlled and directed by money, material things are now our ambitions and goals we strive for. The world and human beings relationships have also changed and we are more distant with each other, which leads to more conflicts. Rousseau states that science will eventually destroy the civilization either from an external threat or internal threat.
These thoughts was very different if you compare to the other French philosophers at the time (Voltaire, Diderot) more progressive and scientifically ideologies was according to Rousseau false enlightenment that only excited the people, but didn’t change the basic injustices in the world. His intentional separation against church, other philosophers of his time made him famous but unpopular at the time. The focus on the individual, separated from the full picture, separates the human from its natural habitat: other human beings. Rousseau’s very individual ideas and critic towards the modern society and the development of science can seem backwards but a lot of his thoughts actually circulate in today’s society. A lot of the predictions he made has been fulfilled but does this necessarily make his beliefs true?
Condorcet’s view was very different from Rousseau; he was positive to progress and change and believed that conflict will lead to it. A more technological and scientifically enlightened human being will be a better person morally according to Condorcet. He states that progress, based on enlightenment, gives human beings: more equality between the nations, removal of the class differences, and an improvement of the mental and moral state. Condorcet counted on less racism, improved commerce, abolishment of all war, elimination of poverty and luxury, equal rights for all human beings and public education with equal opportunity for all. A utopia like that is after hand easily to criticize even though its ideal is very appealing. The scientifically, technological and economic progress Condorcet believed in and hoped for, has today been surpassed by miles. Nuclear power, genetics, and information technology are only a few examples that you never could foresee two hundred years ago.
The world’s total wealth has evolved in a speed that exceeds all estimation and international economy and commerce has
developed. The practices of democracy and public schools have been a reality for a long time, and even though all these changes and improvements have been made, we are still not a step closer to a world free from war, diseases, and injustice. The separation between rich and poor – both when it comes to nations and individuals- is still comparable to the end of the 17th century. Equality between men and women is still in large areas of the world only a dream, and racism is still something that exists every day.
So do we give up on the world Condorcet was counting on? When the progress that is a historical necessity just is a chimera, are you then naïve if you work to make these ideals reality? Condorcet belief that enlightenment would lead to less racism, is actually correct as in my opinion, the more intellectual you are and the better education you receive the less risk you have and tendency to discriminate or have racist views. Racism is something that has stagnated since Condorcet’s times but it is a still reality in almost every society in the world, the reason for this is lack of education, and the culture. I think even if we extract the culture of being raised in a racist household and lack of education, this phenomena will continue to exist in our society due to the separation of different racial groups geographically that exist in the world. Some human beings will always be suspicious to things they are not accustomed to, and people will always will have prejudice thoughts and leap away from rationale thinking. However if these two criteria’s (education, and growing up in a racist environment) and separation between different racial groups would be removed in the world, I believe racism would basically be removed as we see it today in our world both when it comes to gender discrimination, racial discrimination and economic discrimination.
Many people claim that poverty in the world is rising and more people are starving today than hundred years ago, I belong to the optimistic group in this question and believe that the world is slowly becoming a better place to live in, and that the people living in decent environment is rising. Unfortunately the percentage of poor people doesn’t change because of the constant population increase, but I still want to see this as something positive. The problem is the way the wealth of the world is divided out, we could be closer to Condorcet Utopia if this was handled more equally. Multinational corporations are competing out local companies and developing countries with bad economy has a hard way finding its place in the global world and global economy.
The problem lies with the greed of western developed countries that no matter what strive for economic growth. A developed country with economic growth generally has it pretty well, and good economy means happy citizens, so it is not strange that these governments want to see this as well. That’s what the people want, and the politicians in the majority of these developed countries are elected by the people. The problem arises when the economic growth of a developed country often happen of the cost of the undeveloped country’s living standard, large corporations who sells cheaper products compete the smaller businesses out and as a result the countries production stops which leads to less jobs, and no incentive to develop a infrastructure, and as a result the economy falls and the inflation rises. What if the large multinational countries move their production to a developing country? That is also something that’s not beneficial for the developing country; the production is made for a very cheap cost. The corporation and the working conditions are often inhuman and this is just another form of slavery, which cripples the developing country economy. When the demand of production rises, the demand on environment rises as well, which will not affect the developed country when the factory is another country, this will only affect the poor country’s environment and the condition for the population in that country.
But where does this “right” of captivity of economic slavery, by the developed nations, seem to think have come from? Why do we choose to ignore the suffering we cause on our enviroment and other human beings? The problem in my opinion is that we think to short term and that’s something Kant would agree with. All economic growth is in first hand short term, what we need is sustainable growth but how do we reach that?
This is a very unjust spiral that’s been going on for centuries, but it can be broken through negotiations and change in the mentality of the general population of the western world. But I feel a little bit pessimistic that this would ever actually happen in our lifetime, I don’t think that we would be ready to sacrifice our wealth and standard of living today if we were guaranteed a more equal world. Human beings are in general selfish, we want more and more, and I don’t think that we are ready to make that kind of sacrifice today. So our hope for Condorcet Utopia to become reality is that science will develop so that the western world can have its economic growth without using the developing countries as “workers” for their wealth. However, this needs to happen before it’s too late and before we made unchangeable damages to the environment. What are we going to do with the wealth if we don’t have any soil to stand on? Human beings have a tendency to wait until the catastrophe is almost there to make real changes in their behavior. We wait until the cost of the conflict is not worth it anymore, to declare change, and hopefully we will be able to make these changes in our world before it’s too late.
Tags: Condorcet, development, Economy, Filosofi, Future, Global, Kant, Oracle, Philosophy, Politics, poor nations, rich nations, Rousseau, World Future
