The Age of Enlightenment was a broad philosophical movement in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The traditional theological-political system that placed Scripture at the center, with religious authorities and monarchies claiming and enforcing their power by divine right, was challenged and overturned in the realm of ideas.

Mar 4, 2024 · The big five Enlightenment thinkers in terms of who inspired the most discussion were John Locke (natural rights and liberty), Jean-Jacques Rousseau (a fairer society), Adam Smith (founder of modern economics), Immanuel Kant (turned philosophy upside down), and Thomas Paine (called for revolution).

The Age of Enlightenment (also the Age of Reason and the Enlightenment) was an intellectual and philosophical movement taking place in Europe from the late 17th century to the early 19th century. [1][2] The Enlightenment, which valued knowledge gained through rationalism and empiricism, was concerned with a range of social ideas and political id...

Jan 13, 2025 · Enlightenment, a European intellectual movement of the 17th and 18th centuries in which ideas concerning God, reason, nature, and humanity were synthesized into a worldview that gained wide assent in the West and that instigated revolutionary developments in art, philosophy, and politics.

Aug 20, 2010 · Enlightenment philosophers from across the geographical and temporal spectrum tend to have a great deal of confidence in humanity’s intellectual powers, both to achieve systematic knowledge of nature and to serve as an authoritative guide in practical life.

Dec 16, 2009 · The Enlightenment’s important 17th-century precursors included the Englishmen Francis Bacon and Thomas Hobbes, the Frenchman René Descartes and the key natural philosophers of the Scientific ...

Dec 22, 2018 · At the most visible end of the Enlightenment were a group of thinkers who consciously sought human advancement through logic, reason, and criticism. Biographical sketches of these key figures are below in alphabetical order of their surnames.

Feb 29, 2024 · There is a group of thinkers who are often called 'pre-Enlightenment' philosophers since they established some of the key foundations upon which the Enlightenment was built. This group includes Francis Bacon (1561-1626), Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679), René Descartes (1596-1650), Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677), and John Locke (1632-1704).

Jan 13, 2025 · Some of the most important writers of the Enlightenment were the Philosophes of France, especially Voltaire and the political philosopher Montesquieu. Other important Philosophes were the compilers of the Encyclopédie, including Denis Diderot, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Condorcet.

Jan 17, 2025 · Bernard de Fontenelle, popularizer of the scientific discoveries that contributed to the climate of optimism, wrote in 1702 anticipating “a century which will become more enlightened day by day, so that all previous centuries will be lost in darkness by comparison.”