It is usually acknowledged that the core contribution of the Enlightenment is primarily twofold: the first being introduction of reason and science as judgmental principles, and the belief in the future progress of humankind as a shared destiny for humanity as the second. For most Enlightenment thinkers, the only reliable instrument for taking personal and collective decisions was the human reason, taken in the form of critical thinking, rational analysis, or the power of logical thinking. This ‘modern’ reason – a prerogative of solely humans among creatures – could be applied to create a better society from the political, civil, educational, scientific, and religious points of view. What is usually less renowned is that for most of the Enlightened thinkers, this philosophical and cultural step was the prerogative of European or Western-educated thinkers, which implies a gradual exclusion of extra-European civilizations from human progress as a natural phenomenon. Thus, with the exception made for a few French libertines, the creation of a better society was due to reason and critical thinking absent in other civilizations, who could, at the most, inherit this ‘rational power’ thanks to the Western education. This exclusion, which is usually attributed to the violence of the colonialist period, is already implied in the arguments of several Enlightened thinkers. Our investigation will follow three steps: the presentation of the three Western historical paradigms in which Eastern civilizations were inserted between the 17th and 18th century; a comparison between the attitude toward China and Buddhism of two very distant philosophers of the Enlightenment – i.e., Pierre Bayle (1647-1706) and Johann Jacob Brucker (1696-1770) – and a brief reflection over the Enlightenment from an ‘external/exotic’ point of view that will suggest the necessity of a ‘new skeptical Enlightenment’ for an actual intercultural dialogue.

Discording Enlightenments on China: Pierre Bayle's Skepticism vs Johan Jacob Brucker's Exoticism

Ambrogio S
2021-01-01

Abstract

It is usually acknowledged that the core contribution of the Enlightenment is primarily twofold: the first being introduction of reason and science as judgmental principles, and the belief in the future progress of humankind as a shared destiny for humanity as the second. For most Enlightenment thinkers, the only reliable instrument for taking personal and collective decisions was the human reason, taken in the form of critical thinking, rational analysis, or the power of logical thinking. This ‘modern’ reason – a prerogative of solely humans among creatures – could be applied to create a better society from the political, civil, educational, scientific, and religious points of view. What is usually less renowned is that for most of the Enlightened thinkers, this philosophical and cultural step was the prerogative of European or Western-educated thinkers, which implies a gradual exclusion of extra-European civilizations from human progress as a natural phenomenon. Thus, with the exception made for a few French libertines, the creation of a better society was due to reason and critical thinking absent in other civilizations, who could, at the most, inherit this ‘rational power’ thanks to the Western education. This exclusion, which is usually attributed to the violence of the colonialist period, is already implied in the arguments of several Enlightened thinkers. Our investigation will follow three steps: the presentation of the three Western historical paradigms in which Eastern civilizations were inserted between the 17th and 18th century; a comparison between the attitude toward China and Buddhism of two very distant philosophers of the Enlightenment – i.e., Pierre Bayle (1647-1706) and Johann Jacob Brucker (1696-1770) – and a brief reflection over the Enlightenment from an ‘external/exotic’ point of view that will suggest the necessity of a ‘new skeptical Enlightenment’ for an actual intercultural dialogue.
2021
Ars Polona
Internazionale
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11393/302923
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