21st Century Enlightenment

21st Century Enlightenment

The 18th Century Enlightenment was a period of radical social change from the superstitious and religious to scientific and logical. Immanuel Kant, a revolutionary thinker of the time, conceived an idea of Enlightenment that focused on the use of knowledge in an autonomous fashion, differing from other conceptions of Enlightenment that focused solely on the cumulative sum of knowledge obtained. According to his conception of Enlightenment, individuals who possessed expansive amounts of knowledge could in theory, be considered to be unenlightened if their knowledge was unexercised, unapplied, or was inconsequential in helping to make decisions on how their lives were lived. In fact, Kant considered such wanton waste of potential as a sign of intellectual immaturity; the ability to think for one's self marked intellectual maturity. The autonomy afforded to an intellectually mature individual was Kant's conception of Enlightenment.

But was Kant's conception of Enlightenment skewed by the predominantly religious societies of Western Europe? Given the acceptance of religious dogma without question nor the ability to question it, the conception of Enlightenment was possibly affected by the desire to question religious practices, and by extension, other social conventions. In the absence of such controls, where does that leave Enlightenment in modern times?

Matthew Taylor, a labor politician for the Royal Society of the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, conceived a new understanding of Enlightenment and its relevancy to modern society. Taylor discusses the concept of the Enlightenment as a process of change in society that changed the values, norms, and lifestyles and its relevancy to modern society. Paralleling Kant's conception of Enlightenment, Taylor asserts that "21st century enlightenment should champion a more self-aware,  socially embedded model of autonomy" (3:20). But what about "more self-aware?" How does Taylor's conception of Enlightenment diverge with the concept of self-awareness?

In conceiving Enlightenment as self autonomy, Kant established the idea that intellectually immaturity is self imposed. He recognized that familiarity and the resulting sense of security actively oppose his epistemological ideologies; the vices that reinforced self-imposed intellectual immaturity were laziness and cowardice according to Kant. In his conception of self-aware autonomy,Taylor agrees with developmental psychologist, Robert Kegan; "to resist our tendencies to make right or true that which is merely familiar and wrong or false that which is only strange" (4:20) produces individuals who are capable of self-aware autonomy, or as Taylor has constructed, 21st Century Enlightenment.

But this is where 21st Century Enlightenment diverges from Kant's Enlightenment; empathy is a required component to 21st Century Enlightenment. Kant's Enlightenment is an individualistic view of Enlightenment, confined to the self-autonomy which is no different than the self-aware autonomy of 21st Century Enlightenment, but the emphasis on self-awareness and empathy is not individualistic, rather important characteristics that direct the social relationship of individuals in society, both intellectually mature and immature individuals.

Taylor's emphasis on the necessity for a more empathetic society is a result of the differences in society in the past two hundred years. A globalized society that is increasingly interconnected has become increasingly dependent upon the emphatic capacity of its citizens. Focusing on simplistic ideals such as "freedom, justice, and progress" (9:57) undermines the importance of associated behaviors that are required for the betterment of society.Taylor comments that empathy is required for a moralistic approach to autonomy: autonomy that not only affects individuals but society as a whole.

Thus, 21st Century Enlightenment is not only an empathetic approach, but also a moralistic approach to self-autonomy in societies that now require such approaches in order to "reach long-term needs of the whole planet & all its people" (5:57). But how? Social constructions and conventions such as rigorously structured education systems and culturally derived practices such as nationalism limit the capacity for empathy according to Taylor, but the opportunity for 21st Century Enlightenment is there! As stated by Michel Foucault on Kant's Enlightenment, "it has to be conceived as an attitude, an ethos, a philosophical life in which the critique of what we are... is at one and the same time the historical analysis of the limits that are imposed on us and an experiment of possible going beyond them" (9:35); the  and the same applies to 21st Century Enlightenment.

Understanding the self-imposed and externally-imposed intellectual immaturity and indifference to others is necessary for Enlightenment. "To be responsible, to create a big society, to live sustainably  (9:43) are all admirable goals, and possibly achievable through the collective effects of self-aware autonomy. In essence, 21st Century Enlightenment is not only an empathetic understanding for an individual, but an understanding of the implications for society; to better understand another man, understand one self. In understanding "who we are as human beings," "who we need to be," and "who we aspire to be" (10:15), we gain the ability to "think differently" and thus "live differently" (1:18).

Taylor's argument is a relatively simple concept: becoming self-aware allows for emphatic autonomy that society can benefit from. In deviating away from Kant's conception of Enlightenment, does Taylor invalidate the efficacy of a Kant-styled Enlightenment: I would argue no. Building upon the autonomy of individuals to make decisions for themselves, Taylor necessarily validates that aspect of Enlightenment. However, in contextualizing it for modern society, it must be modified in order to expand the concept from pertaining solely on scales of individuality to scales of interconnected societies and its members. 21st Century Enlightenment is  an evolution, not an invalidation of Kant's ideas that are more applicable and necessary in modern society.