According To Kant's What Is Enlightenment?

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Every day the world changes a little more, words that could be freely said 100 years ago can no longer be shouted out without the fear of judgment or worse. Without enlightenment, hardly anyone would know the current proper terms and actions of this generation. What is Enlightenment? Anyone could go to Google and search the dictionary definition of enlightenment or the word enlighten, and they may find something that goes a little like this; "To give knowledge or understanding to someone: to explain something to someone." This definition could seem simple, it could mean something as small as that enlightenment is explaining to a child why thunderstorms happen. While yes, this too is a form of enlightenment; I believe it goes incredibly deeper than that. …show more content…

Tutelage is man's inability to make use of his understanding without direction from another." Self-incurred tutelage is not due to what could be considered ignorance, but more so a person's lack of motivation and bravery to attempt to use their own mind instead of being told by another. Kant writes "If I have a book which understands for me, a pastor who has a conscience for me, a physician who decides my diet, and so forth, I need not trouble myself. I need not think, if I can only pay – others will easily undertake the irksome work for me." I believe this rises an important question in reader's mind. Does our generation today truly know how to think for themselves? Not only does it widely appear that this generation struggle with this, but as well as generations past.

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