Gao Feng 004 The Enlightenment Significance

According to Rousseau's understanding, they have precisely fallen into another kind of ignorance and barbarism. This is also a very important enlightenment that the European Enlightenment Movement has brought to us. Enlightenment is to return to this point, and it is still an ongoing and continuous process.

The fourth level of enlightenment refers to social enlightenment.

Diderot said, "Science is a vast and boundless land, with some areas bright and others dark. The sole purpose of our work is to expand the illuminated regions."

  Diderot, Encyclop  die

Where lies the enlightenment significance of society that Diderot offers us?

In fact, what the entire group of European Enlightenment thinkers focused on was not how some advanced and intellectual individuals came to recognize certain concepts of great significance to humanity. What they did was to transform the era and society they were in through institutional reform, systemic change, or even social movements. This was their ultimate goal.

So, their aim is not merely to remain at the stage of ideological transformation. The ideological transformation and such changes that I have undergone are only achievable by those with profound thoughts, or those who truly have a far-sighted vision for society.

It's not like that. Their purpose is precisely to bring about changes in the entire society through their work and efforts. Therefore, such an enlightenment movement has the significance of being a pioneer for society or for the development of the country and society.

Of course, the enlightenment of this society is based on the enlightenment of culture and thought.

Here I would like to add one more point. In the French Enlightenment, the enlightenment of thought was more importantly derived from religious enlightenment. Therefore, the main task of the enlightenment of thought was to completely destroy the feudal church system dominated by "Christianity" that had been formed since the Middle Ages; and to establish a religious belief system with "Protestantism" as the main body and based on multiple religions.

French philosophers, they were not true atheists, but they had already diverged greatly from the theistic theology of Christianity. However, in Marx's view, there was no essential difference.

However, in fact, the differences between them are still quite significant. The four concepts of enlightenment we mentioned have led to the French Enlightenment bringing about earth-shattering changes to the subsequent society and even to thought.

Of course, these four kinds of enlightenment do not mean that there are only these four aspects. It merely indicates that we can understand the dimensions of enlightenment from these four perspectives. These four aspects actually encompass politics, ideology, society, culture, and the entire historical development process.

What kind of logical connection is there among these four dimensions?

Of course, there is a certain logical connection among them, but it is not rigorous. We merely point out to you that there are these four kinds of enlightenment or that the significance of enlightenment can be understood from these four dimensions. We can simply outline the logical connection among them. That is to say, in the entire historical process of enlightenment, the historical starting point or the historical starting point of the era is political enlightenment first.

The enlightenment of politics was a historical starting point of the entire French Enlightenment Movement.

However, this starting point is based on the enlightenment of thought, that is to say, the enlightenment of thought has become a foundation of the entire Enlightenment Movement. This foundation, in fact, is quite easy to understand if we think about it. Because the change of a social system is often first rooted in the change of the basic understanding of this society. Without an overall understanding of this society, it is hard to imagine that there would be so-called historical and social changes. Therefore, this is even more so for the change of a system.

Without a change in mindset, it is very difficult for a society's system to change. Just like the reform of our economic system and the transformation of our social economy, it actually started with a change in thinking. As we all know, the reform and opening up that began in 1978 was actually the start of a powerful ideological movement. Without that ideological movement, the reform of our economic system and all our social reforms would have been hard to advance.

What is this ideological movement?

It was the great discussion on the principle that "practice is the sole criterion for testing truth" and the ideological movement to discard the "Two Whatevers".

The reform of the entire society must be accompanied by the liberation of thought. Without this, a great deal of discussion would be like a castle in the air and fail to grasp the major ideological changes in the whole society. That is to say, before any reform takes place, there will definitely be some hints and preparations to make the masses understand. Without a lot of signs and preparations as a forerunner or precursor, there is no hope for any obvious changes in the entire society.

So, without this ideological movement, it would be very difficult for us to understand what kind of outcome China's economic reform would have. It might have been extremely difficult to advance, or even our reform and opening up might not have been able to take place at all. If the ideological constraints had not been broken first, our actions would have been hard to truly take root.

So, in this sense, thought is the forerunner of action and also the foundation of political reform. It is precisely in this sense that we understand ideological enlightenment as a foundation of political enlightenment. I believe this is easy for everyone to understand.

Regarding what is mentioned later, cultural enlightenment and social enlightenment are both processes that unfold on the basis of political enlightenment. Cultural enlightenment is based on an overall understanding of the evolution laws of human society and history. It is precisely based on such an understanding that the concept of cultural enlightenment is formed.

Even so, the enlightenment of thought led to the enlightenment of culture, and eventually to the enlightenment of society. But what are the manifestations of these three enlightenments in real life?

Its manifestation is the enlightenment of politics.

Therefore, political enlightenment is both the starting point and the end point of history. This is easy to understand. A change in thought always aims at social change as its ultimate goal. And the best outcome of enlightenment is actually to achieve political reform through the movement of social enlightenment.

So, the historical status of the French Enlightenment lies in the fact that it is not merely an ideological concept but a social reality. Even more so, it has become a social reality.

From this perspective to understand the Enlightenment, we believe it will be more profound than the common understanding. At the same time, it can also help us understand the close connection between general philosophical theories and social reality. Because according to Marx, if a theory is to be grasped by the masses, it must be thorough. And by thorough, it means being able to grasp the essence or root of things, and this root is the problem that the reality we face needs to solve.

If a theory fails to grasp the problems that need to be solved in reality, it cannot be said to have grasped the essence. Since you haven't grasped the essence, your theory is not thorough. And if it's not thorough, it cannot be mastered by the masses. Therefore, the logical connection here is very close.

Therefore, all theories are not only profound conceptual responses to the reality of a society, but also have a direct impact on that society's reality.

So, from a philosophical perspective, it is not groundless. If a philosophy is merely groundless, as Engels put it in Anti-D  hring, "such a theory can actually be criticized by people or even by rats."

Because it is not worth our time to take it seriously. But truly valuable thoughts and philosophies can directly reflect the reality of society and at the same time have an impact on it. Hegel had a very profound understanding of this. When we read Hegel's "Phenomenology of Spirit", we will find that when Hegel presents a process of development of "absolute spirit" in his philosophy, it is actually a reflection of the historical evolution in the past, and it cannot be separated from the changes of that era.

When Kant presented his critique of pure reason, or when he offered his thoughts on human rational thinking, he was by no means suggesting that one should face the wall and pull their own hair out. I think this is a point that we should always keep in mind when studying philosophy. Of course, this is just to offer a way of thinking and a method of thought. It is not a specific approach to studying philosophy, but rather a way to understand the relationship between philosophy and social reality at all times.

How to understand this? It might be hard to understand?

Since it is a way of thinking, then why is it not a specific method for studying philosophy?

Because, a way of thinking to understand philosophical concepts provides us with how to reflect the generation and development of concepts in a social evolution process. This is only a basic understanding of philosophy. However, when dealing with philosophical issues, we cannot mechanically apply such a method.

When dealing with philosophical issues, the approach we advocate more is what is called "the method of logical analysis".

When we present a philosophical inference, we do not need to verify how this theory functions in reality. If a theory is good, it is because it can reflect the development of reality, rather than saying that the theory is good only after it has acted upon reality.

That would be disastrous, because we have already paid a heavy price to verify this theory. In other words, we cannot kill all the people and then say that everyone is going to die, and then conclude that the statement "everyone is going to die" is a truth.