591. Counterenlightenment.

 In earlier items in this blog I discussed the Counter Enlightenment of Vico, Hamann, Kierkegaard, Adorno, Nietzsche and the postmodern French philosophers. Foucault, Gadamer, Lyotard, Derrida, and Rorty. They criticised the dominance of reason, universalism, absolutism, equilibrium, mono-disciplinarity, and static, rigid world views.

 In his book ‘Cosmopolis’ Stephen Toulmin argued that there was an earlier attempt, with theb humanism of Erasmus, and Montaigne, who pleaded for tolerance, diversity, individualism,  The king of France Henry IV, engineered the ‘Edict of Nantes’ that ensured the liberty of religion in France.

 According to Toulmin, this period ended with the murder of Herry IV in 1610, and the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. This initiated endless religious wars, upheavals, poverty and strife in the 17^th century, which is often lauded as ‘the age of reason’, but engendered dogmatism, separation of scientific disciplines, absolutist, universalist pretentions in science, religion and politics, which would justify the religious and political oppositions, and emergence of separate states to contain the wars. One sceptical 17^th century philosopher was David Hume. The philosopher Kant launched his critical theory, and maintained a universalist ethics.

 The Enlightenment of the 18^th century celebrated reason and the imposition of static ultimate, absolute order, universalist science and rule, until the 20th century (Nietzsche died in 1900) The Enlightenment heritage had grown static and dogmatic.

 Now we see a re-emergence of intolerance, universalism (‘our values apply to everyone, one populace’). exclusion, absolutism, nationalism. isolationism (no more help for Ukraine, exit from the EU), rigidity and conservatism (no change) indifference to environmental damage, in waves of populism. We can hardly call that a re-emergence of Enlightenment, since it is irrationalist. It is more a darkening inhumanism.