This book systematically traces the development of the idea that the improvement of human understanding requires public activity.

Peter Schouls examines the role played by the concepts of freedom, mastery, and progress in Descartes' writings, arguing that these ideas express a vital and fundamental feature of Descartes' thought. These theories also occupy a central position in the thought of the Enlightenment. Since the more contentious claim is that they function centrally in Descartes' works, Schouls presents a careful and detailed examination of the conjunction and use of these ideas in Descartes' writings. This examination warrants the conclusion that they play the same role in Descartes' works as they do in writings typical of the Enlightenment.

What epistemic assumptions framed eighteenth-century thinkers' speculations regarding origins? What, if anything, connected these speculations? The best way to understand the Enlightenment's obsession with origins is to study it in conjunction with the contemporary conceptualization of originality as a criterion of aesthetic value, Catherine Labio maintains. Her expansive survey of the era's thought places special emphasis on epistemology and is genuinely interdisciplinary, drawing on such fields as anthropology, geometry, historiography, literary criticism, and political economy. One of the most striking facets of Enlightenment thought, according to Labio, is the emergence of aesthetics as a master discourse that enabled its users to make sense of worlds ostensibly unrelated to the arts. In particular, once knowledge became defined as knowledge of things made by human beings, originality became valued not only for its novelty but also as a guarantee of epistemological certainty. Labio analyzes the views held by a variety of European thinkers—including Baumgarten, Condillac, Descartes, Kant, Locke, Rousseau, Adam Smith, Vico, and Edward Young—on the origins of ideas, languages, nations, nature, and wealth. Throughout, the author deals with a wide range of primary and secondary materials.

Ben-Yami shows how the technology of Descartes' time shapes his conception of life, soul and mind–body dualism; how Descartes' analytic geometry helps him develop his revolutionary conception of representation without resemblance; and how these ideas combine to shape his new and influential theory of perception.

One of Slate’s 10 Best Books of the Year Anthony Gottlieb’s landmark The Dream of Reason and its sequel challenge Bertrand Russell’s classic as the definitive history of Western philosophy. Western philosophy is now two and a half millennia old, but much of it came in just two staccato bursts, each lasting only about 150 years. In his landmark survey of Western philosophy from the Greeks to the Renaissance, The Dream of Reason, Anthony Gottlieb documented the first burst, which came in the Athens of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. Now, in his sequel, The Dream of Enlightenment, Gottlieb expertly navigates a second great explosion of thought, taking us to northern Europe in the wake of its wars of religion and the rise of Galilean science. In a relatively short period—from the early 1640s to the eve of the French Revolution—Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke, Leibniz, and Hume all made their mark. The Dream of Enlightenment tells their story and that of the birth of modern philosophy. As Gottlieb explains, all these men were amateurs: none had much to do with any university. They tried to fathom the implications of the new science and of religious upheaval, which led them to question traditional teachings and attitudes. What does the advance of science entail for our understanding of ourselves and for our ideas of God? How should a government deal with religious diversity—and what, actually, is government for? Such questions remain our questions, which is why Descartes, Hobbes, and the others are still pondered today. Yet it is because we still want to hear them that we can easily get these philosophers wrong. It is tempting to think they speak our language and live in our world; but to understand them properly, we must step back into their shoes. Gottlieb puts readers in the minds of these frequently misinterpreted figures, elucidating the history of their times and the development of scientific ideas while engagingly explaining their arguments and assessing their legacy in lively prose. With chapters focusing on Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke, Pierre Bayle, Leibniz, Hume, Rousseau, and Voltaire—and many walk-on parts—The Dream of Enlightenment creates a sweeping account of what the Enlightenment amounted to, and why we are still in its debt.

A study of scientific naturalism in the Enlightenment. In tracing the materialism of Diderot, La Mettrie, Buffon, and D'Holbach to its sources, it offers a fresh appraisal of the total influence of Descartes on the Enlightenment. Originally published in 1953. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.