The Dream of Enlightenment: The Rise of Modern Philosophy

Gottlieb’s new account of the enlightenment is a pleasant and easy read. The thought of major philosophers is balanced with their biographies and an overall sense of the enlightenment program (challenging the hegemony of the church and aristocracy by the advocacy of science and reason) comes through in a lucid fashion.The title is, however, somewhat misleading. The book principally concerns philosophy rather than science and the empirical method. The latter are discussed, of course, but the chapters cover Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke, Bayle (surprisingly), Leibniz and Hume, where one might have expected extended discussions (there are brief discussions) on Bacon, Newton and, e.g., the Dutch physicians/Newtonians who helped spread news of English science to their continental patients.Late in the book (p. 196), Gottlieb comments that “there are few avowed Leibnizians, Lockeans or Hobbists today.” He refers to a 2009 poll of philosophers “who were asked to pick the dead thinker with whom they most identified.” The top four: Hume, Aristotle, Kant, Wittgenstein. Fair enough, but why does Gottlieb’s survey of enlightenment philosophers end with Hume rather than with the equally influential (in all honesty, probably far more influential) Kant? Kant not only completes and extends some of the most important philosophic threads of the eighteenth century; he is a crucial bridge to the Romanticism which followed.We all have our favorites, of course, but I am surprised that Berkeley is not given far more attention, not just as a bridge to Hume, but as an enormous influence on such literary figures as Blake. If one looks at the book baldly it is essentially an account of seven philosophers. The final chapter “What Has the Enlightenment Ever Done for Us?” (a clever play on Cleese’s question concerning the Romans in Monty Python’s Life of Brian) attempts to pull all of the threads together in 13 tidy pages. Unfortunately, the enlightenment is far more complex than that and a book which at first appears to be a grand synthesis turns out to be a fairly basic primer.The “Suggestions for Further Reading” (p. 281) contain a spare eleven titles and Peter Gay’s magisterial study of the enlightenment is not among them. Gottlieb’s enlightenment is also essentially French, a kind of dual between Voltaire and Rousseau. Hume is not seen as part of the Scottish enlightenment or, indeed, as part of a larger British enlightenment. Johnson, e.g., is mentioned briefly and is contrasted with Hume, though Johnson explicitly said once that all of Hume’s ideas had passed through his own mind. Gottlieb catches the more moderate aspects of the British enlightenment (Hume scoring religion but in a reverent manner) and he appreciates the fact that the enlightenment begins in England—and Voltaire’s recognition and praise in that regard—but he fails to see how important these distinctions are. Hume makes a crucial and obvious (but somehow easily forgotten) distinction between faith and reason. Faith is, by its very definition, closed to rational attack. Thinkers who have that faith, Johnson, e.g., are still capable of embracing the great mass of the enlightenment program. At bottom, the enlightenment is an extremely complex set of ideas and debates whose ultimate contrast now is not with the church and aristocracy but with the romanticism(s) that replaced it. On another level it highlights the conflicts between science and philosophy which were of such deep concern to the Anglo-American mid 20th century. Gottlieb gives us some wonderful hints of this on p. 77: “Both [Locke and Hobbes] maintained that some traditional puzzles are merely confusions masquerading as problems, which appear to be substantive only because people do not pay enough attention to how words get their meanings. This idea was far from new in the history of philosophy—it is found in Plato’s time and in every subsequent period—but Hobbes made much more of it than most, and Locke followed his example.”Yes, indeed. And that is why Wittgenstein makes the list of the top four philosophers with whom contemporary philosophers associate themselves. The most important questions are, as he argued, those of which we cannot speak. Hence the importance of the British enlightenment’s figures of faith (Newton, Boyle, Johnson, et al.) for our understanding of the total picture. Gottlieb gives us glimpses of these issues but does not pursue them to the degree that one might wish.Bottom line: a lucid and workmanlike exposition of the thought of a handful of enlightenment philosophers that is very light (but occasionally quite suggestive) on the overall patterns that constitute this era in Western thought.

The author gives a concise history of philosophy from Descartes to Voltaire, by a circuitous route that includes Leibniz, Newton, Locke, Hume etc. He provides a good description of the periods these people lived in and the challenges they faced when trying to publish their work(s). The book is enjoyable to read and one wished that there was more to absorb from such an important period of history.

“The Dream of Enlightenment” by Anthony Gottlieb It seems that much of what is worth remembering in Western (European) Philosophy happened in two spurts of about 2 centuries each---the Athens of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle (550-400 BC) and the Enlightenment of Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke, Newton, Leibniz, Voltaire and Hume (1600-1800). This second period is the subject of this outstanding book (the same author also summarized the first period in his “A Dream of Reason”). The wisdom of the “ancients” of the first period held sway during the intervening period until the 17th century when Francis Bacon (1561-1626), Blaise Pascal (1623-62) and others who believed (in Pascal’s words) Those whom we call the ancients were really new in all things, and properly constituted the infancy of mankind; and as we have joined to their knowledge the experience of the centuries which have followed them, it is in ourselves that we should find this antiquity rather than in others. Bacon’s insistence that all old ideas were suspect and that a Philosopher’s time was better spent finding the facts in the world about him than in dusty libraries motivated others to do just that, although Bacon himself dismissed the results of Galileo (1564-1642) and Johann Kepler (1571-1630) because they were tiresomely mathematical and did not think much of Copernicus’ heliocentric model for the universe.. Renee Descartes (1596-1650), who had invented analytical geometry to solve then-modern physics problems about space and motion, undertook the development of a comprehensive mathematical “mechanical” theory for motion of bodies in terms of their interactions with other bodies to replace the ancient Aristotlean theory. His theory of motion was for a short time a rival to that developed somewhat later by Isaac Newton (1642-1727), and he also applied his mathematics to the design of lens for telescopes. He distrusted the senses and thought that all wisdom was to be found by rational thought, a process which led him to several deductive proofs of God. He is remembered mainly as a mathematician and an abstract thinker who made the basis of knowledge the most basic question of philosophy. The work of three very different Englishmen--Thomas Hobbs (1588-1679), John Locke (1632-1704) and David Hume (1711-76), a Dutch-Portugese Jew---Baruch Spinoza (1632-77), a German polymath---Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716), and two French intellectuals--- Francios Voltaire (1694-1778) and Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-78), completes the author’s discussion of the Enlightenment. It may seem strange that Rousseau is included in this pantheon of philosophers, because he was definitely not reconciled to the civilization of his day, nor to that of any other. The Enlightenment is generally credited with the ideas that led to the American Declaration of Independence and the French Revolution. It is also frequently credited with the ideas that led to the reign of terror following the French Revolution and to the Russian and German dictatorships of the 20th century. According to the author, the case for the Enlightenment is on its firmest ground when we point to the waning power of religious authorities to interfere in and even end people’s lives, to the toleration of religious dissent, to scientific progress, and to the gradual dismantling of political institutions that were too close to feudalism and too far from democracy.

Unless you're studying for a advanced degree in philosophy, I'm afraid reading the stuff is much like panning for gold: a great deal of effort for a very occasional nugget of insight. But this book - wow! You really get inside the head of these revered icons via Gottlieb's narrative. He provides all the goodies: historical context, character description, incidental correspondence between philosophers, high praise or, sometimes, puerile criticism by one philosopher of another., etc., etc. It is refreshing to encounter a very readable, well explained summation of the various philosophies of these iconic figures without endlessly try to slog through their sonorous screeds. This is the first book on philosophy I've had trouble putting down. I can't wait for Gottlieb's next one!

I read Gottlieb’s “The Dream of Reason” (2000) some years before I started reviewing on Amazon. I enjoyed it greatly and have been looking forward to this present sequel which has appeared sixteen years later. But if I remember the earlier book properly, this later one is very different in character. The former one, as I remember it, was a lively, lucid and straightforward account of philosophy from the Greeks to the Renaissance, which illuminated much of the knowledge I had already. The current book, on the other hand, takes more of the reader’s knowledge of philosophy for granted, is poorly organized, more discursive, meandering and personal, and it brings in the lesser-known works of the philosophers to modify and even to challenge the ideas that have been generally received from their better-known works. I think there is also some unevenness, both in that some chapters are more densely written than others, and also in his choice of what aspects of a philosopher’s work to emphasize. There are only 244 pages of text; and some biographical details, some political events and some earlier antecedents take up quite a few pages which I think might with advantage have been devoted to a less cursory exposition than he gives to certain ideas.To take as an example the chapter on Hobbes, at 49 pages the longest in the book: Hobbes has invoked God so frequently that, if he meant what he said, we (and his enemies) cannot justifiably call him an atheist. Gottlieb brings quotations from “The Elements of Law”, from “De Cive” and from “De Corpore”, which gave me (at least) new angles on Hobbes. As for discursiveness, Gottlieb compares Hobbes’ view of the State of Nature with Rousseau’s; and my conception of both of these was modified. He compares Hobbes’ view with Rousseau’s rather than with Locke’s, presumably because Gottlieb has dug up a quotation from Locke’s “First Tract on Government” of 1660, but not published until 1967, which accepted Hobbes’ view. But these views were very different from those Locke expressed in his classic “Second Treatise on Civil Government”, published in 1689, and to which Gottlieb does not refer in the chapter on Hobbes (though he will in that on Locke). He explores such rather arcane corners of Hobbes’ work as his attempts to square the circle. And he adds his own opinions on the theories he discusses.Gottlieb devotes his last chapter of just 12 pages to “Voltaire, Rousseau and the Philosophes” (in which, incidentally, he has Rousseau teach that the “multitude” had to be forced to be free, when what Rousseau actually said the General Will of the multitude would force the dissenting individual to be free.)So this is a somewhat idiosyncratic book. I did not find it an easy one to read, and I cannot believe the claim of the Spectator’s Dominic Green, quoted in the blurb, that it “looks set to become a modern classic”.

Very much in the style of Gottlieb’s earlier work (The Dream of Philosophy) but focusing on the the middle period of philosophy that deals with, among others, Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke and Hume. Certainly enjoyed the book; it is easy to read and never fails to be engaging. I learned a lot from it, and I’m looking forward to a further volume that covers the contemporary scene in philosophy.I hope you find me review helpful.

This is a book for people with a general interest in philosophy or those interested in the development of modern thought in the arts or social sciences.It is really a great read. I wish i has had this book when I was a student. Lovely, lovely writing !

There are many books on a similar subject but none have quite the same interesting conversational style

Very good introduction for the layman to philosophy. Written in plain, easy to understand language without diminishing the subject.

Good book. Easy to read. I liked the part on Spinoza the most.

It was a present for a friend. Greatly enjoyed I hear.

good read as expected, thanks

This is one of the best books on the main enlightment philosophers you will find anywhere. Not dissapointed.

All fine.

The follow up to his Dream of Reason. This books focuses on the development of philosophy during the Enlightenment Period. Highly enjoyed it. My only complaint is that I found that it ended rather abruptly. Great book for someone who has a general interest in learning about philosophy and can be used as primer for jumping off into more detail of the philosophers he discusses. Hope there is a 3rd installment and can't wait for it.

As a physician i have a very distant recollection of that little of philosophy teaching I got as a pre-university student. What I can say now of that far away learning experience is just that I didn't enjoy it. Well, I must say just the opposite about this book: no agiography, no neutral description, no pills of what you absolutely have to repeat, I enjoied a lot the critical discussion, the contradictions the blend of geniality and conservatism, the wide wanderings of great minds at work.I would suggest this book to anybody with even a passing interest in the job of reasoning

I must of been in many past life's because I am a true history/philosophy/theology and anthropology buff when it comes to reading...A.G makes a very good adaption of early philosophers...I enjoyed his books makes for good reading and listeningSide note: All books that I buy/rent I own the audio to go with to the exception of children's book which I read to my grandchildren

Modern philosophy was born with the advent of enlightenment. Anthony Gottlieb's book features eight chapters about eight great philosophers. His book is fun to read as it is written without any kind of philosophical jargon.

This is a fantastically easy book to understand. The first time I've had an inclination of what philosophy is about. So well written, witty and engaging. And I have a post graduate degree...