The great American experiment in democracy owes a lot to the
18th century European Enlightenment.
Progress and enlightenment were possible, Thomas Paine
proclaimed. The road to 18th
century enlightenment was paved with belief in reason, material science, and
secular government, and Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin saw by the same
lights.
The forward march of material science has undoubtedly reshaped
American life, making us masters of Earth’s resources. Empires have been built, wars fought,
and vast wealth created. The ideas
of the philosophes propelled American
history forward, all in line with our vaunted Manifest Destiny.
But the Enlightenment was also supposed to trend toward
liberty (could that have meant unfettered capitalism?), equality (a blatant
failure), and brotherly love (really?). The subjective side of enlightenment,
what Jefferson called the “pursuit of happiness” was part of the founder’s vision. But the picture from the subjective
side is pretty dismal. The nation
is depressed and caught up in a killer opioid epidemic.
The counter indications are huge. The American civil war was proof of something quite the opposite
of brotherly love. There was
nothing humane or enlightened about the North and the South heroically
slaughtering each other. And given
that racist pathology lives on in America today, Enlightenment tolerance has
made some but not that much headway.
Are we in spirit a country of brotherly love? Sometimes, but Americans also like to
shoot themselves and each other to death, about 92 times a day or roughly 33
thousand times a year. Brotherly
love, sure, but all too many seem to love their guns more than their brothers.
America is not only supposed to be enlightened but also a
Christian nation. Would Jesus stand
square with the NRA or with the victims of gun violence? Is it Christian to grovel before an idol – the Gun – the most
unchristian object imaginable?
The Enlightenment was supposed to lead to a more peaceful
world. But reason and material
science have not created a peaceful world. On the contrary, reason and material science are repeatedly used
with destructive efficiency in fighting wars and building empires. America was the first nation in world
history to use atom bombs for the mass annihilation of civilian populations.
Reason, god of the enlightenment, is an efficient servant. The technology of espionage,
surveillance, and weapons of enormous destructive power are constantly
evolving, consuming the wealth of the nation whose infrastructure is failing,
education eroding, the people are deserted by a Congress more loyal to their lobbyists.
America leads the world in arms production and sales. An NBC report states that the U.S.
spends more on military technology than all the nations of the world combined. That one country should have become the lone “super” power is
counter to the way history should be unfolding, according to Enlightenment ideas.
Reason and the democratic fruits of our labor were supposed
to empower the whole of society, not a tiny fraction of money-mad
sociopaths. Progress was supposed
to be toward justice, not toward the inequities witnessed everywhere today. America is sliding from a once viable democracy
and money has a stranglehold on the soul of democracy, which is respect for truth and freedom.
Enlightenment? Look
with a clear eye: our leaders have swifted us from the founding holocaust of
native America and black slavery to the present state of permanent war. And is it enlightened to create an
apocalyptic climate crisis and then deny there’s a problem?
Science and technology have been co-opted by the uncivil and
the unenlightened.
The conclusion should be apparent. The European Enlightenment has left us high and dry, or
maybe the converse. It meant well but threw us off balance
from the start. For all its mighty achievements, it made us smarter and smarter
about less and less that is humanly important. Reason, science, technology have become alienated from the
common needs of life. We need to deepen
and renew our concept of enlightenment.
The emphasis has been on material progress for the few. The new emphasis needs to be on
human progress for all.