Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution, Research Paper Example

The history of human civilisation is characterised by various stage of development with various cornerstones or ideas dominant on each stage. With each epoch, human perception of the world and human nature was becoming more and more advanced and systematic, finally reaching the contemporary stage of technological and information age perception of the world and universe. However, the modern human development would not be possible with the previous gradual evolution of world perception. The aim of this paper is to outline the essence of the epoch of the Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution in the human history.

The core of the epoch of Enlightenment is the transition of the world perception from the dogmatic institutionally-imposed religious framework to the search of a rational and intellectual explanation of the world and diverse phenomena in it. The age of Enlightenment followed the Renaissance period, when the shift from divine world perception to the human-oriented view took place. Enlightenment followed this human-oriented approach and concentrated on scientific and logical exploration of the functionality of a human body and also the role of an individual in the world. In this regard, the previously dogmatic authority of absolutism and the rule of the Catholic Church were challenged and the freedom of an individual expression and self-exploration became predominant (Sloan and Burnett, 2003).

In terms of the development of the human civilisation, this epoch ended the times of dogma and control over one’s thought and gave a rise to scientific and philosophical freedom of research and exploration of the human potential. Without this freedom, humanity would not be able to evolve further both mentally and scientifically (Sloan and Burnett, 2003). The end of the authoritarianism and Church dogmatism meant that previous control of Inquisition and absolutist monarchies was no longer stopping human beings from finding the answer to the questions that religion and royal authorities could not provide. This epoch posed questions for the next epochs to answer. In other words, this was the epoch that shaped the systematic human self and world perceptions through the means of logic, intelligence and science rather than just faith in God (McNeese, 2000).

In terms of the New Rationalism and the Scientific Revolution, the primary change in people’s lives was that they no longer perceived their lives in terms of religious prescriptions and explanations that could no longer give exhaustive answers. People began to find answers to their existence, illnesses and improvement of their lives in the existing means of the material world they lived in and not the spiritual realm controlled by Church (Sloan and Burnett, 2003). In this regard, the development of mathematics, chemistry, and mechanics gave people the new source of explaining the phenomena of their lives and also provided new means of its improvement instead of a blind faith in divine help. From the institutional perspective, people gained freedom from the power of the Church that used the spiritual explanation of life for its political purposes (Sloan and Burnett, 2003).

As a result of the epoch of Enlightenment and Scientific Revolution, the Industrial Revolution took place. The primary impact of the Industrial Revolution on the world is that it implemented the ideas of Enlightenment through the means of scientific discoveries to change every aspect of human life. In this regard, the substitution of the manual workforce with machines and mass production of good contributed to the improvement of the quality of life (McNeese, 2000). On the other hand, it has also demonstrated and indoctrinated technological dependence of human society, which would increase with every new break-through invention and divide one epoch from another (McNeese, 2000). Moreover, the Industrial Revolution was the beginning of the contemporary mass production, capitalism and consequent consumerism. Thus, it was one of the driving forces of human progress. Overall, the age of Enlightenment was the start of the individualism and human-centred perception of the world reflected in all aspects of life.

References

McNeese, T. (2000). The Industrial Revolution. St Louise, MI: Milliken Publishing.

Sloan, K. and Burnett, A. (2003). Enlightenment: discovering the world in the eighteenth century. London: British Museum Press.