Monday, June 27, 2005

Kan't Enlightement

These days what I am craving for, is a bit of free time to sit in a coffee shop and read Immanuel Kant's Enlightenment article. I am halfway through reading it and I enjoy every word of it. Kant is one of the main philosophers behind modernism. Now that I am living in the West, I understand him better. When he says "Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-incurred immaturity" and emphasizes that “It is so convenient to be immature”, it’s like he is talking about the very basic rule of living in the West. Many of my immigrant friends have experienced the day when they realized that there isn't any help or guidence and they have to figur it out by themselves. Kant explains that in the process of enlightenment, “obedience” is very important to keep the society in order. Therefore "He must simply obey. But he cannot reasonably be banned from making observations as a man of learning on the errors..., and from submitting these to his public for judgement."
I really like to translate this article to Persian, because I think it has a lot to say about the situation that we Iranians are experiencing in general. But I don't want to make a promise that I can't deliver. For now, I highly recommend you to read the article in English.

2 comments:

Solivan said...

I have read that articl for 5 times! but still i believe that there are several ideas that I didn't catch them.

Anonymous said...

ُSabereh jan,
I never would call Toronto "west". It might have a piece of anglosxson culture and a piece of american life but hardly could call it west.