Wake Up! from The Sleep of Reason: Johannes Faustus and “The Aufklärung Song.”

“Aufklärung” means “enlightenment,” as in The Enlightenment. But what is enlightenment? Here’s the core of what Immanuel Kant had to say about this fundamental cognitive, moral, and sociopolitical concept in his seminal 1784 essay, “What is Enlightenment?”: Enlightenment is the human being’s emergence from his own self-incurred immaturity. Immaturity is the inability to make use … [continue reading]