Natural rights
The idea that human beings, just by virtue of being human, possess rights like life liberty and property
Consumer Revolution
Inductive reasoning
Using specific observations to create general principles
Philosophes
Population increases in the 1700s
Rising birth rates, improving medical technology, vaccines, and bubonic plague went away
Denis Diderot
Nicolaus Copernicus
Challenged the geocentric model of the universe through mathematics and put forward the heliocentric model, where everything orbits the sun.
Thomas Hobbes
There is no morality in the state of nature. You need government to order the chaos of nature
Humoral theory of the body
The body is made up of 4 substances: blood, yellow bile, black bile, and flem? Imbalance of these 4 lead to disease. This is where blood letting came from
Francis Bacon
Developed inductive reasoning
Geocentric model of the universe
Every body in the galaxy circled around the earth, including the sun. This was the Catholic Churches view and presumed model of the universe in midevil europe
Charter of towns 1792
Catherine the great extended civl liberties to Russian Jews
Enlightenment thinkers applied new methods of reasoning to politics, and human institutions
Coffee Houses
Grew with the increased demand for leisure during the consumer revolution and helped spread enlightenment ideas
Paracelsus
Rejected the humoral theory and claimed that chemical imbalances caused disease, meaning chemical remedies could be used to cure people.
Salon
private drawing rooms where wealthy Parisian women would have intellectual discussions with aristocrats
Reading Revolution
The transition in Europe from a society where literacy consisted of patriarchal and communal reading of religious texts to a society where literacy was commonplace and reading material was broad and diverse. Books also became less religious. So religious censorship increased
John Locke
Argued that natural rights were given by god, not a government, so a government couldn’t take them away. Therefore power originates with the people
Thanks to new technologies, fewer people were required for farming, leading many to move to the cities.
Atheism
Contagious Diseases Act
This allowed police officers to arrest any woman they suspected to be a prostitute. They were then permitted to give that woman an examination to prevent the spread of STDs. This is state-sponsered sexual assault.
A Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792)
Argued that women and men were equal, and anything women seemed inferior at, it was only because they had been denied education and opportunities by men
Using general principles to determine specific consitions
Enlightenment views of religion
Deism
Voltaire argued that there was a god, but god didn’t intervene in human affairs.
Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Attacked mercantilist economics. Promoted laissez-faire, free-market economy, and supply-and-demand economics.
Galileo Galilei
Built a telescope and observed that other planets and moons, existed, and weren’t just balls of light
Voltaire
Most famous French philosopher. Produced many works that criticized social and religious institutions of France. Supported religious tolerance, natural rights, but didn’t believe in democracy, only enlightened absolutism
Enlightened absolutists monarchs
Frederick the great of Prussia: tried to help the people. Increased freedoms of press and speech to weaken the nobility and strengthen his power.
English writer and early feminist who denied male supremacy and advocated equal education for women
