Kant's Use
Kant's essay describes the Enlightenment as "man's release from his self-incurred tutelage". "Sapere Aude" is his charge to readers to follow this program of intellectual self-liberation, the tool of which is Reason. The essay is a shrewd political challenge, suggesting that the mass of "domestic cattle" have been bred by unfaithful stewards not to question what they've been told. Kant classifies the uses of reason as public and private. Public use is use in discourse in the public sphere, such as in political argument or analysis; private use is such use of reasoned argument that a person entrusted with official or organizational duties might reasonably make in that capacity. Skillfully praising Frederick II of Prussia for his receptiveness to Enlightenment ideas, Kant imagines his enlightened prince instructing subjects, "Argue as much as you will, and about what you will, only obey!" It is the courage of individuals to follow Sapere Aude that will break the shackles of despotism, and reveal through public discourse, for the benefit both of the population and the state, better methods of governance, or legitimate complaints.
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Famous quotes containing the word kant:
“A writer must always try to have a philosophy and he should also have a psychology and a philology and many other things. Without a philosophy and a psychology and all these various other things he is not really worthy of being called a writer. I agree with Kant and Schopenhauer and Plato and Spinoza and that is quite enough to be called a philosophy. But then of course a philosophy is not the same thing as a style.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)
“The ‘I think’ which Kant said must be able to accompany all my objects, is the ‘I breathe’ which actually does accompany them.”
—William James (1842–1910)