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Good Life In Western Civilization

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Western Civilization has been characterized by the striving to figure out what “the Good Life” is and people trying to apply it to their current civilization. If society builds upon itself to ideal state then our world today should be the closest to the utopian state yet. Advancements in technology, science, human rights should prove that the ideal good life should be closer to the most definitive definition yet. However, specifically in Western Civilization, there has been multiple conflicting movements even within a single time period to accomplish the goal of defining a universal ideal good life that all society can follow. In Ancient Greece, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle were all trying to figure out their view of how society should be and each had a slightly different version of their ideal version of the good life. The different versions of these philosophers are going up against the views of Ancient Greeks through the works of Plato’s Apology and Allegory of the Cave. In the Apology, Socrates is on trial for corrupting the youth of Athens, not believing in the Gods, and going against the sophists and their ideals version of the good life. Socrates even …show more content…

The characteristics of the enlightenment that reason would eventually give rise to an optimistic utopian society where everyone would have a place in a utopian society is evident. Letters Concerning Toleration, people are allowed to believe in Christian faiths that are not just Catholicism as a way to preserve their own soul and follow rules from their church to be in their good life. In Kant’s What is Enlightenment, a man has reached enlightenment when he emerges from a state of self-imposed pupilage and beings thinking for himself. Nothing is wanted in enlightenment but liberty and liberty to make public knowledge of one’s reason to

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