Kant's Advantage Over Prometheus In The Enlightenment

Self-Improvement: Kant’s Advantage Over Prometheus In The Enlightenment It is tempting to believe that Goethe’s protagonist, Prometheus, acts according to Kant’s ideals in “What is Enlightenment”, since Prometheus has the “courage” to use his understanding without anyone else’s guidance. Kant’s introduction seems to make this fact clear to a reader. However, by only looking at his introduction, the reader will miss Kant’s real application of “courage”, which is to submit one’s own observations with others to try to improve their ideas. In reality, he criticizes Prometheus’s methods of showing courage, as it is actually harmful to the enlightenment. Kant’s conception of the enlightened human being is superior to Goethe’s protagonist Prometheus, because Kant’s vision discourages the anarchic behavior that Prometheus possesses, which if left unchecked, would cause humanity to suffer. In order to prove this claim, this paper will be structured to use Kant’s idea of an enlightened human as a lens to critique Prometheus’s example, and I will then determine the progress of each vision’s approach makes in their respective versions of humanity. I will

In Kant’s second to last paragraph, he explains that a pro-enlightenment head of state “allows his subjects to make public use of their own reason and to put before the public their thoughts on better ways of drawing up laws, even if this entails forthright criticism of the current legislation”. Kant is saying that his ideal ruler allows others to make suggestions to improve the legislation. In this case, the people are improving their situation, as they are helping with “drawing up” better laws. With this approach of using one’s “courage” to share their ideas with the public, no one suffers, and humanity gets to progress with its