Rousseau iluminista?

as trevas das Luzes no Discurso sobre as ciências e as artes

Abstract

Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) doesn’t show in his argumentation the enthusiasm, optimism and engagement with the human rationality expected from an idea, perhaps stereotyped, of Enlightenment philosopher, in his debut work, the Discourse on the Arts and Sciences, from 1750, in spite of emphasizing that he doesn’t attack the sciences and arts themselves, but their deleterious relationships with virtue and costumes throughout history. Besides, the inventory of moral and political losses caused by sciences and arts to peoples and the suspicion on reason as the main means of emancipation and moral improvement of human being, which can be found in the Discourse, turns a Rousseau still intuitive and debuting thinker into a critical without any illusion in regard to the achievements and potential of human reason. More precisely, he diagnoses and thinks about the darkness of lights. Thus, how can we understand and classify Rousseau’s reflection in this specific intellectual moment in which his thinking is an outline and glimpse of what will be the renowned Discourse on the Origin and Basis of Inequality Among Men, from 1755? That’s the motivation and problematizing horizon of this article on the first Rousseau’s philosophical reflection.