Think Deeply About Your Feelings

I think that I agree with a mix of both perspectives. The Enlightenment emphasizes intellect and reasoning rather than tradition while Romanticism is an art movement that emphasizes the emotions and creativity of each individual, as well as placing importance on nature. Although reasoning and learning are important, one cannot live in a world where they do not appreciate the beauty in the world around them. With a combination of both, one can use reasoning to explore more of nature as well as emotions and art.

The Enlightenment and Romanticism have impacted my thinking about western culture due to the fact that each one plays an important part in the everyday life of college students. STEM students are often thought of as using reasoning in their field which is an example of Enlightenment thinking while art majors exemplify Romanticism thinking more. I feel like Enlightenment thinking has more emphasis and respect placed on it due to potentially higher-paying jobs. However, I think both the Enlightenment and Romanticism are important because due to the different values each has and how it shows that life is not all just scientific thinking, but also being more in touch with emotions and nature.

The most interesting takeaway from the class for me was how aesthetic experience can be both sensible and intellectual, and how it can reunite man as a society. I also think that its interesting how Schiller focuses on the Greeks and places them on a high pedestal. This seems to be a recurring theme throughout this time. Not only were their ideas and unity exemplified, but so was their architecture. This could also relate back to aesthetics and how they are important in uniting man, demonstrated by the fact that many of our important government buildings are based on Greek architecture.

Does Society Cause Disease?

With so few sources of illnesses, man in the state of Nature has, then, little need for remedies, and even less for Doctors; in this respect, too, the human species is no worse off than all the others, and one can easily find out from Hunters whether they come across many unhealthy animals in their treks” (Discourse on Inequality)

There’s been a recent viral outbreak in Wuhan that has been all over global news as of late. Society has forced everyone away from the state of nature, where they would naturally spread out. In nature, people are foremost concerned with basic and personal needs and not worried too much about what others are doing. In order for everyone to have adequate resources from the natural world, people wouldn’t tend to be very close together and steal from each other, but would instead move on to different areas that contain more resources. Without society, there would never exist such high population densities that we see in our largest cities, and this allows for rapid expansion of diseases. The fact that the people of Wuhan have been forced to rely on the artificial government for meeting many people’s basic needs as opposed to providing for oneself and living off of nature has led to civil unrest because the government has been unable to deliver supplies to many. People naturally realize the many disadvantages of society and the lack of capability government has in meeting basic needs during states of emergency. People place power in government in return for meeting basic needs of the people, but many times society fails to reciprocate and needs aren’t met. (Also, sorry this is late.)

https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/what-its-like-to-try-to-get-treatment-for-the-coronavirus-in-china