Q: What was the impact of Diderot’s encyclopedia? Diderot’s encyclopedia lit the flame of Enlightenment among its readers. It inspired them to question authority and dare to learn more.

Diderot was an original “scientific theorist” of the Enlightenment, who connected the newest scientific trends to radical philosophical ideas such as materialism. He was especially interested in the life sciences and their impact on our traditional ideas of what a person – or humanity itself – are.

Why is Denis Diderot significant? The French philosopher and essayist Denis Diderot served as chief editor (1745–72) of the Encyclopédie, and in that role he was one of the originators and interpreters of the Enlightenment.

Denis Diderot (1713-1784) was a writer and philosopher whose corpus of work contributed to the ideas of the French Revolution. As the name suggests, it was a vast compilation of articles and essays, designed (according to Diderot) to “change the way people think”.

Diderot’s most important ideas were individualism, the use of reason, the power of nature, and the belief in humanity’s progress. Denis Diderot had a very important impact on the the general way of thinking, as he went through a complete cycle of knowledge, and worked to do so in others as well./span>

John Locke (29 August 1632 – 28 October 1704) was an English philosopher and physician regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers, especially concerning the development of political philosophy. His writings influenced Voltaire and Rousseau, but most importantly, the American revolutionaries.

His political theory of government by the consent of the governed as a means to protect the three natural rights of “life, liberty and estate” deeply influenced the United States’ founding documents. His essays on religious tolerance provided an early model for the separation of church and state./span>

The Enlightenment produced numerous books, essays, inventions, scientific discoveries, laws, wars and revolutions. The American and French Revolutions were directly inspired by Enlightenment ideals and respectively marked the peak of its influence and the beginning of its decline./span>

John Locke’s most famous works are An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689), in which he developed his theory of ideas and his account of the origins of human knowledge in experience, and Two Treatises of Government (first edition published in 1690 but substantially composed before 1683), in which he defended a …/span>

John Locke’s version of social contract theory is striking in saying that the only right people give up in order to enter into civil society and its benefits is the right to punish other people for violating rights. No other rights are given up, only the right to be a vigilante./span>

Among these fundamental natural rights, Locke said, are “life, liberty, and property.” Locke believed that the most basic human law of nature is the preservation of mankind. To serve that purpose, he reasoned, individuals have both a right and a duty to preserve their own lives.

Locke was influenced by a long English tradition of laws limiting the monarch’s power. He approved of Parliament’s checks on the king’s power and of the English Bill of Rights, which strengthened Parliament as the representative of the people. Locke argued that monarchs did not have a divine right to rule.

Philosopher John Locke is often credited with founding liberalism as a distinct tradition, based on the social contract, arguing that each man has a natural right to life, liberty and property and governments must not violate these rights. Liberalism started to spread rapidly especially after the French Revolution.

These ideas were first unified as a distinct ideology by the English philosopher John Locke, generally regarded as the father of modern liberalism.

Classical liberals were committed to individualism, liberty, and equal rights. They believed these goals required a free economy with minimal government interference. Some elements of Whiggery were uncomfortable with the commercial nature of classical liberalism. These elements became associated with conservatism.

Like Hobbes, Locke believed that human nature allowed people to be selfish. This is apparent with the introduction of currency. In a natural state, all people were equal and independent, and everyone had a natural right to defend his “life, health, liberty, or possessions.”

According to Locke, we are born into perfect freedom. We are naturally free. We are free to do what we want, when we want, how we want, within the bounds of the “law of nature.” The problem that most have in understanding this theory of Locke’s is their frame of reference./span>