Discourse on the arts and sciences
Rousseau’s reading:
If we looked back ten years ago, we could see that life among people is hectic nowadays comparing to that time. It’s not like the simple life our grandparents used to live. It involves more activities, even work-life and the normal life of people are more involved which before they were more separate. And these changes are happening because of science. By learning science, we will be only wasting our time and won’t learn anything. Rousseau found it essential to talk about something as important as science and focus on it since it plays a significant part in changing humanity, and it plays a vital role in people’s life. But all this talk could have benefited us in the past. And now that we’ve changed, we need to act and live according to those changes. We should adapt to the modern life that we’re living now and to the changes that come along with it, which are all about science. He talks about three exigent points: education, religion, and the difference between talent and virtue.
In the discourse of art and science, the authors either talk about art or science. They talk about the effect of each one on another. And what’s the relationship between each of them, how either of them affects our lives. Some are against science, and some are with it, unlike Descartes, Rousseau is against science and believes that it only is a waste of time while in fact, we ignore the necessary things that we should be learning. It is essential for us to know Rousseau’s argument and whether we agree with him. Because everything that we do nowadays take us in the direction of science.
Rousseau, despite his hard language, makes sure to get his points across. He starts off his paragraph by calling science “insane” or silly (p46). They are giving us the idea of the topic of this paragraph, which is science and education. Rousseau presents a problem, which is science. Now the question is not in science itself. It’s in the style of teaching it. Rousseau says that by studying science, we don’t learn anything; he means that it can benefit us later in life. We learn and learn from the very beginning of childhood until the end, and we learn everything except the things we are supposed to learn, which Rousseau refers to as “duties.” Rousseau asks a question which is “what are we supposed to learn?” He then comes up with an answer about the things we should learn, which are simple, but science distracts us from acquiring them. These things include (temperature, humanity, courage, and magnanimity), which have a big soul (P.47). They should learn something that they will do later in their lives and not forget then (P.47). What Rousseau thinks we should care about is a virtue. He thinks this way because most people don’t benefit from what they’re learning, and it will be entirely useless for them not to know what to do with the information they have. It’s like someone is in war, and they have an excellent weapon, but they don’t know how to use it, and in this case, this will be a burden rather than something useful to defend themselves.
I can’t entirely agree with Rousseau; Science actually can help people understand things better. What differentiates human beings from other beings is that they are very curious about everything going on around them. Science will help us feed this desire that we have for knowledge. It has made our life easier in many ways. At that time, mostly finding a job depended on the physical power of the people, while nowadays, it depends on the knowledge you have in certain areas, and physical strength is less required. Nowadays, life is getting easier for disabled people as well. Some tools help them in their daily life. Hearing aids for deaf people, many complicated surgeries for people with rare conditions, helped cure simple diseases that caused death before. But now we can even prevent getting those diseases by vaccination. We can now modify food with vitamins and vaccines that we can send to developing countries. Rousseau also says that science will distract us from what we are supposed to do. I believe science is what we do now, so we are doing what we’re supposed to do. All this is now possible because of science. If the goal was to milk a cow by your hands in the old times, now there are tools for it, and it has made the process much more comfortable.
Science makes us think with reasons. By believing in science, we will try to have rights for everything. We will not just decide on things blindly. Instead, we will make decisions based on the reasons and the evidence we have. We will not depend on faith or our luck but on the evidence and the reasons we have. Since we know the purposes, and we have the evidence in front of us, we will act responsibly. If we relate the current situation with science and how it can be true for our case, it will be like “stay at home so the virus won’t infect you. It makes you think logically and give you the reasons. You wouldn’t say, “I have faith so that I won’t be infected.”
People can learn anything if they focus on it and practice it, but virtue, unlike science, you cannot study it or look up to someone and examine them. It’s within yourself. You look into yourself, and you already know what you should do and what you shouldn’t do. It can always whisper to our ears; it will be carved in our soul. Rousseau’s thinking seems perfect for his time when life was simple and did not depend on other people worldwide. Everything we do nowadays can be taken out to other countries, and it can go worldwide, and this is what we want and need in our generation now.
Rousseau, in another argument, talks about religion. He believes that people are more afraid of God than they respect him (P.47). Science has taken people away from the direction and has affected their soul because science doesn’t care about religion. So the closer people are to science, the further they will be from virtue and faith. I have had this conversation with many friends, and I can safely say that I agree with Rousseau on this point. People are afraid of God rather than respecting him; this is invalid because they worship him is not correct, and it’s not the point of praising God. For this, Rousseau says that we should focus more on virtue and not science so that people know the true meaning of worshiping God. They don’t have a full understanding of religion, and they don’t know how it feels like to worship God and not only be afraid of him.
Talents and virtue.
Those two words say a lot by themselves, Rousseau dedicated a good part of his reading to those two words. Despite talent being good at what you already have, which is something specific, and virtue being good in general, what are other differences? Rousseau asks an important question that makes us pause for a moment and think about it. What makes a person successful? Is it the way they choose the decisions and keep their minds on something? Is this what we value? Or is it something else like being effective by having talents. Rousseau says that people won’t ask whether a book is useful but instead if it’s well written.
With this, we can discuss the intellect of genius, who are they, and how they differ from other people. Newton, Descartes, and Bacon are considered to be the intellect of a genius. Those people cannot be treated the same way that we treat other people because their minds were out of that world. They were able to go to places that other people could not, and they discovered facts that people were ignorant of for so long. They were able to overcome the obstacles they were facing (P.50), having said that it also means that they should not expect people to think the same way or cross “If we wish nothing to lie outside their genius, then nothing must lie beyond their hopes” (P.50). The boundaries they crossed because what they have is talent and cannot be done by everyone. It’s essential to look at the examples that Rousseau brings for being excellent intellect of genius for that time. One of them is Lord Chancellor of England, and the other being The prince of eloquence was Consul of Rome. Rousseau also mentions how they should be rewarded and treated by the kings. The only reward that suits them is an honorable asylum in their courts. The kings can also benefit from them since they are great philosophers and great thinkers.
Great minds and thinkers are either there or not; the thoughts are either there or not, there’s no in-between. For this, I agree with Rousseau. Those people like Newton had a different perspective on life. This is not something that you can alter by studying it or trying to imitate those people or something that you can practice on. It’s something you have got within yourself.
A great author like Rousseau was anxious about what people were busy doing. His more significant concern was that what they were doing was useless and benefited them in no way. We wouldn’t have been in this place if it wasn’t for science. It’s made some problematic operations possible, it’s made life easier for disabled people, and it’s been a great help for them. The existence if science can be taken to explore further and can be benefited from the intellect of the genius. Even if it wasn’t for them, it could help people in general by helping them understand the world better.