WAS IST AUFKLAERUNG?

In preparation for the bicentennial of Immanuel Kant's death next month, Die Zeit has a series of essays from prominent intellectuals on Kant's most famous topic, "What is enlightenment?" Among the highlights: Bernard-Henri Lévy exposes several of what he calls the "illusions of enlightenment" and recommends a (chastened) revival of the idea of "critique" to counter those illusions. Francis Fukyama argues that modern science and technology seem to have made Kantian freedom impossible by withdrawing any scientific ground for a defense of the noumenal (or its analogue). Gianni Vattimo picks up on the structure of political authority in Kant's original essay and updates it with reference to modern mass media, two essays attempt an answer in dialogue with islamic traditions, and Karl Kardinal Lehmann, the Bishop of Mainz, turns the question into a call for a reinvigorated theology.