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Zeitgeist and the Individual

The problem of man's individual ability to act in a complex society and exist under a nation state that directs his behavior has been predominant since the Enlightenment. The role of the zeitgeist, or the general trend of thinking in a period of time, versus man's own freedom to think has been a more recent concern of post-Enlightenment philosophy.

A major proponent of individual mental liberty was John Stuart Mill, whose treatise On Liberty advocates the freedom of man to think what he will think in addition to act how he will act as long as society is not threatened by his thoughts or actions (117). Reasonable self-interest, therefore, is the guiding light for moral interaction with others. Yet for Mill, it is not enough to guarantee freedom of action; a society must balance social control with the freedom of the people to express their opinions and hold the opinions that suit them.

The treatment of the zeitgeist gained more attention after World War II and the horrific brainwashing of the German people by National Socialism. Philosophers and writers began to view the zeitgeist as a negative force because of its capacity to rob an individual of his or her own motive to think. Robert Waller describes the lack of individual freedom to think that characterized 1930s Germany: "We speak scornfully of the crowd, undisciplined and unaware of its own motives (or disciplined and unaware of its own motives, as in the case of Hitler's stage-managed bloodthirsty carnivals)" (Be Human or Die, 72). He also writes on the competing spirits of natural history and observational sciences that characterized the Enlightenment debates (150). Zeitgeist existed then too as competing camps of knowing, the most generally accepted winning out.

But since World War II, social critics have actively denigrated the practice of blindly following where the zeitgeist leads, at least rhetorically, and have been in favor of a self that challenges its...

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Zeitgeist and the Individual. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 10:54, March 28, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/2000090.html