Philosophical Minds Zurich

Join us for the premier of a collective reading & text discussion session!

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) is one of the central figures of Western philosophy, known above all for his work on reason, autonomy, and moral judgment. His 1784 essay Beantwortung der Frage: Was ist Aufklärung? is short — a few pages — but precise in a way that rewards slow, careful reading.

For this session, we do exactly that: read the text together, paragraph by paragraph, in the tradition of a philosophy seminar. What does Kant mean by Unmündigkeit — the self-incurred immaturity he sees all around him? Where does he draw the line between the public and private use of reason, and does that distinction hold? These are not rhetorical questions; they are ones the text itself invites us to sit with.

It can serve as perfect preparation for the May event.

You cannot speak about Enlightenment in Europe without naming Immanuel Kant. In his 1784 essay Was ist Aufklärung? he offered a definition, which was was bold in its simplicity: it is the human being's emergence from self-incurred immaturity — the failure to think for oneself, not from lack of capacity, but lack of resolve. His shorthand for this was sapere aude! : dare to know (or to think).

The essay raises questions that haven't settled with time. What does it mean to think for oneself, and how free are we to do so? How does his vision hold up in an age of algorithmic feeds, institutional inertia, Artificial Intelligence, and information overload? This evening takes the essay as a starting point for a broader conversation about autonomous thinking, critical expression, and what remains of the Enlightenment idea today. Prior reading is useful but not required.