Enlightenment versus Modernist - Nietzsche, Freud, and Kafka - Essay Example

Three modernists, Nietzsche, Freud, and Kafla, will show how personal feeling or interpretation dictated the modernist period in contrast to an enlightenment point of reality.
Friedrich Nietzsche was a German philosopher. Nietzsche promoted nihilism by proclaiming “God is dead” (Morgan, 36). Instead of interpreting God as an all-powerful creator, Nietzsche believed God was used to creating a society of morality without a purpose. While an individual from the enlightenment might reason that God and morality must exist for society to function smoothly, Nietzsche believed morality needed to be examined without the excuse of God. Nietzsche’s reality was looking into philosophical arguments that are still up for debate to this day. Unlike the reasoning of the enlightenment age, Nietzsche’s views are debatable. They cannot be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Franz Kafka was a modernist writer. He was born in Germany. Instead of using reasoning in reality, Kafka wrote stories that today would be considered science fiction. An example is The Metamorphosis. In this story, Kafka had a traveling salesman turn into a huge insect (Kafka). An Enlightenment-influenced thinker would never think of this plot because humans cannot turn into huge insects. Kafka would have probably responded to this line of thinking by replying “not yet”. Modernists believe that not everything can be explained by human reasoning yet. The modernist keeps theorizing until the day their thoughts are proven. However, modernist does not stop thinking just because they cannot prove their theories.

Sigmund Freud was a German doctor that pioneered psychoanalysis and psychotherapy. He theorized that every human has an id, ego, and superego. Freud also laid out different theories about human development like the anal complex, Oedipus complex, penal envy, and so forth. All of these theories, at the time, could not be proven. Today they cannot be proven, but the symptoms can be seen in humans. Does every woman wish she had a penis? That can never be judged truly. Some over-aggressive women can be diagnosed in this manner. Since psychology is an inexact science, it cannot be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt. Individuals of the enlightenment period would say Freud was crazy. No amount of solid reasoning could prove psychoanalysis. The only interpretation of human behavior can make or break psychoanalysis.

The reality of an individual in the enlightenment era was based on solid reason. Modernists’ reality is based on interpretations. Nietzsche, Kafka, and Freud used their interpretations and reasoning to create their reality. Instead of using reason for what they could prove, these modernists used reasoning on an internal basis. Not only did modernists interpret their data, but today’s scientists, writers, and philosophizers can interpret their data. Not only can their data be interpreted today, but built upon. Reality is in the eye of the beholder, for individuals from the enlightenment era and the modernist era. Read More