Reading Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind | Alexandria
Read Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind by Nicolas de Condorcet. Predicting human extinction while imprisoned during the French Revolution, Condorcet's radical optimism birthed modern progress theory. His shocking insight? That education and reason would inevitably advance society, even as he faced death. Today, his vision of cumulative knowledge and social equality challenges our cynicism about human potential.