I.  Introduction:  Are we reverting to the Old World Order which the Founding Fathers of this country tried to replace?  Washington and Franklin and Paine and Jefferson and the other heroes who led our nation to its independence saw themselves as creating a New World Order, beginning with the revolution in this country and then spreading to the whole world.  The global spread of democracy and a widening interest in human rights may suggest that their goal of a New World Order is in the process of being realized.  But are there some aspects of the current situation which indicate that we have not totally succeeded in moving beyond the Old World Order?

 II.  To address that question, we must look again at the Old World Order which our first leaders were trying to vercome and how the New World Order was to be different.
        A.  The notion of a New World Order was rooted in the ideals of the 18th century Enlightenment in Europe.  Jostein Gaarder, in his wondeful novel about the history of philosophy called "Sophie's World," lists those Enlightenment ideals as:  (1) opposition to authority based just on tradition--philosophical or political or religious, (2) rationalism or faith in reason and philosophy and science, (3) the enlightenment movement, the notion that all people regardless of class are capable of being educated and thinking for themselves, (4) cultural optimism, the view that increased knowledge and education would lead to great human progress, (5) the return to nature as opposed to just following the conventional beliefs and practices of those at the top of the society, (6) natural religion, as opposed to the prevalent supernatural religion based on a special revelation, (7) human or natural rights, that is the rights of all persons to think for themselves and to be treated humanely whatever their social status.
        B.  Gaarder's list of the seven ideals of the Enlightenment which served as the basis for the hoped-for New World Order can be used to evaluate our progress toward their implementation.
        C.  With regard to the seventh one, human rights, although there is still a long way to go before we can say that we have succeeded, we seem to be moving in the right direction.  Slavery has been abolished.  The rights of women and children and minorities are presently being addressed.  Both in this country and in the world, we seem to be making progress despite persistent resistance from some ultra-conservative groups.
        D.  With regard to the fourth one, cultural optimism, despite being greatly disillusioned by the two World Wars and the Cold War, at least for the moment, bouyed by the unbelievable prosperity at home and the Pax Americana on the global level, there seems to be a renewed confidence in the future and what knowledge and education can do both in this country and in the world.

III.  Rather than considering all of the seven ideals of the Enlightenment one by one, however, I want to focus on what I consider to be the two most crucial ones, the first two, opposition to authority and rationalism.  In particular, I want to note how we may be slipping backward on these two important foundations of the New World Order.
        A.  With regard to opposing political and religious authorities, it seems that at least some progress has been made.  Authoritarian regimes are being replaced by democratic ones where leaders are elected & where opposing points of view can be expressed without fear of torture or imprisonment.  The number of governments which openly support some
religions or ideologies while openly persecuting others is declining.
                1.  But all is not well, even in our own country.  There may not be a particular state church and there may not be officially sanctioned ideologies, but there is a more subtle kind of restraint on political and religious beliefs.  That restraint is exercised through "public opinion" and the media and pressures exerted on the media by organized religious groups and the upper echelons of the business community.
                        a.  Even in our so-called "free" society, can any teacher or well-known athlete or entertainment personality say right out that they think that "organized religion is a sham and a crutch for weak-minded people"?  Look at what happened to Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura when he tried that.  After the controversial interview in Playboy
was published and brought to public attention, Ventura's public support ratings dropped from 72% favorable to 54% favorable.  He was vigorously attacked by the media.  After an ad in the Minnesota Star Tribune demanded
that he apologize to Christians, press releases by the Minnesota Atheists seeking to defend Ventura were ignored.  They finally had to resort to a paid ad of their own to get their views in print.
                        b.  Look at all the publicity regularly given to the Pope and his various pronouncements and visits.  Viewpoints of Protestant ministers and Jewish rabbis are given a hearing.  Even other religious leaders such as the Dalai Lama are given sympathetic coverage, but philosophers are just ignored as if they didn't even exist.
                        c.  The same kind of bias in the media extends to ideological viewpoints.  Economists or writers who espouse the wonders of capitalism are typically given a great deal of opportunity to express their views while critics of capitalism and democracy tend to be ignored or even ostracized.  For example, there is virtually no coverage of a philosopher such as Noam Chomsky.
        B.  The situation is even worse with regard to the second Enlightenment ideal of reliance on reason and philosophy and theoretical science.
                1.  The main problem here is in the area of education. Because of the influence of fundamentalist organized religious groups, certain ideas such as the history of thought in the 16th, 17th, 18th centuries and Darwin's 19th century theory of evolution are not taught in the schools.  Most of our college students do not even know who Copernicus
was or why he was important.  They have heard of the theory of evolution and believe that it must be wrong, but they have no idea of the details of what is asserted by that theory.  Many believe that the Bible is all true, but they have no idea of what it really says.  For example, they are utterly amazed to find that the Bible says that the sun and moon were
created on the fourth day of creation, and a few do not even realize there is a problem with such a statement since they don't have a good grasp of what makes days and nights.  Surveys indicate that over one-third of Americans expect a second coming of Christ, and 45% believe that the world will end--sometime--in an Armageddon and "Rapture."  It is as if these people were living in the tenth century.  Many lack any under-standing of how science operates or of the various divisions of scientific enquiry such as biology, chemistry, and physics; and most have no idea at all of what philosophy is.
                2.  I don't want to be too critical of what organized religion does.  No doubt many good things in our society such as care for the less fortunate are promoted by traditional organized religion.  But when it comes to traditional doctrinal religions, examining traditional beliefs in order to discover the truth is not one of their strong points.
                3.  Until recently, there was hope that students would be exposed to a liberal education when they got to college.  They would be exposed to philosophy and critical history and mathematics and some science.  But now the colleges are being taken over by professional schools which can provide a high level of vocational training but not much in the way of general education, which it is assumed--often mistakenly--that the students already received in highschool.  The result is a new aristocracy of young people who have the technological skills to make much money quickly but who lack much of an  understanding of what the world and life is all about.
                4.  This lack of general education exists not only in our national society but in the world as a whole.  An important focus of education for young people even in the poorer countries is engineering. Engineers are usually wonderfully trained to be able to accomplish whatever the leaders of their society tell them to do and to do it without asking too many questions.  And they generally are paid well to do this.
                5.  More than any other period in Western History, the Enlightenment was the time when philosophy and theoretical science replaced traditional religion and the influence of the social aristocracy as the guiding force in human history.  The present loss of the influence of philosophy and theoretical science in human society suggests at least a
partial slipping back to the Old World Orde r.
                6.  In America's Real Religion, Unitarian minister A. Powell Davies observes:
     "Progress . . . seldom moves . . . [smoothly].  After a time of strenuous exertion comes a period of relaxed effort.  This gives to reactionary forces their awaited opportunity.  Never in history has liberation been won by a single victory; it must be won repeatedly, over and over again. . . .
     Moreover, [even in the 18th century] there had been at all times a considerable minority which had never conceded that a decision had been gained.  It was not a unified minority.  Opposition to the Revolution [for a New World Order] had stemmed from many causes.  But what it came to in the end was that 'property and privilege' felt threatened by the onward march of human rights.  To resist this march, and if possible to reverse it, thus became the unifying purpose which drew the dissidents together.
     In furthering this purpose, it was soon perceived that traditional religion could be useful; it could cloud the issues through reviving dying loyalities; it could mask the fact of tyranny and make it seem inevitable, just as it had done in the past.  With the help of religion, 'property and privilege' could be restored, almost as they were before; and it would be
accepted as "in the nature of things" just as it used to be."

IV.  The Enlightenment was based on the notion that all human beings could think for themselves, that they should not simply be propagandized to believe whatever some religious tradition told them to believe or to accept whatever the people with power in the society wanted them to believe.  It is precisely with regard to the ideals of questioning authority and relying on reason and philosophical thinking to discover what is true and good that I fear we may not yet have moved beyond the Old World Order either within our country or within our world.