Western Culture Global Presents

The Top 100 Heroes of Western Culture
These individuals have most contributed to replacing ignorance with knowledge, savagery with civilization, disease with health, tyranny with liberty, poverty with abundance, and despair with happiness.



#59: Denis Diderot (1713-1784)

Denis Diderot (1713-1784) was a French writer and philosopher who produced the Encyclopedie, a vast collection of accumulated knowledge and largely a summary of Enlightenment ideas.

Diderot described the goal of the project as "All things must be examined, debated, investigated without exception and without regard for anyone's feelings.”

The Encyclopedie often challenged superstition and religious dogma. For instance, the project supported religious tolerance and classified religion as merely a branch of philosophy, not as the ultimate source of knowledge and morality.

Despite much opposition in its time, the Encyclopedie succeeded in spreading many Enlightenment ideas -- ideas which were ultimately responsible for lifting millions from poverty, ignorance and despair and bringing about our advanced civilization.



Go to #60: Plato


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