François-Marie Arouet
1694-1778 · French Enlightenment · Renowned
Voltaire was the arch-philosophe, and he made a career of attacking the church: superstition, clerical power and the courts that served both, in the name of toleration and reason. He spent his fame clearing Jean Calas, a Protestant broken on the wheel on a charge Toulouse judges invented. Candide answers the claim that this is the best of all possible worlds with earthquake, flogging and slavery.
Signature
The position Voltaire is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Conviction
- strongly leans Uncertain
- Theology
- Deism
Positions on the 4 axes the sources answer
- Truth
- leans Objective (75 on a 0–100 scale from Subjective to Objective)
- Polity
- strongly leans Liberalism (100 on a 0–100 scale from Illiberalism to Liberalism)
- Conviction
- strongly leans Uncertain (0 on a 0–100 scale from Uncertain to Certain)
- Allegiance
- leans Global (75 on a 0–100 scale from Local to Global)
16 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Voltaire refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Theology
- Deism
What is your position on the existence and nature of God or gods? - Government
- Monarchy
What is your ideal form of government? - Highest Good
- Freedom
What is the highest good? - Knowledge
- Sense Experience
What is the ultimate foundation of knowledge? - Ethics Basis
- Natural Law / Utilitarian Calculation
What is the ultimate basis of ethics? - Agency
- Compatibilism
What is the nature of human agency and freedom? - Time
- Linear Progressive
What is the fundamental shape of time? - Authority
- Consent of the Governed
What is the legitimate source of authority? - Law
- Social Contract
What is the ultimate source of legitimate law? - Human Nature
- Tabula Rasa
What is human nature? - Primary Bond
- Humanity
What is your primary bond and loyalty?