Sophie’s World Reflection

Script Graphic Organizer

Format Podcast

Chapter 24, the enlightenment

School of Enlightenment
Philosophy

Group Member Role

Kai Pfeuffer Expert Guest

Preston Olander Host

Checklist:
Consistent Format
Summary of Narrative
Summary of Book structure
Discipline of Philosophy Chosen (a chapter to focus on)
At least one quote
Clear connections between translation in Philosophy and Paradigm shifts
Clear connection between the Book structure and Paradigm shifts

Quotes

Pages Quote Reason for quote

 305-30 “‘With regard to our own methodical doubt, Good example of paradigm
6 we are right now starting from scratch. We shift in Sophie’s vision of
don't even know whether we think. It may her world.
turn out that we are thoughts, and that is
quite different from thinking. We have good
reason to believe that we have merely been
invented by Hilde’s father as a kind of
birthday diversion for the Major’s daughter
from Lillesand. Do you see?’”

311 “Now was the time to start enlightening the Example of paradigm shift
masses. This was to be the basis for a in philosophy. Poverty was
better society. People thought that poverty the fault of ignorance so
and oppression were the fault of ignorance people decided that
and superstition. Great attention was education was a good
therefore placed on the education of solution.
children and of the people.”

Script Outline:

P: So, Kai Pfeuffer, an expert of Sophie’s world. It's an honor to have you on the Presto show

K: Thank you, it's an honor to be here.

P: Of course. Well, I know a bit about Sofie’s world, but seeing that you are the expert, can you
give us a quick run down of the story, a little summary if you will.

K: Sophie’s world is a fantastic book. It follows an adolescent girl named Sophie Amundsen and
her journey of learning the history of philosophy. For the first 15 chapters or so it seems to be
just a philosophical history textbook with a bit of a story behind it, but then odd things start to
happen. Her philosophy teacher figures out they only live in the mind of a man named Albert
Knag who is writing a book named Sophie’s world for his daughter Hilde. Over the course of
many chapters Sophie and Alberto manage to escape from Albert King's head and they end up
living in the real world as spirits.

P:I’ve heard about some weird shifts in perspective in Sofie’s world. Could you shed some light
on that for us?
K: In the beginning of the book, the story is told from the perspective of Sophie. She lives her
normal life with the exception of learning philosophy from Alberto. However, halfway through the
book, Sophie undergoes a paradigm shift. Her world is flipped upside down as she learns that
she is a character who lives in a book for the visual-pleasure of a girl named Hilde. Her actions,
decisions, thoughts and philosophical education is all controlled by the author, Hilde’s father.
The narrative switches at this point to Hilde’s point of view, reading about Sophie’s life. Learning
Sophie's whole world lives in the mind of a person in the real world is a huge paradigm shift for
the reader.

P: What is a paradigm shift?

K: A paradigm shift is a fundamental change in understanding of the concepts, rules and views
of society. An example of this from my physics class is the paradigm shift from the geocentric
view of the solar system and heliocentric view of the solar system. That is, when people started
believing that the world revolves around the sun like other planets, and stopped believing that
everything revolved around the earth. In Sophie’s world there is a major paradigm shift that
completely uproots the book structure halfway through the story. Fairy tale creatures begin to
appear and Sophie and Albeto begin to do things without meaning to. Sophie and Alberto learn
from their changing world that they do not have control over their lives, for they are characters in
the book of God, or Albert Knag, Hilde’s Father. This is a fundamental change for them as the
concepts and rules of the world they live in have been thrown out the window. They must
relearn the new concepts and rules about their world, as Alberto says in the Enlightenment
Chapter: ‘With regard to our own methodical doubt, we are right now starting from scratch. We
don't even know whether we think. It may turn out that we are thoughts, and that is quite
different from thinking. We have good reason to believe that we have merely been invented by
Hilde’s father as a kind of birthday diversion for the Major’s daughter from Lillesand. Do you
see?’” With this paradigm shift, the book structure shifts. We jump out the rabbit's fur and enter
the world of Hilde as she reads about Sophie and Alberto.

P: From the chapter you just quoted, where Sophie finds out she’s not real, What was the focus
of the Enlightenment Chapter?

K: The entire book is structured upon philosophy lessons in the form of letters or in person
encounters with Alberto. In this way, each chapter teaches about a different era of philosophy
through the ages. The enlightenment chapter discusses the enlightenment philosophers and the
enlightenment age from 1500s-1800s. The Enlightenment philosophers focussed on human
reason, civilization, God’s interaction with the Earth and natural rights. Unlike previous schools
of philosophy such as Berkeley’s studies and future schools of philosophy such as Kant’s
studies, they believed that humans had the ability to take control of their lives. The
enlightenment philosophers had a great appreciation for access to knowledge and developed
the encyclopedia. They also had a very progressive view of female rights that were a great shift
from previous schools of philosophy and were active in the founding of future equality for
women and education, although unsuccessfully in their time period. These beliefs of the
Enlightenment philosophers enlightened the public and changed the public view of the world
forever, serving as a form of paradigm shift. Their spread of knowledge to the less commonly
educated was recorded in the chapter: “Now was the time to start enlightening the masses. This
was to be the basis for a better society. People thought that poverty and oppression were the
fault of ignorance and superstition. Great attention was therefore placed on the education of
children and of the people.” This was a great example of how philosophy led to societal change
or paradigm shift of education and rights.