"The Enlightenment was an intellectual movement which began in seventeenth-century Europa and espoused an optimistic project: an end to human ignorance and the slavish adherence to ancient texts and dogma; the application of scientific principles to solving the world's problems; the elimination of inequality between the sexes; and the advocacy of political rights for all citizens. Modern western society, with its democratic institutions and its reliance on science as the basis of technology and industry, is largely an outgrowth of Enlightenment ideals. "