Vivian Tu

Dr. Robin Tremblay-Mcgaw

C&I 11A- Text Analysis Paper

23 October 2017

Nature versus Culture: A Take on Diderots Supplement

The Enlightenment was a period during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries that was

known as the Age of Reason or Revolution. During this time, many different ways of

understanding of mankind were developed by several philosophers. Denis Diderot, the author of

the Supplement to the Voyage of Bougainville, highlights the difference between culture and

nature. His supplement gives a debate between Frenchmen A and B, who discuss about the

conversation between Orou, a native Tahitian, and a chaplain that of which accentuates their

different cultures. Diderot implies in his text that human nature is the ideal state of the human

mind, since human nature ultimately allows one to be free of any corruption that culture may

produce.

To give a specific definition of culture, Clifford Geertz, a cultural anthropologist,

provides his take on this concept in his book The Interpretation of Cultures. Geertz states that a

man without culture does not exist, since that would make man savages instead of humans. Thus,

he believed that ...culture, rather than being added on, so to speak, to a finished or virtually

finished animal, was ingredient in the production of that animal itself (Geertz, 47). Geertz

explains that culture and man have grown together in order to develop the behavior of man

themselves. Man has never solely existed without culture because culture defines who man is.

This concludes that culture is what develops man into who he is. Culture is integral to the state of

man, and man could not have lived without it. Thus, Geertz implies that culture is fundamentally
anything, such as language, thought and innovation, that allows human behavior to develop

intellectually and physically.

Given this definition of culture, this would imply that humans should draw away from the

concept of nature; Diderot argues the opposite in his text. One of the issues that Diderot focuses

on in this supplement is the relationship between morality and law. In the premise of the story,

Orou, a Tahitian native asks the chaplain to take one of his daughters or his wife, to bed.

However, the chaplain refuses since doing so would only go against his morals. This confuses

Orou and he begins to critique the chaplain's religion, retorting that you will merely breed

rascals and wretches, inspired by fear, punishment and remorse, depraving their conscience,

anxious when innocent, calm only in crime, they will have lost sight of the pole star which

should have guided their way (Diderot, 437). Even though the chaplain tells Orou that God

makes the laws that people should morally follow, Orou tells him in his retortion that this

ultimately contradicts Nature. Nature is a natural force that humans should follow and by

removing oneself from that, they end up corrupt no matter what they do because they did not

follow what their heart and natural state tell them to do. The natural state prevents man from

being susceptible to any corruption that exists. Nature allows man to live the way they want to,

without being anyones property. By instilling culture, people are

This is apparent in debate between Frenchmen A and B. Frenchman B explains that men

follow three laws, which are the natural code, the civil code and the religious codewhich

theyre obliged to breach in turn, since these codes are never in agreement (Diderot, 438).

Those with culture, ultimately contradict themselves, in accordance to their beliefs. They have to

find balance between these three codes, and even then, they cannot contemporarily live with all

three codes. They have to decide for themselves which laws that they follow. The Frenchmen
conclude that those on Tahiti are savages because they live differently. Frenchman B even states

that, ... the most savage people on earth, the Tahitians,... are nearer to having good laws than

any civilised people (Diderot, 439). Frechman B understands that the there are good and bad

laws and that without laws, there is no such thing as morality. Tahitians, according to these

Frenchmen, have morality. However, based on this statement, this implies that the Frenchmen

agree that civilized men are inevitably immoral. There are laws that take away the freedom of

some people, yet these Frenchmen are normalizing this idea. Diderot emphasizes this point,

showing how these Frenchmen, are ironically, calling Tahitians savages, even though they are

living the way that they want to. The Tahitians are the ones who are morally better than civilized

people, yet the Frenchmen find that despicable. The Frenchmen feel superior to the Tahitians

through their culture.

Diderot, in this sense, argues that human nature keeps man alive, regardless of the

importance of culture. Human nature is as, if not, more important than any culture that man

develops because nature provides a space for man to become who he wants to be. In a sense,

Diderot believes that culture is a contradictory way of living, since this does not allow them to

live in unity with their natural state of mind, which is to simply survive on the innate abilities of

humankind. Culture removes man from what they truly are, and ultimately, that causes

dissonance with human nature. Human nature has always been our beginning that we cannot

forget. Nature is not supposed to be removed from culture since nature give one the freedom of

choice. Living in the natural state brings man closer to himself, and Diderot emphasizes this

point through the debate of Frenchmen A and B.

 Work Cited

Diderot, Denis. Supplement to the Voyage of Bougainville. The Longman Anthology of World

Literature. Vol. D., edited by David Damrosch, David L. Pike, 2009, pp. 434-441.

Geertz, Clifford. The Impact of the Concept of Culture on the Concept of Man. The

Interpretation of Cultures. Basic Books, 1973. pp. 33-54.