Well, the original point was whether philosophy had any influence on world events, not whether that influence was good or not.

To me, the idea that ideas don't play a major role in world history and politics seems odd. There's nothing more fundamentally human than trying to understand the world around you and wanting to shape it in a certain way. Of course material conditions are important; the French Revolution wouldn't have happened had the state not gone bankrupt. But it also wouldn't have happened in that way without Enlightenment ideas. Very basic principles of the revolution, some of which were kept by Napoleon and in subsequent generations and still live on today were formulated by those enlightenment thinkers. Just consider the declaration of human rights.