International Relations. A self-Study Guide to Theory

creation myths that describe and explain how the world came into being and 
how death and the periodical cycles of season evolved. Other myths reflect on 
the dualisms of dark and light, heaven and earth, or matter and mind. Evidence 
for such mythological perceptions of the universe has been found all over the 
world: myths of the world and of divine creation exist in Chinese, Japanese, In-
donesian, Indian, African and many other cultures. The first “scientific ele-
ments” have been ascribed to the physical world view of the peasant societies 
of the Neolithic Age in Europe (around 7000 BC). These societies had ideas 
and models of a flat earth embedded in the sea with a dome-shaped heaven car-
rying the sun, the moon and the stars, all created by gods (Bedenig 2011: 31).
In a more narrow sense, however, European history generally attributes 
the emergence of the idea of science to philosophical thought in Greek antiq-
uity. Greek philosophy is still appreciated today for having invented the sci-
entific method of interpreting observations by a theory, for the idea of using 
theory to make predictions for unknown phenomena, for the principle of veri-

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fying a theory, and for the idea of a clear separation of science and religion 
(an excellent overview is provided by Bedenig 2011: 33-48). As has been in-
dicated above by the example of the geocentric world view, it was by using 
scientific methods of systematic observation and mathematical calculation 
that the Greeks came to know that the earth was a sphere and assumed that it 
must be the center of the universe. Ptolemy and his followers formulated 
these findings in their geocentric geometric model. The world views as de-
scribed above are “scientific” in that they formulate assumptions, theories 
and hypotheses about the world/the universe in a systematic way and invent 
methods to come to know about the world. They reject traditional mythologi-
cal explanations of the phenomena in favor of “rational” explanations. 
This adoption of rational explanations occurred as early as the so-called 
Pre-Socratics, who asked fundamental questions about the “essence” of 
“things”. These questions included: what is and from where does everything 
come (ontological questions about being); how do we explain the things and 
objects we see (epistemological questions about knowing). They also tried to 
describe nature mathematically. The questions, problems and paradoxes at 
the core of pre-Socratic thought became the basis for modern mathematics, 
philosophy and science in general. In the history of Greek philosophy and in 
subsequent periods, there have been different answers to those fundamental 
questions. However, the core questions and problems of what is, how to 
know something, and which methods are needed to obtain that knowledge 
have remained throughout history, right through to the present. In fact, the 
very idea of systematic thought in terms of ontology, epistemology and 
methodology – the core of the idea of science – goes back to the philosophy 
of Greek antiquity! This period fundamentally shaped the core questions and 
hence the core subject of what is now called philosophy of science, as de-
fined as a sub-discipline of philosophy (see our discussion in Unit 2).
In short, Greek philosophy heavily influenced our modern idea of science, 
which was developed in an historical process of European philosophy now 
encompassing more than 2500 years. To understand our idea of science and 
the prestigious status science has gained in our societies today, it is worth 
taking a closer look at some ancient Greek positions in regard to ontological, 
epistemological and methodological questions. Particularly interesting are 
those questions and problems for which there have been competing positions 
and arguments. 
For example, the early belief existed that true knowledge could only be 
gained by applying strict rationality – meaning both logical reasoning and