Leonid Zhmud The Origin of the History of Science in Classical Antiquity
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The Origin of the History of Science in
History of Astronomy still further.
That Eudemus’ astronomy was an idealized construction is hardly surpris- ing. In a sense, so is any history of science, which is bound to rely on selected facts and to interpret them from contemporary positions. This does not necess- arily imply that Eudemus modernized early Greek astronomy, attributing to it opinions that it ought to have held from the point of view of his own time. 94 Ad- mittedly, this cannot be ruled out: Aristotle is known to have indulged in such interpretations, 95 nor is contemporary history of science immune from them. In regard to the History of Astronomy, however, any direct evidence for this is lacking. From the abundant data of explanations of celestial phenomena by ear- lier thinkers, Eudemus apparently selected the major discoveries that demon- 93 An Epicurean text of the late fourth century calls one of Eudoxus’ students @stro- logogewmétrh~ (Philod. De Epicuro II (PHerc. 1289), 6 III). See Sedley, D. Epi- curus and the mathematicians of Cyzicus, CErc 6 (1976) 27f. 94 It would be intriguing to speculate on the degree to which Eudemus’ work reflected astronomers’ views on the history of their science. What did the names of Anaxi- mander, Pythagoras, Cleostratus, and Anaxagoras mean to them? Were they aware of their individual contributions to the development of astronomy? How original, in other words, was the historical approach to astronomy developed by Eudemus? The material to answer this question is, unfortunately, lacking. 95 Cherniss. Aristotle’s criticism, 352ff. Chapter 7: The history of astronomy 252 strated the progress of mathematical astronomy from its modest origins to its then contemporary state of ‘perfection’. The facts he reports are not only con- firmed by other presently available data (or do not, at least, contradict them) – they form the actual basis of the modern history of early Greek astronomy. That allows us to characterize Eudemus’ approach to the study of Greek science, al- beit with reservations, as genuinely historical. Current views on mathematical astronomy differ in many respects from those of Aristotle and Eudemus. An influential trend in the history of astron- omy regards mathematical astronomy as a science that, proceeding from accu- rate, systematic, and preferably dated observations, builds quantitative models of heavenly bodies’ movements and thus makes possible accurate predictions of their appearance in the firmament. 96 From this viewpoint, the history of Greek astronomy really starts not with Thales and Anaximander, but with, at best, Meton and Euctemon, if not Eudoxus or even, paradoxically, Hippar- chus. 97 The ‘speculations’ of the Presocratics, who, unlike Babylonian astron- omers, never conducted, let alone recorded, any systematic long-term observa- tions, either do not enter this history at all or remain marginal at best. This trend in the historiography of Greek astronomy is worth a special study. 98 Suffice it to say here that the history of astronomy as seen by Eudemus has much more appeal for me, if only because it better represents the views on the real tasks of science held by both Greek and the early modern astron- omers. 99 Besides, it better corresponds to the facts. Maqhmatik3 @strología as conceived by Aristotle and Eudemus should more properly be called geometrical astronomy, to distinguish it from the 96 Scientific astronomical theory is “a mathematical description of celestial phenom- ena capable of yielding numerical predictions that can be tested against observa- tions” (Aaboe, A. Scientific astronomy in Antiquity, Download 1.41 Mb. Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: |
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