Leonid Zhmud The Origin of the History of Science in Classical Antiquity

Paneg. 103). See also proagage$n (Paneg. 37, Antid. 185) and proércesqai
(
Antid. 82; Ep. 4, 10).
141
For ëpídosi~ in an Academic treatise dealing with progress in mathematics, see 3.1.
For ëpídosi~, aÿxánein, proagage$n and proércesqai in Eudemus’ History of
Geometry, see 5.5.
142
See e.g.
Paneg. 10, Nic. 32, Antid. 82, 185 and above, 52f.

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Chapter 2: Science as técnh: theory and history
78
38–40) as
pro¯toi heuretai and censures Sparta, which in the field of discoveries
is more backward than Greeks and foreigners (
Panath. 202–209). Isocrates de-
nounces his rivals’ proud claims to the novelty of their inventions as futile (
Hel.
2–3). On the other hand, he finds worthy of admiration not only Homer and the
founders of the tragedy (
Ad Nic. 48), but also those who create new speeches
(
Antid. 81–83), as well as all those who by painstaking thought and endeavor
discover some useful things (
Ep. VIII, 5), though the latter remain, unfortu-
nately, less popular than the winners of athletic competitions (cf.
Paneg. 1–2,
Antid. 250). These reproaches betray the wounded ambition of a man who,
sharing the common aspiration for priority and creative originality, failed to
win acknowledgment for his innovative efforts. It is this resentment that may
have made him shift the accent from prõto~ to eûret2~, i.e., to the figure of
‘innovator’ who is, at the same time, a ‘perfection seeker’, ëxergazómeno~:
And it is my opinion that the study of oratory as well as the other técnai would
make the greatest advance if we should admire and honour, not those who make
the first beginnings in their crafts, but those who are the most finished craftsmen
in each, and not those who seek to speak on subjects on which no one has spoken
before, but those who know how to speak as no one else could (
Paneg. 10).
143
In the eulogy of Eugoras, Isocrates returns to this idea once more: worthy of
praise are not only the heroes of the past, but those of the present as well,
though envy prevents people from glorifying the deeds of their contemporaries
(5–6). A reasonable man should, however, ignore the envious, particularly be-
cause we know that:
progress is made, not only in técnai, but in all other activities, not through the
agency of those that are satisfied with things as they are, but through those who
correct, and have the courage constantly to change anything that is not as it should
be (7).
144
Unable to claim for himself the status of a discoverer, Isocrates points out that
the Greeks owe their high level of cultural development not only to the dis-
coverers who lived in the distant and more recent past, but also to those like
himself, who are capable of improving what has already been invented and of
bringing it to a state of perfection.
We have had a chance to see how closely the notions of the progress of
técnh in the past and of its nearing perfection in the present come together.
145
The experience of the man of the 19
th
century, who could observe steady pro-
gress in practically every field in both the past and the present, made him extend
this tendency into the future as well. This extrapolation, which still seems natu-
ral to us, is not in fact to be taken for granted. The authors of the classical epoch
143
Transl. by G. Norlin. Cf. ëxergazoménou~ in Isocrates and ë~ télo~ ëxergázesqai
(
De arte, 1), above, 59.
144
Transl. by La Rue van Hook.
145
See above, 59f.

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5. From ‘progress’ to ‘perfection’
79
reasoned differently: the more striking the progress that had already been made,
the more natural it seemed to believe that the efforts of contemporaries, includ-
ing their own, would soon reach a perfection not, or unlikely, to be surpassed in
the future.
146
Generally speaking, the combination of the idea of progress re-
lated to the past or the present with a firm belief in perfection to be achieved in
the near future is not rare in the history of European thought. Descartes believ-
ed that, after the discovery of his principles, humankind was on the verge of
mastering nature completely, with only two or three victories left to win.
Charles Perrault, an active participant in the ‘dispute between the ancients and
the moderns’, thought of the 18
th
century as the peak of perfection. The feeling
that perfection (a relative one) was an aim that could be achieved used to be
widespread in the 18
th
century as well,
147
combined, as it was in Diderot, Rous-
seau, and Voltaire, with the notion of a decline likely to follow the peak.
Since the ancient idea of progress is not very different from similar views
current in the pre-industrial epoch,
148
one can hardly explain it by the ‘aversion
to infinity’ or the ‘predilection for perfect forms’ so often attributed to the
worldview of the Greeks.
149
It can rather be accounted for by natural limits im-
posed on the social and cultural experience of those who were the first in the
history of humanity to reflect on progress.
150
If the radical shift of views on
progress, i.e., the transformation of the idea into ideology, took place at the turn
of the 18
th
century, why expect thinkers of the classical epoch to share the no-
tions typical of Comte or Spencer and, having found none of the kind, deny to
them any idea of progress at all?
151
A balanced approach seems to be more pro-
ductive, one that allows us to find in the views of the classical writers upon this
subject something that we share, without blotting out the features that separate
theirs from modern notions, on the one hand, or overemphasizing them, on the
other.
Let us note for example that Isocrates touches upon social, political, and cul-
tural aspects of ‘progress’ much more often than upon those related to the
growth of knowledge. On the individual level, the ends or results of progress
are moral improvement (