Aristotle: the Technical Model Applied to Physics

The theoretical aspect of τέχνη continued to influence Aristotle’s thinking about science as a search for causes. By the time of the Metaphysics, Aristotle has already started to distinguish productive sciences (ποιητικαί) from theoretical ones (θεωρητικαί). Yet he still finds it important to remind his audience that they are distinct, and for this reason,

he and refers to his Ethics for a more precise account of their differences.46 _{Aristotle also}

continues to follow Plato, and distinguishes τέχνη from experience or a knack

(Metaphysics A 1, 980b26-981a12), although the distinction is not as sharp in Aristotle as it is in Plato. Aristotle thinks that with enough experience in something, a person is likely to become technically proficient at it, perhaps even more proficient than someone with only theoretical knowledge (Metaphysics A 1, 981a13 ff.). What Aristotle

maintains, however, is the belief that the person of experience can neither teach nor make systematic progress, since any discoveries she makes will be accidental (981b14 ff.). And in describing the project of the Metaphysics as an inquiry into the kinds of causes and principles that wisdom itself will study47_{, Aristotle is still thinking about ἐπιστήμη}

on the model of τέχνη, and continuing in the tradition of seeking the appropriate causes, but also, like Plato did for rhetoric in the Phaedrus, refining the method of inquiry so that it is appropriate for each discipline.48 _{What is appropriate for each discipline will}

vary. Unlike some Academics, who tried to apply mathematical precision and methods to many disciplines, Aristotle thinks “it is the mark of an educated man to look for precision in each class of things just so far as the nature of the subject admits” (Nicomachean Ethics I 2, 1094b24 f.). And so, part of Aristotle’s project, whether in

46_{Metaphysics A 1, 981b25-17: εἴρηται μὲν οὖν ἐν τοῖς ἠθικοῖς τίς διαφορὰ τέχνης καὶ ἐπιστήμης καὶ τῶν ἄλλων}

τῶν ὁμογενῶν.

47_{Metaphysics A 1, 982a4-6: ταύτην τὴν ἐπιστήμην ζητοῦμεν, τοῦτ’ ἂν εἴη σκεπτέον, ἡ περὶ ποίας αἰτίας καὶ περὶ}

ποίας ἀρχὰς ἐπιστήμη σοφία ἐστίν.

48 _{On the departments of physics as kinds of inquiry, cf. On the Parts of Animals I 1, 645a21-3: οὕτω καὶ πρὸς}

τὴν ζήτησιν περὶ ἑκάστου τῶν ζῴων προσιέναι δεῖ μὴ δυσωπούμενον ὡς ἐν ἅπασιν ὄντος τινὸς φυσικοῦ καὶ καλοῦ. “In this way as well we must approach inquiry into each of the animals without disgust, since in all of them exists something natural and worthwhile.” On celestial physics as inquiry, see De Caelo II 1, 286a5. On the study of the soul as inquiry, see De Anima I 2, 403b24. On physics in general as inquiry into sensible things, see Physics III 5, 204a 35.

physics or in ethics, is to show how his own method is a development and refinement of the methods of his predecessors. and then to isolate the appropriate first principles of these sciences at a general level, so that others can continue the work of seeking the facts and working out the causal relations that account for them. Once the appropriate first principles have been found, and the method refined, “it would seem that any one is capable of carrying on and articulating what has once been well outlined, and that time is a good discoverer or partner in such a work; to which facts the advances of the arts are due; for any one can add what is lacking” (1098a22-26).49 Rarely, however, does

Aristotle claim to be starting a new discipline; instead, he sees his own work as perfecting or completing the advances made by others.50

This leads to the other characteristic of τέχνη that continued to be associated with ἐπιστήμη once the two notions began to come apart: ἐπιστήμη, like τέχνη, is teachable. Unlike people who have experience, “in general it is a sign of the man who knows, that he can teach, and therefore we think art more truly knowledge than experience is; for artists can teach, and men of mere experience cannot” (Metaphysics Α 1, 981b8). Sometimes teaching took the form of imitating the products of an expert. Notably the method of education used by the Sophists and teachers of Eristic consisted in just this:

49 _{The same point is made at Sophistical Refutations 34, Metaphysics Α and α. See note below.}

50 _{In Sophistical Refutations 34 he suggests that he thinks the whole development of syllogistic is, in fact, an}

entirely new discipline, and this obviously has extensive implications for how he conceives of both acquiring facts, giving definitions, and presenting demonstrations. However, logic seems to be the only discipline which he claims to have invented. Even in Metaphysics, he prefers to think of himself as one of a line of thinkers investigating σοφία and first principles. The doxography of Metaphysics A and the description of progress in attaining truth in α1 might serve rhetorical purposes, but it is clear that Aristotle is one, if not the first, philosopher to see his place in the history of thought. This view is developed in Jaeger (1957), Paideia: The Ideals of Greek Culture, 3-7, and seems to influence the work of Zhmud (2006), The Origin of the History of Science in Classical Antiquity, Chapter 4.