The Revival of the Ionian Tradition

Science is frequently linked to the scientific revolution, a transformative era in the late 16th and early 17th centuries characterized by a revolt against the dogmas of the Catholic Church and a fervent quest for individual knowledge. What ignited this rebellion and quest for understanding, especially after centuries of unwavering adherence to biblical authority?

The answer lies in literature—specifically, the texts of Ancient Greece. This was not the first scientific revolution. In fact, the foundation of science was laid nearly two millennia earlier by a group of Greek thinkers in the Ionian colonies.

As various cultures collided near the Mediterranean, these early Greeks came to realize the limited scope of their understanding of the cosmos. Each civilization had crafted its own deities and narratives, leading to a cacophony of conflicting stories. This plurality of gods and myths led them to conclude that human understanding is inherently flawed—our explanations are often mere conjecture.

Rather than resigning themselves to ignorance, they established a vital tradition for the advancement of human knowledge: a commitment to reason and open, critical dialogue aimed at uncovering truth. The philosopher Xenophanes encapsulated this notion:

> "The gods did not reveal, from the beginning, > All things to us; but in the course of time, > Through seeking we may learn, and know things better... > These things we learn are like truth. > But as for certain truth, no man has known it, > Nor will he know it; neither of the gods, > Nor yet of all the things of which I speak. > And even if by chance he were to utter > The final truth, he would himself not know it: > For all is but a woven web of guesses."

The emergence and evolution of the Ionian tradition is a compelling narrative that has enriched our lives immensely. It has enabled even the less privileged to enjoy a standard of living surpassing that of ancient monarchs. If this doesn't inspire gratitude, remember that this tradition emerged but once.

It commenced with thinkers like Thales and Anaximander and endured merely a few centuries before facing challenges—first from the Persian invasion of northern Greece, then from the conquests by the Macedonian and Roman empires. Ultimately, it was nearly extinguished when the Catholic Church, swayed by the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle, repressed free thought, declaring the Bible as the sole repository of knowledge. Although there was a brief revival under the Abbasid caliphate at the dawn of the first millennium, it wasn't until after the fall of Constantinople in 1453 that scholars fled to Italy with whatever ancient texts had survived, reigniting the flame of knowledge.

The Copernican Shift

The revival of ancient Greek philosophy ignited a wave of optimism in Italy that soon spread throughout Europe. Reason once again nurtured the flourishing of art, literature, and intellectual discourse akin to the Golden Age of Ancient Greece. Artists and thinkers like Michelangelo, Shakespeare, and Leonardo Da Vinci approached each day with the excitement of children, eager to explore the realms of possibility.

However, the resurgence of ancient cosmological ideas sparked significant controversy.

Historically, many believed that the Earth occupied the center of the universe. This belief was natural; after all, it appears as though everything revolves around us, and we don't feel the Earth moving. For Christians, this was a settled matter, as biblical accounts assert that the sun halted its orbit around the Earth (Joshua 10:12), leaving little room for debate.

Then came Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543), an ecclesiastical astronomer who challenged this long-held view. He proposed that the sun, not the Earth, is at the universe's center, a radical departure from established thought. His theory was not merely a result of new astronomical observations; rather, it was inspired by Platonic philosophy that held the sun in high esteem due to its role in illuminating the material world.

The implications of Copernicus' theory were monumental.

Understanding the potential backlash from the Catholic Church, Copernicus entrusted the publication of his heliocentric model to a friend, posthumously. Back then, the consequences of challenging ecclesiastical authority were dire.

Moreover, Copernicus faced opposition not just from the Church but from reformers as well. Martin Luther, years after the book's release, dismissed the heliocentric theory as heretical, arguing that it contradicted scripture.

In response to the growing dissent from reformers and dissenters, the Council of Trent convened in Italy to address the authority of the Church. They issued decrees that encompassed all aspects of Church governance and published the Index of Forbidden Books, listing 583 heretical texts, including Copernicus's On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres. They also formed a group of zealous missionaries, the Jesuits, and reinstated the Roman Inquisition to root out heresy.

One figure who refused to succumb to this oppression was Giordano Bruno (1548–1600), a courageous advocate for free thought. Bruno read the banned texts and came across Lucretius's thought experiment, contemplating the infinity of the universe based on the trajectory of an arrow shot from its edge. This led him to believe in an infinite cosmos, devoid of boundaries, and populated by stars akin to our sun.

Eager to share his insights, Bruno became a target for the Inquisition, which arrested him for heresy. During his trial, he acknowledged minor theological errors but emphasized the philosophical basis of his beliefs. Unyielding, he refused to recant.

When sentenced to death, Bruno challenged his judges, stating, "Perhaps your fear in passing judgment on me is greater than mine in receiving it." In February 1600, he was executed, a martyr for the cause of free thought.

A decade later, Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) made a groundbreaking discovery with his telescope: four moons orbiting Jupiter, challenging the geocentric worldview. The Church remained intransigent, demanding that Galileo refrain from supporting heliocentric ideas.

In his characteristic cleverness, Galileo framed his arguments as a fictional dialogue among three friends discussing the heliocentric model. Initially successful, the Church soon caught on, and Galileo faced threats of torture unless he confessed to heresy.

Ultimately, he capitulated and was sentenced to life under house arrest, while his book was added to the Index of Forbidden Books. Yet, outside the Church's reach, his ideas spread rapidly, leading to the eventual abandonment of the geocentric model.

The Ionian tradition was reignited.

The Scientific Revolution

Galileo's rejection of the geocentric model was indeed remarkable, but he pushed further. Prior to him, Aristotle's assertions had gone largely unchallenged, particularly his claim that heavier objects fall faster. Galileo, however, built an inclined plane to test this hypothesis.

If Aristotle were correct, the heavier ball should descend more rapidly than the lighter one. Contrary to expectations, both balls rolled down at the same speed. In this moment, Galileo not only refuted Aristotle but also laid the groundwork for future scientists, enhancing our understanding of gravity.

While Galileo was a scientific pioneer, Johannes Kepler arguably grasped the essence of knowledge creation better than his contemporaries. Driven by a passion for harmony across music, mathematics, and divinity, Kepler sought to explain planetary motions relative to the sun. However, he remained open to empirical evidence, discarding the harmonious circular orbits of Copernicus when contradicted by Tycho Brahe's observations.

Kepler recognized that the path to truth necessitates a humble approach of trial and error. He consistently stated that one must formulate hypotheses and discard them if they do not align with observations. It took numerous attempts before he established the elliptical orbits of planets.

Despite Kepler's insights, it was his contemporaries, Francis Bacon and René Descartes, who garnered acclaim for their theories of knowledge. While they played a pivotal role in inspiring the belief in the individual's capacity to acquire knowledge, both ultimately replaced one dogma with another.

Bacon viewed nature as a book to be read through sensory experience, advocating for the cleansing of preconceived notions to reveal nature's true essence. This empirical approach laid the groundwork for later thinkers, including John Locke, who described the mind as a blank slate filled by sensory experiences, a concept known as Empiricism.

However, the idea that one can read knowledge from nature is fundamentally flawed. The brain requires a theoretical framework to interpret sensory data; without it, observation lacks direction. Philosopher Karl Popper illustrated this by challenging students to observe without a guiding hypothesis, demonstrating the necessity of a theoretical basis for meaningful observation.

Similarly, Charles Darwin acknowledged the intrinsic link between observation and perspective, asserting that all observations serve a particular viewpoint.

Descartes, on the other hand, sought an unshakable foundation for knowledge. He proposed that one must discard any belief that can be doubted, including sensory perceptions, which he deemed unreliable. Instead, he posited that the act of thinking itself is proof of existence.

This led him to conclude that an infinite god must be the source of all thoughts, thus resting his epistemology on another form of dogma.

In summary, when we ponder the meaning of 'science,' we recall the invaluable and delicate body of knowledge forged 2,500 years ago by Greek thinkers in the Ionian colonies. They recognized human fallibility and understood that advancing toward truth requires proposing bold hypotheses and rigorously critiquing them.

Furthermore, the critical aspect of empirical refutability, as emphasized by Galileo and Kepler, is essential for scientific claims. A claim must be vulnerable to falsification, and the more audacious the claim, the more significant its contribution to knowledge.

Falsifiability has become a cornerstone of scientific inquiry, as articulated by Popper, distinguishing rigorous scientific claims from metaphysical assertions.

Ultimately, it is vital to acknowledge that there is no singular source of knowledge. All human understanding—scientific or otherwise—is conjectural. Bacon and Descartes erred in framing their inquiries around a search for a true source of knowledge, a perspective shaped by a millennium of reliance on biblical authority.

The transition from the Ionian tradition of conjectural knowledge to a source-centric view did not begin with the Church; rather, it traces back centuries earlier to Aristotle's theory of demonstrable knowledge, which sought to combine induction with logic to achieve infallible truths.

In our next exploration, we will delve deeper into Aristotle’s epistemology and investigate how the quest for certainty can constrain our appreciation of the vast realms of possibility.

John Driggs Come explore with me this beautiful, awe-inspiring Space of Possibility | johndriggs.org

(Next Episode: The Essence of Aristotle’s Arrogance: The Failures of Ultimate Explanation) (Last Episode: Critical Rationalism: The Birth of Progress— Part 2)

Footnotes

[1] Galileo wasn’t the first to perform an experiment, of course, though his experiment typically marks the beginning of modern physics. [2] Charles Darwin, More Letters of Charles Darwin, edited by Francis Darwin and A.C. Seward, Appleton, New York (1903), volume I, p. 195. [3] Descartes, 1640 letter to Regius, AT 3:65. [4] Descartes, Replies 7, AT 7:537. [5] Descartes, Med. 1, AT 7:20; Med. 6, AT 7:77; Med. 3, AT 7:39. [6] Descartes, Med. 5, AT 7:69; Med. 3, AT 7:48ff; Med. 5, AT 7:71