This rich volume, deriving from an Oxford conference held in 2015, brings into the limelight the polysemous notion of technē (‘skill’, ‘craft’, ‘art’, ‘expertise’) as it figures in Greek epistemology, ethics, cosmology and metaphysics from Protagoras to Proclus. In 11 chapters and a helpful introduction, it provides an overview of the issues concerning the knowledge involved in expert productive activity. The contributions also reveal points of scholarly disagreement and signpost avenues for further investigation.
The first three chapters focus on Plato’s approach to technē against the background of earlier accounts. In Edward Hussey’s view (Chapter 1), Protagoras’ educational project of political expertise is informed by Hippocratic criteria for technē status and is grounded in a Xenophanes-inspired, proto-pragmatic epistemology reliably preserved in Plato’s Theaetetus. Tamer Nawar (Chapter 2) examines the notion of technē emerging in Socrates’ exchange with Thrasymachus in the Republic, highlighting three of its key features: its being constituted by a two-way ability, its foolproof application by the genuine expert and its orientation towards some good. Rachel Barney (Chapter 3) proceeds from the Protagorean vision of expert deliberation in public and private matters to the expansion upon this idea by Plato’s Socrates. Barney attributes to Plato a quasi-deontological model of a disinterested and teleological craft of virtue, rooted in human nature, which plays an architectonic role by governing and expressing itself through our other, elective practical identities.
While Nawar puts emphasis on the continuity of Plato’s and Aristotle’s views, Barney shows that the craft analogy, properly understood, plays an ongoing role in Plato’s dialogues. Barney also reminds us that the ideal craft-expert is exemplified by the Demiurge in the Timaeus. This lays some ground for Thomas Kjeller Johansen (Chapter 4) who tackles the question of how the Demiurge’s paradigmatic expertise is compatible with his apparent lack of qualification to create mortal beings. Johansen argues that, by delegating the task to the lesser gods, the Demiurge achieves exactly what his expertise requires: he guides the lesser gods to employ a technē distinct from his own, thereby completing the best possible cosmic order.
The Demiurge’s reasoning, as portrayed in the Timaeus, is read by Neoplatonists as rational reconstruction after the fact. Eyjólfur Kjalar Emilsson (Chapter 10) presents Plotinus’ rejection of divine deliberation and reaffirms the originality of his metaphysics of production. Jan Opsomer (Chapter 11) explains how Neoplatonists merge Platonic metaphysical tenets with a Peripatetic analysis of divine nous, then explains Proclus’ specific stance. Of special interest are the ways in which human technai differ from their divine model: they deal not with eternal Forms but with contingent logoi invented and transmitted by human experts who deliberate about how to fulfill needs which derive from contingencies of mortal existence.
Ursula Coope (Chapter 5) and Robert Bolton (Chapter 6) offer diverging analyses of Aristotle. Coope argues that all forms of understanding (epistēmē) involve grasping explanations. Technē, being or involving practical understanding, is no exception, but unlike the demonstrative knowledge of finite items required for theoretical understanding, craft-expertise is essentially open-ended and depends on the genuinely human ability to work out comparative explanations in unprecedented cases. By contrast, Bolton insists on the diversity of Aristotelian technai: in contexts labeled ‘esoteric’ by Bolton, technē involves genuine scientific knowledge, while in ‘exoteric’ contexts, a conception of expertise grounded in experience and memory is sanctioned.
The next three chapters are devoted to post-Aristotelian developments. In what is essentially a long paper divided in two, Voula Tsouna offers an illuminating account of Stoic and Epicurean views concerning everyday technai and the specific expertise involved in living a happy life (chapters 7–8). Tsouna highlights the differences and similarities of these rival views by referring to the Platonic antecedent to which they both react. In Chapter 9, Stefan Sienkiewicz looks at Sextus Empiricus. He argues that, on the one hand, the Modes in which the ability constitutive of Pyrrhonism, that of setting out equipollent oppositions, manifests itself defy systematization but, on the other hand, Sextus sees them as productive of a happy life. As a result, Sienkiewicz claims, Sextus himself could reasonably take his argument to satisfy one of two recognized criteria for being a technē. This suggestion could be further developed by dealing with the context of the peculiar Pyrrhonist claim to happiness, the polemical appropriation of Stoic criteria for technē, and the precarious difficulties facing any Pyrrhonist with the audacity to offer a positive account of anything other than their appearances.
The volume is essential reading to anyone interested in Greek philosophical reflections on technē. Those with a pre-existing interest are likely to come away invigorated; others might find themselves looking at old problems from a refreshing angle. Apart from small hiccups (for example, a claim featuring twice on p. 53 and n30; read ‘became’ for ‘because’ in Tim. 42d–e quoted on p. 42), the volume is carefully edited. Readers are assisted by a bibliography, general index and index locorum.
