## 1. Xenophon



Xenophon's only sustained discussions of
*episteme* and *techne* are in two of
his Socratic works, *Memorabilia* and *Oeconomicus*. The
*Memorabilia* recounts conversations which Socrates held on a
variety of topics; the *Oeconomicus* is a conversation largely
devoted to one, i.e., the art of running a successful estate and
household. In these works, knowledge is intimately tied to knowing how
to do things, especially the more organized kind of knowing-how
designated by *techne*. There is no distinction between
*episteme* as theoretical knowledge and
*techne* as mere craft or skill. Socrates explicitly
identifies as *technai* such activities as playing the harp,
generalship, piloting a ship, cooking, medicine, managing an estate,
smithing, and carpentry; by association with these *technai*,
we can include housebuilding, mathematics, astronomy, making money,
flute playing, and painting. Without marking any difference, he also
calls many of these activities *epistemai*.



At the beginning of *Memorabilia*, Xenophon, in fact, portrays
Socrates as uninterested in the abstract investigations of the
physical philosophers. Socrates, he says, eschewed the investigation
of the *kosmos*; he preferred looking into human affairs.
Besides, humans cannot understand the universe, as shown by the
inability of those who engage in these kinds of study to agree
(I.i.11-14). In fact, towards the end of the work, Xenophon says
that Socrates held that the study of geometry should be pursued to the
point where one could measure a parcel of land he meant to buy; study
of more complicated figures he disparaged because he did not see the
use of it (IV.vii.3). If after this introduction we did not expect to
find a very great difference between *episteme* and
*techne*, we would not be disappointed.



Almost all occurrences of the word
'*episteme*' show its close connection
to skill, practice, and *techne*. In a jocular vein,
Critoboulos says he wants to gain the knowledge
(*episteme*) which will allow him to win over those
with good souls and beautiful bodies (II.vi.30). Socrates compares the
knowledge (*episteme*) of justice to the knowledge
of letters, i.e., a skill (IV.ii.20). As well, the verb
*epistasthai* -- the root of *episteme*
-- carries the sense of knowing how to do something. The stronger
know how to use (*chresthai*) the weaker like slaves
(II.i.12-13). If one does not know how to pilot (*me
epistameno(i) kubernan*) a ship -- a
*techne* -- both he and his ship will be lost
(II.vi.38). One must learn the crafts (*technai*) of war from
one who knows them (*epistamenon*) (II.i.28). Socrates says
that some of the sub-skills of generalship -- which elsewhere he
calls a *techne* -- come by nature and others come
through knowledge (*episteme*) (III.i.6-7).
The difference is between what is not acquired and what is acquired;
but we find no distinction -- as in Plato -- between what is
acquired by teaching and what is acquired by training. Thus Xenophon
does not make the Platonic distinction between theoretical instruction
and learning by practice (cf. *Meno* 70a-b).



Socrates emphasizes that learning an *episteme*
-- what we would call a field of knowledge -- entails care,
diligence, and practice. He says that idleness does not put knowledge
worthy of mention into the soul; one must also have care or diligence
(*epimeleia*) for doing fine and good deeds (II.i.20). Free men
(actually gentlemen farmers) who are not idle but exercise diligence
(*epimelomenous*) in those useful things they understand
(*epistantai*) are happiest; work and application
(*epimeleian*) help men to learn what they need to know and to
remember what they learn (II.vii.7-8). Near the beginning of the
*Memorabilia*, Socrates argues against those who say that a
just man can never become unjust. Rather, he says, those who do not
train the soul (*askountas*) cannot carry out the functions of
the soul (I.ii.19-20). Diligence and training, then, are the
basis of these skills, not a theoretical grasp of principles.



Even at his most theoretical, Xenophon's Socrates shows a
practical bent. Saying that those who know what each virtue is can
expound these to others, he gives definitions for the virtues. A pious
man, for instance, knows the laws respecting the worship of the gods
and thus worships the gods lawfully; and, in general, the man who
knows what is lawful with respect to the gods (*ta peri tous theous
nomima eidos*) is pious (IV.vi.1-4). The pious man,
then, is defined by informed religious practice. The most abstract
definition would seem to be that of wisdom. Claiming the wise are wise
by knowledge (*episteme(i)*), Socrates says wisdom
is knowledge. Next, however, he cautions that no one can know all
things; so a person is wise to the extent that he knows (IV.vi.7).
Knowledge, then, can be accumulated. Since knowledge is divided into
various skills, such as managing an estate and generalship, and their
subdivisions, the wise man would appear to be someone who acquires as
much of this kind of knowledge as possible. If so, he is a person of
wide accomplishments, not someone with a theory about the
universe.



Throughout the *Memorabilia*, Xenophon weaves the theme of the
craft of ruling (*basilike techne*). This craft is the finest of
virtues and *technai*, by which men, public and private, become
capable of ruling and benefiting other men and themselves (IV.ii.11).
Kings and rulers are not simply those who are chosen but those who
know how to rule (*tous epistamenous archein*). In this regard
they are compared to others who exercise a *techne*, such
as ship's pilots (III.ix.10-11). A good king does not just
manage his own life well but also that of the ones he rules and he is
the cause of their happiness (III.ii.2-3). However, he also
argues that rulers have a more pleasant life than those who are ruled.
His interlocutor, Aristippus, takes him to be claiming that the ruling
craft is happiness. In answer, Socrates describes the life of what is
obviously a gentleman, capable of winning good friends and subduing
enemies, fit in body and soul to manage his household, to help his
friends, and serve his country (II.i.19-20). These constitute
the happy life of the gentleman; they also make him able to make
others happy (IV.i.2-3). Although
ruling is associated with happiness (*eudaimonia*), Socrates is
not tempted to generalize about happiness; instead of an account of happiness,
he enumerates the activities of a flourishing member of the
dominant class.



In the *Oeconomicus*, Socrates uses knowledge
(*episteme*) and craft (*techne*)
interchangeably to refer to the practical undertakings of a gentleman,
called in Greek *kalos k'agathos* -- literally one
who is fine and good. He opens the work with the question whether
estate management (*oikonomia*) is the name of a type of
knowledge (*episteme*) like medicine, smithing, and
carpentry. Then he asks whether he and his interlocutor can say what
the function (*ergon*) of estate management is, just as they
can say what are the functions of these other *technai*
(I.1-2). When he uses *episteme* in what
follows, the focus of his discussion is some aspect of estate or
household management. He refers indifferently to the knowledge
(*episteme*) and the craft (*techne*)
of estate management and of farming; the latter includes sub-skills
such as breeding stock (V.3) casting seed (XVII.7) and the planting of
trees (XIX.1). However, there is a distinction between illiberal arts
(*banausikai technai*) and those worthy of a gentleman. The
latter are the craft of war (*polemike*
*techne*) and that of farming (*georgia*).
The illiberal arts confine one to the workshop and narrow one's
interests to his own welfare; the crafts of war and farming give one a
wider scope so that he can attend to his friends and city
(IV.2-4; VI.5-9). In fact, farming is the mother and nurse
of the other *technai* (V.17). However, knowledge by itself is
not sufficient to prosper. There are those who have the knowledge and
resources to increase their estates but are unwilling to do so (I.16).
Others, like Socrates' respondent Critoboulos, might gain such
knowledge but do not have the wealth necessary to make use of it
(II.11-13). Still, Socrates says, knowledge is not sufficient to
profit but one also needs care and diligence in order to put his
knowledge into effect (XX.2-6). This unused knowledge is not
untried theory but neglected skill.


## 2. Plato



In Plato's dialogues the relation between knowledge
(*episteme*) and craft or skill
(*techne*) is complex and surprising. There is no general
and systematic account of either but rather overlapping treatments,
reflecting the context of different dialogues. Nevertheless, Plato
emphasizes certain characteristics of both that demonstrate a
sustained and consistent engagement with the two concepts.



Throughout the dialogues characters frequently cite
*techne* as a way of illustrating important points in
their philosophical conversations. Some crafts mentioned are medicine,
horsemanship, huntsmanship, oxherding, farming, calculation, geometry,
generalship, piloting a ship, chariot-driving, political craft,
prophecy, music, lyre-playing, flute-playing, painting, sculpture,
housebuilding, shipbuilding, carpentry, weaving, pottery, smithing,
and cookery. Each of these activities is associated with the word
*techne*, e.g., medicine with the *iatrike
techne*. Each is also associated with a practitioner, e.g.,
medicine with a physician (*iatros*). Other crafts are
mentioned but without practitioners, e.g., arithmetic, flute-making,
and sorcery. Socrates uses medicine much more than any other
*techne*; other crafts repeatedly mentioned, albeit less
frequently than medicine, are house-building, weaving, political
craft, music, shoemaking, piloting a ship, generalship, prophecy,
carpentry, farming, horsemanship, flute-playing. To our contemporary
ears this list is quite various; it is hard to think that they all
have any interesting characteristics in common. Such crafts, or
*technai*, as farming and building have concrete, inanimate
products. Horse training and huntsmanship care for animate but
non-human beings. Medicine cares for the health of humans. Calculation
has neither a concrete product nor does it provide care.



In some dialogues, craft (*techne*) and knowledge
(*episteme*) seem interchangeable in much the same
way as in Xenophon's Socratic dialogues. In the
*Charmides* (165c) Socrates says that medicine, i.e., the
physician's craft (*iatrike techne*), is the
knowledge (*episteme*) of health. In
*Euthydemus* (281a) Socrates says that what guides right use of
materials in carpentry is the knowledge of carpentry
(*techtonike* *episteme*). In
*Ion* (532c) Socrates tells the rhapsode Ion that he is not
able to talk about Homer with craft and knowledge. In
*Protagoras* (356d-e) Socrates refers to measuring as both a
craft and a kind of knowledge.



However, Plato's interest in *techne* is not
innocent. He uses the notion as a way of explicating central themes,
such as virtue, ruling, and the creation of the cosmos. As a
consequence, he develops a complex account of *techne*.
First of all, a craft has a function (*ergon*); this is what it
characteristically does or what it characteristically accomplishes. In
fact, crafts are differentiated by their specific functions
(*erga*)(*Rep.* 346a). A similar idea is assumed in the
exchange between Dionysiodorus and Socrates (*Euthydemus*
301c), as it is by Socrates in *Euthyphro* (13d) and
*Ion* (537c). While the *ergon* of a craft is its goal,
the goal is frequently identified with a result separate from the
activity of the craft. In the *Euthydemus* (291e) the goal
(*ergon*) of medicine is health just as food is the goal
(*ergon*) of farming. When in the *Charmides* (165e)
Critias denies that calculation has an *ergon*, in the way that
a house is the *ergon* of building or a garment of weaving,
Socrates answers that nevertheless calculation is about the odd and
the even. His answer suggests the possibility of a
*techne* whose goal is not a separate result -- an
idea to be found in the *Statesman*. Still in the
*Gorgias* (453e-454a) Socrates argues that calculation produces
as its *ergon* persuasion about the amount of the odd and the
even -- a result separate from the activity of calculation.



As the concept of *techne* develops, the role of
reflective knowledge is emphasized. Whereas *techne* is
associated with knowing how to do (*epistasthai*) certain
activities, *episteme* sometimes indicates a
theoretical component of *techne*. For example, the
physician knows how to care for the sick (*Rep*. 342d), to
prescribe a regimen (*Rep*. 407d), to provide for the advantage
of the body (*Rep*. 341e), to make someone healthy
(*Charm*. 174c), to make someone vomit (*Laws* 933b).
However, the *episteme* associated with craft means
more than simply how to do certain activities. The physician knows or
recognizes (*gignoskein*) health by medical knowledge
(*episteme*) (*Charm.* 170c). Since health
is the goal of the medical craft, the physician understands the goal
of the craft. Plato emphasizes this knowledge as a distinct aspect of
the craftsman's skill. Sometimes this aspect is theoretical in
the root sense of *theoria* -- looking. In the
*Cratylus* (389a-b) Socrates talks about the carpenter who
makes the weaver's shuttle; he looks to (*blepon*)
something whose nature is to weave. This latter seems to be a material
model because Socrates supposes what would happen if it were to break.
In that case, the carpenter looks to the form (*eidos*) of
shuttle, that which is shuttle (*ho estin kerkis*). In the
*Gorgias* (503d-e) all craftsmen work not at random but look
toward the goal of their craft (*ergon*) so that what each
produces will have a certain form. Socrates cites painters,
housebuilders, and shipbuilders. In *Republic* VI Socrates
compares philosophers who are rulers to painters who look to a model
(484c).



The theoretical aspect is also expressed as articulate reasoning about
the goal. In Plato's view, the ability to explain why he does
what he does is one of the most important characteristics of the
craftsman. In the *Charmides*, Socrates says that we test the
physician by questioning him since he understands health
(*Charm.* 170e5-7). Expanding on the idea of testing,
Socrates says they will investigate the physician in what he says and
in what he does, on whether what he says is true and whether what he
does is right (171b7-9). This theoretical side of craft is
further developed in the *Gorgias*. In his conversation with
Polus and later in his conversation with Callicles, Socrates carries
on a sustained reflection about craft. In his conversation with Polus,
Socrates distinguishes four crafts (*technai*: medicine,
physical training, judging, and legislating; the first pair are
concerned with the body and the latter with the soul (464b). These
crafts provide their care always for the best, either of the body or
of the soul (464c). Unlike empiric practice (*empeiria*),
*techne* has an account to give by which it provides the
things it provides, an account of what their nature is, so that it can
say the cause of each (465a). In the conversation with Callicles,
Socrates returns to this account, when he seems especially interested
in the ability of *techne* to give an account. He says
medical *techne* investigates the nature of the thing it
cares for (*therapeuei*) and the cause of what it does and has
an account to give of each of them (501a). In the first instance,
medicine cares for, or treats, the body; but, more particularly, it
cares for the good of the body, i.e., its health. So, this
*techne* has an account to give of health and of what it
does to achieve the end of health.



So far then, a craft is defined by its goal and is a kind of
knowledge. Fully developed, this knowledge is knowing how to
accomplish a goal on the basis of an understanding of the goal; the
understanding can be articulated in an account. The account informs
and guides the skilled practice. A craftsman's being able to
articulate the goal is most fully developed, perhaps, in the
*Laws*. The Athenian Stranger describes the distinction between
the slave doctor and the doctor of free men as resting on the ability
to give an account. The slave doctor relies on experience
(*empeiria*) and has no account to give for his procedure. The
free doctor not only has an account, he communicates it to his
patients as a way of eliciting their cooperation in the course of
treatment (720 b-d). Presumably, the patients come to appreciate the
reasons for the actions the doctor undertakes as well as the regimen
he prescribes because they better understand the nature of health and
the way the treatments produce health. In fact, the empiric doctor
laughs at the free doctor for instructing his patients -- as
though he were trying to make them into doctors themselves (857
d-e).



There is a second feature of *techne* that is vital for
understanding its importance to Plato. In the *Gorgias*,
*techne* is distinguished from *empeiria* not only
by its ability to give an account but also because it seeks the
welfare of its object. The physician and the physical trainer seek the
welfare of the body, just as the judge and the legislator seek the
welfare of the soul (464c). These features of *techne*
figure in one of Plato's persistent themes, the knowledge needed
to rule the city. One of its most important occurrences is in the
*Republic*, where Socrates characterizes ruling as a kind of
*techne* that looks out after the welfare of the city
(*Rep.* 342e). But in other dialogues as well, the authentic
ruler has a knowledge, both practical and theoretical, that allows him
to achieve what is good for the city. In fact, the passage just cited
from the *Laws* is part of an analogy to explain why the
legislator should be able to explain to the citizens the reasons
behind the law, and presumably why the law is good for the city.



Indeed, most accounts of knowledge in the dialogues are carried out in
the context of such discussions. Even in the *Theaetetus*, the
dialogue most often thought of as dedicated to epistemology, we find
the same theme. When he argues against Protagoras' relativism,
Socrates gets the sophist to concede that some people are wiser than
others when it comes to what is good for the city (167c-d). Socrates
then seizes upon an analogy with medicine. While each person may be
the final authority for himself when it comes to what is hot, dry, and
sweet for him, in matters of health and disease not everyone knows the
healthy for himself nor is he able to cure himself. Just so, while
Protagoras may hold that for each city what is fine or base, just or
unjust, pious or impious is what the city takes it to be, what is
really advantageous for the city is not the same as what it takes to
be advantageous (171e - 172b). Although Socrates'
investigation of knowledge becomes more abstract when he introduces
being, not-being, likeness and unlikeness, identity and difference,
unity and plurality, to this group he adds the fine and the base, the
good and the bad (185c-186a). The soul itself investigates these
things, trying to determine their being (*ousia*) and their
opposition to one another and the being of that opposition. Finally,
the investigation of being, non-being and the other opposites --
including the fine and the base, the good and the bad -- also
reflects both on the being of each and on its usefulness (*pros te
ousian kai opheleian*) (186c).While Socrates does not
explain what reflecting on their usefulness amounts to, the remark
shows a link, however slight, to the original motivation for the
investigation of knowledge-- i.e., providing what is really
advantageous for the city.



Nevertheless, these passages from the *Theaetetus* draw our
attention to a change in the notion of *episteme*.
Knowledge of the forms tends to become an end in itself; and in this
way the idea of knowledge as pure theory begins to make an appearance
in the dialogues. This tension is also prominent in the
*Republic*, of course, where Socrates introduces and develops
the notion that rulers should be philosophers, who are defined by
their knowledge of forms. At the beginning of the discussion of
philosophical rulers in *Republic* IV, knowledge and craft fall
into a familiar pattern of interchangeability. After defining the
three classes in the city, Socrates is looking for the knowledge
(*episteme*) in virtue of which the city is
well-counseled. He dismisses the crafts of carpentry, smithing, and
farming -- obviously crafts and called *epistemai*
(428b-c). While these focus on some partial good for the city, the
*episteme* of ruling takes counsel for the city as
a whole and what is best for it internally and externally (428 b-d).
Then, in *Republic* V, Socrates introduces an altogether
different notion of the knowledge that philosophers will have --
one whose object is forms. Indeed this passage defines for most
readers Plato's idea of *episteme*.



Knowledge (*episteme*) is the ability to know the
real as it is (477b). The context shows that when Socrates talks about
the real, he is referring to the forms. In the *Republic*, the
prominent forms are the forms for the beautiful, the good, and the
just. In the *Symposium*, Socrates describes the form of the
beautiful as neither coming to be nor passing away, as not changing in
any other way, as never being or even appearing to anyone as anything
but beautiful (211a-b). Since an analogous description applies to the
good and the just, one can see that forms are very different from the
sorts of things we experience through the sensory perception
associated with the usual *technai*. After forms are introduced
in the *Republic*, they are the objects of the most abstract
and highest knowledge, afforded by the power of dialectic. At the end
of Book VI, Socrates uses the words for knowledge that we have found
in other contexts-- understanding (*gnosis*) and
knowledge (*episteme*). However, in the Divided
Line passage a new vocabulary is introduced, as though the conception
of knowledge has changed in a fundamental way. As he has in other
places, Socrates divides the visible world (*horaton*) from the
intelligible (*noeton*). Whereas before the intelligible
had been the undivided field of *gnosis* and
*episteme*, now it is subdivided into the fields of
mathematical or deductive reasoning (*dianoia*) and the
grasping of the unhypothetical beginning point (*nous*). The
latter is the goal of dialectic (511a-b).



Later in *Republic* VI there is a connection--of a
different sort--between *techne* and
*episteme*. Knowledge, in the sense of
*episteme*, will be deductive and logical like
mathematics; unlike mathematics, its deductions will be based on
foundations that need no further justification. In part it will be
something like mathematical deduction based on fundamental reality. Two
aspects of this account are significant. First, using a mathematical
model as the root of this conception of knowledge makes it purely
theoretical; it is theoretical because, like calculation in the
*Charmides* (165e), it has no separate product. Its
*ergon* seems to be the activity itself of dialectical thought.
Second, in using mathematical thinking as an analogue for dialectic,
Socrates is still relying on the notion of *techne* since
both geometry and calculation are *technai*. 



Nevertheless, in the Divided Line, Socrates posits intelligible
entities, abstract but real, as objects of mathematical thought and of
dialectical knowledge. Although it treats them only as hypotheses,
mathematics reasons about the odd and the even, the various kinds of
shapes, and the three kinds of angles. These are entities distinct
from their perceptual representation in material diagrams. In turn,
dialectic does not treat forms as hypotheses but comes to know what
each is. This knowledge comes from grasping their relation to the
unhypothetical beginning point, the form of the good (509d-511e). The
super-eminence of the knowledge of the good leads to the
latter's becoming an end in itself. When philosophers, after
years of study, at last see the good, they would prefer to stay at
this level and not go back down into the city to rule. They must be
forced, by argument, to undertake the task of applying their knowledge
of the forms to the affairs of ruling (519c-520e). So, when this
account introduces abstract but real entities as objects of knowledge,
Socrates comes close to giving theoretical knowledge a sphere of
activity that is distinct from that of practical knowledge.



Nevertheless, even though *episteme* is tied to
forms, it still has a role in *techne*. First, at the
beginning of *Republic* VI, Socrates gives his interlocutors a
peculiar description of what the philosopher will do with this
knowledge of reality. Converting Socrates' negative description
of the non-philosopher, we find that the philosopher has a knowledge
(*gnosis*) of the reality of each form, thus a clear
paradigm in his soul. Like painters, philosophers look to
(*apoblepontes*) the truest paradigm, always referring to it
and contemplating it as accurately as possible; in this way they
establish here the laws respecting the fine, the just, and the good,
if there is need to establish them, or take care to preserve those
that are established (484c-d). By comparing philosophers to painters
who imitate a paradigm, Socrates is giving to the knowledge of forms a
role within a kind of craft which imitates forms. This notion of
imitating forms is an important one for Plato; he uses it again in the
account of creation in the *Timaeus*. At 28a, the Demiurge
-- the craftsman of the universe -- looking at
(*blepon*) that which does not change and using it as a
paradigm, fashions its form and power into his creation. In the
subsequent passage we learn that this unchanging paradigm is the
intelligible animal that contains all other intelligible animals
(30c-d).



Besides the contexts in which *episteme* of forms
results in imitating them, the dialogues offer another important way
of reconciling knowledge of forms and *techne*. In the
*Sophist*, the Visitor from Elea elaborates an analogy between
*techne* and dialectic, whose objects are clearly forms.
He begins with the idea that there is a *techne* for
telling which letters join to which, just as there is
*techne* for which musical notes mingle and which do not
(253a ff). Then the Visitor turns to the kinds (*gene*)
that he has just introduced: being, rest, motion, sameness, and
difference (254d-e). Making an analogy with the grammatical and
musical *technai*, he posits a sort of knowledge
(*episteme*) for showing which kinds harmonize and
which do not. This is also the knowledge of how to discriminate
according to kinds, which the Visitor calls dialectic. While this
knowledge of how to distinguish and to harmonize forms is compared to
craft, it is not productive, the way carpentry is productive. However,
in the *Statesman*, the Visitor takes up the relation of
dialectic, conceived of as theoretical, with practical knowledge. He
contrasts *epistemai* that are practical -- like
carpentry -- and those which are for knowledge only (258d). The
Visitor calls them respectively the practical
(*praktike*) and the theoretical
(*gnostike* -- clearly related to
*gnosis* and *gignoskein*)(259d). The
practical *epistemai* cover what are otherwise called
crafts; however, the theoretical is subdivided into (a)
*epistemai* like calculation, which only judges or
distinguishes the things known and (b) *epistemai* like
that of the architect (*architekton*), which command and
are thus called commanding (*epitaktike*) (259e). The
Visitor may seem to have blurred his original distinction between
practical and theoretical by including commanding knowledge
(*epitaktike*) in the latter category. Still, the notion
that at least part of theoretical knowledge only judges the things
known gives us a basis for distinguishing theoretical from practical
knowledge. The former entails craft-like skill; but the skill remains
focused on the objects of knowledge. In calculation the objects are
numbers; in dialectic they are the kinds. This kind of knowledge has
no product separate from its activity; by contrast, practical
knowledge actually produces something separate, in the way carpentry
does. This way of expressing the difference suggests that theoretical
*episteme* is not so much a body of knowledge as an
ability to grasp very abstract sorts of distinctions. 



Still, by including commanding knowledge, the Visitor has left a
middle ground between the purely theoretical and the practical.
Certainly architecture is not practical since it does not directly
produce anything, in the way carpentry does. However, it does give
commands, whose effects are practical; thus, it is not for knowledge
only, in the way in which calculation is for knowledge only. Insofar
as architecture is an analogue for the political craft, the Visitor
seems to be exploiting this middle ground (259e). It is as though the
Visitor is trying to associate the political craft with the most
abstract disciplines, like geometry, even though it has to have
practical impact. In fact, including commanding knowledge under
theoretical knowledge reflects again the tension between the knowledge
needed to rule and the elaboration of that knowledge. The ruler needs
to be able to engage in purely theoretical investigation; he also
needs to bring order into the city. The Visitor turns to the latter
activity when he compares the kingly or political knowledge to
weaving. Finally, he arrives at the conclusion that the kingly
knowledge weaves together all the other *epistemai*
-- like generalship and judging -- as well as the laws and
those things having to do with the city (305e). While no resolution is
offered to this tension, two features of this long discussion are
suggestive. If the kingly or political *episteme*
is like weaving, it depends on the ability first of all to distinguish
what it will weave together. Insofar as dialectic is the skill of
distinguishing the things known, it can serve as preliminary to
weaving because it is preliminary to showing how the kinds harmonize.
Further, if political knowledge is like architecture, it is a
commanding knowledge (*epitaktike episteme*);
it gives commands. If we search for the source of these commands, a
likely source is the relations and distinctions to be found among
forms. If so, the abstract structures discovered by
*gnostike* are normative for the city, the way the
forms are in the *Republic*.


## 3. Aristotle



The obvious place to begin a consideration of
*episteme* and *techne* in
Aristotle's writings is in Book VI of the *Nicomachean
Ethics*. Here Aristotle makes a very clear distinction between the
two intellectual virtues, a distinction which is not always observed
elsewhere in his work. He begins with the rational soul (*to te
logon echon*) which is divided into the calculating part (*to
logistikon*) and the scientific part (*to
epistemonikon*). With the calculating part we consider
(*theoroumen*) things which could be otherwise whereas with
the scientific part we consider things which could not be otherwise.
When he adds that calculation and deliberation are the same, he
indicates why calculation is about what could be otherwise; no one deliberates
about what cannot be otherwise (1139a5-15). Things which could be otherwise are, e.g., the contingencies of everyday life; things which
could not be otherwise are, e.g., the necessary truths of mathematics.
With this distinction between a reality which is contingent and a
reality which is necessary, Aristotle has laid the foundation for the
strong distinction between *techne* and
*episteme*.



Then the account turns to action (*praxis*), where we find the
kind of thought that deals with what is capable of change. The
efficient cause of actions is choice (*prohairesis*). The cause
of choice is desire (*orexis*) and reasoning toward an end
(*logos ho heneka tinos*). Thought (*dianoia*) by itself
moves nothing, only thought that is practical
(*praktike*) and for the sake of an end. So, practical
thought (*dianoia praktike*) belongs to the calculative
part and pertains to practical truth; theoretical thought
(*theoretike dianoia*) belongs to the
scientific part and pertains to truth and falsity. In turn, practical
thought governs productive (*poietike*) action. The
latter has an end separate from the action, i.e., the product; we will
see that this kind of practical thought is  *techne*.
Underlining the way action requires the two elements of the soul,
Aristotle sums up by saying choice can be called intellect fused with
desire (*orektikos nous*) or desire fused with thought
(*orexis dianoetike*) (1139a17-1139b5). While
this chapter suggests that the truth sought by practical thought is
different in kind from the truth sought by theoretical
thought--because their respective objects are different--it
ends with the summary claim that attaining truth is the function of
both parts of the rational soul; then he turns to the virtues which
make the soul able to attain the truth.



There are five virtues of thought: *techne*,
*episteme*, *phronesis*,
*sophia*, and *nous* (1139b15). Various translations
have been offered for each of these terms. Most often,
*techne* is translated as craft or art. While
*episteme* is generally rendered as knowledge, in
this context, where it is used in its precise sense, it is sometimes
translated as scientific knowledge. However, one must not confuse this
usage with our contemporary understanding of science, which includes
experimentation. Conducting experiments to confirm hypotheses is a
much later development. Rather, translating
*episteme* as scientific knowledge is a way of
emphasizing its certainty. In any event, as soon as Aristotle
introduces these five terms, he turns to the distinction between the
first two virtues. First he defines *episteme*, as
he says, in its accurate sense and leaving aside its analogous uses.
Scientific knowledge is distinguished by its objects, which do not
admit of being otherwise; these objects are eternal and exist of necessity.
More precisely, scientific knowledge comprises demonstration, starting
from first principles; the latter must also be known, although they
are not known by demonstration (1139b15-30). The full account of
*episteme* in the strict sense is found in
*Posterior Analytics*, where Aristotle says that we think we
know something without qualification
(*epistasthai...haplos*) when we think we know
(*gignoskein*) the cause by which the thing is, that it
is the cause of the thing, and that this cannot be otherwise
(71b10-15). As though to emphasize the necessity of what is
known, he most frequently uses geometry as an example of
*episteme*. In this regard, it should be pointed
out that Aristotle uses the notion of cause (*aitia*) in a
broader sense than it usually has in contemporary thought. Thus,
understanding how the geometrical axioms lead to a theorem that right
triangles have a certain property would be an instance, for Aristotle,
of understanding the cause of the proven property of the right
triangle.



The two virtues of thought that deal with what can be otherwise, i.e.,
what is contingent, are *techne* and
*phronesis*, craft and practical wisdom. Aristotle
emphasizes the former, a disposition (*hexis*) with respect to
making (*poiesis*), is distinct from the latter, a
disposition with respect to doing (*praxis*). First,
*techne* is a disposition that produces something by way
of true reasoning; it is concerned with the bringing into existence
(*peri genesin*) of things that could either exist or not. The
principle (*arche*) of these things is in the one who
makes them, whereas the principle of those things that exist by
necessity or by nature is in the things themselves (1140a1-20).
For instance, carpentry makes this house and medicine produces health
in a particular case. What is contingent is whether this house exists
or whether health exits in this case. Since what it produces could
exist or not, its products are one of the ways craft deals with the
contingent. 



By contrast, practical wisdom does not make something separate the way
craft does. Its province is doing (*praxis*) and not making
(*poiesis*). Presumably Aristotle is relying on a
distinction between activity, whose end is in itself, and making,
whose end is a product separate from the activity of making. When
someone plays the flute, e.g., typically there is no further product
of playing; playing the flute is an end in itself. However, when one
makes a house, e.g., the activity of making a house is not an end in
itself but has a product, which is separate from the activity. This
distinction is clearer in the opening paragraphs of the
*Nicomachean Ethics*. There Aristotle says that each
*techne*, investigation, action (*praxis*), and
undertaking seems to aim at some good. The ends vary, however; some
ends are the activities themselves and some ends are products
(*erga*) beyond the activities. As examples of these latter
kinds of ends, he cites health as the end of medicine, a ship as the
end of shipbuilding, and victory as the end of generalship; these ends
are products separate from the respective activities
(1094a5-10). 



The distinction between making and doing is also important for another
distinction, in Book Two, between craft (*techne*) and
virtue (*arete*) because virtue is a kind of doing. The
value of the works (*ginomena*) of *technai* is in the
works themselves--because they are of a certain sort. Whereas the
value of a virtuous action depends on the agent, who must act with
knowledge (*eidos*) and deliberately choose the action
for itself; finally, the action must come from a fixed disposition of
character. The latter two features do not belong to
*techne* (1105a25-1105b5). Presumably, then, the
craftsman does not choose his activity for itself but for the end;
thus the value of the activity is in what is made. In the case of
virtue, by contrast, the value is not in a separate product but in the
activity itself. In the light of what Aristotle says about the
activity of virtue, we can better understand practical wisdom. For it,
doing well (*eupraxia*) is an end in itself. However, this end
is quite expansive; it is doing well as a human being, living life
well in general. 



Aristotle ends this chapter by saying that practical wisdom belongs to
the second part of the rational soul, i.e., the part whose object is
what is contingent. Its virtue is the ability to form opinion
(*doxa*) with respect to what is contingent
(1140a1-1140b30). Of course, craft also belongs to this part of
the rational soul. So, it appears that both of these intellectual
virtues, which deal with contingent reality, form (*scil.*
true) opinions. In the case of *techne*, the opinions are
the basis for production; and in the case of *phronesis*,
the opinions are the basis for living well. By making explicit the
role of opinion in dealing with contingent reality, Aristotle has
marked the fundamental difference between
*episteme*, as scientific knowledge, and
*techne*.



With this distinction we seem to have, at last, the classic division
between the purely theoretical and the purely practical. Scientific
knowledge concerns itself with the world of necessary truths, which
stands apart from the world of everyday contingencies, the province of
craft. Still, there are many problems of interpretation surrounding
this description of scientific knowledge in *Posterior
Analytics*. While we cannot address them in this article, we can
at least point out a central one. The description just given of
*episteme* makes scientific knowledge into a
deductive system in which the relations among terms are invariable and
necessary. The problem for commentators has been how to reconcile this
description of *episteme* with Aristotle's
actual procedure in such treatises as the *Physics* and *De
Anima*, where one does not find a deductive system of invariable
and necessary relations. One possible explanation is that these
treatises are preliminary sketches for a truly scientific treatise. So
one could envision another *Physics* which would be a series of
deductions, all expressing invariable and necessary truths about
nature. However, this charitable assessment does not avoid all
problems. In *Metaphysics* II, Aristotle explicitly undermines
the possibility of an *episteme*, in the strict
sense, with respect to nature. At the end of Book II, Aristotle makes
a distinction between the accuracy to be found in mathematics and that
in other disciplines. Mathematical accuracy, he says, cannot be
expected in all things but only in those which do not contain matter.
In particular, then, one cannot expect mathematical accuracy in the
study of nature since it is concerned with matter (995a15-20).
If 'mathematical accuracy' means the grasp of necessary
and invariable relations among terms, then the study of nature will,
by definition, have no such accuracy because what it studies contains
matter. About nature, then, we might have to settle for something less
than *episteme* in the strict sense. Indeed, in
Book VI of the *Metaphysics*, Aristotle seems to make a major
concession on the issue of *episteme* when he says
that there is no knowledge of the accidental, i.e., what happens
infrequently, because all *episteme* is of that
which is always or for the most part (*hos epi to polu*)
(1027a20). Instead of grasping what is always and necessary, knowledge
can then grasp what happens for the most part, e.g., the regularities
of nature, to which there are exceptions.



There is, then, some ambivalence in Aristotle's use of the term
*episteme*. For our purposes in this article, we
will leave suspended the question whether
*episteme* in the strict sense is achievable in the
study of nature. Still, we can recognize a secondary sense of
*episteme*, since Aristotle in some contexts uses
*episteme* although the strict conditions do not
hold. One of these contexts appears to be the study of nature. Whether
in the study of nature *episteme* in this secondary
sense is the best that can be done or whether it can be converted into
*episteme* in the strict sense, there is still a
secondary sense of *episteme*, one that is not
defined in terms of what is eternal and necessary. As we shall see,
this secondary sense is important for understanding the relation
between *techne* and *episteme*.



Now that we have traced Aristotle's way of distinguishing craft
from scientific knowledge and from virtue, we can focus on craft as
productive. As we have just seen, craft produces something by way of
true reasoning. Aristotle also gives us a very interesting sketch of
this practical reasoning at work. In an important example from
*Metaphysics* VII we see how the account of the goal is the
basis for reasoning which ends in action. In production the form is in
the soul of the one who produces; in the case of medicine, health is
such a form. To begin with, health is knowledge
(*episteme*) and an account (*logos*) in the
soul. Then the physician engages in the following kind of reasoning:
since health is this particular state, if the patient is to be
healthy, he should have this other particular state, for instance
homogeneity, and if he is to have homogeneity, he should have heat.
The physician continues to reason in this way until he arrives at the
last step, the thing he can do. From this point the process, which
aims at health, is called production (1032b1-10).



With this sketch of practical reasoning we can come to closer grips
with what sorts of things could not be otherwise. Let us begin with health
and the claim that the physician has an account of health. It is
health that is the cause of the steps in the practical reasoning
because it explains what is to be done. In what way does health admit
of being otherwise? One possibility is that what constitutes health is not
invariable; thus the account of health would not be invariable. While
it seems unlikely that health is variable in this sense, what
obviously could be otherwise is whether health exists in this particular
case or not. If health does not exist in this case, it is up to
medicine to restore it. In this sense, as well, all of the steps
prescribed by the practical reasoning could be otherwise. In the case of
this patient, homogeneity may or may not exist; heat may or may not
exist. However, there is another sense in which the steps in the
syllogism might admit of being otherwise. Each step alleges a productive
relation -- e.g., heat produces homogeneity. Now, there is a
sense in which these relations could be otherwise. While heat produces
homogeneity, in a particular case heat causing homogeneity may or may
not exist because there may or may not be heat. To say of all these
conditions that they could be otherwise, then, implies that they could or
could not exist. Whether these conditions exist or not depends on an
agent bringing them into existence. So the field of craft is those
conditions that can be brought into existence by an agent.



To this kind of contingency, however, another must be added. The
productive relation can be contingent in another sense. It is
contingent whether heat, e.g., produces homogeneity. Heat does not
invariably nor necessarily produce homogeneity, although it does do so
for the most part (*Prior Analytics*, 32b5-20). There
are, then, two kinds of contingency possible in practicing medicine.
The first kind has to do with whether the physician acts or not; the
second kind has to do with whether the productive relation holds or
not. On the one hand, if the first kind of contingency held but the
second did not, the physician would have a nearly sovereign command of
health. If the productive relations between heat and homogeneity and
between homogeneity and health were invariable and necessary, then so
long as the physician could produce heat, he could invariably produce
health. On the other hand, if the productive connections were not
invariable and necessary -- but only held for the most part
-- then the physician could reliably but not invariably produce
health (*Metaphysics*, 1026b30-1027a25). One could say of
contingent productive connections that they hold unless something
unusual happens, that, e.g., heat always causes homogeneity unless
something unusual intervenes. Accidental factors -- by definition
factors which arise infrequently -- can defeat the causal link
between heat and homogeneity. But since accidental factors are
infrequent, one can claim that for the most part heat causes
homogeneity. In view of this kind of contingency, what the physician
can claim to know is that heat produces homogeneity unless something
unusual intervenes. In his deliberations, what he does not know is
when something unusual will happen (*Nicomachean Ethics*,
1112a20-1112b10).



Scientific knowledge, in the strict sense, does not deal with these
kinds of contingency. Nevertheless, Aristotle still describes medicine
-- which does deal with contingency -- as an
*episteme*, as we have seen. Indeed, from time to
time, Aristotle mentions *episteme* and
*techne* in the same breath, as though they are not as
distinct as *Nicomachean Ethics* VI would make them seem. In
the *Physics* (194a20), Aristotle argues that the student of
nature will study both form and matter. To illustrate he says that it
belongs to the same *episteme* to study the form as
well as the matter; the physician, for instance, studies health as
well as bile and phlegm. In *Nicomachean Ethics*, in his
polemic against the Platonic notion of the good itself-- using
*episteme* and *techne* indifferently
-- Aristotle says the physician does not study health as such but
human health -- even the health of this human because it is
individuals that he cures (1097a10-15). Clearly, if medicine is
an *episteme* which studies health, it is also a
*techne* which produces health. If he were using
*episteme* in its strict sense, he ought not to
have called medicine *episteme*. Indeed, the mixing
of *episteme* and *techne* is not
confined to medicine. In *Nicomachean Ethics* II, when he
illustrates the notion of the mean between extremes, he cites experts
in physical training. Generalizing, he says that every
*episteme* achieves well its goal (*ergon*)
by looking at the mean and using that as a standard in its products.
Then when he says next that the good craftsmen *technitai*
(craftsmen) and *techne* look to the mean, he shows there
is no hard distinction between *episteme* and
*techne* in this context (1106b5-15).



Thus, a mixed picture of *episteme* and
*techne* begins to emerge. While *techne*
deals with things which could be otherwise, Aristotle still has a tendency to call
it *episteme*. The reason for this tendency is
probably that, while the person with *techne* does not
have *episteme* in the strict sense, he has
something close to it. At the beginning of the *Metaphysics*,
Aristotle says that the person with *episteme* and
the person with *techne* share an important similarity.
There Aristotle contrasts the person of experience (*empeiria*)
with someone who has *techne* or
*episteme*. The former knows that, when Callias had
such and such disease, thus and such helped him, and the same for
Socrates and many others. However, the person who has a
*techne* goes beyond experience to a universal judgment.
This judgment is that this remedy helped all individuals of this type,
with this disease. Examples of the types of individuals are the
phlegmatic and the bilious, when afflicted with a burning fever
(981a5-15). However, it is important to note that the universals
cited -- phlegmatic and bilious -- have a role to play in
explaining a fever and, thus, a role to play in the account of a cure.
As Aristotle says, the master craftsman (*technites*) is
wiser than the person of experience because he knows the cause, the
reasons that things are to be done. The mere artisan
(*cheirotechnes*) acts without this knowledge
(981a30-b5). Aristotle goes on to say that in general the sign of
knowing or not knowing (*tou eidotos kai me eidotos*) is
being able to teach. Because *techne* can be taught, we
think it, rather than experience, is *episteme* (
981b10). Presumably the reason that the one with *techne*
can teach is that he knows the cause and reason for what is done in
his *techne*. So we can conclude that the person with
*techne* is like the person with
*episteme*; both can make a universal judgment and
both know the cause. Of course, the *episteme* in
question is not meant in the strict sense; *techne* is
like *episteme* only in the secondary sense.



Still, even if the craftsman is capable of a universal judgment about
the cause of disease, we ought not to conclude that there is no
difference between *techne* and
*episteme*, even in the secondary sense. We can
take our cue from the kind of accuracy Aristotle says is to be
expected in the study of the supreme good. In *Nicomachean
Ethics* I 3, he says that it is political science
(*politike* *episteme*) which pursues
this study (1094b1). Since there is disagreement and error surrounding
the topic of the good, we must be content, concerning such a subject
and relying on similar premises, to show the truth roughly and in
outline. Given a subject and premises that hold for the most part
(*hos epi to polu*) similar conclusions will follow. He
adds that it is the mark of an educated person to seek the amount of
accuracy (*takribes*) that the nature of the subject matter
permits (1094b20-25). Later in Book I, Aristotle returns to the
problem of the accuracy appropriate to different undertakings; one
must seek accuracy (*akribeian*) according to each subject
matter and to the degree that is appropriate to the method for
investigating it. He illustrates this problem by comparing geometry
with carpentry. Both seek (*epizetousi*) the right angle,
the latter insofar as it is useful for his product and the former as
to what it is and its properties, since he is looking for the truth
(1098a25-30). Here Aristotle suggests the notion of practical
accuracy, clearly distinct from mathematical accuracy, is possibly
distinct from the accuracy of the study of nature. After all, the
accuracy needed for production might also fall short of the standard
required by the study of nature, even when this study is
*episteme* in the secondary sense. Finally, nothing
in the last distinction undermines the claim that
*techne* is clearly distinct from
*episteme* in the strict sense. The former is
confined to the world of contingencies; the domain of the latter is
what is necessary.


## 4. The Stoics



Among the Stoics, the relation between *episteme*
and *techne* is the richest and most focused of all the
accounts we have so far considered. That relation is enmeshed in the
Stoic account of virtue, in which the two notions of knowledge and
craft flow together in forming the science and art of living. Zeno
refers to a *techne* which cures the diseases of the soul
(*SVF*, i.e. *Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta*, I 323) and
Chrysippus says that practical judgment (*phronesis*) is
a kind of *techne* concerning the things having to do
with life (*SVF* II 909). While virtue is compared to a
*techne*, it is also a complete and unshakeable
understanding of the universe. It has then some of the features of an
*episteme* in Aristotle's strong sense.
Clearly, such a position rests on the basis of peculiar Stoic
doctrines. We can begin with the Stoic idea of impulse to action.
Diogenes Laertius says that, according to the Stoics, an animal has
self-preservation as the object of its first impulse
(*horme*). So, the first thing appropriate
(*oikeios*) to every animal - including humans - is
its own constitution and the consciousness of this. Impulse leads
every animal to seek what is appropriate to it and rejects what is not
appropriate. In addition, the constitution of adult humans includes
reason; so, reason supervenes on what would be purely automatic
impulses in other animals. Stoics say that reason is itself the
craftsman (*technites*) of the adult's impulses
(Diogenes Laertius 7.85-6).



For the Stoics, however, reason's being the craftsman of all
adult human impulses does not imply a division between the rational
and any non-rational parts of the soul. Orthodox Stoics do not divide
the soul into reason and non-rational desires. Without this division
there is no basis for a distinction between
*episteme* as an intellectual virtue and reason as
exercising a kind of *techne* with respect to some
non-rational element. Rather, there is only the reasoning
(*dianoia*) and governing principle
(*hegemonikon*) which is capable of opposite states and
thus becomes either virtue or vice (Plutarch, *On moral virtue*
441 C-D). Moral weakness or hesitancy comes from alternating judgments
about what is morally right (446E-447A). Such an account implies that
reason controls impulse solely by its judgments. One's emotions,
then, are not independent of reason; they cannot pursue as good
something different from what reason takes to be good. In those who do
not know what the good is, reason gives rise to mistaken impulses to
action. For instance, the belief that health is good is mistaken
because only virtue is good; still, this mistaken belief is expressed
as fear at the prospect of losing one's health, which, in turn,
can move one to preserve health at the expense of virtue. However, in
the one who knows that virtue is the only good - the sage
- reason, unimpeded by fear, gives rise to impulses that aim
only at virtue. If reason is the craftsman of impulse and if
*techne* implies knowledge, then it molds one's
impulsive feelings, i.e., the ones that lead one to act, through
knowledge of the good. 



However, this knowledge of the good locates what is good for the sage
in what is good for the whole universe. Zeno says that the end of life
is to live in accordance with nature. In fact, living in accordance
with nature is the same as virtue (Diogenes Laertius, 7.87).
Chrysippus modifies Zeno's claim when he says that living in
accordance with virtue is equivalent to living in accordance with the
experience of what happens by nature. What happens by nature is
governed by universal law, which is right reason pervading everything
and is identical with Zeus, who is the leader of the governance of
everything (Diogenes Laertius, 7.87-8). The consequence is that
the sage's reason, endowed with knowledge of the way right
reason pervades the universe, supervenes on impulse with the good of
the whole in view. Chrysippus says that there is no other or more
appropriate way of approaching the account of things which are good
and bad or the virtues or happiness than from universal nature and
from the governance of the universe. (Plutarch. *On Stoic
Self-contradictions* 1035 C-D)



At this point, we can appreciate the way Stoicism presents a distinct
view of the relation between *episteme* and
*techne*. Socratic intellectualism holds that what one
knows to be good is sufficient for one to do what is good; but it has
no moral psychology to justify the claim. Finding the claim itself
paradoxical, Plato explains the hesitancy to do what one knows to be
good by introducing non-rational elements into the soul. (See the
entry on
 ancient ethical theory,
 especially the sections on Socrates and on Plato.) Finally, the
Stoics return to a form of Socratic intellectualism. However, Stoicism
provides the missing moral psychology with its doctrine of the unity
of the soul. In the soul of the Stoic sage, the knowledge of the good
is an unshakeable grasp of what is good both for the sage and for the
whole universe. Because of its unity, there is nothing in the soul of
the sage to oppose this knowledge. It is as though the Stoics assume
that, without opposition, this sort of knowledge would naturally pass
over into action once the connection is made with a particular
situation. Any reason to think otherwise is false. One type of false
opinion is theoretical (and external to moral reasoning) and comes
from mistaken views about moral psychology that clutter the soul up
with non-rational parts. The other type is practical (and internal to
moral reasoning) and comes from failure to know that virtue is living
in accordance with nature and is the only good. This type of false
opinion gives rise to such emotions as fear, which impede living in
accordance with nature. Once these are swept away, knowledge of what
is good is motivation enough to act. In the sage, then, where the
unity of the soul is perfected, the theoretical grasp characteristic
of *episteme* just is a *techne*.



The way this *techne* works is illustrated in another
widely held Stoic teaching, i.e., the unity of the virtues. Zeno held
that virtue is practical knowledge (*phronesis*) in
various forms. When *phronesis* deals with what is owed
to others it is justice (*dikaiosune*); when it deals
with what should be chosen it is moderation
(*sophrosune*); when it deals with what must be
endured it is courage (*andreia*). In all of these definitions
Zeno means *phronesis* to be knowledge
(*episteme*) (Plutarch, *On moral virtue*
441A). According to Sextus, the Stoics say that
*phronesis*, being knowledge
(*episteme*) of the good and the evil, provides a
*techne* concerning life (SVF III 598). Here we can see
the 'sage' or fully perfected human being has a kind of
insight into what is good and bad in each situation of life. In its
particularity, this insight is like that of a master craftsman, who
knows what is appropriate at each juncture of his practice. And like
the master craftsman, the sage reacts appropriately both in the way he
feels and in the way he acts.



Still, there is room for a distinction between
*episteme* and *techne*. Several
authors attribute to Zeno the notion that a *techne* is a
systematic collection of cognitions (*katalepseis*)
unified by practice for some goal advantageous in life (SVF I 73). The
difference between *techne* and
*episteme* properly speaking is that the latter is
said to be secure and unshakeable by reason (Stobaeus
2.73,16-74,3). In general, however, *techne* does
not have the same kind of stability (Cicero, *On Ends* III.50).
Indeed, such *technai* as love of music, and liberal arts in
general, are not even called knowledge (Stobaeus, 2.67, 5-12; cf
Seneca, *Letters* 88). Nevertheless, such distinctions between
*episteme* and *techne* do not keep
the Stoics from characterizing virtue as *techne*. This
special *techne* does consist in a secure and unshakeable
insight into what is appropriate at each juncture of life.



A significant refinement of this *techne* is found in
Cicero's *On Ends*. In Book V, Piso, representing the
views of Antiochus of Ascalon, gives an overview of philosophical
schools. The account depends on the notion of the highest good
(*summum bonum*) because differences about the highest good
define the possible schools. The explication of these differences
begins with an analogy drawn from the crafts (*artes*,
Cicero's Latin for the Greek *technai*). First of all,
the art is different from its object. Second, as medicine is the art
of health and navigation the art of guiding ships, so prudence
(practical wisdom) is the art of how to live (*vivendi ars est
prudentia*). Piso presents this last claim as common to all the
schools, or at least as a good way to present an element which is
common. Next he says that whatever prudence would aim for is something
suited to our nature and the object of natural impulse (what the
Greeks call *horme*). Stoics hold that prudence aims for
the primary objects of nature. The primary objects of nature include
such things as life and health. However, Stoics do not hold that
actually obtaining the primary objects of nature is the highest good.
Rather they maintain that making every effort to obtain them (i.e.,
appropriate ones among them, given the circumstances), even if one is
unsuccessful, is morality and is the only thing desirable for itself
and the highest good (V.16-20).



If life and health are among the primary objects of nature, then the
Stoic teaching is that doing everything to obtain life and health is
morality. But this claim must be qualified; it is not moral to strive
for life and health in an unjust way. Another of the primary objects
of nature is human solidarity. Thus, making every effort to obtain
life and health (and the other primary objects of nature) is the same
as being virtuous, just as making every effort to cure a patient is
the same as following the craft of medicine. Whether the sage actually
obtains life and health (or his other specific objectives in his
actions) is beyond his control. Finally, however, virtuously striving
for these is more important than obtaining them -- it is, in
fact, the only true good.



In Book III, the Stoic Cato explains this complicated position. Human
beings begin life automatically and instinctively seeking the primary
objects of nature, but as their power of reason develops, they come to
realize, if they attain a correct understanding, that moral action is
really the end of life. So they shift the aim of their life, from the
primary objects of nature themselves to doing everything possible to
attain them. Using an analogy to marksmanship, Cato says that someone
who makes it his purpose to hit the target would do everything he
could to hit the target. Thus, he says, his end would be to try
everything he could. Cato's thought is that the sage will aim
for such things as health; however, the good -- and therefore the
end he seeks -- is in the way he pursues health. Thus, actually
getting health is preferable to not getting it, but pursuing it in a
moral way is what is desirable in itself. So, he explains, wisdom
(*sapientia*) is not like medicine or navigation but closer to
acting and dancing, where the end is the exercise of the art and is in
the art itself and not external to it. Even this analogy to the art of
dancing is not quite adequate. According to Cato, a virtuous action
entails all the virtues; presumably he means, e.g., a just action is
also moderate and courageous. However, not every dance movement
includes all the possible dance steps (III. 22-25). In sum, the
Stoics give us the powerful idea that the excellent human life, and
happiness, is the same thing as performing in an artful way, striving
for a life of natural satisfactions, but actually finding ultimate
value in the way one strives.


## 5. Alexander of Aphrodisias



In commenting on the notion of contingency in Aristotle's
*Prior Analytics*, Alexander introduces the idea of stochastic
*techne* -- an idea important for the Stoic
explanation of virtue that we have just seen. Aristotle himself
recognizes a kind of knowledge that deals with things that happen for
the most part; what happens for the most part is distinct from what
may or may not happen (*Prior Analytics*, 32b5-20). In
his commentary on the kind of syllogism relative to what happens for
the most part, Alexander calls the *technai* that use this kind
of syllogism stochastic. The root sense of 'stochastic' is
the ability to aim or hit. Obviously there is an ambiguity in the
notion. A necessary condition of being able reliably to hit the target
is being able to aim; but aiming and hitting are different. If one
aims well, she usually hits, but contingencies can intervene.
Stochastic *technai* are ones subject to this kind of
contingency. Alexander calls them stochastic, in the sense of
conjectural (*In An.Pr*. 39, 15-40, 5). When the
physician, e.g., aims at health, his aiming is a kind of conjecture,
albeit a grounded one, that such and such treatment will produce
health.



Alexander develops the notion of stochastic *techne*
further in his commentary on Aristotle's *Topics*.
Addressing the problem that dialectic does not always achieve its
goal, i.e., leading the interlocutor to a contradiction, he divides
*technai* into ones which achieve their ends by definite steps
and those which cannot (*In Top*. 32,10-34,1). Given
materials, tools, and other conditions, carpentry, e.g., can produce
houses by following a series of steps each of which is effective in a
determinate way. However, medicine does not always cure and certainly
does not cure with the reliability that carpentry produces houses.
Even though medicine tries everything in its power, chance can
intervene so that it does not achieve its goal, the curing of the
patient. When carpentry, by contrast, tries everything in its power,
it achieves its goal. If there is failure, it is the result not of
chance but of error in executing the *techne*, as
Alexander says in *Quaestiones* (*Quaestio* 2.16,
10-25). To mark the difference between these two kinds of
*techne*, Alexander says that the task (*ergon*)
of medicine is to try everything possible to achieve its goal
(*telos*); but achieving its goal is not (totally) within the
power of medicine. He calls stochastic, then, the sorts of
*techne* whose task is to try everything possible to
achieve its goal, the realization of the goal being subject to
chance.



In a different vein, Alexander makes an interesting addition to
Aristotle's distinction between *episteme*
and *techne*. In his account of wisdom in Book One of the
*Metaphysics*, Aristotle argues that knowledge is valued for
its own sake. In one place, Aristotle says that what distinguishes
experience (*empeiria*) from *techne* is that the
latter has a rational account, which explains what it does. Of course,
the one with experience may be more effective than the inexperienced
person who has only the rational account. Still, we think the
craftsman wiser than the empiric because of his knowledge of the
account (*Metaphysics* 981a 5-30). The suppressed
conclusion is that wisdom is characterized by knowledge of causes
quite apart from the utility of knowing the causes. Another argument
shows that wisdom is not productive knowledge. Since wonder is the
beginning of philosophy, satisfying that wonder is an end in itself.
In fact, this kind of pursuit arose when the requirements of necessity
and ease were satisfied (*Metaphysics* 982b 10-15). So
wisdom is knowledge without practical utility, an end in itself.



In his commentary on the *Metaphysics*, Alexander interprets
these arguments as showing that pure knowledge is superior to action.
But there is a difference between the claim that there is a kind of
knowledge which is an end in itself and the claim that pure knowledge
is superior to action. The latter idea is a distinct development in
thinking about the relation between knowledge and craft. This
development rests on the notion that action implies need and it is
better to be without need. So knowledge that fills no need is superior
to action, which fills some need or other. We see this idea at work in
the auxiliary arguments which Alexander offers to back up or explicate
claims made in Aristotle's text. For instance, when Alexander
first claims that Aristotle means to show that knowledge is more
honorable than action, he says that action aims at some end other than
itself. As though remembering that virtuous action -- unlike
productive action -- has no end outside itself, he immediately
offers an argument to the effect that even virtuous actions have
reference to the passions. Divine beings, who are without passions,
have no need of virtue. Those who have passions need the virtues in
order to control the passions (*In Metaph.* 2, 1-10).
Obviously, to have passions is to be in need. The contrast between the
divine and the human also figures in another auxiliary argument. In
passing, Aristotle says that one might justifiably think that wisdom
is beyond human ability because in many ways human nature is in
slavery (*Metaphysics* 982b30). Alexander explicates the remark
about slavery by saying that humans are slaves in that they need such
things as health and prosperity. But what is divine is free of all
need (*In Metaph.* 17, 15-20).



Alexander returns to this theme in his commentary on Aristotle's
*Prior Analytics*. At the beginning of the commentary, he
claims that theorizing is the highest of human goods. In making out
this claim, Alexander points to the situation of the gods, who are
without emotions and therefore do not need the moral virtues. Nor do
they need to deliberate. What is left is contemplating the truth. For
the gods, theorizing about truth is continuous and uninterrupted. Such
a state is impossible for humans in general; but some may approach it.
By leaving behind emotions and the human condition, one may engage in
the divine activity of pure theorizing. Insofar as one is engaged in
this activity, a human becomes like the gods. If becoming like god
(*homoiosis theo(i)*) is the greatest good for
humans, then syllogistic, the method for theorizing, is most valuable
(*In An. Pr*. 5,20 - 6,10). Although expressed
hypothetically, becoming like god is being put forth as the greatest
good for humans. Even if a human cannot always be in such a state,
when he is in a state of continuous and uninterrupted theorizing about
the truth, he is just so far forth like god. In this discussion
Alexander is building on themes found in Aristotle's
*Nicomachean Ethics* (X.7-8). There Aristotle argues that
the life of contemplation is happiness because it is the virtue of the
highest part of the soul, reason. Since this part is the most
god-like, contemplation is in some sense divine activity. Still, in
these passages, Aristotle continues to talk about integrating
contemplation of truth within the context of a human life. By
contrast, Alexander suggests that one might lead -- or at least
strive for-- a god-like life of pure contemplation. In such an
account, pure theory is expressly divorced from practice and promoted
over it.


## 6. Plotinus



As might be expected, Plotinus' philosophy does not have much
use for the concept of *techne*. Its account of knowledge
is fuller than that of craft and is close to Aristotle's idea of
*episteme* in the strong sense. In the
*Enneads*, *episteme* is not directly
associated with *techne*. In the first place,
*episteme* refers to the particular cognitive state
of the first hypostasis from the One, Nous, in which there is an
identity between knowledge and what is known (VI. 6. 15). Our souls
gain true knowledge by the presence of Nous, although Nous knows
non-discursively while our souls characteristically know in a
discursive way (V. 9. 7; IV. 3.18). Discursive knowledge is the sort
of knowing that moves from, e.g., premise to conclusion;
non-discursive thought, then, is a unitary grasp or understanding.
Discursive knowledge, through dialectic, is able to speak in a
reasoned way about each thing, say what it is and in what way it
differs from others, and what it has in common with those with which
it exists, and so on. It does all these things with certain knowledge
(*episteme*) and not by opinion (I. 3. 4). Plotinus
also uses *episteme* in another sense to refer to
the various branches of knowledge which are articulated in theorems
(e.g., IV. 3. 2). Since the ideal state for a human is to enjoy the
knowledge which is found in Nous and then, beyond that, the
contemplation of the One, Plotinus gives short shrift to the civic
virtues of courage, justice, and moderation. Once one attains the
higher levels, he gives up the civic virtues in their usual sense. At
this level, moderation, for instance, is not measure and limit but
rather separation from one's lower nature (I. 2. 7. 25).



*Techne*, then, is even further down Plotinus' list
of concerns. He gives as examples of *technai* grammar,
rhetoric, lyre playing, music, housebuilding, medicine, and farming
(II. 3. 2. 10-15; IV. 4. 31. 15-20). The most important
use of the nature of *techne* is to illustrate points
about the coming to be of the universe. Plotinus holds that Nous gives
rise to the rational principle (*logos*) which is responsible
for the existence of our universe (III. 2. 2) although the rational
principle does not create the universe because the universe neither
comes into existence nor perishes (III. 2. 1). Still, Plotinus uses
analogies with *techne* to explain the work of the
rational principle. In the treatise on beauty, he says that beauty in
the material world comes from shape or form and rational principle;
insofar as matter is ordered by these it is beautiful. As an
illustration of this point he cites the way *techne* can
bestow beauty on a house and its parts (I. 6. 2). In justifying the
presence of both good and evil in the universe, he cites the way a
painter includes varying and contrasting elements in painting (III. 2.
11). In another very striking passage, Plotinus invokes the
*technai* of dance, music, and drama to explain the way
contrasting elements in the life of the universe are blended (III. 2.
16). Nevertheless, there are ways in which the activity of the
rational principle is different from *techne*. The most
important is that rational principle does not reason that the universe
should exist; the creative power of rational principle is the power to
make another thing without striving for its being made. This power is
not acquired or learnt the way a *techne* is (III. 2. 2).
In explaining the way nature works, Plotinus says that nature is
productive because of its contemplation of realities in Nous. Its act
of contemplation makes what it contemplates-- as though the very
act of contemplation were automatically productive (III. 8. 4). In a
similar vein he says that the universe is an image of reality but does
not exist by discursive thought (*dianoia*) nor by contrivance
of craft (*epitechnesis*) (II. 9. 8). Plotinus, then, is
proposing the interesting notion that pure thought, while distinct
from craft, can be productive in its own right.



Hence Plotinus can dismiss *techne* as later than soul
and imitating it, making unclear and weak copies, childish things not
worth much, stacking up many devices in making an image of nature (IV.
3. 10). Still, Plotinus makes some interesting claims about craft when
he is being less severe. Making an analogy with the beauty in Nous,
Plotinus says that the statue is beautiful not because of the stone
but because of the form which craft puts in it. Moreover, this beauty
which exists in the craft is much better than the beauty expressed in
the stone (V. 8. 1). Drawing another analogy between Nous and
*techne*, he says that the forming principles of the
universe come from Nous the way the forming principles in the souls of
craftsmen come from their crafts (V. 9. 3). Finally he raises the
question whether *techne* might be based somehow in the
intelligible world. In answer, he distinguishes those crafts which
imitate nature from those which consider proportion in general. The
former are painting, sculpture, dance, and mime. However, music deals
with proportion of an intelligible kind (V. 9. 11). Music, then, has
some grasp of purely intelligible proportion.