Productive Knowledge in Ancient Philosophy

This work investigates how ancient philosophers understood productive knowledge or techn&&&234; and used it to explain ethics, rhetoric, politics and cosmology. In eleven chapters leading scholars set out the ancient debates about techn&&&234; from the Presocratic and Hippocratic writers, through Plato and Aristotle and the Hellenistic age (Stoics, Epicureans and Sceptics), ending in the Neoplatonism of Plotinus and Proclus. Amongst the many themes that come into focus are: the model status of ancient medicine in defining the political art, the similarities between the Platonic and Aristotelian conceptions of techn&&&234;, the use of techn&&&234; as a paradigm for virtue and practical rationality, techn&&&234;&&&180;s determining role in Platonic conceptions of cosmology, techn&&&234;&&&180;s relationship to experience and theoretical knowledge, virtue as an 'art of living', the adaptability of the criteria of techn&&&234; to suit different skills, including philosophy itself, the use in productive knowledge of models, deliberation, conjecture and imagination.

'The book is well produced ... Johansen has skillfully assembled a rich collection of papers that can be read with benefit not only in its parts but also as a whole.' James L. Zainaldin, Bryn Mawr Classical Review

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