Schmitt C.B. (ed.) The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy
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Epistemology
of the
sciences
707
rather
than
with discovery and investigation; for the goal common to many
of
these treatises,
that
of
showing
how to knit facts and principles together
into a body of rational science, is one
that
cuts across the discovery/
communication distinction. The sixteenth-century literature on ordering
and disposition
of
the sciences is vast. Discussion of axiomatic methods has
already been touched on. Ramist didactic method and the furious polemics
which
surrounded it appear to have had substantial impact in the
epistemology
of
the sciences.
104
A further sixteenth-century development
with
important, but as yet little explored, epistemological implications is
that
of humanist promotion of the use of 'dialectical' methods of
presentation and persuasion
that
concentrate on probable argument
—
argument by analogy, citation of
exempla
and so on —
rather
than
demonstration in the strict Aristotelian sense.
105
The
historiography
of
the sciences undergoes great changes in the course
of
the sixteenth century. To
start
with
there
is a move away from a
conception
of the
arts
and sciences as having emerged fully fledged at the
hands
of
the sages of antiquity towards a
view
of them as gradual products
of
prolonged endeavour.
106
Related to this is a development of awareness
of
the importance
of
social
and cultural factors in the growth
of
knowledge,
the basic traditional historiographic motifs of
successio
and
translatio
studii
being
augmented by speculations about the roles of, for example,
education, printing and the amassment of observations on the growth of
knowledge.
107
Further, by the end of the century
there
is a measure of
awareness
of
progress in the mathematical
sciences
as constituted not merely
by
the development
of new
artifacts and better methods
of
calculation
and
prediction but also by improvement at the theoretical
level.
108
These
historiographical developments are, I suggest, of paramount importance
for
the epistemology
of
the sciences; for their outcome is the emergence in
the seventeenth century of notions of linked practical and theoretical
progress through systematic and collaborative endeavour, notions
that
are
presupposed by the major seventeenth-century programmes for the
advancement of the sciences.
104.
See, for example, Hoppe 1976, pp. 25-32, on its influence on methods of classification of
organisms;
Hannaway 1975 on its role in the constitution of chemistry as a discipline.
105.
On humanist promotion of probable argument and its links with development of discourse in
utramquepartem as a didactic vehicle see
Vasoli
1968a; C.J. R. Armstrong
1976; L.
Jardine
1977
and
in
this volume; Schiffman 1984. On the possible importance of this for the epistemology of the
sciences
see
Vasoli
1974, pp. 637-8; N. Jardine 1979; Dear 1984.
106.
See, for example, P. Rossi 1962; Maravall 1966; A.
Keller
1972.
107.
N. Jardine 1984, ch. 8. 108. Ibid.
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708
Problems
of knowledge and action
THE
PROBLEM
OF
CONTINUITY
The
sixteenth-century epistemological topics outlined above have played a
considerable role in the controversy about the question of continuity
between the 'new' sciences and epistemologies of the seventeenth century
and earlier developments. In its earlier phases this controversy was tied up
with
large questions about the relative contributions of 'humanism' and
'scholasticism' to 'the scientific revolution'. Latterly it has involved also the
issue
of
the relative importance for the development
of
science
of
orthodox
and university-centred learning on the one
hand
and unorthodox and extra-
curricular learning on the other. A number
of
recent
authors
have expressed
reservations about the
terms
of
these debates, both on the grounds
that
they
are often premised on highly questionable assumptions about the link
between scientific progress and conformity to a 'scientific method' and on
the grounds
that
they
tend
to overlook the great diversity of late
Renaissance programmes for the reorganisation and reform
of
learning and
the constitution of new sciences.
109
The following observations on the
epistemological
topics discussed above are concerned only with the more
specific
question of continuity within the domain of epistemology of the
sciences.
Regressus,
and the tradition
of
discussion
of
the
nature,
form and limits of
scientific
demonstration
of
which
it forms a
part,
has occasioned the liveliest
controversy. Randall, Crombie and others discerned in this tradition the
progressive elaboration
of
an experimentally oriented hypothetico-deduc-
tive
methodology, claiming substantial anticipations of the methodology
of
the 'new science' as typified by
Galileo.
110
Randall, indeed, went so far as
to assert on the strength of these parallels
that
'the "father" of modern
science,
in fact,
turns
out to be none other
than
the Master of them
that
know',
to which Olschki memorably replied
that
'some fossil material
collected
from the last ramifications of scholasticism
will
never restore to
Aristotle
the paternity of modern science'.
111
Such extreme positions are
less
in evidence today. The claim
that
experimental and hypothetico-
deductive orientations arose in the tradition of Aristotelian discussions of
demonstrative method has been subjected to serious criticism. In particular,
it now seems clear
that
the sixteenth-century Aristotelian emphasis on the
109.
Cf. P. Rossi 1982; Schmitt 1984, § 1.
110.
Randall
1961;
Crombie 1953. (The suggestion
that
regressus as articulated by Zabarella anticipates
aspects of
Galileo's
methodology is to be found in Cassirer
1911.)
For a balanced account of the
controversy
sparked off by Randall's claims see Aristotelismo veneto 1983, 1, pp. 435-57 (Berti).
in.
Randall 1940, p. 203; 1961, p. 63; Olschki 1943, p. 355.
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Epistetnology of the
sciences
central roles of demonstrative induction and other a
posteriori
forms of
inference cannot be interpreted as showing a concern with experiment in
science.
112
Further, it has been shown
that
the scattered references to
resolutive and compositive methods in Galileo's mature works are more
closely
affiliated to classical and Renaissance accounts of resolution and
composition in geometry
than
to the demonstrative syllogisms of
regressus.
113
On the other hand few would now contest the claim
that
Galileo's
conception
of
science
shares with the Aristotelian conception
of
a
demonstrative science the ideals of certainty and demonstration from
evident principles.
114
The
sources and fortunes of the sixteenth-century Italian discussions of
the status of mathematical demonstrations and the grounds of certainty in
mathematics have been little studied. These debates are, however, reflected
in the
treatments
of the status of mathematics by Christophorus
Clavius,
Giuseppe
Biancani and Galileo's friend and mentor Jacopo Mazzoni,
treatments
which interestingly combine insistence on the certainty and
excellence
of
mathematics and mathematical demonstration with emphasis
on the substantial role of mathematics in the study of nature.
115
The
issue of the status of astronomical hypotheses provides the context
for
perhaps the most striking of epistemological continuity theses. Pierre
Duhem maintained
that
it is possible to trace from classical antiquity to the
physics
of
his day two epistemological traditions in mathematical science, a
realist (and in his
view
misguided) tradition in which the aim of
mathematical science is taken to be
that
of
uncovering
the real causes which
underlie the phenomena and a 'fictionalist' (and in his
view
fruitful)
tradition in which the aim is taken to be
that
of
economically
classifying and
predicting the phenomena.
116
Duhem's thesis is questionable on several
scores.
In particular,
there
is,
at least for the sixteenth century, little evidence
of
views
on the status
of
hypotheses in other mathematical
sciences
—
optics,
112.
See especially Skulsky 1968; Schmitt 1981, § vm.
113.
N. W. Gilbert
1963.
See also Aristotelismo veneto
1983,1,
pp. 435-57 (Berti); Wallace 1984, pp. 146,
302.
114.
However, there remain important questions about the date, intention and relation to his mature
works
of the treatises in
Galileo's
hand, De praecognitionibus et praecognitis in particulari and De
demonstratione: see Carugo and Crombie 1983; Aristotelismo veneto
1983,1,
pp. 349-78
(Wallace);
Wallace
1984. The treatises, which deal with questions arising from Aristotle's Posterior Analytics,
contain
material probably derived from lectures delivered by Paolo
Valla
at the
Collegio
Romano
in
1588. The De demonstratione includes the quaestio: An detur regressus demonstrativus? On the
sources
and contents of these
logical
treatises see
Wallace,
1984, ch. 1.
115.
On
Clavius
see
Galluzzi
1973;
Homann
1983;
Wallace 1984, pp. 136-40. On Mazzoni see Purnell
1971,1972;
Galluzzi
1973.
On Biancani see
Schilling
1969,
pp. 53-5; Giacobbe
1976;
Wallace 1984,
pp.
141-7.
116. Duhem 1908;
1913-59,
iv, 2, chs. 8-9, vi, 1, chs.
10-11.
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710
Problems
of knowledge and action
music,
mechanics and the like - comparable to those which were prevalent
in astronomy;
thus
Duhem's interpretation of attitudes to astronomical
hypotheses as representative of general epistemological attitudes to
mathematical science is called in question. Further,
there
can be little doubt
that
Duhem's partition of
views
into 'realist' and 'fictionalist' fails to do
justice to the range
of
views
in the period.
117
We have seen
that
two
of
these
sixteenth-century attitudes to astronomical hypotheses, the Averroist
treatment
of the hypotheses of orthodox astronomy as straightforwardly
false
on natural philosophical grounds and the 'realist'
view
that
Ptolemaic
planetary models are realised in a plenum
of
substantial orbs, have medieval
origins.
The question of medieval antecedents to the various sceptical
attitudes to astronomy
that
proliferate in the later Renaissance is more
problematic. Some of the arguments used in the sixteenth century for
holding all astronomical hypotheses to be doubtful appear to derive from
medieval
Averroist arguments for the falsity of Ptolemaic hypotheses
despite their capacity to save the phenomena. But it remains unclear
whether
there
is any substance to Duhem's linking of 'fictionalism' in late
medieval
astronomy with allegedly sceptical tendencies in nominalist
epistemology.
118
If
in fact the spread
of
sceptical
attitudes to astronomy in
the sixteenth century has little or no medieval precedent, the question arises
of
the extent to which it can be related to the sixteenth-century revival of
interest in forms of classical scepticism.
119
This question requires further
study, as does the question
of
the import
of
the sixteenth-century debates on
the status of astronomical hypotheses for seventeenth-century epistemol-
ogy
of the sciences.
In conclusion a couple of reflections on the question of
epistemological
continuity are in order. First, the evidence strongly suggests
that
no general
answer to the question is to be had. Where, for instance, the case for a
substantial Aristotelian component in the scattered methodological com-
ments of
Galileo's
mature works is a questionable one, the case is solid for
substantial (though very different) Aristotelian components in the method-
ologies
of
Francis Bacon and William Harvey. Similarly, where sixteenth-
century debates on the status
of
astronomical hypotheses provide a context
for
Kepler's epistemology, it seems unlikely
that
any comparably specific
context
can be established for Descartes's epistemology of science.
Secondly,
it seems
that
in the study of Renaissance epistemology of the
sciences
concentration on questions of continuity and impact on 'the new
117.
Copernican Achievement 1975, PP- 244-75 (Donahue); N. Jardine 1984, ch. 7.
118.
Duhem
1913-59,
vi, pp.
616-18.
119. See N. Jardine 1987.
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Epistemology
of the
sciences
711
science'
is not only apt to lead to retrospective bias in selection of material
and anachronism
of
interpretation, but is also premature. Only a small
part
of
this vast field is even touched on by recent scholarship, and
there
are but a
handful of studies
that
examine epistemological writings of the period in
detail in terms of their genres, their disciplinary and intellectual contexts
and the concerns and projects of their authors.
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XII
PHILOSOPHY
AND HUMANISTIC
DISCIPLINES
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20
THE
SCOPE
OF
RHETORIC
AND
POETICS
The
modern reader approaching Renaissance texts in the expectation of
finding a clear-cut distinction between rhetoric and poetics
will
soon be
disappointed. Their isolation as critical
terms
is a product
of
post-Romantic
literary theory, deriving from a period in which traditional rhetoric had
been banished from education. To approach a rhetorical culture like the
Renaissance with post- or even anti-rhetorical expectations is obviously
anachronistic, and can only produce complaints about the 'confusion' of
rhetoric with poetics. To us the two disciplines seem to be directed to
different
goals:
poetics, deriving from
poiesis,
is the art
of
making a poem or
work
of literature, whereas rhetoric is concerned with constructing
effective,
that
is, persuasive discourse. A
pure
poetics would consider the
artwork on its own, while rhetoric would see it in
terms
of its
effect
on an
audience. But in the Renaissance, as in other periods, poetry used techniques
of
proof
and persuasion, addressed
itself
to the practical intellect and existed
as a force for good or
evil
in the world. Renaissance readers did not regard
literary works as autotelic; indeed, the concept
that
any work
of
art could be
self-ended, without a function in human
life,
would have been foreign. In
that
period classical rhetoric, enthusiastically revived, provided a compre-
hensive system both for creating and for evaluating works
of
literature, by
which
they meant not just poetry, drama and fiction, but also letters, history
and philosophical treatises. While rhetoric and poetics were notionally
separate disciplines from philosophy,
given
a distinct and subordinate place
in the university
arts
curriculum, in practice during the Renaissance both
became attached to ethics. Indeed, the main justification for their existence
was
often said to be their ability to convey the teachings of moral
philosophy with more powerful
effect.
Rhetoric distinguished
five
stages
of
composition:
inventio,
the discover-
ing
of material;
dispositio,
its structuring and arrangement;
elocutio,
its
formulation in language;
memoria
and
pronuntiatio,
its memorising and
715
RHETORIC
AND
POETICS
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716
Philosophy
and
humanistic
disciplines
appropriate delivery (the last two stages were originally developed for
speeches delivered in a forum or law-court, but came to have other practical
applications in the Renaissance). Rhetoric also distinguished
three
kinds of
oration (and, by extension, any literary work): the
judicial
or forensic type,
concerned with proof and disproof, as in a court of law; the deliberative
type,
involving persuasion and dissuasion, as in
politics;
and the demonstra-
tive
or epideictic type, devoted to praise and blame. Each type
of
speech
had
a style appropriate to itself, as did the various literary genres, the choice of
which
was governed by the principle
of
decorum. Writers and readers were
trained to observe the constituent
parts
of
an oration, in one popular version
exordium,
narratio,
divisio,
confirmatio,
confutatio,
conclusio.
Rhetoric
also
had a
detailed lore
of
linguistic
devices,
the tropes and figures
of
speech
that
made
language more
effective
in its appeal to the mind and the emotions. The
history of rhetoric shows these doctrines appearing afresh in every
generation. The complete scheme of rhetoric appears throughout Renais-
sance literature.
Poetics,
as understood in the Renaissance, was a more limited art. While
rhetoric governed the whole art of language, an ars
poetica
was either a
treatise on literary composition as such
—
in which case, as in Horace's
Epistula
ad
Pisones
(the Ars
poetica),
it was a verse rhetoric addressed to the
poetic genres of tragedy, comedy and epic
—
or it was a manual for the
specific
techniques of verse composition, metre, stanza form and diction.
Since
most of these
artes
poeticae
also included discussion of the figures and
tropes, the distinction between rhetoric and poetics collapses again. The
sense
ofpoetica
as
that
branch
of
literary criticism treating
of
poetry begins to
emerge in late sixteenth-century commentaries on Aristotle's
Poetics,
but
these are themselves often deeply rhetorical, conflating Aristotle with
Cicero
or Horace, whose Ars
poetica
shows many debts to classical rhetoric.
Any
attempt
to define a poetics uninfluenced by rhetoric in this period
would
be futile. Indeed, it is significant
that
recent literary theory has
recognised
that
all forms of communication imply some kind of rhetoric,
and
that
the literary work only comes into existence through the
collaborative
activity of the reader.
Expectations of a clear-cut distinction
will
be defeated again when we
look
at the types
of
literature in which discussions
of
rhetoric and poetics are
found. Since both are language arts, and since language was so important to
Renaissance humanism, material is widely scattered. Grammar, the first
stage
of
the
trivium,
taught the ability to read and write Latin. But from the
time of Quintilian the grammar teacher had also taught authors, so
that
the
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