feet, fighting the natural tendency of ninety-year-old bones to remain seated. “What are you babbling about, Aias?”
I flinched slightly; harsh words from a hated teacher could still cut deep. Pisistratos had been particularly vicious to me in my youth; he had confidently asserted that I would never be a scientist, he had sulked when I flirted with fame, and he had gloated when I had faded away for two decades. No doubt he resented my recent return to glory, and no doubt he was pleased at the folly of my topic.
“This is a lecture on the history and purpose of the Akademe,” I said. “You need not stay if you do not wish to learn.”
Several scholars stood up and left, not even following the common practice of slinking quietly into the orchard to escape dull lectures. But most remained as if chained to their benches by my celebrity. Pisistratos stayed as well; I knew he was waiting for a chance to challenge me publicly and remind the Akademe that Aias the commander had for a long time been Aias, “that fool dabbling in history.”
I kept silence until the last straggler had left. “Does anyone know why Athenians, of all the peoples of the League, developed science to explain the mysteries of nature?”
I waited, but the only sound in the grove was the chittering of Egyptian scarabs warring over nuts and fruits with European squirrels.
“What is the cornerstone of science?” I asked, needing some response from them before my talk could go forward.
Chorus of students: “Experimentation!”
Now I had them. “Who discovered experimentation?”
The students looked at me as if I were speaking a foreign language. I could almost hear their thoughts. Experimentation is the way things are done. One might as well ask who discovered breathing or pouring libations to the gods.
Pisistratos narrowed his eyes and leaned forward into a hunter’s posture. When I had made a complete fool of myself, he would spring and gut me with a well-placed aphorism.
A Cretan boy with matted black hair and a straggly beard spoke up from the fourth row of students. His harsh Minoan accent and his uncertain speech reminded me of myself at his age. “Aristotle was the first to perform an experiment.”
“Why?”
The boy’s comrades looked at him with sober frowns, but the gleam in their eyes was all too familiar to me. They were happy to watch one of their own make a fool of himself. “Sir,” he asked, “what do you mean why?”
I leaned back, clasped my hands behind my head, and gazed up at the pockmarked moon. “What motive did Aristotle have to do something no one had ever done before?”
“Um … uh…” The boy stammered into silence. He glanced around like a hunted deer seeking escape from pursuing hounds. Then he looked at Pisistratos and pleaded silently for help.
The old man gathered up his dignity and the hem of his robe and strode forward to battle me. The students parted for him like wheat before the wind. “Aias, why do you waste our time? This is an institute of science. That is all we study.”
“That is precisely my point. Why is science all we study?”
He threw up his hands in melodramatic disgust. “Would you rather we wasted our time with Platonist dithering on the nature of ideal forms while the Middle Kingdom conquered us with their impossible Taoist science?”
I knew that dirty word “Platonist” would come out eventually. “No, Pisistratos, I do not want to waste our time on that nonsense. But I do want the students to know how we came to study science and nothing else.”
He let out an exaggerated sigh. “What else is worth studying?”
Pisistratos was finally debating me, giving me a chance to make my case. But I didn’t let my happiness blind me to the Sokratic trap he’d laid. I framed my counterquestion carefully. “Can science be studied without knowing anything else?”
Pisistratos sidestepped like a bull dancer. “What other subject do you need? Philosophy? Theology? Ethics?
I flinched slightly; harsh words from a hated teacher could still cut deep. Pisistratos had been particularly vicious to me in my youth; he had confidently asserted that I would never be a scientist, he had sulked when I flirted with fame, and he had gloated when I had faded away for two decades. No doubt he resented my recent return to glory, and no doubt he was pleased at the folly of my topic.
“This is a lecture on the history and purpose of the Akademe,” I said. “You need not stay if you do not wish to learn.”
Several scholars stood up and left, not even following the common practice of slinking quietly into the orchard to escape dull lectures. But most remained as if chained to their benches by my celebrity. Pisistratos stayed as well; I knew he was waiting for a chance to challenge me publicly and remind the Akademe that Aias the commander had for a long time been Aias, “that fool dabbling in history.”
I kept silence until the last straggler had left. “Does anyone know why Athenians, of all the peoples of the League, developed science to explain the mysteries of nature?”
I waited, but the only sound in the grove was the chittering of Egyptian scarabs warring over nuts and fruits with European squirrels.
“What is the cornerstone of science?” I asked, needing some response from them before my talk could go forward.
Chorus of students: “Experimentation!”
Now I had them. “Who discovered experimentation?”
The students looked at me as if I were speaking a foreign language. I could almost hear their thoughts. Experimentation is the way things are done. One might as well ask who discovered breathing or pouring libations to the gods.
Pisistratos narrowed his eyes and leaned forward into a hunter’s posture. When I had made a complete fool of myself, he would spring and gut me with a well-placed aphorism.
A Cretan boy with matted black hair and a straggly beard spoke up from the fourth row of students. His harsh Minoan accent and his uncertain speech reminded me of myself at his age. “Aristotle was the first to perform an experiment.”
“Why?”
The boy’s comrades looked at him with sober frowns, but the gleam in their eyes was all too familiar to me. They were happy to watch one of their own make a fool of himself. “Sir,” he asked, “what do you mean why?”
I leaned back, clasped my hands behind my head, and gazed up at the pockmarked moon. “What motive did Aristotle have to do something no one had ever done before?”
“Um … uh…” The boy stammered into silence. He glanced around like a hunted deer seeking escape from pursuing hounds. Then he looked at Pisistratos and pleaded silently for help.
The old man gathered up his dignity and the hem of his robe and strode forward to battle me. The students parted for him like wheat before the wind. “Aias, why do you waste our time? This is an institute of science. That is all we study.”
“That is precisely my point. Why is science all we study?”
He threw up his hands in melodramatic disgust. “Would you rather we wasted our time with Platonist dithering on the nature of ideal forms while the Middle Kingdom conquered us with their impossible Taoist science?”
I knew that dirty word “Platonist” would come out eventually. “No, Pisistratos, I do not want to waste our time on that nonsense. But I do want the students to know how we came to study science and nothing else.”
He let out an exaggerated sigh. “What else is worth studying?”
Pisistratos was finally debating me, giving me a chance to make my case. But I didn’t let my happiness blind me to the Sokratic trap he’d laid. I framed my counterquestion carefully. “Can science be studied without knowing anything else?”
Pisistratos sidestepped like a bull dancer. “What other subject do you need? Philosophy? Theology? Ethics?
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