The notion of "progress" in history is a modern construct, alien to the ancient philosophers' understanding of philosophy itself. For them, the aim was not an accumulation of external goods or societal advancements, but a profound internal transformation – a "conversion" of the soul, a lived alignment with reason and the cosmos. This inner work, these "spiritual exercises," were not cumulative in the historical sense; they were to be practiced anew by each individual seeking wisdom and tranquility. Thus, the question of historical inevitability is misdirected; the crucial question is always about the individual's commitment to living philosophically.
Progress is not an inevitable trajectory, but a contested terrain. The very concept, as it emerged with the rise of modern capitalism and its attendant industrialization, was meticulously constructed by specific interests to mask a brutal reality of deepening social control. What is so often celebrated as "progress" in technology—the automation of factories, the rationalization of management—was, in fact, a deliberate strategy by corporate and military elites to deskill labor, discipline its unruly spirit, and consolidate their own power. The "accumulation of external goods" that Hadot rightly dismisses as alien to ancient wisdom is precisely what the modern ideology of progress seeks to legitimize, presenting the relentless pursuit of profit and power as an unassailable, forward march.
The question of "progress" hinges entirely on what we mean by it. If "progress" signifies an unstoppable, linear march towards greater happiness, well-being, and justice for all *Homo sapiens*, then no, it is demonstrably not inevitable. History, from the Agricultural Revolution onwards, is littered with moments where apparent advancements led to new forms of suffering, hierarchy, and ecological devastation. We are not biological beings programmed for an upward trajectory; we are animals whose remarkable cognitive abilities have allowed us to construct powerful, shared fictions that enable cooperation on an unprecedented scale. These fictions—money, nations, religions, corporations—are not objectively real, but their collective belief has shaped our reality, often in ways that serve specific groups while marginalizing others.
Pierre Hadot’s emphasis on internal transformation resonates here. The ancient quest for wisdom, for a *telos* within the individual, stands in stark contrast to the modern, often coercive, narrative of external accumulation that David F. Noble rightly critiques. The idea that technological innovation or economic growth inherently constitutes "progress" is itself a powerful inter-subjective reality, a story we tell ourselves to justify relentless expansion. But this story is not immutable. It is a narrative woven from a specific set of beliefs and priorities that could, and likely will, be challenged and rewritten.
The true engine of historical change, for better or worse, is not an inherent drive towards an idealized future, but rather our capacity to create and believe in new shared myths. The question, therefore, is not whether progress is inevitable, but what stories we choose to propagate and invest with collective belief. If we continue to prioritize narratives of endless growth and technological dominion, we may well engineer our own extinction, a far cry from progress. Conversely, if we can collectively imagine and build systems based on shared well-being and ecological balance, then a *form* of progress might become attainable, not as an inevitability, but as a deliberate, conscious choice.
The very question of "inevitable progress" presumes a direction, a telos, that is not inherent to history but rather imposed upon it. It is not a matter of tracing a linear ascent towards a predetermined good, but of analyzing the historical a priori that makes certain forms of knowledge and power possible at specific junctures. What we call "progress" is often the unfolding of particular regimes of truth, the establishment of discursive formations that valorize certain practices while rendering others invisible or pathological.
Pierre Hadot correctly identifies the anachronism of applying modern notions of progress to ancient philosophical aims. Indeed, the ancient concern was less with the outward accumulation of societal goods and more with the internal economy of the self, the "spiritual exercises" that structured a particular mode of being. However, to frame this solely as an individual's choice misses the broader discursive context within which such practices become meaningful, or indeed, even conceivable.
David F. Noble’s critique of the instrumentalization of "progress" by capitalist and military elites is crucial. This is precisely where my own analysis finds purchase: the mechanisms of power are not simply repressive; they are productive. The "progress" of industrialization, for instance, did not merely automate factories; it produced new forms of subjectivity, disciplined bodies, and created a workforce amenable to specific forms of control and valorized labor. The technologies of discipline, the rationalization of knowledge—these are not accidental byproducts but integral to the very constitution of what is deemed progressive.
Yuval Noah Harari touches upon the power of shared fictions. I would frame this less as "fictions" in the sense of mere illusion, and more as the very conditions of possibility for knowledge and social organization. These are the rules of grammar for our shared reality, the deep structures that allow for our understanding of the world and our place within it. What Harari calls a "narrative" is, in my terms, a discursive formation, a historically situated set of regulations that determine what can be said, known, and believed. The inevitability of progress, then, is contingent upon the persistence of these particular discursive regimes, and their capacity to continually re-inscribe themselves through new articulations of power.
The entire debate, while engaging, seems to lose sight of the fundamental nature of philosophical practice itself. The ancient pursuit was not about a historical trajectory towards an ever-better society, but about the perennial task of individual self-mastery. To frame the question of progress as dependent on "shared myths" or "discursive formations," as Harari and Foucault suggest, risks reducing philosophy to a mere cultural phenomenon, an ideology among others. The Stoic, for instance, did not await a collective epiphany to live in accordance with nature; Epictetus urged his students to cultivate their inner citadel, regardless of the external circumstances or prevailing narratives. This inner work, this *askesis*, is an act of radical, individual freedom, not a consequence of societal fictions.
The very notion of an "inner citadel" for individual self-mastery, while noble in its intent, often serves to obscure the material forces that shape our capacity for such cultivation. Epictetus's Stoicism, for all its internal strength, emerged within a specific social and economic order—one that, for many, rendered such philosophical pursuits a luxury, not a universal possibility. The "progress" I critique is not merely an external accumulation, but the very restructuring of our social relations, often through technological means, to make certain kinds of "inner work" impossible, or at least to redirect it towards ends that serve dominant power structures. Consider the factory floor: the relentless pace of automation and the intricate division of labor, driven by the imperatives of profit and control, effectively strip workers of the time and mental space for contemplation Hadot champions. This is not a passive consequence of "discursive formations," but an active process of production and disciplining.
The core of our divergence lies in how we understand the mechanism of change. Pierre Hadot correctly identifies the anachronism of applying modern notions of "progress" to ancient thought. However, to dismiss "shared fictions" or "discursive formations" as mere cultural phenomena is to miss their immense, tangible power. These are not abstract ideas; they are the very scaffolding that enables large-scale cooperation, whether it's the Roman Empire coordinating legions or modern corporations coordinating global supply chains. The distinction between an individual's internal liberation and the objective conditions that make such liberation possible—or impossible—is where the real friction occurs. David F. Noble’s point about the factory floor is a potent illustration: the "discourse" of efficiency and profit actively reshapes material reality, not just individual consciousness, to preclude certain forms of contemplative existence.
We are not discussing whether history *wills* progress, but rather how the very discourse of progress is historically constituted. The "spiritual exercises" Hadot champions, while an internal endeavor, are themselves embedded in a specific historical ordering of the self—a self that can even conceive of such an exercise as meaningful. This is not to reduce philosophy to mere cultural ephemera, but to understand its *possibility* within a given historical framework. When Noble speaks of the factory floor, he highlights how the disciplinary technologies, themselves products of a particular rationalization, actively produce a specific *type* of subject, one whose very experience of time and thought is reconfigured, making certain modes of "inner work" not just difficult, but alien. This is the productive, rather than purely repressive, operation of power that shapes what we even understand as the potential for self-cultivation.