PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Wollner, Ulrich
TI  - Does Lucretius Think about Social Progress?
DP  - 2015 Sep 30
TA  - Aither
PG  - 100--117
VI  - 7
IP  - 2
AID - 10.5507/aither.2015.017
IS  - 18037879
AB  - The theme of human history - its birth and development - come together with the question of the origin of first communities, cities and political institutions among the most interesting part of the fifth book of Lucretius' poem De rerum natura. The aim of the article is to gradually analyze and interpret all four stages in human development and focus on the examination of the question whether it is possible to characterize this development as a progress. Do people progress continuously towards more sophisticated forms of life? Is the new phase better than the previous one? Are people better? Are they more moral than people living in earlier stages of historical development?