An overview of the concepts of change and development - from the premodern to modern era

This chapter focuses on the concepts of change and progress: on one hand, it approaches this topic from the point of view of the history of science; on the other hand, from the point of view of modern developmental psychology. The section on the history of science focuses on the historical period of the pre-modern Hellenistic era to the Enlightenment. This period is long, and it therefore includes several, different world views and cultural trends. In this chapter culturally significant trends of thought within the PtolemaicAristotelic tradition are described.The section on the modern developmental psychology approach analyses the following questions: (1) which characteristics must changes …