On each other’s shoulders

Photo taken at Amstel Railway Station, Amsterdam

I think that many of us don’t realize how much we owe to others in what we have done and achieved, including to many we don’t know and whose work we do not build on and do not continue. I realized it again, when I was reading Aristotle’s Metaphysics, especially Book II.1, in which he says:
“The investigation of the truth is in one way hard, in another easy. An indication of this is found in the fact that no one is able to attain the truth adequately, while, on the other hand, we do not collectively fail, but everyone says something true about the nature of things, and while individually we contribute little or nothing to the truth, by the union of all a considerable amount is amassed.”
Here Aristotle says that much can be achieved only collectively and that, even in case the contribution of each of us is small, the overall result can be great. However, that we need others is not only true for collective results but also for individual results, so Aristotle:
“It is just that we should be grateful, not only to those with whose views we may agree, but also to those who have expressed more superficial views; for these also contributed something, by developing before us the powers of thought. It is true that if there had been no Timotheus we should have been without much of our lyric poetry; but if there had been no Phrynis there would have been no Timotheus. The same holds good of those who have expressed views about the truth; for from some thinkers we have inherited certain opinions, while the others have been responsible for the appearance of the former.”
We stand on the shoulders of others, or as Isaac Newton said (see my blog): “If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” Newton stressed that that those on the top, like the best researchers and the best philosophers and everybody who is good if not excellent, build on the work of others, improve it etc. Everything we do could not have been done without what our predecessors have done before us. But Aristotle says here that those on whose shoulders we stand are also known because of those after them who used their ideas. That is certainly true as well. For instance, a composer who has been forgotten no longer counts, even if his music belongs to the best ever composed. Out of sight, out of mind.
However, there is more, I think. We stand not only on the shoulders of those whose work we use and continue, but also on the shoulders of those who made mistakes; who followed the wrong path, so that their work led to nothing; who are our contemporaries but whose work is inferior to ours; on the shoulders of those who simply participated in the discussion and did their work in their own ways without having any direct relation to what we are doing; etc.
Let me give an example. I my younger years, I participated in running competitions. My results were not bad, but they didn’t exceed the club level; good enough for being selected for the club team, but much below the national if not international level. Nevertheless, I always said: Without me, the top runners would not have been so good as they are now. I said it jokingly, but it was seriously meant. Without runners of my level and the levels below me (and also thanks to the few much better than me, of course), there wouldn’t be athletic clubs and there wouldn’t be competitions; there wouldn’t be national champions, international champions and Olympic champions. Good runners couldn’t prove that they were good and wouldn’t be selected. Of course, many people knew that they were good, but there wouldn’t be competitions, selections and championships. Or, if we think of other fields of activity, there wouldn’t be bad arguments that good philosophers could correct; there wouldn’t be scientists who would have to correct the mistakes of bad science, etc. Without an infrastructure built by the unknown and the anonymous there wouldn’t be scientific journals; those journals wouldn’t be printed etc. Need I go on? I think that the message is clear: Everyone who is good in his field owns a lot to bunglers and duffers and to those who do their work in silence.