[80] that you change something given into something better, otherwise you would not act at all. Let me exemplify this by our situation here. None of you would come to this lecture if he had not the right or wrong idea that AFTER this, he has made SOME infinitely small prograss^a [sic.] in his thinking--that is the only reason to come to this lecture, or at least it should be: there are unfortunately other reasons, such as grades and examinations, which are incidental. But the essential reason is certainly that you believe you make, between 11 and 12 o'clock, in some way, or some small point, a very small progress. And so it is with every activity which we perform. Now this means that action has in itself, as an essential element, the idea of progress, and cannot be separated completely from this idea. It is intrinsic in action itself. Man as action purposefully, as putting an end before himself in thought or imagination, and then using means for this end, is a reality which cannot be denied, and where the idea of progress is equally rooted, as it is in the technical realm. But there is a difference. In the technical realm, progress has that character which it has received in modern times, namely the character of indefiniteness. You can go on indefinitely in everything where technical elements are involved. There is no limit. In all other realms there IS a limit. And this limit is--let me immediately shock you with the decisive term--"freedom^b." In the realm of technical action, the object which is shaped, according to the scheme of means and ends, is subject to our continuously transforming activity. It cannot resist. YOU CAN resist, when I am teaching you, and you do, to a great extent, not only against what I say--that would be the necessary and good form of resistance, namely to criticize what I say (and I hope you do--and you did very much, in the end of the last lecture, about progress)--and that is good. But there is another form of resistance, namely the resistance of not wanting to take in at all, which expresses itself amongst other things in forgetting, in throwing out again. Now this is an example and is decisive for the belief, for instance, in man's educational progress, if we look at mankind as a whole. In which sense is educational progress possible? -- now here I anticipate something of later lectures next semester, but anyhow, why shouldn't l?--repetition is the mother of wisdom anyhow! [some laughter]. So let me say this: with respect to TECHNIQUES of education, there MAY be a progress, and probably is. With respect to mankind being educated, and transformed by education^c, there is no progress^d. There is of course the possibility that special things are removed and other things are replacing it--the savage has other forms of educational expression