Socrates, Aristotle and Plato's work has been relevant for 2000 years and I don't see it becoming irrelevant any time soon. Same with Descarte, Kant and many, many more.
Mankind's greatest goal and challenge is building a society. Building space rockets might help that, but they might not. One might argue that ancient Greece and Rome had better societies or at least equal to what we have today.
While the slavery issue (which eventually changed into servitude, which got changed into indenture, which - after many, many years - got changed into personal loans and mortgages...) is one of the less savoury aspects in Roman society, women actually did have clearly defined rights in the Roman age. They could own property, had the right to marry or divorce, the right to re-marry after a divorce or after being widowed, etc. The problem was that the patriarch had even more clearly defined rights which he could wield over anyone in the household, from his wife to his slaves. Women did not have the right to vote, nor the right to be voted into any office (other than some religious positions). Then again, these rights are a recent (less than 100 years old) addition to many if not most modern states...
Are we better people than our grandparents and in their turn are they better than theirs?
On average, are people becoming better people over time?
I don't think that's a given and that's what society is.
Whatever system is in place it's human nature to game it. While we can have all sorts of inclusivity built in to the rules, people will always find ways to sidestep them.
I'd say, as a society we're no better or worse than the Romans on average, we just have more stuff.
The proof of the pudding is that people in the most primitive of societies are just as happy if not happier than middle class westerners
A weird reflex every generation has, is to provide a better life to their children. Even though most of the time, it's far from the case. Less developed countries send their kids to modern schools thinking a modern job will ensure a nice life, while I'm convinced that the parents life was full of human knowledge not taught anymore.
Below a certain threshold, easier life doesn't mean better. Some rich folks don't let their children inherit for this reason.
> Any society in the West today, with all its imperfections, is way better than anything in ancient Greece or Rome
The folks who assembled the computer you're using to write this are very likely to disagree. Any society in the West today, even if better than anything in ancient Greece or Rome, is closer to them than you think.
I've read a good deal of Plato in translation (Socrates didn't write any books), and I'd eagerly trade all of Plato for an equal volume from Hipparchus, Herophilus, Ctesibius, Eratosthenes, Pytheas, Chrysippus, Eudoxus, Democritus, and lost works of Archimedes, Apollonius, Euclid ... I'd gladly trade it for a fraction of those.
Aristotle I've only read a little of; he gets to survive, I guess, though I would go for at least a partial trade in his case too.
Mankind's greatest goal and challenge is building a society. Building space rockets might help that, but they might not. One might argue that ancient Greece and Rome had better societies or at least equal to what we have today.