Kant scholars have rarely addressed the centuries-old tradition of casuistry and the concept of conscience in Kant’s writings. This book offers a detailed exploration of the period from Pascal’s Provincial Letters to Kant’s critique of probabilism and discusses his proposal of a (new) casuistry as part of an moral education. *** -/- Die Debatte um Kasuistik und Probabilismus zählt zu den wichtigsten Themen der Moraltheologie und Moralphilosophie der frühen Neuzeit. In der enormen Verbreitung der Literatur über die Gewissensfälle (casus conscientiae) (...) und in der großen Resonanz der Lehre von den wahrscheinlichen Meinungen (opiniones probabiles) in der ersten Hälfte des 17. Jahrhunderts findet sich ein wirkungsmächtiges Modell für die Analyse des moralischen Handelns, in welchem Universalität des Gebots und Kontingenz der Handlung, Notwendigkeit der Norm und individuelle Freiheit miteinander versöhnt werden. Dennoch erregt dieses Modell heftige Kritik, die in Pascals berühmtem Angriff in den Briefen in die Provinz (1656–1657) gipfelt. So beginnt für die Kasuistik und den Probabilismus eine lange Krise, welche die Entstehung der modernen Moralphilosophie und den Siegeszug des kantischen Paradigmas ankündigt. Die Krise von Kasuistik und Probabilismus fällt zusammen mit einer einsetzenden rigoristischen Reaktion der christlichen Moraltheologie sowohl katholischer als auch protestantischer Prägung,welche die moralischen und spekulativen Folgen eines Rückgriffs auf Gewissensfälle und wahrscheinliche Meinungen als inakzeptabel ablehnt. Die Ablehnung geht aber weiter und dringt bis in den Kern der philosophischen Reflexion vor: Die rigoristische Reaktion gegen Kasuistik und Probabilismus entzündet sich im moralphilosophischen Denken Kants als Folge seiner umfassenden kritischen Revision der Grundbegriffe der Moralphilosophie sowie insbesondere seiner Neubestimmung des Verhältnisses von Gewissen und praktischem Urteil. Dem Grundsatz des Probabilismus setzt Kant das Kriterium der moralischen Gewißheit („quod dubitas, ne feceris!“) entgegen, das er als „Postulat des Gewissens“ bezeichnet (RGV 6:185.23–186.9).Und die Kasuistik wird als eine „Critic der Handlungen nach Sophistic“ abgestempelt, als eine „Uebung, um nach der Sophistic das Gewissen zu hintergehen oder es zu chicaniren, insofern man es in Irrthum zu setzen denkt“ (V-MS/Vigil 27:620.2–5). Dennoch weist Kant den kasuistischen Fragen eine herausragende Stellung in der Tugendlehre zu und legt der Kasuistik im Rahmen der ethischen Methodenlehre, also im Hinblick auf pädagogische Anwendungen, letztlich eine positive Funktion bei. Vermutlich ist Kants Angriff auf Kasuistik und Probabilismus durch den Einfluss Pascals philosophisch vermittelt. Kants Verhältnis zu Pascal und, allgemeiner, zu dem historischen Hintergrund, welchem dieser angehört, sind gleichwohl noch erstaunlich wenig erforscht: Trotz der wiederholten (stillschweigenden oder sogar ausdrücklichen) Hinweise an wichtigen Stellen in Kants Schriften richtet die Kant-Forschung ihre Aufmerksamkeit nur selten auf die Jahrhunderte währende Tradition der Kasuistik und den Begriff des Gewissens, der in ihrem Rahmen ausgearbeitet wird. Aus dieser langen Geschichte wird in diesem Band insbesondere der Zeitraum „von Pascal bis Kant“ eingehend untersucht, d.h. der noch wenig erkundete Zeitabschnitt von der beißenden Polemik von Pascals Briefe in die Provinz bis zu Kants eigener Kritik des Probabilismus und seinem Entwurf einer (neuen) Kasuistik als Teil der ethischen Methodenlehre. (shrink)

The new protocol for information distribution amongst scientists within the CERN, once slightly refined and publicly announced as the Worldwide Web in the August of 1991, has led to impressive achievements beyond the starting plan.

Several recent studies of early modern natural philosophy have claimed that corpuscularism and experimental philosophy were sharply distinct or even conflicting views. This chapter provides a different perspective on the relation between corpuscularism and experimental philosophy by examining Domenico Guglielmini’s ‘Philosophical Reflections’ on salts (1688). This treatise on crystallography develops a corpuscularist theory and defends it in a way that is in line with the methodological prescriptions, epistemological strictures, and preferred argumentative styles of experimental philosophers. The examination of the (...) ‘Reflections’ shows that early modern philosophers could consistently endorse, at the same time, corpuscularism and experimental philosophy. (shrink)

Review of Carlo M. Lucarini et Claudio Moreschini, Hermias Alexandrinus, In Platonis Phaedrum scholia, Berlin – Boston: De Gruyter, 2012, lxiv+293 pp., ISBN 978-3-11-020115-4.

In this paper, I have been able to demonstrate that the so-called Lexicon Theeteti is an apographon of Pal. gr. 173, a well known Plato's manuscript of Xth century. The codex Laurentianus 57,24, which contains the lexicon, previously dated to XIV/XV century, was also backdated to the first half of XIVth century.

In juxtaposition with the myth and tragedy of Ovid’s Medea, this paper investigates the possibility within the Kantian conception of agency of understanding moral evil as acting against one’s better judgment. It defends the thesis that in Kant self-deception, i. e. the intentional untruthfulness to oneself, provides the fundamental structure for choosing against the moral law. I argue that, as Kant’s thought progresses, self-deception slowly proceeds to become the paradigmatic case of moral evil. This is discussed with regard to two (...) important topics in his later moral philosophy: the doctrine of radical evil and the crucial role of the duty of truthfulness in ethics. The inquiry into Kant’s theory of conscience unfolds both against this theoretical background and in light of its historical roots in the polemic against casuistry and probabilism. This contribution closes with a brief look at the tools Kant implements to counter this tendency to self-deception in moral judgment and particularly at the role casuistry plays within his conception of moral education. (shrink)

APh 75-03933: Discussione di problemi testuali e nuove proposte di lettura.

APh 75-03932:Sono presentati i risultati di una nuova collazione dei principali manoscritti delle prime sette tetralogie, estesa anche a codici non utilizzati dall'edizione corrente degli scoli. Viene esclusa una redazione tardo-antica del corpus che risulta un prodotto specificamente bizantino redatto in tre fasi fra il 9° sec. e la metà del 10°.

Gender studies has produced various analyses around issues such as social “roles,”coexistence and power relations; seeing language as a central aspect, especially since the development of performativity theory produced by philosopher Judith Butler. In this paper, so, I would like to focus on the existing relationship between language and gender relations, particularly in the workplace; pointing out how some possibilities and structures are dense with unequal and sexist modalities. The analysis will consist of a first theoretical section, in which the (...) specific relationship between the gendered “male”subject and language will be emphasized, and a second in which these considerations will be portrayed in the corporate context. The purpose is to show how specific aspects of masculinity have generated specific power relations, delineating, and defining stereotypes and categorizing views. Attributes that have then flowed into the different social dynamics of our society, establishing different job roles and possibilities. To give more profundity, I adopted a methodology that fuses the logical-linguistic theoretical perspective, to the analysis of empirical data collected through interviews, questionnaires, and training meetings at two partner companies. (shrink)

Da tempo era vivamente sentita l’esigenza di una nuova edizione degli scoli a Platone, che sostituisse quella di Greene del 1938. Questo volume contiene una nuova edizione degli scoli relativi ai dialoghi delle prime sette tetralogie, fondata su una completa collazione dei testimoni principali, aumentati di due unità rispetto all’edizione precedente, e corredata da un apparato di fonti e paralleli, il cui rapporto con gli scoli è stato del tutto rimeditato alla luce delle recenti acquisizioni della critica.

Around the middle of XVI th century, in the Florence of Grand Duke Cosimo I de’ Medici, Bernardo Segni (Firenze, 1504–1558) translated and commented some Aristotelian works in the Florentine vernacular. His works represents a very important innovation in the panorama of Italian Aristotelianism, because they are the product of circles outside the university world and are the first attempt to translate in Italian the works of the great Greek philosopher. In this paper, I’ll examine some aspects of his works, (...) in particular of his translation of Nicomachean Ethics. (shrink)

The 14 essays in this volume explore the relationship between philosophy and religion from antiquity to the contemporary age, as well as the development of a philosophy of religion in modern times. It does so by focusing on the topics of atheism, the nature of Christ, and the Cartesian origins of rational theology, on the one hand, and on the contemporary ramifications of philosophy of religion: in hermeneutics, phenomenology, and historical materialism, on the other.

The difficulties that Troeltsch faced in his intellectual endeavors derive from the ultimate dualism characterizing, in his perspective, the existence of man: namely a dualism between the historicity of his existence and the need of an ultimate meaning – and of the unity of such a meaning with life itself. According to Troeltsch, dualism is articulated on different levels, for the reason that the historical dimension of man is composed by different and often contrasting elements. Man, indeed, must satisfy immediate (...) needs, deriving from his animal nature, but also organize himself in the economic, political and ethical spheres, ‘before’ entering the strictly religious one. The process of spiritualization of the natural dimension crosses all these areas: as a result, such a dimension is purified and oriented towards the unity of the ‘ultimate things’: a goal which is unattainable, as long as the natural dimension is ultimately historical. The Troeltschian category of compromise (Kompromiss) has not always been appreciated and perhaps has not always been properly understood. This attitude is well exemplified by the judgment of Benedetto Croce, for whom compromise hides and at the same time distorts dialectic. In recent decades, however, a more charitable approach has emerged: it has been recognized that, in Troeltsch’s perspective, compromise is not the expression of a resigned Irenism, but the historical realization of ideal aspirations. Such a realization that will always be imperfect because as it is conditioned by circumstances: in the human being the constitutive inclination to the ‘ultimate things’ will coexist with an equally intrinsic finiteness. (shrink)

Review of B. Vancamp, Untersuchungen zur handschriftlichen Überlieferung von Platons Menon, Palingenesia Band 97. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2010.

Nel corso della seconda metà del XX secolo si è progressivamente svilppata ed affermata una cosmologia “standard”: vedremo in che cosa consiste e come si è costituita. Vedremo anche quali sono i suoi limiti e quali nuove teorie si candidano per superarli. Vorrei comunque chiarire subito che la cosmologia standard, per quanto possano sembrare sorprendenti i suoi risultati (qualche specialista parla di preposterous universe, ovvero di un assurdo universo), si fonda su esperimenti ed osservazioni, ed avrebbe potuto essere falsificata tante (...) volte: ciò non è finora accaduto. Al cuore della cosmologia standard abbiamo quella che viene chiamata “teoria del Big Bang” la quale, offrendo una descrizione quantitativa dell’origine comune e dell’evoluzione di tutto l’universo osservabile, rappresenta una delle grandi conquiste intellettuali del XX secolo. Detto questo, nel quadro della teoria del Big Bang sono ancora possibili molti modelli diversi: soltanto alla fine del XX secolo si è finalmente avuta la convergenza su un modello particolare, che costituisce il modello standard (detto anche concordance model). Che cosa possiamo invece definire come cosmologia non standard? A parte le teorie alternative al Big Bang che appartengono al passato (come quella dello Stato Stazionario), abbiamo oggi teorie che si propongono di andare al di là del Big Bang e di spiegare ciò che la cosmologia standard per sua natura non è in grado di spiegare. Abbiamo così l’inflazione, i modelli di pre-Big Bang, gli universi-brana, il Multiverso, che a livelli diversi si basano su una nuova fisica non verificata sperimentalmente: siamo dunque in un campo altamente speculativo, ricco di ipotesi e molto lontano dalla pratica quotidiana dell’astronomo. In questo contributo cercherò di seguire una traccia storica e, per quanto riguarda la bibliografia, salvo poche eccezioni rimanderò ad una piccola selezione di review e libri nei quali il lettore potrà trovare i riferimenti agli articoli originali e specialistici. Per un’introduzione aggiornata in lingua italiana alla cosmologia, segnalo il testo a livello universitario di Bonometto(2008). (shrink)

Gottlob Frege criticized Kant's use of the term "representation" in a footnote in the Foundations of Arithmetics. According to Frege, Kant used the term "representation" for mental images, which are private and incommunicable, and also for objects and concepts. Kant thereby gave "a strongly subjectivistic and idealistic coloring" to his thought. The paper argues that Kant avoided the kind of subjectivism and idealism which Frege hints in his remark. For Kant, having "Vorstellungen" requires the capacity of synthesis, by virtue of (...) which the mind goes beyond its subjective states, and its modifications become presentations of an independent world. (shrink)

En este trabajo realizo un examen crítico del reciente libro de Silvana Gabriela Di Camillo sobre la crítica de Aristóteles a la teoría platónica de las Ideas. El libro de Di Camillo es un trabajo muy serio cuya lectura recomiendo ampliamente. Sin embargo, considero que cuatro de las principales tesis que la autora defiende tienen varias dificultades y mi objetivo aquí es presentar argumentos detallados en contra de ellas: la interpretación de la distinción entre argumentos más y menos rigurosos del (...) tratado Sobre las Ideas; la tesis de que la separación es el blanco esencial de las críticas aristotélicas a las Ideas; la interpretación de las opciones que Platón tiene para responder al argumento del tercer hombre, y la tesis de que la separación de las Ideas debe entenderse como homonimia. In this paper I examine Silvana Gabriela Di Camillo's recent book on Aristotle's criticisms of Plato's theory of Ideas. Di Camillo's book is a very serious work that I highly recommend. Nevertheless, I consider that four of the main theses that the author defends face several difficulties and my aim here is to offer detailed arguments against them: the interpretation of the distinction between more and less accurate arguments of the treatise On Ideas; the thesis that separation is the essential target of Aristotle's criticisms against Plato's Ideas; the interpretation of the options available to Plato to reply to the third man argument; and the thesis that the separation of Ideas should be understood as homonymy. (shrink)

Nella sua straordinaria opera scientifica, Franco Selleri si è sempre opposto alla rinuncia alla comprensione della struttura della realtà e della natura degli oggetti fisici, che egli considera come l’elemento caratterizzante delle principali teorie della fisica del Novecento e che è stata stigmatizzata da Karl Popper come tesi della “fine della strada in fisica”. Sin dalla fine degli anni ’60, egli ha sviluppato quella riflessione critica nei confronti delle teorie fondamentali della fisica moderna, in particolar modo della teoria delle particelle (...) elementari e della meccanica quantistica, e in un secondo tempo delle teorie relativistiche, che contraddistingue il suo programma di ricerca. Nel corso della sua intensa e infaticabile attività scientifica, Selleri è entrato in proficuo contatto con molti grandi fisici e filosofi della scienza, instaurando un intenso dialogo critico con Louis de Broglie, John Bell e Karl Popper. Le sue originali e non convenzionali ricerche lo hanno portato a risultati significativi non solo nell’ambito dei fondamenti della fisica, ma anche della storia e della filosofia della fisica. Per questo abbiamo voluto dedicare un numero speciale di Isonomia al nostro impareggiabile amico e collega, sia per la sua passione instancabile e la sua profonda conoscenza dei fondamenti formali, concettuali e filosofici delle teorie della fisica contemporanea, sia e forse ancor più come maestro di una prospettiva perennemente critica che egli ha sempre seguito e proposto con particolare rigore ed estrema determinazione. (shrink)

Non è un caso che l’enhancement umano, cioè il potenziamento di capacità fisiche, cognitive ed emotive degli esseri umani con l’ausilio di tecnologie, sia diventato un tema centrale nei dibattiti etico-applicativi e nei tentativi contemporanei di arrivare a una comprensione più adeguata della natura umana. In esso si incontrano quesiti decisamente ricchi e complessi, sia dal punto di vista tecnoscientifico e medico sia da quello filosofico – e lo fanno in un modo che ci permette di vedere questi quesiti sotto (...) una nuova luce. Il numero raccoglie alcune voci italiane, tedesche, inglesi e statunitensi su diversi aspetti della problematica dell’enhancement umano. Tra le tematiche discusse troviamo il potenziamento genetico, le dimensioni etiche dell’enhancement, la relazione uomo-tecnologia, il cosiddetto enhancement morale, la relazione tra enhancement ed eugenetica, la distinzione tra potenziamento e terapia e la rilevanza delle neuroscienze per lo sviluppo futuro delle bio-tecnologie, della medicina e dell’etica. (shrink)

The text presented contains an interview conducted with Domenico Losurdo about "La lotta di classe. Una storia politica e filosofica" (Laterza: Rome 2016) [Class Struggle: A Political and Philosophical History (Palgrave: New York 2018)] and "La sinistra assente. Crisi, società dello spettacolo, guerra" (Carocci: Rome 2014).

Review di due libri essenziali per conoscere meglio Amedeo Avogadro e il suo impegno nella società civile del tempo.

The Catena aurea entium of Henry of Herford is part of the work of re-elaboration of Aristotle’s natural-philosophical corpus, which characterised the European intellectual environment in the Late Middle Ages. In the central books of his encyclopaedia, Henry comments on the works of natural philosophy of Albert the Great, placing himself in continuity with the cultural project started by Albert in Cologne. The present article aims to compare the 5th book of the Catena aurea entium, which consists of a comment (...) per modum quaestionis on the Meteora of Albert the Great, with some meteorological quaestiones composed between the 13th and 15th centuries. This analysis will lead me to grasp the philosophical orientations and interpretation of Henry and also his reception of Albert the Great’s meteorology. In the 5th book, Henry introduces an extensive medical section taken from the pseudo-Aristotelian Problemata, in which he applies the Galenic medical principles to meteorology. Besides, in the quaestio 105 (V 1 105), he interprets Albert through the theological-poetic explanation of ancient origins on the sacrality of the number three and an excerpt from the Liber proverbiorum. (shrink)

Il breve saggio si propone di esaminare la centralità della figura materna nell’opera di un ingegnoso costruttore di storie della letteratura italiana del Novecento: Alberto Moravia. La scelta dell’Autore nasce dalla rilevanza della tematica nella sua opera, in cui peraltro è quasi sempre assente il punto di vista femminile delle “voci” delle donne. Ciò sembra paradossale e questa circostanza è di grande interesse critico. In particolare, a dispetto delle interpretazioni più canoniche, secondo cui Moravia – negli scritti realizzati tra (...) il 1929 e il 1964 – ha inteso compiere una “distruzione” dell’immagine materna nel quadro di una visione pessimista della famiglia borghese, dovremo considerare un più complesso e articolato universo materno nello scrittore romano, in cui è possibile ricostruire cinque modelli – la “madre autoritaria”, la “madre-non madre”, la “madre padrona”, la “madre-angelo custode” e la “madre-seduttrice” –, ben esemplificati nei principali romanzi ma che si ritrovano nei racconti che Moravia scrive ininterrottamente dagli anni Trenta agli anni Sessanta, la cui mole ha determinato, ancor oggi, una mancanza di studi sistematici. In secondo luogo, la tematica della madre sarà esaminata nelle trasposizioni cinematografiche italiane delle opere letterarie di Moravia. Va ricordato che il rapporto dello scrittore con il cinema fu particolarmente intenso. Per un verso, la “settima arte” rivestì un ruolo non secondario nella formazione ed esperienza estetica dell’Autore romano, che al cinema si interessò anche professionalmente nelle vesti di critico cinematografico, a partire dal primo dopoguerra, dapprima, per La nuova Europa e Libera stampa, poi, per L’Europeo e L’Espresso, a cui dobbiamo aggiungere l’attività di saggista per numerose riviste specializzate. Per altro verso, il cinema italiano non solo ha attinto a “mani basse” dall’opera di Moravia per sceneggiature di pellicole, che furono pietre miliari della sua storia. L’elenco dei romanzi e racconti adattati al grande schermo rende conto della grande influenza nella cultura italiana degli anni Cinquanta e Sessanta: La provinciale (1953) di Mario Soldati, La romana (1954) di Luigi Zampa, Peccato che sia una canaglia (1954) di Alessandro Blasetti, Racconti romani (1955) di Gianni Franciolini, La ciociara (1960) di Vittorio de Sica, La giornata balorda (1960) di Mauro Bolognini, Risate di gioia (1960) di Mario Monicelli, Agostino (o la perdita dell’innocenza) (1962) di Mauro Bolognini, La noia (1963) di Damiano Damiani, Gli indifferenti (1964) di Francesco Maselli, Le ore nude (1964) di Marco Vicario, La donna invisibile (1969) di Paolo Spinola, Una ragazza piuttosto complicata (1969) di Damiano Damiani, L’amore coniugale (1970) di Dacia Maraini, Il conformista (1970) di Bernardo Bertolucci, e molti altri ancora. Come avremo modo soltanto di accennare, il successo della letteratura moraviana nel mondo del cinema italiano si deve a molteplici fattori, tra cui la raffigurazione dei personaggi e degli ambienti, la focalizzazione su certe tematiche e, non da ultimo, lo stile narrativo, particolarmente adatto alle trasposizioni cinematografiche. Come caso di studio, ci soffermeremo, infine, sulla figura materna della versione filmica de La noia di Damiani, con l’obiettivo di verificare se nel passaggio dal libro alla pellicola, quella particolare connotazione della madre autoritaria abbia subito delle alterazioni. L’ipotesi che muove l’analisi è che la stesura delle sceneggiature, la raffigurazione dei personaggi e la messa in scena delle sequenze filmiche facciano emergere un riadattamento adeguato al largo pubblico, con il sovvertimento dell’andamento cronologico, alcune “lacune” di ordine psicologico nella raffigurazione dei protagonisti e un certo cedimento moralistico alla cultura ancora dominante negli anni ’50 e ’60, in cui la figura materna, sia quando è incattivita dalla povertà che quando è inaridita dalla ricchezza, anela comunque agli affetti familiari, trovando in essi una qualche forma di redenzione. (shrink)

Roberto Cordeschi, La scoperta dell’artificiale. Psicologia, filosofia e macchine intorno alla cibernetica, Milano, Masson–Dunod, 1998, pp. 320; Domenico Parisi, Mente: I nuovi modelli della Vita Artificiale, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1999, pp. 200.

This paper analyzes the objections of Adolf Reinach to Kant’s transcendental apriorism, shedding light on (1) the speculative distance separating their conceptions of philosophy (namely Reinach’s phenomenology and Kant’s transcendental critique), and (2) the consequential misunderstanding which is at the core of Reinach’s confrontation with Kant. In particular, attention is paid to the issue of the transcendental constitution of objectness, i.e. the question of the givenness of an object with respect to certain functions proper to the subject. In order to (...) illustrate how such a concept is completely absent in Reinach, I will compare his position with those of Husserl, in their relations with Kant’s interpretation of Hume’s philosophy. (shrink)

The theology of Pier Damiani († 1072) is still an understudied theme in his scholarship, in particular, for what it concerns his Trinitarian and Christological doctrines. The aim of this study is to reconstruct and discuss especially Damiani’s Christological views as formulated in Letter 81, better known as his De fide catholica. It is argued that Damiani’s approach is mostly exegetical, as he mainly points to and comments on Biblical passages in support of Catholic doctrines. Still, he assumes a peculiar (...) method of investigation, as he devotes the main body of the Letter to the question of the correct understanding (recta intelligentia) of the Catholic interpretation of Christology, and reserves only the final summary to a discussion of Biblical authorities. Eventually, it is argued that despite Damiani’s attempts at clarifying the matter, he acknowledges an inherent difficulty in explaining how it is possible that God became man without truly assuming the person of man, and, if He did so, how this did not give rise to two, however indistinct, persons or hypostases. The concept of ‘co-union’ of human and divine natures, introduced by Damiani, makes the simultaneous unity and distinction of the two natures intuitively clear, but it remains a concept that is not clarified in all its details and implications. (shrink)

By taking into account Epicurus’s extant texts and the most recent bibliography, this article aims at showing that he was not a convinced and stubborn atheist, as it was often believed during the Middle Ages. Rather, his idea of religion was vivid, positive and respectful of the traditional deities: to such an extent that Epicurus can be characterized as an ascetic and even mystical figure.

One of Fabio Rossi’s most important works analyses the themes of evil and suffering in 20th-century French philosophy. Among others, Rossi presents Louis Lavelle’s contribution on such themes and his reading of the mutual influences between philosophical reflection, emotional experience and religious transcendence. The article aims to make use of some of the conceptual tools made available by Rossi and Lavelle in order to understand François Mauriac’s treatment of evil and suffering in some of his novels, namely Le Mystère Frontenac, (...) Noeud de vipères and Le Mal. The role of family bonds, social rules, the body and its weaknesses, and nature are among the themes around which Mauriac centers his reflection about suffering and its inevitable presence in human life. (shrink)

La Cappella Carafa di Santa Severina, nella chiesa di San Domenico Maggiore a Napoli, era uno dei luoghi preferiti della giovinezza di Giordano Bruno. La sua struttura, che ricorda il teatro di Giulio Camillo, e la presenza di trenta simboli astrologici scolpiti sugli archi, la rendono la “stanza della memoria” ideale per l’applicazione dell’innovativa arte della memoria sviluppata dal filosofo Nolano. -/- The ‘memory place’ of Giordano Bruno. The Carafa of Santa Severina Chapel in the church of San (...) class='Hi'>Domenico Maggiore, Naples, was one of the favourite places of Giordano Bruno’s youth. Its structure, similar to that of Giulio Camillo’s theatre, and the presence of thirty astrological symbols carved on the arches, make it the ideal ‘memory place’ for the application of the innovative ‘art of memory’ developed by the philosopher. (shrink)

"Sofò e Fefilìa" attinge dal mondo antico - dalla sua potenza -, ma possiede come sfondo del lucido meditare la contemporaneità. Un'analisi estrema, tragica, della vasta gamma dei sentimenti umani, che coniuga - in modo personale e innovativo - diverse anime: la poetica di d'Annunzio; la filosofia di Cioran, Weil, Heidegger, Schopenhauer, Leopardi, Pascal; la psicologia del profondo di Jung. Un tema, tanti temi: la vita-morte con le sue molteplici declinazioni in chiave gnostica. Sofò, perché Sofia è sapienza, lucetempo delle (...) menti, seme di salvezza. Il mito gnostico insegna, infatti, che l'uomo spirituale ritornerà alla luce e sarà la redenzione. Fefilìa, in quanto Fede e Amore costituiscono le cifre dell'e-sistenza. Prefazione: prof. Alberto Giovanni Biuso - Disponibile sul sito: BookSprint Edizioni - Prefazione del Professore A.G. Biuso: "Un titolo singolare ed enigmatico mostra già il piglio con il quale Maria Emanuela Randazzo affronta il mondo e vive la scrittura. Un piglio fatto di passioni trafelate, di metamorfosi volute, di ambizioni teoretiche, di ascese e cadute. Le parole di questi versi e i versi di queste composizioni sembrano addensarsi in una volontà di dire tutto che produce vortici, a volte oscurità, e il cui esito è un mostrarsi a se stessa e al mondo per come si è e per come si vorrebbe diventare. Mostrarsi ed essere profondamente sola. Una solitudine non casuale, non voluta, non amata ma inevitabile, è infatti una delle tonalità del libro. Piglio, volontà e solitudine si esprimono e vivono in un «pensiero nascosto del giorno non fondo», in un mondo che «è voluntas, pura impalpabilità» ma che è anche capace di generare versi molto vari tra di loro (con accenni spesso persino futuristi o alla Palazzeschi e con vari neologismi) e che però esprimono lampi della tradizione poetica italiana come «illumini le notti d’Oriente» oppure «solo di braci e sassi la vita sarà costituita». Non sembra comunque che l’autrice ponga in primo piano la versificazione in quanto tale ma il suo obiettivo è piuttosto rivelare ciò che sinora ha scoperto del mondo: il suo arcano, il dolore che lo pervade e anche la nascosta e tenace dimensione di riscatto che affonda in antiche sapienze religiose dell’Oriente e dell’Occidente. Una redenzione che abita nella potenza della Necessità, nel Fatum, del «misero essere non sfuggevole al destino già scritto» che noi tutti e i nostri sentimenti siamo. I sentimenti. Da lì partono e qui ritornano i versi di Emanuela Randazzo. Anche la filosofia - che di queste pagine vorrebbe essere il significato e l’espressione - diventa un sentimento poiché «il più bell’ornamento è l’Intelligenza». E poi l’amore, naturalmente, espresso in una varietà di accenti anche decisamente erotici: «Io verserò le mie sostanze, tu verserai le tue, /non prima di aver assaporato la mia rosa», che credo raggiungano il loro esito migliore in due versi quanto più oggettivi possibile: «E i miei occhi hanno visto l’onore, / la gloria del vero Amore». Nel mezzo del suo cammino, che «così in un’altra vita discende», l’autrice ci chiede: «Giunge a te la mia voce? Il mio canto?». Possiamo risponderle che la voce è giunta e il canto si è dispiegato in versi nei quali abita una potenza antica e una passione sempre rinnovata verso la parola, il tempo, l’enigma, nell’ambizione di essere «usignolo della vita nuova». Dove c’è poesia c’è luce, sempre. Quella luce che «prima o poi verrà» e che la passione e il dolore di una giovane poeta ancora una volta evocano". (shrink)

Discussione a partire dal libro di Giorgio Agamben "Karman. Breve trattato sull'azione, la colpa e il gesto", Bollati Boringhieri, 2017.

Conscientious objection in health care is a form of compromise whereby health care practitioners can refuse to take part in safe, legal, and beneficial medical procedures to which they have a moral opposition (for instance abortion). Arguments in defense of conscientious objection in medicine are usually based on the value of respect for the moral integrity of practitioners. I will show that philosophical arguments in defense of conscientious objection based on respect for such moral integrity are extremely weak and, if (...) taken seriously, lead to consequences that we would not (and should not) accept. I then propose that the best philosophical argument that defenders of conscientious objection in medicine can consistently deploy is one that appeals to (some form of) either moral relativism or subjectivism. I suggest that, unless either moral relativism or subjectivism is a valid theory—which is exactly what many defenders of conscientious objection (as well as many others) do not think—the role of moral integrity and conscientious objection in health care should be significantly downplayed and left out of the range of ethically relevant considerations. (shrink)

Potentialities of attention and distraction with respect to images are critically reprised by Neapolitan artist Domenico Antonio Mancini. In Landscapes (2019), Google Street View addresses painted on canvases take the place of outlying areas of Italian cities, and of canonical oil ‘vedute’ paintings, obliging the viewer to switch from aesthetic absorption to a multitasking, reflexive attention enabled by the tools of mobile devices and the operative agency between the displayed and depicted images. Attracted by the ephemeral, geo-localized vistas displayed (...) on their smartphones, spectator-users must deal with the dynamis of the on-line GSV images: rhetorical and predictable, though, at the same time, and perhaps unintentionally, serendipitous and figural. (shrink)

periphery looks at you with hate. This phrase in red neon struck the visitors of Landscapes, an exhibition by Domenico Antonio Mancini in the Lia Rumma Gallery in Naples, in 2019. It was not addressed to the public but to the nineteenth-century pictorial views relocated in the last room of the exhibition, as if repainted by the immaterial vandalism of the colored light. The exhibition’s theme was the visibility of contemporary suburban environments, now accessible through Google street view visualizations. (...) Mancini’s non-representational Landscapes are Google addresses, not aesthetically appreciable but pragmatically challenging: the visitor must type on a touch screen to access to the outskirts of Naples, Palermo, Catania, Rome and Milan. The words at the end of the exhibition almost literally replicated a black graffiti drawn on Palazzo Missori in Milan. Are these relocation and remediation just about artification? What happens when, browsing Google street view, I take a close look at that graffiti recalling the political protests during the streets the 1960s? The deictic transitability in space and time of the hypermediated image can activate a fortuitous narrative and an open interpretation by looking back on the present as if it were past. Even a digital landscape is a moral landscape like that of public art for Danto, with a «internal beauty» whose meaning is not already embodied in architectural and artistic media but accessible and shareable through our portable devices. (shrink)

The nature of pre-reflective self-consciousness—viz., the putative non-inferential self-consciousness involved in unreflective experiences, has become the topic of considerable debate in recent analytic philosophy of consciousness, as it is commonly taken to be what makes conscious mental states first-personally given to its subject. A major issue of controversy in this debate concerns what pre-reflective self-consciousness is an awareness of. Some scholars have suggested that pre-reflective self-consciousness involves an awareness of the experiencing subject. This ‘egological view’ is opposed to the ‘non-egological (...) view’, according to which the subject, in being pre-reflectively self-conscious, is just aware of their own occurrent mental state. In this paper, I argue in favour of the egological view. The argument I develop is a qualified version of a line of reasoning originally provided by Rosenthal and builds on a proper clarification of the ontological status of token mental states. More precisely, I argue that token mental states are structured ‘fact-like’ entities having their subject among their constituents. Accordingly, one cannot be aware of one’s own occurrent mental state without thereby being aware of oneself. (shrink)

In this paper I will focus on a crux in two Platonic scholia, where manuscripts have the impossible διονύσιον, but Greene suggests δίκαιον. This amendment was made on the basis of a gloss of Photius’ Lexicon, although the corresponding gloss of Suidas confirms the text of Platonic scholia. However the agreement with Photius is not so important, not only because it is impossible to prove that he reproduces the text of the glossary composed by the Atticist Aelius Dionysius without any (...) modification (it is also the source of Suidas and other Byzantine lexica, and especially of the so called Erweiterte Synagoge, which the Platonic scholia derive from as well), but also because our scholia reveal elsewhere a major affinity with Suidas than with Patriarch’s Lexicon. In the light of a careful review of the loci paralleli I therefore suggest the reading δημόσιον. (shrink)

This paper examines the relationship between some scholia to the IIId book of Plato’s Republic, Proclus’ commentary on it, and the so-called Chrestomathia, a work that the manuscripts attribute to the Neoplatonic philosopher himself. The conclusion is that the relationship between the three texts is highly problematic, and that we cannot think of a simple and direct derivation from one another. The author of the scholia probably made use of texts different from those that have come down to us, or (...) alternatively he has reworked his sources in a personal way. (shrink)

Some remarks about commentaries on Plato in the medieval Byzantium.

The term 'covert mixed quotation' describes cases in which linguistic material is interpreted in the manner of mixed quotation — that is, used in addition to being mentioned — despite the superficial absence of any commonly recognized conventional devices indicating quotation. After developing a novel theory of mixed quotation, I show that positing covert mixed quotation allows us to give simple and unified treatments of a number of puzzling semantic phenomena, including the projective behavior of conventional implicature items embedded in (...) indirect speech reports and propositional attitude ascriptions, so-called 'c-monsters,' metalinguistic negation, metalinguistic negotiation, and 'in a sense' constructions. (shrink)

In his essay against Eberhard, Kant denies that there are innate concepts. Several scholars take Kant’s statement at face value. They claim that Kant did not endorse concept innatism, that the categories are not innate concepts, and that Kant’s views on innateness are significantly different from Leibniz’s. This paper takes issue with those claims. It argues that Kant’s views on the origin of the intellectual concepts are remarkably similar to Leibniz’s. Given two widespread notions of innateness, the dispositional notion and (...) the input/output notion, intellectual concepts are innate for Kant no less than for Leibniz. (shrink)

Many scholars claimed that, according to Immanuel Kant, some judgements lack a truth-value: analytic judgements, judgements about items of which humans cannot have experience, judgements of perception, and non-assertoric judgements. However, no one has undertaken an extensive examination of the textual evidence for those claims. Based on an analysis of Kant's texts, I argue that: (1) according to Kant, only judgements of perception are not truth-apt. All other judgements are truth-apt, including analytic judgements and judgements about items of which humans (...) cannot have experience. (2) Kant sometimes states that truth-apt judgements are actual bearers of truth or falsity only when they are taken to state what is actually the case. Kant calls these judgements assertoric. Other texts ascribe truth and falsity to judgements, regardless of whether they are assertoric. Kant's views on truth-aptness raise challenges for correspondentist and coherentist interpretations of Kant's theory of truth; they rule out the identification of Kant's crucial notion of objective validity with truth-aptness; and they imply that Kant was not a verificationist about truth or meaning. (shrink)

There are some interesting similarities between Aristotle’s ‘mixed actions’ in Book III of the Nicomachean Ethics and the actions often thought to be justifiable with the Doctrine of Double Effect. Here I analyse these similarities by comparing Aristotle’s examples of mixed actions with standard cases from the literature on double effect such as, amongst others, strategic bombing, the trolley problem, and craniotomy. I find that, despite some common features such as the dilemmatic structure and the inevitability of a bad effect, (...) Aristotle’s mixed actions do not count as cases justifiable through application of the Doctrine of Double Effect because they fail to meet the crucial necessary condition of the Doctrine according to which the bad effect can only be a merely foreseen side-effect and not an intended means. (shrink)

This paper traces the ancestry of a familiar historiographical narrative, according to which early modern philosophy was marked by the development of empiricism, rationalism, and their synthesis by Immanuel Kant. It is often claimed that this narrative became standard in the nineteenth century, due to the influence of Thomas Reid, Kant and his disciples, or German Hegelians and British Idealists. The paper argues that the narrative became standard only at the turn of the twentieth century. This was not due to (...) the influence of Reid, German Hegelians, or British Idealists as they did not endorse the narrative, although Thomas Hill Green may have facilitated its uptake. The narrative is based on Kant’s historiographical sketches, as corrected and integrated by Karl Leonhard Reinhold. It was first fleshed out into full-fledged histories by two Kantians, Wilhelm Gottlieb Tennemann and Johann Gottlieb Buhle. Numerous historians, several of whom were not Kantians, spread it in the English-speaking world. They include Kuno Fischer, Friedrich Ueberweg, Richard Falckenberg, and Wilhelm Windelband. However, the wide availability of their works did not suffice to make the narrative standard because, until the 1890s, the Hegelian account was at least as popular as theirs. Among the factors that allowed the narrative to become standard are its aptness to be adopted by philosophers of the most diverse persuasions, its simplicity and suitability for teaching. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to discuss the way the videogame The Last of Us: Part II (Naughty Dog, 2020) manages to entice players to question the ethical adequacy of their own gaming behaviour.

El objetivo de este artículo es clarificar la noción de «vida auténtica» tal y como es descrita por Joan Roura-Parella en su última obra Tema y variaciones de la personalidad (1950). Por «vida auténtica» se entiende una vida autogobernada, que permite al individuo realizar su propia singularidad y, por tanto, preservar su autonomía y dignidad como persona. Una vida dominada por factores ajenos al propio individuo, sean cuales sean éstos, es una vida alienada, que no permite el desarrollo del individuo (...) en tanto la persona que es. Se señala la relevancia filosófica de la propuesta de Roura-Parella, que es la de ofrecer una justificación no-evidencial para una forma de vida cristiana, agapística. De acuerdo con Roura-Parella, una forma de vida basada en la entrega amorosa para con el prójimo está justificada en tanto que ésta es el resultado último de nuestra propia condición natural, constituyendo así un acto de afirmación personal y siendo, por tanto, condición necesaria para gozar de una vida auténtica — «la vida alcanza su hondo sentido al salirse de sí misma para darse a los demás» (Roura-Parella, Tema y variaciones de la personalidad, 1950, p. 229). Se señalan las diferencias y semejanzas de la propuesta de Roura-Parella con respecto a las de Miguel de Unamuno y Joaquim Xirau, autores que fueron cercanos a Roura-Parella y quienes, aunque partiendo de razonamientos distintos a los de Roura-Parella, también concibieron la entrega amorosa para con el prójimo como un acto de afirmación personal. (shrink)

In a paper recently published in this journal, Navin and Largent argue in favour of a type of policy to regulate non-medical exemptions from childhood vaccination which they call ‘Inconvenience’. This policy makes it burdensome for parents to obtain an exemption to child vaccination, for example, by requiring parents to attend immunization education sessions and to complete an application form to receive a waiver. Navin and Largent argue that this policy is preferable to ‘Eliminationism’, i.e. to policies that do not (...) allow non-medical exemptions, because Inconvenience has been shown to maintain exemption rates low while not harming parents by forcing them to do something that goes against their beliefs. We argue that it is at least doubtful that Inconvenience is ethically preferable to Eliminationism: while the latter disregards the value of liberty, Inconvenience disregards the value of fairness in the distribution of the burdens entailed by the preservation of a public good like herd immunity. We propose a variant of Inconvenience, which we call ‘Contribution’, which we think is preferable to the versions of Inconvenience discussed by Navin and Largent in that it successfully strikes a balance between the values of parents’ liberty, fairness and expected utility. (shrink)

Kant claims that the nominal definition of truth is: “Truth is the agreement of cognition with its object”. In this paper, I analyse the relevant features of Kant's theory of definition in order to explain the meaning of that claim and its consequences for the vexed question of whether Kant endorses or rejects a correspondence theory of truth. I conclude that Kant's claim implies neither that he holds, nor that he rejects, a correspondence theory of truth. Kant's claim is not (...) a generic way of setting aside a correspondence definition of truth, or of considering it uninformative. Being the nominal definition of truth, the formula “truth is the agreement of cognition with its object” illustrates the meaning of the predicate “is true” and people's ordinary conception of truth. True judgements correspond to the objects they are about. However, there could be more to the property of truth than correspondence. (shrink)

With the introduction/start of Horizon Europe, the European Commission made gender equality plans a basic requirement for participation in its research framework programme. Not all institutions have adopted the GEP – some have done so only partially – however, the document represents an attempt to pursue gender equality in different areas. The GEP at the academic level may represent an attempt to apply the vulnerability paradigm to contexts. In accordance with the purpose of the GEP, the analysis of language becomes (...) central, especially in its performative and reiterative key of discriminatory patterns. Reflecting on communication opens the possibility of counteracting stereotypes and creating equal environments through, for example, the creation of specific vademecums. Therefore, using the theoretical lenses of vulnerability and language, a reflection on the opportunities offered by the adoption of GEP is made. (shrink)

Johannes Müller von Königsberg (1436-1476), better known as Regiomontanus, is widely considered as the most influential astronomer and mathematician of 15th-century Europe. He was active as an astrologer and deemed astrology to be the queen of mathematical sciences. Despite this, Regiomontanus's astrological activity has yet to be fully explored. A brief examination of Regiomontanus's manuscripts shows that his astrological interests were accompanied by interests in the arts and in methods of prognostication. This article studies an unconventional astrological-chiromantical text, whose relevance (...) is threefold: a) it sheds new light on Regiomontanus's astrological interests; b) it enriches our knowledge of Regiomontanus's efforts to learn and understand Greek-Regiomontanus transcribed it into his own manuscript during his sojourn in Italy from 1460-1467; and c) it is the sole extant text in the Greek tradition that provides a system for prognostication from the study of a person's hand, the parts of which are considered as being under the domain of planets. The article provides an English translation of Regiomontanus's transcription, alongside a brief commentary, and studies the intellectual and historical context of that production through manuscript analysis. (shrink)