The present book is the first to undertake a systematic study of Peirce’s conception of historical knowledge and of its value for philosophy. It does so by both reconstructing in detail Peirce’s arguments and giving a detailed account of the many ways in which history becomes an object of explicit reflection in his writings. The book’s leading idea may be stated as follows: Peirce manages to put together an exceptionally compelling argument about history’s bearing on philosophy not so much because (...) he derives it from a well-articulated and polished conception of the relation between the two disciplines; but on the contrary, because he holds on to this relation while intuiting that it can easily turn into a conflict. This potential conflict acts therefore as a spur to put forth an unusually profound and multi-faceted analysis of what it means for philosophy to rely on historical arguments. Peirce looks at history as a way to render philosophical investigations more detailed, more concrete and more sensitive to the infinite and unforeseeable nuances that characterize human experience. In this way, he provides us with an exceptionally valuable contribution to a question that has remained gravely under-theorized in contemporary debates. (shrink)

According to Perdurantism, persons are identical to maximal aggregates of appropriately interrelated temporal parts. Within the Perdurantist framework, an epistemic concern arises, targeting the perduring persons’ belief that they are persons, suggesting that, ultimately, they are not in a position to know that they are persons as opposed to temporal parts. Despite the consideration it has received over the years, this concern has not yet been converted into a full-fledged objection. This paper aims to address this gap by exploring the (...) possibility of formulating a coherent Epistemic Objection against Perdurantism. We shall examine several epistemological principles around which such an objection might be built, arguing that none of them, in the end, allows a plausible formulation of the objection. As a result, we shall conclude that the burden of proving that in a Perdurantist setting persons are not in a position to know that they are persons rests with the objectors. (shrink)

The traditional role of evolutionary theory in the social sciences has been to explain the existence of an object in terms of the survival of the fittest. In economics this approach has acted as a justification for hypotheses such as profit maximisation, or the existence of institutions in terms of their overall efficiency. This volume challenges that view and argues that one of the first tasks of economic theory should be to explain the enormous diversity of institutional arrangements that has (...) characterised human societies. (shrink)

Volume 28, Issue 5, September 2020, Page 966-986.

The article focuses on the link between memory, folk narratives, and critical thinking. I suggest in particular that there are instances in which the transmission of a folkloric story, such as a legend or a tale, can intersect with a person’s life experiences and facilitate the articulation of critical perspectives on society that might otherwise go unexpressed. The opportunity for discussing this idea is offered by the work of early twentieth-century Chicago sociologist Jane Addams. In her book The Long Road (...) of Woman’s Memory (1916) Addams dealt with the modern revival of an ancient legend and investigated its interplay with the recollections, grievances, and aspirations of working-class women. (shrink)

“[I]t is the belief men betray, and not that which they parade which has to be studied.” This short Peircean sentence has been the subject of important yet underrated attention in the reception of Peirce’s philosophy, passing through the art historians Edgar Wind and Erwin Panofsky and arriving finally at Bourdieu. This paper explores the affinities between Peirce’s and Panofksy’s thinking, as well as their historical connections and their common sources, taking its cue from an analysis of the similar arguments (...) the two authors offer to justify the analogy between Gothic architecture and Scholasticism. The fulcrum for the comparison between Peirce and Panofsky is located in the writings of Edgar Wind: a leading figure, this article proposes, in the history of European pragmatism. (shrink)

Traduit de l'italien par Marilène Raiola et Thierry Bedouelle Préface de Jean-Robert Armogathe Le premier mérite de T. Gregory est de présenter l'état actuel des recherches, sur un mode critique, illustré par des exemples. Tandis qu'un consensus s'était établi qui voyait dans les "libertines érudits" les derniers humanistes de la Renaissance, Gregory y voit les premiers représentants d'une pensée articulée des Lumières. A une Renaissance perçue comme le dernier feu du passé il oppose une interprétation nouvelle, hardie, d'ouverture des temps (...) modernes, de genèse de la raison classique. Sans doute il faut s'entendre sur les mots : cette raison-là contient bien des éléments magiques, astrologiques, alchimiques. Mais n'avons-nous pas trop souvent procédé par anachronisme et anticipé notre conception de la rationalité sur un âge où elle se constituait, à partir d'autres éléments? Gregory décrit la mise en place de cette rationalité inchoative, la genèse de la raison classique. A partir de l'introduction. (shrink)

We are living a historical phase in which phenomena of enormous significance intersect: the digital turn, the “ecological transition”, the pandemic contingency, against the backdrop of a unique event in the history of human civilization and of Earth itself: for the first time behaviours and choices of a living species are among the main causes of a biotic transition.The way of thinking, planning, building cities and houses faces with new scenarios. Human and social sciences are called to a deep and (...) fundamental reflection, in the sign of complexity and of the overcoming of scientisms. This contribution, starting from a radical re-thinking of dwelling, intends to provide a critical review of some concrete perspectives of “urban and housing transition” towards new spatial and relational models. (shrink)

Previous studies of H. Richard Niebuhr's intellectual background have fallen into two groups: those that stress the German and especially Kantian sources of Niebuhr's thought, and those that emphasize the American and especially pragmatic sources of his thought.

Tullio Viola – One of the most relevant aspects of your intellectual career is your reflection on the link between historical and normative arguments with regard to values. This reflection goes back at least to your 1997 book The Genesis of Values, and may be seen to culminate in the methodological chapter of your 2011 book on The Sacredness of the Person, in which you talk about the need for an “affirmative genealogy” of values. As you have made clear (...) many times (most recently in the article... (shrink)

It is well known that Charles S. Peirce's first attempt to construct a theory of metaphysical categories, already displaying the triadic pattern that would later become the keystone of his philosophy, directed itself towards the three English personal pronouns: I, IT, THOU.2 As many scholars have already noted, these three spheres of the phenomenal world identified by the young Peirce prelude to the 1867 "New List" (Quality, Relation and Representation) as well as to the later categories of Firstness, Secondness and (...) Thirdness.But apart from their documentary significance as the seed of Peircean metaphysics, the writings on I, IT and THOU also have a philosophical interest in their own right, one which deserves to.. (shrink)

A partir del análisis crítico que Martha Nussbaum realizara sobre la obra de Judith Butler, proponemos examinar el vínculo entre la reflexión filosófica y la práctica política en el marco del feminismo. Para ello analizaremos el modo en que cada una de estas autoras reflexiona en torno al lenguaje, las identidades, el poder, la dominación y las formas de subvertirla.

Whenever disagreement arises, dialogue is often presented as a natural remedy to conciliate opposing subjects. Absence of dialogue resulting in conflict appears thus as being somehow unnatural, a behavioural trait artificially induced by a variety of cultural forces, religion in particular. In this paper I would like to argue that the opposite case might be truer. Dialogue is in fact a most unnatural and unlikely event and, for this reason, to consider it as the natural foundation for a shared universal (...) ethics is a potentially dangerous oversight. Dialogue is heavily dependent on consciousness and language, which are not discreet natural entities, but rather complex culturally-influenced constructs. We shall then explore the problem of the constructions of meaningful dialogues in the light of considerations on the formation of consciousness, taking into account the way in which metaphysical beliefs delimit and shape our epistemological possibilities and our understanding of self and alterity. (shrink)

italiano: Secondo l’interpretazione di Hegel gli edifici religiosi egiziani, e tra essi in particolare i templi, rappresentano l’inizio della storia dell’architettura, e con ciò di tutta la storia dell’arte.L’architettura religiosa egiziana ha un carattere simbolico, perché la sua forma cerca di rappresentare il contenuto spirituale senza esservi pienamente adeguata. Così il tempio egizio allude al divino con la sua intera struttura, ma non ha propriamente un interno, dedicato al culto dell’immagine del dio.L’egittologia contemporanea ha corretto Hegel su questo punto, perché (...) in generale il tempio egizio aveva un interno che custodiva l’immagine della divinità. Tuttavia la tesi di Hegel rimane paradossalmente valida per un caso particolare dell’esperienza egiziana, che egli non poteva conoscere: nella religione monoteista di Amarna il tempio del dio solare Aton non ha immagini e non ha un centro, perché il divino è presente dappertutto, come la luce del sole, che illumina egualmente ogni parte del tempio..Parole chiave: Egitto; architettura; tempio; simbolo; immagine. (shrink)