Riccardo Martinelli

This essay is about the Wolfgang Köhler’s philosophical ideas expressed in his The Place of Value in a World of Facts of 1938. Köhler, who strongly supports a scientific world view, considers the question as to whether science is able to cope with human values, besides natural facts. Relying upon phenomenological analyses, and on his previous researches in natural philosophy, Köhler introduces his doctrine of “epistemological dualism”. From a historical point of view, this theory exhibits some similarity with the philosophical ideas expressed by Köhler’s Berlin mentor Carl Stumpf. It is argued that Köhler’s epistemological dualism actually supports ontological monism and aims at offering a unified view of natural facts and human values.

L’opera filosofica di Novalis, inedita e frammentaria per ragioni biografiche, è stata a lungo trascurata. Gli studi fichtiani e l’interesse per la scienza sono alla base della sua «Enciclopedistica», nella quale la filosofia della musica ha un posto rilevante. Novalis conosce la scienza acustica del suo tempo e riconduce i rapporti tra suoni e figure a una forza formatrice presente nella natura fin dal livello inorganico. La medesima forza si presenta poi nell’uomo tramite la voce, espressione più autentica della libertà assoluta dell’Io. Lungi da ogni «sentimentalismo» l’identità di uomo e natura si manifesta in una rarefatta estetica simbolica condensata da Novalis nell’immagine dell’«arpa eolia».

Music represents a crucial issue in nineteenth-century philosophy and science. Scholars generally possessed a good musical competence and contributed to the explanation of sound perception and aesthetic enjoyment in music. Reflexions on musical psychology, in turn, influenced general theories of mind, sometimes in an impressive way. Meinong plays a remarkable role within this context. Together with Mach, Ehrenfels and Stumpf, Meinong contributed to overtake Helmholtz ’ physical-physiological theory, supporting a more comprehensive approach. He was repeatedly concerned with problems such as to- nal fusion, tone quality and melodic perception. Although Meinong did not develop musical problems systematically, he assumed a quite original and interesting position. His ideas have been developed by some of his followers in the School of Graz.

Peirce’ s intellectual debt to Kant’ s transcendentalism has been long recognized. In this essay I investigate Kant’ s thoughts on “what is pragmatic” as a source of inspiration for him. Peirce was well acquainted with this often neglected facet of Kant’ s philosophy, that influenced both the core idea and the lexical coinage of his pragmatism. Both thinkers drew attention to the consequences of cognition for human actions. Pointing at the definition of the meaning of a defined notion, however, Peirce narrows remarkably the domain of Kant’ s “pragmatic horizon”. Accordingly, Kant cannot be truly considered a forerunner of Peirce’ s pragmatism.

This essay addresses the interrelations between philosophy and experimental sciences that lie at the heart of Carl Stumpf’s epistemology. Following a biographical exposé demonstrating how Stumpf succeeded in acquiring a dual competence in both philosophical and scientific fields, we examine the vast array of academic disciplines encompassed by his research. Such a biographical treatment aims, indeed, to better promote the thrust of Stumpf’s assertion that philosophical enquiries should always be carried out in close connection with scientific practices, and underlines how philosophico-scientific interactions established his work as a central pillar in the history of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century German thought.

Con lo sviluppo dell'antropologia moderna, alcuni problemi filosofici si ripropongono in forma inedita. Riflettere sull'uomo non significa più conoscere se stessi, né parlare di Dio o dell'anima, ma confrontarsi con un essere problematicamente proteso tra determinatezza e libertà, tra "natura" e "mondo". Il volume mostra come lo svolgersi di questa vicenda sia assai meno frammentario e discontinuo di quanto talora si presuma. Il problema antropologico è al centro di un vivace ed aspro dibattito che, dal fiorire dell'antropologia all'epoca di Herder e Kant, giunge, attraversando l'intero sviluppo del pensiero ottocentesco e in particolare le opere di Hegel, Marx, Darwin e Nietzsche, fino all'«antropologia filosofica» e alla critica dell’«antropologismo» da parte di Husserl e Heidegger. E’ su questo sfondo tematico che si comprendono molti degli sviluppi novecenteschi e contemporanei

This essay focuses on realism in ontology and on the problem of defining reality. According to the definition given by many realists, reality is independent of our thoughts, conceptual schemes, linguistic practices, etc. Yet, this merely negative definition of reality has some disadvantages: it implies a dualistic view, and it is incompatible with scientific realism. As an alternative, I introduce and discuss the traditional definition of reality as effectiveness, or capability of acting. I then attempt to determine to what extent this definition can be helpful in the debate concerning ontological realism.

Ehrenfels, Höfler and Witasek competently contributed to a musical aesthetics based upon the principles of the Graz school. In spite of a shared general psychological framework, they deeply differ in applying it to the aesthetics of music. A double tendency can be pointed out. Ehrenfels and Höfler enthusiastically supported Richard Wagner and vindicated the aesthetic value of his music. Accordingly, they made large use of analogies between musical and organic Gestalten. In a platonic vein, Höfler also thinks of melodies as timeless objects, which are discovered rather than created by great artists. On the contrary, Witasek’s approach is quite rationalistic. Avoiding any intrusion of metaphysics, he describes the intellectual and emotional processes involved in hearing a piece of music. Wholly independently of Wagnerism, Witasek explains the complexity of musical experience in the general terms of Meinongian psychology.

This is a preface to the contributions gathered in the issue. They are the outcome of two workshops held at the University of Trieste in 2014 and 2015 on the subject of pragmatics and pragmatism. Besides the obvious lexical affinity, pragmatics and pragmatism share the basic belief that practice and human action play a crucial role in the explanation of meaning and truth, but also in the solution of ethical questions, etc. The text highlights some philosophical questions related to these fields of research.