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658Individuality, Individuation, Subjectivity in Early Modern Philosophy (edited book)„Vasile Goldiş” University Press. 2015.For generations of scholars the emergence of the notion of human subjectivity has marked the shift to philosophical modernity. Mainly traced back to Descartes’s founding of philosophy on the Cogito and to Kant’s ‘Copernican Revolution’, the rise of subjectivity has been linked to the rise of the modern age in terms of a reconsideration of reality starting from an analysis of the human self and consciousness. Consequently, it has been related to long-standing issues of identity, individuation and…Read more
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619Reading Descartes. Consciousness, Body, and Reasoning (edited book)Firenze University Press. 2023.This volume takes cue from the idea that the thought of no philosopher can be understood without considering it as the result of a constant, lively dialogue with other thinkers, both in its internal evolution as well as in its reception, re-use, and assumption as a starting point in addressing past and present philosophical problems. In doing so, it focuses on a feature that is crucially emerging in the historiography of early modern philosophy and science, namely the complexity in the productio…Read more
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496Tra antichità e modernità. Studi di storia della filosofia medievale e rinascimentale. Raccolti da Fabrizio Amerini, Simone Fellina e Andrea Strazzoni (edited book)E-theca OnLineOpenAccess Edizioni. 2019.Raccolta di saggi sulla storia della filosofia rinascimentale e moderna.
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446A Logic to End Controversies: The Genesis of Clauberg’s Logica Vetus et NovaJournal of Early Modern Studies 2 (2): 123-149. 2013.This article provides an analysis of Johannes Clauberg’s intentions in writing his Logica vetus et nova (1654, 1658). Announced before his adherence to Cartesianism, his Logica was eventually developed in order to provide Cartesian philosophy with a Scholastic form, embodying a complete methodology for the academic disciplines based on Descartes’ rules and a medicina mentis against philosophical prejudices. However, this was not its only function: thanks to the rules for the interpretation of ph…Read more
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371Tra antichità e modernità. Studi di storia della filosofia medievale e rinascimentale. Raccolti da Fabrizio Amerini, Simone Fellina e Andrea Strazzoni (edited book)E-theca OnLineOpenAccess Edizioni. 2019.Raccolta di saggi sulla storia della filosofia rinascimentale e moderna.
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348A Letter of Peter Hartzing to Gerhard Wolter MolanusNoctua 7 (1): 158-181. 2020.This contribution provides a transcription and translation of, and a commentary on, a letter of the German-Dutch-Japanese polymath Peter Hartzing to Gerhard Wolter Molanus, abbot of Loccum and famous collector of coins and medals. In the commentary, a survey of the life and intellectual endeavours of Hartzing is provided.
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309Neglected sources on Cartesianism: the academic dictata of Johannes de RaeyIntellectual History Review 33 (4): 525-586. 2023.In this article, I provide a historical and bibliographical exploration of the handwritten, dictated commentaries (dictata) of Johannes de Raey (1620/1622–1702) on the texts of René Descartes (1596–1650), shedding light on their structure, development, and on their relations with the academic commentaries of Johannes Clauberg (1622–1665) and Christoph Wittich (1625–1687). The study of these commentaries, which are extant as class notes, is important because they conveyed one of the first systema…Read more
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263The Foundation of Early Modern Science: Metaphysics, Logic and TheologyErasmus University Rotterdam-Ridderprint BV. 2015.The present study defines the function of the foundation of science in early modern Dutch philosophy, from the first introduction of Cartesian philosophy in Utrecht University by Henricus Regius to the acceptance of Newtonian physics by Willem Jacob ‘s Gravesande. My main claim is that a foundation of science was required because the conceptual premises of new ways in thinking had to be justified not only as alternatives to the established philosophical paradigms or as an answer to the “sceptica…Read more
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246The Letters of Burchard de Volder to Philipp van LimborchNoctua 5 (2): 268-300. 2018.These notes contain an annotated edition of the only four extant letters of Burchard de Volder to Philipp van Limborch. In the first letter De Volder provides Van Limborch with some information about the subscription to the Dordrecht Confession of Faith by professors. In the second letter De Volder comments upon Van Limborch’s De veritate religionis Christianae. This letter is interesting as it provides insights into De Volder’s views on religion and theology. The third letter served as a cover …Read more
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233Some unpublished fragments on Descartes’s life and worksThe Seventeenth Century 37 (5): 801-839. 2022.In this article I present some unpublished fragments concerning the life and works of René Descartes (1596–1650), gathered from the academic commentaries of Johannes de Raey (1620/1622–1702) on his treatises. The fragments, of different degrees of reliability, are important as (1) they reveal how the image of Descartes was shaped among his first followers and biographers; (2) they offer insights on his now lost manuscripts, to which De Raey had access after his death. They concern, amongst other…Read more
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228The didactic, persuasive and scientific uses of illustrations after DescartesNoctua 2 (1-2): 432-480. 2015.The aim of this article is to unveil the ways of teaching new philosophical paradigms in Dutch Universities between Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century, by means of an analysis of the uses of illustrations in Cartesian and Newtonian natural-philosophical textbooks. This analysis allows to understand the overall functions of philosophical textbooks, where illustrations act as conceptual means, filling the gap between the premise of a theory and its actual contents; didactic means, aiming to help t…Read more
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212Between Descartes and Boyle: Burchard de Volder’s Experimental Lectures at Leiden, 1676–1678In Davide Cellamare & Mattia Mantovani (eds.), Descartes in the classroom: teaching Cartesian philosophy in the early modern age, Brill. pp. 174-198. 2023.In this chapter I provide a reconstruction of the contents of the lectures provided by Burchard de Volder by means of experiments at Leiden, in the years 1676–1678, as well as of the natural-philosophical interpretation he provided of the experimental evidences he gained. Such lectures, mostly based on the experiments described by Boyle, served De Volder to teach natural-philosophical ideas which he borrowed from Descartes, and which he re-interpreted in the light of Archimedes’s hydrostatics.
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196Johannes de Raey and the Cartesian Philosophy of LanguageLias. Journal of Early Modern Intellectual Culture and its Sources 42 (2): 89-120. 2015.This article offers an account of the philosophy of language expounded in the Cogitata de interpretatione (1692) of the Dutch philosopher Johannes De Raey (1620-1702). In this work, De Raey provided a theory of the formation and meaning language based on the metaphysics of René Descartes. De Raey distinguished between words signifying passions and sensations, ideas of the intellect, or external things. The aim of this article is to shift away the discussion of De Raey’s critique on the applicati…Read more
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189Subjectivity and Individuality: Two Strands in Early Modern PhilosophySociety and Politics 9 (1): 5-9. 2015.For generations of scholars the emergence of the notion of human subjectivity has marked the shift to philosophical modernity. Mainly traced back to Descartes’s founding of philosophy on the Cogito and to Kant’s ‘Copernican Revolution’, the rise of subjectivity has been linked to the rise of the modern age in terms of a reconsideration of reality starting from an analysis of the human self and consciousness. Consequently, it has been related to long-standing issues of identity, individuation and…Read more
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187Agrippa, Heinrich CorneliusEncyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy. 2016.Agrippa was the main expounder of the occult philosophy, which is the knowledge of the hidden causes of things and is finalized to their manipulation by magic. Magic, in turn, is the highest form and the end of philosophy. According to his De occulta philosophia, magic is threefold: natural (concerning sublunar world), celestial (concerning stars and heavenly intelligences), and divine (concerning God and higher angels). It consists of the manipulation of concrete objects and of the summoning of…Read more
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179The Lost Dictata of Henricus RegiusIn Fabrizio Baldassarri (ed.), Descartes and Medicine: Problems, Responses and Survival of a Cartesian Discipline, Brepols. 2023.In this chapter, I discuss the contents of the now lost academic dictata of Henricus Regius, embodying one of the first comprehensive teachings of natural philosophy inspired by René Descartes at a university. These contents are partially extant in Martin Schoock’s Admiranda methodus (1643), and can be reconstructed from Regius’s early texts and correspondence with Descartes. They reveal that Regius was original with respect to Descartes especially in his account of magnetism, which was function…Read more
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175Philosophy and Mathematics at the Turn of the 18th Century: New Perspectives – Philosophie et mathématiques au tournant du XVIIIe siècle: perspectives nouvelles (edited book)E-theca OnLineOpenAccess Edizioni. 2017.The essays gathered in this issue of the journal Noctua focus on the various relationships that were established between philosophy and mathematics from Galileo and Descartes to Kant, passing by Newton.
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173Hartlib, SamuelEncyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy. 2016.The main aim of Samuel Hartlib was to provide an advancement of learning finalized to the amelioration of the material conditions of men and the pursuit of a religious peace, i.e., the unification of the Protestants. To this aim, inspired by Comenius, he devoted his efforts or gathering knowledge by the creation of a society or office of learned men (in technical fields, philosophy, and theology), and by the establishment of a network of correspondents (the Hartlib Circle). The method of discove…Read more
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167The Use and Plagiarism of Descartes’s Traité de l’homme by Henricus Regius: A ReassessmentPerspectives on Science 31 (5): 627-683. 2023.In this article I discuss a particular aspect of the Dutch reception of the ideas of René Descartes, namely the use of his Traité de l’homme by Henricus Regius. I analyze the use that Regius made of the theory of the movement of muscles, passions, hunger, and more generally of the neurophysiology expounded by Descartes in his book (not printed until 1662–1664). In my analysis, I reconstruct the internal evolution of Regius’s neurophysiology, I illustrate its sources beyond Descartes (i.e., Jean …Read more
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166More, HenryEncyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy. 2016.Henry More was an expounder of Cambridge Platonism, as he largely relied on a Platonicinspired standpoint in pursuing his aims: the demonstration of the immortality of soul, the critique of atheism and religious enthusiasm. He maintains that soul emanates from God (being therefore not created and pre-existing body) and argues for the existence of a spirit of nature as means to explain natural phenomena, which cannot be accounted for only in mechanical terms. Moreover, he argues for the extended …Read more
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163RamismEncyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy. 2017.The main aim of the French logician and philosopher Petrus Ramus was to provide a method of teaching the liberal arts enabling the completion of the undergraduate program of studies in 7 years. This method was based on a new logic, in which the complex structure of Aristotle’s Organon and of the Summulae logicales of Peter of Spain is reduced to two main doctrines: the invention of arguments, by which it is possible to find the notions for reasoning and disputing in any discipline, and the dispo…Read more
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156Cavendish, MargaretEncyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy. 2016.Margaret Cavendish was a philosopher and writer active in mid-seventeenth century England. She is important not just as one of the first women active in philosophy in early modern age but as the expounder of an original scientific theory based on vitalism and materialism, by which she rejected the mechanical philosophy of Descartes and Hobbes and the experimental philosophy of Boyle and Hooke. Also, while not developing a theory of gender equality, she envisaged a form of emancipation of women b…Read more
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150La filosofia aristotelico-cartesiana di Johannes de RaeyGiornale Critico Della Filosofia Italiana 7 (1): 107-132. 2011.The search for an agreement between Aristotle’s and Descartes’ philosophy was aimed at making Cartesian physics acceptable in the Dutch universities by showing its consistency with Aristotelian thought. Their agreement is defended by Johannes De Raey in the Clavis philosophiae naturalis (1654), where he interprets the Corpus Aristotelicum from a Cartesian standpoint. Those Aristotelian positions which are inconsistent with Descartes’ are treated as erroneous. The Scholastic positions, moreover, …Read more
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137Ignis/FeuIn Igor Agostini (ed.), Nouvel Index scolastico-cartésien, Vrin. pp. 1-11. forthcoming.
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135Tying the Double Metaphysics of Johannes Clauberg: Ontosophia and Rational TheologyIn Stefano Caroti & Alberto Siclari (eds.), Filosofia e religione. Studi in onore di Fabio Rossi, E-theca Onlineopenaccess Edizioni. pp. 156-187. 2014.The German philosopher Johannes Clauberg (1622–1665) was the first academic teacher who attempted to put the philosophy of René Descartes (1596–1650) at the basis of all disciplines of the traditional curriculum of studies, that is, to establish a Cartesian Scholasticism. To this aim, he developed a first philosophy, i.e. a metaphysics including rational-theological arguments, which was based on Descartes’s Meditationes de prima philosophia (1641). By it, Clauberg attempted to provide philosophy…Read more
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133Le premesse del discorso sulla soggettività nell’età moderna: il dibattito cartesianoI Quaderni Della Ginestra 8 (1): 6-13. 2013.Il discorso moderno e contemporaneo sulla soggettività prende le mosse dall'opera di René Descartes (1596-1650), universalmente considerato l'iniziatore della filosofia moderna. Improntata ad un severo meccanicismo, la filosofia di Descartes nasce come un tentativo di sostituzione della fisica aristotelica nel curriculum universitario dell’epoca. La fisica, secondo l'ordine degli studi delle università a cavallo fra ‘500 e ‘600, costituito dalle discipline filosofiche e letterarie del trivio e d…Read more
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131Sturm, JohannEncyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy. 2016.Johann Sturm was a Reformed pedagogic innovator, who established a teaching curriculum for gymnasia in order to provide an education based on the humanist ideals and on evangelical piety. This model described the contents and the method of learning for boys from 7 to 16 years and consisted mainly of the study of grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic (based on Cicero and on classic literature). His method of learning was based on memorization and imitation rather than on the understanding of formal ru…Read more
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129The Crypto-Dualism of Henricus RegiusIn Stefano Caroti & Mariafranca Spallanzani (eds.), Individuazione, individualità, identità personale. Le ragioni del singolo, Le Lettere. pp. 133-151. 2014.The current literature on Henricus Regius mainly focuses on his connections with the relevant context of the Utrecht crisis, on his relations with Descartes, on his views in medicine and natural philosophy, as well as on his notion of human being. Being these a weighty source of the analysis of Regius’s thought, I will focus on a still overlooked topic: namely, the logical and metaphysical arguments employed by Regius with regards to dualism. In fact, in the light of such arguments one can ascer…Read more
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125Humor/HumeurIn Igor Agostini (ed.), Nouvel Index scolastico-cartésien, Vrin. pp. 1-4. forthcoming.
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123On Three Unpublished Letters of Johannes de Raey to Johannes ClaubergNoctua 1 (1): 66-103. 2014.The present study aims to present a transcription and a commentary of three unpublished letters of the Dutch Cartesian philosopher Johannes de Raey, addressed to his former student Johannes Clauberg. Mainly containing suggestions concerning the defence of Cartesian philosophy and academic affairs, these letters, dating back to 1651, 1652 and 1661, bear witness of a steady friendship and of a certain cooperation in rebuking the critiques moved by Jacob Revius in his Statera philosophiae cartesian…Read more
Areas of Specialization
History of Western Philosophy |
History of Science |
17th/18th Century Philosophy |