73084 - History of Modern Philosophy (2) (LM)

Learning outcomes

The lectures allow the student to interpret the significant nodes of European thought in the fifteenth and eighteenth Centuries and to identify intersections with other areas of Western culture. Skills about the main interpretation and historiographical lines in order to modern philosophy and the concept of modernity, allow to recognize topics and themes' projections of modern thought in the contemporary philosophical debate, and to proceed retrospectively to the origin of subjects and long-running problems.

Course contents

From the "speculum vivum" to the "vis viva".
II. Infinity and monas in Leibniz' universe

Qual è ’l geomètra che tutto s’affige/per misurar lo cerchio, e non ritrova/pensando, quel principio ond’ elli indige/ tal era io a quella vista nova:/veder voleva come si convenne/ l’imago al cerchio e come vi s’indova (Dante, Paradiso XXXIII). Π, irrational numbers, shadows dissolved in Dante's infinite abyss, announce the philosophical-scientific-theological conception of Nicholas of Cusa’s infinite. The same “devices” would return, two centuries later, in the Leibnizian conception of the monad as a finite and mobile mirror reflecting an immutable infinite, namely a world's framework, which only a logic, or a mathematics, of infinity can investigate.

The second module of the course (30 h) focuses on Leibniz's philosophical and scientific conception.
Monad, point of view, vivum speculum, shadow, phantasma, vis viva, ideal point and point at infinity... are some of the entries dealt with during class.
The aim is to correlate Leibniz's thought not only to t philosophers like Cusano, but also to twentieth-century theoretical conceptions.

Readings/Bibliography

All students are expected to know

G. W. Leibniz, Monadologia, Torino, Bompiani, 2001

G.W. Leibniz, Discorso di metafisica, in Saggi filosofici e lettere, a cura di V. Mathieu, Bari, Laterza, 1963, pp. 104-144.

G.W. Leibniz, Sulla natura in se stessa, , in Saggi filosofici e lettere, a cura di V. Mathieu, Bari, Laterza, 1963, pp. 289-306.

Cusano e Leibniz. Prospettive filosofiche, a cura di A. Dall'Igna e D. Roberi, Milano Mimesis, 2013

furthermore:

two of the following essays (students who have not attended classes should choose and read three essays):

G. Deleuze, La piega. Leibniz e il Barocco, Torino, Einaudi 2004

- M.R. Antognazza, Leibniz. Una biografia intellettuale, Milano, Hoepli, 2015

- R. Casati, La scoperta dell'ombra, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2008

- A. Angelini, Matematica e immaginazione nel Rinascimento, Milano, Editrice Bibliografica, 2016

- R. Lupacchini, Nella mente della natura. Dalla scienza della luce alla dottrina delle ombre, Pisa, ETS, 2020.

Teaching methods

Unless otherwise noted, all classes will be given online on MS Teams.

 15 lectures.
During the course central paragraphs of the Leibniz' texts listed in the bibliography will be read and and compared with some sources and some critical interpretations of later philosophers. Students are required to provide the text before the course begins.
Summaries and schemes of the classes will be periodically uploaded on AlmaDigital Library.
Students who attend classes are required to enroll, before the course begins, to the distribution list, ID: annarita.angelini.Leibniz, password: Leibniz
We recommend the students to see regulary the teacher's web page on which will be uploaded any information and change useful to those who attending the classes.
Students who have attended classes can replace the above texts with specific topics. These topics have to be agreed with the teacher at the end of the course.

Assessment methods

Oral examination: Students are recommended to bring the texts when examining.The interview focuses mainly on analysis and critical interpretation of the sources.
Students who have attended lectures may agree on exams (whether written or oral) devoted to specific topics.

Assessment criteria and thresholds of evaluation:

30 cum laude - Excellent as to knowledge, philosophical lexicon and critical expression.

30 – Excellent: knowledge is complete, well argued and correctly expressed, with some slight faults.

27-29 – Good: thorough and satisfactory knowledge; essentially correct expression.

24-26 - Fairly good: knowledge broadly acquired, and not always correctely expressed.

21-23 – Sufficient: superficial and partial knowledge; exposure and articulation are incomplete and often not sufficiently appropriate

18-21 - Almost sufficient: superficial and decontextualized knowledge. The exposure of the contents shows important gaps.

Exam failed - Students are requested to show up at a subsequent exam session if basic skills and knowledge are not sufficiently acquired and not placed in the historical-philosophical context.

Teaching tools

The text is an essential tool in order to actively participate in the classes. It is recommended to get hold of the text before classes.
The summaries of the lectures will be periodically (every three to six lectures) uploaded and allowed to the online consultation. Students have to enroll to the distribution list ID: annarita.angelini.Leibniz, password:Leibniz

Office hours

See the website of Annarita Angelini