- Docente: Rossella Lupacchini
- Credits: 12
- SSD: M-FIL/02
- Language: Italian
- Teaching Mode: Traditional lectures
- Campus: Bologna
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Corso:
First cycle degree programme (L) in
Anthropology, Religions, Oriental Civilizations (cod. 8493)
Also valid for First cycle degree programme (L) in History (cod. 0962)
First cycle degree programme (L) in Philosophy (cod. 9216)
Learning outcomes
By the end of the course students will be aware of the ways of construing the notion of truth and have a semantic notion of the same. They will be able to tackle complex themes like the relation between truth and natural language, or to harness their philosophical know-how to the social sciences and to formulating a scientific explanation.
Course contents
Characters of Scientific Knowledge
The concept of measure is crucial for philosophy of science. What is meant by measuring? Is it possible to measure the infinite? How to give a numeric value for a physical quantity through measurement? In the Greek mathematics, the issue of incommensurable quantities determined the divergence between arithmetic and geometry. In some sense, a similar question arises in quantum physics from the difficulty of reconciling the continuous description of an isolated system with the uncertainty relations between observable quantities.
How does the observer affect the measurement process? How does geometry take hold of the mind of nature? Seeing perspective drawing as an art of measure, the Renaissance painters were first to gain a clear awareness of the ideal character of geometry.
This course aims to clarify the dialectic contrast “real-ideal” by exploring the link between artistic and scientific representation, and to show the opposition discrete-continuous not as a problem to be solved, but rather as an inescapable presupposition for defining both the notion of “real number” and the notion of “observable quantity”.
Mathematical Ideas
- Incommensurability
- Infinity: Potential and Actual
- The Euclidean Space
- Perspective
- Ideal Elements
- Computability
- Real Numbers
Physical Forms
- Observable Quantities
- Measuring and "Seeing"
- The Sensible World
- The Representation Space
- Virtual Reality
- The Uncertainty Principle
- The Continuity Principle
Readings/Bibliography
Main References
Stillwell J. (2019), A Concise History of Mathematics for Philosophers, Cambridge University Press
Weyl H. (1949), Philosophy of Mathematics and Natural Science, Princeton Univ. Press, Princeton (§§ 1-4; 19)
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Deutsch D. (1997), The Fabric of Reality, Penguin, London
Feynman R. P., Leighton R. B., Sands M. (1965), "Quantum Behaviour", The Feynman Lectures on Physics, Addison-Wesley, Reading MA (chap 1)
Essays
Cassirer E. (1927), The Individual and the Cosmos in Renaissance Philosophy, Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia 1963 (Chaps. 1-2, 4)
- Plato, Republic , VI-VII
- Plato, Timaeus
- Cusanus N. [1440], On Learned Ignorance, (Book I: Chaps 1-17, Book III)
Hilbert D. [1918], «Axiomatic Thought», in From Kant to Hilbert, edited by W. Ewald, Oxford Univ. Press 1996
Weyl H. [1932], «The Open World», in Mind and Nature, edited by P. Pesic, Princeton Univ. Press, Princeton 2009
Further Reading
Gillies D., Philosophy of Science in the Twentieth Century, Blackwell, Oxford 1993
Lupacchini R., Angelini A. (eds), The Art of Science. From Perspective Drawing to Quantum Randomness, Springer 2014
Weyl H., Philosophy of Mathematics and Natural Science, Princeton Univ. Press, Princeton 1949
Teaching methods
Lectures
Students are advised to attend classes regularly.
Assessment methods
Written and oral examination.
Marks:
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 correctly 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 - Basic skills and knowledge are not sufficiently acquired. Students are requested to show up at a subsequent exam session.
Office hours
See the website of Rossella Lupacchini