CITATION: Cornelli, G. 2016. A review of Aristotle’s claim regarding Pythagoreans fundamental beliefs : all is number?. Filosofia Unisinos, 17:50-57, doi:10.4013/fsu.2016.171.06.
Nonostante tutti i tentativi recenti di riscattarla e di metterla nuovamente al centro dell’attenzione politica e accademica, l’infanzia continua a situarsi al margine delle preoccupazioni “serie” del mondo adulto. É un fatto che non ha bisogno, mi sembra, di prove ulteriori rispetto a quelle che quotidianamente si traggono dalla lettura delle pagine economiche e politiche dei nostri giornali. É tuttavia necessario rinunciare ad una lectio universale di questa assenza, che pretenda di generalizzare sistematicamente e in tutti i campi questa esclusione (...) del mondo dei bambini. É all’interno della tradizione della cultura occidentale, della quale la filosofia, quella con la ‘F’ maiuscola, é allo stesso tempo promotrice e prodotto, che possiamo tentar di comprendere l’ampiezza del problema. E anche in questo caso va ricordata l’assenza continua dei bambini dai testi classici della filosofia occidentale. Anche se non assenza della pedagogia, nel seno della ricerca di tekhnai educative che permettevano di “inquadrare” l’infanzia in una società o in un’altra, l’assenza dei bambini é più che altro esclusione dal protagonismo, dalla centralità del suo mondo specifico, dalla rilevanza epistemologica di questo modo di vita in relazione alla “veritá” come tale. Ma anche un’affermazione come quella appena accennata, rischia di riprodurre acriticamente slogan politico-pedagogici poco utili. Senza negare tale assenza e le sua gravi conseguenze per società ancora troppo “adultiste”, quello che si vuol fare é cercare, in una “discesa libera” nella storia del pensiero occidentale, segnali di “altre possibilità”, di equivoche presenze, di sorprendenti centralità del bambino e de suo mondo. Solamente un ritorno all’origine del pensiero occidentale permette uno sguardo allo stesso tempo ingenuo e profondo verso la contraddizione radicale dell’esistenza umana. In queste ricerca, la figura di un “divino bambino” emerge, riflessa nello specchio, da antiche favole da sempre raccontate. Raccontate ai bambini, sì, per dormire. Ma soprattutto agli adulti, perché possano capire. (shrink)
Desde a Magna Grécia de Pitágoras, Empédocles e Parmênides, passando pelas relações “perigosas” entre a sabedoria nascente e as tradições órfico-dionisíacas, em nítida continuidade com a mitologia arcaica e as narrativas teogônicas, dialogando com as práticas médicas asclepíades, a filosofia antiga visita cavernas. A caverna da República, uma das mais poderosas e fecundas alegorias do pensamento ocidental, é simultaneamente herdeira e ponto de fuga da longa trajetória dessa metáfora. Não se pretende aqui, no entanto, compreender a imagem platônica como a (...) consumação de uma velha tradição filosófica que “pensa em cavernas”; procura-se, antes, iluminar essa alegoria com a interpretação oferecida pela filosofia acadêmica posterior. No Antro das Ninfas, Porfírio parte de 11 versos de Homero para habilmente desenhar uma exegese inspirada na teoria platônica da alma. A lectio porfiriana permite sugerir que a imagem da caverna revela algo mais que uma simples alegoria literária. Ela dá prova da existência de relações dialógicas e circulares entre a filosofia platônica e o imaginário religioso popular do mundo antigo. (shrink)
This article proposes to address the relationship between philosophy and politics through the 5th-4th Century's intellectual debate on ethics and politics in Athens. A debate which takes place in the wake of the rise of a new individuality, marked by the discovery of the tragicity of the soul. What stands out in this debate is the redefinition of a philopolitical stand in all its historical ambiguity and ethical idealism. Aristophanes, Thucydides, Euripides, Gorgias and, obviously, Plato himself are striving to define (...) the possibility of the encounter between philosophy and the city, public and private, justice and interests, individual and community. The Platonic solution for the problem reveals complexity and articulation typical of his thought: the philosopher that shelters himself from the storm behind an academic wall is the same who "in order for himself not to seem nothing but words" sails towards the uncertain Syracusan project. (shrink)
In Plato’s Symposium eros and paideia draw the fabric of dramatic and rhetorical speeches and, especially, the picture of the relation between Socrates and Alcibiades. This paper will focus, firstly, on two important facts, which are essential for the correct understanding of the dialogue, both of which appear at the beginning. First, it is said that Socrates, Alcibiades and the others were present at the famous banquet, and second, that the banquet and the erotic speeches of the participants were so (...) celebrated as to attract the attention for several decades to come. So, the memory of that symposium is thus the memory, far beyond the other symposiasts, and through the erotic speeches, of something precise: that is, a particularly significant relationship, that between Socrates and Alcibiades. What matters most for the aim of this paper is the fact that Alcibiades is considered one of the major reasons for the defeat of Athens and the main cause of the crisis into which the city was plunged during the last years of 5th century BC. Due to the distrust of the city towards the groups of ‘philosophers’ that remitted to Alcibiades’ group, it is no surprise that the so-called Socratics committed themselves to refuting the accusation of Socrates having been Alcibiades’ mentor, to the point of reversing the charge. In the same way as the others Plato, also a Socratic, concerns himself with what might be called the ‘Alcibiades’ Connection’. Realizing there obviously was no way to deny the deep connection between Socrates and Alcibiades, he uses a clever dramatic construction with the intention of operating a political intervention upon the memory of this relationship, that is, of rewriting history, with the intent of relieving him of a more precise charge, which must have especially weighed upon Plato andupon Socrates’ memory: of him having been Alcibiades’ lover/mentor. This Platonic apology is based, ultimately, in a clever rhetorical strategy, which emphasizes the now traditional sexual paranomia of Alcibiades, in order tomake him guilty of an attempted excessive and outrageous seduction not only of Socrates, but of the polis itself. Reusing comic and oratorical/rhetorical motifs of his time, therefore, Plato deepens the J’accuse against Alcibiades, trying to withdraw him from the orbit of Socrates and the Socratics. (shrink)
The paper deals with the "deuteros plous", literally ‘the second voyage’, proverbially ‘the next best way’, discussed in Plato’s "Phaedo", the key passage being Phd. 99e4–100a3. The second voyage refers to what Plato’s Socrates calls his “flight into the logoi”. Elaborating on the subject, the author first (I) provides a non-standard interpretation of the passage in question, and then (II) outlines the philosophical problem that it seems to imply, and, finally, (III) tries to apply this philosophical problem to the "ultimate (...) final proof" of immortality and to draw an analogy with the ontological argument for the existence of God, as proposed by Descartes in his 5th "Meditation". The main points are as follows: (a) the “flight into the logoi” can have two different interpretations, a common one and an astonishing one, and (b) there is a structural analogy between Descartes’s ontological argument for the existence of God in his 5th "Meditation" and the "ultimate final proof" for the immortality of the soul in the "Phaedo". (shrink)
No mês de Novembro de 2017, em ocasião do Dia Mundial da Filosofia da UNESCO, a Cátedra UNESCO Archai, do Programa de Pós-Graduação em Metafísica da Universidade de Brasilia, organizou um hangout Unesco sobre o tema Filosofia, gênero e feminismo, do qual participaram diversxs colegas brasileirxs, especialistas do tema, acima assinadxs. A gravação integral do hangout está disponível aqui: https://youtu.be/LH5LwTegGG4. Segue abaixo uma transcrição, revista e adaptada pelxs autorxs.
