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Language and Empty Names
by Prof. Michele Marsonet. In a short but important article [1] , the Polish woman philosopher Izydora Dambska criticized the thesis - endorsed by Tadeusz Kotarbinski [2] - to the effect that there are “empty” terms which denote no objects at all, besides the usual general and singular terms. Dambska remarked that “we usually find cited as examples of empty names such self-contradictory names as <square circle> or <son of a childless mother>, or names of mythical deities - fictitious figures that exist only in legends, poems, no…
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National identity and global culture
by Professor Michele Marsonet (University of Genoa, Italy). It is often said today that the agreement on the possibility of greater mutual understanding among human beings has failed. Would have led to the resurgence of long-suppressed hatreds, hatreds that have their source in the differences linked to national identities, ethnic and religious. We would be short before the end of universalistic concepts that have permeated the last centuries. In addition, the skepticism resulting from the growing success of postmodern ideas on the philosoph…
Pragmatism and analysis: different points of view
by Prof. Michele Marsonet Many thinkers nowadays react against the strictures of the analytic tradition by reviving the American philosophy par excellence: pragmatism. The forerunner of this trend of thought in the second half of the past century is Quine, even though he has never been a full-fledged pragmatist: his stance is better pictured by saying that he inserted pragmatist elements in a largely analytic (and even logical empiricist) stance. Following Quine we find Rescher, who began re-evaluating pragmatism in the late 1960’s. Rescher’…
