Full Professor of Philosophy of the Person -Snn Raffaele University, MilanFrom 2009 Director of PERSONA, (Research Centre in Phenomenology and Sciences of the Person: http://www.unisr.it/list.asp?id=5565, which has a permanent forum open to interested researchers: Phenomenologylab, www.phenomenologylab.eu/From 2011 Chief Editor of “Phenomenology and Mind” – The Online Journal of PERSONA: http://www.phenomenologylab.eu/index.php/2011/07/phenomenology-and-mind/Recent Research Projects:PRIN 2006-2008, Local Director – Ontology of the Human Person: Social Relevance and Neurobiological Correlates - in collaboration with the Faculties of Medicine and Psychology.PRIN 2010-2012 Local Director - Person, Social Cognition and Normativity - in collaboration with the Faculties of Medicine and Psychology. Beitrag zum Entwurf – Villa Vigoni Gesprächs in den Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften (Im Rahmen der Vereinbarung mit der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft) – Antragsteller: Prof. Dr. Andreas Speer, Forschungschule A.R.T.E.S., Universitaet Köln, R. De Monticelli, Research Centre for Phenomenology and the sciences of the Person, San Raffaele University
The Oxford Handbook of Phenomenological Psychopathology
Edmund Husserl’s relevance for phenomenological psychopathology and psychiatry hinges in part on ... more Edmund Husserl’s relevance for phenomenological psychopathology and psychiatry hinges in part on the foundational and methodological aspects of his philosophy, as rooted both in Gestalt psychology and experimental phenomenology of perception and thought. A second distinctive reason for his persisting and increasing significance lies in his Socratic quest for the foundations of meaning, order, value, and coherence within ordinary experience, which still provide clinicians with concepts to focus abnormal patterns on all these parameters. Besides this twofold renewed framework of clinical theory, Husserl’s analyses of consciousness and personhood deliver a series of categories and distinctions still in use in best diagnostic and clinical practices.
L'A. etudie le sentiment de l'origine (ek) qui s'exprime a travers la notion platonic... more L'A. etudie le sentiment de l'origine (ek) qui s'exprime a travers la notion platonicienne de participation et qui fonde l'ontologie de Platon. C'est cette possibilite d'etre, percue comme propre et originaire, qui rend possible le chemin de connaissance platonicien
Metodo. International Studies in Phenomenology and Philosophy, Jan 12, 2015
This paper focuses on value, which I shall provisionally define as the experiential aspect of nor... more This paper focuses on value, which I shall provisionally define as the experiential aspect of normativity. That there is an experiential aspect of normativity is a main claim of classical phenomenology. This paper aims to provide some evidence for this claim. I shall first discuss the current state of knowledge concerning normative properties and the dilemma of normative supervenience (Part 1). We shall then devote ourselves to an exercise in visual and emotional exploration, accompanied by a phenomenological analysis of value(s), which will allow us to spell out what appears to be wrong with all the competing proposed non-phenomenological solutions to the dilemma (Part 2). I shall finally outline a phenomenological way out of the dilemma, thereby indicating the path to a full-fledged phenomenological axiology.
The Oxford Handbook of Phenomenological Psychopathology
Edmund Husserl’s relevance for phenomenological psychopathology and psychiatry hinges in part on ... more Edmund Husserl’s relevance for phenomenological psychopathology and psychiatry hinges in part on the foundational and methodological aspects of his philosophy, as rooted both in Gestalt psychology and experimental phenomenology of perception and thought. A second distinctive reason for his persisting and increasing significance lies in his Socratic quest for the foundations of meaning, order, value, and coherence within ordinary experience, which still provide clinicians with concepts to focus abnormal patterns on all these parameters. Besides this twofold renewed framework of clinical theory, Husserl’s analyses of consciousness and personhood deliver a series of categories and distinctions still in use in best diagnostic and clinical practices.
L'A. etudie le sentiment de l'origine (ek) qui s'exprime a travers la notion platonic... more L'A. etudie le sentiment de l'origine (ek) qui s'exprime a travers la notion platonicienne de participation et qui fonde l'ontologie de Platon. C'est cette possibilite d'etre, percue comme propre et originaire, qui rend possible le chemin de connaissance platonicien
Metodo. International Studies in Phenomenology and Philosophy, Jan 12, 2015
This paper focuses on value, which I shall provisionally define as the experiential aspect of nor... more This paper focuses on value, which I shall provisionally define as the experiential aspect of normativity. That there is an experiential aspect of normativity is a main claim of classical phenomenology. This paper aims to provide some evidence for this claim. I shall first discuss the current state of knowledge concerning normative properties and the dilemma of normative supervenience (Part 1). We shall then devote ourselves to an exercise in visual and emotional exploration, accompanied by a phenomenological analysis of value(s), which will allow us to spell out what appears to be wrong with all the competing proposed non-phenomenological solutions to the dilemma (Part 2). I shall finally outline a phenomenological way out of the dilemma, thereby indicating the path to a full-fledged phenomenological axiology.
Draft to be published in a Handbook of Phenomenological Psychopathology and Psychiatry. Identifie... more Draft to be published in a Handbook of Phenomenological Psychopathology and Psychiatry. Identifies methodological and substantive issues which have been taken over by the classics of Phenomenological Psychiatry
A speech as Invited Speaker at the Opening of 2016 Academic Year at the University of Bologna. Su... more A speech as Invited Speaker at the Opening of 2016 Academic Year at the University of Bologna. Subject: The philosophical roots of the European Union in the super-national reality of Western academic tradition.
This is the text of a talk in memory and honor of Giuseppe Lo Manto, Pippo for all his friends, a... more This is the text of a talk in memory and honor of Giuseppe Lo Manto, Pippo for all his friends, a marvelous teacher at the Liceo Einstein (Palermo), and the founder of the Settimane di Studi Danteschi, that for twenty-four years has attracted and involved thousands of young people from Sicily and Italy in passionate discussions and performances about the Divine Comedy, and the world literature and thought of all ages. This year's week (2020) was the first without Pippo, and it was dedicated to him, starting from the caress that Dante gives his master, Brunetto Latini, "e chinando la mano alla sua faccia" (Inferno XV, 29.) A Pippo vorrei dedicare una riflessione sul senso dell'insegnamento che non è solo il poco che ne verrà fuori oggi. Gli dedico in cuor mio, da quando se ne è andato, ogni momento della riflessione costantemente interrotta e costantemente ripresa che accompagna le mie giornate, da quando ho deciso di ritirarmi, appunto, dall'insegnamento attivo, con qualche anno di anticipo. Perché io abbia preso questa decisione è quasi irrilevante : il solo aspetto che c'entra con quello che vorrei dire è che, nell'essenziale, la ragione di questo ritiro è che il mio insegnamento non è più all'altezza, se mai lo sia stato, del modello di Magister che ho in mente quando penso a Lo Manto. E penso a lui, che non mi fu letteralmente maestro, anche per impossibilità anagrafica, ma che vidi per così dire nel pieno esercizio del suo magistero; ma penso anche ad altri, in particolare ad alcuni dei miei maestri effettivi, di quelli veri che ebbi la fortuna di avere. Anche per me, dunque, è tempo di bilanci, ed è per questo che la mia riflessione sarà magari inetta, ma è certamente sincera, urgente anche per me. Con la differenza che per quanto poco io possa essere stata all'altezza del mio modello, gran male non posso aver fatto, perché i ragazzi che hanno già, magari anche solo provvisoriamente, scelto la loro via e vengono all'Università, sono un po' più difesi dalla nostra inettitudine, sia perché sono già più maturi sia perché assorbono in proporzione assai più piccole dosi di eventuale danno da ciascuno di noi. E dunque l'ultima di queste considerazioni preliminari è che, invece, enorme, nel bene e nel male, è e sarà, nella vita di ciascun ragazzo e ragazza, il peso di un insegnante così ancora centrale come è, nelle scuole secondarie, l'insegnante di umanità (tornerò poi sul senso di questo latinismo e
A Leibnizian suggestion about the kind of automata we are-not only non-replicable, but embodied a... more A Leibnizian suggestion about the kind of automata we are-not only non-replicable, but embodied and enactive (against the Classic Computational Model of the mind) and unitary, holistic and self-originating albeit not self-created (against the Embodied Mind Model). Involving a view of Free Will alternative both to Incompatibilistic Libertarianism and Compatibilism, as a sub-property of a self-individuating power, or the power of initiating a course of action.
To be published in the Oxford Handbook of Phenomenological Psychopathology, edited by Giovanni St... more To be published in the Oxford Handbook of Phenomenological Psychopathology, edited by Giovanni Stanghellini, Matthew Broome, Anthony Fernandez, Paolo Fusar-Poli, Andrea Raballo and René Rosfort., Forthcoming
This paper addresses the topic of the emotional conflict by presenting a fictional case study, ex... more This paper addresses the topic of the emotional conflict by presenting a fictional case study, exemplifying the overwhelming force of social pressure on individual consciousness. This is a phenomenon we are well familiar with in the wake of the era of totalitarian states in 20 th century Europe, although it seems also to be a structural feature of social life not just limited to totalitarian contexts, as Milgram's and Zimbardo's experiments show. The moral conflict endured by the hero of our narrative displays a rich phenomenology of value experience, revealing an amazing yet essential link between moral courage and intellectual insight. Drawing on some basic tenets of a phenomenological theory of emotional feeling, this paper argues for three distinctively anti-Kantian claims concerning the relations i) between autonomy and moral knowledge, ii) between moral knowledge and social conformism; iii) between morality and individual personality. Coleridge defined imagination as " The power to disimprison the soul of fact ". At least since Aristotle, literary fiction has served as a laboratory for philosophical inquiry, presenting us, as Aristotle has it, with what is more plausible, or close to the truth, than historical facts, which enjoy at best a contingent, particular truth, as opposed to the necessary and universal ones that concern what is essentially possible. That's why my study case is a literary one, taken from Vasilij Grossman's Life and Fate, this immense epic novel which has rightly been regarded as the 20 th century's War and Peace. Life and Fate contains perhaps one of the deepest intuitions about what makes a life worth living that we can find in contemporary literature. That is especially so insofar as it captures an important part of what we have learned from the history of the 20 th century and the tragic age of the totalitarian states in Europe. The intuition I refer to is about truth and freedom, as well as their link. Through the vicissitudes faced by the novel's characters, we learn to see the unity of moral and intellectual freedom, which grow and wane together. There is a kind of harmony, of unity, or at least a deep connection, between moral courage and intellectual vision, between morality and knowledge, what is given to the will and what is given to the intellect, or, again, we could say, between moral and intellectual values or virtues. We might even think of it as the connection between ethics and science (§1). This is the important discovery that emerges from Grossman's lifelong inquiry into the effects of totalitarianism on the individual mind. Because of this link, the lack of political freedom can have devastating effects even at a spiritual level. At the same time, an individual's resistance to the overwhelming force of social pressure on its consciousness may enable that individual to experience the unity I have just introduced – and to grasp it in a blissful experience, as we shall see, comparable to what in a more religious age would be called salvation. This " salvation " – or rather, this rescued selfhood – is what is at stake in the moral conflict we shall examine with Grossman's poetic imagination as our guide (§2).
Contemporary philosophical research on emotions has focused on their intentionality, in particula... more Contemporary philosophical research on emotions has focused on their intentionality, in particular on the specific intentional work done by feeling (" feeling-towards " in Peter Goldie's positive phrasing, as opposed to a tendency to " over-intellectualize " emotions, explaining them in terms of beliefs and desires, or to reduce them to purely subjective states or qualia). But is there any satisfactory general theory of feeling, capable of putting some order into a stunning variety of affective phenomena, often piled up quite haphazardly? After discussing Goldie's approach, focusing on the relation between emotions and values, which is much discussed in contemporary analytic philosophy (§1), this paper, drawing on classic sources in phenomenological literature, provides three principles that define feeling's specific intentionality (§2). On the basis of these three principles, I attempt to outline a full-fledged phenomenology of feeling (§3), showing the crucial role played by emotional life in shaping personhood, personal identity and the foundations of practical reason. Finally, I suggest some answers to questions raised in the preceding sections, including the crucial one about the connection between two levels of affective sensibility that appear to be involved in value experience: one that is basically embodied, and one that is cognitively of a " higher " level, involved in a large variety of acts and behaviors characteristic of a rational and moral agent – such as a human being (§4).
Il filo conduttore di questa riflessione insegue le occasioni perdute, quelle “ore stellari dell’... more Il filo conduttore di questa riflessione insegue le occasioni perdute, quelle “ore stellari dell’umanità” (Stefan Zweig) che avrebbero, se non dissipate, favorito una svolta dell’umanità europea e di quella globale verso un’era di rinnovamento di civiltà. E’ un tentativo di liberare la mente dall’assedio esclusivo del presente e dell’ossessiva ripetizione di poche formule sulla guerra che sta devastando l’Ucraina ma anche, sostengo, l’Unione Europea: resuscitando quella memoria dalla quale soltanto proviene il pensiero critico, ma anche la pietà e la speranza. Perché l’eredità della filosofia e della ragione pratica si faccia finalmente design istituzionale e progetto universalmente civile: perché in luogo della selva geopolitica degli equilibri di potenza si instauri la forza del diritto. Perché dall’Europa riparta un giorno la costruzione di quella “federazione mondiale di repubbliche” di kantiana memoria, che due grandi spiriti universalistici del Novecento, Altiero Spinelli e Michail Gorbacëv – hanno lanciato come un compito per noi, oltre la loro sconfitta.
Dietrich von Hildebrand, D. La bellezza alla luce della redenzione, Presentazione e trad. it. di Claudio Fontanari, Bologna: EDB, pp. 49-101, 2021
In filosofia una questione di metodo diventa presto una questione di sostanza - e perciò in defin... more In filosofia una questione di metodo diventa presto una questione di sostanza - e perciò in definitiva la domanda che potrebbe accompagnare una lettura “giusta” di questo saggio è: ma siamo sicuri – cristiani o no – di sapere che cosa sia “redenzione”, che cosa si possa intendere con questa parola? Ne siamo forse più sicuri che di sapere che cosa sia “bellezza”? Quanto mutate potranno uscire entrambe le nozioni, dall’incontro con il pensiero di von Hildebrand?
Uploads
Papers by Roberta De Monticelli