Un' idea di umanità

About this book

TABLE OF CONTENTS (in English) Introduction Chapter 1: Facing Nature 1. Modern Dilemmas 2. In Search of Human Nature 3. Naturalistic Fallacies 4. Between Nature and Identity Chapter 2: After Darwin 1. Prologue: Darwin’s Relevance for Philosophy 2. Species 3. Time 4. Mind and Nature 5. Morality 6. Epilogue: Our Victorian Contemporary Chapter 3: Naturalisms 1. Raising the Stakes 2. Darwinism 3. Darwin and Religion 4. We, Animals Abstract: Darwin and his evolutionary theory of the origin of species are still at the centre of a fiery public debate that goes far beyond the boundaries, vague as they are, of the scientific community. In spite of the repeated calls to consider it a limited and empirically amply supported set of scientific claims, it continues to be the object of a dispute whose implications far exceed the long but, on the whole, peaceful theoretical controversy that it helped to arouse. It is easy to understand why. Darwin’s claims have a much more direct and significant impact on our self-understanding than other scientific theories. While they pave the way for answering the traditional metaphysical questions about our origin and destination, they run up against the religious, cosmic, anthropological, ethical imaginaries and, consequently, most of the social practices upon which our civilization is based. A long and winding cultural process of redefinition of man-and-nature relationship has come to an end with Darwin. Its main result is a historically unprecedented view of human nature or, more precisely, a radical naturalization of how we understand our life form.