Italian idealism: Difference between revisions

==Risorgimento HegelismHegelianism==

De Sanctis's concept of [[art]] and of [[italian literature|literary history]], inspired by Hegel, will stimulate the genesis of Crocian idealism.<ref name=Garin974>{{harvnb|Garin|2008|pp=974-976974–976}}.</ref>

[[Augusto Vera]], author of writings and commentaries about Hegel, was a famous philosopher in Europe, who interpreted the Hegelian [[Absolute (philosophy)|Absolute]] in a [[religion|religious]] and [[transcendence (philosophy)|transcendent]] sense.<ref name=Garin961>{{harvnb|Garin|2008|pp=961-964961–964}}.</ref>

An opposite interpretation was formulated by [[Bertrando Spaventa|Bertrand Spaventa]], for whom the [[Spirit]] was [[immanent]] in the [[history of philosophy]].

Reconstructing the development of [[Italian philosophy]], Spaventa argued that [[Italian Renaissance]] thought of [[Giordano Bruno|Bruno]] and [[Tommaso Campanella|Campanella]] had been at the origin of [[modern philosophy]], but had stopped due to the [[Counter-Reformation]]. Its task now was to catch up with [[European philosophy]], linking up with [[Giambattista Vico|Vico]]'s mind philosphyphilosophy, which along with those of [[Pasquale Galluppi|Galluppi]], [[Antonio Rosmini|Rosmini]], and [[Vincenzo Gioberti|Gioberti]], had anticipated themes of [[Kantism]] and [[German idealism]].

The [[thesis, antithesis, synthesis|synthesis]] of the actual thinking of the [[Spirit]] was then placed by Spaventa, as the only reality, not only after the hegelian moments of [[Idea]] and of [[Nature]], but so as to permeate them also from the beginning.<ref name=Garin964>{{harvnb|Garin|2008|pp=964-974964–974}}.</ref>

After a parenthesis characterized by [[positivism]], in 1913 [[Giovanni Gentile]] (1875–1944) with the publication of ''The reform of Hegelian dialectics'' resumed Spaventa's interpretation of the Hegelian [[Idea]], seeing in Hegelian Spirit the category of [[Becoming (philosophy)|becoming]] as coinciding with the [[pure act]] of thought in which the whole [[reality]] of nature, history and spirit was transfused.<ref name=Garin995>{{harvnb|Garin|2008|pp=995-1066995–1066}}.</ref>

Every thing exists only in the mental act of thinking it: there are no single empirical entities separated from the [[Transcendentals|trascendental]] [[consciousness]]; even the [[past]] lives only in the actual, [[present]] moment of memory. To Gentile, who considered himself the "philosopher of [[Fascism]]",<ref>M. E. Moss (2004), ''[https://books.google.itcom/books?id=a3ufdGvSo1MC&printsec=frontcover&dq=isbn:082046838X&hl=it&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiez8Os0NfZAhUpDMAKHWz1ApkQ6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q&f=false Mussolini's Fascist Philosopher: Giovanni Gentile Reconsidered]'',. New York: Peter Lang, 2004. {{ISBN |9780820468389}}.</ref> [[actual idealism]] was the sole remedy to [[philosophy|philosophically]] preserving [[Libertarianism (metaphysics)|free]] [[Agency (philosophy)|agency]], by making the act of thinking self-creative, and, therefore, without any contingency and not in the potency of any other fact.<ref name=Garin995/>

{{lang|it|Una concezione idealistica mira a concepire lo stesso assoluto, il tutto, come idea: ed è perciò intrinsecamente idealismo assoluto. Ma assoluto l'idealismo non può essere se l'idea non coincide con lo stesso atto del conoscerla; perché - è questa la più profonda origine delle difficoltà in cui si dibatte il platonismo - se l'idea non fosse lo stesso atto per cui l'idea si conosce, l'idea lascerebbe fuori di sè qualche cosa, e l'idealismo pertanto non sarebbe più assoluto.<ref name=Gentile>[[Giovanni Gentile]], ''[https://archive.org/stream/thetheoryofminda00gentuoft#page/n1/mode/2up The Theory of Mind as Pure Act]'' [1916], chapter XVII, § 1, pp. 253-254, translated by Herbert Wildon Carr, London, Macmillan, 1922.</ref>}}

To his actual vision was opposed since 1913 [[Benedetto Croce]] (1866–1952, cousin of [[Bertrando Spaventa]]) who in his ''Essay on Hegel'' interpreted Hegelian thought as immanentist [[historicism]]: he also understood the Hegelian dialectic of the opposites in a different way, integrating it with that of the «distincts».<ref name=Garin995/> According to Croce, infactin fact, the life of the [[Spirit]] also consists of autonomous moments that are not opposed, but rather distinct, that is:

*"[[artArt]]", [[intuitive]] [[knowledge]] of the [[particular]], which aims to [[beauty]];

*"[[philosophyPhilosophy]]", [[logical]] knowledge of the [[universal (metaphysics)|universal]], which aims to [[truth]];

*"[[economyEconomy]]",   [[volition (psychology)|volition]] of the particular, which aims to [[usefulusefulness]];

*"[[ethicsEthics]]", volition of the universal, which aims to [[good]].<ref name=Garin995/>

Referring to [[Giambattista Vico]], Croce identified [[philosophy]] with [[history]], understood not as a capricious sequence of events, but the implementation of [[Reason]], in the light of which it becomes possible the historical understanding of the genesis of facts, and their simultaneous justification with itsher own unfolding.

{{lang|it|La storia non è mai giustiziera, ma sempre giustificatrice; e giustiziera non potrebbe farsi se non facendosi ingiusta, ossia confondendo il pensiero con la vita, e assumendo come giudizio del pensiero le attrazioni e le repulsioni del sentimento.<ref name=Croce>[[Benedetto Croce]], ''[https://books.google.itcom/books?id=5FHuAgAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&hl=it#v=onepage&q&f=false Theory and history of historiography]'' [1917], p. 89, translated by Douglas Ainslie, London, Harrap, 1921.</ref>}}

[[Historian]]'s task is therefore to overcome every form of [[emotion|emotionality]]ality towards the studied matter, and to present it in form of [[knowledge]], without referring to good or evil.<ref name=Garin995/>

After having characterized Italian philosophical [[Italian culture|culture]] for over forty years, after the [[secondSecond worldWorld warWar]] the neo-idealism entered a crisis, replaced by [[existentialism]], [[neo-positivism]], [[Phenomenology (philosophy)|phenomenology]] and [[marxism]].<ref name=Garin995/>

* {{cite book | last = Garin | first = Eugenio | title = History of Italian Philosophy | publisher = Rodopi | translator-last = Giorgio A. Pinton | location = New York | year = 2008 | isbn = 9789042023215|pages=961–976| ref=CITEREFGarin2008 | url = https://books.google.itcom/books?id=sVP3vBmDktQC&printsec=frontcover&hl=it#v=onepage&q&f=false}}

* Myra E. Moss, ''[https://books.google.itcom/books?id=a3ufdGvSo1MC&printsec=frontcover&dq=isbn:082046838X&hl=it&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiez8Os0NfZAhUpDMAKHWz1ApkQ6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q&f=false Mussolini's Fascist Philosopher: Giovanni Gentile Reconsidered]'', Peter Lang, 2004 {{ISBN |9780820468389}}

* Myra E. Moss, ''[https://booksarchive.google.itorg/details/books?id=ux8mpuhFa7kC&printsec=frontcover&hl=it#v=onepage&q&f=falsebenedettocrocere00moss Benedetto Croce: Essays on Literature and Literary Criticism]'', SUNY Press, 1990 {{ISBN |9781438413754}}

*{{cite web|url=http://www.filosofia.it/archivio/images/download/argomenti/Sasso_IdealismoItaliano.pdf|author=Gianluca Miligi|title=L'idealismo italiano: intervista a Gennaro Sasso| |publisher= Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, per l'Enciclopedia Multimediale delle Scienze Filosofiche |language=Italian |format= PDF| year=2002 | accessdate=March 6, 2018}}