Behind a succinct account about Euler and his connection with the philosophy, on show forth his arguments for to prove the effective existence of the absolute space in the Mechanica sive motus scientia (1736) and in the Reflexions sur l’espace et le temps (1748). These works constitute the Euler’s first approximation in defence of the doctrine of space held by Newton, and against: the Metaphysicians(Leibniz, Berkeley). This paper point at the possible ascendancy about Kant, especially in Von de m ersten (...) Grunde des Unterschiedes der Gegenden im Raume (1768). (shrink)

This paper analyses some aspects in Osiander’s (1498-1552) “Preface” to De Revolutionibus (1543) by Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1453) and the “Preface Letter” also by Copernicus to the Pope Paul III (1468-1549). The reading is carried out from the intellectual framework where the works are written, taking as a reference De Disciplinis (1531) by Juan Luis Vives (1492-1538), whose pedagogical thought had great influence on the 16th century. This paper points at the coincidence of attitudes as to the function of Mathematics, and (...) therefore, of Astronomy, for both a purely probabilistic assessment of theastronomical hypotheses, and the overcoming of the instrumentality of the calculations by means of their practical use. This last channel, promoted by a sceptic academicism which was already present in the first half of the 16th century, contributes to a better understanding of the reality of the progressive acceptation of a new structure of the world. Vives has very frequently been talked of as the clear antecedent of the great masters of thought of the modern culture, but his style and the dynamics of his thought -totally Humanist- are very different from those of Copernicus and Osiander, and thus, this paper aims to analyse his cultural context and his reflections about himself. (shrink)

This paper is intended to be a homage to the philosopher Ludovieo GEYMONAT, deceased in Milano the 29-XI-1991. It presents his contribution to the introduction of the neopositivism in Italy, in the thirties; the posterior planning of an epistemology strongly influenced by the History of Science; and the continous dialogue with the neopositivism, behind that GEYMONAT has embraced the dialectic materialism, as a philosophic general frame.