Wolff develops a reinterpretation of the philosophical categories of traditional practical philosophy in order to adapt its content to the requirements of modern thought. Both rationality, that must infer goodness understood as the object of behaviour, and desire, that motivates human behaviour, are for Wolff already newly defined through the categories provided by the philosophy of the seventeenth century. In order to save the content of the ethics of goodlife, Wolff develops a rationally-foundet theory of motivation that then from Kant (...) onwards was used to combat traditional ethics. The relevance of Wolff's practical philosophy does not so much consist in that it revives and updates philosophical categories of an old tradition whose demise seemed inevitable with the appearance of the modern period. It consists much more in that Wolff's practical philosophy unites two epochs which, following him, can no longer be conceived without difficulty in a coherent theory of practice. By means of a positive reference to Hobbes, Descartes and Leibniz, Wolff arrives at a solution - in keeping with the requirements of modern philosophy - of the Aristotelian problem of how goodness may be comprehended as real and achievable by humans. (shrink)

A partir –al menos– de 1960, diferentes interpretaciones de la ética aristotélica de la virtud han condicionado profundamente el carácter de la discusión filosófica contemporánea en torno al bien y a la justicia. De hecho, es a través de una utilización de interpretaciones diferentes de la ética de la virtud, que se han hecho valer reivindicaciones y argumentaciones contra la ética deontológica de origen kantiano. Desde presupuestos filosóficos muy similares el problema ha sido afrontado tanto en el ámbito filosófico anglosajón (...) como en el ámbito alemán. La tesis de este trabajo es que de la Scienza nuova de Vico es posible extraer el modelo de una forma del comprender y una teoría del lenguaje que permiten articular el significado individual de la experiencia de la fragmentariedad y casualidad de la vida que la interpretación debe ordenar, constituyendo de este modo el sentido del propio ser, que se realiza a través de un comprender que es, contemporáneamente, el proyecto de un hacer.Much of the recent objections brought against some of the claims in deontologic ethics have arisen in connection with the the ethics concerning virtue. The discussion has been fruitful both in the Anglo-saxon and Germanic academies. The thesis of this paper is that Vico’s New science may furnish a pattern as to enable us to understanding both a metaphysic and a theory of language through which it may be constructed a conceptual frame to unify our own experiences. The problem of identity and the self is best understood when it is viewed from the Vichian claim in terms of which the meaning of the self is explained as the proyect of realizing. (shrink)