"Eco wittily and enchantingly develops themes often touched on in his previous works, but he delves deeper into their complex nature... this collection can be read with pleasure by those unversed in semiotic theory." —Times Literary Supplement.

Serendipities is a careful unraveling of the fabulous and the false, a brilliant exposition of how unanticipated truths often spring from false ideas. From Leibniz's belief that the I Ching illustrated the principles of calculus to Marco Polo's mistaking a rhinoceros for a unicorn, Umberto Eco offers a dazzling tour of intellectual history, illuminating the ways in which we project the familiar onto the strange to make sense of the world. Uncovering layers of mistakes that have shaped human history, Eco (...) offers with wit and clarity such instances as Columbus's voyage to the New World, the fictions that grew around the Rosicrucians and Knights Templar, and the linguistic endeavors to recreate the language of Babel, to show how serendipities can evolve out of mistakes. With erudition, anecdotes, and scholarly rigor, this new collection of essays is sure to entertain and enlighten any reader with a passion for the curious history of languages and ideas. (shrink)

In a companion volume to his "History of Beauty," the renowned philosopher and cultural critic analyzes our attraction to the gruesome, horrific, and repellant in visual culture and the arts, drawing on abundant examples of painting and sculpture, ranging from antiquity to the works of Bosch, Goya, and others.

In the course of the long debate on the nature and the classification of signs, from Boethius to Ockham, there are at least three lines of thought: the Stoic heritage, that influences Augustine, Abelard, Francis Bacon; the Aristotelian tradition, stemming from the commentaries on De Interpretatione; the discussion of the grammarians, from Priscian to the Modistae. Modern interpreters are frequently misled by the fact that the various authors regularly used the same terms. Such a homogeneous terminology, however, covers profound theoretical (...) differences. The aim of these essays is to show that the medieval theory of signs does not represent a unique body of semiotic notions: there are diverse and frequently alternative semiotic theories. This book thus represents an attempt to encourage further research on the still unrecognized variety of the semiotic approaches offered by the medieval philosophies of language. (shrink)

Why are we deeply moved by the misfortune of Anna Karenina if we are fully aware that she is simply a fictional character who does not exist in our world?But what does it mean that fictional characters do not exist? The present article is concerned with the ontology of fictional characters. The author concludes thatsuccessful fictional characters become paramount examples of the ‘real’ human condition because they live in an incomplete world what we have cognitive access to but cannot influence (...) in any way and where no deeds can be undone. Unlike all the other semiotic objects, which are culturally subject to revisions, and perhaps only similar to mathematical entities, the fictual characters will never change and will remain the actors of what they did once and forever. (shrink)

What is beauty? What is art? What is taste and fashion? Is beauty something to be observed coolly and rationally or is it something dangerously involving? So begins Umberto Eco's intriguing journey into the aesthetics of beauty, in which he explores the ever-changing concept of the beautiful from the ancient Greeks to today. While closely examining the development of the visual arts and drawing on works of literature from each era, Eco broadens his enquiries to consider a range of concepts, (...) including the idea of love, the unattainable woman, natural inspiration versus numeric formulas, and the continuing importance of ugliness, cruelty, and even the demonic. Professor Eco takes us from classical antiquity to the present day, dispelling many preconceptions along the way and concluding that the relevance of his research is urgent because we live in an age of great reverence for beauty, "an orgy of tolerance, the total syncretism and the absolute and unstoppable polytheism of Beauty." In this, his first illustrated book, Professor Eco offers a layered approach that includes a running narrative, abundant examples of painting and sculpture, and excerpts from writers and philosophers of each age, plus comparative tables. A true road map to the idea of beauty for any reader who wishes to journey into this wonderful realm with Eco's nimble mind as guide. (shrink)

One is the beloved author of The Name of the Rose, a celebrated scholar, philosopher, and self-declared secularist; the other is a preeminent clergyman and a respected expert on the New Testament. In this intellectually stimulating dialogue, often adversarial but always amicable, these two great men, who stand on opposite sides of the church door, discuss some of the most controversial issues of our day, including the apocalypse, abortion, women in the clergy, and ethics. As we voyage onward into the (...) new millennium, they frame a debate about matters that have already begun to rage, always aware of the gulf between belief and nonbelief that separates them, constantly probing and challenging, but also respectful of the other’s viewpoint. For believers and nonbelievers alike, the result is both edifying and illuminating. “Their correspondence,” writes Professor Harvey Cox in his introduction, “lifts the possibility of intelligent conversation on religion to a new level.”. (shrink)

On the Shoulders of Giants collects previously unpublished essays from the last fifteen years of Umberto Eco's life. With humor and erudition, one of the great contemporary thinkers takes on the roots of Western culture, the origin of language, the nature of beauty and ugliness, the imperfections of art, and the lure of mysteries.

Beauty is both a history of art, and a history of aesthetics. Eco draws on the histories of both art and aesthetics to define the ideas of beauty that have informed sensibilities from the classical world to modern times. Taking in painting, sculpture, architecture, film, photography, the decorative arts, novels and poems, it offers a rich panorama of this huge subject. It traces the philosophy of aesthetics through history and examines some of the many treatises that have sought to (...) define it. Eco writes about Botticelli and Michelangelo, but also about the way fashion of the 1960s owes much to ancient Egyptian dress, or the fact that ancient Roman and eighteenth-century hairstyles have much in common. Bespreking van de Nederlandse vertaling in: Boekman. 17(2005)65(winter. 106-107). (shrink)

La crisi dello strutturalismo e i confini della semiotica in un volume importante della produzione di Eco. Un libro che trova la sua continuazione ideale in 'Lector in fabula'.

Edgar de Bruyne publie ses Études d'esthétique médiévale en 1946, un ouvrage d'une grande dimension qui a dmandé baucoup d'effort, tenant compte avec les autres publication qu'il avait publié dans les années avant la guerre. L'article présent situe de Bruyne dans la philosophie louvaniste et les néo-scolastiques. L'auteur constate que de Bruyne, thomiste qu'il était lui-même, a liberé l'idée esthétique médiévale de l'idée esthétique thomiste. Plus tard il écrivit sur l'esthétique dans la pensée grecque et romaine jusqu'à l'humanisme. AInsi il (...) démontrait qu'il n'y avait pas de système ethétique thomiste en soi, mais que ces idées faisaient partie d'une plus large idée d'esthétique, dans laquelle l'intuition intellectuelle joue un rôle important. Grâce à de Bruyne on connaît mieux la civilisation médiévale. (shrink)

Unlike conventional ethical theory, environmental ethics—and eco-philosophy generally—have frequently been able to escape the desiccating rigors of analytical thinking. This is due in large part to the nonconforming and creative work of people like Henryk Skolimowski, whose ideas have influenced the philosophical dialogue for nearly 40 years now. The guiding principle of his new worldview, that the world is a sanctuary and not a machine, implies a radically expanded conception of eco-ethics. And his metaphysical stance of noetic monism demands (...) that mind and reality be taken together, as a unit. These ideas fit well with the recent trend in philosophy of mind toward panexperientialist ontologies. Collectively, such notions point toward the concept of universal intrinsic value in nature, and a concomitant form of ethics that I call “universal sympathy.”. (shrink)

The article presents Henryk Skolimowski’s standpoint on the civilizational role of technology in the context of his eco-philosophy concept, it also reviews the changes underway in science and technology and the challenges posed on their rationality. Despite its evident historical anchoring, Skolimowski’s position appears to contain many currently important ideas and solutions.

This is the third technical paper in a five part series on "ecocriticism" as it relates to the author's work on fear and fearlessness.... focused engagement with Desh Subba's philosophy of fearism in the last three years, and with his attempting to link Subba's notion of "fearism" and the "fearist perspective" with ecocriticism....

Calls for society to reconnect with nature are commonplace in environmental discourse. The expression ‘Interconnectedness with Nature’ has a place in African eco-philosophy. The departure from this...

The paper analyses the meaning and implementation of the notion of sustainable development from the viewpoint of Henryk Skolimowski’s eco-philosophy. Skolimowski formulates a radical criticism of the Western civilisation with its dominating forms of rationality and the resulting technological implementations. In his opinion, this system is a source of imbalance both in the nature and social life of people in the global scale, which results in various types of civilizational crises. We will particularly pay attention to the theoretical proposals (...) formulated by Skolimowski in his The Genius of Light and Sacredness of Life. In this work he refers to Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s vision of evolutionary philosophy, enriched with his own original philosophical ideas. Skolimowski particularly emphasises the emergence of the photosynthesis phenomenon, and subsequently logo- and theo-synthesis in evolution process. He claims that these are the forms of light condensation whose laws of development control our planet as well as the whole cosmos. The human species participates in this process taking part in the evolutionarily developing possibilities of transcendence and self-realisation. As Skolimowski suggests, the process of self-realisation and transcending should manifest the character of the conscious self-limitation of man in his relations and interactions with nature and society. The idea of cosmic ethics, of imperative character, developed by him is to serve this purpose. (shrink)

The article presents the typological and conceptual tools used by Henryk Skolimowski to describe and explain the relation between man and nature. Skolimowski claims that the main determinant of this relation is the way man sees nature, i.e., the vision of nature which prevails in his culture and times. In other words, decisive for our relation to nature is cosmology. The first part of the article outlines the fundamental functions of the cosmological model which are to interpret daily and scientific (...) experiences, to establish the type of actions which relate to man and nature. The second part concerns the structure of worldview which is based on a cosmological model. The structure of worldview embraces a cosmological model presenting the general structure of nature, eschatology understood as a realm of human life and cosmic goal, and ethicsdetermining human behaviour. (shrink)