Acta Philosophica

Laura Palazzani, Etica della ricerca sugli esseri umani. Dalla biomedicina alle scienze sociali, Morcelliana, Brescia 2025, pp. 272

Elena Colombetti — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Leonardo Messinese, Emanuele Severino. Il destino e il mortale, Feltrinelli, Milano 2025, pp. 304

Nicolò Tarquini — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Antonio Malo, Vittime e oppressori. L’ideologia Woke, Edusc, Roma 2024, pp. 298

Miriam Savarese — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Eri Mountbatten-O’Malley, Human Flourishing : A Conceptual Analysis, Bloomsbury Academic, London 2024, pp. 240

Juan Andrés Mercado — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Lorenzo Rustighi, La scienza politica in Aristotele. Funzione, oggetto, metodo, Carocci, Roma 2024, pp. 183

Giovanni Citrigno — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

A Note on the Proposition “Deus est” in Thomas Aquinas

Davide Falessi — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

This note aims to discuss and develop two interpretations within the framework of the so-called ‘Fregean-Geachean Thomism’ regarding the sense of ‘est’ in the proposition ‘Deus est’ in Thomas Aquinas. The two interpretations are the following : (1) Kenny’s interpretation, which claims that the ‘est’ in ‘Deus est’ must be understood as specific existence (anitas) : ‘there is/ there are …’ ; and (2) Ventimiglia’s interpretation, which claims that ens ut verum (being as true) – the sense of being in which, according to Aquinas, the ‘est’ in ‘Deus est’ should also be understood – is analogous to an assertion sign : ‘it is true/the case that […].’ I will argue that both interpretations can be harmonised within a unified perspective, if situated within the epistemological context of Aquinas’s account and refined with more theoretical and historical accuracy. This will be achieved by introducing the distinction between secundum se and quoad nos, drawing a parallelism with the distinctions between the senses of being (quidditas and anitas), and by highlighting similarities Aquinas sets forth between the way we know that God exists and the way we know that privations, such as blindness, exist.

The Intentionality of Freedom in Time: On the Polian Conception of Personal Future

Juan José Padial — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Leonardo Polo's transcendental anthropology has (i.) a very original and (ii.) congruent and rigorous conception of the personal or free future. Original in that it makes the future a personal transcendental, i.e. a characteristic that allows access to personal being, without which one could neither (a) personally exist oneself, nor (b) know the core of personal existence. This explains the philosophical relevance that the polian conception of the future can have both philosophically and existentially.

Community and Communion: A Necessary Distinction

Pierpaolo Donati — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

The concepts of community and communion are often superimposed in a communitarian semantics that is increasingly difficult to realize because postmodern culture makes it inconceivable. Christian theology retains a communitarian semantics but fails to translate it into concrete practices. Why ? The reason is that, if it is true that no one can fulfill themselves as a person without relationships of communion, on the other hand we must see and address the otherness (as difference) that exists in communion and community. How can we bridge the gap between the needs of communion and the ability to organize stable and fruitful communities ? The fact is that the differentiation between the bonds of communion and those of community has grown. The former are spiritual relationships of mutual giving that have no boundaries, while the community has boundaries, however permeable, and can only be generated when the subjects manage to create a common world through relational otherness.

Aristotle on when Ignorance is an Excuse

Filip Grgić — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Ignorance is sometimes an excuse: in certain circumstances, if a person has done something wrong, she is blameless if she did not know what she was doing. What are those circumstances, and why is ignorance sometimes considered a legitimate excuse and sometimes not? At first glance, Aristotle’s response to these questions is quite rigorous: a legitimate appeal to ignorance as an excuse requires an appropriate causal history of ignorance and action, and the corresponding mental state of the agent and the observers. Thus, it seems that the agent’s ‘I didn’t know’ is a genuine excuse only if the agent was subjected to bad luck. In this paper, I try to show that these strict conditions can still be somewhat relaxed, and that there are many actions in which ignorance can be a legitimate excuse even though they do not belong to the type of genuine involuntary actions.

Kantian Humanity as the Basis of All Values

Lantz Miller — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

At least three bases of all values have been proposed over the centuries: Kantian valuing of humanity, a sentimental account, and the valuing of life itself. If a single value consistently underlies all the other values, we should consider whether a “meta” basis itself is a value. Perhaps, though, one of these bases of all values provides a way to end circularity. These meta prospects merits full, separate coverage. This article concentrates on Kantian humanity as the ultimate value. Such value-basis has received perhaps the greatest amount of coverage in recent philosophical literature. Part 1 analyses proposed arguments, prominently by Korsgaard and her critics. Part 2 goes into detail investigating the issue from five different critical perspectives: term-coherence; methodological, economic, social, and alternative-values. The intent is to assess Kantian concepts of humanity as value basis and, more broadly, to investigate the basing of all values solely upon the valuing of humanity. This article concludes that the Kantian-humanity value-basis cannot yet fulfil the needs of a value basis of all other values. Such shortfall calls for a particular “meta” philosophical angle.

On the Relationship between Theory and Praxis in Kantian Transcendental Philosophy

Marco Mulone — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Despite the well-known Kantian distinction, the relationship between theory and praxis turns out to be much richer than it might appear at first. This is not only because the definition in the Critique of Pure Reason leaves a space open for further determinations, but also because the further developments of Kant's criticism, in particular the Third Critique, seem to converge towards the conjunction of these two poles: towards the principle of the unity of speculative and practical reason. The aim of this essay is to expose the problematic nature of the Kantian distinction by showing its partiality, in order to offer a broad perspective on a reason that, as a whole, realizes itself in the world.

In Search of Peace

Domenico Burzo — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Acknowledging the problem of war and peace as a key element in all his thinking, Romano Guardini dedicates to it an intense reflection, and places it first and foremost in the political sphere as its natural and most appropriate dimension. By insightfully looking at the evolution of Western culture and civilization, he outlines the current face of war, defining it as an "absolute war". He highlights how this absolute war is inextricably linked to the problematic nature of technical-scientific progress and to the power that derives from it, posing questions and challenges of the utmost urgency to contemporary man. Among these, the search for an adequate peace to the current historical-existential conditions is essential, together with the conscious need to develop an equally adequate political attitude, whose realism can be enlivened by the most concrete spiritual sources that nourish the human being.

M. F. Sciacca on Philosophy: Issues and Perspectives

Alessandra Modugno — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

The essay aims to offer a reflection on the historical-theoretical contribution of Michele Federico Sciacca’s philosophy on the 50th anniversary of his death. The path is divided into three movements. The first considers his relationship with the authors of the history of Western philosophy, in particular Plato, Augustine and Rosmini, who were his main references ; the second examines Sciacca’s conception of philosophy. Finally, the third explores some of his theoretical contributions, in particular interiority understood objectively, metaphysical intelligence and relational anthropology.

The Entanglement of Sensibility and Rationality

Minghui Li — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

The relationship between the Sensibility and Rationality is a consistent thread in Habermas’s exploration of aesthetic political issues. In the 1960s, he examined the literary public sphere through aesthetic common sense to interrogate democratic systems. Engaging Adorno and Benjamin’s theories, he reconciled sensibility and rationality via mimesis and metaphor, culminating in 1980s communicative rationality. This framework situates Kant’s ‘I think’ within ‘language games’, positioning language as absolute mediator between subject and object cognition. In the paradigm of communicative rationality, aesthetics is categorized into types of discourse, and aesthetic common sense is misused as logical common sense, while the sensuous community presumed by aesthetic universality is replaced by a conceptual community. Transitioning from linguistic modality to embodied perception modality, the exploration of sensual communication and the unmediated aesthetic community thus becomes an aesthetic path to break through Habermas’s discourse of political.

Religion in the Thought of Byung-Chul Han

Alejandro Martínez Carrasco — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

In Byung-Chul Han's work there is an important presence of religious elements that intertwine with the core concepts of his philosophy. The aim of this study is to analyze and systematize Han's approach to religion and to see what role it plays in his thought as a whole. This approach is articulated around two main stages: a first one marked by the criticism of the onto-theological metaphysics of Western thought of Christian tradition, against which he proposes friendliness as an alternative, inspired by the Buddhist tradition; and a second one marked by the criticism of the current neoliberal society and its false religions, against which he opposes contemplative practices, often directly inspired by the Christian tradition.

Maria Rosa Antognazza, Thinking with Assent. Renewing Traditional Account of Knowledge and Belief, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2024, pp. 312

Ariberto Acerbi — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Marta Bertolaso, Angelo Marinucci, Le questioni aperte della vita – Epistemologia della Complessità, Rubbettino, Soveria Mannelli 2024, pp. 140

Maria Alessandra Varone — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

James Edwards, Brian Leiter, Marx, Routledge, London 2024, pp. 316

Rodrigo Jungmann de Castro — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100

Roberto Granieri, Conoscere l’essere. Platone, Aristotele e la costruzione della filosofia prima, il Mulino, Bologna 2024, pp. 233

Giovanni Citrigno — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0100