Giambattista VicoGiambattista Vico 1668-1744Slide 3VicoSlide 5Slide 6Vico & The New ScienceSlide 8Slide 9Slide 10Vico’s CritiqueSlide 12Slide 13Slide 14Slide 15Slide 16Slide 17Slide 18Slide 19Slide 20Slide 21Slide 22Slide 23Slide 24Slide 25Slide 26Slide 27Giambattista Vico 1668-1744Giambattista Vico 1668-1744Italian philosopher, Lawyer, historian, student of ancient Rome, rhetoricianborn in Naples, Italy, June 23, 1668; d. there, Jan. 22 or 23, 1744attended a Jesuit school, and was for a time enrolled in the law school of the University of Naplesfirst intellectual influences were Plato and Machiavelli and he was especially adept in the fields of jurisprudence, linguistics and history.Giambattista Vico 1668-1744His first important lecture, "On the Method of the Studies of Our Time," was printed in 1709 and was followed immediately by another lecture, "On the Most Ancient Knowledge of the Italians.”In 1600 he was elected professor of rhetoric at NaplesVicoDesigned a “new science,” quite different from Descartes Vico's work has attracted attention for the modern study of rhetoric, language, poetry, architecture, aesthetics, law, moral philosophy, politics, education, metaphysics, society, culture and history. Vico's thought has importance for the full range of problems within the sphere of humane letters and the study of the self and of social institutions.VicoArgued that rhetoric, not reason, was the basis of social life, and that the growing hegemony of scientific thinking threatened to undermine common beliefs and values (Herrick 176).Feared the domination of science Sought answers about human experience in poetry and mythologyVicoArgued that language originated with rhetorical devices native to human imagination and maintained that language allowed people to impose order on existence, create meaning, and establish society.His philosophy focused on human historyIn his New Science, he argued that the historical method could be as exact as mathVico & The New ScienceThe New Science is clearly a philosophy of historyhere Vico presents the principles of humanity and gives an account of the stages common to the development of all societies in their historical life He also shows how all human thought and action is connected to imagination and memory as well as to reason.Vico & The New ScienceIt is also an attack on Cartesian philosophy. Vico believed that Descartes' ideas were exclusively oriented toward mathematics and the physical sciences. According to Vico, Descartes neglected other branches of the human experience -- art, law, and history.Vico & The New ScienceHeld that rhetoric was essential to all the arts and all human ways of making sense of the worldWas fascinated by the processes through which the human mind learns Advanced a theory of the relationship among language, thought, and experience based on four tropesVico & The New ScienceVico attacked three fundamental principles of Cartesian philosophy: the appeal to self-consciousness as the basis of all knowledge -- the cogito; the belief that God's existence could be proven a priori, that is, prior to experience; and the reliance on a method of clear and distinct ideas as the universal criterion of truth.Vico’s CritiqueBy 1720, this criticism was not really that much of a surprise. John Locke had already demolished Descartes in 1690, and even the French philosophers who admired Descartes for his work, could only criticize him in light of what they understood about Locke and Newton. For Vico, there may be ideas that are clear and distinct, but these ideas could subsequently turn out to be false.Vico’s CritiqueAnd although mathematical propositions satisfied the Cartesian criteria of self-evident truths, certitude is not to be found in self-evidence, but in the fact that mathematical systems are man-made. So Vico, skeptical of Descartes, cast doubt on the greatest 17th century doubter of them all. The epistemology which Vico addressed in opposition to Descartes, is the foundation upon which his revolutionary philosophy of history was built.Vico’s CritiqueDescartes neglected history altogether -- compared to science and mathematics, history was a poor thing indeed. Vico, however, thought differently. The historian could achieve a more profound knowledge than the natural philosopher. Nature was not made by man -- it was external to man, outside him. In the case of history, by contrast, the world to be studied and comprehended is the human world -- the result of human will, success and failure, loves and hates.Vico’s CritiqueIn considering the course of human history, Vico was ahead of his time. He did not wish to suggest that we interpret the past in terms of our own characteristic purposes, interests and ideas. This is what Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) had done.Vico acknowledged his debt to Hobbes but he also believed that Hobbes was guilty of an error.By discussing the origins of human society, the origins of civil society, the social contract and the state of nature, Hobbes assumed that human nature was a fixed entity.Vico’s CritiqueIn other words, Hobbes assumed that men, living in some state of nature, that is, before civil government, had mental powers and outlooks essentially the same as men of the 17th century.Vico called this a "pseudo-myth." Hobbes and others had created a false picture of how early man lived, thought and behaved.Rejecting all these misconceptions in a flash, Vico argued that man is a being who can only be understood historically. Vico's approach, then, was the opposite of both Hobbes and Descartes.Vico’s CritiqueHe rejected the belief that all men have looked at themselves and their world in exactly the same way. Once he recognized this, the task and scope of historical investigation took on profound methodological implications. The materials for reaching historical understanding were close at hand -- for Vico, they are to be found above all in language and in myths, fables and traditions which have been handed down from earlier times.Vico’s CritiqueHistorical study requires not only a high degree of skill -- study also require that the historian embrace and imaginative capacity for recapturing the past (empathy) -- a past that is vastly different from the present of the historian.One of Vico's most crucial insights lay in his claim