Franco Volpi (

Vicenza Vicenza ( , ; or , archaically ) is a city in northeastern Italy. It is in the Veneto region, at the northern base of the Monte Berico, where it straddles the Bacchiglione, River Bacchiglione. Vicenza is approximately west of Venice and e ...

, 4 October 1952 – 14 April 2009), was a

philosopher Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

historian of philosophy The history of philosophy is the systematic study of the development of Philosophy, philosophical thought. It focuses on philosophy as rational inquiry based on argumentation, but some theorists also include myth, Religion, religious traditions ...

and a professor at

Padua University The University of Padua (, UNIPD) is an Italian public research university in Padua, Italy. It was founded in 1222 by a group of students and teachers from the University of Bologna, who previously settled in Vicenza; thus, it is the second-oldest ...

, who wrote regularly to the Italian newspaper ''

La Repubblica (; English: "the Republic") is an Italian daily general-interest newspaper with an average circulation of 151,309 copies in May 2023. It was founded in 1976 in Rome by Gruppo Editoriale L'Espresso (now known as GEDI Gruppo Editoriale) and l ...

''. Volpi was an expert in

German philosophy German philosophy, meaning philosophy in the German language or philosophy by German people, in its diversity, is fundamental for both the analytic and continental traditions. It covers figures such as Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Immanuel Kant, ...

, in particular

Martin Heidegger Martin Heidegger (; 26 September 1889 – 26 May 1976) was a German philosopher known for contributions to Phenomenology (philosophy), phenomenology, hermeneutics, and existentialism. His work covers a range of topics including metaphysics, art ...

and

Arthur Schopenhauer Arthur Schopenhauer ( ; ; 22 February 1788 – 21 September 1860) was a German philosopher. He is known for his 1818 work ''The World as Will and Representation'' (expanded in 1844), which characterizes the Phenomenon, phenomenal world as ...

. He investigated the relationship between

nihilism Nihilism () encompasses various views that reject certain aspects of existence. There have been different nihilist positions, including the views that Existential nihilism, life is meaningless, that Moral nihilism, moral values are baseless, and ...

and the

nothing Nothing, no-thing, or no thing is the complete absence of ''anything'', as the opposite of ''something'' and an antithesis of everything. The concept of nothing has been a matter of philosophical debate since at least the 5th century BCE. Ea ...

, and between philosophy and current

psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...

. In one of his works, he wrote that "real philosophical questions have a history but have no answer". For him, nihilism undermines truth, weakens religion and dissolves

dogmatism Dogma, in its broadest sense, is any belief held definitively and without the possibility of reform. It may be in the form of an official system of principles or doctrines of a religion, such as Judaism, Roman Catholicism, Protestantism, or Islam ...

. Volpi also taught at the University of Witten/Herdecke as well as the universities of Laval, Poitiers and Nice. Volpi died on 14 April 2009, at the age of 56, after being run over by an automobile as he rode his bicycle.

Works

* ''Heidegger e Brentano. L'aristotelismo e il problema dell'univocità dell'essere nella formazione filosofica del giovane Martin Heidegger'', Cedam, Padova, 1976, pp. 144 * "La rinascita della filosofia pratica in Germania", in:''Filosofia pratica e scienza politica'', Francisci, Abano/Padova, 1980, pp. 180 (with Carlo Natali, Laura Iseppi, Claudio Pacchiani) * "Sulla fortuna del concetto di decadence nella cultura tedesca: Nietzsche e le sue fonti francesi", ''Filosofia politica'', 1995 * ''Lexikon der philosophischen Werke'', Kröner, Stuttgart, 1988 * ''Guida a Heidegger'', Laterza, Roma-Bari 1997, 1998, pp. XVI-387 * ''Hegel e i suoi critici, Per i licei e gli istituti magistrali'', Laterza, Roma-Bari 1998 * ''Il nichilismo'', * ''Heidegger e Aristotele'', Daphne, Padova, 1984, pp. 226 (ristampa Bari, Laterza, 2010)

References

Sources

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