ONTOLOGIA POVERA E REALISMO DEBOLE. IN DIALOGO CON ACHILLE VARZI SU CIÒ CHE C’È

Abstract

In this essay I will compare the classical ontological realism (Platonic) and the ultra-weak realism, connected to an austere nominalism, of Achille Varzi, also recalling a comparison between the concepts of the Italian philosopher and the Kantian distinction between noumenon and phenomenon. To this aim, I will conduct a detailed analysis of two works by Varzi published in 2014 where the metaphysical, and in a certain sense also the ethical-political, reasons of the ultra-weak realism are explained. After the study of Varzi’s essays I will analize the chapter of the Critique of Pure Reason that Kant dedicates to the distinction of objects of knowledge into phenomena and noumena. Then, I will try to determine whether the transcendental scheme that the human mind places between objective reality and our way of representing it and communicating it to others – that is what for Quine is the schema of language and for Kant is the way of structuring the “possible experience” – is really everything we talk about and which we refer to, or instead if through this cognitive super-structure we are able to bring to light and communicate some actual aspect of the noumenal reality.