Philosophy of Social Sciences

The course reconstructs the genealogy of three key concepts in the contemporary natural, social and human sciences, namely Organism, Machine and Language, and in particular their validity and reception, i.e. the way they have been interpreted historically and have become interdisciplinary. Modern natural philosophy has often described, for example, the bodies of living beings as machines, while organicist theories (e.g. cybernetics) have attempted to construct computational apparatuses capable of behaving like organisms. Information theory emerged as the mechanisation of language in the same years in which linguistics was taken as a model for anthropology. These are just a few examples of the complicated circulation of ideas that has innervated the thought of the last century, but what are the cultural and political implications of such conceptual translations and contaminations?

The course is mainly organised around two axes or two main analogies: the Organism-Machine relationship and the Machine-Language relationship. These two axes run through modern and contemporary thought and play key roles in the development of the postulates of several contemporary disciplines such as biology, linguistics, information theory, cybernetics, anthropology, sociology, psychoanalysis, etc. The subject of the course is essentially thinking by analogy (or models), i.e. the way in which a scientific object is often represented with the properties of an object belonging to another ontological field. The course's method of analysis is that of the critical and political epistemology (in dialogue with Michel Foucault's archaeology of the humanities and Ernst Cassirer's philosophy of symbolic forms), whereby the historical conditions under which these concepts were forged and their various ideological interpretations and functions will be analysed.

The course is intended for students with interests primarily in philosophy and the history of science and technology, as well as students from the area of the natural, human and social sciences. Interdisciplinary discussion is encouraged throughout the course.

- a good basic knowledge of the main epistemological and methodological debates in the natural, human and social sciences
- knowledge of the main research perspectives and scientific methodology in the natural, human and social sciences, including interdisciplinary research.
- knowledge of some of the main philosophical issues discussed in the natural, human and social sciences and understanding of their relevance to the social debate.

Students will also acquire:
- the ability to approach emerging issues in the social-scientific field through the conceptual and terminological apparatus of philosophy and philosophy of science.
- the ability to identify and discuss some of the philosophical and social implications of issues raised by the social sciences in specific cases of application.
- the ability to assess the validity and relevance of philosophical argumentation in social-scientific debates.

No specific knowledge of the topics under investigation is expected.

1. The concept of Organism in the natural, human and social sciences.
2. The concept of Machine in the natural, human and social sciences.
3. The concept of Language in the natural, human and social sciences.
4. The Organism-Machine analogy in modern and contemporary philosophy.
5. The Machine-Language analogy in contemporary philosophy.

Preliminary bibliography:

Foucault, Michel. The Order of Things: An Archeology of the Human Sciences. Routledge, 1994.

Huneman, Philippe, and Charles Wolfe. ‘The Concept of Organism: Historical Philosophical, Scientific Perspectives’. History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences 32 (January 2010): 147–54.

Harrington, Anne. Reenchanted Science: Holism in German Culture from Wilhelm II to Hitler. Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press, 2009.

Jameson, Frederic. The Prison-House of Language. A Critical Account of Structuralism and Russian Formalism. Princeton Essays in Literature. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1972.

Jameson, Frederic. The Years of Theory: Postwar French Thought to the Present. London: Verso, 2024.

Dosse, François. History of Structuralism. Vol 1- The Rising Sign 1945-1966. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997.

30% class presentation.
70% final essay (individual, discussed during the exam).
The essay (approx 6000 words) will be on a topic related to one of those discussed during the course (but different from the topic addressed by the student during class presentation), and pre settled with the course tutor.

Lectures, class discussions, student presentations, possible seminars with invited speakers.

English

Teaching language: English.

written

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Circular economy, innovation, work" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development