Roberta Corvi

According to Cassirer, knowledge is not a passive mirroring of the world, but it is a mode of objectiving and questioning reality, which requires an active processing by the human subject. Nevertheless, Cassirer admits that this task is not the prerogative of scientific knowledge alone but is also realized by other cultural activities of men...

The paper is focused on the comparison between the analytical or reductionist approach and the system approach. The latter is more inclusive than the reductionist epistemology, which is able to justify the component approach, but fails to suitably grasp the interactions among the several constituents, thus running the risk to neglect or even miss the overall complexity...

The paper concerns the notion of knowledge and argues that knowledge is not to be identified only with episteme (i.e. true and demonstrated belief) but with right opinion too, if we want to avoid both skepticism and relativism. In order to get over the ancient dichotomy between doxa and episteme we have to reform both of them, adopting a systemic approach. The systemic view can help us define knowledge as a dynamic set, where change is possible and where novelties can always come out. Knowledge is a difficult achievement, but we really can grasp some truth, even if not all truth, because the world is very complex and subtle, while our cognitive skills are limited.