La Metafisica in questione

As part of the philosophical workshop PRAGMATEIA, on the occasion of the publication of Grandezza della Metafisica. Opere Teoretiche Scelte [The Greatness of Metaphysics: Selected Theoretical Works] by Vittorio Possenti (2 vol., Mimesis 2025), the faculty of philosophy continues the direct confrontation with the classical and radical questions of metaphysical reflection.

Nihilism sustains that Western thought has entered beyond remedy into a catastrophe that led to the death of metaphysics announced two centuries ago (“That which, prior to this period, was called metaphysics has been, so to speak, extirpated root and branch” – Hegel). Philosophy today would be a profane time, deprived of any “metaphysical sanctuary”.

The greatness of metaphysics resides in its necessity, which one realizes above all when it is forgotten. To go beyond nihilism, the secular tradition of the philosophy of Being and realism possesses untapped potential; it is capable of both reprisal and revival. The way appears less arduous than it once did: modern philosophy marked by antirealism has ended, and the diagnosis on the end of metaphysics is being reversed. What needs to be done is to recommence both from being (ente) and from Being (esse).