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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. Human cultural activities are many and manifold, nonetheless culture, like knowledge, constitutes a unity that presents the characteristics of a system, in which parts mutually condition each other.

This paper addresses some aspects of the current relations between science and democracy, with a specific focus on the question of the «rightful place» of science in democratic societies, and on the meaning and implications of what is called «democratization of science». After a brief illustration of the traditional liberal and self-referential model of science, and of the supposed separatedness between science and society, the paper describes some impasses in science and the scientific community, and argues in favor of a rethinking of science in the light of the principles governing democratic societies.

This contribution presents some specifications on the phenomenological and theoretical aspects of the processes of emergence. In the framework of the theoretical incompleteness as a condition probably necessary for the establishment of processes of emergence, the need for compatibility and equivalence between the possible evolutionary steps of emerging complex systems is considered. We consider phenomena and theoretical aspects compatible with the establishment of processes of emergence. There may be aspects between them that are necessary and possibly sufficient. This in the context of the absence of a theory of emergence. Absence that could be theoreticallly necessary within the framework of the validity of the theoretical incompleteness required for emergence.

It is for sure that any scientific model is very partial, depending upon the choice of a peculiar view point. This implies that the comparison of different models of the same natural phenomenon, allowing for a multiplicity of vantage pints, it is (at least in principle) the most fruitful way to knowledge. Notwithstanding that, to look for a ‘complete description’ obtained by the summation of the different models, is an almost sure guarantee of failure. The neat superiority of predictive models that consciously decide not to take into consideration the major part of the information with respect to computational intensive ‘all-inclusive’ strategies is evident. These ‘all-inclusive’ approaches are promoted by ‘Big Data’ supporters claiming for the need of approaches devoid of any ‘cognitive bias’. Here I will show how the conscious limitation to a specific viewpoint is not only a wise knowledge strategy but mirrors some facts of nature suggesting a self-generated simplification of the natural world that most generative scientific theories are able to catch.

The interpretation of music has always been a subject of intense reflection, due to the importance of its cultural, artistic, philosophical and anthropological implications. Being an interpreter means connecting the musical composition to the audience, since he is allowed to perform the musical object and to represent it perceptively in the present time, bringing it back to life through his own artistic contribution. For this reason he plays an essential role in conveying forms of transversal knowledge in various levels of description. For a long time, the musical notation constituted the only resource to leave an eternal trail of the composition and of the composer’s intentions; according to the interpreter, the latter may be a valuable source of information or a limit on freedom of expression. The codification of musical score in fact contains margins of indetermination which refer to the complexity of the musical phenomenon and makes it possible to find right in the uncertainty an exceptional resource for the interpretation. The main concept of this work is reconfiguring the interpretive function through a systemic approach and producing a permanent and continuous recreation of the music, using as reference some aspects related to the forms, stylistic models and search paths which appeared in Early Music.

The branch of systemic studies is currently a growing field of research. The impressive contacts and exchange of view among different and heterogeneous sciences has merged into a new general perspective that can properly be called «Systemic Philosophy», satisfying the demand for «new ideas» perceived in various fields. A brief presentation of some results achieved in this area of studies shows how this path could be theoretically promising.

Whole, parts, relation, emergence, interaction, final cause: all these words can be successfully used to focus on the Art expression? May these tools be useful when reading a picture, a fresco cycle or a sculpture? The answer is yes. This paper analyzes some well-known works of Art through the System Theory point of view and its notions. Supposedly, many things have already been said but this analysis just offers some examples of what the Systemic Theory suggests. From Kandinsky to Giotto, Parmigianino, Piero Della Francesca and Mark Rothko a new way of observing can slowly change the idea of Art.

This paper proposes to show in a very short text how Plato activates a reflection that we can legitimately define as systemic. The Athenian philosopher is indeed convinced of the complexity of reality, both physical and ideal. Indeed, everything is an uni-many entity, i.e. both one and multiple: Plato explicitly affirms the identity of one and many. A one-sided position in favour of one or the other horn of the alternative does not stand the critical test. In short, every reality is a whole composed of parts: even an Idea is composed of Ideas and is part of a higher Idea. This vision has an ontological justification: the reality is constituted by a limiting principle that organizes a disordered reality giving rise to a mixed entity: it is an ordered disorder. On this basis we understand the processes proposed by Plato to analyse reality itself, such as the diairesis, and also the political and ethical choices that Plato proposes.

The epistemological significance of the general theory of systems clearly emerges not only from a synchronical look at the structure of knowledge, but also from the attention to the diachronic aspects of the cognitive process, in other words to what we can call ‘systemic crisis’ and ‘systemic reconstructions’. The paper tries to show the plausibility of this thesis by examining, on the one hand, the theory/experience relationship in the controversy between Poincaré and Duhem, and, on the other hand, Einstein’s heuristic strategy to reach towards the theory of relativity. Precisely in the light of Einstein’s strategy the problem of realism is introduced and discussed in a wider philosophical perspective centred on the two correlated themes of the epistemological subject/object dualism and the sceptical instance. In the conclusion, a model of empirical realism is proposed in opposition to metaphysical realism.

Many people are still convinced that the indigenous medicine was in a stage of admixture with witchcraft and magic, more or less as it is believed for medicine to be practiced among so called «primitive» civilizations. This conviction is contradicted by what the first Spanish conquerors explicitly declared regarding medicine they encountered in the new land of conquest, and it is even more in contradiction with the very clear distinctions that «scientific» doctors of Mexico prior to the arrival of Cortés expressed in their texts, in which they separated clearly their way of conceiving and practicing medicine from the practices of the sorcerers, curators and charlatans.