The Unity of Power, Wisdom, and Love as an “Other” Modernity in T. Campanella

The Overcoming of the Modern Concepts of Telesio and Descartes in Campanella’s Primative Metaphysics

Abstract

The demand, in Telesio, of an immediate opening of knowledge to reality and the demand, in Descartes, of an absolute criticality and problematic nature of knowledge are fundamental concerns in modernity, which however lead to a nihilistic result if developed in their mutual irreconcilability. This nihilistic result, that has permeated modernity, is to be framed as a separation of knowledge from the ground of being and as a consequent inability of acting in a way that is consciously grounded on being. Campanella’s “primalitative” metaphysics, which sees being as a “toticipative” (divine) communication of power (ground), wisdom and love, holds firm on the demands of Telesio and Descartes and reconciles them by drawing upon Augustine’s act of self-certainty. In this reconciliation an “other” modernity takes shape, in which the individual is called to self-determination through participation in the divine “toticipation”.