Giambattista Vico

Giambattista Vico (born Giovan Battista Vico 23 June 1668 – 23 January 1744) was an Italian political philosopher and rhetorician, historian and jurist, of the Age of Enlightenment. He criticized the expansion and development of modern rationalism, was an apologist for Classical Antiquity, a precursor of systematic and complex thought, in opposition to Cartesian analysis and other types of reductionism, and was the first expositor of the fundamentals of social science and of semiotics.

Quotes

 * Verum esse ipsum factum
 * The truth itself is made.
 * On the Most Ancient Wisdom of the Italians (1710)


 * Men first feel necessity, then look for utility, next attend to comfort, still later amuse themselves with pleasure, thence grow dissolute in luxury, and finally go mad and waste their substance. (Gli uomini prima sentono il necessario, dipoi badanoall’utile, appresso avvertiscono il comodo, più innanzi sidilettano del piacere, quindi si dissolvono nel lusso, e finalmente impazzano in istrappazzar le sostanze.)
 * The New Science 241 (1744)


 * Uniform ideas originating among entire peoples unknown to each other must have a common ground of truth.
 * The New Science 144 (1744)