An Essay in Universal Semantics

by Achille C. Varzi

Like the journal TOPOl, the TOPOl Library is based on the assumption that philosophy is a lively, provocative, delightful activity, which constantly challenges our inherited habits, painstakingly elaborates on how things could be different, in other stories, in counterfactual situations, in alternative possible worlds. Whatever its ideology, whether with the intent of uncovering a truer structure of reality or of shooting our anxiety, of exposing myths or of following them through, the outcome of philosophical activity is always the destabilizing, unsettling generation of doubts, of objections, of criticisms. It follows that this activity is intrinsically a dialogue, that philosophy is first and foremost philosophical discussion, that it requires bringing out conflicting points of view, paying careful, sympathetic attention to their structure, and using this dialectic to articulate one's approach, to make it richer, more thoughtful, more open to variation and play. And it follows that the spirit which one brings to this activity must be one of tolerance, of always suspecting one's own blindness and consequently looking with unbiased eye in every comer, without fearing to pass a (fallible) judgment on what is there but also without failing to show interest and respect.

158 pages, Hardcover

First published June 16, 1999

About the author

Achille C. Varzi is an Italian-born philosopher. He teaches at Columbia University, where he has been a member of the philosophy faculty since 1995.

Varzi has made notable contributions to the fields of philosophical logic (mainly vagueness, supervaluationism, paraconsistency, formal semantics) and metaphysics (mainly mereology and mereotopology, causation, events, and issues relating to identity and persistence through time). His first book, Holes and Other Superficialities (1994, with Roberto Casati), was an exploration of the realist ontology of common sense and naive physics. His more recent work is inspired by a nominalist-conventionalist stance.

Varzi is currently an editor of The Journal of Philosophy and an advisory editor of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Varzi is also a prolific writer for the general public and contributes regularly to several Italian newspapers.

Achille C. Varzi is a second cousin of the Italian racecar driver Achille Varzi.