Publication 8226

Excerpt: During the brief history of Constructivism, many authors (Foerster & Glasersfeld, 2000; Glasersfeld, 1985, 1992, 2007; Hermans, 2003; Mahoney, 1988; Mancuso, 2000) have claimed the Neapolitan philosopher Giambattista Vico (1668–1744) as a forerunner of constructivist epistemology. ’Verum est ipsum factum’ (to be true is one and the same as to be made) has a high level of commonality with Kellian epistemology through two statements: (i) science is the knowledge of how things are construed; (ii) man knows only what is construed by himself (Glasersfeld, 1985). These assumptions subsume a circular constructive process (Foerster, 2003) and a metaphor of man as a system organizing himself and his world (Maturana & Varela, 1972; Piaget, 1937). In Vico’s words (Vico, 1744/1783) we are our poetics (etym. Greek’poiéin’: to make), we embody and stage this so-called world.