New Humanities is an international research and teaching project promoted by an interdisciplinary group of people from five different faculties and departments based at the University of Roma Tre. Initially set up as a forum for academic dialogue between the humanities and the sciences (including social sciences), the project became a transition space and platform for experiencing new research methodologies and teaching curricula that would question the present epistemological order of the European university system. In order to develop this approach, we have organized our work around a number of interdisciplinary clusters, each describing an epistemological node. In this paper we will discuss five interconnected case studies that emerged from an active collaboration between scientists and humanists. The first node, Protocols of Vision, investigates the cognitive nature of sensory perception and the different forms of knowledge it produces—empirical, artistic, and scientific. Memory: Mathematics, Computer Science, and Literature recapitulates many of the different threads in these discussions by exploring the interdependencies between the various kinds of memory: from external to subjective memory, from storage tools and techniques of self-construction to the invariance of mathematical structures. The third node, Signs and Bodies between Digital and Gendering, reflects on the problematic relationship between digital media and literary and linguistic gendering. Narrative Identity: Nature, Ontogeny and Psychopathology critically re-examines the main concepts and theories concerning the nature, ontogeny, and pathologies of the autobiographical self or narrative identity. Finally, the last node, Contribution of Quantum Physics to the Idea of Consciousness is a cross-cultural investigation into the phenomenon of consciousness tackled from the points of view of quantum field theory and ancient Indian philosophy

In 17th century French theatre two different figures of servants can be identified: the first one shows ability and fantasy at the service of his young master; the second one is not only awkward, but above all he is not able to hold his lower instincts. By breaking the rules of the high-society gallant code, does the odd servant challenge the high values? The article tries to give an answer to this question by analyzing two servants of Molière's theatre: Mascarille and Scapin. Mascarille performs both roles: the first one in L'Étourdi, the second one in Les Précieuses Ridicules, in either of them modifying the sources of the respective comedies. In Les Précieuses Ridicules the final punishment of the servants, despite its cruelty, does not imply an identification with their reasons. This identification, indeed, is prevented by the stylistic distinction that in the classical doctrine definitely separates the high and the low register, the comic and the serious. On the contrary, Scapin in Les Fourberies changes the dramatic type of the valet: he reverses the hierarchy of values because of his sense of honour and his consequent actions. His victory is the triumph of Drama itself and of its rules, which overcome those governing society.

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Using Scotus's theory of the determination of the divine will as a frame of reference in their discussion of divine foreknowledge, predestination, contingency of the world, and the human freedom of choice, the immediate Parisian successors of the Subtle Doctor in the fourteenth century attempt to illuminate some obscure issues left without clarification by John Duns Scotus, on the way to developing new theories and new theoretical tools capable of corroborating and going beyond the original teaching. This article intends to demonstrate, in particular, how Francis of Meyronnes, OFM, nick-named Princeps Scotistarum , in the midst of late-medieval doctrinal discussions assumes Scotus's theory of the determination of the divine will and how he resolves the question of the relationship between the divine will as a primary source, and the human will as a secondary source of contingency in the world, to the advantage of the human freedom of choice.

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