GALLUPPI, PASQUALE

Italian philosopher; b. Tropea, Calabria, April 2, 1770; d. Naples, Dec. 13, 1846. His fame as a philosopher went beyond the confines of the kingdom of Naples and Italy; he was known by E. B. de condillac, A. rosmini-serbati, V. cousin, and W. hamilton, among others. In 1831 he gained the professorial chair of logic and metaphysics at the University of Naples. The French Academy of Sciences named him "corresponding socius" and Louis Philippe granted him the Cross of the Legion of Honor.

For Galluppi, immediate consciousness of oneself is the first truth that necessarily serves as the first principle. The perception of myself, through its modifications, grasps what is outside of me. Upon this is focused the activity of the mind, which decomposes and then recomposes its elements "in analysis and synthesis, that is, in the faculties which isolate and decompose perceptions, and in that which unites and composes them" [Saggio filosofico sulla critica della conoscenza, six v. (Naples 1819–23) 1:2.10]. Judgment is distinct from feeling; analysis and synthesis are the basis for every universal judgment.

Along with kant, he accepts a priori practical synthetic judgments as precepts without which it is "impossible to establish the morality of actions" [Filosofia della volontà, four v. (Naples 1832–40) 4:147]. He criticizes any form of eudaemonism or Utilitarianism as a morality not based upon disinterested action, the sole guarantee of all public and private virtue. Virtue is not a means, but an aim: "the consciousness of having practiced it should be a pure pleasure distinct from, and independent of, the pleasure resulting from the reward" [Elementi di filosofia, six v. (Messina 1820–27) 5:37]. Nevertheless, Galluppi maintains that the useful can accompany duty, as long as the former is subordinated to the latter.

Bibliography: g. di napoli, Enciclopedia filosofica 2:576–581; La filosofia di Pasquale Galluppi (Padua 1947).

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