Ordine dal caos, ovvero metafisica e semiotica dell'agentività

From a semiotic point of view, agency has not to be hought as a generic action. An agent is a willing and conscious actor, not just a cause. This distinction raises the problem of what are the necessary conditions for the cause of an action in order to be considered as an agent; and how to decide that the result of an action should be attributed to an agent rather than to an impersonal cause. These conditions for agency are considered from a theoretical–philosophical point of view and then discussed in the most relevant case of agency attribution in the Western culture, the idea of the world as a created entity. This idea is discussed with reference to Greek and Scholastic philosophical texts, as well as in the contemporary theory of Intelligent Design. Eventually it is traced down in the biblical text, through an analysis of the first verses of the Genesis.