Cosimo De Giorgi: il viaggio tra scienza e conoscenza, tra territorio e paesaggio

This contribution is aimed at suggesting the recovery of an epistemological and methodological approach to Cosimo De Giorgi's scientific work, in a historical context, such as that between the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, characterised by the epochal transition to the new methods of research and a new conception of science. De Giorgi is a solitary, but not isolated, researcher who knows how to maintain contacts and comparisons with the rhythms and results of contemporary European research. His methodological awareness reaches peaks of maximum clarity when he links the scientific method to issues relating to the scientific training of the younger generations, which he sees as closely con-nected to effective scientific dissemination. In an attempt to focus, even methodologically, the authentic sense of De Giorgi's scientific vision, the theme of the 'journey' is assumed here as an analytical-epistemological point of reference, placed in relation to the semantic pairs 'science/knowledge' and 'territory/landscape', to be understood as analytical tools for critical comparison, as logical binomials on which to converge De Giorgi's various and articulated researches, starting from the geological and hydrogeological ones that kick off all his scientific activity.