Musica, scienza e seconda natura

This paper aims to develop some epistemological reflections about music theory as a peculiar item in the history of ideas, straddling artistic practice, philosophy and mathematics. This is discussed starting from the analysis of a short Hellenistic treatise known as Sectio Canonis and then examining the revitalization of some of its implications in the Early Modern age, through the work of Zarlino and Vincenzo Galilei, in substantial agreement with some reflections contained in Leopardi’s Zibaldone. Intertwining a basic phenomenology that emerges from scientific experiments, and a historically determined one produced by cultural habits, a ‘second nature’ emerges which properly constitutes the object of harmonic science. Finally, the relation of harmonic science and modern science is briefly discussed.