Professor Giuseppe Del Re (1932–2009) was a full professor of theoretical chemistry at the University of Naples, and a full member of the International Academy for Philosophy of Science and the European Academy for Environmental Problems. He was a founding member of the International Centre for Transdisciplinary Research and Studies and was a member of the scientific board of several journals, particularly the international philosophical journals La Nuova Critica, Fiolsofia Oggi and Hyle.
Professor Del Re’s main achievements in his primary research field are marked by the well-known “Del Re Method” for the determination of atom charges in molecules and by the introduction of maximum localization hybrids in the molecular orbital method. Both procedures have been utilized by researchers in the whole world. In the field of epistemology, as a result of lectures on the chemical origin of life, he has carried out research on "complexity" with special reference to (a) organization as a characteristic of living beings, (b) mind-body problems, and (c) chemistry and its status as an independent discipline.
In his lifetime, Del Re published over 180 papers, about 170 in internationally recognized scientific and philosophical journals. He was editor of a book on the brain-mind problem published by the Pontifical Academy of Science, translated into Italian and authored a book on the electronic states of molecules. He was research group leader in 1959–62 at RIAS, Baltimore, U.S.A, invited researcher at the Institut de Biologie Physico–Chimique of the University of Paris 1963–1970, and was invited professor in Canada, Germany, France, Peru, and Hungary. His most recent appointment out of Italy was as invited professor at the École Normale Suprieure in Paris in 1997.
In The Cosmic Dance, Giuseppe Del Re states that he met Thomas F. Torrance through activities in the International Academy for the Philosophy of Science. Of Torrance, Del Re writes: "I found him not only a friend, but a thinker whose understanding of the implications of recent science for a world-view worthy of man I could share completely" (p. xv). Del Re and his wife Maria Teresa Benedetti translated and edited an Italian anthology of Torrance's essays (#1992-544), and Torrance contributed the foreword to The Cosmic Dance (#1999-GDR-1).
Thomas F. Torrance, Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992); #1992-544
Thomas F. Torrance, "Realismo e Apertura nell'Indagine Scientifica e Teologia," in Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992), 41-55; #1992-544a
Thomas F. Torrance, "La Formazione della Mente 'Moderna' da Descartes a Kant," in Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992), 57-132; #1992-544b
Thomas F. Torrance, "L'Integrazione della Forma nella Scienza Naturale e nella Scienza Teologica," in Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992), 133-192; #1992-544c
Thomas F. Torrance, "Il Recupero del Realismo nella Moderna Epistemologia e il Pensiero di Michael Polanyi," in Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992), 193-281; #1992-544d
Thomas F. Torrance, "Le Certezze Ultime e la Rivoluzione Scientifica," in Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992), 283-315; #1992-544e
Thomas F. Torrance, "La Scienza e il Senso del Divino nel Pensiero di James Clerk Maxwell," in Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992), 317-353; #1992-544f
Thomas F. Torrance, "La Teologia Cristiana nel Contesto Dei Cambiamenti della Scienza," in Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992), 355-379; #1992-544g
Thomas F. Torrance, "Il Recupero del Realismo nella Moderna Epistemologia e il Pensiero di Michael Polanyi," in Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992), 193-281; #1992-544d
Thomas F. Torrance, "La Scienza e il Senso del Divino nel Pensiero di James Clerk Maxwell," in Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992), 317-353; #1992-544f
Giuseppe Del Re, The Cosmic Dance: Science Discovers the Mysterious Harmony of the Universe (The Templeton Press, 1999)
Thomas F. Torrance, "Foreword," in Giuseppe Del Re, The Cosmic Dance: Science Discovers the Mysterious Harmony of the Universe (The Templeton Press, 1999), pp. ix-xii
Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti, "Introduzione: Una Chiave di Lettura: L'Essere e la Verità come Fondamenti della Scienza," in Thomas F. Torrance, Senso del Divino e Scienza Moderna, ed. Giuseppe Del Re, trans. Giuseppe Del Re and Maria Teresa Benedetti (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1992), 1-40
