Editorial

Abstract

The current issue of Cognitio: revista de filosofia offers nine contributions from scholars of pragmatism and contemporary epistemology in general, covering, as has been its tradition, a varied range of themes. Five of the texts directly address Peircean philosophy in its most diverse aspects: objective idealism, philosophy of art, intuition and continuity, as well as his conception of science. The other articles cover various themes on contemporary epistemology, including neo-pragmatism.

Nicholas Guardiano, from Southern Illinois University Carbondale, discusses objective idealism within Peircean metaphysics in the articles in the Monist series (1891-93). In Guardiano's text, "the tenability of the primordiality of mind is defended as the one intelligible theory for explaining evolution, variety, human consciousness and other observed facts of the world."

Objective idealism is also the theme of T.L. Short's article in response to David Dilworth's text published in Cognitio 12(1), commenting on Short's essay published in the same issue. Here, Short raises the question as to how Peirce's philosophical writings should be read. Are they a single philosophical system or a sequence of alternative hypotheses? And, further, how is that question to be resolved?

It is a fact that Peirce did not leave any systematic study on philosophy of art. Would it be possible to conceive a conceptual structure within the Peircean works that enables a reflection on art? Ivo Ibri, from the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo, answers this question with a vigorous yes. It is an instigating text that opens up new possibilities of study in a virtually new field within Peirce's philosophy.

Peirce's denial that the human being possesses the faculty of intuition is the theme of the text by Robert Lane, from the University of West Georgia – USA, the second of two articles on the subject. Here also, objective idealism is evoked as "a more general iteration of the metaphysical aspect of his earlier denial of intuition."
Still on aspects of Peircean philosophy, Lauro Frederico Barbosa da Silveira, from the UNESP-Marília Graduate Program in Philosophy, examines the role of induction as a process for a progressive determination of concepts.

Claudio Vialle, from Universidade de Córdoba – Argentina, presents an essay which is the second part of his study on Mead's philosophy. This is a work on moral philosophy that points out some difficulties within Mead's system. "Morte e Suicídio no Tractatus de Wittgenstein" [Death and Suicide in Wittgenstein's Tractatus] is the title and theme of the article by José Fernando da Silva, graduate student in philosophy from PUC-SP, and a professor at Universidade Mackenzie, showing that suicide is the absolute denial of life.

Marcos Rodrigues da Silva, from Universidade Estadual de Londrina, analyzes "the structure of a realistic argument used to uphold the idea that belief in the truth of accepted theories is justified by the acceptance of scientific theories". Based on pragmatic concepts, Silva studies some complexities in the assumptions of that argument.

Finally, Robert E. Innis, from the University of Massachusets Lowell, examines the notion of religious naturalism in Josiah Royce. The article covers the core aspect of the Roycean notion of the Absolute and its relation to some pivots of the religious problem as Royce saw it.As can be seen, by the quality of its thematic spectrum, this is one of the most interesting issues of Cognitio.

I would like to take this opportunity to mention that the 14th International Meeting on Pragmatism (IMP) will be held at PUC-SP during November 5-8, 2012, welcoming, as senior guest speakers, members of the International Organization Committee (IOC), which is organizing the Charles S. Peirce International Centennial Congress, to be held at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, in Lowell, MA, United States, in 2014.

Besides attending the 14th IMP, the sixteen members of the IOC, composed of international Peirce specialists, and in which the Editor of Cognitio, Professor Ivo Ibri , also participates, will meet to discuss the planning stages of the congress celebrating the 100th anniversary of Peirce's death. For this reason, it was agreed that the 14th IMP will bear the subtitle Toward the 2014 Charles S. Peirce International Centennial Congress. It is doubtless an event of the highest academic importance, which will attract scholars of pragmatism and related philosophical currents, both from Brazil and abroad, during 2012.

The Center for Pragmatism Studies, which organizes the International Meetings on Pragmatism and publishes Cognitio, takes this opportunity to welcome in advance all members of the IOC, placing Cognitio at their disposal to receive, together with other national and international contributions that it routinely accepts, the submissions of the essays which will be presented at the 14th EIP.

Edélcio Gonçalves de Souza
Assistant editor