Toward a Peircean logic of meditation

Michael L. Raposa

doi:10.1515/sem-2021-0119

Article

Toward a Peircean logic of meditation

Michael L. Raposa

Published/Copyright: October 19, 2021

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From the journal Semiotica Volume 2021 Issue 243

Abstract

Peirce’s philosophy, to a great extent, continues to be neglected as a potentially valuable resource for theologians and scholars of religion. This essay represents an attempt to rectify that state of affairs, albeit focused narrowly on how some of Peirce’s ideas might help to illuminate the role that attention plays in transforming consciousness and shaping certain meditative practices. Such practices display a logic consistent with the one that Peirce described in the process of developing his semiotic theory and his theory of inquiry. While his writings on logic are voluminous, Peirce produced only a very few scattered remarks about the “logic of meditation,” broadly conceived. One purpose of this essay is to collect and to examine carefully those remarks. Another is to evaluate their significance for contemporary philosophers of religion who are invested in the task of trying to understand the nature and purpose of meditation, not as a single type of exercise, but in its various forms and manifestations.

Keywords: attention; contemplation; logic; meditation; musement; Peirce

Corresponding author: Michael L. Raposa, Lehigh University, Bethlehem, PA, USA, E-mail: mlr0@lehigh.edu

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Received: 2021-08-30

Accepted: 2021-09-22

Published Online: 2021-10-19

Published in Print: 2021-11-25

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Articles in the same Issue

https://doi.org/10.1515/sem-2021-0119

Keywords for this article

attention; contemplation; logic; meditation; musement; Peirce