Bringing Maths and Philosophy Together: Russian-Brazilian Project Explores Logical Pluralism

In late October and early November, HSE University hosted the Autumn School on ‘Logic and Formal Philosophy’ and a conference on logical pluralism as part of a collaborative project uniting Russian and Brazilian philosopher-logicians and mathematician-logicians. The project’s leaders and participants, Elena Dragalina-Chernaya, Itala Loffredo D'Ottaviano, Marcelo Esteban Coniglio, and Evandro Luis Gomes, shared their insights about the initiative.

The joint project ‘Pluralist Perspectives on Logic and Formal Philosophy’ is a collaboration between the HSE International Laboratory for Logic, Linguistics and Formal Philosophy (LLFP) and the Centre for Logic, Epistemology, and the History of Science (CLE) at the University of Campinas, Brazil. It focuses on addressing the meta-mathematical and methodological challenges arising from the pluralism of logical systems. Running from 2024 to 2026, the project brings together researchers from both countries.

As part of the joint project, the Autumn School on ‘Logic and Formal Philosophy’ and a conference on logical pluralism dedicated to the memory of Newton da Costa—a renowned Brazilian mathematician, logician, and philosopher who passed away in 2024—were held at HSE University. This autumn, Brazilian colleagues also participated in LLFP’s annual ‘Formal Philosophy’ conference.

Elena Dragalina-Chernaya

‘Our partner in this joint project, the Brazilian Centre for Logic, Epistemology, and the History of Science at UNICAMP, has nearly 50 years of history. It was founded in 1977—15 years after the university itself. According to recent data from Brazil’s Ministry of Education, UNICAMP has become a leading institution in the country. In 2014, the first cooperation agreement between UNICAMP and HSE was signed. Our academic partnership with CLE began through joint conferences, monographs, and academic exchanges. The choice of this topic stems from the mathematical and methodological challenges posed by the diversity of logical systems, requiring collaborative efforts from philosopher-logicians and mathematician-logicians.

Our team includes philosophers such as project leaders Fabio Bertato, Itala Loffredo D’Ottaviano, and myself, as well as Evandro Gomes, Vladimir Vasyukov, and Vitaly Dolgorukov, along with mathematicians Walter Carnielli, Marcelo Coniglio, Rodolfo Biraben, Mikhail Rybakov, Daniyar Shamkanov, Anastasia Onoprienko, and Denis Fedyanin. Students and graduate students participating in the project also represent the philosophical and mathematical schools of our universities.

The project's outcomes, like any research endeavour, will primarily manifest in a series of publications in high-ranking journals and presentations at international scientific conferences.

We plan to hold annual Russian-Brazilian workshops on logical pluralism

The first one has just recently been held at HSE University in memory of Newton da Costa, the patriarch of Brazilian logic.

Earlier, in October 2024, the Russian-Brazilian Autumn School on ‘Logic and Formal Philosophy’ was held. Such schools will be conducted regularly. We aim to integrate and further develop the well-established traditions of CLE and LLFP's logic schools. The school involved students, graduate students, and young researchers in philosophy, mathematics, computer science, as well as linguists, psychologists, and other specialists interested in modern logic.

The prospects for studying logical pluralism are tied not only to the anticipation of inspiring mathematical results that satisfy our scientific curiosity or their planned applications in computer science, but also to the hope of gaining a deeper understanding of the premises and limits of our rationality, fostering dialogue across different sciences and cultures

Itala Loffredo D'Ottaviano, Full Professor in Logic and the Foundations of Science Centre for Logic, Epistemology and the History of Science University of Campinas, Brazil, is a long-term partner of the HSE laboratory and has visited Moscow many times. She talks about the significance of cooperation with the Russian university and further prospects.

Itala Loffredo D'Ottaviano

‘Collaboration with HSE’s Laboratory for Logic, Linguistics and Formal Philosophy under the framework of a special agreement between our universities is immensely important. Russian scholars—mathematicians and philosophers of the 20th century—have significantly advanced science, and their influence in the 21st century remains immense. We study their legacy and strive to contribute to the development of science.

Exchanging scientific opinions and engaging in discussions in Moscow has been incredibly engaging and valuable. My colleagues and I delivered presentations and participated in the sessions of the Autumn School and the workshop five to eight times.

I would like to highlight the high level of preparation demonstrated by the students who participated in the discussions. At first, they were a bit hesitant to ask questions and speak up, but they quickly adapted to the working rhythm and posed important and complex questions about the topics of our presentations

Brazilian scholars presented several reports, including ‘Horizons of Logic for the 20th Century: Russian Contributions to Non-Classical Logics– Andrei Kolmogorov, Ivan Orlov, Valery Glivenko, Dmitry Bochvar’, ‘Charles Sanders Peirce and the Horizons of Logic for the 20th Century’ (Itala Loffredo D’Ottaviano); ‘Non-Deterministic Matrices and Swap Structures Semantics: Applications to Non-Classical Logics and Combination of Logics’, ‘Truth-Tables for Intuitionistic Propositional Logic: A New Interpretation and Decision Procedure Based on Restricted Non-Deterministic Matrices’, ‘On First-Order Ivlev-like Modal Logics’ (Marcelo Esteban Coniglio); ‘Beyond the Columns of Hercules, a History of Paraconsistency:  from Heraclitus of Ephesus to Stanisław Jaśkowski and Newton da Costa’, ‘The Mirror Has Two Faces: Logical Pluralism from the Perspective of da Costa and Quine’ (Evandro Luis Gomes).

@ HSE University

Marcelo Esteban Coniglio, Full Professor at the Department of Philosophy and Vice Director of the Centre for Logic, Epistemology and the History of Science at the University of Campinas, is a fan of Russian culture and history. He is one of the co-authors of the book ‘Many-values Semantics and Modal Logics: Essays in Honour of Yuriy Vasilievich Ivlev’ alongside editors Ekaterina Kubyshkina and Dmitry Zaitsev.

Marcelo Esteban Coniglio

‘It was a great honour for me to work on this book. Yuriy Ivlev is one of the outstanding philosopher-logicians whose works are not widely known internationally because they were mostly published in Russian.

In fact, the works of Russian scholars, such as mathematician Andrey Kolmogorov, were foundational texts in Brazil when I was a student

One of the goals of our joint project, of which I am proud to be a part, is to develop and deepen scientific ideas and actively involve students in research on the problems of logic and the interplay of its different schools.’

@ HSE University

Evandro Luis Gomes, Professor, Department of Philosophy, Graduate Programme in Philosophy, State University of Maringa, Parana, Brazil, also emphasised the importance of historical legacy for contemporary researchers in logic and philosophy, particularly the contributions of Russian scholars.

Evandro Luis Gomes

‘The organisation of the school and workshop was excellent. The presentations and discussions were a source of inspiring motivation for my future work. I would also like to highlight the outstanding work and engagement of the students, with whom it was an absolute pleasure to interact. I am confident that international scientific cooperation between Brazil and Russia will be both interesting and fruitful.’

@ HSE University