Logic Is A Belief System

[Dumbass]

Science and religion both are belief systems, but at least science is based on logic. unfortunately even logic is a belief system.

 

 

[Moderator's note: this discussion has been split off from The (epistemological) Foundations Of Physical Reality as it is not related to that topic.]

[sanctus]

Dumbass, care to develop on why you think that logic is a belief system? Some interpretations might be, eg. if person buys A then he is interested in B. But hardcore logic (eg. if a theorem in mathematics is proven to be true based on the given premises) is not a belief system, altough everyone has the option to not accept logic. The fact that one can choose to accept or not logic, doesn't make it a belief system. A belief system is defined by the fact that the things in it can not be proven (that's why it is a belief), you can't say that about logic...

[Dumbass]

Sanctus, I think all logic is based on empirical observations,for example,  if someone is a liar,he is not honest, (law of contradiction), the only reason such a law exists is merely due to the act that it goes against the way we view the world and think about it, but it reality the way we view the world and think about it, does not make  anything true or false, and to repeat, i think all logic, is based on empirical observations, that we accepted without a choice.

 

Now, assuming you agree logic is empirical, then by Hume's attack on causality, i would say logic is a belief system, the only thing, that gives logic an edge over religion, is the fact that logic is much more consistent in our minds.

 

 

Also, for you last point, i could in fact say that about logic. Logic is based on the three laws of thought, and i Challenge you to prove to me they are true.

[Buffy]

No, *application* of logic is dependent upon definitions/assumptions. With proper tip of the hat to Kurt Gödel, logic is an abstract, internally consistent system. If there is a "failure of logic" it has entirely to do with it's mapping onto a real-world instance, and that's the fault of the application not logic.

 

The three laws of thought are *axioms* in logic, they define a logical system and everyone can agree with them. If you find in your *mapping* to the real world a case where you think they are violated, that's a fault in your *mapping* not in *logic itself*.

 

If I say "all members of the Genus Equus are members of the Genus Equus" and you complain "but Zebras are not Horses" that's not a violation of the Law of Identity, it's that you're mis-mapping the real world entities into a logical model, you haven't "disproved" the Law of Identity.

 

I split this thread off from the one on Foundations of Physical Reality thread because this is all about application of models, which is not (despite constant attempts to twist it into being) what it is about.

 

Carry on, however note that while we're very open minded, there's more than a little resistance here to Caterpillar-like behavior.

 

Also, lack of response to "challenges" is never taken as a "win" here. In an awful lot of cases, not responding is a tacit message that the challenge is silly (and we have a forum area here for that: one you do not want to end up in).

 

 

When I use a word it means exactly what I want it to mean, no more and no less, :phones:

Buffy

[Dumbass]

I have three main points to argue for, since am a dumbass, I will not weave them into a single argument.

 

First, the axioms of logic are only consistant becouse our world is, when you apply them to QM they fail. Since our thought process evolved to be consistent with the classical world, it will also be consistent with logic. The chain goes like this, world makes mind, mind makes logic. Logic was invented just to explain pattrens in our thoughts, there is nothing special about it.

 

Second, the only way for a rational parson to believe in logic is to logicly examine logic, but if logic is inconsistent, isn't possible it could claim to be true when in fact it is not?

 

Third, let us for the sake of the argument accept your axioms, then we still have problem in knowing wheather each logic step does infact agree with axioms, you might say "by the Y axiom X is true" but in that statement as sure as you are, it is still based on your own reasoning which could be wrong or even worse, deceiving.for example you could be a "brain in a vat" where your brain made that leap of faith when infact it does not exist.

 

 

Btw I hope you change my views. Since for the last 5 years I been on a sceptical rollercoster, starting with losing belief in God till a few months ago I lost faith in my own existence.

Edited June 27, 2014 by Dumbass

[Buffy]

By definition, logic is an abstract mathematical exercise.

 

It has absolutely nothing to do with the world until you choose to apply it to the world.

 

At that point if you find an "error in logic" it is rarely due to the logic itself, but in errors in the mapping between logic and the world caused by an inadequate/inaccurate mapping that you created, thus it is not an error in logic is an error in mapping.

 

Logic is a branch of mathematics, and given it's strict explication of its laws and assumptions, it has no dependency on "your own reasoning which could be wrong or worse." What makes any element of logic true is not your own interpretation of it, but the fact that it can be reconstructed and replicated by any mind and proven. 

 

There is a whole branch of logic that applies probability (Fuzzy Logic) that has been applied to quantum mechanics with quite a bit of success, but in any case, that is still wholly an issue of mapping and any failure there of is a failure of the mapping, not the logic.

 

I mentioned Kurt Gödel earlier, and you may not be familiar with him, but he is famous for his Incompleteness theorems which demonstrate a hole in logic that basically says that a logical system can't prove itself. Using this however to claim that "logic is broken" is equivalent to saying "because Einstein proved that Newton was 'wrong' there is no gravity," which unfortunately people who do not really understand it have a tendency to do.

 

It's fine to be skeptical, but if you're going to argue against conventional wisdom in an area where there is no dispute, in order to be taken seriously you need to demonstrate that you actually have an understanding of the topic. You're confusing some pretty fundamental issues here, and debate simply doesn't work if you're using a language that no one else understands.

 

 

The more I think about language, the more it amazes me that people ever understand each other at all, :phones:

Buffy

[Dumbass]

Buffy. You ignored my post completely. I think the problem is that you think am a dumbass. My fault obviously.

 

Also, you are talking about logic from a mathematical point view. Where I am talking from a phillosphical point of view.

 

I suggest you read an article by Dummit called "is logic empirical?" . Also another one by the same name by Putnam.

 

Also I will argue that we have no laws of gravity. Just look up the "problem of induction" by David Hume.

 

You see Godel isn't famous for discovering a fault in logic, no! that was old news. He is famous for proving it using logic.

 

To repeat. Logic is just a formal system we created. But the fact it is formal does not mean it is consistent just that it is not based on physical observation but mental observations.

 

Also you might wanna read on paraconsistent logic.

Also fuzzy logic is just applied multi-valued logic.

[Buffy]

Oh no, on the contrary, I don't think you're a dumb *** at all, but I do think you're being a bit incoherent.

 

The fact is that Putnam and Dummett are all about application of classical logic to the real world. Putnam based some of his work on reconciliation between Euclidian and non-Euclidean Geometry (and please note that while geometry itself is a mathematical abstraction, the activity he was engaging in was *mapping*), which is a perfect example of the Newton/Einstein argument I posed above. Both Putnam's and Dummett's works dive headlong into metaphysical issues about the real (empirical) world, ending up talking about perception and how individual minds may differ in their perception of reality, whether it is a "mental observation" or a "physical" one.

 

So, no, actually I was directly addressing what you're talking about, because I've heard stuff like this before.

 

Quantum Logic was devised specifically to deal with quantum mechanical systems, and basically weakens distributive axioms. Putnam's key contribution was to try to argue that it applies to all systems, not just quantum ones, but Putnam himself seemed to abandon it. Insofar as this again is simply an issue of empirical application, Quantum logic itself is not intrinsically a disproof of logic or that it is merely a figment of a mind or that it would be inconsistent between minds.

 

Paraconsistent logic is quite fun to play with, and in fact has all sorts of applications to the real world, mostly because it allows simplified models of the real world to be built that have strong predictive power, no matter that they allow "P and not P" within them. Fuzzy Logic also allows this in application because it allows probabilistic degrees of contradiction to lead to accurate predictions.

 

The point here being that what Quantum and Paraconsistent (and other) logics do is simply change one of the axioms of Classical logic in internally consistent and abstract ways that are not subject to "interpretation" in and of themselves, but certainly all are equivalently capable of being misapplied by people who don't understand what they are trying to model in mapping a logical description to the real world.

 

So to get to the original point you were making that I'm disagreeing with here: no, logic is not a "belief system."

 

Now if you want to argue about the application of logic to prove inconsistencies in the real world, that's fine, but quite frankly if you think about it for a minute, if everything including all mathematics and logic is based on "belief" there really is no reality at all: all the world's a stage and we're all just actors playing parts in your own personal version of The Truman Show or maybe The Matrix, in which all bets are off.

 

If that's the case you might be best off just thinking of me as Agent Smith. The question is, are you really Neo?

 

You're obviously not dumb at all, but you do have a tendency to assume we all know what you're talking about, and that the links you're trying to establish are obvious. They're not. As my favorite high school English teacher used to say, "Restate, restate, restate!"

 

 

If his was more than just a vague ambition, if he was absolutely determined to discover the truth, there's no way we could prevent him, :phones:

Buffy

[Dumbass]

Nice post. I think we actually agree on most and this post made your views more clear to me.

 

Also I have severe ADHD so my points are usually all over the place and I tend to typo a lot, so I apolgize about that.

 

I do believe am Neo and you are Agent Smith. I describe my self as a subjective idealist and sometimes when am in the mood,I believe in solipsism.

 

 

Now the only issue I have left is your sepration between world and Logic.

 

I don't see why such a seperation is warrented. For example 1+1=2 But I see no logical reason why is this true, I only believe such a thing becouse the physical world tells me 1+1=2 but if I lived in a world where 1+1=3 Then my logic would be itself false and not the mapping.And such a world would require a different type of logic.

[Dumbass]

In other words. The axioms of logic are based on physical reality. And physical reality can not be Proven to be correct.

[ErlyRisa]

I like Dumbasses train of thought...

 

but to be careful... it makes you sick, it happens to the lonely.

 

"Logic", or as you put it a belief in a system:

 

It's stuff that usually ends up creating loopy type thoughts: thoughts that come back in on themselves.

 

I'm actually considering labeling it as a type of disease, pro-created, mainly by TV.

You see in our western world, many of the "upper, in charge" WANT things they can't have, nor do they understand...

eg. Free Energy, or Faster than Light Travel, or even worst yet: the primordial answer to the universe of why (which I thought they knew that answer is as being 1 , or get a bible and towel because your going to cry if you knew the truth)

 

I find most of what the human race ends up doing is just recycling the same old with the same new, to make it look like some-one succeeded in achieving something in their lives: especially for those that have simple aspirations, upbringing and attributes (which define their thoughts/goals/requirements for life). Sadly some of us, like for example the astutely versed, bored, and what I would perceive to be: lonely people, waste their time conversing on topics that people 2000 year ago have already discussed.

 

I admit, that it is nice. Especially so, too try to speak, about those truly foundational questions... but in the end you know what?

 

Computers are faster than us now... there is no point in discussion: It's time for play, most if not everyone around us (ie those not on this forum) are doing things in thier lives that require no thought at all, and they enjoy themselves: I would like that life more, it is easier, and I wish it upon more people, becuase going nuts about philosophy is not something worth pondering about when there are simpler baby discussion topics out their:

 

I'll get the ball rolling:

Why is the sky Blue,

and Why are my meatballs soggy?

 

 

PS The last person to truly delve deep into philosophy was castrated after he finished his work: He too in the end just wanted to relax and retire...and not have too think anymore.

 

its time to become pets: and somehow accept that we may never have an answer to FTL or why.

[Buffy]

Now the only issue I have left is your sepration between world and Logic.

 

I don't see why such a seperation is warrented. For example 1+1=2 But I see no logical reason why is this true, I only believe such a thing becouse the physical world tells me 1+1=2 but if I lived in a world where 1+1=3 Then my logic would be itself false and not the mapping.And such a world would require a different type of logic.

It's not that the separation between logic and reality is warranted or not, it's that logic is not dependent upon reality at all.

 

That you have used things like counting on fingers to understand concepts in math or logic was probably very useful to you in learning how they work, but that's just your process of learning and has no reference to why abstract systems of math or logic require no reference to the real world to be valid.

 

This is why you'll get halfway through Whitehead & Russell's Principia Mathematica before they're able to justify "1+1=2".

 

That you think it's required doesn't mean that as far as mathematics and logic goes, anyone who knows what they're talking about thinks so too.

 

In other words. The axioms of logic are based on physical reality. And physical reality can not be Proven to be correct.

So in other words, no, axioms of logic are NOT DEPENDENT UPON physical reality, so therefore physical reality is superfluous to logic, and thus whether physical reality can be "proven" or not is completely irrelevant to the validity of logic.

 

 

The world is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper, :phones:

Buffy

[Dumbass]

Look. They are tied to our thinking process. And our thinking process is tied to the world.

 

Abstract things don't live in some kind of special place, they live in our minds.

[Buffy]

The "tree falls in a forest, does it make a sound" argument simply confuses the issue. The abstract nature of math and logic means that they will be consistent in every mind and every state of reality. It's the more interesting corollary that comes out of Leibniz' "all possible worlds" proposition. You don't need a particular mind or a small group of like-minds in order for it to work.The failure of the "tree falls/sound" argument is that it is completely anthropocentric and dogmatic to boot: do the birds hear it? Heck, if there are no density waves generated in the air when it falls--measured or not--then basically you have an argument that nothing exists without you in it, whether it's abstract or not, and that's really just avoiding the critical distinction between "the abstract" and "physical reality" which is indeed meaningful insofar as the abstract will continue to exist in different physical realities.So when you say:

 

Abstract things don't live in some kind of special place, they live in our minds.

No, they don't live in a "special place," they live everywhere all the time in every conceivable universe.Schrödinger wanted folks to understand that an alive-and-dead cat was absurd, but if you insist that the answer is "there is no cat," then the point he was trying to make is completely lost.I can see now that you only care about the metaphysical issues of reality and existence here, and are just using logic as a useful whipping boy in the process. I'm obviously not going to convince you so don't mistake my responses as an attempt to, I'm just trying to clarify the issue for folks reading this who will be confused by what you're saying.Many people would sooner die than think; In fact, they do so, :phones:Buffy

[Dumbass]

But for me atleast and logicly speaking, there is no physically world nor abstract. Only ideas and the distinction between the physical and mental representation of those ideas is only in the magnitude of the liveliness of the idea.

 

 

That being said. I think we are to just agree to disagree, errrr! Screw that!!! I wont agree to that. But I will disagree to agree.

[CraigD]

A belated welcome to hypography Dumbass! What a fun thread you’ve started here! :)

 

Science and religion both are belief systems, but at least science is based on logic. unfortunately even logic is a belief system.

For me, it’s confusing to immediately consider logic to be a belief system in the same sense that a religion is one. Rather than one of the traditional seven liberal arts, logic is to me simply the arithmetic of special kinds of numbers. For the usual 2-state logic, these numbers are conventionally called booleans. The elementary operations are AND, OR, and NOT. AND is closely analogous to addition of integer and several other common kinds of numbers, OR to multiplication, and NOT only a little more complicated to analogize, as something like NOT A :: absolute_value(A-1).

 

Logic, to me, is a practical tool, more like a hammer or shovel than religion or science, which are conceptually much larger, complicated, and complex.

 

Despite this initial dissonance, I can get pretty quickly and easily to the point of accepting the OP’s proposition “religion and logic are both belief systems.”

 

When labeling things in natural language, I like to look at the origin (etymonology) of the words used. “Belief” has an interesting one. In classically antiquity (about 8000 BC+), the closest concept appears to me expressed by the Greek words pisteuo and latin persuedare, from which our present day English word persuade comes, and meaning that, the active, rhetorical act of compelling agreement. Our present day “believe” comes from a different concept, expressed ca 300 AD+ by the Old Germanic ga-laubon and Old English geleafa, which mean “to hold dear/love”, with the implication of trusting that which he love. So, as best I can suss, a “belief system” is collection of things one loves and trusts, reasons why, and procedures for determining if a new thing should be loved and trusted.

 

Arithmetic, of which I consider logic a kind, is certainly something I love and trust, so I’m comfortable terming it and logic one of my belief systems, or part of my overall belief system – but only is kept strictly apart of religious belief.

 

In modern religious thought, belief appears to me to have been narrowly defined as something like “accepting as true that which one cannot or should not attempt to explain”. For a religionist (which I’m not), a religious belief is loved and trusted in much the same way I love and trust arithmetic.

 

I’ve not seen the idea of arithmetic as a belief system in much credible literature, nonfiction or fiction. It appears in theistic apology (explanation), along the lines of “atheists claim to be superior to us in accepting only what they can logically prove, but this claim is false, because logic is just a belief system, like our religious faith”. I don’t consider these explanations credible.

 

The most direct and succinct expression of the idea of arithmetic as a belief system in literature I can recall is a from Neil Stephenson’s 1999 novel Cryptonomicon (which, though IMHO authorial self-indulgent I highly recommend to folk of a philosophical bent): Randy Waterhouse: "We make our way in the world by knowing that two plus two equals four, and sticking to our guns in a way that is kind of nerdy and that maybe hurts people's feelings sometimes.”

 

First, the axioms of logic are only consistant becouse our world is, when you apply them to QM they fail.

This is, I think, a common misconception, one that’s addressed squarely in good introductory modern physics classes.

 

The elements of classical mechanics are bodies with (in principle) exactly known masses and velocities. The elements of quantum mechanics are mathematical functions (called wavefunctions) from which the probabilities of various properties of a particle can (in principle) be calculated. Boolean arithmetic (logical) expressions can be made about the elements of classical mechanics or quantum mechanics.

 

Logic only seems to fail when one attempts to use CM techniques (formalism) on QM elements – that is, attempt to calculate exact the exact mass and velocity the particles described by QM wavefunctions. CM provides useful approximations of the outcomes of some large collections of QM events. “Semi-classical”/“quasi-classical” approaches to QM can be useful in understanding QM and bridging around intractable QM calculations, but CM techniques should not be directly used to calculate properties of particles described by wavefunctions.

 

Putnam and Dummett’s “Is Logic Empirical?” articles you mention (thanks – this is my introduction to them), are, I believe, an illustration of the misapplication of CM techniques to QM elements, reflected in logical statements that can be made “reasonable interpretations” of QM, not of the inherent need for a non-2-state logic for QM formalism. This is not to say that a non-2-state logic for QM formalism could not be useful, possibly very useful.

 

interpretation of quantum mechanics are not themselves QM – that is, they don’t involve only QM wavefunctions and their manipulation. Interpretations of QM, or any scientific theoretical formalism, are IMHO best considered means by which we can avoid confusion and improve our intuition about QM and other theoretical formalism.

 

Btw I hope you change my views. Since for the last 5 years I been on a sceptical rollercoster, starting with losing belief in God till a few months ago I lost faith in my own existence.

Kudos on abandoning theism, Dumbass! :thumbs_up

 

Compelling persuasion on the existence problem is a pretty tall order for an internet forum. If Descartes’ venerable “I think, therefore I am” and all his 17th century writing isn’t enough for you, you might try something newer, like David Deutsch’s 1997 The Fabric of Reality. In chapter 4, he goes beyond the usual dismissal of solipsism (which I’m guessing is your present purgatory, Dumbass) to dismissing it as “realism weighed down by worthless baggage introduced only to be explained away”.

 

But for me atleast and logicly speaking, there is no physically world nor abstract. Only ideas and the distinction between the physical and mental representation of those ideas is only in the magnitude of the liveliness of the idea.

I’d take this a step further and say that ideas are just useful terms to describe ensembles of physical states of neurons corresponding to mental states, as “emergent phenomena”. The perception of External, physical events, and mental representation of them emerge from distinct neurochemical/anatomical phenomena, but both remain emergent, not causative or otherwise privileged.

 

Years ago, from reading psychologist Fritz Perls’ 1969 Gestalt Therapy Verbatim, I was fascinated by his speculation that something like what I think you mean by “liveliness of the idea” – what psychologists of the old psychoanalytic school termed cathesis – could account for distinctions between internal ideas, unconscious or conscious, ideas about external reality, and motor (muscular) action. With neuroimaging techniques available as early as the late 1970s, however, this idea was discredited. Brains just don’t physically work this way.

 

I’d have to have a lot more communication with you, Dumbass, to more than guess at your thoughts and feelings, share relevant experience from my life, and offer useful advice, beyond warning you to avoid idea that discard the “feeling and thoughts as emergent phenomena” idea I sketch above in favor of parapsychologist Rupert Sheldrake’s morphic resonance or stuff like it.

[Dumbass]

CraigD. It will take me some time to directly respond, heck, maybe never, since many things you mention are beyond my knowledge.

But I will address a couple points.

First, matter including brains does not exist. They are merely impressions or representations, depending on if you are an idealist or a materialist. As in Hume or Schopenhauer, respectively.

Second, even if logic was a belief system, atleast it is based on observations and does not allow bullshit interpiations like religon, or even worse, shifiting the burden from people to God.

Third, "I think therefore I am" is ****ing bullshit. For a start I do not think, its like saying, "does that table doubt its doubting?" the statement is just illegal. Also, even if there was thinking, that does not mean I am is doing that.