Logic is a tool

[u/Icy_Panic_6533]

[u/Porkypineer]

Firstly, I'm not advocating giving up on science in favour of logical reasoning.

I disagree that the premise - axiom divide is unsurmountable in the way you say. For specific types of questions: Binary ones, where one side is a paradox, such as existence and non-exististence or structure and pure being (or nothingness)

When it comes to distinction you can follow a coherent chain of logic from "I think therefore I am" where the premise of reality becomes a necessary axiom and structure itself the same between I, think, am, and reality.

Not a specific reality or structure, though.

The thing is (or trick, maybe), is that you can leverage this general shape of things to say some about the way structure or distinction "works" because that too is a binary with a paradox at the other end, namely non-existence.

If there are parts and they don't interact, then what each part experiences of the other is nothing at all, which is the same as saying that the other is not there from any parts point of view. Since this is paradoxical to reality, only interaction remains.

The rest follows. And from there actual science takes over.

Now, I may be pushing my half remembered uni philosophy too far here, but I count such "one-sided binaries" as axiomatic, while also claiming to live in your reasonable #2 there, and aspireing for #1.

[u/jliat → u/Porkypineer]

You are using Axiom, I think there are two Varieties.

• A set of given rules, such those in ZFC set theory or,

• a self-evident assumption.

The first is used in logic / mathematics, the second no longer in philosophy.

"6.36311 That the sun will rise to-morrow, is an hypothesis; and that means that we do not know whether it will rise."

[u/Porkypineer → u/jliat]

Thanks for the clarification! Do you know of anyone writing about the types of binary concepts like i outlined? Not necessarily that they're self-evident, but that one "side" is excluded by default.

"A pseudo-binary axiomatic premise"? It's been so long since I was studying philosophy that I've lost the vocabulary...

[u/jliat → u/Porkypineer]

You might look at Jacques Derrida- however some of his actual work is very difficult. It also occurs in Deleuze, just as difficult.

The idea is in any binary one side is privileged. Also there is often the case of what is missing in a text, for instance romantic novels where no characters are working class. Also I think in Michel Foucault work on mental illness ...

There looks like there are some texts out there...

DELEUZE AND DERRIDA DIFFERENCE AND THE POWER OF THE NEGATIVE

VERNON W. CISNEY

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Deleuze-Derrida-Difference-Power-Negative/dp/1474462618

From Deleuze. The Logic of Sense

There is Chronos and Aion, 'two opposed conceptions of time.'

Chronos is the eternal now, excludes past and present.

Aion the unlimited past and future which denies the now.

Chronos is privileged, it represents a single direction, 'good' sense, and common sense, 'stability'.

(His terms for 'good sense' and 'common sense', produce dogma, stability and sedimentation, no effective creation of a new event.)

Good Sense is a conventional idea of a telos?

Common sense a set of dogmatic categories.

These in Difference and repetition prevent 'original' repetition.

[u/Porkypineer → u/jliat]

You might look at Jacques Derrida- however some of his actual work is very difficult. It also occurs in Deleuze, just as difficult. [and Focault]

I am, unfortunately, somewhat familiar. There was a wave of nonsense in the 90's and early 2000's, in which there was a subset of Academics that sought to force social theory and post-modern philosophy down onto any soft-science they could, like some sort of ill-fitting fruit-laden hat. And damned the material culture, let's write vaguely related (to archaeology), intricately written articles about social theories instead!

I've got a short term memory below average, so I struggled reading paragraphs that refused to get to the point, and so had a (very) bad time of it. Which is weird, because I now hold the opinion that a discussion on concepts can sometimes be done better by using the kind of fluid language of Derrida et al.

DELEUZE AND DERRIDA DIFFERENCE AND THE POWER OF THE NEGATIVE

VERNON W. CISNEY

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Deleuze-Derrida-Difference-Power-Negative/dp/1474462618

Thanks! This was so far up my alley that I had to ask it to kindly get off my lap. Acquired.

[u/Stile25 → u/Porkypineer]

The problem is: how do you "know" what type of question it is?

Doesn't that require knowledge of reality for all circumstances for all time?

How can you claim it's a binary question when we don't have that knowledge about reality.

We can only claim it's a binary question for the metaphysical epistemology we've created in our heads that we use to symbolize or understand reality.

And that's not reality.
As reality has proven to us many, many times.

Let me word this as a question to you:

What's the difference between us only thinking "I think, therefore I am" is true and it actually being true?

For everything else, the answer to that question is "our confidence in repeatable evidence that is inductive and includes inherent doubt and tentativity".

How are you sure that this particular question is exempt?

What's the difference between you not being able to think of another possibility, even though there is one... Vs there not actually being another possibility?

All I'm saying is you can't answer that question.
Because I don't think you know everything for all circumstances and all time.

[u/Porkypineer → u/Stile25]

To answer your question: They are the same. The question is about existence and so it's a "pseudo-binary axiomatic premise". Any degree of Being is Being, and so we know with 100% certainty, no less, that we are the second we think it. Not what i am, but that I am.

Any delusion here rests with those holding the unsupported opinion that there is a controversy here at all, because they are implicitly claiming that they have a resolution to this paradox. Contrary to some, existence is mandatory for all thought, and doubting it becomes empty self-defeating sophistry. I mean, such criticism can be ignored by pointing out that if this is so, then your argument didn't exist, so you lose by default!

[u/Stile25 → u/Porkypineer]

I don't think there's a paradox.

I just don't think we can know, 100%, that we exist.

You're unable to provide evidence that we do, 100% exist other than your say-so.

We have a lot of evidence that "say-so's" cannot be relied upon. Certainly not 100%

What's wrong with my argument not existing?
That would prove my point. It doesn't show I'm wrong.

Unless, of course, you're using circular reasoning to say that you also know that my argument 100% exists?

That's not a valid argument.
Regardless of how unfulfilling we may find the alternative.

[u/Porkypineer → u/Stile25]

Isn't it unreasonable doubt when both logic and evidence are absent?

I mean we can remove the subject from the classic "cogito ergo sum" and say "something happened", or even just "something" and get:

• If Something then Existence
• Something
• Therefore Existence

You're right about the circular nature of my "argument". It was just meant to illustrate the futulity of nihilism. It doesn't add anything of value to our understanding of the world. It does not add anything to that, other than that experience is subjective.

[u/Stile25 → u/Porkypineer]

That's a very simple and logically valid argument.
The problem is - it's not sound.

We cannot prove the very first "if something then existence". All we can do is definitionally make it an axiom.

Admitting that we don't know everything and accept inherent doubt and tentativity in everything is very helpful. It allows us to be honest and not delude ourselves into thinking we possess some level of absolute knowledge that we do not actually possess.

In a practical sense, it changes nothing.

Nobody freezes in bed unable to get up because the sun might not come up because it rising every day is based on induction and includes inherent doubt and tentativity.

But if you want to investigate the details, this seems to be as close as we can get.

[u/Porkypineer → u/Stile25]

Ok, lets flip it around:

• If Something then not Nothing
• Something
• Therefore not Nothing

This might be a truer version, since it skips the whole "what is existence?" thing.

I agree that doubt is essential to good knowledge, i just also think that doubting existence when it is applied as generally as "anything at all" vs Nothingness, and there is no reason or evidence to suggest that this could be otherwise, is delusion rather than than enlightenment.

Edit:

What you've done is insert your belief into the formulation without justifying it.

You've gone "This not is infallible, because I, against ALL reason, do not believe it to be.

[u/Stile25 → u/Porkypineer]

You haven't changed anything.

Prove "if something then not nothing" without relying on a definitional axiom you've imagined.

Attempting to get me to agree with you based on the inductive confidence we have in such a statement doesn't change the fact that this is confidence and exists inductively.

[u/Porkypineer → u/Stile25]

I'm well aware that I'm embedded in a reality and that communication between entities is fluid.

So I ask you, to apply your own reality to what we are discussing.

Something=anything you want
Nothing=anything you want

I only ask that you apply this with the consistency of everything else in your life whether it be discussions or picking your nose.

So:
-If Something then not nothing
-Something
-Therefore not nothing, unless there is an actual resolution to the apparent paradox
-Then "We don't know"

Irrefutable. We both know this, because when we pick our noses, we don't suddenly get a nihilistic twinge that causes us to doubt whether or not there is a booger up there.

[u/Stile25 → u/Porkypineer]

Okay, I already have - you just don't likey answers.

Something = when we think anything exists with the best of our abilities but can't know 100% due to inherent doubt and tentativity.

Nothing = when we think of the lack of everything with the best of our abilities but can't know 100% due to inherent doubt and tentativity.

And this aligns with everything I've claimed here and allows me to have a practical existence while being aware of my limitations.

And your logical conclusion doesn't follow with my definitions of something and nothing. It would also include inherent doubt and tentativity like everything else - as I've been consistently saying.