Thread: Is Logic Necessarily Infallible?

Originally Posted by thegnome54

Very well put.

The only practical conclusion I can think of from this dilemma is this:

If anyone ever develops a model of the universe which makes absolutely no logical sense, and yet provides accurate results, it should be accepted by the scientific community. Of course, it would be much better to have an equally successful model that actually makes sense, but if that is not available...

Of course, the very concept of accepting illogical means which provide useful ends seems to be based on logic as well. I don't believe any human being will ever be able to really address this issue, since our thoughts are so helplessly entwined in logic.

I don't know, I feel like I'm going in circles, but at the same time there should be some useful conclusion to be taken from this realization that logic is not necessarily infallible.

logic is just that, logic. logic is not truth or infallible. the word logic implies a thinking mind making a conclusion. logic does not exist if there is no mind to think it, which is not the same as truth which exists without a mind. truth is infallible. logic is the mind understanding that infallible truth.

if a model of a universe makes no sense, yet provides accurate results, should it be accepted by the scientific community? the answer lies in does that scientific community care for a higher logic or a human logic. because it is human logic that you can some how make this 'model of the universe' and have it accurately depict the universe. as if the universe can be put in a box.

is it even logical that truth is based on charts, graphs, measurements and numbers? is the scientific method even logical when considering you can't even ask it all questions, and if you can't ask it all questions how could our scientific method tell us about the truth and reality of the universe?

the problem with human logic is just that, it comes from our head. so all those measurements and numbers attribute to nothing if you don't know what truth is. logic isn't the only method for understanding truth. there is also experiencing and being. a person who is in love will always understand the meaning of being in love better than a scientist looking at being in love from a logical stand point of measuring his heart rate.

Originally Posted by juroara

logic is just that, logic. logic is not truth or infallible. the word logic implies a thinking mind making a conclusion. logic does not exist if there is no mind to think it, which is not the same as truth which exists without a mind. truth is infallible. logic is the mind understanding that infallible truth.

if a model of a universe makes no sense, yet provides accurate results, should it be accepted by the scientific community? the answer lies in does that scientific community care for a higher logic or a human logic. because it is human logic that you can some how make this 'model of the universe' and have it accurately depict the universe. as if the universe can be put in a box.

is it even logical that truth is based on charts, graphs, measurements and numbers? is the scientific method even logical when considering you can't even ask it all questions, and if you can't ask it all questions how could our scientific method tell us about the truth and reality of the universe?

the problem with human logic is just that, it comes from our head. so all those measurements and numbers attribute to nothing if you don't know what truth is. logic isn't the only method for understanding truth. there is also experiencing and being. a person who is in love will always understand the meaning of being in love better than a scientist looking at being in love from a logical stand point of measuring his heart rate.

You can ask the scientific method any question you want, as long as there is an objective answer to be found.

I also object to your last analogy, because the scientist does not fully understand love as a result of his limited information, not his logical approach. A person merely experiencing love understands it a lot less than a person who completely understands the mechanics behind it. A complete mechanical understanding implies an understanding of the feeling itself, as well.

I also don't understand how you can claim infallible truth exists outside of human logic. Think of what you used to reach this conclusion. It's really fundamentally impossible for us to assess the validity of our logic, because it permeates our thoughts - no, it IS our thoughts - and it's not possible to assess assessment itself without using assessment. If that makes any sense.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

You can ask the scientific method any question you want, as long as there is an objective answer to be found.

I also object to your last analogy, because the scientist does not fully understand love as a result of his limited information, not his logical approach. A person merely experiencing love understands it a lot less than a person who completely understands the mechanics behind it. A complete mechanical understanding implies an understanding of the feeling itself, as well.

I also don't understand how you can claim infallible truth exists outside of human logic. Think of what you used to reach this conclusion. It's really fundamentally impossible for us to assess the validity of our logic, because it permeates our thoughts - no, it IS our thoughts - and it's not possible to assess assessment itself without using assessment. If that makes any sense.

then you don't understand my post at all, not object to it.

is numbers and graphs the logical approach to understanding the universe?

if a scientist wants to understand 'being in love', is the method of using human science the most logical method? or, is falling in love himself the most logical method to understanding being in love?

wait, take a moment. I'm very word choosy

were not talking about the 'mechanics of love'. we are talking about 'being in love'. what is the most LOGICAL approach to understanding 'being in love'? 'being in love'? or the 'mechanics of love'? do not the mechanics of love only explain, the mechanics of love? and do you not need to be in love, to understand what it means to be in love? do you get what I am saying?

this is the limitation of science currently, the limitation of scientific logic behind the scientists mind. therefore, it is the scientists logical method that is not logical in understanding being in love. that does not mean the mechanics won't help you understand 'better', but they can never substitute the real experience necessary to understand the reality of being in love.

do you understand what I am saying?

what is the most logical way to understand what its like to run? RUNNING? or studying the muscles?

of course this is an easy and silly example, but what I am trying to get at is, when we start looking at the science about the universe and claim to know it all, were just IDIOTS. I mean, numbers, graphs, measurements, even photographs - these things only give us a skewed and limited understanding of reality. And then to create a model out of it, get real! Scientists in my opinion, are some of the most illogical people on earth, regardless if they are the most intelligent.

All those scientists listening to radio waves being sent from 'aliens'. Come on! Is that logical? To spend your entire life listening to something you don't even know is there? As if an intelligent alien race is equally wasting their life away listening for our radio waves which will reach them, when what, were extinct? Is that, logical? Is it logical because of all the math and science behind it?

I understand your last statement, so you made sense. But thats an entirely different subject! While it is my human logic making me believe that there is an infallible truth. If there was no infallible truth, (in my eyes) than anything you believe in would be true. But since what you believe in, as true as it is for you, is not a true reality for others, this is for me evidence the truth is not relative. it is infallible.

Originally Posted by juroara

if a scientist wants to understand 'being in love', is the method of using human science the most logical method? or, is falling in love himself the most logical method to understanding being in love?

You're mixing up 'logical' and 'practical'.

yes, it is more practical to simply be in love. However, the most logical way to TRULY understand what it's like to be in love is to STUDY being in love. You will never gain a complete understanding from simply being in love - the only way to truly and completely understand the phenomenon is to study it.

Originally Posted by juroara

when we start looking at the science about the universe and claim to know it all, were just IDIOTS. I mean, numbers, graphs, measurements, even photographs - these things only give us a skewed and limited understanding of reality.

Very true. BUT. There is no better way - no other way, even - to understand the universe to the best of our ability. It obviously works, too, because you're using a computer invented through these 'numbers and graphs' of science.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

You're mixing up 'logical' and 'practical'.

yes, it is more practical to simply be in love. However, the most logical way to TRULY understand what it's like to be in love is to STUDY being in love. You will never gain a complete understanding from simply being in love - the only way to truly and completely understand the phenomenon is to study it.

Very true. BUT. There is no better way - no other way, even - to understand the universe to the best of our ability. It obviously works, too, because you're using a computer invented through these 'numbers and graphs' of science.

is that what you really believe? o_O

do you really believe you can read a biology text book about the chemicals that go on in your brain and say, you now know what its like to be in love? even if you lived as a hermit, you can understand it better than actually being in love?

thats a scary thing to believe in

what about the act of being selflessness in a relationship, making sacrafices you weren't making before? can a textbook make you understand the act of selflessness better than committing an act of selflessness yourself?

no I am not confusing logical with practical. the most logical way to understand love is, love.

the numbers and graphs of science didn't poop out a computer. that took a creative human mind. it is a human invention, and something very solid and real that we can study. the study of the universe is different. we can't step outside of the universe, open it up and study it as a whole. were inside of it and we can only see a small portion of the whole, thus the endless theories. looking at those numbers and graphs alone is not the best way to understand the universe, they HELP, but those numbers and graphs don't have the answers written over them. materialistic logic is that they do, but that's illogical.

those numbers and graphs are encrypted. and now you need a mind to decode the message behind those numbers and graphs about this thing larger than life. and this is where scientists, spiritualists, and materialists go head and head at each other.

if two opposing theories use the very same numbers and graphs, who is right? who is wrong? we use them to support theories but we all know the theory could still be wrong, so much for the reliability of using numbers and graphs.

it makes some of our more famous scientists amazing, if not even super natural. how did those famous scientists come up with a theory that was 'right' even before they had the evidence to back it up? einstein didn't rely on numbers to discover truth, he discovered truth and then expressed it in numbers. I mean, had the crazy dude relied on the contemporary science around him, could he have made new discoveries? No.

the point I am trying to make here, is just like the computer, the truth about the universe isn't pooped out of numbers and graphs. it still requires a creative human mind to interpret that information, and even a creative mind to have blind faith in something outside of that information

and if we think, thats it, those numbers and graphs say everything then we stop advancing, stop discovering and can never hold truth. because every great scientist had to think outside the box, had to think outside of the contemporary numbers and graphs of science around him.

whose mind (logic) do you rely on to interpret the information? thats the real beef of how to understand the universe, and the battle between science and religion, and the battle between materialism and spirituality.

Debating logic with logic seems... fallacious.

Irony is such a sweet fruit.

Originally Posted by juroara

do you really believe you can read a biology text book about the chemicals that go on in your brain and say, you now know what its like to be in love?

I said a COMPLETE mechanical understanding. We do not know enough biology at this point to get anywhere NEAR a complete understanding. I believe that if you do have a complete mechanical understanding, that would inherently mean that you understand what it feels like to the person experiencing it, and you would know much more about the root of the actual processes and motivations than someone who has merely experienced it.

"the point I am trying to make here, is just like the computer, the truth about the universe isn't pooped out of numbers and graphs."

What is it with you and numbers and graphs? Science is not numbers and graphs. That's math. Science is the gathering of empirical knowledge.

"thats the real beef of how to understand the universe, and the battle between science and religion, and the battle between materialism and spirituality."

I disagree. I think that the beef of the problem is that religion and spiritualism are not based on evidence.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

I said a COMPLETE mechanical understanding. We do not know enough biology at this point to get anywhere NEAR a complete understanding. I believe that if you do have a complete mechanical understanding, that would inherently mean that you understand what it feels like to the person experiencing it, and you would know much more about the root of the actual processes and motivations than someone who has merely experienced it.

"the point I am trying to make here, is just like the computer, the truth about the universe isn't pooped out of numbers and graphs."

What is it with you and numbers and graphs? Science is not numbers and graphs. That's math. Science is the gathering of empirical knowledge.

"thats the real beef of how to understand the universe, and the battle between science and religion, and the battle between materialism and spirituality."

I disagree. I think that the beef of the problem is that religion and spiritualism are not based on evidence.

Science = math. Math = science. That is just simply inarguable in the academic world.

Furthermore, thegnome, I would like you to consider this point that I was originally trying to make:
- Science, math, logic, language - all things humans utilize to understand their surroundings are incapable of encapsulating their environment because they are expressing/interpreting intangible things through tangible methods. This is why you say, "I am hungry" - you cannot express the "I" nor can you prove/show/know the "I" but you do know that "I" am hungry and express it to the outside. Furthermore, science can only know what it interprets - the hand pulling the blind man is the intangible world pulling science. The methods, models, and theories are our ways or predicting and acting alongside the hand pulling. However, we can not (yet) actually experience the hand.

Considering where you arguments are going, I think you will agree with this.
~

Originally Posted by O'nus

Science = math. Math = science. That is just simply inarguable in the academic world.

Math is a way of writing shorthand logic, while science is the acquisition of knowledge through logic and experimentation. Though they are essentially inseparable, that does not make them one and the same.

Originally Posted by O'nus

This is why you say, "I am hungry" - you cannot express the "I" nor can you prove/show/know the "I" but you do know that "I" am hungry and express it to the outside. Furthermore, science can only know what it interprets - the hand pulling the blind man is the intangible world pulling science. The methods, models, and theories are our ways or predicting and acting alongside the hand pulling. However, we can not (yet) actually experience the hand.

Considering where you arguments are going, I think you will agree with this.
~

I'm not quite sure what you mean when you refer to 'intangible' things. When I am hungry, it is a very tangible thing - it's chemicals signaling to my body that I am in need of food. The "I" is just my physical body, isn't it?

Originally Posted by thegnome54

Math is a way of writing shorthand logic, while science is the acquisition of knowledge through logic and experimentation. Though they are essentially inseparable, that does not make them one and the same.

I'm not quite sure what you mean when you refer to 'intangible' things. When I am hungry, it is a very tangible thing - it's chemicals signaling to my body that I am in need of food. The "I" is just my physical body, isn't it?

Please bear with me as the logic and math relation theory was created by Bertrand Russell and Ludwig Wittgenstein who later on showed how all science and math cannot reach the "facts" of the world.

What/where/who is the "I"? You can identify what influences it and correlations with the expressions, but can you identify what you are referring to when you say "I"? Consider this when you ask if the reference of "I" is tangible.
~

Originally Posted by O'nus

Please bear with me as the logic and math relation theory was created by Bertrand Russell and Ludwig Wittgenstein who later on showed how all science and math cannot reach the "facts" of the world.

What/where/who is the "I"? You can identify what influences it and correlations with the expressions, but can you identify what you are referring to when you say "I"? Consider this when you ask if the reference of "I" is tangible.
~

Math is nothing but logic, but I don't think math is science. I don't care who says so, it doesn't make sense to me. Are you sure you don't just mean that math is equal to logic?

What is the "I"? It is my physical body. Where? Well, right here. Who seems a bit irrelevant - who is a rock or a tree? There is no objective answer to that. When I say "I", I am referring to my physical body, more precisely my brain, and usually my neocortex. I don't believe humans are anything other than physical beings, so "I" is as tangible as a rock or a tree, is it not?

Originally Posted by thegnome54

Math is nothing but logic, but I don't think math is science. I don't care who says so, it doesn't make sense to me. Are you sure you don't just mean that math is equal to logic?

What is the "I"? It is my physical body. Where? Well, right here. Who seems a bit irrelevant - who is a rock or a tree? There is no objective answer to that. When I say "I", I am referring to my physical body, more precisely my brain, and usually my neocortex. I don't believe humans are anything other than physical beings, so "I" is as tangible as a rock or a tree, is it not?

Math is logic. Science is the endeavour for empirical truth through unbias, testable, systematically observable means. Math attempts to justify science through empirical means. Math is a tool of science. Saying math is not science is like saying logic is not philosophy. We can argue the hell out of semantics but the fact is; science and math are human defined by scholarly humans; the mass majority of scholarly humans will agree that math is science. Anyways, this is not my point.

Since I am having troubles illustrating to you why Wittgenstein stopped caring about why math is logic, I will try and show you the steps he took.

You will note the problem with this.
O'nus: "I am hungry."
gnome: "I am also hungry"

Who is I now?
~

Originally Posted by O'nus

You will note the problem with this.
O'nus: "I am hungry."
gnome: "I am also hungry"

Who is I now?
~

A counter example:

"My shirt is blue."
"My shirt is also blue."

I see no problems here, as we are both clearly referring to our own physical bodies/shirts. The fact that we use the same noun does not make our shirts intangible.

About the semantics thing - "A is a tool of B" != "A is B". That's all I'm saying.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

A counter example:

"My shirt is blue."
"My shirt is also blue."

I see no problems here, as we are both clearly referring to our own physical bodies/shirts. The fact that we use the same noun does not make our shirts intangible.

Yes, you still have a problem here - who is "my"? How can we identify "my"? I see that this is going to be troublesome, I may make a thread explaining Wittgenstein because this has proven to be more troublesome to communicate than I thought (which was a crucial part of this philosophy).

Define science and math in such a way that they are not related.
~

Originally Posted by O'nus

Yes, you still have a problem here - who is "my"? How can we identify "my"? I see that this is going to be troublesome, I may make a thread explaining Wittgenstein because this has proven to be more troublesome to communicate than I thought (which was a crucial part of this philosophy).

Define science and math in such a way that they are not related.
~

Math and science ARE related, they're just not the exact same thing, that's all.

"My" means that it belongs to me - my physical body. I don't see any situation that isn't resolved by only considering the physical body.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

Math and science ARE related, they're just not the exact same thing, that's all.

"My" means that it belongs to me - my physical body. I don't see any situation that isn't resolved by only considering the physical body.

Define science and math.

In regards to the philosophy I have been trying to convey to you, please expect a thread to be created in just a little while. I will try my best, in the context of Wittgenstein, to explain the problems we are facing here.

In the meantime; consider that "my" is a language that anyone can use. If "my" is a universal language that we all use, then how is it that everyone can use it? You may be inclined to suggest the relativity of the word by saying, "the person who is saying 'my'" but what about when I say, "You never think of my feelings" or "My opinion is different than yours".

I will make a thread about this..
~

Originally Posted by O'nus

Define science and math.

In regards to the philosophy I have been trying to convey to you, please expect a thread to be created in just a little while. I will try my best, in the context of Wittgenstein, to explain the problems we are facing here.

In the meantime; consider that "my" is a language that anyone can use. If "my" is a universal language that we all use, then how is it that everyone can use it? You may be inclined to suggest the relativity of the word by saying, "the person who is saying 'my'" but what about when I say, "You never think of my feelings" or "My opinion is different than yours".

I will make a thread about this..
~

Math is a way of expressing logic.
Science is the process of gathering knowledge through empirical means.
They are not the same, that's all I'm saying.

I appreciate your efforts to get me to understand this concept, I'm sure there's something I'm missing here. I simply don't see a problem with "my" or "I", because I see both as a reference to the speaker's physical body.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

Math is a way of expressing logic.
Science is the process of gathering knowledge through empirical means.
They are not the same, that's all I'm saying.

I appreciate your efforts to get me to understand this concept, I'm sure there's something I'm missing here. I simply don't see a problem with "my" or "I", because I see both as a reference to the speaker's physical body.

Perhaps think of the "I", "my", etc. in the sense that they are externally existing from consciousness and are part of the world. I will elaborate in my thread.

If science is the process of gathering knowledge through empirical means, how is math/logic not gathering knowledge through empirical means?
~

Originally Posted by O'nus

If science is the process of gathering knowledge through empirical means, how is math/logic not gathering knowledge through empirical means?
~

Math/logic is not a process, it is a tool. A shovel is not the same as digging, though they are mostly inseparable.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

Math/logic is not a process, it is a tool. A shovel is not the same as digging, though they are mostly inseparable.

From what you are saying, the following is not a process:
p is q
q is a
p is a

This is logics primordial modus ponens. Can you explain how this is not a process?
~

Originally Posted by O'nus

From what you are saying, the following is not a process:
p is q
q is a
p is a

This is logics primordial modus ponens. Can you explain how this is not a process?
~

"IF
p is q
AND
q is a
THEN
p is a"

If that's what you mean, then that is a logical process. However, when we're getting this precise, that is not math, it is an application of math. Math has no driving goal or end to it, it is simply a system of expressing logic. Science, on the other hand, has a drive - to gather knowledge. Math can be used to find knowledge, but that's just using math scientifically.

Originally Posted by thegnome54

"IF
p is q
AND
q is a
THEN
p is a"

If that's what you mean, then that is a logical process. However, when we're getting this precise, that is not math, it is an application of math. Math has no driving goal or end to it, it is simply a system of expressing logic. Science, on the other hand, has a drive - to gather knowledge. Math can be used to find knowledge, but that's just using math scientifically.

I am getting confused then. Are you saying now that science is not the process but math/logic is?
~

Originally Posted by O'nus

I am getting confused then. Are you saying now that science is not the process but math/logic is?
~

Neither is a process. Both have processes.

Originally Posted by skysaw

Neither is a process. Both have processes.

Okay, how do you define them then? ie. what is math and its process and what is science and its process?

I have my own grounds for understanding these concepts but I want to understand more what thegnome is explaining.
~