9 upvotes, 4 direct replies (showing 4)
View submission: Logic has no foundation - except in metaphysics. Hegel explains why.
"because we cannot prove logic itself, we need something higher"
This is in itself axiomatic.
Logic is proven by its utility as compared to the alternative. It may not have been posited purely on the basis of some prior set of principles, but that only matters if you think that the arrival at formal logic was some kind of purely intellectual exercise.
In fact it was a very empirical exercise. And since the reason logic works so well is that it comports to some kind of framework that applies to the way events connect to one another in the world, one can argue that logic as a formalism was effectively bootstrapped.
Given a "higher power" or a bootstrap explanation, it's really just down to whether Occam's razor appears in your toolkit or not.
Comment by zefciu at 31/01/2025 at 16:48 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
This is in itself axiomatic.
Yes. Of course. This is something that all the appeals to metaphysics, God etc. share. They give us an illusion of finding the "deepest" truth, but in fact they just shift our axioms from one domain to the other.
Comment by Traditional-Run1134 at 01/02/2025 at 00:35 UTC
2 upvotes, 1 direct replies
"In fact it was a very empirical exercise. And since the reason logic works so well is that it comports to some kind of framework that applies to the way events connect to one another in the world"
Hegel does acknowledge this, especially with respect to Aristotle: "The interest in [Aristotelian logic] lies with becoming acquainted with the procedures of finite thinking, and the science is correct when it corresponds to its presupposed object." (Encyclopedia Logic §20z). For the purpose of simplicity, I'll treat Hegel's usage of 'Finite' here to mean empirical.
Hegel's critique of Aristotelian logic isn't per se that it is wrong; within the realm of empirical reality, it cannot be wrong because "it corresponds to its presupposed object." The fact that logic arose out of empirical observations isn't Hegel's problem; it's rather that this logic is only applicable to said empirical reality (which Hegel also claims to be 'presupposed').
To discuss things like Being, God, Truth etc. Hegel thinks this kind of logic fails because for Hegel these things are demonstrably *infinite* (to explain the full extent of what hegel means with this would require an essay of its own, here it's suffice for it to mean something similar to Plato's forms). In claiming this, Hegel also makes the claim that *we can know* these things, but just through a different form of understanding than that of formal logic, namely through *dialectical logic*.
This kind of logic begins with "*Being, pure being,* without any further determination" (Science of Logic, pp 59). The reason for this beginning is that pure Being on its own is the lowest kind of thought we can produce, and because of this Hegel equates it with nothing, making the Logic literally begin with *nothing*; that is, the biggest possible abstraction from the world we inhabit. For Hegel it is because he thinks his logic starts with nothing and thereby doesn't appeal to material reality that it is better than aristotelian logic – his logic is, as he claims, *presuppositionless.* The other thing his Logic also necessarily does with this kind of beginning is *coincide with ontology*, thereby giving logic *metaphysical* rather than *empirical* foundations.
Comment by Dictorclef at 31/01/2025 at 16:34 UTC
2 upvotes, 2 direct replies
So what you're saying is that logic can prove itself?
Comment by paxcoder at 31/01/2025 at 15:09 UTC
2 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Second paragraph:
Suppose the justification we give takes the form of an argument. But logic’s laws are presupposed by every rational argument. Hence, any argument we might give for them would be viciously circular.