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Sarpedon
Guest
How can we know that human reason is accurate and reflects truth? Do we have to have faith in reason intially before we can try to use it?
thanks,
Andrew
thanks,
Andrew
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Texas_Roofer
Guest
Read about Natural Moral Law for you answers. A quick over view God implants a longing for right in the human heart.
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Sarpedon
Guest
That seems to reflect emotions more than reason. We can’t prove the truth of reason through reason, so to what must we appeal?
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Texas_Roofer
Guest
Emotion is not the Natural Moral Law. The laws refers to your predestine desires to do good, be a father, protector, provider, treat God’s other children well. It is to this internal compass you appeal.
Is picking a flower right or wrong? My compass says if the flower is important to others where it is then it is wrong to pick it. Thus hurting God’s other children. However if abundant and unimportant now I could pick it if I have a greater good
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QuicumqueVult
Guest
I’d invite you to consider the sentence, ‘I believe in order to understand’ (in Latin, 'Credo ut intelligam).
Rarely does one arrive at faith via reason, and never by reason alone. Faith is a gift from God, which we must simply accept (Baptism) and embrace (for many, Confirmation).
Reason is not a sufficient arbiter of sacred doctrine (revealed truth). On the contrary, reason (in matters of faith) and conscience (in matters of morals) must be grounded in revealed truth, ratified by the pillar and ground of the truth, the church of the living God (1 Timothy 3.15), and interpreted by the magisterium in its public pronouncements.
But the Holy Father can answer your question much better than I. This is difficult reading but thorough. You won’t find a better source for mitigating conflicts between reason and conscience.
"Conscience and Truth" (Dallas: 1991)
Rarely does one arrive at faith via reason, and never by reason alone. Faith is a gift from God, which we must simply accept (Baptism) and embrace (for many, Confirmation).
Reason is not a sufficient arbiter of sacred doctrine (revealed truth). On the contrary, reason (in matters of faith) and conscience (in matters of morals) must be grounded in revealed truth, ratified by the pillar and ground of the truth, the church of the living God (1 Timothy 3.15), and interpreted by the magisterium in its public pronouncements.
But the Holy Father can answer your question much better than I. This is difficult reading but thorough. You won’t find a better source for mitigating conflicts between reason and conscience.
"Conscience and Truth" (Dallas: 1991)
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QuicumqueVult
Guest
That is in a nutshell the principle of communion. Beautifully stated. But then, a field aflush with Texas bluebonnets and Indian paintbrushes is exactly the medium for muses, in Texas Roofer’s case, a magisterial muse.
This does beg the question, ‘How many bluebonnets can you pick before it spoils the shot?’
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Sarpedon
Guest
But that has to do with moral descions, not intellectual reasoning. My question is: how do we know that reason is accurate? Reason can’t be proved through reason, because it would be begging the question. If we can’t validate reason through reason, how can we? Do we need faith in reason in the first place?
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john_ennis
Guest
It’s hard to ignore that your doubts (or your questioning) result from reasoning. You can’t escape it. Even your doubting is like a validation of reasoning.
Reminds me of whoever it was that doubted reality itself, and his own existence, till he realized that his awareness of doubting was proof of his doubts’ invalidity.
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Sarpedon
Guest
I can’t escape it, but does that make it true? I’m not questioning whether reasoning exists, only whether we can prove its truth.
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PoliSciProf
Guest
This is a most interesting and important question. Philosophical inquiry is not easily satisfied by assertions of natural law. I would actually argue that the most important philosophical question is the reasonableness of reason. In an age dominated by positivism, historicism, relativism, post-modernism, etc., the philosophical recovery of the reasonableness of reason is perhaps the only antidote to the spirit of nihilism and its political consequences. It is fair to say that the natural law proponents must meet the challenges of Nietzsche and Heidegger and this requires a serious confrontation with their works. Unless this happens, natural law becomes indistinguishable from other modern ideologies. What is at stake is nothing less than the very possiblity of philosophy. I hope the philosophy forum will take on this challenge.
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tdgesq
Guest
Not even the laws of logic are self-authenticating. Their validity has to be assumed first before you can start doing reasoning at all. You are correct that they must initially be accepted on faith. So you see, everybody accepts certain things on faith; in fact, the most important things about us. That is how things work with regard to the preconditions of knowledge. In some ways, you are asking the wrong question.
It isn’t whether we accept reason based upon faith, because we all do in order to engage in reasoning. It’s whether our own reasoning process can account for reasoning or not. I am a Christian because I believe it is the only system that can account for reasoning.
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john_doran
Guest
no.
no. at least not on any normal definition of “proof”.
but so what? we can’t prove most of our most fundamental beliefs (e.g. the existence of the real world, of other minds, the past, that we are not brains in vats in some alien laboratory, etc.); we can still know that there’s a real world, other minds, that our senses are reliable, etc…
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cpayne
Guest
Reason demands self-evident premises (for example, A or not-A is always true–the law of excluded middle). If someone disputes self-evident premises, the only response is to point out that they are self-evident. If they still persist in arguing the point, it’s like trying to describe the color red to a color-blind person, EXCEPT I do believe the color-blind person can’t see red. I don’t believe people with normal cognitive abilities can’t see the truth of self-evident premises, even if they for some reason or another want to deny the truth of these premises.
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cpayne
Guest
For example, once I was discussing God’s existence with a guy at work. I started off saying, “Well, let’s begin by agreeing that either God exists or it is not the case that God exists.” Except we got no further, because he would not acknowledge even this. With people like that, the problem is not a rational problem, but willful denial.
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Sarpedon
Guest
I think we have to accept these self-evident premises on faith. Since reason demands them, they cannot be proved through reason. How else could they be proved?
This is all purely philosophical and not really practical. I certainly believe that I exist.
Does anyone know what the Church teaches on this? I know that fideism is considered a heresy, but I think that’s more practical fideism (nothing can be known by reason)
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AndyF
Guest
PoliSciProf
I do note there is a propensity to accept reasoning that concludes in favor or positive to dogma, and not to accept it if it is negative, regardless if the same sound process was used to achieve the result.
AndyF
I do note there is a propensity to accept reasoning that concludes in favor or positive to dogma, and not to accept it if it is negative, regardless if the same sound process was used to achieve the result.
AndyF
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AgnosTheist
Guest
lets use examples:
how do we know that this human reasoning is true:
If A=B and A+1 = 2, therefore B+1=2.
For one thing, if other people can accept that WITHOUT BIAS. Thats what objectivity is all about.
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AndyF
Guest
We are graced with a degree of Faith befitting our state. The individual must make gains through the help of the Holy Spirit and the fruits of the Church, through the sacraments,through daily works and prayer.
Attaining Faith requires effort.
St. Ignatius’s Spiritual Exercises offered at various recognized Catholic retreats have this aim in mind.
AndyF
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AgnosTheist
Guest
If you rely on bias, what you get is opinion not truth.
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tdgesq
Guest
He didn’t say he relies on bias, but upon faith. Just like you do. Everybody does. Even the mathematical proposition you provided above assumes that the laws of logic are universally valid. There is no basis for that. You accept it on faith. Certain philosophical skeptics would claim that you are biased by assuming such things.
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