u/JerseyFlight

“12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
13 Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.” Ephesians 6 KJV

How are we supposed to read this? What are we to think? Just being honest, this seems like obvious nonsense. So what makes it true?

“Because it’s a word from God,” though (in actual reality) it’s supposedly written by a man named Paul? In other words, it’s false. It is the writing of a man to man.

What was the subconscious that wrote this trying to accomplish? The person who wrote this probably believed it.

So what happens if humans believe this error? They withdrawal from reality and live in delusion. They believe they have an all-powerful imaginary friend named “God” adorning them in magical armor.

They also believe there is some kind of hidden conspiracy of mystical beings waging some kind of war. So what about those who are actually f*cking up the world, this narrative keeps consciousness from even seeing such things.

And my how this must inflate the ego placing it in a celestial drama where there is no real risk, no actual fight, just words and a whole lot of predictable imagination, altogether shallow.

This kind of nonsense makes humans stupid.

…is the fact that philosophy is not inherently rational, and is not synonymous with rationality, but that it must justify its claims like everyone else.

Just because one has a philosophy doesn’t mean their philosophy is rational, or that it has anymore substance beyond an abstract castle floating in the sky. In their presumptuousness philosophy and theology are very much the same. Most of them are just authoritarian ideologies demanding the highest allegiance of respect without actually earning it.

About Thinking Is Power

Knowledge may be power, but there’s simply too much to know. Plus, we carry access to nearly all of humanity’s knowledge in our pockets. In today’s information (and misinformation) age, what’s more important is the ability to find reliable information and use it to draw reasonable conclusions.
The point is, knowledge isn’t enough. We also need better thinking.

Thinking Is Power (TIP) is based on an award-winning general-education science course designed to teach students critical thinking, information literacy, and science literacy skills. Since its launch in 2021, TIP’s content has been featured in a range of publications (such as Skeptical Inquirer and Skeptical Science), translated into several different languages by international organizations/publications (such as Italy’s CICAP, France’s Citizen4Science, and Poland’s Nauka o Klimacie), and used by dozens of educational institutions globally.

Or he has other reasons. (Maybe your discourse isn’t as rational as you think it is).

Rational incompetence is prolific, so this can indeed be a motivation for evasion.

From a higher vantage, intelligence must reach a place where it has the capacity to evaluate the effort required for the value gained. (Time is lost. Energy is lost. Therefore life is lost).

Engaging sophistry doesn’t offer anything, it just wastes time. So as soon as a discourse is identified as sophistry, one should either make an example of it, or walk away.

It would be foolish to answer every claim, unless every claim was relevant and valid. It is foolish to evade relevant and valid claims.

I disengage when I spot ignorance, wherein I would have to construct a ladder just to get my opponent up to the same ground floor. If one does it once, twice, three times— how many times should one do it?

Based on the irrationalist’s view, how can an interlocutor be rationally obligated to do anything when it’s all just a game of human construction? In this context, isn’t the act of merely not playing an act of winning?

Let the hedonist cease from objecting to hedonism. His special pleading can be flicked right back at him.

Those whose position is based on self-refuting statements, why should we engage? For they are requiring of us what they have already violated themselves. We prove we are wiser by simply walking away.

Few there are who consciously accept the rational foundations of discourse as rules that should also govern their discourse.

Look for soundness, but soundness alone is not enough, it must also be accompanied by relevance.

Use irrationalists to make a public example of irrationalism, not to persuade the irrationalist away from his ways. For he did not enter into his irrationality through reason, so it’s highly unlikely he will be reasoned out of it. He must first correct the defect of his emotional attachment to unreason, which means he must mature enough (and become educated enough) to be able to follow reason to its conclusions, so he can use it to inform his beliefs.

You can’t refute the laws of logic, no one can, because the act of refuting them requires them.

But you can refute people who use them fallaciously.

There is one tactic that certain schools of thought who use these laws tend to commit, be they Christian Apologists or Ayn Randians:

While the laws themselves are certain, that doesn’t make the leap one takes from them certain.

Apologists, for example, use these laws to establish truth and then attempt to insinuate that their religious beliefs are synonymous with the truth of these laws.

Ayn Randians do the same thing, except they leap to an economic theology.

This is called a Non-Sequitur Fallacy, it means the conclusion doesn’t follow from the premise. It’s an irrational leap, but exceedingly effective when paired with the laws of logic.

So while we can’t refute a person who argues for the truth of the laws of logic (we can only agree with them) we can refute any irrational leaps they take from the premise of these laws. And we can only do it because of these laws.

Anyone who thinks they’re operating outside these laws simply manifests that they’re ignorant. They are being deceived by an irrational narrative that can’t even make itself intelligible without these laws.

This is indeed my testimony at this point in history.

I was educated in the laws of logic as a Christian, and following them eventually pulled me out of Christianity. The laws overturned the apologetic indoctrination I was exposed to.

Later I was absorbed into Hegelianism, believing that Hegel had transcended the laws of logic, which was false. Once again, the laws of logic saved me from an all-consuming, irrational system.

Hegel’s thinking is indeed titanic (I doubt there has ever been a more procedurally rational mind) but he made a fatal error when he tried to legitimize contradiction. The very laws he must invoke to even make such a claim, refute the very move he tried to make.

This is worth saying: I didn’t just posture toward thought, I took it serious from the beginning and wanted to know how it worked and how to wield it. I wanted to know what was true. This is something I still carry in myself. It is who I am in the dark when no one is looking. And I have paid a high price for it psychologically. Not only because this disposition is alienating, but because wanting to know the truth (in this reality) is necessarily going to draw one into suffering. There is no way past it because reality is full of unpleasant truths. Reality is the opposite of the romantic and the ideal.

My disposition is to always keep thinking, searching and questioning. I never rest content with where I’m at.

My second discovery of the laws of logic was far greater than my first. The second time, after Hegel, I actually grasped the absolute certainty of these laws. And (amazingly!) I find they have still not been exhausted. I can hardly believe it. They just keep on unfolding and increasing in their power, relevance, depth and beauty.

All my rational gain, all my substantive consciousness, all my logical power, is tranced back to these laws. They didn’t only emancipate me from two cults (Christianity and Hegelianism), they keep on emancipating me. They are what actively upholds and makes possible my rational freedom.

If the truth of 2+2=4 

Requires 2=2, +=+, = = =, and 4=4, 

Then the more fundamental truth of A=A is necessarily presupposed by the truth of 2+2=4.

This is a transcendental argument.

Insofar as 2+2=4 is certain, the principle of identity is more certain because it is a necessary condition for the possibility and truth of 2+2=4.

[What’s rationally fierce is that any position that tries to refute this presupposes the same necessary condition of intelligibility, which entails the same epistemic priority of identity.]

Crows: “Bro, we’re scared AF, bangs going off everywhere that sound like guns.”

Me: I know, this must be a difficult night for you.

Crows: “Can we chill in your roost for a bit, just for the night?”

Me: Sure, come on in, just don’t poop on the floor, use the toilet this time. Oh yeah, and don’t leave peanut shells everywhere either. I was cleaning that sh*t for three days last time. And keep it down, my neighbors thought I was having a rave.”

Crows: “Thanks man, you’re the best. Our murder is a legion now. Come on in boys!”

Because we must first accept the fact that reality is true and the laws of logic are the standards of truth.

A real conversation begins with a simple premise: reality exists independent of our feelings, preferences, or political loyalties. If we cannot agree that there is an objective world to discover rather than one to invent, then we are not debating the same reality (we are speaking from separate worlds, one person thus existing in a world of delusion).

We must affirm the absolute authority of the laws of logic that we already presuppose. The laws of logic are not optional conventions; they are the rules that make meaning possible. Without them, words lose their definitions, contradictions become acceptable, and language can no longer distinguish truth from falsehood.

Only then is it possible to have a real discourse. The purpose of conversation is not to score points, defend identities, or gather applause. It is an honest and shared search for what is true based on logical standards. That requires a willingness to let evidence correct us, reason guide us, and reality overrule us when we are wrong.

Crows: “Yay, here comes the kibble man! (“Look at that bag he pulled from his pocket! Yay!”)

Me: “Here you go, some kibble for your palette.”

Crows: “Hey kibble man, can we have some more, I mean, we know you want to save some for yourself.”

Me: “Lol, you think I’m eating kibble?”

That is correct. But Socrates is not merely saying things,

He’s reasoning.

More precisely, he is reasoning according to the laws of logic.

That is what gives his words their force. It is why his questions corner his opponents, expose contradictions, and cut through confusion. His arguments are powerful not because of rhetoric, but because they are governed by principles that all meaning already depends on.

When someone speaks without regard for logic, words lose their ability to communicate truth. They become disconnected sounds rather than coherent thought.

Take those who say, "The Law of Identity is false." Their statement already assumes what it denies. The terms in the sentence must retain the same meaning from beginning to end; otherwise, the sentence has no definite content. If the words do not keep their identity, nothing has been asserted in the first place. The denial depends on the very principle it attempts to reject.

Socrates understands this.

He insists on clear definitions. He requires that terms keep the same meaning throughout an argument. He refuses to let contradictions be rhetorically elevated to “insight.” His method works because it remains anchored to the laws of thought.

Just as the certainty of "2 + 2 = 4" presupposes the Law of Identity, every meaningful discussion of justice, virtue, or truth presupposes the same logical foundation. Without it, reasoning collapses into ambiguity and contradiction.

Socrates does not prevail because he is cleverer than everyone else. He prevails because he refuses to abandon the conditions that make rational discussion possible. He follows an argument wherever logic leads, he takes logic seriously, and when his opponents abandon logical consistency, their position collapses under its own contradictions.

So yes, Socrates is “just saying things.” But his words have weight because they are disciplined by logic. They are not merely expressions of opinion; they are attempts to conform thought to reality. That is why his arguments continue to endure— it’s not because they’re philosophical, it’s because they’re logical!

Perhaps, if its speculation is designed to generate a rational hypothesis. Of course, philosophy doesn’t work through reason (though it confesses to be the highest manifestation of reason).

Philosophy, once taken to be the master of unearthing presuppositions, has now become a dogmatic presupposition.

The one who aligns himself with philosophy sees it as his right to assert the superiority of philosophy. He’s like a rich kid with no talent who thinks he’s better than all the poor kids simply because he’s rich (though philosophy isn’t actually rich, it just pretends to be, living off the cultural capital of its withering reputation). But philosophy certainly can’t perform in bed.

Surely there must be a value for this speculative form?

The problem is that philosophy lies about itself. It claims to be a student of reason, but really it’s a spoiled child of imagination, demanding respect where respect hasn’t been justified. It enters a room announcing its genius, only to downgrade itself the moment it speaks.

A philosopher, what’s that? A person so desperate for praise, so desperate to occupy a place of authority that they’re willing to speak nonsense.

One on side there is rank idealism smuggled in, on the other side there’s a juvenile nihilism smuggled in.

It is neither genius or talent to play off shock value: horror, the grotesque, the morbid, psychopathy. Any psychologically damaged human can do this— I consider these to be humans that lack intelligence, imagination and developmental humanity. Like so many, purely ego driven, without responsibility toward their fellow man.

I find the search for literature to be quite difficult, so much so that I am drawn back toward religious literature. (Isn’t this strange, why?)

Not because it has something direct to offer, but because one can read it indirectly; one can read it negatively. (And strangely, it usually begins in nihilism, believing itself to have transcended it through the divine, which is delusion, but in order to read it intelligently, one must not follow this delusion, one must see through it as they read it).

What I need in an author: he must understand that truth is real, but not be religious. She must grasp existence through the prism of nihilism but not succumb to it. I need a writer that understands tragedy, but has overcome it through a discipline that reaches toward life, realizing that subjecting oneself to suffering is not wise.

I need an author that sees through the vanity of academia and formalism, the lie of needlessly multiplying complexity in pursuit of prestige (which is just more ego seeking).

I need a hard-hitting naturalist who doesn’t succumb to romantic notions of life, and yet, assaults life with intelligence and courage.

One who writes great stories must be a Humanist, but few are self-conscious Humanists. One with an accurate worldview must implicitly be a sociologist and psychologist, they cannot defend a few at the cost of destroying civilization.

Few writers embody these specifications.

Teach a man to be a Reasoner and he will collide with your claims. He will go forth with reason and blast through superstition and error.

Because what is error if it’s not a contradiction?

This rational approach to modern philosophy has not been applied to modern philosophy.

Modern philosophers do not appreciate a Reasoner auditing their books. It greatly annoys them, because they wrote their books by making use of contradiction, assuming it to be valid, so they resent being called out for it.

They expect the modern philosophy-reader to accept their premises as “profound,” not to rationally question them. They demand praise, not dissent.

Have you ever seen a skill Reasoner deconstructing modern philosophy? It’s a thing of beauty because it restores order and sanity. It’s like a hot knife slicing through butter. (See Aristotle Metaphysics Book 11),

Definitions of Proof:

“A fact or piece of information that shows that something exists or is true.”

“A logical argument that shows that a mathematical or scientific statement is correct.”

Cambridge 

——

a: the cogency of evidence that compels acceptance by the mind of a truth or a fact.

b: the process or an instance of establishing the validity of a statement especially by derivation from other statements in accordance with principles of reasoning.

Merriam Webster 

—-

“Proof most often refers to: Proof (truth), argument or sufficient evidence for the truth of a proposition.”

“Mathematical proof, a convincing demonstration that some mathematical statement is necessarily true.”

“Evidence, information which tends to determine or demonstrate the truth of a proposition.”

Wikipedia 

————-

Every definition of proof presupposes something to be proved, terms that retain their meaning, propositions that retain their identity,
rules of valid inference, and a distinction between truth and falsity.

Without identity, no proposition could remain determinate, no meaning could remain stable, no inference could preserve its conclusion, and no distinction between truth and falsity could be maintained.

If identity were absent, none of these definitions could even get off the ground. There would be no proposition that remained the same from premise to conclusion.

So what does this tell us about the proof of identity?

It tells us that identity is not established by proof. Rather, every proof is established through identity. No proposition enjoys a stronger epistemic status, because the very intelligibility of proof is contingent upon the Law of Identity.

The certainty of identity is prior to the certainty of every proof, since the very intelligibility of proof depends upon it.