Being, first principles, Metaphysics

Mere Metaphysics: Part Five. The Principle of Excluded Middle

by Dave Seng
Photo courtesy of Nathan Perkins

By the starting-points of demonstration I mean the common beliefs, on which all men base their proofs; e.g. that everything must be either affirmed or denied, and that a thing cannot at the same time be and not be, and all other such premises. — Aristotle, Metaphysics

So far, we have been exploring two of the most essential properties of Being, or existence—the principle of noncontradiction and the principle of identity. Now we will examine the third principle of metaphysics and epistemology, the principle of excluded middle. The principle of excluded middle states that either something exists and shares some important properties of being, or it does not. In logic this is known as an “either/or” statement. Computers and logic gates in integrated circuits are built on this principle (either certain conditions are met such as a voltage or a “1,” or not). Results depend on the input.

What we are learning is that there are important logical applications to metaphysics. This should not be surprising, after all, because the principles of logic are properties of being (which is the object of study for the metaphysician). Further, because of the principles of logic are properties of being, they have important epistemological and metaphysical implications. They tell us how we can think correctly (logic), how we know something (epistemology), and what the ultimate foundations of reality are (metaphysics).

It is important to remember that these principles of metaphysics are not products of our thinking or our minds. That is, they are not created by our minds or thoughts. They are properties of reality. They inform how we think about reality but are not created by our thinking. This is part of what it means to be a realist—the laws of logic are real properties of actually existing things (being). Idealists, such as Kant, Berkeley, and others believed that reality is a product of ideas or one’s mind. Idealism is a magnificent error of modern philosophy.1 Reality is the determinant of order—not our thoughts, feelings, or desires.

But what can the principle of excluded middle tell us about cosmological arguments for the existence of God?

At the most basic level, something either is or it is not. I can have a good day in one sense and a bad day in another sense but there is no denying that I experience the day itself (unless I slept through it, but the day occurred nonetheless). Ontologically (the nature of existing things), my cat, my son, or my computer either exist or do not. Being either is or it is not. As Aristotle reminds us, one of the starting points of all demonstration and thought is that everything at its most basic level must be either affirmed or denied. In this case, being can not be denied.

Philosopher Peter Kreeft puts it this way (calling it the law of excluded middle), assuming no ambiguity of terms:2

A thing is either x or not x. A predicate must be either affirmed or denied of a subject; there is no third possibility. A proposition is either true or false, there is no third possibility. This is the law of excluded middle.3

This helps us to apply the principle of excluded middle to the first premise of our cosmological argument—something exists, being is. Reality cannot be denied. (Click here for the particular cosmological argument being explicated.)

The laws of identity, noncontradiction, and excluded middle are not only necessary for thinking correctly about something, and knowing the truth of something, but they are laws, principles, and properties of being, or reality. They tell us how all being has to be and everything that makes up being (that which has being) must be. Kreeft helpfully puts it this way,

The universe and everything in it, and also the self, (1) can’t ever be what it isn’t (the Law of Non-contradiction), (2) always must be what it is (the Law of Identity), and (3) always either is or isn’t (the Law of Excluded Middle). Also, (4) all that comes into being—i.e. all changing being—has a cause (the Principle of Causality), and (5) everything that is has a sufficient reason why it is and is what it is (the Principle of Sufficient Reason).4

All being and becoming (changing being) rests on these metaphysical, epistemological, and logical principles. We will examine the Principle of Causality and the Principle of Sufficient Reason in future posts. For now, it is enough to know that anything that participates in reality either is, or it is not. Being itself either is or it is not.

Works cited

Adler, Mortimer J., Adler’s Philosophical Dictionary: 125 Key Terms for the Philosopher’s Lexicon New York: Scribner, 1995.

Kreeft, Peter, and Trent Dougherty. Socratic Logic. 3rd ed. South Bend, Ind: ST Augustines Press, 2008.

Sources for digging deeper:

H. W. B. Joseph, An Introduction to Logic (1916; repr., Cresskill, NJ: The Paper Tiger, 2000).

Norman Geisler, God: A Philosophical Argument from Being (Matthews, NC: Basion Books, 2015).

Notes:

1 Mortimer Adler, for example calls idealism “the greatest of all modern philosophical mistakes” in his book entitled Adler’s Philosophical Dictionary, S.V. Idea.

2 At this point, we don’t need to distinguish between the terms “principle” and “law”. For this series we will use the terms synonymously. The concept is the same. At the most elemental ontological level of reality, a third option of being is eliminated or ruled out.

3 Kreeft, Peter, and Trent Dougherty. Socratic Logic. 3rd ed. South Bend, Ind: ST Augustines Press, 2008, 188.

4 Kreeft, Peter, and Trent Dougherty. Socratic Logic. 3rd ed. South Bend, Ind: ST Augustines Press, 2008, 359.

Being, Epistemology, Logic, Ontology

On the Law of Noncontradiction

by Dave Seng

The law of noncontradiction states that nothing can both be and not be at the same time and in the same relationship. Put more formally, “A” can not be “B” at the same time and in the same relationship. The first part of the law is pretty straight forward. A fish can not be a cat or a frog can not be a table, at least at the same time. Being can not be nonbeing at the same time. Opposites can not be true at the same time and in the same relationship. It is contradictory to say that nonbeing is being at the same time. Contradictories can not both be true. One must be false, while the other is true.

Sometimes, however, the relationship part of the law is not understood. For example, I can be both a father and a son at the same time but not in the same relationship. I am my father’s son, and my son’s father but those are different relationships. Further, I can be my son’s biological father but not my son’s legal father if he were to be legally adopted. That, too, is a different relationship.

A basic feature of reality is that opposites can not exist in the same way and same relationship.

Because the law of noncontradiction is a basic property of being (reality), we learn that it is foundational to a proper understanding of metaphysics, ontology, and epistemology (theory of knowledge). Truth is clarified when the law on noncontradiction is properly understood.

The law of noncontradiction is a metaphysical first principle because it speaks to basic nature of reality. It helps us understand what is or is not so.

The law of noncontradiction is an ontological first principle because it points to the act or type of being a thing is–what can or can not be.

The law of noncontradiction is an empistemological first principle because it tells us what can or can not be known.

Finally, the law of noncontradiction helps us determine what is true and false, because opposites can not both be true. At the most fundamental level one statement or act of being can not be both true and false at the same time and same relationship.

Being, Metaphysics, Ontology

A Philosophical Reflection on Sir Roger Penrose and Jordan Peterson

by Dave Seng

[Note: For the conversation between Sir Roger Penrose and Dr. Jordan Peterson, click here. What follows is my reflection on the conversation.]

The deepest of all philosophic problems: Is the Kosmos an expression of intelligence rational in its inward nature, or a brute external fact pure and simple? – William James, Principles of Psychology

I recently viewed this discussion between Sir Roger Penrose and Dr. Jordan Peterson on the nature of consciousness which ultimately expands to philosophical reflections on some interesting qualities and characteristics of time and the origin of the cosmos. I am not a trained physicist and I understand that Penrose may not reflect the consensus of his field. Nonetheless, Peterson and Penrose present a rational discussion of the most perennial and foundational ideas surrounding the nature of the consciousness and the universe. I also think that Penrose presents some thought provoking ideas about the world we inhabit and should be given rational and careful consideration.

Penrose and Peterson are an interesting pairing and it reflects some foundational issues regarding the relationship between science and philosophy. One thing I noticed in the discussion is that Peterson is a very much a global thinker or a speculative philosopher in the manner of Whitehead or many earlier classical philosophers (Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, among others). These philosophers seek a unifying whole to all of reality and want to connect all the sciences and human experience into a consistent world view. This kind of philosopher, according to Plato “is the spectator of all time and all existence” … and will intellectually “move spontaneously towards the true being of everything.”1 As C. D. Broad explains about the nature of speculative philosophy, “The hope is that, by this means, we may be able to reach some general conclusions as to the nature of the universe, and as to our position and prospects in it.”2 In this conversation, however, we see Peterson pursuing deeper unifying metaphysical themes that focus on the nature of reality, while Penrose simply stops at the theoretical physical level. I think the reason for this is that Penrose understands that physical inductive science can only go so far. He stops at the end of his field and what it can do. On the other hand, philosophical inquiry resists empirical solutions because philosophers are seeking the meaning, truth, and logical connections of reality as a whole. Philosophers want to know what the foundation of empirical truth is and what makes it possible in the first place. These are not empirical questions. I believe this is the source of the slight frustration that Peterson demonstrates. (For what it’s worth, I thought the conversation turned much more friendly after it moved to art, which both have a love for.)

Regarding induction and observational science, Alfred North Whitehead put it this way,

Induction presupposes metaphysics. In other words, it rests upon an antecedent rationalism. You cannot have a rational justification for your appeal to history till your metaphysics has assured you that there is a history to appeal to; and likewise your conjectures as to the future presuppose some basis of knowledge that there is a future already subjected to some determinations.3

Science itself is based on metaphysical and theological principles. (I’ve written about this in the context of Lucretius, here. And professor Ken Samples has made important insights here.) Peterson was simply asking questions that physics can not answer.

A really interesting point made in the discussion, is the fact that consciousness is not computational. If consciousness is not computational, hard AI (computational self-consciousness) will ultimately fail. Researchers are still not sure how to define consciousness, or really understand what it is at all. Nonetheless, Peterson and Penrose seem think that Kurt Gödel’s incompleteness theorems support the non-computational nature of consciousness. Briefly, Gödel’s first theorem states that there will always be statements about natural numbers that are true, but are unprovable within the system. Gödel’s second theorem states that the system itself cannot show its own consistency. What this means is that there must be an axiom outside the system that makes sense of the system in the first place. For a more practical illustration, Gödel uses the “liars paradox” to support his theorems. The paradox in its simplest form arises from considering the sentence “This sentence is false.” If the sentence is true, then it is false, and if it is false, then it is true. A computer can be programmed to write the sentence but it has no resources within its own system to make sense out of it. It takes a human outside the system to understand the sentence is logically self-contradictory. The earliest pioneers of programmable logic—Alfred Tarski, Alonzo Church, and Turing’s Halting Problem—all deal with aspects of this important problem. The human will never be replaced. Further, there must be something outside the system which makes sense out of the system itself. In other words, the system is ontologically dependent on an axiom outside itself that gives it meaning and significance. It appears that Peterson is acutely aware of this situation.

So what does this have to do with the discussion of cosmology at the end of the dialogue? First, I’m not really sure about Sir Roger Penrose’s conception of time and his cosmological model. I need to look into it a bit more. If he is right, however, it might pose a problem for the Kalam cosmological model. The Kalām cosmological argument runs this way:

1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence.

2. The universe began to exist.

3. Therefore the universe has a cause of its existence.

Proponents of the Kalām cosmological argument (Craig, Koontz, Pruss and others) rely on space and time as having a definite starting point and draw heavily on scientific evidence (such as the Big Bang). If Penrose is correct, however, then the universe is an infinite, which might undermine the Kalām argument. Of course, Craig and others will point to the impossibility of traversing an infinite and perhaps the second law of thermodynamics to make their case for the beginning of the universe. These are fine points points, indeed, and along with the principle of causality, do hold some significance. In the end, however, the Kalām cosmological depends on a very specific model of the universe for its validity.

There are other ways to formulate a cosmological argument that does not rely so much on one particular interpretation of the science. The Thomistic way of arguing is valid whether or not the universe is finite. This cosmological argument is sometimes called the argument from Being. It looks like this (taken from Norman Geisler’s book, God: A Philosophical Argument from Being):

1. Something exists (e.g., I do)

2. Nothing cannot produce something.

3. Therefore, something exists eternally necessarily.

A. It exists eternally because if ever there was absolutely nothing, then there would always be absolutely nothing because nothing cannot produce something.

B. It exists necessarily because everything cannot be a contingent being because all contingent beings need a cause of their existence.

4. I am not a necessary and eternal being (since I change).

5. Therefore, both God (a Necessary Being) and I (a contingent being) exist. (= theism)

It is not necessary to go into the principle of existence, or the principle of identity and the rest of the first laws of metaphysics here. What is important to note are two things—the ontological dependence of reality on God as Necessary Being and the absence of temporality as a starting point.4 The ontological dependence is necessary regardless whether or not time is infinite. On the substance of Thomistic argumentation, one philosopher puts it this way,

We know from experience that the world is contingent, that is, it depends on something outside itself for its existence. And this would be true even if the world has always been here, for an infinite collection of contingent things is no less contingent than a finite one. But there must be some unconditional, ultimate being upon which the world depends, otherwise it would have no final basis for existence.5

Aquinas argues against an infinite series, but the series he thinks is impossible is a per se series, or one that extends infinitely upwards in being. The argument from being focuses on contingency and ontological dependence and does not rely on one particular model of the universe. So if the science changes, an explanation for being is still necessary. This might be one advantage that this argument has over the Kalām cosmological argument. If Penrose is correct, time may not be the most fundamental element of reality and it seems to do some pretty strange things both at the quantum level and the macro or cosmic levels. But no one can deny that being is and it stands in front of us as a mystery which is truly one of the most enduring questions of human existence.

In the final analysis, Penrose may or may not be right in his arithmetic regarding the infinity of the universe, but he still misses the ontological weight of the issue.

I’d like to thank my friend Dr. Derek Gardner for pointing me to this video and providing inspiration for this post.

1 The Dialogues of Plato. Translated by J. Harward. Vol. 6. Great Books of the Western World. Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1990. 374 – 375.

2Scientific Thought. New Yourk: Harcourt, Brace, 1923. 20.

3 Science and the Modern World, vol. 55, Great Books of The Western World Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1993. 156.

4 I am always reminded of Exodus 3:14 – one translation of the Hebrew reads of God’s self-description “I am who causes to be” or “He who causes to be”.

5 Miller, Ed L., and Jon Jensen. Questions That Matter: An Invitation to Philosophy. 5th ed. Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2004. 276.

Metaphysics, Ontology, Philosophy

Of Simple Apprehension and Concept

by Dave Seng

Now it is impossible for a thing’s being to be caused by its essential principles, for nothing can be the sufficient cause of its own being, if its being is caused—Thomas Aquinas

In previous posts, we spent some time thinking about how the intellect works and receives reality. The intellect is potency to knowledge and can only receive that which is in act (being) through sense experience. As St. Thomas reminds us, “intelligence is compared to sense, as act is to potency”.1 It is important in this discussion to understand the distinction of simple apprehension and concept because the blurring and conflating of these categories is one of the greatest errors among Idealists. We have seen that through induction and abstraction, the essence of the external object is married to the intellect. This union of essence, or universal, with the intellect is also known as, concept, idea, species or intention. For now, we will use the term concept.

There are many different kinds of concepts, of course, and it is the task of metaphysicians and logicians to catalog, classify, and put them in proper order. For classical realists, knowledge is always of being – of that which is in some order. In this way, epistemology would be better understood as the ontology of knowing—an examination of the first principles and the order of knowing reality.

In the order of knowing, the concept is not the being of the external object, it is the essence. (Being, or that which is in act, is always matter and form.) The concept resides in the intellect as the essence or universal abstracted from external reality through the senses. To confuse the concept, or idea, with being itself is the error of the idealist.

The realist philosopher Daniel Sullivan puts it this way:

It is important to recognize that while the concept is necessary to rational knowing, it is only a means by which we know, and not that which we know. It is a necessary means, just as eyeglasses may be necessary for me to see with; yet just as it is really the table I see and not the lenses of my eyeglasses, so too it is really the thing itself I know and not my concept of it. To say that the objects of my knowing are concepts rather than things would be to fall into the trap of those philosophers called Idealists. For if all we ever know is always idea, then we can never know whether or not there is anything existing outside our mind corresponding to our ideas. Thus, following the Idealist, all reality would consist of minds and the thoughts they think.2

If one does not properly make the distinction between concept and real actual being, skepticism, uncertainty, and doubt about reality results. The perennial questions of reality will always be reduced to subjectivism. One would have no certain contact with reality outside their mind.

Drawing from St. Thomas, Dr. Adler explains:

This distinction between the id quod (that which) and the id quo (that by which) of our intellectual acts prevents us from ever saying that our concepts are that which we are conscious or aware of when we understand ideas. We could not be aware of the concepts in our minds and also at the same time be aware of their intelligible objects. If we were, we could not distinguish between them, which would mean we could not affirm that such objects exist and are shared by other minds.3

Our concepts do not tell us that things are, they tell us what things are; they reveal nature or essence, not existence. “The existence of things is outside the order of concepts,” wrote St. Thomas.4 The point to remember is that the being of an idea or concept in the mind is a different mode of existence than that of the actual external object – each belongs to a different order. Physical reality and knowing are different orders. Cognitively, humans have the ability to distinguish between that which and that by which they are aware of something. This allows one to affirm or deny the reality of something through the intellectual faculty of judgment. When the mind engages in careful and critical reflection, the essence in the intellect always points back to concrete reality. (I explained a little how the faculty of judgment works in my posts on Berkeleyan Idealism. I hope to develop the idea further as we move along.)

The process by which the intellect grasps the essence or universal is what classical realists call simple apprehension: apprehension, because the mind receives and comes to understand the essential nature of the sense object; simple, because the mind naturally takes in the intentional concept without affirming or denying it through the faculty of judgment. The operation of simple apprehension is the first act of knowing.

Without these concepts firmly understood, it is easy to fall into the error of Idealism. However, the idealist must conclude that the essence, or concept, is the cause of reality (indeed, that is the very definition of Idealism) but this is impossible because no contingent being can be the cause of its own existence.

Works Cited

Adler, Mortimer. Adler’s Philosophical Dictionary: 125 Key Terms for the Philosopher’s Lexicon. New York: Scribner, 1995.

Aquinas, Thomas. The Summa Theologica Volume 1. The Great Books of the Western World, edited by Mortimer J. Adler et al., Vol. 17, Encyclopedia Britannica, 1996.

Sullivan, Daniel. An Introduction to Philosophy: Perennial Principles of the Classical Realist Tradition. Charlotte, North Carolina: TAN Books, 2009.

Wilhelmsen, Frederick D. Man’s Knowledge of Reality: An Introduction to Thomistic Epistemology. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1956.

Notes

1Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Trans. by Father Laurence Shapcote of the Fathers of the English Dominican Province (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1996) 1a, q.3, art. 5.

2Daniel Sullivan, An Introduction to Philosophy: Perennial Principles of the Classical Realist Tradition (Charlotte, North Carolina: TAN Books, 2009), 79.

3 Mortimer J. Adler, Adler’s Philosophical Dictionary (New York: Scribner, 1995), S. V. Idea.

4Frederick D. Wilhemsen, Man’s Knowledge of Reality: An Introduction to Thomistic Epistemology (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1956) 29.