I feel rather silly sometimes. When I tell philosophers around here that I have to take time out of my schedule to reply to the patently absurd kind of nonsense which Nanson emits, I feel embarassed. But I guess there is SOME chance that even a guy like Nanson can learn something, so I feel in some sense morally obligated to continue to battle the forces of unreason.
I had told Nanson that even as long ago as Aristotle (died 322 BCE) people had recognized that circular reasoning was fallacious. This is not an appeal to authority, depite Nanson's rantings. I was simply pointing out that the fact that circular reasoning is fallacious is not new. It has been around for thousands of years. It would be an appeal to authority if I had said that circular reasoning is fallacious BECAUSE Aristotle said so, but I did not make that claim in any way.
So, for Nanson to accuse me of appeal to authority, as he does also in another letter written today, is ridiculous. He cannot even see that I did NOT use circular reasoning and I did NOT appeal to authority, so he should be the last person on this list giving out logic advice.
So his statement that:
The Bible was around for several thousand before Aristotle, so
perhaps you should wise up.
is nonsense, and false, as are his claims that I had just written a logic text (I have not, and I never claimed that I did) and that I am just an amateur at this stuff. Come sit through my Elementary Symbolic Logic course, Nanson.
Nanson wrote:
> You start with Aristotle and I start with the Bible; everyone starts
> somewhere, or else there would be an endless string of premises, and
> the human mind is incapable of infinite reasoning.>
> ...my point is that EVERY philosophical position
> eventually reaches the point of circular argument. There are
> foundational premises which must be assumed in order for any
> knowledge to occur.
>
> Do you, the great logician, deny that?
Doug says:
Here is Nanson's main problem, which also seemed to be the problem for RH and others: they mistake the circularity of a specific argument for the circularity of an entire epistemological system. And they compound the problem by calling epistemological systems circular which are not circular.
Let me explain. I have been arguing constantly on here that an argument whose conclusion is contained in its premises is of no value. That is what is meant by "circular" argument. See previous posts for details. Or see a logic book. But it is a completely different issue whether all epistemological (theory of knowledge) systems have to "start somewhere." Even is all of them did have to start somewhere (I suppose what is meant here is foundationalism, where one adopts a certain set of beliefs as basic and then derives conclusions from them, as in geometry), this would not make all arguments circular.
A circular argument would be something like this:
All dogs are canines.
Therefore, all dogs are canines.
However, what Nanson and pals want to suggest is that all arguments are on equal footing, in a manner of speaking. By thinking that all knowledge has to start somewhere, they mistakenly think that all arguments are of equal value, but clearly this is false. Consider:
All dogs are canines.
Spot is a dog
Therefore, Spot is a canine.
and:
If my dog is a danger to the public, I will fence it in.
My dog is a danger to the public.
Therefore, I will fence it in.
Clearly, there is a logical force behind the latter two which is absent from the previous circular argument. To claim that they are all of equal value is patently absurd. The conclusions of the latter two are not to be found in the premises. And just because the latter arguments require background knowledge to be convincing (e.g. that there are dogs, that the world exists, etc.) does not make it circular. This does not mean that the conclusion must be in its premises.
Nanson also said:
> I said your argument was self-refuting, because it is. The proof is
> in your premise that circular argument is absolutely worthless, which
> is unargued
Doug: No, I gave reasons. And good ones, too.
Nanson:
and foundational to your Aristotelian system,
Doug: I am not, nor have I ever claimed to be, an Aristotelian
Nanson: "It is you who was stupid enough to rule out everything labelled "circular," when you must know that I am definitely within my epistemic rights to make the statement you originally tried to refute.
Doug's final points:
1. No, it is not within your epistemic rights, since I had shown that I was not using a circular argument. You are wrong to say that I was.
2. You are engaged in contradiction again, Nanson. If you think all arguments are circular, that they are all of equal value, then you cannot argue that anyone else is incorrect, since everyone follows the same system which you do. They just have a different "starting point."
3. It turns out, however, that foundational systems (those which use axioms or "starting points") are not circular. It is true that one must accept the axioms to accept the conclusions, but one need not accept the CONCLUSIONS in order to accept the axioms. THAT would be circularity. Nanson just shows astonishing ignorance of what it is that he is claiming. He asserts the exact opposite of circularity is present in all knowledge systems, and then asserts that they are all circular!