A Look at The Laws of Logic

Recently (in relative terms) a conversation took place between Alex J. O’Connor, a notable contemporary atheist Philosopher, Rachel Oates, a youtuber and self-proclaimed “skeptic”, and Stephen Woodford, another atheist thinker who posts on youtube. The conversation, called “Should We All Be Nihilists?” tracks several absolutely fascinating topics – from nihilism to whether or not the mug on the table in front of them exists. But one stands out from the rest, when Alex poses the question to the conversation:

Are the laws of logic necessarily true before they are observed through the senses?

That is, given that the senses are fallible and therefore no information received through them can be trusted with certainty, is it possible to arrive at the Laws of Logic as inherent truths without the need to cross their barrier of perception and trust that information from the outside world? Must one be aware of the world before understanding said laws? To further elucidate the question with an example: Is it self-evident to someone without any sensory experience at all that the cup in front of the three cannot be both a cup and not a cup simultaneously (or that contradiction cannot exist in general, considering they have no context for what a cup is)?

A picture from the conversation itself. Rachel Oates (right), Alex O'Connor (center), Stephen Woodford (left).

There was no broad agreement between the parties whether or not sensory perception and experience was a prerequisite for knowledge of the Laws of Logic. Alex took the perspective that the Laws of Logic were inherently true, and that could be known with or without the need to trust any sensory information from the other side of the barrier. Rachel and Stephen, on the other hand, took the perspective that the sensory information outside was necessary to verify the Laws, and consequently so was trusting them. However, I would posit an entirely separate approach: That the question itself is flawed as it assumes the Laws of Logic are valid even if the sensory information is certainly true.

Consider the discovery of the way in which light behaves – both like a particle, and like a wave. This caused tremendous confusion in the field of physics at the time as it violated the Laws of Physics as they were understood. However, the photon persisted in its existence nonetheless. Why? Because the Laws of Physics exist are descriptive of a framework we have for understanding the universe as we have perceived it. They are notably not dictative of what is possible in the universe. The very same principle can be applied to the Laws of Logic. Rather than being dictative of what can and cannot exist or come to pass, they describe a framework for understanding the fundamental rules of our world.

This has implications for the conversation on the sensory barrier that spurred this sort of thought. The answer to the question then is: absolutely not. The Laws of Logic are not necessarily true without that information, because they are the very rationalisation of that sensory information themselves. Importantly, they are not sacrosanct and separate from it as Alex might suggest, but a manifestation that seems apparent due to our intimate sensory embeddedness in the world. The Laws of Logic may not exist on either side of the barrier of the senses but as a product of them.