Academic trending of formal logic classes offered in 2008 reference William of Ockham in theoretical execution:
“the simplest solution
is the best solution”
Formal logic parallels geometry in structure and chemistry in method; the former supplies a blueprint of verification while the latter insists success by memorization. Thus, a complete mastery of formal logic is achieved not only by practicing certain rules, but through an elegant navigation and appreciation of their workable environment.
Arguments verified “reductio ad absurdum” (reduction to the absurd) challenge the aforementioned tenets by reducing formal logic to a game of elimination. In lieu of proof by axiom manipulation, reductio ad absurdum proofs seek not to justify a particular solution but to dismantle and negate every other possible solution. An assumption is made, and the logician presents absolutely no evidence of this assumption’s logical coherency except that all alternative solutions are ridiculous.
Proof by reductio ad absurdum is relatively simple to learn. In contrast to classic logical methodology, an adherent to this devastatingly existential strategy needs not even understand why or how their proof works.
The pleasantries of such a streamlined approach sour rapidly. At their ripest, Kelley receives an “A” in logic class, albeit with a residual sentiment of anger; somehow, her philosophical sharpness has been dulled by overreliance on efficiency and underestimation of a 21 year-old woman’s intellectual gauge.
Yet the most disastrous outcome of engaging formal logic reductio ad absurdum begins when pen-and-paper critical thinking forges a transposition into worlds outside textbook exercise. A variety of factors may or may not contribute mechanically or willfully to its mental embroidery – a notoriously pragmatic heritage, an utter absence of celestial declaration, a self-destructive neurosis, my lovers and the death of my loves.
I am in the process of eliminating each philosophical system, every theory of existence, all ethical frameworks and, most tragically, the concept of beauty in its entirety. The longer I live the more negated life becomes. Inconsistencies, fallacies, mistakes and regrets, they atonally nuance my assertion
“x is true”
and they do this in such a manner as to invade and permeate every aspect of thought – people and positions, to me the difference is inconsequential if it exists at all.
I don’t need to answer why this destructive proclivity guides my life or how I even initiated the aggressive quest for complete and total emptiness. My nihilism necessitates no further validation beyond capability.
Anomalies in systems, their presence, it warrants continuing existence.
(my sole relief is poetry.
my sole reliever is the poet.
He’d be
the boy who listens to my fingers speak.)
Sunday, July 12, 2009
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2 footnotes:
"...the aggressive quest for complete and total emptiness."
Brought me to tears.
I tried to post a comment on that poem in your blog, but was greeted with an absence of anything resembling a text box. Ilikedit.
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