Metaphysics - Axioms and Logic

 

Without a foundation, one cannot build - every coherent philosophical system must have axioms.  An irreducible self-evident truth, meaningful in all acts of knowledge, which cannot be logically negated, is an axiom.  The axiom is a rock-stable premise.

 

Axiomatic-like is what the whole of metaphysics and epistemology can be said to be, and that it cannot be logically negated.  While this is so, there are only three concepts which are irreducible - the fundamental building blocks of all the others.  These concepts are:

 

• Existence - the fact that something is.  You exist, and objects around you exist.

• Identity - the fact that something has definite attributes.  You, and the objects around you, exist in a definite way.

• Consciousness - the fact that you perceive (introspectively and extrospectively).

 

These axioms can be expressed in an introspective or extrospective way:

 

• I (existence) am something (identity) that perceives (consciousness).

• I perceive (consciousness) something (identity) that exists (existence).

 

We can validate these axioms by the fact that their denial is illogical, and by directly experiencing them ourselves.

 

Denial of these axioms is illogical because they are meaningful in the very act of denial.  For example, someone would express his existence if he denies that he exists.  Likewise, someone would express the fact that he is conscious, if he would claim to be unconscious, by his ability to formulate and express his denial.

 

This error is called the Stolen Concept fallacy, and it is necessarily committed by anyone who attempts to deny a metaphysical or epistemic concept: the concept of existence is forced to be used by the denier in his very attempt to deny it.

 

Logic is an attribute of the axiom of identity, and is the method by which we select disagreements from our thinking. The laws and fallacies of logic can be classed to three basic laws, despite them being numerous:

 

• The law of identity: A is A.

• The law of non-contradiction: A cannot be not-A.

• The law of excluded middle: B can either be A or not-A.

 

The fundamentals of logical thinking are what these laws provide. Logic is one of the three parts of reason, as we will see later.