Christocentric Philosophy

In part 4 , we discussed the epistemology of logic. There we noted briefly the issues regarding the relation of logic to facts. Here, we shall expand on those issues. First of all, we must note that our logical systems are only useful to us as long as we can use them to gain knowledge of the world. We use logic to navigate the world, make sense of our experience, reason, and gain knowledge. A logical system that can yield no knowledge of facts is not very useful to us as knowers. If all our logical systems were good for was abstract proofs, that would not help us at all in gaining relevant knowledge. Logic is seen as a way for us to extend our knowledge. By logically manipulating the facts which we know, we can come to conclusions and new information. There is an assumption in the above line of reasoning that we must take note of, however. We have assumed that there is some sort of correspondence between our system of logic and the system of facts which exist independent of our minds.

Continuing the discussion on the Van Tillian argument from logic, we could consider logic from yet another perspective: ethics. From this perspective, the apologist can argue from the normativity of logic. Part of our intuitions about logic informs us that logical truths aren’t just truths - they are “laws”. Hence, the name “laws of logic” or “laws of thought”. They are thought of as not just telling us what is true, but what it right when it comes to reasoning and thinking. For example, the law of non-contradiction may tell us that a proposition and its negation cannot both be true at the same time and in the same sense. However, the law of non-contradiction is taken to do more than that: it tells us that, in our thinking, we should avoid contradictions. If someone runs into contradictions in their reasoning, such a person is seen as violating some law and doing something wrong  or inappropriate . This means that laws of logic are normative and prescriptive ; they prescribe how we

PART FOUR: THE EPISTEMOLOGY OF LOGIC  Another area which one can employ the Van Tillian argument from logic concerns the epistemology of logic. The major claim here is that the justification of logical truths and principles can only be provided on the basis of Christian Theism. We can raise the question of how exactly one justifies the truths of logic; what evidence does one have that his most strongly held beliefs about logic are true? The justification of truths in general has traditionally fallen into two categories: a posteriori justification, and a priori justification. A posteriori justification concerns justification that is based on empirical experience of the world. Meanwhile, a priori justification concerns justification that does not need to refer to empirical experience in any way. Justification of logical truths have fallen into these categories as well. A Posteriori Justification  Dr. Bahnsen, in his second opening statement in his debate with Dr. Stein, says: Now if yo