Logic and God

[MacMan]

I'm not looking for a huge debate, but I'm just curious: Do you believe logic transcends the universe, or is it merely a feature of it? That is, if you believe in a creator, do you believe the creator created logic?

I am of the opinion that logic and the universe are independent of one another, and if there is enough interest in this thread I will post my supporting evidence. For now, however, I will only say that I am atheist who has been forced to classify myself as an agnostic due to my mathematical understanding of the underlying nature of the world.

 

[Renzokuken]

I am a Christian, so i do believe in God, our creator. I guess God created our logic, or through him giving us free will, we have created our own.

 

[B~E]

Logic is a method. How on Earth do you *creat* a method?

 

[MacMan]

Logic is our fundamental mechanism for determining truth. To us, 1+1=2, but there can be entirely different logic systems where this is untrue. The merit of those other systems, however, is slim to none in most cases.

 

[Flempipes]

A creator

 

[MacMan]

A creator

Try communicating a complete thought next time.

 

[B~E]

To us, 1+1=2, but there can be entirely different logic systems where this is untrue.

I'll ask this as humbly as I can: how can that be possible? I've only had a minimum of training in logics, and I'm worthless in maths, so I can't really wrap my head around this possibility of a system where 1+1 doesnt equate 2

 

[MacMan]

I'll ask this as humbly as I can: how can that be possible? I've only had a minimum of training in logics, and I'm worthless in maths, so I can't really wrap my head around this possibility of a system where 1+1 doesnt equate 2

You can define 1+1 to be whatever you please, but more importantly you can define axioms which construct a completely different logic system than the one you are accustomed to. Note that we can come up with any number of such systems...

For example, you are accustomed to Euclidean geometry because that seems to describe the world around us, however God could have just as easily constructed the universe as a hyperbolic one (essentially this means the internal angles of a triangle would not sum to 180, and note that this is simply a geometric system of logic I'm describing).

The importance of my question, however, is that if logic transcends the universe, then we can logically construct all other possible logic systems available to all other possible universes the creator (if there is one) could have constructed. From there some interesting observations can be made regarding creation.

 

[B~E]

Note that we can come up with any number of such systems...

So this is all just a thought experiment, like a social contract or an "original position" in social sciences. But what's the point of it?

 

[MacMan]

So this is all just a thought experiment, like a social contract or an "original position" in social sciences. But what's the point of it?

That question was answered in the last statement of my previous reply, I'm just looking for opinions right now -- mainly, what people, theists in particular, believe the extent of their creator's powers are.

 

[B~E]

From there some interesting observations can be made regarding creation.

...for exemple? Sorry if I seem to be pressing you, but you seem to be the one who's on to something regarding that question.

 

[PauseBreak]

I believe God created logic, as with everything in the universe. Do I believe logic is supreme? Well, the double slit experiment pretty much is illogical but there it is.

 

[MacMan]

I believe God created logic, as with everything in the universe. Do I believe logic is supreme? Well, the double slit experiment pretty much is illogical but there it is.

You're confusing something illogical with something unintuitive.

 

[Tw@]

I believe in science and evidence.

 

[Ntrik_]

I don't think the God has anything to do with our logic. We created them as years went by; if you think about social logic, the most basic one being "thou shall not steal", that logic could easily be altered if our society never had any monetary currencies to begin with.

Hmm I guess that sounded kind of like "morals and ethics", but it seems logic and morals are kind of a same thing when you compare them in social terms...

my point still stands for mathematical or scientific logics however.

 

[Tipsy]

Personally, I believe logic transcends to the universe, part of it because of my belief as someone who believes in God that it stretches into the metaphysical since the metaphysical.

An interesting twist to throw in is how far can humans take logic. I say this in the spirit that we can only see things through the human brain and the purpose of the human brain is not to expand our power or rational though, but rather an evolutionary survival mechanism. Granted there is some overlap between survival mechanism and rational thought.

I bring that up because I believe logic can explain everything and really has no shortcoming, it is on the human side of the equation where there is a disconnect.

Anywho, my opinion.

 

[x42bn6]

So this is all just a thought experiment, like a social contract or an "original position" in social sciences. But what's the point of it?

2 is defined as the successor of 1 (proof can vary from a couple of lines to about 67,000 lines). You could define "+" as a totally different thing. One can define the "+" in "a+b" to be "a+b+ab" where these "+"s are the addition symbols we recognise by default. It can be proved that this still is a mathematical group and hence mathematical structures can be built from this. I'm not sure it's a field or a ring so it might not have full use (division, for example, isn't a ring because division by zero is undefined, but addition operations are rings, fields and groups).

We could've defined "1+1" to equate to "1", because "a*b=[sup]def[/sup]a+b-1" where "*" is our new addition operator, and had we done so when the first mathematical and logical systems were created, it would've made sense, if tedious. Use is a different matter. If I have 2 tins and add 2 more tins to my collection, I would have 4, but "2+2=3" with my new definition. Not really useful, which only really implies addition in this sense isn't quite the same as concatenating loads of 1s together.

Of course, one can then say that we are making our own logic system. Which is true - we can make pretty much any logic or mathematical system we want, but you will be limited by the properties such as reflexivity (what would be the implications of a system where a=a was false?), rings, groups, fields, associativity, and so on. The question is whether someone up there gave us this system, or the idea.

To me, (mathematical) logic arose because of intuition. Caveman A thought that if he made another spear, he would have more spears so if one broke, he had another spare. Enter Caveman B, who has hundreds of spears, stolen. He steals one of Caveman A's spears. Caveman A sees this and thinks, "Ah! One of my spears is gone!" Addition and subtraction were born.

Hence I think that logical systems are independent of the Universe. Did we create logic systems? Of course. We created the notion of truth and used it to make decisions. Proof by contradiction, reflexivity, etc. are direct results of this. Unless the person up there gave us the idea of a logic system, I am guessing we created it. But did we create logic? I'm not sure that's possible. What we think of as true or false is a logic system. So I'm taking the stance that logic is a human creation, unless God gave that knowledge to us. And, of course, that is going to be difficult to prove or disprove.

Then there is the problem that the logic system we use at the moment may not be able to solve all the problems we come across (Godel's Theorem?). Then we could shift our logic system and solve this problem. Of course, we might have to redefine 1+1 to be 3, but then again, these systems are only as useful as we think they are.*

 

[AZN_FLEA]

someone define logic, then we can all go over how that particular logic was with us by default or we created logic.

btw B-E, because the other two guys gave complex answers to your 1+1=2 question, ill answer simply.

1+1=2 in all number systems except the binary system where 1+1=11 not 2

 

[x42bn6]

Note that that is not quite an example of a different 1+1. Essentially it is another way of writing 2. In other words, syntactically, 1[sub]2[/sub]+1[sub]2[/sub]=11[sub]2[/sub] is syntactically equivalent to 1[sub]10[/sub]+1[sub]10[/sub]=2[sub]10[/sub].*

 

[AZN_FLEA]

but its a more easily understandable and logical (IMO) than what you are implying.

if + could mean anything, then what i am saying can mean anything at all. basically it would kind of kill logic because what i am saying could be interpreted totally differently by everyone whereas if every word had an assigned meaning to it, we can all make sense of it.