Tag: Reasoning

Simply.

Published on April 18, 2026

I think the thing that brought clarity to this lesson, and indeed to all the prior lessons was learning that what is asserted universally is necessarily, and simply necessary – unless stated otherwise. This makes complete sense now, and my intellect, having happily accepted this teaching from the Philosopher, now automatically makes that assumption of necessity upon the hearing or reading a universal premise. At the same time however, I can sense myself now actively looking for any qualifying indication of particularities that communicate any sense or mood actuality in the syllogism.

Also, I think I now better understand what reductio ad absurdum is doing, and how there are two kinds simulating two different scenarios. The first being via contradiction, where an objection is made to a perfect or true syllogism. To which then that objection is assumed as true and tested against the original premises. The absurdities of that false objection becoming quite obvious. The second being via conversions or figures, where a false syllogism is asserted first. To which then the false syllogism, assumed as true in the reductio, is offered a perfect syllogism in a contrasting response, with the same premises to demonstrate which syllogism makes the most sense side by side. I attempted my first reductio ad absurdum mentally today concerning the issue of baptism in the Eastern Orthodox Church and found that it actually powerfully served to show the truth in the Catholic Church on this issue. I can see now the benefit of running through argumentation in order to put all these things into practice. It’s not to inflate the ego, but to seek the truth.

EAR

Aristotle, Prior Analytics. Book 1, Chapter 15.

Fluidity.

Published on April 2, 2026

One thing I was not prepared for was coming into contact with the fluidity of contingent syllogisms. Up until now, everything has been very straightforward and rigid. Syllogisms of necessity and actuality, while the rules were difficult to understand at first, now seem like child’s play compared to the two recent chapters on contingency. The idea of conceptual conversions, how what is initially asserted as contingent could theoretically be converted to its opposing contrary, almost seems to demand that the intellect keep a bird’s eye level view of the syllogism, and does not permit one to go ‘down the rabbit hole’ as it were with these premises. To me, it almost seems to beg that one does not grant any assertion made, but to pay closer attention the key words shaping the premises: e.g. ‘it happens’, ‘it may’, it could be’, ‘contingently’, ‘perhaps it is’, etc. It is all incredibly abstract, so I hope that it will lock in with more examples for the mind to sink in and latch on to. However, I think I am beginning to notice the general pattern going on here. The prior intense studies of being extremely sensitive of the middle, practicing the mental formation of valid syllogisms in different figures, and subdividing these chapters into main ideas is paying off in a big way. I would have given up at this chapter if I had not done the necessary work prior to this. Also, the conclusion at the end, really brings all of this home. Necessary conclusions require necessary premises, and contingent premises do not warrant necessary conclusions. That is a very profound idea to ponder on. A lot of claims are made in our times, and I need to get in the habit more of challenging an asserter to provide evidence for any great assertion made; rather than just taking him for his word and now being subject to whatever rhetoric is to follow, whether it be true or false.

EAR

Aristotle, Prior Analytics. Book 1, Chapter 14.

Minor.

Published on March 6, 2026

There is a distinction that has remained with me from the past three lessons. It is that the minor premise alone being necessary, with the exception of Darapti, seems to never yield a necessary conclusive proposition. The tutor confirms my interpretation of why this is the case. I reason that it is because the lesser extreme is posterior to the greater extreme in a priori, therefore what is necessary of a lesser in any figure, necessarily has no bearing on its syllogistic relationship with a greater. As I think about this, it seems to me that if we forget the hierarchical flow of terms in the different figures of syllogisms, then we are certainly tempted into thinking of everything being autonomous to itself and having prior causes to it. I don’t know why, but I can’t help but wonder if this line of thinking is a rotten fruit of the post-modern intellectual movement. If so, then it would explain why everything for a rational mind seems arbitrary, disconnected, and chaotic. There is essentially no flow, no connection, no relationship, and frankly an abyss of pointlessness without a mind that is perceptive in Prior Analytics. This seems to be a recipe for a possible existential crisis.

EAR

Aristotle, Prior Analytics. Book 1, Chapter 11.

Substitution.

Published on February 24, 2026

I spent two weeks on this chapter. I think it was the most difficult I’ve encountered thus far, but my perseverance, and struggle has yielded some very illuminating fruits from the labor. First of all, I was not expecting Aristotle to switch the middle from B to A in the first part of this chapter. That caught me completely off guard, and I could not understand what in the world was going on, what we were talking about, why we were talking about it, and the purpose of these demonstrations.

Nothing made any sense at all. My mind, having become accustomed to B being the automatic middle, struggled to disassociate it from being anything else other than the middle term. This caused many problems in my comprehension and tracking of necessity with the 2nd figure. My mind incorrectly assumed that: B was still the middle, the examples given were still in first figure, C A was the original conclusion now being temporarily tested as the minor premise, and somehow that was supposed to tell me whether this reconfigured 2nd figure syllogism could be necessary or not. Only after much wrangling with the tutor did I then realize that A was the new middle, and everything suddenly become clear and simple. The only thing I could ask is: “Why would he not tell me when the middle was about to change?”. Whatever the reason, as I go into this next chapter, I’m going to be far more sensitive to term positions, and ontological nuance. It’s as if every word in the syllogism is now significant to me and drastically affects the meaning of what is being asserted.

EAR

Aristotle, Prior Analytics. Book 1, Chapter 10.

Perseverance.

Published on February 19, 2026

What is perseverance? It must be that in which one accepts what is, what was, and what will be. This acceptance seems to be predicated on trust, but in what? Trust in oneself, or trust in the One who made you able to trust? That is an interesting question. I suppose if one must trust in himself, then an ego, by necessity has to project an image in which it can cling to in order to subsist at all. For what is it to say: “I am nothing, therefore I know not”, rather than: “I am X, therefore all things subject to and predicated of X, I am and know of”. That seems reasonable but perhaps it is not, for X surely cannot define you or me. So, if we invest ourselves as if we are the substance in which X derives from, then we must be deceiving ourselves to believe that we are where X begins and where it stops. This must be the root of pride then, that it is the fragile state of putting one’s essence as being that in which is assumed, such as X. So then, can this persevere? Perhaps for a time, until it is severely tested, and by ‘tested’, I mean when it is existentially proven false, and unable to handle severity in truth.

EAR

Decision.

Published on February 11, 2026

The fear of not making a decision, and thereby causing the suffering of others due to inaction, seems to be predicated upon a lack of trust, lack of service, and a lack of humility. The constraints that press upon a man to influence his sense of reason, while certainly helpful as guidelines, are suffocating constrictors for the leader who must act. The irony here is that in failing to read the implications of the present moment: the movements, the indicators, the disturbances, and the slow tide of chaos looming in the near distance, all seem to beg the necessity of courage being needed for action.

As it says in Proverbs that: there is wisdom in many counselors (Proverbs 15:22), so is it the assurance of the collective experience of who you collaborate with, that speak far greater gravitas, and truth, than what can be necessarily quantified, and demonstrated on a spreadsheet. We are either rational human beings, who collectively collaborate to overcome challenges together, or a bunch of dead husks working in silos: with blinders, earplugs, and cold hearts assumed to ignore the needs of our neighbor and prioritize the needs of our wallets.

EAR

Silence.

Published on February 9, 2026

Silence does not equal approval. To assert otherwise is false, an equivocation, and a logical fallacy. To assert such, seems to conceal a deceptive and desperate desire to survive at the cost of one’s neighbor. It is as if to say: “I will fall, but you will fall with me”. Such absurdities should be called out for what they are and not be conformed to. The defense seems to be to object and not grant such an assertion. For the moment we grant such a fallacious lie, we give power to someone else to assert over us. As if the sophist has the power to define things as being contrary to what they are, what they signify, and how we understand them. Silence is not affirmation, or negation, it is neither. If it is neither than how can it be of necessity, actuality, or potency? Silence is nothing, neither what is not, nor not what is. Therefore, it must be humility, the immoveable essence from which all things derive. To enter into silence, is to enter into the timeless and humiliating place of nothing. For from nothing everything came to be, because God spoke. So, silence is not approval, or privation; if it were either, then there would be no need of the Truth. And what kind of reality is that? Absurd.

EAR

Privation ≠ Demonstration.

Published on February 7, 2026

In my studies this week, I was stuck on the following passage from Aristotle: “In other things, therefore, it is demonstrated after the same manner through conversion, that the conclusion is necessary, just as in existing or being present with a thing.” I wrestled with its meaning, or rather what its point was. After re-reading the chapter, and after many dialectical sessions with the tutor, a workable interpretation came to the surface of my mind.

I noticed that in the prior passage Aristotle is speaking of privations: “For a privative assertion is in a similar manner converted, and we similarly assign to be in the whole of a thing, and to be predicated of every.” The more I thought about it, the more I came to the conclusion that a confirmation of what something is not, could not be a certain demonstration of what that very same thing is. E.g. the propositions ‘no B is A’, and ‘no A is B’, co-witness a universal privation that both A and B are not each other. However, we have not ascertained what A and B are. On the other hand, the first figure syllogism Barbara demonstrates what A and B are: viz. ‘every B is A’, and ‘some A is B’ post-conversion.

Therefore, in my notes, I wrote the following to summarize this passage: “What is affirmatively necessary, conclusively, is demonstrated by conversions.”

EAR

Aristotle, Prior Analytics. Book 1, Chapter 8.

Reductio.

Published on January 28, 2026

I have learned and now know how to properly do the reductio ad absurdum to valid syllogisms. Even though, I think what I learned was perhaps too far outside the scope of this chapter. During my study, I saw there was a sharp distinction being drawn by Aristotle between ‘demonstrations’ and ‘demonstrating through the impossible’. For some reason, I sensed that I needed to fully understand what these actually meant, before proceeding any further. What ensued was a confusing week in figuring out what exactly I was looking at.

The principles seemed straight forward at first: assume the opposite conclusion, convert the premises if needed, and compare with original syllogism. It seemed easy enough to execute. So, with that in mind I began to write out, and chart different reductio examples from different valid syllogisms. The problem is that I did not realize that the reductio syllogism was structurally inverted. Meaning, that the opposite conclusion was now the new major premise, thus flipping the original order of the premises. I assumed that the premises of reductio syllogism kept the same sequence, but with the opposite conclusion being different. Also, my understanding of what direction the reductio would lead us was completely flawed. I mistakenly thought the reductio would lead us in the direction of imperfection, not back to the perfection of the 1st figure. Lastly, I was not aware that the lesser extreme in the valid syllogism becomes the middle term in the reductio.

All of these things were unbelievably dense, difficult, and confusing to sort out. However, I think I’ve learned a very valuable tool and intellectually grown from the labor I put into it.

EAR

Aristotle, Prior Analytics. Book 1, Chapter 7.

3rd figure.

Published on January 20, 2026

This lesson went smoother than the other two figures. I was tracking all the distinctions just fine, so perhaps that is a sign that there has been a growth in perception for these syllogisms. One thing that became more evident to me as I began to notate, and chart the syllogisms, was the positioning of the middle term across all three figures. Viz. in the first syllogism the middle is both subject, and predicate, in the second figure the middle is only the predicate, and now in the third figure the middle is only the subject. Stumbling on this made the hierarchical flow of the first figure, the categorical order of the second figure, and the convergent induction of the third figure, more obvious to me.

Maybe this will all begin to tie together the more I internalize these valid syllogisms? When possible, I’ve been trying to just meditate on different ones in atomized form, the relationships of the terms, what they are implying, thinking of the middle, the flow predication, etc. I’m avoiding any attempt to do demonstrations on my own with any ideas I already know and sticking to ABC terms. I’m interested in finding out what is next from Aristotle now that these figures have been taught to me.

EAR

Aristotle, Prior Analytics. Book 1, Chapter 6.