Q&A: Referral for Study
Referral for Study
Question
Hello,
I read your book “Truth and Not Stable.” Although I really enjoyed it, I feel I still haven’t exhausted the point of how one is supposed to decide what the axioms are from which I begin my logical process. On the one hand, axioms are the unreasoned starting points from which everything begins, and on the other hand—precisely because of their importance—I keep looking for a justification for why they, specifically, should define my life. Unfortunately, I’m being drafted in the coming weeks, so I don’t have a lot of time to immerse myself deeply in the topic. I’m looking for material I can sit with in a focused way for something like two weeks and make progress on the issue. I’d be happy for the Rabbi to recommend one of his books, or books by others if relevant.
Thank you very much!
Answer
I don’t understand the request. Are you looking for a way to find your assumptions? Read various things and think, and choose what you believe and what you accept. I don’t know what to say about this beyond that.
Discussion on Answer
And to the point—reading and thinking belong to systems that still aren’t able to give me an answer, because as I understood it, an axiom by definition is something unreasoned—that is, you can’t arrive at it by logical means. The question is how to approach dealing with axioms when on the one hand they are non-logical by definition, so there is no way to persuade or be persuaded toward one axiom or another, and on the other hand I can’t manage to assign too much importance to inner intuition.
And to the point—reading and thinking can’t help me, since I’m trying to deal with axioms and I’m currently in a problematic place because I understood that axioms are something unreasoned—that is, one cannot persuade or be persuaded by logical means; but on the other hand, I also can’t manage to assign importance to my inner intuition.
And if we take this one step further—logical thinking itself and the grounding I’m looking for are also based on my own axiom that such a thing as proof exists and that logic works, so that too is lacking. My question is how to approach dealing with axioms at all in such a subjective world.
I explained in Truth and Not Stable that the difference between a fundamentalist and a synthetic thinker is the question of whether his axioms are subject to rational testing and to the critique of his thought. That is how axioms are adopted, and that is also how they are abandoned.
If someone does not accept his own intuition, I have nothing to say to him. In what terms do you want an answer if you have no solid basis at all on which one can build?
Honestly, I’m not sure… But if we go back for a moment to the issue of axioms—I’m trying to understand the essential difference between the fundamentalist and the synthetic thinker. I’ll try to phrase again the question that was bothering me (although it’s likely that I didn’t understand your answer about the difference, and not that you didn’t understand my question…).
Isn’t the use of logic as a regulator of axioms also itself an axiom? Meaning, in the end both types act directly according to their axioms, and it seems the only difference is belief in different axioms—and then it already seems like we’re back to speaking in the language of narratives. That is, one is not preferable to the other…
I read it again, and in my assessment I understood your question היטב and you did not understand my answer. I’ll explain again.
Everyone has axioms that he adopts not on the basis of a logical argument (for there are no more basic axioms). On the other hand, if there is a way to adopt axioms (I attribute this to intuition), then in that same way one can also give them up. This is what it means to subject your axioms to the test of common sense (= intuition).
The fundamentalist, once he has decided on his path, is not willing to subject it to critical examination. For him it is not based on intuition but on something beyond reason (whatever that expression may mean. In my opinion it is empty of content). Therefore he is also unwilling to subject it to the test of intuition and common sense, and he clings to his axioms as if they were absolute truth.
In other words, the fundamentalist thinks he possesses absolute truth, whereas the synthetic thinker thinks he does not.
Definitely. The problem is that before reading Truth and Not Stable (and certainly after), I can’t manage to find a sufficient criterion that would let me arrive at a feeling of truth about anything. I don’t know whether it’s because I can’t separate truth from certainty or not, but I wasn’t able to understand the difference between a person who carries out logical procedures on an axiom that he gets from inner intuition—a non-logical place (= living according to an axiom that one should act according to logical procedures + the axioms to which he applies the logical axiom)—and a fundamentalist who acts directly from axioms that he also chose out of intuition. That is, in the end both models directly live out their inner axioms, and the fact that one of them also has the axiom that one should use reason doesn’t seem to make an essential difference between them in this respect.
If you could sharpen this point for me or refer me to one of the places where you discuss it in depth, I’d be very grateful. At the moment, just as I don’t attach much importance to other people’s axioms because they have no real grounding, I’m also unable to attach importance to my own axioms.