Article 7: Whether all reality is logical?

Objection 1: It seems that it is not, for God transcends all that whichis finite, and therefore transcends logic, which is the inventionoffinite human minds.

Objection 2: Furthermore, evil is not logical. It is contrary to reason.That’s one of the things that makes it evil. Yet evil is real. Thereforenot all that is real is logical.

Objection 3: Furthermore, love is real but love is not logical.

Objection 4: Furthermore, insanity exists, in many forms. But being insane, almost by definition, is the opposite of being logical.

Objection 5: Furthermore, having children is not logical. As Robert Farrar Capon says, “Flaving fits is more rational than having chil- dren.” (An Offering of Uncles)

Objection 6: Jokes are also not logical. That’s why they are funny. But there can be a certain truth to them.

Objection 7: We do not know all of reality. Therefore we do not know whether or not there is any unknown reality that is not logical. For if there were, it would not be knowable by us, since we must know a thing according to the laws of logic.

On the contrary, as Socratic Logic explains, “Just as 2 plus 2 are unfailingly 4, so if A is B and B is C, then A is unfailingly C. Logic is universal, timeless, unchangeable, and certain. It is not certain that the sun will rise tomorrow. (It is only very, very probable.) But it is certain that it either will or won’t.”

I answer that whatever is real is logical because whatever is real, is real and not not-real; and to say this is to assume the two basic principles of logic, the law of identity and the law of non-contradiction. To say that not all reality is logical is self-contradictory and self-refutiing.

While it is quite possible for the human mind to conceive, and even to believe, things that contradict any other kind of laws—e.g. miracles, which at least seem to contradict the laws of physics-it is impossible for any human mind to conceive anything that contradicts the basic laws of logic, especially the law of non-contradiction. For instance, to say that a man walked through the wall may be to say that he performed a miracle; and that may be false, but it is meaningful. But to say that a man both walked through the wall and did not walk through the wall at the same time and in the same sense is not to say anything meaningful or comprehensible at all.

Reply to Objection 1: To say “God transcends logic” is to presuppose the principles of logic, such as the subject-predicate structure ofaproposition and the law of non-contradiction (“God does transcendlogic” must not mean “God does not transcend logic”). If Godtran-scends logic, God transcends the law of non-contradiction, in whichcase “God transcends logic” can mean that “God does not transcendlogic.”

In fact, assuming the existence of God, God must be the ultimateontological foundation for logic. That is why its supreme principles,identity and non-contradiction, are absolute, eternal, necessary, andknown a priori, not dependent on the existence or knowledge ofanyother reality. X is X because God is God, because the divine natureisone and self-consistent; and X is not non-X because God is not non-God.

Logic is not a human invention. If it were, it could be changed.But its fundamental principles cannot be changed, but are necessarily true of all possible worlds.

Reply to Objection 2: When one chooses evil over good, one chooses contrary to reason (i.e. contrary to the right use of reason). Butallstatements about this irrational choice must conform to the lawsoflogic. For instance, if it is true that X is evil in a certain respect, it cannot at the same time be true that X is not evil in that respect. Evilchoices are indeed irrational, but statements about them need notbe.

Reply to Objection 3: The same distinction holds for love. Lovemaybe irrational (in fact, some forms of it are, others are not), but state-ments about it need not be.

Reply to Objection 4: And the same is true for insanity. Also, as G.K.Chesterton says,

The madman is not the man who has lost his reason. Themadman is the man who has lost everything except his reason ... if a man says that he is the rightful King of England, it is no complete answer to say that the existing authorities call him mad; for if he were the King of England that might be the wisest thing for the existing authorities to do . . . his mindmoves in a perfect but narrow circle. A small circle is quite as infinite as a large circle; but, though it is quite as infinite, it is not so large. In the same way the insane explanation is quite as complete as the sane one, but it is not so large. . . . Curing a madman is not arguing with a philosopher. It is casting out a devil. (Orthodoxy)

Reply to Objection 5: Not having children would be even less “rational” than having children. If universalized, it would end the human race.

Reply to Objection 6: If the laws of logic did not hold, jokes would not be funny. For even if a joke is funny because it seems to break a law of logic, a law must first exist in order to be broken.

Reply to Objection 7: (1) If it were possible that any part of reality were truly illogical, not subject to the law of non-contradiction, we could not know which parts these were except by the law of non-contradiction. (2) If this were possible, then the reality that seems to us to be logical might in fact be illogical, and we could never know it was—which results in absolute skepticism, which is self-eliminating (Question VI, Article 1).

Article 8: Whether deductive arguments (e.g. syllogisms) really prove anything?

Objection 1: It seems that they do not, for as the ancient Greek skeptics pointed out, every syllogism depends on its premises, which it assumes rather than proves. In order to be certain of the syllogism’s conclusion, these premises must be proved by other syllogisms, whose premises in turn depend on still other syllogisms and other premises, et cetera ad infinitum, so that nothing is ever proved with certainty.

Objection 2: As David Hume (implicitly) and John Stuart Mill (explicitly) point out, a syllogism cannot deliver the new knowledge it claims to deliver in its conclusion. For either the conclusion merely repeats in different words what has already been said in the premises—in which case there is no new knowledge, only newwording, and the syllogism is simply a complex tautology—or it addstothe knowledge that is already in the premises—in which case it commits the fallacy of non sequitur, for there is more in the conclusionthan the premises warrant. So every syllogism is either a tautologyora non sequitur.

“All men are mortal and Socrates is a man, therefore Socratesismortal” seems to prove that Socrates is mortal, but it does not;forwe could never know that all men are mortal unless we alreadyknowthat Socrates is mortal. So the conclusion, which seems to follow,orcome after the premises, really must precede, or come before them.

Objection 3: People do not learn from syllogisms, nor are theycon-vinced to change their minds by them, but by other factors, especially experience, intuition, and emotion. Syllogisms are therefore usefulonly for displaying the reasons one already has, not for changingothers' minds. But education involves changing others’ minds (i.e. stu-dents’ minds, including your own, when you are self-educating).Therefore they are useless for education.

On the contrary, all the greatest philosophers, including thoselikeHume who wanted to persuade us of the uselessness of deductiverea-soning, and especially syllogisms, have used deductive reasoning,andespecially syllogisms, to persuade us.

I answer that “reasoning” means mentally moving from the judgment that some things are true (the premises) to the judgmentthatsomething else is true (the conclusion); and this is done in twoways:inductively, when the conclusion follows only with probability(usually because the reasoning proceeds from particular premisestoamore universal or general conclusion) or deductively and withcer-tainty (when the reasoning proceeds from a universal premisetoaparticular conclusion that logically comes under it). But all reasoningcan be useful and persuasive. Therefore deductive reasoning, especially syllogisms, can be useful and persuasive.

Reply to Objection 1: Aristotle answered this objection very simply:the infinite regress of proving the premises of premises stops at two points: direct and indubitable sense experience and the direct and indubitable intellectual experience, so to speak, of logically self-evi- dent first principles such as “Do good, not evil” in practical reasoning and the laws of identity, non-contradiction, and excluded middle (either p is true or not true) in theoretical reasoning. If any proposition can be shown to contradict either of these two starting points, that proposition is shown to be false. (See Socratic Logic, 3.1 edition, pp. 219-22)

Reply to Objection 2: The objection presupposes Nominalism (the denial of real universals) and empiricism (the denial of a priori knowledge). We can know that “all men are mortal” before we know that “Socrates is mortal” because we understand that mortality, unlike height or gender, is essential to all men because all men have animal bodies. We can and often do thus derive the knowledge of its properties from our understanding of a universal essence, a priori. (See Socratic Logic, 3.1 edition, pp. 222-30.)

The Nominalist and Empiricist objection to deduction is as fatal to science as it is to philosophy, for science too relies on deduction in predicting what the observed consequences of the truth of a hypothesis must be, before observing the presence or absence of these consequences. In fact, all applications of mathematics to nature are deductive and predictive: only if 2+2=4 universally can I be sure that 2 planets plus 2 more planets will = 4 planets tomorrow as well as today.

Reply to Objection 3: This very objection answers itself, for it seeks to change the mind of the defender of syllogisms—by a syllogism!

One may know both premises and not put them together in one’s mind until someone does this in a syllogism. E.g. one may know (1) the general principle that animals that give live birth are mammals, and also (2) the particular fact that whales give live birth, and yet (3) not realize that whales are mammals, but believe that whales are fish. An important contemporary example of this principle is the following: according to the polls, each of the following propositions is believed by about two-thirds of Americans: (1) that an unborn human child is an innocent human being, and (2) that it is always morally wrong to deliberately kill an innocent human being, and (3) that abortion, which is the deliberate killing of an unborn humanchild, is not always morally wrong. A syllogism may newly revealtosomeone the inconsistency and logical impossibility of all thesebeliefs being true at the same time. 

Article 9: Whether words intend real things?*

Objection 1: It seems that they do not, for one of the most popularand progressive philosophies today in Western civilization (Europeand North America) is Deconstructionism, whose central claimisthat it is only a popular and traditional but mistaken myththatwords (“text”) have “intentionality,” i.e. some fixed and objectivemeaning (“logos”) as intending or pointing to or symbolizing thingsin the supposedly-objective and common “world.” Deconstructionism denies this “intentionality” in words as well as in things. It maintains that not only are things not “words” (i.e. they are notsigns,with fixed meanings or essences, as ancient man believed) butevenwords are not “words” (i.e. they do not “mean” or intendrealthings), but are simply opaque things. (“A poem should be palpableand mute/ Like globed fruit. /A poem should not mean but be”-Archibald MacLeish, “Ars Poetica.”)

Objection 2: This philosophy (that words do not intend real things)is the third stage and culmination of critical thinking in the historyof human thought. Ancient and medieval philosophy centeredon metaphysics, classical modern philosophy on epistemology, and con- temporary philosophy on language. In each of these three stages, an j initial naivete (three forms of “logocentrism”) was replaced by a more critical, skeptical, subjective, and relativistic outlook as a result of dialog among the great philosophers. The ancient Greek philosopher Gorgias could be seen as a prophet of the future history of phij losophy when he summarized his philosophy in three theses, each of which denied one of the three fundamental meanings of “logos’' or fixed, objective, natural essence: (1) in metaphysics, “nothing is real” (no “logos” in reality); (2) in epistemology, “if anything were real, it could not be known” (no “logos” in knowledge); and (3) in linguistics, “if anything could be known, it could not be said, or communicated” (no “logos” in speech).

Objection 3: Critical thinkers should use a “hermeneutic of suspicion.” If they do, they will notice that opposition to Deconstructionism typically comes from bourgeois right-wing middle-class white male heterosexual conservative establishmentarians. This is evidence for the claim that behind all logocentric reasoning lies the “will to power” over non-bourgeois, non-white, non-male, non-heterosexual, non-conservative, “transgressive” anti-establishmentarians. When we hear them speak of “the truth” we should always ask “Whose truth?” For “truth” is a constructed mask on the face of the will to power. Truth is relative to race, class, gender, and sexual ori- entation.

On the contrary, every philosopher in the history of human thought who has ever intended to communicate his philosophy has broken with Deconstructionism’s denial of intentionality in the very act of communicating. Even if the philosophy communicated was intended to be some form of skepticism, it was intended to communicate.

I answer that it is difficult to argue with a philosophy that does not argue or put any faith in argument, but merely dogmatically states its program of destruction. We will therefore instead give this philosophy its proper place in the history of human thought:

The first great philosopher to write, Plato, claimed that even were “words” (/ogo/), i.e. signs or images of Platonic Forms. Christianphilosophers like Augustine, Bonaventura, and Aquinas agreedwiththis, putting Platonic Ideas in the mind of God and concluding thattheGod who designed the universe could and did use things as signs (ontological words) of other things. (See Summa Theologiae 1,1,10.)Forinstance, a lion could be a sign or icon of God through its royal quality (the “King of Beasts”). Not only did the word “lion” signify alion,but a lion also signified the leonine aspects of God.

This Platonism was abandoned by atheistic, agnostic, materialistic, or resolutely secular thinkers, for whom only wordswere“words” (logoi) and things were only things. For instance, a lionwasonly a lion and meant nothing beyond itself, although the word“lion” meant something beyond itself: a real lion.

Finally, Deconstructionism claims that even words arenot“words” (logoi) but only things. This is like a lion looking at a bookabout lions and concluding that it is only a toy to be chewedup.There is no need for serious philosophers to take this chewingseri-ously. I have already used far too many words to dismiss this philosophy which dismisses words.

The denial of the intentionality of concepts and wordsis thedenial of either the distinction or the correspondence betweenlan-guage (“text”) and reality (“world”). This is the most radicalandindefensible form of skepticism in the entire history of humanthought. For even total, simple, and unqualified skepticism, thoughimmediately self-contradictory, must assume that its words are meaningful, and true. The denial of the very concept of truth,in Deconstructionism, is even more radical and more unjustifiable,more immediately self-contradictory, than the denial of our abilitytofind it (Skepticism).

If words are not signs, then neither are the words in the Deconstructionist claim that words are not signs. Thus the verystate-ments of Deconstructionism destroy themselves; this philosophyisintellectual suicide. Or, even worse, it is not serious; it is a sneerrather than an argument, an “inside joke” against “naive” traditionalists who take words and thought seriously—in other wordsallthehuman beings, of every philosophical persuasion, who haveeverlived, in the entire history of the world, except the “in the know”Deconstructionists.

Reply to Objection 1: The fact that a philosophy is “popular” among philosophers is no argument for it, unless truth is told by polls. And Deconstructionism itself assumes this principle when it criticizes the more popular (outside the ranks of avant-garde philosophers) view that words mean real things.

And if we try to tell the truth with clocks instead of arguments, as we do when we say a philosophy is true because it is “progressive,” we find that that itself is an argument, in fact a syllogism.

The rest of the “objection” is mere dogmatic assertion, not argument. It is the dogma that there can be no dogmas.

Reply to Objection 2: Gorgias was not a philosopher but a Sophist and a triple Nihilist: metaphysically, epistemologically, and linguistically. Deconstructionism is simply the third and final nihilism; and since nihilism is decadence, it is the final stage in intellectual decadence.

Reply to Objection 3: Traditional and commonsensical “logocentrism” is indeed a form of antidisestablishmentarianism. We are grateful to our opponents for one thing only: the opportunity to write the longest word in the English language.

Those who speak of the “hermeneutic of suspicion” and the “will to power” make one exception to that suspicion and that will: themselves. For if they did not, they would not only contradict themselves, putting themselves and their own theory under the same disqualifying suspicion, but also disqualify themselves from debate as terrorist bombers disqualify themselves from debate. Bombs are powers not arguments, whether they are physical or intellectual.

Truth can no more be reduced to power than light can be reduced to heat; this entire philosophy is based on an arbitrary and unjustifiable confusion of categories.

To say that “truth is relative to race, class, gender, or sexual ori- entation” is similar to saying that it is relative to height or weight or hair color. It is also self- refuting. This philosophy is a form of intellectual suicide—or pretended suicide, which is in a way worse because it is hypocritical. It lacks seriousness and honesty. It deserves as much attention as a sneer.

Article 10: Whether symbolic logic is superior to Aristotelian logic for philosophizing?

Objection 1: It seems that it is, for it is a modern development,andwould not have become popular if it were not superior. In fact, 99%of all formal logic textbooks in print today use symbolic rather thanAristotelian logic.

Objection 2: It is as superior in efficiency to Aristotelian logicasArabic numerals to Roman numerals, or a computer to an abacus.

Objection 3: Aristotelian logic presupposes metaphysical and epistemological realism, which are no longer universally accepted.Symbolic logic is ideologically neutral. It is like mathematics notonlyin efficiency but also in that it carries less “philosophical baggage.”

On the contrary, the authority of common sense is still on the sideofAristotelian rather than symbolic logic. But common sense is theori-gin, basis, and foundation of all further refinements of reason, including symbolic logic; and a branch should not contradict its trunk,anupper story should not contradict its foundation. All philosophicalsystems, including symbolic logic, since they are refinements of, beginwith, and depend on the validity of common sense, even whiletheygreatly refine and expand this foundation, should not contradictit, assymbolic logic does. (See below.)

I answer that at least two essential principles of symbolic logic contradict common sense: (1) the counter-intuitive “paradox of materialimplication,” according to which a false proposition materiallyimplies any proposition, false as well as true, including contradictories (see Socratic Logic, pp. 266-369); and (2) the assumption thataparticular proposition (like “some elves are evil”) claims more,not less, than a universal proposition (like “all elves are evil'’), since it is assumed to have “existential import” while a universal proposition is assumed to lack it, since symbolic logic assumes the metaphysical position (or “metaphysical baggage”) of Nominalism. See Socratic Logic, pp. 179-81, 262-63 and The Two Logics by Henry Veatch. Furthermore, no one ever actually argues in symbolic logic except professional philosophers. Its use coincides with the sudden decline of interest in philosophy among students. If you believe that is a coincidence, I have a nice timeshare in Florida that I would like to sell to you.

Reply to Objection 1: Popularity is no index of truth. If it were, truth would change, and contradict itself, as popularity changed—including the truth of that statement. And thus it is self-contradictory.

Reply to Objection 2: It is not more efficient in dealing with ordinary language. We never hear people actually argue any of the great philosophical questions in symbolic logic, but we hear a syllogism every few sentences.

Reply to Objection 3: Symbolic logic is not philosophically neutral but presupposes Nominalism, as shown by the references in the “/ answer that” above.

Question II: Metaphysics

(Note: half of these ten questions concern not issues within metaphysics but the status and legitimacy of metaphysics itself, becausethe entire science of metaphysics has been under suspicion amongphilosophers ever since Hume and Kant. [See my Socrates MeetsHume and Socrates Meets Kant,])

Article 1: Whether metaphysics is something esoteric,arcane, or occult?

Objection 1: It seems that it does, for this is how it is classifiedinbookstores in California. It is “under the sheets” with witchcraft.

Objection 2: Furthermore, most ordinary human beings viewit thisway. For as its very name indicates, it goes beyond (meta) ordinaryhuman knowledge, as the physical sciences do not.

Objection 3: There is good reason for this classification, for metaphysics is supremely abstract and thus supremely removed fromandirrelevant to the life of ordinary people.

On the contrary, the word “metaphysics” means simply “beyondphysics.” But most of the questions that people naturally ask(e.g.“Who am I?” “What is the highest value?” or even “Does heloveme?”) go beyond physics and beyond the competency of physicsto answer. But these questions are not regarded as esoteric,arcane, or occult, except perhaps by the most adamant materialists.

I answer that metaphysics goes “beyond physics” not by dealing only with non-physical realities but by dealing with more universal questions, questions about all of reality, or “being qua being”: questions such as: (1) “Is causality a real relation?” (2) “Is time objectively or only subjectively real?” and (3) “Is there any reality that is intrinsically unintelligible?” These questions are (1) not esoteric, for every- one knows what “causality” means and everyone deals with causes and effects constantly; in fact, the very asking of this question is an attempt to mentally cause, or bring about, an answer. (2) Nor are they arcane, for “time” is not an arcane concept but very present and up-to-date! (3) Nor are they occult, for “intelligibility” is not only not an occult concept but its very opposite.

Reply to Objection 1: If we let California bookstores define our philosophy for us, we would all be “creating our own reality,” naming and taming “our” angels, and taking out-of-body trips to Jupiter by channeling planetary spirits.

Reply to Objection 2: Every science in some way goes beyond ordi- nary knowledge, including philosophical sciences, which are “sci- ences" in a broader and looser sense than the physical sciences, but still a meaningful sense (for instance “the ordered, rational knowledge of reality through causal explanations”).

Reply to Objection 3: As will be shown in question 5 below, metaphysics explores the necessary foundations of all human knowledge and the truths or principles that hold true for all objects of human knowledge. Thus the most fundamental differences of opinion in all the other divisions of philosophy, including the most relevant and practical questions of ethics and politics, are always based on differ- ences of opinion in metaphysics. These differences have emerged even in logic, apparently the most metaphysically neutral division of philosophy. (See the last four Articles of question 1 above.) Thus nothing is more universally “relevant” than metaphysics.

Article 2: Whether metaphysics originates in experience?

Objection 1: It seems that it does not, for metaphysics, in ordertotranscend physics, must seek a priori knowledge, not a posterioriknowledge. But a priori knowledge by definition is prior to experi-ence and does not originate in experience.

Objection 2: If metaphysics, like the special sciences, originatedinexperience, then its questions would be resolvable by experience,asthe questions of the special sciences are, in which experienceddataconstitute the standard which verifies or falsifies hypotheses. Butthequestions of metaphysics are not resolvable by experience, for if theywere, they would have been resolved by now, and the same universalor nearly-universal agreement would have been reached there ashasbeen reached in the special sciences. These questions have notbeenresolved. And the reason is that metaphysical statements are notinprinciple verifiable or falsifiable by experience.

Objection 3: If metaphysics originated in experience, as bothcom-mon sense and the special sciences do, its conclusions wouldrevealnew facts of experience, as both common sense and the specialsci-ences do. But it does not.

On the contrary, all human knowledge (as Aristotle says) beginsinexperience, though (as Kant says) it does not necessarily followthatit also ends in experience. Since metaphysics is part of humanknowledge, it too must in some way begin in experience.

I answer that all of philosophy is an attempt by reason to understandand illumine our human experience in depth, rather than an attemptto expand it in width, so to speak, i.e. to add data or detail as theparticular sciences do. And to understand experience, it is necessarytobegin with experience. Therefore all of philosophy begins with experience. And metaphysics is part of philosophy. Therefore metaphysics begins with experience. Everything we experience has one thing in common: it is real, it is some kind of being. Metaphysics explores this fact, and seeks the common laws and principles of all being. “Being” is not a contrast or an alternative to experience; it is the object of all experience. As Marcel shows, it is also the subject of all experience, for my being is equally in question when I question being [ as such. (See II, 2.) For this reason, metaphysics, the study of being as being, does not ignore or fly from experience, as a rocket escapes the I earth into the vacuum of outer space. Rather, it digs into the ground I of experience, as an engineer builds a foundation under a building.

Reply to Objection 1: The objective truths sought by metaphysics are I indeed a priori, for they are true universally, true of all possible expeI rience. But the psychological process of arriving at these truths begins I with experience.

Reply to Objection 2: Not only the questions of metaphysics, but also f many other meaningful and important questions, in fact all or nearly all philosophical questions, in all the other divisions of philosophy, have not been “resolved” if “resolved” means “universal agreeI ment.”

An argument which resolves an issue or answers a question in an objectively valid way does not depend on everyone’s subjective agreement for its validity. If it did, then “A=B and B=C, therefore A=C” would be made invalid if just one stubborn-willed or feeble-minded person denied it.

Actually, experience is the test of truth in metaphysics, just as it is in common sense or the sciences, though in a less direct or empirical way. For instance, the metaphysical positions of radical monism (the denial of real plurality) or pluralism (the denial of real unity) are both refutable because they fail to explain our experience of real dif- ferences or real unities. In metaphysics, as in the other sciences, a theory or hypothesis is judged by its adequacy in explaining the data of experience. The difference is that in metaphysics we explain a more total range of experience. In that sense, metaphysics relies on the most experence.

Reply to Objection 3: Metaphysics seeks not new experiential databut an illumination and explanation of experience. It seeks theulti-mate grounds of, or conditions of possibility for, what we experience.It is like a patient’s X-ray rather than an additional patient. It is likespelunking rather than engineering.

Article 3: Whether metaphysics is a legitimate science?

Objection 1: It seems that it is not, for every legitimate sciencehassome distinctive subject matter by which it is distinguished and defined.But metaphysics has no distinctive subject matter, since it studies allofbeing qua being. Therefore metaphysics is not a legitimate science.

Objection 2: Metaphysics is an attempt to understand all of being,orbeing as a whole. But we are only parts of being, and the part cannotcomprehend the whole. Only God could be a metaphysician.

Objection 3: To comprehend X, one must transcend X. For instance,the soul can comprehend the body, man can comprehend animals,adults can comprehend infants, and the wise can comprehend thefoolish, but not vice versa. The reason for this is that the understandingof X cannot be a part of X. For the act of understanding X is anaddition to X, as taking a picture of a person with a camera is an additionto that person and is not any part of that person. For the cameradoesnot take a picture of itself. Thus only a being that transcends all beingcould understand all being. But “a being that transcends all being”isa contradiction in terms. Therefore metaphysics is impossible.

Objection 4: Human knowledge is always perspectival. It cannotknow the universal laws of being, for it is limited to what fits intoitshuman perspective, and is so conditioned by the knowing apparatusthat it is impossible to know things as they are in themselves outsidethat perspective as conditioned by that apparatus.

On the contrary, “all men by nature desire to know,” as Aristotlesays. They desire to know all that is knowable. Bernard Lonerganin Insight calls this “the unrestricted drive of the mind to know all that there is to know about all that there is.” But no natural desire is in vain. For nature never produces a desire that corresponds to no real object, or one that is in principle unattainable. Therefore this knowledge is possible.

I answer that metaphysics is a legitimate science because philosophy is a legitimate science (see above, Question 1, Article 4), and metaphysics is a necessary part of philosophy. In fact, all the rest of philosophy depends on metaphysics. For instance, what knowing is (which is the question of epistemology) and what the human knower is (which is the question of philosophical anthropology) depends on what is. For instance, if all non-material reality is not real, then all non-material, non-empirical knowledge and powers of knowing in the human knower must also be unreal.

Reply to Objection 1 : Although metaphysics does not have a specific and limited subject matter, it has a distinctive point of view (it studies being qua being), and this is how it distinguishes itself from all other sciences. As Heidegger says, metaphysics explores not only what things are but the fact that they are. (Introduction to Metaphysics, ch. 1)

Reply to Objection 2: Man can be observed to have a God-like power of transcendence over the whole from the mere fact that he raises questions about the whole. This is a fact whether or not one grounds this fact in the belief that man is made in God’s image.

Reply to Objection 3: It would be a contradiction if man transcended all being in his being, but it is not a contradiction if man tran- scends all being in his knowing of all being. Thus, unlike a stone, a knower of a stone transcends the being of the stone in knowing the stone. This is the distinctive and remarkable thing about knowledge: that a knower can give another being a second being, another life, so to speak, in consciousness. An ephemeral rainbow can be eternalized in memory.

Reply to Objection 4: This Kantian principle, that things-in-themselves are unknowable, would indeed make “transcendent” metaphysicsimpossible, and has in fact made it questionable and unpopular amongmany modern philosophers. But the principle is false, for it is self-con-tradictory. It asserts as a thing-in-itself that things-in-themselves cannotbe asserted. Or, if this assertion is not a thing-in-itself but onlyanappearance, which may not correspond to things-in-themselves, thenitasserts nothing and denies nothing about things-in-themselves, orrealbeing. And if it denies nothing about real being, it cannot deny the real-ity of traditional metaphysics.

Kant tried to draw a limit to all possible thought, but(asWittgenstein pointed out) this is self-contradictory because “to drawa limit to thought, thought must think both sides of that limit.”

This is not to deny that our knowledge of being itself is perspectival, and limited by our perspective. To know a mountainfrombelow, or from above, or from halfway up, is indeed to knowit fromthree different perspectives. But it is to know the real mountain!

Article 4: Whether metaphysics is practical?

Objection 1: It seems that it is not, for it seeks knowledge for its ownsake rather than for action or practice.

Objection 2: The popular opinion of the “absent-minded professor”contains at least a basic truth: that philosophers in general, andmetaphysicians in particular, are the least practical of human beings.

Objection 3: Action is always concerned with particular persons,sit-uations, and choices. But metaphysics abstracts from everythingparticular in seeking the most universal principles of all being. Thus,inabstracting from the particular, it abstracts from the practical.

On the contrary, G.K. Chesterton says, “It is a practical thing foralandlady to know her tenant’s income, but it is even more practicaland necessary that she should know his philosophy.” And SamuelJohnson says, “If your guest professes seriously to be a materialist,then when he leaves you should be careful to count your spoons.”

I answer that how one lives is a most practical issue. But one lives according to one’s philosophy, whether or not one adverts to it consciously. But all the other divisions of philosophy depend on metaphysics. Since metaphysics is the heart of philosophy, and one’s philosophy is the heart of one’s life, and life is most practical, it follows that metaphysics is most practical. Not to know or even inquire about the most basic laws and principles of the country one lives in is certainly not practical. But we all live in the country of being, unless we and/or the world we live in are only illusions.

The close connection between metaphysics and practice can be seen in studying any major philosophy. Four examples are Platonism, Aristotelianism, Hinduism, and Marxism.

Plato’s ultimate metaphysical principle that unifies and explains all that is, the “Form” or “Idea” of the Good, is also the ultimate practical principle, since all practice aims at some good.

For Aristotle, all explanation is through causes; and of the four causes, the final cause, or the good (the essential meaning of “the practical”), is “the cause of causes” since only because any act is directed to an end or final cause, does the efficient cause impose the formal cause upon the material cause.

For Hinduism, the supreme good of human life is the realization of one’s true identity or divine being, in a metaphysical insight or enlightenment.

For Marxism, because of its metaphysical materialism (that all reality is matter), and because matter is essentially competitive, all of history is competition (class conflict); and because economy regulates all material goods, economics is the key to all of human life and history.

Reply to Objection 1: Theoretical sciences, which seek knowledge for its own sake rather than for the sake of practice, typically yield the most practical and life-changing knowledge of all. For instance, Einstein’s theoretical physics and mathematics produced the nuclear age.

Reply to Objection 2: Popular stereotypes, like analogies, may be good clues but they are bad arguments. Furthermore, it is “absentminded professors” like Aristotle, Newton, and Einstein, who have in fact changed the world of human practice the most, howeverindirectly.

Reply to Objection 3: Abstraction leaves the realm of the particular,the immediately experienced, and the practical, only to return toitagain with greater understanding (and thus greater freedomandpower). Metaphysical knowledge moves in a great circle, from immediate experience, through questioning of its ultimate foundations,tounderstanding its ultimate principles, and finally back again, applying these principles to the world of experience.

Metaphysics is indeed the most abstract of sciences. But nothingis more practical than abstraction. It raises man above the animalandis the source of all science and technology as well as philosophy. Onlywhen primitive man abstracted “sharpness” from “this sharp stone”did he conceive the technology of changing dull stones into sharpones and thus invented knives.

All the valid objections against “abstractions” on the partofExistentialist and Personalist philosophers like Kierkegaard, Bergson,Marcel, and Buber are objections against the reification of abstractions, Whitehead’s “fallacy of misplaced concreteness”—e.g.Descartes’ two-substance anthropology (“the ghost in the machine”),or Locke’s definition of ideas as objects of knowledge, or Aristotle’sfamous critique of Plato’s Forms. But Aristotle used abstractions expertly.

Article 5: Whether metaphysics is unavoidable?

Objection 1: It seems that it is not, for most people do in fact avoidit. There are far more physicians than metaphysicians. Thus thesignature protest of “Bones” McCoy to Captain Kirk from “Star Trek,”“Dammit, Jim, I’m a doctor, not a philosopher!” (i.e. a physician,nota metaphysician).

Objection 2: It depends on a man’s will whether he will inquire intoany question. Thus, just as questions of economics are avoidableforthose not interested in money, such as monks who take a vow of poverty, questions of metaphysics are avoidable for those who choose to avoid them. And most people do choose to avoid them, for they require the supreme degree of abstraction, which most people are neither capable of nor interested in.

Objection 3: Whatever is controversial is avoidable. For if an idea is controversial, only some, but not all, people embrace it; and those who do not, avoid it. But metaphysics is controversial, for the majority of philosophers today are skeptical of its possibility. Therefore, it is avoidable.

Objection 4: No single concrete example can be shown of a single practical, crucial issue that necessarily depends on metaphysics.

Objection 5: Persons are more important than abstractions like being. And the more important cannot depend on the less important. Therefore philosophical anthropology cannot depend on metaphysics.

On the contrary, no Israelite who heard (through Moses) the word from God in the burning bush, “I AM,” could fail to understand it. But this was a metaphysical statement. (In fact, it was the metaphysical statement.)

I answer that there are three ways, at least, in which metaphysics is unavoidable: (1) by reduction; (2) by analysis of meaning; and (3) by an immediate and intuitive experience.

(1) Reduction is a kind of obverse of deduction, which is reasoning to a particular conclusion from a universal premise. When a conclusion is challenged, it is reduced to its premise in a reductio ad absurdum. For example, if Socrates is not mortal, then it is not true that all men are mortal; and if events, such as the Big Bang, can come into existence without being caused by any “Big Banger,” then anything can happen for no reason at all, such as a large blue rabbit appearing on your head. I

(2) It can be shown that the meaning of a statement that is not explicitly metaphysical nevertheless is so implicitly (such as “God exists,” That’s true for you but not for me,” or “If I can kick it, it’s real.”)

(3) Finally, there are experiences that are common to all mankindthat raise metaphysical questions, such as Heidegger’s “fundamentalquestion of metaphyiscs,” “Why is there anything at all rather thannothing?”, which he says is present in three common metaphysicalmoods:

Why is there anything rather than nothing? . . . each of us is grazed at least once, perhaps more than once, by the hidden power of this question, even if he is not aware of what is happening to him. The question looms in moments of great despair, when things tend to lose all their weight and all meaning becomes obscured. Perhaps it will strike but once like a muffled bell that rings into our life and gradually dies away. It is present in moments of rejoicing, when all the things around us are transfigured and seem to be there for the first time, as if it might be easier to think they are not than to understand that they are and are as they are. The question is upon us in boredom, when we are equally removed from despair and joy, and everything about us seems so hopelessly commonplace that we no longer care whether anything is or is not—and with this the question “Why is there anything rather than nothing?” is evoked in a particular form. - (Introduction to Metaphysics, ch. 1, “The FundamentalQuestion”)

Reply to Objection 1: There are more metaphysicians than physicians, for not everyone is a physician but everyone is a metaphysician,since everyone makes claims about being. “Bones” McCoymayavoid being a starship captain, since that is as much a special choiceas being a doctor, but he cannot avoid philosophizing, and thereforemetaphysicizing, even in the very protest against it, for he says thathe is a doctor, not a philosopher.

Reply to Objection 2: What depends on our will includes ourownsubjective attention and interest. What does not depend on ourwillincludes the nature of objective reality and the essential structureofthought and language. Thus we can choose to avoid turningourattention to being, but we cannot avoid being, unless we cease tobe.As Kierkegaard says in Concluding Unscientific Postscript, “existence has the remarkable trait of compelling an existing individual to exist whether he wills it or not.”

We can avoid abstracting from the particular to the supremely universal and thus we can avoid consciously entering the realm of metaphysical questions; but we cannot avoid existing and living in that realm, for there is no other. For outside being there is only nonbeing.

But though we can avoid making abstractions, we cannot avoid our inherent capacity to make them. Everyone, by having a human mind rather than merely an animal mind, is capable of metaphysical abstractions, such as: “If 1 can kick it, it’s real which is a statement of metaphysical materialism. |

Reply to Objection 3: Those who intend to avoid metaphysics do not really do so. For any indicative sentence, that is, any assertion that I something is (an existential judgment), or that something is what it is I (a copulative judgment about what it is, thus about both essence [“what”] and existence [“is”]), is by its nature a metaphysical state- ment, a statement about what is, even if the one who utters it does not attend to that fact. Thus one can avoid metaphysics only as one can avoid ethics: one can fail to attend to ends, goods, goals, and values, but one cannot fail to choose to act in one way or another l because he desires to attain some end or good. As the choice to deny j ethics is an ethical choice (e.g. Nietzsche’s judgment that beyond good and evil” is better than its opposite), so the choice to deny metaphysics is a metaphysical choice. It argues that reality, and/or reason, and/or the relation between reality and reason, really is such that metaphysics is impossible. E.g. Kant’s claim that we cannot know things-in-themselves is a statement about things-in-themselves.

Reply to Objection 4: Whether or not it can be morally good, or permissible, to abort one’s unborn child is certainly a crucial and practical issue. But this issue depends on metaphysics. For if universal essences such as human nature are in fact real (which is a metaphysical issue), and if all human beings possess this essence (which is an issue of philosophical anthropology dependent on the prior metaphysical issue), and if human knowledge is capable of knowing such universal (which is an issue of epistemology dependent on both the prior metaphysical and anthropological issues), and if there are uni-versal moral rights possessed by human beings based on their posses-sion of this universal human nature (and this ethical assumptionisdependent on all the previous assumptions), then the “right to life”must be the first of these rights, and the foundation of all others; andabortion violates the essential rights of a human being, however smalland undeveloped.

Another metaphysical dimension of this same practical issueofabortion is the ontological status of potentiality. If all individualhuman beings possess universal human nature, they also possess,assoon as they possess human nature, a real potentiality to exerciseinthe future distinctively human acts such as reasoning, even thoughsome of them are not capable of exercising such powers at themoment, by reason of paralysis, or sleep, or coma, or by reasonofbeing not yet fully developed, being unborn or newborn. Andthisassumption of real potentialities, like the assumption of real essences,is also a metaphysical assumption. If there are no real universalnatures and no real potentialities inherent in them, it follows thatwedo not have the capacity to know them epistemologically, nor dowetherefore have the moral obligation to recognize them and respectthem.

A similar logical structure can be shown regarding slaveryorracism. Metaphysical Nominalism, which denies the reality of universal essences or natures, and the consequent epistemological skepticism regarding our knowledge of such universal natures, would allowus to believe in a plurality of human species rather than just one—e.g.slaves vs. masters, or “last men” vs. “Ubermenschen,” asinNietzsche, or blacks vs. whites—and this would allow radically dif-ferent treatment of these different species, as we treat plants andani-mals in radically different ways (we do not break limbs off dogsaswe break limbs off trees), or different species of animals (we donotcrush cats as we crush ants), or animals and humans (we do noteathumans as we eat cows).

Reply to Objection 5: (1) Being is not the supreme abstraction, for if weabstract from everything we are left with nothing, not with being.Being (existence) is positive reality; it is essence that is negative in rela-tion to existence, limiting existence to only a specific kind of existence.

(2) Personhood is not an accidental addition to being, but the fullness of being, the ultimate meaning of being, as Aquinas says: “The person is that which is most perfect in all of being.” (ST I, 29, 3) See Norris Clarke, Person and Being.

Article 6: Whether universals are real?

Objection 1: It seems that they are not, for only individuals exist. If there are two horses in a stable, Tammy and Sammy, there is not a third horse there called Horseness, or the nature of horses.

Objection 2: Universals, or universal natures or essences, are potential, not actual. For instance, the nature of horse and the nature of unicorn are both universals, but only horses actually exist, not unicorns. Universals are existentially neutral. They do not exist.

Objection 3: No one tries to find horseness, or blueness. Common sense recognizes only individuals.

Objection 4: Whatever has actuality has activity. As Aquinas puts it, 1 “first act” (actual being) always manifests itself in “second act” (activity) of some kind. But universal forms or essences do not and cannot act; only individuals do. Therefore they lack actuality. They are either mere potentialities or mere ideas.

Objection 5: Belief in universals leads to stereotyping, for instance: “You can’t do that; that’s not feminine, and you’re a woman.” Or: “Oh, you’re Irish? Here’s a drink. Tell me a story.”

Objection 6: Universals are formulable in laws or rules. But “there’s an exception to every rule,” as is shown by the falseness of stereotypes.

On the contrary. Nominalism (the denial of universals) is self-contradictory, for it is a universal statement (“all universals are unreal”). As G.K. Chesterton says, “If [as Nominalism says] ‘all chairs are different,’ how can we call them all ‘chairs’?” (Orthodoxy). (The “on the contrary” argument is typically an argument from authority, andtheauthority here is that of language, its inherent [universal!] structure.)

I answer that the reality of universal can be shown in three ways.(All of them can be found in Plato.)

The first way is epistemological. Universals are needed to accountfor the facts of human knowing. For intellectual knowledge, as dis-tinct from sensation, is always of unchanging universals, such as tri-angularity, redness, or mass, not changing particulars, such as theGreat Pyramid, a rose, or a ten-ton truck. If universals are unreal,then intellectual knowledge has no object.

The second way concerns values. Values are universals. If universals are unreal, so are values. Values, or goods, are objects of humanwilling. Human action and desire is a striving for not-yet-realizedgoals. These goals are not sensory particulars, for everything in thesensory world is already realized, or actual. Nor are they merely subjective; they are the objects of subjective striving. What we strive foris not our desire for happiness, or virtue, or money, or power, norourknowledge of such things, but the things themselves.

The third way is metaphysical. All particular realities change,asHeraclitus rightly taught (“You can never step into the same rivertwice”). But the universal nature of being cannot change,asParmenides rightly taught. Therefore the universal nature of beingtranscends particulars, as Plato taught.

To say that universals are real does not, however, necessarilyentail the Platonic position that they are separately real, or existingsubstances. It may well be, as Aristotle held, that horseness is realonly in horses and in the minds of those who know horses—i.e. thatuniversals are not substances but the (real) forms of individual substances, and that they are real as separate abstract universals onlyinthe human minds that abstract them. This (Aristotelian) positioniscalled (by Aristotelians and Thomists) Moderate Realism as distinctfrom Platonic Extreme Realism.

Reply to Objection 1: Horseness is indeed not a third horse but is thenature of the two horses that are there. If there were no horseness,wecould not truly call Tammy and Sammy two horses.

Reply to Objection 2: The nature of a unicorn is only potential, since unicorns do not actually exist, hut the nature of a horse is actual because horses do actually exist. Since “universal are existentially neutral,” they are not necessarily only potential but can also be in actual existence.

Reply to Objection 3: Common sense recognizes universal by using common nouns (like “horse”) as well as proper nouns (like “Tammy” and “Sammy”).

Reply to Objection 4: If universal forms are not real because they do not act, then matter (the co-principle with form) is not real either for the same reason. That which acts, the agent of activity, is the whole substance, not its universal form alone or its individuating matter alone.

Reply to Objection 5: “Abusus non tollit usum” (the abuse does not take away the use). Belief in universal does not necessitate stereotyping; it merely allows it. Similarly, belief in God does not necessitate blasphemy, but allows for it, and free will does not necessitate moral evil, but allows it.

Reply to Objection 6: Laws, rules, or generalizations which concern accidents do indeed have exceptions, but those concerning essences do not. For instance, using lethal violence, if necessary, to protect the innocent against a lethal aggressor is an exception to “thou shalt not kill,” but no triangle has more or fewer sides than three.

“There’s an exception to every rule” is a self-contradictory proposition. For either there is an exception to that rule, or not. If there is, then there’s not an exception to every rule, and that proposition is false. If there isn’t, then that proposition is also false, because that proposition says that there is.

Article 7: Whether both oneness and manyness are real?

Objection 1: It seems that oneness is not real, for existing things are many, and nothing can be both one and many, therefore existing ings are not one.

Objection 2: Oneness is not real, for the universe is the sum totalofall the many existing things, but the universe is not another existingthing. The universe itself is the only unity among its diverse entities.

Objection 3: Manyness is not real, for the authority of the greatreli-gious mystics uniformly testifies that ultimate reality is one,notmany.

Objection 4: Manyness is not real, for, as Parmenides argued, manyness is the opposite of oneness; but being is one, for being is onlybeing and not also nonbeing, by the law of non-contradiction.Ifbeing is one, it is not many, since many is the opposite of one,andnothing is the opposite of itself.

On the contrary, common sense always accepts both onenessandmanyness, as can be seen in the very structure of language (e.g. thedifference between common and proper nouns, and between thesin-gular and the plural.).

I answer that the onus of proof is not on the one whowouldaffirm the reality of both oneness and manyness, but on theonewho would deny either one. But all the arguments for thesetwodenials are refutable. We experience both oneness and manyness,and metaphysics should explain our experience, not explainitaway.

Reply to Objection 1: Things can be both one and many in differentrespects. Thus some existing things—members of the same speciesare many substances sharing one essential form.

Reply to Objection 2: (1) The very term “universe” impliesbothunity and diversity.

(2) If anything else exists besides the universe (e.g. God), thentheuniverse is not the sum total of all the many existing things, sothepremise is questionable.

(3) There are other unities, other than membership in the oneuni-verse, that are found among the diverse entities in the universe. For instance, there is also the unity of a species.

Reply to Objection 3: (1) It is improper when doing philosophy to settle a philosophical issue by religious authority, whether mystical orscriptural. (2) Not all mystics agree that the many is an illusion, evenamong Hindus (e.g. Ramanuja vs. Shankara), and much less amongChristians, for whom the Trinitarian God is both one God and many(three) Persons.

Reply to Objection 4: Being can be both one and many in different respects. It is self-contradictory for the same proposition to be bothtrue and false, and two contradictory propositions cannot both betrue. But two contrary concepts or predicates or essences can be possessed by the same subject. E.g. I can be both visible (in body) andinvisible (in soul), and both good (ontologically) and evil (morally).

Article 8: Whether time is real?

Objection 1: It seems that time is not real, for time is correlative to change, but change is logically impossible. For “X changes” is a self- contradictory proposition. For in order for X to change, it mustbecome non-X. If X does not become non-X, then X does not change. If, on the other hand, X does become non-X, then X is no more, andceases. But if a thing ceases, it cannot do anything, including change.

Objection 2: Time involves past, present, and future. But the past is unreal, because it is dead, and the future is unreal, for it is unborn, andthe present does not move, but simply is. Therefore nothing that is moves and changes. But time involves change. Therefore there is no time.

On the contrary, everyone implicitly admits that time is real in every action they perform, whether mental or physical, for every humanaction takes time to perform.

I answer that to say or think that time is unreal takes time. So if time is unreal, we cannot say or think that time is unreal. But if we can- not say or think that time is unreal, we cannot argue for that proposition, for we cannot argue for what we cannot say or think.

Reply to Objection 1: In ordinary change, X changes in its accidentsbut not in its essence, which “stands under” ( sub-stans ) those acci-dents as a bridge stands under the cars that move over it. The objection fails to distinguish these two different aspects or dimensions of X.

Reply to Objection 2: It is not time that exists, but beings. And beingschange—e.g. your mind while you read this sentence. Time measureschange. The three dimensions of time are not three possible beings. The objection concretizes abstractions.

Article 9: Whether all that is real is material?

Objection 1: It seems that it is, for common sense always turnstomaterial examples such as humans, animals, plants, minerals, or starswhen thinking of examples of real beings.

Objection 2: No one has ever seen the invisible. But all knowledgebegins with and depends on sense observation of the visible, or theobject of one of the other senses. Therefore the existence of invisible,immaterial beings cannot be known, only believed.

Objection 3: The “principle of parsimony,” or “Ockham’s Razor,”tells us to avoid needlessly complex explanations. But explainingthevisible and tangible by supposing the existence of invisible and intangible beings (such as God, angels, or souls) is a needlessly complexexplanation. For modern science can explain everything withoutrecourse to immaterial beings. For instance, the most commonlybelieved example of an immaterial being is the human soul or mind,but there is no example of a mental act or activity or event that can-not be explained scientifically by a material event in the brain.

On the contrary, as C.S. Lewis says (in Miracles, ch. 3), “the knowledge of a thing is not one of that thing’s parts.” Therefore the knowledge of matter is not just a part of matter but transcends matter.

I answer that (1) the knowledge of any object cannot be a part (or dimension) of that object. For if it were—if the-fact-that-I-knew-X (let us call that Y) was one of the parts of X—then the X that exist- ed independently of my knowing it would not be the same as, but would be less than, the X that I knew, since it would lack one part: namely, Y, or the-fact-that-I-knew-X. But in that case my knowledge of X would not be a true knowledge of X, for true knowledge is the identity of knowing subject and known object.

(2) But I can know material things. Materialism could not be true if I did not know material things.

(3) Therefore my knowledge of material things must be not merely a part of the material things I know.

In fact, I can know, by science, some truths about the entire universe, about all of matter, about matter as such (e.g. that F=MA, or that E=MC2 ). Therefore my knowing act must transcend the entire universe. But the universe is the sum total of all matter. Therefore my act of knowing transcends matter.

Reply to Objection 1: (1) Common sense is not materialistic. Most materialists are either philosophers or scientists, not ordinary people. (2) Common sense is not infallible. (3) It is more reasonable to take common sense seriously as a negative criterion than as a positive one; that is, what common sense strongly contradicts (e.g. materialism) is for that reason probably false, but what common sense does not claim to know (e.g. angels, or Black Floles) is not for that reason unreal.

Reply to Objection 2: From our experience of knowing the visible (e.g. a platypus) we can reason to the existence of the invisible (e.g. the mind that knows the platypus, or perhaps even the strange Mind that designed it).

Reply to Objection 3: (1) Ockham’s Razor is a useful methodological principle for science, but this does not make it a true ontological principle for philosophy.

(2) We find many real beings that are superfluous and need not exist (e.g. the platypus). But explanations should conform to the nature of experienced reality, not to an a priori abstract methodological principle. The materialist’s supposed empiricism is really anti- empirical.

(3) The material sciences have not explained all that exists, forthey have not explained their own existence. Mere matter cannotthink about matter, explain matter, or be either true or false aboutmatter. For mere matter is not about anything; it just is. Ideasare“about” things. Materialism, which entails the denial of the existenceof ideas, is an idea. Materialism is an “ism.” Thus it refutes itself.

(4) Cybernetics has indeed shown a corresponding material eventin the brain for every supposedly immaterial event in consciousness.But this no more disproves the existence of immaterial consciousnessthan the fact that every material event we can point to must beanevent in consciousness by the very fact that we point to it disprovesthe existence of matter. An immaterialist (Buddhist, Hindu,orChristian Scientist) could use the same argument, with the samepremise of Ockham’s Razor, to eliminate all material reality andleaveonly thought, because any example of matter that anyone caneverthink of is also an example of thinking.

Article 10: Whether all that is, is intelligible?

Objection 1: It seems that it is not, for if it were, we wouldall be! intellectually satisfied. But we are not. If we are wise, like Socrates,we know that we are ignorant and therefore we ask questions, ashedid. Asking questions stems not from our intellectual experienceofand satisfaction with intelligibility, but our experience of and dissat-isfaction with unintelligibility.

Objection 2: Not everything is intelligible, for God is not intelligibleto finite minds, since He is infinite.

Objection 3: No one can experience all things. Therefore no onecanknow whether or not some of the things he has not yet experiencedmay be unintelligible, even if all the things he has so far experiencedhave been intelligible.

Objection 4: Mere formal logic reveals something that is unintelligible: Unintelligibility is unintelligible—by the law of non-contradiction.

Objection 5: It is impossible to prove that all reality is intelligible I without begging the question, for all proof presupposes intelligibility.

On the contrary, Parmenides says, “It is the same thing that can be > thought and that can be.” And Hegel says, “The real is the rational I and the rational is the real.” Even if all the rest of what these two philosophers said is rejected, these two statements stand.

I answer that no natural desire is in vain. But we have a natural desire I to know everything. If some of reality is not intelligible, our natural I and innate desire to know everything, which defines us as human, is I a meaningless and self-frustrating desire, a radical failure built into [ the very nature of things, human nature, and their relationship.

If reality as such were not intelligible, then our demand to explain | what we experience and observe would be futile. For the fundamental principle of all explanation is the principle of intelligibility. All l explanation is reduced to this formula: “If this hypothesis were not true, then the real data we experience or observe would not be intelI ligible.” Thus all explanation and all search for explanation would cease if all reality were not intelligible or if we ceased to believe that it was.

Reply to Objection 1: There is no contradiction between maintaining (1) that all reality is in principle intelligibile by its own nature, and (2) that our minds are always less than omniscient and therefore in need of more questioning. In fact, the presupposition of questioning is the hope for an intelligible answer.

Reply to Objection 2: The infinite God is perfectly intelligible to the infinite mind of God. God is not fully intelligible to man, but He is fully intelligible in Himself. (He is “pure light, and in Him is no darkness at all.” John 1:5) Lack of intelligibility to any given mind is not the same as lack of intelligibility in itself.

Reply to Objection 3: (1) To say that some domains of reality are intelligible while others are not, we would have to know the whole of reality first. For we cannot divide a genus into two species without knowing the genus. But we can know a thing only if it is knowable(intelligible).

(2) If we do not accept the principle of universal intelligibilityfrom the beginning, and if we suppose instead that there may be somereal beings, or some parts of reality, or some domains of reality, thatare unintelligible, there is no way of knowing, before we investigate,whether or not the particular domain of reality we are now investigating might be one of those parts that is unintelligible. This resultsin universal skepticism.

Reply to Objection 4: This is a sophism. Or, if not, it is simply false;for “unintelligibility ” is an intelligible concept, though a purely negative one, like darkness or nonexistence.

Reply to Objection 5: (1) It is true that the Principle of Intelligibility,like the law of non-contradiction, cannot be demonstrated fromanyprior principle without begging the question. The fact that it cannotbe proved does not mean that it is not true, or that it is not certain. It is in fact self-evident, and necessarily presupposed, like the lawofnon-contradiction, as the objection itself shows.

(2) The objection assumes that everything must be proved. Thisis a self-contradictory assumption, for it cannot be proved.