ARTICLE: There Is No Truth by Greg Koukl

[STR Ambassador]

There is No Truth by Greg Koukl

I recently was asked a question that I get asked a lot. It's a common challenge Christians face on the campus. It was offered as I spoke in the lecture hall at Oregon Institute of Technology in Klamath Falls, Oregon, to a Christian group who had rented the facility.

As I flew back this morning I reflected on the question. I started jotting some notes down, and it was interesting the way it all fell together. The question was this: How do you deal with somebody who says there is no truth?

Now this is very popular claim on campus because of deconstructionism and postmodernism--the radical skepticism that's sweeping the academy. It's the idea that you can't know anything for sure. Nothing is set in concrete. Everything is influenced by our culture, our upbringing and our presuppositions, so it's impossible to get at any objective truth.

I flatly reject this notion that there is no truth or, if there is, it is unknowable. I think there are a number of things we can know for sure simply because the opposite is not possible. If we can even utter the sentence, "There is no truth"--and, of course, we must at least utter the sentence to make the claim--then a number of things must be objectively true of necessity.

First of all, if someone holds that there is no truth, then there's at least one thing that's true: the statement they just uttered that there is no truth.

It's one of those awkward situations for a person making a claim, because there's no way their claim can be true. If it's false, it's false (of course), but if it's true, it's still false. If it's true that there is no truth, then it's also false, because the statement itself identifies a truth.

This is called a self-refuting statement. It's as if I said, "I can't speak a word of English," and said it in English, that would be self-refuting of course. The claim "There is no truth" is one of those kinds of statements. Even to utter the statement itself is a statement of truth, and so the statement "There is no truth" can't stand. It defeats itself. It commits suicide. So it's true that the statement, "There is no truth" is false. That's one thing that's true. But there's more.

In order to state the phrase "There is no truth," an individual must exist to make the statement and to ponder whether there are truths or not.

Remember Descartes, sitting in his oven back in the 17th century? He said, "I can doubt everything except for one thing. I can't doubt that I am doubting." From this reflection came his famous dictum, Cogito, ergo sum, "I think, therefore I am."

I must exist if I'm pondering my existence, Descartes concluded. Someone who states that there is no truth must exist to make the statement, and so it's true that at least one individual, the one uttering the statement, must exist. So now we have at least two things that are true. But there's more.

Time must also exist.

In order to express the sequence of words "There is no truth"--or even have such thoughts in one's mind--the word "is" must come after the word "there," and the word "no" after both of them, and one thing can only follow another in temporal sequence if time exists--present, past and future. So time must exist as an objectively true thing, because this statement was uttered with words in temporal sequence.

The statement itself is a proposition, so propositions must exist. That's a truth.

The phrase also contains tokens, words that token the ideas (types) behind them. It's true that tokens and types must exist.

The concept of negation expressed in the word "no," must exist as an idea.

There has to be the concept of unity (the idea that the four words work together in a sentence).

There must be plurality (the multiple words each distinct from one another).

Individuality must exist to differentiate one word from another, separating the units.

The law of non-contradiction must exist and be true. If the statement "There is no truth is true," then its opposite must be false, i.e., if there is no truth, then it is not the case that there is truth.

That statement is also distinguished from all of its contradictions, so the law of identity--that a thing is identical to itself--must be true. A thing is itself and not something else.

There's at least one sentence that exists, because the person just uttered it. That must be true.

There are English words, and grammatical relationships between the words—subject and predicate. That must be true.

The numbers one through four must exist because there are four different words.

Addition must be true, because you add those units up and get the number four.

The alphabet exists.

Parts of speech, like nouns and verbs, exist as truths.

Do you see the point? In order to even utter the statement, "There is no truth," there must be at least 17 things true. They must, in fact, be necessarily true, given the statement itself. When I say necessarily true, I mean there's no way they can be false, given the statement "There is no truth" uttered in English. If there is such a statement uttered in English, then all these other things must be true. It's impossible for them not to be true.

That's why radical skepticism like this is not justified. As one thinker put it--Dallas Willard, a Christian philosopher at USC--if we want to be intellectually honest skeptics, we must be as skeptical about our skepticism as we are about our knowledge. We should take the burden of proof to defend our skepticism instead of simply asserting our skepticism. Anyone can assert disbelief. Whether they can make sense out of it is a different thing.

Just uttering the statement, "There is no truth," in itself establishes the truth of many different things. And if we can establish their truth just by uttering such a statement, then it seems to me there are a whole lot of other things we can determine to be true as well, and can be just as certain about.

Therefore, radical skepticism is unjustified. The statement "There is no truth" is false.

The original article is located here:
http://www.str.org/free/commentaries/apologetics/relativism/thereisn.htm

[johnransom]

That's why radical skepticism like this is not justified. As one thinker put it--Dallas Willard, a Christian philosopher at USC--if we want to be intellectually honest skeptics, we must be as skeptical about our skepticism as we are about our knowledge. We should take the burden of proof to defend our skepticism instead of simply asserting our skepticism. Anyone can assert disbelief. Whether they can make sense out of it is a different thing.
I always wonder why this patently self-evident statement does not get made more often (including by myself). No one ever seems to point out that skepticism is a philosophical dead end, either for the above reasons, or for the equally valid reason that the object of skepticism should be to surrender a position of skepticism. But skeptics of course never seem to address the issue of what constitutes adequate evidence with which to establish the truth of anything.

And personally, I love Greg Koukl's stuff.

[STR Ambassador]

Johnransom,

You may be interested in the book "Putting Skeptics in Their Place" by John Greco. It's a philosophic treatment and is a bit challenging, but it's a very nice treatment of different kinds of skeptical claims and how they ultimately fail. Not all are self-refuting so that's not always a helpful response. Greco's book helps clarify the different kinds of claims a skeptic may be making.

[Da Lone-Warrior]

STR Ambassador:

Johnransom,

You may be interested in the book "Putting Skeptics in Their Place" by John Greco. It's a philosophic treatment and is a bit challenging, but it's a very nice treatment of different kinds of skeptical claims and how they ultimately fail. Not all are self-refuting so that's not always a helpful response. Greco's book helps clarify the different kinds of claims a skeptic may be making.


But one can be skeptical without denying Truth. More often than not, "skeptics" have been concretely denying the role of an ecclesiastical institution in its role in providing governance over their lives regarding what they should and should not do.

As such making the question a matter of Truth or not, seems like a red-herring. Instead, it is a question of apologetics. Why should I surrender over how I should live my life to a Church. There are after all different denominations, even among "Classical" Christianity, to say nothing of other religions.

Who is to say which one is right? What certainty do we have that they haven't gotten off on the wrong course? Evidence shows that the Jews of Jerusalem viewed Mohammed as a liberator, not as one who had come to establish a new religion. They were being liberated from their Byzantinian Christian oppressors. As such, it seems possible that Mohammed never meant to start up a new religion, but rather a Judaism for non-Jews, in likely reaction to the form of Christianity he was exposed to.

If one wants to, one can list a pretty long list of failings of the Christian Church(es). If they do in fact have Truth, then why have they stumbled so many times? How do we know that we are not stumbling again in our current manifestations? What do we got that others didn't?

Those seem like the types of questions that are often at the heart of people who claim they deny Truth.
dlw

[STR Ambassador]

dlw,

Very good points. And exactly why, as apologists for Christianity, we have to be careful not to make charges toward the skeptic that are not accurate portrayals of his views. John Greco's books is very good at describing the different kinds of skepticism. Christians certainly bear some burden of proof as to why Christianity is the Truth and someone should give their lives to Christ. The Church over the centuries, and even currently, has place too many stumbling blocks in the way of those searching. Greg Koukl has said: The Gospel is offensive enough; we shouldn't add any more offense to it. But then, we also cannot remove the offense inherent in the cross.

It shows respect to the skeptic and searcher to listen carefully to what their point or objection is and respond to that, rather than the misunderstand and fail to answer the question.

STR Ambassador

[Da Lone-Warrior]

STR Ambassador:
Very good points. And exactly why, as apologists for Christianity, we have to be careful not to make charges toward the skeptic that are not accurate portrayals of his views. John Greco's books is very good at describing the different kinds of skepticism. Christians certainly bear some burden of proof as to why Christianity is the Truth and someone should give their lives to Christ. The Church over the centuries, and even currently, has place too many stumbling blocks in the way of those searching. Greg Koukl has said: The Gospel is offensive enough; we shouldn't add any more offense to it. But then, we also cannot remove the offense inherent in the cross.

It shows respect to the skeptic and searcher to listen carefully to what their point or objection is and respond to that, rather than the misunderstand and fail to answer the question.

STR Ambassador

Good answer. However, then the methodology of Apologetics is often inductive. Ie., one listens to the non-Christians and seeks to understand what intellectual stumbling blocks make it difficult for them to embrace Christianity as a faith. However, induction has the potential to result in one rejecting an aspect of traditional/classical Christianity as not essential. The problem is that other Christians may believe that such an aspect is essential.

Here I am thinking specifically of Greg Boyd's book, "Letters from a Skeptic". In this book, Greg Boyd answers his fathers questions about Christianity and the Problem of Evil by affirming the reality of evil and, consistently, rejecting aspects of the Augustinian theodicy, especially the use of spatial metaphors to time and its corresponding notion that God's Omniscience entails an Exhaustive Definite Foreknowledge.

Now, I am sure that you know this notion is at the root of much controversy among "Evangelicals" in the US today. The Evangelical Theological Society came very close to barring membership to anyone who believed such, since it denied the infallibility of scripture according to them.

However, as illustrated by the ongoing debate at this board, it would be blithe to say OVTheists reject Scripture. What seems to be the case is that they uncovered one aspect of Christian Theology that has proven to be a non-essential and now seek to set out Christian Theology with a different interpretation of God's relationship to Creation and Time.

As such, apologetics may have the potential of undermining some things Christianity has taken as Truths and show that they are truths and that quite different Christian Theologies may be possible, as is shown by Gary Dorrien's book, "The Remaking of Evangelical Theology". The only history of Evangelical Theology ever written by a non-evangelical.

One consequence of viewing this is that there is potential disagreement on what consists of essentials, on what is Christian Unity presupposed. Ontotheological agreement doesn't appear to have been a reliable base in the past. It has served as a source of much disunity and fragmenation among Protestants in general.

Another consequence seems to be that inessentials play an important role in the ways we Christians choose to let our lights shine for the world. I.e., we may have the keys to the kingdom, but we weren't given a blue-print as to how we should let our lights shine. In the other link, you refer to a second tier of doctrines and values that clearly and immediately are deduced from the first list and the Bible. This seems to imply that this second tier would also fall under the category of essentials. But this denigrates the importance of tradition and experience. It also fails to explain why Christians do disagree on much doctrine.

As I understand it, prior to the Protestant Reformation, in Christianity it was accepted that both Tradition and Scripture coexisted and that Tradition was not irreducible to Scripture, but not infallible like Scripture and subject to change over time.

With the protestant reformation, it seems many protestant denominations now conflate their traditions with scripture, thus making doctrinal fights often the basis for the splitting of Churches. The infallibility of Scripture, thus, may have become a code for saying that one's traditions of interpreting scripture are the one correct way to interpret scripture.

Whereas, the RCatholic Church raised its traditions to the level of Scripture and denied that they could change, since to do so would require acknowledging that Protestant Churches were in fact also Christian. This then led the RCChurch to become a force against progress in the countries where it predominated.

And so in either case, truths were made out into Truths, since to deny that the Bible did not provide a blue-print plan for what was right conduct in all possible situations would potentially lead to a questioning of the basis for why we should give authority to our ecclesiastical institutions of governance/decision-making on such matters, if in fact they are fallible.

But allowing for fallibism in how we understand the will of God doesn't free us from our responsibility. It makes the concrete question of how we govern ourselves more important and potentially makes ecclesiology more important. As with a study of the forms of gov't in states, how decisions are made about what Church practice will be becomes an object of study and learning, as well.

Sorry if this doesn't take the form of a question. I just think that the implications of doing apologetics are greater than you have made them out to be and that it is not true to the actual methodology of Theology, the deductive method that you described in the other link.

dlw

[Da Lone-Warrior]

How would reconcile a commitment to the pre-Protestant-Catholic schism notion that Churches rely on both Scripture and Tradition with a commitment to the inerrancy of scripture?

dlw

[scottatiwu]

[i know in this post I use plural nouns, which may appear as a basic contradiction of what I'm saying, but keep in mind I'm speaking objectively from a subjective framework]

when a person says "there's no such thing as truth," they're not simply unaware that thats a self-contradicting statement, they are watering down a plausible philosophical argument, namely "We can never know if there is such a thing as objective truth." We see what we believe to be objective truth, but that's precisely the problem, we SEE it. we experience what we believe to be objective truth SUBJECTIVELY. though Kant's ethical beliefs were terrible, his prolegomena (sp?) to any future metaphysic was brilliant. we can't know any object in itself. [though I know Kant believed that the object still existed, he didn't qualify that very well.] Thus, subjective truth is far more important than objective truth.
A person can move on philisophically from this point, but as Christians we must understand that such a move is a choice and not a neccesity. Thus, within a subjective framework only a working philosophy is acceptable. A philosophy of life is the only one which can be "constructed" in the wake of post-modernity.
Furthermore, I think a true solopsistic-existentialist philosophy is the best leg for true faith to stand on. It does not say "this is right for me, that is right for you," but simply "this is right for me."

[Ryokan]

Here is my take on it. I say, "There is no Truth!" That's very cocky! How could I know that there is no truth? But should I say, "I cannot know for certain something is true." I think I would have a leg to stand on. Thoughts?

[STR Ambassador]

Skepticism is certainly warranted in some cases - depends on what kind of claim is being made. The one you offer isn't detailed enough to know. There are different kinds of skeptical claims, some warranted and others not. And at some point, in the face of evidence, certain kinds of skeptical claims require justification themselves. You may be interested in a very interesting and thorough analysis of skepticism and truth in "Putting Skeptics in Their Place" by John Grecco. Grecco is a philosopher of epistemology at Fordham University.

STR Ambassador

[Ryokan]

How would Koukl suggest we verify what we recieve from our senses and memories as things that correspond to reality, or does he deal with "Last Tuesdayism".

[scottatiwu]

you can't warrant skeptisicism, it carries it's own justification. I'm not talking about healthy Cartesian skepticism, Descartes wasn't thorough enough. when honest doubt, Hume-like doubt, creeps in there isn't anything that is incapable of being consumed. of course hume had his inconsistencies, like asking for a demonstratable miracle when miracles are by nature non-demonstratable, but thats not the point.

[Ryokan]

Humes problem is that he went and demanded scientific explainations after he utterly discredited science.

[scottatiwu]

I know, I was just referring to his basic principle of doubt.

[Saint Phil]

Hawgwash to the title of this thread!

Jesus said in John, "I am the way, the truth, the light. No man comes unto the Father except by Me."

Wise up you atheists and get saved with the power of Jesus or you'll end up burnin in hell for eternity - which is a very long time!

[Vorkosigan]

Wise up you atheists and get saved with the power of Jesus or you'll end up burnin in hell for eternity - which is a very long time!

If burning in hell for eternity is what it takes to keep me away from people like you forever, I'm all for it.

Thus, within a subjective framework only a working philosophy is acceptable.

Bingo. That's why Koukl is essentially refuting a strawman.

But should I say, "I cannot know for certain something is true." I think I would have a leg to stand on.

All you can do is pile up evidence and see which way it points.

[Tyrhonius]

Well, I just happened to come across this post while doing some research on the internet.

The poster is quite correct when he says that the proposition, "There is no truth" is self-refuting.

However, what he failed to point out was that the proposition to the opposite effect, "There is truth" is circular. The issue is whether or not Truth exists. To express the proposition that truth exists already assumes that which is in question, namely, the existence of truth. The speaker, when he or she utters the proposition, already assumes that it is true. But how can truth of a proposition concerning the existence of truth be assumed to be true without begging the question? In other words, what is really being said is "It is a truth that truth exists."

Therefore, it seems that the both propositions are problematic. Where do we go from here?

[TuckEverlasting]

Great first post.

Therefore, it seems that the both propositions are problematic. Where do we go from here?

:popcorn:

[BronzeArcher]

I don't think it's so bad. You can't prove axioms without assuming them first. I can't say that the law of non-contradiction is a fundamental law of reality without assuming it; much less the law of identity. I'm ambivalent about Descartes' foundationalism, but I like his indubitability test.

[Tyrhonius]

You can't prove axioms without assuming them first.

Oh really, now does that go the same for your axiom about, well, axioms!

If we really want to live by the Truth, then we need not be concerned about the "Truth."

God is not to be found in the Scriptures. He and his kingdom already exists within, as Jesus says in Luke.

The greatest threat to Christianity is "God." If anyone feels the need to defend their faith, then they need to get rid of it.

The will to resist creates stress and anxiety, therefore "resist not." And do not be passive, for it is a sign of fear, so go "buy a sword."

Forget about apologetics, and the world will be converted.

Converted not to Christianity, but to the life Jesus wants each and every person to live which is acutally how we all really want to live anyway but just not quite aware that we do.

[djdavo]

All you can do is pile up evidence and see which way it points.


that helps us for beliefs about truth. that isn't truth, though. truth exists independent of evidence.


for example: is a red ball red because we see that it's red, or is it red because it has the property of 'redness'?

2+2=4 whether we're aware of it or not.

[djdavo]

Oh really, now does that go the same for your axiom about, well, axioms!

If we really want to live by the Truth, then we need not be concerned about the "Truth."


God is not to be found in the Scriptures. He and his kingdom already exists within, as Jesus says in Luke.



you refer to Luke. i take it you believe that Luke is an accurate portrayal of Jesus? why believe luke and not the other eyewitness testimonies? why believe a specific portion of Luke and not all of it?

God is not found in the scriptures..then why did Jesus quote every book in the OT (except for 2) as the authoritative word of God?



The greatest threat to Christianity is "God." If anyone feels the need to defend their faith, then they need to get rid of it.

1 Peter 3:15 (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=67&chapter=3&verse=15&version=31&context=verse)
But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.

Jesus IS God, so how can God be the biggest threat to christianity?





The will to resist creates stress and anxiety, therefore "resist not." And do not be passive, for it is a sign of fear, so go "buy a sword."

Forget about apologetics, and the world will be converted.

Converted not to Christianity, but to the life Jesus wants each and every person to live which is acutally how we all really want to live anyway but just not quite aware that we do.


what life is it "jesus wants"? where are you getting your information from about what Jesus wants for us?

furthermore, don't you need apologetics to assert your point in the first place? you referred to Luke as your proof text for what you believe....otherwise it's just your word against mine with no proof...

[Little Shepherd]

Therefore, it seems that the both propositions are problematic. Where do we go from here?
I think it comes down to intuition. STR has articles on this topic that are quite insightful. Intuition refers to basic knowledge that is hardwired into us. In fact, if we didn't have that intuition, it would make learning impossible. Regardless of the discipline you study, if you trace something you know back far enough, you will come to a place where logic can take you no further. Where your knowledge rests on one or more presuppositions that you understand instinctively.

The STR guys like to use math as an example. You can know math formulas are correct, but in order to do so you must understand what numbers are, and to understand what they are, you must understand what they represent. At this point, you can write the numbers out, or you can represent them with tokens. None of this proves anything; at some point you have to accept that you just understand the concept of numbers, and that you are able to build on this basic knowledge. I'll link you to the articles I found:

Intuition: A Special Way of Knowing (http://www.str.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=5360)
Knowledge by Intuition (http://www.str.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=5394)
Proving Math (http://www.str.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=5511)

That's a start. There was another article I considered linking to, but it only had one relevent quote which I'll say here. It was an article from their Ambassador training program, I believe, because the quote was "All throughout the course we've appealed to intuition. You've got to (appeal to intuition) eventually." Nobody denies that you have to appeal to intuition at some point. I think all anyone's saying is that it's not a problem. Saying we can't know anything for certain because of it is an extreme and unwarranted reaction.

[Tyrhonius]

Regardless of the discipline you study, if you trace something you know back far enough, you will come to a place where logic can take you no further.


Don't you find it a bit ironic that your conclusion on the role of intuition was deduced logically, not intuitively.

None of your statements about intuition can be made without logic. If there is place "where logic can take you no further," then you couldn't express it in language. But sense you did, it means that logic has already taken you there!

[Tyrhonius]

Regardless of the discipline you study, if you trace something you know back far enough, you will come to a place where logic can take you no further.


Don't you find it a bit ironic that your conclusion on the role of intuition was deduced logically, not intuitively!

None of your statements about intuition can be made without logic. If there is a place "where logic can take you no further," then you couldn't express it in language. But since you did, it means that logic has already taken you there!

[Little Shepherd]

Don't you find it a bit ironic that your conclusion on the role of intuition was deduced logically, not intuitively.
Not in the least. And if you examine the logic enough, you will find that every logical conclusion rests upon a bed of presuppositions that one must instinctively know in order to have developed the logic in the first place. Quite fascinating, really.
None of your statements about intuition can be made without logic. If there is place "where logic can take you no further," then you couldn't express it in language. But sense you did, it means that logic has already taken you there!
But where did my logic come from? It's a knowledge skill built upon the basic foundation of intuition. You rely on intuition to provide the foundation on which knowledge skills are built, and then you can use those knowledge skills to identify that intuition must exist in order for there to be any learning in the first place. It makes sense enough to me.

[Tyrhonius]

Not in the least. And if you examine the logic enough, you will find that every logical conclusion rests upon a bed of presuppositions that one must instinctively know in order to have developed the logic in the first place. Quite fascinating, really.

Lil Shep,

What I'm trying to say is that the thesis that "all logical conclusions rest upon intuitive presuppositions" is itself a logically deduced conclusion. Therefore, it is impossible to conceptualize intuition as being prior to logic because all thoughts and assertions about intuition must ultimately rely on logic if they are to be coherently thought and asserted. But this is not to say that logic is prior to or superior to intuition, it is just that the two "mutally arise."

But where did my logic come from? It's a knowledge skill built upon the basic foundation of intuition. You rely on intuition to provide the foundation on which knowledge skills are built, and then you can use those knowledge skills to identify that intuition must exist in order for there to be any learning in the first place. It makes sense enough to me.

I would just say that the intution and logic are not the same, but neither are they different.

[Little Shepherd]

What I'm trying to say is that the thesis that "all logical conclusions rest upon intuitive presuppositions" is itself a logically deduced conclusion. Therefore, it is impossible to conceptualize intuition as being prior to logic because all thoughts and assertions about intuition must ultimately rely on logic if they are to be coherently thought and asserted. But this is not to say that logic is prior to or superior to intuition, it is just that the two "mutally arise."
Intuition is not the same thing as the ability to recognize and identify intuition. For sake of the following illustration, let's assume that I've never been introduced to the concept of "hats". I don't know what they are, what they look like, what they have in common, how they can differ from each other while still being hats, etc. Now say that I am introduced to hats, and over time I learn to recognize all those things about them. My ability to recognize hats did not come before the hats themselves. Just because I can't personally recognize them at a particular time doesn't mean they don't exist at that time.

Intuition is a little different in that I possess intuition even if I cannot recognize it. This intuition that I am born with provides the foundation on which I build my knowledge, including knowledge skills such as the ability to apply logic. Then using my logic skills, I can look back and see that I have this base of intuition on which my knowledge rests. However, the intuition is there before I learn to recognize it. Intuition and logic do not mutually arise -- logic arises from intuition.
I would just say that the intution and logic are not the same, but neither are they different.
They really aren't the same thing. They are, however, intimately connected in that logic(and knowledge in general) is wholly dependent on having this base of intuition.

[Tyrhonius]

They really aren't the same thing. They are, however, intimately connected in that logic(and knowledge in general) is wholly dependent on having this base of intuition.


The ability to distinguish hats from other objects and to distinguish different kinds of hats requires logic. The categories of identity and difference are logical in nature. Furthermore, one can reason that if such and such an object has such and such features, then it is a hat. If such and such an object does not have such and such features, then it is not a hat.

One does not use logic only to "look back." If it were not for the logical categories of subject and object there would be "no-thing" (object) for "you" (the subject) to look back upon.

All thinking implies the logical distinctions of subject and object and identity and difference. One could equally make the case that for their must be a logical foundation for intuition to even exist.

While I respect your opinion on this issue, I cannot see how your attempts to give priority to intuition over logic can succeed.

What's more important I think is to develop our intuitive and logical capabilities and increase mental awareness for the benefit of all.

[Little Shepherd]

The ability to distinguish hats from other objects and to distinguish different kinds of hats requires logic. The categories of identity and difference are logical in nature. Furthermore, one can reason that if such and such an object has such and such features, then it is a hat. If such and such an object does not have such and such features, then it is not a hat.
I agree, but that has nothing to do with what I said. You seem to be under the impression that I said that distinguishing hats from other items falls under intuition. I never said that.
One does not use logic only to "look back." If it were not for the logical categories of subject and object there would be "no-thing" (object) for "you" (the subject) to look back upon.
You're right that one doesn't use logic only to "look back", but it is one function we can accomplish using logical tools that we've developed. Your second statement is false, however. Just because we don't know of something, and just because we haven't personally developed a category for it using our logic, doesn't have any bearing on whether it exists or not. However, if we are introduced to something new, we can use the logical tools we've developed in order to create a new category(if necessary) and place the new object into it.
All thinking implies the logical distinctions of subject and object and identity and difference. One could equally make the case that for their must be a logical foundation for intuition to even exist.
No, one could not make that case. However, you could possibly make the case that intuition is a specific subset of logic on which all other aspects of logic must be built. You have to assume that all intuition is logical in order for this to be the case, but if that is true, then intuition is the logical foundation on which all other knowledge(including logic) rests. Intuition is the bare minimum knowledge/logic that one must possess in order for any learning to be possible.
While I respect your opinion on this issue, I cannot see how your attempts to give priority to intuition over logic can succeed.
If one is built upon the other, then the one that is being built on must come first. It is more important in the fact that it is absolutely necessary for learning to happen in the first place. It is not, however, more useful in the long run. You cannot do much with the bare minimum knowledge encompassed by intuition. You must build upon it, and make use of what is built -- but without it nothing can be built in the first place.
What's more important I think is to develop our intuitive and logical capabilities and increase mental awareness for the benefit of all.
It is important to develop logical capabilities, yes, but you cannot develop your intuition. You either have it, in which case you have a foundation on which you can properly build(learn), or you don't have it, in which case you're a vegetable. If you're using a different definition for intuition, which I think you might be given this statement, then we're not discussing the same thing at all.

[Tyrhonius]

You say that intuition is the base of logic, but that is an "intuitive" conclusion, which as it happens, can only be expressed in logical form. Being such, it becomes circular to suggest that it is intuitively true that intuition is prior to logic. You can't use your intuition to prove the priority of intuition. It might even be true, but how could you really know that when all coherent conceptual thought is conducted logically. Again, intuition might stand behind logic, but you can't assert it in a way that doesn't beg the question. If you want to prove the truth that intuition is prior to logic, then you will need recourse to something that is independent of both intuition and logic to serve as a criterion. Unfortunately, us humans are not afforded the luxury of such mental resources (and even if we were those resources would also require justification by even higher level resources, and so on ad infinitum).

[Little Shepherd]

You say that intuition is the base of logic, but that is an "intuitive" conclusion, which as it happens, can only be expressed in logical form. Being such, it becomes circular to suggest that it is intuitively true that intuition is prior to logic. You can't use your intuition to prove the priority of intuition.
No. Just no. I didn't say anything that could have given you that impression. Comments like the above make me wonder if you actually bothered to read what I wrote.
It might even be true, but how could you really know that when all coherent conceptual thought is conducted logically. Again, intuition might stand behind logic, but you can't assert it in a way that doesn't beg the question.
I challenge you to prove this.
If you want to prove the truth that intuition is prior to logic, then you will need recourse to something that is independent of both intuition and logic to serve as a criterion.
Why?
Unfortunately, us humans are not afforded the luxury of such mental resources (and even if we were those resources would also require justification by even higher level resources, and so on ad infinitum).
I disagree completely, but then I hold some things to be self-evident and not in need of proving(such as the law of noncontradiction and basic numerical and mathematical principles). If an infinite regress was actually necessary to prove anything, then we could never know anything for sure. Pardon me if I find that notion absurd.

[seer]

Calvinism, Intuition and Occasionalism:

The idea that we can not know anything based on intuition, induction, empiricism etc.... That all our thoughts (true or false) are presented to the mind by God using the occasion of our senses. This is coming from the Calvinist camp. I believe that the germ of this idea started with Gordon Clark, and I'm finding more and more Calvinist running with the concept...

http://www.vincentcheung.com/2006/12/13/in-god-we-trust/


http://bnonn.blogspot.com/2006/12/on-science-part-2-observable-empirical.html