Chapter 52

Formal deductive reasoning is analytic by nature. Though complex, it contains no new information, it simply rearranges what we already know; which is to say the conclusions implicitly follow necessarily from the premises. In some instances a simple analysis is not objectively valid and for that reason it cannot imitate superior logic. Thus we find ourselves involved in a difficulty which did not originally present itself within our normally recognized sphere of validity.

We are not barred from appealing to ultimate truth. It remains doubtful whether my project of thought has in every respect gone beyond the former conditions of normal sensibilities that correspond to the collective unity of thought shared by most people. I recognize that we do of course make use of a great number of empirical impressions without any use of deduction, with actions simply being a dissent from experience.

I find an extended range of practical application with the functions and orders of those mental powers which help differentiate the question of right from the question of fact, which is directly contemporaneous with the certainty we associate with formal logic. It is to me then, understanding, judgment, and reasoning that is entirely consistent without being derived from experience. If we are in possession of disagreeing conceptions that are not objectively valid and thus do not belong to the logic of truth, this should be of such a nature as a simple phenomena that would be without significance or be rejected as only a change in quantity, not in quality.