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Lewis on Axioms/Presuppositions

PostPosted: January 4th, 2010, 12:04 pm
by sqrt[-1]
Did CSLewis ever write anything on Axioms or Presuppositions?

I am not even sure that is the correct terms - I am thinking along the lines of ideas that form the "root" of your thinking that you use to build your ideas/beliefs upon. (eg. "The laws of logic are true", "I exist", "I experience the world in it's real form" etc)

Re: Lewis on Axioms/Presuppositions

PostPosted: January 4th, 2010, 1:08 pm
by archenland_knight
Greetings i:

I don't think we've met before.

I suppose that in a way, "The Abolition of Man" deals with the subject, but I'm not sure if it's the sort of approach you're thinking of.

Re: Lewis on Axioms/Presuppositions

PostPosted: January 6th, 2010, 12:04 pm
by sqrt[-1]
Hi,

I can't say that I remember much about the themes in "The Abolition of Man" - I will give it a re-read and let you know.

What I was looking for was similar to axioms in mathematics - except for philosophy. eg. In maths everything is derived from a set of laws (called axioms) which are just assumed to be true.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axiom

I believe that in philosophy there may exist a similar set of root beliefs that a person may have (possibly Presuppositions?) and was wondering if Lewis wrote anything on the topic. (purely for my own interest)

Thanks again.

Re: Lewis on Axioms/Presuppositions

PostPosted: January 11th, 2010, 11:14 pm
by archenland_knight

Re: Lewis on Axioms/Presuppositions

PostPosted: March 2nd, 2010, 8:34 pm
by Nerd42
Yeah The Abolition of Man deals with axioms in philosophy of ethics. Lewis was very critical of and I recall him making the "infinite regress argument" against it at some point though I don't at present remember where.