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1. The Laws of Thought
LESSON 3

2. "Liberalism is in tension with
democracy. Democracy is a means
not only of dispersing political power
and thus of protecting the private
sphere against invasion by the public
sphere, but also of enabling people to
enforce their dislike of other people's
self-regarding behavior"
Richard Posner, Overcoming Law, (Harvard, 1995),
p.25.
● This is an ignoratio elenchi. Posner says
there are problems with democracy. But
even if he is right, this doesn’t respond to
the point about elitist judges.
● Why does Posner start talking about
democracy? He assumes that without
judicial review, all decisions would be made
by majority rule.
● Joyce calls this a “false cause” fallacy.
Richard Posner responds the objection to judicial
review that it permits elitist judges to impose their
values on the rest of us in this way:
Review

3. An I Proposition.
Some S is P, does not rule out All S is P, the
corresponding A proposition. It leaves this open.
An A Proposition implies the corresponding I
proposition.
“All S is P” implies “Some S is P”
● This isn’t true in mathematical logic.
Examples:
“All men are mortal” implies:
“Some men are mortal”.
“Some men are mortal” leaves open:
“All men are mortal’
● In ordinary language, we often don’t say
“some” if we can say “all”.
I wouldn’t say, “Some U.S. Presidents were older
than 35” if they all are. But this is isn’t a
requirement of logic.
Review

5. “If A, then B” “If A, then not-B.” This
does not violate the law of contradiction.
Can you see why not?

6. The law of contradiction says that
something that exists cannot have
contradictory properties.
● A hypothetical proposition does
not say that anything exists.”
● If A, then B” and “If A, then not
B.” are not contradictory unless
we assert that A exists.

7. ● “If you deny the law of contradiction, then
you also have to affirm it”
Only if someone says, “the law of contradiction
is never true.” If someone says, “There is at
least one true contradiction”, this refutation
does not work.
Is This Correct?

8. Law of Identity

9. As far as metaphysical reality is concerned (omitting
human actions from consideration, for the moment),
there are no 'facts which happen to be but could have
been otherwise'... Since things are what they are, since
everything that exists possesses a specific identity,
nothing in reality can occur causelessly or by chance.
The nature of an entity determines what it can do and,
in any given set of circumstances, dictates what it will
do." (The Ayn Rand Lexicon, 333.)
Apart from human actions, however, Rand believed that every
event was determined in the sense that, at any given moment,
only one outcome was possible — nothing that happens could
have happened otherwise. Leonard Peikoff uses the example of
a helium-filled balloon to clarify the issue: if, under the same set
of circumstances, it were possible for a balloon to act in more
than one way — if it could rise or fall — then the law of identity
would be violated. "Such incompatible outcomes would have to
derive from incompatible (contradictory) aspects of the entity's
nature. But there are no contradictory aspects. A is A."
This is a misapplication of the law of identity. If the
helium balloon goes up on one occasion and down
on another, these aren’t contradictory properties at
the same time.
If Peikoff says that incompatible properties
would have to derive from incompatible aspects
of the balloon’s nature, he is assuming the law
of causation. But he is trying to show that this
law follows from the law of identity, so he is
begging the question.

11. ● Contradictory and Contrary
Propositions
● An A proposition and an O propositions
are contradictories.
“All men are mortal” (Universal affirmative) and “Some
men are not mortal” (Particular negative)
● An E proposition and an I proposition are
contradictories.
“No dogs are evil” (Universal negative) and
“Some dogs are evil.” (Particular affirmative)
● An A and an E proposition are contraries.
“All men are mortal” and “No men are mortal”

12. A distributed term applies to the whole extension of
the term.
An undistributed term does not.
In “All men are mortal”, “men” is distributed—all men.
“Mortal” is undistributed. We don’t know how many of
the mortal beings are men.

13. Because cooking takes less time and labor than it
used to, the cost of eating has dropped…This is what
I mean when I say that free markets have created the
obesity epidemic. Advances in food technology have
reduced the monetary and time costs of eating, and
these technological advances are a result of free
market enterprises responding to consumer demand.
Some market defenders might dispute me on this
matter, pointing out that the obesity epidemic has
only taken off in the last several decades, whereas
capitalist enterprise has only been around for at least
two hundred years. But by this reasoning, we'd be
forced to conclude that free markets aren't
responsible for HDTVs, or iPods, or aluminum siding,
none of which existed at the dawn of time.
Peter Ubel, Free Market Madness (Harvard Business Press, 2009), pp.
27-28

14. Because cooking takes less time and labor than it
used to, the cost of eating has dropped…This is
what I mean when I say that free markets have
created the obesity epidemic. Advances in food
technology have reduced the monetary and time
costs of eating, and these technological advances
are a result of free market enterprises responding
to consumer demand. Some market defenders
might dispute me on this matter, pointing out that
the obesity epidemic has only taken off in the last
several decades, whereas capitalist enterprise has
only been around for at least two hundred years.
But by this reasoning, we'd be forced to conclude
that free markets aren't responsible for HDTVs, or
iPods, or aluminum siding, none of which existed
at the dawn of time.
● This is an ignoratio elenchi.
● The relevant point is when the advances in food
technology occurred, not when free markets began.
● Ubel argues that advances in technology caused
the obesity epidemic. If they didn’t, it’s irrelevant
whether free markets were responsible for the
advances in technology.

15. “The basic defense, [of appropriating
unowned property by claiming it] however,
is quite general and straightforward. It is
that if a prospective owner can in fact
perform it, taking possession of a thing is
a feasible act of his that is admissible if it
is not a tort (in this case not trespass) and
violates no right; but this is the case by
definition, by the thing being identified as
‘unowned’.”
Anthony de Jasay, Against Politics, Routledge, 1997,
p. 173

16. “The basic defense, [of appropriating
unowned property by claiming it]
however, is quite general and
straightforward. It is that if a
prospective owner can in fact perform
it, taking possession of a thing is a
feasible act of his that is admissible if it
is not a tort (in this case not trespass)
and violates no right; but this is the
case by definition, by the thing being
identified as ‘unowned’ ”
This begs the question: it assumes
that there are no rights to unowned
property.