How can you know the truth?
Since schools do a poor job of teaching the problem of the unproven premise, make special note of it now. It is clear that all rational thought has to be based on truth. If you don’t base your thoughts on truth, your thoughts are not rational.
A logical syllogism only tests the form of the argument to see if it’s a valid form. However, a statement can have valid form and still be unsound. The conclusion can be false. You need to do two things before you can know a conclusion is true. You must use valid form, and you must have true premises. Valid form and true premises make a sound argument. If you have a sound argument, you know the conclusion is true.
Logic books tend to leave out the most important component. They don’t tell you how you can know the truth?
How can you know the truth?
The solution is to go back to the root of how you know. You must dig down to the starting point of thinking. The starting point cannot be something you just made up. It can’t be something someone else made up. It must be absolute. Otherwise, you can’t truthfully say you know anything. All you can say is, “That’s what I prefer to be true, so that’s what I prefer to believe.”
The human mind can’t reason to truth. No one can get outside himself or herself to objectively observer or experience anything. And yet knowledge exists. Where does it come from. It comes from God. Those of us who have been willing to acknowledge Him when He leads, teaches, and corrects us have discernment to know the difference between what God is saying and what comes from demons or fallen human minds. The wonder is that anyone who sincerely seeks Christ finds Christ.
