The Impossibility Of Irrationalism

Irrationalism could refer to one of two things: 1) an ideology or epistemological framework that actively rejects reason or 2) the metaphysical belief that logic does not govern all of reality, or reality at all.  I'm going to refute the latter idea here.  It is an idea I have never seen either seriously considered for long or embraced by anyone outside of certain select groups of people I have interacted with.  Irrationalism is not untrue because of its minority following, though, but because it is impossible.

In the comments for another post, I wrote this [1]:


"As for logic, it is impossible for it to 1) not exist and 2) not be inherently true, universal, and inviolable. It is impossible for a "logicless" realm to exist. If it did, it would be a logicless realm and not a logical one (meaning the law of identity still applies by necessity); the fact that it is logicless means that the laws of logic are not true within the realm (meaning the law of noncontradiction still applies by necessity); and the realm, being logicless, is one of the only two ways it could be, namely logical or logicless (meaning the law of excluded middle still applies by necessity). Logic governs all things by necessity, as there is no other way that reality could be. Nothing, not even God, is capable of operating outside of these laws. The very imagining of logic not existing or governing something is impossible (I mean that while someone can understand what the word "logicless" means he or she could never produce an actual example of it), just as such a thing (logic not existing/governing a thing) is entirely impossible in reality."


In a later comment on the same post, I wrote the following to emphasize and establish the same general points, speaking once again of the three laws of logic--the law of identity, noncontradiction, and excluded middle.  I basically restated what I did before:


"None of these could be suspended even in a dimension outside of our universe, whether in heaven, some multiverse scenario, or something else. The only way a realm could truly escape logic would require being governed by logic, making the very concept of alogicality self-defeating and inherently impossible! The place would be alogical, meaning it still is what it is. It would exclude logic, and thus the law of noncontradiction is still true because for an alogical place to exist the law of noncontradiction must be false, which means that it is actually still true. And it would likewise also still be governed by the law of excluded middle, since it could only be either alogical or logical. Of course, it can't actually be alogical, but I am merely showing how the only way a dimension/universe could be alogical is if it is still under logic, which would by necessity mean that it isn't and can't be alogical at all!"


The nature of a logicless realm inevitably does not escape logic, and thus there is no such thing as an item, concept, or reality that actually is "logicless."  Concerns that logic doesn't apply outside of our immediate experiences or outside of our universe are unnecessary, and amount to nothing but worries about something that is utterly impossible.  Irrationalism is false in its entirety.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/08/examining-meditations-part-5-i-am-i.html