Perhaps most renowned for his infamously stupid "Pascal's wager" [1] regarding an alleged justification for commitment to theism, Blaise Pascal, the French philosopher of the 1600s, wrote against the truths of rationalism. In his very pitifully organized and unfinished work Pensées (Thoughts), Pascal confuses the objective laws of logic for the human intellect, denies absolute certainty, and thus directly and indirectly rejects the epistemological self-evidence and metaphysical self-necessity of logical axioms. This is not only self-undermining in the sense that he is trying to saw off the branch his philosophy stands on. It is inherently erroneous because reason cannot be false. For it to be false, it must still be true, and thus it is both true and absolutely certain. This is something I have clarified many times and is of the utmost importance. Literally everything else depends on reason for its truth and knowability (and just because something is true does not necessarily mean it is knowable, though it must be consistent with the laws of logic)!
Here are examples of statements in his Pensées:
"In a word, extremes are as if they did not exist for us nor we for them; they escape us or we escape them.
Such is our true state. That is what makes us incapable of certain knowledge or absolute ignorance." (63)
"Let us then seek neither assurance nor stability; our reason is always deceived by the inconsistency of appearances;" (63)
Knowledge without absolutely certainty is logically impossible, for if something is not known with absolute certainty so that it cannot be illusory or merely assumed at best, then it could be wrong. If it could be wrong, then it is not known, but believed. Belief can be perfectly rationalistic, of course: this entails recognizing the intrinsic truths of logical axioms, the necessity of the other things which are dictated (which is all aspects of all matters) or revealed by them, and not making assumptions. Logic cannot be false without still being true, and thus it is incapable of being false. For instance, if nothing followed from anything else by necessity so that it is true independent of all things besides pure reason, then it would logically follow from the nature of reality that logic is false, and anyone who "knows" this would be relying on reason to disprove reason. Both metaphysically and epistemologically, reason cannot be false! Its falsity would still require its truth, making it true in itself either way, and therefore it is inescapable on all levels even for the person who neglects the discovery of it or believes it is a psychological construct or yet another unprovable concept.
Contrary to what Pascal would claim in one of the above quotes from Pensées, reason is not illusory or subject to deception. It is true regardless of all else and a conscious mind can misunderstand it, but only avoidable so. Logic cannot be deceived. People can be deceived, but only at their own willingness, because they ignore or forsake logic. It is issues like the sight of a distant lighthouse or the memory of one's last meal that might be illusory and only have the appearance of truth and still no one has to make assumptions based on perception or probability. Yet these facts about assumptions and illusion are knowable through reason--it does not follow from having a memory of an event that the event happened, or that if it did, it occurred exactly as one remembers. While the sensory perception and memory respectively must by logical necessity still exist in one's mind in order to be misleading, no one is forced by what seems to be the case to believe that which cannot be proven. It is also reason that allows people who are rationalistic to distinguish between the "appearances" Pascal speaks of and what must be true no matter what, which all reduces down to logical axioms or things necessitated by them.
The person who rejects any of this can only believe that they know something without in actuality knowing it (they ignore reason and thus believe in assumptions), believe that nothing at all is knowable (meaning they believe they know nothing is knowable, which is a contradiction in their worldview and a logically impossible thing, for axioms and other necessary truths are knowable), or believe that they have no beliefs (again, this means their position refutes itself due to logical impossibility). All of these things are not just irrational to believe, but they also contradict what is true even if someone does not know it or care about it: the logical necessities that cannot have been any other way. There is inherent truth, and it is knowable, but it is not rooted in God or the natural world or the human mind; it is self-necessary and governs all truths and falsities about all of these other things and more, and it is what allows for epistemological analysis to begin with. In fact, because it is inherently true, reason is the only thing that has to exist in itself [2]. Pascal is an utter fool because the only true fool is someone who by direct intentionality or passive stupidity refuses to align with the objective truths of reason.
Since they cannot be false, logical axioms can only be true in themselves. Since they are inherently true, all other truths depend on them, so no one can "know" anything else without first knowing them; there are only assumptions or beliefs that correspond to the necessary truths that are above the intellect that can grasp them. Moreover, nothing is possible in reality or even hypothetically (which is still a matter of the reality of logical truths) if it contradicts axioms or other necessary truths. Since logical facts are inherently true, they are epistemologically accessible to all willing people, though someone could go their entire life in ignorance of them and thus never truly knowing anything, instead living with sheer assumptions. Since they cannot possibly be false and are knowable in themselves, there is absolutely certainty to be found in logic and all that it illuminates.
Pensées. Pascal, Blaise. London: Penguin Books, 1995. Print.
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