<html><div style='background-color:'><DIV> <P>No. My point is just that you can run an argumrent either way. If you don't like the conclusion, and it's valid, you can reject a premise. Most arguments in philosophy of any importance are not neatly encapsulated in a simple schema, and, if you don't like the conclusioon, and don;t see a premise you can attack, you can reject on the basis of some arguable invalidity,e,g,, find a false dichotomy somewhere presupposed. </P> <P>Anyway, this is nitpicking on the side. The main thing is the pragmatic truism that you can hold any belief true (or false) if you arew illingto make enough changes elsewhere. That's why Posner's right that philosophical arguments don't trump strong intuitions. --jks<BR><BR></P></DIV> <DIV></DIV> <DIV></DIV>>From: "Ken Hanly" <KHANLY@MB.SYMPATICO.CA> <DIV></DIV>>Reply-To: lbo-talk@lists.panix.com <DIV></DIV>>To: <LBO-TALK@LISTS.PANIX.COM> <DIV></DIV>>Subject: Re: Ethical foundations of the left <DIV></DIV>>Date: Sat, 21 Jul 2001 13:43:36 -0500 <DIV></DIV>> <DIV></DIV>>I dont understand. Both modus ponens and modus tollens are valid. There is no question of testing their validity except aa an exercise for students in constructing truth tables. Are you talking about soundness? <DIV></DIV>> <DIV></DIV>>Cheers, Ken Hanly <DIV></DIV>> I agree with P that in general, a strong intuition trumps an apparantly strong argument for a counterinituitive conclusion. It's a pragmatist platitude taht one man's modus ponens is another man's modus tollens, that if an argument has an unpalatable conclusion, we might do well to reassess the truth of the premises and test the validity of the reasoning. This is also Rawls' view. It is the basic idea that the notion of reflective equilibrium i supposed to capture. <DIV></DIV>> <DIV></DIV>> --jks <DIV></DIV>> <DIV></DIV>> <DIV></DIV>> <DIV></DIV>>------------------------------------------------------------------------------ <DIV></DIV>> Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com <DIV></DIV>> <DIV></DIV></div><br clear=all><hr>Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at <a href='http://go.msn.com/bql/hmtag_itl_EN.asp'>http://explorer.msn.com</a><br></html>