Reductio ad Absurdum - An Essay

This essay is written by Mohit Gandhi, my son :

If you asked a person who has not studied science which object would fall faster – a heavier one or a lighter one, the most probable answer would be the heavier object. It seems logical too, doesn’t it? After all, if there’s a button and a cupboard falling from the same height, it would seem that the cupboard would come down quicker. So, it seems reasonable to take the initial premise that heavier things do fall faster than lighter things. Now, take two pieces of stone, A and B, where A is heavier than B. So, if we tie A with B, then B should act as a drag on A since A will fall faster when compared to B. Thus, A tied to B should fall slower than A by itself, however, A-B tied together are actually heavier than A alone, thus, as per the initial premise A-B should fall faster. This is a manifest contradiction in itself, thus we know that the initial premise was wrong. This is a classic example of reductio ad absurdum, a tool where one takes an opponent’s premises and deduce something absurd from them, i.e., one deduces a contradiction officially.

Reductio ad absurdum was first recognized and studied by the Greek philosophers and has become an important tool in both formal mathematics and philosophical reasoning, as well as a common argument in daily lives. Indian parents seem to use it most often. Let us take one more example – we all have heard many times that the world would be a better place to live in, if everyone lived like Jesus. So, the initial premise is that the world would be a better place if everyone lived his or her life like Jesus. Thus, we would have 7 billion people living on charity of others, roaming from town to town and preaching about God (which no one would apparently be listening to). When there would be no one creating wealth, there would be no one to get the charity from – there would be just 7 billion people preaching about God. Soon, everyone would starve and die. The world might be a better place for vultures and maggots who would feed on all the Jesus wannabes, but far from the beautiful, if seen from human perspective. Thus, the world would be both a beautiful place as well as a horrible place for humans if the initial premise were true.

When we are struck, we seek answer in philosophy, which has been a favourite method for the Greeks and Indians. If we consider the said proposition in terms of philosophy, we would have to think in terms of specific branches of philosophy. For example, idealism seeks to take the idealistic view of every scenario, but as the above example has shown, everything idealistic cannot make sense. Another branch of science, naturalism, seeks to set everything in the fold of nature, but then, it is not in consonance with scientific or modern progress; when man lived in nature fully, he did not live long and suffered many diseases which he did not know what they were, did not know how to treat them, and held rain, lightning, sun and moon responsible for them. We can find some succour from an amalgamation of different branches to arrive at a suitable conclusion so far as this topic is concerned, which means 'a method of proving that something is not true by showing that its result is not logical or sensible'.

Looking at the proposition from another angle, it is not necessary for the result to be logical or sensible in all cases. For example, a warrior risks his life in the battlefield knowing well that his death means the end of world for him, yet he goes for it. His death too is no guarantee that the life of the remaining people would be improved.

This comes to infer that we cannot think of any proposition in a limited or restricted sense, as different criteria apply to a situation. Everything cannot be measured entirely along scientific principles, nor can it be measured entirely along sociological or political principles or other domains. Often, a holistic approach has to be taken, and there are circumstances when one is forced to take a biased or one-sided view; all this depends on a particular case and its peculiar circumstances.

This stand is taken by the theories developed by a branch of science called pragmatism. It seeks to solve problems in a practical and sensible way rather than by having fixed ideas and theories. When we adopt a logical and rational approach to solve a problem or answer a question, we are for most part sure that we will take a perfect view; but then, there is nothing perfect in the world. All branches of philosophy have their inherent shortcomings, and we have to consider them when we tend to make a decision. Thus, pragmatism may be the preferred choice for resolving most problems, yet it cannot help in every problem that we might face; in some of them, other branches that look at life in a very limited way can help us too. For example, pragmatism may seek to reject honesty when an entrepreneur is likely to face losses, but so is not the case with idealism, which may think it is better to suffer losses than to give up honesty; and in my view, that is a better stance to take. If a soldier thought of his personal safety and wavered from making the supreme sacrifice, the entire nation could fall in a shambles. As the society is like a rainbow, it needs all the colours to make it lively; so, there should be some people like Jesus too, though not all.

Coming to conclusion, we can say that the outcome is not the perfect criteria to decide whether something is justified or not. There are other points worth considering, and we must not neglect them during the course of our thinking and decision-making process. In other words, we must keep an open mind to come to a conclusion, rather than taking a toughened stand behind the solid-looking walls of a limited ideology, even if it is as concrete as science.