Another place where modern symbolic logic merely manipulates mental symbols while traditional Aristotelian logic expresses insight into objective reality is the interpretation of a conditional (or "hypo-thetical") proposition such as "If it rains, I will get wet." Aristotelian logic, like common sense, inter-prets this proposition as an insight into real causality: the rain causes me to get wet. I am predicting the effect from the cause. But symbolic logic does not allow this commonsensical, realistic interpretation. It is skeptical of the "naive" assumption of epistemologi-cal realism, that we can know real things like real causality; and this produces the radically anti-com-monsensical (or, as they say so euphemistically, "coun-ter-intuitive") "problem of material implication" (Kreeft, 19).

Thus, in Socratic logic the student still must study special terms (i.e., categories, predicables, division), material fallacies (i.e., inductive fallacies, procedural fallacies), the rules and nature of definition, contradiction in terms of the square of opposition, different kinds of arguments, syllogisms, induction, and even some philosophical applications of logic - including logic and theology, metaphysics, cosmology, philoso-phical anthropology, epistemology, and ethics. But, for the Christian, this kind of progressive study, as Kreeft, Schwarze, Lape, and others teaching in this area readily testify, will make one a significantly better thinker.

Don’t misunderstand. Logic is not the same as philosophy, but it is an excellent preparation for the study of philosophy. Kreeft puts it this way, "Logic is to philosophy what a tele-scope is to astronomy or a cookbook to a meal. It is an instrument. It is no substitute for the real thing, but it makes ‘the real thing’ work much better" (Kreeft, 358). For example, I mentioned above some of the "philosophical appli-cations of logic," beginning with logic and theology, followed by metaphysics, cosmology, etc. These divisions correspond to the most basic questions about life, that is, questions about God or the Ultimate Reality; about reality as such (important in addressing various forms of Eastern mysticism); about the visible universe; about human nature; about how we know; and about good and evil, the nature of the "good life," and the "good society."

But how practical is Socratic logic for the Christian? If you have read this far, I realize most believers today are not regular readers of journals like Faith and Philosophy, a quarterly produced by the Department of Philosophy at Asbury College. But did you know that it is logically provable that there is a God who is, as the Bible teaches, an infinitely perfect being? Indeed, there are many different kinds of arguments for God’s existence. Can the principles of logic, together with sensory (experiential) data available to every-one, together supply premises from which the existence of God can be validly deduced in ways that should convince most people? Yes, but a valid argument is one thing, refusal to believe what is true is quite another.

The most famous arguments for the existence of God, such as those of Thomas Aquinas and Anselm, try to show that the answer is a definite yes. But can any sense data prove or disprove the existence of a God who by definition cannot be sensed? Modern empiricists claim that the answer is no - that God’s existence cannot in principle be proved.

Can formal logic alone disprove atheism, that is, is atheism logically self-contradictory? Anselm’s famous "ontological argument" answers yes. Does the existence of evil in the world (the opposite of good) disprove an infinitely good God? The most famous argument for atheism answers yes.

Regardless of how we answer these kinds of questions, we must answer the arguments of the other side. In short, the debate over the existence of God, which is often involved in contexts like the creation vs. evolution debate, is not merely one about faith, as many Christians presume, it is one about logic. In other words, it is not just about our "sharing personal feelings," rather it is a hard look at facts and arguments. Many unbelievers in our postmodern world are not at all interested in our personal feelings, rather they want something more objective and sound.