When Logic Deceives Us
Everyone was convinced that the cause of the problem was clear. Opinions followed one another, interpretations multiplied, and evidence accumulated, until it seemed that the truth no longer required discussion.
But a minor review revealed that the very first piece of information on which everything was built was false. In a single moment, not just one result fell, but an entire chain of conclusions collapsed—conclusions that had seemed utterly logical just minutes earlier. Everyone realized that the trust they had placed in the results had been greater than the trust they had placed in the initial premise.
This happens in our lives more than we imagine. We do not always err because we think poorly, but because we start from an idea we have not tested sufficiently. The moment we feel reassured by it, the mind takes over the task of building upon it, layer by layer, until it resembles a truth that is difficult to approach and challenging to question. Doubting it feels as though we are doubting our own capacity to think, rather than the idea itself.
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This is why we misunderstand logic. We expect it to discover the truth, while its function is entirely different. It does not choose the starting point, nor does it verify its validity; rather, it accepts it as given, then connects it to what follows according to precise rules.
If the starting point is correct, it leads us to a correct conclusion; if the starting point is misleading, it leads us to a misleading conclusion with the same degree of precision. Logic does not create truth; it merely reveals what can be produced from the premises placed before it.
From this, two rational individuals, possessing equal intelligence and using the same method of thinking, can arrive at entirely different convictions. The disagreement did not begin with logic; it preceded logic itself, on the day each chose the initial idea from which they started, inherited it, or received it from their environment, and then treated it as a truth that required no reconsideration. Here lies the real trick. Logic is not a judge searching for the truth, but a lawyer who sincerely defends the first assumption we trusted. The longer it remains in our minds, the more evidence we marshal to protect it—not because it has become more correct, but because we have become more attached to it and more inclined to ignore anything that might threaten the stability of the picture we have constructed for ourselves.
Therefore, many human disputes do not revolve around facts, but around different starting points that no one pays attention to. Each side believes it is debating the results, while the roots of the disagreement are hidden in an old assumption that has not been reviewed since the very first moment, and perhaps its owner never asked themselves: How did I arrive at this idea in the first place?
Thus, before asking yourself: Was the conclusion correct? ask a more important question: Was the initial idea worthy of building everything that followed upon it?
The mind does not deceive us when it uses logic; it deceives us when it easily grants its initial trust, then makes logic its guardian until the end.
A Kuwaiti writer
