Susanna Krizo

NN, you wrote: “Logic acting upon axiomatic premises is the ONLY method of acertaining provable truth.”
So you are saying that we need to have a first principle, a self-evident truth, as the basic premise from which we deduct our conclusion? That is precisely what I said, i.e. you cannot use an inference as you premise. You can only create inferences from a premise and accept them or reject them according to proof. But here’s the real pickle when it comes to theology: how do you determine what the first principle is? How do you prove God’s existence? How do prove God is good? By using logic? That was the fallacy of the ontological argument of Anselm of Canterbury. He argued that since the mind could not conceive of anything greater than God, it proved the existence of God. But as has pointed out, this makes God’s existence dependent on the mind, i.e. what the mind cannot perceive does not exist, which is a false assumption.

You wrote: “Your first syllogism is not formally valid, you have committed the formal fallacy of affirming the consequent.”
I wonder where you studied logic… The following is from Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:
“A good argument is one whose conclusions follow from its premises; its conclusions are consequences of its premises. But in what sense do conclusions follow from premises? What is it for a conclusion to be a consequence of premises? Those questions, in many respects, are at the heart of logic (as a philosophical discipline). Consider the following argument:
1.If we charge high fees for university, only the rich will enroll.
We charge high fees for university.
Therefore, only the rich will enroll.
There are many different things one can say about this argument, but many agree that if we do not equivocate (if the terms mean the same thing in the premises and the conclusion) then the argument is valid, that is, the conclusion follows deductively from the premises. This does not mean that the conclusion is true. Perhaps the premises are not true. However, if the premises are true, then the conclusion is also true, as a matter of logic. This entry is about the relation between premises and conclusions in valid arguments.” (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/logical-consequence)
I.e. If a god can create life and a woman can create life, it follows that a woman is a god. The conclusion is not true, but it is valid.

You wrote: “oh, and actually the converse of a true statement is not logically necessarily true, only the contrapositive is”
This is what I said too.

You wrote: “Might I suggest that Lewis’ lament for the state of the educational system was not unjustified.”
I graduated from High School in Finland, which is considered the best educational system in the world in all international comparisons (US is solidly at the bottom when 8th graders are compared).

To your last comment: there is always an opponent in a debate. An opponent does not mean that we are in a competition; it means that there are two parties in the debate.
Better luck with your next post.