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reality, comes to develop a metasystemic reasoning rule: no line of reasoning/set of evidence can
overturn any other reasoning/set of evidence if, after careful investigation and reflection, both
appear independently plausible, even when they appear to be logically inconsistent (unless they
constitute an antinomy or absurdity).
Needless to say, that parenthetical statement is important. Metasystemic thinking cannot
justify genuine irrationality. Nonsense is nonsense, and antinomies and absurdities must be
rejected. But in some important cases, sense can at first look like nonsense and can be
prematurely rejected. As the noted logicians Cohen and Nagel recognized: "Great care must be
exercised in making sure that what appear to be contrary instances are really so in fact."
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Let us return to an example from physics. There are two lines of experimental evidence
that are mutually exclusive, one of which shows light to be made up of particles, and another to
be composed of waves. These two sets of results appear to be contradictory. Perhaps
eventually, through further research and reflection, physicists will be able to formulate a
formally coherent, unified model of a "wavicle." Until then, they currently simply affirm both
bodies of reasoning/evidence without understanding how they cohere. Metasystemic reasoning
makes it possible for us not to foreclose on truth simply because at present we cannot come up
with a coherent solution.
Metasystemic thought is also practically important since few people have been endowed
with a high enough intelligence to be able to resolve the logical paradoxes that face adult
thinkers (and believers). Actually, most adults faced with such problems resort to presystemic
(i.e. prelogical) thought, holding beliefs without rigorous logical reflection, and so holding
paradoxical beliefs without recognizing the contradiction (e.g. most Christians believe in the