No Beans About It: The Necessity of the Principle of Sufficient Reason

Does dismissing the PSR result in cognitive anarchy?

In a world where the principles of sufficient reason (PSR) does not hold, my head might be filled with beans, and the random snapping of a bean could, by chance, generate a thought. This thought may seem to be the result of prior thoughts or interactions with the world, but in truth, it’s just a coincidence, a random product of the snapping beans, which themselves careened into my head from nothing. These thoughts, quite rightly, could be considered a dependable foundation for rational belief. Nevertheless, if things can exist or occur without adequate explanation, then the idea of a thought being caused by a random snapping bean becomes an inscrutable competitor to every proposed explanation. In such a scenario, the possibility of discerning events with explanations from those without is really not possible at all, leaving us with no non-arbitrary way of deciding that our thoughts (including this one) are anything other than capricious occurrences masquerading as insights reliably tethered to reality. This scenario doesn’t just threaten empirical knowledge acquisition, as Pruss and Koons contend; it crumbles the architecture of reason itself. For all we know (if PSR is false), our beliefs might not have resulted from the workings of our cognitive faculties, but from something completely detached from any truth or logical norms, like spontaneously generated beans. Our beliefs could be entirely unfounded but nevertheless come with the false appearance of having some rational basis. Our convictions, however rational they may seem, might be nothing more than the echo of a bean’s toot in the wind…

This argument demonstrates retorsion: By doubting PSR, we undermine any rational grounds we might have for that very doubt.

For more in defense of PSR see The Best Argument for God.