Logic Manipulation Ability Page Creation

[Qawsedf234]

Your help would be appreciated here.

Just from a quick read through, I'm more with Agnaa than DT regarding Logic manipulation. Ultimately, their points about it being a different way to approach Law manipulation seem more solid for the system in my mind than a separate power in itself.

 

[Everything12]

Can examples of characters this would apply to be given, and are any of their uses so distinct from law manipulation that it justifies this new ability? Does it serve any actual indexing purpose, or would it actually serve to create confusion, as users try to figure out if something applies or is just law manipulation, like the people in this thread?

 

[Antvasima]

Thank you for helping out.

It seems like Agnaa has more support here.

Should our Law Manipulation page get an extra "type" section for "Logic Manipulation" then?

 

[DontTalkDT]

This debate is far from concluded... like, it's on pause because Ultima wanted to tell me something and didn't get around to that yet.
As said, I will pick it up around Easter if Ultima doesn't get back before that. But as it stands nobody should vote on this.

If anything, this could be closed and then reopened when Ultima or me make our points.

 

[Antvasima]

Okay. No problem. We can wait then.

 

[DontTalkDT]

I said I would get back to this on Easter at the latest. It's Easter. So I get back to this. Good thing Easter is a range of days lol
I mean, which day is more fitting for this than one dedicated to a god some argue can manipulate logic? Well, maybe the birthday of Kurt Gödel, one of the most influential logicians ever, but for that we would have had to wait for another week... maybe we can finish this debate on that day...

I will keep this in two parts. In the first part, I will argue in favour of the page existing. In the second part, I will argue about the High 1-A stuff.
For the latter, I will try to keep things focused on established facts, but... quite frankly, after rereading the debate, I have a feeling that we might have to branch out into another thread. I have the impression that cases beyond logic were only very briefly discussed during the last tiering revision and that we have no proper rules for such cases written down. I believe a reexamination of how to integrate these things into the system may be inevitable. But I will try to see if we can reach a conclusion here without having to talk about considerations pertaining to Monads, logic surpassing R>F and other such topics. If not, I guess I will make that thread at some point.

Part 1: Why Logic Manipulation should be an ability​

Special Standards Need To Be Documented​

Logic Manipulation operates under unique constraints and freedoms that warrant dedicated documentation. It already requires tighter limitations on extrapolation, as noted:

By its very nature Logic Manipulation can, with sufficient evidence, pose an exception to virtually any rule we have. In exchange, Logic Manipulation is much more tightly bound to exactly what it is said and shown to do. As Logic Manipulation by its nature is contradictory, one can only do very limited logical reasoning based on it. Typically one is limited directly to the explanations of the verse regarding what it can do and can not extrapolate any further, even if seemingly sensible.

For example, it might be tempting to say that a logic manipulator who is explained to be able to manipulate logic to change reasoning such that being burned does not alter his state of being, would be able to do a similar thing to defend against water-based attacks. However, for a logic-breaking power, there is no true guarantee that it would abide by such a seemingly sensible pattern and the principle of explosion would indeed prevent such reasoning.

If the explanation of the power, on the other hand, clearly states that the user is able to do something like that against any attack, then it would be fine to operate under the assumption that it does so.

Also already touched upon is that it can pose an exception to virtually any rule. E.g. A logic manipulator bypassing a R>F difference isn’t an anti-feat to it because logic manipulation, by its nature, is allowed to violate foundational assumptions. At least as long as it is explicitely enough stated to work by logic manipulation.

A third standard is a new one I would wish to suggest due to numerous questions regarding "is this logic manipulation?" I have received on my wall.
I think we should make it a rule to only list Logic Manipulation if there is at least one rule of logic known to have been manipulated.
That's for two reasons:

1. I have gained the impression that many fictions use "logic" when referring to either the laws of nature or concepts. (e.g., "logic of fire" makes next to no sense with the literal sense of the word) It seems reasonable to account for non-literal use of the verse by requiring at least one known clear usecase.
2. Even if we believed something with no known rule of logic broken / manipulated is actual logic manipulation for any reason, it would be pointless to list it: Due to the extrapolation standard I quoted at the start of this section, there would be no relevant application. Say someone creates a fireball via logic manipulation, but it's not clear in which exact way logic manipulation was involved. Then it would make no difference that it was done via logic manipulation. It would, for example, still be just as negatable as usual, since as far as we know the negation can target a part of the process that isn't directly logic manipulation based. Only when we have a word on how the ability was involved, say by manipulating logic to make the fireballs existence a logically inevitable fact, we can actually conclude that regular negation does nothing.

These standards need to be visible, and a dedicated Logic Manipulation page would be the logical place to host them. Burying them under Law Manipulation would reduce accessibility and visibility to those not already aware of the standards.

1-A Tiering Considerations Need Documentation​

This goes in a similar direction as the prior section. Long story short, no matter how we decide on the issue, how Logic Manipulation interacts with the Tiering System is neither trivial nor obvious.

Even if we accept Agnaa's interpretation (i.e. logic = High 1-A+, but Logic Manipulation doesn't automatically grant that), it still requires explanation. And you see the preceding debate. There is enough to be said on the topic.

And if we are to go deeper into the whole conundrum of how illogical things are to be evaluated eventually, a Logic Manipulation page may not be a bad place to list the results of that as well.

We Already Have Similar Pages Which Are Separate For A Reason​

We already have distinct pages for powers like Mathematics Manipulation and Causality Manipulation, which could be viewed as subsets of Law Manipulation. Logic is even more fundamental—the bedrock beneath mathematics, which underpins physics. It’s odd to separate higher-level abstractions like math and causality but lump logic back under law.

Like, for verses where we have hierarchies of metaphysical aspects, laws are usually ranked far below logic, with logic often being in effect even at the highest level.

This also aligns with philosophical precedent. In theories like Leibniz’s possible worlds, logical possibility serves as the base for any world’s viability. Logic persists even when other laws vary.

And of course, Logic Manipulation has its own unique applications, like affecting nondual entities or changing the scope of "possible worlds".

Logic Manipulation and Law Manipulation Interact Differently​

Most importantly, in the end, we need to treat Logic Manipulation as a different ability, so listing it as such will simply spare us the trouble of asking "is this Law Manipulation also Logic Manipulation?" each time.

From a resistance standpoint, things that work on other law manipulation wouldn't work on logic manipulation. If you can resist changes to the laws of nature, or to things like magically enforced laws such as the sword which has the "rule" that only the chosen one can unsheath it, that does not at all imply that you could resist Logic Manipulation. In fact, one of the common reasons to resist these things is by being a creature that is beyond such laws and governs them from above... and that virtually never includes logic. Most law-transcending beings still are bound to act in the confines of logic. It's treated as a different metaphysical aspect, usually.

Same from a nullification standpoint. You have an ability with feats of nullifying law manipulation? Or perhaps one that has a statement of being able to nullify all laws, both natural and magical? That would not be enough to conclude that Logic Manipulation would be nullified. There is a big difference between negating a power that makes gravity or souls work differently and negating a power that can decide to paradoxically continue working after nullification, because paradoxes are real. Like, for all the reasons you wouldn't assume causality manipulation is nullified by regular law manipulation nullification, logic manipulation wouldn't be nullified either.

And the verse is also true. Logic Manipulation has little to do with other laws, so resisting or nullifying that would be weak grounds to say other laws are affected.


Hence, if we didn't list Logic Manipulation as separate, we would always need to judge whether Law Manipulation is Logic Manipulation in order to understand how it interacts with other powers. It doesn't seem easier on the discourse to not have that clarified on the actual profile. Doubly so if we actually have standards for Logic Manipulation, as suggested in the first section. Because at that point, even listing "Can manipulate logic" wouldn't answer whether it meets Logic Manipulation standards, prompting debate every time the character is used.

It seems far more convenient to have an actual signifier for "is Logic Manipulation according to our standards". And the way we would do that would either be to have a Logic Manipulation page or, as Antvasima suggested, have Logic as a type of Law Manipulation.

I think the page is a more elegant solution. If we had just a type, we would have two types "Type 1 (everything else)" and "Type 2 (Logic)". It would still require us to debate what is Logic Manipulation and what not, but be less elegant, still have the explanations on the same page, and require us to ass Type 1 to the majority of not Logic Manipulation profiles. It's better than not making a distinction at all, to be clear, but I think it's a better solution to split the page off.

Part 2: The High 1-A+ Stuff​

So, to start this section, let's document that, in my understanding, everyone is fine with "real" logic as a whole being High 1-A+ stuff. The debate is not about whether logic as such has that ranking, but if and when a logic manipulation ability would tier-wise scale to the ranking of "real" logic instead of scaling to some more limited kind of logic.

It's Weird to Default to Doubting That Something Is the Thing It Says It Is​

I don’t think it’s reasonable to default to the assumption that something affected by logic manipulation isn’t "real" logic - especially when it's explicitly stated to be.

If an author says logic itself is being altered, that should be accepted unless contradicted by other evidence. And that contradiction can't come from just the ability existing. Dismissing it outright would be akin to saying the power is logically impossible, and thus automatically invalid, essentially banning the ability through skepticism alone. There is something called "suspension of disbelief" and we should use it to at least such an extent as that we can, in principle, believe the ability to exist if it is described to.

As a metaphor, let's consider a magically summoned fireball. One could argue that it should be "fake fire", because real fire burns some chemical while a magical fireball just burns without such a process. One could then go and say that, since the way the creation of the fireball was done isn't realistic, we shouldn't assume it to have the temperature of actual fire - it could even be cold instead. And fiction does give us actual examples of magical fire that freezes things.
Yet we wouldn't do that. If an author writes of magically created fire, we assume that the circumstances of its magical creation don't influence its properties. We start with the assumption that the thing described as fire is actual fire until proven otherwise, even if created via an impossible process.

And logic manipulation should be the same. We can have a debate on whether logic being manipulated is an anti-feat in itself, but as far as I am concerned the conclusion is irrelevant. We should suspend our disbelief to the point where the ability isn't an anti-feat to itself.
Even if logic manipulation makes no sense for actual logic, we should go in and believe that logic means the proper thing despite the impossible supernatural context, up until the properties are contradicted beyond the fundament of the ability itself. Much like how the fireball should be assumed hot as fire until we see it isn't, even if the way it burns making no sense by the laws of nature.
And just as there is freezing fire, there is lower-tier logic manipulation, but that shouldn't be our assumption just from the fact that the thing in question was altered supernaturally.


And just to preemptively address it: This is no contradiction to setting the standards of evidence for logic manipulation mentioned in Part 1. There is a difference between requiring evidence that the word "logic" when used means what we think it does and doubting it after having such evidence just because a power manipulated it.


All in all, I simply think that, as long as we default to logic being High 1-A+, we should default to Logic Manipulation being the same. We can talk about particular showings being anti-feats, but not the very premise of the ability. If it’s stated to affect logic, we start from that point, unless the effects clearly contradict what we know logic to be.

Regarding the Mutability Argument​

We link the idea of logic being High 1-A+ to the set of all possible worlds: Affecting all possible worlds is High 1-A+. The definition of "possible" is "abides by the laws of logic", therefore, changing the laws of logic affects all worlds. Hence, we get High 1-A+.

Agnaa argues that the set of all possible worlds is immutable. That true logic manipulation, of the High 1-A+ kind, would alter it. So to avoid that contradiction, it only makes sense to assume that logic manipulation doesn't actually alter "real" logic, but only laws that we assumed were logic but aren't.

The argument he brings forth for the set of all possible worlds being immutable isn't all that wrong. Let me quote it.

That's not real mutability. From outside of time, you can have worlds A, B, and world X, which changes from world A to world B halfway through its existence. From outside of time, these are distinct, as X always has the property of changing. But if one were to change X outside of time to always be world A, then it would no longer be distinct from world A, and there would be a gap left by world X in the set of all possible worlds.

This is a simple example, since many layers of "truer time" could exist, but once you reach the truest, it would not be mutable.

In principle, the idea is sound in virtually all cases. However, Logic Manipulation is just the one exception to that.

The problem is that the argument only works if "possible" always means the same thing. In the context of logic, it typically does. If some state of affairs is contradiction-free now, then it will also be later. If it isn't, then it never was. But that is not true if logic itself is being manipulated. Because then what were contradictions once can be made to no longer be contradictions or new logical rules can be added that make new things contradictory.

The word "possible" has different meanings before and after logic manipulation, so the argument that worlds that can be included in the set of all possible worlds must have always been included already doesn't apply.

To maybe put this into less abstract words, let us consider two different systems of logic. Say, standard mathematical logic and intuitionistic logic. You can not argue that the class of all possible worlds in standard mathematical logic must be the same as the class of all possible worlds in intuitionistic logic. In each separately their class of all possible worlds is immutable, as any alteration would already be reflected by an already contained possible world, yes. However, that holds no relevance between the systems, as standard mathematical logic doesn't contain switching to intuitionistic logic as a possibility, because what is non-contradictory in one might not be in the other. Hence, such a change can include worlds into the set that were not in it before.

So, the answer to the question "is the set of all possible worlds changable" depends on which definition of "possible" you use and which actions of "change" you include "changeable":

1. If you mean "possible" by one system of logic and you only allow actions that are allowed in that system of logic, then the set of all possible worlds is immutable.
2. If you mean "possible" by one system of logic, but allow actions beyond that system of logic, such as logic manipulation, then the set of all possible worlds is mutable.
3. If you mean "possible" as in "there is some imaginable system of logic in which this world is not contradictory" then it is immutable even to logic manipulation as every logical system one could manipulate logic into would be covered. (incidentally, this would be identical to just the set of all worlds, logical or not, as no laws of logic is also a system of logic)

Our High 1-A+ definition doesn't mean 3. It's not Meta-logical possibility we talk about.
When we talk about all possible worlds, we mean all possible worlds according to one system of logic (we have not really made a decision on which one, though).
So while immutable to alterations that are logical, it is mutable in regard to alterations of logic itself, as those aren't logical.

As such, all things considered, I don't see a contradiction here. The ability High 1-A+ for manipulating all possible worlds within one logical system, which is not immutable when it comes to actions beyond said system. Affecting all logical systems was never a requirement, and also shouldn't be. (Even Monads couldn't fulfil that)

Regarding Logic Manipulation Being Governed By Causality​

A related argument I wish to refute independently is the idea that logic being manipulated implies logic is governed by cause and effect, and hence should be restricted in scope, just as causality manipulation would be.

First, I disagree with the premise that it means it is governed by causality. This goes back to the "what is the order of metaphysical aspects" debate. As I said on such threads in the past, in principle, one can argue that various metaphysical aspects should govern each other in a circular way. E.g. if there is conceptual manipulation, that means someone causes an effect on concepts, meaning they are governed by causality. However, that means causality has properties and properties come from concepts, so causality is governed by concepts... so what governs which here?
Same for logic. Some would even argue that the law of cause and effect is purely of a logical nature.

In general, don't think it's in line with our usual standard to say that anything that is an ability is automatically governed by causality. We resolve those loops by not defaulting to a specific order of metaphysical aspects and accepting the one a fiction presents to us.

To that comes that, even if we were to accept logic being governed by causality based on this argument, it wouldn't be regular causality. We would be talking about a meta-causality beyond logic, which can facilitate logic switching operations. It doesn’t make sense to apply regular causality standards to something that exists beyond logical structure.

Ultimately, you can not deduce a contradiction to the ranking of Logic Manipulation from an assumed causality that is beyond logic, because it is beyond logic. Remember rule #1 we decided for logic manipulation: No extrapolation based on logically contradictory things.

What Impact Does High 1-A+ Logic Manipulation Actually Have?​

This was also something I debated with Agnaa, so let me briefly go over this.

The practical differences are in my eyes primarily about hax interaction:
Information Manipulation of a (non-smurf) 3D character would usually be assumed to be easily overwritten by a 1-A character. This wouldn't apply for Logic Manipulation (of the non-contradicted High 1-A+ kind) as they would both actually manipulate the High 1-A+ logic. So logic manipulation would be an ability that is completely independent of tiering (outside of cases with anti-feats).

Aside from that, it could be used to scale other things. However, that greatly depends on evaluation. The example I brought up is that one could support feats of governing all concepts being High 1-A+ by finding that they also govern logic. As Agnaa pointed out, the set of all concepts could be considered High 1-A+ anyway, which is true, but often things aren't quite clear cut in practice and supportive evidence helps.
On the other hand, there are of course also cases where something governs logic and one instead finds that to be an anti-feat for High 1-A+ Logic and downgrades the tier of logic manipulation instead. That is also an option. It depends on what makes sense for the metaphysical thing we are talking about and for the setting.

Agnaa asked what I would think about giving a something like an abstract entity that govern logic High 1-A+ durability. In principle, I think that is fine. However, that is mostly a formality. It hardly changes interactions. Like, to manipulate an entity that is logic you will need some logic manipulation anyway, in the same way you need conceptual manipulation to affect an entity embodying a concept. And since that would get the same rank, logic manipulation would work regardless of the tier.
Meanwhile, you can not scale that tier around under normal circumstances. If someone can punch the manifestation of High 1-A+ logic out with their fist, then that is an anti-feat for logic and the durability ranking would be removed instead.
It would only be scalable in cases where something govern the manifestation of logic, but that is just identical to the case of something governing logic, which we discussed in the prior paragraph.

Lastly, there was the question of layers. I see no immediate reason to deviate from our general practice of allowing for the argument of stronger or weaker manipulation. It makes as much and as little sense as it does for other metaphysical aspects IMO. But correct me there if I'm wrong.

Conclusion​

Logic manipulation is a difficult power, and because it’s a difficult power, it deserves its own clearly labeled corner. Compared to other Laws, Logic operates under different assumptions, interacts differently with resistance/nullification, and carries its own unique baggage when it comes to tiering.

On the High 1-A+ front: We currently logic itself as High 1-A+ and as long as we do Logic Manipulation should defaul to to the same until it has at least one anti-feat.
To tier fiction we have to be willing to suspend disbelief to at least the level that the story asks us to. An ability shouldn't serve as anti-feat to itself.
So let's not doubt that magical fire burns. If it says it’s logic, and it behaves like logic, and the author clearly means logic, then we should treat it same as logic.

 

[Agnaa]

I think we should make it a rule to only list Logic Manipulation if there is at least one rule of logic known to have been manipulated.
That's for two reasons:

1. I have gained the impression that many fictions use "logic" when referring to either the laws of nature or concepts. (e.g., "logic of fire" makes next to no sense with the literal sense of the word) It seems reasonable to account for non-literal use of the verse by requiring at least one known clear usecase.
2. Even if we believed something with no known rule of logic broken / manipulated is actual logic manipulation for any reason, it would be pointless to list it: Due to the extrapolation standard I quoted at the start of this section, there would be no relevant application. Say someone creates a fireball via logic manipulation, but it's not clear in which exact way logic manipulation was involved. Then it would make no difference that it was done via logic manipulation. It would, for example, still be just as negatable as usual, since as far as we know the negation can target a part of the process that isn't directly logic manipulation based. Only when we have a word on how the ability was involved, say by manipulating logic to make the fireballs existence a logically inevitable fact, we can actually conclude that regular negation does nothing.

This doesn't seem to line up to me. "This object's existence is a logically inevitable fact" isn't a rule of logic, so I think you'd need to reword things more carefully. Another phrase you used ("requiring at least one known clear usecase") seems better.

These standards need to be visible, and a dedicated Logic Manipulation page would be the logical place to host them. Burying them under Law Manipulation would reduce accessibility and visibility to those not already aware of the standards.

I don't think it's that bad. We've got redirects to catch people who try looking for the Logic Manipulation page (I wonder if those can push people to a specific section of a page).

1-A Tiering Considerations Need Documentation​

This goes in a similar direction as the prior section. Long story short, no matter how we decide on the issue, how Logic Manipulation interacts with the Tiering System is neither trivial nor obvious.

Even if we accept Agnaa's interpretation (i.e. logic = High 1-A+, but Logic Manipulation doesn't automatically grant that), it still requires explanation. And you see the preceding debate. There is enough to be said on the topic.

And if we are to go deeper into the whole conundrum of how illogical things are to be evaluated eventually, a Logic Manipulation page may not be a bad place to list the results of that as well.

I think, regardless, the Tiering System FAQ would be a better place for that.

And also, my view was much harsher than just "Logic Manipulation doesn't automatically grant that";

I kinda fundamentally disagree. If it's a High 1-A+ structure being manipulated, it's the fundamental structure for all possible worlds. If it's possible to mutate that, then it cannot be the fundamental structure for all possible worlds, since both the pre-manipulation set of logic, and the post-manipulation set of logic are possible worlds within that series; there's something more fundamental that allows both to exist. It's more like altering mathematics at that point.

Essentially, I could only see a High 1-A+ rating for logic-based hax being justified if those abilities rely on the state of logic, without relying on it being altered. Such as a character for which them dying is a logical impossibility. But as you mentioned with the invocation of "my opponent existing implies I'm stronger than them", that sort of ability would still be limited by its in-verse showings. And even then, it seems plausible that a truly general precept of logic like that would be able to be bypassed and exploited by other characters (i.e. by changing such an immortal/transcending character to fundamentally be someone else, causing that law of logic to no longer apply to them).

The short version would be "Logic is High 1-A+, but it cannot be manipulated, and abilities which rely on the current state are limited at in-verse showings, rendering this theoretical tiering irrelevant and misleading."

We Already Have Similar Pages Which Are Separate For A Reason​

We already have distinct pages for powers like Mathematics Manipulation and Causality Manipulation, which could be viewed as subsets of Law Manipulation. Logic is even more fundamental—the bedrock beneath mathematics, which underpins physics. It’s odd to separate higher-level abstractions like math and causality but lump logic back under law.

Like, for verses where we have hierarchies of metaphysical aspects, laws are usually ranked far below logic, with logic often being in effect even at the highest level.

This also aligns with philosophical precedent. In theories like Leibniz’s possible worlds, logical possibility serves as the base for any world’s viability. Logic persists even when other laws vary.

And of course, Logic Manipulation has its own unique applications, like affecting nondual entities or changing the scope of "possible worlds".

One of my reasons for not wanting a separate page is due to it having vanishingly few legitimate users. There are 1,561 pages with Law Manip, 136 pages with Math Manip, and 822 pages have Causality Manip. So far you haven't been able to provide a single example; the one linked in your draft no longer has that ability.

And my other reason is that, in all practical cases, it just involves changing the laws which apply to a portion of reality. I reject the application of changing the scope of possible worlds, and I'd say that sufficient Law Manip would work on nondual entities.

No users + no new uses + misleading advice (i.e. saying logic is High 1-A+) = bad idea for a page.

Logic Manipulation and Law Manipulation Interact Differently​

Most importantly, in the end, we need to treat Logic Manipulation as a different ability, so listing it as such will simply spare us the trouble of asking "is this Law Manipulation also Logic Manipulation?" each time.

From a resistance standpoint, things that work on other law manipulation wouldn't work on logic manipulation. If you can resist changes to the laws of nature, or to things like magically enforced laws such as the sword which has the "rule" that only the chosen one can unsheath it, that does not at all imply that you could resist Logic Manipulation. In fact, one of the common reasons to resist these things is by being a creature that is beyond such laws and governs them from above... and that virtually never includes logic. Most law-transcending beings still are bound to act in the confines of logic. It's treated as a different metaphysical aspect, usually.

Same from a nullification standpoint. You have an ability with feats of nullifying law manipulation? Or perhaps one that has a statement of being able to nullify all laws, both natural and magical? That would not be enough to conclude that Logic Manipulation would be nullified. There is a big difference between negating a power that makes gravity or souls work differently and negating a power that can decide to paradoxically continue working after nullification, because paradoxes are real. Like, for all the reasons you wouldn't assume causality manipulation is nullified by regular law manipulation nullification, logic manipulation wouldn't be nullified either.

And the verse is also true. Logic Manipulation has little to do with other laws, so resisting or nullifying that would be weak grounds to say other laws are affected.


Hence, if we didn't list Logic Manipulation as separate, we would always need to judge whether Law Manipulation is Logic Manipulation in order to understand how it interacts with other powers. It doesn't seem easier on the discourse to not have that clarified on the actual profile. Doubly so if we actually have standards for Logic Manipulation, as suggested in the first section. Because at that point, even listing "Can manipulate logic" wouldn't answer whether it meets Logic Manipulation standards, prompting debate every time the character is used.

It seems far more convenient to have an actual signifier for "is Logic Manipulation according to our standards". And the way we would do that would either be to have a Logic Manipulation page or, as Antvasima suggested, have Logic as a type of Law Manipulation.

I think the page is a more elegant solution. If we had just a type, we would have two types "Type 1 (everything else)" and "Type 2 (Logic)". It would still require us to debate what is Logic Manipulation and what not, but be less elegant, still have the explanations on the same page, and require us to ass Type 1 to the majority of not Logic Manipulation profiles. It's better than not making a distinction at all, to be clear, but I think it's a better solution to split the page off.

I don't think this is actually more different than the existing variation between which cases of law manip are resisted by other characters. I don't think we should automatically say that "logic manip" trumps all other laws without supplementary context for that, as I don't believe it legitimately involves altering a High 1-A+ structure.

It's Weird to Default to Doubting That Something Is the Thing It Says It Is​

I don’t think it’s reasonable to default to the assumption that something affected by logic manipulation isn’t "real" logic - especially when it's explicitly stated to be.

If an author says logic itself is being altered, that should be accepted unless contradicted by other evidence. And that contradiction can't come from just the ability existing. Dismissing it outright would be akin to saying the power is logically impossible, and thus automatically invalid, essentially banning the ability through skepticism alone. There is something called "suspension of disbelief" and we should use it to at least such an extent as that we can, in principle, believe the ability to exist if it is described to.

All in all, I simply think that, as long as we default to logic being High 1-A+, we should default to Logic Manipulation being the same. We can talk about particular showings being anti-feats, but not the very premise of the ability. If it’s stated to affect logic, we start from that point, unless the effects clearly contradict what we know logic to be.

I believe the very premise goes against the fundamentals of the highest echelon of our Tiering System, but I can see you go onto that in the next section.

Still, for this, I made this exact same appeal during the Tiering System revisions, and people said "No, we should doubt fiction and insist that Monads are the highest possible beings, and that they cannot be surpassed."

Regarding the Mutability Argument​

We link the idea of logic being High 1-A+ to the set of all possible worlds: Affecting all possible worlds is High 1-A+. The definition of "possible" is "abides by the laws of logic", therefore, changing the laws of logic affects all worlds. Hence, we get High 1-A+.

Agnaa argues that the set of all possible worlds is immutable. That true logic manipulation, of the High 1-A+ kind, would alter it. So to avoid that contradiction, it only makes sense to assume that logic manipulation doesn't actually alter "real" logic, but only laws that we assumed were logic but aren't.

The argument he brings forth for the set of all possible worlds being immutable isn't all that wrong. Let me quote it.

In principle, the idea is sound in virtually all cases. However, Logic Manipulation is just the one exception to that.

The problem is that the argument only works if "possible" always means the same thing. In the context of logic, it typically does. If some state of affairs is contradiction-free now, then it will also be later. If it isn't, then it never was. But that is not true if logic itself is being manipulated. Because then what were contradictions once can be made to no longer be contradictions or new logical rules can be added that make new things contradictory.

The word "possible" has different meanings before and after logic manipulation, so the argument that worlds that can be included in the set of all possible worlds must have always been included already doesn't apply.

To maybe put this into less abstract words, let us consider two different systems of logic. Say, standard mathematical logic and intuitionistic logic. You can not argue that the class of all possible worlds in standard mathematical logic must be the same as the class of all possible worlds in intuitionistic logic. In each separately their class of all possible worlds is immutable, as any alteration would already be reflected by an already contained possible world, yes. However, that holds no relevance between the systems, as standard mathematical logic doesn't contain switching to intuitionistic logic as a possibility, because what is non-contradictory in one might not be in the other. Hence, such a change can include worlds into the set that were not in it before.

So, the answer to the question "is the set of all possible worlds changable" depends on which definition of "possible" you use and which actions of "change" you include "changeable":

1. If you mean "possible" by one system of logic and you only allow actions that are allowed in that system of logic, then the set of all possible worlds is immutable.
2. If you mean "possible" by one system of logic, but allow actions beyond that system of logic, such as logic manipulation, then the set of all possible worlds is mutable.
3. If you mean "possible" as in "there is some imaginable system of logic in which this world is not contradictory" then it is immutable even to logic manipulation as every logical system one could manipulate logic into would be covered. (incidentally, this would be identical to just the set of all worlds, logical or not, as no laws of logic is also a system of logic)

Our High 1-A+ definition doesn't mean 3. It's not Meta-logical possibility we talk about.
When we talk about all possible worlds, we mean all possible worlds according to one system of logic (we have not really made a decision on which one, though).
So while immutable to alterations that are logical, it is mutable in regard to alterations of logic itself, as those aren't logical.

As such, all things considered, I don't see a contradiction here. The ability High 1-A+ for manipulating all possible worlds within one logical system, which is not immutable when it comes to actions beyond said system. Affecting all logical systems was never a requirement, and also shouldn't be. (Even Monads couldn't fulfil that)

Our High 1-A+ definition says that 1, 2, and 3 are equivalent, but that in each of those cases, those later cases are theoretically accessible without representing physically meaningful things, and so they don't actually exist. But if we altered our interpretation of which of these are physically meaningful, then beings which encompass/ground any of those would be able to encompass/ground the others to exactly the same extent.

If multiple of those are shown to exist in one verse, then that demonstrates that the later cases are physically meaningful. And so, we downgrade anything which scales to the lower cases. That's why we don't have different levels of strength among the second type of High 1-A+, or in Tier 0. And I believe this would hit Logic Manipulation too, since if the set of "possible worlds" is mutable, then that means the true ultimate possibility space is meta-logical, and so only that would be High 1-A+, and so those logic users would be downgraded.

I'd hope you see the issue with the thing you're suggesting; if you say that the third type of High 1-A+ is something impossible for even Tier 0s, then where would we rate characters who scale to that, by embodying/grounding such a system? And how would we square that with the dogmatic insistence we place that nothing can be above Monads at all?

What Impact Does High 1-A+ Logic Manipulation Actually Have?​

This was also something I debated with Agnaa, so let me briefly go over this.

The practical differences are in my eyes primarily about hax interaction:
Information Manipulation of a (non-smurf) 3D character would usually be assumed to be easily overwritten by a 1-A character. This wouldn't apply for Logic Manipulation (of the non-contradicted High 1-A+ kind) as they would both actually manipulate the High 1-A+ logic. So logic manipulation would be an ability that is completely independent of tiering (outside of cases with anti-feats).

Aside from that, it could be used to scale other things. However, that greatly depends on evaluation. The example I brought up is that one could support feats of governing all concepts being High 1-A+ by finding that they also govern logic. As Agnaa pointed out, the set of all concepts could be considered High 1-A+ anyway, which is true, but often things aren't quite clear cut in practice and supportive evidence helps.
On the other hand, there are of course also cases where something governs logic and one instead finds that to be an anti-feat for High 1-A+ Logic and downgrades the tier of logic manipulation instead. That is also an option. It depends on what makes sense for the metaphysical thing we are talking about and for the setting.

Agnaa asked what I would think about giving a something like an abstract entity that govern logic High 1-A+ durability. In principle, I think that is fine. However, that is mostly a formality. It hardly changes interactions. Like, to manipulate an entity that is logic you will need some logic manipulation anyway, in the same way you need conceptual manipulation to affect an entity embodying a concept. And since that would get the same rank, logic manipulation would work regardless of the tier.
Meanwhile, you can not scale that tier around under normal circumstances. If someone can punch the manifestation of High 1-A+ logic out with their fist, then that is an anti-feat for logic and the durability ranking would be removed instead.
It would only be scalable in cases where something govern the manifestation of logic, but that is just identical to the case of something governing logic, which we discussed in the prior paragraph.

Lastly, there was the question of layers. I see no immediate reason to deviate from our general practice of allowing for the argument of stronger or weaker manipulation. It makes as much and as little sense as it does for other metaphysical aspects IMO. But correct me there if I'm wrong.

I do think that there is kinda of an issue here, since this would involve the second type of High 1-A+ (embodying all possible worlds), rather than the first type of High 1-A+ (being able to affect arbitrarily many worlds), and we don't allow any power variation in the second type.

 

[Ultima_Reality]

Restarting the discussion, eh. Alright, so:

I said I would get back to this on Easter at the latest. It's Easter. So I get back to this. Good thing Easter is a range of days lol
I mean, which day is more fitting for this than one dedicated to a god some argue can manipulate logic? Well, maybe the birthday of Kurt Gödel, one of the most influential logicians ever, but for that we would have had to wait for another week... maybe we can finish this debate on that day...

I will keep this in two parts. In the first part, I will argue in favour of the page existing. In the second part, I will argue about the High 1-A stuff.
For the latter, I will try to keep things focused on established facts, but... quite frankly, after rereading the debate, I have a feeling that we might have to branch out into another thread. I have the impression that cases beyond logic were only very briefly discussed during the last tiering revision and that we have no proper rules for such cases written down. I believe a reexamination of how to integrate these things into the system may be inevitable. But I will try to see if we can reach a conclusion here without having to talk about considerations pertaining to Monads, logic surpassing R>F and other such topics. If not, I guess I will make that thread at some point.

Part 1: Why Logic Manipulation should be an ability​

Special Standards Need To Be Documented​

Logic Manipulation operates under unique constraints and freedoms that warrant dedicated documentation. It already requires tighter limitations on extrapolation, as noted:


Also already touched upon is that it can pose an exception to virtually any rule. E.g. A logic manipulator bypassing a R>F difference isn’t an anti-feat to it because logic manipulation, by its nature, is allowed to violate foundational assumptions. At least as long as it is explicitely enough stated to work by logic manipulation.

A third standard is a new one I would wish to suggest due to numerous questions regarding "is this logic manipulation?" I have received on my wall.
I think we should make it a rule to only list Logic Manipulation if there is at least one rule of logic known to have been manipulated.
That's for two reasons:

1. I have gained the impression that many fictions use "logic" when referring to either the laws of nature or concepts. (e.g., "logic of fire" makes next to no sense with the literal sense of the word) It seems reasonable to account for non-literal use of the verse by requiring at least one known clear usecase.
2. Even if we believed something with no known rule of logic broken / manipulated is actual logic manipulation for any reason, it would be pointless to list it: Due to the extrapolation standard I quoted at the start of this section, there would be no relevant application. Say someone creates a fireball via logic manipulation, but it's not clear in which exact way logic manipulation was involved. Then it would make no difference that it was done via logic manipulation. It would, for example, still be just as negatable as usual, since as far as we know the negation can target a part of the process that isn't directly logic manipulation based. Only when we have a word on how the ability was involved, say by manipulating logic to make the fireballs existence a logically inevitable fact, we can actually conclude that regular negation does nothing.

These standards need to be visible, and a dedicated Logic Manipulation page would be the logical place to host them. Burying them under Law Manipulation would reduce accessibility and visibility to those not already aware of the standards.

1-A Tiering Considerations Need Documentation​

This goes in a similar direction as the prior section. Long story short, no matter how we decide on the issue, how Logic Manipulation interacts with the Tiering System is neither trivial nor obvious.

Even if we accept Agnaa's interpretation (i.e. logic = High 1-A+, but Logic Manipulation doesn't automatically grant that), it still requires explanation. And you see the preceding debate. There is enough to be said on the topic.

And if we are to go deeper into the whole conundrum of how illogical things are to be evaluated eventually, a Logic Manipulation page may not be a bad place to list the results of that as well.

We Already Have Similar Pages Which Are Separate For A Reason​

We already have distinct pages for powers like Mathematics Manipulation and Causality Manipulation, which could be viewed as subsets of Law Manipulation. Logic is even more fundamental—the bedrock beneath mathematics, which underpins physics. It’s odd to separate higher-level abstractions like math and causality but lump logic back under law.

Like, for verses where we have hierarchies of metaphysical aspects, laws are usually ranked far below logic, with logic often being in effect even at the highest level.

This also aligns with philosophical precedent. In theories like Leibniz’s possible worlds, logical possibility serves as the base for any world’s viability. Logic persists even when other laws vary.

And of course, Logic Manipulation has its own unique applications, like affecting nondual entities or changing the scope of "possible worlds".

Logic Manipulation and Law Manipulation Interact Differently​

Most importantly, in the end, we need to treat Logic Manipulation as a different ability, so listing it as such will simply spare us the trouble of asking "is this Law Manipulation also Logic Manipulation?" each time.

From a resistance standpoint, things that work on other law manipulation wouldn't work on logic manipulation. If you can resist changes to the laws of nature, or to things like magically enforced laws such as the sword which has the "rule" that only the chosen one can unsheath it, that does not at all imply that you could resist Logic Manipulation. In fact, one of the common reasons to resist these things is by being a creature that is beyond such laws and governs them from above... and that virtually never includes logic. Most law-transcending beings still are bound to act in the confines of logic. It's treated as a different metaphysical aspect, usually.

Same from a nullification standpoint. You have an ability with feats of nullifying law manipulation? Or perhaps one that has a statement of being able to nullify all laws, both natural and magical? That would not be enough to conclude that Logic Manipulation would be nullified. There is a big difference between negating a power that makes gravity or souls work differently and negating a power that can decide to paradoxically continue working after nullification, because paradoxes are real. Like, for all the reasons you wouldn't assume causality manipulation is nullified by regular law manipulation nullification, logic manipulation wouldn't be nullified either.

And the verse is also true. Logic Manipulation has little to do with other laws, so resisting or nullifying that would be weak grounds to say other laws are affected.


Hence, if we didn't list Logic Manipulation as separate, we would always need to judge whether Law Manipulation is Logic Manipulation in order to understand how it interacts with other powers. It doesn't seem easier on the discourse to not have that clarified on the actual profile. Doubly so if we actually have standards for Logic Manipulation, as suggested in the first section. Because at that point, even listing "Can manipulate logic" wouldn't answer whether it meets Logic Manipulation standards, prompting debate every time the character is used.

It seems far more convenient to have an actual signifier for "is Logic Manipulation according to our standards". And the way we would do that would either be to have a Logic Manipulation page or, as Antvasima suggested, have Logic as a type of Law Manipulation.

I think the page is a more elegant solution. If we had just a type, we would have two types "Type 1 (everything else)" and "Type 2 (Logic)". It would still require us to debate what is Logic Manipulation and what not, but be less elegant, still have the explanations on the same page, and require us to ass Type 1 to the majority of not Logic Manipulation profiles. It's better than not making a distinction at all, to be clear, but I think it's a better solution to split the page off.

Part 2: The High 1-A+ Stuff​

So, to start this section, let's document that, in my understanding, everyone is fine with "real" logic as a whole being High 1-A+ stuff. The debate is not about whether logic as such has that ranking, but if and when a logic manipulation ability would tier-wise scale to the ranking of "real" logic instead of scaling to some more limited kind of logic.

It's Weird to Default to Doubting That Something Is the Thing It Says It Is​

I don’t think it’s reasonable to default to the assumption that something affected by logic manipulation isn’t "real" logic - especially when it's explicitly stated to be.

If an author says logic itself is being altered, that should be accepted unless contradicted by other evidence. And that contradiction can't come from just the ability existing. Dismissing it outright would be akin to saying the power is logically impossible, and thus automatically invalid, essentially banning the ability through skepticism alone. There is something called "suspension of disbelief" and we should use it to at least such an extent as that we can, in principle, believe the ability to exist if it is described to.

As a metaphor, let's consider a magically summoned fireball. One could argue that it should be "fake fire", because real fire burns some chemical while a magical fireball just burns without such a process. One could then go and say that, since the way the creation of the fireball was done isn't realistic, we shouldn't assume it to have the temperature of actual fire - it could even be cold instead. And fiction does give us actual examples of magical fire that freezes things.
Yet we wouldn't do that. If an author writes of magically created fire, we assume that the circumstances of its magical creation don't influence its properties. We start with the assumption that the thing described as fire is actual fire until proven otherwise, even if created via an impossible process.

And logic manipulation should be the same. We can have a debate on whether logic being manipulated is an anti-feat in itself, but as far as I am concerned the conclusion is irrelevant. We should suspend our disbelief to the point where the ability isn't an anti-feat to itself.
Even if logic manipulation makes no sense for actual logic, we should go in and believe that logic means the proper thing despite the impossible supernatural context, up until the properties are contradicted beyond the fundament of the ability itself. Much like how the fireball should be assumed hot as fire until we see it isn't, even if the way it burns making no sense by the laws of nature.
And just as there is freezing fire, there is lower-tier logic manipulation, but that shouldn't be our assumption just from the fact that the thing in question was altered supernaturally.


And just to preemptively address it: This is no contradiction to setting the standards of evidence for logic manipulation mentioned in Part 1. There is a difference between requiring evidence that the word "logic" when used means what we think it does and doubting it after having such evidence just because a power manipulated it.


All in all, I simply think that, as long as we default to logic being High 1-A+, we should default to Logic Manipulation being the same. We can talk about particular showings being anti-feats, but not the very premise of the ability. If it’s stated to affect logic, we start from that point, unless the effects clearly contradict what we know logic to be.

Regarding the Mutability Argument​

We link the idea of logic being High 1-A+ to the set of all possible worlds: Affecting all possible worlds is High 1-A+. The definition of "possible" is "abides by the laws of logic", therefore, changing the laws of logic affects all worlds. Hence, we get High 1-A+.

Agnaa argues that the set of all possible worlds is immutable. That true logic manipulation, of the High 1-A+ kind, would alter it. So to avoid that contradiction, it only makes sense to assume that logic manipulation doesn't actually alter "real" logic, but only laws that we assumed were logic but aren't.

The argument he brings forth for the set of all possible worlds being immutable isn't all that wrong. Let me quote it.

In principle, the idea is sound in virtually all cases. However, Logic Manipulation is just the one exception to that.

The problem is that the argument only works if "possible" always means the same thing. In the context of logic, it typically does. If some state of affairs is contradiction-free now, then it will also be later. If it isn't, then it never was. But that is not true if logic itself is being manipulated. Because then what were contradictions once can be made to no longer be contradictions or new logical rules can be added that make new things contradictory.

The word "possible" has different meanings before and after logic manipulation, so the argument that worlds that can be included in the set of all possible worlds must have always been included already doesn't apply.

To maybe put this into less abstract words, let us consider two different systems of logic. Say, standard mathematical logic and intuitionistic logic. You can not argue that the class of all possible worlds in standard mathematical logic must be the same as the class of all possible worlds in intuitionistic logic. In each separately their class of all possible worlds is immutable, as any alteration would already be reflected by an already contained possible world, yes. However, that holds no relevance between the systems, as standard mathematical logic doesn't contain switching to intuitionistic logic as a possibility, because what is non-contradictory in one might not be in the other. Hence, such a change can include worlds into the set that were not in it before.

So, the answer to the question "is the set of all possible worlds changable" depends on which definition of "possible" you use and which actions of "change" you include "changeable":

1. If you mean "possible" by one system of logic and you only allow actions that are allowed in that system of logic, then the set of all possible worlds is immutable.
2. If you mean "possible" by one system of logic, but allow actions beyond that system of logic, such as logic manipulation, then the set of all possible worlds is mutable.
3. If you mean "possible" as in "there is some imaginable system of logic in which this world is not contradictory" then it is immutable even to logic manipulation as every logical system one could manipulate logic into would be covered. (incidentally, this would be identical to just the set of all worlds, logical or not, as no laws of logic is also a system of logic)

Our High 1-A+ definition doesn't mean 3. It's not Meta-logical possibility we talk about.
When we talk about all possible worlds, we mean all possible worlds according to one system of logic (we have not really made a decision on which one, though).
So while immutable to alterations that are logical, it is mutable in regard to alterations of logic itself, as those aren't logical.

As such, all things considered, I don't see a contradiction here. The ability High 1-A+ for manipulating all possible worlds within one logical system, which is not immutable when it comes to actions beyond said system. Affecting all logical systems was never a requirement, and also shouldn't be. (Even Monads couldn't fulfil that)

EhhhhHHHHHHHHHHHH... I'm sympathetic to this proposal. I really am, but a big issue I have with Logic Manipulation as an ability tout court is how it's one of those things that, by nature, can't be consistent with themselves.

To draw from the argument I've made earlier in this thread: Take the law of non-contradiction, for example. At bottom it's just the affirmation of "A ≠ ~A." That is to say: A thing is not what it is not. Or, in logical terms, that a proposition is distinct from its negation. With that in mind, it's patently clear that it's impossible to write a feat where the LNC is ever actually defied. Because the very distinction between the LNC being messed with and the LNC not being messed with is, itself, already an instance of the LNC.

So as I see it, it's an identical issue with having a tier exclusively for apophatic theology (of the most extreme possible variety, that is. Because Tier 0 as of right now already is apophatic in a sense). In there, it's "You can't make any true statement about God." But this obviously falls under performative contradiction, since, in saying we can't make any true statements about the thing, we are making a true statement about the thing. Similarly: Here, in claiming to mess with logic, we are presupposing that logic is intact for the scenario itself to work. Don't think this really works for a fictional-tiering system. And I don't think the magical fire analogy works because magical fire never actually contradicts itself in being shown or affirmed, unlike this, it only contradicts physical laws.

Now, there's this bit here that to my mind is of interest:

If you mean "possible" as in "there is some imaginable system of logic in which this world is not contradictory" then it is immutable even to logic manipulation as every logical system one could manipulate logic into would be covered. (incidentally, this would be identical to just the set of all worlds, logical or not, as no laws of logic is also a system of logic)

Seems you're agreeing that, once we "zoom out" enough, we reach an all-encompassing viewpoint where there is nothing else to cover and alteration is impossible. And further you seem to agree that negating logic altogether is not possible ("No laws of logic is also a system of logic"). My contention is that this already holds true right at the law of non-contradiction (In other words, all possible logical systems necessarily assume the form of LNC in its most basic form, even paraconsistent ones, so the seemingly most ordinary logical law is actually "meta-logical" by your standards), so I don't think Logic Manipulation fares very well as a High 1-A+ ability if the paradigmatic example of a Logic Maniplation feat can already be shown to be impossible.

(FWIW, when I wrote the Tiering System, I assumed only the three classical laws for the definition of High 1-A+, also).

Now, with this out of the way: You could probably say that Logic Manipulation doesn't need to stretch that far to count as High 1-A+. That is: You don't need to warp the LNC itself, just some other less extensive logical law that only covers a single possible system of logic and that'd still suffice for High 1-A+. In which case... Maybe, yeah. I'd have to think further on it. The problems that arise there are less to do with the idea itself and more with the fact that the Tiering System is a bit cramped as it stands, in that it puts Tier 0 at the top and then defines High 1-A+ backwards from it as "The space of everything the Monad can produce." But obviously if the Monad grounds logic itself and we accept alternate logical systems as possible, then it encompasses not one possible system, but all of them. So the system just isn't fine-grained enough for this at present.

(Which btw is also why I disagree with saying that Tier 0s wouldn't encompass the "meta-logical" landscape you describe. Once you arrive at the idea that even logic itself is grounded in their nature as an expression of it, then they ipso facto are also the ground of discourse itself, not this or that particular system of discourse. Not really uncommon nor even particularly hard to formulate. For example here's Vittorio Hösle's idea of God as "the ingathering of all a priori truths." If this showed up in a verse I'd gladly accept it as absolutely all-encompassing in scope, for reasons already outlined)

 

[DontTalkDT]

This doesn't seem to line up to me. "This object's existence is a logically inevitable fact" isn't a rule of logic, so I think you'd need to reword things more carefully. Another phrase you used ("requiring at least one known clear usecase") seems better.

The problem with "requiring at least one known clear usecase" is that one may argue that "my magic involves logic manipulation to create a fireball by unspecified means" is a use case, which isn't the intention here. The idea is that one can point to one thing that actually changed about logic itself.

When I talk about "manipulating logic to make the fireballs existence a logically inevitable fact" I mean "creating an inference rule that states P(x) => T, where P is "the fireball exists under circumstances x" or something. Maybe not the best example, yes. I should perhaps point to a clearer one, like, altering the law of excluded middle to survive an attack by being neither hit nor not hit by it... or something like that.

I guess for the rule the formulation one could put it tighter as "In order for Logic Manipulation to be listed, there needs to be at least one specific known change to logic itself which the character can accomplish via the ability." Or something in that direction.

I don't think it's that bad. We've got redirects to catch people who try looking for the Logic Manipulation page (I wonder if those can push people to a specific section of a page).

I mean, they can. But quite frankly, I don't see the gain of making logic manipulation exist in all ways except being actually separate, when that is the easier and cleaner solution.
Like, the search lists logic manipulation, logic manipulation has its own area, logic manipulation is separately noted on profiles ideally... that is just treating it as a separate ability already.

I mean, if you come from that angle, what's your stance on doing it as a separate type of law manipulation like Antvasima suggested? I think it's the inferior option, but it seems to go into your ballpark.

I think, regardless, the Tiering System FAQ would be a better place for that.

Depends for which part of it IMO. Considerations more relevant for the users of the ability would go better on an ability page, while considerations more relevant to tiering itself would go more on the FAQ page. With cross-reference links between both.

And also, my view was much harsher than just "Logic Manipulation doesn't automatically grant that";

I know, but giving an in-depth summary of the position wasn't really the point. Just that there is much to be written down.

One of my reasons for not wanting a separate page is due to it having vanishingly few legitimate users. There are 1,561 pages with Law Manip, 136 pages with Math Manip, and 822 pages have Causality Manip. So far you haven't been able to provide a single example; the one linked in your draft no longer has that ability.

No, as said, they still have that. The thread you mentioned wasn't about it not being logic, it was that it shouldn't be listed as logic manipulation because we currently list that as law manipulation. Like, the profile still mentions logic being manipulated quite a number of times, but now explained under the umbrella of law & concept manipulation, instead of as a separate ability, as our current standards don't allow logic manipulation as separate ability.

Second example would be Kawakami-verse.

I want to say White Queen for third, but by the new standard she actually falls through, as she is just vaguely above logic, such that nothing is impossible to her, without specific manipulation (and it's not the High 1-A+ kind of logic anyway).

I would imagine a number of the verses having nonduality also feature it, considering how closely related those things are, but I don't really know those verses tbh.

I don't think this is actually more different than the existing variation between which cases of law manip are resisted by other characters. I don't think we should automatically say that "logic manip" trumps all other laws without supplementary context for that, as I don't believe it legitimately involves altering a High 1-A+ structure.

It "trumping" other laws wasn't the point, nor even part of the reasoning I provided. I, by all means, meant for those interactions to work that way even for the cases that aren't High 1-A+ due to anti-feat. It's a matter of being a different category from a metaphysical standpoint.

As such I would like you to explain more how you think interactions between logic manipulation and law manipulation would work and why. Or why you think that statements of "all laws" would usually include logic manipulation, assuming you reject that point of mine as well.

I believe the very premise goes against the fundamentals of the highest echelon of our Tiering System, but I can see you go onto that in the next section.

Still, for this, I made this exact same appeal during the Tiering System revisions, and people said "No, we should doubt fiction and insist that Monads are the highest possible beings, and that they cannot be surpassed."

Our High 1-A+ definition says that 1, 2, and 3 are equivalent, but that in each of those cases, those later cases are theoretically accessible without representing physically meaningful things, and so they don't actually exist. But if we altered our interpretation of which of these are physically meaningful, then beings which encompass/ground any of those would be able to encompass/ground the others to exactly the same extent.

If multiple of those are shown to exist in one verse, then that demonstrates that the later cases are physically meaningful. And so, we downgrade anything which scales to the lower cases. That's why we don't have different levels of strength among the second type of High 1-A+, or in Tier 0. And I believe this would hit Logic Manipulation too, since if the set of "possible worlds" is mutable, then that means the true ultimate possibility space is meta-logical, and so only that would be High 1-A+, and so those logic users would be downgraded.

I'd hope you see the issue with the thing you're suggesting; if you say that the third type of High 1-A+ is something impossible for even Tier 0s, then where would we rate characters who scale to that, by embodying/grounding such a system? And how would we square that with the dogmatic insistence we place that nothing can be above Monads at all?

Well, quite frankly, I hoped to settle this debate without having to clarify the entire interaction of the tiering system with logic. I suppose it seems like I won't get around it, though. I guess I will make a separate thread then, as soon as I figure out how I can formulate these things with proper precision. (Time to pick up a book on formal metalogic, I suppose)

But to point out one thing immediately: Our High 1-A+ definition is by no means 3.
It explictely invokes the laws of thoughts as fundamental to the structure, while 3 goes beyond that.
One can now argue that 3 would receive the same ranking in the current system, as we had the principle to not tier things beyond logic in the tiering system revision, but that isn't really the point of the debate.

That's also the answer to your last question: I do think 3 is beyond Tier 0 beings (or at a minimum the logically consistent kind. Something logical can't have power to a non-logical domain), but I expect that difference to be lost to unquantifiability beyond the parts that abide regular logic. (We will eventually also have to agree on which logic we even wish to use as a default)

I do think that there is kinda of an issue here, since this would involve the second type of High 1-A+ (embodying all possible worlds), rather than the first type of High 1-A+ (being able to affect arbitrarily many worlds), and we don't allow any power variation in the second type.

I don't get that point.

Restarting the discussion, eh.

If you already show up tell me what you wanted to write in my PMs already. I have been waiting months for that

EhhhhHHHHHHHHHHHH... I'm sympathetic to this proposal. I really am, but a big issue I have with Logic Manipulation as an ability tout court is how it's one of those things that, by nature, can't be consistent with themselves.

To draw from the argument I've made earlier in this thread: Take the law of non-contradiction, for example. At bottom it's just the affirmation of "A ≠ ~A." That is to say: A thing is not what it is not. Or, in logical terms, that a proposition is distinct from its negation. With that in mind, it's patently clear that it's impossible to write a feat where the LNC is ever actually defied. Because the very distinction between the LNC being messed with and the LNC not being messed with is, itself, already an instance of the LNC.

So as I see it, it's an identical issue with having a tier exclusively for apophatic theology (of the most extreme possible variety, that is. Because Tier 0 as of right now already is apophatic in a sense). In there, it's "You can't make any true statement about God." But this obviously falls under performative contradiction, since, in saying we can't make any true statements about the thing, we are making a true statement about the thing. Similarly: Here, in claiming to mess with logic, we are presupposing that logic is intact for the scenario itself to work. Don't think this really works for a fictional-tiering system. And I don't think the magical fire analogy works because magical fire never actually contradicts itself in being shown or affirmed, unlike this, it only contradicts physical laws.

Metalogical formal discourse solves that problem.
The distinction between object language and metalanguage is to be strictly maintained.

I mean, really, there are enough adherents of intuitionist logic to make it clear that it is not that easily debunked.

And further you seem to agree that negating logic altogether is not possible ("No laws of logic is also a system of logic"). My contention is that this already holds true right at the law of non-contradiction (In other words, all possible logical systems necessarily assume the form of LNC in its most basic form, even paraconsistent ones, so the seemingly most ordinary logical law is actually "meta-logical" by your standards), so I don't think Logic Manipulation fares very well as a High 1-A+ ability if the paradigmatic example of a Logic Maniplation feat can already be shown to be impossible.

No, they factually do not all admit to the law of non-contradiction. Easy example: Trivialism when viewed with classical logic as the metalanguage, is easily seen to not assume LNC.

Now, with this out of the way: You could probably say that Logic Manipulation doesn't need to stretch that far to count as High 1-A+. That is: You don't need to warp the LNC itself, just some other less extensive logical law that only covers a single possible system of logic and that'd still suffice for High 1-A+. In which case... Maybe, yeah. I'd have to think further on it. The problems that arise there are less to do with the idea itself and more with the fact that the Tiering System is a bit cramped as it stands, in that it puts Tier 0 at the top and then defines High 1-A+ backwards from it as "The space of everything the Monad can produce." But obviously if the Monad grounds logic itself and we accept alternate logical systems as possible, then it encompasses not one possible system, but all of them. So the system just isn't fine-grained enough for this at present.

(Which btw is also why I disagree with saying that Tier 0s wouldn't encompass the "meta-logical" landscape you describe. Once you arrive at the idea that even logic itself is grounded in their nature as an expression of it, then they ipso facto are also the ground of discourse itself, not this or that particular system of discourse. Not really uncommon nor even particularly hard to formulate. For example here's Vittorio Hösle's idea of God as "the ingathering of all a priori truths." If this showed up in a verse I'd gladly accept it as absolutely all-encompassing in scope, for reasons already outlined)

Not sure why you think your example has relevance for logic systems in general. At the point where it states certain statements are inevitably true, it subscribes to a specific logic system or at least a set of specific logic systems: Those that admit to those statements being necessarily true. Not all systems do (and I say that without even knowing which a priori truths he may be referring to). Whatever he talks about will not even be a well-formed formula in all systems. Much less true given there are logics where all formulas evaluate to false.

Given, positions that argue that certain assumptions are necessarily true no matter what aren't rare, but let's not make the mistake of thinking that those are formally part of all logic systems. These positions merely argue other logics are inherently wrong. (and of course, none of these positions has general acceptance)

---

Overall, I guess we better focus on the page creation bit for now. The High 1-A+ bit seems to require debate on how the tiering system is supposed to interact with logic on a more general plane, so another thread for that needs to be made. Which I will gladly do as soon as I find a good approach and the necessary time to write it.

 

[Agnaa]

The problem with "requiring at least one known clear usecase" is that one may argue that "my magic involves logic manipulation to create a fireball by unspecified means" is a use case, which isn't the intention here. The idea is that one can point to one thing that actually changed about logic itself.

When I talk about "manipulating logic to make the fireballs existence a logically inevitable fact" I mean "creating an inference rule that states P(x) => T, where P is "the fireball exists under circumstances x" or something. Maybe not the best example, yes. I should perhaps point to a clearer one, like, altering the law of excluded middle to survive an attack by being neither hit nor not hit by it... or something like that.

I guess for the rule the formulation one could put it tighter as "In order for Logic Manipulation to be listed, there needs to be at least one specific known change to logic itself which the character can accomplish via the ability." Or something in that direction.

That would be better.

I mean, they can. But quite frankly, I don't see the gain of making logic manipulation exist in all ways except being actually separate, when that is the easier and cleaner solution.
Like, the search lists logic manipulation, logic manipulation has its own area, logic manipulation is separately noted on profiles ideally... that is just treating it as a separate ability already.

I mean, if you come from that angle, what's your stance on doing it as a separate type of law manipulation like Antvasima suggested? I think it's the inferior option, but it seems to go into your ballpark.

Thinking about it big-picture, rather than just responding to isolated segments of your posts, my preferences would be: No Change > In the FAQ > Own Page > Redirected to Section in Law Manip > Type in Law Manip

No, as said, they still have that. The thread you mentioned wasn't about it not being logic, it was that it shouldn't be listed as logic manipulation because we currently list that as law manipulation. Like, the profile still mentions logic being manipulated quite a number of times, but now explained under the umbrella of law & concept manipulation, instead of as a separate ability, as our current standards don't allow logic manipulation as separate ability.

I don't see how this qualifies by the standards you're outlining. It's literally just describing law manip but calling those laws "logic".

"The logic that two identical energies cannot harm each other", that's just a law of how reality works, not a fundamental axiom of logic. "The logic that nothingness cannot be destroyed", same there, "it reduces all logic to nothing" is hopelessly vague wordslop.

Second example would be Kawakami-verse.

Funnily enough, this case seems inferred by the evidence provided there. There simply exists "the concept of allowing contradictions". This concept is not shown to be altered, and it only applies to a portion of reality, evidenced by it being possible while in Low-Gear, but not after the character moved to Top-Gear:

Top-Gear had no contradiction allowance concept, so concept creation was impossible there no matter how much they struggled. Doing so would be playing god, so it was only possible in a world that allowed for anything.

I'm not fully sure that these "Gear"s are meant to be worlds, but it kinda seems like that:

“The ten other worlds and this world are perceived as individual gears and so we refer to them as such. 1st-Gear through 10th-Gear all had their own unique characteristics. And do you know what we called this power of ‘how things are’?” Without waiting for an answer, Ooshiro said, “Concepts. We called them concepts! They are a power that can control even the laws of physics. They are the ultimate reason behind everything. That is what concepts are!”

So you're saying that the fundamental logic that underpins and applies to all possible worlds, and is thus High 1-A+

Only applies to a part of the world

And your evidence for this is that logical contradictions are possible in some places

And thus, that characters which can't even modify that logic in any way, scale to High 1-A+

I hope this page is just unfinished and that there's better evidence for this.

Also, you in that page seem to indicate that there's a bit of a scaling chain of Logic < Concepts < Will (which is used by the weapon Georgius, as well as the 3rd-Gear's gods of war and 5th-Gear's mechanical dragons). Here Will is put into and used to drive machines built by humans and used to destroy cities. Ignoring the anti-feats inherently present on every level of this is ridiculous. You are indicating that there's multiple things scaling above High 1-A+ Type 2, and that these things can be wielded by humans, and yet will only result in meager damage.

It "trumping" other laws wasn't the point, nor even part of the reasoning I provided. I, by all means, meant for those interactions to work that way even for the cases that aren't High 1-A+ due to anti-feat. It's a matter of being a different category from a metaphysical standpoint.

As such I would like you to explain more how you think interactions between logic manipulation and law manipulation would work and why. Or why you think that statements of "all laws" would usually include logic manipulation, assuming you reject that point of mine as well.

I think they're both simply opening the rulebook for reality and rewriting that. Pieces of fiction that explicitly mention "laws of physics" or "laws of logic" are referring to different parts of that book, and so those wouldn't cross over, in the same way that a character who is unaffected by the reaction force would still be affected by gravity. I think we should be willing to generalise that as far as we're willing to generalise general invocations of laws to other physical laws which they haven't explicitly invoked.

Well, quite frankly, I hoped to settle this debate without having to clarify the entire interaction of the tiering system with logic. I suppose it seems like I won't get around it, though. I guess I will make a separate thread then, as soon as I figure out how I can formulate these things with proper precision. (Time to pick up a book on formal metalogic, I suppose)

But to point out one thing immediately: Our High 1-A+ definition is by no means 3.
It explictely invokes the laws of thoughts as fundamental to the structure, while 3 goes beyond that.
One can now argue that 3 would receive the same ranking in the current system, as we had the principle to not tier things beyond logic in the tiering system revision, but that isn't really the point of the debate.

That's also the answer to your last question: I do think 3 is beyond Tier 0 beings (or at a minimum the logically consistent kind. Something logical can't have power to a non-logical domain), but I expect that difference to be lost to unquantifiability beyond the parts that abide regular logic. (We will eventually also have to agree on which logic we even wish to use as a default)

I don't have much to say to this, if you agree that this goes against our current Tiering System. I disagree with both the current Tiering System, and the one that would seemingly come about from your proposed changes.

I don't get that point.

I'm not sure how else to explain that.

When initially determining the Tiering System, we discussed the two potential variations of High 1-A+. Characters who can affect arbitrarily many worlds, and characters who embody all possible worlds. After this discussion, we agreed that for the former type some of those characters could be stronger/weaker than others, but that for the latter type every character from every verse would be the same strength; if a verse said otherwise, that would be treated as a contradiction, and the weaker of those characters would be downgraded.

If you already show up tell me what you wanted to write in my PMs already. I have been waiting months for that

True!

 

[DontTalkDT]

Thinking about it big-picture, rather than just responding to isolated segments of your posts, my preferences would be: No Change > In the FAQ > Own Page > Redirected to Section in Law Manip > Type in Law Manip

No grounds to compromise on then, huh? Too bad.

I don't see how this qualifies by the standards you're outlining. It's literally just describing law manip but calling those laws "logic".

"The logic that two identical energies cannot harm each other", that's just a law of how reality works, not a fundamental axiom of logic. "The logic that nothingness cannot be destroyed", same there, "it reduces all logic to nothing" is hopelessly vague wordslop.

Regarding the "destroying nothingness" one could debate.
However, things I think show that "violating reason" is "violating logic" here are the clear cut cases where it produces logical paradoxes.
Like "perfect test score, while also having wrong answers", "slower things go before faster things", "dodging an attack no longer means you avoided it", "not cutting things doesn't mean you didn't cut them". (especially the latter two)
He evidently selectively abolishes the law of non-contradiction here to establish logic paradoxes, which I think would qualify.
It are examples of specific changes to logic that happen.

(A supporter also wanted me to point out that "Reason" = "Logic" in the verse, but I don't know the deeper context so the relevance of that is for a CRT to determine)

Funnily enough, this case seems inferred by the evidence provided there. There simply exists "the concept of allowing contradictions". This concept is not shown to be altered, and it only applies to a portion of reality, evidenced by it being possible while in Low-Gear, but not after the character moved to Top-Gear:

I'm not fully sure that these "Gear"s are meant to be worlds, but it kinda seems like that:

So you're saying that the fundamental logic that underpins and applies to all possible worlds, and is thus High 1-A+

Only applies to a part of the world

And your evidence for this is that logical contradictions are possible in some places

And thus, that characters which can't even modify that logic in any way, scale to High 1-A+

I hope this page is just unfinished and that there's better evidence for this.

Also, you in that page seem to indicate that there's a bit of a scaling chain of Logic < Concepts < Will (which is used by the weapon Georgius, as well as the 3rd-Gear's gods of war and 5th-Gear's mechanical dragons). Here Will is put into and used to drive machines built by humans and used to destroy cities. Ignoring the anti-feats inherently present on every level of this is ridiculous. You are indicating that there's multiple things scaling above High 1-A+ Type 2, and that these things can be wielded by humans, and yet will only result in meager damage.

Well, I didn't want this to become a CRT of the verse and would prefer to not debate the actual ranking in depth tbh. Entire reason I didn't bring it up as an example sooner. I will give an explanation, but I hope we can debate the actual details once that stuff is actually finished and I can make a thread on the verse with detailed explanations.

The contradiction allowance concept was created and there is a weapon that could destroy it. Likewise, things can be made to participate or not participate in a concept. Those things would affect logic. So it would be logic manipulation via concept manipulation. Not directly, though, no.

What the Gears is concerned, they are not spatially separate universes. Each Gear represents a set of concepts. The citizens and objects of each Gear participate in a selection of their Gears concepts and none of the others (usually). But things with different sets of concepts follow different laws of nature and the laws of nature of the different Gears don't interact with each other. Hence, while all Gears technically exist in the same place, none of the things in one Gear interact with the things in other Gears, making them different worlds in practice. Incidentally, travelling between universes is then, of course, not an issue of portaling to a different location, but actually requires you to change which concepts you participate in to "translate" your existence to the standards of the different reality.
So, it's not that the concepts are spatially limited in their application. A 1st Gear stone can be made to participate in 2nd Gear concepts just fine without moving its location in space. But the moment you do that it will stop interacting with 1st Gear and interact with 2nd Gear instead.
So when it comes to the concept of contradiction allowance only working in Low-Gear, what that means is that things build in other Gears don't participate in that concept and hence need to actually abide logic, while things participating in Low-Gear's concept set can in principle ignore logic, as they participate in the Concept of Contradiction Allowance.

What Will is concerned... it's the least explored metaphysical aspect in the verse. The only thing actually drawing on its power is the concept destroying machine (they city destroying machines don't). And all we're really told about it is that it exists independently from any and all concepts. Will being put into machines is only in the sense that you can fuse a human with a machine and humans have will. Given, the fact that existence itself, including humans, minds and machines, only exist as long as concepts do and will exists even without them, probably tells us something, but... yeah, I think that is a debate for another day. Will leaves much to interpretation and that is better voted on in a CRT about the verse.

For what is relevant for this thread: The verse clearly features logical laws as a metaphysical aspect which can be altered, albeit indirectly.

I think they're both simply opening the rulebook for reality and rewriting that. Pieces of fiction that explicitly mention "laws of physics" or "laws of logic" are referring to different parts of that book, and so those wouldn't cross over, in the same way that a character who is unaffected by the reaction force would still be affected by gravity. I think we should be willing to generalise that as far as we're willing to generalise general invocations of laws to other physical laws which they haven't explicitly invoked.

If a verse says "this character can manipulate all laws there is" I would assume that covers at least all laws of physics, even those not explicitly mentioned. I would not assume it includes logic.
If a character defeated all the abstract representations of the laws of the universe and made themselves immune to them, and those included laws governing magic and destiny, I would believe those and the laws of physics are included. Furthermore, if the verse showed more supernatural laws later, I would assume those were included.
But if they said logic is a metaphysical aspect later, then I wouldn't include that up until it is specified more cleanly.
Same for a character with an ability that grants law manipulation resistance or nullification. I wouldn't hold it to just exactly the demonstrated law, but extend to those of a similar type.

Like, fundamentally, I think there are three kinds of laws currently unified in law manipulation. Physical laws, magical laws and logical laws. And those are independent categories. Why magical laws wouldn't be separated, I understand: There is no idea of what those entail that would apply between verses, so we couldn't really say what they even are in general. As such we can also not say that what a magical law is in one verse, is one in another.
But for logic it works, as the category is clear.

I'm not sure how else to explain that.

When initially determining the Tiering System, we discussed the two potential variations of High 1-A+. Characters who can affect arbitrarily many worlds, and characters who embody all possible worlds. After this discussion, we agreed that for the former type some of those characters could be stronger/weaker than others, but that for the latter type every character from every verse would be the same strength; if a verse said otherwise, that would be treated as a contradiction, and the weaker of those characters would be downgraded.

That problem seems to be about the idea of High 1-A+ characters being assumed to have different amounts of strength then, which I haven't really suggested. That would go into the domain of giving a tier to things beyond logic that is different from the tier they would get if we reduced their feats down to only the logical components. I'm not currently suggesting to do that.

 

[FinePoint]

Spoiler: Explanation

In real life, laws don't actually have any power.
They're observations of trends based on evidence.

Opposites don't attract because it's law that they do, rather we say it's a law because they always happen to.

Newton's laws claimed to describe the movement of objects, but we later discovered they were inaccurate because his observations were limited to relatively slow objects. Yet in reverse, his laws would correctly guess the relative acceleration of an object on those scales, so we claim it must be true.

Logic is fundamentally the same. We say that 2=2 because we observe it consistently to be true.
If we discovered a 2 which was actually a 3, it would not violate any fundamental part of the universe, only the logic which we have prescribed to it.
We would simply have to amend our logic to match.

So ultimately, to manipulate either and change the world is itself illogical: a product of fiction.
And since we have no real basis, we begin to argue semantics. We don't actually categorize abilities based on whether they're actually different on principle, but if they're perceived different enough and are interpreted different enough and often enough that the average person would view them as different things. That is why we bother to categorize at all, rather than lump everything under reality manipulation, which, in a literal sense, would describe every single ability.

So semantically, I only see one small difference:
To manipulate a law is to change the statement: "Two must be equal two."
To manipulate logic is to change the statement: "Two is always observed to be equal to two."
Either way, you are merely manipulating a statement about what is true and what is false in general, or if those are even the categories.

To me, these differences simply aren't significant enough to justify splitting them into entirely different pages.
In a vast majority of cases, the outcome and restrictions would be exactly the same.

I wouldn't see the harm in mentioning that there might be a difference on the law manipulation or FAQ page, just in case it comes up.

 

[Agnaa]

Regarding the "destroying nothingness" one could debate.
However, things I think show that "violating reason" is "violating logic" here are the clear cut cases where it produces logical paradoxes.
Like "perfect test score, while also having wrong answers", "slower things go before faster things", "dodging an attack no longer means you avoided it", "not cutting things doesn't mean you didn't cut them". (especially the latter two)
He evidently selectively abolishes the law of non-contradiction here to establish logic paradoxes, which I think would qualify.
It are examples of specific changes to logic that happen.

(A supporter also wanted me to point out that "Reason" = "Logic" in the verse, but I don't know the deeper context so the relevance of that is for a CRT to determine)

Ultima pointed out the issues with manipulating the law of non-contradiction in particular. But I'd also wonder how far you're willing to infer this sort of thing; would Medaka Box's Contradictory Conjunction qualify for Logic Manipulation in your mind, as it lets its users paradoxically manifest the most impossible outcome, defeating opponents and destroying objects too strong for them.

Well, I didn't want this to become a CRT of the verse and would prefer to not debate the actual ranking in depth tbh. Entire reason I didn't bring it up as an example sooner. I will give an explanation, but I hope we can debate the actual details once that stuff is actually finished and I can make a thread on the verse with detailed explanations.

The contradiction allowance concept was created and there is a weapon that could destroy it. Likewise, things can be made to participate or not participate in a concept. Those things would affect logic. So it would be logic manipulation via concept manipulation. Not directly, though, no.

What the Gears is concerned, they are not spatially separate universes. Each Gear represents a set of concepts. The citizens and objects of each Gear participate in a selection of their Gears concepts and none of the others (usually). But things with different sets of concepts follow different laws of nature and the laws of nature of the different Gears don't interact with each other. Hence, while all Gears technically exist in the same place, none of the things in one Gear interact with the things in other Gears, making them different worlds in practice. Incidentally, travelling between universes is then, of course, not an issue of portaling to a different location, but actually requires you to change which concepts you participate in to "translate" your existence to the standards of the different reality.
So, it's not that the concepts are spatially limited in their application. A 1st Gear stone can be made to participate in 2nd Gear concepts just fine without moving its location in space. But the moment you do that it will stop interacting with 1st Gear and interact with 2nd Gear instead.
So when it comes to the concept of contradiction allowance only working in Low-Gear, what that means is that things build in other Gears don't participate in that concept and hence need to actually abide logic, while things participating in Low-Gear's concept set can in principle ignore logic, as they participate in the Concept of Contradiction Allowance.

What Will is concerned... it's the least explored metaphysical aspect in the verse. The only thing actually drawing on its power is the concept destroying machine (they city destroying machines don't). And all we're really told about it is that it exists independently from any and all concepts. Will being put into machines is only in the sense that you can fuse a human with a machine and humans have will. Given, the fact that existence itself, including humans, minds and machines, only exist as long as concepts do and will exists even without them, probably tells us something, but... yeah, I think that is a debate for another day. Will leaves much to interpretation and that is better voted on in a CRT about the verse.

For what is relevant for this thread: The verse clearly features logical laws as a metaphysical aspect which can be altered, albeit indirectly.

That problem seems to be about the idea of High 1-A+ characters being assumed to have different amounts of strength then, which I haven't really suggested. That would go into the domain of giving a tier to things beyond logic that is different from the tier they would get if we reduced their feats down to only the logical components. I'm not currently suggesting to do that.

Drawing an equivalence between the second type of High 1-A+, and a concept, which is surpassed by two different kinds of metaphysical aspects in the verse, is a contradiction, as the second type of High 1-A+ cannot be surpassed in that way.

If a verse says "this character can manipulate all laws there is" I would assume that covers at least all laws of physics, even those not explicitly mentioned. I would not assume it includes logic.
If a character defeated all the abstract representations of the laws of the universe and made themselves immune to them, and those included laws governing magic and destiny, I would believe those and the laws of physics are included. Furthermore, if the verse showed more supernatural laws later, I would assume those were included.
But if they said logic is a metaphysical aspect later, then I wouldn't include that up until it is specified more cleanly.
Same for a character with an ability that grants law manipulation resistance or nullification. I wouldn't hold it to just exactly the demonstrated law, but extend to those of a similar type.

Like, fundamentally, I think there are three kinds of laws currently unified in law manipulation. Physical laws, magical laws and logical laws. And those are independent categories. Why magical laws wouldn't be separated, I understand: There is no idea of what those entail that would apply between verses, so we couldn't really say what they even are in general. As such we can also not say that what a magical law is in one verse, is one in another.
But for logic it works, as the category is clear.

I think something like "the laws governing reality" would reasonably include logic, too.

 

[Firestorm808]

Users can manipulate logic, the reasoning conducted or assessed according to strict principles of validity or situations, actions, circumstances or qualities of being justifiable by reason. With this power, users can achieve logically impossible feats on a whim, and freely redefine on a metaphysical level what is possible and impossible. This ability may either be derived from some highly transcendent powers, or simply exist without much of a cause. Despite being completely outclassed by forces beyond logic, the user can legitimately be considered among the most powerful beings in existence, shaping reality, metaphysics and causation with nothing but a thought and ignoring all kinds of physical and metaphysical laws like they didn't exist at all. Essentially, to anything bound by logic, the user would seem completely undefeatable and capable of doing anything, perhaps even appearing to be omnipotent.

This is a definition of Logic Manip from the SP Wiki. Looking at this and the sample page from DT, the ability seems much wider in scope that just "Law Manip." Whereas Law manip is the existing rules of reality, Logic Manip goes deeper into abstract thought and metaphysical aspects.

 

[DontTalkDT]

This is a definition of Logic Manip from the SP Wiki. Looking at this and the sample page from DT, the ability seems much wider in scope that just "Law Manip." Whereas Law manip is the existing rules of reality, Logic Manip goes deeper into abstract thought and metaphysical aspects.

At least in my head, it is a different category as well, but that is evidently subjective.

Spoiler: Explanation

In real life, laws don't actually have any power.
They're observations of trends based on evidence.

Opposites don't attract because it's law that they do, rather we say it's a law because they always happen to.

Newton's laws claimed to describe the movement of objects, but we later discovered they were inaccurate because his observations were limited to relatively slow objects. Yet in reverse, his laws would correctly guess the relative acceleration of an object on those scales, so we claim it must be true.

Logic is fundamentally the same. We say that 2=2 because we observe it consistently to be true.
If we discovered a 2 which was actually a 3, it would not violate any fundamental part of the universe, only the logic which we have prescribed to it.
We would simply have to amend our logic to match.

So ultimately, to manipulate either and change the world is itself illogical: a product of fiction.
And since we have no real basis, we begin to argue semantics. We don't actually categorize abilities based on whether they're actually different on principle, but if they're perceived different enough and are interpreted different enough and often enough that the average person would view them as different things. That is why we bother to categorize at all, rather than lump everything under reality manipulation, which, in a literal sense, would describe every single ability.

So semantically, I only see one small difference:
To manipulate a law is to change the statement: "Two must be equal two."
To manipulate logic is to change the statement: "Two is always observed to be equal to two."
Either way, you are merely manipulating a statement about what is true and what is false in general, or if those are even the categories.

To me, these differences simply aren't significant enough to justify splitting them into entirely different pages.
In a vast majority of cases, the outcome and restrictions would be exactly the same.

I wouldn't see the harm in mentioning that there might be a difference on the law manipulation or FAQ page, just in case it comes up.

There certainly is a nominalistic take on the matter that works as such. However, that is hardly the only theory in real life and by far not a universally accepted one.

Thing is, if we are talking about either logic and law manipulation, it makes little sense to talk about a theory in which logic and laws don't exist as entities, but are only formulations of how we observe reality.
If someone manipulates a law that governs gravity, that only makes sense if there is such a law binding the physical matter of creation into behaving according to it. Similarly, if someone manipulates the principle of non-contradiction that imples there is actually a thing that prevents contradiction from happening.
If that weren't the case, what were they manipulating?

Ultima pointed out the issues with manipulating the law of non-contradiction in particular.

Not sure what you are referencing here.

But I'd also wonder how far you're willing to infer this sort of thing; would Medaka Box's Contradictory Conjunction qualify for Logic Manipulation in your mind, as it lets its users paradoxically manifest the most impossible outcome, defeating opponents and destroying objects too strong for them.

If it had ever demonstrated to bring forth an outcome logically impossible then yes. But IIRC it doesn't go that far.

Drawing an equivalence between the second type of High 1-A+, and a concept, which is surpassed by two different kinds of metaphysical aspects in the verse, is a contradiction, as the second type of High 1-A+ cannot be surpassed in that way.

The actual debate I would like to leave for the CRT. But to point out two things at a general level: We are allowing the sum of all universals to be High 1-A+, meaning concepts governing these worlds in itself should be no issue, and the tiering system specifies we allow powers that govern all logically possible worlds:

The apex of this tier, represented also by a "+" modifier in their Attack Potency section (High Outerverse level+), corresponds to characters whose power encompasses meta-qualities, meta-meta-qualities, and any and all conceivable extensions of this process, being on a which in which their power influences the space of all logically possible worlds

Generally, I don't see the issue with a thing that governs all possible worlds especially if that thing is beyond logic.

I think something like "the laws governing reality" would reasonably include logic, too.

That seems speculative IMO and I have the impression that in many many fictions the sum total of all laws doesn't include logic. Otherwise many potent law manipulators would solve their problems by just ignoring contradiction. As you yourself pointed out, there is a big gap between law manipulators and logic manipulators in number, which is probably because most people don't throw those into one pot.

 

[Agnaa]

Not sure what you are referencing here.

This post and the start of this post.

If it had ever demonstrated to bring forth an outcome logically impossible then yes. But IIRC it doesn't go that far.

I mean, it's based around the idea of it being contradictory, so I think that's its intent. "I'm too weak to destroy this rock, therefore I destroyed it" seems to be intending a logical contradiction.

The actual debate I would like to leave for the CRT. But to point out two things at a general level: We are allowing the sum of all universals to be High 1-A+, meaning concepts governing these worlds in itself should be no issue, and the tiering system specifies we allow powers that govern all logically possible worlds:

Generally, I don't see the issue with a thing that governs all possible worlds especially if that thing is beyond logic.

I never said my issue was with governing. I said my issue was with it being surpassed.

 

[Theglassman12]

I don't really see the point in this being a separate page compared to law manipulation. Ignoring how the sandbox just sounds like another flavor of law hax, what actual characters exist on the site that has this very specific application of logic manipulation? The only example I see is from a series that had Logic manipulation nuked a while ago, which makes it all the more harder to take seriously as a legit powers and abilities page since there's no real examples we can use to define what makes this unique compared to normal law hax.

 

[DontTalkDT]

I don't really see the point in this being a separate page compared to law manipulation. Ignoring how the sandbox just sounds like another flavor of law hax, what actual characters exist on the site that has this very specific application of logic manipulation? The only example I see is from a series that had Logic manipulation nuked a while ago, which makes it all the more harder to take seriously as a legit powers and abilities page since there's no real examples we can use to define what makes this unique compared to normal law hax.

As already said earlier in the thread it didn't have "logic manipulation nuked". The argument, from what I see, was entirely "we list logic manipulation as law manipulation currently, hence it should just be listed as that". That currently no profile will list "logic manipulation" is a self-fulfilling prophecy as such an ability page currently doesn't exist.

Second example of logic manipulation would be Kawakami-verse who can accomplish it via their conceptual power. (The pages of affected characters already exist)

Other characters probably have it, but fail by current strict standards I wish to set for the power. E.g. The White Queen has statements like this:

Is anything impossible?

And if so, is that due to the individual, due to society, due to the world, or due to logic or physical laws?

Hee hee hee. Sorry. It is a little cruel for the strongest of the strong to ask a question like that. Please don’t let it get to you, brother.

Nothing is impossible for me.

I am a true queen. I am not bound by logic or the physical laws; they obey my very existence. You could say the “world” is just one of my many unimportant servants.

I would bet there are a number of nondual Tier 1-A/0 gods that have it, but there comes in the fact that I just don't read too many fictions with that kind of stuff.


Anyway, if you don't want it as an ability page, how do you stand regarding other options? Things like making it a separate Type of Law Manipulation or even just adding standards about it to the Law Manipulation page?

This post and the start of this post.

As I already replied to the latter of said posts, that whole argument Ultima makes there is just a result of him failing to cleanly distinguish between object language and metalanguage.
If you talk in trivialism about trivialism, then you will find that it abides the law of non-contradiction. If you talk in classical logic about trivialism, you will find that it absolutely does not. If a narrator talks about logic manipulation, they do so in the metalogic (typically classical logic) not the object logic (the logic being manipulated). As such, any statement the narrator makes about the object logic, the statement as a whole being formulated as classical logic, will have the properties of classical logic like non-contradiction. However, that isn't to be confused with the object logic abiding the law of non-contradiction.

To be absolutely clear here: Generally, the law of non-contradiction could be expressed as
¬(P ∧ ¬P)
(in predicate logic we could add an all quantor in front of that, I think, but it's not needed)
If we talk about two logics, we get two interpretations of each symbol.
Let's use subscript t for trivialism and subscript c for classical logic. So we have the symbols: ¬t, ¬c, ∧t and ∧c.
Now, in trivialism the symbols evaluate as follows: ¬tP evaluates to true, regardless of what the truth value of P was (although we only really have to deal with P being true, as trivialism knows no false propositions). Similarly, A ∧t B evaluates to true, regardless of what A and B is.
For classical logic we on the other hand follow the typical truth tables.

Now, if we ask about the law of non-contradiction, we really have to think about first in which language (trivialism or classical) we ask which part.
We could mean
¬t(P ∧t ¬tP)
If so, P is true (or not, doesn't matter, I'm skipping over defining truth values), then ¬tP is also true, then P ∧t ¬tP is also true and hence ultimately ¬t(P ∧t ¬tP) is true. So if we ask entirely in trivialism it says the law of non-contradiction holds true, despite e.g. "the sky is blue" and "the sky is not blue" both being valid in that logic simultaneously.
But if we usually talk about whether the law of non-contradiction holds in trivialism, we really mean a statement more like
¬c(P ∧c ¬tP)
And here we can see that it doesn't hold. Assuming P is true, then ¬tP is true, then P ∧c ¬tP is true, but ¬c(P ∧c ¬tP) is false, as we deal with negation is classical logic.

Which is to say, if some series says that for some logic that is being manipulated the law of noncontradiction doesn't hold anymore, what is meant is likely that, if the logic has the logical negation operator ¬o,
¬c(P ∧c ¬oP)
is false for some P.

I mean, it's based around the idea of it being contradictory, so I think that's its intent. "I'm too weak to destroy this rock, therefore I destroyed it" seems to be intending a logical contradiction.

The series also defines it as bringing forth the least probable outcome, though, not strictly an impossible one. Like, hitting a rock with a weak hit and destroying it is unlikely but not logically impossible. (e.g. you could hit a weak spot) In a universe with differing laws of natures it's also imaginable, for instance.
Given, for that as well, it seems like a case one could debate, best in a CRT. I don't pretend to remember every usage of the power, so maybe there is something convincing in there.

I never said my issue was with governing. I said my issue was with it being surpassed.

I'm not sure what you mean with being surpassed in this context then. I mean being higher on the metaphysical totem pole in terms of A defines B, which I would say means to govern as well.
At no point did I mean to talk about something like a higher layer separate reality.

 

[Agnaa]

As I already replied to the latter of said posts, that whole argument Ultima makes there is just a result of him failing to cleanly distinguish between object language and metalanguage.
If you talk in trivialism about trivialism, then you will find that it abides the law of non-contradiction. If you talk in classical logic about trivialism, you will find that it absolutely does not. If a narrator talks about logic manipulation, they do so in the metalogic (typically classical logic) not the object logic (the logic being manipulated). As such, any statement the narrator makes about the object logic, the statement as a whole being formulated as classical logic, will have the properties of classical logic like non-contradiction. However, that isn't to be confused with the object logic abiding the law of non-contradiction.

To be absolutely clear here: Generally, the law of non-contradiction could be expressed as
¬(P ∧ ¬P)
(in predicate logic we could add an all quantor in front of that, I think, but it's not needed)
If we talk about two logics, we get two interpretations of each symbol.
Let's use subscript t for trivialism and subscript c for classical logic. So we have the symbols: ¬t, ¬c, ∧t and ∧c.
Now, in trivialism the symbols evaluate as follows: ¬tP evaluates to true, regardless of what the truth value of P was (although we only really have to deal with P being true, as trivialism knows no false propositions). Similarly, A ∧t B evaluates to true, regardless of what A and B is.
For classical logic we on the other hand follow the typical truth tables.

Now, if we ask about the law of non-contradiction, we really have to think about first in which language (trivialism or classical) we ask which part.
We could mean
¬t(P ∧t ¬tP)
If so, P is true (or not, doesn't matter, I'm skipping over defining truth values), then ¬tP is also true, then P ∧t ¬tP is also true and hence ultimately ¬t(P ∧t ¬tP) is true. So if we ask entirely in trivialism it says the law of non-contradiction holds true, despite e.g. "the sky is blue" and "the sky is not blue" both being valid in that logic simultaneously.
But if we usually talk about whether the law of non-contradiction holds in trivialism, we really mean a statement more like
¬c(P ∧c ¬tP)
And here we can see that it doesn't hold. Assuming P is true, then ¬tP is true, then P ∧c ¬tP is true, but ¬c(P ∧c ¬tP) is false, as we deal with negation is classical logic.

Which is to say, if some series says that for some logic that is being manipulated the law of noncontradiction doesn't hold anymore, what is meant is likely that, if the logic has the logical negation operator ¬o,
¬c(P ∧c ¬oP)
is false for some P.

Then the logic that's being manipulated isn't High 1-A+.

It isn't the fundamental basis for every possible world. It isn't the highest governing authority of what exists. And so, manipulation of it should not be given an absurdly high rating.

I'm not sure what you mean with being surpassed in this context then. I mean being higher on the metaphysical totem pole in terms of A defines B, which I would say means to govern as well.
At no point did I mean to talk about something like a higher layer separate reality.

You're saying that there's multiple steps above logic, which means that some of them surpass others, and so, your excuses about governing don't apply.

The second type of High 1-A+ only has one value. We allow powers on that level, but we don't allow some to be stronger than others. It's a weaker form of Tier 0, and has weaker forms of the same limitations on verses which are placed there.

My biggest issue is with the way you're treating the rating of logic manipulation. Both that you are asserting an extremely high potency of it by default, and that you are allowing cases which go against the way we currently handle High 1-A+ type 2.

 

[Theglassman12]

Yeah the White Queen stuff I still see that as just law hax. I don’t mind it being a part of Law manipulation’s page but this whole thing on Logic manipulation being High 1-A+ feels counter intuitive given last time I checked, that and tier 0 aren’t meant to be something people can control at will.

 

[Antvasima]

@Ultima_Reality @Executor_N0

What do you think should be done here?

 

[FinePoint]

There certainly is a nominalistic take on the matter that works as such. However, that is hardly the only theory in real life and by far not a universally accepted one.

Thing is, if we are talking about either logic and law manipulation, it makes little sense to talk about a theory in which logic and laws don't exist as entities, but are only formulations of how we observe reality.
If someone manipulates a law that governs gravity, that only makes sense if there is such a law binding the physical matter of creation into behaving according to it. Similarly, if someone manipulates the principle of non-contradiction that imples there is actually a thing that prevents contradiction from happening.
If that weren't the case, what were they manipulating?

Well, if we do assume that a higher power has set rules in place which must be followed rather than the other way around, then logic and law are more literally the same thing (those rules), just applying to different scenarios.

I do respect that there may be a technical difference in certain perspectives, but I think it will confuse people on which to use if we split them up when they're so extremely similar in definition and implementation. Semantically, a system of logic could be a law itself, so I think that works as a very practical assumption for our purposes.

 

[Ultima_Reality]

@Ultima_Reality @Executor_N0

What do you think should be done here?

I'll look over what went on since I last posted.

 

[Antvasima]

Thank you very much for helping out.

 

[DontTalkDT]

Then the logic that's being manipulated isn't High 1-A+.

It isn't the fundamental basis for every possible world. It isn't the highest governing authority of what exists. And so, manipulation of it should not be given an absurdly high rating.

I don't see how you come to the conclusion that the logic by which the narrator of a work is talking in has any bearing on what happens in the work.
The meta-logic isn't part of the fiction, it's just what is used to convey what happens in the fiction to the reader.

It's like saying that a book being written in English proves that English is a language existing in the universe of the book. (Quite literally, if one considers that a "logic system" is also called a formal language)

You're saying that there's multiple steps above logic, which means that some of them surpass others, and so, your excuses about governing don't apply.

The second type of High 1-A+ only has one value. We allow powers on that level, but we don't allow some to be stronger than others. It's a weaker form of Tier 0, and has weaker forms of the same limitations on verses which are placed there.

My biggest issue is with the way you're treating the rating of logic manipulation. Both that you are asserting an extremely high potency of it by default, and that you are allowing cases which go against the way we currently handle High 1-A+ type 2.

I'm only defaulting to a high rating, because the tiering system defaults to the assumption that logic isn't surpassed at any lesser rating currently. I'm open to talking about abolishing that standard, but as long as we don't, this is where we end up. (In fact, I think looking at philosophical theories regarding what truth means in fiction, there is solid reason to argue R>F differences shouldn't be considered to maintain logic by default. However, doing so would also mean Monads don't maintain default superiority where R>F is involved)

I don't see how High 1-A+ is a weaker form of Tier 0. Monads qualify by the lack of qualities. The class of all possible worlds has all the qualities. So they have different properties.

That aside, some of them surpass others, but that is in a defining sense. Concepts aren't bigger or "more powerful". They are simply defining for what's below them, logic included.
Practically speaking, there being multiple things governing all possible worlds is not contradictory. B governing C and C governing all possible worlds, is only problematic because B governing C implies that you can have several differing C and as consequence several different classes of all possible worlds (meaning that what you had prior was never the actual class of all possible worlds).
For anything else that would be valid, but not for C = logic. Because if B is concepts and C logic, then while there could be differing C, all other ones are not governing possible worlds, but impossible worlds.

It's again that logic just has a special place in this. For anything else, if you can alter it, both a world with it altered and a world with it unaltered must be part of the class of all possible worlds.
But for logic, if you alter it, you don't gain another possible world. You gain an impossible world that would not be part of the class of all possible worlds.
Correspondingly, if you alter the concepts that govern logic, the resulting world would also not be part of the realm of the original logic, and hence an impossible world. The contradiction that is the reason the "surpassing" thing you mention usually doesn't work does not apply in this specific case.

Well, if we do assume that a higher power has set rules in place which must be followed rather than the other way around, then logic and law are more literally the same thing (those rules), just applying to different scenarios.

Isn't that a property of all metaphysical aspects, though? That they are abstract things which ultimately describe how specific parts of physical reality work?

 

[Agnaa]

I don't see how you come to the conclusion that the logic by which the narrator of a work is talking in has any bearing on what happens in the work.
The meta-logic isn't part of the fiction, it's just what is used to convey what happens in the fiction to the reader.

It's like saying that a book being written in English proves that English is a language existing in the universe of the book. (Quite literally, if one considers that a "logic system" is also called a formal language)

Because it truly reflects what's occurring in the world; it's not just at the level of the reader.

Character A removed the law of non-contradiction. They did not also fail to remove the law of non-contradiction. That's not just a part of the writing, it's part of the truth of the world.

If the telling doesn't reflect the truth of the world, then that telling would not be relevant imo. We should rate characters based on what's actually occurring in their world, not some extra-textual stuff which we know is not actually occurring.

I'm only defaulting to a high rating, because the tiering system defaults to the assumption that logic isn't surpassed at any lesser rating currently. I'm open to talking about abolishing that standard, but as long as we don't, this is where we end up. (In fact, I think looking at philosophical theories regarding what truth means in fiction, there is solid reason to argue R>F differences shouldn't be considered to maintain logic by default. However, doing so would also mean Monads don't maintain default superiority where R>F is involved)

I see.

I don't see how High 1-A+ is a weaker form of Tier 0. Monads qualify by the lack of qualities. The class of all possible worlds has all the qualities. So they have different properties.

Yes, they are indeed different tiers. One of them is absolutely everything, and one of them is the underpinning of absolutely everything. These are still quite related in their similar reference to "absolutely everything", and the consequences of us dogmatically keeping that the same between series.

A potential Tier 0 would run into issues if there was a character which was outside of their domain of "absolutely everything", just the same as a potential High 1-A+ Type 2 would.

That aside, some of them surpass others, but that is in a defining sense. Concepts aren't bigger or "more powerful". They are simply defining for what's below them, logic included.
Practically speaking, there being multiple things governing all possible worlds is not contradictory. B governing C and C governing all possible worlds, is only problematic because B governing C implies that you can have several differing C and as consequence several different classes of all possible worlds (meaning that what you had prior was never the actual class of all possible worlds).
For anything else that would be valid, but not for C = logic. Because if B is concepts and C logic, then while there could be differing C, all other ones are not governing possible worlds, but impossible worlds.

It's again that logic just has a special place in this. For anything else, if you can alter it, both a world with it altered and a world with it unaltered must be part of the class of all possible worlds.
But for logic, if you alter it, you don't gain another possible world. You gain an impossible world that would not be part of the class of all possible worlds.
Correspondingly, if you alter the concepts that govern logic, the resulting world would also not be part of the realm of the original logic, and hence an impossible world. The contradiction that is the reason the "surpassing" thing you mention usually doesn't work does not apply in this specific case.

I'm just repeating myself at this point.

We do not consider that to be a true distinction. We consider "impossible worlds" to simply be incoherent objects that cannot be actualised. If they are shown to be coherent, then a High 1-A+ Type 2 or a Tier 0 failing to encompass them would revoke that tiering. Since you are arguing that, in this case, logic can be altered to refer to different sets of possible/impossible worlds, it follows that such logic cannot be High 1-A+ Type 2. And a Tier 0 who is the underpinning of all logic, but where the objects they're grounding can be changed through those concepts, cannot be Tier 0.

I already brought up these types of cases while we were discussing the tiering system changes in the first place, and people still dogmatically asserted that it wouldn't represent any way of achieving different levels of power.

We were outvoted. Revert the tiering system changes entirely, or give this idea up.

 

[Ultima_Reality]

If you already show up tell me what you wanted to write in my PMs already. I have been waiting months for that 🔫

Aye aye. Fair's fair. I'm gonna be really busy this week, but I'll make do. (Though some of it I think is gonna bleed over into this discussion anyway)

(In fact, I think looking at philosophical theories regarding what truth means in fiction, there is solid reason to argue R>F differences shouldn't be considered to maintain logic by default. However, doing so would also mean Monads don't maintain default superiority where R>F is involved)

Do share, btw. Interested. (Probably in PMs though)

Metalogical formal discourse solves that problem.
The distinction between object language and metalanguage is to be strictly maintained.

I mean, really, there are enough adherents of intuitionist logic to make it clear that it is not that easily debunked.

I believe what Agnaa responded with up there suffices to address this:

Because it truly reflects what's occurring in the world; it's not just at the level of the reader.

Character A removed the law of non-contradiction. They did not also fail to remove the law of non-contradiction. That's not just a part of the writing, it's part of the truth of the world.

If the telling doesn't reflect the truth of the world, then that telling would not be relevant imo. We should rate characters based on what's actually occurring in their world, not some extra-textual stuff which we know is not actually occurring.

From the talk up here, I'm assuming you're not actually applying the meta-language/object language description as if it were a cosmological feature of verses with Logic Manipulation in them. Would be an interesting argument for sure, but, in lieu of that: Yeah, what Agnaa says holds true.

No, they factually do not all admit to the law of non-contradiction. Easy example: Trivialism when viewed with classical logic as the metalanguage, is easily seen to not assume LNC.

Trivialism is hardly a logical system. It's just "All propositions whatsoever are true," at which point any discussion, really, is meaningless. Hence you have even dialetheists (As in, people who think there are true contradictions) like Graham Priest admitting that trivialism is just straightforwardly incoherent and to be avoided.

Not sure why you think your example has relevance for logic systems in general. At the point where it states certain statements are inevitably true, it subscribes to a specific logic system or at least a set of specific logic systems: Those that admit to those statements being necessarily true. Not all systems do (and I say that without even knowing which a priori truths he may be referring to). Whatever he talks about will not even be a well-formed formula in all systems. Much less true given there are logics where all formulas evaluate to false.

Given, positions that argue that certain assumptions are necessarily true no matter what aren't rare, but let's not make the mistake of thinking that those are formally part of all logic systems. These positions merely argue other logics are inherently wrong. (and of course, none of these positions has general acceptance)

Goes back to what I've said about non-contradiction (That it, in effect, is something presupposed by all discourse whatsoever). Your responses were: 1) Meta-language/Object-language distinction, which as said, I think Agnaa already sufficiently addresses, 2) Trivialism, which isn't any discourse at all so much as the termination of any discourse. So the full force of the objection remains.

"All formulas evaluate to false" is also only coherent in a strictly formal setting, which doesn't mean it can be coherently transposed into an actual reality. As long as we have a verse to be working with, a state of affairs will always be obtaining (i.e. Something will be true); the alternative to this is there simply being... no verse at all.

Either way: As you said, the debate also gets into the whole "What logical system do we assume for the Tiering System?". For reasons already stated, our current High 1-A+ is the immutable totality of all worlds that you mentioned up there as the "third option." It's not that there are others things we are neglecting, it's that these other things are, as far as we are concerned, genuinely just noise. That's not to say I'm unsympathetic to expanding the Tiering System to be more inclusive in that respect, but I think it goes a bit beyond what this thread is for, even putting aside the general considerations that bona fide Logic Manipulation might not even be possible to truly have in fiction.

 

[IdiosyncraticLawyer]

Bump.

 

[IdiosyncraticLawyer]

Bump.

 

[Jin2188]

Got permission to comment from @Antvasima.

I agree with having Logic Manipulation as a separate page, but definitely don't make it High 1-A+ by default, that's literally the mother of all NLFs.
It's not Type 2 High 1-A+ at the very least, since @Ultima_Reality points out that the framework of all possible worlds cannot be modified due to being an expression of a Tier 0.

The problems that arise there are less to do with the idea itself and more with the fact that the Tiering System is a bit cramped as it stands, in that it puts Tier 0 at the top and then defines High 1-A+ backwards from it as "The space of everything the Monad can produce."

Altering the space of everything a Tier 0 can produce would involve modifying the Tier 0 itself, which cannot happen since a Tier 0 transcends differentiation, including the differentiation between states. Therefore, only a Tier 0 would ever possess this form of Logic Manipulation, making it pointless to make a separate page for.

There's no reason to believe it would necessarily be Type 1 High 1-A+ either, unless "all possible worlds" as a cosmological concept actually exists within the verse. Otherwise, it's just an NLF.

That being said, I do pretty strongly advocate for Logic Manipulation to be its own page distinct from Law Manipulation, I just think it should be scaled based on feats and/or cosmology scaling rather than this crazy abstract stuff. If a character defeats a 1-A+ character with their Logic Manipulation, then that character and their Logic Manipulation are also 1-A+ via scaling. If "logic" exists at a specific level of reality, say 3 layers into 1-A, then a character that can manipulate that level has Logic Manipulation and is 3 layers into 1-A. No more, no less. I fail to see any issue with this way of doing things.

The main reason why I advocate for Logic Manipulation being its own thing instead of being tied to Law Manipulation is because Logic Manipulation is fundamentally different from Law Manipulation. No two ways about it.

I think they're both simply opening the rulebook for reality and rewriting that. Pieces of fiction that explicitly mention "laws of physics" or "laws of logic" are referring to different parts of that book, and so those wouldn't cross over, in the same way that a character who is unaffected by the reaction force would still be affected by gravity. I think we should be willing to generalise that as far as we're willing to generalise general invocations of laws to other physical laws which they haven't explicitly invoked.

In this analogy, logic is not some "set of rules" in some part of the rulebook, logic IS the rulebook. It's what allows for there to be rules at all. If Law Manipulation is like editing the pages of the rulebook, Logic Manipulation is like changing the organization of the rulebook itself, reorganizing the table of contents, and possibly adding and removing pages and even whole chapters. That's not to say Logic Manipulation is necessarily more powerful than Law Manipulation, just that it has a different domain of effect, even if there is significant overlap between the two.

Additionally, as pointed out by @DontTalkDT:

We already have distinct pages for powers like Mathematics Manipulation and Causality Manipulation, which could be viewed as subsets of Law Manipulation. Logic is even more fundamental—the bedrock beneath mathematics, which underpins physics. It’s odd to separate higher-level abstractions like math and causality but lump logic back under law.

He also points out that laws and logic are usually treated differently by fictional verses:

From a resistance standpoint, things that work on other law manipulation wouldn't work on logic manipulation. If you can resist changes to the laws of nature, or to things like magically enforced laws such as the sword which has the "rule" that only the chosen one can unsheath it, that does not at all imply that you could resist Logic Manipulation. In fact, one of the common reasons to resist these things is by being a creature that is beyond such laws and governs them from above... and that virtually never includes logic. Most law-transcending beings still are bound to act in the confines of logic. It's treated as a different metaphysical aspect, usually.

Same from a nullification standpoint. You have an ability with feats of nullifying law manipulation? Or perhaps one that has a statement of being able to nullify all laws, both natural and magical? That would not be enough to conclude that Logic Manipulation would be nullified. There is a big difference between negating a power that makes gravity or souls work differently and negating a power that can decide to paradoxically continue working after nullification, because paradoxes are real. Like, for all the reasons you wouldn't assume causality manipulation is nullified by regular law manipulation nullification, logic manipulation wouldn't be nullified either.

I don't think either of these points were properly addressed or debunked.

I also think @Ultima_Reality's arguments regarding the impossibility of true logic manipulation are quite strange:

Say a verse has a logic manipulator and who deletes the Law of Excluded Middle, and this results in the world being totally rewritten into one accommodating for the absence of that law. Obviously, since the verse gave us a coherent scenario to work with, we can clearly reason out and apply logic to it: The LEM-less world (A~) is not the same as the LEM world (A), and vice-versa, and so obviously, noncontradiction applies. It also applies with the very inference that the verse made: "He erased the Law of Excluded Middle, therefore the world changed accordingly." That conditional is itself logical, too.

Further: In the new world, the LEM is erased as opposed to not erased, and so you can even say that, ultimately, LEM itself still applies!

Take the law of non-contradiction, for example. At bottom it's just the affirmation of "A ≠ ~A." That is to say: A thing is not what it is not. Or, in logical terms, that a proposition is distinct from its negation. With that in mind, it's patently clear that it's impossible to write a feat where the LNC is ever actually defied. Because the very distinction between the LNC being messed with and the LNC not being messed with is, itself, already an instance of the LNC.

You can apply this exact same line of reasoning to Causality Manipulation. If a character manipulates an event to cause itself, that's impossible to believe because the character still caused the event, and caused the event that made that event cause itself. Should we throw out Causality Manipulation then? Of course not, we just follow what the fiction tells us is happening. I see no reason why this shouldn't be the same for Logic Manipulation.

In conclusion: I think @Agnaa and @DontTalkDT are both wrong, but you both make good points too. I want Logic Manipulation to be its own page, but I cannot accept it being scaled so ludicrously high by default.

 

[Agnaa]

I think this is best left until during/after discussing the nonduality revisions.

 

[FinePoint]

I think this is best left until during/after discussing the nonduality revisions.

Indeed. The proposals there may end up covering the role of the page proposed here (especially in regards to contradictions).

 

[DontTalkDT]

Indeed. The proposals there may end up covering the role of the page proposed here (especially in regards to contradictions)

The nonduality page (/future paraconsistency page) is only focussed on self-application, though. Causing contradictions would still not really have a page.

 

[FinePoint]

The nonduality page (/future paraconsistency page) is only focussed on self-application, though. Causing contradictions would still not really have a page.

True. I feel like the two could probably be combined somehow, but there is already a precedent for existence-based passives having their own pages.

Anyway, in light of that discussion I've definitely changed my mind on this.

I still think this covers a very specific niche that won't come up that often, but I realize now that it's an important niche.

 

[Jin2188]

bump

 

[Jin2188]

bump

 

[Jin2188]

bump

 

[Firestorm808]

What else is needed here?

 

[Vietthai96]

What else is needed here?

Probably waiting for DontTalkDT and Ultima, also iirc new Nonduality page Paraconsistent Physiology need to be finished before processing this page

 

[Jin2188]

bump