Reasoning is the cognitive process of looking for reasons for beliefs, conclusions, actions or feelings. Humans have the ability to engage in reasoning about their own reasoning using introspection. Different forms of such reflection on reasoning occur in different fields. Although reasoning was once thought to be a uniquely human capability, other animals also engage in reasoning.
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Reasoning is the cognitive process of looking for reasons for beliefs, conclusions, actions or feelings. Humans have the ability to engage in reasoning about their own reasoning using introspection. Different forms of such reflection on reasoning occur in different fields. Although reasoning was once thought to be a uniquely human capability, other animals also engage in reasoning.
In philosophy, the study of reasoning typically focuses on what makes reasoning efficient or inefficient, appropriate or inappropriate, good or bad. Philosophers do this by either examining the form or structure of the reasoning within arguments, or by considering the broader methods used to reach particular goals of reasoning. Psychologists and cognitive scientists, in contrast, tend to study how people reason, which cognitive and neural processes are engaged, how cultural factors affect the inferences people draw. The properties of logics which may be used to reason are studied in mathematical logic. The field of automated reasoning studies how reasoning may be modelled computationally. Laywers also study reasoning.
History of reasoning
It is likely that humans have used reasoning to work out what they should believe or do for a very long time indeed. However, some researchers have tried to determine when, in the history of human development, humans moved from using myths to describe the world to attempting to reason about the world, and when humans first began to reason about their own reasoning.
Babylonian reasoning
In Mesopotamia, Esagil-kin-apli's medical Diagnostic Handbook written in the 11th century BC was based on a logical set of axioms and assumptions, including the modern view that through the examination and inspection of the symptoms of a patient, it is possible to determine the patient's disease, its aetiology and future development, and the chances of the patient's recovery.H. F. J. Horstmanshoff, Marten Stol, Cornelis Tilburg (2004), Magic and Rationality in Ancient Near Eastern and Graeco-Roman Medicine, p. 99, Brill Publishers, ISBN 9004136665.
During the 8th and 7th centuries BC, Babylonian astronomers began employing an internal logic within their predictive planetary systems, which was an important contribution to logic and the philosophy of science.D. Brown (2000), Mesopotamian Planetary Astronomy-Astrology , Styx Publications, ISBN 9056930362. Babylonian thought had a considerable influence on early Greek thought.
Greek reasoning
The works of Homer, written in the eighth century BC, contain mythic stories that use gods to explain the formation of the world. However, only two centuries later, late in the sixth century BC, Xenophanes of Colophon began to question the Homeric accounts of the creation of nature and the gods. He wrote:
