'Reason' is the mental process of evaluating the possiblilities and estimating the most probable outcome, if a hypothetical scenario was attempted in the real world. Complex imaginary situations can be considered... involving multiple induced generalizations and simplifications... and then rules invoked, that are presumed to be independant of gravitation, comets, time and space. Sequences of rules are applied to the simplifications until a 'conclusion' has been 'deduced'. For the most part, these conclusions are not unanticipated revelations, but results that are suspected from general experience and have defied all attempts at disproof. What is called 'reason' therefore is only rarely... if ever... able to provide new knowledge, but only serves to reassure the cultivators of doubt, that certain generalizations are 'valid'.

The foundation of the reasoning process is the accumulated sensory data that is selectively recorded in the memory structures. Not everything that is sensed is recorded... since unlimited storage capacity is not available... so there is a filtering system in place whereby only that information which will enhance survival or which is deemed to be relevant is 'stored'. Using the capacity of the memory to reconstruct previous events, the awareness can 'recall' multiple events and 'induce' a simplification such as... 'all rocks fall towards the earth'. 'Reason' is the capacity of an awareness to suppose a hypothetical situation with respect to these induced simplifications, and estimate the probability of a sequence of events. Thus it may be reasoned that... 'if this rock is lifted and released, it will fall towards the earth.'

The structures of 'reason' are transparent forms, whose seemingly undeniable certainties, are revealed as being fragile, brittle and conditional, when exposed to the turbulent and transient domain of reality. All logic and mathematics... considered as intellectual structures... are hypothetical structures which are constructed under the constraints of closed-circuit self-contained rules which adhere meticulously to the 'law of the excluded middle'. This is to say that any hypothetical simplification is allowed to be modified or manipulated in conformity to a set of rules, but only in such a manner that it either agrees absolutely with the rules or directly contradicts the rules. There is no 'middle' way wherein there is partial agreement. The supposition has been in circulation for many centuries that 'reason', 'deduction', 'rationalism', or 'a priori' processes are available and capable of providing 'truths' that are 'absolute'. The pythagorean theroem ' a² + b² = c² ' is assumed to have independant and universal truth. Within the abstract and purified domain of an intellectual contemplation that is conducted in an environment of suspended-animation... where the realities of time, space and the impermanent transiences of existence are supposed not to exist... analysis of the symbol '>' as meaning 'greater than', will inevitably compel the introspector to admit the introspected implication ' if (a > b and b > c) then (a > c) ' as undeniable. But such statements only exist in the closed circuit environment of awarenesses, where simplified rules of manipulating concepts are imposed so that lines of choice and conclusions are unique and unambiguous. The real world is not like that. The environment of logic and mathematics isolates itself in the mind, so that the realities of participation in a chaotic temporal existence is ignored as irrelevant. The moment a,b or c are meant to refer or stand for some aspect of the real world, then time and chaos will ensure that any permanent assumptions about their continuing identity will be unjustified. What was 'a' a moment ago has been distorted by heat, 'b' has lost weight due to evaporation, and 'c' has been remeasured using improved technology. The 'conclusions' of reason may sometimes approximate what happens in the real world, but they are certainly not 'absolute'.