I have no need to explain optical illusions as they do not really exist in the outside -mind independant world (as you put it). This is how you know them to be illusions. In fact it takes scientific investigation to reveal this. Straight stick looks bent in water. Investigation reveals it is merely the effect of the water bending the light from the suns rays.
I didn't explain my point about optical illusions particularly well. Yes, we do know that in the cases that we call optical illusions this is the mind having an effect. However, how can we know, in cases in which we believe that we are seeing a mind independant reality, that we really are? You have, in explaining the problem of the "bent" stick, used science. However, the ability of science to cohere with a mind independant world is exactly what you are trying to defend, and as such your use of it here is invalid.
In fact (and bear in mind that science isn't my strong point, so I may be talking cack here), it is my understanding that at a microscopic level most "solid" things are, in fact, empty space. Why, then, do we perceive them as being solid? Is this not an illusion?
I can ascribe the rules of logic to everyday matters concerning the way I might go about my everyday life. I might not be able to predict the future from the past but I can safely assume and even guarantee that if x was the case and still continues to be the case in the present-then all other things governing and connected to x will continue to be the case for that moment/present also. That is to say that the result will be the same (thing).
A few points here. Firstly, I think that we are talking about different things when we refer to "logic"-I mean hard logical principles such as mathematics. You mean everyday things (but those which are by no means accepted as logical necessities) like causation. It's no big deal, I just need to get what you mean straight in my head.
Second, I am not entirely sure as to how we apply the laws of causation. We can only apply these laws to what we perceive. You can only know that you really ought to move out of the way of the car because you have enough previous experience or knowledge of hitting hard things fast to believe that this causes you pain. You therefore require perception. However, perception is exactly what you are trying to defend; you state that what you term logical laws (or cause and effect etc) can help show us that our perceptions match the mind independant world. However, if we cannot know that the perceptions which we require for our knowledge of cause and effect match the mind-independant world, how can we use the law of cause and effect to show that we perceive the mind-independant world.
If, on the other hand, you are trying to show that we must perceive a mind-independant, static world "correctly" as cause and effect shows us that this world persists and its effects on us remain the same, again this can only help you to an extent. I agree with you that, so far, these laws of cause and effect do work; I know that if something hits me hard it will cause me pain. However, all that this shows again is that the world that we perceive, and not the mind-independant world persists. At the very most (and I would contend even this) it shows that science coheres exactly with the world that we perceive, and that the perceived world is persistent and, so far, unchanging. However, it still fails to show that science coheres with the mind-independant world.
EDIT: Dolph's point, that "the rules of logic are only a series of processes you apply to existing data and assumptions to reach a result. The only thing that a result has to fulfill to be logical is that it's consistant with the data and the assumptions used to arrive at it" backs me up far more than it backs you up. Dolph is stating that logic can only work for the data that we provide it. In our past experience, cars hitting us hard hurts and, using our logic, we therefore believe that we should not get hit by cars. However, the data that we provide here to be "used" by the logic is data from the perceived, and not the mind-independant world.
Imagine that the logical law of cause and effect is like the addition sign in maths. It is hugely useful, and can give us very accurate results. However, it is only as good as the numbers that you put in either side of it. Imagine (if it's possible, I know it's an odd request!) that you know of no numbers. If this is the case, we cannot obtain any knowledge or data from the use of addition. Likewise, we do not know the mind-independant world. We can therefore not apply logic to it, and can therefore not glean any data about it from logic.
and just because I'm not labelled a Christian shouldn't really mean anything - if you lead a good life I hardly see why you would go to 'hell' and if there isn't a God well then I haven't wasted any time over it.
