The Problems of Indeterminacy and Autonomy of Law

The legal indeterminacy thesis argues that law is indeterminate, either due to inherent linguistic ambiguity, or due to the nature of logical argument or because law is rife with antinomies. Parallel to this argument is another related argument, that law is a relatively autonomous discipline with its own inner logic, its own inner development, that functions essentially independently of other considerations such as market forces, political developments or moral considerations. The theories of legal indeterminicity and the theory of the relative autonomy of legal interpretation are related in that if law were indeterminate then law would necessarily also be autonomous. I argue however that law is not radically indeterminate, and that the indetermincity thesis is generally taken too far.Likewise, I argue (contra Teubner5 and Duncan Kennedy) that law is not autonomous: law is in an interdependent relation with the economy, a feedback relation where both the law and the economy influence each other but which in the end is determined more often than not by market forces rather than by legal structures. That is, I take a weak and purely descriptive view of law as determined mostly by market forces (secondarily, by moral considerations) rather than the amoral strong prescriptive view of law and economics proposed by Richard Posner. In my opinion the main cause of the misconception of law as somehow indeterminate is due to erroneous understandings of epistemology which do not see the distinction between theoretical and practical logic.32 PagesTable of Contents:I. Truth A. Kurt Goedel, Indeterminacy and Autonomy B. Theories of Truth 1. The Correspondence Theory of Truth 2. The Consensus Theory of Truth 3. The Coherence Theory of Truth 4. The Pragmatic Theory of Truth 5. Truth Statements are reflections of the material world. II. Logic A. Practical versus theoretical logic 1. Theoretical logic 2. Practical logic B. (Qua)Ternary Logic 1. Interpretations (Values) of Statements 2. Truth Functors 3. Ternary logic invalidates reductio proofs. C. Puzzles in law 1. Antinomies in Law a. Conflicts of Law b. Lacunae 2. Paradox a. Paradoxes of Material Implication Reveal the Inadequacy of binary logic. b. Paradox in Laws c. Circling the Square: Statements about Pegasus Conclusion: Law and Morality