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Two Cognitive Systems, Two Implications, and Selection Tasks
Dual-process theories of reasoning take for granted the fundamental difference between the two cognitive systems, Systems 1 and 2. This paper, in contrast, argues that System 1, which is responsible for fast, intuitive, associative, and effortless reasoning, can be explained to be just as logical as System 2, which is said to draw consequences in rulebased, rational and criticised fashions. The only difference between the two systems is argued to be that the former draws conclusions in a logic which is diagrammatic, and moreover a positive and implicational fragment of ordinary, classical logic. Such a fundamental connection between the two systems is then applied to explain away cognitive biases in the Wason card selection task. The selection task thus ceases to represent a paradigm case of confirmation bias, because both systems of reasoning exhibit important processes of logical inferences.