Life is full of questions. Some of these questions have answers. Other questions can’t be answered, atleast not by us. These questions become paradoxes. The beauty of paradoxes is that they maintain the mystery of life. They remind us, time and again, that there are some things that are unknown to us and probably will remain unknown to us. They remind us that despite all that, we will probably never stop trying. There are countless philosophical paradoxes that will have you rethink life and reality, existence and what is beyond it. After all, constant thinking, persistent questioning is what keeps life interesting and prevents it from degrading down to the boredom of just breathing in and out.
Questions are the waves in an otherwise calm ocean. Questions like When did everything begin? What was there before the beginning? If there was nothing before the beginning, how can something come out of nothing?
The Ship Of Theseus
Theseus was a celebrated Greek hero whose ship was preserved for several decades, many of its parts replaced over time to keep it strong and durable. Eventually, it made an interesting addition in the various thought provoking philosophical paradoxes.
Now consider.
There is a ship and it is decaying. Now imagine that every single part of it—every piece of wood, every scarp of metal—is replaced by new ones gradually. One at a time. Every month, maybe every year or so, a replacement is made until, after a few years, each and every part of the ship has been replaced.
The question is a simple one.
Is it the same ship?
Is the ship that is there after the replacement, the same as the ship that was there before any part was replaced.
The question is an easy one, because the question is always easy.
It’s the answering part that spins the wheels.
If the ship is the same one that was when it was first made, then why? When every single of its atom is different, why is it still the same. Is it the idea of the ship that actually is the ship. Is there no physical existence of the ship itself. By this principle, do all the ships have the same identity. Suppose there is a person who had never seen the ship before it’s parts were replaced. But now he sees the ship without knowing about it. Is this a different ship for him.
If the ship is now different, then what would you say about the human body. We lose our cells and give birth to new ones continuously. In about seven years, almost every single cell of the human body has been replaced. Is this now a different body.
This paradox questions existence and identity to which there seems to be no concrete answer. Is an object that has had all of its components replaced the same object? There are several diffenrt adaptations of this paradox, including the Axe whose handle as well as blade have been replaced one by one. Is it the same axe?
Is anything ever the same?
What is identity? Does it sustain over time? What is change?
Parmenides was a Greek Philosopher who said that everything is fire and everything is flux. Flux means continuous flow. Everchanging and eternal. He compared everything to a flowing river, every drop of whose water changes by the second. The river remains the same but it is never the same twice. You can never step into the same river twice because the water is different, and you are different.
Time is much like this river, perhaps—the opposite of constant, the thing that makes a thing different in a second. Are you the same person you were yesterday? Is it even in your hands?
Who are you? Not the body. Not the name.
Is anything yours to claim except your soul?
The Liar Paradox
A person says that ‘I am lying.’ Is this a truth or a lie?
The Liar paradox is another one of the Ancient Greek philosophical paradoxes which is often attributed to Epimenides who claimed that ‘All Cretans are liars.’ It must be noted here that Epimenides was himself a Cretan. This is what makes his statement a paradox. If all Cretans are liars, as his statement suggests, then he himself is a liar (being a Cretan) and his statement is a lie, which means all Cretans are not liars.
A simpler form of the paradox is ‘This statement is False.’
If this statement is true, then it is, indeed false. Whereas, if it is false as is being claimed, then it is true. It is contradictory statement which manipulates logic, language and semantics to reach a state of self contradiction.
Another interesting version of this is the Pinnochio paradox. You might remember pinnochio as the wooden doll from bedtime stories whose nose grew longer whenever he spoke a lie.
In this paradox, Pinnochio says, ‘My nose is growing now.’ This is another self contradictory statement. If his nose is growing, then he’s telling the truth and his nose shouldn’t be growing. If it isn’t growing then he’s telling a lie and it should be growing, but isn’t.
These kind of semantical philosophical paradoxes make us question Truth and it’s meaning. What is Truth? Is it just a metaphorical ideal or does it have any real value?
Can there even be a truth? Or is it just subjective, depending on your poin of view?
There is a famous Buddhist example which seeks to explain the multiple nature of truth. Consider an elephant, standing peacefully in a forest. Now consider five blind people, who want to find out what exactly it is that’s there right in the middle of the path. They can’t see the elephant so they try to touch it, feel it and then deduce the truth. One blind person comes across the trunk of the elephant and claims that it is a rope, another finds a leg and says that it is a pillar. A third grabs one large ear and calls it a fan, a leaf, whatever you’ll take.
Everyone has half a truth, some part of the truth, true nonetheless. None of these five people know the whole truth, the absolute truth.
We are like these five people, blinded by our judgement and viewpoint and biases. We see half the truth, or a third, or a fifth of the truth and we take it to be the whole truth. We fight with anyone whose half isn’t exactly identical with our half. We forget that there are no identical truths. Tehre just are complementary truths. Like pieces of a puzzle that will come together to make a bigger, beautiful picture if only we are tolerating enough to let others show their pieces.
Consider a sixth, not blind person sitting on a log far behind them, looking on in amusement. I like to think that there is someone out there who knows the whole thing. I like to imagine some higher, eternal being who knows it all and is both frustrated and amused as we go on thinking that the tiny portion of the picture we can see is all there is to reality. Who can see the elephant clear as day and is trying very hard not to laugh as we rise up in petty disputes over ropes and pillars and fans.
Even if we can never actually see the bigger picture, like the five blind people, I like to imagine that there is someone out there who hopes that we can still figure it out. Eventually. With a little bit of teamwork.
The Omnipotence Paradox
One of the most common theological and philosophical paradoxes, the omnipotence paradoxes are often used to question the omnipotence of God in monotheistic religions.
Omnipotent means, literally, all powerful. An omnipotent being has no limitations and can do everything and anything. It is an attribute usually associated with God in the western conception. The Omnipotence Paradox is also known as the paradox of the stone, because it features a stone. A very heavy stone, apparently.
Can an omnipotent being create a stone that is too heavy for its creator to lift?
Can God make a mountain He can’t lift?
The answer to these question falls nowhere near the usual Yes or No.
Both the answers lead one to the conclusion that the being in question is not, after all, omnipotent.
If you say that the Being cannot create a stone too heavy to lift, then that questions the capability of the omnipotent being. On the other hand, if the Being can, indeed create such a stone, then not being able to lift it, they are again not omnipotent.
In this kind of paradox, if the Omnipotent being can do one thing, then they can’t do the other.
An answer to this kind of question is tricky because ther can be no answer. Ther can be only an implication and something to be proven, in this case, the fact that God is not omnipotent.
There have been many philosophers who have attempted to answer this Paradox, including Descarte who claimed that yes! God can infact do such things as make it so that ‘twice two is not four’
2 x 4 ≠ 8
Another philosopher claimed that the crux of the paradox is to claim that God is not omnipotent. That this statement is worded as such to render the claim irrefutable.
We don’t know about God, but the thing we do know about, atleast, is the human determination to question what they don’t believe in. The human determination to question and to doubt and to challenge anyone and everyone to give an answer to that question.
It is this determination to question that had made us what are. An extremely inquisitive, strangely perceptive, highly imaginative and curious, such a curious race of beings who will demand answers, no matter what.
If you have an interest in Philosophy and a penchant for questions, also check out A Powerful Discussion on The Glass Philosophy
