Philosophy

Dialetheism is a thesis about truth that certain statements can be be both true and false at the same time. Motivations for such come from cases such as the Liar's Paradox: "This sentence is false." To assert that the sentence above is true is to also assert that it is false at the same time. Similarly, to assert that it is false is to also assert that it is true at the same time. Similarly, The statement in this box is false. Other motivations include the paradoxes of Zeno in which both reason and experience seem true (The arrow seems to be moving, empirically speaking; but, rationally, an arrow that occupies any set of points in space-time isn't moving at all). Nonsensical Statements This refers to semantic issues in dialetheism. In the two cases cited above, of course, the Liar's paradox is about the meaningfulness of the statement; we ask the question: Does it make any sense? Does it communicate anything? If it doesn't convey any sense of meaning, then it ...

From Marbaniang, Domenic.  Epistemics of Divine Reality © 2007. To the attacks of the pluralists, Zeno of Elea, disciple of Parmenides offered several arguments in form of paradoxes that demonstrated the utter absurdity of commonsense realism. Since absurdity is a sign of falsity, it is false that reality is many. Hence, Zeno argues that reality must be one. It may be noted that the paradox may also mean, contrary to Zeno’s contention, that reason is false and experience is true. However, since it is difficult to label reason as false without the use of reason itself, the certainty of rational reality looms over that of experience. Few of Zeno’s most famous proofs are as follows: The Paradoxes of Plurality The Argument from Denseness If there are many, they must be as many as they are and neither more nor less than that. But if they are as many as they are, they would be limited. If there are many, things that are are unlimited. For there are always others between the things that are,...

Excerpt from Epistemics of Divine Reality , p.227, 2007 Metaphysical sensations involve the accompanying sense of the paradoxical, which gives rise to metaphysical emotions. The various paradoxes are the paradoxes between reason and experience, viz ., transcendence-immanence, infinity-finitude, immutability-mutation, necessary-contingent, and unity-plurality. The inability of reason and experience to solve the paradoxes generates negative emotions. As has been already seen, neither reason nor experience, which are in reality, by combination, the source of the problem, can bring about a solution. For that would mean in each case to lift oneself by one’s own bootstraps. The only solution reason brings in is the rational which nullifies the empirical, ultimately leading to non-dualism. The ultimate that experience can do is the relativizing of truth to the chagrin of reason. The dissatisfaction of any such solution is bound to generate emotions that are negative; for man is not just consc...