I related to several things in this post. I sometimes feel exactly the same way about my writing. How I get interested in a topic but over time all the themes start to mesh together and seem to be the same until I discover another idea which I can cling onto for a brief amount of time.
I also find paradoxes interesting though I've never thought about the approach that paradox is possible because there does not exist absolute truth but rather shifting relative ones. Held them both in the back of my mind but never connected the two dots, so thanks for that :)
I mean, paradoxes just seem baked into so many aspects of life which leads me to conclude it may either be a basic property of reality or we humans are just completely inadequate. In language with the Epimenides paradox, in philosophy our human nature, in psychology how we yearn for happiness while actively sabotaging its fulfillment, in physics quantum mechanics (superposition and it's disappearance when it's measured), in art the paintings by Escher, in mathematics Gödel's theorem, for just a few examples.
And of course, also the paradox/tension between self-love and self-improvement, greatly struggled with that, now it got a little better. I hope you can find a way to deal with this tension
Is your newsletter not focused on once particular topic because of the importance you put on intrinsically motivated curiosity?
Wish you a great day!
Ps. I'm also quite a Philosophize this! fan and graduated high school this month, cool coincidence :)
Glad you could relate! It's nice to hear I'm not just going in circles in my own head
I'm unfamiliar with many of the paradoxes you mentioned actually, but excited to check them out. Some I've noticed are life and death, failure and success, love and fear, simultaneously being a part and a whole, and of course, progress and contentment.
And that is a great question! I think it is because each of those things, those curiosities, holds an important, inseparable role in my life - to cut out any part would be to only show part of myself. Ultimately, this newsletter is for me to explore my curiosities by thinking through them with writing - and hopefully stumbling on some insight or relatability along the way.
What are some of your favorite Philosophize this episodes?
Personally, I have started at the beginning with the oldest episodes and so far liked the episode on Buddhism and the two episodes on Stoicism the most. What about you?
I recently found the ones on the panopticon really interesting (ep 186 plus some before and after).
And wow :0 thank you for your explanation! I actually have heard of a few of them I just didn't realize. Another one in psychology/biology is how happiness never lasts after we reach our goals. But as for the others like Gödel's theorem, and quantum mechanics, I think I'll have fun looking into those.
One time I was in calc 2 class and my teacher was explaining how there were different sizes of infinity. Like how one infinity could be infinitely bigger than another infinity? Or something. It just kind of blew my mind. I don't even remember much but I remember feeling confused and in awe at the same time.
Yeah true, which is why there exists the theory that there's a happiness set point for every person basically.
Oh I've heard about that, really confusing but also cool. There also exist infinites that don't include all numbers at least that's what I've learned once during pi day at school (yes a day for the number pi). The teacher even showed us the proof via some geometric diagonal chart and I tried to disprove it actually 😂
Oh I can explain the paradoxes quickly if you want:
The epimenides paradox is that a sentence asserts its own wrongness, for example:"I am lying."
If the person's lying, then the statement is true, but if the statement is true, then they're lying (because it says so in the statement), but if they're lying the statement is false etc.
With human nature how we are altruistic but also selfish, we help others and sacrifice our own lives but at the same time commit mass murder.
The paradox in psychology how we want to be happy or at least always assert that while constantly comparing ourselves to others, trying to acquire shiny objects, doing things that don't actually make us happy, hold back from something that would cause us joy out of fear etc.
With quantum mechanics, that an elementary particle doesn't have any specific location but instead is "in two places at once" = certain probability that the particle is in one position, also a probability that it is somewhere else and we don't know which one's true until we measure it and then it collapses and there's just one position, though because of the Heisenberg principle not really a position but a possible space in which it could be.... Schrödinger's cat is a good illustration of that
Escher's a painter who portrayed paradox in his work, for example in his painting "Drawing Hands."
Gödel's theorem basically says that no formal mathematical system can prove all true statements. Because every system that usefully shows truths of number theories can also make self-referential statements. And you can basically make the epimenides paradox as a mathematical statement, a statement that when interpreted says "I cannot be proved in this system."
I related to several things in this post. I sometimes feel exactly the same way about my writing. How I get interested in a topic but over time all the themes start to mesh together and seem to be the same until I discover another idea which I can cling onto for a brief amount of time.
I also find paradoxes interesting though I've never thought about the approach that paradox is possible because there does not exist absolute truth but rather shifting relative ones. Held them both in the back of my mind but never connected the two dots, so thanks for that :)
I mean, paradoxes just seem baked into so many aspects of life which leads me to conclude it may either be a basic property of reality or we humans are just completely inadequate. In language with the Epimenides paradox, in philosophy our human nature, in psychology how we yearn for happiness while actively sabotaging its fulfillment, in physics quantum mechanics (superposition and it's disappearance when it's measured), in art the paintings by Escher, in mathematics Gödel's theorem, for just a few examples.
And of course, also the paradox/tension between self-love and self-improvement, greatly struggled with that, now it got a little better. I hope you can find a way to deal with this tension
Is your newsletter not focused on once particular topic because of the importance you put on intrinsically motivated curiosity?
Wish you a great day!
Ps. I'm also quite a Philosophize this! fan and graduated high school this month, cool coincidence :)
Glad you could relate! It's nice to hear I'm not just going in circles in my own head
I'm unfamiliar with many of the paradoxes you mentioned actually, but excited to check them out. Some I've noticed are life and death, failure and success, love and fear, simultaneously being a part and a whole, and of course, progress and contentment.
And that is a great question! I think it is because each of those things, those curiosities, holds an important, inseparable role in my life - to cut out any part would be to only show part of myself. Ultimately, this newsletter is for me to explore my curiosities by thinking through them with writing - and hopefully stumbling on some insight or relatability along the way.
What are some of your favorite Philosophize this episodes?
Ah okay mhhm, ah I understand, good answer.
Personally, I have started at the beginning with the oldest episodes and so far liked the episode on Buddhism and the two episodes on Stoicism the most. What about you?
I recently found the ones on the panopticon really interesting (ep 186 plus some before and after).
And wow :0 thank you for your explanation! I actually have heard of a few of them I just didn't realize. Another one in psychology/biology is how happiness never lasts after we reach our goals. But as for the others like Gödel's theorem, and quantum mechanics, I think I'll have fun looking into those.
One time I was in calc 2 class and my teacher was explaining how there were different sizes of infinity. Like how one infinity could be infinitely bigger than another infinity? Or something. It just kind of blew my mind. I don't even remember much but I remember feeling confused and in awe at the same time.
Ah okay, I'll give them a listen then.
No problem :)
Yeah true, which is why there exists the theory that there's a happiness set point for every person basically.
Oh I've heard about that, really confusing but also cool. There also exist infinites that don't include all numbers at least that's what I've learned once during pi day at school (yes a day for the number pi). The teacher even showed us the proof via some geometric diagonal chart and I tried to disprove it actually 😂
Oh I can explain the paradoxes quickly if you want:
The epimenides paradox is that a sentence asserts its own wrongness, for example:"I am lying."
If the person's lying, then the statement is true, but if the statement is true, then they're lying (because it says so in the statement), but if they're lying the statement is false etc.
With human nature how we are altruistic but also selfish, we help others and sacrifice our own lives but at the same time commit mass murder.
The paradox in psychology how we want to be happy or at least always assert that while constantly comparing ourselves to others, trying to acquire shiny objects, doing things that don't actually make us happy, hold back from something that would cause us joy out of fear etc.
With quantum mechanics, that an elementary particle doesn't have any specific location but instead is "in two places at once" = certain probability that the particle is in one position, also a probability that it is somewhere else and we don't know which one's true until we measure it and then it collapses and there's just one position, though because of the Heisenberg principle not really a position but a possible space in which it could be.... Schrödinger's cat is a good illustration of that
Escher's a painter who portrayed paradox in his work, for example in his painting "Drawing Hands."
Gödel's theorem basically says that no formal mathematical system can prove all true statements. Because every system that usefully shows truths of number theories can also make self-referential statements. And you can basically make the epimenides paradox as a mathematical statement, a statement that when interpreted says "I cannot be proved in this system."