Contradiction's Quest

[Moody]

Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
I am large, I contain multitudes.
[Whitman, 'Song of Myself'.]

The path up and down is one and the same. [Heraclitus, B60]

1
Hail! Our Philosophy demands that we aspire to the kind of awesome magnificance of history's Great and Noble Aryan thinkers.
Their Superhumanity is as a vast ocean, carrying all kinds of contradictions within it; on this surging River of Becoming we stamp out Thorshammer of Being.

2
Lo!
Our 'critics' call our Philosophy of Power, Domination, Blood/Soil and Leadership 'contadictory' (?!?) ... as this were a slight!
Because of their narrow, reductionist materialism, - 'contradiction' isn't 'allowed'!
Ha!
We ROAR with Homeric laughter at these timid, logic-chopping ones!

3
Sieg!
OUR Philosophical heritage is straightforward enough; it has the noble aristocrat Herclitus as its Founder, while Nietzsche is our 'modern'.
Both these men were bitter enemies of those who seek to impose sterile 'laws of logic' on thinking itself, such Aristotle's prissy 'law of non-contradiction';
"Law of non-contradiction: in classical logic, the principle that contradictaries cannot be true together and cannot be false together.
In modern logic, the principle that no statement of the form (p and not-p) can be true".
[Dictionary of Philosophy, Penguin]

Pah!
Aristotle, the first formulator of this 'law' naturally took Heraclitus to be his opposite.

4
Thurisaz!
Heraclitus's most famous utterance bucks the paltry laws of Aristotelian logic;
"We step and do not step into the same rivers, we are and we are not". [Heraclitus, B49a]


This is our kind of Philosophy - Timeless, Terse, and Lapidary; etched on the Megaliths of Etermity ... And how we Love Eternity!

And listen to Heraclitus as he evokes the sUperhuman: "Immortals are mortals, mortals immortals: living their death, dying their life". [Heraclitus, B62]

Yes, we are Aryan men of a million contradictions - men of Strength per se by that very token! We are gods among men, a Caste ready to Rule the Sterile Slaves of Logic. Bend Thy knee!

[Moody]

This spirit of Contradiction seen in the Noble Hellene Heraclitus is also found in the Germanic mind.
We see that Boehme [1575-1624] said that all things are both Yes and No.
And Novalis, who did much to revive Boehme's work wrote;

"It is perhaps the highest task of the higher logic to annihilate the law of contradiction".

We met this 'law' of Aristotle's in my first post in this thread - we annihilate such life-denying dogmas as this pretended forbidding of contradiction!

"Kant held that in reasoning about the world as a whole we inevitably fall into contradictions or 'antinomies'".
[Dictionary of Philosophy]

Modern philosophy has already begun to hack away at the taboo of contradiction;

"Hegel argued that such contradictions are far more widespead and significant than Kant believed. Any finite thought or conception, taken in isolation, involves a contradiction ...
Thinking ... has an impulse to overcome the contradiction. It often attempts to do so, initially, by resorting to an infinite regress ..."
[ib.,]

So, for Hegel;

"Finite things, like finite thoughts, involve Contradictions.
Just as finite thoughts have an impulse to overcome Contradiction, and thus move on to other thoughts, so finite things have such an impulse that leads them to move and change".
[ib.,]


It was this recognition of the Necessity of Contradiction that led, of course, to Hegel's famous dialectic;
Everything contains its own Contradiction, its thesis and antithesis.
In an attempt to over-come this Contradiction a synthesis of thesis and antithesis is created; a third way emerges.

"For Hegel, thought proceeds by successively revealing and overcoming contradictions ..."
[ib.,]

Quantum theory will later support this will-to-contradiction.


Thus another thing, a third-thing, is always created which itself will immediately produce its own Contradiction and so on, and the Cycle will continue!

Contradiction is the Spur of our Dynamic Philosophy of Flux, which flows from the stream of Heraclitus over the course of millennia and then flourishes in Germany as described, and leads onto Nietzschean Philosophy and Quantum Theory.

Be not afraid of contradiction!

[Jack]

A = A, A does not equal non-A is a bastardisation of Aristotle's law of non contradiction.

"It is impossible for the same thing at the same time to belong and not belong to the same thing at the same time and in the same respect."

First, man's intelligence (i.e. analytical capacity) varies from individual to individual - the smarter individual will see more detail to A than one intellectually retarded - the retard will see a 'different' A. Second, the quality of man's senses also vary (e.g. someone partially deaf will hear song A differently than a man with perfect hearing (representative realism). Third, man quite often chooses to ignore/distort information that does not conform with his own objectives. Fourth, to take the A=A proposition in the most refined sense, A=A so long as time is frozen in which case A changes to post-A. The identity known as 'A' remains itself but no longer corresponds with physical reality - the concept and the real are two different but closely related things.

[Moody]

"A = A, A does not equal non-A is a bastardisation of Aristotle's law of non contradiction.

Moody; Than why did you write in the very first post of your thread entitled 'Rationalism to Nihilism to Faith' [the thread meant to announce your 'new dawn'!] that;
"The Law of Non-Contradiction [A is A; A is not non-A]" ?
(8th 'paragraph' down)
As you well know, this is the accepted logical form of the Law [better - (p and not-p) ], and that Aristotle was, of course, the pioneer of Logic.
(p and not-p) is a way of writing the law concisely, rather than the hopelessly turgid and confused paragraph that you provide in the post to which this is a reply, which I won't bother to quote back in full.

Are you now back-peddling from your previously simplistic position that the law of non-contradiction must always be true?

Your previously dogmatic stance has EASILY been DESTROYED.

Already you begin to crumble.

I am here, - like Heraclitus, Hegel, Nietzsche and Heisenberg before me, - to teach you all the Way of Contradiction - heed me my brethren!

[Jack]

Jack "A = A, A does not equal non-A is a bastardisation of Aristotle's law of non contradiction.

Moody; Than why did you write in the very first post of your thread entitled 'Rationalism to Nihilism to Faith' [the thread meant to announce your 'new dawn'!] that;
"The Law of Non-Contradiction [A is A; A is not non-A]" ?
(8th 'paragraph' down)

That's a much simplified version of the paragraph of Aristotle which I've quoted.

As you well know, this is the accepted logical form of the Law [better - (p and not-p) ], and that Aristotle was, of course, the pioneer of Logic.
(p and not-p) is a way of writing the law concisely, rather than the hopelessly turgid and confused paragraph that you provide in the post to which this is a reply, which I won't bother to quote back in full.

To reject the Law of Non-Contradiction is to believe that there are no particular characteristics which can be used to distinguish one object from another, to believe the world is a haze.

Are you now back-peddling from your previously simplistic position that the law of non-contradiction must always be true?

No.

Your previously dogmatic stance has EASILY been DESTROYED.

How? I see a handful of quotes, no reasoning or proof.

Already you begin to crumble.

The world does not exist in your head Moody. I have not begun to crumble.

I am here, - like Heraclitus, Hegel, Nietzsche and Heisenberg before me, - to teach you all the Way of Contradiction - heed me my brethren!

Ha. Show us this 'way', and show us how it can be upheld.

[Moody]

"To reject the Law of Non-Contradiction is to believe that there are no particular characteristics which can be used to distinguish one object from another, to believe the world is a haze".

Moody; Not so; the Law is a logical dogma that does not accord with experience. It is just a way of limiting discourse to make things simpler.

Your constant repetition of the fear of a "haze" just refers to your own short-comings.
The fact that you view the world in such a static and limited sense allows you to believe that there are 'no contradictions'.

Those of a broader mind and experience know that life IS contradiction.
As I have demonstrated there is a whole tradition of philosophising which goes back at least to Heraclitus which actually rejects the Law of non-Contradiction.
Not only that, but modern post-Quantum scientific thought actually supports this rejection of the Law.

Read the work of Heraclitus and look at the dialectic of Hegel [ I have given some essentials in my first two posts] first.

You all need to do this to prepare for the development of my Way of Contradiction; you might also turn to the whole culture of Romanticism and Neoromanticism to acquire an understanding of this out-look in general terms.

Only by rejecting the taboo against Contradiction can greatness and superhumanity be accomplished.
As Nietzsche said in his Zarathustra, one must have "chaos in one to give birth to a dancing star".

I am that Dancing Star.

[Jack]

Jack; "To reject the Law of Non-Contradiction is to believe that there are no particular characteristics which can be used to distinguish one object from another, to believe the world is a haze".

Moody; Not so; the Law is a logical dogma that does not accord with experience.

Yes it does.

It is just a way of limiting discourse to make things simpler.

The world is understandable.

Your constant repetition of the fear of a "haze" just refers to your own short-comings.

I do not 'fear' haze, but I know that A is A.

The fact that you view the world in such a static and limited sense allows you to believe that there are 'no contradictions'.

'Static'? Where did I say the world was static?

Those of a broader mind and experience know that life IS contradiction.

Then one begins to wonder why you object to another's posts when he contradicts himself...

As I have demonstrated there is a whole tradition of philosophising which goes back at least to Heraclitus which actually rejects the Law of non-Contradiction.
Not only that, but modern post-Quantum scientific thought actually supports this rejection of the Law.

'Post Quantum' now? The rules of Quantum Physics are still being worked out and no, the Law has not been refuted, whatever you wish to believe, and it will not be.

Read the work of Heraclitus and look at the dialectic of Hegel [ I have given some essentials in my first two posts] first.

Very rough essentials I might add. I've read the collected wisdom of Heraclites (I have a copy on the shelf behind me) and I've read about Hegel's dialectic outside of this forum (if you'd read my post on idealism you'd know that - http://www.forums.skadi.net/showthread.php?t=33330)

You all need to do this to prepare for the development of my Way of Contradiction; you might also turn to the whole culture of Romanticism and Neoromanticism to acquire an understanding of this out-look in general terms.

Go ahead, show your Way of Contradiction.

Only by rejecting the taboo against Contradiction can greatness and superhumanity be accomplished.

Here I disagree but I encourage you to explain how.

As Nietzsche said in his Zarathustra, one must have "chaos in one to give birth to a dancing star".

I am that Dancing Star.

Arrogance is considered the mark of a failed man according to Aryan ethics.

[Moody]

A=A is the last refuge of the truly trivial.

The trivial ones who cannot countenance contradiction, and have no sense of humour [which is born of life's contradiction].
Most of all, they are without that great mark of higher culture, Irony.

Our philosophy, stretching as it does from Heraclitus to Nietzsche is rich in irony - 'we are large, we contain multitiudes'.
Thus Spake the Dancing Star.

Only in us is Progress made - we are the inventors of the Wheel, after all.

Let us lok at Quantum.

Our outlook is very much a 'third possibility'. The naural triads of Aryan culture - three castes, three states of being, becoming and passing-away. Why, even a 'tribe' means literally a 'third'.

The third thing always goes beyond the dualistic A or non-A of classical logic.
Indeed, this classical logic actually states that 'tertium non datur' [i.e., 'there is no third thing'].

According to this dogma, two alternatives exhaust what is possible (!)

Not so;

"In quantum theory we have to admit that there are other possibilities which are in a strange way mixtures of the two former possibilities".
[W. Heisenberg, 'Physics and Philosophy', 1958]

Quantum Theory [QT] reasserts our ancient Aryan Triad.

The great Werner Heisenberg [1901-1976] put forward his Uncertainty Principle in 1927. He was director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Physics in Berlin from 1941 on, and after WWII he organised the Max Planck Institute in Berlin.

"It is especially one fundamental principle of classical logic which seems to require modification. In classical logic it is assumed that, if a statement has any meaning at all, either the statement or the negation of the statement must be correct.
Of 'here is a table' or 'here is not a table', either the first or the second statement must be correct.
'Tertium non datur', a third possibility does not exist ....
In QT this law 'tertium non datur' is to be modified ..."
[ib.,]

Here Heisenberg attacks the so-called ban on contradiction in classical logic.

"One may distinguish various levels of language.
One level refers to objects - for instance, to the atoms or the electrons.
A second level refers to statements about objects.
A third level refers to statements about statements about objects etc.,
It would then be possible to have different logical patterns at the different levels ...
Classical logic may be in a similar manner 'a priori' [i.e., 'from what is earlier'] to Quantum logic, as classical physics is to QT..."

To deny these possibilities is to live in the intellectual Stone Age.
As the renowned modern cosmologist says;

"Most Quantum Cosmologists ... accept the full range of Quantum alternatives as actually existing realities. That is, one would, for example, assert an existence of two Universes ..."
[Paul Davies, Intro to Heisenberg]

Clearly this is an Aryan way [think of the twin sun theory of the ancient Aryans], and doesn't stop there, even going on to;

"Postulating an infinity of co-existing parallel worlds, or realities ..."
[ib.,]

This is a feature of all Aryan thought - it is polythesistic, not monotheist; it is multi-dimensional not one-dimensional. Whether we look at our mythology, our philosophy, our art or our science, we see that the Aryan way is the Way of Contradiction.

[Jack]

Answer the question. How can a stone be a stone and not be a stone at the same time in the same respect.

[Moody]

Nietzsche cooly eviscerates Aristotle's hated 'law' of non-contradiction [LONC], which states that something, 'A', cannot both be 'A' and 'non-A' at the same time!

Nietzsche gets straight to the nub when he says that this 'law' is due to the limitations of its adherents;

"This [LONC] is a subjective empirical law, not the expression of any 'necessity', but only of an inability.
If according to Aristotle, the LONC is the most certain of all principles, if it is the ultimate and most basic, upon which every demonstrative proof rests, if the principle of every axiom lies in it; then one should consider all the more rigorously what PRESUPPOSITIONS already lie at the bottom of it...
In short, the question remains open: are the axioms of logic adequate to reality or are they a means and measure for us to CREATE reality, the concept 'reality', for ourselves? - To affirm the former one would, as already said, have to have a previous knowledge of being - which is certainly not the case.
The proposition [LONC] therefore contains no CRITERION OF TRUTH, but an IMPERATIVE concerning that which SHOULD count as true."
[Nietzsche, WTP 516]

Ha!
This 'law' tries to make its limited observation, its 'is', into an 'ought', even though these same logicians consider this to be another 'sin'!
Oh how they ... contradict themselves.

As usual, we see that their logic is based on the fallacy that there are identical things and static one-dimensional states of being in the world.

"Supposing there were no self-identical 'A', such as is supposed by every proposition of logic (and of mathematics), and the 'A' were already mere appearance, then logic would have a merely apparent world as its condition.
In fact, we believe in this proposition under the influence of ceaseless experience which seems continually to confirm it.
The 'thing' - that is the real substratum of 'A'; OUR BELIEF IN THINGS is the precondition of our belief in logic".
[IB.,]

Here, Nietzsche prefigures Quantum Theory: compare Nietzsche with the following;

"How, asks Heisenberg, can we speak about atoms and the like if their existence is so shadowy?"
[Paul Davies]

Nietzsche was arguing that of atoms long before this [see also his references to Boscovich in Beyond Good and Evil, 1886];

"The A of logic is, like the atom, a reconstruction of the thing - If we do not grasp this, but make of logic a criterion of true being, we are on the way to positing as realities all those hypostases: substance, attribute, object, subject, action etc., ( note 'to hypostastise is to regard or treat something that is not a 'thing' or an object as if it were one'); that is, to conceiving a metaphysical world, that is, a 'real world' - THIS, HOWEVER, IS THE APPARENT WORLD ONCE MORE -"
[Nietzsche, ib.,]

And so,

"In short, logic does not doubt its ability to assert something about the true-in-itself [namely, that it CANNOT have opposite attributes]".
[ib.,]

Nietzsche is at his destructive best here;

"Here reigns the coarse sensualistic prejudice that sensations teach us truths about things - that I cannot say at the same time of one and the same thing that it is hard and that it is soft. [The instructive proof 'I cannot have two opposite sensations at the same time' - quite coarse and false]".
[ib.,]

Coarse is right - go kick that stone!

"The conceptual ban on contradiction proceeds from the belief that we are ABLE to form concepts, that the concept not only designates the essence of a thing but COMPREHENDS it - In fact, logic [like geometry and arithmetic] applies only to fictitious entities that we have created.
Logic is the attempt to comprehend the actual world by means of a scheme of being posited by oursleves; more correctly, to make it formulatable and calculable for us -".
[ib.,]