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In literature, the paradox is an anomalous juxtaposition of incongruous ideas for the sake of striking exposition or unexpected insight. It functions as a method of literary composition and analysis that involves examining apparently contradictory statements and drawing conclusions either to reconcile them or to explain their presence.
Buttered cat paradox: Humorous example of a paradox from contradicting proverbs. Intentionally blank page: Many documents contain pages on which the text "This page intentionally left blank" is printed, thereby making the page not blank. Metabasis paradox: Conflicting definitions of what is the best kind of tragedy in Aristotle's Poetics.
Paradoxes can also take the form of images or other media. For example, M.C. Escher featured perspective-based paradoxes in many of his drawings, with walls that are regarded as floors from other points of view, and staircases that appear to climb endlessly. [14] Informally, the term paradox is often used to describe a counterintuitive result.
Ivar Nilsson as the Fool in a 1908 stage production of King Lear at The Royal Dramatic Theatre in Sweden [5]. In his article "The Wisdom of the Fool", Walter Kaiser illustrates that the varied names and words people have attributed to real fools in different societies when put altogether reveal the general characteristics of the wise fool as a literary construct: "empty-headed (μάταιος ...
Zeno's arguments may then be early examples of a method of proof called reductio ad absurdum, also known as proof by contradiction. Thus Plato has Zeno say the purpose of the paradoxes "is to show that their hypothesis that existences are many, if properly followed up, leads to still more absurd results than the hypothesis that they are one."
In literary terminology, a paradox is an apparent contradiction that is nevertheless somehow true. [6] Paradox can take the form of an oxymoron , overstatement or understatement. Paradox can blend into irony .
There are many examples of antinomy. A self-contradictory phrase such as "There is no absolute truth" can be considered an antinomy because this statement is suggesting in itself to be an absolute truth, and therefore denies itself any truth in its statement. It is not necessarily also a paradox.
When the paradox was first formulated, the cognitive theory of emotions was a dominant force in philosophical thought. [4] For cognitivists, emotions involve judgments or beliefs. For example, one's anger at somebody involves the judgment or belief of wrongdoing by that somebody. [4]