Paradoxes

Evoking Authenticity: through polyhedral global configuration of local paradoxes (Part #2)

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Paradoxes and contradictions are here considered to be dissonant opposites whose existence undermines the coherence of behaviour ordered by rational principles. This can form the basis of an alternative approach to aesthetics, as in Paradoxism initiated by Florentin Smarandache [more]. The concern of this paper, however, is that they force people to act in ways with which they are not comfortable and that are troubling to their consciences. This may be accompanied by complex exercises of rationalization and denial. It may be difficult to reconcile such differences, especially in response to the pointed questions of innocent children.

As discussed elsewhere (Antagonistic Dualities: Polarization and Paradox, 1983), one approach to the logical discontinuity between contradictory "answers" is through the study of paradoxes. For Solomon Marcus (1982): "Paradoxes occur when two different levels of knowledge, of language, of communication, of reality, of human behaviour, etc. are seen as one level, are mixed, are superposed, are combined, or are confused." He gives 18 pairs of levels which demonstrate a variety of paradoxes of which some are well-known to specialists.

To clarify the semiotic difficulties involved, Marcus groups them into four types:

1. Semiparadox: A against B, but not necessarily B against A (e.g. "Mary gave birth to a child and got married")
2. Paradox: A against B, and B against A. If "against" is a logical negation, for example, this results in a logical paradox (e.g. when something is simultaneously good and bad)
3. Semiantinomy: A against B, and A for B, where "for" is a binary relation which is inverse with respect to the relation "against" (e.g. the well-known claim of Epimenides the Cretan that "All Cretans are always liars")
4. Antinomy: where (A, B) and (B, A) are both semiantinomies, such that the first term of a dichotomy both opposes and needs the second term, with the terms attracting and rejecting each other.

Solomon Marcus and Monica Tataram have applied these distinctions in the analysis of 60 interacting global trends noted by the Goals, Processes and Indicators of Development Project (Paradoxical and and antinomic aspects of the global trends in the world today, 1982). They argue:

"When dealing with the contemporary world, a basic step is to learn how to progress from a descriptive to an evaluative analysis, from what is directly perceived to what is scientifically understood, although such an understanding may sometimes surprise the intuitive perception....Many such trends are organized in opposite pairs, but their contradictory nature is much more richer and perfidious than what these binary oppositions reflect."

The difficulty with any such approach is that the very logic of the method employed disguises the full force of the paradox and of the hiatus it engenders in any univocal communication. It effectively prevents the insertion of the engendering elements into the same framework, unless they are denatured and converted into symbolic entities, as in the case of the Marcus initiative.

A particular concern here is with the way in which such unresolved differences get internalized as tensions that undermine individual and collective health and any feeling of well-being. In a sense exposure to a paradox is to place oneself "in the line of fire". This may be used to advantage or may, through stress, be a direct cause of ill-health.

Colin Talbot (How the Public Sector Got its Contradictions, 2003) makes a useful comment on choice of terminology:

I use the word 'paradox' to denote apparently mutually exclusive and contradictory elements of a situation or system that nevertheless do co-exist. As I will explain later, I prefer the term 'paradox' to that of 'contradiction' because in the Marxist and Hegelian traditions, which have largely appropriated the term contradiction, it has become inextricably linked to the idea of synthesis - that is resolution of contradictions. My emphasis is on irresolvable, permanent, contradictions and the notion of 'paradox' captures this more accurately and strongly.

Talbot distinguishes three types of contradictions:

• Dilemmas are contradictions that can be resolved by simply making a choice between two incompatible alternatives. This is the most often adopted approach when examining contradictory aspects of public institutions.
• The second approach - and type of contradiction -- comes from the Marxist/Hegelian tradition and involves the dialectical synthesis of the (contradictory) aspects of two phenomena to produce a third -- new -- 'thing'. In the Marxist/Hegelian tradition synthesis is always positive, that is it moves in a 'progressive' direction.
• There is however a third approach to contradictions which sees them (or at least some of them) as permanent -- that is they will not go away. They cannot be resolved either through choice (as with dilemmas) or by synthesis. If choice is exercised in favour of one 'pole' of the contradiction the other pole will not be suppressed, it will simply resurface later, or in a slightly different guise. [more]

It is the latter which is the prime focus of what follows. Talbot introduces the valuable question: Why is it that paradoxical political, organisational or managerial behaviour seems to be not merely possible but actually beneficial, in certain circumstances?

Such paradoxes may be particular to an individual and may be fundamentally disruptive of the harmonious flow of daily life (as notably identified in Chinese as *** or in Japanese as ***). The disturbing paradoxes for some may be of little significance to others.

A suggestive preliminary checklist for consideration in this process might include:

Such a random selection may be seen intellectually as simply a list of antonyms. The emphasis here however is on the experiential response to such antonyms as they are used to categorize and order phenomena of daily life. An extensive study of these antonyms has been made in the context of a project on Human Values [more]. A comprehensive list of some 3,000 value concepts was ordered and clustered in terms of 230 value polarities, like those above. The study pointed to the possibility of globally configuring all such value polarities together [more]. Some steps were taken in this direction in the online version of this database, but were handicapped by constraints of mathematical algorithms and computer graphics technology [more].

At this stage, without denying the possibility and desirability of more complex and comprehensive configuration, the focus here is on any individual's personal choice of the more limited (say 4-12) active paradoxes that "torture" their own daily life.

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