Paradox Thread

Its just like the title my friends, post a paradox, explain it completely and we can discuss it. I'll start with the Grelling-Nelson Paradox, it is a very interesting english paradox.

Pretty much it is about a word describing words that don't mean what they are (The word verb isn't a verb, the word long isn't long), Heterlogical Words.

The paradox is this: If the word Heterological is heterological then it is autological (making it heterological). It is much like if I said: This sentence is untrue.

Never heard of that one, and it was pretty clear until I got to the actual paradox. Can't heterological be autologically defined and heterological only in the sense of it actually being called the word heterological?

The paradox I'm accustomed to seeing is the Grandfather Paradox, where someone goes back in time, kills their grandfather, but now they won't be born so how could they kill their grandfather in the first place?

I can't wrap my brain around what I just read. @_@

Best paradox has to be time travel & its effects.

Paradoxes are awesome i agree with the time travel one being the best. I also believe the theory that nature will prevent any time travel paradox from occuring though to maintain stability. I think everyones heard of this one Irresistible force paradox: What would happen if an unstoppable force hit an immovable object?

What would happen if an unstoppable force hit an immovable object?

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Considering physically neither of those objects could exist, so the law of physics wouldn't apply in that situation; the object that couldn't be stop would just pass through the immovable object. The object that cant be moved, stays and the object that cant be stopped continues on. I believe that answer satisfies both the requirements of that paradox.

My favourite paradoxes are Stable Time Loops - The Doctor is stuck in the Pandorica, but its ok because Rory gets a Sonic Screwdriver from Future!Doctor. Rory uses the screwdriver to open the Pandorica, freeing Present!Doctor, allowing him to become Future!Doctor and free Present/Past!Doctor. Yay!

Are there Oceans in Space? said:

Never heard of that one, and it was pretty clear until I got to the actual paradox. Can't heterological be autologically defined and heterological only in the sense of it actually being called the word heterological?

The paradox I'm accustomed to seeing is the Grandfather Paradox, where someone goes back in time, kills their grandfather, but now they won't be born so how could they kill their grandfather in the first place?

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They become their own grandad.

I only know the typical.

''Days where you wish you had a time machine so you could go back and undo something stupid you did. But upon undoing the doing you did, you no longer in the future wish for the time machine, which then re does the undid doing you originally did.'' So on so forth.

Livewire said:

I can't wrap my brain around what I just read. @_@

Best paradox has to be time travel & its effects.

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Agreed. Paradoxes are great and analyzing them is exhausting yet helpful in improving your understanding of life. Life is after all, paradoxical :3

Time travel has to be the best. It's quite enjoyable trying to find a right way to explain what would happen were time bent O_O
As has been mentioned. You travel back in time and kill your grandfather. So you don't exist anymore. But how is your grandfather dead if you're not there to kill him? He's not dead, so you're still there, back to square one... /headache :(

My favorite paradox:

There is a card with a sentence on each side. One side says: "The sentence on the other side of this card is true". The other side says: "The sentence on the other side of this card is false"
Which of the two is true?

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LOL

ZettaSlowbro said:

Considering physically neither of those objects could exist, so the law of physics wouldn't apply in that situation; the object that couldn't be stop would just pass through the immovable object. The object that cant be moved, stays and the object that cant be stopped continues on. I believe that answer satisfies both the requirements of that paradox.

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Here's a variant of that paradox:
Let's say there is a bullet which can shoot through any barrier. Let's also say there is an absolutely bullet-proof armor which no object can penetrate. What will happen if such a bullet hits such an armor?

This one cannot be explained with your reasoning ;)

PEDRO12 said:

Here's a variant of that paradox:
Let's say there is a bullet which can shoot through any barrier. Let's also say there is an absolutely bullet-proof armor which no object can penetrate. What will happen if such a bullet hits such an armor?

This one cannot be explained with your reasoning ;)

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That is true.
The best (Theoretical) answer I could give is that both objects switch places in space-time. Or the bullet appears on the other side of the armor, where the bullet never gets stopped, and the armor is never actually broken or has it's self penetrated.

ZettaSlowbro said:

That is true.
The best (Theoretical) answer I could give is that both objects switch places in space-time. Or the bullet appears on the other side of the armor, where the bullet never gets stopped, and the armor is never actually broken or has it's self penetrated.

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Actually the armor would have to be penetrated for that. Even if within a fracture of a milli-second the two switch places, they'd have to go through each other because matter does not simply disappear.

But if I were to give a reasoning, I'd say Einstein: E=ΔMC².
The two would collide at the break point, the energy from the impact and at such a speed would cause the bullet to de-materialize into energy and the area where the armor hit would do the same. Energy can exchange position so long as it doesn't get destroyed. Then after passing each other, the two would materialize back to their original forms.

PEDRO12 said:

Actually the armor would have to be penetrated for that. Even if within a fracture of a milli-second the two switch places, they'd have to go through each other because matter does not simply disappear.

But if I were to give a reasoning, I'd say Einstein: E=ΔMC².
The two would collide at the break point, the energy from the impact and at such a speed would cause the bullet to de-materialize into energy and the area where the armor hit would do the same. Energy can exchange position so long as it doesn't get destroyed. Then after passing each other, the two would materialize back to their original forms.

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If we're applying physics neither of those objects could exist in the first place. Which is why most paradoxes are only theoretical, if any answer can be given then it has to be as far fetched as the question, and is why my solution ignored any conservation of mass.

That being said, I like your reasoning.