paradox
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈpæ.ɹəˌdɒks/
note: without the Mary–marry–merry merger
ipa: /ˈpæɹ.əˌdɑks/
note: Mary–marry–merry merger
ipa: /ˈpɛɹ.əˌdɑks/
Forms: form: paradoxes
Etymology: From Middle French paradoxe, from Latin paradoxum, from Ancient Greek παράδοξος (parádoxos, “unexpected, strange”).
Senses: examples: text: "This sentence is false" is a paradox.
text: The active sense of living which we all enjoy, before reflection shatters our instinctive world for us, is self-luminous and suggests no paradoxes.
ref: 1909, William James, A pluralistic universe. Hibbert lectures, page 347:
text: According to one version of an ancient paradox, an Athenian is supposed to say "I am a liar." It is then argued that if the statement is true, then he is telling the truth, and is therefore not a liar […]
ref: 1962, Abraham Wolf, Textbook of Logic, page 255:
glosses: An apparently self-contradictory statement, which can only be true if it is false, and vice versa.
examples: text: It is an interesting paradox that drinking a lot of water can often make you feel thirsty.
text: The most fundamental paradox is that if we're never to use force, we must be prepared to use it and to use it successfully.
ref: 1983 May 21, Ronald Reagan, Presidential Radio Address:
glosses: A counterintuitive conclusion or outcome.
examples: text: Not having a fashion is a fashion; that's a paradox.
text: How quaint the ways of Paradox! / At common sense she gaily mocks! / Though counting in the usual way years twenty-one I've been alive, / Yet reck'ning by my natal day, / Yet reck'ning by my natal day, / I am a little boy of five!
ref: 1879, W. S. Gilbert, “The Pirates of Penzance”, in The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan, published 1941:
glosses: A claim that two apparently contradictory ideas are true.
glosses: A thing involving contradictory yet interrelated elements that exist simultaneously and persist over time.
examples: text: He is a paradox; you would not expect him in that political party.
text: You are a paradox of bitch and angel.
ref: 1999, Virginia Henley, A Year and a Day, →ISBN, page 315:
glosses: A person or thing having contradictory properties.
examples: text: And only by dismantling our preconceptions of age can we be free to understand the paradox: How young are the old?
ref: 1994, James Joseph Pirkl, Transgenerational Design, →ISBN, page 3:
glosses: An unanswerable question or difficult puzzle, particularly one which leads to a deeper truth.
examples: text: Ay, truly; for the power of beauty will sooner / transform honesty from what it is to a bawd than the / force of honesty can translate beauty into his / likeness: this was sometime a paradox, but now the / time gives it proof.
ref: 1594, William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, Act III:
text: they contended to make that Maxim, that there is no faith to be held with Infidels, a meere and absurd Paradox [...].
ref: 1615, Ralph Hamor, A True Discourse of the Present State of Virginia, Richmond, published 1957, page 3:
glosses: A statement which is difficult to believe, or which goes against general belief.
examples: text: The need for paradox is no doubt rooted deep in the very nature of the use we make of language.
ref: 1906, Richard Holt Hutton, Brief Literary Criticisms, page 40:
glosses: The use of counterintuitive or contradictory statements (paradoxes) in speech or writing.
examples: text: Thus, like modern disputants, they aimed either to confute the respondent or to land him in paradox.
ref: 1866, Edward Poste, Aristotle on Fallacies, Or, The Sophistici Elenchi, translation of original by Aristotle, page 43:
topics: human-sciences
philosophy
sciences
glosses: A state in which one is logically compelled to contradict oneself.
examples: text: Defiance-based paradox is employed so that the family will actively oppose and deliberately sabotage the prescription.
ref: 1988, Martin Lakin, Ethical Issues in the Psychotherapies, →ISBN, page 103:
qualifier: psychotherapy
glosses: The practice of giving instructions that are opposed to the therapist's actual intent, with the intention that the client will disobey or be unable to obey.
Synonyms: sense: counterintuitive outcome
word: shocker
sense: person or thing with contradictory properties
word: juxtaposition
sense: person or thing with contradictory properties
word: contradiction
sense: unanswerable question
word: puzzle
sense: unanswerable question
word: quandary
sense: unanswerable question
word: riddle
sense: unanswerable question
word: enigma
sense: unanswerable question
word: koan
sense: therapy practice
word: reverse psychology
Hyponyms: Abilene paradox
Achilles paradox
Allais paradox
archer's paradox
Arrow paradox
arrow paradox
Arrow's paradox
Baker's paradox
Banach-Tarski paradox
barber paradox
barn-pole paradox
Benardete's paradox
Berkson's paradox
Berry paradox
Bertrand's paradox
Bhartrhari's paradox
birthday paradox
Blub paradox
bootstrap paradox
boy or girl paradox
Burali-Forti paradox
clock paradox
Cuomo's paradox
Curry's paradox
C-value paradox
d'Alembert's paradox
diamond-water paradox
Easterlin paradox
Ehrenfest paradox
Ellsberg paradox
envelope paradox
Epimenides paradox
European paradox
exchange paradox
Fermi paradox
French paradox
Galileo's paradox
gentle murder paradox
Gibson's paradox
Girard's paradox
grandfather paradox
Grelling-Nelson paradox
Grim Reaper paradox
hangman paradox
Hawking's paradox
Hempel's paradox
Hooper's paradox
hydrostatic paradox
infinite hotel paradox
information paradox
interesting number paradox
Jevons paradox
Klein paradox
ladder paradox
lek paradox
Levinthal's paradox
liar paradox
liar's paradox
Löb's paradox
Loschmidt's paradox
Loyd's paradox
micro-macro paradox
Moravec's paradox
necktie paradox
Newcomb's paradox
observer's paradox
Olbers' paradox
paradox of fiction
paradox of saving
paradox of thrift
paradox of tolerance
Parrondo's paradox
Pepsi paradox
Petersburg paradox
Peto's paradox
potato paradox
raven paradox
region-beta paradox
Richard's paradox
Ross-Littlewood paradox
Russell's paradox
Sagan's paradox
Saint Petersburg paradox
Siegel's paradox
Simpson's paradox
Smale's paradox
sorites paradox
St. Petersburg paradox
submarine paradox
Supplee's paradox
surprise test paradox
tea leaf paradox
Tullock paradox
twin paradox
twins paradox
unexpected hanging paradox
Weyl's paradox
Yablo's paradox
Zeno's paradox
Derived terms: counterparadox
nonparadox
paradessence
paradox acacia
paradoxist
paradoxography
paradox sunflower
Related terms: paradoxical
paradoxically
paradoxician
paradoxism
paradoxling
paradoxology
paradoxy