On the dilemma for rational thinking

If we search for a single truth by language alone (ie, not by empirical hypothesis testing, but merely logically), we’ll end up in Russell’s paradox (as, for example, cladists and particle physicists have done). This theoretical truth is, however, just that back side of the single object we started from. The end of this search is thus merely the back side of what it started from.

This fact has been expressed many times before in many different ways, like, for example, that “We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time” (T. S. Eliot).

The fact does not mean, however, contrary to what cladists and particle physicists think, that this paradox is real (ie, can be found), in the form of “the tree of life” or “Higgs particle”, but just that it is the end of logical reasoning. Instead, a hypothetical finding of this thing (ie, the paradox) would actually falsify the existence of the single thing the reasoning started from, because if the front side of this thing is real, then the back side of it can’t be real, and vice versa, since two aspects of a single real thing can’t be a single real thing (ie, two aspects can’t be one aspect).

What rational thinking can achieve is thus limited by an internal paradoxical contradiction in conceptualization. The dilemma for us rational thinkers is thus whether we shall acknowledge this contradiction or not, since acknowledging it benefits our opponents, ie, the believers, whereas not acknowledging it places us among our opponents, ie, as believers.

We rational thinkers thus have the choice of either admitting that we can’t find the truth or  join the believers in a different, but just as contradictory, belief. I choose to admit that I can’t find the truth. What do you choose?

Another contribution to understanding of conceptualization http://menvall.wordpress.com/