Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Andries Botha: Matthias, there is no truth. There is no right and there is no wrong. There’re just opinions. There’re just theories. There are suppositions and hypotheses. That’s what makes life so interesting. Nothing is concrete.

by Andries Botha

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Angaangaq Lyberth: Answertext will be available soon.

by Angaangaq Lyberth

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Anthony Arnove: Well, the answer in a word is dialectic. But, I am not going to spend three minutes trying to explain that. So, I will leave it as an issue of further exploration and discussion, but I think it’s a concept that is important today given the prevalence of binary thinking in our world to understand contradiction, to understand change, to understand flux, to understand the complexity of the dialectic is an interesting philosophical issue, but this is a question that ultimately gets an understanding of the possibility for social change, understanding the possibility of resolving the contradictions of our society. There will be new contradictions in an emancipated society, but not the kinds of contradictions that we confront today that are such stark and profound ones that threaten the sustainability of the planet.

by Anthony Arnove

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Anuradha Koirala: No comments. I don’t have any answer to it. I think it is like two wheels --four wheels of a car walking on the street and one gets punctured, but it still goes. They contradict what’s [inaudible]. I think it is like that.

by Anuradha Koirala

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Anuradha Mittal: Well, two answers to a single question can be right but still contradict each other because there is no such thing as one correct answer. All answers come from our experiences, from our circumstances, and given that there can be many many answers, and that is the beauty and the possibility of this world.

by Anuradha Mittal

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Ashok Gangadean: I love this question. Because it really for me is symptomatic of the whole evolution of consciousness and culture. Because what we see, if we step back from any one particular cultural lens and go into a global space and look at the pattern of all our great teachings across the age. We find that they show us that when we are in the egocentric way of processing ourselves in our world, we always end up in a polarity. And the reality that we see in that ego eyes, ego mental space, will always give us contradictory answers. And that’s been the pattern of all philosophy. If look at the evolution of philosophy, say in the European tradition, from our Greek origins of Socrates, all the way through to contemporary Derry Da, we find that same polarizing position. When Socrates came on the scene, he found these two contradictory answers. Is “being” eternal and unchanging, or is it becoming? And the two great metaphysicians of the day, the geniuses, gave contradictory appearing answers. That being is eternal, unchanging still, and the other answer is “being” is always becoming, never the same, always in process. How can those contradictory answers both be true? Can they be true? Can “being” be to the lens we find from the Bible that God created the universe? Or the answer we get from physics of the Big Bang, is it Big Bang or Genesis? What are these answers? We get this pattern all through history. And so, when we go to this higher integral consciousness of global consciousness and wisdom, we find that what at the lower level is contradictory and apparently contradicting one and another, find a meeting point in this higher place. That “being” in this integral sense is both still in motion, is both being in process. “Being” is becoming, the finite has the infinite within it. The one has the many within it. The global has a local and the local has a global. So, this is the pattern of integral holistic consciousness.

by Ashok Gangadean

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Audrey Kitagawa: It is not necessarily a contradiction but more of a perspective, and the relationship of the perspective of the perceiver to the object. So for example, if you are the child of a woman, then you would say that she is my mother. But if you are the husband of the woman, you would say she is my wife. We are talking about the same person, but the others that are in relationship to this person is different. So the perspective of the child to the mother, and the perspective of the husband to the wife, even though we are talking about the same person, carries with it a different perspective, and therefore the child would say this is my mother, the husband would say this is my wife. These are not contradictory answers, but rather they're talking about their different relationship and perspective in relationship to this person. And so therefore while answers may seem contradictory, we're not really talking about contradictions but really about differing perspectives and different relationships in relationship to the subject matter.

by Audrey Kitagawa

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Avi Primor:

by Avi Primor

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Benjamin Fahrer: Government says it's an intelligence test. Well, everyone comes from their different experiences. Everyone comes from a different perspective. They can be right because of the context in which they’re coming from. They can contradict each other because of the different ways in which the people have experienced that situation. This experience here is very different for each participant. And it might be a question to how your experience was, some will say, “Oh, it was cold”, “I was tired”. They can say, “Oh, I was invigorated and energized”, “I was inspired”, “Oh, I want to go home”, “Oh, I want to stay here forever”, right? These are very different contradicting answers. But yet they’re both right, because they’re all based on our own experiences. It’s our experience that then make our answers. Honor each others experiences, accept the contradictions and try not to judge or have expectations. No judgment, no expectation.

by Benjamin Fahrer

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Benson Venegas: How? The point maybe is to make the right question to find the right answer. So two answer to the same questions is possible, and can be right. Because we can see the same problem from different perspectives. So perspective can really lead us to see the same situation and see things from - give the different - the same or the different answer. And at the same time these answers could contradict each other. When you get to this point, the only valid answer is the one that is based on mutual responsibility, and is also based in the use of principles and also related to your values. So solution can be greater and stronger when diverse perspectives are brought together.

by Benson Venegas

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Bianca Jagger: Answertext will be available soon.

by Bianca Jagger

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Bill Joy: I think that each of us has our beliefs and our own truths and questions can be right for one person, the answer to a question can be right for one person and wrong for another. It can be right in one point in time and wrong in another. Should we gain weight? Should we lose weight? Both can be true and contradict each other at the same time. They could be true for different people. They can be true depending on what we intend to do next. They can be true based on things we don’t know. So I think there are many questions, non-scientific, not objective questions, questions about our desire, questions that are contingent based on our present situation that there can be multiple answers to.

by Bill Joy

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Bora Cosic: This is really a difficult question. It is understandable that it comes from the land of classical metaphysics. On the other hand it handles Greece science by which every thesis was confronted with other contradictory thesis from which was also believed to be true. This is how dialectic was found. A big Croatian poet suggested to the ruling party of Tito’s Yugoslavia a formula by which no truth is eternal, there some other truth might be more truthful, sadly that party didn’t hold to that philosophical idea.

by Bora Cosic

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Brian J. Weller: Okay, well yeah, you see the nature of any answer when you think about it is paradoxical. Rightness is a relative value. Ethics, ethos, which is one of the four levels of Greek speech, shows us the dance of opposition which upholds creation. So, if you think about it, its opposition you know, as opposed to contradiction. Yeah, that’s the nature of an answer isn’t it, if you think about. An answer is always the expression of a point of view, so contradiction (opposite speaking) is simply speaking from a different perspective. So yeah, the nature of all answers is paradox. So, I guess really I don’t see this as a problem. I see this as actually quite an accurate description of perceptual reality. Since we’re talking about “the perceiving eye,” what is the eye that is singular? That is the deep, deep question; the single eye. You know, the third eye, and the third eye is really the eye of knowledge. I’m reminded of the great Hindu trinity of Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu; there’s a dance of opposition right there. Brahma the creator; Shiva the destroyer, and Vishnu the balance in between. Of course, the great dancer in the relative world, the god of dance, was the Lord Krishna, incarnation of Vishnu.

by Brian J. Weller

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Catherine David: This is really Wittgenstein for the poor. Well, I do not see very well….This is really evident that I do not see what could be added. Too much pragmatic philosophy, no doubt. (… to much practical philosophy, I told them. It is really incredible that people ask questions that are so stupid. What do they have in their mind? No, it is worrying; it is really worrying. That what follows … but this is really amazing. If these questions are the good ones, how will the others be? The question that follows is the question of humanity. I think that Yves Gamèche would tell the same why we are that…., what a glorious mess here. Or it is because I am tired? But this is not possible.)

by Catherine David

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

China Keitetsi: Answertext will be available soon.

by China Keitetsi

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Constantin von Barloewen:

by Constantin von Barloewen

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Cornel West: Well, there is a certain kind of perspectivism as opposed to relativism, a contextualism as opposed to nihilism that’s at work that allows for the answers to be partially right providing inside casting light in response to a question, while also having contradictory elements against each other. But for the most part I think that when you have two answers to a question that are right, but those answers are not identical, I wouldn’t say they contradict one another. I would say they compliment one another. In that first wonderful paragraph of David Hume’s essay on the skeptic, he talks about the ways in which the world is so mysterious and the variety of things in the world are such that we must never be reductionists and think that we have one answer, one method, one algorithm, one orientation that fully embraces a complexity of the world, the variety and diversity and heterogeneity of the world. And, I think he is right. So, it's not so much for me a matter of whether they contradict; it’s the question of whether they compliment because we need a variety of different answers to single questions. I don’t think one of us have, had possessed the definitive view, viewpoint perspective on any one of these questions. That’s why democracy is so very important for dialog. They hear a variety of voices because no one of us bears a pure unadulterated truth and no one of us are vessels of pure virtue. So, we need one another; we’re dependent on each other’s views. And, in the end, we still fall short and that’s why the world remains incomplete and that’s why the future remains open ended.

by Cornel West

Sep 9, 2006 6:00:00 PM cite

Dedi Baron: Answertext will be available soon.

by Dedi Baron