Showing posts with label paradox. Show all posts
Showing posts with label paradox. Show all posts

Saturday, December 12, 2009

Bertrand's Paradox

This paradox was discovered by Bertrand Russell in 1901.

Some classes are members of themselves; some are not. For example, the class of all classes that have more than five members clearly has more than five classes as members; therefore the class is a member of itself. On the other hand, the class of all men is not a member of itself, not being a man. What of the class of all classes that are not members of themselves? Since its members are the non-self-members, it qualifies as a member of itself if and only if it is not.