Aristotelian v.

Non-aristotelian Thinking
Aristotle studied at Platos Academy and himself a tutor of Alexander of Macedonia, who had 1. Conquer the world atop
his bucket list. Aristotle got renowned for many things, but probably his big influence came from a codified system of logic.
He holds a place as a patron saint of modern science because he thought that knowledge comes from observing things, rather
than just thinking about them. Aristotelian logic became a foundation of the scientific method. It fits in neatly with our
subject-predicate-object language structure and is the lingua franca of the Western Gate.
Aristotle from The School of Athens
Korzybski explains that Aristotle based his logic on the assumption that A=A. That is, that each thing has a unique identity
and that it equals itself. This is common sense. A chair is a chair. An apple is an apple. A thing is itself in every way.
From this premise, we get that anything is either A or not A, and that something cannot be both A and not A. An apple is an
apple; it is not a chair. It cant be both an apple and a chair. This is also common sense. It is how we identify things as
discreet, separate entities that we can compare with other things. We can then make categories of things that are similar and
contrast them to things that dont fit in those categories.
This is how the It-mind organizes information. But is it true?
Not if we accept Korzybskis statement that, The map is not the territory it represents. Then, A is not A. No two things are
identical in every way. No object is the same as it was at some point in the past, even if the changes are seemingly irrelevant.
Few people will argue that an ice cube placed in a hot frying pan is the same in every way but a few seconds later. In its
interactions with its (rather warm) environment, it changes. While it may be useful to consider it the same ice cube for a
short while, that becomes impractical when the cube turns to water and then to water vapor.
Is an apple sitting in a fruit basket the same apple a minute later? How about a day? A month? How about you? Are you
identical to what you were a minute ago? A week? A year?
We humans experience a mysterious continuity of personal identity and it has baffled us for eons. You are the same You that
You have always been. But in every objective way, we change moment to moment. In the time it takes you to read this
sentence, your body will discard and replace over ten million cellssix hundred billion in a day. Your autonomic nervous
system has one foot on the gas and one on the brake and alternates faster than a New York City cab driver. Your thoughts and
emotions eddy and swirl, peak and dive throughout your day. Your body-mind is an agglomeration of living entities that are
in constant flux. There is no thing that you areyet there You are nonetheless.
Who would know the world must go beyond names.
Nameless, all things begin.
Named, all things are born.
There is no story without naming. There are no objects. When we name, we focus on similarities and ignore differences. And
more differences than similarities exist, if looking closely. To have a story we ignore for a moment that the cat in my lap is
quite a bit different from the same cat ten minutes ago. This necessary step in organizing information ensures we get things
done.
Aristotelian logic helps in this way. Rat poison remains a poison one day to the next. A=A. No benefit comes from eating a
quantity of it. Rat poison, not existing sugar... A thing occurs as either A or not A. Some people label sugar a poison, but that
does not make them equivalent. Differences far outweigh similarities. A thing cannot exist as both A and not A.
Thus we bring order into the Mystery of What-Is. Canned goods sits down aisle five and dairy chilled on aisle fourteen.
Canned dairy gets found on aisle five. Labels get used as our maps to help us locate stuff. They help so long as we remember
maps but represent territory they represent.
One step beyond societal Gates, and we need new maps. The compass of aristotelian logic spins wildly as it seeks its
magnetic north. Non-aristotelian logic complements common sense like quantum physics and relativity complement our
mechanical worldview of Newton, Maxwell, and Kelvin.
A not A. Fixed objects get replaced by fluid processes. Multi-valued orientation supplants either/or, two-valued thinking.
Things gets evaluated by awareness of their context and environment. A statement may seem true and not-true in a shared
moment.
A substance can poison when ingested in sufficient quantity, so sugar can get called a poison and not a poison. In quantum
physics, a photon remains both a particle and a wave. It has location and non-location, mass and no mass. Schroedingers cat
both lives and dies. Each human has both male and female qualities.
Still, while non-aristotelian thinking may hold more accurate means of navigating What-Is, it also comforts to know that
canned goods still get found on aisle five.