Oxymoronic Language and Logic in Quantum Mechanics and James Joyce
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4387226 |
|---|---|
| Authors | David Overstreet, David H Overstreet (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1980 |
| Volume | 9 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 37 |
| Publication date | 1980-01-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | SubStance (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0049-2426 • E-ISSN: 1527-2095 |
| Publisher | Project MUSE (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.2307/3683904 |
| OpenAlex | W2315788646 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 2 |
Oxymoron comes from Greek and means pointedly foolish. Pointedly foolish is itself an oxymoron. The phrase describes a language construction which on first reading may appear to be nonsense, but upon understanding is seen to make an imaginative point. Used mainly by poets in witty turns of phrase, this rhetorical device might seem of limited intellectual use. However, oxymoronic language and logic that oxymoronic language creates are increasingly useful conceptual tools. The oxymoron's technical value derives from its ability to overcome dichotomies created by Western (Cartesian) thought. The yoking of opposites in oxymoronic phrase (in Joyce, it can be a single word) forces imagination to synthesize a unique conceptual entity. Other examples of oxymorons can be created endlessly: cold tears, mournful optimist, bright blackness, creative cretin, God-fearing atheist, and screeching harmony. Grand examples can be found in Aristotle, Unmoved-Mover; Suetonius, Make haste slowly; Lao Tzu, Practice non-action. Work without doing. Taste tasteless; Milton, Darkness visible; Addison, Eternity! Thou pleasing, dreadful thought; MacLeish, the armless ambidextrian; and from Romeo and Juliet, 0 heavy lightness! serious vanity! / Mis-shapen chaos of well-seeming forms! / Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health! Each of these gives reader, or more precisely, conceptualizer, an aesthetic experience and a charge of recognition that neither word alone could create. By conceptualizing an oxymoron, opposites are joined and one can conceive inconceivable. Each extreme position presented in oxymoron remains boldly visible and is not neutralized, but held in mind. The dichotomy is retained to keep precision of extremes. Yet by understanding oxymoron with necessary intuitive joking, vast middle of concept is enlivened and experienced. Unity is perceived. This mystical yoking of discrete opposites into a metaphysical union is aesthetic. The reader/conceptualizer of oxymoron is not simply a recipient of a concept, but is a participant
Physics · Quantum · Quantum computer · Quantum logic · Quantum mechanics · Theoretical physics · Classical Philosophy and Thought · Historical Philosophy and Science · Philosophy · Quantum Mechanics and Applications
| Citations per year | 0.07 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 1996 - 2012 (17) |
| Highly cited | No |