The Five Most Mind Numbing Paradoxes

Sometimes one thinks to themselves “I wonder if that's impossible”. And then sometimes a smart person thinks that, but they decide to elaborate on their thoughts. This often causes a great many people confusion. I'm not going to pretend to understand all of these in their entirety, and I commend anybody who does. I am merely a messenger. I may put in my two cents on the subject, but that's about as far as it'll go.

1. Jourdain's Paradox (aka The Double Liar Paradox)

   Imagine if you will that you are in possession of a card. You look at the card, and the side that you are looking at says “the sentence on the other side of this card is false”. You think to yourself "Okay, it"ll probably say something like Panda bears eat Penguins, or 99% of people aren't not very not un stupid on the other side'. You flip it over and low and behold, you get a sentence that says “the sentence on the other side of this card is true”. What do you do?
   
   If you're me, you begin to overanalyze it. You say "Wait what?". You rack your brain trying to understand what's going on. Let's analyze each side of the card here, to try to understand.
   
   “The sentence on the other side of this card is false” Okay, the sentence on the other side of the card says “The sentence on the other side of this card is true”. That would mean that the sentence on the other side of the card is false. Okay, that's not too bad, if we leave it at that, both sides of the card are false.
   
   “The sentence on the other side of this card is true”. Let's flip the card over. “The sentence on the other side of this card is false” Well if the other side of the card is any indication, this is a true statement. So we flip the card over to side one, and that means that we have a false statement. So that means that the other side of the card is not true, but is false. We flip the card over, and are sucked into an infinite loop. If you are interested in this paradox further, grab a note card and write your own Jourdain paradox. Have fun with that.

2. The Infinite Room Paradox

   A hotel with infinite rooms. Yay, a dream come true. No more over bookings. But imagine now that this is the future and we have an equally infinite amount of people. That would mean that we can fill all the rooms. Yay, that's a lot of money. Uh oh though, one more person shows up. Can he get a room?
   
   One side of the argument says yes. Look, it's an infinite amount of rooms. That means a never ending supply of rooms. I don't care how many people show up, there's always going to be enough rooms. Infinity is means unlimited in a basic sense. No doubt it would be a large hotel, but there's enough rooms for everyone. And I mean everyone.
   
   The other side of the argument says no way. I don't care if it's an infinite amount of rooms. If an infinite amount of people show up, and then one more, too bad, no room for him. Many will argue that infinity is just a really high number, but not unattainable. And therefore, if an equal number of people show up, and then one more, there's no way he's getting a room.
   
   I don't want to take sides on this because I'm a rational person. But I will anyway. Infinity is an infinite. It sounds stupid, but I believe infinity is unlimited. And therefore, they could fit one more. But then again maybe I'm just stupid, I mean look at that my explanation of the Jourdain Paradox. That was rather confusing.

3. Unstoppable Force Meets an Immovable Object

   Now then, I'm not one to judge, but who thinks of this stuff? I like to think about weird stuff too, but come on. There's a point where you just need to stop and think about something else. Anyways, let's move on.
   
   
   Let's say you're playing tee ball, but your also the Hulk. And the tee is made of the same thing as Wolverine's skeleton. The Hulk has a baseball bat (also made out of said Woverine's skeleton metal) and is a horrible tee ball player. He aims, he swings, and he misses the ball, but hits the tee. Did I forget to mention that the tee is welded to a five mile in diameter sheet of immovable metal, and that the Hulk is Super Hulk whom is unstoppable in all senses of the word? Cause that's kind of important.
   
   Who wins? One is unstoppable, one is immovable. One of them has to give, but neither of them can. Think about it.
   
   Or don't, because this is one that scientists have taken all of the fun out of it. Physicians and other smart people have stated that two such objects could not exist in the same reality. If they did, the universe would explode or something. It's okay to unhappy right now, I know I was when I first found out.

4. Time Travel

   You've heard them all before, or maybe you haven't, let me elaborate on two of my favorites.
   
   You go back in time. Your having a great time, livin' it up in the 70's. When all of a sudden, some hippie has the audacity to tell you that your “Like ruining the vibe. and stuff… like man” . You get angry, and decide it's time to pop a cap. You kill him, and it just so happens it's midnight and whatever voodoo magic you did to travel back in time has worn off. You get back home and suddenly realize that it was your grandpa for some reason (as in I have no idea how you found out it was your grandpa). What happens. Many will say that you couldn't have been born, and therefore could not have gone back in time and killed your grandpa, and therefore, you didn't. Others will tell you that since he's dead, you weren't born, and therefore you cease to exist. These are the people that are probably right, so listen to them.
   
   This next example was the first I heard about time travel paradoxes. And that was that you go back in time to Beethoven's pad and have him listen to his 9th symphony (ignoring the fact that he's pretty deaf) before he wrote it. You travel back to your time. No strings attached. But now you have a symphony without an origin. You didn't invent it, you just brought it back to Beethoven. But Beethoven didn't invent it, he just listened to it. Therefore, you ruined time. I have no idea what would happen after this, but I believe it would have to do with the deaths of trillions of people world wide. And it would be all your fault. Jerk.

5. Schrödinger's Cat

   For those of you that know about Schrödinger's Cat, you will likely point out that this is more of a Quantum Mechanics sciencey thing than a paradox, but it was so un-understandable to me, that I had to place it on the list. Here's the lowdown. this Schrödinger guy says that he wants to explain Quantum Mechanics in an easy and understandable way. So he creates a metaphorical cat and a metaphorical box, and a metaphorical poisonous gas that is released if a Geiger Counter detects a change in radiation. Here, let me elaborate.
   
   So we have this cat, let's call him Joey, we place him in a box. This box has a machine rigged up in it which is a Geiger counter that will break a vial of poison if a change in radiation is detected. In this box with Joey and the contraption is a tiny radioactive substance that has an equal chance of decaying in an hour, as not decaying in an hour. If it decays, the contraption breaks the vial releasing the poison and killing the cat. Now here's where things get trippy.
   
   Schrödinger says that if we leave the box for the designated hour, then one can claim that Joey is alive. But one can also claim that Joey is dead. And therefore, he is both. Without direct observation, Joey is in a state of blurred reality where he is both at the same time. It's okay to be confused right now, unless you're a super genius or a Quantum Mechanic (note to self, check to see if that is a real job) then your chances of fully understanding the ideas behind Quantum Mechanics are slim to none. But that doesn't mean you can't sound smart by talking about it. As a final thought, I give you this poem. It reflects an experiment I attempted recently, with failed results.
   
   

So, in conclusion, there's a lot of things that are going to make you scratch your head and wonder “how…” out there. But that doesn't mean you can't do something about it. Just Google it, that should help. If that doesn't help, Wiki it. If that doesn't help, make a fake Wiki article and then tell people to go look it up after you explain it to them. So go on and show people how smart your. As long as they don't read too much into it, they won't be able to tell if you're fake smart, or real smart. It's a beautiful thing.