Self-descriptive words

Logic Level 2

Let the adjective autological be defined as an adjective that is self-descriptive (such as "short" or "polysyllabic".) Let the adjective heterological be defined as an adjective that is not self-descriptive (such as "long" or "monosyllabic".)

The adjective heterological is...

neither heterological autological

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1 solution

Denton Young
Jul 29, 2015

heterological can't be autological, because if it were, it would be correctly self-descriptive. But by the definition of heterological, it can't be.

heterological also can't be heterological, because then it wouldn't be correctly self-descriptive. But by the definition of heterological as a word that isn't correctly self-descriptive, its description is correct, so it would then be autological.

Therefore, it can't be either of the two.

Godel, Escher, Bach provides a nice introduction to this idea of "strange loops".

Raj Magesh - 5 years, 10 months ago

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