Eubulides is most famous for inventing the forms of seven famous
paradoxes,[1] some of which, however, are also ascribed to
Diodorus Cronus:[7]
The Liar (pseudomenos) paradox: A man says: "What I am saying now is a
lie." If the statement is true, then he is lying, even though the statement is true. If the statement is a lie, then he is not actually lying, even though the statement is a lie. Thus, if the speaker is lying, he tells the truth, and vice versa.
The Masked Man (enkekalymmenos) paradox: "Do you know this masked man?" "No." "But he is your father. So – do you not know your own father?"
The Electra (Elektra) paradox: Electra doesn't know that the man approaching her is her brother,
Orestes. Electra knows her brother. Does Electra know the man who is approaching?
The Overlooked Man (dialanthanôn) paradox: Alpha ignored the man approaching him and treated him as a stranger. The man was his father. Did Alpha ignore his own father and treat him as a stranger?
The Heap (sôritês) paradox: A single grain of sand is certainly not a heap. Nor is the addition of a single grain of sand enough to transform a non-heap into a heap: when we have a collection of grains of sand that is not a heap, then adding but one single grain will not create a heap. And yet we know that at some point we will have a heap.
The Bald Man (phalakros) paradox: A man with a full head of hair is obviously not bald. Now the removal of a single hair will not turn a non-bald man into a bald one. And yet it is obvious that a continuation of that process must eventually result in baldness.
The Horns (keratinês) paradox: What you have not lost, you have. But you have not lost horns. Therefore, you have horns.
The first paradox (
the Liar) is probably the most famous, and is similar to the famous paradox of
Epimenides the Cretan. The second, third and fourth paradoxes are variants of a single paradox and relate to the problem of what it means to "know" something and the identity of objects involved in an affirmation (compare the
masked-man fallacy). The fifth and sixth paradoxes are also a single paradox and is usually thought to relate to the vagueness of language.[8] The final paradox, the horns, is a paradox related to
presupposition.[9]
Legacy
These paradoxes were very well known in ancient times, some are alluded to by Eubulides' contemporary
Aristotle[10] and even partially by
Plato.[11][6]Chrysippus, the
Stoic philosopher wrote about the paradoxes developed by Eubulides and characterized the Horns paradox as an intractable problem (aporoi logoi).[9]Aulus Gellius mentions how the discussion of such paradoxes was considered (for him) after-dinner entertainment at the
Saturnalia,[12] but
Seneca, on the other hand, considered them a waste of time: "Not to know them does no harm, and mastering them does no good."[13]