We tend to see the world in terms of opposites: Black versus white, young versus old, good versus evil. Things are hot or cold, people are friends or enemies, Places are near or far.
It seems that for every word describing a property of the world, we have a corresponding word to describe its antithetis. It feels as though the entire world around us consists of opposing principles.
But maybe it’s just us. Perhaps the human brain has evolved to think of things in terms of twos. It’s something we do so naturally, so instinctively, that we can’t even catch ourselves doing it. Because of the way our brains are wired, we look around us and everywhere we see binary divisions.
One could imagine some intelligent species evolving differently — perhaps around a principle of threes. Such beings would look at the world around them and see everything divided into threes. For any word describing a property, they would have not one but two corresponding words describing complementary states.
Where we see black and white, they would, perhaps, always see black, gray and white. To discuss shade without always thinking of gray would to them be incomprehensible. And such shades of gray might be written into all of their thought and discourse. They might find it meaningless to discuss “good” or “evil” without reference to the state between those two extremes.
As you read this, it is possible that you might find such a way of thinking to be illogical. But maybe that says less about what is logical, and more about the limitations of our own human brain.