JackDaydream wrote: ↑October 10th, 2021, 11:22 pm
Duality may be seen as inherent in life and in the universe, as suggested in the idea of the yin and yang. It is played out in so many ways in the idea of light and dark, masculine and feminine, as well in good and evil, and other divisions.
Claude Levi Strauss built an entire social philosophy on this subject. But he was quite clear that it is a social phenomenon.
Structuralism is one way of looking at the primitive human mind to help our understanding of culture.
So, no this has less to do with the
nature of reality, and more to do with the social structuration of society and human interest.
There is no absolute light and dark. The dualisms we create over this area are more to do with a human comfortable level of light energy, that our eyes are accustomed to. The physical reality is that there
is such a thing as light, but nothing in nature called "darkness". Darkness is the relative absence of light which is present by degrees. This is not a natural duality, but a humanly constructed dualism. Even if you imagine the inside of a heavy sided lead box, the darkness inside is interupted by neutrinos, but that aside it is not a thing in-itself but a negative of light which is value.
But our humanly constructed dualism light/dark spills over into adjectives by which we describe things we understand/or not, or things we love/hate. None of which are inhabit strict dualities. THey are just metaphors.
Nor are masculine and feminine true dualities. They are simply human interested points of interest. Though many like to castigate non-binary, transgender, and transsexuality, there is no doubt that they represent a continual challenge to this particular dualism. And though we like to point to "nurture" as a feminine trait, I know men that are more nurturing than some women. Strength too is though of as masculine, but there are many examples of women stronger than men.
Many species can change gender. Some are hermaphrodite, and some neuter.
So this is just another human dualism and not a natural phenomenon.
As for good and evil. Neither are forces of nature and they do not represent funemental features of the universe. The universe can be divided up by human conceit into things that are good and evil. But there are grey areas and many disagreements between different people's point of view.
To paraphrase Hobbes:
Good is that which pleaseth man; Evil is that which pleaseth him not.
There is nothing which is absolutely good, and nothing which is absolutely evil.
Everything that is attributed as good or evil by humans, can be oppositely attributed by some other human or in the interests of some other species, and I challenge you to give an example oif you think this is not correct.
All dualisms are human conceits. The universe has no interest in them.