Paradox of Surprise? Yes? No?

[HalcyonicTrust]

Just something I thought of really:

"If you expect to be surprised when you're not surprised are you surprised?"

Or a shorten version:

"If you expect to be surprised when you're not, are you?"

I'm pretty suspicious of a flaw here somewhere making it not a genuine paradox....but I'm not sure where it is.

[downbeatplumb]

(29th December 2010 17:27)EvidenceVsFaith Wrote:  Just something I thought of really:

"If you expect to be surprised when you're not surprised are you surprised?"

Or a shorten version "If you expect to be surprised when you're not, are you?"

I'm pretty suspicious of a flaw here somewhere making it not a genuine paradox....but I'm not sure where it is.

Its.....BOOOOOO did that surprise you.

[HalcyonicTrust]

A bit.

[Rhizomorph13]

I depends on the surprise you are expecting. Like, if you think someone is going to pop out and say boo, but instead you turn the corner and there is a naked women, you would be genuinly surprised. The way you have posed it, I would say is too vague because it isn't specific enough, or clear enough to be a paradox.

If you are hypervigilent and hard to surprise, could you be surprised? Certainly, because there is always something outside your expectation that could happen. It is more a matter of intensity that would illicit the surprise response.

[HalcyonicTrust]

I mean that if you expect to be surprised at time X, but at time X you aren't surprised, wouldn't you then be surprised because you were expecting to be surprised but, weren't?

[Rhizomorph13]

Ahhh, I see, interesting. Ok, so then if you expect to be surprised, you will be surprised if and only if you aren't surprised which would surprise you and therein lies the paradox. Yep, sounds like a paradox to me. Good one.

[The Omnissiunt One]

(29th December 2010 18:14)EvidenceVsFaith Wrote:  I mean that if you expect to be surprised at time X, but at time X you aren't surprised, wouldn't you then be surprised because you were expecting to be surprised but, weren't?

Hmm... I'm not sure. The surprise at the lack of surprise occurs after time X, when the surprise you were expecting didn't take place. So what really happened was a non-surprise at time X followed by a surprise at time Y (immediately after time X). Which I'm not sure is a paradox. Also, I'd question whether an expected surprise is actually a surprise, or rather an anticipated unusual event, whose exact nature is unknown. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I'm unsure.

[HalcyonicTrust]

I think you have sussed the flaw. You can't be surprised and not surprised at exactly the same time. But maybe all paradoxes are really contradictions it's just we haven't been able to unravel them yet? Something either is or isn't.... so how can paradoxes really exist?

[Darwinian]

NO!

Because you are surprised about not being surprised rather than the thing that you thought would surprise you. Therefore it is a different 'surprise' that you have experienced.

Discuss...

[HalcyonicTrust]

As well as the time aspect (the 'when'), you have also found an error in the thing aspect (the 'what').

Congrats Darwinian.... not a paradox....

Do you think that whilst a logical contradiction remains unable to be spotted and seems a paradox then it remains a paradox? Are paradoxes merely logical contradictions that haven't been spotted yet? (And so, was my paradox a paradox until its contradiction was spotted to be a contradiction?).

Or are paradoxes logical contradictions that logically can't be spotted?