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On cladistics and realism in general
Cladistics is an approach within biological systematics that is characterized by that it only recognizes groups it calls “clades”. A clade is defined as “an ancestor and all its descendants”.
An example of a clade is a cell that splits into two cells. The clade is a group of three, consisting of the original cell and both resulting cells. The group thus bridges time by joining consecutive entities into groups. Another example is thus me yesterday and me today. The clade is a group of two, consisting of me yesterday and me today.
The problem with this kind of group is that it doesn’t recognize the entities the group consists of per definition. This fact can be understood if we consider the question: how many entities do I (as a clade) consist of`? A cladist would probably answer: “one, two, three or whatever”, but the problem is that if it is one, then clade equals entity, whereas if it is two or more, then clade does not equal entity. The problem is thus whether clade equals entity or not.
The significance of this problem may be difficult to understand, but it can be understood by comparing with human and primate; a human is a primate but a primate is not necessarily a human. If we recognize primate but not human, or more generally only recognize groups of entities, then we will never reach an unambiguous end, because the end is ambiguous, actually paradoxically contradictory, between one and many. This ambiguity, or paradoxical contradiction, will, however, show up as an impossibility to allocate one entity consistently into any of the distinguished clades. The problem is the opposite to if we do recognize the difference between one and many, that is, that we can’t do what we understand that we can’t do in the opposite aspect. Fact is the same, only the interpretations of it differs. It is the common end for realism and nominalism – Russell’s paradox.
Bertrand Russell himself tried to escape his paradox by distinguishing reality into two worlds: the world of existence and the world of being, within which things like clades do exist (ie are real) in the world of being. The problem with this solution is that the world of being is ambiguous in relation to the world of existence and that there thus are several truths in the world of being about the world of existence per definition. The solution thus leaves the notion of truth as a matter of gray scale rather than of black and white. The solution does thus not solve the problem that realistic approaches like cladistics end up in Russell’s paradox.
(The same goes for particle physics ending up in the so-called “Higgs particle”. This kind of particle is just an example of Russell’s paradox.)
Nothing can actually save us from Russell’s paradox, because it is a consequence of conceptualization itself, and not only that, but moreover a fundamental feature of reality. Our struggle to avoid it is thus vain. It is actually the core of being.
Source: http://menvall.wordpress.com/2014/06/07/on-cladistics-and-realism-in-general/
