Albert Einstein, a name practically everyone is aware of. A theoretical physicist who managed to unlock multiple mysteries of the cosmos with his whopping 160 points of intelligence. Born on 1879 March 14 and died on 1955 April 18, in his 76 years walking on this Earth, he managed to attain multiple accomplishments, including his most famous one; the special and general theory of relativity and the concept of rest energy (E=mc²).
Some of Einstein’s other contributions to science include: providing empirical evidence for the atomic theory, enabled the determination of Avogadro's number (therefore the size of molecules), the mystery behind the photoelectric effect, etc.
His works are extremely prominent that they are still even discussed and taught to this day.
Heraclitus, on the other hand, is a Greek philosopher of circa 540 BCE who is remembered for his study in cosmology, in which fire forms the basic material principle of an orderly universe. According to Plato and Aristotle, Heraclitus had opinions that would lead to logical incoherence. His Doctrine of Flux and the Unity of Opposites suggests that everything is constantly changing, opposite things are identical, and everything is and is not at the same time.
To be honest, it isn’t easy to understand the arguments that Heraclitus presented, except for the first one: that everything is constantly changing.
Disclaimer
Despite introducing a conflict between the statements of these wonderful individuals who lived on this Earth on very different conditions, I would like to clarify that at no point am I saying any one of them is, in any shape or form, better than the other, nor are their statements more correct or acceptable than the other. The contrasting of their statements are simply to explore the region where their ideologies split off and attempt to recognize at which point and to what degree they oppose each other.
I merely stumbled upon their statements on the internet and thought it would be fun to compare the two, which would further enrich your and my philosophy.
No offense is intended.
A forming conflict
Needless to say, both of them have lived extremely productive lives full of knowledge and wisdom. However, we will be focusing upon only one of their statements and comparing them to each other. At first glance, one might begin to wonder how the following are related to each other, much yet, how they seem to oppose each other, but bear with me here.
You see, Einstein’s definition of insanity is:
“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”
His quotation implies that attempting to become successful in trial-and-error is insanity, except for if success is met at the first try. Failing to achieve the desired result on the first attempt would pretty much void the chances of success on the next attempt if no change is done.
According to Heraclitus,
“No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.”
This statement satisfies one of his Doctrine of Flux and the Unity of Opposites’ concepts, which states that everything is constantly changing. Our surroundings are in constant change that no two situations will be completely identical, a concept analogized with the constant flow of water in a river, where a person can never touch the exact same water on the river twice since the course of the water always changes.
Where the trouble begins
Trouble between the connection of these two statements arises if we attempt to mix their main contents. If Einstein suggests that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results, but if Heraclitus claims that everyone and everything constantly changes, then nothing really happens over and over again. Therefore insanity, in terms of Einstein’s definition, does not exist.
Conclusion
From my own philosophical standpoint, a complementary relationship between the statements of both Einstein and Heraclitus will only appear if the following questions are answered:
How big should the significance be so that a) it isn’t counted as doing the same thing twice and b) change did not happen?
I will be extremely delighted to hear your thoughts down below. Since this only has a little over 700 words, perhaps because this isn’t a complete thought process just yet, rest assured that there will be a second part to this blog after I have done more thinking and research about this topic.
