Achille’s paradox… why can’t Achilles just reach the tortoise?
In: Other
It’s a hypothetical and a thought exercise, not a literal impossibility.
So…the idea is that if Achilles sets out to catch the tortoise he’ll say “the tortoise is 1 mile away” and then no matter how fast he goes to run that mile, by the time he traverses that mile the tortoise will be a smidge further ahead. Achilles then would have to recalibrate and run the new gap, and be hit with the same problem again. The knowledge of where you are and where the tortoise is is insufficient to reach the tortoise – you can guess and overshoot (i’ll run 2 miles and be safe!) or guess and get lucky and nail it, but you can’t _plan_ to do a perfect catch because your knowledge at the time is discontinuous with the state of you and the tortoise in the future.
Latest Answers