“No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man.” -- Heraclitus
Heraclitus lived for the most part of his life during the late 600 B.C. and died in the early part of the following century. He preceded the more famous philosopher named Socrates by over a hundred years. From his one and only known written works only parts and pieces survived.
Heraclitus believed in a world that is always constantly changing, hence that famous quote. There was very little anyone could have argued with then and certainly there is little anyone can do today to disagree with the notion that the only constant is change. But can one really be a different person from one moment to the next?
The river Heraclitus referred to had to have been the river of time. Even if only a second had passed, the water flowing by and the contents of every unit volume passing through changes any portion of the river where one steps into; having aged even by a second, changes the man whose thoughts, even what he feels, too are always changing. That is, of course, open to debate about how largely or how minutely the change is, from one unit of time to the next, which now makes it a philosophical, if not a sociological complexity - best avoided than discussing it any further.
Where we may find less complicated, though least well known or debated over, was that of Heraclitus' insistence on the "unity of opposites" - much less debatable, at least, in those days through much of modern history.
Simply put, if we look around us today, we see the coincidence of opposites that prevail over the nature of almost everything. We know about light and darkness, the South and North orientations in magnets, pain and relief, sorrow and happiness, etc. Heraclitus thought seriously about the universe as a place where if there is one thing, it has a coinciding opposite. Day has a coinciding night which unifies both. He must have believed that that was how best to explain the universe. If there was land, there was water, if there was war, there was peace, if people cried, people laughed, etc.
If we cut the bar magnet (shown below) exactly in half, we will not have one north and one south magnets.
Both halves will still have north and south poles like the original longer bar. In fact, even if we cut the magnet into smithereens to the size of grains of sand, each speck will have a north and south pole. Positive and negative charges remain opposites down to a single atom - a positively charged proton and a negatively charged electron. It's the universal duality of the coincidence of opposites.
Heraclitus saw the human conditions of his time. It was no different from what we see today. However, today we are witnessing the great blurring of the pages of opposites. We see subtle and not so subtle leveling of opposites. The highs of achievements and lows of failure are to be no more. The honors accorded to those who achieved through sheer effort and determination shall be no more of value over those who did not put the efforts to achieve.
Today, it seems the trend, the unity of opposites must be broken apart. Unity of opposites must be blurred with the veil of Equity.
Today, there is an attempt to alter the conditions that for millennia was the prevailing rule.
Long before Heraclitus, pages were written up in The Book of Genesis, chapter 1,
4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
We do not know if Heraclitus had read the Old Testament but we can say that the idea of the "unity of opposites" was not his alone. Whether one sees the story of creation as allegorical or not, the idea of the "unity of opposites" preceded Heraclitus by many centuries. The opposing poles of morality - good and evil - had long been exemplified, far longer than the establishment of law and order against lawlessness. But today we are confronted with the great blurring of what used to be fundamentally a simple "what is right and what is wrong".
It seemed so simple then that human aspiration towards the ecstasy of victory was a self-driven motivation because the alternative is the agony of defeat. Achievement was preferred over failure; we savor relief because we know what it was like to deal with pain. But today, society is forced to face the slow degradation of achievement by eliminating what honors and accolades that come with it. Participation trophies in sports become synonymous with attendance, honors classes eliminated, homework is not mandatory, requirements for graduation are not so clear cut anymore.
Modern socio-economic conditions are stratified between the haves and the have-nots, or split between the rich and the poor. But, lest we forget, in this universe, there is no such thing as a free lunch.
Astronomers tell us that wherever they train their observation, the universe looks the same - as if matter is distributed evenly. Against the backdrop of dark empty space are sparkles of flickering lights. Each light a star or farther away a bundle of swirling stars but the universe is mostly dark and seemingly empty. In every star each photon of light is produced at the expense of destroying elements of hydrogen, turning them into helium, and in the process energy is produced. It is the same manner that fire is produced by burning wood, at the expense of turning it into ashes. No free lunch.
Out of the thousands of aspiring athletes only a handful become stars in their sports. But it always comes with a price and sacrifices - hours and hours of training and practice that each individual athlete was willing to put in, the sacrifices of missing out on other activities, and the discipline of repetitive workouts. Businesses are built up that way. Often at the expense of personal and even family sacrifices that we had the Henry Fords, the Steve Jobs, etc.
The "unity of opposites" is the rule. No one appreciates what it is to have who does not realize what it is like to have nothing. Against that rule is the "equity of distribution" (versus the "equality of opportunity"). Only those who strive harder than the many will achieve the most.
And so it is that we go back to Heraclitus's river. Opportunities always come along that river. One must make the most as he or she steps into one because it will not be the same river as he or she is not the same person at each passing moment. It is never the same river because the universe does not allow going back, it does not favor regrets but it smiles at those willing to try again and again. That is because, the universe allows for however many times a person is willing to step into the river.
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