Michael Yoo Brian Rabern Phil 101 Homework 5 A riddle of a clean-shaven barber who lives in a small town shaves

all the people that do not shave themselves. Who shaves the barber? This is known as a paradox because it is a never ending loop of thoughts. To start this thought cycle, one would first start interpreting that since the clean-shaven barber obviously shaves, there must be someone that shaves him. The next interpretation made would be that the barber shaves himself. This creates a problem because if the barber were to shave himself, then he would be contradicting the catch in the riddle. Since he only shaves people who do not shave themselves, then by shaving himself he would be shaving someone that does not shave himself. He indeed is in fact shaving himself, so he, at the same time, cannot be able to shave himself. This is the reason why he cannot shave himself. This riddle is an easy to understand example of what paradoxes are. Paradoxes are statements or thoughts that contradict themselves within themselves. One example that comes to thought is the never ending staircase, which when climbed a one story of stairs will lead a person to the same spot that they originally started at even though they are climbing upwards. A place to view this would be in the middle of the movie Inception. Coming back to the thought of the barber, there has to be a solution to the argument, and my answer to this riddle is that the barber does not grow any hair. If the barber does not grow any hair, then he need not be shaved. If the barber need not be shaved, then no one would need to shave him, and he would constantly appear clean shaven. Have the riddle say that the barber grows facial hair, then I would be at an utter confusion to the question.