This is paradoxical. A fool suits both as a friend and as an enemy.

How do you solve this paradox?

A fool might let you die because he doesn't realize that you are drowning until it is too late, so it would be better to have a smart person as a friend.

A smart person as an enemy would be a challenge, but you would never underestimate him as you might a fool.

A smart person suits both as a friend and as an enemy.
How do you solve this paradox?

Thank you. You created another paradox but you didn't solve the fool's predicament.

Thank you. You created another paradox but you didn't solve the fool's predicament.

So now we have identical twin paradoxes. :P

I actually don't think either are paradoxes, just descriptions of interesting situations.

In both cases the genius is the worse pick because he has the upper hand. However, if we pick the fool we have the upper hand - in that case, we become the genius.

I think human relationship is a spectrum between love(friend) and hate(foe). A fool has to constantly live with the contradiction: friend AND foe to all. How does the poor guy make sense of his relationships?

What should a fool think when he meets someone? Friend/Foe? Which is the best strategy to follow (for a fool)? To avoid everyone or embrace everyone?

Yes, but friend and foe are contradictory.

It's only contradictory if you choose both simultaneously. The reason for each choice is the same: you have the upper hand around the fool, whether friend or foe or a neutral party.

A fool has to constantly live with the contradiction: friend AND foe to all. How does the poor guy make sense of his relationships?

Just ask any genius how they deal with the same problem. Most would say that they do the same as any fool would and stay away from people that don't like them.

What should a fool think when he meets someone? Friend/Foe?

Everyone has this problem.

I know viewpoints may vary here. Depends a lot on worldview, attitude, and strategic thinking. Anyway let me present, what to me appears peculiar, a case. I'll then present my views and you can comment.

Scenario 1

Which do you prefer as a friend?
1. A fool
2. A genius

I'd choose the genius.
— TheMadFool

A genius can be good company, someone to learn from but, a big but, it's not wise to be with people who're too smart

Why not?

(think superintelligent aliens).

What do you have against superintelligent aliens?

(...other than that there probably aren't any.)

A fool on the other hand will have no deliberate intentions to harm you and will be good fun to be with - a friend, in other words.

If you're in love with her, there's no reason why there couldn't be a genuinely, fully good, two-sided mutual relationship.

Aside from that, of course there are many activities that can be shared with anyone who is pleasant. And yes, the people you're referring to wouldn't have lots of the kinds of personality-defects that others can, and often do, have.

Often it's the complex devices that go haywire.

For example, a cat or dog won't have all the tiresome psychological problems that would put you off from many or most humans.

But, if you think that all fools are good company, then I suggest that you visit the Reincarnation topic at these forums.

Scenario 2

Which do you prefer as an enemy?
1. A fool
2. A genius

The fool, of course.

Obviously, not a genius. He's to smart and will outmaneuver you and beat you. So, again a fool is preferable - as an enemy. You can beat him easily.

...or evade him.

But...

This is paradoxical. A fool suits both as a friend and as an enemy.

How do you solve this paradox?

Even if true, it wouldn't be paradoxical. Fools could just be better. But, in general, as a friend, the genius would be more interesting company, and more helpful, in various ways, including as someone from whom you can learn more.

(But we learn important things from our pets. I used to walk our dog, and that dog (choosing the routes) taught me about the outdoors and the exploration of places. And many people report having learned important things from animals.)

Michael Ossipoff

This is paradoxical. A fool suits both as a friend and as an enemy. — TheMadFool

I can't see any paradox in that, nor even anything surprising.

There are many examples where a certain set-up is the best at both extremes of a linear continuum.

eg, which would you prefer to have as the sole enclosure of your body as you pass through a 200 degree oven?
(1) light underwear
(2) a heavily insulated non-combustible airtight capsule with built-in life-support systems

and what about as you pass through a minus 200 degree super-freezer?

All it demonstrates is that many relationships in the world are non-linear.

This is paradoxical. A fool suits both as a friend and as an enemy. — TheMadFool

The best people in the world are fools, and so are the worst people in the world. No paradox here because "best and worst" refer to a different set of qualities from "fool and genius".

A fool suits both as a friend and as an enemy

So a fool can be a friend or an enemy. I don't think that's paradoxical. If there are two sets, a) the set of all friends and b) the set of all enemies then why can't a fool be a member of both sets

"I know viewpoints may vary here. Depends a lot on worldview, attitude, and strategic thinking. Anyway let me present, what to me appears peculiar, a case. I'll then present my views and you can comment.

Scenario 1

Which do you prefer as a friend?
1. A fool
2. A genius

A genius can be good company, someone to learn from but, a big but, it's not wise to be with people who're too smart (think superintelligent aliens). A fool on the other hand will have no deliberate intentions to harm you and will be good fun to be with - a friend, in other words.

Scenario 2
Which do you prefer as an enemy?
1. A fool
2. A genius

Obviously, not a genius. He's to smart and will outmaneuver you and beat you. So, again a fool is preferable - as an enemy. You can beat him easily.

But...

This is paradoxical. A fool suits both as a friend and as an enemy.

How do you solve this paradox?"
--TheMadFool
It only seems like a paradox because you are comparing apples to oranges. In Machiavellian type thinking (the typical framework where one deals with an real enemy) the opposite of an enemy isn't a friend but an ally. and having a fool for an ally and or allies is usually not a good thing. Perhaps a very smart person in power may not have too much of a problem being surrounded by fools, but if one is of limited capacity themselves and then they make the mistake of hiring fools to advise them, then it will likely spell disaster at some point.

If you are a king or a leader of some sort it might be useful to talk to or be entertained by a fool or jester, but the people that occupy such positions are not part of the same spectrum as one's advisors, allies, or political enemies.

A paradox is a statement that, despite apparently sound reasoning from true premises, leads to a self-contradictory or a logically unacceptable conclusion. — Wikipedia

A friend is not a foe and the converse is true.

So, when a fool is both a "good" friend and foe, there's a paradox because friend and foe are mutually exclusive classes. There can't be a person who's both a friend and a foe. So, where do we place the fool. Please construct a Venn diagram to understand the paradox. The overlap area between the friend class and foe class is empty. So, no member of the fool class can occupy that region. Hence, the paradox.

But no one's saying that the same individual can be both a friend and a foe.

The proposition is just that, if a fool is a friend, then s/he's a more desirable friend than non-fools.

...and that if a fool is an enemy, then s/he's a more desirable enemy than non-fools.

A dog makes a better junk-yard guard than does a snail.

A dog makes a better sled-puller than does a snail.

That doesn't imply that every dog is both a junk-yard guard and a sled-puller.

Michael Ossipoff

...or that the same dog must be able to be both a junkyard-guard and a sled-puller.

Michael Ossipoff

But no one's saying that the same individual can be both a friend and a foe. — Michael Ossipoff

But...

A fool is both a ''good'' friend and a foe. A fool is both at the same time. That's not possible because no friends are foes.

A fool is both a ''good'' friend and a foe. A fool is both at the same time. That's not possible because no friends are foes. — TheMadFool

No, because it's not the same fool. The friend fool isn't the foe fool.

You might as well argue that it's a paradox for a friend and a foe to both be doctors.

Please draw a Venn diagram.

I'm talking about ALL fools

The fool can be a good friend, or he can be a good foe. That doesn't mean he is either of them. Since he need not be either of them in your scenario, he isn't paradoxically simultaneously both.

What about all fools? Some might be your friend, some might be your foe, and most will be complete strangers.

You're not making any sense.

Does this help?

Also, I would prefer a genius as a friend, because I see no reason to expect that the genius would use their super-powers against me, and I'd be concerned that I'd get impatient with the less-intellectually gifted alternative and be rude to them, which would upset them and me.

But maybe that's just me.

A fool is a ''good'' friend and a ''good'' enemy. It's not a ''can'' issue.

This is paradoxical. A fool suits both as a friend and as an enemy.

How do you solve this paradox? — TheMadFool

Befriend fools, not philosophers.

Thanks for diagramming the content of my argument. Note, it's not drawn in standard form re categorical logic. Anyway:

Argument 1
All fools are friends
No friends are foes
So,
A) No fools are foes

Argument 2
All fools are foes
No friends are foes
So,
B) No fools are friends

A) No fools are foes means
C) It is false that Some fools are foes
B) No fools are friends means
D) It is false that Some fools are friends

But we know that:
E) Some fools are foes
F) Some fools are friends

C and E : contradiction
D and F : contradiction
look above

Good advice

If we know that E) Some fools are foes and that F) Some fools are friends then we know that the premise "All fools are friends" in argument 1 is false and that the premise "All fools are foes" in argument 2 is false.

You're obviously going to get a contradiction if you start with contradictory premises.

You're obviously going to get a contradiction if you start with contradictory premises — Michael

A) All fools are friends
B) All fools are foes
C) No friends are foes

A, B and C are true

We get the conclusions:

D) No fools are friends
E) No fools are foes

A and D can't both be true. They can both be false:
F) Some fools are not friends. But F contradicts A.

B and E can't both be true. They can both be false: G) Some fools are foes. But G contradicts E.

A) All fools are friends
B) All fools are foes
C) No friends are foes

A, B and C are true — TheMadFool

A, B, and C can't all be true, as that entails a contradiction. If your premises lead to a contradiction then one or more of your premises are false. It's a straightforward proof by contradiction.

Furthermore, your claims are ambiguous. When you say that someone is a friend, are you saying that they're my friend or that they're someone's friend? Because a fool can be a friend to one person and a foe to another. So which of these are you trying to say?

1. All fools are my¹ friends
2. All fools are my¹ foes
3. None of my¹ friends are my¹ foes

4. All fools are someone's friend
5. All fools are someone's foe
6. No-one is a friend to one person and a foe to another

Regardless, 3) is the only reasonable premise.

¹ Can replace with any individual