Zeno's paradox
- any of various versions of a paradox regarding the relation of the discrete to the continuous and requiring the concept of limit for its satisfactory explanation.
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Origin of Zeno's paradox
after Zeno of Elea
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Zeno's paradox
[(zee-nohz)]
A paradox is an apparent falsehood that is true, or an apparent truth that is false. Zeno, an ancient Greek, argued that a number of apparent truths such as motion and plurality are really false. A well-known, simplified version of one of his paradoxes is that an arrow can never reach its target, because the distance it must travel can be divided into an infinite number of subdistances, and therefore the arrow must take an infinite amount of time to arrive at its destination.
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The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
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