Note on Russell's Paradox I. M. R.

Pinheiro1

Abstract

In this note, we solve Russell's Paradox. We prove that the paradox is just an allurement to help us teach people the foundations of Mathematics properly. Once more, simply putting things in the right environment proves the problem to have resisted time exclusively because of people not being able to see the difference between machine and purely human language. Key-words: Russell's Paradox, Russell, normal sets, inclusion, subset.

Introduction

In [A. D. Irvine, 2009], we find out that Bertrand Russell ([A. D. Irvine, 2010]) wrote to Gottlob Frege about this paradox in June of 1902. Frege would be working on the foundations of Arithmetic, printing his second book on the topic, when he received a letter from Russell letting him know about a possible inconsistency of weight in his theories (Frege's). Russell basically had created a 'set that contained all sets that do not contain themselves' and had called such a set R. The definition of the relationship 'contain' or the definition of the inclusion relationship in Mathematics is well exposed in [Eric W. Weisstein, 1999]: A subset is a portion of a set. B is a subset of A (written B C A) iff every member of B is a member of A. If B is a proper subset of A (i.e., a subset other than the set itself), this is written B C A. The empty set is, by definition, a set without any elements.
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Can we then say that the empty set contains itself? According to the just-mentioned definition, one would say that, with certainty, we can assert that the empty set contains itself because every member of the empty set is a member of the empty set (notice that denying this means that we are capable of exhibiting at least one member of the empty set that is not inside of the empty set...). Now, can we find a set that does not contain itself? According to the definition that we mention here, one would say that, with certainty, all sets contain themselves because, quite trivially, every member of any randomly chosen set A belongs to A. That happens even when A has no members, as we have just said... . Therefore, R, the so famous set of Russell, would have to be empty. There would be some problem with R if R did not contain itself, is it not? R contains itself, therefore R contains one member according to Russell. The fact that R contains one member means that there is at least one set that does not contain itself, which is the own R, according to Russell. We here try to elaborate on what seems to be impossible to elaborate on.

The special set R, sometimes called 'normal set'

Interesting that there are scientific texts calling the elements of R 'normal sets' (see, for instance, p. 45 of [Stephan Krner, 1986]), meaning that people actually think that a set that does not contain itself is more acceptable than a set that contains itself... . When we think of Geometry, this is not so acceptable, that a set contains itself, is it not? Geometrically, any set could be put over itself without us being able to discern between the first image of the set and the one we have placed over it. We tend to think that, in this case, one set is not contained in the other, but coincides instead.

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We tend to think that things that contain other things are bigger than the things that they contain like the jars that contain, for instance, lollies. The lollies are inside of the jar, then the jar contains the lollies and the lollies are contained in the jar... . That makes us think that one thing, X, can contain another thing, Y, only if X is bigger (in size) than Y. If we think of the concrete world, we obviously cannot have a set containing itself, therefore, for it would be impossible to dress a can of soft drink, for instance, with another of the same dimensions without destroying shape, like no two things can occupy the same space, like precisely the same, and that we ''know' 'for sure''... . Mathematics, however, has taken off the dimensions of things. In it, it is possible to deal with 'entities' inside of a sheet of paper, entities that cannot be seen as anything else that is not the own sheet of paper, that is, entities 'that are absorbed' by the object they lie over. No thing is two dimensional in our world, but things may be two dimensional in Mathematics, such as the straight line in the Cartesian plane, therefore we cannot understand, if using our 'natural imagination' (call it the 'concrete world reasoning'), the objects in the Cartesian plane. That was the problem Russell was having, trivially. R contains itself, yet R is empty. There is no conflict of any order in what has just been said therefore and no problem with the principles of Frege for Mathematics whatsoever. If R is empty, then R={}. We have already concluded that R has to be empty because every set contains itself. Now, because R={}, Russell ends up saying that R={R}. No. That is the absurd move involved. R C R because { } C { }, also R C { } and { } C R, but R { } and therefore R R. R is not a set that does not contain itself. R also contains itself, therefore is not an element of R (we

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are obliged to remember our Primary School Mathematics classes here: We cannot have and C for the same couple of entities (it is either one symbol or another to express the mathematical relationship between them)). It happens that R is empty, that is it. Does R contain R even so? Sure. The same way the empty set contains itself, R contains itself. It is seriously hard to see any conflict in any of this, quite sincerely. The problem is, once more, the difficulty of Russell of discerning between purely human and mathematical language. We cannot base ourselves in the concrete world when talking about Mathematics. We have to accept the world of Mathematics and its limitations instead. Different from real life, in Geometry, we can have the can of soft drink covering itself perfectly well, what would, for instance, give us darker lines for the can in a computer software of special type. In Geometry, the can can contain itself with no conflicts.

Conclusion

Russell paradox is one more allurement, this time in Mathematics. Russell had a doubt that he passed to Frege. Frege did not notice the doubt of Russell and assumed that Russell's doubt was the proof of him (Frege) being wrong in something. Frege perhaps was in a rush because his second volume was being printed or perhaps he trusted Russell a 'bit too much'. Basically, R C R does not imply that R has one element, it implies that all elements of R are in R, as our definition for inclusion tells. The difference between proper and improper subset is not small: R is an improper

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subset of R and the term 'improper' has been adopted precisely to remind us of the fact that R is actually equal to R, therefore should not be an element of R if the brackets are taken away (concrete world reasoning). The mistake of Russell resumed to inadequate translation from purely human to mathematical language.

References

A. D. Irvine. (2010). Bertrand Russell. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2010 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.). Retrieved November 7 2011 from

http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2010/entries/russell/.

A. D. Irvine. (2009). Russell's Paradox. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2009 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.). Retrieved November 7 2011 from

http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2009/entries/russell-paradox/.

Eric W. Weisstein. (1999). Subset. MathWorld-- A Wolfram Web Resource. Retrieved November 7 2011 from http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Subset.html.

Stephan Krner. (1986). The philosophy of Mathematics: An introductory essay. Courier Doves Publications. ISBN-10: 0486250482, ISBN-13: 9780486250489.

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