Contrasts

It is one of the principal tasks of the brain to classify the environment surrounding us. Though, when first classifying a visual sensory impression, the brain is not particularly finicky: It differentiates between light or dark, left or right, big or small, thick or thin. The brain discriminates opposites and contrasts: We weigh up between the one and the other extreme. Every feeling has a counter-feeling. We think in an antipodean way, we think in contrasts: After having located the poles, we are able to draw connecting lines between these two extremes in order to become aware of all the nuances and shades within these graduation lines. Only by weighing up opposites we can achieve the most efficient and useful results - this is an evolutionary fact. It is indeed only possible to weigh something up or assess something with the help of contrasts and opposites. Or else, how could we make a decision without having considered at least a second point of view? Scales do always have two pans; you must have a counterweight in order to weigh something against something else.
 
The fact that we think in ways of contrasts is accompanied by the circumstance that we even belief to detect contrasts where there are none at all: We think that sweet is the opposite of sour. Strictly speaking, however, there can only be one single contrast to a specific feeling, condition or object. But as regards sweet, not only sour, but also bitter and salty could be appropriate opposites. So what is the contrast to sweet - sour, bitter or salty?
 
In everyday life, these decisions are dependent on the situation: A lemon is associated with the contrast sweet/sour, a grapefruit is associated with the contrast sweet/bitter; and nobody would ever associate these two examples with the contrast sweet/salty. This assignment is not necessarily very exact, but at least it has to be possible because such an assignment of contrasts makes it easier for us to classify objects and so forth. We are so dependent on this contrariness that we even speak of contrariness where we actually encounter only slightly different nuances. It is easier for our brain to think in ways of contrasts than in different nuances. We are, of course, aware of these different nuances; we fully understand them: Realizing these different nuances is the result of the classification process. And this mechanism in our brain is based on the ability to weigh up contrasts.