why bother with opposite viewpoints?
Theory and Computing Sciences Building during construction
Visiting the construction site today… it is revealing to hear people discuss the drastically different sides of the building: massive, floating, concrete panels on one side; and, darkly thin metal skin on the other.
Zizek’s book The Parallax View, repeatedly, examines to the fullest both sides of an arguement. And then exposes the impossibility of a resolution: sometimes viewpoints simply can not be reconciled. They are simply opposites, and further understanding will not come through compromise.
Getting along (or simultaeously holding both viewpoints) can only emerge through reconceptualizing the situation such that opposite viewpoints can be exchanged for a more broadly held, singular, new viewpoint that is all encompassing. Likely, of course, a traumatic event may occur, assisting, finding or demanding that previously held beliefs are not valid in such a situation.
And new viewpoints that enrich our world are born. Or in the case of this building, the two drastically different sides seem perfectly natural to people using the spaces.