LogFAQs > #985874196

josh posted...

No, but I get angry when someone says "more" unique.

Bro, unique is a binary it either is or it isn't. You can't be more or less.

If we treat "unique" as an absolute binary identifier, nothing is truly unique. To exist as a useful concept, you have to narrow the scope (like saying that humans are a unique species because we cook our food, while ignoring that humans aren't a unique species because there are plenty of other carbon-based life forms to lump us in with), and deciding on the appropriate scope to use creates a continuum of uniqueness. Within that continuum, it is accurate to say that something that is unique within a broader scope is more unique than something that is unique within a narrower one.

One could argue that that continuum is a series of discrete binary decisions (albeit a functionally infinite one) and therefore not strictly continuous, but it still creates the basis for comparisons between entities based on the number of criteria for which those entities qualify as "unique." In the car example, a car that is unique in all three of those aspects is more unique than a car that is unique in only one of them, because 3 is more than 1.

Put differently, you cannot say that those two cars are equally unique (A=/=B). You also cannot say, however, that neither car is unique (A=/=0 and B=/=0). In a binary system, if neither A nor B can equal 0, both must equal 1, but if A cannot equal B, only one of them is allowed to equal 1. This means a binary system is logically impossible. Other values beyond 0 and 1 must be used to accurately describe the situation.