No doubt the characteristics of the famous pairs of opposites have been studied by someone fully qualified, but, judging by the vagueness and confusion with which they are treated in nearly all contemporary literature, few people have troubled to do it or have been able to find the work of the qualified, if it exists.
Herewith is an attempted analysis, the results of which are surely suggestive and would upset a number of apple-carts if applied.
A. Complementaries co-exist: both must be present at one time and place. They are absolute in the sense of not being relative points on a scale. For instance:
Obverse and reverse
Positive and negative
Right and left
Subject and object
B. Opposites are mutually exclusive and cannot co-exist (at one time and place); i.e. when one appears its opposite disappears. These are relative in the sense of being points on a scale. For instance:
Light and dark
Hot and cold
Heavy and light
Good and evil
Love and hate
Joy and sorrow
Pleasure and pain
C. Only 'things' and their contraries are pure pairs of opposites. For instance:
Being and non-being
Self and not-self
All categories are mutually dependent, are a function each of the other.
Note: It is an error to regard one element of 'B' as Positive and the other as Negative: that they can never be. The two categories 'A' and 'B' are incompatible, at right-angles, i.e. of a different direction of measurement. 'A' alone has polarity.
