Life is binary
Have you ever thought about why the number two is so important? Why we keep referring to it? I think it is important because it is the smallest element count of a set that can represent choice. Think about a power switch. The switch has two states, ON and OFF. If it only had one state there would be no choice. If it had more, like {ON, ALMOST_ON, OFF}, it would still be a valid representation of choice, but with three outcomes.
Considering that, I like to think that life, the world around us, god or whatever, the whole realm of existance, is binary. It might not seem that obvious at first but let us examine three scenarios of choices.
The power switch
Let us get back to the power switch described above. Now, if we need to represent the outcome of a choice regarding a switch we can do so simply by reffering to the state the switch is on. For example, the switch is ON. We can also refer to the state that remains, the one not selected. The switch is not ON. That seems obvious, but we will (ab)use this way of thinking in the next scenarios.
The battery
Now imagine a new scenario of choice, one regarding a battery. One could say the choice elements that exist regarding the battery are {FULL, CHARGING, USED}, which would indicate a FULL battery, a USED battery when it is not full but also not being charged and a CHARGING battery to indicate that it is currently in charge. Now describing a state is as simple as reffering to it by name, but what if the states were, say 1000? Or even, infinite? We could go with the more universal “chain of binary choices”. We can describe the state FULL for example by saying that the battery is not charging and is not used. That means the battery is currently FULL, providing that the states are totally distinct. This will make more sense in the next scenario. I hope…
Colors
Now let’s try representing the states of a choice of one color from the infinite range of colors. This time we can’t use the naming technique because the set and the distinct states are, well, infinite! I mean one could, given enough free time label a lot of colors and describe others by grouping them (i.e. This is a shade of RED). That is not accurate enough, though. Again, my solution of choice is creating a “chain of binary choices”. For example, describing the color YELLOW can be done as follows: The color is not RED and is not BLUE and is not MAGENTA and is not GREEN … and is not BLACK. In between, we would need to write infinite “is not” clauses, but in general it is a pretty effective way. For human beings it works a lot better to label some colors and use those labels to name them. Even if a color is not labeled, humans can be more verbose and describe it (It is a dark shade of brown, close to the color of spruce wood). However, if a machine needed to represent colors, that could be a way of doing so.
Epilogue
Given those three scenarios, one could say that any choice in life can be represented by a “chain of binary choices”. If you managed to get through this, you can now go around saying to people that life is binary, because really, who’s to say it isn’t?