Human beings are obsessed with conflict. Conflict attracts us just as a light will draw a moth into its orbit, even it ultimately means the destruction of the moth. Conflict of all sorts dominates our entertainment. Increasingly every aspect of our social life is viewed through the filter of polarization, us and them, winner and loser, right and wrong. As human beings we are virtually incapable of simply holding a pair of opposites, of allowing that two points of view can exist simultaneously, that twp interpretations can illuminate one another rather than negate each other. Any contradiction demands some sort of outcome in which one side or the other "wins", comes out on top, prevails over the other.
http://www.aikiweb.com/columns/gledyard/2005_03.html
