The Monstrefact: The Four Guards of ‘Labyrinth’

In this episode of STBYM’s The Monstrefact, Robert discusses the four guards from the 1986 film ‘Labyrinth” and their paradoxical relationship to the truth…

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of
My Heart Radio. Hi, my name is Robert Lamb and
this is the Monster Fact, a short form series from
Stuff to Blow Your Mind focusing on mythical creatures, ideas,
and monsters in time. One of my favorite films of

(00:26):
all time is easily The fantasy musical Labyrinth, a movie
that summons the combined creative talents of Jim Hinson, Brian Froud,
Carrie Jones, David Bowie, Sarah Connolly, and composer Trevor Jones,
just to name a few. While its predecessor film The
Dark Crystal took its fantasy world creation incredibly seriously, Labyrinth

(00:51):
leans more into pure musical fun and python esque absurdity.
Now there's a lot of this flavor to discuss in Labor,
but I wanted to talk specifically about the four guards
that Sarah encounters as she makes her way across the
Goblin King's labyrinth. They are doglike humanoid creatures that guard

(01:11):
a pair of doors. They are either conjoined beings and
therefore two guards, or they are affixed behind their signature
shields in a way that allow for two beings per shield.
Their absurd appearances of course, linked to their visual resemblance
to double headed European playing cards, in which a king, queen,
jack or joker is double bodied and double headed in

(01:34):
such a way that the card can be discernible from
either side of the table. According to St. Bindet and
the Excellent Labyrinth Festiary, the heads of the left door
guardian are Alf and Jim, while the heads of the
right door are Ralph and Tim. When Sarah encounters the guardians,
she quickly learns the rules concerning their doors. One door

(01:59):
leads to the assle at the center of the labyrinth, where,
of course, Sarah is trying to go in order to
rescue her step brother Toby, while the other door leads
to bum certain death. The lower heads have no idea
which doors which, but the upper heads do, but Sarah

(02:19):
is only permitted to ask one of them. Furthermore, one
of the two guards always tells the truth, while the
other one always lies, So Sarah faces a conundrum. How
can she find out which door is which? How can
she risk asking the wrong guard and being lied to.

(02:40):
The scenario instantly invokes what is known as the liar's paradox.
If a liar tells you they are lying, well, then
they are telling the truth. Consider the statement quote, this
sentence is a lie unquote. If that statement is true,
then it's false. If it's false, then it's true. Oh mind. Sarah,
of course, is a bright young woman and makes the

(03:01):
short work of the guardians and their attempts to confuse her.
As John Touri points out in the paper objective falsity
is essential to lying an argument from convergent evidence published
in philosophy studies. In one she engages in what is
called answer laundering. If Sarah simply asked one of the

(03:21):
guards which doors which, then it might be a true
or untrue statement that she gets in return, and her
chances therefore are no better than simply picking a door
at random. Instead, she launders one answer through another tory
explains quote by asking one guard whether the other guard
would say that this door leads to success. Sarah deduced

(03:43):
the correct one either she gets the truth about a
lie or a lie about the truth. Whenever she has
told yes, the correct answer is no, and whenever she
has told no, the correct answer is yes. The truth
and the lie dependably canceled each other out In scenario
provided to restresses that lies cannot be true. Urry points

(04:05):
out that the riddle of the Four Guards is a
variant of the Knights and Naves logic puzzle from Raymond
Smoleans publication What is the name of this book? The
scenario in the book that closely resembles the scene from
Labyrinth involves a knight and a nave otherwise indistinguishable. Who
guard a fork in the road? Which road do you take?

(04:28):
Dare you ask these two men, given that one is
secretly a noble knight and the other secretly a vile nave,
Only one of them is going to give you a
good answer. The other one is going to lie to you.
The solution again comes via answer laundry. Ask which path
the other individual would say is the correct one. So
this is how the Four Guards of Labyrinth work, unless

(04:51):
I am lying, which I am not. Tune in for
additional episodes of The Monster Fact each week. As always,
you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow
your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow Your Mind is

(05:13):
a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from
my Heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.