 Now non-symmetric relations, including asymmetric ones, are typically described as imposing an order upon the things they relate; they admit of what is also called differential application (Fine 2000: 8). This means that for any such non-symmetric \(R\) there are multiple different ways in which \(R\) potentially applies to the things it relates. Why? If the way that loves applies to \(a\) and \(b\) when \(a\) loves \(b\) were no different from the way that loves applies to them when \(b\) loves \(a\), then the loves relation couldn’t be non-symmetric, because otherwise \(a\) couldn’t love \(b\) without \(b\)’s loving \(a\). So we have to distinguish between the two different ways that loves is capable of applying to \(a\) and \(b\). Similarly we can distinguish the six different ways that the ternary between relation potentially applies to three things. By contrast, we’re not required by the same reasoning to distinguish between the different ways in which a (strictly) symmetric relation applies to the things it relates. There’s no corresponding necessity to distinguish the way that the adjacency relation applies to \(a\) and \(b\) when \(a\) is adjacent to \(b\) from the way that the adjacency relation applies to them when \(b\) is adjacent to \(a\) because \(a\) cannot be adjacent to \(b\) without \(b\) being adjacent to \(a\).