DRFseven

No, I only meant your beds and monsters or those of your children.

The mysterious kind. The kind that you can't see, but that seem to be there, anyway. The kind that give people the feeling they are there. The kind children and credulous adults often believe exist.

No, I didn't mean the kind that could be described by traditional descriptions of *Big Foot, I meant the kind that don't obey the ordinary laws of physics that other creatures obey. They could be invisible or keep on getting through closet doors without opening them no matter how many times the closets are checked. I'm talking about the undetectable kind of monsters.

You mean the writers wrote the accounts and categorized them as fiction. Still, as I'm sure you know, many writers have written about things that are true and have published those things as fiction. As a matter of fact, some are so thinly disguised, the writers are sued over them. Being classified as fiction is no proof of a piece of writing being fictitious.

*Note: I have recently heard of people who now classify Big Foot as a true spook; they say it can become invisible at will. I used Big Foot in the traditional way of referring to a normal, though elusive, visible ape-like creature. My monsters, though, are like God, ghosts, and the New Big Foot.

Just my luck. The one book you've ever read that is NOT classified as fiction and HAS mysterious creatures in it is NOT available for discussion. What a strange coincidence!

So what if it's true? It's not an answer, is it? So why respond? You have not addressed what was asked.

I haven't read it; I'll look it up. In any case, I'm sure you know you're not stupid and I seriously doubt anyone else who's ever read your comments thinks so. Still, that doesn't make it OK, in my opinion, for anyone to say such a thing, but I am the boss of exactly nothing.

Well, yes; that's why I want you to explain them. I don't need someone with rational beliefs to explain them; I understand those.

I hope you will. You understand, probably 90% of believers refuse to discuss it.

Well, OK, if you mean you can't necessarily write about it because you don't understand it or you don't know where to start, then I say, great; that's a start! If you mean you do understand how to start talking about it, but it's too personal, then I say, again, that of course you have your rights to personal privacy, but, then why try to respond at all to this question?

Just in case you answer, let me reiterate the question again.

There are concepts we encounter in life that are defined as "that which cannot be falsified." You believe in some of them but not others. Can you tell why this might be so?

HelenM

Amos

Well, for one, hell is real and monsters are not.
Hell is a Catholic idea and they would never tell a lie while monsters is a Disneyfied idea of demons and therefore a lie.

DRFseven

You see, this is puzzling. You seem to be suggesting that believing in the types of spooks suggested by writers of The Bible or by Maurice Sendak in Where The Wild Things Are is crazy and that a person who does so needs to medicate him/herself out of it because they are inappropriate beliefs. Then, on the other hand, you apparently think those kinds of beliefs are appropriate for you. Are you saying, maybe, that though these mysterious creatures probably exist, if we are anxious about them, we should try to do something to stop thinking they exist? But what if some type of devil gets us because we weren't worried enough to keep ourselves safe; I mean, that's the purpose of anxiety, it's not always counterproductive, you know. Or what if we encourage our children (or grandchildren) to bravely dangle their legs and feet over the edges of their beds and they end up getting snatched by some monstrous demon and never heard from again?

How do you know that? How do you know Maurice Sendak wasn't writing about something he secretly thought was real? And even if he didn't think it was real, it might be real, anyway! Anything might be real! While you are reading this, there might be a Sponge Bob reading it, too (I hope so; he's so cute!).

Remember, your position is that we cannot state that something that cannot be proven to exist does not exist (from your original argument). So I am only advancing your own argument, here. My position is that, though your point is technically true, we all DO state that those types of things don't exist and, what's more, we teach our children they don't exist. You, as you have admitted, do it, too, in the case of some of these characters, but not all of them.

Before, you insisted there was a categorical difference between disproving one thing (hell) and disproving another thing (monsters). But, since then, we have clarified that these monsters are the mysterious kind that don't always exist in the physical realm (like Satan or God), so I would like to know if you have changed your mind about that? Do you now think that we cannot reasonably say to our children that there are no monsters under their beds now and that there never will be?
...actually I don't think I've read monsters under the bed books. I don't think it's politically correct to read nasty scary stories to kids these days is it? Or not unless they are grandfathered in or come under some exemption such as being in the Bible (that would only apply to Christians obviously)?


I did, but it certainly didn't answer the question. You think that there is some doubt as to who might be going to hell, if it even exists as in popular current Christian thought. You say it can't be proved, and you reiterate that it can't be disproved. However, that does nothing to tell me why you don't allow those same points for other mysterious things of which various people have proposed the existence.

Here's another puzzle. Do you consider your beliefs rational or irrational?

Helen, you stepped in on both threads and asserted something. You said, essentially, "I'm right, but I won't talk about it." Surely you understand why that is not acceptable as an answer; you have not shown why you are right. I started the second thread, then, hoping someone who would or could answer it might come along. When you came back, I thought, good, maybe she's ready to answer (and I was hoping you'd answer because I consider you a very honest, sincere person; I'd rather have an answer from you than from lots of other people). But you are kidding yourself if you think you have actually answered; you have only talked around the problem and given yourself the illusion of having "stood up" to the question. I'm not claiming you are being deceitful; I just think it's hard for you to see.

Well, I hope, if you never answer me, that you answer yourself.

DRFseven

D'oh! Why didn't I think of that!!!??? Amos, you are one bright dude.

Amos

The point is that hell is only real because we create the monsters to make it real and just as we color our own heaven while on earth so do we gather feul for our own hell while on earth.

DRFseven

I'm sorry, man; you seem like a nice person, but you're in too deep for us to have a meaningful discussion. I wish it were possible but it's not. Goodbye and fare thee well, Amos.

HelenM

DRFseven

Well, the problem with focusing on "actual situations" instead of hypotheticals is that hypotheticals is what the discussion is based upon. If you don't discuss hypotheticals, you won't be able to discuss the problem with which this post is concerned. So we have yet another reason you can't discuss whether or not your allegations are reasonable. As you know, the only reason for using the example of the monsters under the bed is that it is a good categorical match for discussing the spooks that populate The Bible. Most very young children (in Western culture, anyway) will believe in anything they've heard of, but, for some reason, they stop believing in monsters under the bed, though most of them continue to believe in hell, demons, gods, and other spooks (unless, of course, they never heard of them in the first place).

You know what points; credibility points. Some things add up to you to be credible and some don't. What system do you use to figure the points when neither can be proven?

The thing that usually works for you to get out of answering is to think of something that doesn't answer the question, but is true, and answer with that. Then, when you are questioned, you can assert vehemently that it is the truth! For instance, when someone asks you if you think your reasons are irrational, you could start talking about how asserting your irrationality might get you out of answering. Then if you are challenged you can answer that you DID, too, think so and that you will never agree with anyone who says you didn't.


Yes, and, as usual, I thought it was a very nice piece of writing. Why you would go to all the trouble to figure out what Jesus supposedly meant about hell when you don't trouble at all to try to find out if there even was a real Jesus is puzzling, but I still liked the writing.

That's right; start talking about whether or not you did something "against forum policy", instead of whether you gave an answer to a particular question.

No, Helen; you're like the child who was not allowed to call his brother "Stupid", so he took to calling him "Shupid"; you did not post the words "I'm right." However, you did argue with AspenMama, Michael, and myself (maybe others as well) and I assume you were not arguing that you were wrong, were you? I assume you were arguing that you were right. This is what you said in the KelliAnn thread about hell:

What you were arguing was that someone told KelliAnn that she needn't worry about hell because there is no hell. You stepped in and objected, saying that no one had proved there was no hell and that people shouldn't make assertions about things that weren't proven. Then, of course, is when I asked you if you would reassure your children that there were no monsters and you said that was different, etc., etc., and I started this thread about that question.

Now you tell me that your children have never been concerned about monsters under the bed and that you can't answer hypothetical questions. Is there some reason that you can't answer hypothetical questions other than it woud require you to face a question you don't want to face?

I'll give you an example that is NOT hypothetical. My three-year-old granddaughter often thinks about the monsters under her bed and in her closet. In fact, if she were to meet you, she would immediately tell you about her cats and dogs and about the monsters in her room. Do you think I should reassure her there are no monsters or let her think that she may be right about them? Somehow I have the feeling you're going to say you have another policy of not advising people.

Don't be shupid.

HelenM

DRF

I know you'll say I'm being evasive again but please bear with me...

I live in an irrational world. I have to take medication that I have no clue whether it works - and more often than not I don't believe it does. Who knows what long-term effects it might have. Why can't I try not taking it? Because everyone around me would freak out. Ah but half of them freak out anyway just because I was ill and they will never trust me again. Well, maybe in a couple of decades... Well, half of them didn't trust me already based on me making the mistake of telling them my diagnosis when I had no symptoms at all . When I got ill they probably simply thought "I knew it". Their main goal seems to be 'protect myself against the mentally ill person'. Do you have a clue what it's like to not be 'normal'???

Ok I'm ranting.

But...given that, what's the point in trying to be rational about anything?

I gave up on rationality. Now it's more a matter of, try to live my life in an irrational world where most people don't have a clue what it's like to be diagnosed with a mental health disorder and mostly it's because they don't care.

Is that irrelevant? It's not irrelevant to me, that there came a point where I had to say "what's the point?" and decide if rationality was the point, the world would be a very different place.

Most people don't want to be rational. If you do, good luck: you're swimming upstream.

No offense...

Did I tell you I'm reading Carl Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World" (because it was highly praised on Sec Web). It's very good. I read my husband (who's an atheist) the list of fallacies from the chapter "The Art of Baloney Detection" and he wishes he had time to write out an example illustrating all of them. He said I should since I have so much spare time . (That would be after I do the taxes, presumably )

Anyway I have to buy it - at present I only have a library copy.

But just to show you that I do listen to what people say, here. And in fact the chapter "there's a dragon in my garage" begins so similarly to the whole 'monsters' thing I was wondering whether you'd read it too!

love
Helen (shupid as they come...)