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Is Santa claus real?

ReverendHellh0und said:
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some of yous people. /facepalm
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As opposed to some of you people?

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Wessexman said:
What is my position? You don't even know what it is. I'll tell you, it is simply that all we think is real in some sense.
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Unfortunately, everyone keeps pointing out to you that you're wrong, but you ignore it entirely. :roll:
 
ReverendHellh0und said:
"Eight-year-old Virginia O'Hanlon wrote a letter to the editor of New York's Sun, and the quick response was printed as an unsigned editorial Sept. 21, 1897. The work of veteran newsman Francis Pharcellus Church has since become history's most reprinted newspaper editorial, appearing in part or whole in dozens of languages in books, movies, and other editorials, and on posters and stamps:



"DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old.
"Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.
"Papa says, 'If you see it in THE SUN it's so.'
"Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?

"VIRGINIA O'HANLON.
"115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET."

VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except [what] they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You may tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, VIRGINIA, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood."


Merry Christmas
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I have a feeling 8 year old Virgina was a little too young to comprehend the response...
 
Cephus said:
Unfortunately, everyone keeps pointing out to you that you're wrong, but you ignore it entirely. :roll:
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Are you everyone? How am I wrong? Even you have not pointed that out. In fact everyone (I presume we are using this term to refer to ourselves now) has shown that ideas, concepts, thoughts and images are real. Just because the form of Father Christmas exists only in one's mind or in pictures does not make it any less real than if that form existed in flesh. What it means is though is that Father Christmas doesn't exist as a human being in our universe or level of existence.
 
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Cephus said:
Then you're paying less attention than I thought.
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Now you're trolling as much as you can. As I edited my last post to say;

How am I wrong? Even you have not pointed that out. In fact everyone (I presume we are using this term to refer to ourselves now) has shown that ideas, concepts, thoughts and images are real. Just because the form of Father Christmas exists only in one's mind or in pictures does not make it any less real than if that form existed in flesh. What it means though is that Father Christmas doesn't exist as a human being in our universe or level of existence.

This is an important distinction, as the Goddess informed Parmenides. Indeed it can used as the start of one important, discursive perspective on metaphysics (that of all-possibility or the infinite), so I'm not simply playing around for no reason. Indeed there is an old Platonic quip that you get closer to the truth the more you include in your system, or that every system of metaphysics is more truthful the more it includes.
 
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Who knew Santa was such a serious subject. Santa= Serious Biz:2razz:
 
Wessexman said:
Are you everyone? How am I wrong? Even you have not pointed that out. In fact everyone (I presume we are using this term to refer to ourselves now) has shown that ideas, concepts, thoughts and images are real. Just because the form of Father Christmas exists only in one's mind or in pictures does not make it any less real than if that form existed in flesh. What it means is though is that Father Christmas doesn't exist as a human being in our universe or level of existence.
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Alright, I'll make you a trade. I will agree that an idea and a physical object are both "equally real", but only if you will agree that they are real in functionally different ways.
 
Paschendale said:
Alright, I'll make you a trade. I will agree that an idea and a physical object are both "equally real", but only if you will agree that they are real in functionally different ways.
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I will agree that they have a different kind of existence in our current plane of existence, certainly.

You don't really have much to trade though, because unless you want to say the word real shouldn't be used but some other word (which would simply mean we have to debate over some over term), then you simply cannot deny they are equally real.
 
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Wessexman said:
I will agree that they have a different kind of existence in our current plane of existence, certainly.

You don't really have much to trade though, because unless you want to say the word real shouldn't be used but some other word (which would simply mean we have to debate over some over term), then you simply cannot deny they are equally real.
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It's the connotations that important. "Santa isn't real" usually refers to whether or not he is a flesh and blood creature who delivers presents. Not whether or not we have genuinely imagined him. By the definition of real that you're using, there's nothing that isn't real, because the moment we think of it, it becomes real. At least a real idea. I think specifying that you mean the idea is real, rather than the person, would help clear up your meaning a lot.
 
Paschendale said:
It's the connotations that important. "Santa isn't real" usually refers to whether or not he is a flesh and blood creature who delivers presents. Not whether or not we have genuinely imagined him. By the definition of real that you're using, there's nothing that isn't real, because the moment we think of it, it becomes real. At least a real idea. I think specifying that you mean the idea is real, rather than the person, would help clear up your meaning a lot.
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There is no set meaning, but I'd say real has the meaning I gave it, in philosophical thought (though I suppose I read a lot of Platonic, Christian and mystical thought and not a lot of modern philosophy, so my experiences may be particular) much more, more than other terms like exist or manifest and that these are more often used to describe what you mean by real. But there is certainly not set term.

My entire point was to explore the notion that everything we think is in some sense real; and real as a concept, image and idea which thought grasps and so thought cannot be simply written off as uniform and all thoughts indistinguishable, as was implied by at one person earlier in the thread. I was simply trying to challenge the narrow, more naturalistic viewpoints of some.
 
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Wessexman said:
There is no set meaning, but I'd say real has the meaning I gave it, in philosophical thought (though I suppose I read a lot of Platonic, Christian and mystical thought and not a lot of modern philosophy, so my experiences may be particular) much more, more than other terms like exist or manifest and that these are more often used to describe what you mean by real. But there is certainly not set term.

My entire point was to explore the notion that everything we think is in some sense real; and real as a concept, image and idea which thought grasps and so thought cannot be simply written off as uniform and all thoughts indistinguishable, as was implied by at one person earlier in the thread. I was simply trying to challenge the narrow, more naturalistic viewpoints of some.
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Why challenge it? Is it flawed?
 
zgoldsmith23 said:
How is the naturalistic viewpoint flawed?
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Naturalistic is an imprecise term. If you want to see me refute the likes of Cephus with their narrow viewpoint see the thread on Love. Or offer up your idea of naturalistic and I will show the flaws in that.
 
Wessexman said:
Naturalistic is an imprecise term. If you want to see me refute the likes of Cephus with their narrow viewpoint see the thread on Love. Or offer up your idea of naturalistic and I will show the flaws in that.
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Delusional much?
 
Cephus said:
Delusional much?
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As I said in the other thread, your act is falling apart. You like to try and dismiss all those you disagree with on religion and philosophy as idiots who have no arguments and are just appealing to emotion or illusions. The problem is this only has a shot of working when you at least try and present intelligent comments. When you start relying on the sort of stuff you are now, basically trolling insults, it is hard to understand how you think your act can continue to have even the semblance of any force.
 
Cephus said:
And, no matter how strongly they believe it, they're factually wrong. Wishful thinking does not produce truth.
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How are they wrong?
 
Paschendale said:
It's the connotations that important. "Santa isn't real" usually refers to whether or not he is a flesh and blood creature who delivers presents. Not whether or not we have genuinely imagined him. By the definition of real that you're using, there's nothing that isn't real, because the moment we think of it, it becomes real. At least a real idea. I think specifying that you mean the idea is real, rather than the person, would help clear up your meaning a lot.
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I think what he is describing is more than an idea... it is a creation. A movement. The "idea" of Santa has taken on a life of it's own and it is a living and breathing entity that nothing could tear asunder.
 
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