All those years not believing in Santa Claus. All those wasted years...

@lifewasgiventous1614

5 жыл бұрын

Roy The Mac Hahaha I love this comment.

@commieslapper3718

5 жыл бұрын

Good one haha

@armageddon4831

4 жыл бұрын

anything we give energy to in this MATRIX becomes real. did women become gods as satan promised eve? sure they did. we give them all our energy...even worship

@TheJimmyClip

4 жыл бұрын

Brilliant angle to take. Makes so much sense this way. Thank you!

@vonheer7418

3 жыл бұрын

The virgin santa denier vs. the chad santa believer.

"The phases of life: You believe in Santa; you don't believe in Santa; you are Santa."

@XmassWraith

3 жыл бұрын

The third stage comes about by looking in the mirror and screaming as it begins to snow outside

@MachoMaamRandallSandwich

2 жыл бұрын

This is the plot to the film Santa Clause

@XmassWraith

2 жыл бұрын

@@MachoMaamRandallSandwich right except it’s the horror film it was always meant to be

@notloki3377

2 жыл бұрын

@@XmassWraith why would santa claus scream at snow?

@XmassWraith

2 жыл бұрын

@@notloki3377 He isn’t screaming at the snow. See, once he screams it’ll cut away to a shot of outside and the snow falling as his screaming is heard in the distance.

the Pageau fairy puts insight and understanding under my pillow every week

@lisaonthemargins

4 жыл бұрын

This is the most perfect comment. I lolled :)

@thestraightroad305

3 жыл бұрын

Hahahahahahaha!! 😄🤣😄🤣

@2thewaythetruththelife

2 жыл бұрын

Same

Now I have a great way to explain Santa to kids WITHOUT lying to them! Gracias Jonathan.

@ImOk...

10 ай бұрын

This is a long video about nothing. “Santa Claus” was based on a real person. His name was St. Nick and he was said to be a legend for traveling around and giving away his inherited wealth. He was a Greek bishop born around 280 AD in Patra (Roman Empire) near Myra which is now in modern-day Turkey. Nick was a fiery defendant of the Christian doctrine, especially in 303 AD when bibles were burned and priests were forced to renounce a Christianity or face persecution. The name Santa Claus means Saint Nick (Klaus/Claus is an anglicized abbreviation of the name Nicholas or Nikolaos in Greek). He is depicted as Northern European even though it’s the opposite of reality/history.

@7ilver

8 ай бұрын

@@ImOk... That really has nothing to do with the video.. It seems you missed the point completely

@ImOk...

8 ай бұрын

@@7ilver Are you sure you’re not understanding correctly?

@7ilver

8 ай бұрын

@@ImOk... Im sure. I watched countless of his videos and read the book his brother wrote. The point of the video exists independent of Santa that's why he was able to use the Tooth Fair or a Chair as an example along side Santa. Providing historical context behind the origin of Santa is nice but doesn't relate to the point of the video whatsoever.

The Truth Fairy puts wisdom under your pillow.

Your mouth is your helper, and the mall Santa is... Santa's helper.

The video succinctly describes my suspicion on the flaw of objectively viewing the world. I was an atheist(as in I want to view the world as objectively as possible). But I encounter the "rock" problem. Let's ask the question if a rock exists? Technically, no. What you really have is a collection of quarks arranging themselves into protons and neutrons circling by a cloud of electrons that arranged themselves into an energetically stable configuration that gives rise to their periodic structural lattice which we then calls a crystal and the collection of crystals that clumps together through Van der Waals force is what known colloquially as a 'Rock'. A rock is merely the conceptual representation of the arrangements of quarks in a very very very specific ways, just like Santa Claus is a conceptual representation of a very very very specific network of electrons moving around in the neurons of around 2 billion people(Christians). A rock's existence is no more valid than the way we perceive it and if our perception is what makes something real, the permanent rise of something like Santa Claus must therefore be real too by definition. You can say its not real because you can't weigh it. There's something you can't weight too. KZread. Does KZread exist? What KZread really is from an objective point of view is a collection of sequentially firing of nano-sized transistors in a computer/server. You can't measure KZread nor can you weigh it. You can obviously weigh the electrical charge on all the transistor that involved in generating KZread, or the staffs from the Janitor to the CEO of KZread, or perhaps the weight in gold its revenue represents. But is KZread merely the firings of transistors, or the company staff that runs it, or the staff that runs its parent company Alphabet Inc., or is it the culmination of our collective consciousness manifesting via the generation and viewership of KZread content that makes up KZread? Or is it just Quarks? Technically yes. But it's not a helpful analysis.

@malchir4036

4 жыл бұрын

"Let's ask the question if a rock exists? Technically, no." It exists. The fact that the rock can be ontologically reduced to quarks doesn't mean the rock doesn't exist, which is our denotation for that collection of quarks in that manner. That reference however, is not the referent itself, nor relevant for the actual existence of the referent. You guys wouldn't pass a graduate level ontology class and are impressed by postmodern blabbering. It usually ends the minute physical harm or money is involved.

@joshuasy10

3 жыл бұрын

Wow man that's really helpful way of explaining it, thanks

@benjaminlquinlan8702

3 жыл бұрын

There's two categories ; everything and nothing; and the latter doesn't exist... Go ahead point to nothing ...

@0live0wire0

3 жыл бұрын

​@@malchir4036 This comes down to materialism vs idealism and that argument is a little bit older than postmodernism.

@olgakarpushina492

3 жыл бұрын

@@malchir4036 how does this refute the existance of Santa? If your argument is denotation, than it's just a definition problem. Well, we define Santa therefore he exists.

I _really_ loved the story of your daughter and the tooth fairy. Thank you Jonathan. Sometimes children are much wiser than we think.

@AndyJarman

4 ай бұрын

Makes you wonder if age brings us anything that we don't already own.

The fact you can talk that way with children makes me smile

I actually shed a tear at the tooth fairy story. Beautifully put.

Santa Claus is not one physical deity. But instead is made up of the carols and the laughs who are in reference to Santa Claus. Santa Claus is made up of the people who dress up as him, the figure in children's minds who put the presents under the tree (the mystery and delightful anticipation accompanying the night before Christmas) - the old man on the street who wishes you a merry Christmas and as you walk past him, laughs; oh oh oh oh. Santa Claus is the personification of Christmas, and to say he doesn't exist is like saying Christmas doesn't exist. Santa Claus is the spirit of Christmas. I never thought of it like this; thank you; insightful video and you put a smile to my face. I've always given my children presents under the guise of being Santa, and now I realise I was Santa; I was a manifestation of him. I'm always going to play Santa and when my children grow old I'll tell them what you have told me in the hope that they shall do the same. I now believe again in Santa.

This brings so much more depth to “god is dead and we’ve killed him” and “there is no such thing as govt, just people acting as govt”...among others. Thank you.

This is without a doubt one of the best videos I've seen in a very long time. I've not yet come across any thinker who explains these concepts with the wit, brevity and humour that you do, Jonathan. All of your work should be compulsory viewing for anyone remotely interested in the times we live in, because your videos above all others that I have seen truly shine a light on the dark age we currently live in. By which I mean that the world as presented by the materialists like Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins is so drab, 2D and lifeless in contrast to the rich tapestry of being that you describe. Can I just add that I became a Christian in my late 20s because all throughout my childhood and early adulthood, although it was cool to be atheist, I couldn't help but intuit that there was much more to this universe than meets the eye. It is such a relief to find that I am not the only person who has noticed this, and a pure delight to have its geography laid out in so lively and vivacious a manner. Thank you, brother!

@chaiTV

3 жыл бұрын

What? His argument is that Santa exists because the little girl believes he does for a brief moment in a shopping mall. For something to "exist" it needs to satisfy the full definition of the word, not just a warm and fuzzy moment in time. The little girl's belief in a fairy tale is not enough. She isn't aware the adults made up the story, and paid a man to dress up in a suit. When Santa only exists for an ignorant child at the shopping mall, Santa most certainly does not exist. As for God, we don't have higher intelligent beings to ask, but if we did, there's a very good chance they'd inform us that God doesn't exist in the way described by popular religions.

@Lu11abi

3 жыл бұрын

@@chaiTV I agree his take falls short, cuz while we collectively co-create a giant world-spanning puppet-ghost of "Santa" who exists, for sure, in the realm of "mankind's imagination" or something, that puppet has no agency of it's own, so is a bad springboard to argue for the reality of a human Soul or an Eternal God...

@bradspitt3896

3 жыл бұрын

@@Lu11abi This is phenomenology. You're coming at it from a materialist view of consciousness, which is metaphysical, not scientific.

@franciscocaldas5258

3 жыл бұрын

@@Lu11abi he has no agency? Where is the pattern of the Santa Claus located materialistically? Is the whole santa in my head? Are the parts of the Santa distributed through all of our heads, and their sum is the whole? Its not in the little girl's imagination. It came from outside her

@empcat1254

2 жыл бұрын

@@chaiTV that's not what he said.

You just changed my life. Merry Christmas!

The question is...do parents exists?

@ImTheSlime

5 жыл бұрын

waterglass21 - does DNA exist?

@briansinger5258

5 жыл бұрын

Parents are a tool of the patriarchy, a social construct. ;)

@TheFreekg

5 жыл бұрын

Parents are merely a medium for Santa Claus to touch our hearts.

@Dezzmatic

5 жыл бұрын

Yes, but we speak merely to the mouthpiece of the meta-parent.

@SpiritualFox

5 жыл бұрын

They don't wanna include me in their superhero web cosplay. I suppose things would get too heavy. Being cross +rigger

About Santa - good demonstration of how phenomenological method works.

@nicodez9212

5 жыл бұрын

Скрытый смысл how exactly does the phenomenological method work? I know it starts with from the first person perspective.

@JamesMathison

5 жыл бұрын

Nico Dez - I can't answer this question, but this conversation between John and his brother might come close: kzread.info/dash/bejne/Yop9tKNvhJaZn5c.html His book seems to provide a profound mindset shift to be able to see the world in a phenomenalogical way (in a way that not even John understood before reading it). I haven't read it myself, but I'd like to.

@skrsmysl

5 жыл бұрын

Nico Dez, it is a consistent reduction of the semantic layers - "levels of being", as a result of which we come to the essence (Santa) that is manifested in them.

@lifewasgiventous1614

5 жыл бұрын

I thought phenomenological observation Just means the way it is observed. So for instance the earth is flat, phenomenologically speaking...because that’s how we observe it when walking around on it.

"To me it seems completely absurd to say Santa Claus doesn't exist. Because, obviously, Santa Claus exists." *cut to intro* Well played, Jonathan. Well played. I really like your videos, man; very insightful, each of them. Keep at it; keep doing God's work.

You know, I never really stopped believing in the Three Wise Men even when my mother told me that she was the one placing the gifts. I knew their spirits existed, and my mother placing the gifts was a consequence of their existence.

I recently discovered your channel thanks to a tweet from J.B.Peterson. I'm glad i found it, your videos are so interesting. Your analysis are easily understandable and brilliant. I was as an adolescent a deep nihilistic atheist and as i'm growing up, i'm more and more fascinated by the meaning of life, the symbolic of human experience. What does it mean to be part of the human being journey. As you open my understanding, i'm more and more agreable with faithful people. Faithful people who understand why they believe, who thought hard about what it means to believe. I can't find pleasure anymore to speak with a nihilistic guy who has no purpose in his life. You have my thanks from France, more people here should see your work as we are the European champions of nihilisim, materialism and post-modernism mixed chaos. Have a nice day Jonathan

My neighbor told the Christmas story to her 3 year old son at the time, then when they went to the mall and he saw Santa there he said "Look mommy! It's Jesus!"

This video is highly underrated. It actually summarizes The Symbolic World in a way anyone can understand. Btw, check out Akira the Don's music video of this too :D

I love the intro. Always gives me the chills :)

Love your work, Jonathan. This is a unique channel with an important scope of content.

I have been falling in love with your channel and content. Some of it is over my head in understanding, but there's a spark of curiosity and a sense of truth that seems to settle into my being. Especially during these dark times, it was your videos that i was guided to watch that helped me come out of a dark spell that i had been stuck in for a few weeks. I began knowing nothing about Orthodox faith, and now I find myself asking all sorts of questions to my inner dialogue. Thanks for sharing your light. Merry Christmas.

"Because obviously Santa Claus exists" rap_battle_black_people_react.mpg

@RogerTheil

5 жыл бұрын

Empire of Autism lmao

@mrwtfwhy

5 жыл бұрын

PSYCH_das_the_wrong_number.mpg

@pedrinhum2

4 жыл бұрын

@@mrwtfwhy lol

This is the best video (of those I've seen) by you so far. Great job!

@lajexander

5 жыл бұрын

I think the same pragmatical argument could be made to rationalist types in this way "Are numbers real? If not, why do you insist on using them? Does the amount of utility you get out of treating them as something 'real'-like make them more or less real?" I think this would be effective as most of them are sciency types and have lots of experience with numbers.

@andrewkelly2028

5 жыл бұрын

That is a very good way to look at it.

@legionofdecency8390

5 жыл бұрын

lajexander Numbers are only a concept in your head. If you want to include concepts in your head as being real, then they are real. The same goes for santa and god, as they are only concepts in your head. Why would the utility of an idea have anything to do with how real it is? Is a number more or less real than a Realicorn? If utility equals realness then why are we talking about ideas being real? We should be talking about their usefulness. Santa (the idea) is useful because it keeps children in line during christmas season. God (the idea) is useful because we don't want people masturbating or being gay. They are watching.

@lajexander

5 жыл бұрын

Killface Killer That was a great reply until the last seven words. Then it became the best 🤣

Oh my word... this was an actual breakthrough for me! Thank you sooo much! Btw love your work brother ☦️

Lovely Jonathan, just lovely. Thank you. Came back here as Christmas is coming. - I'm going to come here every year around Advent.

I've been watching this channel for a couple days straight. I love your analysis. I feel like the more diverse your understanding of Christianity, or anything really, the more you start to see the patterns. I'm an artist as well so I can relate it to when I started to paint the figure and still life with only color. The patterns and relationships started to reveal themselves the more intensely I looked for them. And I literally mean patterns in color. Similar to pointillism, I started to separate out local color then mold the forms based on a sort of wrestling with the truth of what I was seeing. My work is now completely different and much more abstract expressionistic but I do have a very serious understand of drawing and painting realistically which helps to make sense of the chaos. I think knowing the "scales" is essential when venturing out into a more chaotic forms of image making like abstraction and expressionism. A good foundation in anything will help you when you wander off into the unknown. You'll have a sort of tool kit to make it more real, or at least bring something back from the void. I feel the same way about the search for what Christianity means in the modern world.

It really makes sense. I can’t get enough. I wish i have seen your site long ago. Thank you.

This is absolutely brilliant! Really opened my mind to a concept I hadn't thought of before. Thank you Jonathan Pageau.

I loved this and the second part as well... you should have a ton more people following your content.

Really finding your ideas and studies on symbolism fascinating . Keep up the good work .

So basically he’s a social construct

@JonathanPageau

5 жыл бұрын

Not completely, because "societal constructs" necessarily flow out of the structure of reality in which society exists. For a society to function it cannot be structured in any which way, but rather there are certain patterns by which functional societies exist, so too a society has expressed the being and pattern which makes us recognize Santa Claus as an important being, a desired story and trope which is remembered and passed on by all.

@pelonp3691

5 жыл бұрын

I understand now

@callummilburn8204

5 жыл бұрын

Kinda like the relationship between nature and nurture and how that expresses itself as lived experience. There is physical, phenomenological, individual and social components etc that express themselves. The brain can be reduced to an individual but the mind cannot. This does not mean by default supernatural. But that our sense of being does not end at the skin. it includes the relationship we are in with others and the culture we are embedded in. These Tooth fairies can be as real as our hand or internal thoughts or feelings. But expressed through cultural tropes. Because they cannot be reduced down to one person individually.

@pelonp3691

5 жыл бұрын

Jonathan Pageau Santa Claus makes more sense to me but why is the tooth fairy an important being? What sort of value is gained from believing a fairy gives you money for losing your baby teeth? Does it have something to do with growing up?

@Ifailedeverything

5 жыл бұрын

Adrian H I think it may have come from the idea that teeth falling out is a scary thing for kids. Important bits of your body, for no apparent reason falling away. Unlike hair or fingernails which don't hurt when you cut them losing a tooth hurts and it bleeds. Parents tell the child it's ok, this means a new tooth will grow -- But we don't know how long it'll take. A fairy that gives you money the very next day is sort of like a deposit on the idea that you'll be getting a newer, better tooth. Plus it acknowledges that a tooth is valuable and needed as it'll be difficult to eat for some time.

Please pray for Joe everybody, he’s had a rough year

My favorite Pageau video. I recommend this as an intro to him whenever I get the chance

Jonathan, I think your argument is pretty solid, but it left me wondering about consciousness. Surely we cannot deny the existence of a BELIEF in the spirit of a culturally-dependent entity called Santa Claus, nor the fact that people who adhere to that culture act out his existence, in Petersonian terms. What I don't understand - and I'm not saying you've implied that this is possible in the video at all - is how one could make a leap from a phenomenological existence of a belief in Santa Claus, and the fact that he does have objective properties, to the conclusion that this entity possesses consciousness or, if you will, a soul. I ask this, of course, because this leap would be necessary in order to formulate a phenomenological claim of the existence of God, which, again, I don't think you're explicitly trying to prove here. Do you think that leap is possible or is consciousness not encompassed in this ontology? Thank you for the video. Great stuff.

@LuisLopez-dw7ug

3 жыл бұрын

Good Q

@brysoncochran4423

2 жыл бұрын

I think that maybe Saint Nicholas existed and that Santa Claus is somewhat/somehow tied to that spirit/soul. The life of Saint Nick and the mythos of Santa are from the same spirit. Saint Nick did not know that he would become Santa after his death, but his hope/prayer for the world encompassed such a heart and idea for the whole world. Maybe, just maybe, his prayers for the world were answered and He is able to still use his hands and his feet today after his death...through his soul/spirit.

@LagMasterSam

2 жыл бұрын

You could argue that the collective mental effort and physical actions of people believing in Santa Claus forms a distributed mind/soul. Kind of like how an ant hive has a distributed mind that vastly exceeds what any individual ant has going on their individual nervous systems. If the combined efforts of ant minds can form such an impressive super-mind, just how impressive is one formed by human minds?

I love the slightly maniacal cackle that Jonathon gives when he talks about the 'voice of the United states' near the end of the video ... where he realizes that he is communicating a form of realisation that is both essentially true and yet can be taken as literally false. Really think this video hits it out of the park. For the material realist/neuroscience/new atheists a way of understanding this may be we, as a species, seem to be able to orient our attention to different levels of neuroprocessing (E.g I can see Santa Claus, the Joe who is dressed as Santa Claus, the Santa Claus as a representation of category called mall workers or mall Santa clauses or mall members of public or out of mall member of public or member of human race or member of life or member of the universe of material things. To do each of those requires a variance in brain processing which can be seen by different patterning on mri, as an example. This different patterning also facilitates and inhibits over areas of brain function which has a top down sequential change on other cellular function (tissue/organ etc) and thus they process differently and achieve different states of being. Consciously while we can cognitively differentiate or highlight or attend to aspects of experience (what I see or hear or even within the realms of sight such as colour or movement) this is always contingent upon synthesis or synasthesia (some brain parts get direct connection from multiple sensory organs). If we were to synthesize a person in a community in a world of beings in a world of animals in a world of material in a world of forces in a world of flux/interactions and encapsulated that process we could envision a unity. Some people envision this as a form of being (gods etc) and some folks don't (atheistic ultimate causation).

@2b-coeur

2 жыл бұрын

But ultimate causation is not the same as ultimate Reality - see The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness and Bliss

I found your channel today and I find it very informative. Thank you Jonathan 🙂

Absolutely love this video!! This form of love is one that exists within me....lol Great video Jonathan. Thank you so much for what you give here. You add so much to my journey.

@XmassWraith

3 жыл бұрын

Then you’re good people.

"The Hogfather" by Terry Pratchett is a very interesting fantasy novel that approaches this argument *from* the absurd. There's even a SkyTV made-for-TV movie that wasn't too bad. An excerpt from the book to entice: “All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable." REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE. "Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little-" YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES. "So we can believe the big ones?" YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING. "They're not the same at all!" YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET-Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED. "Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point-" MY POINT EXACTLY.”

@Lu11abi

3 жыл бұрын

Very clever and emotional writing by a true master Psychopomp, Terry Pratchet... But I don't buy it um...ontologically. Justice, Mercy, Duty...these things have some sorta "form" like light...they are a part of us, at least, if not the Universe itself, whether we were here or not.

@SomebodySaveRap

2 жыл бұрын

@@Lu11abi I’m agnostic and I love his idea.

I have never been able to explain to people what i mean when i say i believe in santa. This is brilliant.

This is really fascinating. It’s funny because I remember being sort of a Santa agnostic as a kid lol My parents never told me one way or another but I would sometimes leave cookies out just in case. As for the Tooth Fairy, on some level I always knew that my dad was the one putting the money under my pillow, but at the same time I knew “the tooth fairy” was the reason in an abstract sense. This is the first video to put that into words

Jajaja, thanks for systematize that thought, also the story with your daughter was pretty funny. Loving your videos!

This ties in so much to what I've wanted to say to people but always fumbled; magic exists, but it's not how you think it is.

If this is the case for the way in which God exists, it seems that God's existence depends on our belief. In this line of thinking wouldn't God have not existed before humans?

While I appreciate how you've laid this out, (I dig the concept of non-corporeal memes/archetypes/myths having actual physical impact here on earth) I worry about how unconstrained this explanation seems to be, and how it can essentially be applied to anything thereby effectively able to be redefined in whichever way one deems it. How might one avoid this problem?

@minagalexe

2 жыл бұрын

120%

@josephtravers777

2 жыл бұрын

God is love. Period.

@empcat1254

2 жыл бұрын

@@josephtravers777 but what does that mean realy?

@josephtravers777

2 жыл бұрын

@@empcat1254 He made us for Himself and wants us to know Him

@walrus8444

2 жыл бұрын

The definitions humans create are not arbitrary. So if you try to redefine something in a way that is not in line with reality your definition is less likely to sustain the more time passes.

Jonathan, love the story about your daughter and the tooth fairy!

@Roescoe

5 жыл бұрын

That was an a-ha moment for me (and I'm 24) It explains the magic of the game. Also I enjoyed the part where his daughter carried the game on to another person. I explains so well where traditions come from and how they function.

Once a man who roamed and gave Who rung his bells through night and day A spirit absorbed and played each year Removing winters touch of fear Out from the hearth and into the hand We spread this love across the land The gift of giving has no bounds The cycle goes around and round To feed the deer to feed the hounds Never forget the man that sounds

My goodness this is so freaking helpful

I admire you very much for articulating belief so that even a modern person like me can grasp it. It's really cool that you laugh so much, too, because it shows you know how counterintuitive it is for us to consider this seriously, but we gotta get over ourselves to get to the good stuff!

I’m now in a head spin of what constructs are and different scenarios in which they play out.

This is one of the most interesting motions I've heard in a long time. It opens the world, by several degrees, for me. Thank you.

Great video! Your work is new to me. Begs the question, how wise is it to let our kids put on the persona of characters or even caricatures of evil entities at Halloween, including so called fairies, or Disney (supposedly good in some cases, but...)?

This reminds me of CS Lewis essay on Transposition. I guess how higher abstract medium transpositions into the lower physical medium. Something like that, lol

Santa Claus dropping the gavel. Judges Angels and praying to the spirit of the United States... Thoroughly enjoy your work

Did you just assume Santa's gender?

So there is a degree of existence that goes beyond the material, and influences our actions by allowing us to embody their being. So are you a Christian mainly because you believe the best embodiment for humanity is in the narrative of the story of Jesus? Would you say there is a problem with the religious people that are more concern with the material existence of Jesus and his return rather than trying to embody Jesus? I think those are the people the new atheist types are criticizing. I think this video made things a bit more clear for me. Thanks Jonathan.

@mickeymick2861

5 жыл бұрын

God not becoming flesh=>No resurrection & afterlife=>No objective reason to embody Jesus.

@AdHominus

5 жыл бұрын

There would no way for us to embody Christ if He had not also been embodied. Does that make sense?

@ElefantPenisJr

5 жыл бұрын

Fibius Maximus I didn't say those realities are mutually exclusive or even in conflict. I was looking for some common ground between the people like Jonathan and Peterson that have a more sophisticated view of religion and the new atheist types. Discussions between these two groups never get anywhere because they are always talking about different aspects of religion. It would be interesting to see where the conversation would go once each group acknowledges the other side of the coin.

@ElefantPenisJr

5 жыл бұрын

AdHominus Could you explain your reasoning for saying that? Santa Claus did not have to exist in any point in time in order for parents to embody a Santa Claus and give happiness to their children. Why would it be any different for the story of Jesus?

@AdHominus

5 жыл бұрын

Space Man Santa Claus is conceived of as an incarnate being. Christ without a body would be a purely spiritual being. You cannot "embody" an unincarnate being by definition. Christ represents both God's incarnation and Man's deification. Without both processes occurring simultaneously, there can be no face-to-face relationship between Man and God. Only signs and symbols.

How is Joe doing 3 years later? Just curious? Is he still playing Santa? Did his girlfriend come back? Love your work, Johnathan. Thank you, for what you are doing.

@TakiGosc427

Жыл бұрын

Now there's no Joe, only santa

@joshvarges9230

Жыл бұрын

@@TakiGosc427 in harmony with santa

Very enlightening. Thank you, Jonathan.

You have justified my naive childhood in the best way.

Brilliant video. Simple explanation for lots of metaphyisical misconceptions.

This is exactly why i convinced my wife to NOT promote Santa in our home. And if my Kids asks i will tell: Well, santa is as real as Mickey Mouse. But not real like mom and dad, or Jesus.

Having pictures of Santa Claus, having songs about Santa Claus, and having people dress up as Santa Claus; all those things do not in the slightest, let alone "obviously," prove the existence of Santa Claus. The fact that many people imagine a being does not prove the existence of that being. Were that to be the case, then the fact that a single person imagined a being, no matter how exotic or improbable, would then constitute proof that that being "exists". The point is, the imagination can indeed conceive of beings that do not exist. You seem to reify the imagination.

@drooskie9525

2 жыл бұрын

Yes it does. You're getting hung up on the idea of material existence. Not even kids are that stupid. You yourself do not even "exist" on that level either. You are a communion of different elements forming a coherent unity. Science sees things at the lowest level, and therefore, doesn't see "you". There's no test science can do that tells me you're "Michael Meo". You're a contained being, sure, Santa is less-so, but you're not as contained as you might think.

Jonathan, that was an awesome explanation. Something not easy to explain, by the way. I learned something. Thanks!

This forces me to think more about something I haven't figured out, about how much utility there is in learning about and paying attention to the spirits of beings associated with paganism and idolatry.

Thank you for all the hard work!!

It seems everything exists.

@tracik1277

5 жыл бұрын

bluemeeni I’ve always thought similarly. It started with hearing so often as a child “it’s just your imagination”. I used to think, well my imagination exists, it has a purpose and a meaning, I know it’s my imagination and I’m not deluded so I can’t discount it as part of reality and my experience of the world.

This is brilliant. Very unique way of seeing things.

This is so profound to me. Wonderful video

Dude... I'm so pushing you on Quantum of Conscience and Owen's Bears!

Wonderful discussion. I have a lot to think on.

Very interesting. A few years ago I thought the same thing you said when some "modern" parents said that the festivity of the three wise men (who in Spain play a role similar to Santa Claus) is an evil deception towards children by adults. For me it was the best holiday of the year, and this continues even after discovering the truth about the way of existing of these beings. But with the three wise men or Santa Claus is difficult (Not impossible) to turn them into something harmful. Even being a skeptical agnostic, I can see how this works and the role it plays in our lives. But I have a question: Where is the limit? What happens when we give free rein to these identities? A nation, a race, a gender, science, God or the very idea of ​​Reason have also shown their negative faces throughout history, and all can be considered entities of that type. It's easy to explain to a child that Santa Claus's way of existing is not the literality of a single bearded old man who visits every house in the world in a single night flying on a sled ... but how would you explain to an adult the inherent dangers of believing in some entities in the wrong way?

To summarize - there is a world of objects and matter (phenomenon, concrete things as they present to us) and a world of ideas and meaning (noumenon - abstract things in themseves) and they both form what we call reality. The respective schools of thought are materialism and idealism and the argument is which takes precedence in forming reality. Atheists and the "modern man" is concerned with materialism and is contented with the answers science provides, regarding it as the bringer of "objective truth" or even the only truth there is. He treats science as religion while failing to acknowledge the irony and is blind to the one-sidedness and impotence of science when dealing with problems within the world of ideas and meaning.

Dear Journal. I have reached the pinnacle of enlightenment. I now believe in santa claus and the tooth fairy.

The family under the bridge is a great children’s book that perfectly exemplifies this. I encourage anyone who has kids to read it with them around Christmas.

There are massive differences between believing in God and Santa; Santa only exists as a role/character because humans invented him, God is more than a role or a character and exists regardless of humans. The reason an Atheist said to me that he rejected Christianity was because his parents, like you, treat it with the same level of realness as Santa (and so he never had the motivation or divine experience to make his faith personal). Unless I remember incorrectly: Jesus is a separate entity from the church (also called the Body of Christ). Yes people can characterize Christ, fulfill his roles, be his tools, but they're still physically parts of the Church. The Church is joined/married with Christ, but that doesn't mean the members of the Church have become Christ.

Hey Jonathan. The offer still stands if you want to meet with any of the Wizards here in New Zealand. We can do this over skype or some such, to make it easier.

Going back and re-watching all these. Author Grant Morrison has made a very similar argument about Superman, stating he's essentially real in the same sense you've described here, has a set of widely known characteristics appearance and behaviors. But it seems there is a missing piece, otherwise what prevents a complete fictional creation from being spiritually real in this way?

So as a practical question, are you saying santa is a "spiritual" existence with a will or a purpose or more like a sort of existence that exists due to chance? Do these higher or deeper levels have a unified existence in the real world or are they what make up our social relationships in a purely non "logical" way?

Does Tim Allen exist?

@fendranm2914

5 жыл бұрын

Brandon Wilkinson Yes. He lives in Finland.

Brilliant video! This reminds of my favorite comic book writer Grant Morrison’s perspective on comic superheroes as well. Of course, the difference with God is He doesn’t just exist not on that level, but above it. He’s more real than we are.

your story about the tooth fairy kind of reminds me of when i learned about Christ's presence in the eucharist. I learned about it when i was 17 or 18, and we had been Orthodox since i was 12, so i kind of knew it but the way your daughter reacted to your explanation has the same feeling as i had when i first understood it, or heard it talked about it, i guess...idk if that makes sense, but this is so fascinating

This was quite impassioned and hit the spot. Dramatis personae et vitae!

So what would your response be to Sam Harris when he says that a person could decide to from now on consider what Spiderman would do. That any problem, or situation that comes up in the day, he will respond by considering what Spiderman would do and then act based on that? Would that mean that Spiderman is real?

The interpretation of Santa Claus as someone who wants to put children at ease when you talk to them reminds me of the old version of Miracle on 34th Street with Maureen O’Hara. It also makes me think that my mom didn’t push me to go over and sit on Santa’s lap because I was too scared to speak to strangers. Prayer works the same way I’ve read; we are taught we need to speak out what is on our hearts, and we gradually become ingrained in a silent meditation of our life’s work. The Tooth Fairy also really worries me because I’d be afraid of waking my child to put a coin under their pillow. I wouldn’t even begin to know where to store or what to do with the baby teeth afterward.

Is a product brand considered similarly as a phenomenon? It is considered an entity, is patternistic and manifests as a culture, communicates the actual service and the mission/vision, all down to its resellers and ads. The buyer responds to it thru their reaction towards the brand (e.g. availing it, disliking it, recommending or making it a lifestyle)

This video transformed my life from atheist materialism Orthodox Christianity, ultimately. It wasn't overnight. And it wasn't easy. But this video played a pivotal role. thank you, Jonathan!

How real, or in what form, is Jesus compared to Santa and the Tooth Fairy?

Jonathan, love your videos! Is it your belief that God exists the same way Santa clause does? Meaning that the idea of God becomes incarnate in human beings as does the idea of Santa Clause but has no independence (or no more independence than any other idea) from humanity? Thanks in advance!

@loganwilliams6872

2 жыл бұрын

I have this same question. It seems like he's saying that God does not exist outside of man's concept of him.

@brandonburns5249

Жыл бұрын

@@loganwilliams6872 I think the inverse is what he’s getting at. God does exist, which is why you have a concept of him.

A kid getting hyped to give her friend money on behalf of the tooth fairy is hilarious and cute

Even things with out physical form exist. He touched on that love exists. We can feel love. We can see the effects of love. Even when we can’t understand love, for example, when two people love each other and we can understand why they love each other, we can still see the love they share. Love exist separate to those who share love. When a person you love dies, you can still feel and see the love they had for you and you can feel the love you have for them. The love two people have is felt for generations after two people die in their children and grandchildren. Items can be imbued with love. When you look at a picture, a homemade sweater, a baseball glove, or even a something a trivial as a comb, you can feel the love, experiences, and memories emanating out of them. Metaphysical things exist just as much and often last longer than physical things.

Do you have any short story, essay, poem or even quotation that explains this in short?

This was great, it helped my daughter understand part of a much larger concept. Thanks.

Thanks Martha! :)

"Man some people are going to freak out at this!" No shit Sherlock, I think you blew a few valves.

Do u think Santa always existed or do u believe we created him/maintain his existence?

I can show you a square with a circular projection. Also, cold ice is dry. If it is cold enough, it is so dry that doesn't react with sodium at all.

That's the best 1 min introduction yet hahaha love it

Love this video and year after year I’m sharing it to defend Santa Clause. Especially to my Christian friends!