| The CROWN of CHRIST - Understanding the Times in the Light of Scripture |
| The CROWN of CHRIST - Understanding the Times in the Light of Scripture |
ARCHIVE - December 7, 2009
No, Virginia, there
is no Santa Claus!
No, Virginia, there
is no Santa Claus!
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In September of 1897, the New York Sun
published one of the most famous editorials
ever written in the English language. In it,
Francis P. Church answered the question of an
8 year old reader: is there a Santa Claus?
Mr. Church lied to Virginia O’Hanlon, and
the irrational arguments he used do not hold
up. To begin, he wrote that we live in a
skeptical age, and foolishly believe that only
those things we see can actually exist. His
claim boils down to:
Some skeptics are wrong.
All Santa-deniers are skeptics.
Therefore, all Santa-deniers are wrong.
This syllogism is invalid because the middle
term (skeptics) is undistributed. We might say:
Some dogs are huge.
All beagles are dogs.
Therefore, all beagles are huge.
But not all beagles are huge. We cannot draw
a universal conclusion from limited premises and
undistributed middle terms. Mr. Church lived in
a time when formal logic was still taught in the
schools. He knew his editorial was unsound; he
just didn’t care.
His second claim is that if love, generosity
and devotion exist, then Santa exists as well.
This is a hypothetical syllogism:
If goodness exists, then Santa exists.
Goodness does exist.
Therefore, Santa exists.
This argument is structurally valid, but it is
unsound because its first premise is false. It is
possible for goodness to exist without Santa
Claus. Atheists do love, Jews can be generous,
and Christians who don’t keep X-mass are
devoted to the God of the Bible. Civility,
kindness and virtue are human realities - not
virtues unique to those who lie to their children
about “Santa Claus”.
Mr. Church went on state what seems to be
his central argument. If there were no Santa,
there would be no child-like faith, poetry or
romance. Life would be dreariness and nothing
more. This is valid, not unsound:
No real world is dreary.
All Santa-less worlds are dreary.
Therefore, no real-world is a Santa-less
world.
Wow. We who do not believe in Santa are
living in a fake world created by our own
fancies. Isaac had no child-like faith in the tents
of his father Abraham! - so with Jesus at the
knees of Joseph the carpenter! Only children
taught about Saint Nick have faith?
Also, the Greek and Arabic classics - the Iliad
and Odyssey of Homer - and the Rubaiyat of
Omar Kayyam - well, not poetry at all. And
forget looking for romance in the ancient
literature of India and China. No good thing
exists outside of the Kingdom of Santa…
Of course, Mr. Church never meant to be
valid or sound in his reasoning. Like most
modern people, he knew what he wanted to
believe and said what he had to say to back it
up. Don’t bother me with logic or truth, my mind
is made up. He ends up saying that if Santa
doesn’t exist, then no fairies live on our lawns.
Church's editorial would be a joke - if the United
States wasn’t living out its silly irrationalism to
this day.
Santa, you will tell me, is a comforting
fable, a bit of harmless fun for the kinder. What
about Jesus? Is He an entertaining myth as
well? Is God the Son a character in an evolving
folklore tradition with room for new stories
about Him each passing X-mass? Do you
wonder why so many of your children and
grandchildren leave Jesus but keep Santa?
When fun trumps truth, Jesus will lose every
time.
Train up a child in the way he should
go: and when he is old, he will not depart
from it. Proverbs 22:6
published one of the most famous editorials
ever written in the English language. In it,
Francis P. Church answered the question of an
8 year old reader: is there a Santa Claus?
Mr. Church lied to Virginia O’Hanlon, and
the irrational arguments he used do not hold
up. To begin, he wrote that we live in a
skeptical age, and foolishly believe that only
those things we see can actually exist. His
claim boils down to:
Some skeptics are wrong.
All Santa-deniers are skeptics.
Therefore, all Santa-deniers are wrong.
This syllogism is invalid because the middle
term (skeptics) is undistributed. We might say:
Some dogs are huge.
All beagles are dogs.
Therefore, all beagles are huge.
But not all beagles are huge. We cannot draw
a universal conclusion from limited premises and
undistributed middle terms. Mr. Church lived in
a time when formal logic was still taught in the
schools. He knew his editorial was unsound; he
just didn’t care.
His second claim is that if love, generosity
and devotion exist, then Santa exists as well.
This is a hypothetical syllogism:
If goodness exists, then Santa exists.
Goodness does exist.
Therefore, Santa exists.
This argument is structurally valid, but it is
unsound because its first premise is false. It is
possible for goodness to exist without Santa
Claus. Atheists do love, Jews can be generous,
and Christians who don’t keep X-mass are
devoted to the God of the Bible. Civility,
kindness and virtue are human realities - not
virtues unique to those who lie to their children
about “Santa Claus”.
Mr. Church went on state what seems to be
his central argument. If there were no Santa,
there would be no child-like faith, poetry or
romance. Life would be dreariness and nothing
more. This is valid, not unsound:
No real world is dreary.
All Santa-less worlds are dreary.
Therefore, no real-world is a Santa-less
world.
Wow. We who do not believe in Santa are
living in a fake world created by our own
fancies. Isaac had no child-like faith in the tents
of his father Abraham! - so with Jesus at the
knees of Joseph the carpenter! Only children
taught about Saint Nick have faith?
Also, the Greek and Arabic classics - the Iliad
and Odyssey of Homer - and the Rubaiyat of
Omar Kayyam - well, not poetry at all. And
forget looking for romance in the ancient
literature of India and China. No good thing
exists outside of the Kingdom of Santa…
Of course, Mr. Church never meant to be
valid or sound in his reasoning. Like most
modern people, he knew what he wanted to
believe and said what he had to say to back it
up. Don’t bother me with logic or truth, my mind
is made up. He ends up saying that if Santa
doesn’t exist, then no fairies live on our lawns.
Church's editorial would be a joke - if the United
States wasn’t living out its silly irrationalism to
this day.
Santa, you will tell me, is a comforting
fable, a bit of harmless fun for the kinder. What
about Jesus? Is He an entertaining myth as
well? Is God the Son a character in an evolving
folklore tradition with room for new stories
about Him each passing X-mass? Do you
wonder why so many of your children and
grandchildren leave Jesus but keep Santa?
When fun trumps truth, Jesus will lose every
time.
Train up a child in the way he should
go: and when he is old, he will not depart
from it. Proverbs 22:6
