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> The paranoiac's pain is real, even if the cause is imaginary. That's exactly the point of the sentence.
by mcphage 8y ago
> The paranoiac's pain is real, even if the cause is imaginary.
That's exactly the point of the sentence.
- foldr 8y agoNo, the sentence talks about imaginary pain, not real pain with imaginary causes.
- SamBam 8y agoBut pain is subjective by definition. What does "imaginary pain" mean? The answer can only include some notion of "cause."
- foldr 8y agoImaginary pain is pain in your imagination, just like an imaginary car is a car in your imagination. If you stub your toe, you are really in pain and not just imagining it. If you imagine stubbing your toe, you are only in imaginary pain (assuming that you imagine it to be painful).
- SamBam 8y agoPrecisely. You brought up cause (stubbing your toe). You're agreeing with me.
- mcphage 8y ago> the sentence talks about imaginary pain It does. But read what the sentence says about "imaginary pain"—that it still hurts. That feeling of hurt is pain. So the sentence is saying that "imaginary pain" is just "pain". So pain that you might think is imaginary, is actually real.
- foldr 8y agoOr, equally, pain that you might think is real is actually imaginary. (If the two terms are equivalent, substitution should work in either direction.) Seems obviously false to me.
- Dylan16807 8y ago> No, the sentence talks about imaginary pain, not real pain with imaginary causes. That's exactly what you're getting wrong. "Imaginary pain" does not mean "imagining a situation where imaginary-you is in pain". It means pain with imaginary causes that applies to the real you.
- foldr 8y agoThat's not a possible meaning of "imaginary pain" in my dialect of English.
- YuriNiyazov 8y agoSeems like the sentence might just be a poor translation from Swedish.