Daughter's Questions: Life Before Birth ?

For reasons I'm not aware of, this evening my daughter was asking the question, "Where was I before I was born?" which quickly became "Where was I before I was concieved?". As Christians we said that she existed in the mind of God, but aside from that that she had no "further existence" until conception. This she found a rather distressing thought. Talking it through, this all became more rather than less confusing, at least initially. Many people express anxiety about the possibility of going out of existence, but here our daughter was seemingly equally anxious about at some point not having existed.

After discussions of pre-existence and reincarnation, we went on to talk about the concept of existence, about it not being a "predicate" (although we didn't use those words), and about the impossibility of imagining one's own funeral except from the vantage point of another pair of eyes. I thought the first part was essential as she seemed to think of "non-existence" as a state of being in utter darkness unable to sense or interact with anything outside herself. For her part, she seemed to find the discussion of funerals more helpful, especially once she realised that we agreed that we couldn't fully imagine our own non-existence ... but that we didn't think that meant it couldn't be (or have been).

How would you have approached this?

IFTTT: If This Then That

If you spend much of your life online, and haven't discovered IFTTT, you may want to check it out. IFTTT, "If This Then That" is a way of connecting up various online services, and allows basic automation to make things easier. If I've done things correctly, this post which started on my blog will soon be appearing automagically on my facebook page.

Did it work?

The Chronicles of Narnia and Philosophy - Free on Android

Been meaning to point out this freebie. Android users should get it while you can on Google Play.

Android App: Bloggeroid

Found this app and thought I'd try it out. Let's hit 'Publish' and see what happens!

Daughter's Questions: Eating Meat

Around her birthday, our daughter asked us whether it's cruel to eat meat.

I think a lot of children at some point ask this one, and it's a difficult question. Partly because it is so morally unsettling and makes we non-vegetarians question ourselves. What is the best answer we can provide? Or perhaps we should all go vegetarian?

Daughter's Questions: Why is the sky blue (or red)?

A few months ago my daughter asked another of her perceptive questions. After asking why the sky is blue, and recieving an explanation, she quickly followed up with a questions about why sunrises and sunsets are red.

I'd been ready with an answer for the first, but not the second and then it quickly turned out that my answer to the first wasn't sufficiently thorough. The answers related to the wavelengths of red and blue light being at opposite ends of the visible spectrum, and the way that light of shorter wavelengths gets more easily diffused as it travels through the atmosphere.

However, blue isn't at the end of the spectrum, violet is. So that should be diffused more in the sky. The sky shouldn't be blue during the day ... it should be violet. Why isn't it?

Daughter's Questions: Frankenstein's Monster?

Our daughter continues to ask difficult questions. One recent query was whether (in principle) if you assembled all the atoms and molecules correctly, you could make a person. Would they be a real person? Would they be alive?

I think this is an awkward question for those of us who, like me, don't believe that we are merely material machines. Does my view commit me to saying that such a thing wouldn't be alive? That if it was alive, it wouldn't be a person? Or are there other ways for non-materialists to go here? I think so, but I'd be keen to hear your thoughts.

For the record, my basic answer was "I don't know ... and I'm not sure anyone else knows for sure either."