(idea) by moJoe Sat Aug 05 2000 at 1:02:40
In relation to the "reality" of various deities through out the known history of mankind.

Reality concerns itself with the true or actual; that which exists. Earlier--while speaking in the catbox about Celtic Gods and Ghostbusters (in sequence)--I observed that Zool was not a "real" Sumerian god and that he was imaginary; invented specifically for the movie. The opinion/counterpoint was made that all of the Celtic Gods aren't actually real either, eluding to the not entirely invalid observation that Zool and the Celtic Gods were similar in that way (made up). For the sake of argument, the Celtic Gods may, in fact, be "real" (read corporeal, sentient, etc...). For that matter any God in history or as of yet unimagined may exist within our Universe yet I doubt I am far out of line when I observe that it is improbable that they could all exist/have existed. For the sake of ease, we will be assuming that the Celtic Gods which we used in this particular conversation, are not and never have been "real" in the most common sense of the word. If you believe in Celtic Gods, you may be more comfortable using Jesus or Zeus in their stead; it really isn't that important.
Though it is true that Zool was an imaginative construct as have been many other (perhaps even all) religious deities through history, I observed that pragmatically, Celtic Gods actually had/has followers; they, for better or worse, changed the life course of a large group of people if not all of history through faith and in deed. Zool, on the other hand, was a great bad guy in a well-liked movie that is all but forgotten except in nostalgic reminiscence.

My example was Jesus.
Possibly driven by Jesus himself, but certainly because of the existence of Jesus, man has build great cathedrals, fought religious jihad's, started charities where there were none, stolen, preached tolerance and murdered the innocent. Some things fantastic, some things horrible; many small, a few monumental and all of them, thing and deed, due to the existence of the belief in Jesus.
The question of Pragmatic Palpability is; regardless of the actual corporeal or sentient, astral existence of Jesus or the Celtic Gods; are they "more real" than Zool?
Though I know I am not the first person to ponder this sort of thing, I would still be interested to hear all of your thoughts on it.

This node has been officially sanctioned as a World Theological Mexican Style Wrestling Federation war node!

C'mon guys, no action figures from MATTEL® unless we get it in gear.
I like it! 1 C!