Talk:Flying Spaghetti Monster

Nominating along with Invisible Pink Unicorn. Both are encyclopedic. Not dictionary material. Korodzik 19:04, 24 September 2009 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure from the way they are used. They have each been used in anti-Creationist rhetoric often enough that they seem to have a lexical life of their own, albeit possibly only in a narrow context of religion. colourless green ideas dream furiously is such a famous example that one wonders if it also has a comparable life of its own, at least among linguists. DCDuring TALK 21:08, 24 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep. Good evidence of usage in books.  This includes both pro and anti creationism works.  The definition needs work, as it doesn't explain the parody angle or origins of this term.--Dmol 22:32, 24 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Name of a specific entity. Please cite attributive usage where the reader doesn't have to be in on the joke. —Michael Z. 2009-09-25 00:25 z 


 * I trust you would apply the same logic to God, Allah, Yahweh, Zeus, Odin et al.? -- Visviva 10:06, 25 September 2009 (UTC)
 * And Bible, Torah, Koran, ... --EncycloPetey 14:01, 25 September 2009 (UTC)
 * There is no evidence that these were ever used except as rhetorical devices. They are no one's actual deity. Not to say that they shouldn't be included. Aren't they more like early bird or China syndrome, evocative of a parable or incident known in a context? Or like flying purple people eater? DCDuring TALK 15:13, 25 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Pastafarians would beg to differ. You may be right about the unicorn. -- Visviva 15:31, 25 September 2009 (UTC)
 * LOL. The site makes my case about the strictly rhetorical use. There are many kinds of fictions. This is an insincere kind. Though sincerity is not a CFI criterion, it has always seemed a wise course to limit the "fictional universe" standard to purely literary fictions. DCDuring TALK 16:16, 25 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Well, I would agree (I think?) that we shouldn't apply the fictional universe standard. But the specific entities criterion is more troubling.  It seems obvious to me that deity names shouldn't require attributive use, but I'm having a hard time figuring out why.  Part of it may be that attributive use doesn't work that well when the specific entity is known to us only as a set of attributes.  A mythological god like Zeus is one thing, but a more abstract being like His Noodliness or the God of Moses is more problematic.  I'm trying to come up with a specific rationale that would not be widely regarded as blaspemous... -- Visviva 00:48, 29 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Yeah, some good questions brought up here, for the purpose of evaluating and developing our guidelines.


 * But FYI, in English, God (and god) is used in dozens of senses, phrases, and compounds. OED includes a section “attrib. and Comb.,” with categories attributive and appositive substantive combinations (e.g., God-box, slang ‘church’, God slot in broadcasting, God squad), objective (God-consciousness, God-maker, God-monger), possessive (God's-eye-view), participial (God-adoring), with passive participle (God-begotten), adjective (God-full, cf. Godful).  OED has very little about Allah or Yahweh, Zeus is allusive (“the Zeus of Weimar”) or combining (“Cretan Zeus-worship”), and Odin is absent. —Michael Z. 2009-09-29 04:05 z 


 * Interestingly, the OED does have an entry for Hephæstus (their spelling), a pretty minor god of the Ancient Greek pantheon, for whom it notes the derived adjectives and . †  ﴾(u):Raifʻhār (t):Doremítzwr﴿ 05:08, 29 September 2009 (UTC)


 * We’re probably going to have to close the door on some the littlest deities, lest we open it to 333 millions of Hindoo gods … ;-Þ †  ﴾(u):Raifʻhār (t):Doremítzwr﴿ 05:17, 29 September 2009 (UTC)


 * The deity question is interesting and important, but what could be more obvious than that this headword is not the name of a deity. I don't see any particular reason do discriminate against the attestable deity names of polytheistic religions. DCDuring TALK 11:46, 29 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I was ignoring the attestability vs. slippery slope thing, largely so I could post that little link. :-D Heck, why not all the 八百万の神 (800,0000 gods) of 神道 (Shintō) if we can get ‛em?! Dya reckon English translations of the 古事記 (Kojiki) and 日本書紀 (Nihon Shoki) count as well-known works?


 * It may be obvious, but it’s difficult to offer objective criteria for why the Flying Spaghetti Monster isn’t a deity. Divinity is rarely an all-or-nothing affair. Consider the Nazarene: Is he only divine? Heresy. only human? Heresy. A bit of both? Heresy. Then what, in God’s name, is he?! Good question, that. Then there are the angels. There are lots. Which ones do we let in, just the seraphim, or should we accept some cherubim and ophanim as well? There are nine choirs of angels in Christianity. Technically, none of them are divine, even though they’re fairly strongly analogous with the lesser gods and demigods of many polytheistic religions’ panthea. Then there are various nymphs, genii loci, and god-begotten heroes of lore when one considers more animistic belief systems. And it isn’t just Achilles and the Cæsars who claim demigodhood and practise apotheosis; we could quite reasonably have entries for all of the easily-attestable 125 Emperors of Japan (as descendants of 天照大御神 — Amaterasu Ōmikami), or 124, depending upon how you interpret the 人間宣言 (Ningen-sengen). Furthermore, one needn’t be divine to be significant to a religion — Buddha was just a teacher, and Mohammed was a prophet; then again, if we let them in, what do we do about Xenu? He’s pretty important to the Church of Scientology, even if news of him only passes to us through the science-fiction oracle Lafayette Ronald Hubbard, and even if he is a genocidal galactarch. Not easy, huh? †  ﴾(u):Raifʻhār (t):Doremítzwr﴿ 15:54, 29 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Faced with a really interesting, challenging problem, it is so often more efficient to reframe it as some thing easy. Existence of initialism + Pawley criteria => keep. Deity is not a criterion for inclusion or exclusion under current CFI, nor is it likely to be under editable CFI. DCDuring TALK 16:31, 29 September 2009 (UTC)


 * That skews things far too much in favour of long deity names. We’d omit the Hindu goddess of destruction and eponym Kāli:, but retain some obscure Sumerian river spirit. †  ﴾(u):Raifʻhār (t):Doremítzwr﴿ 16:45, 29 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep, but I'm not sure why. -- Visviva 00:48, 29 September 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep both. Pawley makes it easy. The fairly widespread use of the acronym within some context implies idiomaticity within that context. Perhaps we could be more explicit about which circumstances and what nature of such use and evidence thereof is acceptable to us, but I'd bet on this. DCDuring TALK 12:00, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

This is a good exercise. Think about what it is about the names that makes us want to include them or not. Hint: divinity is a quality of a being, not of its name. —Michael Z. 2009-09-29 19:39 z 


 * Good point. I once proposed the sufficient (but not necessary) criterion for inclusion that the proper noun have an attestable derived “proper adjective”, which would, for example, let in, given the existence of the derived adjectives and . Perhaps we should compile such a list of sufficient criteria… †  ﴾(u):Raifʻhār (t):Doremítzwr﴿ 02:52, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Kept, consensus. As a proper noun it's susceptible to an RFV mind you. Mglovesfun (talk) 14:14, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Unclear Quotations
These quotations are too unclear about what the FSM signifies to be helpful in a dictionary entry.


 * This is an error: Pastafarianism is the religion, the Flying Spaghetti Monster is its spaghedeity.
 * This is an error: Pastafarianism is the religion, the Flying Spaghetti Monster is its spaghedeity.

Also a nickname for the siphonophore Bathyphysa conifera
See Wikipedia article. Equinox ◑ 23:34, 1 September 2023 (UTC)