On 2005-03-29, dragonlady wrote:
In article ,
Kevin Karplus wrote:
Certainly. We never lied to our son about Santa Claus, the Easter
Bunny, or the Tooth Fairy. We told him that these were made-up
characters, but that play-acting them was fun. We still enjoy the
customs without the trouble of having to disillusion him.

I've never understood why some people choose to lie to their kids
about popular myths---what is the advantage (to the child or the
parent) in having a child really believe in Santa Claus or the Easter
Bunny? Yes, it is easy to fool little children, but why??

Because everyone -- including the kids -- enjoys it.

Going along with make-believe isn't lying, it's play. I know there are
people who report that they were angry when they found out that their
parents were "lying", but, frankly, I haven't met any of them, and I
often wonder what else may have been going on between them and their
parents. None of my three were upset -- and, in fact, enjoyed "playing
along" once they were old enough to no longer believe in magic. I
wasn't upset, nor were any of my 5 siblings.

We still play make-believe games, including Santa Claus, the Tooth
fairy, and the Easter Bunny, but we play them with all participants
knowing that they are make-believe. Fantasy games *are* an important
part of growing up, and I certainly wouldn't want to deprive children
of the pleasure of them, but I think that it is important to children
for them to make the distinction between reality and fantasy at an
early age.

Knowing that a particular game is make-believe does not seem to reduce
the enjoyment of the participants, but discovering that one of your
most important beliefs is not true can be traumatic (hence all the
soul-searching some parents do about whether or not they should break
the news to their children and the fear that some stranger will hurt
their children by telling them the truth).

Believing in magic is a normal stage of childhood development. At some
point, their understanding of the world changes, and they are able to
separate reality from make believe; exactly what age this ability
emerges varies.

Here in Santa Cruz, I'm not sure that the ability ever develops in a
lot of people. The amount of magical thinking in alternative medicine
and other cultural practices is astounding.

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Kevin Karplus http://www.soe.ucsc.edu/~karplus
Professor of Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz
Undergraduate and Graduate Director, Bioinformatics
(Senior member, IEEE) (Board of Directors, ISCB)
life member (LAB, Adventure Cycling, American Youth Hostels)
Effective Cycling Instructor #218-ck (lapsed)
Affiliations for identification only.