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Please stop finding answers to those questions (I.e. "When a tree falls and there is no Ent to hear it... and... what is the sound of one elven had Clapping) They were random extreme examples, I didn't expect any answers, but still the image of an Ent falling over and shouting "Who put that stone there" is amusing, so that make up for it...
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Aw,
Hookbill, do we really have to stop? But it is so amusing! And I wanted to add in my answer to "one hand clapping!" (slaps the person who asks the question with one hand--same sound as a regular clap, maybe a little flatter, depending on how well the hand connects...). I actually found this very 'solution' in a Zen koan years later, and ever since then, I've found Zen Buddhism screamingly funny!
But all that aside, perhaps it is the primacy of the philosophy over the story itself in the minds of those who philosophize as a habit, the picking apart, that irritates those who would seek joy in a good tale. I can see see that, and indeed it seems to hold nicely to the idea of 'breaking a thing to find out what it is,' as Gandalf has said. I put philosophy right alongside the 'search for meaning,' and philosophers are just as guilty of trying to pigeonhole concepts as anyone else, to shut out possible meanings to fit their world view. I don't support this narrow view, but rather prefer an open, wider view that 'everything is true.'
With that, I have noticed that everyone is a philosopher to some extent, about just about everything. Anyone remember the philosophy of Sick Boy in the movie
Trainspotting? "You get old, you can't hack it, and then you die." A bleak philosophy, and, while he believes it "beautifully illustrated," mainly because of the progress of Sean Connery's movie career, Mark Renton can't buy it at all. That is the nature of individual philosophies, and I wouldn't deny anyone the right to form his or her own views from the wealth of source material. It is a dangerous thing to raise the philosophical process over the simple joy of a good story if it destroys the enjoyment of the story. At that time, it is a good idea to seek out "Philosophers Anonymous" and get some help!
Cheers!
Lyta