Monday, March 16, 2009

Expanding the Domain of Theism

[Below is a joke I came up with, so sit back and enjoy the convoluted processes of my brain.]

We tend to categorize people by how many gods they believe in, such as atheist, monotheist, and polytheist.

That covers 0, 1, and 2+. What about people that believe in a negative number of gods? An imaginary number of gods?

There are no prefixes for negative numbers, so I'll invent some, using negative prefixes (e.g. im-):

-1 gods: immonotheism
-(2+) gods: impolytheism

Wow. That concept hurts the head. A negative amount of gods? As in a void where god(s) should be?

And now, an imaginary/complex number of gods.

There's nothing even close for this. Any proposals?

"ij-" prefix, perhaps? Or "j-"?

In that case...

I think all imaginary numbers should be represented as complex here. Order:

(real part)(ij-)(imaginary part)(-theism)

So:

-(2+)-(2+)i: impolijimpolytheism
-(2+)-1i: impolijimmonotheism
-(2+)+0i: impolytheism
-(2+)+1i: impolijmonotheism
-(2+)+(2+)i: impolijpolytheism
-1-(2+)i: immonojimpolytheism
-1-1i: immonojimmonotheism
-1+0i: immonotheism
-1+1i: immonojmonotheism
-1+(2+)i: immonojpolytheism
0-(2+)i: ajimpolytheism
0-1i: ajimmonotheism
0+0i: atheism
0+1i: ajmonotheism
0+(2+)i: ajpolytheism
1-(2+)i: monojimpolytheism
1-1i: monojimmonotheism
1+0i: monotheism
1+1i: monojmonotheism
1+(2+)i: monojpolytheism
(2+)-(2+)i: polijimpolytheism
(2+)-1i: polijimmonotheism
(2+)+0i: polytheism
(2+)+1i: polijmonotheism
(2+)+(2+)i: polijpolytheism

I think I've just violated reality.

"Guess what? I'm a immonojimmonotheist!"

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