O day and night, but this is wondrous strange!

I know that not everyone believes the same things I do. I try not to get into arguments over politics and religion because I don't see the point. You're not going to convince me, and I'm not going to convince you. So let's talk about something else, mkay?

However, I'm going to talk about religion a little bit. A lot of people believe in something. I do. I believe that the universe was created by God. I believe that I was created by God. I don't believe that I evolved from apes or monkeys or anything. A lot of people believe as I do, that everything was created by a deity of some kind. That's our prerogative. However, many do not believe this. That's their prerogative. Let's not argue about it.

When I was in university, a science professor told my class, "Science can't prove anything. It merely disproves theories until there is only one remaining, and that is the accepted explanation until another theory comes along. Then the process starts over." Since science cannot disprove God, this gets a little sticky. Shall we dismiss the spiritual, and claim that it is disproven, because it cannot be measured through the scientific method? What about those people who claim personal experience of the supernatural? Are they all loonies?

I've seen people on the internetz claim that, yes, we are all loonies. Every single person who believes in any kind of religious or spiritual anything is insane. That's a lot of nutters walking around. Should we be afraid? They could be capable of anything.

Or maybe we're all just stupid. We believe in the supernatural because we'd believe anything. We probably believe that Dr Who is real too. (Hey, don't bring the Doctor into this! Sorry.) Well, if we'd believe anything, why do we insist on sticking to one thing? Why don't we change our minds every time someone challenges us? "Oh, yeah. You make sense. You've convinced me. I have now changed my entire world view." I know I don't do that. Some of my beliefs have slowly changed over time, but none of those changes have been very large, and it takes a long time.

We are not crazy. We are not imagining things. We are not stupid. "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy." (Hamlet Act 1, Scene 5)

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End - Do Absurdities Work?

Warning: This post contains major spoilers for the film Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End!

I recently re-watched the 3rd Pirates movie, and I was struck by an absurdity near the end. The rest of the movie is strong storytelling. I like how the writers threw so much at Will and Elizabeth, and had them questioning their love and trust for each other. This made their characters stronger and more realistic.

And I love all the twists and turns in the story. As a voracious reader, who has read thousands of stories, nothing is more boring to me than a plot I've seen again and again with an ending I can see coming a mile away. Even watching it through for a second time, I was surprised by twists I hadn't remembered.

I don't have a problem with the tragic nature of the ending. Things don't always turn out well, and often I prefer stories that don't have a traditional "happy ending." There's something terribly romantic about how they get married, and then he dies, and then he comes back but now he's the captain of the Flying Dutchman in Davy Jones' place.

The part that bothers me is summed up in the following exchange:

'Bootstrap' Bill Turner: This ship, it has a duty. And where we are bound, she cannot come. One day at shore... ten years at sea. It's a heavy price for what's been done. 
Will Turner: Depends on the one day. 

Ten years??!! Seriously? It would have been tragic if it was one year. Ten is completely over the top. In ten years so much could happen. If they happen to conceive a child during that one day, that child will be ten years old before s/he sees his/her father. Will may not age now that he is immortal, but Elizabeth will. And in ten years, she will age a lot. Say she's twenty at the beginning of this--she'd be sixty by the time they have their fourth day together. It's absurd.

But does it work? Writers are often given the advice to throw as much adversity as you can at your characters because that is what shows their character. Is there such a thing as too much? Is ten years apart too much? What do you think?