Ignorance is Bliss

Idom or not? "Even if we agree that the phrase is not sufficiently different from the sum of its parts to be considered an idiom, its meaning is still highly interpretable - which means we should pay careful attention to its use to determine its truth status. " This statement is self-contradictory. If it is literal, if the meaning of the phrase is exactly or almost so the same as the sum of its parts, the meaning is not "highly interpretable;" the meaning is obvious. If it were an idiom, far removed from its literal meaning, the meaning would require a lot more context to understand; but it is not, since anyone from just reading the phrase without any context can gather the meaning from the actual words. This phrase is wrongly labeled an idiom. The point is not whether it is an idiom, though; the point is whether my opponent is allowed to fudge on the literal meaning to prevent it from supporting my argument. The phrase, "Ignorance is bliss," is an incomplete thought in English. Whose ignorance? Of what? We obviously use this in a human sense; we use it to refer to us. We now have:(my) Ignorance is bliss. As mentioned in the comments, when we use the phrase we do not mean absolute ignorance; that's a different debate. We mean it in the sense of not knowing something pertinent to our situation:(my) Ignorance (of something that applies to my current situation) is bliss. Is this a fair meaning that reflect current usage? Yes. Consider a time we might use the phrase:"I was able to enjoy the party because I didn't know someone was stalking me. Ignorance is bliss, after all. "The literal interpretation works perfectly well for everyday usage. When she finds her stalker in her bedroom, though, she will wish she knew that he was there so she could have called the police in time. Was ignorance bliss? Maybe temporarily. Could vast amounts of pain and danger been saved through knowledge? Absolutely. Which woman is happier: woman A who didn't know and was raped and maimed because of it, or woman B who knew ahead of time, had the guy locked up, and went on with her life unharmed? Counterexamples. To disprove this phrase, I cannot be expected to provide every possible example of a situation in which knowledge of a bad situation leads to happiness. I will not allow my opponent to hoist such a ridiculous burden onto my side of the debate, ESPECIALLY in the penultimate round. It seems reasonable that if I can demonstrate how this phrase is wrong in several instances and show how these are representative of a general principle, I will have upheld my side of this debate. These instances I have given, and can continue to provide as long as I can type, are ubiquitous. I appeal to the common sense of the voters: How much of your life would have been happier if you had the knowledge you needed to avoid the everyday tragedies, disappointments, embarrassments, and failures that we all go through? How many situations have you been in where having complete knowledge would have saved you pain? How many everyday accidents happen, costing time, money, and sometimes lives, that just knowing (what the other diver was doing, that the roller skate was on the stairs, you fill in the blanks) would have prevented the whole thing? I don't have to provide every example in the world to show this phrase is generally wrong; you can each do that for yourselves. My worthy opponent attempts to characterize my initial examples as not being ignorant, but having a false belief. This is not an "either/or" situation; the two are linked. If the characters in my R1 examples had known the truth, they would not have jumped to the false conclusions they did. Since they didn't know the truth about their situation, they made conclusions that were completely wrong and were miserable. "The other examples all have a common theme - the person is happy at the time, but eventually his ignorance catches up with him and he is made miserable. Someone slips on ice and crashes, or shoots someone jokingly not knowing that someone else had loaded the gun. Right away, there is a problem - in most of these examples, it is not true that knowing would make you unhappy. If you knew the road was icy it would not make you unhappy, but you would be more careful. If you knew the gun was loaded you would simply not shoot. "Their ignorance made them unhappy, not blissful. This is exactly the point I am trying to make. In these cases, and so many like them, incomplete knowledge of the situation caused unhappiness. The theme is obvious, I hope: Ignorance is not usually bliss; it is usually the opposite. Ignorance is what allows us to get into situations that cause unhappiness in the first place. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~I hardly know what more to add. I grow repetitive, so I should close here. Kinesis, thank you for a fun debate. If I had known how enjoyable this debate was going to be, I would not have fretted over starting it. :P-C.