lord.jeff said:
Lieju said:
"Philia" literally means "friendship" and is generally used to refer to a great liking of some things, like bibliophilia meaning you love books.
Although in cases like pedohilia or zoophilia it's used to describe sexual feelings, I don't think that really a correct usage of the word.
Doesn't pedophilia literally mean "loving/liking children"?
Zoophilia sometimes refers to non-sexual love of animals, though.
I guess being a something-phile can mean you like it sexually as well, but not necessarily.
It does have both definitions, the sexual one is more used and what most people will assume you mean.
It depends on the company. In certain circles it's used differently. In some communities of spider/invertebrate enthusiasts it's common to refer to oneself and others in the same hobby as arachnophiles.
And maybe it's just people I hang out with, but words like bibliophilia are commonly used, and no-one will assume they mean people who find books sexy.
But I guess for most people only the term "pedophile" is well-known, and that not only is usually used to refer to sexual things, it has quite a lot of negative connotations on top of that.
GeorgW said:
But the thing is that very few spiders are even dangerous. And the amount of people that die from spiders are extremely few. How common it is has nothing to do with how rational something is. To fear all spiders is irrational, to fear taratulas or black widows are a lot more rational, but still a bit irrational seeing as how rare it is for them to attack humans. So I still say that arachnaphobia is a phobia. And I do have it, slightly.
Btw, I sooo want to post a picture that will scare me and a lot of other people, but that would be mean.
True, spiders aren't as dangerous as most people think. Tarantulas (or widows, really) especially aren't that venomous to humans. Some Australian species maybe, but even they aren't exactly deadly.
They are big, so people think they must be dangerous, which isn't true. Even if the fangs are bigger and the amount of venom larger, still, as far as venomous animals go, they aren't even close to the most dangerous(Some snakes and scorpions would come on top of that list, some fish maybe.), and the most venomous spiders aren't tarantulas.
Plus most species kept as pets, the American species in general, are very slow and not defensive, so it's quite easy to avoid getting bit, even if you come face to face with one.
I think irrational fear would be when you know there is no danger in the situation, but that doesn't help at all. It's not rational, after all. If you think that tarantulas will spit venom that will kill you instantly at you from meters away, even though it's not true, fearing them based on that, although wrong information, would be rational.
EDIT: And it's possible to have irrational fear for things that would be dangerous in some situations. For example tigers. If it's fear that makes you unable to watch tv because you're afraid you'll see a tiger in a documentary, or hard to move in a city because you fear that a tiger might have escaped from a zoo, that would be a phobia, I think.
