"In the movie The Princess Bride, Miracle Max pronounces the hero Westley to be “mostly dead,” and then continues to explain the difference between “mostly dead” and “all dead”:
Miracle Max: "See, there’s a big difference between mostly dead, and all dead. Now, mostly dead: he’s slightly alive. All dead, well, with all dead, there’s usually only one thing that you can do."
Inigo: "What’s that?"
Miracle Max: "Go through his clothes and look for loose change."
Note that the initial humor of Miracle Max’s declaration that Westley is only “mostly dead” is effective due to the fact that the viewer knows it to be ludicrous. “Mostly dead” is only funny because we know death to be a total state. Note also that for the narrative of The Princess Bride to continue with Westley as the hero, Max must assert that, “he’s slightly alive.” When we use the word “dead” in normal conversation (and when the Bible uses this word) we do not mean “slightly alive.” We may speak of someone having been beaten until they were “half dead,” but when we use this term, we only mean to indicate that the person was in serious danger of death. If we speak of a person being beaten to death, no-one hearing our words would expect the victim to recover. Once a person is pronounced dead by the doctor, it would be ridiculous to ask, “Well, Doc, how dead is he?”"
The preceding is part of a post at: Strange Baptist Fire
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