King of the Hypothetical

Scott and I have had essentially this same discussion countless times--

VERSION 1
S: Dad, will aliens come into our house?
D: There are no aliens.
S: But what if there were, and they came here?
D: I have never, ever heard of any aliens anywhere.
S: But if there were aliens, they might come in our house, right Dad?
D: Uhh...

VERSION 2
S: Dad, will a monster come in my room?
D: No. There is no such thing as a real monster.
S: But what if a scary monster did come in?
D: That wouldn't happen. I know that there are no monsters.
S: But what if it did happen?

At first I thought he was being unreasonable, illogical. Then suddenly it clicked--

D: If the monster came in, you would hit it. And then run away.
S: [Eyes light up] Yes! Because I am stronger than the monsters. And faster.
D: Right. So it wouldn't even be a problem.

I realized that you can't dismiss his concern outright with an appeal to reason. Instead, you have to give him something to work with. For example, the solution to the possibility of wild animals breaking in was that we could lock all our doors. However, some problems are tougher than others to solve--

VERSION 3
S: Dad, did you know that a tornado can pull the roof off of a house? What if a tornado did that to our house?
D: There are no tornadoes here.
S: But what if one did come here?
D: It wouldn't. We never get tornadoes near our house.
S: Why?
D: Because... we live close to the mountains.
S: [Later] Do all my cousins live close to mountains?
D: Yes. Except for Ava and her mom and dad.
S: They need to be careful of tornadoes then. Right Dad?

(I should note that Scott does not call me "Dad". He has called me by my first name ever since our late-June visit to Kalispell, where he picked it up from all my nieces and nephews. I should also note that there have been 9 tornadoes in Calgary in the last 40 years, so it is technically incorrect to say that we "never" have them, but I don't think Scott would interpret the statistical data properly so I left that out.)