Re: Larsonology Re: OT: Entomology.

On Nov 7, 4:35 pm, b...@xxxxxxxxx (Robert Grumbine) wrote:
In article <pan.2007.11.06.23.42.56.262...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Mark Isaak <eci...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:



On Tue, 06 Nov 2007 14:05:24 -0500, r norman wrote:

On Tue, 06 Nov 2007 18:31:09 +0000, Therion Ware
<autodel...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I dunno about you, but I was most amused to discover that Kinsey (of
sex fame) was originally an entomologist.

Actually that gave him the tools necessary to observe behavior
objectively and to use quantitative methods of analysis; something
sadly lacking in the social scientists of that day (and of this one,
too).

Vladimir Nabokov was also an entomologist. It gave him the tools
necessary to observe behavior closely and, um, probably other stuff sadly
lacking in the novelists of that day.

I understand Gary Larson also studied entomology (though he did not
practice it professionally). It gave him the tools necessary to acquire
an extremely twisted view of life, something sadly lacking in a lot of
people in this day.

Though present in most scientists.

... which is a pause for thought. Larson mentioned his surprise
about the popularity of the Far Side among scientists. Why, after
all, would scientists get, much less enjoy, a strip which featured
talking cows/ducks/paramecia/... and a generally skewed to reality
view of the universe? If anything, scientists might have been the
best audience (my guess).

In one of his books, he included a panel for which the caption was
(and I can quote it, after all these years): "Anatidaephobia: the fear
that somewhere, somehow, a duck is watching you." The illustration was
of an obviously distraught man in an office, and in the distance in
another building a duck has binoculars and is spying on the fellow.

Larson related that he thought this was hilarious, and his editors
must have been used to his oddities because it sailed through without
a hitch. And, he wrote, he didn't realize until much later that of the
tens of thousands of people who saw it in the paper that day, there
were probably a couple dozen who knew what the hell he was talking
about.

Chris

Which reminds me of a story a friend told me once. She was waiting for
the rooftop tennis court at NYU to open and while she was standing
there, a Ruddy Duck (they're ALL ruddy ducks!) fell out of the sky and
landed, dead, on the court. Moments later when the Phys. Ed. guy
arrived and opened the gate, my friend went sprinting across the roof,
shouting "The duck is mine! The duck is mine!" as though the carcass
was a prize that anyone- not just a doctoral candidate in ornithology-
would covet.


I think there's more involved than the previously noted young earth
creationist humor deficiency. YECs being deficient doesn't mean that
scientists would have a surplus, could be auto mechanics who are the
real founts of humor instead. Far Side was a rather particular
kind of humor -- the universe is a very strange and funny place.
Scientists seem very often to have that view themselves. While
we don't expect penguins to talk to us, we can appreciate that they're
the best birds, and all. Further, our categories wind up with some
fuzz. We're used to things not behaving quite how we expect them
to. Far Side just took that to a greater degree. Different thing
about YECs is they seem to have extremely rigid, extremely black and
white categories. Far Side isn't funny to that view.

Oh well. Meanders.

--
Robert Grumbinehttp://www.radix.net/~bobg/Science faqs and amateur activities notes and links.
Sagredo (Galileo Galilei) "You present these recondite matters with too much
evidence and ease; this great facility makes them less appreciated than they
would be had they been presented in a more abstruse manner." Two New Sciences


.

Relevant Pages