2009-08-01
Original: 2009-08-01 on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Title: THE DEBATE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE
Equation at top: ΔC × ΔE = 1
Legend:
ΔC = CERTAINTY IN YOUR OWN VIEWPOINT (blue)
ΔE = EXISTENTIALISM IN YOUR ARGUMENTS (orange)
The comic is a graph. The vertical axis is labeled ΔC, ranging from "high" (top) to "low" (bottom). The horizontal axis is labeled ΔE. Two curves are drawn: a blue curve sloping down-right and an orange curve sloping up-right, crossing in an X / hyperbola arrangement. Speech bubbles from various people are positioned along the curves.
Upper-left region (high ΔC, low ΔE):
Person: "DUDE, I DID MY PhD RESEARCH ON THIS."
Person: "I 'KNOW' A 'GUY' WHO'S AN 'EXPERT.'"
Lower-left region:
Person holding a paper: "HERE'S THE SPREADSHEET. SEE FOR YOURSELF."
Lower-middle:
Person: "I DON'T TRUST 'SOURCES.'"
Upper-right region (high ΔE):
Person: "YOU MIGHT BE RIGHT... IN THIS REALITY."
Lower-right region:
Person resting head on hand: "I AM TWO YEARS INTO MY PHILOSOPHY DEGREE, SIR."
Votey:
Single panel, black-and-white. A woman with glasses (hair up) looks down skeptically at a person leaning excitedly toward her.
Excited person: "IT'S A GRAPH JOKE!"
Woman, flatly: "IT'S A GRAPH."
Equation at top: ΔC × ΔE = 1
Legend:
ΔC = CERTAINTY IN YOUR OWN VIEWPOINT (blue)
ΔE = EXISTENTIALISM IN YOUR ARGUMENTS (orange)
The comic is a graph. The vertical axis is labeled ΔC, ranging from "high" (top) to "low" (bottom). The horizontal axis is labeled ΔE. Two curves are drawn: a blue curve sloping down-right and an orange curve sloping up-right, crossing in an X / hyperbola arrangement. Speech bubbles from various people are positioned along the curves.
Upper-left region (high ΔC, low ΔE):
Person: "DUDE, I DID MY PhD RESEARCH ON THIS."
Person: "I 'KNOW' A 'GUY' WHO'S AN 'EXPERT.'"
Lower-left region:
Person holding a paper: "HERE'S THE SPREADSHEET. SEE FOR YOURSELF."
Lower-middle:
Person: "I DON'T TRUST 'SOURCES.'"
Upper-right region (high ΔE):
Person: "YOU MIGHT BE RIGHT... IN THIS REALITY."
Lower-right region:
Person resting head on hand: "I AM TWO YEARS INTO MY PHILOSOPHY DEGREE, SIR."
Votey:
Single panel, black-and-white. A woman with glasses (hair up) looks down skeptically at a person leaning excitedly toward her.
Excited person: "IT'S A GRAPH JOKE!"
Woman, flatly: "IT'S A GRAPH."
Alt text
A hand-drawn comic titled "THE DEBATE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE," with the mock-physics equation ΔC × ΔE = 1 at the top. A legend defines ΔC as "certainty in your own viewpoint" (blue) and ΔE as "existentialism in your arguments" (orange). The body of the comic is a graph: the vertical axis is ΔC running from high at top to low at bottom, the horizontal axis is ΔE. Two curves form a crossing, hyperbola-like shape, and cartoon people with speech bubbles are placed along them. People high in certainty say things like "Dude, I did my PhD research on this," "I 'know' a 'guy' who's an 'expert,'" and "Here's the spreadsheet. See for yourself," while another sneers "I don't trust 'sources.'" People high in existentialism say "You might be right... in THIS reality" and "I am two years into my philosophy degree, SIR." The joke is that the more existential your arguments get, the less actual certainty you have, like an uncertainty principle. The votey is a separate black-and-white panel: an excited person leans toward a deadpan woman with glasses, exclaiming "It's a graph joke!" and she flatly replies "It's a graph."
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.