solving-sophie39s-choice
Original: solving-sophie39s-choice on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1: A woman holds a gun on a family. She says: "CHOOSE ONE OF YOUR CHILDREN TO BE KILLED!"
Panel 2 (mother, gesturing to her son, a young man with reddish hair): "YOUR SON..."
Panel 3 (mother, gesturing to her daughter, a woman with brown hair): "OR YOUR DAUGHTER."
Panel 4 (son, alarmed): "HOW CAN YOU EVEN ASK ME THAT?!"
Panel 5 (son, now calm and explaining): "OBVIOUSLY, THE SON. THE FACT THAT I'M IN THIS SITUATION IS PROOF THAT I'M IN A HIGH RISK ENVIRONMENT. ERGO, I AM BETTER OFF GETTING A LOW BUT CERTAIN NUMBER OF GRANDKIDS THAN TAKING THE CHANCE OF HAVING NONE."
Panel 6 (daughter, gesturing in): "FROM A GENE PERSPECTIVE, IT'S SMARTER TO SAVE THE FEMALE OFFSPRING."
Panel 7 (son, explaining further): "IF WE ASSUME A NORMAL DISTRIBUTION OF GENETIC PROBLEMS, AND THE..."
Panel 8 (son, hand on chin): "WAIT, WAIT. THE MALE IS OLDER. THE FEMALE IS MORE LIKELY TO POSSESS UNMANIFESTED GENETIC FLAWS."
Panel 9: The son and daughter both stand thinking, captions over them: "PROBLEMS. AND..." / "I..."
Panel 10 (son and daughter together): "OUR MOMMY'S AN EVOLUTIONARY GENETICIST!"
Panel 11: The gunwoman gives money to the two grown children and says: "RUN ALONG, KIDS. HERE'S SOME MONEY."
Votey:
A loose sketch of a woman's face looking down, with a thought/speech bubble above her: "How certain am I that I'm their mother..."
Panel 2 (mother, gesturing to her son, a young man with reddish hair): "YOUR SON..."
Panel 3 (mother, gesturing to her daughter, a woman with brown hair): "OR YOUR DAUGHTER."
Panel 4 (son, alarmed): "HOW CAN YOU EVEN ASK ME THAT?!"
Panel 5 (son, now calm and explaining): "OBVIOUSLY, THE SON. THE FACT THAT I'M IN THIS SITUATION IS PROOF THAT I'M IN A HIGH RISK ENVIRONMENT. ERGO, I AM BETTER OFF GETTING A LOW BUT CERTAIN NUMBER OF GRANDKIDS THAN TAKING THE CHANCE OF HAVING NONE."
Panel 6 (daughter, gesturing in): "FROM A GENE PERSPECTIVE, IT'S SMARTER TO SAVE THE FEMALE OFFSPRING."
Panel 7 (son, explaining further): "IF WE ASSUME A NORMAL DISTRIBUTION OF GENETIC PROBLEMS, AND THE..."
Panel 8 (son, hand on chin): "WAIT, WAIT. THE MALE IS OLDER. THE FEMALE IS MORE LIKELY TO POSSESS UNMANIFESTED GENETIC FLAWS."
Panel 9: The son and daughter both stand thinking, captions over them: "PROBLEMS. AND..." / "I..."
Panel 10 (son and daughter together): "OUR MOMMY'S AN EVOLUTIONARY GENETICIST!"
Panel 11: The gunwoman gives money to the two grown children and says: "RUN ALONG, KIDS. HERE'S SOME MONEY."
Votey:
A loose sketch of a woman's face looking down, with a thought/speech bubble above her: "How certain am I that I'm their mother..."
Alt text
An eleven-panel SMBC comic. A woman points a gun at a family and demands, "Choose one of your children to be killed!" The mother gestures to her grown son ("Your son...") and her grown daughter ("Or your daughter"). The son protests, "How can you even ask me that?!"—then immediately launches into cold evolutionary-biology reasoning for why he should be the one killed: being in this high-risk situation proves he's better off securing a low but certain number of grandkids than risking none. The daughter counters with her own gene-fitness argument for saving the female offspring. The two siblings escalate into dueling genetics analysis (normal distributions of genetic flaws, the older male, unmanifested mutations). They suddenly stop, look at each other, and exclaim in unison, "Our mommy's an evolutionary geneticist!" In the final panel the gunwoman, defeated by their detached calculation, simply hands them money and says, "Run along, kids. Here's some money."
Votey (aftercomic): A rough sketch of a woman's face looking down, with a thought bubble reading, "How certain am I that I'm their mother..."—implying she might be reasoning her way out of any maternal attachment too.
Votey (aftercomic): A rough sketch of a woman's face looking down, with a thought bubble reading, "How certain am I that I'm their mother..."—implying she might be reasoning her way out of any maternal attachment too.
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.