fuzzy-borders
Original: fuzzy-borders on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1:
Woman (dark hair): Would it be ethical to go back in time to kill baby Hitler?
Man (lighter hair): At extremes, it's clearly okay to kill baby Hitler and clearly abot okay to kill, say, baby Helen Keller. So it's a fuzzy border problem.
Panel 2:
Man: If you take all human beings who ever lived and order them by okay-to-murder-ness, is there a cutoff point for time-traveling murder? Can you kill the median baby? The average baby?
Panel 3:
Woman: That's easy. You just scale the punishment to the position in the list. It's okay to murder baby Hitler. The median baby deserves a spanking. Baby Helen Keller gets a piece of candy and a friendly pat on the head.
Panel 4:
Woman: So, if time travel were possible, you'd expect that some babies just start crying for no reason while you're out of the room.
Man: But then that means--
Panel 5:
Man: Time-traveling baby-spankers.
Woman: The most parsimonious explanation.
Votey:
Man (thought/caption): Actually that job is probably automated in the future.
(A balding man rests his face in his hand, looking weary.)
Woman (dark hair): Would it be ethical to go back in time to kill baby Hitler?
Man (lighter hair): At extremes, it's clearly okay to kill baby Hitler and clearly abot okay to kill, say, baby Helen Keller. So it's a fuzzy border problem.
Panel 2:
Man: If you take all human beings who ever lived and order them by okay-to-murder-ness, is there a cutoff point for time-traveling murder? Can you kill the median baby? The average baby?
Panel 3:
Woman: That's easy. You just scale the punishment to the position in the list. It's okay to murder baby Hitler. The median baby deserves a spanking. Baby Helen Keller gets a piece of candy and a friendly pat on the head.
Panel 4:
Woman: So, if time travel were possible, you'd expect that some babies just start crying for no reason while you're out of the room.
Man: But then that means--
Panel 5:
Man: Time-traveling baby-spankers.
Woman: The most parsimonious explanation.
Votey:
Man (thought/caption): Actually that job is probably automated in the future.
(A balding man rests his face in his hand, looking weary.)
Alt text
A five-panel black-and-white SMBC comic. A dark-haired woman and a lighter-haired man discuss the ethics of time-traveling murder. Panel 1: She asks if it would be ethical to go back in time to kill baby Hitler; he says at the extremes it's clearly okay to kill baby Hitler and clearly not okay to kill baby Helen Keller, so it's a fuzzy border problem. Panel 2: He asks whether, if you order all humans by how okay it is to murder them, there's a cutoff for time-traveling murder, and whether you can kill the median or average baby. Panel 3: She says you just scale the punishment to the position on the list, it's okay to murder baby Hitler, the median baby deserves a spanking, and baby Helen Keller gets candy and a friendly pat on the head. Panel 4: She concludes that if time travel were possible, you'd expect some babies to start crying for no reason while you're out of the room; he begins to realize the implication. Panel 5: He finishes, 'Time-traveling baby-spankers,' and she calls it the most parsimonious explanation. Votey aftercomic: a weary, balding man rests his face in his hand with the thought, 'Actually that job is probably automated in the future.'
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.