This doesn’t depress me…does that mean I’m NOT anthropomorphising myself? Ô_o
deliverything
Not intending to be annoying here, but that’s a common logic error, akin to reading the statement “If you have red hair, you have hair.” and interpreting it to imply “If you don’t have red hair, you don’t have hair.”
“if A then B” doesn’t mean “if not A then not B”, though it does mean “if not B then not A”.
In the future Joyce clones is used by inter-stellar societies for super-luminal communication. Unfortunately, they can only be used to transmit erotic material and embarrassing photos from high school proms.
All my professor seemed to be fairly happy in life. Well, except my Mitochondrial Shaping Professor as she was very busy and very stressed all the time, and my advisor had a rough go of it during my final year or so there, but his wife of something like 40 years had just passed away so that’s to be expected.
Yotomoe
I had the entire gamut of Professors. A happy sunshiney one, a brutal severe one, a sarcastic and over it professor, and a professional but chill one.
Yet_One_More_Idiot
Pretty much all of my professors were lovely, happy people. One of my professors (Graph Theory, I think) was such a jolly old fellow we affectionately nicknamed him Santa (he really looked like Father Christmas), and he appreciated the nick. 🙂
I went to see my personal tutor once to ask for a reference for my first job…unfortunately for me I’d never been to see him while I was actually AT university, and his only response was a kind but blank “…and who are you?” xD VISIT YOUR PERSONAL TUTORS OFTEN, even if you don’t actually need help with your studies!
Mark
I guess “personal tutor” would be kinda like “faculty advisor” in the US?
Who are you calling bitter and vindictive? The only part of the job that I’m not keen on is the administration. Teaching undergrads is mostly fun, sometimes games.
Teaching grad students is all the good parts of teaching undergrads, plus a lot more of them actually care about the subject, and are willing to put in the work to get the most out of the courses. Oh, and a few of the brave ones are willing to challenge you – good times!
Advising doctoral students is, almost always, the bomb. Most are super keen and really smart, and you’re basically creating the best future colleague possible by working close with them on interesting problems.
Then there’s the research. It’s what many, of not most, professors take the job to be able to do – all the teaching is, to many, just one of the chores you have to do to get to research. And yeah, research is what I got my PhD to be able to do, but since I’ve enjoyed teaching since long before I got accepted into my doctoral program, teaching isn’t a chore to me.
So as a professor, I end up getting to mostly do two different things that I both love doing, neither feeling like a chore or something I’d prefer not to be doing. So I don’t have much to feel bitter or vindictive about, doing my job.
I like to think he’s actually super well-adjusted outside of work, a model citizen, volunteers his time to do charity work, has an herb garden he’s very proud of, etc.
might be weirder if he acted like a kindergarten/first grade teacher that’s all smiles and giving away cutesy stickers and snacks though i can imagine some college classes might need that as a break lol
i imagine aging makes most ppl grumpy but if someone like robin can get a job after butchering her last one i imagine the job is decent if not stable lol
I think he’s just Like That. He revels in his intellectual superiority and he thinks thinking about the misery and meaninglessness of existence that natural science can reveal is the mark of a clever person. Probably he’s liked everything Neil deGrasse Tyson has ever tweeted.
Or maybe he enjoys knowing weird and wonderful stuff, and loves to share it. Maybe he thinks thinking about the beauty and connectedness that natural science can reveal is just, well, natural.
I’m not seeing a lot of wonder in those statements he makes along the lines of “Life is a fake idea” and “This thing that makes you feel nice is caused by someone else’s agony”, but maybe I’m forgetting something. . .there was also the time he had planned his lesson around baiting the students to make presentations to answer a trick question, but that may be more of an indication of him being an asshole than an insight in his philosophies.
Vegetalss4
The specific way he was being an asshole would be very consistent with being motivated by enjoying his supposed intellectual superiority.
It was based around getting them to say something he could then declare stupid/ignorant
He always seems utterly apathetic or perpetually annoyed or angry. His dialogue is often nihilistic or full of semi-depressing facts presented with the purposeful bluntness of a sledge-hammer to the head. Seems like a cry for help to me – but its hard to judge what’s going on with comic characters.
Azhrei Vep
I think he just seems unusual for being too normal in a comic full of … well, comic characters. Everyone else is some kind of over the top, but he’s just … a dude. Acting like a normal dude. Doc Brock and Asma are weird for being the normal ones.
Forget grass. Just get sedge, which only grows to a specific height, are normally native to the area in the US, and are less likely to produce allergens.
Segnosaur
I prefer planting landmines over grass myself. Really does a good job keeping kids out of my yard.
Mark
If you plant them over the grass, they’re too easy to spot.
Liquid Len
But it still reached the objective while minimizing unwanted consequences, no?
I know. Trees are so much better for cities (they trap more carbon, help support more wildlife, and keep the urban landscape cool). Grass yawns are just water guzzling, herbicide demanding vanity projects – though I guess they are good for kids and dogs to have fun in.
Most lawngrass ends up having very shallow roots, but grasslands can be a carbon sink than forests because they put most of it underground.
Buffalo grass is very short native north american grass, drought resistant and has deep roots. It’s mowed 0-1 times a year, and you do not water it once it’s established.
Kimi
So many native plants for lawns are much better than the introduced varieties, but people tend to prefer the appearance of introduced varieties.
jflb96
That’s because the introduced varieties are what they had at Versailles and all of Capability Brown’s copy-pasted gardens, so they’re what set the trend of having a monoculture in your garden
pig
The introduced varies are also specifically bred to have desirable characteristics–e.g. wear tolerance of foot traffic, sun or shade tolerance, and softness.
It’s a lot more complicated than “that one landscape architect set a precedent two hundred years ago”
HueSatLight
Downsides of buffalo grass: because it is a warm weather grass, it doesn’t green until relatively late in the year and browns early in the fall. It requires full sun. It does not handle wet areas well. The lowest growing varieties are still taller than people mow their lawns (about 6 inches). That’s great for fireflies. But you’ll have more ticks on your ankles too.
It’s work looking into, but I haven’t switched yet, for the yard I take care of.
You seriously use herbicide on lawns kids are going to play on? No wonder America is going to hell. *Hands you a hand basket.*
Azhrei Vep
I’ve certainly never met anybody that used any kind of -cide on grass, or watered it for that matter. All anybody does is cut it before the city fines them and complain about the necessity of doing so.
My yard is a patchwork of whatever wound up dominant in any given spot. Various types of grass, a bunch of crabgrass, dandelions, whatever. As long as it’s green but not noxious or thorny I just let it be.
160 thoughts on “Development”
NGPZ
One of the only Dina strips this storyline, and I’m loving every word of it!!!
YIPEEE!!! ??♾???
*plays “First Staffs” from Rayman Origins CD*
Thag Simmons
Dina’s always great
JoyceisGoingtoHeck
Sorry, my mind went blank after “Dina strips”
Blue
“To where did Joyce suddenly disappear” is quite charming
Ana Chronistic
DINA!!
…
she’s in the laundry room
Doctor_Who
Today’s class is about bird migratory patterns. Brock just wanted to open with something depressing.
Yotomoe
“Today’s lesson is actually kinda nice and wholesome and I won’t stand for it.”
Thag Simmons
Professor Brock is an evolutionary biologist and he believes very steongly in the principle of weeding out the weak
HueSatLight
“If this depresses you, you are anthropomorphizing grass. You are also anthropomorphizing yourself.”
Yet_One_More_Idiot
This doesn’t depress me…does that mean I’m NOT anthropomorphising myself? Ô_o
deliverything
Not intending to be annoying here, but that’s a common logic error, akin to reading the statement “If you have red hair, you have hair.” and interpreting it to imply “If you don’t have red hair, you don’t have hair.”
“if A then B” doesn’t mean “if not A then not B”, though it does mean “if not B then not A”.
milu
<3 the concept of anthropomorphizing yourself
Schpoonman
Professor Brock’s a bit of a pizza cutter, huh?
ValdVin
WaIt, is there a new autoswitch like “boingo” which i haven’t heard about?
Schpoonman
No.
Schpoonman
I should elaborate, it’s a euphemism for someone who is extremely edgy all the time in every direction. All edge, no point.
poofdepoof
Testing: edgelord?
deliverything
Besides, there’s arguably a better autoswitch option for that word:
https://xkcd.com/2036/
Schpoonman
I hope there’s a How To 2 and there’s an entire chapter dedicated to these strips. https://xkcd.com/2744/
Schpoonman
Oh, wow, how had I completely forgotten about “edgelord”?
jeffepp
She needs to work on those teleport reaction skills.
True Survivor
In the future Joyce clones is used by inter-stellar societies for super-luminal communication. Unfortunately, they can only be used to transmit erotic material and embarrassing photos from high school proms.
RowenMorland
This sounds like a DoA huest strip by Zach Weiner where all social information gradually becomes coded in sexy semaphore.
jflb96
They’re also only one way, as the clones can only travel to the specific tree
Slartibeast Button, BIA
No, just superspeed powers. Fortunately, she isn’t dragging her sorta-boyfriend along, unlike Yuki in Megatokyo.
True Survivor
I feel bad for Professor Brock as he is clearly going through something and no-body at all seems to care.
Yotomoe
Yeah he’s a college professor. I’d be bitter and vindictive too.
True Survivor
All my professor seemed to be fairly happy in life. Well, except my Mitochondrial Shaping Professor as she was very busy and very stressed all the time, and my advisor had a rough go of it during my final year or so there, but his wife of something like 40 years had just passed away so that’s to be expected.
Yotomoe
I had the entire gamut of Professors. A happy sunshiney one, a brutal severe one, a sarcastic and over it professor, and a professional but chill one.
Yet_One_More_Idiot
Pretty much all of my professors were lovely, happy people. One of my professors (Graph Theory, I think) was such a jolly old fellow we affectionately nicknamed him Santa (he really looked like Father Christmas), and he appreciated the nick. 🙂
I went to see my personal tutor once to ask for a reference for my first job…unfortunately for me I’d never been to see him while I was actually AT university, and his only response was a kind but blank “…and who are you?” xD VISIT YOUR PERSONAL TUTORS OFTEN, even if you don’t actually need help with your studies!
Mark
I guess “personal tutor” would be kinda like “faculty advisor” in the US?
Needfuldoer
But if he’s tenured, he’s set for life.
Kimi
My college professors in the sciences just loved word puns, giving cellular sex Ed talks, and other such things.
Plonker
Who are you calling bitter and vindictive? The only part of the job that I’m not keen on is the administration. Teaching undergrads is mostly fun, sometimes games.
Teaching grad students is all the good parts of teaching undergrads, plus a lot more of them actually care about the subject, and are willing to put in the work to get the most out of the courses. Oh, and a few of the brave ones are willing to challenge you – good times!
Advising doctoral students is, almost always, the bomb. Most are super keen and really smart, and you’re basically creating the best future colleague possible by working close with them on interesting problems.
Then there’s the research. It’s what many, of not most, professors take the job to be able to do – all the teaching is, to many, just one of the chores you have to do to get to research. And yeah, research is what I got my PhD to be able to do, but since I’ve enjoyed teaching since long before I got accepted into my doctoral program, teaching isn’t a chore to me.
So as a professor, I end up getting to mostly do two different things that I both love doing, neither feeling like a chore or something I’d prefer not to be doing. So I don’t have much to feel bitter or vindictive about, doing my job.
Just the admin stuff.
Mark
This made me happy.
Thag Simmons
Yeah it’s called being a Tenured Professor
Doctor_Who
I like to think he’s actually super well-adjusted outside of work, a model citizen, volunteers his time to do charity work, has an herb garden he’s very proud of, etc.
He’s just got a super weird teaching style.
anon
might be weirder if he acted like a kindergarten/first grade teacher that’s all smiles and giving away cutesy stickers and snacks though i can imagine some college classes might need that as a break lol
anon
i imagine aging makes most ppl grumpy but if someone like robin can get a job after butchering her last one i imagine the job is decent if not stable lol
Amelie Wikström
I think he’s just Like That. He revels in his intellectual superiority and he thinks thinking about the misery and meaninglessness of existence that natural science can reveal is the mark of a clever person. Probably he’s liked everything Neil deGrasse Tyson has ever tweeted.
That’s my read anyway.
Mark
Or maybe he enjoys knowing weird and wonderful stuff, and loves to share it. Maybe he thinks thinking about the beauty and connectedness that natural science can reveal is just, well, natural.
Amelie Wikström
I’m not seeing a lot of wonder in those statements he makes along the lines of “Life is a fake idea” and “This thing that makes you feel nice is caused by someone else’s agony”, but maybe I’m forgetting something. . .there was also the time he had planned his lesson around baiting the students to make presentations to answer a trick question, but that may be more of an indication of him being an asshole than an insight in his philosophies.
Vegetalss4
The specific way he was being an asshole would be very consistent with being motivated by enjoying his supposed intellectual superiority.
It was based around getting them to say something he could then declare stupid/ignorant
Azhrei Vep
What makes you think he’s going through something? He doesn’t seem to be particularly upset or anything that I’ve noticed.
True Survivor
He always seems utterly apathetic or perpetually annoyed or angry. His dialogue is often nihilistic or full of semi-depressing facts presented with the purposeful bluntness of a sledge-hammer to the head. Seems like a cry for help to me – but its hard to judge what’s going on with comic characters.
Azhrei Vep
I think he just seems unusual for being too normal in a comic full of … well, comic characters. Everyone else is some kind of over the top, but he’s just … a dude. Acting like a normal dude. Doc Brock and Asma are weird for being the normal ones.
Mark
Maybe it’s the permanent scowl.
Yotomoe
I also enjoy the smell of a freshly roasted chicken, and I don’t think that can come without a little distress so NYEH.
NGPZ
Mmmm…. me too bruh… ?
Bryy
I love that this strip references a disturbing fact I love telling people.
Nono
I mean, if the death was immediate and painless…
Cmasta1992
Dina is the voice of the comments
Yotomoe
We don’t see Joe’s hand after panel 2 so my going theory is Joyce literally ripped it off as she fled.
JA
Mowing lawns is stupid. Let actual plants grow and screw the grass.
Thag Simmons
Moving lawns is stupid, invest in goats
Kimi
Forget grass. Just get sedge, which only grows to a specific height, are normally native to the area in the US, and are less likely to produce allergens.
Segnosaur
I prefer planting landmines over grass myself. Really does a good job keeping kids out of my yard.
Mark
If you plant them over the grass, they’re too easy to spot.
Liquid Len
But it still reached the objective while minimizing unwanted consequences, no?
True Survivor
I know. Trees are so much better for cities (they trap more carbon, help support more wildlife, and keep the urban landscape cool). Grass yawns are just water guzzling, herbicide demanding vanity projects – though I guess they are good for kids and dogs to have fun in.
HueSatLight
Most lawngrass ends up having very shallow roots, but grasslands can be a carbon sink than forests because they put most of it underground.
Buffalo grass is very short native north american grass, drought resistant and has deep roots. It’s mowed 0-1 times a year, and you do not water it once it’s established.
Kimi
So many native plants for lawns are much better than the introduced varieties, but people tend to prefer the appearance of introduced varieties.
jflb96
That’s because the introduced varieties are what they had at Versailles and all of Capability Brown’s copy-pasted gardens, so they’re what set the trend of having a monoculture in your garden
pig
The introduced varies are also specifically bred to have desirable characteristics–e.g. wear tolerance of foot traffic, sun or shade tolerance, and softness.
It’s a lot more complicated than “that one landscape architect set a precedent two hundred years ago”
HueSatLight
Downsides of buffalo grass: because it is a warm weather grass, it doesn’t green until relatively late in the year and browns early in the fall. It requires full sun. It does not handle wet areas well. The lowest growing varieties are still taller than people mow their lawns (about 6 inches). That’s great for fireflies. But you’ll have more ticks on your ankles too.
It’s work looking into, but I haven’t switched yet, for the yard I take care of.
ktbear
You seriously use herbicide on lawns kids are going to play on? No wonder America is going to hell. *Hands you a hand basket.*
Azhrei Vep
I’ve certainly never met anybody that used any kind of -cide on grass, or watered it for that matter. All anybody does is cut it before the city fines them and complain about the necessity of doing so.
BarerMender
Whut? News flash: grass is an actual plant.
Jamie
More to the point, it’s only one plant. Lawns are basically the poor man’s version of keeping a full-grown tiger in the living room.
Needfuldoer
My yard is a patchwork of whatever wound up dominant in any given spot. Various types of grass, a bunch of crabgrass, dandelions, whatever. As long as it’s green but not noxious or thorny I just let it be.
It still needs to be mowed.
Kimi