418

Kellan
Posted on February 8, 2021 by David M Willis
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418 thoughts on “Kellan”

  1. Ana Chronistic

    HOW DARE

    Not Professor Doc??

    1. a/snow/mous/e

      Professor Broc

    2. Thag Simmons

      I figure Professor Doc is a nickname that he finds incredibly annoying

      1. Needfuldoer

        He’s probably numb to it by now, having heard it since the mid-eighties.

        Professor’s got tenure, he doesn’t have to give a crap anymore.

    3. TheLurkerAbove

      Wow, I just realised, it took a decade before we saw Prof Doc’s counterpart!

    4. Clif

      This is precisely why tenure is a good thing.

    5. Reltzik

      I give Becky one in-comic day, max, before she’s calling him that.

      1. Clif

        We can hope your right.

    6. Needfuldoer

      He does kinda look like Christopher Lloyd, but his head’s a bit more peanut-shaped.

    7. Sporky

      Ohhhh, I get it now! I didn’t recognize him at ALL.

    8. Auron

      The person talking is off-screen so I can only assume it’s you.

  2. Zachary R

    YOU

    ARE ALREADY DEAD

    1. K. Ivan Ruppert

      NANI?!

      1. Rose by Any Other Name

        **grabs lapel**
        “This isn’t the time for a Jo Jo’s reference!”

        1. Tawnee

          I’m given to understand it’s ALWAYS time for a Jo Jo’s reference, and I haven’t even seen it, so it must be a pervasive idea.

        2. Tawnee

          And now having seen my Gravatar, I have to reply again to make it a Joe Joe reference. ^_^

        3. RacingTurtle

          *applause*

        4. Proto

          It’s a good thing that it’s the right time for a Fist of the North Star reference, then.

        5. Demoted Oblivious

          Gonna give the old one-two punch eh?

    2. Slartibeast Button, BIA

      If life does not exist, neither does death.

      1. Keulen

        Thanks to denial, I’m immortal.

        1. Demoted Oblivious

          Conservation of massenergy would indicate that is true. “You” may become heavily disordered and much slower at expressing patterned output however.

      2. Clif

        Life? Don’t talk to me about life. Here I am, brain the size of a planet, and they tell me to take you up to the bridge. Call that job satisfaction? ‘Cos I don’t. Pardon me for breathing, which I never do anyway so I don’t know why I bother to say it, Oh God, I’m so depressed. You think you’ve got problems? What are you supposed to do if you are a manically depressed robot? No, don’t try to answer that. I’m fifty thousand times more intelligent than you and even I don’t know the answer. It gives me a headache just trying to think down to your level.

        And then, of course, I’ve got this terrible pain in all the diodes down my left side.

    3. Needfuldoer

      “You are dead! Not big surprise.”

      – Heavy Weapons Guy

  3. Luke

    So it’s one of these kinds of professors.

    1. Felix

      I mean technically he is not completely wrong. We are all made up of tiny micro machines. But since they are biological in nature I would very much still classify it as life.

      1. Rose by Any Other Name

        Biology. Literally “life study”.
        If he’s taking this stance, then he’s teaching the wrong class.

        1. The Chosen One

          If things fall under biology because they are alive, but are only alive because they are biological, then the whole thing is circular and arbitrary.

        2. Clif

          Biological vs. mechanical is irrelevant to living. Life requires growth, homeostasis and reproduction. Some try to add other conditions such as environmental interaction, cellular composition, or the like, but they really aren’t essential or are a byproduct. If a machine can grow, maintain it’s integrity, and reproduce itself, it’s alive.

          So the Doc is wrong wrong wrong. But as a teaching technique, it isn’t bad.

        3. Some Ed

          My most memorable history teacher in high school had an amazing teaching technique, but he was still wrong about everything he taught.

          His teaching technique was to be entertainingly wrong about everything in the scope of his class that was proximal to one of the details we needed to memorize for standardized testing. Because of his entertaining lies, I’m uncertain of the vast majority of European history from Charlemagne up until 1900, except Rasputin was uncouth and hard to kill, Napoleon was short, took over most of Europe, and a lot of rulers between Charlemagne and Napoleon liked to call themselves “Holy Roman Emperor”s, despite the fact that they weren’t Roman and their rule was anything but Holy.

          I have had history classes that covered this span of time since then, but it was very difficult to remember the real European history in the face of his entertaining lies just for the tests in those classes, let alone after.

          It’s possible that my high school “medieval” history teacher was accurate about more of his history than that, but he spiced up so much of his material, I can’t trust any of it. I only am confident in as much about Rasputin as I am because he asked the class if they knew of Rasputin before he did his piece on him, and one of the other students happened to know about Rasputin.

          His teaching was effective for the purpose of the standardized testing. The lowest score anyone in our class got on the standardized testing was in the 90th percentile for the test, and that helped our school to be ranked the number 1 high school in our state. He was evaluated almost entirely on our standardized test scores, so it was good for his annual review. But it was not effective for any other purpose.

          So far, this professor’s teaching technique has not been as harmful, but I am dubious about the concept of teaching well via a deliberately wrong teaching technique.

        4. Felix

          That’s the sad thing about current education model in the world. The teachers job is to prepare students for the tests and not for the real world after school.

        5. Mopey

          That’s mostly true in the US, due to political efforts for accountability that just translated to “more tests” in schools, and judging the teachers and schools based on how the students did on those tests.

          There are other models for evaluating educations out there, though. For example, track how students fare soon after graduating. Do they get a qualified job or go on to higher, specialized education? That sort of evaluation tends to focus on looking at the school as a whole and lets the schools themselves figure out how to check on how individual students and teachers are doing.

        6. King Daniel

          And Napoleon wasn’t even short! He just surrounded himself with really tall bodyguards, and the British press decided to caricature him as being short when they learned of that.

        7. oz

          I study biology and I kinda agree with the prof here completely. Life is a intuitive distinction for which philosophers eventually invented a definition, but this definition is still arbitrary and is only useful to limit the scope of biology as a science, and even so, it often fails.
          The prof uses Virus as an example because it’s such a classic example of something that can be alive or not depending on how you interpret the definition! Moreover, the definition doesn’t really answer the fundamental question of “what separates us from the rest of the universe?”. It’s exactly as good as if I asked “what separates us from animals?” and you answered “well, humans are bipeds, but featherless”. It’s a working definition, but not one that can answer existential questions. And the answer to the existential question may well be that nothing separates us from animals; in fact we are animals ourselves. And in the grand scheme of things, nothing truly separates living beings from non-living beings, except the particularity that (we believe) most or all living beings on Earth are somehow descended from the same ancestors, which is pretty awesome.
          But this doesn’t answer existential questions, which in the end are about the conciousness, sentience, and soul. To which a cinic (and a biologist can very well be a cinic) can answer, those things are undefinable and undetectable, and in fact, we could very well be machines, just as an ant is a machine, just as a galaxy is a machine. We are all ultimately determined by physics. We limit the scope of our studies to biology, using a working definition to define what that scope is, and we might further limit our focus to say, human biology, or human evolution, but that does not necessarily mean our field of study is fundamentally different from other areas of science.

        8. thejeff

          That seems like a much more reasonable take on the strip than a lot of the “Nihilist!” responses, especially given what he says in the second panel about why he’s telling them that.

        9. Pimellon

          I like this explanation!

        10. milu

          While Brock’s insight signals a somewhat enlightened view of biology i think he may lack a background in semantics.
          So “life” is a word, and the definition of life is a semantic not ontological issue. Fair. But why stop there? “Biology” is also just a word, and so is “Kellan Brock” and yet this blob of organic matter dares to say “I am Kellan Brock”, thereby perpetuating the vain conceit of individuality.
          this phenomenon is true to some extent ofall words. language is at best a discrete approximation of an inherently continuous world. Thats a valuable, insight but it doesnt follow that words have no meaning, just that their meaning is fuzzy

        11. oz

          You might think that’s a gotcha, but “what is an individual” is in fact one of the biggest and hardest to answer questions in Biology

          Literally each field of biology has a different answer to that question and in some cases it’s really just “eh, divide them however you want” while in others it’s literally “forget abt individuals let’s just focus on biomass/genes/populations instead because that’s a more reliable metric”

          Ofc, defining what a species is isn’t any easier

        12. milu

          we agree. you’re just restating my point.
          of course individuality is a problem for biology. because it’s a word. and reality doesn’t do words, it does continuous spectra, virtually 100% of the time.

          also what am i doing responding to a comment 6 days later. *sigh* i have no life.

        13. thejeff

          “Biology is the study of life.”
          “There is no such thing as life.”
          Class is over.

        14. walterw

          “i get an ‘A’ though right?”

        15. C.T Phipps

          In my college, we’d call this, “Letting a physicist teach biology.”

        16. Opus the Poet

          Except this looks less like allowing and more like forcing.

        17. aelfwine

          That “life vs life” is a useful distinction on the sociological level (including having classes on life) doesn’t mean it’s a useful distinction from the point of view of the universe.

          So the professor is absolutely correct: if they’re there to learn what distinguishes life from non-life, from the point of view of the science he teaches, the answer is NOTHING. If you want a sociological or legal answer, *you’re* the one in the wrong class.

      2. Jon

        I am NOT made up of tiny micro machines.

        I’m made up of tiny hot wheels.

        1. Needfuldoer

          So you’re leading the way, but not the real thing?

        2. Yet_One_More_Idiot

          I’m made up of worse – tiny micro machines, hot wheels, AND the occasional 80s transformer just for extra randomness! xD

        3. Demoted Oblivious

          At least it’s not Go-Bots.

        4. FacelessDeviant

          Lego’s here.

        5. Stanistani

          *looks around in a panic* Where? Where?! I only have a spoon!

  4. Doctor_Who

    Sorry indignant person, but Brock’s Fucks Capacitor remains at negative 1.21 Givafucks.

    1. Octopus Ink

      You win!

    2. Chronos

      I hate how beautiful that comment was.

    3. StClair

      slowclap.gif

    4. Jim the Fish

      Pronounced jivafucks, of course.

      1. StClair

        “… what’s a jivafuck??”

        1. Demoted Oblivious

          Something done on a dance floor with a partner. Or at least, so I’ve heard. But I’m on the internet and have never seen a dance floor, or a partner, so ymmv.

    5. Rheinman

      +1 Interwebs for you today

    6. Arianod

      Quick, give this man all the internets! All of them!

  5. Sirksome

    Hmm, interesting new professor. I look forward to seeing him once every two or three years.

  6. Nayann Martinelli

    Sarah is very much alive right now, feasting on the righteous indignation of biology students being told they are not alive.

    1. Chronos

      She’s gonna OD on happiness at this rate.

  7. Vukodlak

    Anyone else hearing the voice of Rick Sanchez?

    1. Doctor_Who

      I mean, “Doc Brown but a jerk” was basically that character’s inception, so it works.

    2. Deanatay

      Not nearly enough puke residue on his chin, tho.

      1. Shen Hibiki

        Well, he was hearing the voice, not saying it’s an spitting image~

    3. Azhrei Vep

      Don’t know who that is. But I do know who Christopher Lloyd is, and that’s where my brain went.

  8. YakkoRex

    Ooooh. This is going to be fun.

  9. Thag Simmons

    he seems nice

    1. Clif

      He seems like the biology teacher we deserve.

    2. Needfuldoer

      He’s having Arby’s for lunch.

      1. Crotonhurst

        Life is pointless and also a lie.
        Eat Arby’s

        1. Stanistani

          *must make rhyme*

          Life is pointless and also a lie
          Eat at Arby’s and blissfully die

        2. Needfuldoer

          You’re thinking of Burma-Shave.

  10. Nono

    I’m hoping he’s playing up the grumpy, unfeeling professor type to drive out the less interested people, but oh dear.

    1. Doctor_Who

      I’ve had some real professors whose bullshit-o-meter starts and ends at zero, and it’s usually the older ones like this.

      Once you get tenure, all bets are off, I think.

      1. Nono

        I’ve had some great tenured professors with actual senses of humour, but the common trend seems to be ‘okay, now I don’t have to play by the rules’.

        Sometimes if you’re lucky, you get the fun version of that.

        1. Regalli

          On the one hand: I know two of the professors I liked and who were both great and supportive almost certainly had tenure.

          On the other hand: My association with this guy is that other professor, who I got his literal last semester before retiring (though because of timing he still had to be an adviser to the freshmen in that class – lucky for me I was retaking it due to illness the previous semester) and who said at the end when there’d normally be course evaluations that he’d basically told the college ‘nope, I’m not having students fill them out, don’t ever show these to me again’ years ago when they first started using them, and if we wanted to leave angry feedback to send a postcard.

          Yeah I don’t have fond memories of that class.

        2. Bruceski

          In high school I got to deal with the equivalent of tenure at that level which is “small town and she’s a lovely person who everyone has fond memories of but there’s some sort of dementia thing going on and nobody has the heart to do anything about it.” The class was terrible; half of us dropped it in protest when the adults wouldn’t listen, studied on our own and scored higher on the AP test than the ones who stayed. That got them to notice and it was her last year.

        3. Regalli

          Ugh, I am sorry.

        4. Needfuldoer

          Apes together strong.

    2. Regalli

      I’m 50-50 on ‘I’m trying to weed out the creationists on day one so we can actually have a class’ and ‘I have tenure and have been here so long I could stab a student to death during class and get out with a reprimand.’

      Or a combination of both.

      1. Huttj

        My impression is that he’s starting off firmly making a point. The difference between something “alive” and “not alive” is *really* hard to define, because when you get down to it there’s no solid transition. There’s no “spark of life” that separates the living from the non, it’s Organic Chemistry all the way down.

        If you try to treat life as “special” you will miss the science, because your own ideas of what is and is not “alive” will color your understanding.

        There’s viruses that are basically a protein shell around some DNA, and yet they spread, breed, and evolve. You can look at the structure and wonder “how the flip is this alive,” and while that can be a question for the philosophers, biology is better spent learning what it does, and how it does it, and how to stop it doing it.

        1. Regalli

          I can absolutely see that, and going for the extremely brusque presentation on Day One serves a purpose if so. But like I said downthread, planned pause for indignation in the syllabus is one of those things that implies SERIOUS ego if so, and that particular brand of confrontational, ego, and fucks not given rarely leads to a good teacher.

          I am also probably biased because I’m familiar with old universe Professor Doc, who was absolutely a jerk in general.

      2. Kamino Neko

        This doesn’t feel particularly aimed at creationists. It would get any religious person, and most materialists.

        That the dividing line between life and not-life is really fuzzy (to the point that it’s HEAVILY debated which side of it viruses are on) doesn’t make it a useless concept. There are things that are obviously on one side, things that are obviously on the other, and things that are stuck in that fuzzy boundary, and in a lot of situations (such as this subject) it’s worth ignoring the fuzzy boundary to discuss the stuff on one side or the other. (Of course, the fuzzy boundary is actually part of the driving force of this subject, but still…)

        1. thejeff

          On the other hand, getting the point across that it’s not a hard boundary, but rather a somewhat arbitrarily imposed distinction is useful. And shooting down the “lesser beings” and “lesser objects” approach is also useful.

          I agree it doesn’t seem really aimed at creationists and would likely be something of a shock to most kids who haven’t really thought much about it. The idea of us as the pinnacle of the tree of life is a pretty common one.

        2. Regalli

          Yeah, there are a lot of ways for the guy to be a perfectly reasonable teacher who gets the material across effectively – or for him to be an absolute nightmare of a teacher who nonetheless is totally right in what he’s saying and not just a nihilist. I think it’s going to depend on tomorrow’s strip at minimum to see if this is just a bombshell to kick off the class that he proceeds to explain in a nuanced way, if he knows his stuff but is going to be terrible at actually teaching it, or if he’s going to be completely awful on all fronts. My fear is the second (again, reminds me of shitty professors and not expecting much of a new incarnation of Professor Doc,) but it could be the first.

        3. thejeff

          It certainly could go horribly wrong, but I’m going to give him more than one strip before I decide.

        4. Regalli

          Reasonable! I really do have my hackles up from the whole ‘grumpy old white guy in academia’ thing bringing back bad memories.

          That and without Jason around as a teacher, we have an open niche for ‘knows the material but completely sucks at teaching it.’ (Robin is a category of her own.) All depends on what’s going to fuck the most with Dina and Joyce (and possibly Becky,) I suppose.

    3. Madock345

      I got a comparative religion degree and that’s how it all goes with those, usually to get rid of the journalism/Media management majors who would try to take our classes for the upper level humanities requirements they have, and were clearly unprepared for actual academics. Not sure what went on in their classes, but from what I saw in mine I assume it involved crayons.

      Anyway, religious scholars are often some incredibly chill people who can sit down and have a polite conversation with people of any belief system, and expect that degree of openness and tolerance in class. Day 2 is all about sensitivity and fostering dialogue. Day 1 is “Let’s discuss the evidence that Jesus was a con artist bastard of a Roman soldier” or whatever. Once you had a few classes and noticed they shrunk by half after the first week, it was really obvious. Then you get the rare fundie or journalist who actually stays and realize why they do that…

      1. Rose by Any Other Name

        I assume you mean the television journalism majors.
        Print journalism majors know how to do work. Pointless, anachronistic, unprofitable work, but well researched and lots of it.
        (If those weren’t different majors where you went, then never mind – they were where I went, and one could tell).

        1. Madock345

          They were different, and the difference was noticeable.

          We also had “Emerging Media Journalism” or something like that as a major, which is basically social media management. They were quite literally preparing for careers running Twitter accounts. Which, I do understand is a skill, but it’s not really a skill set that prepares you to jump straight into 3-400 level classes on polytheistic philosophies.

      2. DSL

        No, I would not like fries with that.

      3. Ray Radlein

        Religious scholars are incredibly chill people right up until you step on the basketball court with them, at which point they turn into count-your-teeth-later elbow-swingers. At least the Catholic ones do.

        They had the court reserved the hour before the Math department, and I used to come early to play with them first

        Good times

    4. Rainhat

      It is true- most of the kindest professors I ever had went out of their way to make the first day or two of class as rough as possible. Something about being easier to go from gruff to informal thsn vice versa if need be.

      1. Demoted Oblivious

        This is absolutely true. I’ve seen courses (civ and mil) implode from people trying to go the other way due to necessity and it just doesn’t work. But start hard and ease up sets a bar of expectations above where it’s needed, so when things come in a little lower, it’s still all good. But getting slackers to raise the bar after they’ve gotten away with a low jump once, just results in them going around or crawling under the new bar. That then poisons the well and results in a hard landing on some other clichés.

  11. Regalli

    Well uh.

    This is gonna be an interesting class.

    Dude has tenure, doesn’t he.

  12. jeffepp

    Well, this explains the Twitter posts.

  13. Alongcameaspider

    I like him already

    1. Blindness

      …he’s making you think, and he might have been the common enemy that both Dina and Joyce needed

    2. Keulen

      Likewise.

  14. danielle

    is he gonna hand out donuts?

    1. danielle

      oh this new avatar rips
      hell yeah

      1. Deanatay

        Her name’s Julia Grey, BTW.

  15. Wagstaff

    Yes indeed, we are machines. Machines that autonomously acquire energy through food or photosynthesis, dispose of our waste, respond to our environment and reproduce ourselves.

    1. justin8448

      Also, we exhibit a defined volume of negative entropy while we do all those things. Neat!

      1. justin8448

        Also: Whoo-Hoo! Winking and smiling Dan is the best Dan.

      2. Slartibeast Button, BIA

        Negative entropy in an open system is NBD.

      3. Chris Phoenix

        Digital computers also have negative entropy. They spend energy to drive their signals to extremes so they restore precision on every operation and never make a mistake in moles of transistor operations and light-years of signal transmission.

        1. StClair

          Wot about all that heat that comes out of the fins and fans and liquid cooling loops, then?

        2. Geneseepaws

          Guessing that’s the waste system?

        3. Demoted Oblivious

          That’s an analogue indicator that there is an orderimg machine at work, so there are several bytes of data, if not more, contained in the existence of that ‘waste heat’, at least until the heat disperses to a point at which it can’t be measurably distinguished from the surrounding environs.

    2. crow

      Maybe we should create a category to put these types of machines in. We could call it something like…lipe?

      1. RacingTurtle

        And we could study these lipe-forms with some kind of science! Piology, maybe! Not to be confused with pie-ology, which tends to taste better

        1. Jamie

          So this is where we get computer viruses from.

  16. Bicycle Bill

    Well, it’s only been how many years since “It’s Walky” ended, and we just now find out Doc Brock’s first name?

    1. Bicycle Bill

      Sorry … should have been “Professor Doc”.

      Brock was the son he had with Dina… who is a student in this class. And if it’s supposed to be him, then the squick factor is so high it just blew the needle off the meter..

      1. Regalli

        I mean, Carla was the child of two current students in the previous verse… but way more likely it was Brock as a name over Docker or something the way Ruth’s last name changed to make the pun a bit less in your face and eh, this one has seniority.

      2. Slartibeast Button, BIA

        TIME TRAVEL!

        [/Hulk]

      3. RacingTurtle

        Wait, I just read that arc! Brock Doc is the son of Professor Doc and his own clone!

        That’s, uh, probably not the origin of the character we met today. More likely this is just Doc’s Dumbiverse counterpart

  17. Jane

    Ah. So he’s that kind of professor.

  18. tim gueguen

    Are we being introduced to an even worse instructor than Robin?

    1. Jamie

      Learning not to play philosopher when doing science is not a bad lesson to learn. If that’s what he’s actually trying to communicate, which I am not yet confident on.

      1. Regalli

        It’s the putting in a pause for indignant shouts and putting that in the syllabus that says to me ‘ego the size of a planet either way.’ (Assuming the shouts, just knowing your audience. Putting it in the syllabus? Who puts their class plans to THAT extent in the syllabus?)

        1. SeanR

          Maybe he wrote it in tiny, radially symmetric ice crystals.

      2. C.T Phipps

        Doctor Manhattan: “A live body and a dead body contain the same number of particles. Structurally, there’s no discernible difference. Life and death are unquantifiable abstracts. Why should I be concerned?”

      3. Ronnie

        He’s playing philosopher too, though, by injecting his extreme nihilism into the class for no good reason.

        1. thejeff

          Or he’s making a point at the start of the class that’s intended to break the expectations he describes in the second panel – not really to expound a nihilistic philosophy.
          Striking down a mystical higher and lower view of life.

        2. C.T Phipps

          Honestly, nothing being alive doesn’t need to be a nihilistic view. If nothing is alive, nothing can die.

    2. Rainhat

      He’s actually teaching something besides “be me”, as course material, so he’s off to a good start.

  19. BBCC

    Sheesh, someone ate Arby’s for lunch. XD

    1. BBCC

      OH COME ON. Rude.

      1. Doctor_Who

        Yeah, I hope your first avatar brought enough Arby’s for the rest of us.

        1. BBCC

          It’s mostly rude I need to go on gravitar roulette all over again. Damn you, Willis!

        2. Sirksome

          Ah! We’re getting a season 2 of The Search for Sal!

        3. BBCC

          Indeed! 😀

        4. Deanatay

          Your quest is hopeless. Just get a Grav!

        5. BBCC

          NO. 😛

        6. Thag Simmons

          alternatively, you can cheat and just manually set the one you want

        7. BBCC

          Party pooper. 😛

        8. Clif

          Yeah, it misses the entire point.

        9. UnfrozenNeanderthal

          only mostly

      2. Regalli

        … Honestly it might be worth waiting until the end of the book before settling in too deep on a gravatar at this rate.

        At least you got a good egg?

        1. BBCC

          Orrrrrr y’all get Search for Sal season 2. Eh? Ehhhhh? 😉

        2. Regalli

          This is Season Two and not Three? (I guess since you hadn’t gotten the first Sal Grav before roulette changed the first time, it counts.)

        3. BBCC

          It’s been deemed season 2 by the people and who am I to argue?

        4. Regalli

          Fair enough!

      3. Jeff K!

        Your one-two avatar punch of Professor Do- er, Brock and Danny is making me think of Danny as Marty McFly…

      4. Reltzik

        And a nice loud round of DYU from everyone…

      5. He Who Abides

        Do I really have to go hunting again?

        1. He Who Abides

          Try number 2.

        2. He Who Abides

          Eh, you got boring.

        3. He Who Abides

          NO.

        4. thejeff

          That’s a really amusing conversation, if you take it as being said by the characters.

        5. Regalli

          Agreed. Asher, nooooo!

    2. Thag Simmons

      wait did the gravs reset *again*

      1. Steamweed

        Yep. Mine used to be eye-squinting Amber.

        1. Steamweed

          Huh. Got her back!

      2. StClair

        I was good with Lucy, but this, this will not stand.

        1. StClair

          let’s see what this does.

        2. StClair

          (nope, smoking’s a hard no for me)

        3. StClair

          last try for the evening.

        4. StClair

          Yay!

      3. thejeff

        I’ve been Roz before. I suppose I can be Roz again, but let’s see.

        1. thejeff

          Okay, but …

        2. thejeff

          Amusing, but nah.

    3. RacingTurtle

      Ah, so that’s why I’m Julia Gray now.

    4. King Daniel

      I’m…I’m Carla?

      I am curious, though, if any of my recently-tried gravmails do have other acceptable options. Carla is more than acceptable, though, so I can easily see myself sticking with her. 🙂

      1. King Daniel

        (dangit, my post above was supposed to include a *does a little happy dance inside*” bit, forgot that the pointy brackets cut out those things in here)

        Well, here’s today’s test

        1. King Daniel

          Huh, Ruth. My “OG” grav – well, not strictly speaking, but the one I had for the longest time in this ol’ comment section.

          We’ll see what tomorrow brings.

  20. Stephen Bierce

    *plays George Harrison’s “What Is Life?” on the hacked Muzak*

  21. Moon

    gilf

  22. TemporalShrew

    I don’t like this man or his bean-shaped head.

  23. tbf

    “You are not alive. Nothing is alive. And you all get A’s. Or F’s. It doesn’t matter.”

    I’m getting some “God’s Not Dead” vibes off how badly this guy is opening his lecture.

    1. Doctor_Who

      Lesson 1: You put the Peeps in the chili…

  24. William Leonard Reese Jr.

    Sir we came here for Science not a 3rd Grader’s understanding Nihilist of Philosophy!

    1. Thag Simmons

      He isn’t wrong.

      1. Jon

        He isn’t right, either. The fact that we don’t have a hard and fast definition of “life” does not put organic structures into the same category as inorganic structures.

        I mean, by his basic premise, there’s no such thing as murder. “Dead” bodies are exactly the same as “living” bodies, right? Just as humans are exactly like crystals?

        1. Chris Phoenix

          One problem is looking for only one dimension of categorization. For some purposes, it’s very useful to distinguish DNA-based organisms from crystals. For other purposes, humans, crystals, and mercury are all “condensed matter.”

          Another problem is thinking that there has to be a clear distinction between categories and we just haven’t found the right definition yet. There are plenty of category families where the extremes (fitting in exactly one bucket) are useful to identify but there’s also a definite middle.

          “Species” is one of those; there are plenty of animals that are in-between recognized species. For that matter, so is “organism” – just look at how some plants propagate. And so is “alive” – look at a mostly-dead succulent and tell me how you know when it becomes all-the-way-dead.

        2. Demoted Oblivious

          “Whoo-hoo-hoo, look who knows so much. It just so happens that your [succulent] here is only MOSTLY dead. There’s a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive. With all dead, well, with all dead there’s usually only one thing you can do.”
          –Billy Max, Miracle Crystal

        3. jothki

          You’re actually begging the question here. If you start with the premise that life is a thing that exists, then of course you’re going to conclude that there are living things. If you deny the existence of life as a concept, the problem disappears entirely.

        4. C.T Phipps

          Life is just an illusion created by discredited scientists called “biologists.” For example, some people believe there is a category of life called “Dinosaurs.” When, of course, it’s just birds and other lifeforms lumped together.

          Dina: HIISSSSSSSSSSSSSS!

        5. CJ

          If you deny that life exists, then you should not be teaching a class on biology, which as a subject presumes that life exists.

        6. thejeff

          Which suggests that perhaps his introductory speech isn’t his full take on the subject.

        7. aelfwine

          You’re trying to apply sociology into biology.

          The professor is basically right. He’s telling you that what is or isn’t “life” isn’t a valid distinction from the point of view of the universe. It’s a distinction that law and society makes, sure.

  25. Jamie

    I knew I should have restocked on popcorn this weekend.

  26. Blindness

    He’s actually got a good point: we are all made up of cells that are basically tiny machines. We are essentially billions of machines working together to create something that seems to have a mind of its own but in reality is still an impulsive organism that has only two purposes in life: to live and to multiply.

    Nothing more, nothing less…

    1. Alaric

      But why would that have anything to do with not being alive? That really doesn’t make sense.

      1. thejeff

        It’s basically a matter of definition. Which I suspect will be his point if we go farther with this.
        Are self replicating machines alive?

        1. Alaric

          I understand that it depends on your definition, but what definition is he using where something being a machine automatically means it isn’t alive? That’s what I’m confused by.

        2. thejeff

          A common casual one where the world is neatly divided into living things and non-living things. The one his students are likely using without thinking much about it.

    2. Opus the Poet

      Life is when certain chemical processes are active. When those chemical processes stop and others begin then the object is no longer alive.

  27. ian livs

    You can always tell when a professor already has their tenure and no longer gives a flying fuck.

  28. Plasma Mongoose

    Pity he never invented the flux capacitor in this timeline.

  29. Svata

    The very definition of “you’re not wrong, necessarily, you’re just an asshole”

    1. C.T Phipps

      It is the job of college professors to challenge perceptions. I like the idea poor Dina is going to be forced to challenge a lot of her ones.

      1. Demoted Oblivious

        Something tells me that this won’t challenge Dina too much. But I look forward to the coming character nature arcs regardless.

        1. C.T Phipps

          That would suck. Dina being a static character would kill a lot of her interest.

  30. Rani

    This is absolutely hilarious. You set us up for a conflict between American Enlightenment values and American Fundamentalism-and instead we get presented with a godless nihilist of the most extreme variety. It’s a situation where Dina is probs going to be the more blindsided party. He’s the walking embodiment of everything Joyce’s community leaders have been warning her about, and Dina’s romanticism of dinosaurs has no place in his worldview. It’s going to be quite the suckerpunch.

    1. Regalli

      Right? I was expecting Joyce’s realization that shit, this makes sense now and possible third existential crisis of the week, not the blunt adversarial Fuck You.

    2. Chris Phoenix

      I think Dina is too sensible to get thrown by this. A sensible person could say “OK, define life however you want, but dinosaurs reproduced and left fossils and they were hella cool!”

      1. C.T Phipps

        Doc: Dinosaurs don’t exist. They’re just lifeforms that were all lumped together in a nonsensical category that is determined by age and location rather than taxonomy.

        Dina: You don’t exist!

        1. Svata

          “they’re the category of Archosaurs more closely related to birds than to Crocs or Pterosaurs. GG. Thanks for playing”

    3. Rainhat

      It’d be funny if Joyce’s exposure to the stuff you’re talking about makes her more able to adapt than Dina. It’s what she’d expect, so she just picks up and moves along.

  31. Passchendaele

    I swear to god if tomorrow’s comic is something like “ah I have a PhD so feel free to call me professor doc hahaha aren’t I a kidder”

  32. Nono

    Okay, okay.

    I’m just waiting for him to give a lecture on altruistic behaviour.

    1. drs

      “You mean the product of kin selection or reciprocal altruism?”

    2. Demoted Oblivious

      Given how much shared DNA exists in members of a tight (or even loose) tribal species, altrustic behaviour still makes a lot of evolutionary sense.

  33. Newllend(henryvolt)

    I tried looking up a page on TV Tropes specifically for scientists characters so nihilistic that they no fucks. But I haven’t found it yet but I feel like if there was such a page then this whole strio would be at the top as an example right next to a Rick Sanchez quote.

    1. woobie

      It’s somewhere.
      It’s too late in the day to go look, though.

      1. Jon

        “Straw Nihilist”, perhaps?

        1. Schpoonman

          The characters Newllend describes may sometimes fall under Straw Nihilist, but that trope itself is a little more broad.

  34. Archivist

    KELLAN!?

  35. drs

    So it’s not just a biology class, it’s “Human Life and Evolution”. No wonder Dina was asking Joyce questions.

    Also -121, so there’s plausibly a -111 that got taken last term.

    1. drs

      I wonder what teaching this class is like in the real IU, set after all in Indiana.

      1. SeanR

        Probably an empty classroom with an i-Pad Duck-taped to a seat in the front row.

    2. drs

      Panel 2 had me going “lesser animals? Really?”

      But then I saw Panel 3 and all was well.

    3. drs

      Doc Brock thinks Richard Dawkins is too soft on religion.

  36. Bogeywoman

    Place your bets. Place your bets right here! Who is the indignant one rising to the bait?

    Becky: 8:1
    Dina: 6:1
    Joyce: 2:1
    Mary: 5:1
    Roz: 3:1
    Walky: 118:1
    Someone continuing the conversation from the previous panel unwittingly involving the entire biol class in their drama: 3:1

    1. Sirksome

      I almost guarantee that’s Dina ranting at Joyce after being triggered by her “debunking” of carbon dating.

    2. Proto

      The fundies are too obvious of choices, I’d put money on Dina.

    3. Svankensen

      5 bucks for Dina, this guy’s hasn’t even read Maturana, Dina will be disappointed.

      1. Demoted Oblivious

        Dear me. How had I not ever heard of this guy? Seems he should be required reading for computer science/engineering too.

        1. Clif

          I think most of us in the AI field that are interested in understanding what we are trying to ultimately accomplish, general intelligence, have run into some of his ideas at one time or another.

        2. Svankensen

          I’m Chilean and I studied environmental sciences, I cheated 😉
          But yeah, at least for me his concepts really help frame and approach otherwise very complex ideas.

  37. Mr D

    Ah shit one of THESE kinda teachers.
    So far up his own ass he can taste his own hair.

    1. Mr D

      Also he looks like Doc Brown.

      1. woobie

        Brock Brown?

        1. Opus the Poet

          Brown Brock, it’s an odd name.

    2. crow

      I majored in Biology and I never met a professor like this. They were all pretty chill.

  38. Sirksome

    You know if Mike were here he’d say something like “Your mom said I was a machine last night in bed!” He’d work a nickel in there somehow and we’d all laugh and respect this new character a little bit less…. maybe. There’s no one to fill that role now. Sad.

    1. C.T Phipps

      Doc: My mom is dead except I don’t believe in dead or alive.

      Mike: What?

      It’d be nice if Mike lived so he could meet someone who didn’t care.

  39. JessWitt

    Does Prof. Brock have his own gravatar now? Or is he just popular enough that folks are making their own?

    1. JessWitt

      Well that answers my question, sort of. Also, crap not Malaya.

      1. JessWitt

        Yeah, hell of an upgrade! Dina’s quite relatable too.

        1. Rowan

          Dina might be my favourite

        2. Rowan

          Nooo this is worse

        3. Rowan

          one more go

      2. Rayndel

        Now I’m curious who I have. I had Sal.

        1. Minim

          I had Carla who is awesome.

    2. Svankensen

      Nope, I’m now stuck with this guy that apparently hasn’t even read Maturana but is gets to teach. I was Doroty before!

  40. Beau Kirin Maysey

    Something something fun at parties…

  41. Acebender

    Edgy professor is edgy

  42. Zaidyer

    This is heavy

    1. Bicycle Bill

      Great Scott!

  43. JessWitt

    Between his appearance and his name, the professor is giving me Ian McKellen vibes.

  44. Lingo

    Life is … a party.

    It all starts when one small circle of friends/atoms/molecules/cells/whatever get an idea (probably from some other friends) to have a party. And so they call some other friends.

    “Hey, you wanna stick it to the man? You want to DEFY ENTROPY?”
    “Wow, yeah, sounds awesome, bro!”
    “Well then come on over, dude!”

    And so all their friends come over and they have a party, Defying Entropy for a while. And during the party there are multiple beer runs, and pizza deliveries, and maybe panty raids. And the party grows so massive, that maybe eventually some of the party-goers leave and start their own parties.

    And during the course of the party, some people leave and some new people replace them, and maybe it goes on so long that none of the original party-planners are even there anymore … but it’s still the same party.

    And it’s an awesome party, right? And eventually it will end, as all parties must, as the party-goers eventually drift away. (Or the party ends suddenly, when the parents come home or the cops bust it, which is a real bummer. Ahem.) Because in the end, you can’t fight the man. Entropy will win.

    But everyone will remember what a grand party it was. We’ll all remember.

    1. Chris Phoenix

      This is beautiful.

      A friend of mine died of COVID today. He was a grand party, and I’ll remember.

      1. Bicycle Bill

        I lost a good friend, same reason, back at the beginning of December. I’ll just advise you to let your memory of them be a blessing to you.

      2. Lingo

        I’m very sorry to hear of your loss.

        I thought up this metaphor the other day (and I probably picked it up from someone else like Douglas Adams, not sure), and I can’t quite remember what prompted it. But I was pleased to have the occasion to relay it to other people today.

    2. SeanR

      Douglass Adams died in May of 2001….just how old are you?
      Well, you channel him quite well.

      1. Lingo

        Heh, I’m in my forties. I did have that endless party on my mind when I wrote this, the one he described in one of the Hitchhiker’s Guide books.

    3. Clif

      “You want to DEFY ENTROPY? ” What is this bit about life defying entropy. Entropy pumps do not defy entropy, they just move it around while increasing it like everything else.

      1. Lingo

        True, but inside the body, you are defying entropy, at least trying to. But like I said, it never lasts.

  45. crow

    This seems like the kind of professor that would make you write a paper stating God is not real.

    1. crow

      NO I WILL NOT BE JOE

      1. RacingTurtle

        Got to get tough! Crow Joe!

      2. Jay

        WEAK, JOE STILL HAS HAD THE BEST CHARACTER ARC FITE ME 1V1

        1. crow

          HE’S AN INTERESTING CHARACTER BUT I DON’T WANT TO BE IDENTIFIED WITH HIM

        2. Demoted Oblivious

          Draw.
          Round two. FIGHT.

    2. tbf

      “Hey, kids, I’m Professor Kevin Sorbo. You may remember me from ‘Hercules: the Legendary Journeys’ and ‘Gene Roddenberry’s Andromeda.'”

      1. Ray Radlein

        Best tweet ever was Robert Hewitt Wolfe, Andromeda‘s showrunner and writer, telling him “You seemed a lot smarter when other people wrote your dialogue.”

        1. StClair

          owwww
          (niiiiiiice)

    3. C.T Phipps

      I’ve met those kind of professors. I usually told them about irreducible consciousness, arguing about the definition of what a “god” meant, and string theory. Then asked which God he meant or what interpretation. I.e. the bureaucrat’s defense.

      🙂

      1. Demoted Oblivious

        Oof. I’m picking up a LOT of reading on the TO DO list today.

        But at first blush, irreducible conciousness sounds like it’s starting from a premise and trying to find proof to support it, rather than looking at the data and developing a theory. i.e. it suffers from the same fallacy as irreducible complexity a.k.a. the “god of the gaps”.

        Caveat: Dunning-Kruger Rule.
        Qualificatioms: I haven’t even finished the wikipedia article yet.

        1. C.T Phipps

          Its more the issue that awareness is something that may be fundamental on an atomic level and our ability to perceive and process that may be what’s evolved rather than consciousness itself.

          Mind you, Chalmer is asking more about “What really is the source of it?” Rather than answering it. Personally, I rather like the fact that neuroscience took for granted a lot of its assumptions and they don’t have an answer for it.

  46. Kazumi

    Does this man literally have the Lenny Face for a face???

    1. Needfuldoer

      I think he’s one of the few characters (so far) to have a color iris without visible sclera.

  47. Yotomoe

    I mean we are kinda robots. We move with electric pulses, have a brain that handles all the proccesses. Have a memory that stores stuff. Has an engine and when we work really hard we generate heat.

    1. Needfuldoer

      “I’m a machine, you’re a machine. Everybody that you know, you know they are machines.”

      – Schoolhouse Brock

      1. Demoted Oblivious

        Yeah, but women don’t find it attractive when I talk about the “Rise of the Machines”.

  48. BarerMender

    Professor, you can teach biology however you like, but you don’t get to fuck with the English language. You can call us machines, or organisms, or whatever you please, but the condition of this entity continuing to function is called life, and the condition of it having ceased to function is called death. There’s no reason to change that.

    1. C.T Phipps

      Biology is a discredited science like phrenology! ALL IS PHYSICS!

      1. SeanR

        Bah. Physics is just Applied Math.

        1. Demoted Oblivious

          Obligatory XKCD: Purity

        2. Demoted Oblivious

          offs
          XKCD: Purity

        3. BarerMender

          As an old math major, I like it. I don’t know if you can call math science, though.

  49. BarerMender

    Oh, hey! I’m Ruth! My favorite character. Bless you, Willis.

  50. Slartibeast Button, BIA

    Back in my day we only needed *three* letter acronyms for courses.

    Damn kids.

    1. StClair

      I was thinking something very similar.

  51. Bladeglory

    Emet-Selch: I do not consider you to be truly alive. Ergo, I will not be guilty of murder if I kill you.

    1. Slartibeast Button, BIA

      If life does not exist, free will doesn’t either…

      1. Bladeglory

        Funny you should mention free will, because Emet-Selch and the other two beings he would consider “truly alive” are all (probably?) Tempered. That means that, even though they have all their thoughts and emotions intact, they’re entirely dedicated to serving their god. Though all three of them would end up serving Zodiark anyway, they no longer have the choice of disobeying so… Funny that the only three “alive” people wind up having the least free will.

  52. RacingTurtle

    Having taught Biology myself, I can confidently say that this guy sucks. Perhaps teaching an introductory-level Bio class in Indiana for 35 years will do that to you—at least, if you started off with a certain amount of arrogance, anyway.

    *excitedly grabs popcorn*

    1. Clif

      I’m not ready to say that he sucks yet. He does not sound like a typical boring lecturer and if he can keep this up, he may have an engaged class.

  53. Proto

    I was gonna post something about “Why are they in Bio 121 instead of 101?” but then I thought back to how totally arbitrary my college class numbering was and thought “yeah, that sounds pretty right”

    1. crow

      Probably something like 121 is Introductory Biology for majors, 101 is Introductory Biology for business students.

      I’m assuming Joyce registered for the major class to be with her friends.

      1. Lingo

        Well Becky is required to major in political science, but maybe she can minor in biology.

    2. Lingo

      Well, Dina probably took 101 last semester, right? Hard to imagine she’s not a biology major and took at least one last semester.

  54. Council

    Well that’s upsetting and bizarre for reasons I don’t understand.

    Does anyone better informed care to fill me in on what viewpoint the professor is showcasing/a parody of? I don’t even know how I’d Google this…

    1. Clif

      Mechanistic Reductionism, Anthropic Mechanism or Mechanistic Materialism.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanism_(philosophy)

      1. Council

        Why, thank you! I’ll read up on it now.

    2. C.T Phipps

      I mentioned above “This is what happens when physicists teach biology.”

      Basically, Doctor Manhattan made a joke about it that biology is only sensible as a field if you are looking at it from a micro point of view but falls apart at the macro.

  55. Liliet

    I like this guy.

  56. Ob

    Does IU really have a “Human Evolution” class? Sounds awfully specific.

  57. bcb

    Oh, hey, it’s this guy. He’s finally in the Dumbiverse!

  58. Jay

    I like this guy, I’d love to have him as a teacher.

  59. Bagge

    as a college lecturer in biology I have so many things I want to say in response to this guy, most of them beginning with ‘while you might have a point you also miss…’

    1. Demoted Oblivious

      Yeah, but you gotta open your mouth and say *something* to get the ball rolling at the front of the class. Shocking the students into alertness is a pretty good grab.

      1. Bagge

        Sure, but what’s wrong with “the subject I teach is cool?”

        1. Clif

          And the students go, “yeah, yeah” and remain unengaged.

        2. Bagge

          But… but… what if I play a youtube clip about someone singing a country song about organelles?

  60. brionl

    I dunno, I think Dina might be down with his philosophy. Given the problems she has with emotions and relating to other people.

    It’s not like he’s denying evolution took place or there were no dinosaurs. Just even more of “Humans are not special” than usual.

    1. Needfuldoer

      We’re just apes with unusually high healing and endurance stats, that figured out how to cheat code our way to the top of the food chain with mechanical contrivances.

      1. C.T Phipps

        Or, if you’re Carl Sagan, you note that consciousness makes us the universe becoming aware of itself.

        1. Clif

          But that’s an illusion. We’re not really aware of even ourselves. At best we’re aware of a highly inaccurate model of ourselves and our minds cheat a lot to accomplish even that.

          Our real trick is somehow using neural structures to implement symbolic processes.

        2. C.T Phipps

          Conan: “If life is an illusion then so am I.”

  61. NaYa

    Also known as Existential Crisis 121.

    1. StClair

      nah, that’s a PHIL course.

      1. SeanR

        Is he still around? I thought Oprah kicked him to the curb.

        1. Demoted Oblivious

          If that’s true, it sounds like she might actually follow her own advice, “when people show you who they really are, believe them.”

  62. DaveM

    So what is stopping me from breaking his nose with my fist (apart from that he is a character in the dumbiverse, and I as far as I can ascertain am not)?

    It’s not assault as he is not alive, it’s not property damage as he’s not alive and therefore has no claim on his “body”. And I’m not alive so I can not be charged with any offence any more than a gun can be charged with killing a person.

    I’m betting should this theory be tested, he’d suddenly be very insistent that legally he IS alive, if only for the purposes of revenge.

    Do you think he knows he’s just reinvented Calvinism (there is no free will or life, we are all just following the program set for us), albeit maybe an atheist form.

    Ah, Nihilism isn’t what it used to be…

    1. Clif

      If you broke his nose with your fist, it might well set off a complex set of physical, chemical and reactions eventually resulting in his fist returning the favor. And while you may not be a responsible living assailant this may not stop agents of the law moving in a completely mechanical manner to charge your completely mythical self with legal violations.

    2. C.T Phipps

      Doc: I am already falling apart every second of the day and will be apart in a few years so, no, it doesn’t matter.

      Walky: MIKE! WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU!? HOW DID YOU GET OLD!

    3. aelfwine

      The law makes a distinction between living and non-living, because our brains and our society does.

      The universe doesn’t (except those parts of our universe which are our brains, of course).

      Like if someone in “gender 101” told you “Gender isn’t real”, you’d get they were making the point that it’s a sociological construct or something. And if someone told in “racial justice 101” that “Race isn’t real” you’d get they were making the same point about race.

      So a biology professor saying “Life isn’t real” is making the same point. Life’s a category of existing things that humans made up.

  63. Sarah

    Is it bad that this is the most reasonable hot take that I’ve encountered in bio? It certainly makes more sense than arbitrarily deciding viruses aren’t alive

    1. Sam

      No one has decided ‘arbitrarily’ that viruses aren’t alive. They are a key point of ‘is this alive?’ that is easily debated because:

      1) They contain RNA or DNA depending on the type. And this is a feature of living things.
      2) They can reproduce, and do so in the fashion of a parasite.
      3) They do not eat, breathe or produce waste. They however, move, reproduce and have DNA/RNA. They do not meet all criteria for life but they meet some. The ones they do not meet, are still met by everything else considered living including plants, animals, fungi, bacteria, protozoans and so on.

      Personally I find the best way to think of them as like robots. Not quite alive but they can assemble more of themselves and move around. Some people will think they are alive because they fit enough criteria for them. But it is difficult to actually define whether a virus is alive or not in a concrete way.

      1. thejeff

        The point I suspect is that “life” is an artificial simplistic distinction imposed on a more complex world – thus you get oddities like viruses that don’t fit the criteria, but seem like they should. In the natural world, there is no such hard boundary between alive and not alive.

      2. SeanR

        The current issue of National Geographic has an article on this.

  64. Sam

    How do I kill this fictional man. As someone who has studied biology, I want to kill him immediately right now. The concept of where life is defined is debatable because viruses, for all intents and purposes, act like robots that can assemble new robots, rather than having behaviours we ascribe to life. Viroids are even less capable than that, just being a circular ring of DNA or RNA. Hell, diseases sometimes are not even caused by anything you could consider alive but by prions, aka misfolded proteins which can somehow by contact result in others being misfolded.

    But HELL NO, humans are not ‘machines’ and saying nothing is alive is just factually incorrect.

    1. Chris Phoenix

      I’ve also studied some biology. In what sense are humans not machines?

      We’re extremely complex, for sure. But – if you were to answer as a biologist – where/what is the detectable yet non-machine part of us?

      Of course, you could say “Not everything is a machine. The weather is not a machine, it’s too mushy and interconnected and unpredictable to be a machine” and I’d say, “Fine, but are you saying the weather is alive?” and then you’d say “No, because…” and then we’d get into “featherless biped with flat nails” territory trying to list the unique characteristics of life.

      I do think “life” and “alive” are useful concepts in some contexts. But only some. If this prof is trying to say “‘Alive’ is not a necessary fundamental property of reality, it depends on your point of view, let me give you a point of view from which ‘alive’ is not meaningful so you have to think about what you mean when you use the word” then I’m onboard with that.

      1. Sam

        I am not going to debate based on abstract metaphors. Is weather alive? No. It is based on the sun, wind, and water, which is not alive because it meets none of the criteria for life. End of story. Just because you can make up a metaphor or comparison doesn’t make it true and I’m not debating this. I’m out.

        1. Clif

          The weather does not reproduce. It does not exhibit homeostasis, quite the opposite (see butterfly effect).

        2. Needfuldoer

          But the weather can go fuck itself.

          *Goes back to shoveling 8″ of snow off the driveway*

      2. Svankensen

        Chris Phoenix, you are looking for autopoiesis.

        1. Svankensen

          Oh crap I got the biology teacher that got stuck in early 20th century positivism. Maybe that’s the reason he looks like doc brown.

        2. Clif

          Autopoiesis is actually better than growth and homeostasis, but is harder to explain.

        3. Clif

          But anyway, autopoiesis and heritable reproduction is all you need for life. Doesn’t matter the particular physics of the universe you find yourself in.

    2. aelfwine

      Or you could opt with not-choosing to define “life”, and then the problem of defining what is “living” and what is “not-living” goes away, and it has absolutely zero effect on biology.

      Like, do you think that the learning of biology is affected one bit if viruses are alive, and if they aren’t? It doesn’t matter! Regardless of whether you call them one thing or the other, they’ll behave exactly the same way!

    3. drs

      Humans are machines. Self-reproducing, self-maintaining, machines. Which, yes, I would usually call ‘life’, but with the exception of consciousness (so far), everything about us can be explained in mechanical terms.

      Vitalism is dead.

      1. Jhon

        Vitalism is the zombie the Professor wants to slay. Vitalism is undead in the sense that most of us are afflicted with a naïve version of it though we should know better.

  65. 0kami

    He seems nice.

    1. 0kami

      Wait, I’m Carla now? How do I change/fix this?

      1. Deanatay

        Why would you want to?

        But if for SOME reason you’re serious:

        1) Change your capitalization on your email – SMTP doesn’t care, but it affects the random generator that assigns the default gravs.
        EG: myname@domain.org => myName@domain.org

        2) Go to https://en.gravatar.com/, and register your email and an image of your choice to be your permanent Gravatar. (That’s how I got my waffle – ain’t it pretty?)

        1. Demoted Oblivious

          Caveat. SMTP routes what is received AS IS. Domain names are still (for now) case insensitive (for character sets where that means something). HOWEVER, some email servers (I’m looking at you exchange) ARE (or can be) case sensitive on the email prefix (the you part). This means that you may not be able to twiddle your username/prefix portion of your email, just the domain portion. Other mail servers (notably google) ignore periods separating alphanumeric characters, so you may be able to twiddle your username by adding any number of periods before, in, and after the prefix.

    2. Queezle

      Try playing with, capitalization in you Mail address. Should change your gravata

      1. Queezle

        Like this

  66. Wraithy2773

    I actually like what he’s saying here.

    Yeah, duh, going “LIFE IS A LIE” is dumb, but I like the notion that trying to define what is alive and what isn’t isn’t exactly helpful. If you try to lump things into “alive” and “not alive”, no matter your criteria, you’re going to be left with a whole lot of weird corner cases that don’t fit into either bucket easily.

    Also, I wager that his *actual* philosophy isn’t that simple. He’s being brusque and blunt with it as a sort of shock of cold water, to get people accustomed to how he views biology and what the focus of the class will be.

    After all, it’s a low-level Biology class, not Philosophy. “What is life” is not a question that’s going to be applicable to this subject, and he doesn’t want to deal with that crap.

  67. Chris Phoenix

    He reminds me a lot of that fake axiology professor Gurwara from Strong Female Protagonist.

    1. DaveM

      Damn I miss that webcomic! (and its erudite commenters)

      1. StClair

        Same.

  68. Bluesnake463

    This guy seems like he’s a barrel of laughs

  69. Barf Ninjason

    Is that Joyce’s great thundering Joyce-hole?

    My favorite scientist-enlightened-me moment: 12 years ago I said to my brother-in-law, a wildlife biologist, how silly I found racialists who emphasized the relatively minor differences in human intelligence based on continental origin, considering how such things were being pushed at a time when, as I said, “the very idea of species differentiation is coming into question” and he said, “It’s always been like that. It’s always been controversial.” Not in the Darwin versus Bebé Yeezus sense (though, that too) but in the what “life is a vast spectrum” sense. What a cool thing to have learned!

    1. timemonkey

      I doubt it’s Joyce. Joyce isn’t really a ‘yell at the teacher’ kind of person.

  70. Mr.Morningstar

    Oooh I hate him

  71. Keulen

    Please tell me this professor drives a DeLorean and pronounces gigawatts “jigawatts”.

    1. Demoted Oblivious

      Gonna need some Bill Nye up in here to correct all this mispronunciation.

      That is how he got his powers after all.

  72. TheHabbadasher

    Well, if I don’t have a life I guess I don’t have to worry about wasting it.

    1. TheHabbadasher

      Malaya, nice!

  73. DaveM

    Damn I miss that webcomic! (and its erudite commenters)

  74. DarkoNeko

    an electric storm… fused him with his… vaccuum ?

  75. Lone Duck

    This guy sounds like he has tenure!

  76. Aprion

    I like this guy. I’d take his class.

    1. Dara

      I… kinda do too

      Cylon solidarity?

    2. Deanatay

      …I mean, I wouldn’t AGREE with him, mostly, but I’d definitely learn something.

  77. AbelUndercity

    Whoa, this is heavy, Brock!

    I’m pretty sure that his stance is more nuanced than this, and the opening is a kind of “short, sharp shock” to jolt the class.

    1. AbelUndercity

      Nope, nope, nope, not Malaya. Nope.

    2. Demoted Oblivious

      Why is everything heavy in the future? Has the gravitational constant changed?

  78. CJ

    Uh, I hate the people who think being scientific means that emotions are irrelevant.

    1. Demoted Oblivious

      To be fair, that is not at all what Prof. Brock said.

  79. GUIGUI

    There is a definition of life that I find interesting:n a non-closed system that is organised in such a way that it can bring back its fluctuating entropy at the same level.

    1. GUIGUI

      (I like my new grabatar)

  80. Sombrero

    Even if my gravatar has been downgraded from Sarah to Lucy (nothing personal, Lucy is alright, it’s just that Sarah is the greatest), this is a happy day because Professor Broc is finally with us. Welcome, prof!

  81. Needfuldoer

    YES! Professor Doc finally makes the jump!

    I’m sure Dina will do the very best she can in this class.

    1. Needfuldoer

      Oh hey, the avatars got rerolled again. And I got…

      Daisy.

      You know what? Fair enough. Her thirst is relatable.

  82. Kitsune

    Is Marty going to be his TA?

    1. Deanatay

      By which you mean Leslie, right?

  83. Daibhid C

    Look, it’s perfectly simple. You breathe and eat and grow, and that is how you know (Oh, oh, oh-oh) that you’re alive, and that’s no jive.

    1. Clif

      Insufficient. Fire breathes, eats and grows. Is fire alive?

      (My pet rust isn’t sure).

      1. Demoted Oblivious

        It even dances, though maybe not the jive.

  84. Juanoku

    So does this place hire ONLY insane people?

    1. Clif

      What? People go to college to be exposed to new ideas. It’s kind of the point.

    2. Demoted Oblivious

      There IS evidence that there is a proliferation of mental illness in acadamia. Something about the stress and mental fatigue I’d wager.

      https://www.nature.com/articles/nbt.4089?fbclid=IwAR1ujMp2cpoUOm984Lruc8ZJiC_1RPWherKesyT7oESy5frdjbGxHBHzhpQ

      1. Clif

        Dealing with students will do that.

  85. Spencer

    Beef get in here.

    Your services are required.

  86. Hydrohead

    Is the spark of life 1.21 Jigawats?

  87. Holly

    I like this professor so far.

    1. Holly

      How appropriate 😀

  88. FacelessDeviant

    If a teacher can’t get through the introduction before the “now look here!”‘s start, then you know its gonna be a good course.

  89. C.T Phipps

    I totally believe Joyce will love this guy and his interpretation of biology. The idea of her becoming a physicist and developing a holistic view of the universe would be a neat twist. Someone who doesn’t have to deal with the messiness of life and gooey bits.

    I also equally love Dina having her views challenged and angered by the unimportance placed on them.

    “Evolution is real!”

    “Not really. It’s an importance placed on a process of random chance that is anthropic really. Things live, things die, and its all going to die anyway. Selection for traits is really arbitrary.”

    “WHAT ARE YOU TEACHING THESE PEOPLE!?”

  90. Ziggy78eog

    I thought this was biology, not philosophy. Doc Brown is teaching the wrong class.

  91. Vulcanodon

    I’d go as far as to say “life”, like consciousness, is an emergent property of certain complex systems. The boundaries of either are not easy to describe, but they are not transcendent to physical reality.

    This’ll cut through a mile of sedimentary foolishness on the first day so they can get on with it.

    1. Vulcanodon

      Should have reversed the order of those two paragraphs.

      1. Demoted Oblivious

        Yeah maybe, but “Should have reversed the order of those two paragraphs,” is a really weird openning.

  92. VanVelding

    Ha-ha. Funny new character.

  93. Chris (the other one)

    I’m hearing Haddaway’s “What is life (love)” in my head as I reread this.

  94. John

    …New favorite character confirmed.

  95. Jon

    Oh I’m sorry is this actually Intro to Philosophy? Teach the actual material, you wannabe nihilist.

    1. Jon

      …Gravatar Roulette is a cruel mistress.

      1. SeanR

        I suspect there is no roulette. That, instead, we all have a “value” or “hash” determined by our email, and possibly username, and there is a mostly-static list of available Gravatars. Unless your “value” is in the single digits, when another Gravatar is added to the end of the list, you get shuffled. You get the remainder, as from Arithmetic, of whatever your “value”, divided by the number of available Gravatars is, as your Gravatar.

        So if there were 11 available Gravatars, and your number ended up being 327, 327/11 is 29 R 8. You get the 8th Gravatar. A 12th Gravatar is added. 327/12 is 27 R 4. You get the 4th Gravatar.

        Don’t like the 4th one? Change the alphabetization of your name and you get…, say 259. 259/14 is 21 R 7. You get the 7th Gravatar.

        This is only speculation on my part.

        1. Clif

          But everytime you change your email name the nature of the universe randomly changes along with the hash algorithm used and your memory of the past results of grav roulette changes with it. In some fortunate cases the hash algorithm is unchanged but the gravitar will now match your new goal.

  96. Needfuldoer

    “What separates us from a virus?”
    A mask, and hopefully a vaccine.

    “A crystal?”
    About half a mile, some spinning penguins, spiky turtles, and a few dozen crates of Wumpa fruit.

    “A plant?”
    Well, I do tend to do little but sit around absorbing nutrients lately…

    “What is life?”
    A board game nearly devoid of strategy. It’s all about where the spinner lands, whether you go to college, a couple of forks in the path, and whether you retire to a house or a country club.

    1. Clif

      Conway’s game of life has no spinner, is completely deterministic, and though it is far from obvious, you can embed universal computability into it with an implementation of an unbounded Touring machine.

      1. Lumin

        Unbounded? That must make it hard to drive!

        1. Lumin

          (Yeah, not Joe, thanks.)

      2. Needfuldoer

        Given enough time and a big enough field, you could simulate Hasbro’s Life inside Conway’s Game of Life. Maybe that would get you on the cover of Life!

        Or you could just say “screw it” and go eat a bowl of Life instead.

        1. Clif

          Life is bittersweet. Or so I’m told.

  97. Rabisch

    I like this prof. He’s started with a huge explosion. I wonder if Joyce will end up liking him and Dina hating him.

  98. Raptorofwar

    I like this man. He’s right, you know.

    1. Raptorofwar

      Oh god, no. My gravatars have only gotten worse and worse.

  99. Shadotterdan

    This guy sounds like he thinks cutting is deep.

    1. Demoted Oblivious

      If cutting isn’t deep, it’s pretty ineffective. Does Rippy the Razor need to be involved for an analysis?

  100. J

    I must get a copy of that syllabus.

  101. BlackScarabFilmZ

    Based on my calculations, when this class gets to the midterms, they’re gonna study some serious shit!

  102. Clell65619

    Wait: (Human) Life and Evolution is a 100 series class?

    Well, at least the Prof knows his audience.

  103. GUIGUI

    Wait, I have actually figured the perfect definition of life!

    Everything that lives, poops.

    1. Kamino Neko

      So trees are zombies?

      1. Joebo

        Trees poop molecular oxygen.

        1. Clif

          Fire poops oxidized compounds.

  104. Dracke

    I had teachers like him while studying biology…others that though the opposite and everything in between. He is talking about the Biomechanics of living beings and some people can be pedantic and go into granular rants over semantics.

    Nice rip off design or pastiche of dear Dr Emmett Brown

  105. nothri

    OH MY GOD THIS CLASS IS FULL OF REPLICANTS!!!

  106. Wakeangel2001

    life is basically complex organic chemistry, any one part of it is not special at all.

  107. MugiwaraNoPancakes

    This man speaks to my soul

  108. DudeMyDadOwnsaDealership

    Something Dina and Joyce can both be irked by, perhaps?

    Introduction to lateral reasoning that sets off popular knee-jerkery 101.

  109. Kitsune

    Leslie is a teacher in her own right, why would she be someone else Teaching Assistant?

  110. Joshua Kronengold

    Apparently, that note in the syllabus also covers the fourth wall.

  111. Graham

    Is this class about evolution or philosophy?

  112. RassilonTDavros

    …so, who is saying “First of all” in that last panel, anyway?

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