“The World That Knew We Were Coming”
—Title of Chapter Six in Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America’s Soul, by Kenneth Miller
Replace Calvin in Sunday’s Calvin and Hobbes strip with “Homo sapiens“, and you have an accurate description of theological human exceptionalism, as well as an inkling of the evolutionary teleology of misguided philosophers like Tom Nagel:
The strip was drawn by Bill Watterson, a very interesting fellow (do have a look at his Wikipedia bio). He stopped drawing Calvin and Hobbes in 1995, but I guess they’re recycled—and none the worse for it.
As for the philosophical/academic preoccupation of some of the strips, Wikipedia notes the following in its piece on Calvin and Hobbes (Calvin is the young boy, Hobbes his stuffed tiger, and you can guess where their names came from):
Watterson also lampooned the academic world. In one example, Calvin writes a “revisionist autobiography,” recruiting Hobbes to take pictures of him doing stereotypical kid activities like playing sports in order to make him seem more well-adjusted. In another strip, he carefully crafts an “artist’s statement,” claiming that such essays convey more messages than artworks themselves ever do (Hobbes blandly notes, “You misspelled Weltanschauung“). He indulges in what Watterson calls “pop psychobabble” to justify his destructive rampages and shift blame to his parents, citing “toxic codependency.” In one instance, he pens a book report based on the theory that the purpose of academic writing is to “inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning, and inhibit clarity,” titled The Dynamics of Interbeing and Monological Imperatives in Dick and Jane: A Study in Psychic Transrelational Gender Modes. Displaying his creation to Hobbes, he remarks, “Academia, here I come!” Watterson explains that he adapted this jargon (and similar examples from several other strips) from an actual book of art criticism.
Here’s that famous “academia, here I come!” strip:
Professor Ceiling cat also has a stuffed tiger!:
Could you say that Calvinball is the first postmodern sport?
No. Theology predates postmodernism.
+1
In the sense of ‘predation’? I wish.
(Why I always use ‘antedate’ when appropriate)
In my youth I once posed the question to my So. Baptist minister, “why must carnivores kill?” His response was to the effect the sin of Adam and Eve.
Which is as good a reason as any not to be a baptist any more!
There is something about moving directly from the sentence “the dynamics of interbeing ….” to “Professor Ceiling Cat also has a stuffed tiger.” that made my day.
I loved that sentence, especially in juxtaposition, too! 🙂
I love Calvin and Hobbes. I especially liked Calvin’s snowmen. My favourite was the one where he had the snowmen all lined up along the driveway saluting his dad.
Truly the product of alternative thought. They are a masterpiece.
“Spaceman Spiff” had his merits.
Each strip is canyon of insight into our existence in the universe. Watterson spoke far outside the zeitgeist, with Athena like intuition, he made us all see a great deal more than we could have expected.
One of the great cartoonists.
My other favorites: Burke Breathed, Gary Larson, and because I’m old enough to appreciate him, Walt Kelly.
Yes to all of those.
Friday the 13th comes on a Wednesday this month!
Lovely way to start out the day!
The Dynamics of Interbeing and Monological Imperatives in Dick and Jane: A Study in Psychic Transrelational Gender Modes. Displaying his creation to Hobbes, he remarks, “Academia, here I come!”
Am reminded of Alan Sokal’s 1996 hoax.
Even though Calvin’s “I believe history is a force” description lacks many of the traditional attributes of personhood, we can still recognize that his purpose-driven elan vitale is in fact supernatural. It would take nothing to label his belief a version of “God.”
I love that particular cartoon. It reminds me a bit of Doug Adam’s puddle story (“this hole was shaped for me!”)
By the way, I was a bit startled by the bright yellow eyes on Professor Ceiling Cat’s tiger. It’s not that they’re “wrong” — just unexpected.
My mother sewed those eyes on and, in a miguided attempt to make pupils, I used some silver paint from my model-plane building days.
Very cool — the real Hobbes would no doubt approve. Except that you left off lasers, but we can’t do everything they demand.
Reminds me of Dawkins’s Law of the Conservation of Difficulty (cited as):
Obscurantism in an academic subject expands to fill the vacuum of its intrinsic simplicity
Always loved Calvin and Hobbes, I have the entire collection buried somewhere. I’m sure it emerge as we start to pack the house up to move – my wife has already had me remove the “inflammatory” books from the bookshelves (apparently only mindless fiction and coffee table hardbacks are acceptable in Tennessee)
Just curious, West, Middle or East (my old “stomping grounds”) Tennessee?
Middle, Brentwood
Recall from the film, Amistad ? Cinqué portrayed by Djimon Hounsou is in dialogue with John Quincy Adams portrayed by Anthony Hopkins:
John Quincy Adams: Cinqué, look. I’m being honest with you. Anything less would be disrespectful. I’m telling you, I’m preparing you, I suppose I’m explaining to you, that the test ahead of us is an exceptionally difficult one.
Cinqué : (speaking in Mende / Ens. Covey translating) We won’t be going in there alone.
John Quincy Adams: Alone? Indeed not. We have right at our side. We have righteousness at our side. We have Mr Baldwin over there.
Cinqué: (speaking in Mende / Ens. Covey translating) I meant my ancestors. I will call into the past, far back to the beginning of time, and beg them to come and help me at the judgment. I will reach back and draw them into me.
… … And they must come, for at this moment, I AM THE WHOLE REASON THEY HAVE EXISTED AT ALL.
— of the survival of the genes.
Blue
Given the popularity of C&H, I’m not sure most folks understood what Watterson was doing in many of his strips.
People get many things wrong, including Frost’s Path Less Traveled By.
Don’t get me started on Frost. People perversely (willfully?) misunderstand Mending Wall and Death of the Hired Man and who can count how many others. Deceptive simplicity leads them away…
Most quotemined poet?
The most quotemined poet is Anon.
Or Yogi “I never said most of the things I said” Berra…
Indeed! It’s so much more poignant and powerful read as an expression of nostalgic regret than as a hymn to individuality.
Even more poignant when read as an ironic commentary on our tendency toward post hoc analysis.
Sure, that’s in there, too. I don’t see those analyses as exclusive. Why would you need to engage in post hoc rationalization if you didn’t have regrets, however small, about the roads you didn’t take?
If one doesn’t take another path, and can’t see around the curve to where it leads, I’m not sure that there’s anything to be nostalgic about. I can see where one can be nostalgic about certain milestones along the path one chose to take.
(I wonder what Frost’s view on “free will” was. Would he consider the decision about which path to take purely deterministic?)
Whatever the poem implies, and whatever one may (reasonably) infer from it, seems it’s also a reflection on making the best decision one can based on inescapably incomplete information.
“Nostalgic” in the sense of wishing to return to the decisive moment and explore the other road, too.
That seems to me to communicate the above rather obviously.
Yes, I’ve always found it bittersweet, and the older I get the more I identify with it.
Calvin appears to be nasty and brutish.
Your post seems to be one adjective short.
And he doesn’t appear to be tall either.
LOL!
Yeah, art and art criticism can be an minefield full of explosive bovine fecal bombs. I guess it’s the nature of the beast, but I’ve seen an exhibit or two that makes me suspect that’s it’s not always a game played in good faith.
I think you want to quote him as saying
“AcademiA, here I come”
not “AcademiC”
The cartoon strip is cute, wish I had it when I was little…
love the tiger! :))
Jerry – I am glad that you used “Calvinian” because my eye first read “Calvinist” and then it sunk in – I much prefer reading about Calvin and Hobbes than about Calvinist theology 🙂
wascawwy
“…Bill Watterson, a very interesting fellow…”
It might say something slightly positive about us that his strip was hugely popular, and has lasting influence. Few talents like that happen along, but obviously there’s a hunger for them.
My kids both first read through the C & H books (we have every anthology) as, well, kids–early elementary age–and reread them many times as they got older; it was fun to see them “get” the strips at different levels of meaning as they got old enough to catch the satire, context, etc.
LOL
I’ve had a Christian literally tell me that it would be objectively morally wrong for he himself not to exist.
You go, Prof. Ceiling Cat!
I trust I am not the only one here who thinks that Calvin and Hobbes is the Greatest Comic Strip Ever Full Stop. Lines and jokes from it have enracinated themselves into the daily speech of myself and other members of my immediate family; my older daughter and I are especially fond of the last line of this one, which even has a (very) slight biology tie-in!
Ha ha! After reading this post, I got nostalgic for Calvin & Hobbes & I downloaded a book from Amazon. I gave my dad a couple complications back in the 90s & he still has them & loves them (of course, I read them too so they were a gift for me as well).
Complicated compilations? 😉
Haha! Curse you ipad! Maybe it was Freudian. I probably did give my dad complications.
Me, too. Watterson was a genius.
Looka that poor tiger’s eyes. Prof CC is holding him way too tight…
He also looks a bit jaundiced. Has he had his hep shots?
Awww, stop making fun of the tiger. He can’t help how he looks. 🙂
🐾