They want to end Edge and bring back Internet Explorer. It’ll start over at IE 33 since 33x3=88, which means Heil Hitler in super secret numerology.

Well, perhaps that process would be more difficult and resource-intensive in this hypothetical scenario, so it would be much easier and less hassle to just keep the bodies alive?

The simple answer is smart shuffle enables them to put songs in your shuffle that record companies paid them to push to you. In other words, Payola.

That might also be true. You never know.

To take it one step further, one can plant (native) wildflower seeds that further promotes biodiversity and attracts pollinators. Plus meadows are beautiful.

Construction workers push wheelbarrows. This particular feature of the image is not mysterious at all and does not need explaining. In the crop circle interpretation, the wheels of the wheelbarrows make the circles in the ground. That’s why they’re in the picture.

You have a short personal observation from 1996 which happens to be published in a newspaper. You like sources? Here’s some sources on manmade crop circles that make explicit that the phenomenon was connected to new age beliefs in the popular imagination:

https://www.nytimes.com/1991/09/10/world/2-jovial-con-men-demystify-those-crop-circles-in-britain.html https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/crop-circles-the-art-of-the-hoax-2524283/ https://www.msn.com/en-sg/lifestyle/travel/the-fascinating-history-of-crop-circles/ss-AA1dFqlU https://pure.knaw.nl/ws/files/480768/Meder26.pdf

Some contemporary news clips of Doug&Dave:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Qzvuqs9Bf7Q https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XkGbnUXfh4U

Dowsing, however is old folk magic:

https://www.britannica.com/topic/dowsing http://dowsing-research.net/dowsing/articles/Dowsing_from_the_Late_Middle_Ages.pdf https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17532-why-dowsing-makes-perfect-sense/

I could go on, but let’s not.

I think my initial interpretation has now been proven correct.

Well, I certainly disagree, but I doubt we can find any common ground here. You seem content with any tenuous connection between concepts to fit your interpretation.

I don’t see an alternative explanation for the characteristics of the cartoon.

It’s definitely cryptic. I’ve suggested that it’s a reference to crop circles elsewhere in this thread, which is still the best interpretation I could find even if that’s not particularly satisfactory either.

In 1991, Doug Bower and Dave Chorley took credit for creating a lot of crop circles in Britain, using ropes and planks. It was a well known story and a cultural meme, even if people didn’t know about Doug & Dave specifically they knew that the crop circles that New Agers believed were messages from aliens actually were created by pranksters. The construction workers are walking around in circles so that the tracks from the wheelbarrows create…mud circles, I guess.

But as I said, this interpretation doesn’t feel satisfactory either, it’s just the best one yet. I’d love to hear a better idea.

No one seems to get this one, at least on the internet. The most likely interpretation I could find anywhere is that he’s referencing crop circles. Which kinda works, but also not…I’m not sure that’s it either.

I mean, if you bend over backwards, sure. But the idea that Gary Larson would expect readers in 1993 to associate the phrase “New Age construction workers” with dowsing practices – instead of actually using the term “construction workers dowsing”, or something – seems unreasonable. Plus it’s not funny at all.

Edit: just for reference, the word “dowsing” does not appear even once in this very long wikipedia article about New Age.

1. They are very specifically walking in circles, not staggering around randomly
2. Dowsing is not a New Age thing at all, there was a man in my grandfather’s village that did it and the practice is a lot older than that

If anyone is curious, “disco” comes into English from the french loan word discothèque, originally from greek δισκος (diskos, as in discus throw, a disk) + θήκη (thiki, originally case or chest but here it means “house”). So a “house of discs” in the same way a “bibliothèque” is a house of books. The Latin meaning is a happy coincidence. That being said, I sincerely hope someone is working on a disco musical adaptation of Dantes Inferno.

So, I understand why there is a naked woman in the joke, what I don’t understand is her motivation.

So you simply already need to know what you’re asking it, gotcha. Seems easy enough.

I had a coworker in the early 00s that would repeatedly fail to search for something because she would type “www.goggles.com” into the address bar.

I’m starting to feel like a shill because I say this so often, but Kagi is the only one I’ve found that actually does the job anymore. To me a search engine that works is worth the small cost each month, but unfortunately I don’t see paying for search becoming mainstream anytime soon.

And here is the link for anyone who didn’t read it.

Something being entertaining to you when you’re a kid that you can acknowledge was shit when you’re an adult is a normal part of growing up.

Sure, I remember my twenties well enough. And then the next stage in growing up is forgiving your younger self and understanding that books can be good in different ways, and that some books are brilliant for kids and teenagers. Good detective fiction can also be brilliant for what it is. You’re nearly there yourself in your original comment. No one is comparing Harry Potter to Gravity’s Rainbow or Wuthering Heights here.

The argument that something should be considered good because there exists other things which can be considered significantly worse is not a very good framework for arguing for the quality of a work of fiction. This is classic “damning by faint praise.”

I’m surprised you didn’t link to Wikipedia…but that’s not really the argument here. The point is one of context and being reasonable, and that in the field of young adult fiction, they stand out. Would I say they’re the best childrens books? No. And if you had been more reasonable - not called them “shit” perhaps - it would have been a different story. And I see you skirt the issue, but the reason people go on and on about the failings of Harry Potter these days is very obvious, and it has little to do with literary value.

The foundational premise of this argument is that you know something to be true because you perceive it to be so. This is like me saying that I know I’m a good cook because I cook every day and enjoy the food that I make for myself.

Or like you saying “her books are simple, accessible, designed for mass appeal, relatively thematically shallow…” Of course it’s my assessment, grounded in experience. I’m not going to do a close reading of the series in this format, I’m sorry. But I don’t really see that level of effort from you, either. (And “accessible” is a weird thing to criticize in a work geared towards children, btw…)

because she did what J. J. Abrams does with every single t.v. show he’s ever made and allude to an elaborate set of mysteries that actively drove fan engagement via wild speculation about the future of the series between novels.

Rowling delivered in the end though, which is what JJ never does and why he should be banned from ever making TV again. I don’t see how the comparison is valid, readers may have been disappointed but there were answers and genuine surprises there.

And I guess the reason you read the whole thing is…that it was so awful? Be honest with yourself.

It’s certainly not without its faults. (One thing I NEVER see mentioned is the excessive fatshaming, I guess there’s not room for more than one narrative at a time.) It is, however, a book written for children and teenagers. And for what it is, the plots and themes ask more of, and give more back to, young readers than so much of the other drivel that is readily available to them. I know this, since I read to my own children and teenagers every day, and buy them books to read for themselves. There is a reason the Potter books are still as popular as ever.

If we’re being honest, the real issue is that Rowling is now le diable du jour, which means everything she ever did is now material for our daily two minutes of hate. The books have to be completely without merit as well because it’s just not possible to hold even mildly conflicting views simultaneously.

Kids are extremely good at learning new things, and on average, old people are not. Whatever explanation to this state of things you prefer, and there’s obviously exceptions, this is just how it is.

How about punk rock is the only thing that is punk rock, starting now?