Also, part of the joke is the hubris / chutzpah of the interviewee, who is attempting to parlay a degree (or whatever it is) in comparative literature into a job at CERN (or wherever it is).
On 22 December 2013 08:55, LizR <[email protected]> wrote: > On 22 December 2013 04:56, Craig Weinberg <[email protected]> wrote: > >> >> >> On Thursday, December 19, 2013 8:24:55 PM UTC-5, Liz R wrote: >>> >>> The unexpected surprise is the jump up the "reductionist food chain" in >>> the last frame. >>> >> >> Right, but its only surprising because there is something that we expect >> to be irreducible which is being reduced. >> > > Not quite, I think it's simply the distance involved that causes the > frisson. If he'd started with, say, history it wouldn't have been terribly > funny to have worked his way to comparative literature. If he'd *started*from > neuroscience (rather than being interrupted there) and gone via say > psychology and a few other things to c.l., even that wouldn't have worked. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
