Explain SMBC — the wiki for Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

This comic imagines a simple technological intervention that could defuse online arguments. A person is looking at their phone, which shows a hostile message: "Eff you, bro!" from "@rEffthguy." Below

This comic imagines an absurd consequence of radically extended human lifespans. A person sits at a computer. The screen asks: "Are you over 10^18 years of age?" The person responds: "What the..." T

This comic satirizes the gap between how real science works and what audiences expect from science entertainment. A character announces: "It turned out my hypothesis was not exactly right, and not ex

This comic explains the concept of "carcinization" — the tendency of media and information systems to converge on outrage-driven content — by analogy to the biological phenomenon of carcinization, whe

This comic satirizes the tendency to treat candy and junk food as a universal solution to minor problems, especially with children. In the first panel, a child says "Daaad, I hurt my knee!" The fathe

This comic satirizes the common rhetorical defense of "taken out of context" and how it can be weaponized to deflect legitimate criticism. In the first panel, a reporter confronts a politician: "Sir,

This comic subverts the popular myth about lemmings committing mass suicide by jumping off cliffs, replacing it with a darker existential observation. The image shows two cute lemmings sitting peacef

This comic riffs on the experience of discovering that adult life involves tolerating a lot of unpleasant things in order to get to the parts you enjoy — using grits as the metaphor. In the first pan

This comic reimagines the Evil Queen from Snow White as a savvy modern entrepreneur. In the first panel, someone asks: "Wait, your poison apple curses people to fall into an ageless sleep?" The Evil

This comic contrasts the experience of troubleshooting physical hardware versus software. The top panel is labeled "When a physical machine won't work." A person looks at a broken device and cheerful

This comic humorously describes air travel from the perspective of a pilot making an announcement, but strips away all the technical jargon to describe the experience in the most literal, childlike te

This comic puts a modern twist on a love potion scenario by introducing the front-facing camera as an unexpected spoiler. In the first panel, a woman announces: "The potion is complete. Tonight my da

This comic imagines a conversation with Optimus Prime from the Transformers franchise, taking his ability to transform literally and to an absurd extreme. In the first panel, someone asks: "Hey Optim

This comic takes a romantic moment — a partner asking "would you always be true to me?" — and derails it with ruthless probabilistic thinking. In the first panel, a woman asks her partner: "Baby, wou

This comic is a pun on "ISO" -- the abbreviation for "Initial Sex Offering," a play on "IPO" (Initial Public Offering), the financial term for when a company first offers its shares to the public on a

This comic plays on the concept of aging and deteriorating eyesight, but takes it in an unexpected philosophical direction. In the first panel, someone asks the long-haired character what their favor

This comic satirizes inflation and Buddhist philosophy simultaneously. In the panel, a Buddhist monk stands in a grocery store, lecturing a shopper about how the happiness that cheese dip will bring

This comic deconstructs the popular self-help cliche "it's about the journey, not the destination." In the first panel, a speaker at what appears to be a lecture or talk declares, "I believe the jour

This comic takes the mathematical concept of long division and applies it to the human body in a darkly humorous way. In the first panel, a child asks, "Do you know how long division works?" -- a sta

This comic takes the scientific concept of a chemical gradient and places it in an everyday social setting. A person with long hair and glasses walks into a coffee shop and announces, "Good morning.

This comic is a meta-joke about the nature of comic strip characters and vision. In the panel, one character says "Betsy, did you see that?" Betsy replies, "I wouldn't say 'see.' I would say 'detect.

This comic explores the tension between the practical and philosophical value of mathematics. In the first panel, a character dismisses math: "Math is useful or whatever, but it can't teach us ethics

This comic is a dark twist on the classic "knock knock / banana / orange" joke that every child knows. The traditional joke goes: "Knock knock." "Who's there?" "Banana." (Repeated several times.) The

This comic addresses the logical fallacy of using someone else's stupidity to validate your own intelligence. In the first panel, someone watching TV or reading comments online says, "Oh my god, look

This comic jokes about quantum computing and encryption. A group of people gather around a computer screen to read a decrypted message that was designed to only be readable once quantum computers beca

This comic presents a rules sheet for a game called "Incomplete Information Tic-Tac-Toe." The game modifies standard tic-tac-toe by adding a hidden-goal mechanic: each round, players secretly roll a d

This comic plays on the tradition of sending flowers to a funeral. In the first panel, an elderly person remarks that they have never understood funeral flowers, since they will be dead and unable to

This comic features aliens arriving on Earth to offer humanity the path to unity, promising that if humans can unify, they will no longer need to destroy themselves. When humans eagerly ask to be taug

This comic depicts the "Stages of Existential Awareness" as a three-stage cycle. In the first stage (yellow), a person panics upon realizing they are trapped in a web of connections, obligations, and

This comic is a lengthy discussion about the trolley problem that escalates through increasingly absurd variations. It begins with the standard trolley problem, then introduces the surgeon variation (

This comic is a play on the insult "beta male." In the first panel, one man calls another a "betta male, bro." The recipient asks for clarification: did he say "beta" as in secondary/inferior, or "bet

This comic plays on the phrase "walking with the Lord." When asked if they are religious, a person replies "yes... and no." They explain that they never found God in a church, but instead found the Lo

This comic uses a parent-child Q&A format to draw a parallel between trees and scientists. A child asks why trees live so long, and the mother explains "selection pressure" -- trees can succeed by out

This comic imagines a refreshingly honest disclaimer at the end of a scientific paper. Instead of the usual hedging language about limitations and future work, the paper would straightforwardly admit:

This comic addresses the existential risk posed by artificial intelligence. A character explains what they see as a fundamental alignment problem: there is a chance that an AI built to solve humanity'

This is a single-panel comic with the caption: "In retrospect, the pop-up book of terminal illness was in poor taste." The image shows a man reading a pop-up book. A skeletal hand -- made of paper, a

This comic plays on the saying "the best revenge is a life well lived." An employee, being fired by her boss, defiantly declares: "I don't care if you fire me, boss! The best revenge is a life well li

This comic satirizes corporate euphemisms for layoffs. A manager announces that "profits are down" and they "need to get rid of 10% of employees." When asked "Which 10%?" the manager replies: "Startin

This comic explores a philosophical argument about value and quality taken to an absurd extreme. Two characters stand on a cliff looking at a rock. One says, "Look at this rock. Is it a dog?" The othe

This comic satirizes the rhetorical tactic of dismissing challenges by implying that the answer is obvious common knowledge. The caption at the top states the premise: "Fact: You can get away with an

This comic plays on the philosophical concept of consistency and how it can be weaponized to justify absurd conclusions. In the first panel, a man discovers a photo album and reacts with alarm: "What

This comic imagines an alien civilization testing whether humanity is ready to join the galactic federation — with a very specific and very low bar for the test. The alien leader addresses Earth's re

This comic is about the psychology of healthy habits and rationalization. In the first panel, a doctor tells a patient, "Dad, would you just quit smoking?" and offers the standard reasoning: "You know

This comic satirizes spiritualism and psychic mediums. A medium tells a client: "I'm getting a vision... yes, I can see him. It's your grandfather. He was loved dearly. He liked board games and he oft

## The Joke A man exclaims "Oh my god, I'm in a world like The Matrix." His friend assumes he means it's a simulation, which is the famous premise of the 1999 film *The Matrix*. But the man clarifies

## The Joke A person addresses "Dear Evolution" to ask why it is so hard being a mammal. Evolution (personified as a voice from above) says "Oh, that's easy" and launches into an explanation. It tell

## The Joke A character says that the real philosophers of today are the "analytic" ones — those who deal with rigorous logic and conceptual analysis. Another character pushes back, asking "You know,

## The Joke Two office workers discuss a meeting. One says "I just had a meeting that could've been an email." The other agrees. Then the first goes further: "Robert Caro wrote a biography of Lyndon

## The Joke A couple sees a shooting star. One says "Sally! A shooting star! Make a wish!" Sally starts to make a wish, but then notices the shooting star is turning — "it's coming right at us." She

## The Joke The comic presents two facts: (1) In 1884, Mark Twain wrote the foreword to a French edition of *The Adventures of Tom Sawyer*, and (2) that foreword is now in the public domain. The comi