Explain SMBC — the wiki for Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

2011-09-13

2011-09-13 View on smbc-comics.com → 1 revision
2011-09-13
Votey panel for 2011-09-13
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This explanation is incomplete or may contain errors. It was generated by AI and has not yet been reviewed by a human editor.

Explanation

The comic is titled "Scientists Have Much Better Pickup Lines" and shows a man at what appears to be a bar using scientific terminology to hit on a woman. He says, "So... now that we've had this memetic interaction, how 'bout we go have a genetic interaction?" The humor lies in replacing common social language with biological jargon.

A "memetic interaction" refers to the exchange of memes (in the original Richard Dawkins sense of cultural units of information, not internet memes), meaning their conversation. A "genetic interaction" is a euphemism for sex, since sexual reproduction involves combining genetic material. The joke is that while the line sounds intellectual and sophisticated on the surface, it is functionally identical to a crude pickup line -- the scientist is just dressing up "we talked, now let's have sex" in academic vocabulary.

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