2011-09-13
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.