2012-01-30
Explanation
The comic personifies science as a heroic warrior figure, "the Spirit of Science," who wields a sword called "Empiricism." He dramatically declares that he battles ignorance, conquers absurdity, and slays inaccuracy -- all noble-sounding goals that align with the ideals of the scientific method.
The punchline arrives when someone points out that while swinging his sword around so recklessly, he accidentally killed all the unicorns. The Spirit of Science reacts with horror and despair. The joke is a commentary on the double-edged nature of scientific empiricism: while it effectively dispels ignorance and debunks nonsense, it also inevitably destroys beautiful myths, fantasies, and things we might wish were real. Science doesn't discriminate between harmful falsehoods and charming ones -- its sword of empiricism cuts through all of them equally.