2014-10-18
Explanation
The Joke
The comic is titled "Teaching Prank #1618033: Start an Analogy Then Leave." A professor stands in front of a chalkboard and tells the class to "imagine simple harmonic motion as a horde of angry badgers. The ears are radians, and--" then suddenly claims his wife is calling and leaves, telling the students that the T.A. will finish the lecture. The T.A. is shown standing off to the side looking horrified, presumably having no idea how to continue an analogy that compares physics to angry badgers.
The Humor
The humor comes from the professor deliberately constructing an absurd, nonsensical analogy and then abandoning it mid-sentence, leaving his teaching assistant to somehow make sense of it. The analogy itself is intentionally terrible -- comparing simple harmonic motion to angry badgers and ears to radians has no logical basis, which is precisely the point. The T.A. is stuck trying to either continue a meaningless analogy or explain to a confused class why their professor just compared oscillating systems to badger anatomy. The prank number (1618033) is itself a joke, as it corresponds to the digits of the golden ratio (phi = 1.618033...), suggesting the professor has an absurdly large catalog of teaching pranks organized with mathematical precision.
References
The number 1618033 in the title references the golden ratio (phi), approximately 1.618033988..., a mathematical constant that appears throughout mathematics and nature. Simple harmonic motion is a fundamental concept in physics describing oscillatory behavior, such as a pendulum or a spring.