applied
Explanation
This comic depicts a conflict between pure and applied mathematics, personified as rival academic factions.
In the first panel, a pure mathematician announces that they can map "these old dodads" with Koszul homology, which would yield a neural network that uses "no training data" -- essentially claiming pure math can solve practical problems. An applied mathematician interjects with "Hey!" and protests that this is "a pure mathematics club" and that "applied math" is not allowed.
The pure mathematician retorts: "Hey hey hey, don't you see, you fools?" and argues that "with the influx of neural networks, everything is potentially applied, so all results are abstract mathematical proofs." Another character objects: "But that means 'pure mathematics' can now be applied!" and the response is: "Yes!"
The punchline comes in the final panels, where the pure mathematician triumphantly declares: "You are all applied mathematicians now. And every pure mathematician who is dead are now on our side." The audience screams "NOOOOOOOOO" in horror.
The joke satirizes the longstanding and somewhat tribal rivalry between pure and applied mathematics. Pure mathematicians have traditionally prided themselves on working in abstract realms untouched by practical concerns, while applied mathematicians use math to solve real-world problems. The comic humorously suggests that the rise of neural networks and machine learning has blurred this boundary so thoroughly that all mathematics is now potentially "applied" -- a fate that pure mathematicians regard as a horrifying contamination of their discipline. The gag of claiming dead pure mathematicians "for our side" parodies the way ideological movements retroactively claim historical figures.