Explain SMBC — the wiki for Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

bad-code

2022-12-13 View on smbc-comics.com → 1 revision
bad-code
Votey panel for bad-code
This explanation is incomplete or may contain errors. It was generated by AI and has not yet been reviewed by a human editor.

Explanation

In this comic, a doctor delivers "good news" to a patient named Mister Jenkins, explaining that his suite of mental pathologies has been identified. However, the doctor reveals that the "treatment" involves taking all of Jenkins's complex, costly behavioral patterns and reproducing them with simple, easy-to-replicate code -- essentially suggesting that his mental illness could be replicated by a basic computer program.

The punchline comes when Jenkins objects to the idea of replacing his elaborate dysfunction with "else statements" (a basic programming construct), and the doctor notes that an "if/else bottler up deflect with else statements" would replicate his behavior. When Jenkins protests "You don't know me!", the doctor's point is proven -- that exact defensive response is itself a predictable, easily coded behavior. The comic humorously suggests that our seemingly complex psychological issues might actually follow very simple, programmable logic patterns.

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