calculus
Explanation
This comic imagines what would happen if you could mathematically describe a truly perfect life -- and why the math would make it impossible to share with others.
A character in bed explains to their partner that they've been trying to use calculus to describe the "maximally good life." The description starts simply enough but quickly spirals into absurdity: it involves a "negative derivative" (indicating it's getting worse, not better), which they dismiss, then describes "self-modifying cyborgs expressing constant pleasure" in a "harmony of gorgeous bodies" in a "glorious combination of animal, intellectual transformation" -- essentially, the mathematically optimal life turns out to be a bizarre posthuman pleasure-singularity.
The partner asks "Can't you just give us that stuff now?" The response: "No. The cyborg equilibrium is so far beyond what human brains can process, explaining it would be like trying to teach a turkey calculus." Humanity isn't just unable to achieve the optimal life -- we can't even understand the explanation of what it would be.
The final panel shows the character floating alone in darkness, having realized they understand the mathematical proof for ultimate happiness but can never share it with anyone because humans lack the cognitive capacity to comprehend it.
The comic satirizes both utopian mathematical thinking (the idea that we can optimize our way to happiness) and the classic science fiction trope of knowledge that is simultaneously perfect and utterly useless. It's also a sly dig at how academic descriptions of "the good life" often become so abstracted and jargon-laden that they bear no resemblance to anything a normal person would recognize as desirable.