To phi or not to phi
Editor ZBicyclist is on vacation, and taking a cue from comics that repeat old episodes is dipping back into the past: June 2021. This was originally posted by EditorM. Is modal fabric still around?
I only recently learned there is a newfangled fabric called “modal”, popular for linens[*] and underwear; which mostly explains the modal-logic joke for me. But some of the rest of these are still puzzling.
[*] No, linens are not presumptively made from linen. Though they can be. Oy!
This appeared on Daily Nous on 13 September 2022, just a couple days after the expression “the present King of England” changed(?) its meaning(?).
The “To φ or not to φ” comics feature on The Daily Nous is done by Tanya Kostocha , Assistant Professor of philosophy at Ashoka University. Russell’s theory of descriptions is long gone, but is still studied for the sake of understanding the variety of refutations and reformulations that succeeded it. Oh, and also for its well-remembered example, “The present King of France is bald” (uttered in 1905, when there was no current King of France).
Pearls Before Swine is so often in service of a pun that we may stop noticing when it pulls off a pretty good one!
Here’s a bit of a CIDU-OY.
I only recently learned there is a newfangled fabric called “modal”, popular for linens[*] and underwear; which mostly explains the modal-logic joke for me. But some of the rest of these are still puzzling.
[*] No, linens are not presumptively made from linen. Though they can be. Oy!
Probably a bit too technical (though not hard to look up). But the point of interest is in how it uses the tools of “photographic meme” but in a drawing. Would the same joke (about “getting cancelled”) work in a direct cartoon format?
Also disturbing is that apparently they say ‘phi’ as a rhyme for ‘be’.
Comics I Don't Understand 