Freud Be Like: Academic Turf Wars

Content Quantum mechanics is so mysterious and illogical... What if vou divide the Planck length in half? That double-slit experiment is so cool, I can change reality with my consciousness! Yes, the world is definitely unreal. imgflip.com

The scientific hierarchy complex in one perfect comic! Mathematicians casually existing in their abstract realm while everyone else squabbles about which discipline is more "pure." Physics majors thinking they're the pinnacle of applied science, chemists feeling superior to biologists, and poor sociologists at the far end getting roasted as "applied psychology." The academic superiority complex is strong with this one! Meanwhile, mathematicians are off in their own universe of pure abstraction, blissfully unaware that the rest of science even exists. As someone who survived undergrad physics, I can confirm this hierarchy is discussed with deadly seriousness in department lounges everywhere.

Evolution gave us these incredible brains capable of art, science, and philosophy... and then randomly threw in depression as a fun bonus feature! It's like getting a Ferrari but the radio only plays sad songs. Our brains evolved to help us survive predators and find food, yet somehow also developed the ability to feel terrible about existence while sitting safely on a couch. Natural selection's greatest prank was giving us consciousness sophisticated enough to question why we have consciousness that makes us miserable.

The academic equivalent of throwing yourself on the mercy of the court. Nothing captures the existential crisis of student life quite like pivoting from "I'll start this assignment tomorrow" to "Does anything truly matter in this vast, uncaring universe?" The beautiful part is how this email manages to weaponize nihilism as an extension request. I've received hundreds of these over my career, and I must admit—the honest despair is refreshing compared to the "my fourth grandmother died this semester" classics. Pro tip for students: professors can smell manufactured excuses from two campuses away, but genuine existential dread? That's just relatable content.

The eternal workplace dichotomy captured in its natural habitat! Designers exhibit classic territorial behavior—experiencing existential dread when another creative joins their ecosystem ("Am I not enough?"). Meanwhile, engineers display the opposite response, embracing new members with primal solidarity ("Apes together strong"). This perfectly illustrates the divergent evolutionary strategies in technical workplaces: designers evolved for specialized individual expression, while engineers developed pack mentality for solving complex problems. It's basically workplace natural selection in action!

The placebo effect is neuroscience's greatest magic trick! Your brain is literally sitting there like "Nope, not gonna heal you" until you swallow some sugar pill, and suddenly it's all "FINE, I'll do my job now." The most ridiculous part? Your brain knows it's being tricked and STILL falls for it. It's like your nervous system is running on the honor system. "Oh, you took medicine? I guess I have to do something now." Meanwhile, pharmaceutical companies are charging $50 for pills that are basically just spicy tic-tacs. Your brain is simultaneously the smartest and dumbest organ you have.