836: Sickness

2026-05-07T03:21:41Z

Orpplejuice: Attempt at a clearer explanation of p-value

{{comic
| number = 836
| date = December 20, 2010
| title = Sickness
| image = sickness.png
| titletext = At least, with p<0.05 confidence.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic was published 2 months after [[Randall]]'s then fiancée, now wife, was diagnosed with breast cancer (see [[:Category:Cancer]]), which is likely what inspired this comic - even though [[Cueball]] sounds like he is the one afflicted by the sickness. The comic is thus about the existential questions that might arise from such a crisis. The moral could be interpreted as that you shouldn't begrudge your fellow human being, regardless of where they find comfort.

Also, any sentence is instantly funny if, at the end of it, you address your audience as "bitches". It may also be a reference to [[54: Science]].

"Slings and arrows of fortune" is an allusion to the "{{w|To be, or not to be}}" soliloquy in William Shakespeare's ''{{w|Hamlet, Prince of Denmark}}''. Hamlet asks himself whether it is "Nobler in the mind to suffer / The Slings and Arrows of outrageous Fortune" (to resign oneself to one's fate and endure what may come), or to "take Arms against a Sea of troubles, / and by opposing end them" (to commit suicide and end suffering); he ultimately concludes that we would rather face the dangers and pains we know on Earth than whatever unknown new ones may come in the afterlife. Cueball appears to agree with Hamlet, thanking "the people who refused to gracefully accept the ineffability of reality": Religion and spirituality can give him the moral courage to face his death, but he'd much prefer to not die in the first place, and won't have to, thanks to medical and scientific innovation. (Actually he will have to eventually.{{Citation needed}} Medical and scientific innovation simply delay the inevitable events of death and entropy.)

Science often involves making a hypotheses about something (such as a vaccine reducing the chance of getting infected by a certain disease), and then testing those hypotheses. In the title text, a “p-value” (probability value) is mentioned, which is a measure of confidence that the hypothesis under scrutiny is true. A p-value of less than 0.05 is commonly used in areas of science as an indicator of significant results. It means that there is a less than 5% chance that the observed results in a particular study would occur if the hypothesis was not true (Note that this does NOT mean that there is a less than 5% chance that the hypothesis itself is not true). This could be a pun on Cueball’s newfound confidence with science, or simply a correction to the last line that some tools may not be guaranteed to work.

==Transcript==
:[The three panels are arranged diagonally, upper left to bottom right.]
:[Two people, Cueball and White Hat, are walking past a tree.]
:White Hat: So, has this sickness opened you up to looking for answers beyond science?
:Cueball: ...no, not really.

:[Cueball turns to face White Hat.]
:Cueball: We've groped for comfort before the slings and arrows of fortune for millennia, and I begrudge nobody their sources of solace.
:Cueball: But Science provides ''tools''.
:Cueball: $100 billion a year in scientific studies and medical R&D has bought us some pretty damn powerful slings and arrows of our own.
:Cueball: This world is amazing, and I'm going to live to experience more of it thanks to people who refused to gracefully accept the ineffability of reality.
:Cueball: I find my courage where I can, but I take my weapons from science.

:Cueball: Because they ''work'', bitches.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Cancer]]
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Religion]]

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836: Sickness