915: Connoisseur - Revision history

Lettherebedarklight: /* Trivia */ add Category:Comics with a Spanish translation

2025-12-15T08:57:17Z

‎Trivia: add Category:Comics with a Spanish translation

Duralumin-here: /* Transcript */

2025-11-12T20:03:49Z

‎Transcript

FaviFake at 15:04, 29 August 2023

2023-08-29T15:04:56Z

FaviFake: New! Joe Biden

2023-08-29T13:09:26Z

New! Joe Biden

Tromag at 14:40, 28 June 2023

2023-06-28T14:40:46Z

172.70.134.107: /* Explanation */

2023-05-15T08:51:50Z

‎Explanation

Gunterkoenigsmann: A link to a connoisseur of Andy Warhol's film of eating a hamburger.

2022-12-08T21:02:45Z

A link to a connoisseur of Andy Warhol's film of eating a hamburger.

Gunterkoenigsmann: /* Explanation: Warhol's man eating a hamburger */

2022-12-08T20:57:28Z

‎Explanation: Warhol's man eating a hamburger

172.70.178.95: /* Transcript */

2022-06-16T16:54:22Z

‎Transcript

Iggynelix: /* Transcript */ cranberries panel reference

2022-05-19T16:23:05Z

‎Transcript: cranberries panel reference

← Older revision		Revision as of 08:57, 15 December 2025
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	[[Category:Sex]] <!-- Canadian surrealist porn -->		[[Category:Sex]] <!-- Canadian surrealist porn -->
	[[Category:Comics featuring Joe Biden]]		[[Category:Comics featuring Joe Biden]]
		+	[[Category:Comics with a Spanish translation]]

@@ Line 38: / Line 38: @@
 :[This panel is below the feet of the two characters from the previous panel. It goes further to the left than those two, and is wider than the previous panels, but it does not go much past the middle, so there is a blank white space to the left of this panel, below the first and most of the second panel. It shows a box, with two star burst on the surface from where two voices emanate from the inside. Over the top left of the panels frame is a small frame with a caption:]
 :A year later:
 :[The voice from left side of the box:]
 :Sure, most closed-mouth frames are boring, but in #415, the way the man's jaw frames the mayo on his hand is pure perfection, and—
 :[The voice from right side of the box:]
 :What a surprise- ''you'' praising a mayo frame. Listening to '''you''', I'd think there was nothing else in The Sandwich.
 :[The voice from right side of the box:]
 :Frankly, the light hitting J.B.'s collar through the lettuce would put #242 in my top ten even if he had ''no'' mayo on his hand at ''all''.

← Older revision		Revision as of 15:04, 29 August 2023
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	:Frankly, the light hitting J.B.'s collar through the lettuce would put #242 in my top ten even if he had ''no'' mayo on his hand at ''all''.		:Frankly, the light hitting J.B.'s collar through the lettuce would put #242 in my top ten even if he had ''no'' mayo on his hand at ''all''.
		+
		+	==Trivia==
		+	This is the first xkcd comic featuring [[Joe Biden]].

	{{comic discussion}}		{{comic discussion}}

@@ Line 8: / Line 8: @@
 ==Explanation==
-[[White Hat]] is fond of good {{w|wine}}, and he can probably distinguish slight differences in different types of wine, perhaps being the type that attends {{w|wine tasting}} parties. He doesn't like the cheap wine that Cueball has served for him (implying a cheap wine cannot be a good one, an opinion held by stereotypical wine snobs), looking with disgust at the label of the offending bottle.
+[[White Hat]] is fond of good {{w|wine}}, and he can probably distinguish slight differences in different types of wine, perhaps being the type that attends {{w|wine tasting}} parties. He doesn't like the cheap wine that Cueball has served for him (implying a cheap wine cannot be a good one, an opinion held by stereotypical wine snobs), looking with disgust at the label of the offending bottle. On the other hand, [[Cueball]] doesn't have a preference; all of them taste the same for him, so presumably he gets the cheaper ones. White Hat tells Cueball that if he just tried some really good wine and paid more attention he would discover a whole new world.
 Cueball's answer is the main message of the comic. He says that you can spend enough time focusing on the details of ''anything'' and develop an appreciation for the nuances. He lists a number of random categories that this is true of: {{w|house music}}, {{w|fonts}}, {{w|ants}}, ending with {{w|Wikipedia:Signatures|Wikipedia signatures}} and {{w|Canadian}} {{w|surrealist}} {{w|porn}}. He claims that, if you spend enough time focusing on any one subject, then you'll become a snobby '''{{w|connoisseur}}''' on that topic. This implies that wine drinking is simply a random hobby, no more valuable than any other.
-White Hat does not seem to like this implication, and claims that some things have "more depth" than others. In many western societies, wine appreciation is a class signifier, and is treated as a mark of culture and education. White Hat appears to embrace this mindset, implying that there's an inherent quality in learning to distinguish "good" from "bad" wines, and that failing to do so means missing out on valuable experiences. Cueball counters this, maintaining that that same level of appreciation could be taken from any experience. As an extreme example, he choosing something as obscure as 500 pictures of {{w|Joe Biden}}, then {{w|Vice President of the United States}} under {{w|Barack Obama}}, eating a sandwich. He claims that if people were locked up in a box with those pictures for a year (therefore being forced to focus on them, for want of other stimulation), they would end up being connoisseurs with the same vehemence regarding which pictures are good (and what makes a picture good) as any wine connoisseur.
+White Hat does not seem to like this implication, and claims that some things have "more depth" than others. In many western societies, wine appreciation is a class signifier, and is treated as a mark of culture and education. White Hat appears to embrace this mindset, implying that there's an inherent quality in learning to distinguish "good" from "bad" wines, and that failing to do so means missing out on valuable experiences. Cueball counters this, maintaining that that same level of appreciation could be taken from any experience. As an extreme example, he chooses something as obscure as 500 pictures of [[Joe Biden]], then {{w|Vice President of the United States}} under {{w|Barack Obama}}, eating a sandwich. He claims that if people were locked up in a box with those pictures for a year (therefore being forced to focus on them, for want of other stimulation), they would end up being connoisseurs with the same vehemence regarding which pictures are good (and what makes a picture good) as any wine connoisseur.
-White Hat claims that this is an exaggeration, but Cueball takes this as a challenge so in the last panel, apparently White Hat and Cueball are actually running this experiment. The final panel shows a box containing at least two people arguing over the relative qualities of what appear to be the photos Cueball referenced earlier. The argument sounds very much like a pair of wine aficionados debating which vintages are best, displaying strong opinions about minute details and invented categories.
+White Hat claims that this is an exaggeration, but Cueball takes this as a challenge so in the last panel, apparently White Hat and Cueball are actually running this experiment. The final panel shows a box containing at least two people arguing over the relative qualities of what appear to be the photos Cueball referenced earlier. The argument sounds very much like a pair of wine aficionados debating which vintages are best, displaying strong opinions about minute details and invented categories. Specialized interests and the people involved in them are used again, with ants being the subject of [[1610: Fire Ants]],  typefaces in [[590: Papyrus]] and [[736: Cemetery]], plastic straws in [[1095: Crazy Straws]], porn-video quality in [[598: Porn]], and common colds in [[2535: Common Cold Viruses]]. In [[1534: Beer]], Cueball also argue slight differences in alcohol brands don't make much difference (in 915 "Wine all tastes the same to me."; in 1534, "maybe we should just admit that all beer tastes kind of bad and everyone's just pretending?") and people just pretend due to social pressure.
 The title text presents the same idea in a different wording. Our brains scale the quality of all things the same way, with a subjective impression of the difference between best and worst largely the same, regardless of what is being evaluated.  Things with a narrow dynamic range, like the Wikipedia signatures or pictures of Biden mentioned the comic, have their negligible differences in quality expanded so that the best are as good as the best of anything, and inversely for the worst.
@@ Line 52: / Line 50: @@
 :Frankly, the light hitting J.B.'s collar through the lettuce would put #242 in my top ten even if he had ''no'' mayo on his hand at ''all''.
 {{comic discussion}}
@@ Line 69: / Line 61: @@
 [[Category:Music]]  <!-- House Music -->
 [[Category:Sex]]  <!-- Canadian surrealist porn -->

@@ Line 12: / Line 12: @@
 On the other hand, [[Cueball]] doesn't have a preference; all of them taste the same for him, so presumably he gets the cheaper ones. White Hat tells Cueball that if he just tried some really good wine and paid more attention he would discover a whole new world.
-Cueball's answer is the main message of the comic. He says that wine is no different from anything else in this respect, and makes a list starting with the wine but then going past {{w|house music}}, {{w|fonts}}, {{w|ants}}, ending with {{w|Wikipedia:Signatures|Wikipedia signatures}} and {{w|Canadian}} {{w|surrealist}} {{w|porn}}. His point being if you spend enough time focusing on any one subject, then you'll become a snobby '''{{w|connoisseur}}''' on that topic.
+Cueball's answer is the main message of the comic. He says that you can spend enough time focusing on the details of ''anything'' and develop an appreciation for the nuances. He lists a number of random categories that this is true of: {{w|house music}}, {{w|fonts}}, {{w|ants}}, ending with {{w|Wikipedia:Signatures|Wikipedia signatures}} and {{w|Canadian}} {{w|surrealist}} {{w|porn}}. He claims that, if you spend enough time focusing on any one subject, then you'll become a snobby '''{{w|connoisseur}}''' on that topic. This implies that wine drinking is simply a random hobby, no more valuable than any other.
-White Hat tries to defend wine by saying that some things have more depth than others (wine being among them), but Cueball challenges him on this by choosing something as obscure as 500 pictures of {{w|Joe Biden}}, then {{w|Vice President of the United States}} under {{w|Barack Obama}}, eating a sandwich as an example. He claims that if people were locked up in a box with those pictures for a year, they would end up being connoisseurs with the same vehemence regarding the best picture as wine tasters can be about the best wine.
+White Hat does not seem to like this implication, and claims that some things have "more depth" than others. In many western societies, wine appreciation is a class signifier, and is treated as a mark of culture and education. White Hat appears to embrace this mindset, implying that there's an inherent quality in learning to distinguish "good" from "bad" wines, and that failing to do so means missing out on valuable experiences. Cueball counters this, maintaining that that same level of appreciation could be taken from any experience. As an extreme example, he choosing something as obscure as 500 pictures of {{w|Joe Biden}}, then {{w|Vice President of the United States}} under {{w|Barack Obama}}, eating a sandwich. He claims that if people were locked up in a box with those pictures for a year (therefore being forced to focus on them, for want of other stimulation), they would end up being connoisseurs with the same vehemence regarding which pictures are good (and what makes a picture good) as any wine connoisseur.
-White Hat claims that this is an exaggeration, but Cueball takes this as a challenge so in the last panel, apparently White Hat and Cueball are actually running this experiment to see if they will end up concentrating on slight differences among the pictures of Joe Biden eating a sandwich, just in the same way that White Hat concentrates on slight differences among different kinds of wine. The result of the experiment is clearly going to Cueball's side, the discussion being mainly between the importance of mayo or the light through lettuce from the sandwiches.
+White Hat claims that this is an exaggeration, but Cueball takes this as a challenge so in the last panel, apparently White Hat and Cueball are actually running this experiment. The final panel shows a box containing at least two people arguing over the relative qualities of what appear to be the photos Cueball referenced earlier. The argument sounds very much like a pair of wine aficionados debating which vintages are best, displaying strong opinions about minute details and invented categories.
 The title text presents the same idea in a different wording. Our brains scale the quality of all things the same way, with a subjective impression of the difference between best and worst largely the same, regardless of what is being evaluated.  Things with a narrow dynamic range, like the Wikipedia signatures or pictures of Biden mentioned the comic, have their negligible differences in quality expanded so that the best are as good as the best of anything, and inversely for the worst.

@@ Line 20: / Line 20: @@
 This mentality may also be applied to online groups based on any subject (such as television shows, films, and other hobbies and interests), where arguments and vehement, stubborn opinions are common despite the fairly unimportant subject. On the other side a man eating a hamburger was a famous [https://channel.louisiana.dk/video/jorgen-leth-andy-warhol-eating-hamburger art project by Andy Warhol].
-The title text presents the same idea in a different wording. The "scale of our brains" refers to a concept similar to Richard Dawkins' {{w|Middle World}}, where things too small (say, smaller than the point of a pin) or too big (bigger than what we can see from a mountaintop) are just out of our comprehension, so the things our brains understand must be neither too small nor too big, i.e. the "middle world".
+The title text presents the same idea in a different wording. Our brains scale the quality of all things the same way, with a subjective impression of the difference between best and worst largely the same, regardless of what is being evaluated.  Things with a narrow dynamic range, like the Wikipedia signatures or pictures of Biden mentioned the comic, have their negligible differences in quality expanded so that the best are as good as the best of anything, and inversely for the worst.
 ==Transcript==

@@ Line 38: / Line 38: @@
 :[This panel has no border (aka a 'frameless panel') and is next to but aligned further down than the first three panels. It shows a zoom out of both White Hat and Cueball again. White Hat now has both glass and bottle held down at his side. Cueball holds his glass down, but tilted away from him. A small puddle of wine is on the floor next to Cueball.]
 :White Hat: But some things do have more depth than others.
-:Cueball: If you locked people in a box for a year with 500 still frames of Joe Biden eating a sandwich, by the end they'd be adamant that some were great and some were terrible.
+:Cueball: If you locked people in a box for a year with 500 still frames of Joe Biden eating a sandwich, by the end they'd be adamant that some were great and some terrible.
 :White Hat: You're exaggerating.
 :Cueball: Oh, really?