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Category: Humor
Posted on: February 28, 2008 10:28 AM, by PZ Myers
Where it doesn't descend into bad poop jokes (the good poop jokes are funny), this collection of photoshopped book covers has its moments.
I like this one: it's the book Brockman told Dawkins that he'd never get published, because it's too controversial — although, of course, it would probably provoke exactly the same cries of outrage his last book did, for exactly the same reasons.
This book, on the other hand…what's inappropriate about that? I want to own this!
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Comments
Posted by: Ted D | February 28, 2008 10:36 AM
The second one is probably the single greatest thing I will see all week. As the youth of today would have it: lol. lol indeed.
Posted by: October Mermaid | February 28, 2008 10:46 AM
My favorite's "The Invisible Child-Eating Crocodiles THAT LIVE ABSOLUTELY EVERYWHERE."
Posted by: Ted D | February 28, 2008 10:48 AM
I'm definitely telling my niece and nephew about the crocodiles next time I see them...
Posted by: BlueIndependent | February 28, 2008 10:54 AM
You know you are an absolute geekwad when you laugh literally OUT LOUD at the Dr. Seuss one. That juxtaposition of the cute Seussian fish with the language of scholarly research was too much for me!
The Claus Delusion will be on my reading list come Thanksgiving.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | February 28, 2008 11:00 AM
But... "fish"? On the cover of a cladistics textbook?
Posted by: Fastlane | February 28, 2008 11:09 AM
You can get "Cat in the Hat" and a few other Dr. Suess books in Latin now, ya know. =)
Posted by: thalarctos | February 28, 2008 11:10 AM
David, if "red fish, blue fish" isn't a phenetic approach, I don't know what is--we'll just have to spot them the term "cladistics".
I still laughed my ass off at it.
Posted by: Slyer | February 28, 2008 11:18 AM
"You can get "Cat in the Hat" and a few other Dr. Suess books in Latin now, ya know. =)"
Awesome! I'm teaching myself Latin.
Posted by: wÒÓ† | February 28, 2008 11:21 AM
(.)(.)
Posted by: Jeff | February 28, 2008 11:22 AM
Yes, the title of the Seuss one should be "One Actinopterygii, Two Actinopterygii, Red Actinopterygii, Blue Actinopterygii".
Posted by: Carlie | February 28, 2008 11:32 AM
I suggest that we commission Cuttlefish to come up with text for the Seuss book. I daresay he would do a fine job of it.
Posted by: Marco | February 28, 2008 11:43 AM
Anybody here happens to know the title of the original black and white sheep book? The design was copied here in Switzerland by a far right and racist party and I wouldn't mind raising that fact... Thanks
Posted by: Eamon Knight | February 28, 2008 12:01 PM
My favorite's "The Invisible Child-Eating Crocodiles THAT LIVE ABSOLUTELY EVERYWHERE."
That one's good, but my pick is the Hobbit-cover spoof. (And of course, the Seuss take-offs. Nothing like juxtaposing one's early childhood nostalgia with a bit of grown-up humour).
Posted by: Rey Fox | February 28, 2008 12:07 PM
But... "fish"? On the cover of a cladistics textbook?
Quiet, you.
Posted by: Kseniya | February 28, 2008 12:08 PM
Whatever happened to Daddy Drinks Because You Cry. Is that out of print?
Posted by: Joe Felsenstein | February 28, 2008 12:10 PM
What's unusual about the second one? The servers at the Molecular Evolution Workshop at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, where some of us lecture every summer on constructing phylogenies using computers, have in the past been called "redfish", "bluefish" and "newfish" -- I think "bluefish" is still active and the director of the course has his email address on it.
Posted by: Brownian, OM | February 28, 2008 12:25 PM
Whatever happened to Daddy Drinks Because You Cry. Is that out of print?
Pop never got around to writing it. He explains why in his tell-all autobiography I Couldn't Come to Your Birthday Party Because That Goddamn Liberal Feminist Judge Took Away My License and There's No Goddamn Way I'm Gonna Spend All Goddamn Day On a Goddamn Bus Fulla Losers With This Hangover and Why Don't You Stop Picking Daddy's Ass and Go Ask Your Mother If She's Still A Whore?
Posted by: Phoenix Woman | February 28, 2008 12:27 PM
So cladistics is to Linnaean taxonomy as online catalog/Library of Congress systems are to the Dewey Decimal System?
Posted by: Julie Stahlhut | February 28, 2008 12:32 PM
I'm kind of fond of "Nuclear Launch Protocol and Command Codes for Single-Person Authorization via Non-Secure Civilian Communication Systems." Wish I'd had that one as a kid!
Then again, our advanced weaponry has already been in the hands of poorly socialized kindergartners for a long, long, time.
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | February 28, 2008 12:43 PM
Pop never got around to writing it. He explains why in his tell-all autobiography I Couldn't Come to Your Birthday Party Because That Goddamn Liberal Feminist Judge Took Away My License and There's No Goddamn Way I'm Gonna Spend All Goddamn Day On a Goddamn Bus Fulla Losers With This Hangover and Why Don't You Stop Picking Daddy's Ass and Go Ask Your Mother If She's Still A Whore?
But he still loves me, right?
Posted by: misterbowen | February 28, 2008 12:59 PM
@20 "But he still loves me, right?"
Only when Daddy hits honey. Only when he hits.
Posted by: jmd | February 28, 2008 1:02 PM
"But... "fish"? On the cover of a cladistics textbook?"
That's what makes it so inappropriate!
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | February 28, 2008 1:09 PM
Only when Daddy hits honey. Only when he hits.
Patriarchy: Fun for the whole family!
Posted by: Abbie | February 28, 2008 1:13 PM
Speaking of books by Dawkins, his new one just sold for 3.5 million!
Just a Theory?
Posted by: The Science Pundit | February 28, 2008 1:26 PM
My favorite one was also the invisible crocodiles, until the Ayn Rand primer. Yes, that was definitely my favorite.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | February 28, 2008 2:00 PM
Wow, Joe Felsenstein (#16)! It's like, cladistics celebrities right here with us grotty plebe commenters!
So, ignoring Marjanović's complaint (which is, presumably, that "fish" isn't a clade unless it includes us tetrapods)(which, presuming to speak for us tetrapods, I have no problem with) a slight improvement on that title might be One fish, two fishes, red fish, blue fish.
Posted by: thalarctos | February 28, 2008 2:06 PM
This is going to hurt me worse than it hurts you.
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | February 28, 2008 2:09 PM
Only when Daddy hits honey. Only when he hits.
This is going to hurt me worse than it hurts you.
And of course, the title of the book is, "Just wait 'til your father gets home!"
Posted by: Muffin | February 28, 2008 2:18 PM
"Sharing is for losers - An Ayn Rand primer". You gotta love that one.
Posted by: Lee Brimmicombe-Wood | February 28, 2008 2:19 PM
One fish,
Two fish,
Red fish,
Blue fish,
I'm no scientific hack, sir!
I know all about sister taxa,
Phylum, class and family
All part of a cladistic tree,
Two forks,
Three forks,
Red storks,
Green storks,
What evolutionary potential!
My cladogram is exponential!
Posted by: Cuttlefish, OM | February 28, 2008 2:22 PM
@11--
To me, cladistics are much easier and Seussical when we adopt the nomenclature of "kinds", as that ancient, accurate science text "the bible" does in Noah's tale:
One fish
Two fish
Red fish
Blue fish
Shellfish
Starfish
Jeebus car-fish
This one looks a little odd
This one's salmon; this one's cod
And all these fish were made by God
Yes, some are red and some are blue
All lived when the earth was new
Some are finned
Some are twinned
And some went blind because man sinned.
Why are they
Such varied creatures?
I do not know
Go ask your preachers.
Some are round
Some thin as sticks
The thin one has
A crucifix
From there to here
From here to there
Funny kinds are everywhere
Here are some
Who like to pray
They pray, for play,
All night and day.
Oh me! Oh my!
Oh me! Oh mh!
What a lot
Of funny kinds go by.
...
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | February 28, 2008 2:25 PM
Why are they
Such varied creatures?
I do not know
Go ask your preachers.
Um, to eat.
Posted by: aiabx | February 28, 2008 2:28 PM
Dr. Seuss? You're .. alive?
Posted by: Monado, FCD | February 28, 2008 2:45 PM
"One teleost, two teleosts"?
Posted by: Grand Moff Texan | February 28, 2008 3:22 PM
And who could forget _The Grinch's Ten Inches_?
.
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | February 28, 2008 3:24 PM
And who could forget _The Grinch's Ten Inches_?
*fans self*
Posted by: mona | February 28, 2008 3:57 PM
"Sharing is for losers - An Ayn Rand primer". You gotta love that one.
Oh, definiteley. My favorite, along with "Nuclear Launch Protocol and Command Codes for Single-Person Authorization via Non-Secure Civilian Communication Systems." Now that I think about it, they might be the only two books that George Bush read as a child. Great, now I'm feeling suspicious.
Posted by: Jim Harrison | February 28, 2008 4:09 PM
How about: Survival of the Fiddies: a Child's Guide to the Evolution of Marine Animals.
Posted by: Check This Out | February 28, 2008 4:17 PM
Have you all seen this or discussed this?
Richard Dawkins was right - this is (mental) child abuse. Videos included.
BBC: Baby Bible Bashers
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | February 28, 2008 4:33 PM
Look at me
Look at me
Look at me now
It's fun to have fun
But you have to know how
Best Seuss rhyme ever.
Posted by: Interrobang | February 28, 2008 5:05 PM
And Lee Brimmicombe-Wood wins the thread, even if "hack, sir" does not in any sense rhyme with "taxa" (it's not even a good eye-rhyme), it still made me whoop. Well done.
(Next, Lee Brimmicombe-Wood is going to tell me they speak a dialect that isn't fully rhotic. Look that up in your Funk & Wagnalls!)
Posted by: Lee Brimmicombe-Wood | February 28, 2008 5:27 PM
Funk you, motherfunker!
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | February 28, 2008 5:30 PM
Funk you, motherfunker!
One need only look to Minnesota's purple midget overlord of funk to know the meaning of life: Dance, Music, Sex, Romance.
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | February 28, 2008 5:35 PM
And all enjoy a welcomed chuckle.
Thanks Interrobang and Lee Brimmincombe-Wood!
At your small expense we enjoy
A modicum of mirth.
Such as you can teach every boy
To love his time on Earth!
The company here is always fun, if not educational, if not confounding, if not rasping, if not . . . Hey, what's that you got?
Posted by: Brownian, OM | February 28, 2008 5:42 PM
Next, Lee Brimmicombe-Wood is going to tell me they speak a dialect that isn't fully rhotic. Look that up in your Funk & Wagnalls!
One need only look to Minnesota's purple midget overlord of funk to know the meaning of life: Dance, Music, Sex, Romance.
Nerd-porn and Prince references.
I just came.
Posted by: PZ Myers | February 28, 2008 5:46 PM
Oh, man. You know I'm the janitor around here, and I have to clean these messes up. I go through like a gallon of bleach every day.
Posted by: Brownian, OM | February 28, 2008 5:47 PM
Blame MAJeff and his pee fetish.
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | February 28, 2008 5:53 PM
I cannot be held responsible for the power of my words. My frame-fu is strong....and thexthy.
Posted by: stavros | February 28, 2008 6:48 PM
PZ, you should know better not to use the word "photoshopped" or you might get sued by Adobe!
Posted by: Lee Brimmicombe-Wood | February 28, 2008 7:15 PM
"One need only look to Minnesota's purple midget overlord of funk to know the meaning of life: Dance, Music, Sex, Romance."
Does this mean PZ is the Professor formerly known as 'Squiggle'?
Posted by: October Mermaid | February 28, 2008 7:25 PM
#39
That is horrifying.
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | February 28, 2008 10:14 PM
One of my few "six degrees" type things (well actually two of them) relate back to Prince. When I was working in the domestic violence service sector, one of the women I worked with had been a teacher of his in elementary school (and he happened to go to school at what is now the Sabathani Center, where OutFront Minnesota, the primary LGBT organization, with whom I've done a lot of work, is located)...and the wife of one of my friend's co-workers used to be one of his dancers. Or something like that.
That little guy can play, and he can lay down the funk like very few other people working today.
And it was awesome while playing pool at the bar the other day to hear "Jungle Love" by Morris Day and the Time ("Ice Cream Castles"-get it!) come on the jukebox. Representing for Minnehopeless in Beantown!
Posted by: shane | February 28, 2008 10:26 PM
I'd forgotten that for the last 7 years GW and his cronies have had the nuclear football in their gosh darned hands. I wonder why they've never punted?
Posted by: shane | February 28, 2008 10:37 PM
Prince my no longer be a Sexy MF.
Stuff about converting to Jehovah's Witnesses and censoring his lyrics
Posted by: Russell Blackford | February 29, 2008 12:00 AM
I love the photo of Daniel Dennett on the cover of the Dawkins book. I wonder how much he was paid for that.
Posted by: maxi | February 29, 2008 7:43 AM
"The Invisible Child-Eating Crocodiles THAT LIVE ABSOLUTELY EVERYWHERE."
Love it!
Posted by: maxi | February 29, 2008 8:17 AM
Also:
"WHERE'S MY FUCKING HEAD?! A Children's Guide to the Islamic Justice System"
Classic.
Posted by: wildcardjack | February 29, 2008 9:40 AM
Whatever happened to Daddy Drinks Because You Cry. Is that out of print?
I don't have that, but I do have "Daddy Needs a Drink" in stock.
Some of the gag titles in here would make best sellers if you bunch of jokers could get around to writing them.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | February 29, 2008 12:28 PM
No, cladistics is a method of phylogenetics (how to reconstruct a phylogenetic tree), not of classification. The Wikipedia article is trash.
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | February 29, 2008 12:31 PM
The Wikipedia article is trash.
That just can't be so....impossible.
Posted by: Brownian, OM | February 29, 2008 12:50 PM
The Wikipedia article is trash.
Well then fix it, dear David, dear David, dear David/
Then fix it dear David, Dear David, fix it.
(I write partially in jest. It's a large article, and you probably don't have the time to give it the overhaul that it needs. Someone should fix it, and I can't.)
Posted by: thalarctos | February 29, 2008 1:24 PM
I like how the books are ordered from least to most disturbing, and cladistics Seuss is toward the end. That means they found cladistics more disturbing than, among other things, child cannibalism, racial slurs, animal cruelty, and funny tapeworm stories.
The list must have been compiled by a strict pheneticist.
Posted by: Dear Liza (aka Украинка) | February 29, 2008 1:35 PM
Brownian, you might explain that cultural reference to dear Mr. David. :-D
Posted by: LARA | February 29, 2008 1:55 PM
How about:
"The Cat in the Hat" and "The Cat in the Hat comes Back," a two book series in Quantum Mechanics.
Posted by: Brownian, OM | February 29, 2008 1:58 PM
Brownian, you might explain that cultural reference to dear Mr. David. :-D
You mean not everyone has been exposed to the exact same cultural and historical references as me? This is what happens when you take God out of the schools.
Very well. The version sung by Harry Belafonte and Odetta is wonderful (then again, Mr. B could sing the ingredients off the back of a Pert Plus bottle and it would be wonderful.)
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | February 29, 2008 2:24 PM
not bad, LARA, but shouldn't it be more like:
The Cat in the Box
The Dead Cat in the Box
The Cat in the Box Comes Back...or Does It?
Posted by: BlueIndependent | February 29, 2008 2:24 PM
Minnesota's purple midget overlord of funk
From now on I will think this every time I see his face. =)
Posted by: Rebecca Haden | February 29, 2008 2:27 PM
I love the Seuss variant -- just in time for his birthday, Read Across America Day!
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | February 29, 2008 2:29 PM
Pan-tene-a
Pro-V-a
Pantene-a, she take me money and run Venezuela
(Women over for-ty!)
Posted by: Kseniya | February 29, 2008 2:56 PM
LMAO!
Posted by: Brownian, OM | February 29, 2008 3:20 PM
Not bad, but this has been my favourite ever since I heard him sing it on the Muppet Show:
Disodium EDTA, glycol distearate,
1-octadecanol, lather, rinse, repeat!
Ammonium laureth sulfate, dimethicone 350,
DMDM hydantoin, lather, rinse, repeat!
Sodium dihydrogen citrate, sodium orthophosphate,
methylchloroisothiazolinone, lather, rinse, repeat!
O-oh, use Pert Plus,
A-ha, for fine hair!
O-oh, use Pert Plus,
A-ha, for fine hair!
Posted by: mothra | February 29, 2008 3:52 PM
I am e-mailing for permission to use the Seuss cover when teaching Systematic Entomology next fall. Yeah, its 'fish' but this is too good to pass by.
David is (of course) quite correct. The Linnaean system, because it is typological (think postage stamp collecting) confounded a number of ideas that we now recognizes as separate concepts: classification, identification, and nomenclature. Also, as David alludes to, because his system was by just over 100 years, pre-Darwinian (speaking Zoology here- his botanical works go back another decade or so), phyletic concepts are nowhere to be seen. The idea of relatedness between species had not been developed.
Posted by: Sven DiMIlo | February 29, 2008 4:56 PM
yeah!
Where are my damn maracas?
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | February 29, 2008 8:09 PM
I agree that it is morally questionable to complain about Wikipedia. I left a comment maybe half a year ago on another talk page (probably that on phylogenetic nomenclature, which I created... and where I sorely need to bring the reference list into some kind of shape...) that I would one day rewrite the article. But as you write, it's a large article... and I'm already supposed to do between 5 and 10 other things, as opposed to reading Pharyngula... So all I can do at the moment is warn people to ignore it.
Actually I know that one. The tune, anyway. I have no idea what the original text is or what language it is in (I didn't follow the link in comment 65). On the other hand, Dr Seuss has never been on TV or on paper over here :-)
Posted by: Seamyst | March 1, 2008 9:01 PM
#13 - I've looked at the covers three times now, and I can't figure out which one is supposed to be the Hobbit-spoof. Which one is it? Am I being exceedingly dense, or is it subtle?
Posted by: Smilodon | March 2, 2008 7:37 AM
I missed The Hobbit spoof too. The two covers displayed here are hoots, especially the Suess cladistics primer. The Ayn Rand and missle system ones also made me laugh out loud, not the thing to do at 7 am when your partner is still sleeping! Thanks for making my morning, Pharyngula!
Posted by: MartinM | March 2, 2008 7:57 AM
Well, that rather depends. How subtle would you consider a dragon lying atop a huge mound of gold next to an urn with suspiciously Tolkein-esque runic inscriptions, on a scale from 1 to 10?
Posted by: Smilodon | March 2, 2008 8:47 AM
Ah, now I see which one is The Hobbit spoof. When I stumbled across it earlier (too early!) this morning I did think Tolkein.