Existential Crisis
Weird new art! Cool? Cool.
At some point, I’m sure, many people face questions about their existence and the existence of the universe. What are we here for? What is our purpose? Are jelly donuts really jelly donuts? I’m here to answer your questions:
Maybe.
I hope that helped.
Ah, science, bane of my youth. It’s no wonder some people are terrified of it when you really think about it. While it is true that I am a big fan of science (I wanted to get involved in every scientific field when I was a kid, still kind of do) it is also true that science nearly destroyed me as a person. Listening to ideas about the Big Bang in seventh grade was a huge mind fuck in a serious way and gave rise to a lot of weird thinking.
You see, people that have to be funny are generally very negative people. Comedy is how some people interface and cope with a world that doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense. If you’re into comedy and also into writing (as I am) then odds are good that you’re pretty messed up. When I learned about the Big Bang, I started to have existential crises. I hadn’t believed in God for a while at that point but this one theory lead to a whole slew of thoughts that I couldn’t really cope with. I began to think about how a universe (clearly a something) could come from nothing. That made me reconsider a deity of some variety but that just gave me the same problem. Where would that deity come from? Then I began to question reality itself, question my existence, and question my questioning.
Eventually I decided to say screw it and start drawing comics. Life is pretty sweet, whatever the purpose of it may be and there’s not enough time in the day to wonder, without real purpose, what it’s all about. Examining our relationships, interactions, and ourselves is complicated enough without the metaphysical implications of existential crises added to the mix. It’s awfully difficult to enjoy what we have when we try to wrap our heads around what amounts to unsolvable problems.
That’s not to say we should never consider them, but being consumed by them makes you a pretty miserable person.
I say this because I know first hand.
Fortunately, it seems a bit more difficult to think yourself out of existence than I’ve made it out to be in this comic.
Nice to know that I’m not the only one who has frequent existential crises. Everyone I know is pretty much sick of me going “is this even real!?” and such.
I get around it by assuming the same thing someone in the matrix would. This universe has rules. It has cause and effect. Whether or not I exist is immaterial to my existence. Death is death is death. If I’m someone’s dream, I still die in a dream. If I’m apart of a simulation, then I might as well enjoy my life for however brief it might be. You will NEVER know if somethings real as long as your limited by human senses.
I AM SMERLIN THE FIRST!
awesome comic!
Unfortunately science is as much a religion as anything else out there that’s more theology based… A lot of it’s theories need a leap of faith to hold them as ‘true’. Sure, science has lots of things it’s proven to be true, but things like the big bang are just a theory, yeah? I kinda forget what we’ve based that theory on.. the fact that the ‘Verse is still expanding, was it? There could be an ebb and flow out there.. a tidal shift of the universe that takes a billion years to revert in it’s cycle, for all we know. Science has a lot of awesomeness to it (as do your comics), but a lot of science needs to be taken with a grain of salt.
I read your comment and puked a little.
Yeah, I understand that most people want to keep science and religion as far apart from each other as can be, while I’ve put them right next to each other.. ‘n I’ll fully admit that first sentence is a horrible choice of wording. I don’t mean to say science IS a religion, just that there are some similarities between the two. Maybe one day I’ll approach the subject with better articulation. Though honestly it makes me laugh that this comment has gotten the reaction it has gotten.. it’s almost a blasphemy unto science, is it not?
I have to agree with you about the fact there are similarities. That’s why I hope that in the future people will know a lot more about the Universe and all this “have faith” thing will be an old joke (like the “animals are created spontaneously”).
Though, being that we don’t see reality as it is, but rather we interpret it, maybe this will be impossible…
arrrarsdgfadfhrdarrrrrrr dammit.
I will give you credit for saying ‘Verse
In the beginning was nothing-which exploded.
Of course, this was thought a bad idea and made many people confused and/or angry but…
Oh, what’s with the new style? 😀
Glad to know I’m not the only one. 😀
Komadori: Science is not a religion.
There is an explicit understanding in science that everything we know may be wrong. Sometimes (though it is understandably uncommon, given the way that the process of science works), a well-established theory will be completely overturned by new thinkers and new evidence. This doesn’t necessarily negate what we already know (think Newton vs Einstein), but it does get us a little closer to reality.
The Big Bang is not taken on faith. It is taken on evidence. A lot of it, to be precise. We’ve even made predictions about how the universe should look based on this theory, and those predictions have held out in later observations (this is a VERY important achievement for a theory — validating or falsifying predictions is how we determine if a theory is valid or not). If we make a new observation tomorrow that conflicts with our theory, then we either need to update our model, or discard it. That’s how science works. It is a process. It is not a set of facts, and not a set of beliefs. And it most definitely is not a religion.
(BTW, you seem to be equating the layman’s definition of the word ‘theory’ with the scientific community’s definition of ‘Theory’. Science does not ‘prove’ things – mathematics is the only field capable of offering proofs – and ‘Theory’ or ‘Law’ is what science calls its best supported models. There’s no such thing as ‘just a theory’ in science.)
I feel like this points out a very clear distinction from religion.
Science updates.
Religion stays the same.
Science accepts its mistakes and updates its resume with the changes.
Religion piggy-backs on scientific claims that gain clout where they previously completely denied them (see creationism->intelligent design)
Science attempts to discover and welcomes challenges.
Religion denounces changes and attempts to stay stagnant in a changing world.
Science admits when something isn’t entirely known and seeks to find out more.
Religion claims unknowns are where God fills the holes.
That being said, there are still unknowns in Science we accept tentatively as facts (“theories”) until proven wrong.
Either way, Cat-God is adorable.
“Some think it [the universe] had no beginning and will have no end; while others have made bold to name its creator and describe its construction. The latter caused me the most astonishment, since they posited some god as the cretor of the universe, but didn’t tell us further where he came from or where he stood when he fitted it all together. Yet it is impossible to conceive of time and place before the creation of the universe.”
(Lucian of Samosata in his dialogue ‘Icaromenippus’, 1800 years ago. Some things never change. ;))
It’s times like this I’m glad I got out of physics and into the trades. The universe can do what it wants.. I’m just gonna build nifty things out of wood.
This is where you have to start looking into the idea of the multiverse, and how this is the universe we exist mainly because this is the only universe so far we can exist in. The Universe came from “nothing”, in a way, but that doesn’t mean there was nothing before it. Just that anything before it compressed/decayed into nothing (or nearly nothing). Remember, every ounce of matter in the entire universe fit into something the size of a grapefruit at some point in time. High school science teachers really should do a better job of making the whole thing sound less… mystical 🙂
My friend seems to have existential crises when he drinks too much red wine, which means I am never taking him to an art gallery opening…
I immediately thought this was a guest comic from Boxer Hockey. I liked the old art style, but that’s just me. Why the sudden change?
What the heck is boxer hockey? As for why the change, I’m not sure really, I like randomly trying new things. I realized Lil K couldn’t be terrifically expressive as he was and I wanted to be able to draw more goofy faces and poses. I’ve been watching Adventure Time randomly and I’ve seen a couple of episodes of Flapjack (which I’m not terribly fond of, but I do like the ridiculous character animation) that kind of inspired me to try something different. Not sure I’ll do it like this every time but it was fun to experiment 😀 I definitely like not using black inks at least.
Durp, I just looked it up, and I can see what you mean haha I really love this guy’s art style! :O Is the writing any good? I’ll have to give it a read sometime, perhaps.
Oh geez, Adventure Time is easily my favorite show ever… Boxer Hockey is pretty good, but he does multi-comic stories frequently so you kinda need to start from the beginning.
Experiment away! I’ll keep reading as long as you keep updating.
My brother and my girlfriend both love Adventure Time and so I kind of got sucked into it. Now whenever I see it on and I have a few minutes I -have- to watch it hahah Yeah I could see that BH is not something you can jump right into pretty easily, but I think I’ll give it a shot. I tend to actually stay away from reading other web comics for some reason. The only ones I’ve ever stuck with for an extended period of time are Penny-Arcade and Hark A Vagrant! It’d be good to expand my (very particular) tastes though haha
If you haven’t seen the original, it’s well worth the watch.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rtyJi3lExo0
I saw it a few years ago and kept thinking, “They need to make a show about this…” then they did and I rejoiced!
I must say I prefer the old precise style, than this one cartoonish. But whatever; its happle tea anyway 🙂
I couldn’t help myself so I made this:
http://drp.ly/1vWKfP
😀
I LOL’d haha
I feel so proud :3
Nice strip, congrats.
Can I let a suggestion? If yes, this is mine, hope you like:
Can you draw an Egyptian strip plotting the “cat-with-the-halo”?
😀
cya
Alternate comic title: “I think, therefore I am not”
New or old artwork, I love this strip 😀
I been there bro.
Anyways, I’m jealous that as a strip comic you’re more able to experiment with different art styles. I wish had more freedom in that area!
Just… don’t watch Inception. I don’t get mindfucked by science classes or even Matrix-esqe thinking, but that movie messed me up pretty bad. >.>
I’d call what happened to K “The Reverse Descartes.” ;D
hahaha I love it! Even if it does sound like a wrestling maneuver. I imagine Hulk Hogan performing his patented “Reverse Descartes” to the cheers of thousands of adoring fans.
story of my life! this explains the existential crisis that has plagued me for the past 12 years!
What if we don’t even exist at all, and we’re actually just drawings in someone else’s divine sketchbook an-OH GOD DON’T ERASE ME!!
If you didn’t immediately think of Bugs Bunny as the artist erasing Daffy Duck in an episode of Looney Toons after reading this comment, you must have been born after ’95.
Or not had cable.
Or simply not watched it nearly as much as I did.
Thanks for that nostalgic recreation.
I think this is the highest commented comic now! Woooweee! I love you people. I just wanted to say I love the discussions that happen on these strips, it’s pretty amazing to have such an intelligent and interested readership. I know what I write about tends to be pretty weird or niche, but it makes me happy to know that people enjoy the strips and/or the blog posts. Thanks so much to everyone for being so awesome and for helping make happle tea pretty successful after just a year of existence <3
<3 happle tea is tops
Either way, it’s still funny and cute. 😀 god kitty rules.
I love your comics. it´s funny all you wrote in this one is pretty much what happend to me i did say screw it too but my mind still play tricks on me and there are days that i just cant stop thinking about it i wonder if that happends to you too.
I’ve thought like that before as well, and I must say, its one of the worst feelings in the world, this questioning of existence. :c
And you’re right, we just have to do what love.
Also, If you haven’t already seen Zeigeist, I highly recommend it. :’D
OOOOOOOMG I was JUST telling a friend of mine how I would have these debates with myself in church when I was little and I’d go round and round until it felt like my brain was going to explode. So perfect.
I love love love this comic, so funny!
the existential kyle theory, you mess too much with existensialism nd the meaning of existence and you will became a superposition of both existing and not existing, until someone kills kenny (you bastards!)
theres a theory that claims after this universe will collapse a new one will start and likely that the process is was and will be through whole existences of diffrent time.. sequences? existences? existences sounds good. also, straight banana:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTN1CUamKP8&feature=BFa&list=PL2681E7FAD7F16120
messing with temporal philosophy is fun
Apparently nothingness is unstable
http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20141106-why-does-anything-exist-at-all