[2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

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Sanjay
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[2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Sanjay »

The Comic

I like this joke but I can't help shake feeling bothered about the third line. Establishing that the two traits are autosomal dominant seems kind of... irrelevant? It's certainly not the only way this kind of inheritance could have happened. I mean, pretty much as long as the two traits weren't both because of spontaneous autosomal mutations (or worse, non-genetic influences), the traits could be inherited.

I suppose it gets you thinking "oh, let's think about genetic inheritance now" for the punchline, but, I don't know.

I just wonder whether a better line would have been something like "both traits were genetically determined" or something.
Last edited by Sanjay on Thu Oct 30, 2014 4:37 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Liriodendron_fagotti »

I agree that it gets you thinking about genes without saying the word, which I think would have spoiled the punchline.
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Re: Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Nerd »

The worst part about this comic is that we will never know for sure if Jack Sprat's wife is named Jeanne.

Ender

Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Ender »

Is it sad that the first thing that went through my head after reading "Jack Sprat could eat no fat" was "So he divorced her?"

A big nod to Zack for the reference!

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Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Edminster »

oh my god could you seriously not wait five minutes for me to activate your account?
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Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Sahan »

That Ender, that's his game.
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Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by GUTCHUCKER »

Stop bugging him, you bugger.
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la

Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by la »

We assume that the child doesn't inherit the SAME mutation from each parent, so he's heterozygous. If the traits were recessive, he wouldn't express either trait; since they're dominant, he expresses both.
Just because a trait is genetically determined doesn't mean that the child will express it. That 3rd line's pretty important; without it, the punchline would be sketchy as hell because of my previous sentence. We need to know if the mutant alleles are recessive or dominant.

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Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Lethal Interjection »

la wrote:We assume that the child doesn't inherit the SAME mutation from each parent, so he's heterozygous. If the traits were recessive, he wouldn't express either trait; since they're dominant, he expresses both.
Just because a trait is genetically determined doesn't mean that the child will express it. That 3rd line's pretty important; without it, the punchline would be sketchy as hell because of my previous sentence. We need to know if the mutant alleles are recessive or dominant.
I don't think it is your sentence that would make the punchline "sketchy as hell".

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Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Sanjay »

I think you are more or less right, La, if we assume that these are Mendelian traits.

I mean, I suppose this is fine.

I mean, I suppose.

I suppose.

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Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Guest »

Lethal Interjection wrote:
la wrote:We assume that the child doesn't inherit the SAME mutation from each parent, so he's heterozygous. If the traits were recessive, he wouldn't express either trait; since they're dominant, he expresses both.
Just because a trait is genetically determined doesn't mean that the child will express it. That 3rd line's pretty important; without it, the punchline would be sketchy as hell because of my previous sentence. We need to know if the mutant alleles are recessive or dominant.
I don't think it is your sentence that would make the punchline "sketchy as hell".
Are you disagreeing on a matter of substance or simply complaining that he wrote "because of my last sentence" rather than "because of what I wrote in my last sentence"?

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Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by GUTCHUCKER »

A matter of substance, in the latest comic discussion?
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Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Guest »

....
You know what I meant, probably.

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Re: [2014-10-30] Jack Sprat, wife, and child

Post by Random »

"both traits were genetically determined" is farther from alternating syllable stress. I think he was going for iambic trimeter (lines 1, 2, and 4) and made 3 longer to draw attention to it and have the timing feel more like a limerick. It's not as impressive or obvious as rhyming jokes have been in the past, but gets the job done.

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