Skip to main content

Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road?

Why did the chicken cross the road???  This is an old one, with a few new entries.   When my dad played this one on me, he delighted to say, "To get to the other side."  Ha, ha.  But leave it to the professionals to interpret.  In the compilation below, there are too many authors to attribute - indeed I don't know most of them.  My humble contributions are the last two, though I feel certain they are not original to me.   The pleasure of this piece is in the humor of extravagant interpretations in philosophy, politics, physics, mathematics, and sociology.

Aristotle:
To actualize its potential.
Plato:
For the greater good.
Sir Isaac Newton:
Chickens at rest tend to stay at rest. Chickens in motion
tend to cross the road
Sigmund Freud:
The fact that you thought that the chicken crossed the road reveals
your underlying sexual insecurity.
Nietzsche:
Because if you gaze too long across the Road, the Road gazes
also across you.
Martin Luther King:
It had a dream.
Jean-Paul Sartre:
In order to act in good faith and be true to itself, the
chicken found it necessary to cross the road.
Albert Einstein:
Whether the chicken crossed the road or the road crossed the
chicken depends upon your frame of reference.
David Hume:
Out of custom and habit.
Darwin:
It was the logical next step after coming down from the trees.
Margaret Thatcher:
There was no alternative.
Chief Dan George:
It was a good day to Die.
Machiavelli:
The point is that the chicken crossed the road. Who cares why?
The ends of crossing the road justify whatever motive there was.
Immanuel Kant:
The chicken, being an autonomous being, chose to cross the road of
his own free will.
Buddha:
If you ask this question, you deny your own chicken-nature.
Shrödinger :
The chicken is on both sides of the road till observed on one side.
Darwin :
Give some time and chickens behavior will be selected so to avoid crossing roads.
Marx:
Who cares about chickens? Except if the chicken produces an accident in which somebody from the working class is injured, in which case we would need a collective investigation to understand the problem and try to solve it, in order to improve our working strength. But the final outcome will then depend on the decision of the Party.
Stephen Jay Gould:
What a question! This chicken is part of Nature, and Nature knows what to do in all circumstances. However if ALL chickens decided to cross that road at the same time it would produce a problem for cars. But after all what is more important: chickens or cars?
Heisenberg :
If the chicken’s position is known, then its momentum is uncertain.
Pascal :
The chicken has its reason of which reason knows nothing.
René Descartes :
The chicken crossed therefore it is.
Paul Dirac :
Whenever a chicken crosses the road, an anti-chicken crosses the road in the opposite direction.
Hillary Clinton:
What difference, at this point, does it make?
Joseph McCarthy
Because it was a communist.
John D. Rockefeller:
To increase profits.
Sigmund Freud:
To find its mother.
Zeno:
Before the chicken could cross the road, it had to go half-way, then half-way again, and so on ad infinitum. Therefore, the chicken cannot cross the road.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Behavioral Science and Problem-Solving

I.                                       I.                 Introduction.                Concerning our general behavior, it’s high about time we all had some understanding of how we operate on ourselves, and it is just as important how we are operated on by others. This is the wheelhouse of behavioral sciences. It is a vast subject. It touches our lives constantly. It’s influence is pervasive and can be so subtle we never notice it. Behavioral sciences profoundly affect our ability and success at problem-solving, from the elementary level to highly complex wicked problems. This is discussed in Section IV. We begin with the basics of behavioral sciences, Section II, and then through the lens of multiple categories and examples, Section III. II.     ...

The Lemming Instinct

  In certain vital domains, a pervasive mediocrity among practitioners can stifle genuine advancement. When the intellectual output of a field is predominantly average, it inevitably produces research of corresponding quality. Nevertheless, some of these ideas, by sheer chance or perhaps through effective dissemination, will inevitably gain traction. A significant number of scholars and researchers will gravitate towards these trends, contributing to and propagating further work along these established lines. Such a trajectory allows an initially flawed concept to ascend to the status of mainstream orthodoxy. However, over an extended period, these prevailing ideas invariably fail to withstand rigorous scrutiny; they are ultimately and conclusively disproven. The disheartening pattern then reveals itself: rather than genuine progress, an equally unvalidated or incorrect idea often supplants the discredited one, swiftly establishing its own dominance. This cycle perpetuates, ensurin...

Principles of Insufficiency and Sufficiency

   The principles we use but don't know it.  1.      Introduction . Every field, scientific or otherwise, rests on foundational principles—think buoyancy, behavior, or democracy. Here, we explore a unique subset: principles modified by "insufficiency" and "sufficiency." While you may never have heard of them, you use them often. These terms frame principles that blend theory, practicality, and aspiration, by offering distinct perspectives. Insufficiency often implies inaction unless justified, while sufficiency suggests something exists or must be done. We’ll examine key examples and introduce a new principle with potential significance. As a principle of principles of these is that something or some action is not done enough while others may be done too much. The first six (§2-6) of our principles are in the literature, and you can easily search them online. The others are relatively new, but fit the concepts in the real world. At times, these pri...