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Prepare to Be Thagomized!
A friend of mine passed along this Mental Floss article on Gary Larson’s Far Side. Many of us here are probably Far Side fans. I know I am. It was normal, growing up, to see Far Side clips taped up in practice rooms, on lab doors, and in teachers’ offices. I didn’t know, though, that Larson’s nickname for the spikes on a stegasaurus’s tail, “thagomizer”, is now an acceptable 
paleontology term. I had heard of “shmooing” before, a process named after cartoonist Al Capp‘s shmoos excuse me, shmoon:
[T]he cellular bulge that is produced by a haploid yeast cell as a response to a pheromone from the opposite mating type (either a or α) is referred to as a “shmoo,” because cells that are undergoing mating and present this particular structure resemble the cartoon character.[12] The whole process is known to biologists as “shmooing.” Shmoo[n] are essential; without them, we would have neither bread nor beer.
Too many of my friends diddled about with microbiology for me not to have heard of shmooing. The migration of the thagomizer from The Far Side to reality is new to me, though.
Larson decided to retire in 1995, before The Far Side grew stale. He seems to enjoy an inconspicuous life supporting conservation organizations and playing jazz guitar. He had studied entomology before switching to a communications major in college, and before becoming a cartoonist, he worked for a while at the Humane Society as an animal cruelty investigator in order to pay the bills. Many of us might still be able to relate to the childhood adventures that inspired Larson’s lifelong love for animals, not just love of the “charismatic megafauna,” but also of the little ones, the “ugly” ones, the creepy-crawly ones. Larson’s grandparents…
“lived by a great swamp. Today it would be called a wetland. But it was a textbook swamp. Crystal clear water, sandy bottom. Salamanders everywhere.” It was fed by a small creek and right behind the high tide drift line. The “frosting on the cake” was that the area was a major habitat for western fence lizards.
Fence lizards are fun – and easy – to catch. Easier than frogs, what we usually caught around where I grew up. Until a transcript snafu, I had looked forward to attending a college where my work-study job would be catching fence lizards. Life had other plans, though. A woods near the school I did end up at contained plenty of beautiful red efts, though.
I doubt I’d be much happier than Larson was to discover any of my old, wild (well, wildish) stomping grounds had been developed. I think it’s natural to feel a sense of loss, of uncanniness or “creepiness”, as Larson put it, upon discovering that sort of change:
“Filled in and a house or two now stands there, and the creek is just a landscape feature through someone’s yard. But the other creepy thing is that, while the drift line is obviously still there, the lizards are all gone. I’ve gone looking for them, walking among the driftwood on a warm, lizardy kind of day. Not a one.”
That said, people gotta live somewhere, too. Opposing development on conservation grounds is not entirely innocent, either: often, it’s used as an excuse for the elites to keep regular folks out of their elite enclaves. And fence lizards remain common, despite human development. I doubt any of us here would agree with Larson that modern humans are “the flora and fauna Nazis.” Still, Larson’s tender attachment to animals, however unrealistic, contributed to what his fans, of all political stripes, love so much about The Far Side.
A few critters are now named after Larson, in that their Latin name carries some variant of Larson’s name. Several other scientific terms (quarks, boojums, etc) derive from literature, serious or humorous. But “thagomizer” and “shmoo” are the only scientific terms I can think of which come from cartoons. Can you think of others?
Published in Science & Technology
Not off hand, but these days, they name new species and such after just about anything.
How about going from comedy musical instruments to weapons of war?
There was a comedian back in the Thirties named Brother Bob Burns. Part of his act was to play a musical instrument that he invented himself. It was basically a “trombone kazoo.”
Burns called it a “bazooka.”
GIs started calling this the same thing:
Great post!
So that’s where Toy Story got that gag?
Sorry, didn’t mean to get off-topic. I never knew this!
Appropriate for our current political situation circa 1986:
No Far Side, but some fence lizard trivia:
Did you know they help prevent Lyme disease?
Wow, it looks just like our Texas Spiny Lizard! I see them all the time.
Not Larson, but this describes my morning. Every morning…
My favorite, natch:
I don’t know any other science words derived from cartoons. But I do know this post was a lot of fun to read!
I didn’t see the joke in this one for a long time until someone pointed it out to me.
Thanks! Given the background of the Futurama writers, perhaps Futurama would be a likely candidate, but I don’t know of any terms migrating from Futurama to scientific reality yet.
The creator of the Simpsons has had at least one animal named after him, Albunea groeningi. (There’s also a fossil turtle called Psephophorus terrypratchetti.) Again, though, that’s not the same thing as a term from a cartoon universe migrating to the real world.
Wow! Another reason to appreciate those little guys!
I think the easiest way to catch fence lizards is with a dental-floss noose. It doesn’t hurt the lizard, and because fence lizards have definite necks and keeled scales, they have a harder time backing out and escaping than, say, a skink would.
Using nooses is a well-established field research technique. And… apparently… so is flicking rubber bands at the poor little fellas to stun ’em???… I hadn’t heard of that one before. Ouch!
In one of his books, Larson said that this and the Cow Tools cartoon posted above were the two that generated the most mail from people who wanted to know what was supposed to be funny.
Heck, it’s still funny even if you don’t see the joke. It’s just funnier when you do.
I have over a dozen Far Side compilation books. Great stuff.
Here’s one I used to wear.
This one marks the only time in recorded history mosquitoes were enjoyable.
Doggone it. I thought the “rabbit ears” were just nascent horns. Had to look it up ’cause I was too embarrassed to admit that I didn’t get it, here.
Oops.
All this time, I had thought the hoof was just a sweet li’l bow on a prepubescent heifer’s head, and that the “joke” is that you can’t tell whether they’re standing in front of the real Grand Canyon, or a “grand canyon” made of stacked bales of hay.
Oops. But usually I get it – I swear I do!…
I know! I know! I kept trying to remember the geologic period of the Grand Canyon rocks and correlate them to the number of teats (<cringe-making word) on the cow’s udder – thinking there must be a joke there. ;)
I thought the joke was simply that Holsteins sounds like a real family name (because it is).
But it’s okay to be wrong. We’re gifted.
This one helped me prepare for the SAT.
I found that so funny when I first read it that I cut it out of the paper and have had it ever since… probably a couple few decades now. Kept in BEER mug on the shelf:
With this one:
It’s always been one of my favorites! Great minds think alike. I’d never seen the Superman one haha!
I originally thought that was a girl with a bow on her head. Then someone pointed out the arm of the other one, and it became obvious he was making bunny ears.