At last, I understand human evolution. It’s all here in this painting.
Working from bottom to top, we witness the ascent of man. First, Homo erectus discovers fire, and stares at a burning twig. This was easier than it sounds, since all he had to do was light it from the volcano erupting over his left shoulder (there’s always a volcano, and it’s always erupting, in these things). If anyone has ever gone on a camping trip with those atavistic boy scouts, you will recognize his expression.
Next, Neandertals invent rocks. Two rocks at once…it’s a triumph!
The next big leap: men invent shaving and art. The subtle revelation in this image is that Cro-Magnon men were also all bronies — notice that he’s drawing a pony.
Civilization arises! Our representative man has invented writing and hats. He has not yet invented shirts, however, and I suspect that what he’s writing is My Little Pony slash fiction. It takes time to progress.
Then, Aristotle. Man has forgotten how to shave. He has, at least, evolved to the point of having half a shirt — clearly, a transitional form. Of course, the most important thing is that he has invented Thinking, or at least, staring vacantly while scratching his neck. He could be thinking about My Little Pony, but at least he’s not being obvious about it anymore.
Darkness follows. The next two and a half thousand years are unimportant and nothing of consequence happens until, at last, with a coruscation of light beams, Ayn Rand invents planets and stars while scribbling Libertarian rape fantasies with Objectivist rationalizations.
In the next phase (not shown), humans worship the god-like Rand to the point of paying $14,000 for cheesy paintings that portray her as the pinnacle of evolution, and thus begins the Fall of Man.
I have to weep at this Art. It tells a grand tragic story.
Isn’t this the opposite of the objectivist message? I mean, her shit was all about rugged individualists who could take or leave the parasites that feed off their inventions and achieved wonderful things solely through their own work.
But this is more or less portraying her as standing on the shoulders of giants, which means her work is merely building on the work of others parasitically.
Unless she literally thought all the great thinkers and philosophers before her were small potatoes compared to her Objectivist wit, which I guess is actually rather likely.
Somebody bought the bad oil on linen comic. Ron Paul, perhaps, now that he’s retired from running for president?
In the first place, they’re not giants, they’re dwarfs. In the second place, she’s not standing on their shoulders, she’s looking over them. And she is totally NOT cheating on the final exam by peeking at their answers! She is just sneering at them. SNEERING.
My Little Objectivist, Capitalism is Magic? The Fountainhoof? Atlas Neighed?
Sorry. (Not sorry.)
Someone liked Rand enough to think this was art….
Nightmare fuel.
Oh. I thought that was the ever ubiquitous Ayla, showing all those lesser evolved peoples what was what.
LMAO!
That naked scribe with the headdress is freaking me out.
Have you heard of Plato? Aristotle? Socrates? Morons!
The worst part: “SOLD”
Jesus wept.
That Rand picture is reminiscent of North Korean Kim family paintings and Saddam’s statue in Iraq.
On the brighter side of things, today’s google doodle is uplifting:
https://www.google.com/doodles/41st-anniversary-of-the-discovery-of-lucy
Unfortunately, the people I showed at work with didn’t get it, and despite none of them being christian. They all said the same thing, “Why is there the extra drawing in there?” Even after explaining “It represents the missing link,” some still didn’t get it.
I didn’t realise who the top picture was supposed to be. My first thought was the Marquis de Sade – somehow I got “sneering French Aristocrat” from that. And I’ve only ever heard of Ayn Rand in passing, much less seen a picture of her.
Also, the light rays seem to be emanating from Aristotle (are we sure it’s Aristotle? Not Plato or Democritus or some other Greek?), not the person above his shoulder. So if it is meant to exalt whoever that is with the fountain pen then it’s not doing a terribly good job.
There’s a key at the link where I cite the price.
PZ, are you sure that you weren’t the comedian, and not Ed Brayton? This post had me laughing.
To me the art looks a lot like the artwork you see in Jehovah’s Witnesses publications like The Watchtower. It has the same kind of colour pallet and art style. They generally don’t have weird rays of light and planets in the background however. And what are those planets supposed to represent, that Rand is the centre of the Universe?
I dunno, on looking at it, I could actually see buying it (albeit not for 14 grand). It kinda has a kitschy charm to it, like a black velvet elvis painting.
Saad, the shirtless scribe is obviously working in a Egyptian grain silo… it’s hot in those things!
The volcano is also not BEHIND homo erectus, but in FRONT of him. Homo erectus was HUGE. Either that or his kid had a science fair and put together a really small volcano.
@davidnangle, 15
It’s true! We even have pictorial evidence of giant skellingtons from yesterland!
From what I’ve read, Ayn Rand didn’t even fully accept evolution. It clashed with her absolutist view of Man.
at first glance, i thought this was an ad for evolve! hair gel.
granted, though, the hat was a tipoff that something was amiss.
Today’s google doodle for Canada is celebrating the 41st anniversary of the discovery of Lucy.
It’s a better graphic.
I’m with timgueguen — uproarious send-up, PZ, and I thank you for the laughs.
That is the most Caucasian-looking Homo erectus I’ve ever seen. Which, I suppose, fits in nicely with the general view of the universe held by loyal Rand-ites: Caucasians are the sacred totem of the evolutionary ladder because, um, reasons…
I’m fascinated by Homo erectus in that picture. For starters, xe looks like an extra from the original Planet of the Apes movie is walking around in just their mask (the shoulders and hand are surprisingly hairless). Then there is the expression. I can’t decide if it’s serious and contemplative or if the extra is depressed over their lot in life and is pondering just burning everything down. I would buy one of these hand-made comic posters if it was just that one character, but the price would have to be more realistic. $14.99? Sold!
I like the fire guy.
I don’t like that everybody is so pale. The guy who lives in the cave may have some excuse, but there should be some melanin in the picture.
I would totally buy a My Little Pony painting from Jaime Lannister there.
Well, if you paid me 14K USD I might take it, provided there are no contractual conditions on what I can then do with it, such as prohibiting me feeding it to the peas… Both the painting and the peas have no taste so it might trick them, eliminating two things too horrible to contemplate at once, besides helping my bank balance.
Although, on second thought, feeding that to them might make them even angrier…
“Not worse than the Time-Life image?” If it’s the image I’m thinking of, that’s crazy talk; it would have to be far superior to this image, for the simple reason that it doesn’t have any Ayn Rands in it.
“the”
leerudolph:
Are you sure? I think some of them are PYGMIES.
(there’s always a volcano, and it’s always erupting, in these things)
I blame Dianetics.
That’s wrong. Geologists invented rocks so they could give confusing names to different brands and flavors of rocks.
Possibly. Neanderthals invent two of them, from which follows such wonderful ideas as three, many, buildings, and cheese, albeit they do tend to get a bit confused and build many three-sided buildings out of cheese.
Bah. We all know that Calvin is the acme of evolution.
Ponies! /)
To be fair, I think the person drawing the pony is a young woman.
That’s…all I got.
Sold from a gallery in Napa. Why do I think some high-tech libertarian dudebro bought it?
Shouldn’t Ayn Rand be pounding away on a Remington Rand typewriter?
Why would anyone want to hang the drawing of a Social Security parasite is beyond me.
You’re reading the picture in the wrong direction. The message is: Ayn Rand is throwing mankind back into the stone age.
The thing about Awful Things, is that they can be a canvas for bits of hilarity. And this was all quite awesome. Thank you, from the bottom of my morning.
Is it just me, or does Ayn Rand look like she’s giving birth to a pineapple, sideways?
I see why this looks so bad. They left off the final stage of evolution!
http://imgur.com/FJBSIIQ
Is that Cornelius or Zeira at the bottom? And Aristotle looks like Taylor.
Day saved.