Questionable Content XIX: Give Jeph Just A *Little* Credit, Here

[Willie the Duck]

Not THAT ridiculous. Karl Witte was 13 when he got his PhD (he's the current record holder). So two by 17 seems possible (if extremely unlikely).

It's entirely possible, it's still ridiculous. Getting PhDs at a young age is one of those things often used in fiction to telegraph 'yes really that smart.' In reality, it's certainly noteworthy and laudable, but more a subtle confluence of smart enough for a PhD (so, not-dumb and dedicated) and precocious. Getting multiple PhDs is another of those things coded 'no, seriously, smart' (I think in MCU they explain how Bruce Banner has 6 or 8 PhDs, for example). It, too, is kinda impressive in reality but not exactly evidence of extreme intelligence (getting one PhD, and then doing some really notable work in that field, would be equally or more impressive). Combining the two (apparently from different grad schools, which the strip highlights as 'shouldn't even be possible but she did it anyways') is communicating 'we're going gonzo on this.' Mind you, I don't personally have a problem with this. The current arc hasn't wowed me, but not because Liz is a cartoon/sitcom genius in a webcomic that regularly follows cartoon/sitcom rules. Liz is smart; Liz is immature; done. In a more grounded fiction the same role could be filled by a 26 year old with one PhD who only acts like a sheltered 19 year old.

[Rodin]

The problem is she's acting like a sheltered 12 year old.

And no matter what age she is, she's thoroughly unlikeable.

[Ionathus]

The problem is she's acting like a sheltered 12 year old.

And no matter what age she is, she's thoroughly unlikeable.

Yep. It's even hard for Liz to compare favorably to someone like Sam or Emmett, who are like 5 years behind her.

My problem isn't with Liz's double PhDs, silly though they are. My problem is that I don't like or care about her.

[Vinyadan]

But what about her sob story??

[Mechalich]

The other problem with Liz is that insofar as she has a sob story, it's her parents fault, but her parents aren't a part of the comic. To unpack: she's 19 now, and has worked at Cubetown for 2 years, meaning she was 17 and a minor when she started working there. Her parents signed off on letting her join this commune of dubiously sapient AIs, which as everyone who's been following the Cubetown stuff has noticed, is absolute madness.

Unfortunately, this is essentially inherent to everything involving Cubetown. Because Cubetown is essentially too crazy to exist even in a sitcom-ified version of the real world, it creates a vortex of failed suspension of disbelief that drags down everything it touches.

[Eldan]

Her parents belong in prison, is my opinion. She belongs... I don't even know. Therapy, for starters. Lots of therapy. She seems near-feral and probably has never been entirely socialized.

[Wraith]

Her parents belong in prison, is my opinion. She belongs... I don't even know. Therapy, for starters. Lots of therapy. She seems near-feral and probably has never been entirely socialized.

That seems a little harsh. Although we haven't seen Liz' parents in the comic, we've seen them trying to contact her on at least 3 occasions in her very short existence, and having been blown off by Liz herself. While it would be nice to think that any parent would instinctively sense her suffering and jump in to help, they can't be expected to be psychic and know when their genius-level daughter is actively lying to them. She's told them everything is fine, and she's too busy to call more often? Well, she has 2 PhDs, she must know what she's talking about, right?

I think it's mostly to do Jeph's inability to really challenge his darlings. Nothing specifically 'bad' has happened to the character, she just hasn't improved as much as she had hoped, living in all-expenses-paid comfort, while being insufferable. I don't demand at all that he torture his characters and create pathos in every comic, but the impression that I get from other readers is that Liz doesn't 'deserve' the amount of attention she's getting - "it would make sense just to assign her a line manager and maybe a counsellor and be done with it, she doesn't need to be 'adopted' and coddled by the main characters", kind of thing? I think I broadly agree with that idea, insofar as Claire and Marten already have too much going on in their own lives to also pick up this stray lost duckling who has done little but be a rude inconvenience to them.

Then again, I also get the vibe that many readers are more like, "she acts like a jerk so let her suffer the consequences", which is NOT a healthy outcome. At least SOME sympathy should be assumed and not have to be 'earned' by Liz' grovelling contrition. While QC is perhaps verging on the excessive, we should at least take the statement "this character is suffering and needs help" at face value

[Mechalich]

I think it's mostly to do Jeph's inability to really challenge his darlings. Nothing specifically 'bad' has happened to the character, she just hasn't improved as much as she had hoped, living in all-expenses-paid comfort, while being insufferable. I don't demand at all that he torture his characters and create pathos in every comic, but the impression that I get from other readers is that Liz doesn't 'deserve' the amount of attention she's getting - "it would make sense just to assign her a line manager and maybe a counsellor and be done with it, she doesn't need to be 'adopted' and coddled by the main characters", kind of thing? I think I broadly agree with that idea, insofar as Claire and Marten already have too much going on in their own lives to also pick up this stray lost duckling who has done little but be a rude inconvenience to them.

I think it's that there's really no need for Liz to be a character at all. She exists to demonstrate how Cubetown's chaos can have real human consequences - she appears to have been on the edge of some kind of mental breakdown - but there's nothing specific to her situation that either Claire or Marten are really trained to address. Her purpose was fulfilled when her case was brought to Claire's attention and she can now safely be removed from the story. There's no real reason to keep her around and the cast is already massively bloated.

Also, the nature of Claire's job as The Librarian is to solve 100 versions of the Liz problem. She can't 'adopt' them all, that's not a scalable solution.

[Rodin]

For myself it’s nothing to do with consequences. I just don’t want her to be a character, because she’s a walking talking destroyer of the suspension of disbelief. I have to believe she somehow survived doing two PhDs at a comically young age yet is apparently not capable of basic self sufficiency. That she somehow got hired for a role with no clearly defined objective and no oversight. That no alarm bells got run for TWO FREAKING YEARS.

Every minute she’s on panel is a reminder of the shoddy world building and storytelling.

And then on top of that she’s simply an unpleasant character. An unpleasant character is tolerable when they’re an antagonist or an obstacle to be overcome, but when the writer is trying to make the character a precocious darling we all love that doesn’t apply.

[Traab]

I mean, the author isnt trying to make her a precocious darling or whatever. Its being made pretty clear that she has a lot of issues to deal with connected, presumably, to the fact that she was probably a studying hermit under pressure all her life and now that she is a doctor of whatever her fields are she is basically cut loose with no idea of what to do from here because she spent all her time cramming for tests and none learning things like how to socialize or even considering what comes next after getting her degree. She is twisted up inside because she thinks that as an adult she should be able to handle this and that asking for help would be shameful and spent two years being twisted up inside because she has nobody she feels like she can turn to, and her abrasive personality, being a mixture of being treated as special all her life and not interacting with anyone outside of her professors and parents pushes everyone away before they can really spot the problems she has. When the only interaction she has with outsiders is yelling at moray "Im special leave me alone to do special stuff!!!" once a month, its no wonder that she has a bad rep and nobody guessing what her problems actually were till she forced herself to interact with marten as long as they did. Its not a perfectly written character, but its a pretty solid one imo with logical connections for all her traits and problems.

[Mechalich]

I mean, the author isnt trying to make her a precocious darling or whatever. Its being made pretty clear that she has a lot of issues to deal with connected, presumably, to the fact that she was probably a studying hermit under pressure all her life and now that she is a doctor of whatever her fields are she is basically cut loose with no idea of what to do from here because she spent all her time cramming for tests and none learning things like how to socialize or even considering what comes next after getting her degree.

Maybe, but this means Jeph fundamentally misunderstands how getting a PhD works. Classes are only a (small) part of it. The primary aspect is conducting original research which requires at least some ability to function autonomously. Exactly how much can vary a lot - some doctoral students work in large labs and are basically handed some set of experiments to monitor and turn into a dissertation and this is fairly likely to apply to Liz - but there's a floor. No one writes your dissertation for you.

She is twisted up inside because she thinks that as an adult she should be able to handle this and that asking for help would be shameful and spent two years being twisted up inside because she has nobody she feels like she can turn to, and her abrasive personality, being a mixture of being treated as special all her life and not interacting with anyone outside of her professors and parents pushes everyone away before they can really spot the problems she has. When the only interaction she has with outsiders is yelling at moray "Im special leave me alone to do special stuff!!!" once a month, its no wonder that she has a bad rep and nobody guessing what her problems actually were till she forced herself to interact with marten as long as they did. Its not a perfectly written character, but its a pretty solid one imo with logical connections for all her traits and problems.

I think a big part of the issue is that her 'problems' are significantly overblown. Being abrasive and antisocial are only problems insofar as they impact overall mental health. Liz is apparently quite content to pursue research into highly theoretical topics largely on her own. She just needs some direction and a publishing schedule (and someone to tell her 'clean your office!' every six months). Something like 'Liz, you're on the muon modeling team, publish something every six to nine months.' It's a one-sentence fix.

[Rodin]

Also, when was the last time you had to clean your office? I don't mean just picking up the trash on your desk or emptying your filing cabinet of old candy bar wrappers. When did you vacuum your office or take the trash bags to the dumpster or any sort of major cleaning?

Last time for me was 2021, because we were spraying disinfectant on everything for COVID. Before then was....2016? I worked weekends and the trash can had fish in it so I proactively took it out so the Monday crew weren't going to be greeted by fishy death.

Offices have janitorial staff. Having the home environment be filthy (like Marigold) is one thing, but offices just don't work that way.

[Wraith]

I think that the biggest issue for me is that looking after mid-crisis teenagers was never supposed to be, is not, and never will be Claire's job, and taking on that task makes everything vague and irrelevant.

The advert was for a librarian, the offer was for Head of IS, and the tasks mentioned seem to imply a Vice CEO-like role; putting aside our objections to this being a ridiculous hiring process, absolutely none of those have anything to do with micro-managing Physics researchers or intervening in mental health beyond referring them away to experts. That is HR's job, and on top of that she absolutely doesn't get to yell at the Head of HR even after she has signed her contract of employment - she doesn't have the authority, resource, contacts or ability to get involved in Liz' predicament.

What this means is, the plot so far makes no sense and where the plot is going is unpredictable, and in a bad way - if there's no continuity between what anyone has done, and what they are doing, then we can't be invested in where they're going to go. Yesterday Claire was interviewing for a librarian post; today she's a CEO who is intervening in a teenage prodigy's mental health crisis; tomorrow she could be learning to fly a helicopter and none of it matters. Wacky hijinks are fine, but have an upper limit - at some point it becomes Axe Cop, and "because lolrandom" thankfully died out as a meme about 10 years ago.

In many ways its a shame because if Cubetown wanted to bring Claire on as a counsellor, or some kind of mental health advisor, or sensitivity reader/advisor based on her backstory, that would not only have a structure but also be interesting! It would let Claire champion underdogs through the lens of her experience as a member of a minority group herself, and it would allow Jeph to introduce a "wacky moron of the week" as there would be a logical reason for AI weirdos to come into her office with problems for her to solve every time he felt like it.... Without the inconsistency of her being the island's #2 and on an implausible salary to boot.

[Vinyadan]

She could have been shooing the cleaning staff.

I am not against Elizabeth as a character; I think she is the least unbelievable thing on the Island. 17 y-o very precocious yet immature, proud, and pretentious kid is hired by a deeply unorganised firm that controls a whole island, gets no adequate support, falls into a rabbit hole of her own making, and alienates to the point of isolation, as she is too ashamed to explain the situation or ask for help: that I can believe or understand.

To make a comparison, SuperPC decides Claire is the Chosen One to be the SuperCEO: that I don't really get. I didn't look up a librarian's course of study, but would she know anything for the job? Is good will all it takes? Now, if it were an Hal 9000 situation, and the PC just glitched and retroconstructed an explanation, and Claire is too set in her stated purpose (kick butt) to say no... but I doubt this is where we are going.

Also, jumping from one side to the other makes me enjoy both less.

[Keltest]

She could have been shooing the cleaning staff.

I am not against Elizabeth as a character; I think she is the least unbelievable thing on the Island. 17 y-o very precocious yet immature, proud, and pretentious kid is hired by a deeply unorganised firm that controls a whole island, gets no adequate support, falls into a rabbit hole of her own making, and alienates to the point of isolation, as she is too ashamed to explain the situation or ask for help: that I can believe or understand.

To make a comparison, SuperPC decides Claire is the Chosen One to be the SuperCEO: that I don't really get. I didn't look up a librarian's course of study, but would she know anything for the job? Is good will all it takes? Now, if it were an Hal 9000 situation, and the PC just glitched and retroconstructed an explanation, and Claire is too set in her stated purpose (kick butt) to say no... but I doubt this is where we are going.

Also, jumping from one side to the other makes me enjoy both less.

Based on what I know of cleaning staff, a lot of them would tie her up and leave her in the hallway rather than leave an office to get to that level. Its a health hazard. Things are living in it. Her opinion is no longer relevant there.

[geoduck]

Cubetown probably has just the one disgruntled janitor that we've previously seen.

[Wraith]

Based on what I know of cleaning staff, a lot of them would tie her up and leave her in the hallway rather than leave an office to get to that level. Its a health hazard. Things are living in it. Her opinion is no longer relevant there.

"Hey Bob, have you finished up in Building Four?"
"Yeah. Well, almost; I didn't clean out Room 12."
"Why not, Bob?"
"A 4-foot-nothing child looked at me funny, told me to go away, kicked some of the 3-foot-tall drift of stale food containers, screwed up balls of paper, and rat-urine-stained-clothing back over the threshold and then shut the door."
"Did she lock the door, Bob?"
"No, an' I have my keys here on my belt if she had. I just thought the kid I didn't recognise who looks barely old enough to drive knew best as to how to do my job over me or you, is all."
"You're fired, Bob."

[Vinyadan]

"You're fired, Bob."

I think that's the key: in a mess like AI Island, no one would fire the janitor who didn't do his job. Would he even know whom to tell? And, if his superior had been told and informed Slimon, would she have done anything?

I agree that janitors tend to take control when they can. But this requires that they got some drilling.

[Traab]

As far as being in charge goes thats already been established as the main problem. Nobody is really in charge of anything. It seems to be a collective of people doing their own thing under their own guidance and the director is this inhuman intelligence that doesnt fully comprehend it all so creates goo girls to act as intermediaries which is ineffective at best. So our hypothetical janitor isnt going to insist on forcing his way into an office where the goblin seems to live full time and refuses to let him enter "because ive got high level research here" or whatever. Chances are he tried the first few weeks got rejected each time and has basically shrugged and written off that office from his job duties because he isnt able to clean it and nobody seems to care.

[Cikomyr2]

Thats the security android, in case anyone else forgot

I sure did

[Ionathus]

Speaking of the janitor, I just remembered:

Did we ever get an answer on whether Cubetown's janitor is an astrophysicist who got hired to be a janitor, a person with janitorial skills who thought he was being hired as an astrophysicist, a hobbyist astrophysicist who was willing to take whatever he could get, or something else? Never got any follow-up on that from the interview scene.

[halfeye]

Speaking of the janitor, I just remembered:

Did we ever get an answer on whether Cubetown's janitor is an astrophysicist who got hired to be a janitor, a person with janitorial skills who thought he was being hired as an astrophysicist, a hobbyist astrophysicist who was willing to take whatever he could get, or something else? Never got any follow-up on that from the interview scene.

Why the heck would we want to follow that up? It's probably next.

[Cikomyr2]

Nice boob joke, Jeff.

Which is nice, the boobs or the joke?

Ill never tell

[Mechalich]

I don't get this sequence. Evan is an AI with a security function, they should not have this sort of half-asleep state of being as an option. Also, they should be able to just turn off external audio inputs, which you'd think they would have learned how to do while living above a bar.

[Ionathus]

I don't get this sequence. Evan is an AI with a security function, they should not have this sort of half-asleep state of being as an option. Also, they should be able to just turn off external audio inputs, which you'd think they would have learned how to do while living above a bar.

Seconded. We've never been shown AI having a "grogginess" state - they're always either fully awake or powered-down like May was that one time she ran out of juice.

Either we're being set up for Evan having some glitch going on, or she's actually a human masquerading as an AI, or (my personal guess) Jeph just didn't care and wanted to draw some fanservice. But hey, at least he was driven to learn how to make clothing drape effects for the joke.

Out of everyone at Cubetown, Evan is the one I'm most willing to read more about. But I'm kinda worried that's about to fly out the window due to wacky hijinks

[Vinyadan]

Maybe it's why Evan is so bad at her job: they installed a bunch of experimental routines on her, like the ability to perform surveillance and take action while her core is in sleep mode. Except she lacks the lucidity to perform either.

[BRC]

Maybe it's why Evan is so bad at her job: they installed a bunch of experimental routines on her, like the ability to perform surveillance and take action while her core is in sleep mode. Except she lacks the lucidity to perform either.

I mean, between Evan being, I think, the most Humanlike AI we've seen (Momo also has a standard caucasian skin ton, but IIRC Jeph usually draws his AI's with different looking eyes to his humans?), and this, it's possible that Evan was an experiment in pushing an AI Chassis as close to human as possible, just to see if they could. This seems like a not-unreasonable take on trying to intentionally simulate the experience of being Groggy the same way robots simulate being drunk.

[Wraith]

Reddit does not like this strip.

The fan-forum is split right down the middle between "lol boobs horny.jpg" and being uncomfortable by the implications of a semi-conscious woman stripping as a punchline.

The snark thread has a list. Yet another inebriated/semi-conscious woman in a state of undress. Poor art and the idea that after 15 years as a professional artist, Jeph has just discovered how to draw fabric (obviously meant as a joke, but difficult to find funny alongside the anatomy and other problems). The inconsistency with AIs having a 'drowsy' mode for some reason. Evan living above a bar and being surprised by bar-noise (otherwise implying that no one has ever used the bar until now, which is a further criticism of Cubetown being empty or used performatively by AI *if* they remember). Evan's art/size being inconsistent.

...At least they seem to have forgotten how annoying and unpleasant Liz was yesterday, and why she deserves comeuppance for continuing to be a gremlin.

[KillianHawkeye]

Well this is probably the biggest party that this bar has ever hosted, so I'll forgive it being an unusual situation for her. And also, do we have any evidence she was designed with a security function in mind, or is she just an AI person who decided to get a job in security?

[Mechalich]

And also, do we have any evidence she was designed with a security function in mind, or is she just an AI person who decided to get a job in security?

It doesn't really matter. QC AIs can edit aspects of their mental state processing system, something that we've seen through examples such as the drunkenness app. Even assuming the case wherein an AI might want to alter their cognition to experience something like the human state of mental fogginess from waking up too early, which is already rather dubious, an AI who works in a security role should cut that right out (seriously, fatigue is probably the number one contributor to mistakes made by law enforcement).