Pineapple under the sea.... Really?
January 29, 2012 2:59 PM   Subscribe

So, Nickelodeon, you tell us that Spongebob Squarepants lives in a pineapple upside down house at the bottom of the sea. Are you really sure about that? Beware of misleading your viewers about the universe, Nickelodeon! posted by rongorongo (66 comments total) 22 users marked this as a favorite
 
I thought it was a "pineapple under the sea"
posted by holdkris99 at 3:04 PM on January 29, 2012 [7 favorites]


IT'S LIKE YOU MATH PEOPLE ARE ALLERGIC TO FUN.
posted by mintcake! at 3:06 PM on January 29, 2012 [18 favorites]


Pineapple under the sea? Really?

It's a show where a living sponge (not the animal type, but the kitchen type) is friends with a talking starfish and works at a fast food restaurant where the sponge grills patties. The sponge's love interest is a squirrel, that lives in a glass bubble, and the squirrel manages to bring in fresh air as to not suffocate.

Also, David Hasselhoff operates as a motorboat.

And you, sir, complain about the math of a crude drawing.
posted by Mister Fabulous at 3:09 PM on January 29, 2012 [20 favorites]


You're saying that wasn't fun?
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 3:10 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


I for one will sleep better now that this important issue has been well and truly sorted out.
posted by Greg_Ace at 3:10 PM on January 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


The adorable snail was kind of fun.
posted by mintcake! at 3:11 PM on January 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


Next you'll be telling me that Tasmanian Devils don't actually travel by spinning around like a tornado, and that roadrunners aren't really several feet tall with purple plumage and making meep meep noises.
posted by hippybear at 3:11 PM on January 29, 2012 [10 favorites]


Don't forget the pet snail who meows!
posted by macadamiaranch at 3:12 PM on January 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


Just last night we were discussing: if Spongebob wears square pants, does he have a square butt?
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 3:13 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


Nope, he's got a bubble butt.
posted by These Birds of a Feather at 3:17 PM on January 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


I also love how the featured video never ONCE uses an actual illustration of the pineapple from the series (which seem to vary widely anyway). So how can we know any of what is contained there as a critique is accurate?
posted by hippybear at 3:25 PM on January 29, 2012


Have I mentioned how much I love Vi Hart? No? Well, I love Vi Hart. Bunches.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 3:28 PM on January 29, 2012 [4 favorites]


Cute math nerd finds fun way to describe the Fibonacci sequence in pineapples. Uses cute snail to make math even more palatable.

Metafilter: SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF!! GARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!

ME: Facepalm.
posted by JimmyJames at 3:29 PM on January 29, 2012 [12 favorites]


ME: Facepalm.

The onus is not on the content consumer to adopt the "correct" perspective.
posted by Brocktoon at 3:31 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


This is a show that has fire underwater.
posted by jscalzi at 3:32 PM on January 29, 2012 [16 favorites]


We get a link to Vi Hart today and we had a link to her father, George Hart, three days ago. We ❤ Harts.
posted by twoleftfeet at 3:33 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


Have I mentioned how much I love Vi Hart?

The paper instrument stuff on Vi Hart's site is pretty wonderful, actually.
posted by mintcake! at 3:33 PM on January 29, 2012


I Liked that kitchen demonstration. That guy really put the "notch" back in "Fibonacci."
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:41 PM on January 29, 2012


"This is a show that has fire underwater."

That is, in fact, much more plausible than Spongebob's house that is totally not a pineapple. All you need for combustion underwater is an alternate electron acceptor.
posted by Blasdelb at 3:43 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


The onus is not on the content consumer to adopt the "correct" perspective.

Uhh ... (a) why not, and (b) if the linked piece is just the expression of someone reacting to some content, doesn't any criticism of that reaction crash on this very principle?
posted by Jonathan Livengood at 3:44 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


Cute math nerd finds fun way to describe the Fibonacci sequence in pineapples. Uses cute snail to make math even more palatable.

Metafilter: SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF!! GARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!


I'd take it lighter if i didn't know people that do this kind of thing in all seriousness. They do it with things that aren't even trying to be scientifically plausible (Spongebob with fire underwater for one), like that CG Resident Evil movie and not shutting up for close to half an hour about how something can't increase in mass, or how in Tron people "don't live in computers".

Swap out cute nerd for annoying borderline aspergers guy and this starts to lose its cuteness pretty quickly.

The snail was cute though.
posted by usagizero at 3:45 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


hippybear: "I also love how the featured video never ONCE uses an actual illustration of the pineapple from the series (which seem to vary widely anyway). So how can we know any of what is contained there as a critique is accurate?"

I figure that's because putting any actual footage of Spongebob on Youtube tends to bring Viacom down on you like the fist of an angry god.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 3:49 PM on January 29, 2012


This reminded me that I wanted to browse the rest of her videos. So far, this one is my favourite, followed closely by snakes and more snakes.
posted by frimble at 3:53 PM on January 29, 2012


Fnarg. Try the favourite one again. I'm not sure what happened there.
posted by frimble at 3:55 PM on January 29, 2012 [5 favorites]


I think our problem is that the Pineapple appears to be bigger on the inside than the outside AND WE REFUSE TO BELIEVE IT'S A TARDIS.
posted by evilmidnightbomberwhatbombsatmidnight at 4:04 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


I totally love Vi Hart. It's silly, really.
(And I never thought watching a sped-up snail could be so great...)
posted by kaibutsu at 4:07 PM on January 29, 2012


This is a show that has fire underwater.

And thus, my favorite bit from all of Spongebob (fast forward to 5:25).
posted by adamdschneider at 4:08 PM on January 29, 2012 [4 favorites]


I adore Vi Hart. Even students who don't get the math she's explaining actually try to understand it when they watch her videos, which is more than many of them do in a classroom.

Everyone needs to snarf down some of that cool button candy she made a video with and watch the one where she makes a mobius-strip player-piano roll.

Or the camel fractals....
posted by tzikeh at 4:11 PM on January 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


Vi Hart is great and I'm going insane - because I could swear that I heard her lisp in this video, which she's obviously never done before.
posted by Foci for Analysis at 4:14 PM on January 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


That was one frenetic snail.
posted by jiawen at 4:31 PM on January 29, 2012


This year is the eight hundred and tenth anniversary of Fibonacci's Liber Abaci. I've been trying all month to find a way to make a FPP about it, but I couldn't find any good links. Alack, I should have looked at the Spongebob angle!
posted by winna at 4:40 PM on January 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


This level of bean plating usually implies Mefi membership. So who is she?
posted by bystander at 4:44 PM on January 29, 2012


Loved the clip, but I'm afraid I'm too under-caffeinated to watch another one.
posted by kuujjuarapik at 4:44 PM on January 29, 2012


Thirty-plus comments, and nobody has pointed out that a cored-pineapple structure would not survive the water pressure at the bottom of the sea, for most values of "the bottom of the sea"?
posted by evidenceofabsence at 4:46 PM on January 29, 2012


Next in the series, Can a Squid Really Play a Clarinet?
posted by not_on_display at 4:47 PM on January 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


AN OPEN LETTER TO NICKELODEON: RESPOND, OR THE SNAIL GETS IT
posted by hermitosis at 4:51 PM on January 29, 2012




Looks like an excuse to do math and show off your snail.

I don't buy it.
posted by Malice at 5:04 PM on January 29, 2012


Duhh... Heavy water.
posted by Mister Fabulous at 5:13 PM on January 29, 2012


I always felt there was something off about Sponge Bob's pad, but the real question is how does Patrick live right under a rock? He even has an Easyboy!
posted by Mojojojo at 5:17 PM on January 29, 2012


Sandy Cheeks is not Spongebob's love interest. Like Patrick, she is his friend. That's it. Spongebob has no love interest. He has like a nine year old boy's brain.
posted by stinkycheese at 5:20 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


Thirty-plus comments, and nobody has pointed out that a cored-pineapple structure would not survive the water pressure at the bottom of the sea, for most values of "the bottom of the sea"?

Of course it would. It doesn't need to be filled with anything other than water, because SpongeBob is a sponge. Don't be absurd.
posted by kuujjuarapik at 5:21 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


This is a show that has fire underwater.

And periodically shows Spongebob in the shower.
posted by mhoye at 5:37 PM on January 29, 2012


Wait wait wait. I thought all three of the houses on the street that Spongebob lives on were drinking vessels from Trader Vic's.
posted by TwelveTwo at 5:42 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


Aside for the mathematically impossible pineapple, there really isn't anything on that show that can't be explained

"And periodically shows Spongebob in the shower."

Spongebob clearly showers in cold, but not super cold, brine
posted by Blasdelb at 5:55 PM on January 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


Heh, I love the "she is so not describing Spongebob!" responses.

I enjoyed Vi Hart so much the last time she showed up on Metafilter that I watched all her videos, then sent the links off to a colleague in the Math department. She passed them on, and a number for her colleagues were unamused... because Vi Hart suggested that Math class could be boring.

I was making the same face then as I am now.
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:08 PM on January 29, 2012


Best dirty joke in Spongebob: the town he lives in is called "Bikini Bottom." Think about it.
posted by ColdChef at 6:16 PM on January 29, 2012


Y'know, I love Vi Hart, but I feel like she's coming at this pineapple thing backwards. It's not that Mathematics has somehow decreed that all pineapples shall have Fibonacci spirals, but that pineapples tend to grow in this cool spiral pattern. The pattern doesn't come from Math - it's just the most efficient way for the little pineappley growth pods to spread themselves out.

What's remarkable is that this crazy sequence that Fibonacci wrote down just to happens to mirror what actually occurs in nature - it's a testament to the power of math to model the world (rather than the world being somehow predestined by mathematics.)

BTW, the process of this growth is called Phyllotaxis. Pinecones exhibit similar cross-wise spirals (left and right, not l/r/vertical like pineapples.) If you get a (full) stalk of broccoli and cut it just right, you can see that each successive branch is around 137.5 degrees off of the previous one. 137.5 degrees being the "golden angle" which is derived from the golden ratino which can be approximated by... the Fibonacci sequence. Cool huh?

For more info, see The Mathematics of Life which explains this more elegantly than I do.
posted by Wulfhere at 6:46 PM on January 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


Looks like an excuse to do math and show off your snail.

Give me a double.
posted by benito.strauss at 7:09 PM on January 29, 2012


What happens with plant growth (you see this in sunflowers too) is that the angle between pods pretty much HAS to be 137.5 degrees. Even a small deviation in the angle of new shoot growth tends to create very visible spiral structures, which are definitely not an efficient way to grow!

I made an animation of what happens when you change the angle slightly. Watch how at 135 degrees, the formation has distinct "arms", which disappear as the angle approaches the golden angle, then begin to reappear as the angle approaches 140. Nature is cool! Math is cool!
posted by Wulfhere at 7:10 PM on January 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


Yes, and I believe this Spongebob character wears square pants. Show me the maths Nickelodeon - if you dare!
posted by mattoxic at 7:14 PM on January 29, 2012


His pants are clearly rectangular. Unless by "square" one means having squared-off corners, which has more to do with 90 degree angles than any actual definition of "square" as a geometric shape.
posted by hippybear at 7:17 PM on January 29, 2012


I've found that, at least in the days where I cared how my ass looked, the squarer my pants were, the better/less square my ass looked. There's probably a mathematical way to explain this, but some things are better left unexplained.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 8:42 PM on January 29, 2012


Guys guys, you are getting worked up over nothing. This is clearly a satirical take on nerd culture. As a group, we accept all the impossible things about the star wars universe and then get ben out of shape over explosions in space.
posted by Ad hominem at 9:17 PM on January 29, 2012


Vi Harts stuff is actually pretty great. Regardless of what you think of this, check-out some of her doodling videos, like snakes + graphs.
posted by lkc at 9:17 PM on January 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


There is shockingly deep mathematics around knot and braid theory, witness the Jones polynomial which von Jones discovered by exploring Subfactors of von Neumann algebras.
posted by jeffburdges at 2:05 AM on January 30, 2012


This is a show that has fire underwater.

And periodically shows Spongebob in the shower.


There is water at the bottom of the ocean.
posted by Segundus at 2:35 AM on January 30, 2012 [3 favorites]


ThePinkSuperhero: "Just last night we were discussing: if Spongebob wears square pants, does he have a square butt?"

Clearly, you missed the Spongebob Roundpants episode.
posted by IndigoRain at 3:45 AM on January 30, 2012


>Yes, and I believe this Spongebob character wears square pants. Show me the maths Nickelodeon - if you dare!

The French translators are much less committal about either clothing or its geometric configuration. He is just "Bob l'éponge".
posted by rongorongo at 4:39 AM on January 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


Speaking of nature, math, and patterns, here is a beautifully rendered animation by Cristóbal Vila.
posted by MrFish at 9:52 AM on January 30, 2012 [1 favorite]


.... which von Jones discovered ....

It's "Vaughan Jones".

I've heard he's said that the idea came to him when he flopped down on the bed after a night out drinking. Take that, benzene ouroboros!
posted by benito.strauss at 9:54 AM on January 30, 2012


My favorite bit of Spongebob physics is that the Krusty Krab has a walk-in freezer.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 9:58 AM on January 30, 2012




That moebius story was absolutely adorable. Off to watch more of her videos...
posted by Gordafarin at 11:37 AM on January 30, 2012


It snows in Bikini Bottom too. And things catch on fire. And Spongebob got stuck at the bottom of a wishing well when he could have just swam or even floated up to the top (not to mention Patrick and Squidward falling down the well, which wouldn't have happened that way either). You could probably fill an encyclopedia with ways in which the show doesn't seem 'realistic' as regards the physics of being underwater.

It probably helps just to forget it altogether really.
posted by stinkycheese at 9:17 AM on January 31, 2012


Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish writes "My favorite bit of Spongebob physics is that the Krusty Krab has a walk-in freezer."

My favourite headbanger is that most inhabitants drive boats with wheels instead of cars or submarines. Of course the submarines don't appear to have any airlocks so they are more like enclosed boats anyways.
posted by Mitheral at 8:47 PM on January 31, 2012


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