ineffabelle | If language is a map of reality, it's a map drawn on a chalkboard in a rainstorm.

The Viking Thread is actually an interesting test of someone's internal linguistic machinery.
If your initial reaction is "OBVIOUSLY it means he's dreaming he's a Viking, and anyone who doesn't get that is stupid or insane", I would suspect that the last letter in your MBTI is probably a J. You generally build your language linearly and formally, and if/when you don't, you're breaking that consciously in order to create an ambiguity on purpose.
But some people create their language out of context and connotation more than a formal understanding of "what language is" (and they're not all stupid or insane).

Personally, I agree with the "He's dreaming of being a Viking" interpretation, in the sense that I think that's probably what the writers meant, but the other interpretation is intuitively clear to me as well. Even though it's probably the first time anyone ever used it that way. New metaphors arise all the time.

Now, comedians/comic writers often have a skill for creating ambiguities and absurdities that they might not even consciously understand, but that somehow "strike them as funny", which is what I suspect happened in this case.

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Somebody posted in MetaTalk months later that he'd met Sam Simon or someone and asked, and the answer is literal Viking. Ralph dreams of being a Viking, and that's word of God.

That sort of thing is why we need deconstruction of text.

I can't believe how much I read of that.

Also fun: the approach of those we'll very loosely call "liberals" and those we'll very loosely call "conservatives" seems similar to several arguments put forth there, as in...
literalists insist it is only Viking, ever.
non-literalists think it could be "champion" (et.al.) and/or (even at the same time) be a Viking in the literal sense (and/or as R.W. would think a Viking would be).

In anticipation of Standard Internet Responses:
-conservative/liberal not used here to map to Democrat/Republican, or most standard political labels
-literalists start being pissier sooner
-also, arguments about what the others think and meant in their own minds and comments to the blog discussion show where it really jumps the viking
-I don't think School Mommy is cromulent to the discussion

I also loved:
"If the human race were exterminated, English would find a new host or wait for one to evolve. English does not sleep. It waits."

Correction to myself: the bigger divide is between non-literalists and those who disallow other interpretation, even as a viewer.

THIS WAS AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

If your initial reaction is "OBVIOUSLY it means he's dreaming he's a Viking, and anyone who doesn't get that is stupid or insane", I would suspect that the last letter in your MBTI is probably a J.

Guilty as charged.

It's funny, for years J and I have used "That's where I'm a Viking!" as a semi-mocking claim of mastery or excellence.

I always test as INFP, though, and the "Viking = awesome" interpretation has always struck me as really stretched and bizarre. Do I strike you as somebody who's excessively formal about language? ;P

a clever child dreaming of being a pirate may be dreaming of conducting pirate broadcasts. less likely - as this is a child - would be pirating copies of Enema Nurses 2 (ah, but perhaps i presume too much ..), but - sure - some generalized Media Pirate (an unimaginable dream when i was coming up).

Its things like this that are going to train me to shut out the endless noise of people who read my works.

Also, this is nothing new. It's just a rehash of Gary Larson's infamous Cow Tools (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CowTools) strip of Far Side.

So....see you again in a month then?

If language is a map of reality, it's a map drawn on a chalkboard in a rainstorm.

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Easy on the J's!

Re: Easy on the J's!

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aargh! what have you done?

Re: aargh! what have you done?