Robots IV: The Academic Emporium

Robots IV: The Academic Emporium
by John Cleese, Andrew Goodwin, Michael Palin, & Scott Rowe (of Le Bateau Ivre), with assistance from Susan Hellein.

Mashed from Monty Python's Flying Circus - "Cheese Shop"
The Players:
John Cheese - Prospective student at the University of Difficulty, IQ
Dr. Wilfred Wensleydale - Deputy Head, Dept. of Philosophy
TradeMark Gunderson -- Program Assistant, who is practicing his beat-matching in the corner of the office.
The Scene: The Departmental Office

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CHEESE: Good Morning.
WENSLEYDALE: Good morning. And may I welcome you to the Philosophy Department at the University of Difficulty.
CHEESE: Ah, thank you my good man.
WENSLEYDALE: And what can I do for you?
CHEESE: Well I was, uh, sitting in the public library on Stupid Street just now, skimming through Being and Time by Mister Martini Heidegger, and I suddenly came over all peckish.
WENDLEYDALE: Peckish, young man?
CHEESE: Esurient.
WENSLEYDALE: Eh?
CHEESE: [In a broad Yorkshire accent]: Eee I were all 'ungry, like.
WENSLEYDALE: Ah, hungry.
CHEESE: In a nutshell. And I thought to myself, 'a little intellectual stimulation will do the trick'. So I curtailed my Heideggerian activites, sallied forth, and infiltrated your place of purveyance to negotiate the possibility of obtaining a degree in philosophy. One that might appease my insatiable appetite for knowledge.
WENSLEYDALE: Come again?
CHEESE: I want to learn about... PHILOSOPHY!
WENSLEYDALE: Oh, I thought you were complaining about the mash-up DeeJay. He's practising his... what is it?
TRADEMARK GUNDERSON: Beat-matching, sir.
WENDSLEYDALE: Ah, yes. Beat. Matching. We teach a class on it. At the graduate level. I do hope he's not bothering you?
CHEESE: Oh, heaven forbid. I am one who delights in all manifestations of the music of the volk as expressed through all means both analogue and digital.
WENSLEYDALE: Sorry?
CHEESE: [In a broad Yorkshire accent]: Ooo, I like a nice tune - you're forced to.
WENSLEYDALE: So he can go on, er, spinning, can he?
CHEESE: Most certainly. Now then, may I ask what sorts of classes you teach here and most importantly what approach you take to the field of philosophy?
WENSLEYDALE: Certainly. What would you like?
CHEESE: I don't understand the question.
WENDSLEYDALE: What philosophers would you like to study during your three to seven years with us?
CHEESE: Well, eh, how about a little Plato?
WENSLEYDALE: I'm afraid we're fresh out of Plato, sir.
CHEESE: Oh never mind, how are you on Aristotle?
WENSLEYDALE: I'm afraid we never teach him during the spring semesters old chap.
CHEESE: Tish tish. No matter. Well, stout yeoman, avail me if you will of your offerings in the field of existentialism, if you please.
WENSLEYDALE: Ah. We've been expecting to hire someone in that area just of late. But no luck so far, as such.
CHEESE: It's not my lucky day, is it? Er, aesthetic cognitivism?
WENSLEYDALE: Sorry, sir.
CHEESE: Theory of mind?
WENSLEYDALE: Normally, yes. But this year the professor is on sick leave.
CHEESE: Ah. Wittgenstein, the only truly worthy footnote to Plato?
WENSLEYDALE: Sorry.
CHEESE: Anscombe?
WENSLEYDALE: Come again?
CHEESE: Elizabeth.
WENDLEYDALE: Oh we only deal in white male philosophers here at the University of Difficulty.
CHEESE: I see. Arendt? No matter. How about Marcuse?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Any Soren Kierkegaard, per chance?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Foucault?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Rorty?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Terry Eagleton?
WENSLEYDALE: Who?
CHEESE: Never mind. Nietzsche?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Derrida?
WENSLEYDALE: ..... Nnnnnnnnnn.....No.
CHEESE: Galen Strawson?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: P. F. Strawson?
WENSLEYDALE: The father? No sir.
CHEESE: Ayer, Quine, Fichte, Locke, Marx, Hegel, Kant, Sartre, Adorno, Hume, Habermas? Whitehead, Alfred North?
WENSLEYDALE: Not currently. In so far as.
CHEESE: Introduction to Cultural Studies, perhaps?
WENSLEYDALE: Ah! We have some cultural studies, yes. This very semester squire.
CHEESE: You do! Excellent.
WENSLEYDALE: Yes. It's, ah ..... it's a bit of a thin class though. Easy A's. That sort of thing.
CHEESE: Oh, I like easy A's.
WENSLEYDALE: Well, it's very thin, actually, sir.
CHEESE: No matter. Fetch hither the cutting edge of twentieth century humane studies! M-mmm!
WENSLEYDALE: I think it's a bit thinner than you'd like it, you see.
CHEESE: I don't care how fucking thin it is. Register me for this class with all speed.
WENSLEYDALE: [checking his laptop] Oh .....
CHEESE: What now?
WENSLEYDALE: The class is full. Very popular, you see.
CHEESE: Really?
WENSLEYDALE: Yes, my good lad.

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CHEESE: Arthur Schopenhauer?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: David Chambers?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Colin McGinn?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Husserl?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Stanley Cavell? The great saint of Hippo, Doctor Augustine?
WENSLEYDALE: No. As I told you before, we only teach causasoid intellectuals here.
CHEESE: Indeed. How foolish of me. You do have some classes in philosophy, do you?
WENSLEYDALE: Of course. It's a department of philosophy. We've got...
CHEESE: No, no, don't tell me. I'm keen to guess.
WENSLEYDALE: Fair enough.
CHEESE: Er, Wensleydale?
WENSLEYDALE: Yes?
CHEESE: Ah, well, I'll try him.
WENSLEYDALE: Oh, I thought you were talking to me. Dr. Wensleydale, that's my name.

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CHEESE: New studies in the cognitive sciences?
WENSLEYDALE: Ah, not as such.
CHEESE: Er, postmodern ethics?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Post-post modern ethics?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Pre-post-modern ethics?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Epistemology and relativism in the age of the iPod?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Philosophy of religion?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Philosophy of education?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: Philosophy of philosophy?
WENSLEYDALE: Not this semester, sir, no.

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CHEESE: Ah, how about Bertrand Russell?
WENSLEYDALE: Well, we don't get much call for him around here.
CHEESE: Not much ca- He's the single most well-known philosopher in the world!
WENSLEYDALE: Not round here, young man.
CHEESE: And who pray tell is the most popular philosopher round here?
WENSLEYDALE: Baudrillard, sir.
CHEESE: Really? Baudrillard?
WENSLEYDALE: Oh yes, sir. He's staggeringly popular in this manor, squire.
CHEESE: I see.
WENSLEYDALE: He's the number-one best selling thinker. Very popular.
CHEESE: I see. Ah, Baudrillard, eh?
WENSLEYDALE: Right, sir.
CHEESE: All right. Okay. Have you got any classes on the great philosopher of La Belle France... he asked, expecting the answer No.
WENSLEYDALE: I'll have a look, sir. Damn it. Baudrillard's off. Our professor in that field, you see, he is rather eccentric. As you might imagine. He's abandoned post-modern theory for Hitler Studies.
CHEESE: It's not much of a philosophy department, is it?
WENSLEYDALE: Finest in the nation, sir. Top tier, according to US News & World Report.
CHEESE: Explain the logic underlying that conclusion, please.
WENSLEYDALE: Well, it's so clean here, sir.
CHEESE: It's certainly uncontaminated by ideas.
WENSLEYDALE: You haven't asked me about our Introduction to Philosophy class, sir.
CHEESE: Is it worth it?
WENSLEYDALE: Could be.
CHEESE: Have you -- SHUT THAT BLOODY DJ UP!
WENSLEYDALE: [To TRADEMARK GUNDERSON] Told you so.
CHEESE: Have you got any room in your class Introduction To Philosophy?
WENSLEYDALE: No.
CHEESE: That figures. Predictable really, I suppose. It was an act of purest optimism to have posed the question in the first place. Tell me:
WENSLEYDALE: Yes, sir?
CHEESE: Have you in fact got any philosophy classes here at all?
WENSLEYDALE: Yes, sir.
CHEESE: Really?

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WENSLEYDALE: No. Not really, sir.
CHEESE: You haven't.
WENSLEYDALE: No, sir, none at all. I was deliberately wasting your time. All I ever read is the backs of cereal packets.
CHEESE: Well, I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to shoot you.
WENSLEYDALE: Right-O, sir.
CHEESE: [Shoots him] What a senseless waste of human cheese.

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Napkin by Scott Wensleydale-Rowe
Image by Susan Gouda Hellein