Cavemen vs. Astronauts Debate: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

{{quote|'''Spike:''' Look, if cavemen and astronauts got into a fight, who would win?

 

When a [[Seinfeldian Conversation]] becomes [[Serious Business]].

But not this time. No, ''this'' time the argument becomes truly heated. Voices are raised. Curses are spit out. Friends are insulted. Furniture is thrown across the room in fury. No one involved is willing to back down until they convince the others that they are right ''right'' ''RIGHT'', ''DAMMIT!!''

 

 

Needless to say, [[Truth in Television]] - just see [[Unpleasable Fanbase]], [[Broken Base]], and [[Base Breaker]] for a number of media-centric examples. Frequently overlaps with [[Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny]].

 

{{examples}}

* Many, many arguments in ''[[Knights of the Dinner Table]]''.

* [[DC Comics]] had to [[Why Fandom Can't Have Nice Things|shut down comments on their blog]] due to a flame war over whether [[Superman]] or [[The Flash]] was faster.

* Many issues of [[Marvel Comics]]' "Marvel Team-Up" comics line cashed in on these kinds of arguments. Want to know if [[Hulk]] or [[Thor]] is stronger? There's an issue where they fight each other.

 

* In ''[[Crimson Tide]]'', a fight ensues when one character said that the [[Jack Kirby|Kirby]] [[Silver Surfer]] was the only true Silver Surfer, and that the Moebius Silver Surfer was shit.

* The "pirates vs. ninjas" debate in ''[[Sydney White]]''.

 

* One ''[[Animorphs]]'' book informs us that, when they were younger, Jake and Marco would spend entire afternoons arguing about whether or not cheese tastes yellow (Marco thought it tasted sorta green). Now that they're older, they have more serious, adult debates, like Who Would Win: [[Spider-Man (Comic Book)|Spider-Man]] or [[Batman]]?

* In Jonathan Swift's ''[[Gulliver's Travels]]'', there is a war waging between people who break their hard-boiled egg at the fat end (the "big-endians"), and those who break it at the narrow end.

** This has spilled over into an analogous war within [[Real Life]] computer science. Some CPUs, such as the Intel x86-compatibles, store multi-byte values with the low-order byte first; other CPUs, such as the Motorola 68000 series, store multi-byte values with the high-order byte first. When multi-byte data from one computer is sent to another, e.g. over a network, the two computers had better agree on which way to encode the data or it could end up mangled. To this day, these two strategies are officially called "little-endian" and "big-endian", respectively, and result in just as much animosity as their Gulliverian namesakes.

* Similar to the ''Gulliver's Travels'' example above, ''The Butter Battle Book'' by [[Dr. Seuss]] features an allegory for the [[Cold War]] being waged over which side of the bread to butter.

 

* The ''[[Angel]]'' episode "A Hole in the World" is the [[Trope Namer]]. Wesley walks in on Spike and Angel after they've spent 40 minutes shouting at each other about who would win in a fight between cavemen and astronauts. Pretty soon every one in the show is getting in on the act; {{spoiler|"cavemen win" is even one character's last words}}.

* On ''[[How I Met Your Mother]]'', Ted brings a picture that could either be a rabbit or a duck to make a point about how a date might seem right for someone but turn out to be wrong, and vice-versa. Then the gang disagrees over which represented the bad choice, the duck or the rabbit. According to Older Ted, it was the longest, most intense argument they've ever had.

** ''[[MythBusters]]'' in general plays host to a lot of myths born of such subjects. Particularly trying to test the legitimacy of taking idioms literally.

* ''[[Supernatural (TV series)|Supernatural]]'': Sam and Dean Winchester have their own version of this as shown in the episode "Death's Door" with Chuck Norris vs. Jet Li.

 

* [[wikipedia:Eshu|Eshu's hat.]]

 

* ''[[Sluggy Freelance]]'' has Torg and Riff debating [http://sluggy.com/comics/archives/daily/20081021 what's the axiom of flavor]: Garlic Butter or Breaded & Deep Fat Fried. [http://sluggy.com/comics/archives/daily/20081022 Zoe acts as referee], and the debate reaches the point of physical violence when the Minion Master [http://sluggy.com/comics/archives/daily/20081027 throws in Salt as a contender].

 

* ''[[Spacebattles.com]]'' has an entire discussion forum dedicated to precisely this issue.

 

* ''[[The Venture Brothers]]'': [[Who Would Win]] in a fight, Lizzie Borden or Anne Frank?

** Henchmen #21 and #24 seem to have these debates a lot. Another episode showed them arguing over whether or not [[The Smurfs|Smurfs]] lay eggs.

** The answer is clearly {{spoiler|Pinkie Pie.}}

{{quote|'''Barney:''' And I say England's greatest Prime Minister was Lord Palmerston!

'''Wade Boggs:''' Pitt the Elder!

* In an episode of ''[[G.I. Joe]]'', the Dreadnoks can be seen in the background having come to blows over whether breath mints or candy mints are better. (Or if one product was a breath mint or a candy mint.)

 

* If an airplane were on a conveyor belt, could it... uh, never mind.

** As noted above, this was tested by the [[MythBusters]]. It worked.

*** No, you're just conceding defeat. The argument is that the treadmill would keep the plane from moving forward.

* Pirates vs Ninjas. That is all.

** [[Rooster Teeth]] parodied the pirates vs ninjas debate by starting Cake vs Pie.

** Also, [[Zombies vs. Unicorns]].

* Coca-Cola vs Pepsi.

* The [[Console Wars]]

* Does .999...[repeating] = 1?<ref>[[wikipedia:0.999|Yes]], but [[Cassandra Truth|nobody will believe you.]]</ref>

**** Not to mention the [[True Blood|Team Bill vs Team Eric]] argument.

*** In fact, let's just say [[Shipping]] in general.

** Heck, ''any'' random, small, and otherwise irrelevant, difference in political, philosophical or religious views could turn into this. We could give examples of this, [[Rule of Cautious Editing Judgment|but we're not going to.]]

* [[The Other Wiki]] [[wikipedia:Wikipedia:Lamest edit wars|has these in spades]]. For example: is that city in northern Poland called "Danzig" or "Gdańsk" in English? There's even been wars about ''punctuation''!

** Though to be fair to punctuation, incorrect punctuation can dramatically change the meaning of a statement. "Let's eat, Grandpa." means something different than "Let's eat Grandpa" just as "Let's help your Uncle Jack off a horse." is something different than "Let's help your Uncle jack off a horse."

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]