C’mon and grab your friends. We’ll go to very distant lands. C’mon and grab your friends. We’ll go to very distant lands.
There may be no two sentences that better describe philosophy than the introduction to Adventure Time.
Philosophy is tough. It can be baffling, daunting, and even scary.
Philosophy is the quest to solve the most difficult questions we can ask. On that quest, the monstrous problems loom . . . who we really are, the meaning of life and death, how we can know the truth, whether we have any free will, the nature of time, the existence of God, . . . everything (and even what “everything” means).
Philosophers, those adventurers who dedicate their lives to trying to overcome these problems, often find themselves in very distant, not to mention weird and often lonely lands—the lands of unpopular ideas, dissident theories, crazy questions, and even crazier answers.
Philosophers may think of themselves as heroes but they are often seen as villains or even monsters—objects of hatred for supposing that the Earth might not be the center of the universe, that the gods might not exist (or if they do exist, might not care what we do), that free will could be an illusion, that science may be missing something important . . . Philosophers may suddenly find themselves unpopular. That’s why it’s best to go on this adventure with a friend.
Exploring Adventure Time is especially fascinating. We will try to figure out whether Finn was fated to lose his arm, if the Ice King is actually such a bad guy, and what it really means to be evil—just to name a few deep questions the show asks us. Adventure Time is chockablock with philosophical questions.
Most fans of Adventure Time are grown-ups but children like it too. Children are willing to ask honest questions, and seriously consider answers that seem absurd at first. Like philosophy, Adventure Time deals with ideas and questions that look and sound crazy. Those are the questions like “How small can something be?” “What does ‘evil’ really mean?” and “If I jump really high, can I end up in space?”
You start looking at the crazy answers when you realize that the obvious, non-crazy answers are usually wrong. Matter isn’t solid, the Earth’s moving, and even time can be bent and distorted. These are the kinds of thoughts that Adventure Time isn’t afraid of . . . in fact, those thoughts are treated, just as they should be, like they’re fun!
Adventure Time takes no crazy thought for granted. Everything humans have taken for granted during their short time on the planet has turned out to be mistaken. Common sense often leads us away from the truth. And the more we study, the less we know.
Adventure Time isn’t a kids’ show. But it does speak to children and to those grown-ups who are still able to think like children—knowing that the world’s full of things they don’t know about, willing to consider and reconsider everything. Thanks to Adventure Time, even old, bearded, and wizened philosophers might occasionally remember why they got into this business in the first place . . . because the world is a wonder, a mystery, and an adventure. We can’t conquer it, we can’t win it, and we can’t beat it, but we can play in it.
So. Let me invite you on an adventure, the kind of adventure that never ends . . . a fun adventure into the weird, wild, and dangerous.
Welcome to Adventure Time and Philosophy!