John Hodgman
Appearances
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
TDS Time Machine | Valentine's Day
Well, that's really the wrong question, John. If you've ever been in love, you know it has a different meaning every day. Some have argued it's always special. Others, by contrast, contend it's gripping stuff. A sizable minority even claims it's a quasi-mental illness prompting the bizarre sexualization of genital-free infants in a daily cartoon stream.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
TDS Time Machine | Valentine's Day
No, John, the question isn't what is love, but why is love?
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
TDS Time Machine | Valentine's Day
Well, sexual attraction serves a clear evolutionary purpose. It's a primal urge that helps propagate the species. You can feel it in this very room. For instance, as I speak, my air of danger, coupled with my otherworldly machismo, is prompting the release of hormones in both the live and television audiences. But that's not love, it's lust. I get that a lot.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
TDS Time Machine | Valentine's Day
Well, that's really the wrong question, John. You're the one who said that that was... The problem is there are so many different kinds of love. The ancient Greeks had almost as many different words for love as they did for pederasty. There was eros, passionate love, philia, familial love, agape, sacrificial love, and meze, the love of appetizers. Like stuffed grape leaves.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
TDS Time Machine | Valentine's Day
Stuffed grape leaves, I have to admit, are delicious. Well, if you love them so much, why don't you marry them? Why would I marry a... No, of course you wouldn't marry a grape leaf. That's my point. You love grape leaves, but you're not in love with them.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
TDS Time Machine | Valentine's Day
Well, yes. That's been my entire premise. Thank you. And it would have been successful, too, if it weren't for one thing.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
TDS Time Machine | Valentine's Day
The prairie vole. The prairie vole, I don't think that I... John, the prairie vole is an unusual species of rodent. Come mating season, they find a partner with whom to breed, but afterward, they remain with that partner and continue to copulate exclusively with them. This, as you've probably already guessed, is where we get the term, to like a prairie vole.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
TDS Time Machine | Valentine's Day
It means to have slow, tender sex with a loving, monogamous partner while burrowed underneath the ground. I thought you were from New Jersey. Studies show that prairie voles experience the same surge in oxytocin that happily married humans do, meaning love is an empirically observable chemical reaction. Meaning... Ipso facto, love is real.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
TDS Time Machine | Valentine's Day
Oh, maybe, but really it means that love can be sold in a pill or time release capsule form now.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
TDS Time Machine | Valentine's Day
I agree. I suppose we're romantics, you and I. We prefer our love the old fashioned way, in an easy to inhale aerosol spray. So that on a day like today, we can wistfully turn to our loved ones and coo, darling, let's like prairie bulls.