Reductio ad absurdum means "reduction to absurdity." It demonstrates that a counter arguement is fallacious or silly by reducing it to an "absurd" conclusion. It is also called argumentum ad absurdum. It is often used in humor and jokes, as well as in discussions of philosophy and religion.
The British comedy group Monty Python (Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin) often took arguments in religion, philosophy, and everything else to the absurd. Here is a classic from their 1975 movie: Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
Crowd: A witch! A witch! A witch! We found a witch! We've got a witch! A witch! A witch! We have found a witch. May we burn her?Many, many Wiccans are familar with this scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975). I have often heard someone with an American faked English accent say indignantly, "This isn't my nose!" when goofing around with each other after a slew of other Monty Python references. Only the comedic geniuses of Monty Python could do a scene on random mob violence against "witches" and make it humorous via making it utterly absurd and surreal. This scene makes allusions to several tests against suspected witches: swimming the witch, weighing the witch against a bible, trial by ordeal.
Sir Bedevere: How do you know she is a witch?
Peasant 1: She looks like one.
Sir Bedevere: Bring her forward.
Woman accused of being a witch: I'm not a witch! I'm not a witch!!
Sir Bedevere: But you are dressed as one.
Woman: [points at crowd] They dressed me up like this!
Crowd: We didn't! We didn't..
Woman: And this isn't my nose. It's a false one.
Sir Bedevere: [lifts up her false nose and looks back at the crowd] Well?
Peasant 1: Well, we did do the nose.
Sir Bedevere: The nose?
Peasant 1: And the hat, but she is a witch!
Crowd: Yeah! Burn her! Burn her!
Sir Bedevere: Did you dress her up like this?
Peasant 1: No!
Peasant 3, Peasant 2: No!
Peasant 3: No!
Peasant 1: No!
Peasant 3, Peasant 2: No!
Peasant 1: Yes!
Peasant 2: Yes!
Peasant 1: Yeah a bit.
Peasant 3: A bit!
Peasant 1, Peasant 2: A bit!
Peasant 2: a bit
Peasant 1: But she has got a wart!
Random Person in the crowd has an embarassed cough
Sir Bedevere: What makes you think she's a witch?
Peasant 2: She turned me into a newt!
Sir Bedevere: A newt?
Peasant 2: [looks embassaed] I got better.
Peasant 3: Burn her anyway!
[King Arthur walks up on the side, standing away from the crowd]
Sir Bedevere: Quiet! Quiet! [The crowd quiets]
Sir Bedevere: There are ways of telling whether she is a witch.
Crowd: Are there? What are they? Tell us. - Do they hurt?
Sir Bedevere: Tell me, what do you do with witches?
Crowd: Burn them!
Sir Bedevere: And what do you burn, apart from witches?
Peasant 1: More witches!
Peasant 3: Wood!
Sir Bedevere: So why do witches burn?
[Crowd stops, and silently thinks while they try to puzzle out an answer]
Peasant 3: 'Cause they're made of wood?
Sir Bedevere: Good!
[Crowd nods and mummers appreciately.]
Random voice in crowd: Oh, yeah.
Sir Bedevere: How do we tell if she is made of wood?
Peasant 1: Build a bridge out of her.
Sir Bedevere: Ah--But can you not also make bridges out of stone?
Peasant 1: Oh, yeah.
Sir Bedevere: Does wood sink in water?
Peasant 1: Ah. No.
Peasant 3: It floats!
Peasant 1: Throw her into the pond!!
Crowd: [cheers] Yeah.
Sir Bedevere: [Quiets crowd] What also floats in water?
[Answers from the crowd, each of which Sir Bedevere indicates that it is not the answer he is looking for]:
Bread.
Apples.
Very small rocks.
Cider! Great gravy.
Cherries. Mud.
Churches.
Lead.
King Arthur: A duck!
Sir Bedevere: [points to King Arthur, who he had not yet noticed, off to the side] Exactly!
Sir Bedevere: [back to the crowd] So, logically--
Peasant 1: [Thinkg hard] If she...weighs the same as a duck...she's made of wood.
Sir Bedevere: And therefore?
[Peasant 1 looks puzzed.]
Peasant 2: A witch!
Crowd: [cheers] A witch! [cheers]
Crowd: A duck! A duck! - Here's a duck.
Sir Bedevere: We shaIl use my largest scales.
[Sir Bedevere and the crowd go scales and set the woman on one side and the duck onthe other.]
Sir Bedevere: Remove the supports!
[They knock the suports out from under the two sides of the scale. As they weigh her, the scales rock back and forth. Briefly she is equal with the duck.]
Crowd: Burn the witch! [cheers] A witch!
Random calm voice in crowd: It's a fair cop.
[Crowd cheers as they carry off the woman.]
Sir Bedevere: Who are you, who are so wise in the ways of science?
Sir Bedevere: I am Arthur, king of the Britons.
Sir Bedevere: [looks surprised and then falls to one knee] My liege...
[The segment ends with Arthur inviting Bedevere to go on a quest with him for the Holy Grail.]--Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
I'm still amazed that I find the scene so funny...
--2013 Myth Woodling
Sources:
You tube: She's a witch!
The classic scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail