History Main / MistakenForProfound

-->'''Mr. Bean''': Hello. I'm Dr. Bean... apparently, and my job is to sit and look at paintings. ''[applause]'' So, um, what have I learned that I can say about this painting? Well firstly, it's quite big. Which is ''excellent''. Because it was very small, you know, ''microscopic'', then hardly anyone would be able to see it. Which would be a tremendous shame. ''[audience nods in approval]'' And secondly - and I'm getting quite near the end now of this analysis of this painting... w-why was it worth this man here ''[points to General Newton]'' spending fifty million of your American dollars on this portrait? And the answer is... erm, well, this picture is worth such a lot of money because... it's a picture of Whistler's mother. And as I've learned by staying with my best friend David Langley and his family, [[ThePowerOfFamily families are very important]]. ''[David cracks a smile]'' And even though Mr. Whistler was perfectly aware that his mother was a [[ApronMatron hideous old bat who looked like she had a cactus lodged up her backside]] ''[[ActuallyPrettyFunny [the audience laughs]]]'' he stuck with her. And even took the time to paint this ''amazing picture'' of her. It's not just a painting; it's a picture of a mad old cow who he thought the world of. And that's marvellous. ''[the audience nod together in agreement and approval]'' Well, that's what I think anyway. ''[the audience stand and applaud]''

Compare IceCreamKoan, ComicallyMissingThePoint, NotActuallyTheUltimateQuestion.

* In ''Series/BoyMeetsWorld'', Shawn ends up sitting in on a college philosophy class. When in response to the question, "Why are you here?" he responds "just visiting," everyone takes it as an expression of his belief on the transience of life. This leads Shawn to start thinking that he doesn't need to apply himself in his high school classes anymore, since he's apparently having such an easy time in a college environment. Subverted later on when Cory, who shows up to try and bring Shawn back, tells the professor that he's "just passing through" and gets mocked for seemingly thinking he can pass himself off as profound by spouting {{Ice Cream Koan}}s in class. Shawn is crushed at the end of the episode when his term paper is flunked by the professor, [[RealityEnsues who points out that his lack of knowledge of the basics (from high school) means that his grammatically twisted, illogical and contradictory paper cannot properly express his thoughts]].

* Trash Heap from ''Series/FraggleRock'' who gave out random bits of advice that usually worked out this way.

* ''TabletopGame/MageTheAwakening'': {{Invoked|Trope}} with the Mind spell "The Inescapable Question", which forces the target to stop and mull over a question the caster asks, even if it's an IceCreamKoan or something totally inane.

* ''Literature/TheSecretOfSantaVittoria'': Following the death of ''Creator/BenitoMussolini'' the city officials, desperate to avoid the wrath of the oppressed townspeople, proclaim town drunk Bombolini the new mayor after mistaking him for the leaders of the mob. As they start second guessing themselves, they relax when Bombolini walks up to the mob and says something that gets them cheering again. It turns out, all he said was that it was time to drink wine.

** A bunch of goth kids mistake Doofenschmirtz's line "there's a platypus controlling me" as a metaphor for whatever is keeping you down, when he really means [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin there's a platypus controlling him.]]
** In ''She's the Mayor'', Candace wins the Mayor for a Day contest because the judges assumed "Why My Little Brothers Should Be Busted" was a political metaphor.

* In ''Series/BoyMeetsWorld'', Shawn ends up sitting in on a college philosophy class. When in response to the question, "Why are you here?" he responds "just visiting," everyone takes it as an expression of his belief on the transience of life. This leads Shawn to start thinking that he doesn't need to apply himself in his high school classes anymore, since he's apparently having such an easy time in a college environment. Subverted later on when Cory, who shows up to try and bring Shawn back, tells the professor that he's "just passing through" and gets mocked for seemingly thinking he can pass himself off as profound by spouting {{Ice Cream Koan}}s in class. [[RealityEnsues Shawn is crushed at the end of the episode when his term paper is flunked by the professor, who points out that his lack of knowledge of the basics (Like what you learn in high school) means that his grammatically twisted, illogical and contradictory paper cannot properly express his thoughts]].

* In ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'', ''Discworld/WitchesAbroad'' mentions that wisdom from far off appears more profound, which explains why saffron-clad young men tend to pay visits to Ms. Marietta Cosmopolite, an Ankh-Morpork dressmaker. They take the phrases she spouts like "I wasn't born yesterday" and "When it rains, it pours" as koans, and end up inventing a martial art inspired by her that involves shouting at people and hitting them with brooms. ''Discworld/ThiefOfTime'' reveals that Lu-Tze of the Time Monks is a follower of "The Way of Ms. Cosmopolite", but it's unclear whether Lu-Tze actually believes it to be profound or not. He seems to find a certain profundity to them, but unlike the other monks, he also knows what they actually mean (he implies at one point that the sheer practicality is ''why'' he thinks they're profound); the other monks try to parse them as koans, which makes them look silly (not that they really need Lu-Tze's help at that).

* ''El Diente Roto'' ("The Broken Tooth") by Pedro Emilio Coll. After a particularly brutish and dull-witted boy gets one of his teeth [[TheToothHurts shattered]] by a stone thrown at him by some thug, he quickly becomes fixated on palping what's left of it with his tongue. [[OralFixation Constantly]]. The people around him, astonished by his sudden silent and calm behavior, are quick to assume that he's deep in thought, and from there it just keeps escalating from them just thinking he's some kind of newly illuminated philosopher to eventually ''getting him voted into office''.

* ''El Diente Roto'' ("The Broken Tooth") by Pedro Emilio Coll. A young thug gets one of his teeth [[TheToothHurts shattered]] by a stone thrown at him and he becomes fixated on palping what's left of it with his tongue. [[OralFixation Constantly]]. The people around him assume that he's deep in thought, and from there it just escalates from them thinking he's some kind of philosopher to eventually ''getting him voted into office''.

* In ''Literature/TheWastelands'', Jake Chambers writes his final essay while losing his mind due to a time paradox. The result is an incoherent mess combining bits of memories from a timeline that never happened with bits of prophecy. Fortunately, his teacher is of the, "[[TrueArtIsIncomprehensible If I don't understand it, it must be brilliant]]" mindset, gives Jake an "A", and says she wants to talk to him about publishing it.

* The Creator/IsaacAsimov short story "The Immortal Bard" is about a physics professor who invented a time machine that can bring historical figures into the present. Creator/WilliamShakespeare is greatly amused at how much meaning people have managed to extrapolate from his plays where there was none, likening it to wringing a flood out of a damp washcloth. He's decidedly less amused after [[spoiler:he takes a college class all about analyzing his own plays [[invoked]][[DeathOfTheAuthor and fails it]]]].

* The Creator/IsaacAsimov short story "The Immortal Bard" tells the tale of a scientist who brings Creator/WilliamShakespeare back to life, and enrolls him in a Shakespeare study class taught by a colleague without telling him. [[spoiler: Shakespeare flunks the course, unable to get his head around all the subtext people have extrapolated from the plays he just wrote to pay the bills, calling it "an ocean wrung from a damp sponge."]] It's left up in the air whether or not the scientist, who is drunk at a party, is telling this story just to mess with his friend, but toward the end of the story, the literature professor starts to remember a very odd student...

* ''Limbo'', by Bernard Wolfe. The protagonist deserts his post as a surgeon during World War III. He hides out on a island for years and on returning to the AfterTheEnd civilisation is shocked to find that some bitter rantings he left in his diary--that people should volunteer to mutilate themselves instead of fighting wars--has become the basic of a worldwide ideology where people practise self-amputation, whereas his impulsive act of desertion is assumed to be a HeroicSacrifice to stop the war, that's turned him into a martyr.

* Film/ForrestGump runs for years because he felt like running, not for a particular cause. As part of the same sequence he accidentally coins the phrase "shit happens", but he was literally just referring to some dog shit he didn't see and stepped in.

* ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia'' makes this a minor RunningGag with Tenya Iida, due to his extremely straightforward and honest personality. When he's first introduced he doesn't like [[TheHero Izuku Midoriya]], thinking that the latter isn't taking [[SuperheroSchool U.A.]]'s entrance exam seriously enough. However, Izuku manages to pass the field test by scoring "rescue points" for saving another student in danger, something the students weren't even told about. Iida jumps to the conclusion that Izuku caught onto the SecretTestOfCharacter and is far cleverer than he realized, apologizing for his earlier rudeness and eventually becoming one of Izuku's best friends. Later on, during the Summer Camp arc, when the teachers tell the students that they'll have to make their own meals, Iida assumes it's another form of training[[note]]since heroes have to be ready to comfort the victims of crimes and disasters, and having delicious food is one way of doing so[[/note]] and gets the other students fired up despite being exhausted from the day's physical exercise. The latter case is lampshaded by Aizawa-sensei thinking to himself "Sometimes Iida's pretty useful to have around."

* In ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'', ''Discworld/WitchesAbroad'' mentions that wisdom from far off appears more profound, which explains why saffron-clad young men tend to pay visits to Ms. Marietta Cosmopolite, an Ankh-Morpork dressmaker. They take the cliches she spouts like "I wasn't born yesterday" and "When it rains, it pours" as koans, and end up inventing a martial art inspired by her that involves shouting at people and hitting them with brooms. ''Discworld/ThiefOfTime'' reveals that Lu-Tze of the Time Monks is a follower of "The Way of Ms. Cosmopolite", but it's unclear whether Lu-Tze actually believes it to be profound or not. He seems to find a certain profundity to them, but unlike the other monks, he also knows what they actually mean (he implies at one point that the sheer practicality is ''why'' he thinks they're profound); the other monks try to parse them as koans, which makes them look silly (not that they really need Lu-Tze's help at that).

'''Capt. Tenille:''' We all want peace! But it's always just out of reach.\\

* ''Fanfic/MassEffectClashOfCivilizations'': As part of a team exploring a space station built by a never before encountered species ([[Franshise/{{Halo}} the UNSC]]).

* In ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'', Mayor is running for reelection, spouting his usual, tired lines. Fuzzy Lumpkins gets tired of Mayor's shouting to the crowd interrupting his sleep, so he yells "SHUT UP!", and people act like it's the best campaign slogan ever.