Me: *seeing a doctor* Did the test come back positive?
Doctor: *has a doctorate in English Lit* I’m sorry, it’s a little more challenging than we thought. We analyzed your imagery, and it appears that you symbolize the fleeting nature of the American dream
Me: oh god
Me: so is that positive or negative
English lit doctor: we cannot put such simple value judgments on an instance of literary symbolism
Me: ok fine. I’m gonna ask a doctor of some harder science then. Hey, actual science doctor. is the test result positive or negative, in the normal sense of “do i have the thing or not”
Doctor of particle physics: well, in my field “positive” means you don’t have the thing. because the thing is an electron