Okay--I was looking at the old thread where tsuwm mentions Douglas Hofstadter. I decided to see if I could find a quotable source on (by) him. I got sidetracked to this intriguing site and learned about something called pataphysics, which has only been mentioned here once before, and in a thread so fine that I immediately decided to ressurrect it.
Queneau joined in 1950 the Collège of Pataphysique, the group of intellectuals and writers whose zany, tongue-in-cheek manner brought a sort of Brothers-Marxist approach to French philosophy. Pataphysics was created by poet and playwright Alfred Jarry (1873-1907), and is defined as the science of imaginary solutions, or the science which investigates not the laws of Nature, but the exceptions to those laws.
http://www.themodernword.com/scriptorium/queneau.html
I don't know anything about pataphysics or Alfred Jarry, so if anyone would care to enlighten me...