Radiohead: 2+2=5 Meaning

Song Released: 2003

2+2=5 Lyrics

(We're on. Thats a nice way to start Jonny)

Are you such a dreamer
To put the world to rights?
I stay home forever
Where two and two always makes up five

I lay down the tracks
Sandbag and hide
January has april's showers
And two and...

1. anonymous

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   Jun 30th 2006 !⃝

   Bush's fuzzy math. Election votes, allowing the count to add up to what he needed. Even though that's not what he recieved, hence 2 plus 2 equals 5. This is in reference to the album title "Hail to the Thief". Suggesting he stole the election.
2. anonymous

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   Jun 8th 2006 !⃝

   I think this song is about people who attempt to change the world, but in the end it's futile because people won't change.
   "Are you such a dreamer, to put the world to rights"
   
   That line just makes me think that although we are governed by laws, when everything is stripped away there isn't really any order, you'd be delusional to try and tell somebody whats right and whats wrong. It isn't right, but that's how it is -> 2+2=5
3. EscapeArtist

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   Mar 23rd 2006 !⃝

   The song is about the way things are by default, and about the useless feeling that comes from the inability to do anything about it. That, at least, is what I heard in an iterview with Thom and Ed.
4. anonymous

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   Feb 1st 2006 !⃝

   I think the song has to do with philosophy, and the fact that people believe what they are told..that 2+2=4, because that's what our teachers say, but really who's to say that 2+2=4 when there's no logical proof that it really is a fact.

   This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
5. anonymous

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   Jan 24th 2006 !⃝

   I was reading 1984 and I remebered this song and made the connection. I really think they're talking about Winton Smith.
6. anonymous

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   Jan 3rd 2006 !⃝

   Also, the idea that 2+2=5 was important in George Orwell's 1984. Not saying that this song is particularly about it, but elements of it seem to link back to 1984. The main character of the novel dreams of a world not controlled by the always-watching Big Brother. In the end, he finds that the people around him were not who he thought they were, that nothing would change, and that Big Brother sees everything.
7. anonymous

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   Nov 25th 2005 !⃝

   I think this song could be about being brainwashed. The line 'two and two always makes a five' kind of made me think of that or people telling you what to think, stuff like that. I'm not sure if that's right, but that's just what I thought.

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