Talk:1501: Mysteries
Here's a list of wikipedia links I compiled that will be useful for anyone wanting to update this page. http://www.reddit.com/r/xkcd/comments/2zog5d/xkcd_1501_mysteries/cpktray 141.101.106.155 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)
And I've got a solar eclipse to see (explainable, but weird!) but I started to compile things. Haven't got any links sorted yet, and percentages are (badly) done by eye. If someone does it better, ignore it.
141.101.98.63 09:33, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
- (Whoops, pasted the flatfile format version by accident, in my rush, rather than the more Wikifriendly one that I discarded. Commenting it out until/unless I redo it. But you should still be able to see the details via the Talk Edit pages if you're bothered. Oh, and there was really too much cloud to see the eclipse for what it was. 141.101.98.63 10:29, 20 March 2015 (UTC))
- Exactly right. (Although I didn't read the zero/zero crossing point is supposed to be maybe 50% on both scales, but instead ±zero. Still, doesn't matter. And perhaps displays/sorts better.) And looks like I don't need to recover my formatted notes after all. 141.101.98.63 11:19, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
199.27.128.176 09:49, 20 March 2015 (UTC) XKCD has explained the Voynich Manuscript before: http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/593:_Voynich_Manuscript
- XKCD has also 'explained' DB Cooper before (1400: D.B. Cooper) if that is worth mentioning. 108.162.250.167 12:06, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
I have to wonder if Randall has ever seen http://keithledgerwood.com/post/79838944823/did-malaysian-airlines-370-disappear-using and if so, whether he simply doesn't believe it. Not to sabotage his 100%-100% example if he wants to keep it there, but I'd put it at only 50% weird and 10% unexplainable. 199.27.133.27 14:02, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
- Oh lawdy, the tinfoil hat brigade has arrived. 173.245.56.202
- Carly Simon
The Carly Simon explanation includes the text "This sets up a paradox in which the song is and isn't about the vain person." This isn't correct. The song is definitely about the person. Carly is thus asserting that the subject's vanity will lead him to a correct interpretation of the song. Going to change the explanation. EverVigilant (talk) 14:51, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
I don't see why this is on Randall's chart. The Wikipedia article is all the explanation the world needs. And Warren Beatty's reaction to the song simply seals it for me. No Big Deal. Move On. – tbc (talk) 18:41, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
- WOW signa
It now says "This is the strongest evidence to date of extraterrestrial radio signals.", which is technically incorrect. We observe radio signals from outer space all the time, they originate from young stars, Big Bang, active galaxies, and so on. This should probably be rephrased to something about extraterrestrial intelligence, but I'm not sure if it deserves to be called "evidence". Jolindbe (talk) 16:18, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
- Regarding the "evidence" bit, I'd go so far as to say that it's a single signal that can't actually be tied down (even in the light of further study) to: a) receiver error/interference; b) terrestrial(/orbital) origin; c) natural universal processes. (In the latter case, especially, c.f. Pulsars, which were tentatively blamed on "Little Green Men" at first, but are now understood for what they are.) Maybe if we'd have had some more WOWs (or longer to listen to the one that we had) we could have analysed it, but it remains a mystery because neither is true. Pretty much everything else has been explained as "not evidence for aliens" (definitively, or on the balance of probability there's a better working theory that it's not) leaving this as... an anomoly. Not 'evidence', but not explained, either. For now! 141.101.98.192 20:45, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
- Dyatlov Pass
Um, Wikipedia regards avalanche as most plausible explanation of the Dyatlov Pass incident, and it appears to be most widespread and down-to-earth explanation that doesn't involve the supernatural or secret soviet weapons test, things like that. Shouldn't we include mention of the avalance then, perhaps? I mean, with such high "explainability" rating it's pretty clear that Randall probably assumes avalanche, since if he assumed other, less widespread theory he probably would downgrade the "explainability" to account for the fact that it's more disputed version. 141.101.89.222 18:13, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
- Off the chart up and to the right
How the Universe came into existence (the physics and math behind "Why is there something rather than nothing?") is far weirder with less of an explanation than anything on Randall's chart – scientists' claims, which redefine "nothing," notwithstanding. And then how life started and evolved (the chemistry and biology – and quantum physics? – at the transition point between inanimate amino acids and cells and the subsequent arrival of homo sapiens) is almost as strange as the Big Bang. – tbc (talk) 18:34, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
- Yep. And how to make a star. And how to make a planet. 108.162.249.158 11:19, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
- Inaccurate explainability rating
I've read the Russian wikipedia article on Dyatlov Pass Incident and not only it's incredibly weird (much more details than condensed English article), but also no plausible explanation is provided that would account for all the incredibly weird stuff going on. I have no idea how that could be awarded 96% explainability.
UVB-76, on the other hand, is a pretty easy to explain as one-time-pad encrypted military broadcast, with buzzing to occupy the frequency and discourage others from using it. How is that just 23% explainable, I have no idea. That's what I've found in Russian sources, anyway.
Also, the Toynbee Tiles mystery is pretty much solved if you trust "Duerr, Justin. Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles" as a source.
There are even more inconsistencies pointed out above. At first I've suspected that the scale is accidentally inverted, but D.B. Cooper story is pretty poorly explained, so it's more like the whole thing is just randomly messed up. --Shnatsel (talk) 19:54, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
- UVB-76
Is it seriously that hard to explain the "UVB-76" thing? I've been listening to this thing for a year now and even have explained how it works from the innards a few months back. Besides, it's not even called UVB-76, it was a mishear of UZB-76, and it's not even that callsign anymore. The callsign has changed to MDZhB and it is a marker to occupy the frequency of the "Codename Vulkan" communications channel. The way this thing works is that it is a bunch of gears that control a buzzer, when the Buzzer goes down you can hear it winding down and the repairmen screwing in some things when they come in. 108.162.219.9 20:49, 20 March 2015 (UTC)
- Lost Colony
Before the Roanoke colonists left, they carved "Croatan" into a post. The Croatan were a small native tribe living on the coast, who'd had friendly relations with the colonists. They disappeared along with them. A generation or two later, a completely new tribe called the Lumbee were found living further inland, with some caucasian features and using European farming techniques. It's pretty obvious what happened. Shanek (talk) 19:20, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
- MH370
I had no idea that *nothing* of MH370 was ever found (or at least so far). Reading up on the wikipedia article makes me even more confused: this map shows the plane going westward basically towards india but then this map shows the searches *west of Australia* and going *down to Antartica*! WTF?? What the hell happened to that plane?! It's now been a *year* and *nothing* was found at all. Totally weird and unexplained. --Anarcat (talk) 23:50, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
- ... and here's the explanation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map_of_search_for_MH370.png. Still freaking mind-boggling if you ask me. That thing could as well be in Khazakstan for all we know. Terrifying. --Anarcat (talk) 00:02, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
