explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

765: Dilution

2024-07-29T14:54:33Z

141.101.99.33: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 765
| date = July 12, 2010
| title = Dilution
| image = dilution.png
| titletext = Dear editors of Homeopathy Monthly: I have two small corrections for your July issue. One, it's spelled "echinacea", and two, homeopathic medicines are no better than placebos and your entire magazine is a sham.
}}

==Explanation==
{{w|Homeopathy}} is the belief that poisons, bacteria, and other harmful substances can actually cure the diseases they normally cause, if they are administered in sufficiently dilute form. The normal procedure is to prepare a solution, then successively dilute it with water or alcohol by multiple factors of 10. (There's also a "succussion" step between rounds, which basically consists of shaking or striking the mixture, but no serious mechanism for how this would affect anything has been provided.) In the medical world, it's known to be completely ineffective, with countless scientific studies repeatedly showing it to have no more effectiveness than a {{w|placebo}}. Keep in mind that homeopathy was invented when standard treatments included blood letting, drugs made with mercury and arsenic, and natural remedies made with nightshade and hemlock. So doing effectively nothing like homeopathy had better results than doing harm to an individual.

Here we find [[Cueball]], a firm believer in homeopathy, applying the idea to fertility by diluting his semen. 30X means that the semen has been diluted with water at a 1:10 ratio 30 times, so the solution contains 1 part semen to one-nonillion (1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000) parts water. Since the average ejaculation contains 200 to 500 million sperm cells, this means the solution Cueball is holding has a 3.5x10-20% chance of containing even a single sperm cell. Clearly, [[Megan]] will not be getting pregnant from this, so she and Cueball will not be passing on their genes to the next generation, which is why the comic states that "the belief in homeopathy is not, evolutionarily, selected for".

According to the belief of homeopathy, diluted sperm should not help in getting pregnant, but help to cure the symptoms, e.g. pregnancy, caused by it{{fact}}. So even if diluting it 30X, would have a homeopathic effect, it would be the opposite of the one Cueball states he wants to achieve.

{{w|Echinacea}} is a genus of flowers commonly used in herbal remedies to stimulate the immune system. Scientific studies have not shown that such an effect exists. The title text is intended to represent a letter to the editors of fictitious journal 'Homeopathy Monthly', starting with a minor complaint that they seem unable to perform the basic proof-reading and fact-checking necessary to correctly spell one of the most well-known herbal remedies. This is followed up by a complete dismissal of homeopathy as a whole and the magazine in particular.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball stands at a desk with a beaker in one hand and a turkey baster in the other. Megan lies in a bed in the same room.]

:Cueball: Okay, this time I've diluted the semen 30x.
:Megan: We'll be ''sure'' to get pregnant now!

:Belief in homeopathy is not, evolutionarily, selected for.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Sex]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

2929: Good and Bad Ideas

2024-05-07T10:29:36Z

141.101.99.33: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2929
| date = May 6, 2024
| title = Good and Bad Ideas
| image = good_and_bad_ideas_2x.png
| imagesize = 595x522px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = While it seemed like a fun prank at the time, I realize my prank fire extinguishers full of leaded gasoline were a mistake.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD- Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This is a scatter plot comparing how good an idea sounds to how good the idea actually is. For example, leaded gasoline sounds like a good idea due to the anti-knocking effects, but is actually a bad idea due to lead toxicity. Fake prank fire extinguishers however sound bad and are bad as they can result in a dangerous situation in an emergency. Putting mold on infections sounds like a bad idea, but this could be referring to Penicillin, an antibiotic.

The title text combines leaded gasoline and a fake prank fire extinguisher into something that is worse than either. Not only is the fire extinguisher fake, it also releases flammable material onto the fire, and there is the additional lead toxicity.

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Idea !! What it means !! How good it sounds !! How good it actually is !! Explanation
|-
|Leaded Gasoline||Adding tetraethyl lead to gasoline to increase performance||++||---||Leaded gasoline was introduced in the early 1920s to greatly increase fuel efficientcy and engine performance. Lead, however, is toxic. Burning the leaded gasoline in an engine releases the lead in the air. This is bad, and was known to be bad at the time, which is why there was an extensive PR campaign by oil companies to prove the alleged safety of the new product, which broadly speaking succeeded up until the 1970s.
|-
|Bloodletting||Releasing "bad blood" from the veins||---||---||You need your blood.{{Citation needed}} Bloodletting has been performed as a medical procedure for at least 2000 years until it was considered pseudoscience from the 19th century, when the harmful effects became known. The idea was to withdraw blood to balance the body's "humors". Nowadays phlebotomy is only used therapeutically in a small number of cases, such as hemochromatosis (too much iron in the body).
|-
|Asbestos||Mineral which does not burn and is good isolation||+++||---||Asbestos was used extensively. Sadly the microscopic fibers which make up asbestos greatly increase the risk of cancer when inhaled.
|-
|Extension cords with prongs on both ends||allows easy connection between 2 female connectors||0 (neutral)||---||Prongs on both ends would make it easier to plug the extension cord in on either side. But once plugged into an outlet, the other end becomes a serious shock hazard.
|-
|Stair Kayaking||Riding down a flight of stairs in a kayak||--||---|| Stair kayaking is a stunt where a person positions a kayak at the top of a flight of stairs and then, using their paddle to push off, rides the kayak down the stairs. This poses significant risks of injury or death, as well as being very bad for the kayak, which is designed to ride on water, not concrete.
|-
|Fake prank fire extinguishers||||---||---|| The idea of placing fake fire extinguishers as a prank, presumably so that a person who thinks they are grabbing a real fire extinguisher will instead find a decoy, sounds very dangerous and potentially life-threatening for many people, and it would, in fact, be highly dangerous. In the United States, (and presumably most countries), this would also be a felony in most, if not all, jurisdictions. An example of a similar situation, although not intended as a prank, can be found here[https://twitter.com/ThatSamWinkler/status/1657154071051239424]
The title text expands this idea by having the prank fire extinguishers filled with (leaded) gasoline. This is literally adding fuel to the fire.
|-
|Always saying what you think||...regardless of the feelings of others or other considerations||++||--||They may reply without concern for ''your'' feelings or other considerations. Openness and honesty are seen as positive character traits in people, however taken to the extreme of ''always'' telling people what you think about them, can lead to awkward or unpleasant situations. Keeping negative thoughts to yourself or telling "white lies" can be considered a better alternative in some situations.
|-
|Replying to spammers||Clicking on the "Reply" button from spam mails and writing (and sending) a reply (or worse, clicking on the links in these mails)||--||--||
|-
|Solar cars||Having {{w|Solar panel|solar panels}} on the car's surface (mostly hood and roof) for power generation||+++||-||Cars require large amounts of energy in short periods of time and portable solar panels do not produce this, nor are they as efficient as fixed installations on the power grid.
There are competitions for solar powered cars, though, like the {{w|World Solar Challenge}}.
|-
|Heelies||{{w|Heelys}} are shoes with a inline skate wheel embedded in the sole, at the heel. ||+||-||Heelys allow the wearer (usually children) to shift between normal walking and rolling like a roller skate. This sounds like fun but has lead to numerous injuries.
|-
|Prequels||A work of fiction (mostly movie) telling the "story before the story" of another work of fiction.||+++||-||More of a good story sounds great on the surface, but the constraints of a prequel's ending needing to create the starting conditions of the original work often precludes organic development and causes contrived plots.
|-
|Transition Lenses||Photochromic lenses in glasses get darker (like sunglasses) in bright light.||+||-||Photochromic lenses are clear lenses that darken when exposed to UV light, then turn clear again when the exposure is removed. The advantage is that wearers of glasses don't need to buy separate (prescription) sunglasses. However, the process is relatively slow (about a minute) so not so useful when there is a quick succession of shade and bright light, perhaps in a forest or when driving. Also, car windscreen filter out UV light to some degree, which prevents the glasses from darkening as required. Finally, the process is temperature dependent, so in hot weather the glasses don't become as dark and in cold weather they might stay dark for too long.
|-
|Cutting pizza in squares||Cutting (a presumably round) pizza in squares||-||-||Most people cut pizza into wedges and hold it by the crust. Cutting it into squares allows for more pieces to be shared, but pieces near the center will have no crust to hold it by, getting cheese and sauce all over your fingers. There will also be lots of leftover tiny pieces. While hardly a disaster like the other items in its quadrant, square pizza pieces are just not very useful and rather inefficient. Cutting a rectangular pizza into squares might not suffer from the problems above, but, unless the pizza itself is square and cut only inot four squares, some people will end up with a higher crust-to-topping ratio than others.
|-
|{{w|Project Orion (nuclear propulsion)|Project Orion}}||Study by the U.S. government looking into nuclear pulse propulsion for spacecraft.||---||-||Using repeated nuclear explosions to generate motion sounds bad for both the spacecraft and everything else, especially with a ground launch, but there are ways to address a lot of the concerns, so it isn't as bad as it sounds. Project Orion's theorized specific impulse and thrust would also be far higher than anything chemical rockets can accomplish. The efficiency of Project Orion is extremely low, however.
|-
|Soup||Soup||0 (neutral)||0 (neutral)||Soup is probably one of the oldest foods created by prehistoric cooks. Most people enjoy it, though many soups are considered somewhat lacking as a meal on their own, or bland.
|-
|Combo washer dryers||A device which combines washing machine and laundry dryer into one device||+++||+||Better at space efficiency, but worse at each task than separate devices.
|-
|Cutting sandwiches diagonally||Cutting sandwiches diagonally||+||+||Generally regarded{{Actual citation needed}} as the structurally superior way to slice a sandwich, providing better support in the hand and fewer all-crust bites. Required in the assembly of a club sandwich, where the diagonal components are stacked again.
|-
|{{w|Diverging diamond interchange|Diverging diamond interchanges}}||Road junction where the two road direction cross over to switch sides (so if you normally drive on the right, now you drive on the left) then switch back to normal after the junction||-||+||Highway engineers believe the shape improves safety and traffic flow through the interchange because switching to the other side facilitates merging to and from the other road in the junction. However the shape appears to be insanity to an unfamiliar driver.
|-
|Toasting sandwiches||Making a sandwich first and then cooking it, as in a {{w|toaster oven|toaster oven}} or frying pan||++||++||The grilled cheese sandwich is a familiar form to most people, and many other sandwiches are improved by toasting as a final step. Others, such as the {{w|western sandwich|Western}} or {{w|club sandwich|club}} are prepared using toast. The {{w|peanut butter, banana and bacon sandwich|Elvis}} is a specific case of a sandwich that normally wouldn't be toasted, but is improved by it - peanut butter, bacon, banana, and jelly, with the assembly lightly fried.
|-
|Crumple zones||Designated areas of a car that crumple in case of a crash... ||--||++||...to absorb the energy of the crash to prevent damage to the passengers
|-
|Sliced bread||Bread, sliced by the baker before packaging for sale||+++||++||It's far more convenient for making sandwiches or toast, but unfortunately presliced bread will go stale faster and some applications may be better off thicker or thinner than the slices provided.
|-
|Pizza||Flat, though usually leavened, bread with tomato sauce, cheese, and often vegetables or preserved meats||++||++ꟶ||Pizza is a widely popular dish throughout much of the world, uncontroversial except {{w|Pineapple|certain toppings.}}
|-
|Eating citrus fruit while at sea||||0 (neutral)||+++||The vitamin C present in citrus fruits prevents one from contracting {{w|Scurvy|scurvy}}.
|-
|Putting mold on infections||Seemingly a reference to ancient practice of pressing moldy bread against infected wounds||---||++||While this sounds like a good way to get a fungal infection, with the correct mold this is a primitive antibiotic, and led to the discovery of penicillin.
|-
|Wheels on luggage||Some luggage bags have small wheels inset on their frame and a carrying handle.||+++||+++||A relatively simple fitting for rigid or semi-rigid luggage that substantially eases its transport through air and seaport terminals.
|-
|Heat pumps||Refrigeration (or air conditioning) technology operated in reverse to heat an area instead.||++||+++||Because refrigeration is a very efficient way to move heat (as long as the cold side's temperature is high enough) this is often far more energetically efficient than directly heating a space. Reversible heat pumps also exist which can take care of both temperature needs in some climates.
|-
|Laser eye surgery||Surgical techniques using lasers for precision cutting in the eyeball.||-||+++||This technology has substantially improved the eyesight of millions of people worldwide by allowing treatment of eye problems otherwise only corrected by lenses, or entirely untreatable. Randall has previously commented on laser eye surgery, amongst other ideas both good and bad, in [[1681: Laser Products]].
|-
|Fecal transplants||Transfer of gut microbiome of healthy person to sterilised gut of ill person.||---||+++||The gut microbiome is a collection of bacteria that lives in our guts. It can influence our health. It is responsible for last stages of digesting our food. It can also produce neurotransmitters that are carried by blood to our brain influencing our behaviour. A healthy microbiome can be destroyed by bad eating habits, unhealthy lifestyle, infections or antibiotics. The important part is a composition of different species of bacteria that compromise the biome. Sometimes it may be necessary to completely sterilise the gut and then take a sample of a healthy biome from another person. A sample is enough as the bacteria will multiply. As long as the patient eats correctly, the microbiome after transplant should develop correctly.

It sounds bad because we tend to think of our feces as something gross, to be discarded. It is called fecal transplant as our feces contain about 50% of gut bacteria, but nowadays the sample usually takes the form of a coated pill that is applied rectally.
|-
|}

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Charts]]

Talk:2898: Orbital Argument

2024-02-24T04:35:59Z

141.101.99.33:

May not be (probably isn't!) the inspiration for this comic, but just yesterday there was news of the latest successes in cooling down {{w|Positronium}} (an 'atom' in which nothing is at the nucleus, the charges 'orbit each other' (or the quantum equivalent)). A co-inky-dink, surely, but just thought I'd mention it in passing... [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.78|141.101.98.78]] 03:13, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

In editing, I'm accutely aware that even the "relatively small" force by the Earth on the Sun is a bad way of putting it. Looked at properly, ''exactly the same'' force is exerted against the Sun by the Earth (heavy item drawn pulled down to light item) as is exerted against the Earth by the Sun (lighter item being pulled down by heavier item). ((Fairly easily proven, these days: e.g. If it were not so, something like a bowling-ball and ping-pong ball could be kept separate by a stick, but released in space where they'd then work as a 'gravity drive' that propelled them one way (or perhaps the other!) without any need for power/propellant.)) Of course, the force should be considered equal (bidirectionally singular) with the inertial framing being the factor that makes the freefalling apple the more obvious thing to fall than the Earth upon which any budding Newton is stood/sat in rapt observation. But the Earth's contribution to the (currently) indivisible joint attraction that drives both sides of any 2-body problem is far more than any given apple and far less than any given star. As and when we can perhaps split this (either directionally 'diode' the flow of gravitational effects, or even independently manipulate inertial and gravitational masses) then perhaps we will need to be more discriminating in calculating/describing about such things. Assuming we don't just go with "gravity is a lie, it's all just mass-curved spacetime", instead. ;) But just thought I'd expound a few different relevent worldviews, of greater or lesser usefulness... [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.33|141.101.99.33]] 04:35, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

Talk:2882: Net Rotations

2024-02-02T19:26:02Z

141.101.99.33:

Wait, so I'm not the only one who thinks about this? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.167.177|172.71.167.177]] 23:28, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
:No, I also do it, just I do it right after I do the turns so I don't have to remember them all. [[User:B_for_brain|B for brain]] ([[User_talk:B_for_brain|talk]]) ([https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCg4bo-hj-mDyOOUp_Yp0pug youtube channel] [https://bforbrain.weebly.com/ wobsite (supposed to be a blag)] 17:24, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
:I used to do something similar in the schoolyard. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.131.75|172.71.131.75]] 07:23, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Second! Still, I'm surprised that there are no edits yet. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.210.160|172.70.210.160]] 23:58, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

This sounds like the premise of the 1966 sci-fi story The Revolving Boy by Gertrude Friedberg. I recall reading it sometime in the 1960s or ’70s. I wonder whether Randall has read the book too — https://solarbridge.wordpress.com/2011/05/19/the-revolving-boy-gertrude-friedberg/
I'm drawing a blank. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.68|162.158.158.68]] 01:05, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
I had precisely the same thought! But I couldn't remember the title of the book - thanks! ([[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.191|172.70.90.191]])
Likewise; I read it long ago and would have had to do some net searching to uncover the name. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.189.166|172.69.189.166]] 17:48, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

I feel like the "worldline torsion" line needs to be explained moreso than the OCD thing, since "worldline" is a word people might not know and it's the crux of the joke. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.62.50|162.158.62.50]] 02:47, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

:A worldline is a relativistic concept, the track of a particle (or anything, by extension) through 4D spacetime. Randall is imagining it as a physical object (not a mathematical abstraction) and thus whenever the actual object rotates, its worldline is twisted. Presumably these physical worldlines would build up torsional potential energy as they twisted, and could eventually be damaged if too many twists/year were present.[[User:Nitpicking|Nitpicking]] ([[User talk:Nitpicking|talk]]) 02:57, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
:: Yeah - something like that needs to go in the explanation.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.47|172.70.85.47]] 09:44, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

I would love to know what my net rotations is. Not enough to actually keep track, mind you. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.178.126|172.70.178.126]] 02:53, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
:I had a season pass to an amusement park a few years ago, and the time I spent on the Scrambler would probably make mine quite difficult to calculate, even if I knew how many times I rode it. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.247.57|172.69.247.57]] 04:41, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
: Probably depends a lot on whether you suffer from Zoolander's Syndrome. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.62|172.70.91.62]] 09:48, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

isn't this a refernce to spacetime torsion and the einstien-cartan theory? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein%E2%80%93Cartan_theory

When I used to do plasma donations (they draw blood, centrifuge it, extract the plasma/platelet fraction and return the red and white cells) I would, when telling someone about it, jokingly say that the only side effect was, then I would jump and spin. [[User:RIIW - Ponder it|RIIW - Ponder it]] ([[User talk:RIIW - Ponder it|talk]]) 08:17, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

This comic makes sense in 2D because the space of rotations has fundamental group ℤ, but in 3D wouldn't you have at most ℤ/2ℤ corrections to make, since SU(2) double-covers SO(3)? cf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_trick [[User:Ncf|Ncf]] ([[User talk:Ncf|talk]]) 09:27, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

:Considering the plane in which you are doing your rotation changes during the day due to Earth rotation, I think that it doesn't make sense in 3D at all. But thanks for {{w|Plate trick|link}}. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 21:00, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Is it worth mentioning the real medical conditions of torsion, e. . a torsion fracture (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torsion_fracture)? [[User:Nitpicking|Nitpicking]] ([[User talk:Nitpicking|talk]]) 12:43, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
:I immediately thought of medical conditions, too, in my case a torsion of the spine https://www.osmosis.org/answers/sacral-torsion . But the exercises that are supposed to alleviate back pain & torsions caused by one-sided movements (like always twisting/bending left when carrying a load, and twisting/bending right without a load) usually don't involve full rotations. [[User:Transgalactic|Transgalactic]] ([[User talk:Transgalactic|talk]]) 00:30, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Remember that, to do it properly, any turns made in your car also have to be reversed in your car, to account for the rotation of the car's atoms. Go do a full loop through a counterclockwise cloverleaf! (Finding one is left as an exercise to the reader.) [[Special:Contributions/108.162.238.82|108.162.238.82]] 13:05, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Don't think it’s worth adding to the article but thought I would mention it here, anyone who has experience spending a long time in a VR headset will almost certainly have had to do this at some point to untwist the tether. To the point that there are apps you can run that show you how much your rotation has changed from the set 0 orientation. [[User:TomW1605|TomW1605]] ([[User talk:TomW1605|talk]]) 13:13, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
:Actually I think it's worth mentioning that the line to your virtual world (not quite a worldline, but close enough to make a pun?) will indeed suffer torsions unless you cancel out your net rotations. :-D [[User:Transgalactic|Transgalactic]] ([[User talk:Transgalactic|talk]]) 00:30, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

The CPSC recommends merry-go-rounds be limited to 13 ft/sec. https://www.sportsplayinc.com/images/cpsc.pdf For a 10 ft radius, that would be one rotation every 4.8 sec. Over "one long afternoon" (which I'll take as 6 hours) that would amount to 4,469 rotations. If you compensated for this with a mere one rotation per day, the excess rotation would be completely offset in 12 years and 3 months, so "decades" is quite an exageration. [[User:Loeb]]
: If your merry-go-round had a 20 inch diameter, though (the minimum at which those recommendations apply), at one a day it would take you nearly 147 years.[[Special:Contributions/172.69.195.60|172.69.195.60]] 09:42, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

It makes me think a lot about [[162: Angular Momentum]] [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.34|141.101.98.34]] 19:45, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

2883 is out, bot's down... [[User:SomeoneIGuess|someone, i guess]]([[User talk:SomeoneIGuess|talk i guess]]|[[Special:Contributions/SomeoneIGuess|le edit list]]) 03:05, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

It's always nice to unwind at the end of the day (sorry)[[Special:Contributions/172.69.214.5|172.69.214.5]] 14:12, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I might be a little OCD, but not to the degree of this comic. When the internet began and I first started using a browser, I would make sure that I always used the back button to return to the home page because I didn't want to use up computer memory space by accumulating too many links on the "back button" stack. [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 17:42, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Who removed the incomplete tag? It's still incomplete, the mouseover text is still unexplained.[[User:Danger Kitty|Danger Kitty]] ([[User talk:Danger Kitty|talk]])
:[https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2882:_Net_Rotations&diff=333760&oldid=333335 The answer to that]. I must admit, I usually rereview it when our "tidy-uppers" (all honest fellows/fellowesses, I hesitate to add!) think they're right to tidy this aspect up, a number of times the removal of the Incomplete tag has actually gotten me to tweak things (not that it should happen like that), but I seem to have missed this instance, or not spotted any remaining incompleteness if I scanned its post-tag state..
:I also think that the importance of the Incomplete tag is now less linked to the actual incomplete state (although obviously it still is, at first), and that it doesn't hurt to leave it up longer, but obviously opinions on that vary. Community opinion may be a bit blurred on this issue. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.33|141.101.99.33]] 19:26, 2 February 2024 (UTC)

Talk:1895: Worrying Scientist Interviews

2024-01-10T15:16:23Z

141.101.99.33: ...you signed at the start of your item, not at the end... misclick or not quite understanding, dunno, but corrrected for you, if you happen to read this....

Why not use Heliologist? :~) [[User:DarkJMKnight|DarkJMKnight]] ([[User talk:DarkJMKnight|talk]]) 14:49, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

If the sun is local breaking news, could be an impending dark age (solar activity destroying all technology) or a dark age (solar implosion/explosion/death). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.5|162.158.79.5]] 15:42, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

: Destroying *''all''* technology would require something on the scale of a solar expansion (hydrogen exhaustion) Solar flares (even those strong enough to burn all life from the face of the Earth) still would not be sufficient to destroy subterranean shelters like NORAD. Only a total extinction event would be capable of destroying all technology. Even if 99.9% of all humans on Earth were killed off, there are very well secured (& insanely well funded) facilities which will survive any event short of total crust-upheaval, at least for a generation or so. Reverting to primitive lifestyle may possibly happen for a *''majority''* of humans, but modern military systems are such that some humans with tech are almost guaranteed to remain, no matter what terrible events occur. In other words, the wealthiest technocratic elite aren't going to die off any time soon. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.58.125|172.68.58.125]] 00:59, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

: Which makes me wonder why only a local reporter is covering the story. Sounds like a media beat-up. The joke appears to depend more on someone's imagination than on the actual news story. [[Special:Contributions/198.41.238.34|198.41.238.34]] 23:10, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

Everyone else is dead except for the reporter who happens to be beret guy

Marine biologist is probably about oil spills or coral reefs/fish dying etc, rather than invasive species --[[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.209|141.101.99.209]] 16:18, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

The explanation for "ornithologist" uses "avian dinosaurs" instead of "birds." There's a link to the wikipedia page for birds, but it's still a potentially confusing inside joke. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.106|172.68.54.106]] 19:01, 27 September 2017 (UTC)
: The reference to "ornithologist" is almost certainly a reference to [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Birds_(film) Hitchcock's "The Birds"] [[Special:Contributions/172.68.253.209|172.68.253.209]] 01:52, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
:: Definitely, rather than the obscure Birdemic movie --[[Special:Contributions/141.101.69.81|141.101.69.81]] 06:32, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

So, wait: worried about what the hell is so wrong with interviewers for them to actually want to talk to these kinds of researchers; or about what is happening to the world are we all going to die is it the end times? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.71|162.158.79.71]] 19:54, 27 September 2017 (UTC)
: This seems to be inspired by horror and disaster movies, so talking to a volcanologist would suggest that a volcano is about to blow and make the local town the next Pompeii. An ornithologist means the birds are about to go psycho like in The Birds (if we're going to list obscure things nobody has ever heard of, I'd put forward a certain episode of a show called Cybersix), etc. That's what this is talking about. So, end times. :) [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 04:45, 29 September 2017 (UTC)

The solar physicist would most likely be talking about an incoming solar flare, which could shut down the electric grid, satellites, and a bunch of other stuff, potentially within minutes, making it the most pressing of the issues. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.75.112|162.158.75.112]] 01:11, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

I think economists and nutritionists are at the lower end for being notoriously wrong in their predictions --[[Special:Contributions/141.101.69.81|141.101.69.81]] 06:35, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

Wow, this comic came on the morning right after the night in which I had a terrifying nightmare about the sun going supernova. I'm SERIOUSLY spooked. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.92.148|162.158.92.148]] 08:53, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
:Well don't worry, the sun is too small to go Super nova. My nightmare as a kid was that it swelled up and swallowed the Earth... This will probably happen, but in 5 bill. years fro now. But when you are 6 years old that is not a number that makes any sense, and I had just heard about the death of the sun :D --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:33, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

Bayes! Uuuh-vey! Considering you should pre-multiply with the probability that the
desaster happens in the first place (which is rather unlikely for the sun),
I definitely would be worried with the economist most. (Mkay, big stock crashes are as
probable as volcano eruptions, but I don't live near one.) [[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.29|141.101.104.29]] 10:10, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
:But economists are interviewed before and after every meeting of the [Federal Reserve / Bank of England / whoever] discussing whether to change interest rates. That's a lot of non-critical interviews. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.76|162.158.34.76]] 10:52, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
:If this is a joke about disaster movies like I think it is, then the probability of a disaster happening is basically 1, then this scale becomes a question of how scary the disaster is. I, for one, definitely think Jaws is a more scary announcement than anything an economist can come up with. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.112|172.68.54.112]] 15:07, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure this is a joke about disaster movies not a serious scale. So Marine Biologist is pretty worrying because it's a shark attack or a giant octopus. Ornithologist is scary because of the birds, astronomers are meteors, etc. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.112|172.68.54.112]] 15:07, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
:This explanation seems pretty confused - the main explanation seems to imply that we're talking about real life, while the table underneath suggests we're dealing with 'movieland' (e.g. an ornithologist in real life is more likely to be talking about a population fall than 'strange behaviour'). My own take is that it's all talking about real life ''except'' for the last entry / title text, which is the punch line, and is referencing 'movieland'.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.155.32|162.158.155.32]] 11:47, 29 September 2017 (UTC)

What about the missing entries? Mathematician: "the discrete logarithm problem has been solved" (eCommerce becomes insecure).
[[User:Divad27182|Divad27182]] ([[User talk:Divad27182|talk]]) 20:29, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

Exactly what I was thinking- after all the heavy handed AGW talk during the campaign, Climatologist is strangely missing from the list.[[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 20:54, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

[[Special:Contributions/172.68.253.89|172.68.253.89]] 23:11, 28 September 2017 (UTC) I can think of one speciality worse: nuclear physicist. Like the Sun, but localised. Imagine how local people must have thought when they were informed of the Fukushima Daiichi plant being compromised in 2011.

I would personally put Criminologist up among the top 4 (depending on how much I believe this is who they'd talk to for a serial killer), and everything else from Entomologist on down would be tied with Archeologist, with Nutritionist perhaps lower (nutritionists never agree, people just listen to the ones saying something they like, so I figure they all need to be taken with a grain of salt except when there's a majority opinion). Seems like these are more influenced by disaster / horror / thriller movies, LOL! Like Ornothogists rate high because of The Birds (which is famous and by a famous director, never heard of that other one, how does it rate a mention?) P.S. The first two comments got doubled up, cleaned it up before it got worse. [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 04:20, 29 September 2017 (UTC)

People who aren't worried about interviewing the archaeologist clearly need to watch more The Mummy and Indiana Jones movies. And Alien, for that matter. [[Special:Contributions/198.41.238.52|198.41.238.52]] 01:59, 30 September 2017 (UTC)

Wow, I got a completely different joke when I read this one. My initial interpretation of the comic was how worried we should all be that the (presumably scientifically illiterate) reporter was going to mangle the science contained in the interview in the interest of sensationalism and selling a news story. Not that your all's' interpretation isn't perfectly valid, but given Randall's previous send ups of poor scientific reporting, that's the direction my mind went first.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.143.246|172.68.143.246]] 22:12, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

I suggest we add this article about the spelling of Archaeologist and Archeologist https://web.archive.org/web/20091205105622/http://www.saa.org/ForthePublic/Resources/OtherUsefulResources/Whyaretheretwodifferentspellingsarchaeology/tabid/1078/Default.aspx
[[Special:Contributions/172.68.211.88|172.68.211.88]] 01:00, 11 October 2019 (UTC)
I added a funny citation needed to the part about the Sun. It's obvious enough to warrant one in my opinion.--[[Special:Contributions/172.69.62.221|172.69.62.221]] 19:10, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

"...regarding the fiery ball that maintains the Earth's orbit and capacity for life." — To be honest, this is overkill. There aren't that many things that can go wrong with the Sun to make the orbit different without affecting the capacity for life. And any number (including suddenly becoming a solar-mass black hole for... reasons(?)) that would definitely mess about with habitability but not actually change the orbit appreciably. Orbital changes are most likely due to other factors entirely, this side of being engulfed by the expaning solar atmosphere (which would be a herald of unhealthy conditions long before that). [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.121|172.70.90.121]] 13:32, 14 March 2022 (UTC)

I feel like many of the explanations on the left end of the scale are inaccurate given that this is BREAKING news specifically. With the economist, although it mentions it might be a crash, it would almost certainly be a crash if it's breaking. For a nutritionist, I feel like the joke there has to do with something being dangerous to eat, given that it's breaking (and more worrisome than an economic crash.) For a criminologist, given that its an interview, and not directly *handling* the criminal, this one could certainly be a loose criminal (again, given that it's breaking.) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.150.181|172.71.150.181]] 08:17, 10 January 2024 (UTC)
:Aside from there always being the possibility of "Breaking News: Somebody just released the results of a long awaited report (and we haven't anything more world-shattering to tell you right now, but we're a 24-hour news channel and we'll broadcast what we get, when we get it...)", I can see how you could also improve the treatment of some. Feel free to try to improve as you see fit.
:Though 'boring' crime statistics ''might'' indeed be of the major newsworthy nature (it's the point at which the government/police/etc are 'proven' officially good (or, probably, bad) at their job by identifying some simplistic number that compares well(/badly) with the number from the last time they released something like this). It's bread and butter for those who report broad-stroke things. Especially if those broad-strokes support their editorial worldview, whatever that might be...
:"Can't you see? Burglaries are up! Robberies and kidnappings are both are way down, but '''I blame the government for the increase in crime''', by which I mean just the robberies, let us skip over those other figures. The lowering of robberies and kidnappings is ''clearly'' due to robbers and kidnappers deciding to do other things, like '''Burglary!!!''' Beware of burglars! And blame this government for concentrating on anti-robbery and anti-kidnapping measures, which turns out to be 'useless' because those are the crimes nobody is even committing, they should have actually been attempting to stop All! These! Burglars!"
:What else would a (tame) criminologist be telling us? Generally "yes, this particular newsworthy crime of a celebratory being forced to sign an autograph, even though they were trying to relax at the beach, seems to indicate a pattern as ..." or "...the trend of being blackmailed for wearing black socks on the golf-course is a fairly new tactic by extortionists, that we had not seen even recorded until just five years ago, but now seems to affect tens of people a year" is more their thing. Whereas going into 'active' analysis such as "we consider the individual who did this to be aged 40-45, a non-denomonational religious background and childhood history of stuttering" or "we believe they escaped by stolen tram to the north of the city, where we are currently concentrating our searches" are more the realm of forensic pathologists/etc (chanelled by the figurehead investigating officer or designated press-relations official), rather than drafting in a person who studies crime trends. (Unless it's off the bat by the news channel, who have their 'pet crime expert' on call and don't care much so long as he says things that they consider news.)
:Just to deconstruct that one item. Doubtless there's multiple interpretations, and (if you think you can make a reasonable case for them) you are free to edit things accordingly. Briefer than this reply, ideally! ;) [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.33|141.101.99.33]] 15:16, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Talk:1620: Christmas Settings

2015-12-23T10:13:32Z

141.101.99.33:

That's how Little Johnny killed Christmas, he left the tap running all night. --[[User:Jarfil|Jarfil]] ([[User talk:Jarfil|talk]]) 05:32, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Pores of your skin?! As utterly horrifying as it sounds, it's probably the most effective of the bunch, considering that all the others might not exist/be blocked in some manner and in some houses. [[User:Bon|Bon]] ([[User talk:Bon|talk]]) 06:27, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxh-Hjj8T9o Swearing dogs are definitely a thing]. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.28|173.245.54.28]] 05:59, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

How'd I do for my first explanation on this site? [[User:VectorLightning|VectorLightning]] ([[User talk:VectorLightning|talk]]) 07:47, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

"These dials, for example, controls..." - is this a mistake? "This dial, for example, controls..." or "These dials, for example, control" would make more grammatical sense. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.33|141.101.99.33]] 09:35, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
: I think that there is more than one dail controlling Christmas. [[User:SirKitKat|sirKitKat]] ([[User talk:SirKitKat|talk]]) 09:53, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
:: Then surely it should be "These dials, for example, control"? [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.33|141.101.99.33]] 10:13, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Talk:1620: Christmas Settings

2015-12-23T09:35:30Z

141.101.99.33: