explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:1939: 2016 Election Map

2018-01-10T21:41:45Z

162.158.202.76:

;Why now?

So why are we getting this map now instead of a year ago? Has something significant to this area just happened in the U.S.A.? (I am a Canadian so might well have missed something.)
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.154|108.162.216.154]] 16:42, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

I'm from the midwest in the US and I'm really confused as well... I also don't find anything particularly funny or poignant in this. So yeah, color me confused in the US. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.75.76|162.158.75.76]] 16:52, 8 January 2018 (UTC) Sam

: At a guess, because we're coming up on the anniversary of Trump's inauguration. [[User:Wwoods|Wwoods]] ([[User talk:Wwoods|talk]]) 23:26, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

I think the idea is that this map, while interesting as an object, still sort of fails as a map - it doesn't provide the sort of easily digestible information that a map of this variety is supposed to show. Conceptually, I don't think it's that different than #1138 (Heatmap) - the map more or less shows population density and fails to easily communicate party alignment. As to why it's showing up in the first year of 2018, my best guess is that mid-term elections are this year...? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.238|172.69.69.238]]

My friend I showed the comic to thinks it could be a general political commentary on the uselessness of these kinds of maps. 1. the map is a year old: useless. 2. there are no numbers: useless. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.75.76|162.158.75.76]] 17:04, 8 January 2018 (UTC) Sam.

I'm wondering if it has to do with the fact that [https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/03/us/politics/trump-voter-fraud-commission.html Trump just disbanded the commission on voter fraud]. I think I heard somewhere that this commission was to "prove why Trump should have won the popular vote". I think the map relates to the whole popular vote versus electoral college discussion.--[[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.172|108.162.216.172]] 17:17, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

I think it might be claiming Trump only won because very many people failed to vote? Either that, or as already mentioned, it's about how useless these maps can be. [[User:Jacky720|That's right, Jacky720 just signed this]] ([[User talk:Jacky720|talk]] | [[Special:Contributions/Jacky720|contribs]]) 17:20, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

The point of the map is that the standard choropleth map for the 2016 election shows the vast majority of us area voting for Donald Trump. (shown on this link http://brilliantmaps.com/2016-county-election-map/) The comic is criticizing the visual accuracy of chloropleth maps in giving a strong understanding of election results (as the majority of voters voted for Hillary). ---- {{unsigned| Widea}}

If this map is really so correct (as stated in the caption) then it has been a huge job to collect the data so precisely and calculate how to split voters across borders when not fitting. This says to me that this is a very big issue for Randall. Of course he has made it clear many times that he is [[1756: I'm With Her|against Trumps election]] and more or less [[1756:_I'm_With_Her#Sad_comics|anything he does]]... I believe there is a lot to learn from this map as opposed to those he mentions in the title text --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 19:33, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

If this map is correct, then there are 252 Trump guys on it and 263 Clinton guys on it, a difference of 11 guys. I don't know how many "other" guys are on it. Just in case someone would like to know. [[Special:Contributions/198.41.230.4|198.41.230.4]] 20:13, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

One thing that the map does clearly show is that voters of Clinton were clustered in heavily urbanized regions (New England to Delmarva, Miami region, Chicago region, Houston and Austin, and coastal California in particular). Those same Clinton clusters are also home to the most third-party voters. Meanwhile, Trump voters were spread out more evenly and in isolated pockets, and there are very few third-party voters living out in the boonies.
I think the takeaway is that Democratic voters are underrepresented because they are grouped so closely together, and those same populations are also prone to giving rise to anti-two-party sentiment. These two factors combined work against liberalist movements in the United States. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.225|162.158.74.225]] 20:23, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

I never realized until now just how few people live in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.46|108.162.241.46]] 20:25, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

I also think Randal needs a lesson in rural/urban voting, as the placement of many of the red figures on this map are, well, a bit off.[[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 22:46, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
: Not necessarily. Each figure represents 250,000 votes, and as someone who grew up in a rural area, it takes a lot of land to get that many people. Take those two red figures in northwestern-ish Pennsylvania. Counting only people who are of voting age, assuming about 2% are ineligible to vote, with a state voter turnout of 70%, and the fact that only ~60-70% of the voters in those counties voted for Trump, it takes all '''18 counties''' in that region--every single county north of Pittsburgh and west of State College (the blue figures beside those two red ones)--to come up with about 500,000 Trump voters. That matches up exactly with the map. (The total population of those 18 counties, if you're curious, is a little under 1.5 million, with Erie being the largest at 280k and Cameron the smallest at 5k.) [[User:Eosa|Eosa]] ([[User talk:Eosa|talk]]) 17:19, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

The claim about Trump being "obsessed" with how red the map appears seems to just be added to be inflammatory. As far as I know, he just gloated about the map a bit on Twitter on the days following his election. He definitely hasn't kept sharing red maps one year later like Randall, and I think we don't consider Randall obsessed. I'm removing it, and I'd rather this not be added back without a source that clearly shows such an obsession. [01000101] [[Special:Contributions/172.68.25.112|172.68.25.112]] 21:13, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
: I'm reinstating it. In April, Trump [http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/04/heres-the-electoral-map-president-trump-gave-reporters.html gave reporters a printout of the counties map], saying at the time, "Here, you can take that, that's the final map of the numbers. It's pretty good, right? The red is obviously us." He later [https://twitter.com/TreyYingst/status/862669407868391424/photo/1 framed and hung a similar map in the West Wing]. In a speech in June, he said, "And those maps, those electoral maps, they were all red. Beautiful red." He has mentioned the election—which keep in mind he only won because of the Electoral College, not because of the popular vote—one out of every five days over the last year. He is clearly obsessed. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.70|172.69.69.70]] 22:48, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
:: I toned down the language a bit, to hopefully address concerns about the potentially controversial use of the word 'obsessed'.[[Special:Contributions/141.101.76.16|141.101.76.16]] 08:59, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
::: I'm fine with the change, even if I personally would stand by the word. Based on his actions (immediately announcing his bid for reelection and holding rallies, etc.) and statements he has made and continues to make nearly a year into his actual presidency, I think a reasonable case can be made that he genuinely dislikes the job of being president and is clinging to the one time when he was really happy—when he was campaigning. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.70|172.69.69.70]] 15:55, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

I count 31 "Green" folks, in addition to whoever counted the red and blues. That means our total is 546 little stick figures. I'm not sure why he picked that number, but it could be the correct number of folks to stick one on the small states of Alaska, Hawiaii, Wyoming, and the Dakotas. He also took the unusual step of counting VOTES instead of population. It'd be fun to have a version with non-voters on it.

I think Randall has always been a map enthusiast. I read this as an alternative map. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.28|108.162.237.28]] 21:54, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

;136,669,237 votes in 2016
To all the guys who are counting the Cueballs in the map: 546 Cueballs multiplied by 250,000 is 136,500,000 votes.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:07, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

My count agrees. Red = 252, Blue = 263, Green = 31 [[User:Ansarya|Ansarya]] ([[User talk:Ansarya|talk]]) 00:48, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

The title text is probably referring to this map on wikipedia:[https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cartlinearlarge.png] [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.106|108.162.249.106]] 06:46, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

"the small impact of the low-population states" Shouldn't it be "high impact"? The vote of a person living in a low-density state has a higher weight than the vote of a person living in a high-density state.
Right? [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 08:21, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
: Actually, Randall's map doesn't show much of anything as regards the relative influence of the states, because it only shows popular votes, and not Electoral College votes, which give proportionately higher representation to the lower population states. So I'd say that sentence should just be removed, or at least completely rewritten to state this as a deficiency of Randall's map (though criticising it for not showing something that it doesn't purport to show in the first place would be a bit unfair).[[Special:Contributions/141.101.76.16|141.101.76.16]] 09:20, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

The table looks weird on a mobile device. The first number column has a way bigger font than the other two. Can be reproduced on a PC by pressing Ctrl+Shift+I (in Chrome), selecting "Nexus 5X" (or similar) at the top and reloading.

--- Assuming the text above is correct, the count is as follows:

<source>
$ for color in red blue green; do ( cat text | pcregrep -o1 "(\d*) $color" | awk -v c=$color '{s+=$1} END {print c, s}') ; done
red 252
blue 264
green 30
</source>[[User:Sysin|Sysin]] ([[User talk:Sysin|talk]]) 12:38, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

I think that this comic might have something to do with [[1902: State Borders]]. [[User:Herobrine|Herobrine]] ([[User talk:Herobrine|talk]]) 10:35, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

; rounding error
Randall's political leanings are obvious, but are we to believe that he picked a ceiling rounding just to get one extra blue guy? One figure is not be noticeable on such a large map. Its an effect of about 0.0018%. Its more likely an artifact of trying to distribute figures across states or an honest mistake. I think that paragraph should be reworked.
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.40|108.162.237.40]] 15:25, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
:I reworded it to state what the exact figure would be and included a note that he rounded both figures up, which I think is interesting trivia in both cases. I don't think anything should be mentioned about a potential bias, for the reasons you state. No one would notice that it's (arguably) off by one unless they obsessively checked every little thing about the map. Randall's choice to round up or down doesn't affect the overall accuracy of the map or whatever point he's trying to convey. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.70|172.69.69.70]] 15:41, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
::I added a possible unbiased reason for the use of ceiling rounding (avoiding the inclusion of partial Cueballs.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.47|162.158.79.47]] 15:43, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
:::Regular rounding, which gets to whichever integer is closest (whether up or down), would also avoid broken people, but it would give Clinton one less guy. I removed your sentence, but added that it could be either due to Randall's political leanings or in order to achieve a better fit in a specific state. It's true that it is hard to point to either without further analysis. [[Special:Contributions/198.41.230.154|198.41.230.154]] 16:19, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
:::: I know this wiki is in love with speculation, but this is such an insignificant detail about this map that there is no need to make guesses about Randall's motivations (political or otherwise) for rounding the way he did. Just state the facts. If a reader wants to draw their own conclusion, that's up to them. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.70|172.69.69.70]] 18:52, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
:::: Couldn't the additional guy also be a result of using regular rounding for each state separately? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.202.76|162.158.202.76]] 21:41, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

As one of those Americans who doesn't like either major political party much, I'm disappointed that there wasn't a third color for voters who voted independent. More people voted independent in 2016 than any other recent Presidential election—that should be enough for at least two or three little yellow guys somewhere, right? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.75.166|162.158.75.166]] 15:47, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
:Is green not enough? [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 16:05, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

As a somewhat red-green color blind person, I have a hard time seeing the green Cueballs on this map. If I zoom in, I can see whether an individual Cueball is red or green, but I can't look at the map as a whole and easily see where all the green ones are. I wish Randall had instead made them dark green, dark brown, or even black so that seeing them wouldn't have been an issue for people like me (~6% of males). [[User:DKMell|DKMell]] ([[User talk:DKMell|talk]]) 21:22, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

542: Cover-Up

2017-12-21T13:40:25Z

162.158.202.76:

{{comic
| number = 542
| date = February 11, 2009
| title = Cover-Up
| image = cover_up.png
| titletext = Man, this trick has saved me so many times.
}}

==Explanation==

[[Black Hat]] and [[Danish]] are trying to clean up the mess that their bloody murder has left. This story may thus be a continuation of [[515: No One Must Know]].

Another guy, [[Cueball]], is on his way home and is about to arrive just when they are finishing the clean up. But then Black Hat realizes that the ceiling has also been stained (by the violent murder...) And now they do not have time to fix it.

But Black Hat knows how to deal with the situation, and when Cueball comes home, he says ''Did you know "gullible" is written on your ceiling''.

{{w|Gullible}} means easily deceived or naive. This is a game many people play with each other "Whoa, someone wrote 'gullible' in the sky!" "Did you know when you look at the Microsoft logo upside-down it looks like the word 'gullible'?" Those that are gullible, check. Those that aren't, don't. In fact they will pointedly not do the thing that the first person has suggested as a show of how non-gullible they are. Black Hat uses this to his advantage to cover up the copious bloodstains on the ceiling and as expected Cueball just says ''Hah. Yeah, right'' and refuses to even glance at the ceiling.

The title text is hinting that Black Hat has had to cover up killing people several times as this trick has saved him many times. Of course there could also be other things than blood that he had to hide (the money he just stole etc.)

==Transcript==
:[Black Hat looking slightly up is holding two rags stained red with blood while Danish is holding an equally bloody mop.]
:Black Hat: Okay, got the blood off the walls.
:Danish: I finished the floor.

:[Black Hat drops the bloody rags behind him while looking up at the ceiling, Danish has put the bloody mop behind her leaning against the wall while covering her mouth with her hands.]
:Black Hat: Good; he'll be home any-
:Black Hat: Oh crap! We forgot to clean the ceiling!

:[Black Hat has moved away from the bloody rags towards Danish who has taken her hands down. They look straight at each other. The bloody mop has fallen over on the floor.]
:Danish: There's no time!
:Black Hat: Wait, I'll handle it.

:[Cueball with briefcase enters the house through the front door behind him, still standing open. He is greeted by Black Hat holding out a hand towards him. The corner of the room and the wall behind them and past the door is outlines with three lines connecting in the corner.]
:Black Hat: Hi. Did you know "gullible" is written on your ceiling?
:Cueball: Hah. Yeah, right.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Danish]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]

Talk:1856: Existence Proof

2017-06-29T08:54:12Z

162.158.202.76:

Whoever added the citation needed got more of a laugh out of me then Randall did this morning. Well done. --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.29|172.68.142.29]] 17:32, 28 June 2017 (UTC)
: I hope you enjoy the joke just as much the second time. And the third. And the fourth. And the fifth. And the sixth. And the... [[Special:Contributions/162.158.75.100|162.158.75.100]] 00:56, 29 June 2017 (UTC)
:: I don't re-read old pages of explain xkcd so often it would stop being funny. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 04:11, 29 June 2017 (UTC)
: <AOL>Me too!</AOL> [[User:RoyT|RoyT]] ([[User talk:RoyT|talk]]) 07:10, 29 June 2017 (UTC)

Does the function have any special hidden meaning, or is it just some random function?
[[User:Thawn|Thawn]] ([[User talk:Thawn|talk]]) 20:23, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

: Yeah - I wondered that too. But I'm not sure if there is enough information to know. [[User:SteveBaker|SteveBaker]] ([[User talk:SteveBaker|talk]]) 21:28, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

: Without knowing what the functions are, there's no way to tell. [[User:Gmcgath|Gmcgath]] ([[User talk:Gmcgath|talk]]) 23:52, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

"I'm finally in the right one," made me laugh more than usual. It added character to Offscreen Student #2, something that the comic usually lacks [[User:HisHighestMinion|HisHighestMinion]] ([[User talk:HisHighestMinion|talk]]) 03:56, 29 June 2017 (UTC)

According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructive_proof "existence proof" means a non-constructive proof. Such proofs are annoying to some mathematicians as they claim existence of something but do not show how to find it. So I fully understand the teacher that she wants to grab a sword and finally find it. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.202.76|162.158.202.76]] 08:54, 29 June 2017 (UTC)