explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:2734: Electron Color

2023-02-09T16:06:09Z

162.158.94.200:

Electrons have no color?! BUt lIgHTnIng strIKeS aRe YEllOw, aND LigHTNing IS MaDe uP of eLECTrOns.[[Special:Contributions/172.71.254.115|172.71.254.115]] 22:43, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
: Actually most colors are emitted by electrons orbiting atoms after absorbing light. The color electrons emit depend on their kinetic energy and available places they can travel, a tiny bit similar to how things change color as they get hotter, but more extreme and general. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.198|172.70.114.198]]
: I'm pretty sure lighting strikes are white. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 20:58, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

It may refer to the Greek etymology of the word "electron". Originally it meant amber, a yellow gem. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.118.146|172.68.118.146]] 23:20, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
:But amber isn't yellow - it's... amber. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.222|172.70.85.222]] 10:40, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

I can't do formatting, I'm new. Sorry! {{unsigned|No Idea If There's A Character Limit LMAO}}

To me, this is 1000% building on the idea of debating the colors of school subjects. I've added a bit of explanation to the text about it. I used my own color associations & reasons (science = green, history = red) as an example, and I'm sure people will disagree with me. Leave your color/subject associations in a reply to this comment, could be a fun little debate! (also, English = blue)
[[User:Zman350x|Zman350x]] ([[User talk:Zman350x|talk]]) 23:50, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
: SocStud is yellow, Math is red, Science is green?, ELA is gray, French is blue, and orange is my least favorite subject out of the rest. I have gotten into many arguments with my friends.
:[[Special:Contributions/172.70.230.157|172.70.230.157]] 00:10, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:: Science = Green (green flask bubbling)
:: Social Studies = Blue (blue and green globe, green is taking)
:: Math = Red (math is reliable, red is a strong color so i associate it with reliability)

:: English = Yellow (all other colors are taken)
:: Also electrons are blue
::[[User:Iffy|Iffy]] ([[User talk:Iffy|talk]]) 23:53, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
::: Hm! I've never heard of school subjects having any assigned colors; much less any debate about it! If we're identifying them by the folders they're kept in, my favorite subject was Ferrari & my least favorite was Porsche.
::: [[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 04:41, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::: I don't recall colour-coded (UK) schoolbooks, in particular (except the "red pirate, green pirate, blue pirate, etc" stories for young kids, the red pirate like only rubies, the green one emeralds, the blue probably sapphires, and had clothing/etc that matched, naturally), but I had (have still, somewhere!) a collection of Usborne Encyclopaedias at home with a veritable rainbow of colours. Mathematics was yellow, I think, Computers a shade of blue, one of the Red or off-Red (slightly pinker, but still deep red) might have been Physics (had geophysics in it, IIRC), I think History was a light-green. I'm sure I never had the whole set, but I had enough to arrange in as close to Richard Of York order as I felt most content to do, when on the bookshelf.
::::: Obviously there ''were'' colours involved with the school stuff. I'm sure different levels of SPMG (Scottish Primary Maths Group?) workbooks were colour-coded, perhaps more for the benefit of the teacher, though the later {{w|School Mathematics Project|SMP}} ones were probably more just identified as "13a", "5b", etc, to work through various sub-subjects and the increasingly advanced techniques thereof, perhaps coloured with highlights only to not be boring black-on-white monochrome covers.
::::: And there's so many other colour-classifications that I instituted for myself, over the years, showing just how useful a hue can be to represent and differentiate a class of something, such as various 3M-style "post-it"-like arrow stickers stuck into the pages of a book for quick reference to all instances of one particular thing or another. For which I suppose I'm grateful to not having any notable form of colour-blindness, to limit my options. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.114|172.70.91.114]] 08:20, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::: Personally, I've always thought that English is red, Math is blue, Sciences are green, History is yellow, and "personal events" are orange.
::::::This is completely BS. This is about the diagrams used for drawing atoms where colors are used for different elementary particles. And Randall clearly explains that they do not have real color. And the jokes that people still have feelings for what colors are chosen based on the conventions used where people first learned about atoms. Have removed the color on subjects completely as it has nothing to do with this comic. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::::PS you cannot be more than 100% on anything :-D --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:46, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I believe this comic was made in response to a book talk Randall did in Seattle, where this question was actually asked to him in person! If you want to hear it yourself, someone recorded the talk here: https://www.reddit.com/r/xkcd/comments/xjuc4i/a_recording_and_autotranscript_of_randalls_latest/
[[Special:Contributions/172.71.142.6|172.71.142.6]] 00:45, 7 February 2023 (UTC) A random new user
: Was it the dorky randall with red hair or the photogenic one with brown hair and blue eyes or am I going wildly mad? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.198|172.70.114.198]] 00:51, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Am I crazy, I always thought of electrons as blue to contrast with the protons which are red[[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.89|172.70.211.89]] 04:47, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:You're all crazy! Elections are 2817.9am & protons are 1.5am. "Yellow" is over 557,000,000,000am! Maybe you've all got your displays' color gamut set too low? ;S
:[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I have also seen protons as red and neutons as white and electron as blue in the diagrams I remember. Never yellow electrons. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::I'm not entirely sure about proton and electrons, but neutrons were black. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 20:58, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

"This comic appears to "elevate" that discussion to the college level." - considering that the students are considerably smaller than the teacher (notice the heads), I seriously doubt this is meant to be set in a college classroom - high school at most, IMHO. Also, "One common debate among schoolchildren is over the "color" of various subjects. Because of the brightly colored folders commonly used to separate subjects in the binder of a young student, the students tend to associate those colors with the subject." - well, not in any school I ever attended, nor with any school class I've ever worked with. I'd be inclined to dispute that this is at all common. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.46.85|172.70.46.85]]
: I agree that this is probably not supposed to be college-level, but the color-subject coordination is definitely real (albeit not a very common topic of debate). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.38|162.158.90.38]] 08:01, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I find it hard to believe Randall is referencing colors of school subjects without alluding to them in any way; to the contrary, I feel fairly certain he's directly referencing the various colors assigned to electrons, protons, quarks, etc, in diagrammatic illustrations of atomic structure. I think the whole first paragraph is way off base (though interesting tangentially).
::[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::I agree with all above here and have corrected the explanation to school class and pupils and diagram colors removing school subject color completely! --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::Was it also worth removing the synesthesia bit? Entirely unrelated to school-subject organisation-by-colour that I also think was an {{w|Red herring|incarnadine ''clupea harengus''}}, but very possibly relevent to "but I happen think it's obvious that <concept> is a <hue> thing!"... For consideration, or as a side-note, whether or not you restore that possible reference. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.203|172.71.242.203]] 10:42, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Electrons are blue, right? In all my textbooks (Germany) electrons are blue. Is this a generally accepted addition? [[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.166|198.41.242.166]] 07:13, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
: I stopped the explanation saying that electrons were (by implication, ''solely'') yellow. If green is used for a nucleon (neutron? red being proton?), they might choose blue for an electron, as contrast. Or black dot or white (black-outlined) small circle to contrast with whatever the nucleons are with their much bigger circles clumped in the middle.
: But, given other regular colour-conventions, I could imagine yellow as a popular 'electron' colour. Either in its own right (influencing the choices given to the other things depicted) or as the main obviously remaining option (the other things having been decided upon first). Horses for courses. And I can imagine cultural/national differences (e.g. what colours your household wiring was set up as, at least before EU standardisation but then red and black still exists in the mindset, despite blue and brown, or whatever it might have been) if not localised 'linguistic puns' to make some choices more 'obvious' than others. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.114|172.70.91.114]] 08:20, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::Indeed, yellow is sometimes indicative of electrical hazard, as opposed to red for flame... So many ways to draw associations!
::[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::Yes blue electrons, red protons and white neutrons are probably common on Europe, it is in Denmark. I'm a physicist and word with radioactive isotopes and teach about them. My drawings are red protons and white neutrons and blue electrons. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I don’t know what Ms. Lenhart is talking about. Electrons are blue, protons are red, and neutrons are definitely grey. Not sure how to sign my comment tho. Oh well {{unsigned ip|172.70.174.115|13:00, 7 February 2023}}
:(You sign your comments with a string of <code><nowiki>~~~~</nowiki></code> (as suggested by the comment at the top of many a comic-discussion page, when you start to edit it)... or you wait for someone else to do what I just did for you, but that's more effort than the four tildes on your part.)
:For what it's worth, I'm mostly with you. Red and grey/dark-grey/black in the centre, as you say. Light blue (or yer actual electric blue?) or (bluish?) white electrons. Depends what colour-pallettes are available to the illustrator/modeller, I imagine, and what else needs a distinct colour alongside the basic trio (e.g. yellow fission/fusion "sparky-flame energy things" or general labelling stuff). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.246|162.158.158.246]] 13:15, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I did some data collection on image searches for atom diagrams, and yes, the defacto color standard is protons red, neutrons grey (less commonly yellow or green), and electrons blue.
::I like this because it gives opposing colors to the opposing positive and negative charges, (the same color choices as the traditional magnet north and south ends, likely not coincidentally,) and a neutral color to the uncharged neutron.
::Which makes me think that when Lenhart says "electrons are yellow" she does not mean in the diagram sense, but rather in the sense "if you make an electron big enough to see, it is yellow".
::[[User:SomeDee|SomeDee]] ([[User talk:SomeDee|talk]]) 16:58, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:electrons are green. y'all are trippin [[Special:Contributions/172.71.154.159|172.71.154.159]] 17:27, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::definitely green. Have none of you ever used a transmission electron microscope? Or an oscilloscope? Green shine everywhere! [[Special:Contributions/162.158.95.22|162.158.95.22]] 09:01, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

I made a survey for this: https://forms.gle/Pu5mkEtBZPUZ6dbb8
[[User:RamenChef|RamenChef]] ([[User talk:RamenChef|talk]]) 18:03, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Electrons are yellow, protons are red, and neutrons are gray. End of discussion.
:What about roses and violets? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.172|172.71.242.172]] 10:49, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

{{w|Quark_(dairy_product)|Quark}} is white, or off-white.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.96|172.70.85.96]] 10:47, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
:I find this comic puzzling. Virtually all colors we see are due to electrons (transitions between different states in atoms, molecules, and solids), so saying they are "too small to interact with visible light" is quite incorrect. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.134.130|172.69.134.130]] 18:48, 8 February 2023 (UTC)
::Yeah. They totally interact with visible light. But only with light of specific frequency matching the energy difference between some electron and free higher orbit it can move to. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 19:00, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

((Snipped))
: What language is this? This is and English site, so please write in English. Google Translate detects it as Hungarian, but leaves almost all of the words untranslated. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.38|162.158.90.38]] 04:31, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
:: It's just a past troll. Who has several times said they've finished trolling, or promised to finish trolling in a given instance if only someone would include some word or other in their next edit. (Spoiler: they never stopped, so we just have to deal with it and carry on.)
:: The 'language' was worked out (it's a conlang that's a mix of actual non-English root words and 'cod Latin'-type transforms, essentially) but I'm not wasting braincells on its inanity or going to make it a 'mainstream thing'. They do worse things to vandalise the site, but that doesn't mean that the above can be left unchallenged as relatively benign.
:: My advice is to ignore it (or revert it away, if nobody else does that quickly enough). [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.222|172.70.162.222]] 09:14, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
:::What is a conlang and what is cod Latin? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.34.45|172.68.34.45]] 15:12, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
:::: "Conlang" means a {{w|Constructed language}}. And I think they actually meant {{w|Dog Latin}} or (more likely, in context) {{w|Pig Latin}}, though "Cod" does {{wiktionary|cod#Etymology_3|sometimes mean}} a fake/imitation of something, so Pig Latin might perhaps be described as a cod-Latin. Or confusingly misrefered to as such, by accident... [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.222|172.70.162.222]] - ooo... I'm routing through the ''exact'' same IP, which is rare enough when I edit my own submissions. Above editor is probably with the same ISP as me. ;)

The might not have a color not even a quark color, but they do have a flavour. The are quantum flavoured: Electro
[[Special:Contributions/162.158.94.200|162.158.94.200]] 16:06, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Talk:2367: Masks

2020-10-03T12:43:33Z

162.158.94.200:

What is the mysterio reference? [[User:Donthaveusername|Donthaveusername]] ([[User talk:Donthaveusername|talk]])
: Mysterio is one of Spiderman's recurrent villains. [[User:Nutster|Nutster]] ([[User talk:Nutster|talk]]) 18:57, 2 October 2020 (UTC)
::Thank you [[User:Donthaveusername|Donthaveusername]] ([[User talk:Donthaveusername|talk]])
: Mysterio could reference this: [https://goosebumps.fandom.com/wiki/Hocus-Pocus_Horror] Sebastian--[[Special:Contributions/162.158.94.200|162.158.94.200]] 12:43, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

How could Randall forget {{w|The Mask}}? Although I'm not sure where it fits on the scale. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 20:32, 2 October 2020 (UTC)
:I was desperately missing an Opera Phantom reference. (Apparently made as a 'skewed partial' mask because the original concept was impossible to ''opera''te in.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.154.216|162.158.154.216]] 22:45, 2 October 2020 (UTC)
:I would assume {{w|The Mask}} protects against infection quite well, considering it protects even against bullets and explosives. It may not prevent spreading the virus to others, though. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 01:18, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

With Batman/Spiderman/Mysterio on the list, wouldn't the Scarecrow mask be that of the Batman Villain? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.56|162.158.255.56]]

It's considered ''possible'' that the virus could be transmitted through the eyes, e.g. by touching a contaminated surface and then rubbing one's eyes. This hasn't been confirmed; it is at most a minor route. Should we mention this when noting the lack of protection offered by e.g. the Lone Ranger / Zorro mask? [[User:BunsenH|BunsenH]] ([[User talk:BunsenH|talk]]) 03:47, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

What about iron man? — [[User:Sqrt-1|The 𝗦𝗾𝗿𝘁-𝟭]] [[User talk:Sqrt-1|talk]] [[Special:Contributions/Sqrt-1|stalk]] 04:06, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

Spiderman's mask is extremely porous, how would it be that effective? [[User:SDSpivey|SDSpivey]] ([[User talk:SDSpivey|talk]]) 04:58, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

2364: Parity Conservation

2020-09-26T02:28:58Z

162.158.94.200:

{{comic
| number = 2364
| date = September 25, 2020
| title = Parity Conservation
| image = parity_conservation.png
| titletext = Bloody Mary is made of antimatter. It explains so much.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BLOODY MARY RESEARCHING PARITY CONSERVATION. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

Bloody Mary is a legend consisting of a ghost, phantom, or spirit conjured to reveal the future. She is said to appear in a mirror when her name is chanted repeatedly. This is why Cueball says he said her name three times. The remark on parity conservation and cobalt-60 is almost surely a reference to the {{w|Wu experiment}}.

The title text references antimatter. In physics, antimatter is like a mirrored (in charge, parity and time) version of matter; matter, which is composed of antiparticles.

It seems as if Cueball is trying to mirror the stuff inside the mirror, to make them real. Since Bloody Mary only exists inside mirrors, if Cueball's experiment was possible, he would create a real Bloody Mary on his side of the mirror.

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

[Cueball is standing in front of an oval wall mirror hanging over a small table. He's holding a tube connected to an electronic device. A face is dimly reflected in the mirror.]

Cueball: Listen, I know I said your name three times.

Cueball: But before you come out of the mirror and murder me, can you hold this cobalt-60 and take some measurements?

Cueball: See, I'm researching parity conservation...

[Caption below the comic]:
It took some negotiating, but I've finally become the first person to coauthor a paper with Bloody Mary.

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

Talk:2363: Message Boards

2020-09-24T07:13:06Z

162.158.94.200: Scooter = moped

Randall stimulates people doing this to their parents? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.234|108.162.219.234]] 01:23, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
:He doesn't necessarily think it's likely. But as the caption says, he's amused by the fact that it's possible because the Internet and message boards have been around long enough. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 02:04, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

It would be interesting to know how many online message boards have actually been in continuous operation for 20 years. The original Usenet newsgroups are actually twice that old, but what about Internet boards? [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 02:04, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
:Reddit is starting to get there, being 15 years old now. I also do know some forums that started in 2003~2004 and are still active (mostly ones tied to still-updating webcomics). So not quite 20 years, but close. --[[User:Elifia|Elifia]] ([[User talk:Elifia|talk]]) 03:04, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
::There'll be BBSes (one I once used is still going, last I checked, well over 30 years old, pre-Web, not sure how many old-guard are there, as I've not for 25 years) and that would rival even pre-split Usenet. A MUD I know (all my characters long timed-out) is still going strong since pre-Web times, too. IRC isn't exactly persistent (and has changed a lot) but still exists. Even if the likes of anon.penet.fi have been closed, there'll be mailer-gateways/request-by-mail things (I used to ask one for Freeware!) on obscure servers. Perhaps Wollongong University still has a Gopher server (one memorable 'place' I visited on a link-to-link round the world trip, back just before I heard of the Berners-Lee thing). I have a habit of forgetting webforums (earliest currently used one was signed into only back in 2008) and a late-'90s one I recall fondly got so spammed (despite whatever passed for CAPTCHA in those days) that the webmaster Read-Onlied it, and domain is now expired. If I was a better person at staying in touch, I'm sure I could have been continuously active for sufficient time on a single platform (I fell off a Usenet group when I lost a newsfeed and refused to use the then-new-fangled Google Groups interface, just the latest insult since WebTV, the push from AOL and the whole Eternal September thing). So, anecdotally, I know there's a good chance. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.34|162.158.159.34]] 03:42, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
:I have been an active member at GameFAQs.com for longer than 20 years. The message boards there opened in 1999.[[Special:Contributions/173.245.52.169|173.245.52.169]] 04:23, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

== Too dumb for this one ==

Is it just me or was the detail the whole joke hinged on a bit more subtle than usual here? Sure, sometimes it's arcane, but I feel like you don't usually need to read between the lines so much to even get the backstory for the joke.

On first read, obviously the two characters know each other, and the fact that a real life acquaintance would reply to a 20yo thread was clearly part of the joke. But essentially I read this as two people complaining about the same thing, as one often does on message boards. By the time I put it together that "NIN85 must be older now" + "new user from context is a teenager" + "most adults don't know many teenagers" + "except they do know their kids" = "she's talking to her kid", it was far too late for me to get the laugh. In retrospect "we talked about this" is a classic parenting line, but given that one tends to talk to many people about many things, it didn't really point me in that direction the way it was probably intended.

Maybe, not being a parent myself, my instincts also led me to assume that an older person would still sympathize and support a young person in search of totally rad transportation, rather than shooting them down like her mother before her :P So the assumption that "we talked about this" = "I, Vespa fan, have already denied you the same privilege" seemed like an especially great leap!

So, probably just having a slow brain day, but is there anything else to it I'm missing? Also, does Randall have kids? [[User:Jerodast|- jerodast]] ([[User talk:Jerodast|talk]]) 04:55, 24 September 2020 (UTC)
:Not just you. It took me a while before I noticed the dates on the posts, but then I put it all together. Maybe a better title for the comic would have helped, something including "necro". [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 05:54, 24 September 2020 (UTC)

Another in-joke is that Vespa is a scooter and there is an electric model [https://elettrica.vespa.com/en/index.php] that require either a moped license or a full motorcycle license, depending on the engine power, that is a premium model, Peugeot electric scooter cost 40% less, for instance.
[[Special:Contributions/162.158.94.200|162.158.94.200]] 07:13, 24 September 2020 (UTC)