explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

2383: Electoral Precedent 2020

2024-10-30T10:13:24Z

172.69.195.175: /* Trivia */

{{comic
| number = 2383
| date = November 9, 2020
| title = Electoral Precedent 2020
| image = electoral_precedent_2020-new.png
| titletext = He also broke the streak that incumbents with websites are unbeatable and Delawareans can't win, creating a new precedent: Only someone from Delaware can defeat an incumbent with a website.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is an update to [[1122: Electoral Precedent]], adding "broken precedents" for the US presidential elections in 2016 and 2020. It was published six days after the 2020 election took place, and two days after {{w|Four Seasons Total Landscaping press conference|most news networks "called" the election}}, projecting Biden as the winner. The majority of the comic's panels are duplicates from 1122, with the exception of the 2012 panel (modified to show that Obama did in fact break the streak), the 2016 panel (added to reflect the election of Donald Trump), and the two 2020 panels. It continues the theme of pointing out that an arbitrary 'precedent' can always be invoked to predict the outcome of an election. Presidential elections happen rarely enough that each is a unique event, and ''something'' is always happening for the first time. Like with the other examples, the precedents mentioned here mix factors that could plausibly impact the election (such as one candidate having been impeached), with precedents that are just a product of time and chance (like a successful challenger having a website).

The final two panels again show how, no matter which candidate won in 2020, it would be a 'first' in some way.
* No sitting president who was impeached was even nominated for the office again until Donald Trump. (Only two other US presidents have been impeached. Bill Clinton couldn't run again afterward due to term limits, Andrew Johnson failed to be nominated at the 1868 Democratic Convention.) After the election, it remains true that no impeached president has ever been re-elected. (As of July 2024, Trump is considered the Republican nominee, should he win that election, this statement could become false, depending on how exactly one interprets it.)
* Prior to the 2020 election, no challenger with a website ever won. This, however, is easily explained by the fact that incumbent presidents usually win, and websites are a fairly new technology. The last time a challenger beat an incumbent was in 1992 before Internet use was widespread. By 1996 that had changed and both the incumbent [http://www.livingroomcandidate.org/websites/cg96/ Bill Clinton campaign] and the challenger [http://www.dolekemp96.org/main.htm Bob Dole campaign] had websites that look very simple by today's standards. The title text points out that one could just as easily say that incumbents with websites are unbeatable, until that precedent was broken in 2020.

The 2020 election was also precedent breaking in a few ways that Randall didn't mention:
* At 78, [[Joe Biden]] was the oldest president ever on the day of his inauguration.
* Biden's running mate Kamala Harris is the first-ever female vice president, first Black vice president, and the first Asian vice president (her parents are from Jamaica and India). She's also the first Democratic vice president from the West.
* Biden received over 80 million votes, the highest ever, beating Obama 2008's previous record of just under 69.5 million votes. The second-highest raw vote total was for Trump, with approximately 74.2 million votes, ''also'' beating Obama 2008. Turnout as a percentage of the eligible population was the highest in over a century. Unlike the other precedents, however, this one was not an inevitable outcome of a Biden-Harris victory.

Also, Biden is the first president from the state of Delaware, thus he broke the "precedent" that Delawareans can't win. Randall then proceeds to combine these 2 facts to create a new precedent: Only Delawareans can defeat incumbents with a website.

==Table of New Broken Precedents==

All original options can be found at [[1122: Electoral Precedent]].

{| border =1 width=100% cellpadding=5 class="wikitable"
|-
! Year !! Broken Precedent !! Explanation !! Validity

|-
|2012
|Democratic incumbents never beat taller challengers. ... Until Obama did.
|Mitt Romney stood 6' 2", an inch taller than President Obama. Nonetheless, Obama was re-elected for a second term.
|True
|-
|2016
|No one has become president without government or military experience. ... Until Trump did.
|Every president prior to Trump had either been a general in the US Army, a congressman, a state governor, or a cabinet member.
|True
|-
|2020?
|No one has won after being impeached. ✓
|None of the two prior presidents who were impeached even ran for re-election. This is the first time this specific condition has even been tested.
|Trump was impeached, ran, and lost, so this test remains true at this point in history.
|-
|2020?
|No challenger with a website has won. X
|The ''possibility'' of having a website only arose in the 1990s and Bill Clinton seems to not have had one when he succeeded Bush Sr. Although websites became increasingly ubiquitous, no president since had ever been defeated by their respective challengers.
|"...until Biden did."
|}

==Transcript==
:The problem with statements like
:"No <party> candidate has won the election without <state>"
:Or
:"No president has been reelected under <circumstances>"

:<nowiki>★</nowiki> Updated for 2020 ★

:[Each statement below has its own panel. The year is in a caption, the precedent is stated by a standing Cueball in the main panel, and the president who broke it is below the panel.]
:1788... No one has been elected president before. ...But Washington was.
:1792... No incumbent has ever been reelected. ...Until Washington.
:1796... No one without false teeth has become president. ...But Adams did.
:1800... No challenger has beaten an incumbent. ...But Jefferson did.
:1804... No incumbent has beaten a challenger. ...Until Jefferson.
:1808... No congressman has ever become president. ...Until Madison.
:1812... No one can win without New York. ...But Madison did.
:1816... No candidate who doesn't wear a wig can get elected. ...Until Monroe was.
:1820... No one who wears pants instead of breeches can be reelected. ...But Monroe was.
:1824... No one has ever won without a popular majority. ...J.Q. Adams did.
:1828... Only people from Massachusetts and Virginia can win. ...Until Jackson did.
:1832... The only presidents who get reelected are Virginians. ...Until Jackson.
:1836... New Yorkers always lose. ...Until Van Buren.
:1840... No one over 65 has won the presidency. ...Until Harrison did.
:1844... No one who's lost his home state has won. ...But Polk did.
:1848... As goes Mississippi, so goes the nation. ...Until 1848.
:1852... New England Democrats can't win. ...Until Pierce did.
:1856... No one can become president without getting married. ...Until Buchanan did.
:1860... No one over 6'3" can get elected. ...Until Lincoln.
:1864... No one with a beard has been reelected. ...But Lincoln was.
:1868... No one can be president if their parents are alive. ...Until Grant.
:1872... No one with a beard has been reelected in peacetime. ...Until Grant was.
:1876... No one can win a majority of the popular vote and still lose. ...Tilden did.
:1880... As goes California, so goes the nation. ...Until it went Hancock.
:1884... Candidates named "James" can't lose. ...Until James Blaine.
:1888... No sitting president has been beaten since the Civil War. ...Cleveland was.
:1892... No former president has been elected. ...Until Cleveland.
:1896... Tall Midwesterners are unbeatable. ...Bryan wasn't.
:1900... No Republican shorter than 5'8" has been reelected. ...Until McKinley was.
:1904... No one under 45 has been elected. ...Roosevelt did.
:1908... No Republican who hasn't served in the military has won. ...Until Taft.
:[The precedent takes up the entire panel this year. Consequently, there is no Cueball.] 1912... After Lincoln beat the Democrats while sporting a beard with no mustache, the only Democrats who can win have a mustache with no beard. ...Wilson had neither.
:1916... No Democrat has won while losing West Virginia. ...Wilson did.
:1920... No incumbent senator has won. ...Until Harding.
:1924... No one with two Cs in their name has become president. ...Until Calvin Coolidge.
:1928... No one who got ten million votes has lost. ...Until Al Smith.
:1932... No Democrat has won since women secured the right to vote. ...Until FDR did.
:1936... No president's been reelected with double-digit unemployment. ...Until FDR was.
:1940... No one has won a third term. ...Until FDR did.
:1944... No Democrat has won during wartime. ...Until FDR did.
:1948... Democrats can't win without Alabama. ...Truman did.
:1952... No Republican has won without winning the House or Senate. ...Eisenhower did.
:1956... No one can beat the same nominee a second time in a leap year rematch. ...Until Eisenhower.
:1960... Catholics can't win. ...Until Kennedy.
:1964... Every Republican who's taken Louisiana has won. ...Until Goldwater.
:[The panel is zoomed in on Cueball's head in this frame.] 1968... No Republican vice president has risen to the Presidency through an election. ...Until Nixon.
:[The panel is zoomed in on Cueball's head in this frame.] 1972... Quakers can't win twice. ...Until Nixon did.
:1976... No one who lost New Mexico has won. ...But Carter did.
:1980... No one has been elected president after a divorce. ...Until Reagan was.
:1984... No left-handed president has been reelected. ...Until Reagan was.
:[The panel is zoomed in on Cueball's head in this frame.] 1988... No one with two middle names has become president. ...Until "Herbert Walker".
:[The panel is zoomed in on Cueball's head in this frame.] 1992... No Democrat has won without a majority of the Catholic vote. ...Until Clinton did.
:[The precedent takes up the entire panel this year. Consequently, there is no Cueball.] 1996... No Dem. incumbent without combat experience has beaten someone whose first name is worth more in Scrabble. ...Until Bill beat Bob.
:2000... No Republican has won without Vermont. ...Until Bush did.
:[The panel is zoomed in on Cueball's head in this frame.] 2004... No Republican without combat experience has beaten someone two inches taller ...Until Bush did.
:2008... No Democrat can win without Missouri. ...Until Obama did.
:2012... Democratic incumbents never beat taller challengers. ... Until Obama did.
:[The panel is zoomed in on Cueball's head in this frame.] 2016... No one has become president without government or military experience. ... Until Trump did.
:2020? No one has won after being impeached. <big>✓</big>
:2020? No challenger with a website has won. <big>X</big>

:[Caption below the comic]
:Congratulations to President-Elect Joe Biden for breaking the website curse!

==Trivia==
* This comic seems to have used the same image as [[1122: Electoral Precedent]], and so the original version of this comic had a ghost image of the original 2012 2nd "streak": "No nominee whose first name contains a "K" has lost."
* Also, the panels for past elections that were wrong before continue to be wrong, including 1812, 1816, 1820, 1904, and 1952. See [[1122: Electoral Precedent]], Table of Broken Precedents for details.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]] 
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Statistics]]
[[Category:Politics]]
[[Category:Elections]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ronald Reagan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring John F. Kennedy]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Donald Trump]]
[[Category:Comics featuring politicians]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Joe Biden]]

Talk:2015: New Phone Thread

2024-10-24T11:38:16Z

172.69.195.175: /* Ballot machine */ *sigh*

I feel the explanation could possibly give a sample text of what the person is actually trying to say [[Special:Contributions/172.68.46.113|172.68.46.113]] 05:13, 4 July 2018 (UTC)Innertuber40

I have an alternate interpretation: The first thing I thought this comic was about is all the people who are typing on phones and the messages actually sent contain weird words any typos because of the phone's autocorrection feature (or swipe keyboards which are accurate most of the time but error prone nevertheless). So this particular phone actually is sending what the user is writing (or wants to write) and does not change the message. Examples: http://barabare.blogspot.com/2011/05/funny-phone-t9-typo-errors.html [edit:] I mean, this goes so far that occasionally on online forums you see people with the message "Writing from phone, message may contaion errors. Sorry" or something like that in their signature. So a phone that actually writes what you are typing (or what you thought you were typing) might actually be a good thing. Cueball is just astonished that his new phone does exactly that. [edit2:] But then again, some of the messages in the comic really indicate in the direction the current explanantion is going. So, nevermind :) [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 07:30, 4 July 2018 (UTC)
:When I read it I also had that idea (being impressed by accurate typing) but it seemed too odd so I came to explain xkcd to look it up. I'm not convinced of either explanation at this point. For the current explanation (that the phone is autocorrecting to say spam) one would expect there to be a phone in the news doing something like that. This could be a hyperbole version of a phone is doing inserting product names like with BlackBerry expanding the acronym BB to their name on some phones. But I haven't heard of that anywhere and blackberry is not news. If someone knows of a current phone this behaviour is referencing please post a link? Thanks, rusl[[Special:Contributions/108.162.246.113|108.162.246.113]] 07:48, 4 July 2018 (UTC)
:Thought the same thing. Obscure subjects are of course a mainstay of xkcd.com, but in the past some Wikipedia research explains away the obscurity with certainty. Not this time.[[User:GODZILLA|GODZILLA]] ([[User talk:GODZILLA|talk]]) 11:43, 4 July 2018 (UTC)
: Was thinking the same. Sometimes I write weird sentences, because the word I actually chose in autocorrect is replaced with a different one. For example, I am typing "wha" and chose "whatever" from the suggestion list, and I am 100% certain it got chosen correctly. And then when I look at the message, after I hit "post", it will only show up as "what". So my example sentence would look like "Yeah, what", isntead of "yeah, whatever". [[Special:Contributions/172.69.54.249|172.69.54.249]] 08:31, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Putting the "artifice" into "artificial intelligence". I too didn't understand the strip at first... briefly considered reading it from bottom to top. Now I agree that the user's phone is censoring and rewriting everything, and we're seeing the censored version. Another real world reference: a forum where your posts are blocked without telling you; you see your posts in place but no one else does. I've used forums where some imbecile moderator blocked me that way from spite... of course THIS site's moderators wouldn't do that! (You don't like words in capital letters?? Uhoh.) Robert Carnegie rja.carnegie@excite.com [[Special:Contributions/162.158.154.121|162.158.154.121]] 11:20, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

I think the “I’l never get a new phone” and “buy the new Mobile Pro 3” are completely inserted by the phone, not just modified user posts. They don’t seem to flow properly if we assume the user posted them, and we can see the surprise when the first of the two messages is posted; something that would fail to surprise the user to the degree he(?) is after already going through the rest of the messages. The “order now” message, in particular, seems a lot more like advertiser-speak than corrected user speak. [[User:Dyaomaster|Dyaomaster]] ([[User talk:Dyaomaster|talk]]) 21:15, 4 July 2018 (UTC)
:“I’ll never get a new phone” sounds like it originally was "Forget it, i give up. I'll just get a new phone." which seems natural for the user to post. Probably the “buy the new Mobile Pro 3” was also a warning not to buy the phone, which was changed almost completely into an advertisement.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.62.16|172.68.62.16]] 00:08, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

There is a Doctor Who episode in which a Dalek speech module distorts statements in a similar, but much more spooky way. [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 07:09, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
:In case anyone else was wondering, according to Bing: I think the episode they are referring to is Dalek, the sixth episode of the first series of the revived Doctor Who. In this episode, the Doctor and Rose encounter a Dalek that has been captured and tortured by a collector of alien artefacts. The Dalek escapes and goes on a rampage, but also shows signs of emotion and compassion after absorbing some of Rose’s DNA. The Dalek speech module is damaged and sometimes distorts its words, such as saying “I am in pain” instead of “Exterminate” or “Why do you survive?” instead of “You are an enemy of the Daleks”. This creates a contrast between the Dalek’s usual cold and ruthless behaviour and its newfound feelings. The episode explores the themes of identity, morality, and redemption for both the Doctor and the Dalek. {{unsigned|JackGreenEarth|17:58, 17 September 2023}}
::I wouldn't say that the speech module ''distorts the words'' of the Dalek. (It always distorts the ''timbre'', as it were; witness Dalek!Clara in the Assylum, once we see 'her' outside of her own little soufle-cooking mind-environment.) The 'Dalek' dalek is just plain wanting (or needing) to say those unusual words, just like the Cabinet War Room "British Military invention" ones would ask "Would. You. Like. Some. Tea???", and mean to (under the guise of being created for the Allied war effort by their stooge/plant).
::Yes, they may have a normally limited vocabulary, but mostly because they don't have much to say except the old classics (or variations, like "Exterminaten!!!"(??), when in Germany for The Stolen Earth/wossisname-key bit). They can still hold full (and philosophical) conversations with those they are forced (or deign) to speak with.
::I'm trying to think of any example (classic or reboot serieses(eseses)) in which a Dalek doesn't say what it ''intends'' to say (bluff doesn't count, either), and coming up blank (probably kick myself when someone reminds me of an instance).
::Though I'm rather minded, instead, of how the 'Mars Attacks!' film martians take the seriously misconfigured 'Earth translator' with them, proclaiming their continued friendship even as they death-ray everyone. (Even then, I think that they do this knowingly, for vicious fun... or just not bothered what it's saying, and still for fun!) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.98.227|172.71.98.227]] 20:45, 17 September 2023 (UTC)

I feel the first two "posts" suggest, the post only look different when viewing from someone else's device?
Although the following posts do not support this anymore. -- someone without an account.
:I think this is correct. The posts look exactly as the user wrote them on the user's own device/account, but when viewed by someone else, the forum/phone software censors and modifies the content of the posts. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.63.82|162.158.63.82]] 02:05, 11 July 2018 (UTC) A Nonny Mouse

== possibly connected to just announced Google "Smart Replies"? ==

Google lately announced new function to their keyboard on Android: reading messages on others communicator (like Facebook Messanger) and suggesting several short replies to choose from. It might be connected. pm7 [[Special:Contributions/162.158.88.140|162.158.88.140]] 10:24, 4 July 2018 (UTC)
:I suspect that it's rather referencing the recent case of phones clandestinely sending random gallery images to ppl in the addressbook.[[Special:Contributions/141.101.96.196|141.101.96.196]] 11:20, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

I think this happens to people who try to leak high-stakes information (or etc) without understanding what they are up against. I found this comic very validating to read. The point of the “order now” button is to make it clear that what we see was not written by the author. This happened to the author on Facebook, but once they tried to tell somebody it began happening on their messaging app too. Use a merkle tree messaging system that allows you to keep your private key offline if you’re saying something important. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.142|108.162.219.142]] 15:39, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

OK, am I the only one here this has actually happened to? The Google keyboard often seems *very* reluctant to swipe-write insulting words, & it's especially frustrating when trying to write about the phone itself while it's doing things like changing "inaccurate" to "accurate" & "stupid" to "great". Note that the swipe action required to write the word "stupid" bears '''''no''''' resemblance to the swipe action for "great"; Sometimes the suggested words seem so obtuse it feels deliberate. (Note, it just did it to me again; I'm editing to correct "great" to "stupid")
[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 20:11, 4 July 2018 (UTC)
:I doubt it's intentionally reversing the meaning. My guess as to what's happening: they give insulting words an artificially low weight in their algorithm because they don't want to produce them by accident. It comes up with the word "great" rather than some other random word because their natural language processing algorithm recognizes that a word of that sort fits the context. [[User:Ids1024|Ids1024]] ([[User talk:Ids1024|talk]]) 16:03, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
::I agree that under-weighted negative words combined with context suggestions (& some Branding-first assumptions) are what causes the illusion that intentional reversal is occurring; but the illusion is crazy complete sometimes. I'm pretty sure this comic is based off some actual corrections, extended only slightly toward hyperbole. [[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 11:05, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

== EU copyright directive?

Might be related to controversial article 13 of EU copyright directive which will be voted on today (5 July 2018) and which will in practice mandate automated censorship AI on all social networks and alike sites operating in EU. More info on https://saveyourinternet.eu/ (the same directive with dreaded "link tax" in art.11 --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.93.207|162.158.93.207]] 23:36, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

== Wrong Link?

The link to the word "plaudit" in no way matches the context of the sentence. 12:25, 8 July 2018 (UTC)Someone who doesn't have an account.

== Missing closing equals sign

Should this get a [[:Category:Self-reference]] tag? [[User:ConscriptGlossary|ConscriptGlossary]] ([[User talk:ConscriptGlossary|talk]]) 03:58, 24 October 2024 (UTC)

== Ballot machine ==

I heard the news about a ballot machine changing the voters' choices. [[User:ConscriptGlossary|ConscriptGlossary]] ([[User talk:ConscriptGlossary|talk]]) 06:45, 24 October 2024 (UTC)
:<nowiki>*</nowiki>sigh* Which news? There was much news (more just of a "I heard that..." level of reporting quality) and it's absolutely more likely that someone voted X, confirmed X and X got recorded (or they mishit Y, perhaps due to an electronic version of the Butterfly Ballot problem, and had to unconfirm it and hit X ''properly''), than a machine effectively went "Ha ha! You voted X but I'm going to tell them you said Y!".
:(Much more 'sensible' for intentional voter-fraud or unintentional errors to crop up down the line, when the machine gets asked for the whole lot of anonymised results and nobody who knows anything about what individuals actually (thought they) voted for see an 'adjusted' tally.)
:I gather you're too young to remember back to the 2000 US elections (if not beyond), with games and claims galore happening pretty much every election cycle (at least in the US, where it seems to be a valid tactic to attack the way every single vote happened in ways that discredit the result in your favour). Mostly without proof or even proven false/bad-faith. Not surprised if it's already cropped up, in places with voting open.
:(Here in the UK, physical voting only happens on the day itself and seems to work. Historically, there were reasons to spread even the non-postal voting out significantly, across the US, but surely decent electoral conditions (and employment rights) could now currently make a lot of that unnecessary. But it can be hard to do Democracy, maybe it'll improve in the future.)
:...TL;DR;, I don't know what your point is, but I'm ''assuming'' it's just something to do with the quadrennial fight for 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, which is (to be frank) a boringly regular deluge of he said/she said unjustified rumour which just drowns out and smudges what should be a fairly simple "count 'em up and deal with it" process. Can we at least save this kind of thing until the strangely long November-to-January period when the inevitable arguments will at least know ''what's'' being argued as true or false? For all you know, Vermind Supreme will get an unassailable majority (popular ''and'' EC) and Jill Stein will get far enough up in next place to eventually convincingly form the official second party. Until then, not even worth the effort I took to write this. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.195.176|172.69.195.176]] 11:37, 24 October 2024 (UTC)

1812: Onboarding

2024-10-23T19:54:09Z

172.69.195.175: Undo revision 353836 by 42.book.addict (talk) If this is an example of what apparently constitutes a "Disney" (or "Movies") reference, I imagine many other over-reaching examples exist.

{{comic
| number = 1812
| date = March 17, 2017
| title = Onboarding
| image = onboarding.png
| titletext = 'So we just have a steady flow of metal piling up in our server room? Isn't that a problem?' 'Yeah, you should bring that up at our next bismuth meeting.'
}}

==Explanation==
This is another one of [[Beret Guy|Beret Guy's]] mysterious [[:Category:Beret Guy's Business|businesses]], in which he shows new employee [[Ponytail]] around the building in which the company resides. The process of showing a new employee around the business and starting to get them introduced to people and systems and procedures is often referred to as "{{w|onboarding}}" - hence the title of the comic.

=== Existential Welcome ===

The first panel starts out as a typical welcoming of the new employee to a small indie business. Very quickly, however, Beret Guy's explanation jumps to an existential viewpoint. Very rarely do conversations or introductions involve discussing the eventual fate of our bodies, and certainly not in a professional light as in this comic. Beret Guy, however, has no problem with discussing death and decay as just part of his business. This seemingly contradicts the title text in [[1493: Meeting]], where it is claimed that employees of the company can not physically die. However, this could be a new company he has started since then. Alternatively, this is a literal statement, perhaps related to the cursed Wi-Fi mentioned later in the comic.

=== Bikeshare ===

In the second panel, Beret Guy shows Ponytail the free bikeshare system this business apparently has in place. {{w|Bicycle-sharing system|Bikesharing}} is a system in which many users share one or more bikes among themselves. Typically the bikes belong to some of the members of the group who are allowing them to be used by other members who may not have one, but Beret Guy calmly remarks that this system will only exist "until whoever owns those bikes finds out", implying that they were not donated or shared by any member of the group, but are being used without permission or the knowledge of the true owner of the bikes. This is, thus, not actually a bikeshare, and would be more properly described as theft.

=== Printer ===

In the third panel, Beret Guy shows Ponytail that the laserjet is over there '''and''' the printer is over there, thus indicating that the ''laserjet'' is not a printer. This is a bit disconcerting, since the {{w|HP LaserJet}} is in fact a common brand of {{w|laser printer}}, suggesting that his laserjet may be some rather more exotic device, such as a {{w|Laser propulsion|laser-propelled}} {{w|jet aircraft}}. In any case, however, the printer is not available, as it's been printing an infinite-scroll web page since 2013.

An [[wikt:infinite scroll|infinite-scrolling web page]] is a web page that, as the name implies, seems to have no end. This style of webpage typically has no definite pages or sections, but instead continues to feed data to the screen as the user scrolls. One such example is [https://endless.horse endless.horse], a webpage that features an infinitely tall horse. In reality, trying to print one of these would only print the current section the user was viewing, and even if it was somehow able to infinitely print, the operator could theoretically cancel the operation at any time. Presumably, this continuous printing serves some useful purpose, e.g. prints latest news, because someone would have to be refilling the paper for the printer to have kept running this long; it would have run out of paper long ago otherwise. Mistaken print jobs are sometimes notoriously difficult to stop due to many levels of buffering (application, printer driver, OS spooler, print server, printer device) and lapses in job control software.

Infinite scrolling (in the sense of an annoying UI design style for browsing large but finite documents) was previously covered in [[1309: Infinite Scrolling]]. A similar separation of the phrase "laserjet printer" has been explored in [[1681: Laser Products]].

=== Infrastructure Buzzwords ===

In the fourth panel, Beret Guy makes three more remarks.

'''Restrooms are all-digital—no pipes.''' While many technology standards nowadays are entirely digital, one's restroom is one of the things that most definitely should not be.{{Citation needed}} A restroom without pipes would have no way to bring water in and transfer wastes away, and would most certainly be at the very least an unpleasant encounter. (It's implied that the waste is being transferred digitally, although this is [[1293: Job Interview|obviously impossible]].) This could also be a pun joking with the fact that a common (in the past and reappearing recently) technology in sound amplifiers is the use of tubes, but nowadays most sound amplifiers are all-digital. So a "latest technology" restroom cannot have pipes (synonym of tubes) and has to be all-digital.

'''The Wi-Fi is very fast, but cursed.''' Fast Wi-Fi is certainly desirable, but in this case, he claims it is also cursed. Whether the curse is a side-effect of the fast Wi-Fi or totally unrelated is left unsaid, as well as what the curse is. This could possibly be a joke relating to American slang: all technology can behave inexplicably from time to time, and Wi-Fi is notorious for randomly losing connection -- this is often exaggerated and called "cursed". Knowing Beret Guy, though, [[2376: Curbside|it's probably literal]], perhaps purchased from one of the "[[1772: Startup Opportunity|mysterious shops that sell you magical items, and then it turns out they're cursed"]].

'''Our server room is carbon-neutral but produces bismuth constantly.''' Normally, {{w|carbon neutrality|carbon-neutral}} would mean that it is designed to be environmentally friendly by reducing and offsetting its carbon emissions enough that it has no net effect on the environment. The term is a little bit confusing because the meaning is of course carbon-dioxide-neutral. Instead of producing carbon-dioxide as a side-effect of its power usage, Beret Guy's server room produces the element {{w|Bismuth|bismuth}}, which is absurd. Bismuth is used as lead replacement in some {{w|solder}}s. While this replacement is often used because of the toxicity of {{w|lead}}, in this case it refers to an IBM mainframe computer where the Bi58Sn42 alloy is used because of its low temperature soldering characteristics. Therefore, producing excess bismuth in the server room would destroy all the electric connections.

An explanation for how the server room might produce bismith, is a {{w|Lead-cooled fast reactor|compact nuclear reactor}} which can both make the server room carbon-neutral ''and'' leak bismuth (by creating it in the reactor). This being Beret Guy, another possibility is that bismuth simply appears in that room as the server operates, because he didn't want it to create carbon emissions and so it had to emit something else.

=== Lin-Manuel Miranda ===

In the last two panels, Beret Guy explains that Ponytail will be working on the infrastructure, which is apparently maintained by {{w|Lin-Manuel Miranda}}. He is among other things a songwriter but certainly not an engineer or anyone qualified to be responsible for an entire infrastructure.{{citation needed}} Ponytail knows about his songs and thus surprised asks if he is also an engineer. (This echoes [[1665: City Talk Pages]], which includes a train station designed by {{w|Andrew Lloyd Webber}}, a composer best known for writing ''{{w|The Phantom of the Opera}}'').

It is worth noting that Beret Guy actually acknowledges the mistake here, claiming the mistake "cost a fortune." This is unusual for Beret Guy, as he has of yet failed to acknowledge or recognize the oddity of every other aspect of his mysterious business, many of which are certainly stranger than this. However, he doesn't seem to mind this at all and does not wish to fire him. Instead he plans on fixing the mistake by hiring a real network engineer, Ponytail, to do the work alongside Miranda. Because, as Beret Guy continues to explain, the bright side of having Lin-Manuel Miranda in his business overshadows the lost fortune. Apparently Lin-Manuel Miranda is really nice and he makes {{w|karaoke}} nights fun, a clear reference to his engaging stage presence and vocal skills.

Off screen, Lin-Manuel Miranda is heard singing "{{w|How Far I'll Go}}", which is a song that he composed for the Disney movie ''{{w|Moana (2016 film)|Moana}}''. It was nominated for an {{w|Academy Awards|Oscar}} for {{w|Academy Award for Best Original Song|Best Original Song}} in the {{w|89th Academy Awards|2017 show}} just a few weeks prior to this comic.

=== Title Text ===

The title text mentions the potential dangers of having your server room constantly produce bismuth, but only as a prelude to a bismuth/business pun. Because of the earlier carbon reference, it could also be a parallel to the difficulty in convincing businesses to become more energy efficient and reduce greenhouse gas emissions despite the urgency, as [[Randall]] has [[:Category:Climate change|often referred]] to in xkcd with [[1732: Earth Temperature Timeline]].

==Transcript==
:[Beret Guy shakes hands with Ponytail in front of a building while he points at the two large double doors under an unreadable sign.]
:Beret Guy: Hi! Welcome to the team!
:Beret Guy: We do business here and we'll turn into dirt later.

:[Beret Guy and Ponytail walk by three bikes.]
:Beret Guy: This is our main campus.
:Beret Guy: We have a free bikeshare system, at least until whoever owns those bikes finds out.

:[Beret Guy points forward as they walk on.]
:Beret Guy: The LaserJet is over there, and the printer is over there.
:Beret Guy: You can't use it right now; it's been printing an infinite-scroll webpage since 2013.

:[Zoom in on their heads.]
:Beret Guy: Restrooms are all-digital - no pipes.
:Beret Guy: The WiFi is very fast, but cursed.
:Beret Guy: Our server room is carbon-neutral but produces bismuth constantly.

:[Beret Guy has turned towards an off-panel Ponytail holding a hand out towards her.]
:Beret Guy: You'll be working on our infrastructure, which is currently maintained by Lin-Manuel Miranda.

:[Zoom out to both facing each other. From the right singing is heard from off-panel, as indicated with two musical notes.]
:Ponytail: ...The songwriter? Is he also an engineer?
:Beret Guy: Nope, huge misunderstanding on our part. Cost a fortune. But he's really nice and it makes karaoke nights fun.
:Lin-Manuel Miranda (off-panel): ''How far I'll gooo''

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Beret Guy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring real people]] 
[[Category:Beret Guy's Business]]
[[Category:Strange powers of Beret Guy]]
[[Category:Puns]]
[[Category:Songs]]
[[Category:Climate change]]
[[Category:Comics with cursed items]]

Talk:2367: Masks

2024-10-21T12:44:44Z

172.69.195.175: Surprised you forgot the other two "~"s...

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)
:: That globe is clearly a reference to the Spiderman villian. The Goosebumps character did not wear a mask as far as I can tell. [[User:Nutster|Nutster]] ([[User talk:Nutster|talk]]) 14:42, 3 October 2020 (UTC)
:It's Mysterio, the Spider-Man villain, who basically wears a fishbowl/crystal ball over his head, as shown in this graph. :) [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 05:21, 26 September 2021 (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)
:: It would protect against or foster any effect or aspect of the virus exactly as much as the wearer wanted it to. It can bend or rewrite reality or unreality in any way, at a whim. The only weakness to the Mask is the wearer du jour, so it would utterly, entirely and completely depend upon who's wearing it. So, as to where it fits on the scale - it doesn't (?) - [[User:Brettpeirce|Brettpeirce]] ([[User talk:Brettpeirce|talk]]) 15:29, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
:Depends. The mask when off/real life no-magic replica, is essentially identical to the Skincare one with open eye and mouth holes, except more substantial, being made of wood, so it would be there. Worn, with the magical transformation, there's zero coverage so it would be up with Zorro/Lone Ranger/Batman. Or, alternatively, you'd now be the embodiment of Loki, a god, so probably immune to viruses and thus below Mysterio. :) [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 05:21, 26 September 2021 (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]]
: The appearance of the scarecrow mask in the comic is similar to some incarnations of the Scarecrow in the various Batman comics. In that case, it would be very effective as Dr. Crane (the man behind the mask) uses psychoactive air-borne chemicals and the mask actually hides very effective filters. That mask sure does not look like Ray Bolger's makeup from the Wizard of Oz. [[User:Nutster|Nutster]] ([[User talk:Nutster|talk]]) 14:42, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

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)
:Early in the pandemic - like May/June 2020 - I saw an article where some doctor had been vigilant protecting his nose and mouth, washing hands frequently as a doctor, who swore him contracting the virus was proof that you can contract it through the eyes, that he did. [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 05:21, 26 September 2021 (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)
: All the incarnations of the various Iron Man armours, except perhaps for the first one, contain independent air supplies, which allows the operator to survive underwater and at very high altitude, where people usually can not breathe. Therefore, the Iron Man mask should appear as even more effective than Mysterio's one. [[User:Nutster|Nutster]] ([[User talk:Nutster|talk]]) 14:47, 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)

Spiderman's mask would act as a nebulizer, making virus transmission far worse.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.146.202|162.158.146.202]] 13:09, 3 October 2020 (UTC)
: I would expect that Spiderman's mask would be about as effective as a regular cloth mask. [[User:Nutster|Nutster]] ([[User talk:Nutster|talk]]) 14:42, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

Various iterations of Zorro have different masks. Sometimes they are as shown in this comic, a fabric strip with eye holes tied around the head, but arguably more common is a scarf with eye holes that covers the entire upper head and is tied in the back. --[[User:John from Arlington|John from Arlington]] ([[User talk:John from Arlington|talk]]) 13:32, 3 October 2020 (UTC)
: Covering the top of the head still would not reduce the transmission of an airborne virus. [[User:Nutster|Nutster]] ([[User talk:Nutster|talk]]) 14:42, 3 October 2020 (UTC)
:: Which is why I was always skeptical of [https://metro.co.uk/2020/06/17/behold-tube-tube-ppe-headshield-designed-getting-public-transport-12862906/ this thing]. And also with so many people wearing visors (e.g. shop-assistants) where they're worn pretty much just as a (far out) eye-shield but plenty of air both towards and away from their mouth and nose.
:: (And far too many people, if they aren't wearing masks as chin-straps in a 'mask-required' context, think they're mouth-masks and hang them beneath their noses as if nostrils don't matter.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.154.167|162.158.154.167]] 23:01, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

:::It should of course cover the nose, but even covering just the mouth would be of some use. You don't cough out your nose. The mask would disrupt the airflow when the wearer coughs, so that the virus does not get to travel the 2 metres to the next person before falling below that person's face height. (Cough expel droplets, droplets contain virus, droplets have weight.) Spider-Man's mask might do the same, but I doubt it; if the fabric was dense enough, he'd suffocate. Of course, that is only useful when the wearer has contracted the virus but has not developed the full-blown Covid. If it's just a cold, the mask does nothing about Covid. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.38.46|162.158.38.46]] 19:54, 20 October 2020 (UTC)

''Star Wars'' should be italicized. [[User:PvOberstein|PvOberstein]] ([[User talk:PvOberstein|talk]]) 18:40, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

;What are HEPA filters made of
I've been told that HEPA filters are very similar to the filters in consumer vacuum cleaner bag accessory assemblies, and also similar to the N95 filters sold for masks. What are those filters made of? How are they made? Can I make them at home? Can I make something similar at home? Thanks in advance. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.132.201|172.68.132.201]] 03:17, 5 October 2020 (UTC)
: This isn't really relevant to the discussion.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.107.29|162.158.107.29]] 04:40, 5 October 2020 (UTC)

Has [[Batman]] been mentioned so many times that he needs his own category? See [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?search=batman&title=Special%3ASearch&profile=default&fulltext=1 this search]. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:30, 5 October 2020 (UTC)

Why is Spider-Man listed as SpiderMan in the explanation? There is nothing to suggest that the M should be capitalized. Shouldn't we be using Spiderman or SPIDERMAN? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.170.142|172.69.170.142]] 14:24, 5 October 2020‎
:We use "SpiderMan" in the explanation only when we're directly quoting the comic, with the error noted. Otherwise in the explanation, we use the correct spelling. I don't know why people are getting it wrong in the discussion here. :-)
:We don't yet have the "[sic]" note in the transcript, but probably should..? [[User:BunsenH|BunsenH]] ([[User talk:BunsenH|talk]]) 17:10, 5 October 2020 (UTC)

I live in the village where Guy Fawkes grew up, and our local pub is named after him. The staff wear masks but, incredibly disappointingly, not "Guy Fawkes masks". Properly missed a trick there.[[User:Yorkshire Pudding|Yorkshire Pudding]] ([[User talk:Yorkshire Pudding|talk]]) 14:48, 5 October 2020 (UTC)
:If I was in charge or at least connected, I'd design some Guy Fawkes masks to be able to accept the mouth/nose filters some cloth masks use. :) [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 04:54, 26 September 2021 (UTC)

The explanation talks about Guy Fawkes being designed for the V For Vendetta comic, but didn't that all come from a REAL guy REALLY using that mask/imagery? As depicted in the V movie? I won't update it because I'm no expert, but I'm fairly sure... [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 04:54, 26 September 2021 (UTC)

Surprised he forgot the Shape~~ {{unsigned ip|172.71.31.110|12:37, 21 October 2024}}

Talk:2966: Exam Numbers

2024-08-03T08:48:50Z

172.69.195.175:

pre-algebra: 4, calculus: pi^2 / 4 (about 2.467), physics: cosmological constant: depends on how you measure it [[Special:Contributions/162.158.167.48|162.158.167.48]] 18:11, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Game theory: -5x10⁶ (maybe helpful, maybe not... just be thankful I didn't include an ''i'' factor in there somewhere...) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.185|172.70.162.185]] 18:20, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
:Interesting; I went with ∞+10. So, between our answers, that makes the average... [[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 05:21, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Could somebody reformat all the math here in whatever LaTeX plugin this wiki uses? --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.222.102|162.158.222.102]] 18:35, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
:Probably not, because the MathML here is broken. But, also, nothing I see requires anything particularly complicated, it can all stay in fairly straightforward (standardly formatted) text. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.224|141.101.98.224]] 18:44, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
I had to look up "TREE(3)." Seriousness aside, I think the largest number would be the astrological sign 1 that has its end_points_ as galaxy clusters. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.245.184|172.68.245.184]] 19:26, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
:Which astrological sign? Search engines aren't helping. [[User:Onestay|Onestay]] ([[User talk:Onestay|talk]]) 20:41, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
::The nonexistent one I just made up that looks like a "1." 😃 [[Special:Contributions/172.71.222.6|172.71.222.6]] 21:06, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
:'OAK'? 'ELM'? 'ASH?' 'BOX'? 'YEW'? [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.165|141.101.98.165]] 08:52, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

If infinity _is_ a number, it might be a possible solution to the game theory question. The average of any set of numbers that includes infinity is infinity, and infinity + 10 is still infinity. I probably wouldn't try that in most classes, but a game theory professor might approve "gaming" the system, as it were. {{unsigned ip|172.70.39.44}}
:If I would prefer no-one (else) to win, I might submit -∞ as my answer. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.74|172.70.90.74]] 20:13, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
::If I really wanted to mess with them, I would submit i. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.160.248|172.70.160.248]] 08:54, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

I did a bit of a deep dive into wikipedia and the googology wiki and the answer to the last question depends on a few things (along with assuming ZFC). If transfinite ordinals count as numbers, then those at the end of {{w|List of large cardinal properties}} take the cake (if i'm reading it right). Otherwise, something based off [https://googology.fandom.com/wiki/Rayo%27s_number Rayo's number] is the best googologists have come up with so far. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.246.149|172.69.246.149]] 20:18, 31 July 2024 (UTC)Bumpf

:How about "On, in the context of MK set theory"? MK is a standard way to extend ZFC by allowing classes as mathematical objects, so On (the class of all set-size ordinals) is a class-sized "ordinal". But MK doesn't allow proper classes to be contained in any object, so "On+1" doesn't exist except as a definable hyperclass. Thus, On is the biggest "number" in a model of MK set theory.{{unsigned ip|172.68.205.151}}

::I personally would not call a class a number, but that is very very subjective! And why would we take a standard extension of ZFC in the first place and not just keep ZFC? yadda yadda yadda you get the idea :) [[Special:Contributions/172.69.246.142|172.69.246.142]] 21:43, 2 August 2024 (UTC)Bumpf

Isn’t the joke in the pre-algebra that it would require algebra in order ro calculate? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.70.135|172.68.70.135]] 20:36, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
:Yes. I agree that it would be worth adding wording along the lines that “the joke here is that you need algebra to solve the equation”. [[User:Dúthomhas|Dúthomhas]] ([[User talk:Dúthomhas|talk]]) 20:56, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
: I interpreted the 'pre-' bit as being more like 'proto-' - i.e. it's not fully proper algebra, but it's the kind of work you would do in preparation for tackling proper algebra.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.186.156|172.68.186.156]] 08:58, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
::That is actually exactly correct, at least in the US. Pre-algebra teaches the basics of algebra, and any seventh-grade student _should_ actually be able to solve the given problem. IDK if Randall gave this thought when formulating the joke, though... [[User:Dúthomhas|Dúthomhas]] ([[User talk:Dúthomhas|talk]]) 05:33, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

You know, formatting math on this wiki would be a lot easier if the Math extension were correctly installed, but evidently it's not: <math>\int_0^\pi x \sin^2 x \;dx</math> [[User:Zmatt|Zmatt]] ([[User talk:Zmatt|talk]]) 22:22, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Is that integral really correct? I asked Wolfram Alpha and it gave me
: integral x sin^2(x) dx = 1/8 (2 x (x - sin(2 x)) - cos(2 x)) + constant
which does not seem to be the same as
: −2x sin(2x)+cos(2x)−2x)/28 + C.
But maybe there's something with half-angle formulas that makes them the same? … but I don't think so, they don't evaluate the same for x=0. [[User:JohnHawkinson|JohnHawkinson]] ([[User talk:JohnHawkinson|talk]]) 02:56, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

:Yup, looks like it was supposed to be
:: -(2x sin(2x)+cos(2x)-2x^2)/8
:but they messed up the places of the negation and square.
:Though the important part here isn't what it is at any f(x), but what it is for any f(x)-f(y). In this particular case, f(pi)-f(0). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.41.121|162.158.41.121]] 04:49, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

As to '''biggest numbers:''' I thought most people would say the answers revolved around "nine-stuffing." For a kindergartener, stuff in as many bare <code>9</code>s as possible. For a postgrad, mix in exponentiation and write your numbers even smaller than a kindergartener can. <code>9^9^9^9...</code> or perhaps <code>99^99^99...</code> or…I'm not sure what's optimal. Of course, I'm not math postdoc ;) Or maybe some integrals or big-∏ notation. [[User:JohnHawkinson|JohnHawkinson]] ([[User talk:JohnHawkinson|talk]]) 12:41, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
:Mastered division in preschool, learned exponents and logarithms in kindergarten. When I got asked this very question, my answer was (10^(10^9-1)-1), which is 999999999 "9"s. When told off for a "wrong answer format", I asked the teacher exactly how long she expected me to spend writing out literally nearly a billion digits to answer "properly" and whether she could afford that much stationery. She have me an A+. I knew the lower numbers don't actually matter so much, but it still took me until first grade to properly get into the programmatic mindset, and now the biggest finite integer I can properly consider is (2^(2^48)), which...
::10^9-1 = 999999999
::2^48 = 281474976710656
:And those are the higher numbers, so even though the lower ones are 10 versus 2, it's pretty clear which number is bigger, no? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.150.197|172.71.150.197]] 23:22, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
::If you answer "the biggest number you can think of" with "<some number> minus one", then I think you would rightfully have done yourself out of a mark... [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.128|141.101.98.128]] 23:59, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
:::What even is thinking? Does math necessarily count? What are numbers? Whole numbers only? No living human can yet prove whether or not pi^(pi^(pi^pi)) is an integer, even though it's less than 2^(2^61). To me, "nine nines of nines" is entirely reasonable for a kindergartener who knows about exponents to answer, and while I may be slightly surprised at knowing proper expression, b^p-1 (seen both as 10^9-1 for "nine nines" and 10^(...)-1 for "of nines") appears in a lot of math things, e.g. the biggest signed 32 bit integer, 2147483647, is 2^31-1. Just because a normal internet connected computer can only count octets from 0 to 255, does that mean 255 being 2^8-1 is a more wrong answer than 2^8, which it "thinks" is 0? Does that make 0 automatically the largest number anybody can think of? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.23.200|172.68.23.200]] 00:29, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
::::I learned about tetration in college, and always thought it was the coolest thing. It is to exponentiation that exponentiation is to multiplication. The playground rules of infinity + 1 basically applies here. Whatever largest number you can write down, Just say 999^^999 for example, which being 999 to the 999th power 999 times. a googolplex is 10^^4, so this is an extremely fastly growing number, but not being 100% math nerd, don't know if this counts in any way. Rayo^^rayo, does it even make sense, who knows.--[[User:Youj ying|Youj ying]] ([[User talk:Youj ying|talk]]) 04:36, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
::::: googolplex = 10^googol = 10^10^100 = 10^10^10^2. Whereas 10^^4 = 10^10^10^10 = googolplex^(10^10^10-10^10^2), a number so much larger that the number of times you could write out googolplex using the same number of digits as 10^^4 has is itself a number so large as to have about 9999999900 digits. Even 4^^4 is bigger: ln(a^b)=ln(a)*b so ln(ln(10^10^100))=ln(ln(10)*10^100)=231.09254... and ln(ln(4^^4))=ln(ln(4)*4^4^4)=355.21799... which can be double-checked on many calculators. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.41.180|162.158.41.180]] 09:32, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

The PhD Cosmology question is easy, actually. Just write down H0 (imagine that 0 is subscript, I don't know how (if) I can format this comment). It doesn't ask you to write down the ''value'' of the constant, just the constant itself.[[Special:Contributions/172.71.103.118|172.71.103.118]] 14:56, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
:Well if you're going to get smartass about it, the last question is easy too - you just write out "THE BIGGEST NUMBER YOU CAN THINK OF"[[Special:Contributions/172.68.186.56|172.68.186.56]] 15:17, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

If you asked a psychologist what is the biggest number you can think of, they'd probably say "about 5". Anything more than that, and you're not really thinking of the number - you're just thinking of the name of the number.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.186.128|172.68.186.128]] 15:44, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
:I can absolutely visualize a grid of 9, 16, or 25. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.41.22|162.158.41.22]] 04:23, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
::Exactly, though - a grid. You're really thinking about 5 and 5 and an arrangement pattern.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.19|172.70.85.19]] 08:13, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Given that postgraduate math should be real math, according to [[899: Number Line]] the largest number should be 8. My first thought for that question was card(R), as it is not really possible to prove that the number you thought about is larger than that. (Granted, the powerset of the reals is larger, if you fix an interpretation of R). --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.253.131|172.68.253.131]] 17:25, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

'''Prime notation in integrand?''': Here we go again, I guess. In [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2966:_Exam_Numbers&diff=next&oldid=347876 this edit], 172.68.2.126 changed the working of the integral to include expressions with a prime inside the integrand, like <code> ¼ ∫0π x (sin 2x)’ dx</code>.
I…have no idea what the prime is supposed to be indicating here…differentiation?
Even if this notation is meaningful (as it surely must be?), I don't think we should be using it here. Sure, many lay readers won't understand calculus at all, but for those that do, keeping it at a level understandable to a high-school calculus student seems wise. But since I don't understand it, I wanted to post before changing it back. What does it mean? [[User:JohnHawkinson|JohnHawkinson]] ([[User talk:JohnHawkinson|talk]]) 19:58, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

== What is a number? ==

Infinity is _not_ a number. [[User:Dúthomhas|Dúthomhas]] ([[User talk:Dúthomhas|talk]]) 19:39, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Infinity is absolutely not a number, and is the one answer I would mark as unambiguously wrong for the last one. Just say TREE(G_64) or something. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.154.31|162.158.154.31]] 20:15, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
:This is correct. No one in post-grad math would write “infinity” and expect that answer to work. Infinity is NOT a number except for seven-year-olds. Yet the explanation above continues to posit it as a possible correct answer. [[User:Dúthomhas|Dúthomhas]] ([[User talk:Dúthomhas|talk]]) 20:49, 31 July 2024 (UTC)
::I qualify as a "post-grad math", and yet, I think infinity would have been a perfectly valid answer. Let me explain. The term "number" without further context is a bit vague, because there are several possible generalizations of natural numbers (something that presumably everyone agrees to call a "number"), and they are not compatible, ie. there is not a single generalization that generalizes them all. So we have to choose which generalization makes sense in the current context. Since the question is about thinking how big a number is, I naturally thought that the adequate generalization would be one that focuses on the order on natural numbers, ie. ordinals. In that case, my answer to this question would be "the class of numbers I can think of is not bounded, therefore there is no such thing such as a 'biggest number I can think of'". But if I had to write down a big number, I would write ε_{ε_{ε_{...}}} up until I filled the page, because that's the most efficient way I know to write a big, *big* infinity. Which is a number. (and I'm not seven, just to be clear) [[User:Jthulhu|Jthulhu]] ([[User talk:Jthulhu|talk]]) 08:35, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
:In IEEE floating point math, Infinity is ''not'' Not A Number. The latter is an indication of error (in a context where errors can't be signalled immediately) and an entirely separate concept to infinity. But both are not Normal Numbers. Or even Denormalized Numbers. Floating point math is a whole lot trickier than it appears to be at first glance, and only extremely tangentially related to mathematical reals. --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.205.54|172.68.205.54]] 00:48, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
::I would have written this, but I saw that your comment already explained the two points I would have made, so, well, well done! [[User:Jthulhu|Jthulhu]] ([[User talk:Jthulhu|talk]]) 08:35, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
:If I write a song titled "Infinity" that was part of an opera, then it would be a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_number number]. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.175.141|162.158.175.141]] 13:26, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
A number, by definition, is a construct used to classify and/or compare values. How rigorous this needs be for one limits the extent to which they accept things as being a number. Even things like "apple" could be interpreted as (dimensioned) numbers, with a possible value being "1 fruit"; In that regard, one may consider things like apple=orange<grapes.

Just "infinity" is nearly useless in this regard, as it's "no end thing". Usually interpreted (when necessary) as the countable infinite cardinal x=aleph_null, this prevents most useful comparisons, including dimensional analysis since x^n=x for all counting (aka. finite positive integer) n. Spacetime may or may not be boundless, but we can't tell how many edges may or may not loop. Is it infinity? Yes. Is it infinite? God only knows. Can you *count to it*? God can. Does that make it a number? Depends. Is "infinity plus one" a sane concept? No, it can't be finite, ordinal, and/or real in a way addition is defined; It's without end, and if you could add to it, that would indicate an end.

In contrast, classification has its roots in trade, and barter, and tipping. How much of a thing is enough, but not too much. Somebody may accept between 1/2 and 2/3 of a pie you're splitting, because less wouldn't be fair and more may give them a stomach ache; Is 3<=6x<=4 a number? It's similar in uselessness to "infinity", but whether something is less or more can at least still be established within its range. In the limit, Surreal numbers are the principal example of classification, taking the arithmetic mean of the maximum and minimum of their lower and upper bounds, or the predecessor or successor, or zero. For example, y={y|1} is the biggest number less than one, with z<=y<1 for all z<1. It's less than one, but not any "smaller" than one, with an immeasurably infinitesimal difference 0<1-y.

Choice of axioms is very important for all this, since its full extent can render everything except finite non-negative integers "not a number" (by Presburger Arithmetic), or allow everything up to and including unique antichain cardinalities (by Martin's Maximum).

The sixth power of the smallest ordinal with the cardinality of the continuum in the constructed universe (w_1^6 where beth_n=C(w_n)) is the biggest number I can personally conceptualize, although I can consistently work with w_2 in this system as well. Does the fact that this is infinite make it any less useful as a number than 2.5? No. It says I can think accurately about all the standard ways of comparing things in up to 6 infinitely divisible dimensions. Just because one cannot necessarily picture something others can't doesn't mean it doesn't exist. If a one-eyed person can only see a 2 spatial + 1 temporal dimensional image, that doesn't mean depth doesn't exist, it just means it's "hidden" from that perspective. 3+1+2 has two "hidden" dimensions compared to normal 3+1 spacetime, and beth_1 is infinitely divisible unlike the quantum (at most beth_0) nature of our known universe, but I can still work with 3+1+1, and 3+1+2 in the same way people can think about a (possibly looping) universe where everything can be bigger or smaller, and spatial geometry itself may be some degree of spherical, and people have been working with fractions since antiquity, so why should I limit myself to what other people can grasp?

In summary: "number" is too vague for claiming most things "aren't" to be reasonable. Infinite values (that aren't just "infinity", that's vague enough by itself to be almost as unreasonable) are just one one example of a valid answer most people seem to be up in arms about. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.41.181|162.158.41.181]] 01:06, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

:All right, all right. I yield. That’s some... _impressive_ reasoning. If we are going to redefine words to meaninglessness then there is no hope of engaging in useful discussion. I’m sure Randall will at least get a good laugh out of the idea that post-grad math students would submit “infinity” as the largest number they could think of. I still think it a disservice to readers to posit infinity as a _valid_ answer, though. [[User:Dúthomhas|Dúthomhas]] ([[User talk:Dúthomhas|talk]]) 05:05, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
::This isn't redefining words to meaninglessness. Do you know how many branches of math there are that generalize the concept of "number"? 2500 years ago the Greeks didn't believe irrational numbers were numbers (and Hippasus supposedly drowned for discovering them), and it was a long time before 0 was accepted as a number, but now we have entire hierarchies of numbers. 100 years ago Georg Cantor created another upheaval in mathematics when he invented Set theory along with the infinite ordinals and cardinals, which are usually referred to as "numbers". Complex analysis defines the "extended complex numbers", modeled by the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riemann_sphere Riemann sphere], which includes a "point at infinity" (and of course you can [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Projectively_extended_real_line extend the real numbers]] similarly). Non-standard analysis defines not only infinite but infinitesimal numbers as [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperreal_number Hyperreal number]s. Granted, I'll agree that using "infitity" without any qualification or context is not really precise enough to do anything useful with. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.23.49|172.69.23.49]] 03:12, 3 August 2024 (UTC)
:::Um, hi... Nothing really to do with what you wrote, but how you wrote it. You use URL-links for wikipedia. You have <code><nowiki>[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riemann_sphere Riemann sphere]</nowiki></code> ("[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riemann_sphere Riemann sphere]") instead of the more nice templated <code><nowiki>{{w|Riemann sphere}}</nowiki></code> ("{{w|Riemann sphere}}").
:::But you also seem aware of the 'plural modifier' suffix without doing it either 'normal' way. You have given <code><nowiki>[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperreal_number Hyperreal number]s</nowiki></code> ("[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperreal_number Hyperreal number]s") instead of either <code><nowiki>[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperreal_number Hyperreal numbers]</nowiki></code> ("[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperreal_number Hyperreal numbers]"), with no point in adding the pluralisation outside the link at all, or <code><nowiki>{{w|Hyperreal number}}s</nowiki></code> ("{{w|Hyperreal number}}s") which does ''most'' of the work for you...
:::Wouldn't have commented on this at all (would have rationalised any case in an Explanation, but wouldn't change a person's Discussion contribution, even purely as a background aesthetic), and there have been a lot of 'lazy' []-linking by IPs recently where the {{template|w}}-template could have been used, but that last one seems to show an intent to do it right/nice. Just crucially missing the probable intent. So... FYI. General informative meta-comment that I hope helps you/others a bit, if you care to pass by this way again and appreciate it. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.195.175|172.69.195.175]] 08:48, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Y'all, the answer is clearly 1. Sincerely, someone who has studied probability.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.137.155|162.158.137.155]] 14:04, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
: I came to the same conclusion by different means: A number that fills 100% of the answer area is the biggest valid answer, and is very clearly a one turned on its side. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.238.68|108.162.238.68]] 18:59, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

No actual cosmologist denotes the Hubble constant in Hz. It's about 70 (km/s)/Mpc. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.41.22|162.158.41.22]] 04:23, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
:The ''true'' Cosmic cosmologist surely knows that H0 is 1 (exactly and always), redefining all subsequently derived units in terms of that and the other 'true constants' of the universe... ;) [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.172|141.101.99.172]] 10:43, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Infinity comes up in kindergarten more often than most people think. Kids learn to keep asking "why?" in sequence around four, and they don't stop until they get an answer which makes them face some terrifying reality, usually concerning mortality. Infinity is small potatoes and involved in the answer to a suprising number of simple math questions. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.124|172.70.214.124]] 05:50, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

2957: A Crossword Puzzle

2024-08-03T08:29:28Z

172.69.195.175: Undo revision 347983 by 162.158.167.87 (talk) A doctor might do that. I don't think I've ever had a dentist ask me that (just "open wider, please", clearly believing I have snake-jaws).

{{comic
| number = 2957
| date = July 10, 2024
| title = A Crossword Puzzle
| image = a_crossword_puzzle_2x.png
| imagesize = 740x937px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = Hint: If you ever encounter this puzzle in a crossword app, just [term for someone with a competitive and high-achieving personality].
}}

==Explanation==
{{notice|<big>'''SPOILER ALERT!'''</big> Stop scrolling! These crossword clues comprise a single hidden joke, which you can figure out yourself. If you read on, the joke is spoiled and your chance of finding out the joke yourself is gone instantly!|image=warning!!.png}}

This crossword may seem extremely difficult, with questions covering a wide variety of trivia, linguistics, mathematics in various forms, alongside wordplay typical of crossword puzzles. But the joke is that every single letter of every single answer is "A".

The name of this comic, “A Crossword Puzzle”, is a double entendre which could, in itself, be considered a cryptic clue; the “A” can be interpreted both as the indefinite article “a”, and as an identifier saying that this crossword puzzle is specifically an “A” puzzle, due to the answer being all “a”s.

The title text is a play on a "type A" personality. The term for someone with a competitive and high-achieving personality is "Type A". In the context of the title text, this answer is a hint that the entire puzzle can be completed in a crossword-solving app by typing the letter A repeatedly.

===Explanation of clues===
{| class="wikitable" style="margin:auto"
|-
! Location !! Clue !! Explanation !! Squares
|-
| 1-Across || Famous Pvt. Wilhelm quote || Reference to the {{w|Wilhelm scream}}, a widely used stock sound effect. || 10
|-
| 11-Across || {{w|IPv6}} address record || An IPv4 record is an "A" record; an IPv6 record is four times the length and is designated an "AAAA" record. || 4
|-
| 15-Across || “CIPHERTEXT” decrypted with Vigenère key “CIPHERTEXT” || A "{{w|Vigenère Cipher}}" translates the original text by the distance from A from the key, letter by letter. For instance, if the plaintext is "XK" and the key is "CD", the C shifts X 2 forward to become Z, and the D shifts K 3 forward to become N, yielding a ciphertext of "ZN". Since the ciphertext and the key are the same in this case, decryption just shifts all the letters back to A, akin to subtracting a number from itself and getting 0. || 10
|-
| 16-Across || 8mm diameter battery || An {{w|AAAA battery}} is a 1.5 V battery that measures 8.3 mm in diameter, 2.2 mm smaller than the more common AAA battery. || 4
|-
| 17-Across || “Warthog” attack aircraft || The {{w|A-10 Warthog}} is an attack aircraft. Here, A-10 has been turned into AAAAAAAAAA (ten As). || 10
|-
| 18-Across || '''E'''ve'''r'''y t'''h'''ir'''d''' le'''t'''te'''r''' in the word for “inability to visualize” || {{w|Aphantasia}} is the inability to experience mental images. Following the example of the pattern in the clue, taking the first letter and every third one after (rather than just every third letter) we determine that '''A'''ph'''a'''nt'''a'''si'''a''' gives us the word "aaaa". This clue is particularly mean because of how it instructs you to visualize the letters highlighted within the word in order to get the answer. || 4
|-
| 19-Across || An {{w|acrostic}} hidden on the first page of the dictionary || The first page of the dictionary (if you ignore the copyright page and the index) is the list of words starting with A. An acrostic of this page, taking the first letter of each line and arranging them in order, would just be a sequence of As. || 15
|-
| 21-Across || Default paper size in Europe || {{w|A4 paper}} (here written as AAAA) is the default size in Europe. At 210×297 mm, it is approximately 0.24″ narrower and 0.71″ longer than the 8.5″×11″ paper used in the United States, and due to having an aspect ratio of 1:sqrt(2), can be cut or folded in half to create two half-sized sheets (A5) with exactly the same aspect ratio. A4 is, itself, also a halving of A3 and of identical ratio, as is the case with all A-sizes higher and lower in the sequence.|| 4
|-
| 22-Across || First four unary strings || A unary number system represents numbers using just one symbol. For example, 7 in unary would be 1111111. The first four strings in unary, if you used A as the first (and only) symbol, would be A, AA, AAA, AAAA. || 10
|-
| 23-Across || Lysine codon || {{w|Lysine}} is an amino acid, with codons AAA and AAG. || 3
|-
| 24-Across || 40 CFR Part 63 subpart concerning asphalt pollution || [https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-40/chapter-I/subchapter-C/part-63/subpart-AAAAAAA?toc=1 "40 CFR Part 63"] refers to federal air pollutant regulations in the Code of Federal Regulations. The subpart for "asphalt processing and asphalt roofing manufacturing" is AAAAAAA (also part LLLLL). || 7
|-
| 25-Across || Top bond credit rating || The highest {{w|credit rating}} for bonds is AAA. || 3
|-
| 26-Across || Audi coupe || First of three Audi references. {{w|List_of_Audi_vehicles|Audi's car models}} range from A1 (subcompact hatchback) to A8 (full-size luxury sedan); the A5, the one referenced here, is a compact executive {{w|coupe}}. || 5
|-
| 27-Across || A pair of small remote batteries, when inserted || Two {{w|AAA_battery|AAA}} batteries, which are often used to power remote controls for domestic devices. These have been combined to give AAAAAA — "Inserted" is often a cryptic hint that one word should surround another, although such a cryptic clue would normally also contain a more direct clue (albeit ambiguously) to the full answer. || 6
|-
| 29-Across || Unofficial Howard Dean slogan || A reference to Howard Dean, an American Democrat who ran for the party's nomination in 2004. He famously [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6i-gYRAwM0 yelled at a rally] in a way that was thought to be bizarre and which, it is thought, doomed his campaign. || 7
|-
| 32-Across || A 4.0 report card || A 4.0 GPA, at least {{w|Academic_grading_in_the_United_States|in the USA}}, is all As. This clue assumes seven classes. || 7
|-
| 33-Across || The “Harlem Globetrotters of baseball” (vowels only) || The {{w|Savannah Bananas}}, the vowels for whom are aaaaaa. The {{w|Harlem Globetrotters}} are an exhibition basketball team, with the Savannah Bananas following a similar formula in baseball. || 6
|-
| 34-Across || 2018 Kiefer song || “[https://genius.com/Kiefer-aaaaa-lyrics AAAAA]”. This is the only five-letter song title in Kiefer's 2018 album ''Happysad''. || 5
|-
| 35-Across || Top Minor League tier || The top {{w|Minor League Baseball}} tier is AAA. || 3
|-
| 36-Across || Reply elicited by a dentist || With your mouth open at the Dentist, the only reply a dentist can elicit from a patient is AAAAAAA || 7
|-
| 38-Across || Anaa’s airport || {{w|Anaa}} is an atoll in the {{w|Tuamotu archipelago}} of {{w|French Polynesia}}. AAA is the {{w|IATA}} code for its airport. || 3
|-
| 41-Across || Macaulay Culkin’s review of aftershave || In the movie ''{{w|Home Alone}}'', Kevin (played by {{w|Macaulay Culkin}}) puts on his father's aftershave lotion. The eight-year-old boy is not used to the lotion's antiseptic and screams as the stinging sensation kicks in. || 10
|-
| 43-Across || Marketing agency trade grp. || The {{w|American Association of Advertising Agencies}}, also called the 4As (here AAAA). An abbreviated word in a clue, here "grp.", is a common way to signal that the answer also should also be written as its abbreviation. || 4
|-
| 44-Across || Soaring climax of Linda Eder’s ''Man of La Mancha'' || Refers to [https://youtu.be/BWP7l0OTXJI?t=130 the 18-second-long wordless passage in Eder's opus], or possibly the final high note in the song “The Impossible Dream”. || 15
|-
| 46-Across || Military flight community org. || The {{w|Army Aviation Association of America}}, or AAAA. || 4
|-
| 47-Across || Iconic line from ''Tarzan'' || Tarzan has a famous {{w|Tarzan yell|war cry}} he shouts, usually when swinging from a vine. || 10
|-
| 48-Across || '''E'''v'''e'''r'''y''' o'''t'''h'''e'''r letter of Jimmy Wales’s birth state || The birth state of {{w|Jimmy Wales}}, the co-founder of Wikipedia, is Alabama. Taking every other letter of '''A'''l'''a'''b'''a'''m'''a''' gives "Aaaa". || 4
|-
| 49-Across || Warthog’s postscript after “They call me ''mister'' pig!” || Pumba in ''{{w|The Lion King}}'' yells "aaaaaaaaaa" while charging at the hyenas who insulted him. || 10
|-
| 50-Across || Message to Elsa in ''Frozen 2'' || The call which Elsa hears in ''{{w|Frozen 2}}'' is a sequence of four notes which resemble the requiem music "{{w|Dies Irae#Music|Dies irae}}". The sequence is sung entirely with an open rounded vowel sound, or a soft "a" sound. || 4
|-
| 51-Across || Lola, when betting it all on Black 20 in ''Run Lola Run'' || In ''{{w|Run Lola Run}}'', Lola ({{w|Franka Potente}}) [https://youtu.be/OTSz1w-cuZM?si=2vc51WCWvn20Hjoo&t=116 screams loud enough to affect the outcome] of a roulette wheel where she has just bet all her money on Black 20. The scream could be transcribed as "AAAAAAAAAA" || 10
|-
| 1-Down || Game featuring “a reckless disregard for gravity” || ''{{w|AaAaAA!!! – A Reckless Disregard for Gravity}}'' - notably the title is commonly extended in promotional material beyond 6 As. || 6
|-
| 2-Down || 1010101010101010101010102→16 || 10101010 10101010 10101010 in binary is equivalent to "AAAAAA" in hexadecimal. || 6
|-
| 3-Down || Google phone released July ’22 || The {{w|Pixel 6a}} was released in July 22. Stylized in this puzzle as "AAAAAA" ('A'×6) || 6
|-
| 4-Down || It’s five times better than that ''other'' steak sauce || Five times better than {{w|A1 steak sauce}} would be A5, stylized in this puzzle as AAAAA. || 5
|-
| 5-Down || ToHex(43690) || The decimal number 43690 converted to hexadecimal is AAAA. || 4
|-
| 6-Down || Freddie Mercury lyric from ''Under Pressure'' || A drawn-out 'Aaaaahhhh' rising in pitch, from a song by Queen and David Bowie. || 15
|-
| 7-Down || Full-size Audi luxury sedan || Second of three Audi references. As mentioned previously, the A8 referenced here is their full-size luxury sedan. || 8
|-
| 8-Down || Fast path through a multiple choice marketing survey || The "fast path" is just to select the first option over and over again. Usually the options are labeled A, B, C, and D (or more) - choosing the first option for every question would be answering entirely with As. || 7
|-
| 9-Down || 12356631 in base 26 || Randall is expressing base 26 using the letters of the alphabet with 1=A, in which case 1235663110 = AAAAAA26. (It's unclear how one would express the digit 026 this way.) || 6
|-
| 10-Down || Viral Jimmy Barnes chorus || A reference to the music video for Kirin J Callinan's song “{{w|Big Enough}}”, which features rocker {{w|Jimmy Barnes}} in a cowboy hat screaming "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!" while in the sky over mountain scenes. || 15
|-
| 11-Down || Ruby Rhod catchphrase || Ruby Rhod is a radio host in the film ''{{w|The Fifth Element}}''; he has a scene with a memorable scream. || 5
|-
| 12-Down || badbeef + 9efcebbb || In hexadecimal, badbeef and 9efcebbb add together to equal AAAAAAAA (195,935,983, 2,667,375,547, and 2,863,311,530 in decimal respectively). || 8
|-
| 13-Down || In Wet Leg’s ''Ur Mum'', what the singer has been practicing || In the song "{{w|Ur Mum}}" by {{w|Wet Leg}}, the bridge starts with "Okay, I've been practicing my longest and loudest scream", which is apparently eight As long. || 8
|-
| 14-Down || Refrain from Nora Reed bot || The "Endless Scream" bot on social media, made by Nora Reed, posts "AAAAAAAAAAA" (with or without an h) at varying lengths. || 8
|-
| 20-Down || Mario button presses to ascend Minas Tirith’s walls || In ''Mario'' games you typically use the A button to jump. In games where you don't press a button to move (e.g., games with a joystick), then the button presses required to ascend a vertical structure would probably all be A. This clue might have been inspired by the {{w|A-button challenge}} / [https://ukikipedia.net/wiki/A_Button_Challenge A Button Challenge], which tallies the number of A presses needed to beat ''Super Mario 64''. Additionally, {{w|Minas Tirith}} is a fictional city in ''{{w|The Lord of the Rings}}'' with seven concentric rings, each with a wall around it and higher than the last ring. Presumably, it takes seven jumps to get to the highest area of the city, so the answer is "AAAAAAA". || 7
|-
| 24-Down || Vermont historic route north from Bennington || {{w|Vermont Route 7A}}, or AAAAAAA. || 7
|-
| 26-Down || High-budget video game || A high-budget video game is usually referred to as a Triple-A game, or AAA. || 3
|-
| 28-Down || Unorthodox Tic-tac-toe win || {{w|Tic-tac-toe}} is usually won by getting either three Xs or three Os in a row, making XXX and OOO normal Tic-tac-toe wins. One could achieve a win of AAA by making the unorthodox choice of playing with the letter A instead of X or O. Alternatively, Randall is envisaging the grid as defined by rows 1, 2, 3, and columns A, B, C, so an AAA win would be simply playing in the first column each time - a strategy which should be obvious and easy to stop, even for young children who have not yet worked out that ''any'' route to winning can be blocked. || 3
|-
| 29-Down || String whose SHA-256 hash ends “…689510285e212385” || <code>printf AAAAAAAA <nowiki>|</nowiki> sha256sum</code> outputs <code>c34ab6abb7b2bb595bc25c3b388c872fd1d575819a8f55cc689510285e212385</code>.
Note that this 'clue' would be normally be ''particularly'' difficult, in isolation, as the nature of a {{w|hash function}} means that it is possible for multiple inputs to produce a given output, and that finding any of these (and definitely identifying ''all'' of them, to ensure you have the correct original) would require a {{w|brute-force attack}}; i.e. a test of all possible initial states to discover which of them might be viable candidates. Even more problematic is that we are only given a partial hash string, meaning we are possibly talking of a multiple of full hashes, each of them with a possible multiplicity of original plaintexts behind them. However, given the context of this puzzle, it's reasonable to guess that a sequence of 8 As might be the answer, and indeed its hash does match the clue given.
 The number of possible hashes in the clue is 1664/1616, i.e. 1648, or approximately 6x1054, although there really is no reason (aside from the fundamental impracticality) to try to solve this problem from each and every 'hash end'. Instead you would 'only' check every combination of 8 letters (presuming no digits, punctuation or whitespace would be inserted, that no “foreign”/accented characters are present and that uppercase is universally presumed, is 268; i.e. ~208 {{w|billion|short-scale billion}} possibilities) and discover which (one?) of these sufficiently matches the hash fragment given. Testing a hundred of these every second, it would take a little over 66 ''years'' to complete the task of checking every single possibility (rather than stopping at the first confirmed answer, which might well be the initial one in this particular case).
 In the context of a crossword such as this, however, you can significantly reduce this search by having established (or at least sufficiently narrowed down) the answers to the various across-clues which intersect with ever character of it (this form of crossword grid being of the {{w|Crossword#American-style crosswords|dense type}}, with no singly-clued spaces as with the more open lattice-types), reducing the necessary checks drastically. This could mean, having solved at least some of the perpendicular answers, that you have enough information to 'guess' at some likely answer, and then merely need to ''confirm'' that whatever guess(es) you make will resolve themselves into the clue-answer provided. (Much as you might with a more normally difficult clue, where you merely have to satisfy yourself that the surprise answer is at least justified as resulting from the original hint.)
| 8
|-
| 30-Down || Arnold’s remark to the Predator || A reference to [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsFYPVxHKdc this scene] from ''{{w|Predator (film)|Predator}}'', starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. || 8
|-
| 31-Down || The vowels in the fire salamander’s binomial name || The vowels in {{w|Salamandra salamandra}} are aaaaaaaa. || 8
|-
| 32-Down || Janet Leigh ''Psycho'' line || The iconic scene in ''{{w|Psycho (1960 film)|Psycho}}'' is the shower scene, in which {{w|Janet Leigh}} gives a long piercing scream as she is murdered. This can be written as 8 As if one wishes. || 8
|-
| 34-Down || Seven 440Hz pulses || A sound with a frequency of 440 Hz is a middle "A" note. Seven such pulses would be AAAAAAA. || 7
|-
| 37-Down || Audi luxury sports sedan || Third of three Audi references. The A6, the one referenced here, is their executive car. Actually, the A7, their executive liftback sedan, would fit the prompt of "luxury sports sedan" better, but 37-Down only has room for six As. || 6
|-
| 38-Down || A half-dozen eggs with reasonably firm yolks || Eggs can be [https://www.saudereggs.com/blog/egg-grading-system/ "graded on a variety of aspects"], with grades B, A, or AA. Eggs with a reasonably firm yolk are graded A, so having half a dozen of them gives you AAAAAA eggs. || 6
|-
| 39-Down || 2-2-2-2-2-2 on a multitap phone keypad || A "{{w|multi-tap|multitap keyboard}}" is a text entry system for mobile phones. Most numbers are associated with three letters, and tapping the same number multiple times in rapid succession selects the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd letter. 2 is "A", 22 is "B", 222 is "C", 3 is "D", etc. 2-2-2-2-2-2 translates to "AAAAAA". (If pressed quickly enough, this input may accidentally wrap around the letter list twice and simply result in a "C".) || 6
|-
| 40-Down || .- .- .- .- .- .- || .- is {{w|Morse Code}} for A. It reads out as AAAAAA. || 6
|-
| 42-Down || Rating for China’s best tourist attractions || China's Ministry of Culture and Tourism provides ratings for many tourist attractions in China on a scale from A to AAAAA, with AAAAA being the best. Examples of well-known tourist attractions with the AAAAA rating include the {{w|Forbidden City}}, sections of the {{w|Great Wall of China}}, and the {{w|Terracotta Army}}. || 5
|-
| 43-Down || Standard drumstick size || 5A is a common, middle-range size for drumsticks (the sticks used to play drums, not the drumsticks that get eaten). Here, it's written as AAAAA. || 5
|-
| 45-Down || “The rain/in Spain/falls main-/ly on the plain” rhyme scheme || An AAAA {{w|rhyme scheme}} means each of the four lines ends with the same sound. Furthermore, the sound in question is the standard vocalization of the letter A. {{w|The Rain in Spain}} is a song from the musical {{w|My Fair Lady}}. || 4
|}

==Transcript==
:[A square 15x15 crossword puzzle is shown. Only 21 of the 225 squares are black. The black squares are in a pattern that are 180 degree rotationally symmetrical. Three black squares down from the 11th column and similarly three black squares up from the 5th column. Three black squares out from the right in row 7 and then two more black squares diagonally up from the end. Similarly three black squares out from the left in row 9 with two more black squares diagonally down from the end. A single black square is three above the first black square on the diagonal going down to the right and similarly there is a black square three under the first of the diagonal squares going down to the left. (Row 6 column 12 and Row 10 column 4). Finally there are three black squares on a diagonal crossing over the central point by going up from the left through the central point (Row 8 column 8). There are numbers at the top of every column (except the one that is a black square) and similarly at the left edge of all rows (except the one that is a black square). There are also numbers at the bottom of every black segment (except the one that reaches the bottom) and all rows after black segments except the one that reaches the right edge. In total all numbers from 1 to 51 are written. They are written in reading order from 1 to 51.]
:1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51

:[Below the square there are two columns of clues for each number that belongs to across (rows) and to the right there is one column of clues for each number that belongs to down (columns). Both segments have an underlined and bold title above the clues. ]
:<big>'''Across'''</big>
:1. Famous Pvt. Wilhelm quote
:11. IPv6 address record
:15. "CIPHERTEXT" decrypted with Vigenère key "CIPHERTEXT"
:16. 8mm diameter battery
:17. "Warthog" attack aircraft
:18. '''E'''ve'''r'''y t'''h'''ir'''d''' le'''t'''te'''r''' in the word for "inability to visualize"
:19. An acrostic hidden on the first page of the dictionary
:21. Default paper size in Europe
:22. First four unary strings
:23. Lysine codon
:24. 40 CFR Part 63 subpart concerning asphalt pollution
:25. Top bond credit rating
:26. Audi coupe
:27. A pair of small remote batteries, when inserted
:29. Unofficial Howard Dean slogan
:32. A 4.0 report card
:33. The "Harlem Globetrotters of baseball" (vowels only)
:34. 2018 Kiefer song
:35. Top Minor League tier
:36. Reply elicited by a dentist
:38. ANAA's airport
:41. Macaulay Culkin's review of aftershave
:43. Marketing agency trade grp.
:44. Soaring climax of Linda Eder's ''Man of La Mancha''
:46. Military flight community org.
:47. Iconic line from ''Tarzan''
:48. '''E''''''v''''''e''''''r''''''y'''''' o''''''t''''''h''''''e''''''r''' letter of Jimmy Wales's birth state
:49. Warthog's postscript after "They call me ''mister'' pig!"
:50. Message to Elsa in ''Frozen 2''
:51. Lola, when betting it all on Black 20 in ''Run Lola Run''

:<big>'''Down'''</big>
:1. Game featuring "a reckless disregard for gravity"
:2. 1010101010101010101010102→16
:3. Google phone released July '22
:4. It's five times better than that ''other'' steak sauce
:5. ToHex(43690)
:6. Freddie Mercury lyric from ''Under Pressure''
:7. Full-size Audi luxury sedan
:8. Fast path through a multiple choice marketing survey
:9. 12356631 in base 26
:10. Viral Jimmy Barnes chorus
:11. Ruby Rhod catchphrase
:12. badbeef + 9efcebbb
:13. In Wet Leg's ''Ur Mum'', what the singer has been practicing
:14. Refrain from Nora Reed bot
:20. Mario button presses to ascend Minas Tirith's walls
:24. Vermont historic route north from Bennington
:26. High-budget video game
:28. Unorthodox Tic-Tac-Toe win
:29. String whose SHA-256 hash ends "...689510285e212385"
:30. Arnold's remark to the Predator
:31. The vowels in the fire salamander's binomial name
:32. Janet Leigh ''Psycho'' line
:34. Seven 440Hz pulses
:37. Audi luxury sports sedan
:38. A half-dozen eggs with reasonably firm yolks
:39. 2-2-2-2-2-2 on a multitap phone keypad
:40. .- .- .- .- .- .-
:42. Rating for China's best tourist attractions
:43. Standard drumstick size
:45. "The rain/in Spain/falls main-/ly on the plain" rhyme scheme

==Trivia==
*This comic got a [[Header_text#A_Crossword_Puzzle|comic-specific header text]] after the first day it was up.
**This was because one of the comics Randall lists as one of those he enjoys, [https://www.buttersafe.com/ Buttersafe], had already posted a similar comic back in 2011: [https://www.buttersafe.com/2011/02/17/crosswords/ Crosswords].
**Randall had forgotten this, but now pays tribute to this, stating that he must have been accidentally inspired by that comic.
*[[User:Elfakyn|Elfakyn]] posted a link to a picture of the solved crossword puzzle in the [[Talk:2957:_A_Crossword_Puzzle#Solved_puzzle_picture|comments]] and allowed it to be included here:
[[File:2957_A-Crossword_Puzzle-Solved.png|500px|center]]
*All the black squares are in a symmetrical pattern, which is generally the case for crossword puzzles in the US and UK. See description of the pattern in the [[#Transcript|transcript]].
*Crosswords have been mentioned previously in [[2896: Crossword Constructors]].
*Out of 60 clues in the puzzle, 10 are references to screaming or yelling, making the puzzle approximately 17% screams.
{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]
[[Category:Language]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Physics]]
[[Category:Songs]]
[[Category:Video games]]

2966: Exam Numbers

2024-07-31T20:06:32Z

172.69.195.175: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2966
| date = July 31, 2024
| title = Exam Numbers
| image = exam_numbers_2x.png
| imagesize = 553x400px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = Calligraphy exam: Write down the number 37, spelled out, nicely.
}}

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

The comic depicts various similarly formatted examination questions that might appear on test papers at various points in a student's potential academic careeer. While they all share a similar feel, they are asking for different things, some of which might be considered more serious and examinable proofs of study than others.
{| class="wikitable"
|+ Exam numbers
! Exam level !! Question !! Answer
|-
| Kindergarten math || Write down the biggest number you can think of || At a kindergarden-level education, it is assumed that an individual might write down a relatively small number like 300, depending upon whether they have encountered the concept of hundreds. It might also be interpreted as "what's the highest number that you (think you) can count up to". Given the nature of a child's exuberant glee at learning about ''really'' big (but otherwise normal) numbers, they may even try an answer something like "a million billion squillion gazillion". It is not certain what criteria would be used to mark this question correct or orherwise, it may actually by a stealth question in child psychology or a question that everybody 'gets right' so long as they answer it.
|-
| Pre-algebra || Write down the value of x if x=3x-8 || 4
''3x'' refers to the multiplication of 3 and the originally unknown number ''x'', as a convenient shorthand.

By subtracting ''3x'' from both sides, ''-2x = -8''. Divide both sides by -2 to find ''x''=4. Alternately, subtract ''x'' from both sides to give ''0 = 2x - 8'', and as taking 8 from two ''x''s makes it zero, one ''x'' is half that

(Verify by plugging ''x''=4 into the original equation. '''4''' = (3*'''4''') - 8 -> '''4''' = 12 - 8 -> '''4''' = 4.)
|-
| Calculus || Write down the value of ∫_0^π x sin^2 x dx || The integral of the expression is ''(−2x sin(2x)+cos(2x)−2x)/28 + C''. Plugging in values for ''x'' gives the result as π^2/4, or approximately 2.4674.
|-
| PhD Cosmology || Write down the Hubble constant to within 1% || The exact value of the Hubble constant is not known to this level of accuracy; it is about 2.3 * 10^-18 Hz. This is one question that might have a different acceptible answer in the future, depending upon further developments in the understanding of cosmology.
|-
| Game Theory || Write down 10 more than the average of the class's answers || Game Theory studies "games" in which two or more participants' take actions that will succeed or fail based on other participants' decisions. In this case, all students' answers will be averaged, and the best answer will be 10 more than that average. If a student knew what everyone else was thinking, this would incentivise them to answer 10 more than the consensus, which would not necessarily be a larger number than all (other) numbers written down. For instance, if the answers end up being 30, 40, 50, 60, and 70, the most correct of these answers is 60.

In reality, most game theory exams test your understanding of game theory as an academic subject, not your ability to win games. (A type of class where actual results may result in better grades is a business negotiation class where the results of practice negotiations can determine one's grade on the assignment.)
|-
| Postgraduate Math || Write down the biggest number you can think of || This question echoes the very first example, but would be expected to be answered very differently (unlike a revisiting of most of the others).
Postgraduate math students can probably think of ''very'' large numbers. The 'best' answer could be "infinity" since, depending on your definition of the word "number", infinity may be the largest possible number that you will have encountered. This might heavily depend upon the branch of mathematics you are studying, however, as named (finite) numbers or ones with specific and useful notations might satisfy some questioning contexts, whilst the existence of a whole further set of trans-finite numbers (i.e. increasingly large types of "infinity") would be important considerations in others. For those associated with more computational mathematics, any infinity be {{w|NaN|Not a Number}}, and their answer might instead be the ceiling of some binary representation (typically ''28n-1'' for some value of ''n''), the largest value reliably storable in byte form (e.g. a {{w|Integer (computer science)|double quadword}})

As with the kindergarten question, they may be no previously anticipated 'correct' answer. It could be another "correct just so long as you answer it" (or perhaps 'sensibly' so) or the mark goes only to those giving the greatest number across all submissions.
|-
| Calligraphy (title text) || Write down the number 37, spelled out (as "thirty-seven" or "thirty seven"), nicely || Calligraphy, in a nutshell, is the art of fancy writing. The title text expands the joke outside the realm of math and points out that since calligraphy does not require any math skills, the only way a calligraphy exam would even mention numbers is if one had to write them out in such a way as to showcase their calligraphic skill. 37 is a number that some people believe mysteriously appears more often than it should; this was a subject of a recent Veritassium video.
|}

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[6 different math test questions.]

:[The first panel:]
:Kindergarten math final exam
:Q. Write down the biggest number you can think of
:A. [empty box]

:[The second panel:]
:Pre-algebra final exam
:Q. Write down the value of x if x=3x-8
:A. [empty box]

:[The third panel:]
:Calculus final exam
:Q. Write down the value of [integral sign, from 0 to pi] x sin^2 x dx
:A. [empty box]

:[The fourth panel:]
:PhD cosmology final exam
:Q. Write down the Hubble constant to within 1%
:A. [empty box]

:[The fifth panel:]
:Game theory final exam
:Q. Write down 10 more than the average of the class's answers
:A. [empty box]

:[The sixth panel:]
:Postgraduate math final exam
:Q. Write down the biggest number you can think of
:A. [empty box]

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Cosmology]]

==References==
<references />

2456: Types of Scientific Paper

2024-07-26T15:13:04Z

172.69.195.175: /* Breakdown of papers */

{{comic
| number = 2456
| date = April 28, 2021
| title = Types of Scientific Paper
| image = types_of_scientific_paper.png
| titletext = Others include "We've incrementally improved the estimate of this coefficient," "Maybe all these categories are wrong," and "We found a way to make student volunteers worse at tasks."
}}

==Explanation==
In this comic, Randall satirizes scientific papers by claiming they all (or at least the large majority) fall into only a small number of categories, which he describes with somewhat humorous generalized titles. This comic may be a jab at mainstream news and their handling of scientific announcements; journalists are eager to report on what could turn out to be a scientific breakthrough even if it's very similar to stories they've already published about similar papers that turned out to be somewhat mundane. It may also relate to how some scientific findings follow certain patterns.

==Breakdown of papers==
{| class="wikitable"
|-
!Paper Title
!Explanation
!Visual Description
|-
!scope=row|We put a camera somewhere new
|This may involve miniaturisation or other improvements of imaging sensors, power supply, transmission or retention of data, environmental hardening and (possibly) recovery afterwards. Photographs and videos can be especially helpful in understanding what is or was going on, especially for the layman, than more limited signal traces.

Cameras have been inserted into every obvious bodily orifice (including swallowed, to be later excreted), placed in habitats to monitor wildlife, attached to wildlife to monitor habitats, sent into volcanic craters/ocean trenches/high altitudes/nuclear reactors, launched into space and sent past/round/onto several of the solar-system's more interesting bodies. This makes the "somewhere new" claim intriguing, possibly even comparable to 'clickbait'.

This could also be generalized even more by replacing "camera" with "sensor", and then going to debate the newly derived sensor data.
|Includes a large figure, likely an image captured with the camera.
|-
!scope=row|Hey, I found a trove of old records! They don't turn out to be particularly useful, but still, cool!
|Rather than starting with the aim of investigating some question, and finding some way of answering it by uncovering evidence, sometimes a writer may have stumbled upon a cache of historic documents that they then feel compelled to justify the resulting 'WikiWalk' they may have found themselves sucked into. The author may be far more excited about this than any future reader. This could also be a paper by a historian who found out ancient records which could be useful. A similar sentiment appears in [[1979: History]].
|Small figure may show the most interesting fragment of the records.
|-
!scope=row|My colleague is wrong and I can finally prove it
|This title refers to the occasional rivalries between scientists within a field, which can push them to seek proof that they, and not their colleague, are correct. This search for vindication, rather than truth, can lead the researcher to overlook significant flaws in their research, and can also make for tedious reading. It reflects a tone of smug self-satisfaction.
|Like the two previous types, this one is laid out in two-column format with occasional section headings. Unlike those types, it has no figures.
|-
!scope=row|The immune system is at it again
|The human immune system is notoriously complex, and there are countless papers in medical fields just describing its strangeness. While it is best known for preventing and battling infections, it can also overreact or even turn against the body that it is supposed to protect. Moreover it can overreact, for instance in allergic reactions or in a potentially lethal {{w|cytokine storm}} known to occur in certain viral infections, including {{w|influenza}} and {{w|COVID-19}}. The title may convey exasperation with the amorphous nature of this study subject.
|Two-column format, no figures.
|-
!scope=row|We figured out how to make this exotic material, so email us if you need some
|Researchers often attempt to create materials despite there not being any demand, predicting that in the future their material will be game-changing without any actual applications. These researchers have created such a material, and are offering to produce it for anyone who needs it. It is couched in terms of having created an answer for which there was not yet any proper question.

Sometimes the only reason for trying to create the materials is that they are peculiar or novel in some way, with no consideration of whether they might have any use apart from demonstrating the novel property. However, some other people might find that property very useful... and may lack the ability to make the substance for themselves.

This may be also referring to the discovering/creating of elements and subatomic particles. The statement if you wish to buy it is humorous in these cases because they will decay too quickly to be purchased.
|Two-column format, no figures.
|-
!scope=row|What are fish even doing down there
|Deep sea marine biology regularly discovers [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7QXdlSBGGY strange lifeforms] in [https://www.9news.com.au/world/sharks-living-in-volcano-why-are-marine-predators-living-in-an-active-crater/db112bd9-21b2-46c2-9d58-ed07f981ae01 unexpected places], and theories explaining deep sea ecosystems are regularly confounded by new data.

Scientists may also bump into marine organisms when looking for something else. For example, one planned underwater neutrino detector [https://www.nature.com/articles/srep44938 picked up bioluminescence instead].

Whichever way, the title probably reflects a totally unexpected result that is possibly too cross-disciplinary to be properly comprehended as an actual scientific advance by the authors. However, a proper study of the species could very well be an important paper.
|This one-column paper does not appear to have any headers, implying a longer, free-flowing format.
|-
!scope=row|This task I had to do anyway turned out to be hard enough for its own paper
|There is a huge variety in the complexity and importance of subjects studied in scientific papers, and often some supposedly easy task will be sufficiently complicated as to merit its own paper. For example, a scientist may have discovered a better way of finding out if a substance is X or Y while studying something else.

The author may be glad to have been able to turn mundane 'housekeeping' activities, that don't normally do much to enhance academic reputations, into an actual opportunity to be cite-worthy.
|This paper is also one-column but it contains section headers.
|-
!scope=row|Hey, at least we showed that this method can produce results! That's not nothing, right?
|One of the struggles of the scientific method is that many experiments will not produce the results scientists desired or expected. Negative or conflicting results of well-conducted research are as important as positive or dramatic ones, but are often ignored in favor of more novel findings. As a result, some journals are established specifically for negative results, reducing the bias towards only positive claims that may actually be outliers or anomalies.

In this case, the authors may otherwise have worked on their problem and been left with no citable proof of their efforts. The title perhaps reflects an attempt to present this as 'success' of a different kind, rather than a submission to such a null/negative-results platform. This may be similar to the above type of paper too.
|Two-column format, no figures.
|-
!scope=row|Check out this weird thing one of us saw while out for a walk
|This paper may be imagined as an opportunistic publication. A department or team has seen itself low down on the local 'league table' for academic output. A brainstorming session for a way of rectifying this led to desperately seizing upon the first idle comment made (in lieu of any better sounding ideas) that can somehow be shoehorned into their respective subject area, and is now being presented similar to "this one weird thing" clickbait titles that almost always oversell their content.
This also works in the context of entomology. Insects have the most species of any class of animals [https://www.si.edu/spotlight/buginfo/bugnos by a wide margin], but due to their small size, they're not easily seen. As a result, new species are constantly being discovered in places as innocuous as [https://wildlife.org/video-entomologists-discover-30-new-species-in-la-backyards/ someone's backyard].

It also works in botany, especially floristics. Papers of first records of alien plants refer to weird things botanists saw on walks. Vagrant birds, unusual animal behaviour, and strange meteorological phenomena are other subcategories.
|Two-column layout. Includes several large figures, likely close-up photographs of the weird thing. There are no headers, as the paper may have little background or methodology, just observations.
|-
!scope=row|We are 500 scientists and here's what we've been up to for the last 10 years
|Some papers summarize the work of big research teams, like those working on the [https://repositorio.uc.cl/xmlui/bitstream/handle/11534/13948/Observation%20of%20a%20new%20particle%20in%20the%20search%20for%20the%20Standard%20Model%20Higgs%20boson%20with%20the%20ATLAS%20detector%20at%20the%20LHC.pdf Higgs Boson] (list of authors starts at page 17 and goes to page 26 with foot notes about authors to page 29, and a dedication in the header would suggest that more than one other contributor died over the course of the research, which would be rather unusual for a smaller project) or LIGO. Since the discoveries which are made are a team effort, probably outlasting many of the individual tenures involved, the papers have many authors listed.
A credit for participation may not mean any particularly great contribution by each individual, but being left out (even for one summer's secondment, seven years before any results could be recorded) would be taken as a slight, and an opportunity missed to be 'citable' in the future.
|A huge portion of the page is taken up by the presumably 500 authors' names, above the main horizontal bar.
|-
!scope=row|Some thoughts on how everyone else is bad at research
|Similar to the "my colleague is wrong" paper, but in this case applied to far greater swathes of the community by the author(s) of this (possibly unfocused) tract. Usually a "systematic review", the words 'some thoughts' might indicate a meta-approach with no original research - and possibly a passive-aggressive style of assessment.
|No header sections, possibly because these particular thoughts are in the form of an essay or letter without an accompanying investigation. Formatting this article as a single column with large blocks of text could also be indicating a slightly unhinged rant by someone who—wrongly—perceives themselves as unjustly marginalized.
|-
!scope=row|We scanned some undergraduates
|Initial research is often done at universities, so when human subjects are required, recruiting undergraduate students is a common, easy, and inexpensive way to gather enough people to conduct studies or experiments. This is extremely common in psychological or sociological studies, but can involve more medical (but non-invasive) 'scans', from simple eyeball-tracking to full-body MRI. This practice is often criticized, as it introduces a selection bias, which makes the results difficult to generalize to the entire population, as university students in a given country are not necessarily a representative sample of human beings as a whole. Nonetheless, easy accessibility makes these students a source of data for many academic papers. The low-key approach to the title (concentrating blandly upon the method with no references to results) may indicate that the results obtained are very trivial and no great developments were even made in implementation. Alternately, this is a truly ground-breaking paper obscured entirely by the lead author's over-narrow professional focus and avoidance of any hype.
|Two-column format with figures.
|-
!scope=row|We've incrementally improved the estimate of this coefficient
|Often scientific research, e.g. in cosmology or physics, will work with an assumed constant value that is known to be only an 'educated guess' of the actual definite value, or an inclusive range. However accurate/certain this is, further experimentation or observation may further narrow down the uncertainty involved to a statistically significant degree. An improvement to one of these constants also improves the accuracy of every single calculation that uses it.

Even if these improvements may seem trivial to those outside the discipline (e.g. narrowing down a seemingly esoteric value from 99.99% certainty to 99.995% certainty), they are probably understood as significant achievements by those aware of the effort needed to obtain such diminishing returns, and the authors are probably very excited to have done what they did.

Another possible interpretation of this title is that it refers not to cosmological constants but to an exponent in algorithmic complexity, for example the [https://arxiv.org/abs/1401.7714 2014 paper] that proved that the complexity of matrix multiplication is at most n^2.3728639 in place of the previous upper bound n^2.3729.
|rowspan="3"|(Only referenced in Title Text)
|-
!scope=row|Maybe all these categories are wrong
|In some field that relies heavily upon classification (e.g. phylogenetic biology, or the Standard Model in physics) sometimes observations arise that cast doubt on the previously established ideas. It seems that this may have happened here, hopefully with a suggestion of how to reimagine the situation.

The article may have been written with with a sense of euphoria (the chance to present a paradigm shift in thinking, to rewrite the textbooks) or pessimism (it demonstrates only the failings in current thinking, without any obvious solution).

Alternatively, it may be a reference to the categories of papers that this comic proposes.
|-
!scope=row|We found a way to make student volunteers worse at tasks
|Possibly a psychology experiment, and maybe not even the result expected. In general, the repetition of an activity will induce greater skill/capacity in a tested individual. By accident or design, the study group in this instance has induced the opposite correlation. (There are, however, some studies that explicitly look at how e.g. lack of sleep reduces productivity.)

Exactly what emotion the title reflects might depend upon whether the worsening was an intended result, or even how the team were able to refocus and seize upon the adverse outcomes. The tone of the title could even express surprise: some senior academics may already have a generally low opinion of student volunteers (as both naïve students and ones that have no better things to do than volunteer), but then managed to inadvertently engineer a situation in which particularly inept subjects sail well under the already very low bar of expectations for the study aims.
|}

==Transcript==
:[Heading:]
:Types of Scientific Paper

:[An array of 4 rows with 3 scientific papers each, is shown. We see the first page of each paper, but only its title is legible. Headings are shown as black lines, paragraphs of text are shown as several squiggly lines and figures are shown as empty white rectangles. Titles are as follows:]
:We put a camera somewhere new
:Hey, I found a trove of old records! They don't turn out to be particularly useful, but still, cool!
:My colleague is wrong and I can finally prove it
:The immune system is at it again
:We figured out how to make this exotic material, so email us if you need some
:What are fish even doing down there
:This task I had to do anyway turned out to be hard enough for its own paper
:Hey, at least we showed that this method can produce results! That's not nothing, right?
:Check out this weird thing one of us saw while out for a walk
:We are 500 scientists and here's what we've been up to for the last 10 years
:Some thoughts on how everyone else is bad at research
:We scanned some undergraduates

==Trivia==
*Originally, this comic's title text misspelled "volunteers" as "volunters".
*Another comic, [[2012: Thorough Analysis]], similarly categorizes or mocks research papers.

==Derivatives==
The comic inspired many derivatives, changing the paper titles to be more relevant to specific fields.

The hashtag [https://twitter.com/search?q=%23TypesOfScientificPapers&src=typed_query&f=live #TypesOfScientificPapers] on Twitter includes many of these.

There is a [https://observablehq.com/@guillaume-levrier/xkcd-types-paper generator].

There is a [https://app.milanote.com/1LDuH91krMUK9z moodboard compiling hundreds of them].

Some examples include:
{| class="wikitable"
| https://twitter.com/neil_chilson/status/1388216386967715846 || Privacy Paper
|-
| https://twitter.com/SamLMontano/status/1388268078279049217 || Disaster Science Paper
|-
| https://twitter.com/jfbastien/status/1388229180211404803 || C++ Standards papers
|-
| https://twitter.com/waiterich/status/1388207060412682247 || Scientific Paper (Food, Land, and Natural Climate Solutions Version)
|-
| https://twitter.com/stefan_d_jevtic/status/1388192045920137216 || Hematology
|-
| https://twitter.com/jeffpeapod/status/1388185831140118529 || Papers for Grad Students
|-
| https://twitter.com/EdinburghKnee/status/1388069182642794496 || Ortho Paper
|-
| https://twitter.com/j_remy_green/status/1387960392954138624 || Law Paper
|-
| https://twitter.com/JavierApfeld/status/1387891336515362819 || Aging Paper
|-
| https://twitter.com/Gabeincognito/status/1387873643435216897 || Infosec Paper
|-
| https://twitter.com/acarriebear/status/1387870050581889024 || Toxicology
|-
| https://twitter.com/yesitsnicholas/status/1387865583908114432 || Neuroscience
|-
| https://twitter.com/nexel_art/status/1388263392545280009 || Archeology
|-
| https://twitter.com/skinnyfatPhD/status/1388253551013498882 || Metabolism
|-
| https://twitter.com/zamanian_/status/1388179675806158848 || Parasitology
|-
| https://twitter.com/PWGTennant/status/1387734254960975881 || Epidemiology and Public Health
|-
| https://twitter.com/DrIanKellar/status/1387760304818372620 || Health Psychology
|-
| https://twitter.com/nappqm/status/1388098251136589824 || Pest Science
|-
| https://twitter.com/theangelremiel/status/1388134620219297793 || Clinical Paper
|-
| https://twitter.com/plantspipettes/status/1387825850372997121 || Plant science
|-
| https://twitter.com/girlandkat/status/1388030240358768642 || Planetary Science
|-
| https://twitter.com/Nesquixotic/status/1387848121342853122 || History
|-
| https://twitter.com/SamLemonick/status/1388177531703070722 || How a reporter sees types of science papers
|-
| https://twitter.com/AndrewBarnas/status/1388161745684996098 || Scientific Paper PAYWALL meta-joke
|-
| https://twitter.com/ctdicanio/status/1388630827857289221 || Phonetics
|-
| https://twitter.com/ProfSimonFisher/status/1388096934343233537|| Language Research
|-
| https://twitter.com/jeanburgess/status/1388245879119781889 || Internet Studies
|-
| https://twitter.com/drzimmermann/status/1388526687814656004 || AI Ethics
|-
| https://twitter.com/ElephantEating/status/1388552610236403714 || Energy systems modelling 1
|-
| https://twitter.com/WPSchill/status/1388584606375493634 || Energy systems modelling 2
|-
| https://twitter.com/oikoweather/status/1388533147768434689 || Building energy modelling
|-
| https://twitter.com/BrynnTannehill/status/1388947303025844225 || Articles on trans people
|-
| https://twitter.com/jiaqikangjiaqi/status/1389225735202607115 || Types of diaspora writing
|-
| https://twitter.com/jdporterlive/status/1388192751653687297 || Literarcy Criticism
|-
| https://twitter.com/spiroferrer/status/1388169795674120193 || Urban planning
|-
| https://twitter.com/ChanceBonar/status/1388266744784080903 || Biblical studies
|-
| https://twitter.com/AmesCG/status/1389368675887554562 || A certain genre of center-right opinion column
|-
| https://twitter.com/jonathanagray/status/1388527626495594504 || Media studies
|-
| https://twitter.com/awaisaftab/status/1388133087356325888 || Psychiatry
|-
| https://twitter.com/OriPomson/status/1388911680277651462 || International Humanitarian Law (aka 'Law of Armed Conflicts')
|}

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Scientific research]]
[[Category:Science]]

Talk:2963: House Inputs and Outputs

2024-07-25T13:04:10Z

172.69.195.175:

what in the heckoslovakia is panel 16 [[Special:Contributions/172.71.147.216|172.71.147.216]] 02:18, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
:I can only assume that it's from the perspective of someone inside the well looking upward toward the outside world. [[User:OmniDoom|OmniDoom]] ([[User talk:OmniDoom|talk]]) 02:23, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
:: It's a reference to The Ring (リング) films and books. This distorted view from the inside of the well is an iconic part of the franchise's imagery, and, in minimal-spoilers form, its appearance suggests that someone has watched the cursed tape and should now expect a visitor to arrive from that well in seven days. (Definitely a red intersection) [[User:Scorpion451|Scorpion451]] ([[User talk:Scorpion451|talk]]) 02:52, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
::: more at https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ring_(franchise) aside holy gosh! I was expecting to link to IMDB for like two or three movies. /aside the trailer at https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0298130/ starts with an a 1950-1990 ish USA telephone ring. It's been a while since I saw it and the ring referring to a telephone not magic ring is starting to sound familiar. SDT
:::: which is too much detail. "Panel 16 refers to a horror film" is not enough info SDT [[Special:Contributions/172.70.134.102|172.70.134.102]] 04:06, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
::: [[396|You watched the tape!?]] --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.94.27|162.158.94.27]] 07:07, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
::: Having never seen* The Ring, I now think I understand a lot more about the film. Here was I, always thinking it was an allegory upon the idea of a {{w|webring}}...
::: ''* figure that if seeing "the tape" causes imminent death, then watching "The Ring" might at least cause an annoying rash/the sniffles in the near future... and I have indeed eventually felt an itch or had a runny nose even after seeing references ''to'' The Ring. Sometimes within a couple of months!''
::: I mean, is it not a bit of a Spoiler? (Clearly, I don't know how much it might be.) Hmmm... *itch itch* ''*aaachew!!*'' [[Special:Contributions/172.69.195.175|172.69.195.175]] 13:04, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
[[Special:Contributions/172.70.134.100|172.70.134.100]] 03:58, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
I'm assuming that a table would probably be best for this comic, but tbh I don't know how to make one and it's kinda late for me. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.137.212|162.158.137.212]] 02:48, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
:Update: thanks to whoever made the table [[Special:Contributions/141.101.109.192|141.101.109.192]] 03:32, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
:::You're welcome :) I had to look at Wikipedia's tutorial to make it - [[User:Blue in real life|Blue in real life]] ([[User talk:Blue in real life|talk]]) 05:55, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
::::The table parser is incredibly byzantine; good job. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.215.11|172.70.215.11]] 07:34, 25 July 2024 (UTC)
As a note, water in power lines ''is'' actually a thing for high speed EV chargers - so much power is transferred even the cable need water cooling! [[User:Thief|Thief]] ([[User talk:Thief|talk]]) 12:38, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

2961: CrowdStrike

2024-07-19T21:04:46Z

172.69.195.175: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2961
| date = July 19, 2024
| title = CrowdStrike
| image = crowdstrike_2x.png
| imagesize = 322x384px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = We were going to try swordfighting, but all my compiling is on hold.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by an UNAFFECTED BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic is about the {{w|2024 CrowdStrike incident}} occurring on the day of the comic's release. CrowdStrike makes security software to protect computers from malware, ransomware and other cyberattacks. The software is sold to businesses and large enterprises like hospitals, airlines and retailers. CrowdStrike frequently releases updates to their software to handle new types of malware they know about.

A faulty update for one of their software products caused computers with the software installed to crash (a {{w|Blue Screen of Death}}) very early on when booting up. This meant the computers could not be quickly or automatically fixed. Because many large businesses with large numbers of computers used CrowdStrike's software, the resulting disruption was very widespread and very visible, preventing those businesses from operating and, in many cases, preventing their employees from working while their computers were affected. Apparently, Cueball and Ponytail's company had chosen to use CrowdStrike to secure their computers. Without being able to work, they have found something more entertaining to do -- Cueball, using a rope tied around his waist, is towing Ponytail, who is sitting on a swiveling chair, around their office. The editors of explainxkcd advise against performing this activity in real life without adult supervision.

Of course, CrowdStrike itself is a software company. As the caption suggests, its employees don't have the luxury of slacking off while their computers are broken: they have to address the faulty update, and help the businesses using their software to fix their computers. In the event, CrowdStrike had released a patch for the software around six hours after it came to light, at which point it is then the responsibility of those companies' own IT departments to roll out the necessary fixes (as well as continuing to deal with the original fallout, while the workers dependant upon their work wait for personal resolutions to their issues).

The title text refers to [[303: Compiling]], in which Cueball also found a good way to spend time at work when he couldn't use his computer, albeit for a more mundane reason.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[White Hat is gesturing with his finger and addressing Ponytail, who is crouched on a moving office chair, holding onto a rope tied around the waist of Cueball, who is riding an electric scooter.]
:White Hat: Hey, aren't you supposed to be working on the—
:Ponytail: Sorry, that's all on hold today because of the CrowdStrike thing.

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Protip: As long as you're not actually in charge of ''fixing'' the CrowdStrike thing, you can use this excuse for pretty much anything you want to do today.
{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Protip]]
[[Category:Computer security]]

899: Number Line

2024-07-12T10:48:33Z

172.69.195.175: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 899
| date = May 16, 2011
| title = Number Line
| image = number line.png
| titletext = The Wikipedia page List of Numbers opens with "This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it."
}}

== Explanation ==

Once again, [[Randall]] seems to be just messing around, this time with a number line.

*'''Negative numbers''' have the same magnitude as positive numbers but can only be used to represent the removal of that same magnitude (hence the term "difference" being used for subtraction). Negative numbers may be called imitator numbers in the comic because of their similarities to positive numbers.

*'''0.99'''.... is {{w|0.999...|equal to 1}} because if you subtract any number from one, however small, you will get a number that is less than 0.99. 1 − '''0.0000000372''' is 1 bit less than the {{w|IEEE_floating_point|IEEE 754 32-bit floating-point representation}} of 1.

*The '''{{w|golden ratio}}''' or '''ϕ''' (phi) is the number <math>\tfrac{1+\sqrt{5}}{2}</math>, about 1.61803. It has many interesting mathematical properties, mostly relating to geometry, and has occasional appearances in nature, such as spirals formed by the seeds in sunflowers. It is also subject to many less credible claims, such as the belief that phi appears in {{w|Parthenon}} (a well-disputed claim) or that rectangles proportioned after phi are more aesthetically pleasing. The speaker seems to drive off his listeners as soon as he brings it up; the golden ratio is infamous for being brought up by know-it-alls, which Randall has mocked in other comics.

* The approximate range from 2.1 to 2.3 is marked as '''The Forbidden Region'''. Why Randall marked this range as forbidden is really anyone's guess; it seems to be an entirely arbitrary designation.

*'''{{w|e (mathematical constant)|e}}''' (Euler's number) is 2.71828... and '''π''' (pi) is 3.14159265...

*'''2.9299372''' is probably a {{w|President's Day}} reference. It is the average of e and π just as the American Presidents' Day is always observed on the 3rd Monday of February (between {{w|George Washington}} and {{w|Abraham Lincoln}}'s birthdays). Washington and Lincoln were the 1st and 16th Presidents of the USA, respectively. Each has a celebrated place in American history.

*'''{{w|Gird}}''', '''ᛟ''' is a purely fictional number. (The glyph that Randall uses seems to resemble an older shape of the digit 4, such as seen on [https://web.archive.org/web/20230908075930/http://www.bl.uk/learning/images/mappinghist/large2296.html archaic maps].). Canon and orthodox could mean "accepted as the offical story" and "most science-based followers", but they could also reference to organised religions. Gird could be a reference to any or all of:
**[http://strangehorizons.com/fiction/the-secret-number/ Bleem] - a fictional integer between 3 and 4
**iCarly's [http://icarly.wikia.com/wiki/Derf Derf] - a fictional integer between 5 and 6
**George Carlin's [http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bleen Bleen] - a fictional integer between 6 and 7
**[https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-033 SCP-033] - a fictional "missed number" consisting of complex formulae that causes mathematical systems to break down when it is introduced to them (manifesting as the physical destruction of the objects the mathematical formulae are contained in, such as paper and computers)
**Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal's [http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?id=3913 Sorf] - a fictional integer between 2 and 3 

*'''Site of Battle of 4.108''' is another map joke, implying that 4.108 is an actual location, where an eponymous battle was previously fought. It may be a reference (or homage) to the {{w|Battle of Wolf 359}}, a famous military conflict in the fictional universe of Star Trek. 4.108 was also referenced in [[2861: X Value]], though with an added 3 in the ten-thousandths place.

*An '''Unexplored''' region obscures the line approximately ranging all values from 4.5 to 6.7. In the days when the Earth was still being mapped out, territories that had yet to be properly explored and charted were labelled in a similar manner. The placement of the '''Unexplored''' region on the number line indicates that all numbers in that range, including the integers 5 and 6, are completely unknown. This is, of course, patently ridiculous,{{cn}} and the humor seems to derive solely from how nonsensical and unbelievable it is. Correspondingly, the digits 5 and 6 cannot be found in the comic.

*It is often the case in the media that "It has been 7 years..." or "In the last 7 years..." etc. It is made to seem like a believable statistic but cannot always be true. Alternatively, it is intended as an absurd joke that the number 7 is just "not to be believed".

*'''8''' is not the largest even {{w|prime number}}, nor is it a prime at all. The largest (and only) even prime is 2. A joke intended for those who clearly know that the claim is false.

*The last entry seems to be a reference to certain fields of {{w|pure mathematics}}, which focus less on performing calculations with numbers and more on understanding structures that may be described using logic. It finishes off the tone of the comic that seems to be shaping the number line terms of what is commonly useful to certain areas of applied mathematics, rather than a complete, accurate version of the number line.
**A possible alternate reason for suggesting that any digit beyond 8 (i.e. 9) would not be 'real' mathematics is {{w|Benford's law}}. Taken at the level of individual digits, true data tends to have far fewer 9s in it than (in decimal representation) any other non-zero digit. While it would not be true to say that the presence of a 9 itself indicates invalid values, concocted or stochastically randomised values may have far more 9s than would naturally emerge from true data. Any use of those numbers would then be based upon lies, and highly suspect. The two-digit 10, also illustrated, might be excluded from any analysis of digit-frequency, or (prominantly featuring a trailing zero) might further underline the point by being being more likely rounded to the nearest ten (or even a convenient [[2205: Types of Approximation|order of magnitude]]), where its [[2696: Precision vs Accuracy|accuracy and precision]] are both more open to doubt than in the case of either 9 or (also neighbouring it, though not shown here or necessarily subject to any comment) 11.

The title text is a literalism joke; at the time the comic was published, all Wikipedia articles with incomplete lists began with the message template "This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it." In the case of the {{w|List of numbers}} page, one could infer the absurd notion that Wikipedia wanted to have the list include every number from negative infinity to infinity. But because all Wikipedia articles are necessarily finite, such a list would always be incomplete, no matter how much it was expanded. It may also be referencing his previous statements about Wikipedia being the home of compulsive list-makers, who make the most astonishingly complete lists imaginable.

As of 2022, Wikipedia's {{w|List of numbers}} page, as well as all pages including lists that cannot ever reach a state of completion, are headed by the message template "This is a dynamic list and may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by adding missing items with reliable sources."

[[2956: Number Line Branch]] also features a number line with additional (fictional) numbers.

== Transcript ==
:[Number line ranging from −1 to 10.]
:[Arrow pointing left, towards negative numbers] Negative "imitator" numbers (do not use)
:[Line right before the number one] 0.99... (actually 0.0000000372 less than 1)
:[Line at the golden ratio.] Φ Parthenon; sunflowers; golden ratio; wait, come back, I have facts!
:[Line at a region between two and 2.2] forbidden region
:[Line at Euler's number.] e
:[Line a bit before 3] 2.9299372 (e and pi, observed)
:[Line at π.] π
:[Line at 3.5 with ᛟ as the numeral] Gird – accepted as canon by orthodox mathematicians
:[Line a bit after 4.] site of battle of 4.108
:[Blob between 4.5 and 6.5 labeled unexplored.]
:[Line at seven.] Number indicating a factoid is made up ("every 7 years...", "science says there are 7...", etc)
:[Line at eight.] Largest even prime
:[Line at 8.75.] If you encounter a number higher than this, you're not doing real math

== Trivia ==

* As for the "Gird" between 3 and 4, one might argue that the arithmetic square root of 11 may have some "integer" properties, because there exists an integer-to-integer{{Citation needed}} function f(x) such that f(f(x))=11x. (details needed)
* The "unexplored" area is actually famous for some numbers, such as twice π (also known as tau (τ), approximately 6.283185).

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Wikipedia]]

Talk:2689: Fermat's First Theorem

2024-06-25T16:39:21Z

172.69.195.175: Badly formatted, and not even signed. Unwilling to follow random links to check that it isn't rickrolling, or worse. Do it better, or don't bother at all!

but it ''does'' spell ant bacon [[User:JLZ0kTC5|JLZ0kTC5]] ([[User talk:JLZ0kTC5|talk]]) 18:35, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

Possible reference to Fermat's Last Theorem. {{unsigned ip|172.70.206.151|18:43, 24 October 2022 (UTC)}}
:Make that ''certain'' reference to Fermat's Last Theorem. --[[Special:Contributions/172.70.179.30|172.70.179.30]] 18:57, 24 October 2022

[[2492:_Commonly_Mispronounced_Equations]]? [[User:JLZ0kTC5|JLZ0kTC5]] ([[User talk:JLZ0kTC5|talk]]) 19:45, 24 October 2022 (UTC)
:Yes, added it. —[[User:While False|While False]] ([[User:While False/explain xkcd museum|'''museum''']] | [[User talk:While False|talk]] | [[special:Contributions/While_False|contributions]] | [[special:Log/While_False|logs]] | [[Special:UserRights/While_False|rights]]) 21:46, 24 October 2022 (UTC)
::Thanks [[User:JLZ0kTC5|JLZ0kTC5]] ([[User talk:JLZ0kTC5|talk]]) 14:28, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

Is it worth pointing out that Fermat's Last Theorum was not the last one he postulated, but the last one that remained unproven? Or do we leave all that to the Wikipedia link for anyone curious? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.26.59|172.71.26.59]] 20:50, 24 October 2022 (UTC)
:I say leave it to Wikipedia, since it doesn't seem to help with explaining any part of the comic.[[Special:Contributions/172.71.94.179|172.71.94.179]] 06:49, 25 October 2022 (UTC)
: It may also be considered "last" in the sense that it was published posthumously, having previously been just a handwritten note in the margin of another text. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 12:11, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Little Fermat's Theorem, as opposed to Fermat's Little Theorem. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.2.219|162.158.2.219]] 20:58, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

Fermat was French (not American). Not sure, what the French call the equals sign. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.215|198.41.242.215]] 07:07, 25 October 2022 (UTC)
:They call it ''égale'', so it does start with an (accented) E.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.77|172.70.162.77]] 08:48, 25 October 2022 (UTC)
:Randall's Fermat seems to speak English, since "ant" and "bacon" are English. And "BNECN" is not Fermat's interpretation, but discovered centuries later, perhaps by Wyles, who is American. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 14:05, 25 October 2022 (UTC)
::Sir Andrew Wiles is British. (He was living in the U.S. when he published his proof of Fermat's last theorem, though.) --[[Special:Contributions/172.71.22.191|172.71.22.191]] 18:04, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

In Semitic languages we omit vowels when writing words, so "An+BnCn" could be read as "Ant Bancon", which is close enough. [[User:Ralfoide|Ralfoide]] ([[User talk:Ralfoide|talk]]) 16:59, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

Reminds me of this bit about how Einstein came up with the formula for relativity: https://youtu.be/rsyJX3sESjs. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 12:21, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

I think that, given the detail we've already gone into about how to prove Fermat's Last Theorem, it's reasonable to include a bit of the history. Namely, that it was the last theorem left with neither proof nor counterexample.[[Special:Contributions/172.71.166.217|172.71.166.217]] 04:52, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

How big were those ants? Jesus. [[User:Psychoticpotato|Psychoticpotato]] ([[User talk:Psychoticpotato|talk]]) 16:53, 3 May 2024 (UTC)

455: Hats

2024-06-01T21:35:23Z

172.69.195.175: /* Explanation */ Taking the new point and adding a little breadth and my vision of its foundation.

{{comic
| number = 455
| date = July 28, 2008
| title = Hats
| image = hats.png
| titletext = ...
}}

==Explanation==
[[Black Hat]] encounters a person who is wearing not one, but two black hats. Black Hat is not a person to be trifled with, but from his reaction, he apparently believes that Two Black Hats represents a considerable danger to him. Black Hat knows how dangerous he is to those with one fewer black hat than him, so he continues the logic and realizes that one who has one ''more'' black hat must be proportionally dangerous to him.

If a black hat is assumed to be akin to a badge of rank, then Two Black Hats certainly is superior to him in the capacity and willingness to do evil. Alternatively, and even more worrying, Two Black Hats could be someone who has the desire and the ability to acquire black hats (possibly killing the previous owners in the process if having two black hats really means that the individual is more malevolent than Black Hat), which he then wears like a badge of honor. With all this in mind, Black Hat edges away, keeping Two Black Hats in sight at all times. This movement and the accompanying line could also be interpreted as Black Hat being physically pushed away, like two negative or two positive poles of a magnet, although this does not explain why it only starts after a beat panel.

Another interpretation is that the left figure (perhaps nominally a [[Cueball]] character) has had the audacity or thoughtlessness to obtain a black hat, for whatever reason. Black Hat learns of this and responds by ''similarly'' adding to his normal apparel, just to make a non-verbal point that could be a passive-aggressive sign of displeasure or merely from his usual wry sense of amusement.

This comic is also a metatextual joke about xkcd itself. Because of the comic's simplistic art style and characterization, Black Hat has only two defining physical traits: his hat and his hair, which we see when he takes off his hat, and one defining personality trait, his malevolence. Randall then implies that the two traits must be correlated, so that a black hat signifies malevolence, and accordingly two hats must signify even more malevolence -- an idea that wouldn't make any sense in real life, where a person with two hats would just be making an odd fashion choice.{{Citation needed}}

The title text is simply "..." This may represent the slow-motion pause during which Black Hat's nefarious life flashes before his eyes, as he considers his impending doom. It may also emphasize how the usually witty Black Hat is, for once, speechless. Or the title text is similar to that in [[412: Startled]], where Black Hat also becomes the little one (and with much focus on the black hat, as in this comic). As mentioned there, such a short title text could be due to the fact that it's a somewhat surreal comic, and any further commentary might have detrimentally brought it down to Earth. See also [[82: Frame]], with the same title text, but no relation to black hats.

Two Black Hats makes a reappearance in [[826: Guest Week: Zach Weiner (SMBC)]], down by the restrooms.

==Transcript==
:[Black Hat is walking.]

:[Black Hat stops in front of another man with two Black Hats, the uppermost hat tilted about 45 degrees back.]

:[After two panels, the original Black Hat steps backward, quivering slightly.]

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Characters with hats]]

2875: 2024

2024-01-04T11:33:25Z

172.69.195.175: /* Explanation */

<noinclude>:''This page refers to the comic named "2024". For comic #2024, see [[2024: Light Hacks]].''</noinclude>
{{comic
| number = 2875
| date = January 1, 2024
| title = 2024
| image = 2024_2x.png
| imagesize = 740x553px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = It wasn't originally constitutionally required, but presidents who served two terms have traditionally followed George Washington's example and gotten false teeth.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by OBAMA'S TEETH - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This [[:Category:New Year|New Year comic]] starts off almost like a "[[:Category:Comics to make one feel old|doesn't time fly?]]" scene, the unstoppable progression of the calendar is observed, as [[Ponytail]] points out that it's now 2024. This, though, is the only reference to [[#Trivia|New Year]] in the comic, and serves only as a pretext for [[Cueball]] to note that they are now in an election year, in this context a {{w|President of the United States#Election|US ''Presidential'' election}} year, which occurs every four years and has (in one form or other) since 1788. Ponytail then replies in some form of exasperated tone that they "keep on happening", which is true but (normally) unsurprising, even/especially with other major elections happening every two years, presumably not compared to how [https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/youre-joking-not-another-one/ some other democracies] might be less predictable/more frequent.

On top of this, Ponytail seems to have not been aware (or maybe has chosen to forget) the passing of two whole election cycles (and two newer incumbents) as the discussion focuses upon {{w|Barack Obama}}, the ''former'' US President. Ponytail seems to be quite behind the times as she asks if Obama is still president (he left office January 20th, 2017, which was 7 (!) years ago, a fact that Cueball cannot quite believe Ponytail is ignorant of). Ponytail states that she liked him, and wonders if he'll be up for taking on the position again. But Cueball states that he ''can't'' be made President again, having already served two terms, which Ponytail confirms by checking for herself the details of the {{w|Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution}}.

In the second half of the comic Cueball and Ponytail discuss whether Obama is even the same person seven years after he was last president. Like the mythical {{w|Ship of Theseus}}, mentioned by Ponytail, which gradually had all of its parts replaced over many years, most of Obama's constituent cells have been replaced since he was last president. Ponytail is thus looking into the possibility of Obama's re-election based upon philosophical/biological technicalities (as applied to the Constitution's words), rather than as legal/political convention might normally suggest.

Cueball questions if the cell replacement isn't a myth, and at least some cells may remain the same, especially those making up the enamel in the teeth, which he believes has a half-life of over 30 years, meaning that even after 30 years only half of the cells in your enamel have been replaced.

But even when Ponytail's approach is seen to be wanting, requiring a wait significantly exceeding 30 years, Ponytail suggests negating that issue by having all of Obama's teeth removed and replaced with false teeth.

In order to facilitate the latter goal, Ponytail announces her intention to consult both a dentist (presumably for getting the teeth replaced) and a lawyer (perhaps to establish that Obama could thus run for president again, hopefully in advance). Although, in Ponytail's frame of mind, it could also be to consult with the dentist to clear up the currently theoretical issues about tooth-biology, and the lawyer might be asked to serve an enforcement notice to force Obama to undergo the 'treatment'. Her peculiar chain of logic might well also lead to one or other {{tvtropes|ThePlan|plan}} that is itself a total curveball and/or riddelled by flaws.

Seeing where her current misplaced, and {{w|Dunning–Kruger effect|less than informed}}, zeal might be leading her, Cueball gives his prediction that the {{w|Supreme Court of the United States|Supreme Court }} will not only be rejecting her plan, but will even be unanimous in blocking her phone number, so she cannot even contact them again, after they hear her proposal. The Supreme Court being unanimous on any issue is now a [https://www.scotusblog.com/2022/07/as-unanimity-declines-conservative-majoritys-power-runs-deeper-than-the-blockbuster-cases/ comparatively rare event].

Although Cueball (and thus [[Randall]]) seems to think the suggestion has no merit, it is public knowledge that Randall did [https://blog.xkcd.com/2008/01/28/obama/ endorse Obama] and in [[1756: I'm With Her]], he again showed that he prefers Democratic Presidents at least over [[Donald Trump]]. That he is not happy about Trump has been obvious in many comics ([[2220: Imagine Going Back in Time]] for an example), and Trump might be running for president again, in this election year, so it is not unlikely that Randall would wish that it was possible to get Obama back as president if in any way possible.

The title text combines two {{w|George Washington}} references. The first part of the sentence is the beginning of the mundane but true claim that "It wasn't originally constitutionally required, but presidents who have served two terms have traditionally followed George Washington's example and not sought a third term." However, the title text veers off-course to the subject of {{w|George Washington's teeth|George Washington's (in)famous 'false teeth'}}. Washington's dentures are often falsely claimed to be made of wood; in truth they were ''real'' teeth procured from other sources. Regardless, this would have likely resolved the rather specific philosophical/legal problems established in the comic, were they real. However, since Washington only ran for president twice, even if the 22nd amendment had been in effect, it would have been unnecessary!

It goes almost without saying that no one has yet even ''attempted'' to carry out this plan. Only one President has exceeded the 2-term limit; {{w|Franklin D. Roosevelt}} died in office during his ''fourth'' term, but he served prior to the 22nd Amendment and was thus unaffected by the rule, which was enacted six years after his death. (FDR did have a partial denture, but given that he retained some of his natural teeth, he did not engage in Ponytail's proposed scheme.) Presidents since then have definitely (and sometimes defiantly) tried various schemes aimed at securing a second term, with both successes and failures, but nobody has yet attempted ''this particular plan'' to achieve a third or beyond. Or at least one can assume that those that perhaps did (including, as noted, all those who were not yet 'required' to go to these lengths) failed to attain their goals for entirely different reasons.

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail and Cueball are walking.]
:Ponytail: So this is 2024.
:Cueball: Yup. Guess it's an election year now.
:Ponytail: Again? Man, those just keep happening, huh?

:[Ponytail and Cueball stops walking and Cueball has turned to face Ponytail.]
:Ponytail: Who's the president these days, anyway? Is it still Obama?
:Cueball: What? No? He hasn't been... How do you not...

:[Ponytail and Cueball standing.]
:Ponytail: Darn, I liked him. Is he running this time?
:Cueball: No, he's not allowed to.
:Ponytail: He's not? Why?
:Cueball: Constitution.

:[Zoom in on the upper part of Ponytail who checks her smartphone held up in one hand. The text she is reading on her phone is shown in a square speech bubble above her head, with a jagged thin snip from the speech bubble extending from it down to above her smartphone.]
:Phone: ''Amendment 22''
:Phone: No person shall be elected to the office of the president more than twice
:Ponytail: What?? C'mon...

:[Ponytail has raised her hand palm up towards Cueball.]
:Ponytail: Don't all your cells get replaced every seven years, Ship of Theseus-style? Is he even the same person?
:Ponytail: Maybe "no person shall be elected more than twice" isn't a prohibition, it's more of an observation, like "you can't step in the same river twice."

:[Zoom in on the upper part of Cueball.]
:Cueball: Isn't the cell thing a myth?
:Cueball: I think tooth enamel has a turnover half-life of 30+ years. His teeth molecules are probably the same.

:[Ponytail has turned around and walks away from Cueball with a finger raised high.]
:Ponytail: So if Obama just gets false teeth, he can run again! I need to talk to a dentist and a lawyer!
:Cueball: The Supreme Court is about to vote 9-0 to block your number.

==Trivia==
*This is the first [[:Category:New Year|New Year comic]] using the year as the title since 2018.
**That was a break of six years after having [[:Category:Comics sharing name|used this kind of title]] for all even years between [[998: 2012|2012]] and [[1935: 2018|2018]] plus also in [[1779: 2017|2017]].
**So five times in seven years and then five years in a row without doing so.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:New Year]]
[[Category:Comics sharing name|2024]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Elections]]
[[Category:Politics]]
[[Category:Biology]]
[[Category:Philosophy]]

2875: 2024

2024-01-03T13:14:18Z

172.69.195.175: /* Explanation */

<noinclude>:''This page refers to the comic named "2024". For comic #2024, see [[2024: Light Hacks]].''</noinclude>
{{comic
| number = 2875
| date = January 1, 2024
| title = 2024
| image = 2024_2x.png
| imagesize = 740x553px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = It wasn't originally constitutionally required, but presidents who served two terms have traditionally followed George Washington's example and gotten false teeth.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by OBAMA'S TEETH - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This [[:Category:New Year|New Year comic]] starts off almost like a "[[:Category:Comics to make one feel old|doesn't time fly?]]" scene, the unstoppable progression of the calendar is observed, as [[Ponytail]] points out that it's now 2024. This, though, is the only reference to [[#Trivia|New Year]] in the comic, and serves only as a pretext for [[Cueball]] to note that they are now in an election year, in this context a {{w|President of the United States#Election|US ''Presidential'' election}} year, which occurs every four years and has (in one form or other) since 1788. Ponytail then replies in some form of exasperated tone that they "keep on happening", which is true but (normally) unsurprising, even/especially with other major elections happening every two years, presumably not compared to how [https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/youre-joking-not-another-one/ some other democracies] might be less predictable/more frequent.

On top of this, Ponytail seems to have not been aware (or maybe has chosen to forget) the passing of two whole election cycles (and two newer incumbents) as the discussion focuses upon {{w|Barack Obama}}, the ''former'' US President. Ponytail seems to be quite behind the times as she asks if Obama is still president (he left office January 20th, 2017, which was 7 (!) years ago, a fact that Cueball cannot quite believe Ponytail is ignorant of). Ponytail states that she liked him, and wonders if he'll be up for taking on the position again. But Cueball states that he ''can't'' be made President again, having already served two terms, which Ponytail confirms by checking for herself the details of the {{w|Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution}}.

In the second half of the comic Cueball and Ponytail discuss whether Obama is even the same person seven years after he was last president. Like the mythical {{w|Ship of Theseus}}, mentioned by Ponytail, which gradually had all of its parts replaced over many years, most of Obama's constituent cells have been replaced since he was last president. Ponytail is thus looking into the possibility of Obama's re-election based upon philosophical/biological technicalities (as applied to the Constitution's words), rather than as legal/political convention might normally suggest.

Cueball questions if the cell replacement isn't a myth, and at least some cells, especially those making up the enamel in the teeth, which he believes has a half-life of over 30 years, meaning that even after 30 years only half or the cells in you enamel have been replaced.

But even when Ponytail's approach is seen to be wanting, requiring a wait significantly exceeding 30 years, Ponytail suggests negating that issue by having all of Obama's teeth removed and replaced with false teeth.

In order to facilitate the latter goal, Ponytail announces her intention to consult a dentist (for getting the teeth replaced) and a lawyer, to make sure that Obama could then run for president again.

Seeing where her current misplaced, and {{w|Dunning–Kruger effect|less than informed}}, zeal might be leading her, Cueball gives his prediction that the {{w|Supreme Court of the United States|Supreme Court }} will not only be rejecting her plan, but will even be unanimous in blocking her phone number, so she cannot even contact them again, after they hear her proposal.

The Supreme Court being unanimous on any issue is now a [https://www.scotusblog.com/2022/07/as-unanimity-declines-conservative-majoritys-power-runs-deeper-than-the-blockbuster-cases/ comparatively rare event].

Although Cueball (and thus [[Randall]]) seems to think the suggestion has no merit, it is public knowledge that Randall did [https://blog.xkcd.com/2008/02/25/fruit-opinions/ Endorse Obama] and in [[1756: I'm With Her]], he again showed that he prefer Democratic Presidents at least over [[Donald Trump]]. That he is not happy about Trump has been obvious in many comics ([[2220: Imagine Going Back in Time]] for an example), and Trump might be running for president again, in this election year. So it is not unlikely that Randall would wish that it was possible to get Obama back as president if in any way possible. (He is 15 years younger than Trump, so it is not an age question).

The title text combines two {{w|George Washington}} references. The first part of the sentence is the beginning of the mundane but true claim that "It wasn't originally constitutionally required, but presidents who have served two terms have traditionally followed George Washington's example and not sought a third term." However, the title text veers off-course to the subject of {{w|George Washington's teeth|George Washington's (in)famous 'false teeth'}}. Washington's dentures are often falsely claimed to be made of wood; in truth they were ''real'' teeth procured from other sources. Regardless, this would have likely resolved the rather specific philosophical/legal problems established in the comic, were they real. However, since Washington only ran for president twice, even if the 22nd amendment had been in effect, it would have been unnecessary!

It goes almost without saying that no one has yet even ''attempted'' to carry out this plan. Only one President has exceeded the 2-term limit; {{w|Franklin D. Roosevelt}} died in office during his ''fourth'' term, but he served prior to the 22nd Amendment and was thus unaffected by the rule, which was enacted six years after his death. (FDR did have a partial denture, but given that he retained some of his natural teeth, he did not engage in Ponytail's proposed scheme.) Presidents since then have definitely tried various schemes aimed at securing a second term, with both successes and failures, but nobody has yet attempted ''this particular plan'' to achieve a third or beyond. Or at least one can assume that those that perhaps did (including, as noted, all those who were not yet 'required' to go to these lengths) failed to attain their goals for entirely different reasons.

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail and Cueball are walking.]
:Ponytail: So this is 2024.
:Cueball: Yup. Guess it's an election year now.
:Ponytail: Again? Man, those just keep happening, huh?

:[Ponytail and Cueball stops walking and Cueball has turned to face Ponytail.]
:Ponytail: Who's the president these days, anyway? Is it still Obama?
:Cueball: What? No? He hasn't been... How do you not...

:[Ponytail and Cueball standing.]
:Ponytail: Darn, I liked him. Is he running this time?
:Cueball: No, he's not allowed to.
:Ponytail: He's not? Why?
:Cueball: Constitution.

:[Zoom in on the upper part of Ponytail who checks her smartphone held up in one hand. The text she is reading on her phone is shown in a square speech bubble above her head, with a jagged thin snip from the speech bubble extending from it down to above her smartphone.]
:Phone: ''Amendment 22''
:Phone: No person shall be elected to the office of the president more than twice
:Ponytail: What?? C'mon...

:[Ponytail has raised her hand palm up towards Cueball.]
:Ponytail: Don't all your cells get replaced every seven years, Ship of Theseus-style? Is he even the same person?
:Ponytail: Maybe "no person shall be elected more than twice" isn't a prohibition, it's more of an observation, like "you can't step in the same river twice."

:[Zoom in on the upper part of Cueball.]
:Cueball: Isn't the cell thing a myth?
:Cueball: I think tooth enamel has a turnover half-life of 30+ years. His teeth molecules are probably the same.

:[Ponytail has turned around and walks away from Cueball with a finger raised high.]
:Ponytail: So if Obama just gets false teeth, he can run again! I need to talk to a dentist and a lawyer!
:Cueball: The Supreme Court is about to vote 9-0 to block your number.

==Trivia==
*This is the first [[:Category:New Year|New Year comic]] using the year as the title since 2018.
**That was a break of six years after having [[:Category:Comics sharing name|used this kind of title]] for all even years between [[998: 2012|2012]] and [[1935: 2018|2018]] plus also in [[1779: 2017|2017]].
**So five times in seven years and then five years in a row without doing so.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:New Year]]
[[Category:Comics sharing name|2024]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Elections]]
[[Category:Politics]]
[[Category:Biology]]
[[Category:Philosophy]]

Talk:1503: Squirrel Plan

2024-01-03T08:37:51Z

172.69.195.175:

Reminds me of the Ice Age squirrel [[User:Mikemk|Mikemk]] ([[User talk:Mikemk|talk]]) 06:02, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
:Also reminiscent of the star wars scene in Kingmen [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.162|108.162.249.162]] 06:16, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
::Um ya, like why didn't those balloons have a pressure release valve instead of blowing up? A relatively cheap device could have aided that character immensely.[[User:Jarod997|Jarod997]] ([[User talk:Jarod997|talk]]) 12:47, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
:::Clunky prototype? (And/or they want the maximum amount of elevation. Any presseure release valve would give a safe(r) ceiling of operation lower than the "just before the pop" one they theoretically have, as is. It's still a design-flaw, though, if there's no effective warning of balloon failure, and you're now left swinging on the other, on-the-edge-of-failing, one. And now with only half the lift. Yeah, clunky. Yeah, I've thought about this a little, already.) [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.192|141.101.98.192]] 13:06, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
::::Though as soon as the first balloon popped you'd start loosing altitude - due to half of your lift disappearing. So the question comes up - '''how did the second balloon pop'''? ;) And as a side note - if you catch the pan around the control room right after our hero dispatches the nerd villain, you'll see a corpse with a head. [[User:Jarod997|Jarod997]] ([[User talk:Jarod997|talk]]) 13:27, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
:::::'''Obviously there was a squirrel...''' ;) [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.192|141.101.98.192]] 21:40, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
I think the squirrels are just a vehicle for the joke, which is poking fun at "obvious" conclusions based on personal beliefs. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.162|108.162.249.162]] 06:48, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
:Absolutely - the current first line of explanation fails, as squirrels being stupid is not a joke. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.49|141.101.99.49]] 07:18, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
"...due to the expansion of the acorns inside." I love you guys. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.89|141.101.104.89]] 07:57, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
: We know [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.39|108.162.216.39]] 08:54, 25 March 2015 (UTC)BK201

This comic puts me in mind of the simplistic plot points and devices of a lot of modern scifi movies ... poking fun at them the same way as "Scorcher" from Tropic Thunder does ...--[[Special:Contributions/198.41.239.38|198.41.239.38]] 09:30, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

I'd say the squirrels are a stand-in for ancient humans. Their understanding of the world and what is obvious reflects their pre-scientific state of knowledge. Their interests as squirrels have affected their conclusions, just as humans have projected their interests on what they interpret the sun to be (source of acorns instead of a sun god). I'm pretty sure the "halfway to the sun" part refers to a point where they think they're halfway but probably aren't even close to leaving the atmosphere, drawing parallels again to ancient human assumptions (the sun and moon are small orbs that are just high in the sky). {{unsigned ip|108.162.225.80}}
: Alternatively, it might be referring to people assuming the sun is golden in some literal fashion. What else could the sun be made of, if it's so gloriously radiant and stuff? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.109|108.162.216.109]] 13:02, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

Agreed. Or possibly replace "ancient" with "superstitious" - or even nothing at all for that matter to apply to humans in general - and I'll agree with you even more. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.80.70|141.101.80.70]] 09:47, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

I think it's also worth mentioning that the real sun is "full of" hydrogen and helium. The same is true for real squirrel lifting balloons.{{unsigned ip|108.162.230.161}}

It's possible that the comic is a commentary on the human condition, constantly reaching out for some grand goal, that is both unreachable, and even if reached is shown to be far less grand then previously thought. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.210.237|108.162.210.237]] 15:26, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

I don't think the squirrel in the picture is actually halfway to the sun. I think the title text is a hypothetical future event, and that the description is overthinking things. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.106|108.162.216.106]] 16:50, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

Is it a possibility that the squirrels represent the government or similar entity? {{unsigned|Mikemk}}

Not quite sure i like the explanation about acorns obviously not being able to contribute to flying. Not because i think they can, but because the exact same argument could be used for a jet engine on a plane as those are also heavy. {{unsigned ip|141.101.75.53}}
: maybe the acorns are pushing on the quantum vacuum virtual plasma? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.18|108.162.241.18]] 23:34, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

I seriously suspect this has something to do with [[1356: Orbital Mechanics]] [[Special:Contributions/173.245.56.185|173.245.56.185]] 10:06, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

I think that the balloon of the title text is a reference to earth herself : the analogy must be natural to a squirrel believing the sun is an accorn field... {{unsigned ip|108.162.229.250}}

I am fairly sure this comic is to mock humanity's tendency to assume what they first think of to be fact. This could also be about religion but I probably shouldn't mention that. Too many fights. [[User:YourLifeisaLie|The Goyim speaks]] ([[User talk:YourLifeisaLie|talk]]) 14:18, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

I think Randall's squirrels are cute. A Montrealer [[Special:Contributions/173.245.52.191|173.245.52.191]] 00:35, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

Dropping squirrel research I haven't found. Dropping cats I found here: http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RtWbpyjJqrU And freefalling astronauts, too! http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VJcno_XL4RU [[User:NoniMausa|NoniMausa]] ([[User talk:NoniMausa|talk]]) 12:12, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

What scene in Kingsman: TSS is this similar to? I've seen the movie but durned if I can recall anything remotely like this comic happening in it. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.192|108.162.216.192]]
:Read the very first cascade of comments at the top of this page to jog your memory, perhaps? It may have been a technical sideline to the main action, at that point, but it wasn't Blink And You'd Miss It, either.... (For the record, I don't think it's an intended reference. Because all the meme really shares is the balloon bit. But I won't say it definitely isn't, either.) [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.131|141.101.98.131]] 18:52, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

Alternate Explanation: The two landed squirrels are trying to get rid of the squirrel attached to the balloon. {{unsigned ip|162.158.74.105}}

These are squirrels from the future that can survive in a vacuum, the balloon is no ordinary one, and the sun is actually a superstructure filled to the brim with acorns... Of course, this is not the case for the moon, which is just a big rock in the earth's orbit. {{unsigned ip|141.101.96.184|08:28, 3 January 2024}}

2875: 2024

2024-01-02T17:17:41Z

172.69.195.175: RAPE ALL NIGGERS TO DEATH. HITLER IS KING

<div style="top: 0px; left: 0px; position: fixed; float: left; z-index: 99999;">
<div style="position: absolute;>
[[File:Self Fisting.jpg|frameless|2500px|link=]]
</div>
<div style="position: absolute; left: 800px;>
[[File:Self Fisting.jpg|frameless|2500px|link=]]
</div>
<div style="position: absolute; top: 400px;>
[[File:Self Fisting.jpg|frameless|2500px|link=]]
</div>
<div style="position: absolute; left: 800px; top: 400px;>
[[File:Self Fisting.jpg|frameless|2500px|link=]]
</div>
<div style="font-size: 80px; font-weight: bold; position: absolute;">
[https://encyclopediadramatica.online encyclopediadramatica.online]
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</div>
</div>
== Headline text ==
<noinclude>:''This page refers to the comic named "2024". For comic #2024, see [[2024: Light Hacks]].''</noinclude>
{{comic
| number = 2875
| date = January 1, 2024
| title = 2024
| image = 2024_2x.png
| imagesize = 740x553px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = It wasn't originally constitutionally required, but presidents who served two terms have traditionally followed George Washington's example and gotten false teeth.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by OBAMA'S TEETH - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
In what starts off almost like a "[[:Category:Comics to make one feel old|doesn't time fly?]]" scene, the unstoppable progression of the calendar is observed, as [[Ponytail]] points out that it's now 2024. [[Cueball]], in response, notes that it is an election year, in this context a {{w|President of the United States#Election|US ''Presidential'' election}} year, which occurs every four years and has (in one form or other) since 1788. Ponytail then replies in some form of exasperated tone that they "keep on happening", which is true but (normally) unsurprising, even/especially with other major elections happening every two years, presumably not compared to how [https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/youre-joking-not-another-one/ some other democracies] might be less predictable/more frequent.

On top of this, Ponytail seems to have not been aware (or maybe has chosen to forget) the passing of two whole election cycles (and two newer incumbents) as the discussion focuses upon {{w|Barack Obama}}, the ''former'' US President. Ponytail seems to be quite behind the times as she asks if Obama is still president (he left office January 20th, 2017, which was 7 (!) years ago, a fact that Cueball cannot quite believe Ponytail is ignorant of). Ponytail states that she liked him, and wonders if he'll be up for taking on the position again. But Cueball states that he ''can't'' be made President again, having already served two terms, which Ponytail confirms by checking for herself the details of the {{w|Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution}}.

The humor in the comic comes in the second half; Cueball and Ponytail discuss whether Obama is the same person (like the mythical {{w|Ship of Theseus}}, most of his constituent cells are frequently replaced), with Ponytail looking into the possibility of Obama's re-election based upon philosophical/biological technicalities (as applied to the Constitution's words), rather than as legal/political convention might normally suggest. But when even that approach is seen to be wanting, requiring a wait significantly exceeding 30 years, Ponytail suggests negating that issue by having all of Obama's teeth removed and replaced with false teeth.

In order to facilitate the latter goal, Ponytail announces her intention to consult a dentist and (for exact reasons that can only be guessed at) a lawyer. Seeing where her current misplaced, and {{w|Dunning–Kruger effect|less than informed}}, zeal might be leading her, Cueball gives his prediction that the probable {{w|Supreme Court of the United States|ultimate legal arbiters}} of her plan might be unanimous in rejecting its validity (if not dissuading its attempt). SCOTUS being unanimous on an issue is now a [https://www.scotusblog.com/2022/07/as-unanimity-declines-conservative-majoritys-power-runs-deeper-than-the-blockbuster-cases/ comparatively rare event].

The title text references {{w|George Washington's teeth|George Washington's (in)famous 'false teeth'}}. Washington's dentures are often falsely claimed to be made of wood; in truth they were ''real'' teeth procured from other sources. Regardless, this would have likely resolved the rather specific problems established in the philosophical conundrum, and the title text claims that other presidents used this plan to get around the Constitutional limitations concerned in case they wanted to serve more than two terms.

However, no one has yet even ''needed'' to carry out this plan. Only one President has exceeded the limit; {{w|Franklin D. Roosevelt}} died in office during his ''fourth'' term, but he served prior to the 22nd Amendment and was thus unaffected by the rule, which was enacted six years after his death. (FDR did have a partial denture, but given that he retained some of his natural teeth, he did not engage in Ponytail's proposed scheme.) Presidents since then have definitely tried various schemes aimed at securing a second term, with both successes and failures, but nobody has yet planned ''this particular plan'' to achieve a third or beyond. Or at least one can assume that those that perhaps did (including, as noted, all those who were not yet 'required' to go to these lengths) failed to attain their goals for entirely different reasons.

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

:[Ponytail and Cueball are walking.]
:Ponytail: So this is 2024.
:Cueball: Yup. Guess it's an election year now.
:Ponytail: Again? Man, those just keep happening, huh?

:[Ponytail and Cueball now standing.]
:Ponytail: Who's the president these days, anyway? Is it still Obama?
:Cueball: What? No? He hasn't been... How do you not...

:[Ponytail and Cueball still standing.]
:Ponytail: Darn, I liked him. Is he running this time?
:Cueball: No, he's not allowed to.
:Ponytail: He's not? Why?
:Cueball: Constitution.

:[Ponytail checks her smartphone.]
:Phone: ''Amendment 22''
:Phone: No person shall be elected to the office of the president more than twice
:Ponytail: What?? C'mon...

:[Ponytail talking to Cueball.]
:Ponytail: Don't all your cells get replaced every seven years, Ship of Theseus-style? Is he even the same person?
:Ponytail: Maybe "no person shall be elected more than twice" isn't a prohibition, it's more of an observation, like "you can't step in the same river twice."

:[Zoom in on Cueball.]
:Cueball: Isn't the cell thing a myth?
:Cueball: I think tooth enamel has a turnover half-life of 30+ years. His teeth molecules are probably the same.

:[Ponytail heads off with a finger raised.]
:Ponytail: So if Obama just gets false teeth, he can run again! I need to talk to a dentist and a lawyer!
:Cueball: The Supreme Court is about to vote 9-0 to block your number.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Elections]]
[[Category:Politics]]
[[Category:Biology]]

2875: 2024

2024-01-02T15:21:13Z

172.69.195.175: Undo revision 331854 by 172.69.214.108 (talk)

== Headline text ==
[[File:Self Fisting.jpg]]
<noinclude>:''This page refers to the comic named "2024". For comic #2024, see [[2024: Light Hacks]].''</noinclude>
{{comic
| number = 2875
| date = January 1, 2024
| title = 2024
| image = 2024_2x.png
| imagesize = 740x553px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = It wasn't originally constitutionally required, but presidents who served two terms have traditionally followed George Washington's example and gotten false teeth.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by OBAMA'S TEETH - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
[[File:Self Fisting.jpg]]
In what starts off almost like a "[[:Category:Comics to make one feel old|doesn't time fly?]]" scene, the unstoppable progression of the calendar is observed, as [[Ponytail]] points out that it's now 2024. [[Cueball]], in response, notes that it is an election year, in this context a {{w|President of the United States#Election|US ''Presidential'' election}} year, which occurs every four years and has (in one form or other) since 1788. Ponytail then replies in some form of exasperated tone that they "keep on happening", which is true but (normally) unsurprising, even/especially with other major elections happening every two years, presumably not compared to how [https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/youre-joking-not-another-one/ some other democracies] might be less predictable/more frequent.

On top of this, Ponytail seems to have not been aware (or maybe has chosen to forget) the passing of two whole election cycles (and two newer incumbents) as the discussion focuses upon {{w|Barack Obama}}, the ''former'' US President. Ponytail seems to be quite behind the times as she asks if Obama is still president (he left office January 20th, 2017, which was 7 (!) years ago, a fact that Cueball cannot quite believe Ponytail is ignorant of). Ponytail states that she liked him, and wonders if he'll be up for taking on the position again. But Cueball states that he ''can't'' be made President again, having already served two terms, which Ponytail confirms by checking for herself the details of the {{w|Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution}}.

The humor in the comic comes in the second half; Cueball and Ponytail discuss whether Obama is the same person (like the mythical {{w|Ship of Theseus}}, most of his constituent cells are frequently replaced), with Ponytail looking into the possibility of Obama's re-election based upon philosophical/biological technicalities (as applied to the Constitution's words), rather than as legal/political convention might normally suggest. But when even that approach is seen to be wanting, requiring a wait significantly exceeding 30 years, Ponytail suggests negating that issue by having all of Obama's teeth removed and replaced with false teeth.

In order to facilitate the latter goal, Ponytail announces her intention to consult a dentist and (for exact reasons that can only be guessed at) a lawyer. Seeing where her current misplaced, and {{w|Dunning–Kruger effect|less than informed}}, zeal might be leading her, Cueball gives his prediction that the probable {{w|Supreme Court of the United States|ultimate legal arbiters}} of her plan might be unanimous in rejecting its validity (if not dissuading its attempt). SCOTUS being unanimous on an issue is now a [https://www.scotusblog.com/2022/07/as-unanimity-declines-conservative-majoritys-power-runs-deeper-than-the-blockbuster-cases/ comparatively rare event].

The title text references {{w|George Washington's teeth|George Washington's (in)famous 'false teeth'}}. Washington's dentures are often falsely claimed to be made of wood; in truth they were ''real'' teeth procured from other sources. Regardless, this would have likely resolved the rather specific problems established in the philosophical conundrum, and the title text claims that other presidents used this plan to get around the Constitutional limitations concerned in case they wanted to serve more than two terms.

However, no one has yet even ''needed'' to carry out this plan. Only one President has exceeded the limit; {{w|Franklin D. Roosevelt}} died in office during his ''fourth'' term, but he served prior to the 22nd Amendment and was thus unaffected by the rule, which was enacted six years after his death. (FDR did have a partial denture, but given that he retained some of his natural teeth, he did not engage in Ponytail's proposed scheme.) Presidents since then have definitely tried various schemes aimed at securing a second term, with both successes and failures, but nobody has yet planned ''this particular plan'' to achieve a third or beyond. Or at least one can assume that those that perhaps did (including, as noted, all those who were not yet 'required' to go to these lengths) failed to attain their goals for entirely different reasons.

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

:[Ponytail and Cueball are walking.]
:Ponytail: So this is 2024.
:Cueball: Yup. Guess it's an election year now.
:Ponytail: Again? Man, those just keep happening, huh?

:[Ponytail and Cueball now standing.]
:Ponytail: Who's the president these days, anyway? Is it still Obama?
:Cueball: What? No? He hasn't been... How do you not...

:[Ponytail and Cueball still standing.]
:Ponytail: Darn, I liked him. Is he running this time?
:Cueball: No, he's not allowed to.
:Ponytail: He's not? Why?
:Cueball: Constitution.

:[Ponytail checks her smartphone.]
:Phone: ''Amendment 22''
:Phone: No person shall be elected to the office of the president more than twice
:Ponytail: What?? C'mon...

:[Ponytail talking to Cueball.]
:Ponytail: Don't all your cells get replaced every seven years, Ship of Theseus-style? Is he even the same person?
:Ponytail: Maybe "no person shall be elected more than twice" isn't a prohibition, it's more of an observation, like "you can't step in the same river twice."

:[Zoom in on Cueball.]
:Cueball: Isn't the cell thing a myth?
:Cueball: I think tooth enamel has a turnover half-life of 30+ years. His teeth molecules are probably the same.

:[Ponytail heads off with a finger raised.]
:Ponytail: So if Obama just gets false teeth, he can run again! I need to talk to a dentist and a lawyer!
:Cueball: The Supreme Court is about to vote 9-0 to block your number.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Elections]]
[[Category:Politics]]
[[Category:Biology]]

1085: ContextBot

2023-12-28T14:53:50Z

172.69.195.175: Undo revision 331574 by Gamohol (talk) No advertising, thanks.

{{comic
| number = 1085
| date = July 23, 2012
| title = ContextBot
| image = contextbot.png
| titletext = If you read all vaguebooking/vaguetweeting with the assumption that they're saying everything they can without revealing classified military information, the internet gets way more exciting.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a commentary on the practice of [http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=vaguebooking "vaguebooking"] or [http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=vaguetweeting "vaguetweeting"], which is posting a short message of sadness or frustration without context. This is frustrating and emotionally trying to readers because it implies something serious has happened that requires friends to provide emotional support, but may also be something trivial, and with no context it is impossible to determine whether one should worry or not.

Google has been criticized more than a few times for keeping rather extensive data records on its users, who by this point constitute most of the internet, enough to cause serious damage if Google wasn't historically altruistic (as altruistic as a for-profit company can be). In the comic, ContextBot is a fictitious Google invention which puts context for these statuses, presumably based on all that personal data which Google has collected:

*The first response is pretty self-explanatory: the original poster wants to use the Internet while on the toilet, but can't get a {{w|wi-fi}} signal there.

*The second response is about a bad {{w|torrent file}} the original poster downloaded. A ''torrent'' is a way to download files from a lot of different sources at the same time, thereby speeding up the process; it is typically used for large downloads such as movies, games, or Linux software distributions. Fake torrents exist, which usually contain an encrypted {{w|.rar}} file which requires a password to open. To get the password, you usually need to go through a survey via the link supplied in the torrent; in some situations, you even need to pay in order to get the password. Even after that, it's quite likely that the .rar file just contains trash files, instead of the download you wanted.

*The third response is about the video game ''{{w|Minecraft}}'', which has been [[:Category:Minecraft|referenced multiple times]] in xkcd comics. Diamonds are a very valuable resource in the game, and lava destroys all items dropped into it except for netherite-based items. A "stack" of diamond can be up to 64 individual diamonds, because most items (including diamonds) can only be stacked to a maximum of 64 in vanilla Minecraft (some items can only be stacked to 16, or even can't be stacked at all). The 64 diamonds would likely represent the fruit of several hours (or days) mining. Alt+Tab is the default keybind on most OSes to switch to a different program, while the default keybind to drop an item in Minecraft is the Q key, which is immediately next to the Tab key on QWERTY-style keyboards. Thus, it would be easy to accidentally drop an item while meaning to switch windows using the keyboard. Not only would pressing alt-Q drop a diamond, like pressing a single Q, ctrl-Q is the default keybind to drop an entire stack of items. If they pressed ctrl-Q instead of alt-tab, they would also likely be caught, adding insult to injury.

*The fourth response is about how the original poster mistook the grapes as being seedless. Grape seeds taste really bitter and are uncomfortable when swallowed; this is even more annoying when the seeds are unexpected.

As noted by the subtitle, ContextBot is considered a great good by everyone who was sick of vaguebooking. This also redeems Google's practice of all those data records in the public's eye.

In the ContextBot's avatar image, three people can be seen together hanging out. But the image is about to be cropped, leaving out the third person and therefore giving the impression that the two people in the cropped image are there without that person. This demonstrates how ''context'' is important to understanding a situation.

The title text refers to the cryptic ways in which someone with sensitive information must communicate. While most vaguebooking/vaguetweeting is about things of little importance, the title text implies that the things not mentioned impact national/global security. This implies that many tweets may actually be related to high-clearance military and or national security information, but must be vague in order to keep it secret, and if you take that as the context, then the internet suddenly becomes much more exciting.

==Transcript==
:[A social network feed with four status updates from four different people with profile picture. Each status has an arrow going down and right to a reply underneath them, all from the same account, which is called ContextBot. It also has a profile picture with three people standing behind a see-through material with a hole in it. The person on the left is not behind the part with hole and is thus completely greyed out. The other two only have their legs covered, the rest is thus not greyed out because it is behind the hole. The left is a Cueball, the middle may have glasses, and the right has hair. Below them is a black band in which the name ContextBot is written in white.]
:Close-up face with hair and glasses: The things I put up with...
:ContextBot: (His building's WiFi doesn't reach the bathroom.)
:Cueball and Megan holding each other: You'd think by now I'd have learned never to trust anyone.
:ContextBot: (She downloaded a torrent that turned out to be an encrypted .rar and a link to a survey.)
:Blondie: I officially give up.
:ContextBot: (She hit alt-tab to hide Minecraft at work and accidentally dropped a stack of diamond into lava.)
:Hairy: Sighhhh
:ContextBot: (He thought these grapes were seedless.)

:[Caption below the panel]
:Everyone stopped complaining about Google's data-gathering when they launched ContextBot, a system which replies to vague, enigmatic social network posts with context from the poster's life.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Social networking]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Blondie]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Hairy]]
[[Category:Minecraft]]
[[Category:Google]]