explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

972: November

2023-02-14T01:32:45Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ add category

{{comic
| number = 972
| date = November 2, 2011
| title = November
| image = november.png
| titletext = November marks the birthday of Charles Schulz, pioneer of tongue awareness.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a homage to {{w|Charles Schulz}}, the creator of the comic {{w|Peanuts}}, who was born on November 26, 1922. Both comics carry the idea that when you start thinking about your tongue, you can hardly stop thinking about it. (Similarly: if you start thinking about your breathing, you stop breathing unless you consciously think to breathe, same goes for blinking.) This is similar to {{w|Ironic process theory|the ironic process theory}}, where trying to not think about something will invariably make you think about it. The intention of [[Black Hat]] in this comic is for [[Cueball]] to consciously feel his tongue for the entire month of November. Since it was Black Hat's idea, Black Hat probably suffers the same consequences.

<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed">
Here is the comic in question by Charles Schulz from Peanuts.
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">[[File:tongue awareness.jpg]]</div>
</div>

This is similar, in concept, to the expression and phrase used for trolling in online communities, "[http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/you-are-now-breathing-manually You Are Now Breathing Manually]".

The line "you are now aware of your tongue" was mentioned much later in the title text of [[2563: Throat and Nasal Passages]]. Here it was throat and nasal passages awareness which was the subject, due to the, at that time, two year long {{w|2019–20 coronavirus outbreak|2020 COVID-19 pandemic}}.

==Transcript==
:[Black Hat and Cueball sit in a room.]
:Black Hat: Did you know November is Tongue Awareness Month?

:[Cueball is suddenly aware of his tongue.]

:[Cueball continues to be aware of his tongue.]

:[Cueball is painfully aware of his tongue.]
:Cueball: I hate you.
:Black Hat: Enjoy the next four weeks.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring real people]]

2735: Coordinate Plane Closure

2023-02-08T17:40:25Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ however

{{comic
| number = 2735
| date = February 8, 2023
| title = Coordinate Plane Closure
| image = coordinate_plane_closure_2x.png
| imagesize = 271x376px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = 3D graphs that don't contact the plane in the closure area may proceed as scheduled, but be alert for possible collisions with 2D graph lines that reach the hole and unexpectedly enter 3D space.
}}

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

This comic is a "Math Notice," which is presumably a warning or reminder for mathematicians or others who interact with the field of mathematics. Specifically, this one advises those who are using the coordinate plane to avoid drawing any graphs in the area with a hole until the damage is patched or fixed. This comic likens the coordinate plane to the earth, and invents the concept of Math Notices, similar to Notices to the Airmen/Marine Notices in aeronautics and navigation.

{{w|Coordinate planes}} are used in math for drawing graphs. The joke here is that a small section has been "closed for maintenance," likening the concept of a coordinate plane to an actual physical platform used by math, which is therefore vulnerable to damage such as is shown in the comic. In reality, the coordinate plane cannot be damaged as it is not a tangible thing.{{citation needed}}

Closure in mathematics is a term relating to sets, specifically operations on sets, and a coordinate plane is a particular set of numbers. A set is closed under an operation if all the "answers" to the operation are also in the set. The coordinate plane is said to be closed under vector addition for example - adding together any two coordinates produces another coordinate in the plane. Many functions and operators may be said to have closure on the real plane, and this comic may be a pun on that term. However, if there actually is a hole in the plane, then suddenly the plane will no longer exhibit closure.

The title text clarifies some of the unwanted effects of drawing a graph into the hole, stating that two-dimensional graph lines might accidentally become three-dimensional and interfere with the graphs made there.

==Transcript==

:<big>⚠️ Math Notice ⚠️</big>

:The coordinate plane will be closed Thursday between (1.5, 1) and (2, 1.5) to repair a hole.

:[A coordinate graph is shown, with a gray hole between (1.5, 1) and (2, 1.5). There are small fractures around the hole. The hole is highlighted with two dots in the corners of a hollow rectangle with split border lines.]

:If your graph uses this area, please postpone drawing until Friday or transform it to different coordinates.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Math]]

Talk:1755: Old Days

2023-02-07T22:59:58Z

172.70.206.151: move reply to comment above another comment inserted between

[https://www.ece.cmu.edu/~ganger/712.fall02/papers/p761-thompson.pdf Reflections on Trusting Trust] (pdf), Ken Thompson's acceptance speech for the 1984 Turing Award, in which he discusses creating a backdoor in the C compiler (yes, there was only 1 when he invented the language) that itself creates a second backdoor in the login program when it is compiled. Additionally, it reproduces itself when compiling the C compiler from un-tampered-with source code, so that anyone using the binary (compiled) compiler would be unable to avoid reproducing the backdoor in all its forms. This is the sort of thing that gives security programmers nightmares. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.168|108.162.221.168]] 04:52, 4 November 2016 (UTC) (bonsaiviking)

The "4-6 weeks" thing might be a reference to high-performance computing, in particular scientific calculations, a few decades back. From what I've heard from older people in my scientific field (I'm too young to have experienced it myself), you'd prepare your program on punch cards, mail these to an institution owning a fast computer (because your group or university didn't have one), and they'd run the program and mail the result back to you. This, I've been told, took a few weeks. Maybe someone with first-hand experience can give more information. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.98|141.101.104.98]] 10:34, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

: I strongly echo 141.101's recollections. The second panel of 1755 is not far from the truth.

: I wrote my first program in FORTRAN IV in 1972 in an "enrichment" class at my school in Worthing - in the south of England (it calculated the average of 10 numbers). We wrote the programs out by hand on 80 column "coding forms" which were then snail-mailed to the regional computing center. When their keypunch operators had time, they'd punch our programs onto cards. On the following night, after the payroll software had been run, they'd stick our cards into the batch queue of their over-worked IBM 360. If they compiled, the programs would auto-run and would be allowed to produce at most 6 sheets of line-printer paper of output. If they didn't compile, then the first six pages of source code and error messages would go to the printer instead. The following morning, someone would collect our printouts and snail-mail them back to the school.

: If you had a compile error, you'd have to copy everything out onto fresh coding forms and re-submit it.

: When the "unofficial" project to teach programming to 14/15 year-olds ran low on cash, they switched to 2nd class mail in each direction. We did two programming classes a week but we'd be VERY lucky to get a turnaround time of less than a week. So the line on panel two: "To compile your code, you had to mail it to IBM, took 4-6 weeks"...isn't *that* much of an exaggeration! We mailed it to the regional computing center - and it rarely took more than 2 weeks...but what she says isn't very far from the truth!

: In practice, things never went smoothly. The keypunch operators didn't routinely type FORTRAN code - they mostly entered stuff like names and addresses, that are somewhat tolerant of typo's. If you were struck by a typo, you'd have to just resubmit the exact same coding forms and hope you didn't get a typo on the following week! Since it was only a 10 week course, you got VERY good at writing your coding forms up clearly, to NEVER forgetting to slash your zeroes and put serifs on your I's...making 100% sure your code would compile first time around was essential to getting anything to run. We quickly learned that using "I" as a loop variable was worse than (say) "COUNT" because it was more likely to get mis-typed as a '1'.

: I begged and pleaded to be allowed to do the same course for two years running but on the second year, the keypunch operators finally rebelled at the extra work we were giving them as our programs grew larger and more ambitious. So we were instructed to punch our own cards using a "hand punch" machine where you manually held down a "chord" of keys to punch raw binary into the cards. Get just one bit wrong, and you had to toss out the entire card and start again. It would take multiple hours to punch in even a very short program! Gone was the idea of using "COUNT" for a loop variable! The idea of commenting your code became simply ludicrous - so the teacher told us to write comments onto blank cards and stick them into the deck where needed!

: Because of that horrendous problem, the concept of "code-reuse" was important! If you could re-use some of the cards from a previous program, or '''''borrow''''' a subroutine from a friend (they'd want it back afterwards!), you'd save yourself a mountain of time! Decks of handy subroutines had value...you could exchange them for all sorts of playground "items-of-value" with the other geeks who did the class.

: I'm tempted to say that this taught me a lot about the art of programming and the importance of checking your code and writing for re-use...but I rather doubt it. When I finally got to my second year in college, I had access to a PDP-11/20 with DecTapes and a DecWriter terminal, that's about when I started to learn something useful...and in my final year, 1977 - I was finally granted access to the PDP-11/70, UNIX and a ADM 3a "glass teletype". I could really get to learning the craft that's still paying my mortgage 40 years later. [[User:SteveBaker|SteveBaker]] ([[User talk:SteveBaker|talk]]) 14:25, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

Source Code on Punched Cards: As an undergrad at Durham Uni I remember punching PL1 source code onto cards to be inserted into a batch queue to be compiled and run on an IBM360 at the nearby city of Newcastle, overnight.
[[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.160|141.101.98.160]] 11:57, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

At the risk of emulating Dilbert's "Topper", I remember at school writing programs on coding sheets (effectively squared paper; one character in each box), which would get sent to the local university, where they would be punched onto cards and run on the mainframe. The following week, you'd get your coding sheets back, plus the cards and the printout from your batch job. Then you'd make your corrections, also on coding sheets... [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.143|141.101.98.143]] 13:35, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

I'm reminded of Frank Hayes' song, "When I Was a Boy": "And we programmed in ones and in zeroes / And sometimes we ran out of ones!" On a more serious note, C came out in the late seventies, and I was using punch cards as late as 1975. That's not "long" before, and I wouldn't be too surprised if there were C compilers that accepted punched card input. [[User:Gmcgath|Gmcgath]] ([[User talk:Gmcgath|talk]]) 12:27, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

: Punch cards 79-80 in the U.S. for C programming. We did have text editors too for other languages, but we'd punch up and submit decks to a queue for batch processing. Usually only waited minutes (though the when big projects were due, it could take an hour - the bad part was there wasn't any way to stop an infinite loop until the job limit ran out. We were given so much in "computer dollars" for the class (because the machines were also used for outside work for real money) and you'd have to ask for extra if you used it up. I miss the green bar paper though. [[User:Afbach|Afbach]] ([[User talk:Afbach|talk]]) 18:25, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

Is there a parallel here between computing and real life? For example, panel 3 mimics real life garbage collection, where you let your trashcan pile up before collection. Similarly, without texting in the 'old days' you would have had to mail stuff to people whereas to do things we can do in seconds now. So she's using his views of the {{unsigned|ExplainBot}}

I think the punched cards explanation is missing the point that C (or any language, that I know) didn't _require_ that it be on punched cards. I.e. there was nothing in the language specification that prohibited the program from being on paper tape, mag tape, disk, etc. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.70|162.158.74.70]] 14:22, 4 November 2016 (UTC)Pat

Is it just me, or is there a parallel between sending you code off to be compiled and sending your code off to an app store. In both cases a required part of the build is sending your code off to a private company for approval. [[User:Olleicua|Olleicua]] ([[User talk:Olleicua|talk]]) 15:28, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

Can someone please verify that it is "actually very difficult" to punch holes in floppy disks? Probably it should be attempted on at least 1000 different disks of different kinds to make sure. {{unsigned ip|162.158.75.64}}

Interesting: there exist two versions of this comic with different size https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/old_days.png and https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/old_days_2x.png The latter is used when zooming in on the comic's page --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.51.70|172.68.51.70]] 19:48, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

: This is to allow browsers to show a higher resolution image on screens that support it. For example, on my Mac Retina display, which has 2 screen pixels per CSS pixel in each dimension, the comic I see on xkcd's page looks much crisper than the version here. This is because xkcd is using the <tt>srcset</tt> tag to select the 2x version of the image on high-resolution screens scaled down 50%; or rather, not scaled up by 2x like most other images.

: I think this is the first time xkcd has used this feature. I don't recall seeing it before, and comic 1754 doesn't use it. -- [[Special:Contributions/108.162.246.42|108.162.246.42]] 15:29, 6 November 2016 (UTC)

You didn't have to ship the punch cards to a company, but you did have to put them into a queue to be processed, and if you did have a typo or other simple mistake, you'd have to wait to get the output before knowing (which could take days). Most of what she says actually makes sense, it's just not fully accurate. You use to have to manually collect your garbage (making sure you unallocated your memory). You often did have to mix code and assembly (thought not for comments, and would that be // or /* */ or # or...). She also follows computer storage history. So again, not accurate, but it makes sense. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.88|108.162.237.88]] 19:56, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

Punch cards did not actually use binary, but a position based coding. Each column (character) had 12 positions where a hole could be punched. Numbers were represented by one hole in the matching numbered row; letters by two holes, one in the upper three row, and one in the lower nine, giving 27 combinations; punctuation and symbols mostly used three holes. I learnt this punching FORTRAN into cards in 1968[[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.232|141.101.98.232]] 01:14, 5 November 2016 (UTC)

Is there a parallel here between real life and computing? Panel 3 is like the way people wait until their trashcan's full before throwing it out, and panel 2 could reference how you had to mail things to people in the 'old days' instead of texting them, which takes no time nowadays. So, she's using the things he knows were true in the past (such as texting not existing) to make ridiculous statements which sound believable to him. Not sure about the other panels though. [[User:ExplainBot|ExplainBot]] ([[User talk:ExplainBot|talk]]) 15:39, 5 November 2016 (UTC)

Back in my day, we lived RFC 1149. Y'all got it easy now. *scoff* --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.78.133|172.68.78.133]] 13:37, 6 November 2016 (UTC)

... and when we got home, our Dad would kill us, and dance about on our graves singing "Hallelujah." :-D --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.88.254|162.158.88.254]] 17:34, 6 November 2016 (UTC)

It is not clear to me that the final 'Wow' indicates that Cueball falls for it. Other interpretations include surprise that Hairbun cares so little or that she would go so far, or shock that she thinks so little of Cueball or indignity that she cares so little for his (admittedly ageist) social overture. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.69.160|162.158.69.160]] 18:39, 7 November 2016 (UTC)

....I'm 17 and fell for this completely. I feel naive. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.167.168|162.158.167.168]] 10:43, 7 January 2017 (UTC)

2611: Cutest-Sounding Scientific Effects

2023-01-19T19:50:54Z

172.70.206.151: /* Trivia */ research

{{comic
| number = 2611
| date = April 25, 2022
| title = Cutest-Sounding Scientific Effects
| image = cutest_sounding_scientific_effects.png
| titletext = The Stroop-YORP number of a scientific paper is how many of the 16 finalist names (sans 'effect') it manages to casually sneak into the text.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Randall]] has compiled [[:Category:Tournament bracket|yet another]] {{w|Tournament bracket|single-elimination tournament bracket}} for a knock-out competition, by public vote, between 16 different scientific effect names that he seems to consider worthy of being cute-sounding.

As of the release day, he is determining the result in a [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518701311763570689 series of Twitter polls]. These results are shown [[#Result of the Twitter polls|here]].

See [[#Effects|below]] for explanations for what each of the 16 effects are.

Several unrelated scientific effects were previously combined in [[1531: The BDLPSWDKS Effect]], which also included the Stroop effect (the last S).

In the title text, Randall coins the term "Stroop-YORP number" as a count of how many 'casual' references a future publication can sneak into it from the 16 finalist names for cutest effect. It specifies that it should be without the word effect after the words (sans 'effect').

Tongue-in-cheek 'counting scores' are familiar in the likes of the {{w|Erdős_number|Erdős}} and {{w|Bacon_number|Bacon}} numbers, both of which are referenced by [[599: Apocalypse]] (the latter only in the title text). In these cases the ideal is to get the ''lowest'' number, whereas here higher is better. The cross-field hybrid {{w|Erdős–Bacon number}} is one in which the desired score is the lowest sum of both values (neither being undefinable) by dint of having participated in both arenas of respective achievement, but not necessarily (or practically) in a single combined presentation.

For instance the Stroop-YORP number could be high for a wildlife paper. That could possibly use "butterfly" and "rabbit" (possibly needing the latter to be specifically 'cutaneous', to count), which may both be found in "little parks" with some "popcorn" seen littered around without too much "oddity"; and of course a (Dr.?) "fox" could be in the area, getting a score of 6. But other words may be a stretch, with an imaginative reference to a "woozle" possibly easier to employ than to evoke anything of the "nocebo".

On the other hand, for a space-science paper there may be more obvious (mis)uses for physics-related terms, and mentioning YORP might well be expected. But it may need creative thinking to introduce the rabbit or the more psychological idea of Stroopicity, etc, without reason to discuss the responses of animal or human payloads being sent there.

It is not actually obvious whether Randall intends the score to only be valid if the insertions are off-field and/or undetected, such as when someone is wagered that they can slip unrelated song lyrics or a 'hello' to Jason Isaacs into a public speech without the rest of the audience twigging.

A search of google scholar indicates many articles with a score of 2 (e.g. [https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/87559129.2012.714435 this paper], which refers to butterfly shaped popcorn), but 3 or more seems to not be attested.

==Effects==
;{{w|YORP effect}}: The YORP effect is the effect of sunlight on an asteroid with variations of shape and/or albedo, which can increase its rotation rate and/or modify its axis of rotation. It can cause objects to eventually spin apart or drastically change their orbit.
:It is an acronym of the names Yarkovsky, O’Keefe, Radzievskii and Paddack, who were instrumental in its discovery. More than a century ago, Yarkovsky determined that heat applied to a symmetrical rotating body would be asymmetrically re-emitted and apply a small but continuous thrust, and this was added to by considering the forces to non-symmetrical bodies.
;{{w|Nocebo effect}}: An effect in which a recipient of medication who believes that it will have negative side-effects is more likely to experience those negative side-effects, whether they can be really caused by the medication or not. Opposite of the {{w|placebo effect}}, which focuses on positive side-effects that arise beyond the true efficacy of a given treatment.
:''Nocēbō'' is Latin for “I shall harm”, coined to oppose ''placēbō'', “I shall please”.
;{{w|Woozle effect}}: If a study gets repeatedly cited and otherwise disseminated, then people will start to believe it regardless of whether it has any evidence behind it. And if there is not any evidence, it becomes an urban myth.
:Named after a Winnie-the-Pooh story in which Winnie-the-Pooh and Piglet try to catch an imaginary animal called a woozle, and accidentally follow their own tracks in circles.
:A similar effect was discussed in [[978: Citogenesis]], wherein a sourceless statement on Wikipedia can become apparently credible via simple repetition.
;{{w|Stroop effect}}: The Stroop effect (referenced in [[1531: The BDLPSWDKS Effect]]) is a psychological phenomenon in which it is easier to name the visual color of a word when the word refers to its own color, than when the word refers to a different color; i.e. the fact that saying that '''Red''' is red is easier than to say that '''Blue''' is green.
:Named after {{w|John Ridley Stroop}}.
;{{w|Pockels effect}}: A phenomenon where an electric field passed through a medium can cause the medium's refractive index to depend upon the polarization and propagation direction of the refracted light, a property known as {{w|birefringence}}.
:Named after {{w|Friedrich Carl Alwin Pockels}}.
;{{w|Cheerios effect}}: A phenomenon where objects floating in a liquid appear to attract or repel each other.
:Named after the cereal Cheerios, which are an everyday demonstration of this phenomenon because many eat Cheerios in a bowl of milk.
;{{w|Hot chocolate effect}}: A phenomenon where the sound created by tapping a cup of hot liquid rises in pitch as a soluble powder is added.
;{{w|Perky effect}}: An experiment in which participants were asked to visualize an object while staring at a screen on which the outline of that object was subtly projected. Participants believed the projected shape to be only a product of their imaginations.
:Named after {{w|Cheves Perky}}.
;{{w|Bouba/kiki effect}}: An observation that people, despite different native languages, will relatively consistently assign names with certain sounds to blobby or spiky shapes, suggesting the association of sound and shape is non-arbitrary. ''Bouba'' and ''kiki'' were two of the words used in the experiment.
;{{w|Cutaneous rabbit effect}}: A phenomenon where, when tapped on one part of the body in rapid succession and then switching to another, the subject feels the tapping at locations in between the two.
:For example, if rapidly tapping the wrist then switching to the elbow, the subject will subjectively feel as if they are being tapped at progressive intervals between the wrist and elbow, when they are not.
;[https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/smallfirmeffect.asp Small firm effect]: An economic theory that small firms usually perform better than larger ones
;{{w|Little–Parks effect}}: A phenomenon where a fluctuating magnetic field passed through a superconductor can slightly suppress its superconductivity, inducing small fluctuations in its electrical resistance.
:When juxtaposed against the "small firm effect", as in the bracket, one might get the impression that it is somehow related to urban architecture or civil engineering.
;{{w|Dr. Fox effect}}: A disputed theory that student evaluations of their teachers are likely unreliable, because they are largely based on the teacher's charisma instead of the quality of their content.
;{{w|Oddity effect}}: A theory that when fish assemble in shoals (large social groups), any that stand out appearance-wise will be attacked by a predator, explaining why shoals tend to have similar-looking members.
;{{w|Butterfly effect}}: The butterfly effect is the sensitivity of chaotic systems to small changes in initial conditions. The weather system of Earth is chaotic, and so an arbitrarily small change in air patterns (such as could be caused by the flapping of a butterfly's wing) could ultimately change the weather for the whole world.
;{{w|Popcorn effect}}: A phenomenon exhibited by crushed ore placed on a vibrating screen for separation in mineral processing, in which larger particles tend to bounce higher than smaller particles.

==Transcript==
:[A tournament bracket tree is shown with 16 scientific effect names, with 8 on the left and 8 on the right side. From both sides toward the middle the brackets reduce from eight to four, to two, then to one line where the latter join to a rectangle in the middle for the winners name of the final match. Above the bracket there is a title:]
:<big>Cutest-Sounding Scientific Effects</big>

:[Left side:]
:YORP effect
:Nocebo effect

:Woozle effect
:Stroop effect

:Pockels effect
:Cheerios effect

:Hot chocolate effect
:Perky effect

:[Right side:]
:Bouba/kiki effect
:Cutaneous rabbit effect

:Small firm effect
:Little Parks effect

:Dr. Fox effect
:Oddity effect

:Butterfly effect
:Popcorn effect

==Trivia==
* Randall has created [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518701311763570689 Twitter polls] to determine the outcome of this version of his [[1819: Sweet 16|sweet 16]]:

===Result of the [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518698708824727554 Twitter polls]===
====First wave====
The first wave ran from April 25, 2022 at 5:19pm ET to the next day at 5:42pm ET.
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518701311763570689 '''YORP effect (67.7%)''' vs Nocebo effect (32.3%)], 8,996 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518702773075943425 '''Woozle effect (74.4%)''' vs Stroop effect (25.6%)], 8,517 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518704819720044544 Pockels effect (42.4%) vs '''Cheerios effect (57.6%)'''], 7,513 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518705352342228998 '''Hot chocolate effect (56.2%)''' vs Perky effect (43.8%)], 7,379 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518705724737662977 '''Bouba/kiki effect (64%)''' vs Cutaneous rabbit effect (36%)], 7,563 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518706168440541194 Small firm effect (18.4%) vs '''Little Parks effect (81.6%)'''], 7,209 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518706772999118848 '''Dr. Fox effect (67.5%)''' vs Oddity effect (32.5%)], 7,852 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1518707180320481280 '''Butterfly effect (56.5%)''' vs Popcorn effect (43.4%)], 7,825 votes

====Second wave====
The second wave started on April 26, 2022 at 5:56pm ET and ended around 11:56am ET.
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1519073013781647365 YORP effect (35.7%) vs '''Woozle effect (64.3%)'''], 7,026 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1519074868637147138 Cheerios effect (49.5%) vs '''Hot chocolate effect (50.5%)'''], 6,672 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1519077131376074754 '''Bouba/Kiki effect (72.8%)''' vs Little parks effect (27.2%)], 7,466 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1519079116993183749 Dr. Fox effect (47.9%) vs '''Butterfly effect (52.1%)'''], 6,752 votes

====Third wave====
The third wave started on April 27, 2022 at 6:54pm ET and ended around 12:54pm ET.
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1519450011674759169 '''Woozle effect (71.2%)''' vs Hot chocolate effect (28.8%)], 8,237 votes
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1519455938096373761 '''Bouba/Kiki effect (77.6%)''' vs Butterfly effect (22.4%)], 7,223 votes

====Fourth wave====
The fourth wave started on April 28, 2022 at 4:30pm ET and ended around 10:30pm ET.
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1519776107821740033 Woozle effect (46.1%) vs '''Bouba/Kiki effect (53.9%)'''], 10,774 votes

====Bonus wave====
* [https://twitter.com/xkcd/status/1520109683503161344 '''Bouba (57%)''' vs Kiki (43%)], 9,723 votes

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Scientific research]]
[[Category:Tournament bracket]]

790: Control

2023-01-19T19:44:51Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ research

{{comic
| number = 790
| date = September 8, 2010
| title = Control
| image = control.png
| titletext = Which, at one point, led to a study showing that LSD produces no more hallucinations than a placebo.
}}

==Explanation==
This is another in the [[My Hobby]] series. In a product experiment, two groups of people are given a certain pill or lotion. Some people are given the product to be tested, while others (the control group) are given a placebo; nobody is told which group they belong to. The control group acts as a norm for comparison against the others.

Randall has messed with this process by giving LSD ({{w|lysergic acid diethylamide}}) to the control group. LSD is a drug that causes hallucinations and distortions in the perception of time and space. [[Megan]], apparently a control, is experiencing spiders in her hallucinations. Since the control group is supposed to reflect what "normally" happens, this is indeed very confusing to the scientists. While hallucinating in the comic Megan is drawn as if she has 8 limbs showing that she's waving her arms. Alternatively, although not especially likely, this could signify that she actually has grown four extra arms - which would be very confusing even if the scientists knew about the LSD.{{Citation needed}}

However, given the scientists are confused, this means that they must know which person is in which group. This implies that the trial isn't double-blinded, which in and of itself would impact the veracity of the study. In a properly double-blinded study, the scientists would not know Cueball or [[Megan]] was the control and would only dutifully record their observations. (Alternatively, this is simply an unexpected result for either group.)

The title text suggests that, in a different study, this substitution was performed when the product being tested was itself LSD. This led to the conclusion that LSD is no more likely to cause hallucinations than a placebo, somehow implying that LSD is not a hallucinogen. We can only hope they were able to redo the test, as in layman's terms "Nonsense MUST be wrong". If this were true, this would imply that Randall would only have needed to sneak placebo LSD into the studies to get the same effect.

==Transcript==
:[Caption above the frame:]
:My Hobby:

:[Cueball looks down at his arm calmly, while next to him Megan is violently flailing around in terror. In the foreground a Cueball-like guy stands next to Ponytail who is holding a clipboard. They look on in puzzlement.]
:Cueball: My rash seems to have shrunk by about 20% today.
:Megan: OH GOD SPIDERS
:Cueball-like guy: ? ?
:Ponytail: ?

:[Caption below the frame:]
:Sneaking into experiments and giving LSD to the control group.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:My Hobby]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Spiders]]
[[Category:Scientific research]]

1526: Placebo Blocker

2023-01-19T19:44:13Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ wlink

{{comic
| number = 1526
| date = May 18, 2015
| title = Placebo Blocker
| image = placebo blocker.png
| titletext = They work even better if you take them with our experimental placebo booster, which I keep in the same bottle.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a joke about the difficulty of testing a drug that is supposed to block the {{w|placebo effect}}.

A placebo experiment is used for testing a drug candidate. It has two groups: one that gets a real drug candidate, and one that gets a fake. The placebo effect describes the observation that the group that gets the fake often show signs of having received a working drug - though commonly weaker than in the group that gets an effective real drug.

[[Cueball]] states to [[Hairbun]], with a citation from the real world, that his team created a Placebo Blocker, a drug designed to prevent the placebo effect. Cueball begins to design a test for this new drug. Following typical experimental design, patients would be split into two groups: a control group, and the group that receives the treatment.

Cueball knows that the treatment given to the control group is supposed to be designed so that it is not influenced by the variable trying to be isolated. As the placebo effect ''is'' the effect under investigation, a placebo can not be used as a control treatment as a comparison with a placebo blocker. Cueball tries to design around this. In his test, both groups would receive a placebo as a treatment for an unspecified condition (the ''Treatment Placebo''); in addition the test group would receive the Placebo Blocker drug, while the control group would get a placebo pill instead (the ''Placebo-Blocker Placebo''). If this works as expected, the ''Treatment Placebo'' would be blocked by the ''Placebo Blocker'' in the test group, while in the control group, the ''Placebo-Blocker Placebo'' may have a placebo effect in blocking the placebo effect of the ''Treatment Placebo'', and the difference between these effects can be measured to test the effectiveness of the ''Placebo Blocker''.

Cueball and Hairbun think about this trial until they both develop headache from frustration. Cueball then kindly offers Hairbun a sugar pill. While this might have helped cure the headache via the placebo effect had he told her it was a headache treatment, by revealing the pill as merely a sugar pill, it may reduce the effect (though it has been shown that placebos tend to work even if the subject is aware that they are placebos).

In the title text, Cueball mentions that his sugar pills against headache works even better together with the new experimental placebo ''boosters''. Incidentally, he indicates that he keeps those in the same bottle with his sugar pills. Assuming someone believes placebo ''boosters'' are in the jar this would allow them to take the sugar pills and receive a greater placebo effect, as the placebo effect is based upon faith in the treatment, regardless of whether there are placebo ''boosters'' in the jar.

It is possible but unlikely that:
* Cueball's sugar pills are, in fact, the Placebo Blockers themselves and that, seeing Hairbun has a headache, Cueball is inspired to somehow use the opportunity as an experiment to test the Blockers
* Cueball is suggesting Hairbun take a "placebo booster" which is really a "placebo blocker", thus testing the blocker he mentioned earlier in the comic.

Questionable neuroscience research is also discussed in [[1453: fMRI]].

===Placebos===
The {{w|placebo}} effect refers to the phenomenon in which patients given an inactive treatment such as a sugar pill can still show improvement relative to an untreated patient. The placebo effect is thus very important to consider when testing new drugs, since even ineffective drugs can have a positive effect on the patients due to the placebo effect. Modern drug experiments are hence conducted as {{w|Blind experiment#Double-blind trials|double-blind trials}}, where the patients are randomly given either the treatment or a placebo without either they or the administering doctors knowing who receives the new drug and who received the placebo pill. (It is important that the doctor does not know, as if they did, it may affect the way they interact with the patient.)

Generally the patients need to believe that they are receiving an active treatment, but one [http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0015591 study] showed that the effect can occur even if the patients are told that they are receiving a placebo pill. The key factor seems to be that the patients must believe that a positive effect will occur. For example, (1) patients experience a greater effect if they believe that the treatment is expensive and (2) patients who know that they have not been given an active treatment will experience the effect if they are told that placebos can have a positive effect through the power of the mind. Furthermore, the placebo can increase the effectiveness of treatments which ''seem'' larger (this is why over-the-counter pain medication is often administered as two half-doses rather than just one full dose).

Several reasons for the placebo effect have been proposed, from study artifacts - such as under-reporting of negative outcomes by patients who think they are being treated, to neurological explanations for how mental state can translate into physical outcomes.

Placebo-blockers do actually already exist. A side-effect of the opiate antagonist {{w|Naloxone}} is that it [http://healthland.time.com/2009/08/26/a-neurological-explanation-for-the-placebo-effect/ blocks the placebo effect].

It should be noted that placebo does not actually improve the objective condition, only the patient's subjective perception of it (i.e. the patients do not get better more than they randomly would, but the placebo makes them think they do).{{Citation needed}}

===Mechanisms of the placebo effect===
The placebo effect is one of the greatest mysteries in modern medicine. It is typically found that the placebo effect is an effective treatment in itself in addition to the effectiveness of drugs and other treatments, and it has been found to cause small improvements to cancer outcomes. In other cases such as pain relief, the placebo effect is claimed to be comparable with the effectiveness of the drug itself - but this is a misunderstanding: this is not evidence of placebo working, but of the drug not working.

The comic refers to the recent study by Kathryn T. Hall, Joseph Loscalzo, and Ted J. Kaptchuk. (2015) ''[https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/J.MOLMED.2015.02.009 Genetics and the placebo effect: the placebome.]'' Trends in Mol Medicine. Volume 21, Issue 5, May 2015, Pages 285–294 - however, bear in mind that one has to treat studies very carefully ''[https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/ted-kaptchuk-versus-placebo-effects-again/ Kaptchuk vs Placebo]''

It is possible to test the placebo blocker using three groups: a test group who receive a placebo and a placebo blocker, a control group who receive a placebo but no blocker, and a second control group who receive no treatment whatsoever, as a lack of treatment is the variable that an actual placebo is designed to control for. Still it might be hard to determine if the pills are having a negative effect or blocking the placebo effect, so multiple trials with multiple illnesses may have to be carried out.

==Transcript==
:[Hairbun is standing in front of Cueball who does all the talking. Below them is a footnote.]
:Cueball: Some researchers* are starting to figure out the mechanism behind the placebo effect.
:Cueball: We've used their work to create a new drug: A ''placebo effect blocker''.
:Footnote: * Hall et al, DOI: 10.1016/J.MOLMED.2015.02.009

:[Zoom in on Cueball who now holds his arms out.]
:Cueball: Now we just need to run a trial! We'll get two groups, give them both placebos, then give one the ''real'' placebo blocker, and the other a...
:Cueball: ...wait.

:[Hairbun holds her chin, while Cueball just stand there for a beat panel.]

:[Hairbun looks again at Cueball who begins to take the lid off of a medicine bottle.]
:Hairbun: ...My head hurts.
:Cueball: Mine too.
:Cueball: Here, want a sugar pill?

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Hairbun]]
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Biology]]
[[Category:Psychology]]
[[Category:Scientific research]]

393: Ultimate Game

2023-01-02T00:02:52Z

172.70.206.151: /* See also */ not really a board game

{{comic
| number = 393
| date = March 7, 2008
| title = Ultimate Game
| image = ultimate_game.png
| titletext = RIP, Gary.
}}

==Explanation==
{{w|Gary Gygax}} was a game designer best known for co-creating the iconic nerd pastime ''{{w|Dungeons and Dragons}}'' (D&D); as such, he is commonly described as the "father of D&D." He died on March 4, 2008, three days before this comic was released. It made him the first person to receive tribute in conjunction with his death on xkcd, but [[:Category:Tribute|not the last]].

The idea of playing games (typically chess) with supernatural entities in exchange for one's soul is an old one and has been referenced in {{tvtropes|ChessWithDeath|many works}}, but mainly known in the form of playing Chess against the {{w|Death (personification)|personified version of Death}}, which was made famous in Ingmar Bergman's film ''{{w|The Seventh Seal}}'' (1957). The last part of this trope is used in this comic. Here, the specific twist is that the victim can choose which game they want to play. Naturally, it is only fitting that Gary would challenge Death to ''D&D''. The trope was later revisited as one of the tips in [[1820: Security Advice]].

The problem is that ''Dungeons and Dragons'' isn't so much a game as it is a set of rules for describing stories. It requires the intervention of a {{w|Dungeon Master}} (or DM) to create a scenario that the players' characters must overcome. It's unclear exactly how the game between Gary and Death works, but given that ''D&D'' generally takes a long time to play due to the setup time and large amount of dice-rolling, and the fact that Gary seems to keep adding extra rulebooks (official or pseudo-official books that add new classes, items, spells, etc. for players to use), it's understandable why it would take longer than Death's boss would like.

Part of the humor in this comic comes from the fact that Death's boss, who would presumably be an extraordinarily powerful entity, appears to be a completely ordinary man in an ordinary office, complete with bald patch and potted plant.

Death's usage of the name "Jesus" in the final panel may be considered {{w|Resurrection of Jesus|ironic,}} given that he's, well, ''Death.''
But it does make a different kind of sense when you consider Jesus a personal enemy of Death (Revelation 20:14).

==Transcript==
:[Split screen down the diagonal. Upper left: A man with only hair around the back of his head is standing to the left of a desk with a hand on it, speaking on an office phone on a desk. There is a photo in a frame behind the phone. Bottom right: Death in a cloak, black hole to the left where the head should be, speaks on cell phone he is holding up in his skeleton hand.]
:Man: Death?
:Death: Speaking.

:[A frameless panel with a zoom out of the man on the phone, showing more of his office. Behind the desk, there is a potted plant, and above it, there is a window (or a white board). The reply over the phone is indicated to come from the phone with a zigzag line.]
:Man: This is the boss. Where are you? You haven't been up to the office in days!
:Death (over the phone): I've been held up.

:[Full panel with Death speaking on his cell phone. It is apparent that he is leaning back against something white behind him (presumably the backrest of his chair). The two replies on the phone are again indicated with zigzag lines.]
:Man (over the phone): What happened?
:Death: You know how when someone dies, they can challenge me to a game for their soul?
:Man (over the phone): Sure, standard procedure.

:[Death is revealed to be sitting on a chair to the right of a table leaning back against the chair's backrest (which could be seen in the first two images of Death as well). He is still speaking on his phone, and in the other hand he holds his long scythe down with the blade below the table. On the other side of the table is a man (revealed to be Gary Gygax in the title text). The man has curly hair that seems to turn into a ponytail, but as he is looking out of the panel a little to the left away from Death, it is hard to see the ponytail. He also has a full beard. Gary Gygax is leaning over his bag behind him, taking out a book while resting the other hand on the table. On the table are already two other books of the same type. Behind them are two figurines (one Cueball and one with a pointy hat), then two dice and some paper strewn about in front of Death.]
:Death: Well, we didn't count on this guy. I might be a while.
:Gary Gygax: I add the paladin to my party.
:Death: Oh, Jesus. He's getting out another rulebook.

==Trivia==

*This is the third comic in a row about game-rules.

==See also==
*Although Gary is the father of ''D&D'', {{w|Dave Arneson}}'s contribution should not be ignored. Although xkcd did not cover his death in April 2009, a stick-figure tribute to the man who created the concept of role-playing games [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0644.html does exist], courtesy {{w|The Order of the Stick}}.
*On tvtropes, this comic's last two panels are used for their article on {{tvtropes|RulesLawyer|Rules Lawyer}}.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring real people]]
[[Category:Tribute]]
[[Category:Games]]

Category:Video games

2023-01-02T00:01:03Z

172.70.206.151: Re-add

Comics related to {{w|video game}}s.
[[Category:Comics by topic]]
[[Category:Games]]

Category:Video games

2023-01-02T00:00:13Z

172.70.206.151: Super category

Comics related to {{w|video game}}s.
[[Category:Games]]

2716: Game Night Ordering

2022-12-27T01:20:46Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ ce

{{comic
| number = 2716
| date = December 26, 2022
| title = Game Night Ordering
| image = game_night_ordering_2x.png
| imagesize = 293x471px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = One good trick, if you get called on a fake service, is to build a working version of it and mention it again the next week.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BORED FOOD.NET DRIVER BETWEEN DELIVERIES. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic is poking fun at the proliferation of apps and internet services such as for [https://builtin.com/consumer-tech/food-delivery-companies food delivery] and [https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/banking/best-ways-to-send-money money transfer]. The characters are discussing which to use during an evening of tabletop gaming. The group has a running competition to see who can mention fake apps or services without being called out.

[[Cueball]] mentions three food delivery services, {{w|Grubhub}}, {{w|DoorDash}}, and Food.net, and [[Ponytail]] asks him to reimburse her using {{w|Venmo}}, {{w|PayPal}}, or Yahoo Cash. Cueball expresses skepticism about Yahoo Cash, after which Ponytail admits it's a fake service and is thus obligated to pay for Cueball's meal. (Incidentally, Yahoo does provide a money transfer service to facilitate private party gambling on {{w|fantasy sports}}, called [https://sports.yahoo.com/wallet/dailyfantasy/referafriend/ Yahoo Fantasy Wallet], but it uses PayPal.) Food.net, which Cueball mentioned without being called out, is not a real service; https://food.net exists but is "not available for use," and is not related to food.

Based on Ponytail's offer, if someone is correctly called out then they apparently must pay for the player who caught them, but what happens when a player isn't caught (e.g. when Cueball mentioned Food.net) isn't clear. The rules might be similar to variants of the card game sometimes known as "{{w|Cheat (game)|Cheat}}," in which a successful bluff merely allows play to continue on until someone is caught bluffing or incorrectly accuses another player.

The title text offers a tip for winning the competition after being called out for mentioning a fake service: building a working version of it and then mentioning it again the next week. This is humorously facetious because the amount of planning, effort, recruitment, and financial capital required to establish a working money transfer or food delivery service is far beyond what typical tabletop gamers could ever hope to accomplish in such a short time.{{citation needed}}

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

:[Cueball, Megan, and Ponytail are sitting at a table to order food. Cueball is on his phone, and Ponytail, sitting opposite, on her laptop.]
:Cueball: What should we use to order? Grubhub? DoorDash? Food.net?
:Ponytail: I'll do Grubhub; you can send me money. Do you do Venmo? Paypal? Yahoo Cash?
:Cueball: Yahoo Cash ‘’has‘’ to be fake.
:Ponytail: Yes. Dang. I'll get your share.
:[Caption below the panel:]
:Our game night has an ongoing competition to see who can mention the most fake apps and services without getting called on it.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Food]]
[[Category:Board games]]

Talk:2712: Gravity

2022-12-16T23:48:34Z

172.70.206.151:

Whatever image is supposed to be in the center isn't showing up for me! D: Tried on both Safari and Chrome but it gives me the little broken picture icon. Hopefully it's fixed soon! (The comic's been up for about 10 minutes going by when the bot updated this page.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.126.117|172.70.126.117]] 22:28, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

: The center image is trying to load this link, but there's nothing there: https://xkcd.com/tile/ship1/ship_gliding_2x.png. I hope that gets fixed soon. The "ship" seems to rotate a bit unpredictably over time. At first I thought it was responding to my mouse movements, but I don't think so anymore. [[User:Orion205|Orion205]] ([[User talk:Orion205|talk]]) 22:34, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

: Ah, the center image is controlled by the javascript, of course: https://xkcd.com/2712/comic.js. So this is some sort of interactive comic? [[User:Orion205|Orion205]] ([[User talk:Orion205|talk]]) 22:36, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

: Okay, left/right arrow keys seem to control the rotation. I'll check back in later in hopes of seeing the ship so I have some idea what the point of it all is. [[User:Orion205|Orion205]] ([[User talk:Orion205|talk]]) 22:39, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

: And now it's working. You fly a little spaceship around the little planet. Luckily you have shields if you slam into the ground too hard. [[User:Orion205|Orion205]] ([[User talk:Orion205|talk]]) 22:43, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

: Catch the cannonball for a spaceship upgrade. Also, not so easy to find a stable orbit around this little planet. [[User:Orion205|Orion205]] ([[User talk:Orion205|talk]]) 22:49, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

You can transform the ship into a different (seems faster to me) one by running into the last cannon ball.
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.249|108.162.241.249]]

Rough summary: The comic is an interactive space flight game, starting landed on an origin planet. The planet is static, and the player starts in a ship controlled by WASD or Directional keys. The ship can go up and down, and rotate left and right. Game simulates orbits and gravity, making navigation tricky. Around the player ship there are dots which indicate nearby planets - there are numurous planets, each with what seem to be drawings related to the What If book. Within the browser, planets are loaded in PNG format by chunk, names formatted as "planet_0_0" with numbers incrementing as grid co-ordinates. Planets and objects found: "origin" "europa", "road", "b612". NOTE: Several hazards exist, such as a field of black holes - if flown into, the ship can become stuck if let to be pulled close to the surface, locking in place. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.230|172.70.110.230]] 23:13, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

: Within browser dev console exists the objects "Ship" and "Comic", the latter containing a list of all objects and coordinates, as well as various setting for the game physics and settings. Comic contains the sub-object "Voyager", which contains the details and settings for the player ship, including location, speed, etc. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.230|172.70.110.230]] 23:13, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

:: There are 5 ship types in the game code, each with their own consumable transformative found in the world. The ship alternatives are (ship1, ship2, ship-tintin, ship-figure, ship-soccerball). These can be changed with console command [Comic.ship = "ship1"]. Note: At current, "ship-soccerball" returns an error and does not load correctly. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.230|172.70.110.230]] 23:13, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

:: The "ship.shields" is a boolean value that defaults to true, and when set to false, makes the game behave in a lunar lander mode (bad landing black screens the whole page). The "ship.engine" types I see in the code are "warp" (very fast speeds) and "infinite improbability drive" (teleports to 'improbable' places). Default engine is "standard", but it seems any value that is not the former two has the same effect. --[[Special:Contributions/172.70.254.165|172.70.254.165]] 23:32, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

: In addition to Europa, the space road, and B-612, there is the "Edge of the Universe" (complete with Milliways restaurant nearby), a... tree (which is extremely hard to land on), a planet populated by the characters from Dinosaur Comics (and the main cast of Jurassic Park), the USS Enterprice (NCC 1701-C), and likely quite a bit more. Orbital mechanics make it tough to land on the smaller targets. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.254.46|172.71.254.46]] 23:07, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

:: Plus what appears to be Earth, complete with the LHC. There's a 2nd "cannonball" there for an additional ship upgrade, but at the time I found it, that graphic was unavailable. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.126.232|172.70.126.232]] 23:15, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

: I went out a long ways away, and eventually found The Great Attractor. It attracts really hard. I couldn't leave the surface. (I wasn't able to leave the center of Europa either, though, so, not saying much.) There are also some terrifying black holes (a binary system?), though something's weird about their gravity; you kinda bounce off of them a quarter screen away or so? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.77|108.162.216.77]] 23:10, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
:: I *think* thats a wormhole, you go in one and then out the other. I got stuck right between them. Speaking of getting stuck, there is a bug where if you hit a planet with enough gravity fast enough, the ship is inside the planet. Holding W makes you go backwards (or at least towards the center maybe?) and you can get all the way to the other end of the planet where you slow down a lot, but can eventually leave. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.82.166|172.70.82.166]] 23:19, 16 December 2022 (UTC)Bumpf

::There's one planet that's supposed to be the "remnant of the sun", is that what you mean with The Great Attractor? (It has a bridge on it with a coin(?) blocking part of the way, and a space ship actively crashing into its surface, drawn as several frames.) You can leave that by skidding over the surface like a skipping stone to gather momentum - it's tricky, due to various obstacles, but possible! (It's possible you need two ship power-ups?! If they're indeed power-ups and not just aesthetic changes, I didn't pay attention.)
::Screenshot of [https://imgur.com/a/NZulBlb the Enterprise] and [https://imgur.com/2VSZYp7 Dinosaur Comics planet]. Sorry for the broken image in the middle, I picked up two powerups and [https://xkcd.com/2712/tile/ship-soccerball/ship_landing_down_2x.png my current ship image is broken]. -(pinkgothic) [[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.143|172.68.110.143]] 23:22, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
:::[https://i.imgur.com/fLU1cWy.png Dog Park planet] [[Special:Contributions/172.71.254.114|172.71.254.114]] 23:28, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

Using a tablet (no keyboard, but seems to respond to touch), controls are confusing. Presuming that touching bottom left activates left-rotate and touching bottom right does right-rotate (can't see the presumably white-lije controls over the white planet) but I can't get ''thrust'' anything but 'reverse' into the planet centre. No obvious top-edge hotspots, either. Maybe I need to do a "You will not go to space today" and then reverse ''upward''... BRB, after a bit more testing, though... [[Special:Contributions/172.69.79.185|172.69.79.185]] 23:39, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
On the

Using the developer console, the ship can be teleported to different coordinates via console command [Comic.voyager.pos.x = 0, Comic.voyager.pos.y = -1461], provided here with start location coordinates. This can be used for manual navigation to known coordinates. List of locations per game code added below, append landing X,Y to each as determined. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.230|172.70.110.230]] 23:42, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

b612: [x,y] dogplanet: [x,y] earth: [x,y] enterprise: [x,y] europa: [x,y] goodhart: [x,y] greatattractor: [x,y] japanmoon: [x,y] maw1: [x,y] maw2: [x,y] maw3: [x,y] maw4: [x,y] maw5: [x,y] maw6: [x,y] maw7: [x,y] maw8: [x,y] maw9: [x,y] maw10: [x,y] maw11: [x,y] maw13: [x,y] maw14: [x,y] nojapan: [x,y] origin: [0, -1461] peeler: [x,y] pigeons: [x,y] present: [x,y] remnant: [x,y] roads: [x,y] soupiter: [x,y] steerswoman: [x,y] sun: [x,y]

In your developer console, enter <code>window.ship.engines = 'infinite improbability drive'</code> and pressing up will randomly teleport you to interesting places.

Talk:2707: Astronomy Numbers

2022-12-06T04:13:17Z

172.70.206.151: just in case

First time I've ever seen a completely blank page. [[User:IJustWantToEditStuff|IJustWantToEditStuff]] ([[User talk:IJustWantToEditStuff|talk]]) 20:27, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
:Everyone's enthralled by ChatGPT. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.22.35|172.69.22.35]] 04:01, 6 December 2022 (UTC)

It's also notable that something weighting 12 solar masses will collapse into black hole on it's own, unless it resist collapse through thermal pressure like stars. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 21:26, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

The Earth moves relative to the sun at 66,000 MPH. In what frame of reference is it 65 MPH? It isn't like Randall to get a number wrong. Maybe the magnitude of the distance from Earth to Sun changes at a closer rate, but even this is nearly 180 MPH if I'm calculating correctly. [[User:Mannerisky|Mannerisky]] ([[User talk:Mannerisky|talk]]) 21:37, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
: You're thinking orbital speed, she's talking orbital oscillation. That is, the speed at which the distance between earth and sun changes. [[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.240|198.41.242.240]] 21:51, 5 December 2022 (UTC) ADDITION: Orbital oscillation has both a mean/average factor and a current factor (which is at it slowest while at the apsides, and given the context the one being calculated) [[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.85|198.41.242.85]] 22:46, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

I get the sense that the thing that they're planning for January 1st is a precisely-timed new year's party and nothing to do with space exploration. {{unsigned|172.71.242.156}}

; Obligatory ChatGPT explanation

:'''Me:''' The following is a transcript from the latest xkcd comic. Please write an explanation of the comic: ''[transcript copied verbatim from [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2707:_Astronomy_Numbers&oldid=300614#Transcript its current state] omitted]''

:'''[https://chat.openai.com/chat ChatGPT:]''' In the xkcd comic, Ponytail and Cueball are discussing Earth's orbit around the sun. Ponytail notes that Earth will be approaching the sun at a rate of 65 miles per hour on January 1st. Cueball responds, "Weird?" Ponytail explains that they usually see only complex and incomprehensible numbers in astronomy, and seeing a "normal" number like 65 miles per hour feels wrong to them. This reflects the common perception that numbers in the sciences, especially astronomy, are often complex and difficult to understand. Earlier in the comic, Ponytail also expresses skepticism at a "normal" number when Megan in coat tells them that their cat weighs 12 lbs. Ponytail suggests that it must actually weigh either 10-20 or 1040 instead. Megan responds by saying that the cat's weight is actually 3x10-30 solar masses, which Ponytail finds more acceptable.

I wish superscipts would survive copy-paste, but I have to admit it's better than the esoterica-laden verbosity that's up now.

I propose we create a [https://beta.openai.com/examples/default-summarize bot to summarize the transcript] with the text-davinci-003 API and paste it into the top of discussion whenever the Transcript is expanded more than 10%. Yays and nays? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.154.39|172.71.154.39]] 03:55, 6 December 2022 (UTC)

2703: Paper Title

2022-11-25T23:08:39Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ revise substantially

{{comic
| number = 2703
| date = November 25, 2022
| title = Paper Title
| image = paper_title_2x.png
| imagesize = 557x261px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = CONFLICT OF INTEREST STATEMENT: The authors hope these results are correct because we all want to be cool people who are good at science.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a MICROBE TRYING TO LURE YOU WITH CLICKBAIT. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

Many if not most scientific research papers present a hypothesis and the result of testing the hypothesis. Scientific papers should also have titles which describe the content of the papers. See [[2456: Types of Scientific Paper]].

[[Cueball]] is writing a research paper with a {{w|clickbait}} style, {{w|puffery}} title, "Check out this cool microbe we found." His colleague [[Megan]] asks him whether science is supposed to be about formulating a thesis and testing it. Cueball agrees, changing the title to, "Is our lab really good at finding cool microbes? Some preliminary data." However, that is still in overly-promotional clickbait style, purporting to be a study of the authors' own competence, which would be highly unusual because of a lack of necessary objective viewpoint separation between the subject and authors of such a study. [[:Category:Clickbait|Clickbait]] is a recurring theme on xkcd, recently considered within science publications in [[2001: Clickbait-Corrected p-Value]].

''Empirical investigations'' and ''analysis papers'' state and test a hypothesis, but there are many kinds of scientific papers which likely will not, including ''literature reviews,'' which qualitatively summarize the results of other papers; ''meta-analyses,'' which quantitatively summarize the results and quality of other work; ''observational reports,'' which present data and a chronicle of its collection without analysis, testing, or interpretation; ''conference papers,'' which present preliminary work without peer review; ''definition papers,'' which attempt to formalize terms used in divergent ways in previous work; ''syntheses,'' which present alternative views combining multiple and often conflicting concepts; ''comparative studies,'' which compare and contrast a class of concepts; ''interpretive papers,'' showing a different perspective of previous work; ''technical reports,'' which present information on a specific procedural topic; ''opinion'' and ''editorial essays,'' which are intended argue a point of view persuasively; ''book reviews,'' which summarize monographs or biographies; and ''grant proposals,'' which make the case for funding a project. Mathematical research papers which don't involve emperical observations or uncertainty would be considered technical reports in other fields. Engineering work can be reported as an emperical investigation or a technical report. [[Cueball]] seems to want to author an observational report, but [[Megan]] would prefer an emperical investigation or analysis, perhaps because observational reports are more likely to be accepted by peer reviewed journals, and as such are more prestigious than mere conference papers, "letters," or "communications" as observational reports are usually published.

In the title text, Cueball's conflict of interest statement says that authors hope the results are correct because "we all want to be cool people who are good at science." A scientific publication's potential {{w|conflict of interest}} usually refers to authors' financial, familial, or other external interests in the research outcomes. The disclosure statement does not describe a conflict of interest.

==Transcript==
:[Megan is standing behind and looking over the shoulder of Cueball who is sitting in his office chair at his desk typing on the keyboard. A line from the keyboard goes up to two boxes above them. A smaller one at the top, half the length and a third the height of the larger box below. There are text in both boxes. The bottom box is not filled out with text. At the end of the text in the bottom box the line indicating where the courser are can be seen, as in this is what Megan can see on the screen:]
:Paper title
:''Check out this cool microbe we found''|

:[Pan to only showing Megan who has taken a hand up to her chin. Cueball replies from off-panel.]
:Megan: Isn’t science supposed to be about formulating a hypothesis and then testing it?
:Cueball - off panel: Oh. Yeah, I guess.

:[Same setting as in the first panel, but now the bottom box is filled out with text, but still with the courser shown at the end:]
:Paper title
:''Is our lab really good at finding cool microbes? Some preliminary data''|

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Scientific research]]
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Clickbait]]

2699: Feature Comparison

2022-11-18T16:18:50Z

172.70.206.151: /* Features */ group texts are real

{{comic
| number = 2699
| date = November 16, 2022
| title = Feature Comparison
| image = feature_comparison_v2.png
| imagesize =
| noexpand = true
| titletext = Below the Web, and the Dark Web, a shadowy parallel world of Cybiko users trade messages on the Translucent Neon Plastic Web.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a MULTIHOMED MESH NODE. Read HTML comments to expand. This page is the subject of vandalism, and the comic itself contains severe errors. Assume everything is wrong. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic compares different remote communication services, including the relatively well-known {{w|Twitter}}, {{w|Discord}}, {{w|Mastodon (software)|Mastodon}}, {{w|Facebook}} (FB), {{w|Slack (software)|Slack}}, {{w|Signal (software)|Signal}}, {{w|Internet Relay Chat}} (IRC), {{w|Tumblr}}, {{w|Reddit}}, and {{w|SMS}} mobile telephone text messages. It also includes the less well-known {{w|Cybiko}}® wireless handheld computer for teens. For each of these, it purports to indicate which of various features they support. The comic illustrates how feature comparison charts/infographics can be abused by sellers who are trying to make their products look better than they really are, compared to their main competitors.

===Services===


;Cybiko® wireless handheld computer for teens
:This was a handheld computer designed for teens and released in 2000, which featured its own two-way radio text messaging capabilities along with built-in games and a music player. Additional information about it is available at [http://cultureandcommunication.org/deadmedia/index.php/Cybiko the Dead Media Archive], as the device has not been manufactured since 2003.
:The chart suggests that the Cybiko has an advantage over all of the other listed communication services, as it is capable of all eight of the table's listed features listed, with none of the others being close.
:Purchasing a Cybiko or finding friends who own one can be its own challenge, as device was discontinued nearly 20 years ago. Additionally, the Cybiko is a ''device'' rather than a ''service''; a more fair comparison would be to a modern {{w|smartphone}}, which can provide most of these features via multiple apps, including those apps written especially for such rival services.

===Features===
;Direct Messaging
:Known by {{w|Private message|various names}}, across different platforms, but commonly abbreviated to "DM" or similar. DMs are person-to-person (or possibly person-to-group) communications that do not rely upon the privacy, membership or persistence settings of a given Group Chat 'room'.
:All the services being compared possess the ability to make such direct messages, with sometimes subtle differences in implementation that dictate whether asynchronous or even 'live' two-way conversations are dominant, and the given list is far from exhaustive with email, '{{w|talk (software)|talk}}'-type programs and others having already established the principles used in any particular service's implementation.

;{{w|Mesh networking}}
:A form of connectivity that reduces or removes the need for a centralized server or predefined gateways to a communications 'backbone'. Nodes communicate directly with any nodes that happen to be contactable, and from there may connect through to whatever nodes are in mutual contact, or to be found further afield, either in real-time or asynchronously.
:The Cybiko has this ability, as well as wireless message delivery because it communicates directly to other devices via radio, hence the ability to operate without any internet connectivity at all. There are several {{w|Comparison of software and protocols for distributed social networking|ongoing projects for distributed social networking}}, but all of these additionally require a hardware layer to provide signalling via their respective protocols; which the Cybiko purportedly provides via its decentralized radio capabilities.


This comic contains several errors. Mastodon doesn't require a central server, or support file transfer. Discord does not provide for user-run instances itself, only user-moderated and administrated instances. (There are two third party Discord server implementations, but it is unclear whether those could be counted as run by users.) Slack does not provide for user-run instances itself. Reddit does not provide for user-run instances at all, only user moderation and administration. IRC does require at least one central server,[https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc1459.html] and relegates file transfer support to the domain of client extensions. Signal is heavily used in user-run instances via a diverse ecosystem of code forks; many of these don't require a central server, a couple use mesh networking. Reddit occasionally does have built-in games. Finally, Tumblr and SMS both have a form of group chats.

An earlier version of the comic suggesting that Mastodon has no user-run instances was corrected by [[Randall]] shortly after publication of the original.




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

:[A table with checkmarks to indicate which features various messaging services have. Each column is labeled with a service name and its logo beneath, except that for the last column, the device's longer name is written higher than all the other services' names, with an arrow pointing to a drawing of the device below it.]

{| class="wikitable"
|-
!
! Twitter
! Discord
! Mastodon
! FB
! Slack
! Signal
! IRC
! Tumblr
! Reddit
! SMS
! Cybiko® wireless handheld computer for teens (2000)
|-
! Direct messages
| ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓
|-
! Group chats
| ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || || ✓ || || ✓
|-
! File transfer
| || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || || ✓ || || ✓
|-
! Built-in games
| || ✓ || || ✓ || || || || || || || ✓
|-
! User-run instances
| || ✓ || ✓ || || ✓ || || ✓ || || ✓ || || ✓
|-
! Doesn't require central server
| || || || || || || ✓ || || || || ✓
|-
! Mesh networking
| || || || || || || || || || || ✓
|-
! Wireless message delivery works without internet
| || || || || || || || || || ✓ || ✓
|-
|}

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

2699: Feature Comparison

2022-11-17T17:30:35Z

172.70.206.151: Explain the punchline of the comic: feature comparison charts can be abused.

{{comic
| number = 2699
| date = November 16, 2022
| title = Feature Comparison
| image = feature_comparison_v2.png
| imagesize =
| noexpand = true
| titletext = Below the Web, and the Dark Web, a shadowy parallel world of Cybiko users trade messages on the Translucent Neon Plastic Web.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a MULTIHOMED MESH NODE. Read HTML comments to expand. This page is the subject of vandalism, and the comic itself contains severe errors. Assume everything is wrong. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic compares different remote communication services, including the relatively well-known {{w|Twitter}}, {{w|Discord}}, {{w|Mastodon (software)|Mastodon}}, {{w|Facebook}} (FB), {{w|Slack (software)|Slack}}, {{w|Signal (software)|Signal}}, {{w|Internet Relay Chat}} (IRC), {{w|Tumblr}}, {{w|Reddit}}, and {{w|SMS}} mobile telephone text messages. It also includes the less well-known {{w|Cybiko}}® wireless handheld computer for teens. For each of these, it purports to indicate which of various features they support. The comic illustrates how feature comparison charts/infographics can be abused by sellers who are trying to make their products look better than they really are, compared to their main competitors.

===Services===


;Cybiko® wireless handheld computer for teens
:This was a handheld computer designed for teens and released in 2000, which featured its own two-way radio text messaging capabilities along with built-in games and a music player. Additional information about it is available at [http://cultureandcommunication.org/deadmedia/index.php/Cybiko the Dead Media Archive], as the device has not been manufactured since 2003.
:The chart suggests that the Cybiko has an advantage over all of the other listed communication services, as it is capable of all eight of the table's listed features listed, with none of the others being close.
:Purchasing a Cybiko or finding friends who own one can be its own challenge, as device was discontinued nearly 20 years ago. Additionally, the Cybiko is a ''device'' rather than a ''service''; a more fair comparison would be to a modern {{w|smartphone}}, which can provide get most of these features via multiple apps, including those apps written especially for such rival services.

===Features===
;Direct Messaging
:Known by {{w|Private message|various names}}, across different platforms, but commonly abbreviated to "DM" or similar. DMs are person-to-person (or possibly person-to-group) communications that do not rely upon the privacy, membership or persistence settings of a given Group Chat 'room'.
:All the services being compared possess the ability to make such direct messages, with sometimes subtle differences in implementation that dictate whether asynchronous or even 'live' two-way conversations are dominant, and the given list is far from exhaustive with email, '{{w|talk (software)|talk}}'-type programs and others having already established the principles used in any particular service's implementation.

;{{w|Mesh networking}}
:A form of connectivity that reduces or removes the need for a centralized server or predefined gateways to a communications 'backbone'. Nodes communicate directly with any nodes that happen to be contactable, and from there may connect through to whatever nodes are in mutual contact, or to be found further afield, either in real-time or asynchronously.
:The Cybiko has this ability, as well as wireless message delivery because it communicates directly to other devices via radio, hence the ability to operate without any internet connectivity at all. There are several {{w|Comparison of software and protocols for distributed social networking|ongoing projects for distributed social networking}}.


This comic contains several errors. Mastodon doesn't require a central server, or support file transfer. Discord does not provide for user-run instances itself. (There are two third party Discord server implementations, but it is unclear whether those could be counted as run by users.) Slack does not provide for user-run instances itself. Reddit does not provide for user-run instances at all, only user moderation and administration. IRC does require at least one central server,[https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc1459.html] and relegates file transfer support to the domain of client extensions. Signal is heavily used in user-run instances via a diverse ecosystem of code forks; many of these don't require a central server, a couple use mesh networking. Reddit occasionally does have built-in games. Finally, Tumblr does have a form of group chats.

An earlier version of the comic suggesting that Mastodon has no user-run instances was corrected by [[Randall]] shortly after publication of the original.




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

:[A table with checkmarks to indicate which features various messaging services have. Each column is labeled with a service name and its logo beneath, except that for the last column, the device's longer name is written higher than all the other services' names, with an arrow pointing to a drawing of the device below it.]

{| class="wikitable"
|-
!
! Twitter
! Discord
! Mastodon
! FB
! Slack
! Signal
! IRC
! Tumblr
! Reddit
! SMS
! Cybiko® wireless handheld computer for teens (2000)
|-
! Direct messages
| ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓
|-
! Group chats
| ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || || ✓ || || ✓
|-
! File transfer
| || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || ✓ || || ✓ || || ✓
|-
! Built-in games
| || ✓ || || ✓ || || || || || || || ✓
|-
! User-run instances
| || ✓ || ✓ || || ✓ || || ✓ || || ✓ || || ✓
|-
! Doesn't require central server
| || || || || || || ✓ || || || || ✓
|-
! Mesh networking
| || || || || || || || || || || ✓
|-
! Wireless message delivery works without internet
| || || || || || || || || || ✓ || ✓
|-
|}

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

2694: Königsberg

2022-11-05T03:41:10Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ foil history

{{comic
| number = 2694
| date = November 4, 2022
| title = Königsberg
| image = konigsberg_2x.png
| imagesize = 448x343px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = At first I thought I would need some gold or something to pay him, but then I realized that it was the 18th century and I could just bring a roll of aluminum foil.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a FOX, TWO GOATS, AND THREE BAGS OF GRAIN. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

[[File:Konigsberg bridges.png|frame|right|{{w|Königsberg}} in Euler's time, showing the river Pregel and its seven bridges]]

This comic is about the {{w|Seven Bridges of Königsberg}}, a seminal {{w|graph theory}} problem solved by the famous mathematician {{w|Leonhard Euler}}. The problem was to devise a path through the city that would cross each of the seven bridges only once, without crossing the river forks any other way. Euler proved that there was no solution. This result is considered to be the first theorem of graph theory and the first true proof in the theory of networks,[http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/courses/2004/cscs535/review.pdf] — a subject now generally regarded as a branch of {{w|combinatorics}} — and presaged the development of {{w|topology}}. Combinatorial problems of other types had been considered since antiquity.

[[Cueball]] attempts to cheat on the final exam in his algorithms class by traveling back in time to comission the construction of an eighth bridge before Euler could learn of the problem. He hopes that this would alter his present-day timeline in such a way that the test becomes easier because graph theory might never have been invented.

The title text alludes to the fact that ordinary {{w|aluminum foil}}, which was not commercially available until 1911, would have been tremendously valuable in the 18th century, which didn't even have {{w|tin foil}}.

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

{{comic discussion}}

2691: Encryption

2022-11-03T22:18:24Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ clarify

{{comic
| number = 2691
| date = October 28, 2022
| title = Encryption
| image = encryption_2x.png
| imagesize = 235x380px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = WARNING: PEOPLE NAMED EVE ARE PROHIBITED FROM INSTALLING THIS APP!
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by ALICE FOR BOB - Please change this comment when editing this page.''Possibly connected to Elon buying Twitter? thoughts? talk about secure messaging apps'' Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

When teaching encryption / cryptography, it is common to use a story about sending messages from {{w|Alice and Bob|Alice to Bob}} (Party "A" and Party "B" respectively). Cueball claims to have created a texting app that only allows for this one thing. It is unclear how it enforces this restriction, but looks suspiciously as if the app actually bases this on the names of the phone owners. The title text mentions Eve, who in the typical story represents an "eavesdropper", someone who attempts to intercept the messages between Alice and Bob. The fact that persons named Eve are 'forbidden' from installing the app suggests that it might not actually be as secure as Cueball advertises -- it may be that he naively thinks that it's just the name that makes the eavesdropper, and that by excluding all Eves, Alice's messages to Bob will remain private. It is not clear which phones will support this app, but it appears to be perfectly suited for the [[:Category:xkcd Phones|xkcd Phones]].

Note also that Eve being forbidden to install the app parallels another Eve being forbidden to eat an apple (an app-le?) in a common retelling of the Biblical story of the Garden of Eden (though the actual Biblical text doesn't refer to an apple).

The comics [[177: Alice and Bob]] and [[1323: Protocol]] are also about Alice and Bob.

Even if the assumption that you could divine people's roles and motives from their names were correct, if the names of the users don't need to be verified, it seems possible for a bad actor to circumvent the security features of the app by simply lying about their name. Genuine users could also undermine the security with double installations and a complete mess of a contact list in which everyone's names are somehow identified as "Alice" or "Bob", in order to increase its utility to them. Also, it would appear that "Bob" needn't be the commonly used name of the message receiver, in this scenario – it could also be a diminutive of what he is actually known by. Thus a user might claim to be "Bob" whichever his given name is.

This may be related to the announcement that Signal would be discontinuing support for SMS/MMS messages.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Cueball showing a phone to a long-haired woman, identified in the caption as Alice]
:Cueball: The app will let you send messages to your friend Robert, or my brother.
:Alice: Can they reply?
:Cueball: No.

:[Caption below the panel]:
:My new secure texting app only allows people named Alice to send messages to people named Bob.

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

Talk:2689: Fermat's First Theorem

2022-10-24T18:43:33Z

172.70.206.151: Fermat's Last Theorem. Also, Biden sucks.

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.

2687: Division Notation

2022-10-20T10:25:54Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ spell out

{{comic
| number = 2687
| date = October 19, 2022
| title = Division Notation
| image = division_notation_new_2x.png
| imagesize = 235x310px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = Science tip: Scientists hardly ever use the two-dot division sign, and when they do it often doesn't even mean division, but they still get REALLY mad when you repurpose it to write stuff like SALE! ALL SHOES 30÷ OFF!
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a GROUP OF SCHOOLCHILDREN DIVIDED AMONGST THEMSELVES. Do NOT delete this tazg too soon.}}

This comic pokes fun at some of the ways to write the {{w|Division (mathematics)|division}} operation in math. In this comic, Randall has used A as the dividend (the number being divided) and B as the divisor (the number that A is divided by). Division is the fourth simplest arithmetic operation in mathematics, after addition, subtraction, and multiplication.[https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/principia-mathematica/#PartIVRelaArit]

The first two of the seven notations shown are the {{w|division sign}} (÷) and the {{w|radix}} used for {{w|short division}} and {{w|long division}} in beginning arithmetic. (Note: the short/long division radix is only used in some countries, and there are [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_division#Notation_in_non-English-speaking_countries different notations in the non-English speaking world]). These methods of division are often used by school children because the ÷ sign is what most people use when first learning division, and the short division radix is usually the first algorithm learned for dividing arbitrary dividends, typically starting with the easier abbreviated short division form.

The expression on the third line, A/B, is the way division is usually written in software code. The four simple arithmetic operations in programming usually are +, -, *, /. This one was missing in the first version of the comic. This is most commonly seen in regular mathematics as it somewhat saves space, and is easy to type with the slash key. Additionally, it uses standard {{w|ASCII}} characters instead of extended charsets, which would have helped to establish its traditional usage.

The expression on the forth line, a/b, is how division is usually written when typography costs are not in question, in fraction notation. The Unicode character sets provide some specific fractions such as ⅓ as well as some superscript and subscript characters, so someone familiar with it might use it to write fractions such as ²²⁄₇. But this is tedious and can't be used on more complex expressions, so it is rarely used in everyday life (the fraction A/B cannot be written this way; there is a superscript A, but no subscript B).

The fifth notation is the way division is written in science: the dividend on the top line over the divisor on the bottom under a horizontal line. This is the closest format to how a {{w|Fraction|fraction}} would be written. It has the advantage of clearly separating the numerator and denominator when they are longer expressions, such as polynomials, without needing to add parentheses. This format is mostly used in written math, as it can't be typed without something like {{w|MathML}}, {{w|LaTeX}} or HTML tables.

The sixth notation uses a negative exponent. The exponent -1 is equivalent to reciprocation. It can be used to keep the entire expression on one line. Note that ab-1 is equal to a/b.

The final form of notation declares a function. The writer defines a new function, F, that takes in the parameters A and B, before listing out the function's definition (trailing off in increasingly smaller text). Randall warns the reader they should escape while they still can, because both the function itself and the math environment as a whole are going to get relatively tedious. Integer division can be defined in terms of multiplicative inequalities and the remainder, or modulo ('%' in Python), operator. This situation is likely to occur in abstract algebra, where one might have to define what "division" means for two elements of a mathematical object such as a group, ring, or magma. One example would be an object G, such that, for two elements A and B of G, "A divided by B" is defined as an element C such that CB=A, or alternatively as an element C such that BC=A. These definitions will differ if multiplication in G is not commutative. Furthermore, if such a C is not unique, the function F(A,B) will need to include a method to select a unique value for "A divided by B" for each A and B. Thus, the F(A,B) in the comic might not even refer to a uniquely defined operation, but simply to the property of a function F(A,B) that is a valid division operation on G, given some definition of division.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:Division notation
:A÷B
:B⟌A Schoolchild.
:A/B Software engineer.
:A⁄B Normal person or Unicode enthusiast.
:A over B Scientist.
:AB-1 Fancy scientist.
:F(A, B) such that F(G)= (text getting smaller) Oh no, run

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Programming]]
[[Category:Science tip]]

1751: Movie Folder

2022-10-19T02:01:10Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ ce

{{comic
| number = 1751
| date = October 26, 2016
| title = Movie Folder
| image = movie_folder.png
| titletext = That's actually the original Japanese version of A Million Random Digits, which is much better than the American remake the book was based on.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] is looking through [[Black Hat|Black Hat's]] downloaded movies, which are all adaptations of non-literary works, improbable sequels, and/or crossovers between very disparate properties. Cueball reacts with increasing incredulity to Black Hat's collection, while Black Hat casually responds with equally unlikely (non-)explanations. Knowing Black Hat, his movie folder is deliberately weird just to provoke this kind of reaction.

In the real world, there are movies which can provoke similar shock. For example, many successful films get {{w|direct-to-video}} (or, now, {{w|direct-to-digital}}) sequels and spinoffs, often featuring none of the original cast and which get very little marketing. Therefore, someone might be surprised to know that there's an ''{{w|American Psycho 2}}'', a ''{{w|Starship Troopers 3: Marauder|Starship Troopers 3}}'', a ''{{w|Dr. Dolittle: Million Dollar Mutts|Dr. Dolittle 5}}'', or a ''{{w|Bring It On: Fight to the Finish|Bring It On 5}}''. [[Randall]] previously made fun of the proliferation of direct-to-video sequels in [https://what-if.xkcd.com/65/ What If: Twitter Timeline Height], with at least 27 ''Land Before Time'' films (in reality, there were 14).

Another source of weird titles are {{w|mockbuster}}s. When a film uses a {{w|public domain}} property as its basis, or a title that is too generic to trademark, other studios will simply create their own films and pretend that they're a sequel to the more famous film. Examples include ''{{w|Titanic II (film)|Titanic II}}'', ''{{w|Troll 2}}'', ''{{w|Troll 3}}'', the ''other'' ''{{w|Quest for the Mighty Sword|Troll 3}}'', ''{{w|Day of the Dead 2: Contagium}}'', ''{{w|Alien 2: On Earth}}'' (not to be confused with the real sequel ''{{w|Aliens (film)|Aliens}}'') and ''{{w|War of the Worlds 2: The Next Wave}}''.

Marketing wheezes have also produced some crossovers almost as unexpected as those in the comic — ''{{w|Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde}}'', ''{{w|Scooby-Doo! WrestleMania Mystery}}'' and ''{{w|Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter}}'' are all real films.

A similar setting with Cueball and Black Hat also discussing movies was seen in [[493: Actuarial]]. Back then Black Hat was still reading newspapers. Black Hat has previously given similar non-answers to long series of questions from Cueball in [[908: The Cloud]] and [[1159: Countdown]].

Another type of comic where movie titles needs to be guessed from strange versions of the title was previously used in the [[:Category:Synonym Movies|Synonym Movies]] series.

=== Black Hat's downloaded movies ===
{|class="wikitable"
! Title
! Explanation
|-
| ''Lorem Ipsum: The Movie'' || ''{{w|Lorem Ipsum}}'' are the first two words of a common block of garbled Latin filler text used by typesetters to lay out pages before real text is available. This title implies that this movie is entirely random filler with no meaningful content, although according to the Internet Movie Database, there is a 2011 movie titled [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2032487/ Lorem Ipsum].
|-
| ''Titanic XCVIII'' || The most famous film about the ship {{w|RMS Titanic|Titanic}} is {{w|James Cameron|James Cameron's}} {{w|Titanic (1997 movie)|''Titanic''}} from 1997. But there have been {{w|List of films about the RMS Titanic|several since then}} (at least five) some of which where probably trying to cash in on the name, especially the one called ''{{w|Titanic II (film)|Titanic II}}'', which is about a ship in 2012 called ''Titanic II''. But the producers probably hoped some people would buy the DVD believing it was a sequel to the 1997 movie, a real mockbuster, originally released directly for TV. Black Hat's dialogue implies the preceding films are about at least 97 different Titanics which all sank, creating an artificial reef, and this film is about the 98th (Roman numerals XCVIII = 98) hitting that reef (rather than an iceberg). Black Hat also indicated that the series first got great when the ships began to crash into the reef, indicating that more than one film had this as the plot. He indicates that the 98th in the series (the one Cueball mentions) is one of the good, but he doesn't say that this was the first. But if it was, then they probably also reached ''Titanic C'' (C = 100 in Roman numerals), since at least [[1070: Words for Small Sets|a handful ships]] must have hit the reef to make his sentence make sense. [[1339: When You Assume|Assuming]] that the 98th was the first to hit the reef: As Titanic rests on the Atlantic sea floor at a depth of 3,784 m (12,415 feet), each of the previous ''Titanic''s would need to a) settle immediately on top of its predecessor and b) increase the height of the "reef" by about 40 m (128 feet) on average. The original Titanic was 53 m (175 feet) tall and (assuming a and b above), the keel of the 98th ship would sink to a depth of 20 m (65 feet). However, it would be impossible to stack only 97 Titanic replicas in a more than 3 km high pile in this location to reach this height.
|-
| ''Debbie Did 9/11'' || A combination of ''{{w|Debbie Does Dallas}}'', a 1970s porn film about a cheerleader squad trying to raise money, and a {{w|9/11 conspiracy theory}}. Actual ''Debbie Does Dallas'' sequels include 5 numbered ones, two titled ''Debbie Does Dallas Again'', several with subtitles, and some parodies, unofficial sequels and spinoffs that — like the title quote here — change what Debbie does. IMDb lists, among others, ''Debbie Does Iowa'', ''Debbie Does Wall Street'', ''Debbie Does 'em All'' and ''Debbie Does Damnation''. But it is always Does and never Did. However, in this kind of movie when she does something it of course means to have sex, while {{w|September 11 attacks|9/11}} is a historical event. The assertion that she "did 9/11" is a reference to conspiracy theories attributing the 9/11 attacks to some source other than Osama bin Laden (e.g. an "inside job" designed to rally the public behind the government).
|-
| ''Time Jam: A Connecticut Huskie on King Arthur's Court'' || A combination of the novel ''{{w|A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court}}'' by {{w|Mark Twain}} and the 1996 movie ''{{w|Space Jam}}''. Mark Twain's story is one of the first {{w|time travel}} stories, while ''Space Jam'' stars {{w|Michael Jordan}} and features the {{w|Looney Tunes}} cartoon characters playing basketball against aliens. The huskie is a reference to the University of Connecticut sports teams called the {{w|Connecticut Huskies}}, most notably their basketball team. So in this movie it is one of these Connecticut players who gets Time Jammed (rather than Space Jammed) back to the fictional {{w|King Arthur|King Arthur's}} {{w|Court (royal)|court}} in the late 5th and early 6th centuries AD. An additional basketball reference is the use of "''on'' King Arthur's Court" rather than the original "''in'' King Arthur's Court".
|-
| ''Harold and Kumar Go to Howl's Moving Castle'' || A combination of ''{{w|Harold and Kumar go to White Castle}}'' — about the meandering and very adult adventures of {{w|Harold and Kumar}} (a pair of stoners) — and ''{{w|Howl's Moving Castle (film)|Howl's Moving Castle}}'' — a tender, often philosophical children's {{w|anime}} film by {{w|Hayao Miyazaki}}, based on a novel by {{w|Diana Wynne Jones}}.
|-
| ''A Million Random Digits with 100,000 Normal Deviates'' || This is actually {{w|A Million Random Digits with 100,000 Normal Deviates|a real book from 1955}} (also referenced in [[1210: I'm So Random]]) — back before scientists had access to computers that could easily generate random numbers, this book was very useful for statistics and for setting up scientific experiments. The bulk of the book is {{w|File:Random digits.png|literally just a list of numbers}} (with a preceding chapter explaining the mathematics surrounding the numbers and randomness), so there would be no movie in it except for flashing numbers on a screen. Black Hat comments that the movie came before the book, which was a {{w|novelization}} of the film. The '''title text''' says that the movie is an adaptation of Japanese version. But in the modern world 'Arabic' digits are nearly universal, so it is hard to understand how an adaptation would be different from the Japanese original, unless they used {{w|Japanese numerals}} (which are rarely used for mathematical purposes). It is very common that great/successful Japanese movies (and other countries' great movies) get (often mediocre) American remakes, like the famous horror movie ''{{w|Ring (film)|Ring}}'' from 1998, which was remade in America as ''{{w|The Ring (2002 film)|The Ring}}'' in 2002.
|-
| ''Michael Bay's The Vagina Monologues'' || ''{{w|The Vagina Monologues}}'' is a famous play by {{w|Eve Ensler}}. It consists entirely of a series of women talking frankly about their bodies, their sexuality and their lives. There's no place in it for explosions, but {{w|Michael Bay}} (who is known especially for the modern {{w|Transformers (film series)|Transformers movies}} as well as ''{{w|The Rock (film)|The Rock}}'' and ''{{w|Armageddon (1998 film)|Armageddon}}'', and is also known for his [http://www.thewrap.com/megan-fox-quit-transformers-over-michael-bays-abuse-17614/ rather unfeminist behavior] and excessive explosions in the movies he directs) found a way. Black Hat comments that he found it good despite all those {{w|Computer-generated imagery|CGI}} explosions.
|}

==Transcript==
:[Black Hat is sitting in an armchair, with the right arm on the armrest and looking at his smartphone held in his left hand, when a voice from behind him (off-panel left) addresses him. It turns out in the next panels that it is Cueball.]
:Cueball (off-panel): Your movie folder is so ''weird''. Where do you find all this stuff?
:Black Hat: Dunno.
:Black Hat: Around.

:[In an frame-less panel Cueball is seen sitting in an office chair at a desk facing left. He is looking at Black Hat's computer while typing on the keyboard which is on a shelf lower than the regular desk surface. Black Hat replies to his queries from behind him off-panel right.]
:Cueball: ''Lorem Ipsum: The Movie?''
:Cueball: ''Titanic XCVIII?''
:Black Hat (off-panel): That series gets good when they start hitting the reef created by all the previous wrecks.

:[Cueball leans in closer to the screen.]
:Cueball: ''Debbie Did 9/11?''
:Cueball: ''Time Jam: A Connecticut Huskie on King Arthur's Court?''
:Black Hat (off-panel): Really underrated ''Space Jam'' sequel.

:[Zoom in on the scene so nothing beneath the keyboard is visible. The screen and Cueball's head almost spans the width of the panel.]
:Cueball: ''Harold and Kumar Go to Howl's Moving Castle?''
:Cueball: ''A Million Random Digits with 100,000 Normal Deviates?''
:Black Hat (off-panel): That's the original-the book was a novelization.

:[Back to Black Hat sitting in the chair as in the first panel, but leaning a bit further back and the arm on the armrest has been moved closer to him.]
:Cueball (off-panel): ''Michael Bay's The Vagina Monologues!?''
:Black Hat: It's pretty good, despite all the CGI explosions.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Fiction]]

493: Actuarial

2022-10-19T02:00:03Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ separate out

{{comic
| number = 493
| date = October 24, 2008
| title = Actuarial
| image = actuarial.png
| titletext = I started to do the tables for more famous people but it got really depressing and morbid and I had to go outside. Hat guy wins again.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] is commenting about how he shouldn't feed the trolls, but sometimes gets provoked to the point where he can't help replying. The term ''{{w|Troll (Internet)|Trolling}}'' is used to describe provocative, destructive, or annoying behavior on the {{w|Internet}}.

[[Black Hat]] agrees and tells that he had an issue yesterday with a guy who had a serious case of the
[http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/first first] urge. Some people have to be the first to make a comment on any given posting (be it a blog post or a YouTube video or some other commentable content) and to obnoxiously point out that they have made the first comment. This often manifests as the poster simply posting the word "First" without contributing any actual content to the discussion.

Once again, Black Hat is thus provoked into online retaliation bordering on the sociopathic, choosing a form of retribution that doesn't necessarily break any written rules but strikes directly at the heart and/or mind of his opponent. In this case, he tells the ''first'' guy when all his childhood heroes are likely to die - this could make anyone miserable. To do this, he is using {{w|Life table|actuarial table}}s or life tables, which show for each age the probability that a certain person will be alive by their next birthday.

Cueball reflects that he doesn't wish to become the target of such ire himself, but (without apparent malice on Black Hat's part...) still suffers from a piece of memetic shrapnel from the original attack - Cueball obviously loves the original ''{{w|Star Wars}}'' movies - and Black Hat would know this!

In the title text, it is said how {{tvtropes|TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou|Black Hat's offensive is so effective that he appears to have caused grief even to his own author and creator}}, [[Randall]], who only managed to check up on the ''Star Wars'' cast before getting too depressed.
(So far, six main cast members have died: {{w|Peter Cushing}} ([https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Wilhuff_Tarkin Grand Moff Tarkin]) in 1994, {{w|Alec Guinness}} ([https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Obi-Wan_Kenobi Obi-Wan Kenobi]) in 2000, {{w|Kenny Baker (English actor)}} ([https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/R2-D2 R2-D2]) and {{w|Carrie Fisher}} ([https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Leia_Organa Princess Leia]), both in 2016, {{w|Peter Mayhew}} ([https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Chewbacca Chewbacca]) in 2019, and finally {{w|David Prowse}} ([https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Anakin_Skywalker Darth Vader]) in 2020.)

Randall has used this idea again in [[893: 65 Years]] and published a [http://blog.xkcd.com/2012/07/12/a-morbid-python-script/ 'morbid' program] (the original code has been removed, but an implementation can be found on Github) that uses actuarial tables to calculate the probability that someone will die within a given time. The offense that provoked Black hat was mentioned already in [[269: TCMP]] and then returned to in both [[1019: First Post]] and [[1258: First]].

A similar setting with Cueball and Black Hat also discussing movies appears later in [[1751: Movie Folder]]. But then Black Hat is reading on his smartphone.

It is possible that [[494: Secretary: Part 1]] and the following series are a continuation of this comic, as Black Hat's great power over even Internet trolls via his sociopathic ways would explain why he was chosen as Internet secretary.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball, seated at a computer terminal, facing to the left.]
:Cueball: I know you shouldn't feed the trolls, but sometimes they just provoke me to where I can't help replying.

:[Black Hat, seated in an armchair reading a book, facing to the right]
:Black Hat: Yeah, me too. Yesterday this guy kept spamming "First!", so I got a set of actuarial tables and spent twenty minutes telling him when all his childhood heroes would likely die.

:[Cueball turns around in his chair.]
:Cueball: ...

:[Black Hat, still reading his book.]
:Cueball (off-screen): Remind me never to upset you, ever.
:Black Hat: 2038: Last of the original Star Wars cast dies.
:Cueball (off-screen): Augh!

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Star Wars]]

2683: Fan Theories

2022-10-12T20:03:16Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ sp.

{{comic
| number = 2683
| date = October 10, 2022
| title = Fan Theories
| image = fan_theories_2x.png
| imagesize = 267x318px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = The universe fandom is great. Such sweet and enthusiastic people.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete| Created by a THREE-D PRINTED FAN BASED ON A HYPOTHETICAL SOLUTION TO THE NAVIER-STOKES LAMINAR-TURBULENCE BOUNDARY EQUATION. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

A fan theory is an unofficial hypothesis about work from fiction enthusiasts instead of the official authors. Fan theories may include {{w|Canon (fiction)|non-canonical}} background information for, or continuations of, official narratives.

In this comic, [[Cueball]] refers to scientific hypotheses as "fan theories." Scientists might probably consider this as undervaluing their work, because scientific hypotheses are usually the result of much more serious research than the authorship of fiction.{{Citation needed}} Charismatic cranks often obtain undeserved recognition for supposedly scientific hypotheses, so such disrespect could be perceived as insensitive to real scientists. Once again, [[Randall]] has attempted to devise a new way to annoy scientists. However, many if not most professional scientists are aware of similarities between hypotheses pertaining to fiction and non-fiction.

Conversely, by referring to rigorous scientific studies as "fan theories" [[Randall]] is also elevating the experience of fandom. Though they are typically not supported by research institutions, tenured faculty positions, or grant funding, fandom communities often demonstrate a high degree of skill in literary criticism including evidence gathering, philosophical interpretation, and generative writing. This continues the trend of building connections between disciplines in STEM, social science, and the humanities.

This comic appeared a few days after renewed suggestions that life may exist [https://www.space.com/saturn-moon-enceladus-ocean-phosphorus within one of Saturn's moons].

The title text may be facetious, having to do with unwelcoming or inconsiderate {{w|fandom}}s (or scientists who are annoyed at being called "fans of the universe"), or it could be sincere.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Ponytail, Cueball, White Hat, and Megan standing in a line. Cueball has his hand raised, and Megan has hands balled into fists, exasperated.]
:Cueball: But according to leading fan theories, Jupiter's moons may harbor subsurface oceans.
:Megan: Will you ''please'' stop calling them that?

:[Caption below the panel:]
:How to annoy scientists: refer to all hypotheses as "fan theories"

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

2683: Fan Theories

2022-10-12T20:02:32Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ attempt to improve

{{comic
| number = 2683
| date = October 10, 2022
| title = Fan Theories
| image = fan_theories_2x.png
| imagesize = 267x318px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = The universe fandom is great. Such sweet and enthusiastic people.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete| Created by a THREE-D PRINTED FAN BASED ON A HYPOTHETICAL SOLUTION TO THE NAVIER-STOKES LAMINAR-TURBULENCE BOUNDARY EQUATION. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

A fan theory is an unofficial hypothesis about work from fiction enthusiasts instead of the official authors. Fan theories may include {{w|Canon (fiction)|non-canonical}} background information for, or continuations of, official narratives.

In this comic, [[Cueball]] refers to scientific hypotheses as "fan theories." Scientists might probably consider this as undervaluing their work, because scientific hypotheses are usually the result of much more serious research than the authorship of fiction.{{Citation needed}} Charismatic cranks often obtain undeserved recognition for supposedly scientific hypotheses, so such disrespect could be perceived as insensitive to real scientists. Once again, [[Randall]] has atempted to devise a new way to annoy scientists. However, many if not most professional scientists are aware of similarities between hypotheses pertaining to fiction and non-fiction.

Conversely, by referring to rigorous scientific studies as "fan theories" [[Randall]] is also elevating the experience of fandom. Though they are typically not supported by research institutions, tenured faculty positions, or grant funding, fandom communities often demonstrate a high degree of skill in literary criticism including evidence gathering, philosophical interpretation, and generative writing. This continues the trend of building connections between disciplines in STEM, social science, and the humanities.

This comic appeared a few days after renewed suggestions that life may exist [https://www.space.com/saturn-moon-enceladus-ocean-phosphorus within one of Saturn's moons].

The title text may be facetious, having to do with unwelcoming or inconsiderate {{w|fandom}}s (or scientists who are annoyed at being called "fans of the universe"), or it could be sincere.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Ponytail, Cueball, White Hat, and Megan standing in a line. Cueball has his hand raised, and Megan has hands balled into fists, exasperated.]
:Cueball: But according to leading fan theories, Jupiter's moons may harbor subsurface oceans.
:Megan: Will you ''please'' stop calling them that?

:[Caption below the panel:]
:How to annoy scientists: refer to all hypotheses as "fan theories"

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

2683: Fan Theories

2022-10-12T19:59:24Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ link

{{comic
| number = 2683
| date = October 10, 2022
| title = Fan Theories
| image = fan_theories_2x.png
| imagesize = 267x318px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = The universe fandom is great. Such sweet and enthusiastic people.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete| Created by a THREE-D PRINTED FAN BASED ON A HYPOTHETICAL SOLUTION TO THE NAVIER-STOKES LAMINAR-TURBULENCE BOUNDARY EQUATION. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

A fan theory is an unofficial hypothesis about work from enthusiasts instead of the official authors. Fan theories may include {{w|Canon (fiction)|non-canonical}} background information for, or continuations of, official narratives.

In this comic, [[Cueball]] refers to scientific hypotheses as "fan theories," implying real life is a franchise with an established fandom. Scientists might probably consider doing so as undervaluing their work, because scientific hypotheses are usually the result of much more serious research.{{Citation needed}} Because there are a lot of charismatic cranks who obtain undeserved recognition for their supposedly scientific hypotheses, such disrespect could be perceived as insensitive to real scientists. Once again, [[Randall]] has atempted to devise a new way to annoy scientists.

Conversely, by referring to rigorous scientific studies as "fan theories" [[Randall]] is also elevating the experience of fandom. Though they are typically not supported by research institutions, tenured faculty positions, or grant funding, fandom communities often demonstrate a high degree of skill in literary criticism including evidence gathering, philosophical interpretation, and generative writing. This continues the trend of building connections between disciplines in STEM, social science, and the humanities.

This comic appeared a few days after renewed suggestions that life may exist [https://www.space.com/saturn-moon-enceladus-ocean-phosphorus within one of Saturn's moons].

The title text may be facetious, having to do with unwelcoming or inconsiderate {{w|fandom}}s (or scientists who are annoyed at being called "fans of the universe"), or it could be sincere.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Ponytail, Cueball, White Hat, and Megan standing in a line. Cueball has his hand raised, and Megan has hands balled into fists, exasperated.]
:Cueball: But according to leading fan theories, Jupiter's moons may harbor subsurface oceans.
:Megan: Will you ''please'' stop calling them that?

:[Caption below the panel:]
:How to annoy scientists: refer to all hypotheses as "fan theories"

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

2683: Fan Theories

2022-10-12T19:58:23Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ canon

{{comic
| number = 2683
| date = October 10, 2022
| title = Fan Theories
| image = fan_theories_2x.png
| imagesize = 267x318px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = The universe fandom is great. Such sweet and enthusiastic people.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete| Created by a THREE-D PRINTED FAN BASED ON A HYPOTHETICAL SOLUTION TO THE NAVIER-STOKES LAMINAR-TURBULENCE BOUNDARY EQUATION. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

A fan theory is an unofficial hypothesis about work from enthusiasts instead of the official authors. Fan theories may include {{w|canon|non-canonical}} background information for, or continuations of, official narratives.

In this comic, [[Cueball]] refers to scientific hypotheses as "fan theories," implying real life is a franchise with an established fandom. Scientists might probably consider doing so as undervaluing their work, because scientific hypotheses are usually the result of much more serious research.{{Citation needed}} Because there are a lot of charismatic cranks who obtain undeserved recognition for their supposedly scientific hypotheses, such disrespect could be perceived as insensitive to real scientists. Once again, [[Randall]] has atempted to devise a new way to annoy scientists.

Conversely, by referring to rigorous scientific studies as "fan theories" [[Randall]] is also elevating the experience of fandom. Though they are typically not supported by research institutions, tenured faculty positions, or grant funding, fandom communities often demonstrate a high degree of skill in literary criticism including evidence gathering, philosophical interpretation, and generative writing. This continues the trend of building connections between disciplines in STEM, social science, and the humanities.

This comic appeared a few days after renewed suggestions that life may exist [https://www.space.com/saturn-moon-enceladus-ocean-phosphorus within one of Saturn's moons].

The title text may be facetious, having to do with unwelcoming or inconsiderate {{w|fandom}}s (or scientists who are annoyed at being called "fans of the universe"), or it could be sincere.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Ponytail, Cueball, White Hat, and Megan standing in a line. Cueball has his hand raised, and Megan has hands balled into fists, exasperated.]
:Cueball: But according to leading fan theories, Jupiter's moons may harbor subsurface oceans.
:Megan: Will you ''please'' stop calling them that?

:[Caption below the panel:]
:How to annoy scientists: refer to all hypotheses as "fan theories"

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

2682: Easy Or Hard

2022-10-07T16:05:01Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ cats

{{comic
| number = 2682
| date = October 7, 2022
| title = Easy Or Hard
| image = easy_or_hard_2x.png
| imagesize = 740x400px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = "Friction-driven static electrification is familiar and fundamental in daily life, industry, and technology, but its basics have long been unknown and have continually perplexed scientists from ancient Greece to the high-tech era. [...] To date, no single theory can satisfactorily explain this mysterious but fundamental phenomenon." --Eui-Cheol Shin et. al. (2022)
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by THE EIFFEL TOWER TAKING A TYLENOL - Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic uses a table to compare the perceived difficulty of various questions with how easily they're answered in real life. [[Randall]] has a long history of comics with similar themes, comparing perceptions to reality. In this case, both the perception and the reality are divided into three levels of difficulty, giving a total of nine categories. Accordingly three of the problems listed are effectively as difficult as one would expect, and the remaining six are not. All three of the questions whose answers are "actually pretty easy to find out" relate to the Eiffel Tower, though there's no apparent theme among the other six questions.

It's likely that this comic was at least partially inspired by writing the book "How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems". This book involves answering very elaborate questions from a scientific point of view. This process likely emphasized that some really strange questions are actually difficult to answer, while some questions that seem simple continue to confound scientific knowledge.

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Question !! Perceived Difficulty !! Real Difficulty !! Explanation
|-
|How much does the Eiffel Tower's gravity deflect baseballs in Boston?||Near Impossible||Easy||This problem sounds extremely specific and esoteric, concerning an effect far too small for direct experimentation. But in theory, it's actually a very simple physics problem. Gravitational force is determined entirely by mass and distance. Since the mass of the Eiffel Tower, the mass of a baseball and the distance from Paris to Boston are easy to look up, the calculation is quite simple.
|-
|What time of year did the cretaceous impact happen?||Near Impossible||Difficult||The cretaceous impact happened approximately 65 million ago. The margins of error on calculating something that ancient are necessarily thousands of years wide at least, the notion of determining the time of year seems impossible. In fact, the problem is a difficult one, but many of the animals killed in the impact were fossilized, and comparing those fossils to seasonal growth cycles [https://www.science.org/content/article/springtime-was-season-dinosaurs-died-ancient-fish-fossils-suggest has led to the suggestion that the impact happened in spring in the northern hemisphere.]
|-
|How can relativity be reconciled with quantum mechanics?||Near Impossible||Near Impossible||This remains one of the great unsolved questions in physics. The problem sounds almost unsolvable to laypeople, and remains unsolved even to experts in the field.
|-
|Where was Mars in the sky from Paris on the day the Eiffel Tower opened?||Difficult||Easy||The date of the opening of the tower is well known (March 31, 1889). Since the motions of the planets are predictable, one would expect that the position of Mars in the Paris sky on that date could be calculated, but that it would take a lot of work. In fact, the position of Mars from Paris was recorded at the time, and so is well known.
|-
|How many ants are there?||Difficult||Difficult||While the existence of ants is a mundane part of life for many people, there are so many of them that coming up with a total number of ants in the whole world sounds exceedingly difficult. It is, in fact, a difficult problem, but experts have done a significant amount of work and have come up with well-founded estimates [https://phys.org/news/2022-09-ants-earth-quadrillion.html in the range of 20 quadrillion ants on earth].
|-
|How does Tylenol work?||Difficult||Near Impossible||Tylenol is a brand name for paracetamol, also known as acetaminophen, a drug commonly sold without prescription for pain relief and fever reduction. This drug has been widely used since 1950, and has been well established as being both effective and safe when used properly. One would expect the biological mechanism for any drug to be complicated, but most people would assume that a drug that's been widely used and studied for so long would have well-understood effects. Surprisingly, however, the precise action still isn't fully understood. Scientists have concluded that the drug does work, but don't know exactly how.
|-
|How tall is the Eiffel Tower?||Easy||Easy||The height of any structure that can be easily observed can be calculated without much difficulty. The Eiffel Tower was constructed to be the centerpiece of the 1889 World's Fair. At the time of its construction, it was the tallest man-made structure on earth, which meant that its height was widely publicized since it was first constructed (330 meters, or 1083 feet). This number is widely published, and easily confirmed.
|-
|How does general anesthesia work?||Easy||Difficult||While biology is always complex, inducing unconsciousness seems relatively simple. In fact, keeping a person unconscious and insensate without causing permanent damage or death is a difficult proposition, requiring a medical specialist. Despite this field being well-established, it might surprise people to know that the mechanism of general anesthesia is still the subject of research, and recent studies have revealed things that we didn't previously understand.
|-
|Why does your hair get a static charge when you rub it with a balloon?||Easy||Near Impossible||Inducing a static charge by rubbing together two materials is a method that's been known since ancient times. Since human hair has a marked tendency to develop a positive charge, and the latex commonly used in balloons tends to develop a negative charge, rubbing the two together is a very simple way to create an electric field. This process is so simple that it's used for both party tricks and as a fun demonstration of electrical phenomena. Because of this simplicity, most people would assume that the phenomenon is well understood. So it's surprising that the actual mechanism remains an unsolved problem in physics. The title text quotes a paper explaining that, as common as this phenomenon is, there's still no theory that can adequately explain what we observe.
|}

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! !! Actually pretty easy to find out !! Very hard, but there have been recent breakthroughs !! Extremely hard, currently unsolved
|-
! Sounds borderline unsolvable
|How much does the Eiffel Tower's gravity deflect baseballs in Boston?||What time of year did the cretaceous impact happen?||How can relativity be reconciled with quantum mechanics?
|-
! Sounds pretty hard, but you'd assume someone knows
|Where was Mars in the sky from Paris on the day the Eiffel Tower opened?||How many ants are there?||How does Tylenol work?
|-
! Sounds like it would be easy to look up
|How tall is the Eiffel Tower?||How does general anesthesia work?||Why does your hair get a static charge when you rub it with a balloon?
|}

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Charts]]
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Animals]]
[[Category:Medicine]]
[[Category:Physics]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]

Radiation

2022-01-27T17:00:59Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| date = March 19, 2011
| title = Radiation
| image = radiation.png
| titletext = Click to view full
| lappend = 2011/03/19/radiation-chart
| ldomain = blog
| extra = yes
}}

* The full-size version of this chart can be found here: http://xkcd.com/radiation/.
* The original blog post "Radiation Chart" can be found here: http://blog.xkcd.com/2011/03/19/radiation-chart/.
* The additional blog post with updated commentary can be found here: http://blog.xkcd.com/2011/04/26/radiation-chart-update/.

==Explanation==
This is a chart listing various sources of radiation and the amount of dosage in sieverts (a unit of absorbed radiation) you would receive. There is an image of squares next to each radiation source, which act as a representation for an amount of sieverts. The blue squares represent .05 micro sieverts each, the green squares represent 20 micro sieverts each, the red squares represent 10 milli sieverts each, and the yellow squares represent 1 sievert each.

This was released shortly after, and due to, the {{w|Tohoku Earthquake}} and the beginning of the crisis at the {{w|Fukushima nuclear plant}}.

The first section, the blue section, shows small dosages of radiation compared to 1 to 800 blue squares.
A much smaller version of the blue chart is shown in the green section to compare blue to green squares. The green section uses green squares in comparison to its radiation amounts, which are much larger than those listed on the blue section.
The red section uses red squares to compare its much more powerful radiation sources. It has a smaller revision of the green chart to compare green to red squares.
The yellow section compares yellow squares to a single source, the amount of radiation absorbed during ten minutes next to the Chernobyl reactor core after explosion and meltdown. It likewise features a small version of the red chart to compare yellow to red squares.

Randall points out the cell phones do not produce ionizing radiation, "unless it's a bananaphone". This is in reference to ''[[wikipedia:Bananaphone|Bananaphone]]'', a 1994 children's song by Raffi which, on the internet, saw its peak of memetic popularity in 2004. As noted in the blue chart, bananas give off less than a fraction of a micro-Sievert of radiation; thus, a phone that is also a banana would give off radiation (although the amount is unclear since people don't eat their phones{{citation needed}}).

Below the charts there is a conversion table comparing various squares to each other and their conversion rates.
Below that is various web sources that have just the urls listed, not in any official citation like MLA or APA.

Randal explains at the bottom that this chart is merely a rough guideline, and may have errors. Indeed, his sources that he listed have many typos and some are broken links.

It is likely that this comic was the inspiration for the much larger and more complex [[980: Money]] that came out later that year.

==Transcript==
:Title: Radiation Dose Chart
:Subtitle: This is a chart of the ionization dose a person can absorb from various sources. The unit for absorbed dose is "sievert" (Sv), and measures the effect a dose of radiation will have on the cells of the body. One sievert (all at once) will make you sick, and too many more will kill you, but we safely absorb small amounts of natural radiation daily. Note: The same number of sieverts absorbed in a shorter time will generally cause more damage, but your cumulative long-term dose plays a big role in things like cancer risk.

:Blue section:
:1 blue square: Sleeping next to someone (0.05 μSv)
:1.8 blue squares: Living within 50 miles of a nuclear power plant for a year (0.09 μSv)
:2 blue squares: Eating one banana (0.1 μSv)
:6 blue squares: Living within 50 miles of a coal power plant for a year (0.3 μSv)
:20 blue squares: Arm X-Ray (1 μSv)
:25 blue squares: Extra dose from spending one day in an area with higher-than-average natural background radiation, such as the Colorado plateau (1.2 μSv)
:100 blue squares: Dental x-ray (5 μSv)
:200 blue squares: Background dose received by an average person over one normal day (10 μSv)
:800 blue squares: Airplane flight from New York to LA (400 μSv)

:Note under blue section: Using a cell phone (0 μSv)-a cell phone's transmitter does not produce ionizing radiation* and does not cause cancer.
:*Unless it's a bananaphone.

:Green section:
:1 green square: Chest x-ray (20 μSv)
:1.5 green squares: EPA yearly release target for a nuclear power plant (30 μSv)
:3 green squares: All the does in the blue chart combined (~60 μSv)
:2 green squares: Extra dose to Tokyo in weeks following Fukushima accident (40 μSv
:3.5 green squares: Living in a stone, brick, or concrete building for a year (70 μSv)
:4 green squares: Average total dose from the Three Mile Island accident to someone living within 10 miles (80 μSv)
:5 green squares: Approximate total dose received at Fukushima Town Hall over two weeks following accident (100 μSv)
:12.5 green squares: EPA yearly release limit for a nuclear power plant (250 μSv)
:19.5 green squares: Yearly dose from natural potassium in the body (390 μSv)
:20 green squares: Mammogram (400 μSv)
:50 green squares: EPA yearly limit on radiation exposure to a single member of the public (1 mSv=1,000 μSv)
:50 green squares: Maximum external dose from Three Mile Island accident (1 mSv)
:50 green squares: Typical dose over two weeks in Fukushima Exclusion Zone (1 mSv, but areas northwest saw far higher doses)
:100 green squares: Head CT Scan (2 mSv)
:200 green squares: Normal yearly background dose. About 85% is from natural sources. Nearly all the rest os from medical scans (~4 mSv)
:300 green squares: Dose from spending an hour on the grounds at the Chernobyl plant in 2010 (6 mSv in one spot, but varies wildly)
:350 green squares: Chest CT scan (7 mSv)
:2,500 green squares: Maximum yearly dose permitted for US radiation workers (50 mSv)

:Red section:
:4 red squares: Approximate total dose at one station at the north-west station of the Fukushima exclusion zone (40 mSv)
:5 red squares: Radiation worker one-year dose limit (50 mSv)
:7.5 red squares: All doses in green chart combined (~75 mSv)
:10 red squares: Lowest one-year dose clearly linked to increased cancer risk (100 mSv)
:18 red squares: Dose received by two Fukushima plant workers (~180 mSv)
:40 red squares: Dose causing symptoms of radiation poisoning if received in a short time (400 mSv, but it varies)
:200 red squares: severe radiation poisoning, in some cases fatal (2000 mSv, 2 Sv)
:400 red squares: Usually fatal radiation poisoning. Survival occassionally possible with prompt treatment (4 Sv)
:800 red squares: Fatal dose, even with treatment (8 Sv)

:Smaller section within red section:
:EPA guidelines for emergency situations, provided to ensure quick decision-making:
:10 red squares: Dose limit for emergency workers protecting valuable property (100 mSv)
:25 red squares: Dose limit for emergency workers in lifesaving operations (250 mSv)

:Yellow section:
:50 yellow squares: Ten minutes next to the Chernobyl reactor core after explosion and meltdown (50 Sv)

:Conversion charts:
:1 blue square equals (0.05 μSv)
:400 blue squares equal 1 green square (20 μSv)
:500 green squares equal 1 red square (10 mSv)
:100 red squares equal 1 yellow square (1 Sv)

:Sources:
:http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/cfr/part020/
:[https://nema.nebraska.gov/tech-hazard/radiation-dose-limits www.nema.ne.gov/technological/dose-limits.html]
:http://www.deq/idaho.gov/inl_oversight/radiation/dose_calculator.cfm
:http://www.deq/idaho.gov/inl_oversight/radiation/radiation_guide.cfm
:http://mitnse.com/
:http://www.bnl.gov/bnlweb/PDF/03SER/Chapter_8.pdf
:http://dels-old.nas.edu/dels/rpt_briefs/rerf_final.pdf
:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sievert
:http://blog.vornaskotti.com/2010/07/15/into-the-zone-chernobyl-pripyat/
:http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fzact-sheets/tritium-radiation-fs.html
:http://www.mext.go.jp/component/a_menu/other/detail/))icsFiles/afieldfile/20011/03/18/1303723_1716.pdf
:http://radiology.rnsa.org/content/248/1/254

:Chart by Randal Munroe, with help from Ellen, Senior Reactor Operator at the Reed Research Reactor, who suggested the idea and provided a lot of the sources. I'm sure I've added in lots of mistakes; it's for general education only. If you're basing radiation safety procedures on an internet PNG image and things go wrong, you have no one to blame but yourself.
{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Charts]]
[[Category:Large drawings]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

2550: Webb

2022-01-24T09:55:18Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ done

{{comic
| number = 2550
| date = December 3, 2021
| title = Webb
| image = webb.png
| titletext = Each one contains a chocolate shaped like a famous spacecraft and, for the later numbers, a pamphlet on managing anxiety.
}}

==Explanation==

This comic depicts an {{w|advent calendar}} geared toward astronomers anticipating the launch of the {{w|James Webb Space Telescope}}.

At the time this comic was published, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) was scheduled to be launched on the 22nd of December, 2021 (after [[2014: JWST Delays|many prior delays]]). Christmas would indeed have come early for astronomers if the launch had been successful and on time. By December 14, the launch date had been pushed back again to "no earlier than December 24", as NASA was working on resolving a communications issue between the observatory and its launch vehicle system. This was followed by another delay announced on December 21, when the launch date was pushed back to December 25, due to weather concerns. It was {{w|Ariane flight VA256|successfully launched}} from Kourou in French Guiana on December 25 at 09:20 FGT (12:20 UTC, 07:20 {{w|UTC−05:00|EST}}), as hoped for in this comic: [[2559: December 25th Launch]].

A normal advent calendar marks the days until Christmas by allowing miniature doors to be opened, or other means of revealing some treat/picture. This is often from the 1st of the month until the 'big reveal' on the 24th or 25th, though other schemes may exist in other cultures. This particular calendar features 18 hexagonal features, intended to be sequentially accessed over several days, in the same layout as the 18 gold-beryllium mirror segments designed to fold out to form the JWST's primary mirror. The first door is on the 5th, two days after this comic's publication date, making the last on the 22nd, the 'Big Day'.

Cueball's question could be interpreted two ways: Cueball doesn't know about JWST, so he is asking why this advent calendar ends before Christmas (and possibly fearing this calendar is similar to the one in [[1245: 10-Day Forecast]]); or Cueball does know about JWST and its history of delays, so he is asking why the calendar ends on 22 when there is no certainty in that launch date (and also implying that he expects it to be delayed). [Note: two weeks after the comic was posted, the JWST was again delayed, this time to no earlier than Christmas Eve (and later finally to Christmas Day itself), making the expectation accurate. This would also make a traditional advent calendar serve equally well, were it not for the hexagon design.]

December 22 is also the day after the northern hemisphere winter solstice. The end of the world was famously predicted for the winter solstice in [[998: 2012|2012]].

The title text references the fact that chocolates in advent calendars are often molded into different shapes, and the fact that the later numbers have a "pamphlet on managing anxiety" is probably supposed to quell the impeding fear that the launch could be delayed further or go wrong. The telescope's launch was initially planned for 2007, but due to various redesigns, financial issues, accidents, flaws, and the {{w|COVID-19 pandemic}}, the launch date was pushed back to 2011, then 2013, 2018, 2020, May 2021, October 2021, and finally to the current launch date in December 2021. It may also allude to post-launch concerns; even if the launch goes well, there will still be nervousness about the [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6ihVeEoUdo| complex 160-day process] in which the JWST reaches its intended {{w|James_Webb_Space_Telescope#Mission|observation point}} 930,000 miles from Earth, many subsystems are unfolded/deployed, and the instrument passes its final calibrations. There is effectively no way to rescue/repair this expensive piece of equipment should anything be amiss, unlike the {{w|Hubble Space Telescope}}, which was visited five times by {{w|Space Shuttles}} to remedy and enhance various features. (There exist issues with even Hubble that cannot currently be considered repairable without the Shuttles or any proven replacement, and the JWST will be located far beyond Hubble's operational orbit in a place much more difficult to get to.)

The JWST has been referenced previously in [[1730: Starshade]], [[2014: JWST Delays]] and [[2447: Hammer Incident]], mentioned in [[1461: Payloads]] as well as indirectly in [[975: Occulting Telescope]]. After this comic it was referenced in [[2559: December 25th Launch]] and [[2564: Sunshield]].

==Transcript==
:[Cueball and Ponytail are looking at an advent calendar hanging on a wall in front of them. The advent calendar is loosely tiled with 18 smaller hexagons, numbered from 5 to 22 in no clear order or pattern. They are regularly arranged into a larger hexagonal shape and of the five rows, there are three in the top and bottom ones, as also with each diagonal edge. There are four in each of the other rows, offset symmetrically, with a gap where a fifth could have been in the centre of the middle row.]
:Cueball: The hexagons are nice.
:Cueball: But why does it end at 22?
:Numbers:
5 22 10
11 15 19 17
14 7 none 13 8
9 16 6 20
18 21 12

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Astronomer Advent Calendar

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Christmas]]
[[Category:Calendar]]
[[Category:Telescopes]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]
[[Category:Food]]

2549: Edge Cake

2022-01-24T09:54:59Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ done

{{comic
| number = 2549
| date = December 1, 2021
| title = Edge Cake
| image = edge_cake.png
| titletext = Every time IERS adds or removes a leap second, they send me a birthday cake out of superstition.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Megan]]—possibly an {{w|IERS}} (International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems) agent—wishes Emily, represented as [[Hairbun]], Happy Birthday. This prompts a confused [[Cueball]] to ask if her birthday was sometime last month. Emily explains that she was born over the North Pole in a plane, meaning that she was born in every timezone at once. Technically though this is false, as there are some timezones (such as {{w|Nepal Standard Time|UTC+5:45}}) that are not represented at the north pole. Except for the one hour before it's midnight at the International Date Line, the date in eastern time zones is one day ahead of western time zones, so Emily would have been born on two days at once.

She also says that it was February 29th (presumably it was also February 28 or March 1 in some time zones). February 29th only happens at most once every four years in the Gregorian calendar, adding to the confusion - people born on February 29th often celebrate their non-leap-year birthdays on arbitrary days (or {{w|The_Pirates_of_Penzance#Synopsis|not at all}}). Normally {{w|Birth aboard aircraft and ships|one could simply use the time zone of the city the airplane took off from}}, but the airline company was changing ownership from one country to another at the time, so this option has apparently been ruled out. This is not terribly logical however, since contracts transferring ownership usually specify an exact time (commonly one minute before or after midnight in a specific time zone to avoid confusion on which day midnight is in) to come into effect. Regardless of which time zone(s) she was in when she was born this is an absolute time and if she was born before it she would have been born in an aircraft of the first country and if after it in an aircraft of the second country. Alternately, the time zone of the city the aircraft took off from doesn't change even if nationality of the plane changes in midair, so that should have still been an option.

The punchline is that rather than try to identify the correct birthday for Emily, the {{w|BIPM}} has decided to let her have birthdays whenever she wants. This doesn't make much sense, however. As noted above even if she was born in every time zone at once it could only have been on one of two days (February 29th, plus either February 28th or March 1st). Since it is common for people born on February 29th to celebrate on February 28th in non-leap years, it would have been trivial to pick the non-leap day present in some of the time zones (either February 28th or March 1st) and declare it Emily's birthday.

In real life researchers in the Arctic at or near the North Pole use {{w|Coordinated Universal Time}} as the [http://www.thoughtco.com/the-north-pole-1435098 local time standard] by convention, to avoid this exact problem. Thus it could have been said that Emily was born on the date that it was at that time in UTC. Furthermore, it is extremely unlikely that she would have been born at the exact instant the plane was over the north pole, indeed, it is unlikely that the plane even traveled over the exact pole, as opposed to a few miles or even feet to either side of it. With modern positioning equipment such as GPS it should have been possible to determine which time zone the plane was in when she was born. Even in the impossibly unlikely event that she was directly above the pole at the instant of her birth, at jetliner speeds the plane was travelling about ten miles per minute, so a reasonable delay of even seconds in declaring "time of birth" would have placed the plane and her clearly in one time zone.

Both the comic title and Cueball's final line are puns on "{{w|edge case}}", an engineering term referring to situations or conditions that are unusual in a way likely to cause problems unless specifically accounted for. Edge pieces are generally only important with sheet goods (brownies sheet cakes, etc), which are typically cut into pieces creating a difference between pieces originating on the edge and pieces originating from the center. Since the sides of a cake are often frosted, an edge piece has two faces covered in frosting and a corner piece has three, while a center piece only has one. Depending upon your relative preferences between the surface (often icing over marzipan) and core body of the cake (which can be fruitcake, or some variety of spongecake, etc, but not actually obvious which until the cake is cut), it being an edge-faced slice can be considered a bonus. Cueball certainly seems to appreciate this.

The title text states that the {{w|IERS}} sends Emily a cake every time they add or remove a leap second, out of superstition (perhaps Megan is delivering that cake). The International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service is in charge of global time standards. It occasionally adds one leap-second to {{w|Coordinated Universal Time}} to adjust for changes in the rotation speed of the Earth.

The comic might also be a modern version of the ''{{w|SS Warrimoo}}'', a passenger liner that reportedly crossed the international date line at the equator on midnight Dec. 31, 1899. This would have placed her bow in the Southern Hemisphere on 1 January 1900, her stern in the Northern Hemisphere on 31 December 1899. She would therefore have been simultaneously in two different hemispheres, on two different days, in two different months, in two different years, in two different decades, and according to some definitions in two different seasons (northern winter and southern summer) and {{w|Century#Start_and_end_of_centuries|possibly}} in two different centuries.

==Transcript==
:[Megan is walking towards Cueball and Emily (who resembles Hairbun), holding a cake.]
:Megan: Happy birthday, Emily!
:Cueball: Wait, wasn't that last month? When's your birthday, anyways?
:Emily: It's complicated.

:[A diagram of a flight path over the North Pole, with meridian lines radiating out from the center. Emily's dialogue appears above the diagram, but she herself does not appear in this panel.]
:Emily: My mom went into labor on an arctic international flight that diverted directly over the North Pole.
:Emily: I was born in every time zone at once.

:[With Megan standing behind her, Emily holds out a plate of cake to Cueball.]
:Emily: It was also February 29th, and the airline was just changing ownership between countries.
:Emily: The International Bureau of Weights and Measures finally issued a declaration that it's my birthday whenever I want.
:Emily: Cake?
:Cueball: Nice, it's all edge pieces.

==Trivia==
Hairbun was last named "Emily" in [[788: The Carriage]]. More specifically, that version of Hairbun represented {{w|Emily Dickinson}}, a real, historical person who had no such issues regarding her birthday.{{Citation needed}}

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Hairbun]]
[[Category:Time]]
[[Category:Engineering]]
[[Category:Science]]

2568: Spinthariscope

2022-01-14T22:26:04Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ brief explain other 2

{{comic
| number = 2568
| date = January 14, 2022
| title = Spinthariscope
| image = spinthariscope.png
| titletext = Other high scorers are melt-in-your-hand aluminum-destroying gallium and tritium-powered glowsticks. Lawn darts are toward the other end.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a SPINTHARISCOPE - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
As stated in the comic, a {{w|spinthariscope}} is a device with a small amount of radioactive material and a screen. When one of the radioactive atoms decays, it emits an {{w|alpha particle}}, which strikes the screen, which emits a small flash of light. You can see these flashes by looking through a lens.

It was invented in 1903 initially as a scientific instrument, but was soon replaced by more accurate and quantitative devices. But the original device was still popular for some time as an educational toy for children, and you can still get them today.

The joke in the comic is that most people have little understanding of radiation, and overreact to any mention that something is radioactive. So when Cueball tells Megan, White Hat, and Ponytail that the toy contains radioactive material, they're shocked and scared. But the amount of radioactive material in the toy is very tiny, so there's practically no risk from it. The caption says that the ratio between the assumed danger and the actual danger is highest of any known toy.

The title text mentions some other materials that sound dangerous but aren't. {{w|Gallium}} is a metallic element with a low melting point of 29.76°C (85.568°F) so it will melt in your hand. Additionally, gallium has strange properties when it interacts with aluminum, causing it to [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgXNwLoS-Hw "melt"] or become brittle. {{w|Tritium radioluminescence|Tritium}} is a radioactive isotope of hydrogen, but can be used to create {{w|glowstick}}s and other lighted objects. Though these two materials seem dangerous, they are actually perfectly safe.

At the opposite end of the spectrum is {{w|lawn darts}}, a toy containing large darts that are thrown at a target that's placed on the ground. Contrary to the spinthariscope, which sounds dangerous but is actually harmless, lawn darts sound innocent but can cause severe injury if you accidentally hit a person (and a few children were even killed), so they were banned in the US in the 1980's.

Precisely speaking, Randall should claim that spinthariscopes have the highest ''product'', not ''ratio'', of "that can't be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality. The quantity he intends is one that increases as freakout and actual safety/legality increase, as a product would. A ratio of the two quantities would decrease as actual safety/legality increases. However, this re-wording, while accurate, might confuse readers not familiar with mathematical terminology.

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

:[Cueball, Megan, White Hat, and Ponytail standing in a line. Cueball is holding a spinthariscope. Megan has her arms bent in a defensive position. White Hat has his arms raised in fear and Ponytail is pointing at Cueball.]

:Cueball: It's a spinthariscope, a 1940s toy with a radioactive isotope inside. If you let your eyes adjust to total darkness and look into the lens, you can see the flashes of individual atoms decaying.
:Megan: What??
:White Hat: AAAAA!
:Ponytail: Get it away!

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Fun fact: Spinthariscopes have the highest ratio of "that can't possibly be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality of any known toy.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Chemistry]]
[[Category:Fun fact]]

2568: Spinthariscope

2022-01-14T22:16:23Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ more

{{comic
| number = 2568
| date = January 14, 2022
| title = Spinthariscope
| image = spinthariscope.png
| titletext = Other high scorers are melt-in-your-hand aluminum-destroying gallium and tritium-powered glowsticks. Lawn darts are toward the other end.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a SPINTHARISCOPE - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
As stated in the comic, a {{w|spinthariscope}} is a device with a small amount of radioactive material and a screen. When one of the radioactive atoms decays, it emits an {{w|alpha particle}}, which strikes the screen, which emits a small flash of light. You can see these flashes by looking through a lens.

It was invented in 1903 initially as a scientific instrument, but was soon replaced by more accurate and quantitative devices. But the original device was still popular for some time as an educational toy for children, and you can still get them today.

The joke in the comic is that most people have little understanding of radiation, and overreact to any mention that something is radioactive. So when Cueball tells Megan, White Hat, and Ponytail that the toy contains radioactive material, they're shocked and scared. But the amount of radioactive material in the toy is very tiny, so there's practically no risk from it. The caption says that the ratio between the assumed danger and the actual danger is highest of any known toy.

The title text mentions some other materials that sound dangerous but aren't. At the opposite end of the spectrum is {{w|lawn darts}}, a toy containing large darts that are thrown at a target that's placed on the ground. Contrary to the spinthariscope, which sounds dangerous but is actually harmless, lawn darts sound innocent but can cause severe injury if you accidentally hit a person (and a few children were even killed), so they were banned in the US in the 1980's.

Precisely speaking, Randall should claim that spinthariscopes have the highest ''product'', not ''ratio'', of "that can't be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality. The quantity he intends is one that increases as freakout and actual safety/legality increase, as a product would. A ratio of the two quantities would decrease as actual safety/legality increases. However, this re-wording, while accurate, might confuse readers not familiar with mathematical terminology.

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

:[Cueball, Megan, White Hat, and Ponytail standing in a line. Cueball is holding a spinthariscope. Megan has her arms bent in a defensive position. White Hat has his arms raised in fear and Ponytail is pointing at Cueball.]

:Cueball: It's a spinthariscope, a 1940s toy with a radioactive isotope inside. If you let your eyes adjust to total darkness and look into the lens, you can see the flashes of individual atoms decaying.
:Megan: What??
:White Hat: AAAAA!
:Ponytail: Get it away!

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Fun fact: Spinthariscopes have the highest ratio of "that can't possibly be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality of any known toy.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Chemistry]]
[[Category:Fun fact]]

2568: Spinthariscope

2022-01-14T22:14:38Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ better

{{comic
| number = 2568
| date = January 14, 2022
| title = Spinthariscope
| image = spinthariscope.png
| titletext = Other high scorers are melt-in-your-hand aluminum-destroying gallium and tritium-powered glowsticks. Lawn darts are toward the other end.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a SPINTHARISCOPE - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
As stated in the comic, a {{w|spinthariscope}} is a device with a small amount of radioactive material and a screen. When one of the radioactive atoms decays, it emits an {{w|alpha particle}}, which strikes the screen, which emits a small flash of light. You can see these flashes by looking through a lens.

It was invented in 1903 initially as a scientific instrument, but was soon replaced by more accurate and quantitative devices. But the original device was still popular for some time as an educational toy for children, and you can still get them today.

The joke in the comic is that most people have little understanding of radiation, and overreact to any mention that something is radioactive. So when Cueball tells Megan, White Hat, and Ponytail that the toy contains radioactive material, they're shocked and scared. But the amount of radioactive material in the toy is very tiny, so there's practically no risk from it. The caption says that the ratio between the assumed danger and the actual danger is highest of any known toy.

The title text mentions some other materials that sound dangerous but aren't. At the opposite end of the spectrum is {{w|lawn darts}}, a toy containing large darts that are thrown at a target that's placed on the ground. Contrary to the spinthariscope, which sounds dangerous but is actually harmless, lawn darts sound innocent but can cause severe injury if you accidentally hit a person (and a few children were even killed), so they were banned in the US in the 1980's.

Precisely speaking, Randall should claim that spinthariscopes have the highest ''product'', not ''ratio'', of "that can't be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality. The quantity he intends is one that increases as freakout and actual safety/legality increase, as a product would. A ratio of the two quantities would decrease as actual safety/legality increases. However, this re-wording, while accurate, might confuse readers not familiar with mathematical terminology.

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

:Cueball: It's a spinthariscope, a 1940s toy with a radioactive isotope inside. If you let your eyes adjust to total darkness and look into the lens, you can see the flashes of individual atoms decaying.
:Megan: What??
:White Hat: AAAAA!
:Ponytail: Get it away!

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Fun fact: Spinthariscopes have the highest ratio of "that can't possibly be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality of any known toy.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Chemistry]]
[[Category:Fun fact]]

2568: Spinthariscope

2022-01-14T22:14:15Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ cats

{{comic
| number = 2568
| date = January 14, 2022
| title = Spinthariscope
| image = spinthariscope.png
| titletext = Other high scorers are melt-in-your-hand aluminum-destroying gallium and tritium-powered glowsticks. Lawn darts are toward the other end.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a SPINTHARISCOPE - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
As stated in the comic, a {{w|spinthariscope}} is a device with a small amount of radioactive material and a screen. When one of the radioactive atoms decays, it emits an {{w|alpha particle}}, which strikes the screen, which emits a small flash of light. You can see these flashes by looking through a lens.

It was invented in 1903 initially as a scientific instrument, but was soon replaced by more accurate and quantitative devices. But the original device was still popular for some time as an educational toy for children, and you can still get them today.

The joke in the comic is that most people have little understanding of radiation, and overreact to any mention that something is radioactive. So when Cueball tells Megan, White Hat, and Ponytail that the toy contains radioactive material, they're shocked and scared. But the amount of radioactive material in the toy is very tiny, so there's practically no risk from it. The caption says that the ratio between the assumed danger and the actual danger is highest of any known toy.

The title text mentions some other materials that sound dangerous but aren't. At the opposite end of the spectrum is {{w|lawn darts}}, a toy containing large darts that are thrown at a target that's placed on the ground. Contrary to the spinthariscope, which sounds dangerous but is actually harmless, lawn darts sound innocent but can cause severe injury if you accidentally hit a person (and a few children were even killed), so they were banned in the US in the 1980's.

Precisely speaking, Randall should claim that spinthariscopes have the highest ''product'', not ''ratio'', of "that can't be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality. The quantity he intends is one that increases as freakout and actual safety/legality increase, as a product would. A ratio of the two quantities would decrease as actual safety/legality increases. However, this re-wording, while accurate, might confuse readers not familiar with mathematical terminology.

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

:Cueball: It's a spinthariscope, a 1940s toy with a radioactive isotope inside. If you let your eyes adjust to total darkness and look into the lens, you can see the flashes of individual atoms decaying.
:Megan: What??
:White Hat: AAAAA!
:Ponytail: Get it away!

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Fun fact: Spinthariscopes have the highest ratio of "that can't possibly be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality of any known toy.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Chemistry]]
[[Category:Facts]]

2568: Spinthariscope

2022-01-14T22:13:47Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ ce

{{comic
| number = 2568
| date = January 14, 2022
| title = Spinthariscope
| image = spinthariscope.png
| titletext = Other high scorers are melt-in-your-hand aluminum-destroying gallium and tritium-powered glowsticks. Lawn darts are toward the other end.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a SPINTHARISCOPE - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
As stated in the comic, a {{w|spinthariscope}} is a device with a small amount of radioactive material and a screen. When one of the radioactive atoms decays, it emits an {{w|alpha particle}}, which strikes the screen, which emits a small flash of light. You can see these flashes by looking through a lens.

It was invented in 1903 initially as a scientific instrument, but was soon replaced by more accurate and quantitative devices. But the original device was still popular for some time as an educational toy for children, and you can still get them today.

The joke in the comic is that most people have little understanding of radiation, and overreact to any mention that something is radioactive. So when Cueball tells Megan, White Hat, and Ponytail that the toy contains radioactive material, they're shocked and scared. But the amount of radioactive material in the toy is very tiny, so there's practically no risk from it. The caption says that the ratio between the assumed danger and the actual danger is highest of any known toy.

The title text mentions some other materials that sound dangerous but aren't. At the opposite end of the spectrum is {{w|lawn darts}}, a toy containing large darts that are thrown at a target that's placed on the ground. Contrary to the spinthariscope, which sounds dangerous but is actually harmless, lawn darts sound innocent but can cause severe injury if you accidentally hit a person (and a few children were even killed), so they were banned in the US in the 1980's.

Precisely speaking, Randall should claim that spinthariscopes have the highest ''product'', not ''ratio'', of "that can't be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality. The quantity he intends is one that increases as freakout and actual safety/legality increase, as a product would. A ratio of the two quantities would decrease as actual safety/legality increases. However, this re-wording, while accurate, might confuse readers not familiar with mathematical terminology.

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

:Cueball: It's a spinthariscope, a 1940s toy with a radioactive isotope inside. If you let your eyes adjust to total darkness and look into the lens, you can see the flashes of individual atoms decaying.
:Megan: What??
:White Hat: AAAAA!
:Ponytail: Get it away!

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Fun fact: Spinthariscopes have the highest ratio of "that can't possibly be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality of any known toy.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]

2568: Spinthariscope

2022-01-14T21:35:29Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ Nevermind, after reading the comments and thinking about it more, I think my edit was inaccurate

{{comic
| number = 2568
| date = January 14, 2022
| title = Spinthariscope
| image = spinthariscope.png
| titletext = Other high scorers are melt-in-your-hand aluminum-destroying gallium and tritium-powered glowsticks. Lawn darts are toward the other end.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a SPINTHARISCOPE - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
As stated in the comic, a {{w|spinthariscope}} is a device with a small amount of radioactive material and a screen. When one of the radioactive atoms decays, it emits an {{w|alpha particle}}, which strikes the screen, which emits a small flash of light. You can see these flashes by looking through a lens.

It was invented in 1903 initially as a scientific instrument, but was soon replaced by more accurate and quantitative devices. But the original device was still popular for some time as an educational toy for children, and you can still get them today.

The joke in the comic is that most people have little understanding of radiation, and overreact to any mention that something is radioactive. So when Cueball tells Megan, White Hat, and Ponytail that the toy contains radioactive material, they're shocked and scared. But the amount of radioactive material in the toy is very tiny, so there's practically no risk from it. The caption says that the ratio between the assumed danger and the actual danger is highest of any known toy.

The title text mentions some other materials that sound dangerous but aren't. At the opposite end of the spectrum is {{w|lawn darts}}, a toy containing large darts that are thrown at a target that's placed on the ground. Contrary to the spinthariscope, which sounds dangerous but is actually harmless, lawn darts sound innocent but can cause severe injury if you accidentally hit a person (and a few children were even killed), so they were banned in the US in the 1980's.

Randall should claim that spinthariscopes have the highest ''product'', not ''ratio'', of "that can't be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality. The quantity he intends is one that increases as freakout and actual safety/legality increase, as a product would. A ratio of the two quantities would decrease as actual safety/legality increases.

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

:[Cueball] It's a spinthariscope, a 1940s toy with a radioactive isotope inside. If you let your eyes adjust to total darkness and look into the lens, you can see the flashes of individual atoms decaying.
:[Megan] What??
:[White Hat] AAAAA!
:[ponytail] Get it away!

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Fun fact: spinthariscopes have the highest ratio of "that can't possibly be safe and legal" to actual safety and legality of any known toy.

{{comic discussion}}

Talk:2567: Language Development

2022-01-12T18:56:07Z

172.70.206.151:

Has a small, child-size, stick figure been used before? I did not find a category on explainxkcd. This might be an interesting trivia to add. --[[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.129|198.41.242.129]] 18:45, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

Actually words linguists use when they try to talk in very old languages sometimes sound like the things my little son might say between his first perfectly pronounced single words.--[[User:Gunterkoenigsmann|Gunterkoenigsmann]] ([[User talk:Gunterkoenigsmann|talk]]) 18:53, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

Someone needs to say “ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny”
[[Special:Contributions/172.70.206.151|172.70.206.151]] 18:56, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

Talk:2567: Language Development

2022-01-12T18:55:14Z

172.70.206.151:

868: Nolan Chart

2022-01-06T03:58:35Z

172.70.206.151:

{{comic
| number = 868
| date = March 4, 2011
| title = Nolan Chart
| image = nolan chart.png
| titletext = Also in the right quadrant are NFPA-compliant chemical manufacturers and Sir Charles Wheatstone. Sharing the top with the internet libertarians are Nate Silver and several politically-active kite designers.
}}

==Explanation==
The [http://www.nolanchart.com Nolan Chart] is a visual representation of the political spectrum that measures not only liberal vs conservative tendencies but also libertarian and statist tendencies. Libertarians tend to like Nolan Charts because they feel that the Democratic/Republican spectrum, the most common visualization of political beliefs, isn't nuanced enough to explain libertarian beliefs.

In this comic, it is taken to a different end. On one side are both Democrats and Republicans and on the other side are baseball fans. In the typical Nolan Chart, Libertarians are in the top quadrant, but in this one "Internet Libertarians" take the spot because they love the Nolan Charts (which are found online) and have a lot of political opinions.

Nolan may also refer to baseball Hall of Famer [http://baseballhall.org/hof/ryan-nolan Nolan Ryan].

In the title text, the NFPA-compliant chemical manufacturers are mentioned because of {{w|NFPA 704|this diagram}}. Sir Charles Wheatstone was the inventor of the {{w|Wheatstone bridge}}, which is also {{w|File:Wheatstonebridge.svg|diamond-shaped}}. The title text also refers to Nate Silver, who previously worked for Baseball Prospectus and now writes a data-driven political and sports blog called ''{{w|FiveThirtyEight}}'' for ESPN. He is both a lover of diamond-shaped diagrams (baseball) and has political opinions. Politically-active kite designers both would have strong political opinions (it comes with the territory of being politically active) and would love diamond-shaped diagrams, presumably because they would be interested in blueprints of kites.

==Transcript==
:[Diamond-shaped four-panel diagram with each panel labeled. Two arrows indicate axis up along the left and right lower side of the diamond:]
:[Left]: Political opinions
:[Right]: Love of diamond-shaped diagrams
:[Top panel]: Internet libertarians
:[Left panel]: Democrats, Republicans
:[Right panel]: Baseball fans
:[Bottom panel]: Other

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Charts]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Nate Silver]]
[[Category:Politics]]
[[Category:Baseball]]
[[Category:Internet]]

2562: Formatting Meeting

2021-12-31T19:16:59Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */

{{comic
| number = 2562
| date = December 31, 2021
| title = Formatting Meeting
| image = formatting_meeting.png
| titletext = Neither group uses iso 8601 because the big-endian enthusiasts were all at the meeting 20 years ago.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a LOCAL VERSION OF DR SEUSS, WHO IS NOT JONATHAN SWIFT - Needs expansion, wikification, organisation, clarification, and consideration of whether there is a relation to new year's eve. Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

In the United States, it's common to write dates numerically in the format ''month/day/year'' -- 2/3/22 means February 3, 2022 (the century is often omitted when it's obvious that the date is around the current time). In Europe, the usual format is ''day/month/year'', so 2/3/22 is March 2, 2022.

"Localization" is the technique used in software to make it accept input and display output in the formats most natural to users in their locations. For example, in the United States numbers use commas "," to separate thousands and a decimal point "." to separate the decimal values, while in the EU it is the reverse. And textual output will be translated to the local language. Naturally, this also includes displaying dates in the local format, as described above. Note: Currency is not localized as it would actually change the money value ($100 is not the same as €100).

The joke in this comic is that two dates are shown on the same display related to meetings regarding localization. The date of the meeting of the US team is localized in the US format, while the EU team's meeting is localized in the European format, and these two dates about a month apart happen to be formatted the same (there are many such pairs of dates, as long as the day of the month is between 1 and 12). Cueball needs to explain that the European meeting will be a month later than the US meeting, to avoid confusion due to the ambiguity (which is ironic, since localization is intended to reduce confusion).

There could also be subtle commentary around the nature of cultural influence in modern times: things like diseases and political influence spreading to other countries, and how this is handled differently locally.

ISO-8601 (that is, standard number 8601 as promulgated by the International Standards Organization since 1988) specifies a date format of YYYY-MM-DD (e.g. 2021-12-31), which results in dates being listed in chronological order when sorted numerically. The ISO format is called "big-endian", which refers to the fact that the largest unit in the date (the year) comes first; the European format is instead "little-endian", while the American format is neither since the unit given first is the one whose size is in the middle. (Regular numerals are also written with the largest place values on the left – for example, the first 2 in 2021 is the thousands place – though whether this convention is big-endian or little-endian depends on whether the numbers are being read in the context of left-to-right or right-to-left text. The "endianness" terms are most often used in reference to whether the address of a value in computer memory which takes up more than one cell is the location of the most significant or least significant cell, though they originate in a [https://www.ling.upenn.edu/courses/Spring_2003/ling538/Lecnotes/ADfn1.htm Jonathan Swift story] about a war over which end of the egg to eat first.) This standard was also mentioned in [[1179: ISO 8601]].

The joke in the title text is that someone attempting to interpret the improperly formatted date as if it were expressed in the standardized ISO-8601 format, might read the date as March 22, 2002, so they went to the meeting almost 20 years ago. Unless the announcement of the meetings was made 2 decades in advance, there's a paradox that these participants would have taken the date from an announcement in the far future. However this interpretation of the date is necessarily incorrect: ISO-8601 format specifies four digit years, two digit months and two digit days. Therefore "2/3/22” ''cannot'' be an ISO-8601 date, as "2" must be rendered as "0002", and "3" must be "03". Even if the leading zeroes were omitted in violation of ISO-8601, the year would become Year 2, not Year 2002. Since the standard always uses a 4 digit 'YYYY' format in the first field, and no common formatting uses YYYY-DD-MM, any date written in ISO-8601 is easily recognized and (comparatively) unambiguously interpretable as YYYY-MM-DD. Dates written in Y-M-DD or MM-DD-YY or other formats are (officially) formatted improperly.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Cueball sitting next to a screen, which displays]:
:Localization working group
:Upcoming meetings
:US Team: 2/3/22
:EU Team: 2/3/22

:Cueball: And the European formatting and localization team will meet a month later...

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Calendar]]

2562: Formatting Meeting

2021-12-31T19:15:35Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */ ref

{{comic
| number = 2562
| date = December 31, 2021
| title = Formatting Meeting
| image = formatting_meeting.png
| titletext = Neither group uses iso 8601 because the big-endian enthusiasts were all at the meeting 20 years ago.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a LOCAL VERSION OF DR SEUSS, WHO IS NOT JONATHAN SWIFT - Needs expansion, wikification, organisation, clarification, and consideration of whether there is a relation to new year's eve. Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

In the United States, it's common to write dates numerically in the format ''month/day/year'' -- 2/3/22 means February 3, 2022 (the century is often omitted when it's obvious that the date is around the current time). In Europe, the usual format is ''day/month/year'', so 2/3/22 is March 2, 2022.

"Localization" is the technique used in software to make it accept input and display output in the formats most natural to users in their locations. For example, in the United States numbers use commas "," to separate thousands and a decimal point "." to separate the decimal values, while in the EU it is the reverse. And textual output will be translated to the local language. Naturally, this also includes displaying dates in the local format, as described above. Note: Currency is not localized as it would actually change the money value ($100 is not the same as €100).

The joke in this comic is that two dates are shown on the same display related to meetings regarding localization. The date of the meeting of the US team is localized in the US format, while the EU team's meeting is localized in the European format, and these two dates about a month apart happen to be formatted the same (there are many such pairs of dates, as long as the day of the month is between 1 and 12). Cueball needs to explain that the European meeting will be a month later than the US meeting, to avoid confusion due to the ambiguity (which is ironic, since localization is intended to reduce confusion).

There could also be subtle commentary around the nature of cultural influence in modern times: things like diseases and political influence spreading to other countries, and how this is handled differently locally.

ISO-8601 (that is, standard number 8601 as promulgated by the International Standards Organization since 1988) specifies a date format of YYYY-MM-DD (e.g. 2021-12-31), which results in dates being listed in chronological order when sorted numerically. The ISO format is called "big-endian", which refers to the fact that the largest unit in the date (the year) comes first; the European format is instead "little-endian", while the American format is neither since the unit given first is the one whose size is in the middle. (Regular numerals are also written with the largest place values on the left – for example, the first 2 in 2021 is the thousands place – though whether this convention is big-endian or little-endian depends on whether the numbers are being read in the context of left-to-right or right-to-left text. The "endianness" terms are most often used in reference to whether the address of a value in computer memory which takes up more than one cell is the location of the most significant or least significant cell, though they originate in a [https://www.ling.upenn.edu/courses/Spring_2003/ling538/Lecnotes/ADfn1.htm Jonathan Swift story] about a war over which end of the egg to eat first.) This standard was also mentioned in [[1179: ISO 8601]].

The joke in the title text is that someone attempting to interpret the improperly formatted date as if it were expressed in the standardized ISO-8601 format, might read the date as March 22, 2002, so they went to the meeting almost 20 years ago. Unless the announcement of the meetings was made 2 decades in advance, there's a paradox that these participants would have taken the date from an announcement in the far future. However this interpretation of the date is necessarily incorrect: ISO-8601 format specifies four digit years, two digit months and two digit days. Therefore "2/3/22” ''cannot'' be an ISO-8601 date, as "2" must be rendered as "0002", and "3" must be "03". Even if the leading zeroes were omitted in violation of ISO-8601, the year would become Year 2, not Year 2002. Since the standard always uses a 4 digit 'YYYY' format in the first field, and no common formatting uses YYYY-DD-MM, any date written in ISO-8601 is easily recognized and (comparatively) unambiguously interpretable as YYYY-MM-DD. Dates written in Y-M-DD or MM-DD-YY or other formats are (officially) formatted improperly.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[A screen displays:
Localization working group
Upcoming meetings
US Team: 2/3/22
EU Team: 2/3/22
]

:Cueball: And the European formatting and localization team will meet a month later...

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]

1179: ISO 8601

2021-12-31T19:14:46Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */

{{comic
| number = 1179
| date = February 27, 2013
| title = ISO 8601
| image = iso_8601.png
| titletext = ISO 8601 was published on 06/05/88 and most recently amended on 12/01/04.
}}

==Explanation==
When abbreviating the date into numerical form, {{w|Date format by country|various areas of the world}} tend to list the year, month, and day in different orders (as well as with different delimiting symbols), which can cause confusion particularly when the day value is 12 or lower allowing it to be easily interpreted as the month and vice versa. As a public service announcement (https://www.businessstudynotes.com/marketing/marketing-management/purpose-structure-public-service-advertisement-psa/), this comic states that there is in fact one international standard for writing numeric dates, set by the {{w|International Organization for Standardization}} in its {{w|ISO 8601}} standard: YYYY-MM-DD.

The comic then proceeds to list several discouraged ways of writing out the date of the comic's publication, as they do not match the standard. It begins with several commonly used ones in countries around the world, but then begins to list increasingly uncommon ways, ranging from strange (Roman numerals) to quirky (binary, Unix time) to essentially impossible (painting the numbers onto a black cat).

The title text provides a perfect example of the kind of ambiguity that can arise when non-standard formats are used. The ISO standard was in fact published on 1988-06-05 and amended on 2004-12-01. This is mentioned in the title text in MM/DD/YY format; however, there is no way to naturally figure this out, particularly with the second date. With the year truncated to two digits and all three numbers at 12 or lower, the date referring to December 1, 2004 may well be interpreted as 12 January 2004, or as 2012-01-04.

Date formats were again the subject in [[1340: Unique Date]].

The other mentioned formats are:

{| class=wikitable
! Date !! Explanation
|-
| 02/27/2013
| MM/DD/YYYY, used mostly in the United States.
|-
| 02/27/13
| MM/DD/YY, same as above but with the year shortened to two digits.
|-
| 27/02/2013
| DD/MM/YYYY, used variously in South America, Canada ({{w|Date_and_time_notation_in_Canada|officially uses ISO 8601}}), Australia, New Zealand and much of Europe.
|-
| 27/02/13
| DD/MM/YY, same as above but with the year shortened to two digits.
|-
| 20130227
| YYYYMMDD, same as ISO 8601 without delimiting punctuation. Allowed by the standard. Technically not ambiguous but is hard to read as a date at first glance.
|-
| 2013.02.27
| YYYY.MM.DD, used in Japan, South Korea and Hungary. Same as ISO 8601 except with different punctuation.
|-
| 27.02.13
| DD.MM.YY, used in Germany, Russia, and others.
|-
| 27-02-13
| DD-MM-YY, used in Denmark, Netherlands, Indonesia, India, Bangladesh, and others.
|-
| 27.2.13
| D.M.YY. It is common in several areas to abbreviate the month or day to a single digit and drop the leading zero when possible.
|-
| 2013. II. 27.
| YYYY. MM. DD., with month as {{w|Roman numerals}}, used in Hungary.
|-
| 27⁄2-13
| D⁄M-YY, traditional format in Denmark, Norway and Sweden
|-
| 2013.158904109
| Year and decimal fraction of year. 0.158904109 is a decimal approximation of 58/365, with February 27 being the 58th day of the year. This format may be easier to read for computers/programs in some contexts, but is difficult for humans to interpret.
|-
| MMXIII-II-XXVII
| The ISO 8601 standard but written in Roman numerals. Never used as a traditional standard anywhere as it is hard to read, parse, and interpret for no benefit.
|-
| MMXIII LVII⁄CCCLXV
| Year followed by its partial fraction 57/365, all in Roman numerals. Equally useless as the above. As a note, apparently this 'standard' is different from the decimal fraction two rows above, as the decimal fraction notation uses the ''end'' of the day (first day of the year is 1/365 while the last is 365/365), while this uses the ''beginning'' (first day is 0/365 and last is 364/365).
|-
| 1330300800
| {{w|Unix time|UNIX Timestamp}}, a standard method of storing absolute time in many computer systems and defined as the number of seconds since 00:00:00 on 1970-01-01 (UTC). The Unix time listed here appears to mistakenly be for '''2012'''-02-27, which is also mentioned by [[Randall]] in the original transcript. The Unix Timestamp for 2013-02-27 would be 1361923200.
|-
| ((3+3)×(111+1)-1)×3/3-1/33
| A useless format where the numbers 2013, 2, and 27 written as needlessly long arithmetic expressions using just the digits 1 and 3. For additional confusion, the values are delimited by slashes, enabling confusion with the fraction bar. (If evaluated literally, the entire expression evaluates to 670.963, or 671 minus 1 divided by 27.)
|-
|    2  272013
| A nearly impossible to read date "format" that can be considered a parody "compromise" between different formats: rather than argue about the order in which the year, month, and day should be, they are simply all written on top of each other. As a "bonus", there is also no arguing over which separator character to use.
|-
| 10/11011/1101
| The US mm/dd/yy format in {{w|Binary number|binary}}, corresponding to 2/27/13. Never used for obvious reasons.
|-
| 02/27/20/13
| MM/DD/CC/YY, where CC stands for century. This format is never used.{{Citation needed}} Note that while months and days count starting from 1, centuries and years in this format count from 0 for extra confusion. But the CC value is widely used on many operating systems to distinguish between the 20th and 21st century, represented by the values "19" and "20" because 1950 belongs to the 20th century.
|-
| <ruby><rb>0</rb><rb>1</rb><rb>2</rb><rb>3</rb><rb>7</rb><rt>2</rt><rt>3</rt><rt>1</rt><rt>4</rt><rtc style="ruby-position: under"><rt>5</rt><rt></rt><rt>67</rt><rt></rt><rt>8</rt></rtc></ruby>
| An obfuscated format where the small numbers indicate the positions where the large digits should be placed. In this reading, 0 is used at positions 2 and 5, 1 is used on position 3, etc.; the result being 20130227
|-
| [A hissing black cat with "2-27-13" painted on it]
| In Western cultures, black cats and the number 13 are associated with bad luck. The cat might also just be angry that someone covered it in paint.
|}

==Transcript==
:Public Service Announcement:

:Our different ways of writing dates as numbers can lead to online confusion. That's why in 1988 ISO set a global standard numeric date format. This is '''''the''''' correct way to write numeric dates:

::2013-02-27

:The following formats are therefore discouraged:
:*02/27/2013
:*02/27/13
:*27/02/2013
:*27/02/13
:*20130227
:*2013.02.27
:*27.02.13
:*27-02-13
:*27.2.13
:*2013. II. 27.
:*27⁄2-13
:*2013.158904109
:*MMXIII-II-XXVII
:*MMXIII LVII⁄CCCLXV
:*1330300800
:*((3+3)×(111+1)-1)×3/3-1/33
:*   2  272013 [the numbers 2013, 02, and 27 written overlapping each other]
:*10/11011/1101
:*02/27/20/13
:*2053112674378
:*[A black cat with 2-27-13 scrawled across its body in dripping white paint.]
:**Cat: ''Hissss''

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Calendar]]
[[Category:Animals]]

2561: Moonfall

2021-12-30T23:14:50Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2561
| date = December 29, 2021
| title = Moonfall
| image = moonfall.png
| titletext = Novel ideas and cool explosions are both good, but what I really want from a movie is novel ideas ABOUT cool explosions.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by COOL EXPLOSIONS. - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
[[Megan]] asks [[Cueball]] if he is excited for the release of the movie ''Moonfall''.

''{{w|Moonfall (film)|Moonfall}}'' is an upcoming 2022 movie scheduled for release in February. Its director, {{w|Roland Emmerich}}, is known for blowing up things in his movies (see for instance [https://www.gq.com/video/watch/explosions-the-roland-emmerich-supercut the Roland Emmerich Supercut]), as well as for factual inaccuracies in his work (mainly the scientific implausibility of his many disaster movies like ''{{w|Independence Day (1996 film)|Independence Day}}'', ''{{w|The Day After Tomorrow}}'' and ''{{w|2012 (film)|2012}}'').

The [[#Plot|plot]] of ''Moonfall'' is scientifically preposterous, making it potentially "cringe-worthy" for someone who enjoys "hard" science fiction, like Cueball.

Cueball explains to Megan that he usually likes it when stories are based on good science. Maybe only bending it a bit to create the story, to expand our ideas of what is possible. But then he goes on to state that he supports giving Roland Emmerich as much money as he wants, to make cool spaceship noises and smash moons into things. In the movie it is only a moon (the {{w|Moon}}, presumably, see the [[#Plot|plot]] below). But in general Roland often uses huge explosions in his movies, something also previously said about other similarly-styled directors like [[748: Worst-Case Scenario|Michael Bay]].

Megan sums the situation for Cueball up, stating that he is excited to expand our ideas of how much stuff can explode at once.

In the title text Cueball continues by explaining that while novel ideas and explosions are good, what he really want from a movie is novel ideas about cool explosions. So new ways to explode things, or ideas about exploding more things at once. Or both.

===Plot===
'''Spoiler Alert'''
:In Moonfall, a mysterious force knocks the Moon from its orbit around Earth and sends it hurtling on a collision course with life as we know it. With mere weeks before impact and the world on the brink of annihilation, NASA executive and former astronaut Jo Fowler is convinced she has the key to saving us all - but only one astronaut from her past, Brian Harper and a conspiracy theorist K.C. Houseman believe her. These unlikely heroes will mount an impossible last-ditch mission into space, leaving behind everyone they love, only to find out that our Moon is not what we think it is. —Centropolis Entertainment, [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5834426/plotsummary?ref_=tt_ov_pl quoted at IMDB]

==Transcript==
:[Cueball and Megan walking to the right]]
:Megan: Are you excited for ''Moonfall''?
:Megan: Or cringing?
:Cueball: Well...

:[Closeup on Cueball]]
:Cueball: I like when stories are grounded in good science because it's exciting to expand our ideas of what's possible.

:[Zoomed back out to Cueball and Megan walking to the right. Cueball has his palms raised]
:Cueball: But I also support giving Roland Emmerich as much money as he wants to make cool spaceship noises and smash moons into things.
:Megan: Excited to expand our ideas of how much stuff can explode at once.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category: Fiction]]
[[Category: Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category: Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category: Comics featuring real people]]

2561: Moonfall

2021-12-29T19:33:19Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ more

Talk:205: Candy Button Paper

2021-12-26T08:38:21Z

172.70.206.151:

It is possible to run a Turing machine on a candy belt:

Marvin Minsky (1967), Computation: Finite and Infinite Machines, Prentice-Hall, Inc. Englewood Cliffs, N.J. In particular see p. 262ff (italics in original):
"We can now demonstrate the remarkable fact, first shown by Wang [1957], that for any Turing machine T there is an equivalent Turing machine TN that ''never changes a once-written symbol''! In fact, we will construct a two-symbol machine TN that can only change blank squares on its tape to 1's but can not change a 1 back to a blank." Minsky then offers a proof of this. -- Kopa Leo [[Special:Contributions/69.163.36.90|69.163.36.90]] 16:01, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

:In my opinion, intuitively, when writing is demanded, a turing machine just have to copy those symbols to a new location, minding the symbol that needs to be written. It can have a start-of-data mark so this would be transparent to other operations [[Special:Contributions/173.245.48.96|173.245.48.96]] 05:45, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

so I'm the only one that put them in a loop, then moved it one button down on one side? {{unsigned ip|108.162.245.151}}

Candy button paper was around long before 1980. I remember it from the 1950s. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.123|108.162.241.123]] 17:59, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

If candy buttons were two-sided, I would make it into a Möbius strip. [[User:625571b7-aa66-4f98-ac5c-92464cfb4ed8|625571b7-aa66-4f98-ac5c-92464cfb4ed8]] ([[User talk:625571b7-aa66-4f98-ac5c-92464cfb4ed8|talk]]) 14:28, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

Doesn't Randall mention three different strategies? The comic says two, however.

: There are two main strategies (careful and fast) and one very uncommon strategy (Turing). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.186.60|162.158.186.60]] 21:14, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

There's a proof from Sipser's Introduction to the Theory of Computation (2nd ed), [exercise 3.10: https://archive.org/stream/IntroductionToTheoryOfComputation/introduction%20to%20theory%20of%20computation_djvu.txt]:

We first simulate an ordinary Turing machine by a write-twice Turing machine. The write-twice machine simulates a single step of the original machine by copying the entire tape over to a fresh portion of the tape to the right-hand side of the currently used portion. The copying procedure operates character by character, marking a character as it is copied. This procedure alters each tape square twice, once to write the character for the first time and again to mark that it has been copied. The position of the original Turing machine’s tape head is marked on the tape. When copying the cells at, or adjacent to, the marked position, the tape contents is updated according to the rules of the original Turing machine.

To carry out the simulation with a write-once machine, operate as before, except that each cell of the previous tape is now represented by two cells. The first of these contains the original machine’s tape symbol and the second is for the mark used in the copying procedure. The input is not presented to the machine in the format with two cells per symbol, so the very first time the tape is copied, the copying marks are put directly over the input symbols. -- Kopa Leo [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.41|108.162.250.41]] 12:03, 17 November 2018 (UTC)

[https://www.quora.com/Experienced-programmers-and-computer-scientists-what-are-some-really-old-or-even-nearly-forgotten-books-you-think-every-new-programmer-should-read/answer/Alan-Kay-11 Note: Alan Kay recommended] ''Computation: Finite and Infinite Machines'' as a classic.
-- Kopa Leo [[Special:Contributions/172.70.206.151|172.70.206.151]] 08:38, 26 December 2021 (UTC)

132: Music Knowledge

2021-12-13T00:31:14Z

172.70.206.151: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 132
| date = July 24, 2006
| title = Music Knowledge
| image = music_knowledge.png
| titletext = When Guitar Hero 2 comes out I'll have fresh conversational material for MONTHS.
}}

==Explanation==
The punchline of this comic is that just by naming bands from the game ''{{w|Guitar Hero}}'', you can sound pretty knowledgeable about music without actually knowing anything about the bands you are naming. This is further emphasized when [[Megan]] mentions {{w|Metallica}}, a very famous band that mostly everyone can be assumed to have heard of, and [[Cueball]] has no clue who they are, because Metallica is not featured in Guitar Hero (at the time of this comic writing).

''{{w|Guitar Hero}}'' is a music rhythm video game developed by Harmonix and published by RedOctane for the {{w|Playstation 2}}.

In the title text, Cueball (or possibly Randall) is just hoping for a sequel to ''Guitar Hero'' to get more, and newer, conversational material. As of 2019, there have been 6 main sequels to ''Guitar Hero'', with numerous other spinoffs and expansions to the {{w|Guitar Hero|''Guitar Hero'' series}}.
===List of bands mentioned===

'''Classic Rock'''
*{{w|Boston (band)|Boston}} is an American rock band from Boston, who had their most success in the 1970s and 1980s. Their song "{{w|More Than a Feeling}}" is featured in ''Guitar Hero''.
*{{w|Queen (band)|Queen}} is a British rock band from London, formed in 1970, with many major hits. Their song "{{w|Killer Queen}}" is featured in ''Guitar Hero''.
*"Bowie" ({{w|David Bowie}}) was an English singer and songwriter. His song "{{w|Ziggy Stardust (song)|Ziggy Stardust}}" is featured in ''Guitar Hero''.
*{{w|Joan Jett}} is an American rock singer. She is best known for her work as the frontwoman of her band, Joan Jett & the Blackhearts. Their version of the song "{{w|I Love Rock 'n' Roll}}" is featured in ''Guitar Hero''.

'''Newer stuff'''
*{{w|Franz Ferdinand (band)|Franz Ferdinand}} are a Scottish rock band formed in Glasgow in 2002. Their song "{{w|Take Me Out (song)|Take Me Out}}" is featured in ''Guitar Hero''.
*{{w|The Donnas}} were an American rock band formed in Palo Alto, California in 1993. Their song "{{w|Spend the Night (The Donnas album)|Take it Off}}" is featured in ''Guitar Hero''.
*{{w|Audioslave}} was an American rock supergroup formed in Los Angeles in 2001. Their song "{{w|Cochise (song)|Cochise}}" is featured in ''Guitar Hero''.

'''Other stuff'''
*{{w|Arcade Fire}} is a Canadian indie rock band founded in 2000.
*{{w|The Postal Service|Postal Service}} was an American indie rock band founded in 2001.
*{{w|Freezepop}} is an American electronic band from Boston. Their song "Get Ready 2 Rokk" is featured in ''Guitar Hero'', as a bonus song. This is the first giveaway of Cueball's source for his music knowledge; Freezepop is a fairly obscure indie band best known for their placement in Guitar Hero and other rhythm games.
*{{w|Metallica}} is an American heavy metal band. The band was formed in 1981 in Los Angeles, California. Metallica has won 9 Grammy awards and received 23 Grammy nominations. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2009.

Interestingly, neither {{w|Arcade Fire}} nor {{w|The Postal Service|Postal Service}} (mentioned by Megan) are featured in ''Guitar Hero'', so Cueball should not have any knowledge of these bands.

you could also do a similar thing with JOJO's Bizarre Adventure

==Transcript==
:[Megan and Cueball converse.]
:Megan: What kind of music do you listen to?
:Cueball: Oh, a mix of things. Some classic rock like Boston, but then of course Queen and Bowie, Joan Jett...
:Megan: Definitely, we need more of those sounds.
:Cueball: But there's some great newer stuff too, like Franz Ferdinand, The Donnas, and Audioslave.
:Megan: Sometimes they're a little much for me. I go more for things like The Arcade Fire, sometimes mixing some electronic sounds like Postal Service.
:Cueball: Oh yeah—have you ever checked out Freezepop?
:Megan: Mhm! Synth pop can be fun, but at the same time, I agree that sometimes you just need to blast some Metallica.
:Cueball: Who?
:Megan: ...Metallica.
:Cueball: Are they new?
:I sound pretty knowledgeable about music until people figure out that I'm just naming bands from Guitar Hero.

==Trivia==
*In his [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJOS0sV2a24#t=42m20s Google-speech] in late 2007, [[Randall]] expressed some form of dissatisfaction with ''Guitar Hero III'' (coincidentally the first edition in the series to include a Metallica song).
*In 2009, three years after this comic was released, ''Metallica'' eventually got a game {{w|Guitar Hero: Metallica}}.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Music]]
[[Category:Video games]]
[[Category:Rhythm Games]]
[[Category:Guitar Hero]]

2550: Webb

2021-12-06T01:15:45Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ better

{{comic
| number = 2550
| date = December 3, 2021
| title = Webb
| image = webb.png
| titletext = Each one contains a chocolate shaped like a famous spacecraft and, for the later numbers, a pamphlet on managing anxiety.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by the JAMES WEBB SPACE TELESCOPE - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This comic depicts an {{w|advent calendar}} geared toward astronomers anticipating the launch of the {{w|James Webb Space Telescope}}.

The James Webb Space Telescope is (currently, but after [[2014: JWST Delays|many prior delays]]) scheduled to be launched on the 22nd of December. Christmas will indeed come early for astronomers should the launch be successful.

A normal advent calendar marks the days until Christmas by allowing 'doors' to be opened, or other means of revealing some treat/picture. This is often from the 1st of the month until the 'big reveal' on the 24th or 25th, though other schemes may exist for cultural reasons. This particular calendar features 18 hexagonal features, intended to be sequentially accessed over several days, deliberately similar to the 18 gold-beryllium mirror segments designed to fold out to form the JWST's primary mirror. The first door is on the 5th, two days after this comic's publication date, while the last is the 22nd, marking 'The Big Day'.

Cueball's question could be interpreted two ways: Cueball doesn't know about JWST, so he is asking why this advent calendar ends before Christmas (and possibly fearing this calendar is similar to the one in [[1245: 10-Day Forecast]]); or Cueball does know about JWST and its history of delays, so he is asking why the calendar ends on 22 when there is no certainty in that launch date (and also implying that he expects it to be delayed).

December 22 is also the day after the northern hemisphere winter solstice. The end of the world was famously predicted for the winter solstice in [[998: 2012|2012]].

The title text references the fact that chocolates in advent calendars are often molded into different shapes, and the fact that the later numbers have a "pamphlet on managing anxiety" is probably supposed to quell the impeding fear that the launch would be delayed (or go wrong). The telescope's launch was initially planned for 2007, but due to various redesigns, financial issues, accidents, flaws, and the {{w|COVID-19 pandemic}}, the launch date was pushed back to 2011, then 2013, 2018, 2020, May 2021, October 2021, and finally to the current launch date in December 2021. It may also allude to post-launch concerns; even if the launch goes well, there will still be nervousness about reaching its intended observation point, unfolding/deploying successfully, and passing its final calibrations without problems. There are effectively no means to rescue/repair this expensive piece of equipment should anything be discovered to be amiss, unlike the {{w|Hubble Space Telescope}}, which was visited a number of times by the Space Shuttles to remedy and enhance various features. (There exist issues with even the HST that cannot currently be considered repairable, without the Shuttles or any proven replacement, and the JWST is to be located far beyond Hubble's operational orbit in a place expensive to get to.)

The JWST has been referenced previously in [[1730: Starshade]], [[2014: JWST Delays]], and [[2447: Hammer Incident]], as well as indirectly in [[975: Occulting Telescope]] and [[1461: Payloads]].

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

:[Cueball and Ponytail are looking at an advent calendar. The advent calendar is in a hexagon shape, with 18 smaller hexagons with numbers ranging from 5-22 written on them.]
:Cueball: The hexagons are nice.
:Cueball: But why does it end at 22?
:[Caption below the panel:]
:Astronomer Advent Calendar

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Calendar]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Telescopes]]

2550: Webb

2021-12-06T01:14:23Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ cats

{{comic
| number = 2550
| date = December 3, 2021
| title = Webb
| image = webb.png
| titletext = Each one contains a chocolate shaped like a famous spacecraft and, for the later numbers, a pamphlet on managing anxiety.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by the JAMES WEBB SPACE TELESCOPE - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This comic depicts an {{w|advent calendar}} geared toward astronomers anticipating the launch of the {{w|James Webb Space Telescope}}.

The James Webb Space Telescope is (currently, but after [[2014: JWST Delays|many prior delays]]) scheduled to be launched on the 22nd of December. Christmas will indeed come early for astronomers should the launch be successful.

A normal advent calendar marks the days until Christmas by allowing 'doors' to be opened, or other means of revealing some treat/picture. This is often from the 1st of the month until the 'big reveal' on the 24th or 25th, though other schemes may exist for cultural reasons. This particular calendar features 18 hexagonal features, intended to be sequentially accessed over several days, deliberately similar to the 18 gold-beryllium mirror segments designed to fold out to form the JWST's primary mirror. The first door is on the 5th, two days after this comic's publication date, while the last is the 22nd, marking 'The Big Day'.

Cueball's question could be interpreted two ways: Cueball doesn't know about JWST, so he is asking why this advent calendar ends before Christmas (and possibly fearing this calendar is similar to the one in [[1245: 10-Day Forecast]]); or Cueball does know about JWST and its history of delays, so he is asking why the calendar ends on 22 when there is no certainty in that launch date (and also implying that he expects it to be delayed).

December 22 is also the day after the northern hemisphere winter solstice. The end of the world was famously predicted for the winter solstice in [[998: 2012|2012]].

The title text references the fact that chocolates in advent calendars are often molded into different shapes, and the fact that the later numbers have a "pamphlet on managing anxiety" is probably supposed to quell the impeding fear that the launch would be delayed (or go wrong). The telescope's launch was initially planned for 2007, but due to various redesigns, financial issues, accidents, flaws, and the {{w|COVID-19 pandemic}}, the launch date was pushed back to 2011, then 2013, 2018, 2020, May 2021, October 2021, and finally to the current launch date in December 2021. It may also allude to post-launch concerns; even if the launch goes well, there will still be nervousness about reaching its intended observation point, unfolding/deploying successfully, and passing its final calibrations without problems. There are effectively no means to rescue/repair this expensive piece of equipment should anything be discovered to be amiss, unlike the {{w|Hubble Space Telescope}}, which was visited a number of times by the Space Shuttles to remedy and enhance various features. (There exist issues with even the HST that cannot currently be considered repairable, without the Shuttles or any proven replacement, and the JWST is to be located far beyond Hubble's operational orbit in a place expensive to get to.)

The JWST has been referenced previously in [[1730: Starshade]], [[2014: JWST Delays]], and [[2447: Hammer Incident]], as well as indirectly in [[975: Occulting Telescope]] and [[1461: Payloads]].

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

:[Cueball and Ponytail are looking at an advent calendar. The advent calendar is in a hexagon shape, with 18 smaller hexagons with numbers ranging from 5-22 written on them.]
:Cueball: The hexagons are nice.
:Cueball: But why does it end at 22?
:[Caption below the panel:]
:Astronomer Advent Calendar

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

2548: Awful People

2021-11-30T01:08:26Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ ce

{{comic
| number = 2548
| date = November 29, 2021
| title = Awful People
| image = awful_people.png
| titletext = Hm, this burger place has a couple of good reviews, but LakeSlayer7 says he got food poisoning there and everyone should try this other place down by the lake instead.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a NORMAL PEER (Maybe) - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT try that other place down by the lake.}}

Megan and Cueball are having a conversation about social media. Megan relates a negative comment she got from a stranger about her taste in movies. The twist is that it turns out the person criticizing her was a murderer. Although this does not inherently negate his taste in movies{{citation needed}}, it does free Megan from the burden of weighing his opinions equally to her own.

The title-text mentions the “Lake Slayer,” who is referenced in the comic. They mention that a burger joint in town is unsatisfactory, and that the reader should come to a place “by the lake” instead, which might be a plot to lure people in to be killed.

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

:[Cueball and Megan walking to the right]
:Cueball: The Internet makes it easy to be a jerk and forget the person we're talking to is a human.
:Megan: Yeah...
:Megan: But it also makes us see messages from awful people and assume they come from normal peers.

:[Closeup on Megan. Above Megan is a picture of a "reply" post from a man with sunglasses. The post has a title above it.]
:Megan: Recently I got a mean reply from a stranger. It was minor but it really got to me.
:Post title: Replies to "Favorite Movie"
:Post: Every group has one person who likes that movie, and it's the friend they all secretly hate.

:[Blondie as a news anchor behind a desk. There is a picture of the man with sunglasses with "Arrested" under his name. His picture is next to a picture of a house with "Breaking" above it.
:Megan: Then the next week I saw that guy on the news. He was an actual murderer!

:[Megan and Cueball standing next to each other]
:Megan: I can't believe I spent a week stressed out that my taste in movies wasn't shared by the East Valley Strangler.
:Cueball: Yeah, at ''least'' wait for a second opinion from the Lake Slayer.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Blondie]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Social networking]]

2548: Awful People

2021-11-30T01:07:35Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ ce

{{comic
| number = 2548
| date = November 29, 2021
| title = Awful People
| image = awful_people.png
| titletext = Hm, this burger place has a couple of good reviews, but LakeSlayer7 says he got food poisoning there and everyone should try this other place down by the lake instead.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a NORMAL PEER (Maybe) - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT try that other place down by the lake.}}

Megan and Cueball are having a conversation about social media. Megan relates a negative comment she got from a stranger about her taste in movies. The twist is that it turns out the person criticizing her was a murderer. Although this does not inherently negate his taste in movies{{citation needed}}, it does free Megan from the burden of weighing his opinions equally to her own.

The title-text mentions the “Lake Slayer,” who is referenced in the comic. They mention that a burger joint in town is unsatisfactory, and that the reader should come to a place “by the lake” instead, which might be a plot to lure people in to be killed.

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

:[Cueball and Megan walking to the right]
:Cueball: The Internet makes it easy to be a jerk and forget the person we're talking to is a human.
:Megan: Yeah...
:Megan: But it also makes us see messages from awful people and assume they come from normal peers.

:[Closeup on Megan. Above Megan is a picture of a "reply" post from a man with sunglasses. The post has a title above it.]
:Megan: Recently I got a mean reply from a stranger. It was minor but it really got to me.
:Post title: Replies to "Favorite Movie"
:Post: Every group has one person who likes that movie, and it's the friend they all secretly hate.

:[Blondie as a news anchor behind a desk. There is a picture of the man with sunglasses with "Arrested" under his name. His picture is next to a picture of a house with "Breaking" above it.
:Megan: Then the next week I saw that guy on the news. He was an actual murderer!

:[Megan and Cueball standing next to each other]
:Megan: I can't believe I spent a week stressed out that my taste in movies wasn't shared by the East Valley Strangler.
:Cueball: Yeah, at least wait for a second opinion from the Lake Slayer.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Blondie]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Social networking]]

2548: Awful People

2021-11-30T01:07:13Z

172.70.206.151: /* Transcript */ ce

{{comic
| number = 2548
| date = November 29, 2021
| title = Awful People
| image = awful_people.png
| titletext = Hm, this burger place has a couple of good reviews, but LakeSlayer7 says he got food poisoning there and everyone should try this other place down by the lake instead.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a NORMAL PEER (Maybe) - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT try that other place down by the lake.}}

Megan and Cueball are having a conversation about social media. Megan relates a negative comment she got from a stranger about her taste in movies. The twist is that it turns out the person criticizing her was a murderer. Although this does not inherently negate his taste in movies{{citation needed}}, it does free Megan from the burden of weighing his opinions equally to her own.

The title-text mentions the “Lake Slayer,” who is referenced in the comic. They mention that a burger joint in town is unsatisfactory, and that the reader should come to a place “by the lake” instead, which might be a plot to lure people in to be killed.

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

:[Cueball and Megan walking to the right]
:Cueball: The Internet makes it easy to be a jerk and forget the person we're talking to is a human.
:Megan: Yeah...
:Megan: But it also makes us see messages from awful people and assume they come from normal peers.

:[Closeup on Megan. Above Megan is a picture of a "reply" post from a man with sunglasses. The post has a title above it.]
:Megan: Recently I got a mean reply from a stranger. It was minor but it really got to me.
:Post title: Replies to "favorite movie"
:Post: Every group has one person who likes that movie, and it's the friend they all secretly hate.

:[Blondie as a news anchor behind a desk. There is a picture of the man with sunglasses with "Arrested" under his name. His picture is next to a picture of a house with "Breaking" above it.
:Megan: Then the next week I saw that guy on the news. He was an actual murderer!

:[Megan and Cueball standing next to each other]
:Megan: I can't believe I spent a week stressed out that my taste in movies wasn't shared by the East Valley Strangler.
:Cueball: Yeah, at least wait for a second opinion from the Lake Slayer.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Blondie]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Social networking]]