explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

1003: Adam and Eve

2022-03-11T13:20:53Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ ce, rejig

{{comic
| number = 1003
| date = January 13, 2012
| title = Adam and Eve
| image = adam_and_eve.png
| titletext = Abel and Steve would've been fine! I like Steve!
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a take on the anti-homosexual refrain, used often at those sorts of rallies "It was Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve". This refrain is used to support the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman because in the {{w|Old Testament}} God created a man and a woman to start the human race. {{w|Adam and Eve}} are in the story in the Bible of the creation ({{w|Book of Genesis}}), and are the first pair of humans, created by God.

Adam walks in on Eve having sexual relations with {{w|Cain and Abel|Abel}}, who is Adam's son, which turns the joke from a homosexual one into an incest one.

In the title text, Adam continues that he would have preferred walking in on Abel and Steve. As well as probably no longer needing to be irked at the surprise involvement of his presumed spouse, and mother to his son, Adam seems not to have a homophobic prejudice (or less of one). Unlike those who use the contemporary version of the phrase. What's more, he doesn't personally dislike Steve in general and possibly considers him one of the better partners available at this time.

==Transcript==
:[Adam, portrayed as Cueball, has his palms out.]
:Adam: It's '''''Adam''''' and '''''Eve''''', not '''''Abel''''' and '''''Eve!!'''''

:[Caption below panel:]
:Adam was freaked out by what he'd just walked in on.

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

Talk:2588: Party Quadrants

2022-03-03T14:02:47Z

172.70.91.126:

I added a first draft. I'm sure someone can make it better.
:The Venn diagram specifically says ''my'' birthday party. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 00:01, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

I can't be the only person who thinks I'd like to go to that party. [[User:Angel|Angel]] ([[User talk:Angel|talk]]) 23:44, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
:Randall doesn't think so, as evidenced by his placing it about an eighth of the way down the chart, rather than completely in the top right - he thinks it will at least be some fun for some people. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 14:02, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Competitions are not uncommon at parties. E.g. "pin the tail on the donkey". [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 00:01, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
: I assume the "not fun" for others part is trivia, specifically geography trivia. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.206.163|172.70.206.163]] 01:05, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
:: I am clearly Randall. I definitely cannot organise parties. The last BBQ I tried to organise, for the neighbours, was pre-Millenium. The weather did ''not'' cooperate and the neighbours moved away within only 10-15 more years!
::(I also haven't even had a birthday party since the early '80s, and haven't minded missing the stressfulness of the occasion at all.)
::Oh, and of course I do love a good map-based problem. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.32|141.101.99.32]] 01:50, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

;Why are there no examples of party games in the other 3 quadrants?
Am I missing something important? For the other 3 quadrants, why are there no examples of party games that may be enjoyed/not enjoyed. Eg; Squid Game (not enjoyed by anyone), TenPin Bowling (probably enjoyed by everyone). [[User:Beechmere|Beechmere]] ([[User talk:Beechmere|talk]]) 02:09, 3 March 2022 (UTC)Beechmere
:Less is more? There's three things. Two different 'party zones' that pretty much are the same thing, except for slight birthday-boy/host differences in emphasis, and the party that ''happens'', which is a self-indulgent planned activity that lies entirely outside those. :There are probably an infinite number of other 'party game spots' to place, but I think it's funny enough to show 'reality doesn't match theory' in just the one highly specific way. YMMV, but that's my interpretation. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.173|172.70.90.173]] 03:22, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
::Agree. The joke is that this diagram clearly indicates where his party should lie on this diagram. Fine if it's his birthday, it's OK it is more fun for him than the guest, but not so it would move up to not fun for the guest. And then he adds his latest attempt at a party, which is extremely fun to him and extremely dull for his guests, a long way from what is appropriate for a party. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:59, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
The statement "while music would be considered fun for most people" should be removed or a [citation needed] added. People have no concept of appropriate volume and have different taste in music, making it no fun, or alternatingly fun, for most attendees. Parties are much more fun when you can actually hear and understand the people around you.

Talk:2587: For the Sake of Simplicity

2022-03-02T13:46:47Z

172.70.91.126: Undoubling my negatives

--[[User:RIIW - Ponder it|RIIW - Ponder it]] ([[User talk:RIIW - Ponder it|talk]]) 23:04, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
So many modern board games are made complex by complex rules, but remain simplistic. Go is very simple (grid of nineteen lines, two types of pieces, and about three rules, but is arguably the most inherently complex game in existence. [[User:RIIW - Ponder it|RIIW - Ponder it]] ([[User talk:RIIW - Ponder it|talk]]) 23:04, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
:That "about" three rules, continues to confound me. Everyone who's tried to explain them to me, says it's easier to learn by playing, but I ''still'' don't fully understand, even after losing a dozen games & watching many more. It's a shapey spacey thing, & I'm not sure it makes sense to me.
:[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 04:19, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Schwarzschild's radius of a mass is the radius of a black hole with equivalent mass. So a Swarchtnhsnthn orchid has similar space warping properties to a black hole. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.33.223|172.69.33.223]] 23:16, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
:Isn't Schwarzchild Orchid a reference to Schwarzchild crystals & jewelry's floral designs, of which the orchid was considered especially beautiful (& expensive) artistry? That was the first place my mind went, with "Schwarzchild Orchid": a crystal orchid by Schwarzchild co. ?
:[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 04:24, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
::Apart from a "family run jewellery business" in basically one location, which you might find with many such surnames, I couldn't find a Schwarzchild connection to a major jeweller. There's Swarovski (and Swarovski Crystals®) and just plain-old Schwartz, as widely-touted brandnames that sell via many online outlets. Now, I'm not 'in the trade' so I'm going just by my basic feeling that you misremember (backed up with a scant two minutes of comparative Googling - including some even less productive side-hunches, e.g. "Schwarzkopf", which got me a train engineer instead of a jeweller) and maybe I'm missing an actually quite famous (but surprisingly not so electronically documented) rival to Fabergé, but right now I don't see it. If you get a good (wiki?)link to what turns out you ''have'' actually correctly remembered, then it's possibly worth at least a Trivia entry to at least make me more informed. Over to you(/whoever gets there first), as you see appropriate! [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.177|172.70.85.177]] 13:45, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Why do people always mangle Schwarzschild's name? it's so appropriate for what he's famous for!

Oh. I just realized that it's the name of someone. As a German, I always assumed the term just refers to the radius of a "black shield" from which no light can escape. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.203.76|162.158.203.76]] 10:07, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

Maybe link to the other comic relating to the schwarzchild radius, [[2088: Schwarzschild's Cat]]? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.249|108.162.237.249]] 12:56, 1 March 2022 (UTC)Bumpf

Ah... I see the change (Stamina->Cardio) makes it a strict layering of 'clarification', each "simplification" needing a further simplification to explain an aspect. When it was the original Stamina it looked like a disconnect "that didn't need explaining" that Cardio values did not need expanding upon, save that (perhaps as already explained) they probably derived upon several other values, such as the yet-to-be-further-clarified Stamina one plus others (BMI, etc). As it now is, it looks like a depth-first explanation, and one can only wonder what new rule 'simplifications' we hit between hitting the bottom of of the current reductionist precis and starting down other branches of rationalisation, on the way to the detail about the lrchids, perhaps. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.64|172.70.86.64]] 14:46, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

One hundred internet points to whomever designs such a game! [[User:Cwallenpoole|Cwallenpoole]] ([[User talk:Cwallenpoole|talk]]) 16:24, 1 March 2022 (UTC)
: Now I'm picturing Matt Mercer running a session of whatever it is... live on Twitch. Dammit. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.161|172.70.110.161]] 18:51, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

Talk:547: Simple

2022-03-02T12:57:18Z

172.70.91.126:

This is possibly even another take by xkcd at conspiracy theories such as the one in http://xkcd.com/966/
:In this comic too he presents conspiracy theories against each other, the black hole with the guidance system.

The fact that the reference of something bad happening is to the Black hole theories comes from the fact that the comic was drawn the same time the theories were most predominant.
:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safety_of_high_energy_particle_collision_experiments#Micro_black_holes [[User:Mr Andersom|Mr Andersom]] ([[User talk:Mr Andersom|talk]]) 13:40, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

I ''don't'' think there's a joke here regarding "particle accelerators not having a guidance system" (paraphrasing the first paragraph of explanation, currently). Maybe there's a confusion about the phrase "the particle accelerator's tertiary F.E.L. Guidance System"? The FEL (Free Electron Laser, IIRC) itself is a tunable lasing 'cavity' for electrons that is magnetic, not optical, in nature, but (again, IIRC) is supplied with electrons at relativistic speeds by way of a particle accelerator (depending on which FEL, sometimes dedicated to the FEL and sometimes "from a main multipurpose ring", such as the LHC might be). Particle acceleration requires that the particles ''being'' accelerated be constrained within the ring (when being brung up to speed or collided within the ring's in-line experiment zones) or redirected out of the ring (or allowed to depart it, but still in a controlled manner) if being used for an out-of-ring experiment. It's true that particles being smashed are thrown together rather haphazardly (when compared, say, with collisions at the scale of vehicle crash tests), but there's actually quite a lot of sophisticated detection equipment used to work out the path of the particles so that ''guidance'' can be applied by magnetic fields (separately from the 'corner turning' ones and/or including those). I think I would consider such systems (including the ones that 'extract' particles for use in off-ring experiments) worthy of the title "guidance systems", albeit external to the particle as opposed to on-board like on a smart missile... And so if (and I haven't checked, so colour me wrong if I turn out to be so) the complex has at least three FELs attached, it's reasonable to assume that the third of these (hierarchically speaking) has, like its brethren, a particle guidance system involved at some point to ensure the electron supply is suitably contained and piped into it... Or it refers to the third of (at least three) beam-guiding systems for the ''lone'' FEL. Maybe even this means something active within the magnetic "wiggler" assembly of the FEL itself, or even (if this is what they do) on the output to the FEL leading ''into'' the LHC itself... But whichever it is, it the relevent FEL Guidance System surely exists in some form or other.

...TL;DR; - I'm pretty much sure the joke is more of an "[[Up_Goer_Five|Up-goer 5]]" nature... I also don't see any reference to Black Holes/conspiracy theories... It's just doing an "If this part is broken, you will not <strike>go to space</strike> collide any particles today" thing, surely? [[Special:Contributions/31.111.87.233|31.111.87.233]] 22:05, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

::Sorry, but I have no time to read this comment. Keep short! --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:18, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
::I agree with 31.111.87.233. There's nothing about conspiracy theories, even indirectly. I've removed that part. I also don't see anything criticizing Simple English Wikipedia, or two versions. To the contrary, he praises it (albeit somewhat exaggeratedly) in the title text. I left it for now, though. [[User:Mattflaschen|Mattflaschen]] ([[User talk:Mattflaschen|talk]]) 08:44, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

There is a [[explain_xkcd:Community_portal/Proposals#Merge_Cueball_.26_Rob|community portal discussion]] of what to call Cueball and what to do in case with more than one Cueball. I have added this comic to the new Category:Multiple Cueballs. Since there is clearly one Cueball that is the protagonist and do most of the "talking" he should probably be listed as Cueball. Just made a note that the other guys also looks like Cueball. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 21:19, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

Maybe it would be worth adding a reference to Randall's new book "Thing Explainer", which follows the same concept.--[[Special:Contributions/162.158.114.229|162.158.114.229]] 00:12, 6 December 2015 (UTC)
:Nah, it's fine without it, since the comic doesn't directly refer to it (for obvious reasons) and because it's not based on the concept of the limited vocabulary that Thing Explainer and Up Goer Five, it's just simplistic. -Pennpenn [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.162|108.162.250.162]] 02:40, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

I looked at the Simple English Wikipedia and there's actually quite a lot of math in it. Maybe the 1st step of the solution would be to add all that stuff to the top of the regular wikipedia pages and shove all the heavy abstraction further down the page. It's advantageous for the 'average' reader to encounter something legible to them first, and it might remind the math professors how to talk to the less-initiated. A good example: https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graph_theory
- savetheoxygen.org
:This is your first contribution, and I'm not sure what the domain-name/username thing is abou, but I'll give you benefit of the doubt without actually seeing where I'd land if I tried it... But just FYI, use <nowiki>~~~~</nowiki> to sign your (Talk/Discussion) edits. If you're serious about sending people off to another place, put something in your User: pages and/or adjust your signature.
:Your comment is fairly good, BTW, but I have nothing to add. I just can't create the User:Talk page to mention all this there, so maybe you'll eventually see this instead. Welcome to the site, if you're still wishing to be active and helpfully contributing. (I'm just a random IP guy, my opinions/etc are my own. But if we argue about anything here it's more about grammar/relativity/what-a-given-drawn-line-represents than personality or first impressions!) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 12:57, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

2466: In Your Classroom

2022-03-01T14:23:48Z

172.70.91.126: /* Table of subjects */ You might as well link it.

{{comic
| number = 2466
| date = May 21, 2021
| title = In Your Classroom
| image = in_your_classroom.png
| titletext = Ontology is way off to the left and geography is way off to the right.
}}

==Explanation==

[[Randall]] has created a thought experiment and corresponding chart about school courses. The idea is, "the subject of the class appears in the classroom" and the chart compares how dangerous and how unusual that would be.

In the title text two points that are off the chart to the left and right are also mentioned. See details about all the subjects in the [[#Table of subjects|table]] below.

Note that Randall uses similar diagrams in each of [[388: Fuck Grapefruit]], [[1242: Scary Names]] and [[1501: Mysteries]], which also contain different items. They also have extra points mentioned in the title text. In the first two comics the points are also off the chart, whereas for the last the description of the point is too long to fit on the chart. Extra info outside the chart is also used in the title text of [[1785: Wifi]], but this is a line graph.

==Table of subjects==
{| class="wikitable"
|+Breakdown of Subjects
|-
!Course Topic
!Weirdness
!Badness
!Explanation
|-

!scope=row|Atmospheric Physics
|0%
|0%
|Absent very strange and unprecedented circumstances, every classroom has an atmosphere {{Citation needed}}, and this is very good, because humans cannot survive without one.
|-

!scope=row|Ethics
|25%
|0%
|Ethical thinking and behavior are widely considered good and should normally be present in education, but are sadly not universal.
|-

!scope=row|Education
|0%
|10%
|Learning usually goes on in classrooms, so education as a concept is both being learned about and present in the form of learning itself.
|-

!scope=row|Bibliography
|25%
|7%
|Bibliography is the study of books, and books are normally present in classrooms, particularly bibliography classrooms. Although, more commonly speaking academically, a bibliography is a list of all sources used to compose a research paper, considered mandatory in all branches of academics but occasionally falsified or written in an incorrect style.
|-

!scope=row|Human Physiology
|0%
|20%
|This comic assumes that there are humans learning in the classroom, which was true at the time this comic was published, although in many places at the time the comic was published, many classrooms were closed due to COVID-19 restrictions.
|-

!scope=row|Public Speaking
|25%
|15%
|Some classes require students to present things in front of the class, which is likely a requirement in a public speaking class. Thus, public speaking itself would be present in the class.
Some classes also have a teacher talking or presenting to the students from the front of the class, another form of public speaking.
|-

!scope=row|Architecture
|0%
|30%
|All buildings can be considered architecture, and most classes take place in buildings. This comic also refers to a class''room'', which is a room, and therefore considered architecture.
|-

!scope=row|Library Science
|25%
|25%
|Library science is concerned with the organization of knowledge, and is useful for finding information. Many classes require [https://papersowl.com/pay-for-research-paper research papers] that require the use of books and other sources of information to complete them. This would be even more appropriate for a class actually taught in the school library.
|-

!scope=row|Furniture Design
|0%
|40%
|Most rooms have furniture,{{Citation needed}} so this would probably be present in a classroom. May also be implying the classroom furniture has not been assembled yet, making it not as good and a lesson in furniture design.
|-

!scope=row|Culinary Arts
|40%
|30%
|Most studies of culinary arts include the teacher and/or students preparing food using the tools and/or techniques that have been taught, so it would be fairly normal for food to be a result of classroom activities. How ''good'' it is, however, can be a mixed bag, especially for student cooking attempts.
|-

!scope=row|Ergonomics
|5%
|45%
|Ergonomic equipment and workspaces promote comfort and efficiency, while non-ergonomic ones may be unpleasant, unhealthy, or even immediately dangerous.
|-

!scope=row|Botany
|40%
|40%
|The near-neutral position of botany (aka plant biology) suggests that the most likely reason for plants to be present would be something like a potted plant, which is not uncommon, and usually not unpleasant, but not very noteworthy. There are other potential reasons for plants to be present, but those are generally less likely.
|-

!scope=row|20th Century Authors
|65%
|10%
|Literature classes would benefit greatly from an open discussion or interview with the author themself. Sadly such things are rare, but not unheard of, putting it slightly on the "weird" side of the spectrum. Well-known authors of the 20th century have an increased likelihood of being dead by 2021, but there are still some authors of the 20th century who were well-established enough to be studied and still alive at the time this comic was published.
|-

!scope=row|Exobiology
|100%
|0%
|Exobiology is the study of extraterrestrial life. This would mean that an alien lifeform was in the classroom. This is extremely weird but very good for people to investigate and research the alien.
|-

!scope=row|21st Century Authors
|60%
|20%
|21st century authors have the advantage (over 19th and 20th century authors) of typically being alive and active at the time this comic was published. However, most authors who were primarily active in the 21st century are still developing their body of work, and/or still awaiting the judgment of history. The better availability of such authors, as compared to 20th century author probably explains the slightly lower "weirdness" score, while the limited body of truly prominent authors probably explains the lower "goodness" score.
|-

!scope=row|19th Century Authors
|100%
|15%
|No author who was active in the 19th century was alive at the writing of this comic{{Citation needed}}, hence, having one of them show up in class would be extremely weird. The opportunity to interact with such a person would be utterly unique, meaning that it scores pretty high on the "goodness" metric, though interestingly not as high as a 20th century author. Possibly, the potential "badness" of having a zombie or other reanimated being show up in your class is weighed against the advantage of having a historical figure there in person. It may also be that someone from the 19th century has an increased danger of having outdated ethics, which may result in discomfort on the part of the students.
|-

!scope=row|Paleontology
|100%
|25%
|Paleontology is the study of the history of life on Earth as based on fossils. In geology classes, it would be normal to have some fossils in the classroom. However, fossils are not usually found in other classrooms, and especially below the college level. Randall is also probably implying the weirdness of finding a live ''Jurassic Park''-style dinosaur.
|-

!scope=row|Robotics
|55%
|30%
|A course on robotics would often be expected to have some form of working models of the robots being discussed. However, for it to have "showed up" in your classroom could imply an actual functioning robot prototype walked into the classroom. While not cause for concern (as long as nobody in the class is named Sarah Connor), this would be a bit weird.
|-

!scope=row|Martian Soil Chemistry
|100%
|35%
|Martian soil only reaches Earth in small amounts, so it would be unusual to find a meaningful amount anywhere, except Mars.
|-

!scope=row|Tourism
|75%
|40%
|Tourists coming into an active classroom would be quite unusual; while tourists sometimes visit university campuses, it would generally be rude for a tour guide to lead them into a classroom when class is in progress. This could also refer to the students leaving to become tourists in another location.
|-

!scope=row|Child Psychology
|60%
|45%
|Children are rarely students in classrooms advanced enough to teach child psychology. In order for child psychology to be on display, presumably someone would have to have brought a child (either for a demonstration, or for some other reason), which is slightly weird, but not unheard of. This is considered slightly "good", presumably because it would give students some opportunity for firsthand observation, and because most people like, or at least tolerate, children.
|-

!scope=row|Entomology
|15%
|55%
|Entomology is the study of insects. Insects getting into a classroom is a very common event, even putting aside the possibility of someone bringing insects specifically to study. Most insects that might get in are relatively benign, but some (such as mosquitoes) might sting or bite, and many people simply don't like insects, even when they're not harmful, pushing this slightly into "bad" territory.
|-

!scope=row|Occupational Therapy
|10%
|62%
|Injury, illness or mental health problem that hinder your participation in life/school. Many students who have significant physical injuries and conditions that require occupational therapy would generally not engage in those activities during a class, although volunteers may be brought in as a demonstration of a particular health problem or method of treatment.
|-

!scope=row|Hydraulic Engineering
|40%
|62%
|Likely in the form of flooding or plumbing problems.
|-

!scope=row|Pest Control
|25%
|70%
|This is not dissimilar to entomology, but pest control tends to involve larger infestations, as opposed to individual insects, and also includes non-insect animals, such as rats. Such events in classroom are not as common as individual insects getting in (especially in a well-maintained building), but are far from unheard of, and risk many negative effects, from bug bites to structural damage, and may require evacuation and fumigation to deal with.
|-

!scope=row|Foodborne Illness
|15%
|80%
|Sometimes students in a culinary arts class do not properly observe hygiene standards and the food they present would lead to illness in those that consume the food. Thankfully, this is rare if the teacher is paying enough attention to proceedings. Students could also be ill from food eaten outside of class.
|-

!scope=row|Criminal Law
|45%
|85%
|This might happen if a crime occurs in the class. While an armed robbery is unlikely, incidents involving theft or drug use are not particularly uncommon. Regardless, such an incident would be very bad.
|-

!scope=row|Physiology of Stress
|0%
|90%
|Stress in a classroom, even stress that's bad enough to manifest itself in physical symptoms, is all too common. Stress that bad is very harmful, and a student realizing that they were manifesting the symptoms they're studying should take it as a warning sign.
|-

!scope=row|Oncology
|25%
|100%
|Oncology is the medical practice of treating cancer. For someone in a classroom full of students to have cancer is, unfortunately, not an uncommon event, putting it on the "normal" side of the scale. While not abnormal, it's clearly very bad.
|-

!scope=row|Ornithology
|60%
|55%
|Ornithology is the study of birds. A bird getting into a classroom would be somewhat strange, but there are circumstances under which it would happen. In most cases, that's not especially dangerous, but it would be disruptive, and introduce the possibility of the bird making a mess, and possibly getting hurt (or even hurting others), which makes it slightly bad.
|-

!scope=row|Animation
|100%
|56%
|Presumably Randall isn't referring to examples of animated works being displayed to the students in an animation class, as that would be normal. However, it would be very weird for animated characters to appear physically in the classroom instead of being projected on screens. Possibly a reference to movies such as ''Who Framed Roger Rabbit'' in which cartoon characters actively interact with the live action cast. As many of the characters abide by different physics, and a couple are depicted as insane, this would be very weird and potentially bad. Possibly also a reference to the horror game {{w|Bendy and the Ink Machine}}, though this would probably be farther down the bad axis than depicted here.
|-

!scope=row|Petroleum Geology
|65%
|60%
|Crude oil coming up through the floor of the classroom would be ''very'' weird. Any potential for hands-on learning experience would be limited, and quickly outweighed by classes being disrupted entirely (be it damage to the building, or oil companies trying to negotiate for the land).
|-

!scope=row|Highway Engineering
|75%
|65%
|A highway being built through an active classroom would be very unusual and not that safe.
|-

!scope=row|Toxicology
|55%
|75%
|Most likely, a toxic substance is present in the room. This is not very weird if the room is in a building that has {{w|asbestos}}-containing insulation (typically associated with buildings constructed before the 1990s, although it has not been specifically outlawed in the United States due to industrial lobbying) or lead paint (which was fully outlawed in 1978, so any paint must have been applied prior to that date). However, toxic substances are unsafe for humans{{Citation needed}}.
|-

!scope=row|Hematology
|75%
|70%
|Hematology is the study of blood. Given that there should be blood in each of the students present{{Citation needed}}, we should probably assume Randall means "large quantities of blood outside of one's body", which would indeed be both bad and weird.
|-

!scope=row|Hostage Negotiation
|70%
|85%
|Reasons as to why there would be hostage negotiations taking place at a school have horrifying implications for the students and teacher.
|-

!scope=row|History of Siege Warfare
|100%
|80%
|This would be an exceptionally strange event. Given that the topic is "history", having it show up implies that either historical figures have the classroom under siege (possibly through time travel or reanimation) or at least that the besiegers are using traditional weapons and methods in their attack. In either case, it would be a very weird event, and also very bad.
|-

!scope=row|Trauma Surgery
|55%
|95%
|An injury severe enough to require trauma surgery would be rare in a classroom, but there are circumstances under which it could realistically happen. Such an injury would be, by its very nature, a very bad thing.
|-

!scope=row|Volcanology
|75%
|95%
|Having a live volcano in one's classroom is both very dangerous and very weird {{Citation needed}}. Volcanoes mature over very long time frames, but even the earliest stages are highly disruptive and potentially deadly, as seen in the {{w|Parícutin#Formation|1943 eruption of Paricutín}} and the {{w|2018_lower_Puna_eruption#Eruption|2018 flank eruption of Kilauea}}. Note this also applies to [[1611: Baking Soda and Vinegar | baking soda and vinegar volcanoes that are offshoots of much larger vinegar hotspots]].
|-

!scope=row|Quasar Astronomy
|75%
|100%
|{{w|Quasars}} are distant astronomical objects that release large amounts of energy. Not only would the power of a quasar destroy the classroom (as well as the rest of Earth), quasars are too large to fit inside any known classroom. For example, {{w|ULAS J1342+0928}} has a mass of 8*10^8 solar masses. This means the event horizon of the black hole is almost 16 AU in radius, and this size does not include the accretion disk.
|-

!scope=row|Ontology (title text)
|<0%
|?
|Ontology is the philosophical study of existence and being. Since there must be ''something'' learning in the classroom, it is unsurprising that ontology is a normal subject to appear in the classroom. It would, in fact, be more bizarre to have a lack of ontology in the classroom.
|-

!scope=row|Geography (title text)
|>100%
|?
|Geographers study the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of the Earth. While each classroom classroom contains a small portion of the Earth's surface (normally not enough of it to be interesting to geographers), having the ''entire Earth'' appear inside a classroom would likely demand explanation. In particular, if this is an ordinary classroom (i.e. located ''on'' the Earth), the planet's simultaneous appearance within its walls would both defy our current understanding of spacetime, and risk [[1515: Basketball Earth | disastrous consequences at the hands of curious students.]] This could also be implying the classroom is suddenly being located on top of a geographic border, which would be highly unlikely, especially if it happened without warning.

|}

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

:[Caption above scatter plot with labeled axes]
:Caption: The thing you study just showed up in your classroom! That's...
:Upper y-axis label: Good
:Lower y-axis label: Bad
:Upper x-axis label: Normal
:Lower x-axis label: Weird

:[First quadrant (left to right, top to bottom):]
:20th century authors
:Exobiology
:21st century authors
:19th century authors
:Robotics
:Paleontology
:Martian soil chemistry
:Child psychology
:Tourism
:[Second quadrant]
:Atmospheric physics
:Ethics
:Education
:Bibliography
:Human physiology
:Public speaking
:Architecture
:Library science
:Furniture design
:Culinary arts
:Ergonomics
:Botany
:[Third quadrant]
:Entomology
:Occupational therapy
:Hydraulic engineering
:Pest control
:Foodborne illness
:Criminal law
:Physiology of stress
:Oncology
:[Fourth quadrant]
:Ornithology
:Animation
:Petroleum geology
:Highway engineering
:Toxicology
:Hematology
:Hostage negotiation
:History of siege warfare
:Trauma surgery
:Volcanology
:Quasar astronomy

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Charts]]
[[Category:Rankings]]
[[Category:Food]]
[[Category:Cancer]]
[[Category:Animals]]
[[Category:Geology]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]
[[Category:Volcanoes]]
[[Category:Engineering]]

Talk:1568: Synonym Movies 2

2022-02-27T19:31:26Z

172.70.91.126:

I believe they are (in order): ''Harry Potter'', ''Rocky'', ''Pirates of the Caribbean'', ''Indiana Jones'', and ''A Song of Ice and Fire''. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.48.114|173.245.48.114]] 04:15, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

I wonder why Randall retained the Roman numerals instead of replacing them with numbers? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.81|108.162.216.81]] 06:35, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

This explanation has got to have the most redundancies of any explanation on this site. It more or less says the same things four times. Those sure are a lot of redundancies. I don't think there is another explanation with this many redun... OK, OK, I'll stop. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.21|141.101.104.21]] 07:05, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

It feels like Randall gave up on this concept halfway through. The last two (or three) Harry Potter titles, all but the first Pirates, and the last Indiana Jones (I refuse to acknowledge that thing that happened in 2008) are not synonyms for the actual title, but Up Goer Five-style plot synopses. --[[User:SaturNine|SaturNine]] ([[User talk:SaturNine|talk]]) 12:01, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

:Or [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL86F4D497FD3CACCE Honest Trailers]. [[Special:Contributions/188.114.97.30|188.114.97.30]] 23:43, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

"Blizzard" is not one of the 1,000 most frequently-used words.
[[User:Comet|Comet]] ([[User talk:Comet|talk]]) 20:50, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

:What gives you the idea that he has restricted himself to the 1000 most common words? The idea seems to be to make somewhat obscure synonyms of the titles using simpler words that would not make great titles themselves. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.53|173.245.54.53]] 02:10, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

All the Tropical Boaters titles are not synonyms for the actual titles, but mere descriptions of something of note in each movie. I agree with SaturNine's comment above about Randall's ... umm ... assiduousness. {{unsigned ip|108.162.249.176}}

An alternate interpretation of this comic could be that he was stretching the concept of a synonym. A synonym can be a word ''or phrase'' and it expresses the same idea as another word or phrase. Some synonyms can be contextual only. Perhaps, the punchline of the joke is that the actual titles of some of these movies are not synonymous with the movie itself. For example, ''Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides'' when the movie was about the fountain of youth. Thus, Randall's synonym movie title rewrites are synonymous with the movie plot more than the title. This could be said for all of them so far. Perhaps, that some are synonymous with the actual titles is coincidence only. --[[User:R0hrshach|R0hrshach]] ([[User talk:R0hrshach|talk]]) 15:56, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

Well, I enjoyed figuring out what series he was referring to! Regarding the alt text, I am looking forward to the upcoming books "The Gusts of the Snow Season" and "A Reverie of the Vernal Season"!--[[User:Rayrox222]] 17:17, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

And now I need to start watching Game of Thrones with someone, if only so I have an excuse to say something like "Let's watch Fun With Chairs!" [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.116|108.162.221.116]] 08:39, 25 August 2015 (UTC)

Have not watched "Hellboy", have not watched "The devil wears prada". But how about "Hellboy wears expensive fashion"? -[[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.93|198.41.242.93]] 14:59, 25 August 2015 (UTC)

Can someone help me with [[:File:radiation.png]]? No matter what dimensions I upload, it appears low-res. {{User:17jiangz1/signature|16:05, 25 August 2015}}
:Nevermind {{User:17jiangz1/signature|00:17, 26 August 2015}}

The explanations for the ASoIAF titles were off. I fixed them a bit, but they're still not great. There's no "Battle of the Five Kings". There's a War of the Five Kings, but within that war, none of the battles involve the forces of more than two of them. Also, they aren't kings of five separate regions of Westeros: Joffrey, Renly, and Stannis all claim to be king of the whole shebang (although it isn't too far off for the other two). The way A Storm of Swords was described implied that Dany's struggles were just beginning, rather than continuing. A Dance with Dragons is very hard to explain, because the story as published does not at all match the story the name was intended for, and the only real dragon-dancing going on is a slew of references to a historical war (which is itself covered in a separate novella), and possibly the last few chapters (which are mostly setup for the next book rather than a conclusion to ADwD). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.52|162.158.255.52]] 11:05, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

:Now that I think about it, why do we need any explanation for the book titles at all? Randall's titles are all straight synonyms, that make just as much sense (maybe more) if you have no idea what the books are about. I'll edit again to simplify. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.52|162.158.255.52]] 11:08, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

The Indiana Jones' "Professor Whip is in Another Movie" explanation is off. "Another Movie" means that the movie isn't like the originals: it's based on aliens and does not fit in the series' established lore. It only implies that it shouldn't have been made as an effect of the point. {{unsigned ip|108.162.210.227}}

''Wandboy and the Fugitive''... that conjures some interesting scenes.

》'''''"Harry Potter!''' On your knees! Right now! I'm not messing around, Harry!"''

》''"I didn't resurrect Voldemort!" "I don't care!"'' [[Special:Contributions/162.158.5.136|162.158.5.136]] 11:46, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

Okay, so next year "Indiana Jones 5 - The Curse of the Golden Catheter" comes out! What would its synonym title be? Go! [[User:Mathmannix|Mathmannix]] ([[User talk:Mathmannix|talk]]) 17:40, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Professor Whip Takes Another Unlucky Thing

Talk:1568: Synonym Movies 2

2022-02-27T19:30:45Z

172.70.91.126:

Talk:2585: Rounding

2022-02-23T23:14:58Z

172.70.91.126:

Wot no {{w|FFF system|furlongs per fortnight}}? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 23:14, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

2585: Rounding

2022-02-23T23:10:21Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ Put measurement wikilinks (for first version of speeds and/or distances, if time units are needed explaining all but minutes feature one step on from these).

{{comic
| number = 2585
| date = February 23, 2022
| title = Rounding
| image = rounding.png
| titletext = I've developed a novel propulsion system powered by loss of precision in unit conversion.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT moving at 7 PB/s (rounded) - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

Normally, when you say you can ride a bike at 45 {{w|Miles per hour|mph}} if you round, you mean that you can ride at a speed between 44.5 and 45.5, but the joke is that he actually means if you go through a extremely long chain of rounding imprecisely, starting at 17 mph, you can get to the value of 45. The title text furthers the joke of rounding imprecisely.

#17 mph = 7.59968 {{w|Metre per second|m/s}}
#8 m/s = 15.5508 {{w|Knot (unit)|knots}}
#16 knots = 4.50083 {{w|fathom}}s/sec
#5 fathoms/sec = 2.72727 {{w|furlong}}s/min
#3 furlongs/min = 5.50001 fathoms/sec
#6 fathoms/sec = 39.5021 {{w|Kilometres per hour|km/h}}
#40 km/h = 21.5983 knots
#22 knots = 40.744 km/h
#41 km/h = 203.809 furlongs/hour
#204 furlongs/hour = 25.5001 mph
#26 mph = 11.623 m/s
#12 m/s = 3.57909 furlongs/min
#4 furlongs/minute = 14.6667 {{w|yard}}s/sec
#15 yards/sec = 7.5 fathoms/sec
#8 fathoms/sec = 14.6304 m/s
#15 m/s = 33.554 mph
#34 mph = 4.53332 furlongs/min
#5 furlongs/min = 32.5867 knots
#33 knots = 18.5659 yards/sec
#19 yards/sec = 9.5 fathoms/sec
#10 fathoms/sec = 35.549 knots
#36 knots = 5.52373 furlongs/min
#6 furlongs/min = 45.0001 mph

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

:[Cueball, wearing a bike helmet and standing next to a bike, is speaking to Megan.]

:Cueball: I can ride my bike at 45 MPH.
:Cueball: If you round.

:[To their right and proceeding down the rest of the comic, arrows show conversions from one measure into another unit.]

:17 MPH
:8 meters/sec
:16 knots
:5 fathoms/sec
:3 furlongs/min
:6 fathoms/sec
:40 KPH
:22 knots
:41 KPH
:204 furlongs/hr
:26 MPH
:12 M/S
:4 furlongs/min
:15 yards/sec
:8 fathoms/sec
:15 M/S
:34 MPH
:5 furlongs/min
:33 knots
:19 yards/sec
:10 fathoms/sec
:36 knots
:6 furlongs/min
:45 MPH

{{comic discussion}}

2581: Health Stats

2022-02-17T15:24:00Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ Disambiguate from being a factor of 10 change in the _value_, rather than the stated minor variation limit.

{{comic
| number = 2581
| date = February 14, 2022
| title = Health Stats
| image = health_stats.png
| titletext = You will live on forever in our hearts, pushing a little extra blood toward our left hands now and then to give them a squeeze.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball|Cueball's]] has a smartwatch that tells him a new health statistic. It is clearly either a new watch or a new feature added to his existing one.

It seems to monitor the volume of blood currently in his left hand (specifically the one the watch is being worn on the wrist of, implying it tracks the inflow and outflow and maintains a running tally) and conveys this quantity in milliliters (ml). It also tracks other stats like his pulse, as seen later, but this is not what currently interests Cueball. Instead he studies the blood volume information and finds it changing from moment to moment. This may be from a combination of his pulse (misaligned to the frequency of the updates) or the vertical position and attitude of his hand (he subtly changes the hand's position from panel to panel). It could just be inaccuracies in the data, an issue with all scientific instruments but more so for consumer devices used without practiced expertise - it is unlikely he has strapped the measuring device tight enough onto his wrist to give scientifically consistent results, even with such slight arm movements as he makes.

He reports his thoughts on this to someone off-panel, who is heard replying to all his comments. At first, Cueball just voices the assumption that the small change is normal, and accepts the movement away from a number he had no reason to disbelieve as realistic. But then two measurements in a row both increase. Although all the changes are slight, compared to the magnitude of the numbers themselves, this freaks him out. He may be [[605: Extrapolating|extrapolating these two data points]] into the future - if this rather selective trend continues, his hand may explode from its ever-increasing volume of blood. Either this, or Cueball noticed that the variation in the first three data points was ±0.025, but the final variation suddenly surpasses this level by ten times this range, massively redefining his evolving expectations.

For whatever reason he becomes anxious, a consequence of this is that his pulse also begins to rise, as also documented by the watch. This could simultaneously increase his blood pressure (not noted as being another monitored statistic) and in turn causing another rise in the volume of blood in his hand. Knowledge of the pulse increase makes him even more alarmed, which will cause a positive feedback loop at least in the short term.

The total difference between the maximum (22.09 ml) and minimum volume (21.81 ml) of blood in his hand is only 0.28 ml compared to an average of 21.9 ml, so less than 1.5% difference. This can realistically be assumed to be a normal fluctuation from heartbeat to heartbeat and/or with change of posture. For that matter, neither Cueball nor ourselves may have any idea what a normal volume of blood in his left hand would be. His comment in the first panel is that he's "not sure how to interpret" the initial measurement, and it might need rather uncommon medical knowledge to do so - even those who have learnt how much blood a typical human body should contain might be stumped by how much of that is just within a typical (or specific) human hand. However, he seems to have assumed that 21.83 ml was a normal measurement simply since it was the first one he saw (a stereotypical {{w|Confirmation_bias#Preference_for_early_information|preference for early information}}).

Just before his anxiety reaches breaking point, his off-panel friend begins to tell him to stop looking at the watch all the time, but is interrupted mid-sentence by Cueball actually freak out. This final outbreak causes his off-screen companion to tease him by saying that "We will treasure your memory", thus joking that Cueball will soon die from the blood loss when his hand explodes.

The title text continues with this teasing where the friend jokes that after his demise he will live on forever in his friends' hearts. From there he will thus also be responsible for pushing a bit more blood into his friends' left hands, now and again, so they can feel this as a squeeze to remind them of how they lost their friend to a left-handed blood explosion.

This is likely meant to parody the tendency of people to monitor minute details of their own health, pandered to by possibly misguided developments in personal meditech, without having a clear idea of what any of the data means. This is arguably much more common today with health devices readily available, which can give the average person data about their own body but often don't offer useful context. Cueball is apparently sufficiently fixated on data that apparent changes to any metric causes him to panic. He doesn't know what the blood volume of his hand means for his health, or even whether it's a useful metric, yet he obsesses over perceived trends in the data. The irony is that his very focus causes a more important metric (his pulse rate) to elevate. This may be intended to suggest that excessive fixation on one's own health can cause elevated anxiety. Ironically, this stress can potentially be more harmful that the things that the person has become upset about.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is looking down and to the right at his bent arm, where a small device is radiating as shown with several small lines. Above him the message from the device is shown in a frame, that is divided in two by a line. The top part has one line of text, with a x at the end for closing the message. And below in the second half are two lines of text. Cueball is speaking to someone off-panel, who replies from a starburst at the panel's edge.]
:Box title bar: New health stat!
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.83 mL
:Cueball: Oh. Cool. Not sure how to interpret that, but good to know, I guess.
:Off-panel voice: I guess!

:[Same setting but Cueball has turned to the left, still looking at his device on his bend arm. The message on the device is now only showing the message part, so it is no longer divided into two parts.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.81 mL
:Cueball: Huh, it's going down. I guess that happens.
:Off-panel voice: Mhm.

:[In a frame-less panel, Cueball now has both arms bent with his hands close together in front of him. He has once again turned toward the right, and is still looking at the device.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.86 mL
:Cueball: Oh weird, now it's going up higher than before.
:Off-panel voice: Maybe you shouldn't look at-

:[Cueball now holds his arm with the device outstretched towards the right, with his other arm bent in front of him a finger raised.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 22.09 mL
:Cueball: It's going '''''way''''' up! '''''Is my hand exploding?!'''''
:Cueball: And now my pulse is rising! '''''Aaaaa!!!!'''''
:Off-panel voice: So sorry. We will treasure your memory.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Biology]]

2581: Health Stats

2022-02-15T19:38:36Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2581
| date = February 14, 2022
| title = Health Stats
| image = health_stats.png
| titletext = You will live on forever in our hearts, pushing a little extra blood toward our left hands now and then to give them a squeeze.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by an EXPLODING RIGHT HAND - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
[[Cueball]] has bought a new smartwatch with a health tracker. For instance, it can monitor the volume of blood in his left hand (specifically the one the watch is being worn on the wrist of), indicating this number in milliliters (ml). While he studies this new information, the volume of blood changes constantly, with his pulse or due to the positioning of his hand (above/below his heart, held up or down; he changes the hand's position from panel to panel) or, more likely, just normal measurement inaccuracies for consumer devices. He tells this to someone off-panel, who replies to all his comments.

At first, Cueball just assumes the small change is normal, but when the changes of two measurements in a row both increase, this freaks him out as he [[605: Extrapolating|extrapolates these two data points]] into the future. If this rather selective trend continues, his hand may explode from its ever-increasing volume of blood. Either this, or Cueball noticed that the variation in the first three data points was <±0.025, but the variation suddenly surpassing this level by one order of magnitude becomes alarming. As a consequence of him freaking out his pulse also begins to rise, likely increasing his blood pressure, which could cause another rise in the volume of blood in his hand. And the pulse increase in itself, only makes him even more scared, causing a positive feedback loop.

The total difference between the maximum (22.09 ml) and minimum volume (21.81 ml) of blood in his hand is only 0.28 ml compared to an average of 21.9 ml, so less than 1.5% difference. This must be assumed to be a normal fluctuation from heartbeat to heartbeat and/or with change of posture.

Just before he freaks out his off-panel friend begins to tell him to stop looking at the watch all the time. But he interrupts this mid-sentence as he starts to freak out. This final outbreak causes his off-screen companion to tease him, by saying that "We will treasure your memory". Thus joking that Cueball must already be assuming that he will soon die from the blood loss when his hand explodes.

The title text continues with this teasing where the friend jokes that after his demise he will live on forever in his friends' hearts. And from there he will thus also be responsible for pushing a bit more blood into his friends' left hands, now and again, so they can feel this as a squeeze, to remind them of how they lost their friend, to a left-handed blood explosion.

This is likely meant as a parable on people monitoring their natural fluctuating body functions too closely as exemplified by the tenth- and hundredth-milliliter decimal place in the output (1/300th-1/3000th of a fluid ounce).

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is looking down and to the right at his bend arm, where a small device is radiating as shown with several small lines. Above him the message from the device is shown in a frame, that is divided in two by a line. The top part has one line of text, with a x at the end for closing the message. And below in the second half are two lines of text. Cueball is speaking to someone off-panel, who replies from a starburst at the panel's edge.]
:Box title bar: New health stat!
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.83 mL
:Cueball: Oh. Cool. Not sure how to interpret that, but good to know, I guess.
:Off-panel voice: I guess!

:[Same setting but Cueball has turned to the left, still looking at his device on his bend arm. The message on the device is now only showing the message part, so it is no longer divided into two parts.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.81 mL
:Cueball: Huh, it's going down. I guess that happens.
:Off-panel voice: Mhm.

:[In a frame-less panel Cueball now has both arms bend with his hands close together in front of him. He has once again turned toward the right, and is still looking at the device.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.86 mL
:Cueball: Oh weird, now it's going up higher than before.
:Off-panel voice: Maybe you shouldn't look at-

:[Cueball now holds his arm with the device outstretched towards the right, with his other arm bent in front of him a finger raised.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 22.09 mL
:Cueball: It's going '''''way''''' up! '''''Is my hand exploding?!'''''
:Cueball: And now my pulse is rising! '''''Aaaaa!!!!'''''
:Off-panel voice: So sorry. We will treasure your memory.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Biology]]

2581: Health Stats

2022-02-15T19:37:50Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ I forgot this edit.

{{comic
| number = 2581
| date = February 14, 2022
| title = Health Stats
| image = health_stats.png
| titletext = You will live on forever in our hearts, pushing a little extra blood toward our left hands now and then to give them a squeeze.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by an EXPLODING RIGHT HAND - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
[[Cueball]] has bought a new smartwatch with a health tracker. For instance, it can monitor the volume of blood in his left hand (specifically the one the watch is being worn on the wrist of), indicating this number in milliliters (ml). While he studies this new information, the volume of blood changes constantly, with his pulse or due to the positioning of his hand (above/below his heart, held up or down; he changes the hand's position from panel to panel) or, more likely, just normal measurement inaccuracies for consumer devices. He tells this to someone off-panel who replies to all his comments.

At first, Cueball just assumes the small change is normal, but when the changes of two measurements in a row both increase, this freaks him out as he [[605: Extrapolating|extrapolates these two data points]] into the future. If this rather selective trend continues, his hand may explode from its ever-increasing volume of blood. Either this, or Cueball noticed that the variation in the first three data points was <±0.025, but the variation suddenly surpassing this level by one order of magnitude becomes alarming. As a consequence of him freaking out his pulse also begins to rise, likely increasing his blood pressure, which could cause another rise in the volume of blood in his hand. And the pulse increase in itself, only makes him even more scared, causing a positive feedback loop.

The total difference between the maximum (22.09 ml) and minimum volume (21.81 ml) of blood in his hand is only 0.28 ml compared to an average of 21.9 ml, so less than 1.5% difference. This must be assumed to be a normal fluctuation from heartbeat to heartbeat and/or with change of posture.

Just before he freaks out his off-panel friend begins to tell him to stop looking at the watch all the time. But he interrupts this mid-sentence as he starts to freak out. This final outbreak causes his off-screen companion to tease him, by saying that "We will treasure your memory". Thus joking that Cueball must already be assuming that he will soon die from the blood loss when his hand explodes.

The title text continues with this teasing where the friend jokes that after his demise he will live on forever in his friends' hearts. And from there he will thus also be responsible for pushing a bit more blood into his friends' left hands, now and again, so they can feel this as a squeeze, to remind them of how they lost their friend, to a left-handed blood explosion.

This is likely meant as a parable on people monitoring their natural fluctuating body functions too closely as exemplified by the tenth- and hundredth-milliliter decimal place in the output (1/300th-1/3000th of a fluid ounce).

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is looking down and to the right at his bend arm, where a small device is radiating as shown with several small lines. Above him the message from the device is shown in a frame, that is divided in two by a line. The top part has one line of text, with a x at the end for closing the message. And below in the second half are two lines of text. Cueball is speaking to someone off-panel, who replies from a starburst at the panel's edge.]
:Box title bar: New health stat!
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.83 mL
:Cueball: Oh. Cool. Not sure how to interpret that, but good to know, I guess.
:Off-panel voice: I guess!

:[Same setting but Cueball has turned to the left, still looking at his device on his bend arm. The message on the device is now only showing the message part, so it is no longer divided into two parts.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.81 mL
:Cueball: Huh, it's going down. I guess that happens.
:Off-panel voice: Mhm.

:[In a frame-less panel Cueball now has both arms bend with his hands close together in front of him. He has once again turned toward the right, and is still looking at the device.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.86 mL
:Cueball: Oh weird, now it's going up higher than before.
:Off-panel voice: Maybe you shouldn't look at-

:[Cueball now holds his arm with the device outstretched towards the right, with his other arm bent in front of him a finger raised.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 22.09 mL
:Cueball: It's going '''''way''''' up! '''''Is my hand exploding?!'''''
:Cueball: And now my pulse is rising! '''''Aaaaa!!!!'''''
:Off-panel voice: So sorry. We will treasure your memory.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Biology]]

2581: Health Stats

2022-02-15T19:37:11Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ Various little things.

{{comic
| number = 2581
| date = February 14, 2022
| title = Health Stats
| image = health_stats.png
| titletext = You will live on forever in our hearts, pushing a little extra blood toward our left hands now and then to give them a squeeze.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by an EXPLODING RIGHT HAND - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
[[Cueball]] has bought a new smartwatch with a health tracker. For instance, it can monitor the volume of blood in his left hand (specifically the one the watch is being worn on the wrist of), indicating this number in milliliters (ml). While he studies this new information, the volume of blood changes constantly, with his pulse or due to the positioning of his hand (above/below his heart, held up or down. He changes the hand's position from panel to panel) or, more likely, just normal measurement inaccuracies for consumer devices. He tells this to someone off-panel who replies to all his comments.

At first, Cueball just assumes the small change is normal, but when the changes of two measurements in a row both increase, this freaks him out as he [[605: Extrapolating|extrapolates these two data points]] into the future. If this rather selective trend continues, his hand may explode from its ever-increasing volume of blood. Either this, or Cueball noticed that the variation in the first three data points was <±0.025, but the variation suddenly surpassing this level by one order of magnitude becomes alarming. As a consequence of him freaking out his pulse also begins to rise, likely increasing his blood pressure, which could cause another rise in the volume of blood in his hand. And the pulse increase in itself, only makes him even more scared, causing a positive feedback loop.

The total difference between the maximum (22.09 ml) and minimum volume (21.81 ml) of blood in his hand is only 0.28 ml compared to an average of 21.9 ml, so less than 1.5% difference. This must be assumed to be a normal fluctuation from heartbeat to heartbeat and/or with change of posture.

Just before he freaks out his off-panel friend begins to tell him to stop looking at the watch all the time. But he interrupts this mid-sentence as he starts to freak out. This final outbreak causes his off-screen companion to tease him, by saying that "We will treasure your memory". Thus joking that Cueball must already be assuming that he will soon die from the blood loss when his hand explodes.

The title text continues with this teasing where the friend jokes that after his demise he will live on forever in his friends' hearts. And from there he will thus also be responsible for pushing a bit more blood into his friends' left hands, now and again, so they can feel this as a squeeze, to remind them of how they lost their friend, to a left-handed blood explosion.

This is likely meant as a parable on people monitoring their natural fluctuating body functions too closely as exemplified by the tenth- and hundredth-milliliter decimal place in the output (1/300th-1/3000th of a fluid ounce).

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is looking down and to the right at his bend arm, where a small device is radiating as shown with several small lines. Above him the message from the device is shown in a frame, that is divided in two by a line. The top part has one line of text, with a x at the end for closing the message. And below in the second half are two lines of text. Cueball is speaking to someone off-panel, who replies from a starburst at the panel's edge.]
:Box title bar: New health stat!
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.83 mL
:Cueball: Oh. Cool. Not sure how to interpret that, but good to know, I guess.
:Off-panel voice: I guess!

:[Same setting but Cueball has turned to the left, still looking at his device on his bend arm. The message on the device is now only showing the message part, so it is no longer divided into two parts.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.81 mL
:Cueball: Huh, it's going down. I guess that happens.
:Off-panel voice: Mhm.

:[In a frame-less panel Cueball now has both arms bend with his hands close together in front of him. He has once again turned toward the right, and is still looking at the device.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 21.86 mL
:Cueball: Oh weird, now it's going up higher than before.
:Off-panel voice: Maybe you shouldn't look at-

:[Cueball now holds his arm with the device outstretched towards the right, with his other arm bent in front of him a finger raised.]
:Box: Left hand blood volume: 22.09 mL
:Cueball: It's going '''''way''''' up! '''''Is my hand exploding?!'''''
:Cueball: And now my pulse is rising! '''''Aaaaa!!!!'''''
:Off-panel voice: So sorry. We will treasure your memory.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Biology]]

Talk:1442: Chemistry

2022-02-10T01:31:35Z

172.70.91.126:

:"I" would have two in Randall's system as a sans-serif element, and four as a serif element. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.202|108.162.249.202]] 00:51, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

::The crossbar on "I" is actually not a serif, it's a part of the letter. Some popular sans-serif fonts that have a crossbar on "I" include Tahoma and Verdana. --[[User:Zagorath|Zagorath]] ([[User talk:Zagorath|talk]]) 13:24, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

What is the force that holds the two or three glyphs of an atom together called? How many bonds does the i's dot in Ti have? Ann how dangerous is comic sans cheMStry? [[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.39|141.101.104.39]] 06:52, 3 November 2014 (UTC)
:Probably not as dangerous as if you were using Aurebesh (look it up).--[[User:KitsunePhoenix|Amaroq (KitsunePhoenix)]] ([[User talk:KitsunePhoenix|talk]]) 03:15, 8 August 2021 (UTC)
:The letter i can only form one bond, as the other side is bonded with its dot. This is pretty basic chemestry![[User:Maplestrip|Maplestrip]] ([[User talk:Maplestrip|talk]]) 08:20, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

::Ok. Let's look at something advanced. Fe. Os. {{w|Ununtrium|Uut}}. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 12:20, 3 November 2014 (UTC)
:::Sorry, but you mean {{w|Nh|Nh}}.
:::Ah, binary atoms. Probably too advanced for this discussion. [[User:Redbelly98|Redbelly98]] ([[User talk:Redbelly98|talk]]) 13:03, 21 July 2018 (UTC)

Presumably hydrocarbon chains are still supported, albeit with hydrogens forming the backbone in a zip-like arrangement. You'd need phosphorous on the end, with a sans serif valence of 1. [[User:SleekWeasel|SleekWeasel]] ([[User talk:SleekWeasel|talk]]) 08:09, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

I believe he is making fun of incompetent chemistry students. I've seen some draw CH4 as C-H-H-H-H, i.e. according to some random and weird rules that have nothing to do with chemistry. - This comic proposes an equally nonsensical new paradigm. - Aeneas, 3rd November 2014, 10:01 CET

The crystalline structure is not like real-life crystalline carbon (neither diamond nor graphite). I removed that but someone should add a bit about it.[[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.39|141.101.99.39]] 11:48, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Old English Krypton is particularly hazardous and may explode on contact. Dark matter is composed entirely of cursive script elements. [[User:DivePeak|DivePeak]] ([[User talk:DivePeak|talk]]) 12:01, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

"Mydrane" is a trade mark for a company that markets miscellaneous medical supplies. "Hydrane" is a process for coal gasification by hydrogenation, producing ideally mostly light hydrocarbon gases (mostly methane) and a minimum of liquid products. Not clear whether either is relevant here.[[User:Taibhse|Taibhse]] ([[User talk:Taibhse|talk]]) 12:29, 3 November 2014 (UTC)
::Hydrane is probally relevant. The real Mydrane almost certainly isn't. However, two other words come to mind; Mydriasis (the dialation of the pupil) and Myopia (near-sightedness), which could be what was happening to us Chemistry geeks when we first saw that. Also, the "compound" he claims to be Mydrane does somewhat resemble a pair of eyes or a pair of glasses. -[[Special:Contributions/173.245.48.137|173.245.48.137]] 17:42, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Amount vs. number.
In the explanation: "the formation of bonds between elements often relies on the amount of valence electrons an element has." Should read, "the formation of bonds between elements often relies on the NUMBER of valence electrons an element has…"

-Avenue

It would be a very interesting exercise to invent a new set of symbols that WERE accurate using this system.[[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 12:47, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

I don't know how relevant this is, but Hydrogen does exist in a metallic phase unde rhigh pressure and temperatures. It's liquid, though, and not crystalline. Also, C2H does also exist, but as a very unstable radical (basically an Acetylene Radical) which seems to be found in space. I have NO idea where Mydrane comes from. There are a lot of Hydrogencompounds ending with -ane (Borane, Silane, Methane), but no idea how this applies here. --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.231.188|108.162.231.188]] 14:21, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Question: does N(itrogen) only have two bonds, or are those angles a different kind of bond (perhaps ionic vs covalent)? If so, tungsten (W) would be interesting, for a start... (In fact, going though the elements in my head, from the monoglyph elements it would be the most complex under this system. The diglyphs might give Meitnerium (Mt... but was that previously Une as a systematic triglyph?) or Thulium (Tm) some interesting qualities, depending on how the system actually works. Triglyphs are always intended to be replaced, so I think those are moot.
:Wow, is this a serious question or are you just trolling for conspiracy nuts? Of course the conspiracy theorists will tell you that before the invention of printing all the angles were curves, and they were compressed to tight angles to make blocks of movable type smaller and cheaper. Reputable experimental chemists, however, have reported that the bonds between two tungstens is stronger than between two uraniums and we can attribute the difference to the angles. It is fairly evident that right angles (e.g. at the upper left corners of "F" and "P") are essentially inert, and it appears that bond strength increases as the angle becomes more acute. Opposing angles (e.g. "K") seem to Kancel each other out. This is still a very contentious topic![[User:DivePeak|DivePeak]] ([[User talk:DivePeak|talk]]) 05:09, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

As for symbols that ''are'' accurate, there are a number of systems. Hydrogen is represented on the "gold discs" on the Voyager spacecraft (as a starting key to easily decode other information on there) but without a complete overhaul of a system, I'd imagine ''no'' advanced civilisation will have started out with "let's show it how it actually works" (accurately, and without elements such as phlogiston creeping in!) before giving arbitrary names. Electron-orbital diagrams probably work well, though, for some things. And something that reveals the (for example) pi-bonds works better in combinatory diagrams. I think. It's been a while since I did any serious chemistry.[[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.112|141.101.99.112]] 14:41, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Oxygen has 6 valence electrons, not two. It forms two bonds because it's got room for two more. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.105|108.162.216.105]] 16:49, 3 November 2014 (UTC)
:In a typographic chemistry system, assuming that molecules can still be 3-dimensional, Oxygen atoms could hypothetically find themselves strung along other atoms whose vertices poke through the O's (like a ring on a pole). If you were to throw quantum tunneling into the mix as well (probably represented by Stencil lettering), then you could have atoms passing through eachother, thus resulting in Oxygen forming into proper chain-links. --[[User:KitsunePhoenix|Amaroq (KitsunePhoenix)]] ([[User talk:KitsunePhoenix|talk]]) 03:15, 8 August 2021 (UTC)

Could Mydrane be My Dr -ane where -ane is the common ending for an alkane. My Dr = CCH...which could be Cape Code Healthcare? ~~rbnm

I wonder how many bonds the capital letter "I" would have-- two or four? Seeing as how Randall writes it in this comic, I'm guessing two. Also, would it be possible for carbon to bond with itself ad infinitum in a chain which looks like the teeth on a zipper ("C", upside-down "C", and so on)? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.238.177|108.162.238.177]] 00:29, 4 November 2014 (UTC)
::Yes, Carbon can form very long chains, and also carbon rings (but only with an even number of carbon atoms).[[User:DivePeak|DivePeak]] ([[User talk:DivePeak|talk]]) 04:23, 4 November 2014 (UTC)
:::Assuming that you're talking Comic Universe, I don't see why it ''can't'' be an odd number of carbons in a ring. Even if we're forced to bend round a ...∩U∩U... sort of thing (only end-connected, between characters, not end-snuggled, IYSWIM) you can have one that bends round outside of the plane of the page similar to a mobius strip and could still 'zipper' in a closed circuit with an odd number.
:::IRL, of course, there's {{w|Cyclopentane}} and {{w|Cyclopropane}} (3- and 5-carbon rings), among others, and {{w|Cycloundecane}} (11-carbon saturated ring, with an irregular and aperiodic "wiggle" around the circuit) shows one way that the Fictional Cyclocarbon could (just with a greater angle of bond between successive carbons, and no hydrogens involved) work with odd numbers. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.112|141.101.99.112]] 07:56, 5 November 2014 (UTC)
::::My bad - I thought the comic universe was only two dimensional and it would have to be an even number. I need to upgrade my screen! [[User:DivePeak|DivePeak]] ([[User talk:DivePeak|talk]]) 02:51, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

Me is not the designation of two carbon chains. Methane is CH4. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.147|108.162.221.147]]rbnm

Any idea why the title text says "usually" more reactive? Do we have examples of where serifs could be less reactive than their sans serif counterparts?[[Special:Contributions/108.162.229.90|108.162.229.90]] 11:51, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
:Usually: For example, serif oxygen and sans-serif oxygen are both inert.[[Special:Contributions/199.27.133.126|199.27.133.126]] 23:45, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

Now if someone comes up with a species with the formula C2H, we know what to call it. Maybe the ion C-≡CH? [[User:Promethean|Promethean]] ([[User talk:Promethean|talk]])

I was never good at chemistry so this is probably a dumb question, but would it be possible to rename the elements to actually work with this convention? Obviously ignoring the fact that some elements may form too many bonds for any letters we have. [[User:Mikeb108|Mikeb108]] ([[User talk:Mikeb108|talk]]) 00:19, 10 February 2022 (UTC)
:Given the 26-letter alphabet, single-characted symbols could cover just 26 elements, possibly the following assignments...
:Valency 0: B,D,O
:Valency 1:P,Q
:Valency 2: A,C,G,I?,J?,L,M,N,R,S,U,V,W,Z
:Valency 3: E,F,J?,T,Y
:Valency 4: H,I?,K,X
:...question marks indicate characters in there twice, because of particular alternate font styles give very different results.
:Maybe something like the sharp points of the A, V, M, etc could be a bond-site. Or the bulges of B, R, etc, mean something.
:If digraph symbols are allowed (Uppercase+lowercase, to avoid confusion with compounds, no using of l (el) in that form if it looks too much like the initial I (ai)...), as currently, then maybe more coverage. Xo is another 4, as is Qh. While Oo is maybe another monatomic element?
:Going into punctuation, # (octothorn!) is actually overkill except perhaps to allow something like xenon octofluoride (I know it can do hexafluoride, but I think that's just tetrafluoride with extra fluorines in the two -Xe-F-F- loops - I really must check), but & would be an interesting two-bondsite (plus two of those lobes, if that works for ionic rather than covalent).
:The main problem is polyvalent elements, especially in the metals, like ferric (Fe3+) vs ferrous (Fe2+) vs ferrate (possibly Fe6+, but my knowledge of iron chemistry is... *ahem*... rusty!). What character(s) do we assign to those? Multiple optional diacritics, as required to achieve the desired modification?
:...I'm not saying it's not possible, but bond-types (there's at least three types to consider, depending on how you group them) and compatability with valid bond-angles (which really needs 3d glyphs with subtly different forms?) and then you end up with slvery similar forms between near-substitute elements that tend to be 'the same but slightly larger' in a bonding situation, etc.
:A less symbolic and more diagrammatic atomic illustration method might be easier to reuse as an alphabet, than the alphabet is to entirely reuse for diagrammatical purposes. But I'm sure with enough tweaking you could get something that works in limited ways. ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 01:31, 10 February 2022 (UTC)

Talk:384: The Drake Equation

2022-02-09T22:00:07Z

172.70.91.126:

Looks like someone mixed up {{w|Frank Drake}} and {{w|Sir Francis Drake|Francis Drake}} --[[User:Btx40|Btx40]] ([[User talk:Btx40|talk]]) 14:32, 19 February 2013 (UTC)

Bs looks more like B6 [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.185|162.158.79.185]] 17:03, 13 March 2019 (UTC)

The title text shows a lack of imagination about how aliens could communicate. It need not be that they're using narrow direction and different bands. First, they could be using radio in a way that wouldn't be detected, much as how no WWII radio expert would recognize modern, digital, encoded cell tower transmissions. Second, there may be other means of communicating over distance, like entangled particles. —[[User:Kazvorpal|Kazvorpal]] ([[User talk:Kazvorpal|talk]]) 07:50, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Alternate solution factor: N= [stuff already mentioned]^["probability" that there is not a God who, if He exists, perhaps made this universe so that there would be no process where beings like us could come from the dust of a planet by natural means.]
Yeah, it does depend on one's bias and worldview. {{unsigned ip|172.70.130.91}}

1671: Arcane Bullshit

2022-02-09T14:25:22Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ Slight shift of perspective. Correcting decade apostrophisations.

{{comic
| number = 1671
| date = April 22, 2016
| title = Arcane Bullshit
| image = arcane_bullshit.png
| titletext = Learning arcane bullshit from the 80s can break your computer, but if you're willing to wade through arcane bullshit from programmers in the 90s and 2000s, you can break everyone else's computers, too.
}}

==Explanation==
When fixing/improving an existing computer program, programmers sometimes need to read, understand, and improve old (and usually bad) code. The older a piece of code is, the less it tends to conform to modern programming practices, and the more likely it is to be "arcane bullshit" from the perspective of a 21st Century programmer.

[[Randall]] seems to feel that willingness to deal with "arcane bullshit" is a "{{w|Catch 22}}" that prevents 80s arcane bullshit from being fixed. Someone completely unwilling to deal with arcane bullshit would lack the patience to learn how to program. Someone extremely willing to wade through an 80s programmer's arcane bullshit is likely to "[[356: Nerd Sniping|nerd snipe]]" themselves into fiddling with {{w|Kernel (operating_system)|kernels}} (which are inherently arcane bullshit) instead of making useful code. Cueball is in the middle of the scale: smart and patient enough to make the 80s bullshit worse, but not smart and patient enough to know how to fix it.

This comic could be a reference to changes in programming methodologies. As the first computer programs were written in the 40's and 50's they were prone to becoming "spaghetti code", where the flow of execution would jump from one part of the program to another using the JUMP which gives no state information. While this method of programming can work very quickly, it makes it difficult to predict program flow and can create interdependencies that are not obvious. In the BASIC language JUMP was called GOTO and the courses for new programmers argued that using GOTO in all but trivial cases was a very bad idea. On the other hand, old programmers argued that calculated GOTO was a sexy way of programming.

To combat the problem computer scientists have relied on increasing the levels of abstraction and encapsulation, by developing {{w|structured programming}}, {{w|procedural programming}}, and {{w|object oriented programming|OOP (object oriented programming)}}.

In structured programming you break your program into well defined blocks of code with specified entry and exit points. By the use of a stack (a portion of memory dedicated to sequentially storing and retrieving contextual information and program state as blocks call other blocks, before returning), it is possible to call a block of code and then have that block of code return control (and any new information) to the point that called it after it has done what was requested.

Very quickly it was decided to mark these blocks of code as functions or procedures, making it trivial for the compiler to know how to call and process the blocks, and make it easier for the user to edit them without having to keep track of the minutae of how they handled. Languages that made this a focus include Pascal, Modula, and C.

Structured and procedural programming were well entrenched in the '80s. Most systems programming was done in mid- or low-level languages, which improves performance by giving the knowledgable programmer explicit control of the data structures in the programs rather than shrouding it in abstraction. But because they are at a lower level the code requires many explicit steps to do seemingly easy things like draw a box on a screen, making it easy for a non-experienced programmer to introduce errors and harder to understand what needs to be happening (ultimately, the flipping of specific bits within the graphical RAM), compared to a high-level command to just "draw a box" with given qualities and have the system work out how exactly that needs to be done.

Although the idea of OOP was around as early as the 1950s, it was not implemented in a widespread fashion until the 1990s. OOP encapsulates the data structures inside of functions, so rather than manipulate any variable directly you call the data structure and tell it to do something to (or with) its elements. This additional level of abstraction can make it a lot easier to work on varied data, if implemented with the correct handlers. It also can protect the program data from unexpected changes by other sections of the program, as most elements are restricted to being changed by the encapsulating code and transfer of information must be implemented in even higher levels of program management.

Because code in the '80s was typically done at a much lower level, it can be hard for programmers used to having the language and libraries silently do much of the work for them. It also meant that programmers would often hard-code expectations into their source code such as the number of files that can be opened at once or the size of the operating system disk buffers. This means if you need the program to handle a larger file, you might need to recompile it after finding and changing all the places in the code that assume the smaller max file size. For graphical output, rather than direct access to a predictably constant configuration of video-RAM, now the extent of the graphics (e.g. size of the 'screen'-array, bit-depth of each pixel, even the endianness of the data) should be discovered as the program loads, or even dynamically configurable while the program is running; such as when the program's GUI window is resized by the user, changing the available 'virtual screen' canvas.

As such, few people are willing to try to surpass the massive barrier to learning how to wrangle the very detailed old code. This group is on the left. To the right are people who have gotten so used to the tools and conventions of the '80s that they spend all of their time adjusting and recompiling the kernel of their computers to match their current needs, instead of actually creating new programs.

In the center is Cueball, presumably representing Randall, who has learned enough to change how the code operates but not enough for his changes to be produce a working fix for whatever emerging issue he might be trying to solve.

As programs age, they often lose support from the initial project head and die out, no longer supported on new computers. So, as the title text says, learning more coding from the '90s and after is necessary for also breaking everyone else's computers.

This could also be a comment on hacking and the advent of the internet and the technologies behind that (TCP/IP, HTML, CSS, PHP...) being '90s/2000s. Computers in the '80s were typically stand alone, so what you are learning can only be applied to your machine. To break everyone else's you need to be in the position of (mis)understanding networking code.

The title text might be a reference to various recently discovered {{w|security vulnerabilities}} in {{w|open-source software}}. In some cases, underskilled programmers have provided flawed code for critical infrastructure with very little review, resulting in global computer security disasters. Randall described some of these in [[424: Security Holes]] (2008), [[1353: Heartbleed]] and [[1354: Heartbleed Explanation]] (2014). Other recent examples include {{w|Shellshock (software bug)|Shellshock}} and vulnerabilities in the {{w|Linux kernel}} involving the [http://timetobleed.com/a-closer-look-at-a-recent-privilege-escalation-bug-in-linux-cve-2013-2094/ perf] and [http://perception-point.io/2016/01/14/analysis-and-exploitation-of-a-linux-kernel-vulnerability-cve-2016-0728/ keyrings] subsystems.

==Transcript==
:[A horizontal graph with arrows pointing left and right with labels. The line has three ticks one towards each end and one in the middle above which Cueball is drawn. Below each tick there is a caption. There is a caption at the top of the panel:]
: Willingness to wade through some 80's programmer's arcane bullshit:
:[Left end:] Low
:[Left tick:] Never learn to program
:[Above Cueball:] Me
:[Center tick:] Learn enough to break everything but not enough to fix it
:[Right end:] High
:[Right tick:] Spend all your time compiling kernels and never make anything

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

978: Citogenesis

2022-02-06T01:11:59Z

172.70.91.126: Undo revision 226588 by 172.70.34.65 (talk) Not today, thank you. Would you kindly peddle your spam elsewhere.

{{comic
| number = 978
| date = November 16, 2011
| title = Citogenesis
| image = citogenesis.png
| titletext = I just read a pop-science book by a respected author. One chapter, and much of the thesis, was based around wildly inaccurate data which traced back to... Wikipedia. To encourage people to be on their toes, I'm not going to say what book or author.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is calling into question the {{w|reliability of Wikipedia}}. This is a favorite pastime of librarians, teachers, and professional researchers, and not usually one of [[Randall]]'s. {{w|Wikipedia}} is a free and freely editable encyclopedia that aims to become a comprehensive, {{w|Wikipedia:Wikipedia in brief|neutral compilation of verifiable and established facts}}. Wikipedia aims to provide only facts backed by {{w|Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources|reliable sources}}. However, this comic strip details a process in which Wikipedia can not only spread misinformation but make said misinformation seem reliable through a process of "circular reporting".

The title of the comic is a play on the word [http://www.merriam-webster.com/medical/cytogenesis cytogenesis]. Cytogenesis is the formation of cells and their development. {{w|Citogenesis}}, on the other hand, is a [http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/portmanteau portmanteau] of 'Citation' and 'Genesis'. A {{w|Citation}} is a reference to a source, used to back up a specific claim, and [http://mw1.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/genesis?show=1&t=1346949206 genesis] means the origin of something. By extension, citogenesis is the creation of text in a reliable source that can be cited to back up a claim.

In the process described here, someone adds an untrue claim to an article in Wikipedia. A writer of some supposedly "reliable source" checks Wikipedia for information, and blindly relies on it, without checking for proper sources - the comic uses rushed writers, such as those responsible for news stories, as an example of someone who may do this. Eventually, someone notices the claim in the reliable source and cites it in the Wikipedia article. The citation now gives the claim credence, as readers don't realize that the official source was based on the Wikipedia article. Thanks to this citation, other reporters, slightly more cautious than the first, consider this bit of information to be reliable and then cite it in articles of their own. Those articles then get cited in Wikipedia, making the claim seem more reliable, encouraging even more reporters to believe it and repeat the claim. Eventually, a long list of citations is available, giving an impression of consensus, even though all of it originated with a single article, which was based on an uncited Wikipedia edit.

Four years before, Randall [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Xkcd&diff=162077300 commented on Wikipedia] about that process happening to him (on a minor detail), which probably indicates the inception of this comic:
<blockquote>''I've never referred to the [[1: Barrel - Part 1|boy in the barrel]] as "Barrel Lad" -- that seems to have started in this [Wikipedia] article. I've called him "Barrel boy" or "The boy in the barrel". Minor detail, but it's funny how sometimes something can appear on Wikipedia, get referenced in other places, and then Wikipedia cites those other places as supporting references. Hooray {{w|Wikipedia in culture#Wikiality|Wikiality}}!'' — Randall Munroe as user "xkcd", [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Xkcd/Archive_2#Notes_from_the_author en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Xkcd#Notes_from_the_author], 3 October 2007</blockquote>

In turn, Randall originated the untrue assertion in this comic that {{w|Steven Chu}}, a physicist, and at the time of the strip the U.S. Secretary of Energy, invented the {{w|Scroll lock}} key, a common button on computer keyboards. Since most people are aware of the scroll lock key but know little about its function or origins, this false information would make for an interesting piece of trivia that would likely spread very quickly.

Following this comic, the actual {{w|Scroll Lock}} and {{w|Steven Chu}} articles {{w|Talk:Scroll_Lock#Thanks_Randall|were}} {{w|Talk:Steven_Chu#Scroll_lock_key|both}} vandalized by "helpful" editors trying to project Randall's reality on Wikipedia. The Wikipedia article on {{w|Citogenesis}} redirects to the {{w|Reliability of Wikipedia#Information loop|information loop}} section on the article "Reliability of Wikipedia". That section ends with crediting the term "citogenesis" to "webcomic artist Randall Munroe", with a link to this comic. This now has three citations. To make matters even more surreal, a Wikipedia editor [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Reliability_of_Wikipedia&diff=517901534&oldid=517901176 once flagged] the link to this xkcd comic as "Dubious - The material near this tag is possibly inaccurate or non-factual."!

We haven't seen a book like the one Randall describes in the title text. But one example of the misuse of Wikipedia by "reliable sources" concerns the former German minister {{w|Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg}}. His complete name contains fifteen names/words and reads: Karl-Theodor Maria Nikolaus Johann Jacob Philipp Franz Joseph Sylvester Freiherr von und zu Guttenberg. An anonymous user added one more ("Wilhelm") to the German Wikipedia, just the evening before Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg was presented as the new Federal Minister of Economics and Technology on February 10, 2009. The next day many major German newspapers published this wrong name ([http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bildblog.de%2F5704%2Fwie-ich-freiherr-von-guttenberg-zu-wilhelm-machte%2F translation of bildblog.de]).

==Transcript==
:Where Citations Come From:
:Citogenesis Step #1
:Through a convoluted process, a user's brain generates facts. These are typed into Wikipedia.
:[Hairy sits at a desk, typing on a laptop.]
:Hairy: (typing) The "scroll lock" key was was designed by future Energy Secretary Steven Chu in a college project.

:Step #2
:A rushed writer checks Wikipedia for a summary of their subject.
:[Ponytail sits at a desk, typing on a desktop.]
:Ponytail: (typing) US Energy Secretary Steven Chu, (Nobel Prizewinner and creator of the ubiquitous "scroll lock" key) testified before Congress today...

:Step #3
:Surprised readers check Wikipedia, see the claim, and flag it for review. A passing editor finds the piece and adds it as a citation.
:[Cueball sits on a couch with a laptop in his lap, typing.]
:Cueball: Google is your friend, people. (typing) <nowiki><ref>{{cite web|url=</nowiki>

:Step #4
:Now that other writers have a real source, they repeat the fact.
:[A flow chart, with "Wikipedia citation" in the center. The word "Wikipedia" is in black, the word "citations" is white with a red background.
:[A black arrow leads from "brain" to "Wikipedia."]
:[A black arrow labeled "words" leads from "Wikipedia" to "careless writers," and a red arrow labeled "citations" leads back to "Wikipedia citations."]
:[A black & red arrow leads from "Wikipedia" to "cited facts" which leads to "slightly more careful writers," which leads to "more citations," which leads back to :"Wikipedia" (all black & red arrows).]
:References proliferate, completing the citogenesis process.

==Trivia==
* The word "was" occurs twice consecutively in the first panel.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Flowcharts]]
[[Category:Wikipedia]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]

2577: Sea Chase

2022-02-05T13:25:23Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ Whoops, bad edit (originally 'three sails on its two masts', before pre-submit cut-down went wrong!)

{{comic
| number = 2577
| date = February 4, 2022
| title = Sea Chase
| image = sea_chase.png
| titletext = There are two rules on this ship: Never gaze back into the projection abyss, and never touch the red button labeled DYMAXION.
}}

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

In this comic, Randall returns to one of his pet subjects: [[977: Map Projections|map projections]]. Unusually, this time it is from the perspective of people living - or, in this case, sailing - upon the world that is quite literally being mapped.

Two sailing ships, of circa 18th century design, are engaged in a close chase across the {{w|Atlantic}}, the aggressor flying the Skull and Crossbones of a stereotypical pirate vessel. It can be seen from the flags of both ships that they are tacking into the wind, the trailing ship seeming to be lighter and yet deploying more effective canvas with two active sails than the forward one can with three. The ship being chased has a plan to escape. And the means to do so. At a crucial moment, [[Cueball]] is told to flip a large, incongruous switch that (like several [[1620: Christmas Settings|other]] [[1763: Catcalling|artifacts]] in the xkcd universe) alters the nature of their reality.

Whereas beforehand the world is directly represented upon a simply contiguous map, the {{w|Robinson projection}}, it is now changed to one (which is actually the new reality) known as {{w|Goode homolosine projection|Goode Homolosine}} in which the flattening of the world mitigates localised warping of angle/distance/area by introducing discontinuities in relatively 'unused' parts of the mapped world, such as the center of the Atlantic.

By precisely timing the change (as they cross a particular {{w|meridian}}, possibly the 40°W one), they leave the pursuer now on the wrong side of the very real gap, allowing the pursued ship to escape whatever fate they were trying to avoid. Though there is still an oceanic connection, it requires sailing down the edge towards the tropics, rounding this particular rent in the planet's surface and heading back up the other side. This is vastly further than Cueball's ship needs to travel to reach (presumably) any European port in which they can safely moor.

The title text elaborates on the policies of the ship: crewmates are never to look into the "projection abyss" and to never hit the red button labeled "DYMAXION."

The first rule suggests that changing the projection of physical reality produces a gap in reality, a void. This may be dangerous to gaze into or simply unnerving to crewmates, hence the rule.

The second rule references a button that seems to do the same thing as the lever but changes the world into a "Dymaxion" (a portmaneau of "dynamic", "maximum" and "tension") projection. The {{w|Dymaxion map|Dymaxion projection}} projects the Earth in a way that preserves land scale as much as possible. (Most maps warp land area, distance, and/or angle.) However, the preservation of scale comes at the cost of dramatically altering a map in a nearly unrecognizable and unintuitive manner. The necessary discontinuities resulting from pressing this button would be even more strange and mind-bending than the 'interrupted' Goode Homolosine, so turning the world into this projection may be bad, and a good reason to create a rule against pressing the button in question.

The Robinson, Goode Homolosine, and Dymaxion projections have been referenced in [[977: Map Projections]].

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

:[A pirate ship flying the Skull and Crossbones is sailing after a merchant ship.]
:Merchant ship sailor #1: They're closing in!
:Merchant ship sailor #2: Hang on, we're almost at the meridian!

:[A map of the Earth in the Robinson projection, with two red dots in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. A voice comes from the red dot further to the east.]
:Merchant ship sailor #2: ''Now!'' Throw the switch!

:[Cueball, representing merchant ship sailor #1, pulls down a giant lever switch labeled "Projection", from "Robinson" to "Goode Homolosine".]

:[A map of the Earth in the Goode Homolosine projection, with one red dot on the American side of the split and one red dot on the European side of the split.]

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Maps]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]

2577: Sea Chase

2022-02-05T13:23:36Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ Up for discussion!

{{comic
| number = 2577
| date = February 4, 2022
| title = Sea Chase
| image = sea_chase.png
| titletext = There are two rules on this ship: Never gaze back into the projection abyss, and never touch the red button labeled DYMAXION.
}}

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

In this comic, Randall returns to one of his pet subjects: [[977: Map Projections|map projections]]. Unusually, this time it is from the perspective of people living - or, in this case, sailing - upon the world that is quite literally being mapped.

Two sailing ships, of circa 18th century design, are engaged in a close chase across the {{w|Atlantic}}, the aggressor flying the Skull and Crossbones of a stereotypical pirate vessel. It can be seen from the flags of both ships that they are tacking into the wind, the trailing ship seeming to be lighter and yet deploying more effective canvas with two active sails than the forward one can with three masts. The ship being chased has a plan to escape. And the means to do so. At a crucial moment, [[Cueball]] is told to flip a large, incongruous switch that (like several [[1620: Christmas Settings|other]] [[1763: Catcalling|artifacts]] in the xkcd universe) alters the nature of their reality.

Whereas beforehand the world is directly represented upon a simply contiguous map, the {{w|Robinson projection}}, it is now changed to one (which is actually the new reality) known as {{w|Goode homolosine projection|Goode Homolosine}} in which the flattening of the world mitigates localised warping of angle/distance/area by introducing discontinuities in relatively 'unused' parts of the mapped world, such as the center of the Atlantic.

By precisely timing the change (as they cross a particular {{w|meridian}}, possibly the 40°W one), they leave the pursuer now on the wrong side of the very real gap, allowing the pursued ship to escape whatever fate they were trying to avoid. Though there is still an oceanic connection, it requires sailing down the edge towards the tropics, rounding this particular rent in the planet's surface and heading back up the other side. This is vastly further than Cueball's ship needs to travel to reach (presumably) any European port in which they can safely moor.

The title text elaborates on the policies of the ship: crewmates are never to look into the "projection abyss" and to never hit the red button labeled "DYMAXION."

The first rule suggests that changing the projection of physical reality produces a gap in reality, a void. This may be dangerous to gaze into or simply unnerving to crewmates, hence the rule.

The second rule references a button that seems to do the same thing as the lever but changes the world into a "Dymaxion" (a portmaneau of "dynamic", "maximum" and "tension") projection. The {{w|Dymaxion map|Dymaxion projection}} projects the Earth in a way that preserves land scale as much as possible. (Most maps warp land area, distance, and/or angle.) However, the preservation of scale comes at the cost of dramatically altering a map in a nearly unrecognizable and unintuitive manner. The necessary discontinuities resulting from pressing this button would be even more strange and mind-bending than the 'interrupted' Goode Homolosine, so turning the world into this projection may be bad, and a good reason to create a rule against pressing the button in question.

The Robinson, Goode Homolosine, and Dymaxion projections have been referenced in [[977: Map Projections]].

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

:[A pirate ship flying the Skull and Crossbones is sailing after a merchant ship.]
:Merchant ship sailor #1: They're closing in!
:Merchant ship sailor #2: Hang on, we're almost at the meridian!

:[A map of the Earth in the Robinson projection, with two red dots in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. A voice comes from the red dot further to the east.]
:Merchant ship sailor #2: ''Now!'' Throw the switch!

:[Cueball, representing merchant ship sailor #1, pulls down a giant lever switch labeled "Projection", from "Robinson" to "Goode Homolosine".]

:[A map of the Earth in the Goode Homolosine projection, with one red dot on the American side of the split and one red dot on the European side of the split.]

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Maps]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]

1172: Workflow

2022-02-04T16:45:46Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ Added reference to Hyrum's law, which is frequently referred to in relation to this xkcd, and expresses the same sentiment.

{{comic
| number = 1172
| date = February 11, 2013
| title = Workflow
| image = workflow.png
| titletext = There are probably children out there holding down spacebar to stay warm in the winter! YOUR UPDATE MURDERS CHILDREN.
}}

==Explanation==
Users will often try to work around bugs in software, and are sometimes able to get used to having the bugs around. Some bugs are even interpreted as features and users complain when the software authors fix them. This phenomenon has been named [https://www.hyrumslaw.com/ Hyrum's law]: the law states that whatever the official feature list actually says, if a program has enough users, eventually every feature (whether intentional, unintentional, or a bug) will be relied upon by someone. A similar effect may be caused by other improvements, particularly those which involve changes in the [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1770 user interface].

This comic shows a somewhat extreme example. An unnamed application had a bug causing the CPU to overheat whenever the spacebar was held down too long. In version 10.17, this bug was fixed. Soon, LongtimeUser4 complained that they relied on the fact that the CPU overheats if the spacebar is held down. They had stumbled across this "feature" (which is, again, weirder than usual) and took advantage of it to streamline their workflow, and they wanted an option to re-enable it.

{{w|Emacs}} (name originally derived from ''E''ditor ''MAC''ro''S'') is a text editor originally written at MIT in 1976 and adopted into the GNU project in 1984. The control key sees extensive use in Emacs, and since it's hard to reach, users often remap it to Caps Lock or some other key. LongtimeUser4 fixed the problem very clumsily ("horrifying," as the admin puts it) and is annoyed that their {{w|kludge}} no longer works. The moral of the story is that you can't please everyone.

Examples of real life changes in software which, though often acclaimed by critics, caused great annoyance among existing user base include ribbons introduced in Microsoft Office 2007, Start screen of Windows 8 or Unity desktop manager bundled with Ubuntu from versions 11.10 through 17.04. In the latter case, developers included an option to use the older interface; for the rest, applications emulating old behavior were developed by third parties.

The title text makes a hyperbole to humorous effect; children will freeze to death during the winter because they won't be warmed by a rather unconventional heater. Making (or creating an illusion of) a connection between one's opinion and {{tvtropes|ThinkOfTheChildren|care for children's welfare}} is a common method of gaining public support, as such arguments are hard to deflect without sounding cruel and uncaring. "holding down spacebar to stay warm" could also be a reference to {{w|Space heater}}.

==Transcript==
:[Changelog for version 10.17 of a piece of software.]
:One change listed: "The CPU no longer overheats when you hold down the spacebar"
:Comments: LongtimeUser4 writes: This update broke my workflow! My control key is hard to reach, so I hold spacebar instead, and I configured Emacs to interpret a rapid temperature rise as "control".
:Admin writes: That's horrifying.
:LongtimeUser4 writes: Look, my setup works for me. Just add an option to reenable spacebar heating.

:Every change breaks someone's workflow.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Computers]]
[[Category:Emacs]]

563: Fermirotica

2022-02-04T16:29:28Z

172.70.91.126: Corrected punctuation alignment, and replaced with prefered tag-template form of CN superscript while I was here.

{{comic
| number = 563
| date = April 1, 2009
| title = Fermirotica
| image = fermirotica.png
| titletext = I love how Google handles dimensional analysis. Stats are ballpark and vary wildly based on time of day and whether your mom is in town.
}}

==Explanation==
The {{w|Fermi paradox}} describes the contradiction between the high probability of {{w|extraterrestrial life}} and the lack of empirical evidence thereof. Age and size of the universe suggest that intelligent life should have occurred somewhere, and that some alien civilizations should have developed technology for {{w|interstellar travel}}. Therefore, one might expect the universe full of life. However, no evidence for any lifeforms on other planets has yet been found by humans. This inconsistency was first noted by {{w|Enrico Fermi}} in 1950 when he posed the question "Where is everybody?". The phenomenon, often called ''The Great Silence'', was later examined more thoroughly in a paper by {{w|Michael H. Hart}}.

A decade after Fermi's observation, {{w|Frank Drake}} formulated the {{w|Drake equation}}, which aims at estimating the number of active, communicative extraterrestrial civilizations in the {{w|Milky Way}} galaxy. The formula presents itself as the product of several probabilistic factors which would be required for such a civilization to exist. Several parameters are unknown and the equation assumes that all factors are weighed equally, therefore the equation is not useful for computing any actual result.

The comic presents a somewhat related equation which computes the average distance from the observer wherein a couple can be found copulating. (The example parameters given in the comic yield 139 metres.) The implication of the equation is that we are surrounded by sex in our everyday lives. Nevertheless, we rarely encounter couples during the act itself.{{citation needed}} Borrowing from the Fermi paradox, the ''Fermirotica'' paradox poses the question: "Where is everybody having sex?". Of course, the lack of empirical evidence of couples having sex can easily be explained by the fact that most couples only have intercourse in privacy. A similar approach might also offer an explanation to the original problem: Alien species might conceal themselves from our observations, e.g. in order to {{w|Prime directive|avoid interfering in the development of civilizations}}. This answer to the Fermi Paradox is commonly called {{w|zoo hypothesis}}.

The second panel has [[Cueball]] sexually aroused by the statistical probability of a couple practising intercourse. This fantasy of his is termed ''statistical {{w|voyeurism}}'' by an off-frame speaker, and is evidently upset by it. Possible reasons for being upset are that he considers it an inappropriate use of statistics, or because it accurately predicts an ''actual'' copulation he is aware of and would rather keep private (e.g. the off-frame speaker is actually about to have sex).

The title text refers to the {{w|Google search#calculator|Google calculator}} and praises its capabilities of {{w|dimensional analysis}}, and more specifically {{w|unit conversion}}. [[Randall]] assumes that most readers will enter the equation with the example parameters into the {{w|Google}} search engine. The built-in calculator will output the result in the correct {{w| SI unit}} ''metre'', although the population density was given as ''people per square mile''. The second part of the title text states that the examples are nothing more than an educated guess, and that the equation is simplified. In reality, more parameters must be taken into account, e.g. the time of day, since most people will have sex in the evening or night. The insulting suggestion that the probability of sex rises when the reader's (supposedly promiscuous) mother is in town represents a ''{{w|Yo Mama joke}}''.

Note that this comic was released on April 1st without being an April Fools' Day comic. But Randall made another April Fool on his reader, see the [[#Trivia|trivia section]].

==Transcript==
:[A formula is shown with the variables explained above:]
:Pd Regional population density (e.g. 18,600/mi²)
:Xf Average person's frequency of sex (e.g. 80/year)
:Xd Average duration of sex (e.g. 30 minutes)
:r=sqrt(2/(π*Pd*Xf*Xd))
:On average, someone within distance r of you is having sex.

:[Cueball standing in front of an easel.]
:Cueball: Mmm, That probable couple 150 meters away is so hot. Oh yeah, theoretically work it, baby.
:From out of frame: Hey! No statistical voyeurism!

==Trivia==
*This comic was released on April 1 with no obvious ties to {{w|April Fools' Day}} and is thus not one of [[Randall|Randall's]], [[:Category:April fools' comics|April fools' comics]].
*But on that day Randall, Jeph Jacques and Ryan North altered their {{w|Domain_Name_System|DNS}} records to point to each others websites. So xkcd.com showed the [http://questionablecontent.net/ Questionable content] website, questionablecontent.net the [http://www.qwantz.com/ Dinosaur comics] website, and www.qwantz.com led to the [http://www.xkcd.com xkcd] website.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Sex]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Your Mom]]
[[Category:Statistics]]
[[Category:Aliens]]

Talk:2568: Spinthariscope

2022-02-03T12:59:44Z

172.70.91.126: Recommending a correction.

Someone has already updated the Wikipedia page to mention this comic reference, before anyone here has gotten around to writing the explanation [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 19:56, 14 January 2022 (UTC)
:But that was not welcome so it has been removed again. But here is the [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spinthariscope&oldid=1065688770 version with the update] which has sparked no less than 26 other edits of the page in less than two days, after no one had made a change to the page since October last year... But at this moment there is no reference to the comic. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:21, 15 January 2022 (UTC)

I added an initial explanation, but I don't recognize the references to gallium and tritium (although I know what glowsticks are), so someone else should fill in about that. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 20:13, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

Seems like there's something off with how the "ratio" is worded. It is a safe and legal toy, so the "actual safety and legality" is actually high-ish, right? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.178.25|172.70.178.25]] 20:44, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

- If "actual safety" is a large number and "apparent safety" is a small number, then their ratio (actual divided by apparent) is a large number. If "sctual safety" is a small number and "apparent safety" is a large number, then their ratio is a small number. So the comic's wording is perfectly fine and logical, and the paragraph about products in the explanation is not needed. (It's also kind of, um, **untrue**, but I'm trying to be kind to whoever wrote it.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.99|172.70.114.99]] 21:44, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

:If you take the amount of screaming in terror (high for the spin-thingie) and DIVIDE by the actual danger (low for the spin-thingie), then you get a ratio that in a rational world would always be close to 1 - the worse something is, the more (rational) people would want it banned. I think his point is that the ho-hum factor, the LACK of protests, for throwing a sharp heavy object high in the air toward a group of other children, divided by the actual danger from said sharp heavy object thrown high toward other children, results in a value on the opposite end of the spectrum. I was one of the kids who threw these things around without thinking, and nobody ever objected. Fortunately, I never saw any kid get killed by them, but that was pure luck. Point being, I don’t think the wording in the comic is wrong; the ‘correction’ is.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.103|108.162.245.103]] 22:35, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

::On second thought, there is something confusing about the wording of the comic: it conflates safety and legality as if they were the same thing, but the fact that they are NOT the same is the problem.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.223|108.162.245.223]] 22:49, 14 January 2022 (UTC)
:::They're not the same, but they're correlated. While the government hasn't always been very dilligent about it, these days dangerous toys usually get banned. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 22:57, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

::But the comic don’t divide the large/low amount of screaming by the low/large amount of danger, but by the large/low amount of safety for spinthariscope/darts. Hence the formula of the comic results in a number close to 1 for both toys, and a regular toy (low amount of screaming divided by large amount of safety) results in a number closer to zero.
::[[User:While False|While False]] ([[User talk:While False|talk]]) 22:57, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

:::You’re right. The comic is misworded, but not by saying “ratio” instead of “product” - it’s misworded by saying “actual safety” when it means “actual danger” thus giving the ratio a backward meaning.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.77|108.162.245.77]] 23:17, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

::::Just so!
::::[[User:While False|While False]] ([[User talk:While False|talk]]) 23:28, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

:I believe the ratio is apparent danger vs actual danger. So spinthariscope would be 10 apparent danger / 1 actual danger. And the lawn darts would be the opposite end of the spectrum: 1 apparent danger / 10 actual danger. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.185|172.70.214.185]] 22:40, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

:To me it appears that you are describing the “perceived danger to actual danger” ratio, while the comic mentions the “perceived danger to actual safety” ratio, which would be of no extreme value (high number divided by high number) for a spinthariscope. So I think that the current explanation, while cumbersome and against the convention of use of ratios, is mathematically true.
:[[User:While False|While False]] ([[User talk:While False|talk]]) 22:57, 14 January 2022 (UTC)
::I think it is perfectly clear what Randall intended to say. And even if it can be misunderstood I think there is no need to make a very big fuss out of that. I have tried to reword the explanation so it begins with stating the obvious intention, and then mentions at the end that it could be misunderstood. Feel free to improve my wording. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:13, 15 January 2022 (UTC)

Make your own Spinthariscope kiddies https://www.instructables.com/Pocket-Size-Spinthariscope/. [[User:Steve|Steve]] ([[User talk:Steve|talk]]) 21:05, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

The {{w|Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Laboratory}}, which was marketed in the early 1950s & contains more energetic radioactive sources (i.e. uranium ores), might possibly be more dangerous. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.143.22|172.70.143.22]] 21:28, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

{{w|Talk:Spinthariscope|The talk page for the Wikipedia article}} has an interesting exposition by an IP in 2010 of why these aren't dangerous and the various isotopes used. [[User:Yngvadottir|Yngvadottir]] ([[User talk:Yngvadottir|talk]]) 21:49, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

And with that simple strip, all existing spinthariscopes sold out. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.50.237|172.68.50.237]] 01:01, 15 January 2022 (UTC)

I remember the (pre-'80s) lawn-darts in the 'leisure equipment box' that our Cub/Scout unit took to every annual camp and other suitable weekend activities (here in the UK). High-density plastic (possibly with a metal slug enclosed within the 'point', to add to the flights' directional stablisation, but maybe ''just'' plastic) and all points and edges rounded. Probably still dangerous if inadvertently thrown straight-enough upwards with enough force that gravity eventually brings it straight back down upon the unwary head of the thrower (or that of a fellow participant awaiting their turn), but we seemed to avoid that predicament. Things like the hefty hockey-sticks (field-hockey), cricket bats and even threadbare boxing gloves probably caused more injuries that needed treatment. But probably more by good luck than any legitimate physical reason. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.77|172.70.162.77]] 03:09, 15 January 2022 (UTC)

I've just added info about decay chains, that there is beta and gamma radiation as well but at negligible doses. I wanted to give more information, but although I know some spinthariscopes use americium-241, I don't know the isotope of thorium used in others. Does anybody else know? [[User:Cosmogoblin|Cosmogoblin]] ([[User talk:Cosmogoblin|talk]]) 10:15, 15 January 2022 (UTC)
:There's an error in this section - it states that alpha decay always leads to an unstable decay product, but in the case of Polonium 210 (which was used in some spinthariscopes), it decays by alpha emission directly into stable Lead 206.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 12:59, 3 February 2022 (UTC)

Even though I know what he's trying to say, it's seriously bothering me how he worded it. [[User:NoriMori|NoriMori]] ([[User talk:NoriMori|talk]]) 08:03, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Re: [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2568:_Spinthariscope&curid=24751&diff=225143&oldid=224628 the removed "US Logic" section], I disagree about it being off-topic, but mostly I think there was no reason to remove. If it were disconnected spam/advertising/vandalism, maybe. It was longer than necessary, but an honest commentary even if drifting a bit. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.155|172.70.162.155]] 00:23, 21 January 2022 (UTC)

Anybody know how much you can buy a spinthariscope for?[[User:New editor|New editor]] ([[User talk:New editor|talk]]) 19:05, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Talk:Countdown in header text

2022-02-02T15:22:58Z

172.70.91.126: /* Side-by-side comparison in "/other images" page. */ new section

During the first three weeks there were so much talk on this page, that it became very long. To help with this I will collapse all the original talk until when it became clear what it was Randall was promoting the day before the countdown ended. It will always be possible to see all the old comments by pressing the expand button to the far right. So feel free to comment below again - then someone might notice that there has been written something new again! --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 19:16, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

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The talk on from [[2565: Latency]] and [[2566: Decorative Constants]] has been moved here by me when I created this page --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:01, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

;From Latency:
What is happening around Feb 1st, there is a countdown that appeared a few hours ago in the upper right corner of the xkcd index. There is also the directory xkcd.com/count-wimRikmef which might be an acronym, if it isnt a countdown package? {{unsigned ip|172.70.130.57}}
:Damn you beat me to it ;-). But I have made a [[2565:_Latency#Trivia|Trivia]] here on this comics page and links to more detail on the [[xkcd Header text]] page. I belie you are a day of, but someone will likely correct me if I'm wrong. As I can see it will be January 31st, 9:59 in Randall's home town Boston.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:06, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
::But damned if I can wait. Sure millions will watch the page when it goes to zero! At least it is no April 1st. :-D --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:10, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

;From Decorative Constants
Any idea what's going on with the clock that's counting downwards in the banner? Currently counting down from 20 days 16 hours? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.95|172.70.214.95]] 22:08, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
:(Simultaneous edit) What is the days-hours-minutes in the box above the comic referring to? The image itself is dated yesterday, as you can see by saving it. Worst-case-scenario, is this a countdown to the end of XKCD? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.223|108.162.245.223]] 22:11, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
:: It's going to hit zero at around midnight on Jan 31st 2022 CST? [[User:SteveBaker|SteveBaker]] ([[User talk:SteveBaker|talk]]) 22:16, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
:::'''Posted this on the previous comics discussion. But lets take it here where there will be more traffic:''' --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 22:44, 10 January 2022 (UTC) -- Copy paste from previous comics discussion:
::::Damn you beat me to it ;-). But I have made a [[2565:_Latency#Trivia|Trivia]] here on this comics page and links to more detail on the [[xkcd Header text]] page. I believe you are a day of, but someone will likely correct me if I'm wrong. As I can see it will be January 31st, 9:59 in Randall's home town Boston.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:06, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
:::::But damned if I can wait. Sure millions will watch the page when it goes to zero! At least it is no April 1st. :-D --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:10, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
::::Yeah - you're right - I messed up. So as I type this, it's Jan 10th 2022 at 4pm - 1600 hrs Mountain time - which is 1800 hours EST. At this moment, the countdown reads 20d 16h 0m - so Jan 30th + (18+16) hours = which is Jan 30th + 34 hours - which is Jan 31st + 10am in Boston (EST). [[User:SteveBaker|SteveBaker]] ([[User talk:SteveBaker|talk]]) 23:05, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
:::::Hey great, can see they agree in the link to reddit below. So happy I got it right both in UTC and Boston. It will be 15:59 here in DK. Not 16:00. ;-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 23:44, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

Counting down to Backwards Day? --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.91.88|162.158.91.88]] 23:28, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
:There's a reddit thread discussing it: https://www.reddit.com/r/xkcd/comments/s0oynl/xkcd_countdown_timer_20d_21h_49m_remaining_until/ I think the most likely guess is that Randall has a new book coming out. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 23:40, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
::Would still seem strange if it came out that day with only promotion before being a count down. But then again, he will have the xkcd communities boiling if he gives no other hint. So every one will see if he promotes a book. Also as they wrote at the time I looked at reddit I do not think it is the end of xkcd, or Webb related. Although Webb was the first I thought about. But I mean even if it came to L2 at that day, it is not going to any specific point but just in orbit. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 23:47, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

::The date fits the idea of it being Backwards Day (https://nationaldaycalendar.com/backward-day-january-31) but what about the choice of time? [[User:SteveBaker|SteveBaker]] ([[User talk:SteveBaker|talk]]) 03:38, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
:::Backwards day... Never head of it until now. Is it big in the US. I mean when looking after dates so obscure they are not mentioned on wikipedia then there are probably lots of things happening on that day? But maybe it is a think in the US? --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 08:48, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
:::: I haven't heard of it until now either, so it is probably one of the bajillions of holidays no one actually cares about, and is unrelated to the countdown. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.163|108.162.221.163]] 13:22, 11 January 2022 (UTC)Bumpf

Someone has noticed the image is changing with pixels added at the bottom left corner and is keeping track of it here: https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ [[Special:Contributions/198.41.238.107|198.41.238.107]] 05:49, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
:Looks like an image is "moving" into the frame because at the moment you can see some white pixel in the lower left, i.e. the black part might end up as a line as part of some comic. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.89.8|162.158.89.8]] 08:31, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
::Thanks used that to pinpoint the start of the countdown. Have added this info to the header text page, and the original trivia. Also just added a line of trivia to this explanation with the link. This was when this comic came out most people noticed the count down. But it did came out while [[Latency]] was up. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 08:43, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
:::Speculating on what it could be, the only thing that makes sense at that angle is a character's arm. 04:47, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
:As of 7 PM PST, the two lines appear to be disconnected from anything else, which rules out a lot of the theories put forth here. Hmmm… I can’t really think of anything it could be other than the wing of an airplane. Maybe it’ll zoom out after it moves into view?[[User:Szeth Pancakes|Szeth Pancakes]] ([[User talk:Szeth Pancakes|talk]]) 03:17, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

The header changes page says that it's forcing "Friday" to move down to the next line. Not for me. Did he fix it, or is it browser-specific? [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 14:58, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
:It must be browser specific. But i have tried bot the old Internet Explorer, Edge, Chrome and Firefox, and it does it in all cases and zooming does nothing.. Which browser do you use? I have corrected to in some browsers though, in the [[xkcd_Header_text#2022-01-10_-_Standard_text_with_countdown|explanation]] you refer to. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 15:31, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

This is much more likely a count down related to the James Webb Space Telescope. At approximately the day the count down indicates the telescope will be orbiting the L2 gravitational spot.Perhaps most of the mirrors will be approximate place to allow for months of fine tuning. An example of a slightly similar idea is https://www.space.com/nasa-james-webb-space-telescope-next-steps
[[User:Punchcard|Punchcard]] ([[User talk:Punchcard|talk]]) 15:35, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
:I really do not think so. There is nothing special about a specific moment for reaching L2. It will go in orbit around it, but when to day it is there or in orbit is hard to pinpoint. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:13, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
::And after I looked at it, it seems it will reach L2 several days before the countdown. See [[Countdown in header text#Theories]]. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 15:31, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

I think the Countdown should get its own entry. What do we think? [[User:Sure|Sure]] ([[User talk:Sure|talk]]) 16:25, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
: I think it should! What with the count itself, the speculation about what it could mean, and now the slowly arriving image (?) this seems like something beyond either of the two comics since it started! [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.49|108.162.219.49]] 18:00, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
: I'm surprised it doesn't have one already. This is one of the more unique situations in a long while, more speculation could happen. [[User:Thisfox|Thisfox]] ([[User talk:Thisfox|talk]]) 22:26, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
::I have now created this page and talk page for us to continue the discussion and make dedicated changes about this countdown here. And have moved all discussion from the two pages that had some already (except a few on the first talk page that was also mentioned here. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:13, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

If you take a look at this [[https://xkcd.com/count-wimRikmef/state|link]] it displays this: '''{"img":"72cb154b23f959f908f5dc8eb03069c6df3f0f54aae896a0e7ed27befb2ee639.png","start":"2022-01-10T17:00:00Z","target":"2022-01-31T15:00:00Z","until":"2022-01-11T20:55:38.205303701Z"}''' [[User:Hoodiesandboba|Hoodiesandboba]] ([[User talk:Hoodiesandboba|talk]]) 20:58, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
:To correct your link:
:"...If you take a look at this [https://xkcd.com/count-wimRikmef/state link] it displays..."
:As to where the "72cb154b23f959f908f5dc8eb03069c6df3f0f54aae896a0e7ed27befb2ee639.png" is rooted, I haven't dug into that (or what transforms might be being applied), but it looks like a manipulation of browser states might be able to prematurely reveal it. (I'm on mobile at the moment, and it's significantly more fiddly to poke into the page-scripting and markup than I can be bothered with this moment, but I know what I'd do with a good acreage of screen, mouse control and a proper keyboard to rattle away at. And the combined minds here surely can do even better than myself.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.116|172.70.91.116]] 22:38, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
::The filename is a random number long enough to prevent brute force guessing to find future images. The state-file looks like some information for the javascript script where this URL comes from. I haven't looked into the script that much but from the values I'd say that it's telling when to start doing refreshs (2022-01-10T17:00:00Z) and when to stop doing that (2022-01-31T15:00:00Z). While these values are constant, the third value changes and is ten minutes after the time the page has been requested. I suppose this is telling the script, when to do a refresh of the image load. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.77.16|141.101.77.16]] 11:05, 13 January 2022 (UTC)
:::After some fiddeling, I've found the origin of the filename: It's the SHA-256 hash of the image [[Special:Contributions/141.101.77.16|141.101.77.16]] 11:05, 13 January 2022 (UTC)
::::There's already a note that it would be impossible to brute-force the filenames. But as the images are very similar to each other, would it be feasible to programmatically generate images similar to the last one (extending up and to the right, different variations of the line shape), hash those files, and test to see if they match images on the server? I'd expect it to reduce the number of possibilities by orders of magnitude, but not sure if that's enough to make brute-force attempts feasible and non-destructive. (Also don't know the PNG format well enough to know if an image with the same pixels in it is guaranteed to produce the same bytes in the file across different implementations) -- [[User:Angel|Angel]] ([[User talk:Angel|talk]]) 11:16, 14 January 2022 (UTC)
:::::Hmm… if it was pure black and white, the total number of possible images would be within the realms of sanity to brute force. But add antialiasing and the numbers rapidly become silly. Even if you only allow pixels to change within a certain distance of the previous image, and restrict greys to places between a black and a white, the numbers quickly become absurd. Although that makes me think about making 1-bit versions of all the images so far, predicting a set of "next frame" possibilities at each step, and training a CNN to pick the correct next one; and if it gets accurate enough by the time we get to the present… hmm. How predictable is antialiasing? Do we know the software he's using to create the images; and if so is there a relatively predictable algorithm applied along the edges? [[User:Angel|Angel]] ([[User talk:Angel|talk]]) 11:41, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

I think it counts down to Lunar New Year (the Year of the Tiger), as measured in Korea (the earliest timezone where that is celebrated). Actually, it reaches 0 one minute before the New Year, so maybe it will switch to seconds for the last minute. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.98.75|172.70.98.75]] 05:10, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
:Could be, but why. Randall has never to rarely? mentioned this new year... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:13, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

I think we are seeing a zoom out of some image. Perhaps it is the arm of Cueball? --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:36, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
:It looks like there's a little curve at the top left of the line entering the frame! This makes the Cueball arm hypothesis more likely. [[User:Sure|Sure]] ([[User talk:Sure|talk]]) 14:18, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
::I also noticed that (and moved your comment up here, as it is kind of a reply to that). Seems like the picture updates every four hours, and that it happened last time at noon UTC today. And thus it will also be at midnight. So 4, 8, 12, 16, 20 and 24. But it is not certain yet and not sure it happened like that the first day or two. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:46, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

I have added the first 12 images on this page: [[Countdown in header text/images]] - anyone may help uploading the new ones there. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:43, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
: Thank you! [[Special:Contributions/173.245.52.194|173.245.52.194]] 12:44, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

Does anyone mind if I make a few spelling/grammar corrections to the article? It feels like the kind of thing that could be interpreted as rude, so I wanted to ask first. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.167|172.70.114.167]] 13:00, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
:No no please help me with my poor spelling. I'm Danish and not very good at spelling in English. Also anything I write is up for debate and can be changed. Just because I started this page do not give me ownership over it. As long as relevant info is not deleted the entire layout maybe changed. But better to get the page going sooner rather than later.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:46, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
::Alright!! Thank you so much for all your great work on this page! [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.151|172.70.110.151]] 18:02, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

I originally put this (without realising it wasn't the Talk page) in the Images sub-page, in response to the revelation it was (very probably) the SHA256 of the image data that was used to name the file:
*When I first looked at it and decided it was an obvious hash (yes SHA256 sounds about right, but nice to know someone's tried it) I personally had hoped it would be a hash of the datetime (plus a salt, maybe, to give it that extra little frisson of difficulty in reverse engineering... ;) ). But if it's as you say I think I'll refrain from getting any rainbow-tables set up and bashing through the possibilities in the rather huge phase-space it could represent. Of course, there must be a look-up table used by the server. It'd be too much to hope for that it's publically exposed though, and totally a rookie-error if it is. (That Randall, and maybe anyone he actually drafted in to implement it to save himself the worry, is surely not going to commit.)
...anyway, bringing it here, as being more conversational than informative. Still thought I should say it, but stupidly long as a comment so maybe I needn't have repasted it again! [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.79|172.70.85.79]] 03:39, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

(Put this in here as it was before in the explanation --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 12:02, 13 January 2022 (UTC):)
Was going to say it's Hangman, but it looks like it's zooming in on the diagonal instead of continuing to make a gibbet. [[User:Thisfox|Thisfox]] ([[User talk:Thisfox|talk]]) 06:37, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

I read the javascript of the countdown and noticed one thing that i didn't see mentioned anywhere on this page: the countdown text is moving upwards. When the countdown started the text was exactly in the middle of the image and at the end of the countdown the text will be at the top (you can see how it will look by changing the time in your system). The code will also make the text disappear and leave only the image after the countdown goes to zero. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.41|162.158.90.41]] 23:52, 13 January 2022 (UTC)
:Uuuh thanks that was interesting. Maybe to make more room for the image? --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 12:09, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

The Greensboro sit-ins started on Feb 1, though the time is different.. But black history month? {{unsigned ip|172.70.135.48}}

Thanks to [[User:Theusaf|Theusaf]] for helping with putting the images up on the image page. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 12:09, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

Anyone here that can make an animation out of the images and put it in the explanation? If it is "easy" could it be updated some times on the way towards the final image on January 31st... Like the one on [[Time]]. That would be really nice. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 17:02, 14 January 2022 (UTC)
:I made an animation: [https://imgur.com/a/INh77nL] (Now i realize it wasn't needed because there already is automatically updating animation linked from the page...) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.105|162.158.159.105]] 18:18, 15 January 2022 (UTC)
::Not if you would let us use it here on xkcd. I have no contact to munvoseli. But if you made one we could upload here on xkcd on this page and then update it a few times, until we have a final version, then that would be much better than having one on a private persons page. Which may be deleted at any time. So cool you made one. If it is possible I would like to have one like the one at [[Time]]. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:41, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

There's something else moving into the frame... We'll have to see what it is. [[User:Sure|Sure]] ([[User talk:Sure|talk]]) 19:12, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

To even find this page, I had to page backward through the comic to get to Decorative Constants, go to the discussion, and come across the link to this page from there. I suggest that there be a direct link to this page from the explanation of every comic that existed while the countdown was in progress. A second question: has anyone determined for sure whether the ‘camera’ is zooming out from a blank spot in the final image, in which case we can expect other stuff to come into view from above and right, OR is it panning onto an image that is not changing size, in which case nothing will appear except from the direction it’s moving toward? And if it’s panning, has anyone tried estimating where the current stuff will end up?[[Special:Contributions/108.162.246.76|108.162.246.76]] 07:42, 15 January 2022 (UTC)
:I agree with you and have now changed the four comics that was active while the count down was active so far, so the link to this page is above their explanations. If people keep updating like this for new comics, there will be a link to the countdown page from the [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page front page]. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:40, 15 January 2022 (UTC)

Does Randall already have kids? If not, maybe his wife is expecting? That's something you'd announce and the last two comics are about kids. Another idea: he's going to space 🚀. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.233.115|162.158.233.115]] 20:47, 15 January 2022 (UTC)
:I’m sure he would have a birth announcement afterward, but I doubt he would try to predict it to the exact second, 21 days in advance.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.106.105|162.158.106.105]] 22:36, 15 January 2022 (UTC)
::Maybe it's a C section? Those are usually scheduled. lol but yeah that's unlikely.Wouldn't rule it out though.[[User:Sure|Sure]] ([[User talk:Sure|talk]]) 13:58, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

I noticed that it almost appears to be the tail fin of an airplane. I don’t know if it is, or if an airplane even makes sense? --[[Special:Contributions/172.70.230.57|172.70.230.57]] 22:11, 15 January 2022 (UTC)
:There's not enough time for it to make the several passes necessary, before the big 'reveal', but I'd have suspected Randall capable of parodying the {{w|Airplane!}} in-title parody of {{w|Jaws}}. Would have somewhat been a {{w|Shaggy dog story|shaggy}}-{{tvtropes|Brick_Joke|brick}} joke, but wouldn't put it past him... [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.79|172.70.85.79]] 00:18, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
:: I actually think, after watching the animation so far on musoveli’s page, it looks more like a main wing of a swept wing commercial aircraft. If it is, and the pattern continues, we should be able to see the main body or an engine nacelle at least. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.62.108|162.158.62.108]] 13:39, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
:::I agree now. First I was sure it was the tail of an airplane, but the way it moves into the image now, makes me think of the wing, with the plane body soon coming into view. That was at image 59... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 17:48, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
::::I think at the time of posting the body has just come into view! I may be wrong, as it is only a tiny sliver, but I am hopeful!--[[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.151|172.70.110.151]] 01:59, 20 January 2022 (UTC)
:::::I'm still more mentally-prepared for it being a tailfin (seen from the side, the 'new' line being the mid-dorsal surface of the main aircraft hull) than the port wing (the new bit being of the lateral airframe surface forward of the wings and perhaps just behind the cockpit point). But this POV will doubtless be overturned by the revelation of the next frame(s), which will make many of us look just as misdirectedly creduluous as each other. ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.22|172.70.86.22]] 02:50, 20 January 2022 (UTC)
::::::I can see the tailfin too, but because I am a human, and we dont shift our opinons easily, i still think its a plane. We might all be wrong though! This makes me think of a game from elementary school where on kid would draw a line, we would guess what it was, then the would draw another, and so on, until we guessed it. (I just realized that I wasnt logged in for my previous few posts here). --[[User:BlackBeret|BlackBeret]] ([[User talk:BlackBeret|talk]]) 13:34, 20 January 2022 (UTC)
::::::(Me again, 172.70.86.22, whatever this signs as.) In case you read me wrong, I was meaning a tailfin ''of a plane'' (rudder surface, vertical stabiliser, whatever), so I think we have agreement. Or had. Not seen the latest picture update(s), so my views may imminently change in a few moments when I actually do, and/or yours also will by the time you read this. ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.173|172.70.90.173]] 16:18, 20 January 2022 (UTC)
:::::::I understood what you meant by tail fin. I also now think you are right, becuase I think I can see a tiny little line poking out from the bottom corner that could be the vertical tail fin. (Is there a better word for it?)--[[User:BlackBeret|BlackBeret]] ([[User talk:BlackBeret|talk]]) 00:46, 21 January 2022 (UTC)
::::::::Once again, my opinion has changed. I now once more believe that it is a wing, now that we can see the windows of the plane. It almost looks like spaceshiptwo, which in my opinion is the coolest rocket in the industry right now. But it isn’t, because it doesn’t have the right wings. That was unrelated.--[[User:BlackBeret|BlackBeret]] ([[User talk:BlackBeret|talk]]) 02:54, 21 January 2022 (UTC)
:::::::::On a second look, it could be SpaceShipTwo in “shuttlecock” formation for reentry. Wouldn’t it be cool to see Randall in space? --[[User:BlackBeret|BlackBeret]] ([[User talk:BlackBeret|talk]]) 15:23, 21 January 2022 (UTC)
::::::::::{{w|SpaceShipTwo}} is not really looking at all like this commercial plane I believe it is. A passenger plane is my idea of how it looks now. I cannot tell if it is the wing or tail we see, but is inclined to sat that the thin line is the top of the passenger hull, and thus it is a wing, as the tailfin would not need this extra line as it is fused with the planes body. I also now begins to think the plane will land somewhere we can recognize (sky line) when the counter ends, and Randall is going there. But if he can actually land somewhere that precise seems farfetched. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 16:07, 21 January 2022 (UTC)

I believe it looks like he would draw the arm and upper "body" of a person running to the left. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.50.107|172.68.50.107]] 01:11, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Am I the only one thinking it'll be another extra long comic like 1190? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.91|108.162.241.91]] 02:52, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Randall is secretly in space, having launched a few days after JWST, and the countdown is to when NASA will see the fruits of his elaborate plan to create the most epic photo bomb of all time. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.187.220|162.158.187.220]] 20:59, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Surprised no one has linked to the xkcd comic called Countdown. It centers on the problem of having a countdown to something and people not knowing what it is (and also not being able to see all relevant information). Seems relevant in a couple ways. https://xkcd.com/1159/ {{unsigned ip|172.70.230.157}}
:Yes but there we don't know when the count ends, but we know what it is about. So kind of the reverse of this countdown. But I think I will add a line about it in the explanation. Also a search for [[Countdown]] goes there so maybe I also add a link here from that comic. (Remember to sign you comment) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:32, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Did anyone calculate the speed/acceleration of the object moving in the frame? We can predict future positions if nothing changes {{unsigned ip|172.70.162.155}}
:It just changed direction so nothing will come from that now. (Remember to sign you comment) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:32, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Randall's new comic is about [[Hypothesis Generation|hyposthesis genration]] (Sound familiar?), and the title text makes a lot of sense if you think about it from his perspective. [[User:Sure|Sure]] ([[User talk:Sure|talk]]) 13:06, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
:I really do not think this comic is a comment on the countdown. But I can see why it could be funny for us here at explain. But I'm quite sure that Randall stays away from all these fora discussing his comics. We put way to much importance to this site if we think he actually comes here... ;-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:14, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

What do the comments in the explanation above that say "the timer may be using EST" mean? The timer is just counting down days, hours, and minutes. We should all see the timer reach zero at the same time even though that may be morning for some readers, afternoon for others, and night for other readers. Randall's living on Eastern Standard Time isn't going to make the countdown run any faster or slower than it would if he lived in a different time zone. --[[Special:Contributions/172.70.126.87|172.70.126.87]] 16:00, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
:Agreed have removed all ref to EST. It is UTZ that is interesting and of course Randall's local time zone in Boston. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 16:29, 18 January 2022 (UTC) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.115.20|172.70.115.20]] 03:54, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
::Guys put that back! It's referring to comic 1061! Not that I think it's likely, butlet's not dismiss that out of hand. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.115.20|172.70.115.20]] 03:54, 19 January 2022 (UTC)
:::That is ridiculous! --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:42, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

I think the image entering the frame is a boomerang! [[User:Sure|Sure]] ([[User talk:Sure|talk]]) 12:53, 20 January 2022 (UTC)
:Well Randall has sure been fond enough of those that we have the [[:Category:Boomerangs]]. However, in none of those have he drawn that extra line that have appeared before you suggested this. So I would say, it is not!--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 16:24, 20 January 2022 (UTC)

Yay, started by the new development with the counter in the [[xkcd Header text]], I was inspired to continue the work I started back in [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=xkcd_Header_text&oldid=175813 June 2019] when I created the page regarding changes in the header. When I began adding the [[xkcd_Header_text#2022-01-10_-_Standard_text_with_countdown|countdown]] at the top I became aware that I had left a period of more than a year with [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=xkcd_Header_text&oldid=224089#Changes_not_documented_yet_2 Changes not documented yet 2] from September 2015 to November 2016 ([[xkcd_Header_text#Changes_not_documented_yet_1|Changes not documented yet 1]] is anything earlier than March 2014). And today I finished documenting the gap so now [[xkcd_Header_text#2016-04-04_-_Protip_on_Garden|Protip on Garden]] is suddenly also here, just below where the undocumented section was, which I deleted today. And thus the protip is now not just mentioned in the trivia on the [[1663: Garden]] page. Of course it would be great to continue backwards, but it is a hughe project. But there where some important changes in the now closed gap, among other the longest running book promotion for [[Thing Explainer]]. Of course I cannot say it is complete back to march 2014, but anything staying longer than two weeks in the front page header I believe I would have found. But I have not walked through every archived version ;-) They load terribly slow. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 16:39, 20 January 2022 (UTC)

I guess when more windows come into view, we’ll finally know whether the windows continue far to the left of the wing, or stop well short of the tail fin (which the two currently showing already seem to me to be too close to). {{unsigned ip|162.158.107.188}}
:That is true. Wonder if the plane will land in a city that can be recognized when the counter runs out? --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 16:07, 21 January 2022 (UTC)

<s>That new bottom-left line worries me. [...]</s> [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.68|172.70.86.68]] 15:50, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
:Retracted. I was still thinking a viewpoint mildly downward, or exactly level with the aircraft, but a very slight upward view (and from slightly forward?) onto the underside of the HS surface would conceivably produce that profile.
:Note that I'm commenting on xkcd.com directly, as the frames in the /images page have been left fallow for a while now. I presume someone is going to catch us up again when they have the wherewithall (unfortunately, I don't right now, hard to edit complex things on this device, and I wouldn't be able to upload the frames to the wiki anyway). ...no rush, we have... 8d 0h 23m left, at least, to be thorough about this. ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.121|172.70.90.121]] 14:37, 23 January 2022 (UTC)
::I have now uploaded up to the current on xkcd nr. 85. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:09, 23 January 2022 (UTC)

I wondered if there was anything else interesting in the js file that updates the countdown. [https://gist.github.com/Toby222/bff2734e98efadd9e9c3b2dc64902c43 So I de-minified it.] (There is nothing noteworthy.) [[User:Toby|Toby]] ([[User talk:Toby|talk]]) 17:20, 23 January 2022 (UTC)

The new parachute theory could be a possibility. I have added this and two others to the top of the image theories and moved all else into an Early theory section. For sure it is a plane. And also added the parachute idea to the countdown theory section. Not my theory, but moved it to two other places than where it was first stated. (Left it there though!). Not special certain it will be, but could be. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:09, 23 January 2022 (UTC)

Maybe Randall found D.B. Cooper? ;D [[User:256.256.256.256|256.256.256.256]] ([[User talk:256.256.256.256|talk about me behind my]] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ/ back]) 13:49, 24 January 2022 (UTC)
:Maybe he's going to announce he ''is'' D.B. Cooper..! [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.121|172.70.90.121]] 14:01, 24 January 2022 (UTC)
:: :o [[User:256.256.256.256|surprised pikachu]] ([[User talk:256.256.256.256|talk about me behind my]] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ/ back]) 11:50, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

I've been checking the possible aircraft used for Zero-G (parabolic) flights, and currently - in the US at least - none of the models used have 'standard' hull-mounted horizontal stabilisers, as in the picture. They're either T-tails or cruciform (midway up the vertical stabiliser), possibly for very good reasons. (i.e., at the most crucial part of the flight envelope, it keeps the control surfaces out of the immediate wake of the wings. Handy feature, more than overcoming the engineering compromises needed to mount things that way.) Assuming any attempt at accuracy{{fact}} this might rule that option out. (And skydiving is usually high-winged non-jets, and this seems to be a low-winged jet.) Though A300-ranged planes have been used in Europe and conceivably loosely fit the given profile. But it looks like a smaller plane than many of the Vomit Comets (and larger than most parachute-party planes). Unfortunately, it still rules far too many other options in, never mind artistic <s>innacuracy</s> drift. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.79|172.70.85.79]] 15:14, 24 January 2022 (UTC)

suggestion: make a bot that uploads the newest image with https://xkcd.com/count-wimRikmef/current .[[Special:Contributions/162.158.187.92|162.158.187.92]] 18:20, 25 January 2022 (UTC)Bumpf
:With just five days left it is not worth the bother... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:50, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

Actually, this started to get a little boring a few days ago. https://xkcd.com/1951/ Just sayin’ [[Special:Contributions/108.162.246.98|108.162.246.98]] 12:52, 26 January 2022 (UTC)

First the airplane image...now two alien-themed comics in a row...Of course!!! It seems so obvious! Randall is an alien! The countdown is to the big reveal! /j [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.99|172.70.114.99]]
:Unless he keeps up alien themed jokes through the week I do not think they will be related to the count down. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:50, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

The new development makes me think it is a plane like {{w|Boeing E-3 Sentry}}. With a radar on top. If not another plane is above, holding this one, which could make it something with a going into space plane? Not sure if those that exist would look like this though. But the radar would probably look like this. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:50, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

(based on 110 frames available): The upper black "arc" can be some hair and the ellipse on the right look like the right glass of a pair of glasses. The latter I think because the upper line of the plane's main body gets refracted a bit. So this might become a picture with a glasses-wearing person in front and a plane in the background. If somebody more web-comic-savy than me recognizes a character we might see the start of Randall's vacation and his vacation replacement.[[User:Kimmerin|Kimmerin]] ([[User talk:Kimmerin|talk]]) 15:43, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

The line below the windows is a fairly common place to switch from a dark to light color with a commercial airline livery, or a line of color, etc. The floor of the passenger compartment is generally a little below the middle of the fuselage, the windows are above. The fuselage looks much more typical if that line is just paint than if it's demarking the fuselage from something else. The curved object in the upper right would be the right place for a winglet if the plane were banking slightly, particularly a winglet like the A350's.

;Countdown not appearing on certain comics (most notably [[980: Money]])
I have not checked every comic, and this may be a bug or nerd sniping, but this could mean... something? Idk [[User:Eebop|Eebop]] ([[User talk:Eebop|talk]]) 02:41, 28 January 2022 (UTC)
: Money has custom text in the header specific to the comic. I assume when he does this it just overrides the default, where the countdown is. [[Special:Contributions/198.41.238.117|198.41.238.117]] 04:09, 28 January 2022 (UTC)
::Yes that is the same for all comics that have [[xkcd_Header_text#Unique_header_text|Unique header text]], so this doesn't mean anything. So far I have found 14 of those. Mainly me who edits the [[xkcd Header text]] page where all changes to the header text can be logged. And the unique headers are listed there as well. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:44, 28 January 2022 (UTC)

I have a feeling the black thing in the top right corner is a bird wing, and the thing beneath it on the plane is its talon, meaning a giant bird is carrying a plane. Maybe the image has absolutely nothing to do with what will happen at the end of the countdown? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.90.23|172.69.90.23]] 13:47, 28 January 2022 (UTC)
:Don't think so, also now it is clear it is the wing. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 08:10, 29 January 2022 (UTC)
::Yeah, I see that now. When I posted that it certainly looked like a talon. My new guess is that I have no idea what the black thing is. However, it appears to be attached to the countdown itself now, maybe a graph?

;Raptors on a Plane?
Excuse me, but that should be Raptors on ''every'' plane.[[User:Szeth Pancakes|Szeth Pancakes]] ([[User talk:Szeth Pancakes|talk]]) 20:08, 28 January 2022 (UTC)
:Looks like a raptor tail to me. [[User:Silverfunk|Silverfunk]] ([[User talk:Silverfunk|talk]]) 14:50, 28 January 2022 (UTC)
</div>
 


;What if? 2 on amazon
There's a listing for What if? 2 (https://www.amazon.com/dp/0525537112) on amazon that may be linked to the countdown? Considering I can't find anything about it before recently I feel like the countdown could've been to announce it. [[User:Flumnble|Flumnble]] ([[User talk:Flumnble|talk]]) 03:29, 30 January 2022 (UTC)
:I originally imagined that, and had (thought I'd) checked Amazon and another retailer, but hy neither showing an 'available for pre-order' that looked relevent was resigned to it being something else. Unless the countdown was to when the pre-orders would be possible... If it is, then someone at Amazon may have jumped the gun/not kept the gunvsafely holstered and broken the embargo early... Going to check your link in a moment, but first checking my prefered (physical) store's web-site and a couple of others... We got Kirk into space, already, so I'm not now too bothered in pushing yet more money Jeff's way. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.73|172.70.85.73]] 03:59, 30 January 2022 (UTC)
:ok, that's definitely correct. the picture in the countdown looks exactly like the top of the book cover. [[User:Lettherebedarklight|https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miLcaqq2Zpk]] ([[User talk:Lettherebedarklight|talk]]) 07:20, 30 January 2022 (UTC)
::That is actually really sad they could not figure out to wait with this until he announced it on xkcd. Shame on Amazon. Buy it somewhere else. :-( But the theories is over. The book anouncement and the dino on a plane was some of my first guesses. But had actually not thought about a new what if book. Can't wait to get my hands on it. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 08:18, 30 January 2022 (UTC)
:::AMAZONNNNNN! >:(!! (No, really, buy it somehwere else, and not just because they ruined the surprise. Signed, your friendly neighborhood anti-capitalist.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.230.63|172.70.230.63]]
::And now the Amazon page is showing a release date in September, with pre-orders now. [[User:MAP|MAP]] ([[User talk:MAP|talk]]) 07:52, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
:::So this whole thing was a 21-day countdown to a botched announcement of something you can’t even see for another nine months? And here we all thought something was actually going to happen at the end of the countdown. At least we don’t have to sit through nine months of frame-by-frame like the Super Bowl watch party.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.107.16|162.158.107.16]] 10:10, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
::::Well this was actually early on the best guess we had, that it was a book announcement. So we should not be so surprised, and I for one stated that it it was not just for the promotion, then it would be very different that with other books. But yes it was a bit little for three weeks, but we did get a new comic and some new design features on xkcd. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 19:10, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

Commenting from Melbourne Australia here. The black figure is clearly the Qantas logo of the 'flying kangaroo'. Randall is coming to visit us downunder {{unsigned ip|108.162.250.234}}
:You did not read the previous comment that revealed it to be the T-rex from the what if series? --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 08:18, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

This countdown first appeared in 2565 - Latency. Could this not be a continuation of that joke? Maybe the next What If? entry? That would certainly be a bit of latency! {{unsigned|ByronCinNNZ}}
:Not really as this happened automatic and with the intended delay. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 19:10, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

It looks as though the drawing was slightly altered for the countdown - the dinosaur's tail is at a different angle between the two drawings.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.187.158|162.158.187.158]] 02:28, 31 January 2022 (UTC).
:True the final image is not the same, but also the planes angle is different. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 19:10, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

Someone should upload a gif of the final wiggling countdown. I would, but permissions... [[User:Toby|Toby]] ([[User talk:Toby|talk]]) 15:17, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
:I agree, if someone can make that gif, I would be very happy to help loading it up on the page. The one on Munvocelis page is cool, but can we except it to stay there for ever? If you can help, then please also reply on my talk page, as I might not see it here later... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 19:10, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
::Thanks to [[User:Toby|Toby]] who provided us with the new gif animation as well as a gif with [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/images/6/64/Countdown_in_header_text_last_minute_wiggling.gif the wiggling]. Have put that on the other image page. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:24, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

:::Thanks for the gif, that really shows what I was curious to see, how the panning out exactly worked. You can see the speed changes in panning really well. Small improvement to make still: I think the last frame (the book frame) should stay on a bit longer before resetting. Like 1-2s? Thanks! [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.226|108.162.250.226]] 21:33, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
::::Like this https://tobot.dev/files/xkcd-countdown/full_animation_fixed_timing.gif? [[User:Toby|Toby]] ([[User talk:Toby|talk]]) 22:44, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
:::::Great with this improvement, and seems that you can upload a new file even if you could not create the new file. Have you seen my message in your talk page Toby? --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 12:50, 1 February 2022 (UTC)
::::::Yes indeedus I have [[User:Toby|Toby]] ([[User talk:Toby|talk]]) 14:29, 1 February 2022 (UTC)
:::::::Great. Maybe you wish to change your own page now, since I used it to make it a link. But my comment there really only belonged in you talk page. Where I also wrote it. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:05, 2 February 2022 (UTC)
::::::::I have made 22 images from countdown Day 20 to Day 0 and the day after and put them here [[Countdown_in_header_text/other_images#Changing_counter_position]]. If you or someone else could make a gif showing this that would be great. Again with a bit longer time with the last image. And also a bit slower for each frame than the gif at the top. That would be cool to have on this page as well. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 10:49, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

== Side-by-side comparison in "/other images" page. ==

Appreciated that the images are reduced to be less problematic, but they still make the page twice as wide as it would normally be. On this device this compresses the rest of the page to "half the screen width" as with when a single huge image (or non-breaking string of text) is put into a page) while the usual CSS bounds are respected for everything else but the browser makes sure all this big thing fits on this (already wide-ratioed) screen. Just a note (which I can't make on the 'othed images' sub-pahe Talk, as I can't create it) although I don't know if anyone should 'fix' it, or even how they would. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 15:22, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

Talk:2575: What If? 2

2022-02-02T15:10:41Z

172.70.91.126:

Yay! \o/ [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 15:09, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

Note that there is actually a term for the 13th month of the year, and it's [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undecimber Undecimber].
[[User:Svízel přítula|Svízel přítula]] ([[User talk:Svízel přítula|talk]]) 15:12, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
:And the Jewish calendar has a 13th month every 2-3 years, since it's a lunar calendar. But rather than a completely different month name, the month Adar is doubled to Adar I and Adar II. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 16:12, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

This is awesome! I really hope one of the answers is about cotton candy breaking one's fall, since it was foreshadowed in book one. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.90.23|172.69.90.23]] 15:21, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT YAYAYAYAYYAY!!!! [[User:Sarah the Pie(yes, the food)|Sarah the Pie(yes, the food)]] ([[User talk:Sarah the Pie(yes, the food)|talk]]) 16:37, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

According to the Simpsons the 13th month is Smarch. What do we do when Simpsons and Randall disagree?
Also, pretty sure 2021 was the first year that 13th month aligned with our reality. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.18|172.70.211.18]] 17:28, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

I can't shake the feeling that he announced it on 31/01 because it's coming out on 13/09 and that's nearly 13/10 which is 31/01 with the month and day digits switched. But I might be one of those numerology people without realising it --[[User:192·168·0·1|192·168·0·1]] ([[User talk:192·168·0·1|talk]]) 17:38, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
:If you're not, you should count yourself lucky! [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.68|172.70.86.68]] 18:15, 31 January 2022 (UTC)
:: :D great pun, you win 1 internet 🎁 --[[User:192·168·0·1|192·168·0·1]] ([[User talk:192·168·0·1|talk]]) 15:09, 1 February 2022 (UTC)

The pre-order through all the different sources is good, but **What if** someone wanted a hard copy of the book autographed by Randall? I don't see any provision for that. [[User:RAGBRAIvet|RAGBRAIvet]] ([[User talk:RAGBRAIvet|talk]]) 00:16, 1 February 2022 (UTC)

Is it just me, but is 7 months in advance a bit early to announce a book release? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.228|108.162.250.228]] 01:04, 1 February 2022 (UTC)
: Seems an oddly advanced announcement to me too, but I guess with transport lines being so messed up, it's an attempt to be prepared well ahead for anything. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.87|108.162.249.87]] 05:12, 1 February 2022 (UTC)

: Yes. Especially in the world of ebooks and audiobooks which have no distirbution delays. With such a delay between completion and release, I'm expecting an ebook and audiobook edition to be available on the release day. I wonder if this sort of delay is normal in the publishing world, or if Randall is just a low priority for his publishers? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.234|108.162.250.234]] 05:05, 2 February 2022 (UTC)
::I think it's the opposite. Books have always needed months to actually fully be published, at least properly without resorting to letrasetting and sneaking time on the office photocopier/Gestetner for ultra-small initial runs - and definitely on a simultaneous worldwide release arranged from the start.
::What we see here is not a delay from the announcement, but the earlier and earlier time at which the announcement gets to the wider public, even the avid fanbase. Even so, there's probably been at least a month or three since Randall signed the contract and submitted the first proofs (of presumably already a roughly compiled proposal that got him that contract to sign), and distributors like Amazon clearly were tipped off enough to prepare for the release...
::And while it might be fairly easy to get the digital print-proofs into eBook format, save for some slight adjustments necessary to make it properly sellable, I imagine the fuss of getting an audiobook recorded (''without'' the complications of sufficiently audio-describing what will surely be an illustration-heavy book) is a task in itself.
::I don't know if they've even put ink to paper yet (or given any audiobook narrator the studio time) except for the proof-run. Even if they have started the mass-printing they probably are far from being able to put sufficient stock into shops tomorrow to meet expectations. We're just learning about it once it is officially inevitable (or even a day before!) rather than wandering into a bookshop in mid-September and getting a pleasant surprise, much like has happened for most ordinary consumers of literature across the entire extent of the book-publishing history. (IMO) [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.225|141.101.98.225]] 09:49, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

This is one of the few times, it is quite explicit that Randall himself is in the comic instead of him as fictional narrator. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.68|172.70.86.68]] 07:01, 1 February 2022 (UTC)

It comes out on my birthday! [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.95|172.70.214.95]] 09:22, 1 February 2022 (UTC)
:Happy birthday! ...in advance. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.173|172.70.90.173]] 12:51, 1 February 2022 (UTC)

It's a crummy commercial? Son of a glitch. [[User:192·168·0·1|192·168·0·1]] ([[User talk:192·168·0·1|talk]]) 15:09, 1 February 2022

This seems like an oddly-specific date to me. When I was at IBM it wasn't unusual for rumors about a product to start circulating more than a year before it would be released, and then IBM would announce that yes, it really was happening and specify something like mid-year of the next year for FCS (First Customer Ship) but the actual FCS date wouldn't be firm until a month or two before the FCS happened . . . and sometimes the FCS would get slipped, even by months like in the case of the S/38 which was the first product I was involved with. Of course, a book is a little bit of a smaller project, but still . . . . [[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.153|172.70.130.153]] 10:16, 2 February 2022 (UTC)
:I think for tech releases, you could benefit from juggling the practical (official) release-date much closer to that point, rather than stockpiling a lot of potentially useful items uselessly in a warehouse just to make sure you have them.
:Alternately, promising a date based on Just-In-Time estimates then suffering delays that push release back is not a good thing either. (Also misestimating demand, see XBox/etc problems.) So, to stop too much of either, you get the rumour-mill going but make it officially official closer to the confirmed/confirmable delivery time.
:A book, probably deliberately scheduled explictly for a particularly popular (pre-)pre-Christmas purchase slot, has less issue being sent to storage for months at a time, and gives you leeway to organise additional print-runs from other partners if any (not uncommon) printing/binding places suffer problems (unlike what we've seen if issues hit one or more of the few specialist chip-fabricators).
:There are probably similar pressures and opportunities. But at different scales which changes the optimal buffer-times between various stages (hint, rumour, confirmation, official confirmation, near-certainty, actuality), and all under the microscope of the modern information-led world.
:(I remember the early days of Discworld series publication. Suddenly there would be a new Pratchett book in the bookstores, without knowing anything of it in advance, even when it was becoming a twice-yearly probability. By the end, attendees of the Discworld Conventions, and then thus all the readers of various official/fan-led online resources, would know roughly what books were in the pipeline a couple of years in advance and were counting down the days for several of them at a time, pretty much knowing the subject and main characters of them already and wildly speculating about storylines long since set in stone while Pterry had already started to work on the successor's successor, or beyond...)
:Not that I know the inside-out of the book industry, and also not so much of the electronics one as yourself, but this is my extrapolation from what I do know/think about them both. I think there's a wide range of possible schedules, with this one not at all being an outlier. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 15:10, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

Talk:2575: What If? 2

2022-02-01T15:08:22Z

172.70.91.126:

2575: What If? 2

2022-01-31T18:13:09Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ Helping? Well, certainly editing.

{{comic
| number = 2575
| date = January 31, 2022
| title = What If? 2
| image = what_if_2.png
| titletext = CLARIFICATION: By 9/13, I mean September 13th, not the 9th day of Jancember, the cursed 13th month that exists between December and January in the transdimensional temporal plane.
}}

*This comic came out just a few minutes after the [[Countdown in header text]] finished. The countdown was to the revelation in this comic!
==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a RESIDENT OF JANCEMBER - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This comic is [[Randall]]'s way of announcing and [[:Category:Book promotion|promoting]] his new book, ''what If? 2'', based on his [[what if?]] blog and following his first what if book.

The entire comic as well as the new [[xkcd Header text]] is a link to a [https://xkcd.com/what-if-2/ what if? 2: the book] page on {{xkcd}}.

Randall ensured the maximum possible attention to his announcement by placing a [[Countdown in header text|countdown]] in the [[xkcd_Header_text#2022-01-10_-_Standard_text_with_countdown|header]] about three weeks prior to the announcement. This has caused a lot of speculation as to what would be revealed on the day of this comics release 2022-01-31. The timer was inside a panel at the top right of the xkcd Header text together with the standard header text: ''xkcd updates every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday''. Inside the panel a picture began emerging after the first day, but the picture only changed approximately once every four hour. First after a few weeks was it certain that it was a plane that was being revealed. And on the second to last day, around twenty days onwards, it was clear that it featured a dinosaur standing on top of the plane and it might have been possible to guess the relation to the "what if?" canon. On or prior to the day before the announcement on xkcd, however, Amazon made visible a preorder page for the book, so the answer was made clear about a day before Randall had intended.

Until then, however, there were numerous [[Countdown_in_header_text#Theories|theories]] about the [[Countdown_in_header_text#Countdown|countdown]] and what the [[Countdown_in_header_text#The_picture|image would reveal]], as the image gradually changed throughout the eventual [[Countdown_in_header_text/images|135 frames]].

In the title text Randall feels that he must clarify the release day, since he has often joked about the way different countries (and people) write dates - he did not used the one version he himself had promoted in earlier comics. He does however give two different versions of the release date: the first is "9/13" in the first panel, which is at least (usually - see below) only readable one way; harder to misinterpret is the more expansive "Sep 13, 2022" in the final panel. What he should have written was, "the book is released on 2022-09-13," using the international standard as defined in the {{W|ISO 8601}} standard and used in [[1340: Unique Date]].

The clarification reads: By 9/13, I mean September 13th, not the 9th day of Jancember, the cursed 13th month that exists between December and January in the transdimensional temporal plane.

Since there are only 12 months in the year 2022,{{citation needed}} then 9/13 actually cannot be mistaken, while 9/12 might be. So there was really no need for this clarification, especially with the last text in the last panel. So this is of course just a title text joke, where he can manage to make a [[:Category:Portmanteau|portmanteau]] of January and December, Jancember, and then then call this a cursed month, since it would be the 13th month, if it came before New Year. This comic came out at the end of January, so it could have been at the end of Jancember instead. 5he number thirteen is by many seen as an unlucky number, so a thirteenth month would be considered cursed by some, or at least unlucky.

==Transcript==
:[Randall, drawn as Cueball, is throwing his arms out as he stands next to a big red book with white drawings on the cover. The cover shows a large passenger plane that has just taken off, as can be seen since the landing gear still has the wheels extended (only one wheel is visible at the middle part and then the one in the front). A Tyrannosaurus Rex has jumped on to the plane and it is biting down on the ceiling of the plane a bit in front of the wings, as if on the back of a prey. The dinosaur has already broken through the ceiling. Below is a jagged landscape with small mountain like peaks in the background. Megan and Cueball are standing on the top of the second of two raised plateaus, looking up at the plane and dinosaur. There is unreadable white text above the plane, then a title beneath the plane, and the authors name below the landscape, and more unreadable text beneath that, all in white. Below the book, there is a small arrow pointing to the right bottom of the book, with a label beneath.]
:Randall: '''Announcement:''' I’m publishing a ''what if?'' sequel!
:Book cover: what if? 2
:Book cover: Randall Munroe
:In stores 9/13, available for preorder now: xkcd.com/whatif2

:[Randall is shown holding up his smart phone in one hand. The screen lights up as indicated with small lines at the top. These point up to at least six SMS texts, each with two lines of text. They are shown in speech bobbles with a small arrow in the bobbles lower left corner. All six are covered partly by either the other five, or by Randall’s head, and none of them can be read in any meaningful way; only parts of sentences or words are clearly visible. The bobbles and the text in them are all drawn in gray. Randall is narrating (not speaking) in this panel, both above the SMS texts, and below.]
:Randall narrating: Ever since I wrote '''''what if?''''', I’ve been flooded with questions.
:Randall narrating: And not just from readers- My friends and family stated texting them to me, too.
:Text 1: Hey could s.. ele
:Text 2: Hypothe…
:Text 3: If you s… Jupiter…
:Text 4: Could my c… or…
:Text 5: Do you… my car…
:Text 6: If I trie… The Sun…
:Randall narrating Honestly, I love it.

:[Randall is again standing next to his red book talking. There is also a second version of the book lying to the right of the closed book, and this has been opened up to reveal two pages. The text is unreadable and the images are very hard to see, but it seems that two people are standing next to each other on the right page. The image at the top of the left page has been enlarged and shown to the right of the open book. It is an image of the Earth that is being peeled by a potato peeler, which takes off a large peel from the north part of Scandinavia and then goes via Russia into Asia. The title and author name can still just be read on the book,but maybe only because they are already known...]
:Randall: The questions are so good. People have asked about touching exotic materials, traveling across space and time, eating things they shouldn’t, and smashing large objects into the Earth. There are questions about lasers, explosions, swingsets, candy, and soup. Several planets are destroyed-one of them by the soup.
:Book cover: what if? 2
:Book cover: Randall Munroe

:[Zoom in on the top part of Randall speaking on.]
:Randall: Like the first book, '''''what if? 2''''' also features collections of short answers, new lists of weird and worrying questions, and some of my favorite answers from the What if site.

:[Only the closed red book are shown in this panel, in an even larger version than in any of the previous panels. But it is still only the title and the author name that can be read, but in this version these can also be read on the spine of the book. Randall is narrating again, and there are text both above and below the book.]
:Randall narrating: If you want to get it when it’s released, you can preorder a copy at xkcd.com/whatif2
:Book spine: what if? 2 Randall Munroe
:Book cover: what if? 2
:Book cover: Randall Munroe
:Randall narrating: Available Sep 13, 2022

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Randall Munroe]]
[[Category:What If?]]
[[Category:Book promotion]]
[[Category:Portmanteau]] 
[[Category:Calendar]] 
[[Category:Dinosaurs]]

Countdown in header text

2022-01-28T12:52:35Z

172.70.91.126: /* Countdown */

{{comic
| date = January 10, 2022
| title = Countdown in header text
| image = Countdown_in_header_text.png
| before = The countdown will probably last 21 days. After February 1st 2022 it is likely to have disappeared. See this [https://web.archive.org/web/20220110183238/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] archive version.
| ldomain = www
| lappend =
| extra = yes
}}
*Go directly to the list of [[Countdown in header text/images|images]].
**Or [[Countdown in header text/images#newestpicture|Jump to the newest picture]]
***The images can also be found [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ here] on munvoseli's page where comparison of two images and an animation can be seen.
{{TOC}}
==Explanation==
*On January 10th 2022, [[Randall]] added a countdown in the top right corner of the [[xkcd Header text]] on {{xkcd}}.
**This happened while the comic [[2565: Latency]] was up.
***First the xkcd Header text was [[xkcd_Header_text#2022-01-08_-_Back_to_standard_text|changed back]] to the [[xkcd_Header_text#Header_text|standard text]] for the first time in almost three years:
****xkcd updates every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
***But already while this Friday-comic was still up on the following Monday the [[xkcd_Header_text#2022-01-10_-_Standard_text_with_countdown|countdown]] was added.
****This was thus up when the Monday comic [[2566: Decorative Constants]] was released, drawing more people to the xkcd page.
*The first [[#Archived Versions|archived version]] from [https://web.archive.org/web/20220110183238/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] read 20d 20h 27m.
**It looks like it started on [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ 01-10 17:00 UTC].
***At that time it would have read 20d 21h 59 min. Just two hours and 1 minute short of 3 weeks.
*This countdown will reach zero on Monday 2022-01-31 at 14:59 (2:59 PM) {{w|UTC}}, or 9:59 AM in Boston, Randall's home town.
**If seconds will be added towards the end, it seems likely that it may end exactly at 15:00 UTC (10:00 AM in Boston).
***Further, the timer may be using [[1061:_EST|EST]], in which case it will count up for four hours on 2022-01-18, and will end on 2022-01-31 23:00 UTC.
****Though either way, it would fall on Monday, and therefore the day comic 2575 should be released.
****The full moon has since passed, and now we know that the timer isn't using EST, so it will indeed reach zero at or near 2022-01-31T15:00Z.
**The timer ends in January. Recall that the month is named for Janus, the Roman god of endings and beginnings. Two salient points: the clock hits zero at the end of the month and the plane is leaving. Look for a big ending and, we hope, something nice to replace it.
*The next day on [https://web.archive.org/web/20220111153818/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-11] a diagonal black bar appeared in the lower left-hand corner of the countdown box and started to move further into the image on following changes to the [[#Images|image]].
**This development called for the creation of this dedicated [[Countdown in header text]] page.
**The line had already moved further into the image at this time, but the latest version will never be available in the web archive.
***This development is reminiscent of the huge comic [[1190: Time]].
*As mentioned above, [https://munvoseli.github.io/ Munvoseli] is keeping [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ track of the changes] to the image on the countdown.
**Although there are (at 2022-01-12 12:35 UTC) thirteen different frames we know of, the first three looks the same (because the diagonal bar was not in the frame yet) and the seventh and the eighth also seems to be the same, even though the bar had already begun moving across the frame from the fourth. This is either on purpose, a slipup or means that The FrameTM might not be zooming out of a larger image.
***However, the images that look the same all have individual addresses on the xkcd server. See more under [[#Images|Images]] below.
***Similarly, frames 91 and 92 seem to be exactly the same. Also frame 92 did not upload as part of the roughly four hour schedule, but between two frames that are part of the regular schedule.

Randall has previously made a comic simply called [[1159: Countdown]]. However, in that the roles are reversed. There we know that the countdown is for (Super Volcano) but not if it will happen soon or very much later. Here we know when, and it is rather soon, but not what.

==Images==
*Images will be put on [[Countdown in header text/images|this separate page]].
**The images can also be found [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ here] on munvoseli's page.
***It is possible to compare two images, chosen between those released, on that page!
***From 2022-01-14 it has also been possible to see an animation.
**See more details at the top of the image page.
*After a few days the black lines forming the image came into conflict with the clock, which has a rounded white frame around it. This can be seen in one of the earliest examples here:
[[File:Countdown in header text Clock Cover Black Lines.png]]
*Also at this time a new development happened after the "plane tail" moved forward it stopped on 2022-01-18 and started moving up (or zooming in). See for instance these two comparison from munvoseli's page showing the difference from the 8 pictures before today, and then after three out today:
[[File:Countdown in header text Compare 40 to 48.png]] [[File:Countdown in header text Compare 48 to 51.png]]
*Later a similar change happens, as it changes from zooming out to slowly moving towards the right, although the windows and the door appear to move more in relation to the frame than the rest of the aircraft:
[[File:Countdown in header text Compare 85 to 90.png]] [[File:Countdown in header text Compare 95 to 90.png]]

===Ongoing description===
** Frames 1-12: A diagonal line.
** Frame 13: A curve seems to begin at the top left of the line.
** Frame 18: The curve connects the diagonal line with a horizontal line.
** Frame 27-28: A new line appears in the bottom left corner.
** Frame 40-42: The new line turns out to be connected to the horizontal line, forming a corner which is not attached to any other line.
** Frame 49: The "camera movement" direction changes, while the object is still moving upward it stopped moving towards the left side, moving towards the right instead.
** Frame 54: A slight upward curve seems to appear in the right line, the left line seems to have a small bend downwards, though that could at that point just be a straight line that Randall drew without a ruler.
** Frame 60-62: A new line appears in the bottom right corner, it turns out to be a continuation of the first original line which curves upward and has a positive slope at that point of the picture, between about 2 o'clock and 3 o'clock. The downward bend of the left line continues on straight in the same direction, it was probably an intentional bend and not an irregularity in drawing a straight line by hand.
** Frame 63: In the minimum of the right curved line a new line starts appearing, way thinner than the others (which were up to this point all rather part of one line) and going slightly downwards and very much to the left, at an angle somewhere between 8 o'clock and 9 o'clock.
** Frame 67: A possible feature becomes visible at the bottom edge of the image that might resolve the exact nature of the (currently presumed) aircraft, e.g. which particular aerodynamic surface we have been seeing and thus from which particular orientation we are viewing it.
** Frame 68-72 makes it clear this must be an aircraft by showing windows and a door and clearly the tail fin. As late as frame 69 some people argued that the tail fin could have been a wing.
** Frame 73-83 brings a horizontal stabilizer into view.
** Frame 87-89: A new curved line appears on the underside of the (presumed) aircraft, so there either is something behind it or it might not be an aircraft.
** Frame 96-99: An arc is coming into view in the upper right corner, likely the top edge of a cloud.
*** Turned out not to be a cloud.
** Frame 101-106 seems to be some kind of radar on top of the plane, like the one on {{w|Boeing E-3 Sentry}}. Or alternatively this plane is hanging beneath another plane. Not looking at all like {{w|Spaceshiptwo}}, but something similar, which could make this plane a spaceplane?
** Frame 106-114 a new element of the image appears on the right side, it could be the end of a wing. The arch no longer looks like a radar. Could be the tail of a Dinosaur or the cape of someone riding the airplane...
*** a cape is unlikely as it would probably be drawn to flap in the wind. The other element does appear to be a wingtip

==Theories==
*Here are different theories for what the countdown is for and what the picture is going to reveal can be added.

===The picture===
*Theories about the picture:
**From 2022-01-21 it became certain that it was a plane! Passenger plane. Door and windows are visible.
***From 2022-01-22 it became clear that it was the rear end, so it was a tailfin that came into the panel to begin with. Up til the day before it was still a bit uncertain if it could have been a wing.
*** from 2022-01-24 a bottom line has appeared which doesn't fit well with a 'standard' airliner. perhaps the image is deliberately misleading (eg will transform into something else)
*** From 2022-01-26 something looking like a radar like the one on a {{w|Boeing E-3 Sentry}} began emerging in the top right corner.
**What will this lead up to - theories about this.
***It could be an airplane with a banner like in [[1355: Airplane Message]].
****That would very soon be clear as the bottom part of the rear end seems to be coming into view during 2022-01-24, if the direction does not change again.
*****This is now ruled out, since the plane is clearly not towing a banner.
***It could end up landing in a city, perhaps with a skyline pinpointing where Randall will be or move.
****However, unlikely to manage this in real life as the count down ends.
****Also, very unlikely (1 in 60, or even 1 in 3600) that such a landing would occur exactly on the hour.
*****But it could also just be the time when he announces he has moved...
***Maybe Cueball will make a parachute jump, and Cueball could represent a real life Randall, as this could in principle be timed very accurately.
****This is something you would schedule a month or more ahead, want to tell people about in advance, want to make a big deal about on your website, is not quite as bizarre as zero-G and probably more fun {{citation needed}}, could be done with an adventurous wife, explains why it’s the tail of the plane in the image, and (assuming no mechanical, medical, or meteorological problems, a safe assumption), might go something like “on my mark, it’ll be 9:59:56 A.M. in Boston... mark. 3, 2, 1, JUMP!” Maybe it’ll be just Cueball/Randall, but could more likely include Megan representing his wife.
****However, it could very easily be that the weather in January could foil the attempt, or at least the timing.
****The plane appears to be a commercial jetliner, though, rather than the small prop planes used for parachute jumps. Unless, of course, Randall is revealing his real identity has been Wesley Snipes all along
*** Perhaps the new item on top of the plane is the tail of a dinosaur? perhaps like the one on the cover of "what if..." book. perhaps it's a new book?
*** There are two flights originating in Boston departing at 09:59 on 1/31/2022: Spirit NK433 to Orlando Florida and Delta DL5696 to Washington D.C.
***Frame 101-106 seems to be some kind of radar on top of the plane, like the one on Boeing E-3 Sentry. Or alternatively this plane is hanging beneath another plane. Not looking at all like Spaceshiptwo, but something similar, which could make this plane a spaceplane?
**** Predicting dinosaur
**** It doesn't look like radar (that's usually on the rear of the plane) and the plane itself looks odd - like it has a ventral fin or wings that attach at the back beneath the passenger door (an improbable arrangement.) The object coming into view on the right of the frame looks more like a person with big hair, reminiscent of the hair of Sideshow Bob - perhaps in the near foreground so as to appear much larger than the plane in perspective. I don't know what's up with the wings/fin on the plane but it seems possible we're going to see someone watching the plane fly away. Possibly the countdown and image relate to someone flying away, either on vacation or some other trip, and perhaps the thing coming into frame on the right is Randall or someone watching them fly away, missing them, etc.
**** the white element overlapping the fuselage could be the start of the wing-tip these fold up at the ends of many modern aircraft, could mean aircraft is banking left.

====Early theories====
Many early theories were generated before the picture was decisively revealed to be a plane.

*It seems after two days and 12 pictures like either something is moving into the frame or that it is a zoom out from a white area of a large picture. Maybe it is the arm of Cueball that will come into view.
*The second line makes it look somewhat like the tail fin of an aircraft.
**Or the wing of an aircraft (left if looking down at it). Perhaps the plane is towing a banner that will fly through the frame.
***After almost a week this looks like the most promising suggestion so far. Now that the direction of the camera movement has changed, we might get to see the rest of the aircraft soon.
****From picture 63, it more and more seems like it was the tail fin of a plane and now we can see the body.
*****It's almost certainly the tail (and now a bit of the rear fuselage) of an aircraft.
******It could just as easily be the left wing and part of the fuselage (showing windows on the right side of an airliner), with the tail fin out of view to the rear, as being the tail fin from an angle where the left wing is out of view behind the fuselage.
*******judging by the relative size of the (presumed) windows, I think it's more likely to be the left wing than the tail fin.
*******Based on the way planes are drawn in [[1868: Eclipse Flights]]. [[1355: Airplane Message]] and [[1669: Planespotting]], plane wings have a point on their edge and tail fins have a flat side, and (if a line is present) a thick line separates wings from the body, whereas thin lines or no lines separate tail fins, so this is a tail fin.
*******In the bottom left there appears to be the top part of a horizontal stabilizer, implying this is the tail.
********It’s a tail fin, that’s finally clear, but that’s the underside of the stabilizer. Which means this would be the best angle to view Cueball/Randall parachuting out of that door, something that would be predictable to the exact minute (barring all kinds of things that could go wrong).
*******Appears to be a door to the left of the windows
*******It could be an airplane with a banner like in [[1355: Airplane Message]]
***Tail of a space shuttle, perhaps?
****While I think Randall would've also drawn in the signature black part of the rudder, the shape fits perfectly
****Timing is close (though not exact) to the Columbia disaster anniversary (2003-02-01 1359 UTC)
***I'm thinking the tail of a Zeppelin.
****Although those normally have longer tail fins.
*Maybe it is some kind of vehicle rolling into frame, like a car?
*Or the word xkcd? (or xkcd 2?)
*Could have been "Hangman", but it looks like it's zooming in on the diagonal instead of continuing to make a gibbet.
*With the new second line appearing in the corner as of frame 28 it looks like it's definitely zooming out of an image. It looks like it could be someone's arm in a running position.
*I think it could also be two legs of a reclining stick person.
*The lines suggest a shark fin and the movement would suggest it swimming across the frame.
**If it was a shark fin, then the most likely candidates would be the first dorsal fin and the pectoral fin, but both end in points rather than edges like in the pictures of the header puzzle. An aircraft tail fin still seems most likely.
*Maybe it's a two-dimensional shape viewed from a weird angle?
**Like a rectangle viewed from a floating, tilted perspective
**Or the top of the k in xkcd
**Or a boat dock?
*The r/xkcd subreddit produced some early theories :
**Cueball's arm
**The letter D, as in "The End"
**A spider's web, in reference to comic 1688
***With the airplane revelation, this reference turned into a meme in the subreddit, where users tried to justify the presence of an airplane shape inside a bigger-scope spider picture
***Some joke theories included:
****A giant spider flinging airplanes from the sky, as a new potential "What If?"
****The lines are a web and the apparent windows the eyes of a giant spider
****The airplane is a complex-looking spider leg, and 8 of them form a spider
***Another redditor made the airplane part of a dragon's head

===Countdown===
*Theories about the countdown:
*Several have already been mentioned in the discussion:
**Maybe Randall is going on vacation?
**Notice that as of now - 22-Jan-2022 7am PST - (not sure exactly when it happened) the countdown has disappeared. Temporarily (perhaps to make the image cleaner?) or permanently? [[User:Pharmacovigilant|Pharmacovigilant]] ([[User talk:Pharmacovigilant|talk]]) 15:38, 24 January 2022 (UTC) The next time I looked (Sunday?), the countdown was back. No idea if it was a glitch or what.
**Randall's next book, either the countdown is counting down to the start of promotion or it is released when the countdown ends.
***Usually Randall has made month long [[:Category:Book promotion|book promotions]] before release. So if it is the release day it is a new way to do it. But he will get a lot of attention. If it is just the start of promoting it, people might get disappointed…
****For instance he began promoting his [[xkcd_Header_text#2015-05-14_-_New_book_Thing_Explainer|new book Thing Explainer]] in the header text. That was in May 2015 and the book was first released [https://blog.xkcd.com/2015/05/13/new-book-thing-explainer/ late November 2015]. Most of this time the header text was promoting the book.
**{{w|James Webb Space Telescope}} (JWST) going into orbit about L2 {{w|Lagrange point}}.
***Randall has already made several comics about the telescope. The latest [[2564: Sunshield]] was released just five days prior to the countdown was started.
***But the telescope will not reach the point but rather go into a large orbit around it, so a precise timer counting down to it seems a bit farfetched.
***On NASA's page on JWST it seems like it will [https://www.jwst.nasa.gov/content/webbLaunch/deploymentExplorer.html#25 go into orbit] 29.5 days after its [[December 25th Launch]], on Christmas Day, so it should have already started the orbit by the 23rd or 24th of January - 8 days before the countdown.
***Also No based on the image.
**{{w|Lunar New Year}}
***In China it starts on February 1st and a [https://yourcountdown.to/chinese-new-year countdown for China] is 8 hours behind.
****The South Korean time zone is UTC+9, hence 14:59 UTC = 23:59 in South Korea, one minute to Feb 1.
*****But it's weird if Randall that has basically never mentioned this holiday suddenly makes a three week countdown for it, and why choose South Korea when most would think of China in this context…?
**Randall will stop making xkcd (Goodbye in the image).
***Hopefully not.
****Agreed, {{tvtropes|PoisonOakEpilepticTrees|to be avoided}}
***It might be a temporary stop (hiatus).
**[https://nationaldaycalendar.com/backward-day-january-31/ National Backward Day]
***This is not a day mentioned on Wikipedia at the time of release of the countdown, so seems unlikely.
**Maybe it will be an announcement of xkcd 2, a new and improved version for… some reason?
***Seems unlikely…
**{{w|Black History Month}}. The {{w|Greensboro sit-ins}} started on Feb 1 1960. Black History Month also begins on February 1st, also in 2022.
***But this countdown stops early on January 31st so seems unlikely.
***However, before changing the Header recently it was about [[xkcd_Header_text#2020-06-03_-_Black_Lives_Matter|Black Lives Matter]] for more than 1.5 years, first ending on December 20th 2021, less than a month before the countdown began. In between that there was a short Christmas sale reminder until a week into 2022. So it could just be another way of reminding of us the issues faced by black people in the US.
****If this was true, I feel like it would be simpler to just change back to the Black Lives Matter text at the top of the screen. Also, it seems increasingly likely as of Jan. 20th that the image is some kind of plane, which doesn't really have much to do with Black History Month (that I know of?)
**The accompanying header says specifically "xkcd updates Monday, Wednesday, and Friday"--maybe the countdown is to the reveal of a new update schedule?
***Very unlikely. This was the standard header for a long time. It was used when Randall had nothing better to say. But with all his books and the trouble in US with elections and BLM, he has used the header as a platform most of the time many years now. So the standard text is rare. But he did return it for two days before adding the count down, making it seem just like normal.
***A guess is that it returned to this, so the header text did not take any focus away from the countdown.
**[[:Category:Red Spiders|Red spider]] attack?
***Un-Likely
**He will become a father - could be a planned C-section.
***As this is unpredictable, and could go wrong, then this would be a dangerous countdown, people can be very superstitious, even if scientist.
**As it currently looks (after a [[1070: Words for Small Sets|few days]] into the countdown) it may be a trip he is taking by plane.
***Maybe going somewhere people could meet him.
****Book tour?
***Moving a long way from home (down under or the like).
****Maybe he's moving to Japan? Could be a plane, and the time zone would fit, at least.
*****Then the countdown would be until when the plane lands, not to midnight.
******What has time zones to do with this clock? It counts down to the same time all over the world, and will reach zero at the same time no matter what time zone you are in.
******Time zones have to do with where it will be midnight when the countdown reaches zero. If it's a countdown to when January ends (a moment before February begins), then it's until that moment in the time zone where the countdown reaches zero at that time.
****If it is a plane, then maybe it will land in a new city Randall moves to when the counter ends, and the skyline will be visible...
**Perhaps it's a start to a new series like [[1190: Time]].
***It is already a series that works like Time, so seems unlikely.
**Zero-G flight, really looks like plane to me.
***Could be time he will first go weightless which could be fairly well known except for bad weather
**A parachute jump by Randall. Could be predicted as well as the zero G.
**How about the [https://www.hitc.com/en-gb/2021/09/09/star-trek-picard-season-2-release-date-plot-cast/ new series of Picard]?
***{{w|Star Trek: Picard (season 2)}} is set to run from March 3 2022, which both Wikipedia (link before) and [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8806524/episodes?season=2 IMDb] agrees upon so bad to miss by more than a month, and what would the plane in the image have to do with this anyway?
***So No!
** The xkcd world tour!! I wish
** I'm beginning to see another part of the picture entering into view, underneath the arc and above the body of the plane. To me, it looks like it could be a leg of sorts (Early bet: it could be a dinosaur)
**Maybe something to do with aliens? Randall posted two comics about aliens secretly observing earth in a row now, could that be related?
** DB Cooper's jump from an airliner was 50 years ago, but not until november

===count-wimRikmef===
* The identifier of the script contains what is probably an acronym, but for what?
** count / wim (?) / Rik (name) & me f(light)
** Or it's just the output of whatever js minimizer was used.
** R = Randall?
** Randall is travelling to Germany? "Wo ist mein Reisepass? Ich komme mit einen Flug"
* The "img" tag has a misspelled "heigth" attribute. Probably just a typo?

==Archived Versions==
*Here is a list of the versions that has been saved to the web archive during the countdown.
**The counter in that version is written behind the date of the web archive.
**Note that the counter is active on the archived version counting minutes down from the start. Some of the versions almost changing the minutes just after loading. But it will always count from the time given here:
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220110183238/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] 20d 20h 27m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220110214138/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] 20d 17h 18m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220111011115/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-11] 20d 13h 48m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220112005828/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-12] 19d 14h 1m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220113044552/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-13] 18d 10h 14m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220114010759/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-14] 17d 13h 51m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220114195624/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-14] 16d 19h 3m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220115052737/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-15] 16d 9h 32m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220116074923/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-16] 15d 7h 10m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220116225217/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-16] 14d 16h 7m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220118050255/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-18] 13d 9h 57m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220118195259/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-18] 12d 19h 6m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220119213308/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-19] 11d 17h 26m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220120103559/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-20] 11d 4h 23m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220120235630/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-20] 10d 15h 3m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220121023331/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-21] 10d 12h 26m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220121102349/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-21] 10d 4h 36m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220122002328/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-22] 9d 14h 36m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220122034744/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-22] 9d 11h 12m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220122223018/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-22] 8d 16h 29m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220123153950/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-23] 7d 23h 20m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220123231820/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-23] 7d 15h 41m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220124200931/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-24] 6d 18h 50m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220125064825/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-25] 6d 8h 11m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220126002713/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-26] 5d 14h 32m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220126175842/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-26] 4d 21h 1m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220127173721/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-27] 3d 21h 22m

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Meta]]

Countdown in header text

2022-01-28T12:51:38Z

172.70.91.126: /* Ongoing description */

{{comic
| date = January 10, 2022
| title = Countdown in header text
| image = Countdown_in_header_text.png
| before = The countdown will probably last 21 days. After February 1st 2022 it is likely to have disappeared. See this [https://web.archive.org/web/20220110183238/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] archive version.
| ldomain = www
| lappend =
| extra = yes
}}
*Go directly to the list of [[Countdown in header text/images|images]].
**Or [[Countdown in header text/images#newestpicture|Jump to the newest picture]]
***The images can also be found [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ here] on munvoseli's page where comparison of two images and an animation can be seen.
{{TOC}}
==Explanation==
*On January 10th 2022, [[Randall]] added a countdown in the top right corner of the [[xkcd Header text]] on {{xkcd}}.
**This happened while the comic [[2565: Latency]] was up.
***First the xkcd Header text was [[xkcd_Header_text#2022-01-08_-_Back_to_standard_text|changed back]] to the [[xkcd_Header_text#Header_text|standard text]] for the first time in almost three years:
****xkcd updates every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
***But already while this Friday-comic was still up on the following Monday the [[xkcd_Header_text#2022-01-10_-_Standard_text_with_countdown|countdown]] was added.
****This was thus up when the Monday comic [[2566: Decorative Constants]] was released, drawing more people to the xkcd page.
*The first [[#Archived Versions|archived version]] from [https://web.archive.org/web/20220110183238/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] read 20d 20h 27m.
**It looks like it started on [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ 01-10 17:00 UTC].
***At that time it would have read 20d 21h 59 min. Just two hours and 1 minute short of 3 weeks.
*This countdown will reach zero on Monday 2022-01-31 at 14:59 (2:59 PM) {{w|UTC}}, or 9:59 AM in Boston, Randall's home town.
**If seconds will be added towards the end, it seems likely that it may end exactly at 15:00 UTC (10:00 AM in Boston).
***Further, the timer may be using [[1061:_EST|EST]], in which case it will count up for four hours on 2022-01-18, and will end on 2022-01-31 23:00 UTC.
****Though either way, it would fall on Monday, and therefore the day comic 2575 should be released.
****The full moon has since passed, and now we know that the timer isn't using EST, so it will indeed reach zero at or near 2022-01-31T15:00Z.
**The timer ends in January. Recall that the month is named for Janus, the Roman god of endings and beginnings. Two salient points: the clock hits zero at the end of the month and the plane is leaving. Look for a big ending and, we hope, something nice to replace it.
*The next day on [https://web.archive.org/web/20220111153818/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-11] a diagonal black bar appeared in the lower left-hand corner of the countdown box and started to move further into the image on following changes to the [[#Images|image]].
**This development called for the creation of this dedicated [[Countdown in header text]] page.
**The line had already moved further into the image at this time, but the latest version will never be available in the web archive.
***This development is reminiscent of the huge comic [[1190: Time]].
*As mentioned above, [https://munvoseli.github.io/ Munvoseli] is keeping [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ track of the changes] to the image on the countdown.
**Although there are (at 2022-01-12 12:35 UTC) thirteen different frames we know of, the first three looks the same (because the diagonal bar was not in the frame yet) and the seventh and the eighth also seems to be the same, even though the bar had already begun moving across the frame from the fourth. This is either on purpose, a slipup or means that The FrameTM might not be zooming out of a larger image.
***However, the images that look the same all have individual addresses on the xkcd server. See more under [[#Images|Images]] below.
***Similarly, frames 91 and 92 seem to be exactly the same. Also frame 92 did not upload as part of the roughly four hour schedule, but between two frames that are part of the regular schedule.

Randall has previously made a comic simply called [[1159: Countdown]]. However, in that the roles are reversed. There we know that the countdown is for (Super Volcano) but not if it will happen soon or very much later. Here we know when, and it is rather soon, but not what.

==Images==
*Images will be put on [[Countdown in header text/images|this separate page]].
**The images can also be found [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ here] on munvoseli's page.
***It is possible to compare two images, chosen between those released, on that page!
***From 2022-01-14 it has also been possible to see an animation.
**See more details at the top of the image page.
*After a few days the black lines forming the image came into conflict with the clock, which has a rounded white frame around it. This can be seen in one of the earliest examples here:
[[File:Countdown in header text Clock Cover Black Lines.png]]
*Also at this time a new development happened after the "plane tail" moved forward it stopped on 2022-01-18 and started moving up (or zooming in). See for instance these two comparison from munvoseli's page showing the difference from the 8 pictures before today, and then after three out today:
[[File:Countdown in header text Compare 40 to 48.png]] [[File:Countdown in header text Compare 48 to 51.png]]
*Later a similar change happens, as it changes from zooming out to slowly moving towards the right, although the windows and the door appear to move more in relation to the frame than the rest of the aircraft:
[[File:Countdown in header text Compare 85 to 90.png]] [[File:Countdown in header text Compare 95 to 90.png]]

===Ongoing description===
** Frames 1-12: A diagonal line.
** Frame 13: A curve seems to begin at the top left of the line.
** Frame 18: The curve connects the diagonal line with a horizontal line.
** Frame 27-28: A new line appears in the bottom left corner.
** Frame 40-42: The new line turns out to be connected to the horizontal line, forming a corner which is not attached to any other line.
** Frame 49: The "camera movement" direction changes, while the object is still moving upward it stopped moving towards the left side, moving towards the right instead.
** Frame 54: A slight upward curve seems to appear in the right line, the left line seems to have a small bend downwards, though that could at that point just be a straight line that Randall drew without a ruler.
** Frame 60-62: A new line appears in the bottom right corner, it turns out to be a continuation of the first original line which curves upward and has a positive slope at that point of the picture, between about 2 o'clock and 3 o'clock. The downward bend of the left line continues on straight in the same direction, it was probably an intentional bend and not an irregularity in drawing a straight line by hand.
** Frame 63: In the minimum of the right curved line a new line starts appearing, way thinner than the others (which were up to this point all rather part of one line) and going slightly downwards and very much to the left, at an angle somewhere between 8 o'clock and 9 o'clock.
** Frame 67: A possible feature becomes visible at the bottom edge of the image that might resolve the exact nature of the (currently presumed) aircraft, e.g. which particular aerodynamic surface we have been seeing and thus from which particular orientation we are viewing it.
** Frame 68-72 makes it clear this must be an aircraft by showing windows and a door and clearly the tail fin. As late as frame 69 some people argued that the tail fin could have been a wing.
** Frame 73-83 brings a horizontal stabilizer into view.
** Frame 87-89: A new curved line appears on the underside of the (presumed) aircraft, so there either is something behind it or it might not be an aircraft.
** Frame 96-99: An arc is coming into view in the upper right corner, likely the top edge of a cloud.
*** Turned out not to be a cloud.
** Frame 101-106 seems to be some kind of radar on top of the plane, like the one on {{w|Boeing E-3 Sentry}}. Or alternatively this plane is hanging beneath another plane. Not looking at all like {{w|Spaceshiptwo}}, but something similar, which could make this plane a spaceplane?
** Frame 106-114 a new element of the image appears on the right side, it could be the end of a wing. The arch no longer looks like a radar. Could be the tail of a Dinosaur or the cape of someone riding the airplane...
*** a cape is unlikely as it would probably be drawn to flap in the wind. The other element does appear to be a wingtip

==Theories==
*Here are different theories for what the countdown is for and what the picture is going to reveal can be added.

===The picture===
*Theories about the picture:
**From 2022-01-21 it became certain that it was a plane! Passenger plane. Door and windows are visible.
***From 2022-01-22 it became clear that it was the rear end, so it was a tailfin that came into the panel to begin with. Up til the day before it was still a bit uncertain if it could have been a wing.
*** from 2022-01-24 a bottom line has appeared which doesn't fit well with a 'standard' airliner. perhaps the image is deliberately misleading (eg will transform into something else)
*** From 2022-01-26 something looking like a radar like the one on a {{w|Boeing E-3 Sentry}} began emerging in the top right corner.
**What will this lead up to - theories about this.
***It could be an airplane with a banner like in [[1355: Airplane Message]].
****That would very soon be clear as the bottom part of the rear end seems to be coming into view during 2022-01-24, if the direction does not change again.
*****This is now ruled out, since the plane is clearly not towing a banner.
***It could end up landing in a city, perhaps with a skyline pinpointing where Randall will be or move.
****However, unlikely to manage this in real life as the count down ends.
****Also, very unlikely (1 in 60, or even 1 in 3600) that such a landing would occur exactly on the hour.
*****But it could also just be the time when he announces he has moved...
***Maybe Cueball will make a parachute jump, and Cueball could represent a real life Randall, as this could in principle be timed very accurately.
****This is something you would schedule a month or more ahead, want to tell people about in advance, want to make a big deal about on your website, is not quite as bizarre as zero-G and probably more fun {{citation needed}}, could be done with an adventurous wife, explains why it’s the tail of the plane in the image, and (assuming no mechanical, medical, or meteorological problems, a safe assumption), might go something like “on my mark, it’ll be 9:59:56 A.M. in Boston... mark. 3, 2, 1, JUMP!” Maybe it’ll be just Cueball/Randall, but could more likely include Megan representing his wife.
****However, it could very easily be that the weather in January could foil the attempt, or at least the timing.
****The plane appears to be a commercial jetliner, though, rather than the small prop planes used for parachute jumps. Unless, of course, Randall is revealing his real identity has been Wesley Snipes all along
*** Perhaps the new item on top of the plane is the tail of a dinosaur? perhaps like the one on the cover of "what if..." book. perhaps it's a new book?
*** There are two flights originating in Boston departing at 09:59 on 1/31/2022: Spirit NK433 to Orlando Florida and Delta DL5696 to Washington D.C.
***Frame 101-106 seems to be some kind of radar on top of the plane, like the one on Boeing E-3 Sentry. Or alternatively this plane is hanging beneath another plane. Not looking at all like Spaceshiptwo, but something similar, which could make this plane a spaceplane?
**** Predicting dinosaur
**** It doesn't look like radar (that's usually on the rear of the plane) and the plane itself looks odd - like it has a ventral fin or wings that attach at the back beneath the passenger door (an improbable arrangement.) The object coming into view on the right of the frame looks more like a person with big hair, reminiscent of the hair of Sideshow Bob - perhaps in the near foreground so as to appear much larger than the plane in perspective. I don't know what's up with the wings/fin on the plane but it seems possible we're going to see someone watching the plane fly away. Possibly the countdown and image relate to someone flying away, either on vacation or some other trip, and perhaps the thing coming into frame on the right is Randall or someone watching them fly away, missing them, etc.
**** the white element overlapping the fuselage could be the start of the wing-tip these fold up at the ends of many modern aircraft, could mean aircraft is banking left.

====Early theories====
Many early theories were generated before the picture was decisively revealed to be a plane.

*It seems after two days and 12 pictures like either something is moving into the frame or that it is a zoom out from a white area of a large picture. Maybe it is the arm of Cueball that will come into view.
*The second line makes it look somewhat like the tail fin of an aircraft.
**Or the wing of an aircraft (left if looking down at it). Perhaps the plane is towing a banner that will fly through the frame.
***After almost a week this looks like the most promising suggestion so far. Now that the direction of the camera movement has changed, we might get to see the rest of the aircraft soon.
****From picture 63, it more and more seems like it was the tail fin of a plane and now we can see the body.
*****It's almost certainly the tail (and now a bit of the rear fuselage) of an aircraft.
******It could just as easily be the left wing and part of the fuselage (showing windows on the right side of an airliner), with the tail fin out of view to the rear, as being the tail fin from an angle where the left wing is out of view behind the fuselage.
*******judging by the relative size of the (presumed) windows, I think it's more likely to be the left wing than the tail fin.
*******Based on the way planes are drawn in [[1868: Eclipse Flights]]. [[1355: Airplane Message]] and [[1669: Planespotting]], plane wings have a point on their edge and tail fins have a flat side, and (if a line is present) a thick line separates wings from the body, whereas thin lines or no lines separate tail fins, so this is a tail fin.
*******In the bottom left there appears to be the top part of a horizontal stabilizer, implying this is the tail.
********It’s a tail fin, that’s finally clear, but that’s the underside of the stabilizer. Which means this would be the best angle to view Cueball/Randall parachuting out of that door, something that would be predictable to the exact minute (barring all kinds of things that could go wrong).
*******Appears to be a door to the left of the windows
*******It could be an airplane with a banner like in [[1355: Airplane Message]]
***Tail of a space shuttle, perhaps?
****While I think Randall would've also drawn in the signature black part of the rudder, the shape fits perfectly
****Timing is close (though not exact) to the Columbia disaster anniversary (2003-02-01 1359 UTC)
***I'm thinking the tail of a Zeppelin.
****Although those normally have longer tail fins.
*Maybe it is some kind of vehicle rolling into frame, like a car?
*Or the word xkcd? (or xkcd 2?)
*Could have been "Hangman", but it looks like it's zooming in on the diagonal instead of continuing to make a gibbet.
*With the new second line appearing in the corner as of frame 28 it looks like it's definitely zooming out of an image. It looks like it could be someone's arm in a running position.
*I think it could also be two legs of a reclining stick person.
*The lines suggest a shark fin and the movement would suggest it swimming across the frame.
**If it was a shark fin, then the most likely candidates would be the first dorsal fin and the pectoral fin, but both end in points rather than edges like in the pictures of the header puzzle. An aircraft tail fin still seems most likely.
*Maybe it's a two-dimensional shape viewed from a weird angle?
**Like a rectangle viewed from a floating, tilted perspective
**Or the top of the k in xkcd
**Or a boat dock?
*The r/xkcd subreddit produced some early theories :
**Cueball's arm
**The letter D, as in "The End"
**A spider's web, in reference to comic 1688
***With the airplane revelation, this reference turned into a meme in the subreddit, where users tried to justify the presence of an airplane shape inside a bigger-scope spider picture
***Some joke theories included:
****A giant spider flinging airplanes from the sky, as a new potential "What If?"
****The lines are a web and the apparent windows the eyes of a giant spider
****The airplane is a complex-looking spider leg, and 8 of them form a spider
***Another redditor made the airplane part of a dragon's head

===Countdown===
*Theories about the countdown:
*Several have already been mentioned in the discussion:
**Maybe Randall is going on vacation?
**Notice that as of now - 22-Jan-2022 7am PST - (not sure exactly when it happened) the countdown has disappeared. Temporarily (perhaps to make the image cleaner?) or permanently? [[User:Pharmacovigilant|Pharmacovigilant]] ([[User talk:Pharmacovigilant|talk]]) 15:38, 24 January 2022 (UTC) The next time I looked (Sunday?), the countdown was back. No idea if it was a glitch or what.
**Randall's next book, either the countdown is counting down to the start of promotion or it is released when the countdown ends.
***Usually Randall has made month long [[:Category:Book promotion|book promotions]] before release. So if it is the release day it is a new way to do it. But he will get a lot of attention. If it is just the start of promoting it, people might get disappointed…
****For instance he began promoting his [[xkcd_Header_text#2015-05-14_-_New_book_Thing_Explainer|new book Thing Explainer]] in the header text. That was in May 2015 and the book was first released [https://blog.xkcd.com/2015/05/13/new-book-thing-explainer/ late November 2015]. Most of this time the header text was promoting the book.
**{{w|James Webb Space Telescope}} (JWST) going into orbit about L2 {{w|Lagrange point}}.
***Randall has already made several comics about the telescope. The latest [[2564: Sunshield]] was released just five days prior to the countdown was started.
***But the telescope will not reach the point but rather go into a large orbit around it, so a precise timer counting down to it seems a bit farfetched.
***On NASA's page on JWST it seems like it will [https://www.jwst.nasa.gov/content/webbLaunch/deploymentExplorer.html#25 go into orbit] 29.5 days after its [[December 25th Launch]], on Christmas Day, so it should have already started the orbit by the 23rd or 24th of January - 8 days before the countdown.
***Also No based on the image.
**{{w|Lunar New Year}}
***In China it starts on February 1st and a [https://yourcountdown.to/chinese-new-year countdown for China] is 8 hours behind.
****The South Korean time zone is UTC+9, hence 14:59 UTC = 23:59 in South Korea, one minute to Feb 1.
*****But it's weird if Randall that has basically never mentioned this holiday suddenly makes a three week countdown for it, and why choose South Korea when most would think of China in this context…?
**Randall will stop making xkcd (Goodbye in the image).
***Hopefully not.
****Agreed, {{tvtropes|PoisonOakEpilepticTrees|to be avoided}}
***It might be a temporary stop (hiatus).
**[https://nationaldaycalendar.com/backward-day-january-31/ National Backward Day]
***This is not a day mentioned on Wikipedia at the time of release of the countdown, so seems unlikely.
**Maybe it will be an announcement of xkcd 2, a new and improved version for… some reason?
***Seems unlikely…
**{{w|Black History Month}}. The {{w|Greensboro sit-ins}} started on Feb 1 1960. Black History Month also begins on February 1st, also in 2022.
***But this countdown stops early on January 31st so seems unlikely.
***However, before changing the Header recently it was about [[xkcd_Header_text#2020-06-03_-_Black_Lives_Matter|Black Lives Matter]] for more than 1.5 years, first ending on December 20th 2021, less than a month before the countdown began. In between that there was a short Christmas sale reminder until a week into 2022. So it could just be another way of reminding of us the issues faced by black people in the US.
****If this was true, I feel like it would be simpler to just change back to the Black Lives Matter text at the top of the screen. Also, it seems increasingly likely as of Jan. 20th that the image is some kind of plane, which doesn't really have much to do with Black History Month (that I know of?)
**The accompanying header says specifically "xkcd updates Monday, Wednesday, and Friday"--maybe the countdown is to the reveal of a new update schedule?
***Very unlikely. This was the standard header for a long time. It was used when Randall had nothing better to say. But with all his books and the trouble in US with elections and BLM, he has used the header as a platform most of the time many years now. So the standard text is rare. But he did return it for two days before adding the count down, making it seem just like normal.
***A guess is that it returned to this, so the header text did not take any focus away from the countdown.
**[[:Category:Red Spiders|Red spider]] attack?
***Un-Likely
**He will become a father - could be a planned C-section.
***As this is unpredictable, and could go wrong, then this would be a dangerous countdown, people can be very superstitious, even if scientist.
**As it currently looks (after a [[1070: Words for Small Sets|few days]] into the countdown) it may be a trip he is taking by plane.
***Maybe going somewhere people could meet him.
****Book tour?
***Moving a long way from home (down under or the like).
****Maybe he's moving to Japan? Could be a plane, and the time zone would fit, at least.
*****Then the countdown would be until when the plane lands, not to midnight.
******What has time zones to do with this clock? It counts down to the same time all over the world, and will reach zero at the same time no matter what time zone you are in.
******Time zones have to do with where it will be midnight when the countdown reaches zero. If it's a countdown to when January ends (a moment before February begins), then it's until that moment in the time zone where the countdown reaches zero at that time.
****If it is a plane, then maybe it will land in a new city Randall moves to when the counter ends, and the skyline will be visible...
**Perhaps it's a start to a new series like [[1190: Time]].
***It is already a series that works like Time, so seems unlikely.
**Zero-G flight, really looks like plane to me.
***Could be time he will first go weightless which could be fairly well known except for bad weather
**A parachute jump by Randall. Could be predicted as well as the zero G.
**How about the [https://www.hitc.com/en-gb/2021/09/09/star-trek-picard-season-2-release-date-plot-cast/ new series of Picard]?
***{{w|Star Trek: Picard (season 2)}} is set to run from March 3 2022, which both Wikipedia (link before) and [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8806524/episodes?season=2 IMDb] agrees upon so bad to miss by more than a month, and what would the plane in the image have to do with this anyway?
***So No!
** The xkcd world tour!! I wish
** I'm beginning to see another part of the picture entering into view, underneath the arc and above the body of the plane. To me, it looks like it could be a leg of sorts (Early bet: it could be a dinosaur)
**Maybe something to do with aliens? Randall posted two comics about aliens secretly observing earth in a row now, could that be related?

===count-wimRikmef===
* The identifier of the script contains what is probably an acronym, but for what?
** count / wim (?) / Rik (name) & me f(light)
** Or it's just the output of whatever js minimizer was used.
** R = Randall?
** Randall is travelling to Germany? "Wo ist mein Reisepass? Ich komme mit einen Flug"
* The "img" tag has a misspelled "heigth" attribute. Probably just a typo?

==Archived Versions==
*Here is a list of the versions that has been saved to the web archive during the countdown.
**The counter in that version is written behind the date of the web archive.
**Note that the counter is active on the archived version counting minutes down from the start. Some of the versions almost changing the minutes just after loading. But it will always count from the time given here:
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220110183238/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] 20d 20h 27m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220110214138/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] 20d 17h 18m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220111011115/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-11] 20d 13h 48m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220112005828/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-12] 19d 14h 1m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220113044552/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-13] 18d 10h 14m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220114010759/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-14] 17d 13h 51m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220114195624/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-14] 16d 19h 3m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220115052737/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-15] 16d 9h 32m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220116074923/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-16] 15d 7h 10m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220116225217/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-16] 14d 16h 7m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220118050255/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-18] 13d 9h 57m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220118195259/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-18] 12d 19h 6m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220119213308/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-19] 11d 17h 26m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220120103559/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-20] 11d 4h 23m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220120235630/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-20] 10d 15h 3m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220121023331/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-21] 10d 12h 26m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220121102349/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-21] 10d 4h 36m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220122002328/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-22] 9d 14h 36m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220122034744/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-22] 9d 11h 12m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220122223018/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-22] 8d 16h 29m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220123153950/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-23] 7d 23h 20m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220123231820/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-23] 7d 15h 41m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220124200931/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-24] 6d 18h 50m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220125064825/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-25] 6d 8h 11m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220126002713/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-26] 5d 14h 32m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220126175842/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-26] 4d 21h 1m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220127173721/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-27] 3d 21h 22m

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Meta]]

2573: Alien Mission

2022-01-26T21:16:45Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ Proper internal link to site page of this comic.

{{comic
| number = 2573
| date = January 26, 2022
| title = Alien Mission
| image = alien_mission.png
| titletext = Fine, we can go search the Himalayas for the Yeti ONE more time, but keep a safe altitude over the Pacific and PLEASE watch where you're going. We can't afford another Amelia Earhart incident.
}}
*This was the eighth comic to come out after the [[Countdown in header text]] started.

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

This strip portrays a conversation between two extraterrestrial flying saucers, in which they discuss their long secret observation of earth, only to reveal that at least one of their purposes was to find {{w|Bigfoot}}, which they have apparently been unable to do. The alien on one ship argues that it's time to give up and accept that no such creature exists on earth, while the other appears to hold out hope, in the face of a complete lack[''disputed - discuss''] of evidence.

The first panel alludes to the fact that UFO sightings only became {{w|Roswell_Incident|commonplace in the 1940s}}.

This strip is related to (and may be a continuation of) [[2572:_Alien_Observers|the previous strip]], which dealt with the reasons why UFO photographs are always out-of-focus and/or lacking details. This strip expands on the reasons ''why'' these alien ships are visiting earth, which apparently include an unsuccessful attempt to locate {{w|cryptids}}.

The humor derives from the fact that UFO enthusiasts and cryptozoology enthusiasts have a similar mindset: they both believe in phenomena that the scientific establishment declares to be baseless. Both systems are fully lacking in clear scientific evidence, but have an abundance of eyewitness accounts and vague/blurry photographic evidence. And both belief systems have existed for many years, but rapidly advancing technology, accumulating data, and ubiquity of high quality cameras have still failed to capture any clear and detailed evidence of either (a point which [[Randall]] seems to find particularly significant). But, while these concepts are so parallel, they're logically independent, as one deals with species that are presumably native to earth, and the other deals with advanced alien species visiting the earth. The notion of alien visitors being interested in cryptozoology is incongruous: to them, all earth animals would presumably seem equally alien.

In previous strips, [[Randall]] has suggested playing conspiracy theories off one another (see [[966: Jet Fuel]]). This has a similar theme: suggesting that UFOs are here to search for Bigfoot (and the Yeti) sounds ridiculous on its face. But any explanation of ''why'' it's ridiculous would apply equally well to the notion of Bigfoot and UFO's individually.

At least some of the aliens clearly have a similar belief, at least in the {{w|Bigfoot}}/Sasquatch, which is why they came to the Earth. This implies that they had some prior knowledge (or suspicion) of its existence, and only then (possibly) narrowed it down to this one planet.

Their very thorough observation of the Earth (enough to comprehensively catalogue many of its humans and even track individual purchases of camera-technology, etc) seems to have been insufficient to find Bigfoot, but neither has it entirely refuted the claims. At least in the view of some of the holdouts with influence over this mission.

Whatever the arguments about the Sasquatch, the title text reveals a separate discussion regarding the {{w|Yeti}} (a similar large hominid purported to reside in the Himalayas), and the tentative permission to conduct ''one last search'' for it. This perhaps implies further unreferenced searches are also being made for the likes of the Loch Ness Monster, Mothman and Chupacabra. It also suggests that they ran into {{w|Amelia Earhart}} while both were flying over the Pacific Ocean, and that's why she disappeared.

That their clearly superior observation technology and methods have been apparently unable to resolve these issues at first seems like it shouldn't bode well for our own cryptozoologists, but the lack of definitively negative results does at least mean there's a degree of job-security, such as there already is.

==Transcript==
:[Four panels, largely featuring two 'classic' Flying Saucers hovering in the sky with speech-lines indicating communication between the saucers/crew.]

:Left Saucer: Sir, can we talk?
:Left Saucer: We've been observing earth for almost a century.

:Left Saucer: Hovering and zooming from place to place, trying to avoid being spotted by humans.
:Right Saucer: Yeah.

:[Frameless panel, showing only the left saucer]
:Left Saucer: By now we've flown over every inch of the surface many times.
:Off-panel from right: Yes? And?

:Left Saucer: Face it: if Bigfoot ''is'' real, he's not anywhere on this planet.
:Right Saucer: But humans have captured some intriguing videos!
:Left Saucer: *sigh*
:Right Saucer: How else do you explain the...

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Aliens]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Amelia Earhart]]

Talk:2573: Alien Mission

2022-01-26T19:21:53Z

172.70.91.126:

hello from Anchorage, AK! {{unsigned|New editor}}
:Hi, but do remember to sign your Talk stuff, however otherwise meaningless. ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 19:21, 26 January 2022 (UTC)

I wonder whether they're also looking for Little Green Men, these aliens being themselves more of the 'bug-eyed monster' type. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 19:21, 26 January 2022 (UTC)

2572: Alien Observers

2022-01-26T15:05:47Z

172.70.91.126: If we're Triviaing, might as well move this here too. Obv. Randall's go-to alien (more examples?) like he has a go-to squirrel.

{{comic
| number = 2572
| date = January 24, 2022
| title = Alien Observers
| image = alien_observers.png
| titletext = ALERT: Human 910-25J-1Q38 has created a Youtube channel. Increase erratic jerkiness of flying by 30% until safely out of range.
}}
*This was the seventh comic to come out after the [[Countdown in header text]] started.

==Explanation==
There is speculation by many people that there could be some form of extraterrestrial life observing us, hovering around in various flying vehicles, or perhaps using some form of giant telescope. These claims are often backed up by blurry pictures which claim to be of alien vehicles. In this comic, the joke is that the aliens are deliberately making sure that all sightings are made unverifiable. However, with [[1235:_Settled|most people now carrying a camera with them all the time]], a sighting that would be unverifiable just by eyewitness testimony could now be captured by a smartphone camera.

This means that in order for the aliens to keep creating unverifiable sightings for humans, they must keep track of what camera capabilities each human has, leading to different distance restrictions for each human, as seen in the diagram. The effective range of each person's camera is depicted as a circular (or spherical) envelope around themselves, two on the cross-sectional diagram and at least one located off beyond the image edge.

There is also an apparently flat ground-hugging 'no fly zone' connecting two of these areas. This may be part of a general prohibition against landing (and/or causing verifiable ground effects, such as {{w|crop circles}}) or it could be there to show that the capability of a self-focussing camera is greatly enhanced when it also has ground-features to autofocus upon rather than a subject surrounded by nothing but sky.

The comic attempts to explain away the issue already discussed in prior comics, such as [[718: The Flake Equation]] and [[1235: Settled]], in which the phenomenon of UFO sightings/reports is still left not resolved (either way) despite what modern technology should suggest is possible. It appears that the reason for this is that the {{tvtropes|SufficientlyAdvancedAlien|sufficiently advanced aliens}} actually make more than enough observations of the human race to continuously determine how to stay just on the side of plausible deniability in any interactions that they still seem to wish to make.

The attitude of the aliens also mirrors that of a subset of humans, namely those who hold disdain for the {{w|consumerism|consumerist}} mindset. These humans are frustrated by the tendency of their fellow humans to compulsively buy the latest and greatest versions of products at all times, often at great expense and without regard for the practical benefits of upgrading. Cellphones are one such product, as Apple and their competitors typically release new phone models annually (occasionally semi-annually), often introducing only minor or cosmetic changes with each new iteration.

In the title text, the aliens note that one particular human now has a YouTube account, meaning they are likely to record video instead of attempting to capture still images. This means that the alien craft used to create the sighting must behave as erratically as possible, in order to avoid being identified. This relates to the often wildly oscillating (as well as blurry) films and videos of 'UFOs' that have been taken by the impromptu human observer, beyond the limit of their ability to hold their fully-zoomed camera steady. Although here it is explained away as the flying saucers ''actually'' moving in an improbably jerky manner to prevent detailed recording of their craft. Further briefings of the sort depicted would doubtless accompany upgrades in optical/digital-stability features or the purchase of a camera tripod.

It appears the aliens have a classification and tracking system for all humans. It is unclear what the system for assigning these identifiers is, since we see two different formats (''38XT11-B-C54'' and ''910-25J-1Q38''). One possibility is that there are two different tracking systems represented, with at least two possibilities for the relation between them.
# Perhaps the two tracking systems are from two different alien agencies dedicated to human tracking, perhaps isomorphic to each other. One may come from a live observation while the other comes via an online alerting system, with no definitive link agreed between the two systems as not even the aliens can guarantee to resolve online anonymity, obfuscation or duplication of identity.
# On the other hand, perhaps the identifier system evolved over time and any given human only has an identifier from one system or the other. Assuming all numbers and letters are usable and each identifier could have only a letter or number in that place, the first identifier represents a space with at least 10*10*26*26*10*10*26*26*100=457 billion entries, while the space of the second is 10*10*10*10*10*26*10*26*10*10=68 billion. Perhaps, like IP addresses evolving from IPV4 to IPV6 because of the fear of exhaustion, the alien tracking systems similarly changed. This would imply the second (YouTube-posting) human is older than the first (cellphone carrying).
# A third possibility is simply regional variations, where different sectors of the Earth have developed their own identification systems, perhaps when population movements (or vacations) were far fewer and intercontinental travel was very rare indeed. Starting from an arbitrary point of time in history, one system may have applied to the Americas and the other to Eurasia (for example) with different challenges of recognising and surreptitiously tracking all individuals from cradle to grave within their communities (the shorter identifier of which forms some part of their full personal code). A revised globally-used system might be in development (or even now be in use, as per the above suggestion) but the diverse legacy systems could still apply to those born before the implementation period).

The identifier for the one buying the phone begins with "Human 38XT11". This seems likely to be a reference to {{w|THX 1138}}. This was the title of {{w|George Lucas}}' first film, which is also {{w|THX_1138#Etymology_and_references|referenced}} in the original {{w|Star Wars (film)|Star Wars}} film. The name contains the number in reverse as well as the letters if human could be written as H.

==Transcript==
:[Three aliens are looking at a screen. They each have six tentacles, of which four are used as legs, and the other two can be used as arms. They also have a small mouth and two eye stalks with a large eye at the end of each. The eyes has large eyelashes all the way around. One of the aliens is standing to the left of the screen, pointing to it by raising one of its tentacles. The other two aliens stand to the right of the screen looking at the picture. The screen's image depicts a cross-sectional diagram showing two humans in a rough landscape. There is a shaded area above each of the humans and the terrain. The shaded area's boundary consists of arcs of differing sizes centered upon each human. To the left of the first human there is also a small straight area over the ground. To the left of this towards the edge of the screen, what appears to be an arc with a very large radius that begins and rises high up compared to the other two arcs, around a point beyond the on-screen image's edge. The rightmost human's zone has a dashed region between concentric radii of different sizes indicating that this zone has been revised further out than before. Four flying-saucer like spaceships are shown in the air close to, but above, the shaded areas. One high near the left curve, one over the flat area, one near the intersection between the two small arcs and one over the middle of the right arc.]
:Left Alien: Human 38XT11-B-C54  just bought a new phone with a 10x zoom, so we have to expand our restricted flight zone by 1,800 meters to keep our ship blurry.
:Right Alien 2: Seriously? Didn't they '''''just''''' upgrade?
:Left Alien: I know, I know...

:[Caption below the panel:]
:The hardest part of being an alien observing Earth is keeping track of what cameras everyone has.

==Trivia==
* The aliens depicted here appear to be the same lifeforms as seen in the bottom row of [[2359: Evidence of Alien Life]].
* They have similarities also to the illustration in [https://what-if.xkcd.com/20 What-If #20].

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Aliens]]
[[Category:Comics referencing THX 1138]]

2572: Alien Observers

2022-01-25T17:41:52Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ Came for the typo, stayed for the adding of yet more wild speculation.

{{comic
| number = 2572
| date = January 24, 2022
| title = Alien Observers
| image = alien_observers.png
| titletext = ALERT: Human 910-25J-1Q38 has created a Youtube channel. Increase erratic jerkiness of flying by 30% until safely out of range.
}}
*This was the seventh comic to come out after the [[Countdown in header text]] started.

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BLURRY MARTIAN SPACECRAFT- What does they mean by did they not just upgrade, and I know I know. Seems weird to say of one person buying a camera. What about all others? Also, what's 910-25J-1Q38, a phone number? Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
There is speculation by many people that there could be some form of extraterrestrial life observing us, hovering around in various flying vehicles, or perhaps using some form of giant telescope. These claims are often backed up by blurry pictures which claim to be of alien vehicles. In this comic, the joke is that the aliens are deliberately making sure that all sightings are made unverifiable. However, with [[1235:_Settled|most people now carrying a camera with them all the time]], a sighting that would be unverifiable just by eyewitness testimony could now be captured by a smartphone camera.

This means that in order for the aliens to keep creating unverifiable sightings for humans, they must keep track of what camera capabilities each human has, leading to different distance restrictions for each human, as seen in the diagram. The effective range of each person's camera is depicted as a circular (or spherical) envelope around themselves, two on the cross-sectional diagram and at least one located off beyond the image edge.

There is also an apparently flat ground-hugging 'no fly zone' connecting two of these areas. This may be part of a general prohibition against landing (and/or causing verifiable ground effects, such as {{w|crop circles}}) or it could be there to show that the capability of a self-focussing camera is greatly enhanced when it also has ground-features to autofocus upon rather than a subject surrounded by nothing but sky.

The comic attempts to explain away the issue already discussed in prior comics, such as [[718: The Flake Equation]] and [[1235: Settled]], in which the phenomenon of UFO sightings/reports is still left not resolved (either way) despite what modern technology should suggest is possible. It appears that the reason for this is that the {{tvtropes|SufficientlyAdvancedAlien|sufficiently advanced aliens}} actually make more than enough observations of the human race to continuously determine how to stay just on the side of plausible deniability in any interactions that they still seem to wish to make.

The attitude of the aliens also mirrors that of a subset of humans, namely those who hold disdain for the {{w|consumerism|consumerist}} mindset. These humans are frustrated by the tendency of their fellow humans to compulsively buy the latest and greatest versions of products at all times, often at great expense and without regard for the practical benefits of upgrading. Cellphones are one such product, as Apple and their competitors typically release new phone models annually (occasionally semi-annually), often introducing only minor or cosmetic changes with each new iteration.

In the title text, the aliens note that one particular human now has a YouTube account, meaning they are likely to record video instead of attempting to capture still images. This means that the alien craft used to create the sighting must behave as erratically as possible, in order to avoid being identified. This relates to the often wildly oscillating (as well as blurry) films and videos of 'UFOs' that have been taken by the impromptu human observer, beyond the limit of their ability to hold their fully-zoomed camera steady. Although here it is explained away as the flying saucers ''actually'' moving in an improbably jerky manner to prevent detailed recording of their craft. Further briefings of the sort depicted would doubtless accompany upgrades in optical/digital-stability features or the purchase of a camera tripod.

It appears the aliens have a classification and tracking system for all humans. It is unclear what the system for assigning these identifiers is, since we see two different formats (''38XT11-B-C54'' and ''910-25J-1Q38''). One possibility is that there are two different tracking systems represented, with at least two possibilities for the relation between them.
# Perhaps the two tracking systems are from two different alien agencies dedicated to human tracking, perhaps isomorphic to each other. One may come from a live observation while the other comes via an online alerting system, with no definitive link agreed between the two systems as not even the aliens can guarantee to resolve online anonymity, obfuscation or duplication of identity.
# On the other hand, perhaps the identifier system evolved over time and any given human only has an identifier from one system or the other. Assuming all numbers and letters are usable and each identifier could have only a letter or number in that place, the first identifier represents a space with at least 10*10*26*26*10*10*26*26*100=457 billion entries, while the space of the second is 10*10*10*10*10*26*10*26*10*10=68 billion. Perhaps, like IP addresses evolving from IPV4 to IPV6 because of the fear of exhaustion, the alien tracking systems similarly changed. This would imply the second (YouTube-posting) human is older than the first (cellphone carrying).
# A third possibility is simply regional variations, where different sectors of the Earth have developed their own identification systems, perhaps when population movements (or vacations) were far fewer and intercontinental travel was very rare indeed. Starting from an arbitrary point of time in history, one system may have applied to the Americas and the other to Eurasia (for example) with different challenges of recognising and serupticiously tracking all individuals from cradle to grave within their communities (the shorter identifier of which forms some part of their personal alphanumeric identifier). A revised globally-used system might in development (or now even in use, as per the above suggestion) but the diverse legacy systems could still apply to those born before the implementation period).

The identifier for the one buying the phone begins with "Human 38XT11". This seems likely to be a reference to {{w|THX 1138}}. This was the title of {{w|George Lucas}}' first film, which is also {{w|THX_1138#Etymology_and_references|referenced}} in the original {{w|Star Wars (film)|Star Wars}} film. The name contains the number in reverse as well as the letters if human could be written as H.

==Transcript==
:[Three aliens are looking at a screen. They each have six tentacles, of which four are used as legs, and the other two can be used as arms. They also have a small mouth and two eye stalks with a large eye at the end of each. The eyes has large eyelashes all the way around. One of the aliens is standing to the left of the screen, indicating it by raising one of its tentacles. The other two aliens stand to the right of the screen looking at the picture. The screen's image depicts a cross-sectional diagram showing two humans in a rough landscape. There is a shaded area above each of the humans and the terrain. The shaded area's boundary consists of arcs of differing sizes centered upon each human. To the left of the first human there is also a small straight area over the ground. To the left of this towards the edge of the screen, what appears to be an arc with a very large radius that begins and rises high up compared to the other two arcs, around a point beyond the on-screen image's edge. The rightmost human's zone has a dashed region between concentric radii of different sizes indicating that this zone has been revised further out than before. Four flying-saucer like spaceships are shown in the air close to, but above, the shaded areas. One high near the left curve, one over the flat area, one near the intersection between the two small arcs and one over the middle of the right arc.]
:Left Alien: Human 38XT11-B-C54  just bought a new phone with a 10x zoom, so we have to expand our restricted flight zone by 1,800 meters to keep our ship blurry.
:Right Alien: Seriously? Didn't they '''''just''''' upgrade?
:Left Alien: I know, I know...

:[Caption below the panel:]
:The hardest part of being an alien observing Earth is keeping track of what cameras everyone has.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Aliens]]
[[Category:Comics referencing THX 1138]]

2497: Logic Gates

2022-01-25T09:52:35Z

172.70.91.126: Undo revision 225579 by 172.70.91.126 (talk)

{{comic
| number = 2497
| date = August 2, 2021
| title = Logic Gates
| image = logic_gates.png
| titletext = In C, the multiocular O represents the bitwise norxondor gorgonax.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a SILICON LOGIC GATE TO A DIFFERENT DIMENSION AND/OR/XOR PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE. The table explaining what the made-up gates would do is incomplete. If it is going to reference quantum logic, it could be nice to have a brief description of any differences first. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

The comic lists {{w|logic gate}}s. The first six are real but the last six are made up and get increasingly absurd. The names for these last six use the same letters and syllables as the first six so as to appear at a glance to be consistent with their naming conventions.

Some of the ways the gate parts are combined seemingly-impossibly can raise ideas in the mind of the reader of how quantum computing involves processing multiple possibilities at once, or how machine learning involves solving systems backward from their outputs to their inputs. The names ring of calling more and more profoundly to some mythological catastrophe.

{| class="wikitable"
!Name
!Explanation
|-
|{{w|AND gate}}
|An AND gate outputs true if and only if both inputs are true. (Inputs 1 '''and''' 2 must be true.)

By convention it is a symbol with a flat input end leading to a semicircular output end.
|-
|{{w|OR gate}}
| An OR gate outputs true if one or the other or both of the inputs are true. (Input 1 '''or''' 2 may be true.)

By convention it is a symbol with a concave input edge leading to an output end resembling a gothic pointed-arch, turned to point onwards.
|-
|{{w|NOT gate}}
|A NOT gate outputs true if and only if the input is false. (The sole input must '''not''' be true.)

The convention for the isolated NOT gate is to be a triangle (reminiscent of a diode or op-amp comparator), that conspicuously points in the direction of logical passage, tipped with a circle.
|-
|{{w|NOR gate}}
|A NOR gate outputs true if and only if both inputs are false. (Neither 1 '''nor''' 2 must be true; alternately interpreted as it must '''n'''ot be true that either 1 '''or''' 2 are true.)

The symbol is the OR shape with the NOT-circle at its tip.
|-
|{{w|XOR gate}}
|A XOR (short for "eXclusive OR") gate outputs true if one, or the other, but not both of the inputs are true. (Mutually e'''x'''cusively, either 1 '''or''' 2 must be true.)

This symbol is the standard OR one but with a further concave line stood-off slightly from the usual one to connect to the input lines to distinguish its more discriminating behaviour.
|-
|{{w|NAND gate}}
|A NAND (short for "Not AND") gate outputs true if one or the other or both of the inputs is false. (It must '''n'''ot be true that both 1 '''and''' 2 are true.)

The symbol is the AND gate with the NOT-circle at its tip.
|-
|NORX gate
|A ''single'' feedline leads into a standard OR-style input end, while two lines are seen departing from an AND-style output front.

If the gate obeys only AND logic and the input is not internally duplicated for the purpose then the result would always be false.

If the gate uses OR logic ''and/or'' the input is internally used for both traditionally-required inputs, then the output would be exactly of the state of the original input.

The two outputs appear to be duplications (unlike Out And Not Out pairings) so the overall effect may be to act as a non-interfering 'splitter' gate.

Alternately, if the single input carries a superposition of two signals (see NORG XORT, below) then this might be teased apart into two inputs, internally, processed (optionally making a new superposition of AND and OR results upon the separated inputs) and propagating onwards into two different and deliberately unentangled (but possibly still each superpositonal) outputs for further quantum processing.

(There are no NOT-type or XOR-type elements to the diagram, yet it is notable as being a partially-rearranged anagram of "XNOR Gate".)
|-
|GAND Ate
|Two inputs feed into an AND-style receiving end. The presumed output end features a mirrored XOR input design complete with two connections onwards.

Assuming it still accepts inputs from the left and produces outputs to the right, it is possible this gate initially acts as an AND-gate to the inward pair but then (randomly?) generates output signals that would, as inputs to an XOR, produce the same output. That is, if both inputs are true then the two outputs are paired as one as true and one as false (in either order); for any other inputs both outputs are in the same and identical (not-specified) logic-state.

(The name is a spoonerism of "AND Gate", but may not necessarily have any meaning beyond that.)
|-
|XAND Gort
|Two inputs, unconventionally, feed into what is otherwise a perfectly standard NOT-symbol with the traditional single output.

How a single NOT is intended to handle two inputs and merge them is not obvious. All obvious functions are already met by existing two-input gates. Perhaps it is logically identical to the NOR gate, but drawn and named to express its nature as "not A and not B" rather than the less intuitive equivalent "not (A or B)".

Or possibly this is intended to create (and then invert) a combined quantum superposition of the two singular input feeds and therefore act as a form of signal multiplexer.

(The name seems only trivially related to the gate names associated with the drawn elements of functionality. "Xand" is a familiar form of the name "Alexander" that is sometimes used for major figures in fantasy novels for its striking "X", while "Gort" is the name of a particularly powerful alien robot seen in various versions of the film The Day The Earth Stood Still. Neither of these facts may bear true relevance, however.)
|-
|NORG Xort
|The initial input end resembles an XOR gate, but with 'negation'-nodes unconventionally sited where the inputs lead inwards. The output end is given a NAND appearance.

An XOR gate should not ultimately react any differently with both inputs pre-negated, compared to how the straight inputs would be handled, but the promise of NANDness may not make things quite so simple, without straying into the possibility of quantum-logic (as suggested above) where it may 'merely' be just highly complex to understand.

(The name given references NOR and XOR, but may be entirely divorced from any logical interpretation of its logical implications.)
|-
|ANDORX Gant
|Two inputs appear to feed into an OR-receiving end-cap, but this transitions into feedlines into a follow-up XOR-receiver, which in turn transitions (without output-capping) into two output tracks each with an 'orphaned' NOT-node upon them.

Generously, it could be interpreted as an OR-gate whose internal result is sent to one output track while the opposite is output to the other track, then both are inverted. Or quantum (re-)superposition and separations may again be at work in this case in ways hard to narrow down.

(The nominal title is yet further lacking in obvious logic, starting with a possible rearrangement of XOR and AND followed by part of GATE with an N inserted. "Gant" could possibly be a reference to a particular sportswear manufacturer/retailer. There is, of course, also the {{w|Gantt chart}}.)
|-
|NORXONDOR Gorgonax
|Two inputs lead into a (N)OR-like entry, the continuing sides of which repurpose as connectors leading through a pair of full anti-parallel NOT gates, before resuming drawn purpose as a NOR-gate output tip.

It is possible the peculiarly placed NOTs are acting as indications of some kind of two-way signal filter/rectifier, if they were to be taken seriously.

(The gate name, however, is a bizarre construct that may even be echoing fantasy/mythology references, such as Gondor and the Gorgon.)
|}

The only real-life logic gate that was omitted is the XNOR gate (short for "eXclusive Not OR"; it compares the inputs, and if and only if they are equal, it outputs true). Note that the "NORG XORT" gate would be logically equivalent to it, if it were tipped to match its uniquely XOR-style tail, since it would then be an XNOR gate with NOT on both inputs, a modification that has no ultimate effect on the logic as it merely switches the case of which exclusivity it needs to be, and does not care which version of same-input it might be responding to.

A double-NOT on an input would produce the identical output again (...if the input is '''not not''' true). Two NOTs preapplied to a (N)AND or (N)OR would produce the same output as a (further-)NOTed version of the (N)OR or (N)AND, conversely (...if '''not'''-1 '''and''' '''not'''-2 then this also means that neither 1 '''nor''' 2). Normally this would be shown, if necessary, as full NOT gates on the lead-in inputs but (see Transcript, below, and the NORG XORT description above) the shortcut element is occasionally used in further mix'n'match symbology (together with reinterpreting connectivity lines as partial shape-edges and vice-versa) in 'understandable' but definitely non-standard ways.

Along with the deliberate confusion of connector and shape-edge lines, directionality is also played with in several cases, with input 'ends' perhaps also at the (implied) output end and reversed sub-symbols implying a composite gate with substructural feedback or perhaps diode-rectification upon a bidirectional logic path.

Much like [[2360: Common Star Types]], as the list progresses, the names start to sound more like mythical creatures, closing with the "Norxondor gorgonax". As with the symbology, the names appear to be nonsensical recombinations of the standard ones (perhaps with off-subject inspirations, in some cases) but often do not match up with the symbolic (mis)use, such as an X in the name not implying/being implied by an XOR's unique drawn feature.

In the title text [[Randall]] claims that in the {{w|C (programming language)|programming language C}} the {{w|multiocular O}} (ꙮ) character, an exotic glyph variant of the Cyrillic letter O, is used to represent the bitwise version of the last operator Norxondor gorgonax (presumably ꙮꙮ represents the non-bitwise version), fitting as the multiocular O is used to refer to "many-eyed {{w|seraphim}}" (angels) in some religious literature. {{w|Gorgon}}s ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2360:_Common_Star_Types beige] or otherwise) have heads covered with snakes instead of hair, and so possess multiple eyes, the most famous was known as {{w|Medusa}} (she was [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/images/e/e5/1608_1088x1074y_Medusa_and_floating_earth.png depicted] in [[1608: Hoverboard]]). The ꙮ character abstractly inspires ideas of great otherworldly demons like those of the Cthulhu mythos.

C is a low-level programming language, and as such, it has many operations that correspond to logical (i.e. bitwise) operations. These contrast with operations that work in a non-bitwise way. For example, "&&" is the non-bitwise "AND" operator that takes the operands as a whole, while "&" is the bitwise "AND" that combines the respective bits of its two inputs independently before spitting out the new single composite value the output bits represent. In non-bitwise operations, 0 always represents "FALSE", while any non-zero value means "TRUE" for inputs, and 1 is used to represent TRUE for outputs. Thus, "14 && 3" gives the result 1: TRUE AND TRUE -> TRUE. In the bitwise operation, using the same values, the decimal value 14 has the binary value 1110 and the decimal value 3 has the binary value 0011, and for this example we get:
1110 = 14
& 0011 = 3
0010 = 2

==Transcript==
:[The comic shows a chart with twelve electronic logic gates arranged in three rows of four. Each gate is depicted as a schematic symbol, with a label underneath. Above them is a header:]
:Common logic gate symbols

:[Here below follows a description of the 12 gates in the three rows, with their label given beneath each description:]

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. Two inputs on the left lead to the vertical left edge of a solid D-shaped symbol. From the right side of the D there is one output.]
:AND gate

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. Two inputs on the left lead to a convex-crescent left edge of a crescent-shaped symbol. The right side of the crescent symbol's shape forms a point at its output. From the right side of the crescent there is one output.]
:OR gate

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. One input leads to a triangular symbol pointing to the right. There is a small bubble symbol connected to the triangle on the output, which leads right.]
:NOT gate

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. This is identical to the OR GATE, except the output has a bubble attached, like the NOT GATE's output.)
:NOR gate

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. This is identical to the OR GATE, except the left-hand arc at the input has a double-stroked line.]
:XOR gate

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. This is identical to the AND GATE, except the output has a bubble attached, like the NOT GATE's output.]
:NAND gate

:[An unusual symbol. This symbol has one input on the left leading to a convex-crescent left edge, like the OR GATE. The output side as a smooth crescent like the AND GATE but has two outputs.]
:NORX gate

:[An unusual symbol. This symbol has two inputs on the left leading to a vertical left edge input, like the AND GATE. The output side has a convex-crescent double-stroked output like the mirror image of the XOR GATE's input. There are two outputs.]
:GAND ate

:[An unusual symbol. This resembles the NOT GATE except there are two inputs instead of one leading into the left side.]
:XAND gort

:[An unusual symbol. This has a double-stroked convex-crescent input like the XOR GATE, but the two inputs have bubbles attached. The single output has a smooth crescent shape with a bubble, like a NAND GATE.]
:NORG xort

:[An unusual symbol. Two inputs lead to a convex-crescent edge, and the two lines of this symbol now enter a double-stroked convex-crescent input like the XOR GATE. The two lines of -this- symbol have bubbles placed half way across their horizontal length, and are presumably the outputs.]
:ANDORX gant

:[An unusual symbol. The symbol is identical to the NOR GATE, except the upper and lower horizontal parts of the symbols hull have a NOT GATE placed on them - one pointing to the left on the upper line, and to the right on the lower line. There is one output to the symbol, with a bubble attached.]
:NORXONDOR gorgonax

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Charts]]
[[Category:Programming]]

2497: Logic Gates

2022-01-25T09:51:57Z

172.70.91.126: Replaced content with "plz dont change thx"

plz dont change thx

User talk:Abigblueworld (real)

2022-01-25T01:50:31Z

172.70.91.126:

Okay I'll bite.. what does ``“What?” Also, Say you and no one else!´´ mean? [[User:256.256.256.256|256.256.256.256]] ([[User talk:256.256.256.256|talk]]) 07:58, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
:As the one who reverted most (all?) of that particular vandalising chain, back when it happened, I'm not sure there's even an answer. But if I missed any, do use your own judgement. (BTW, 256s, I still love your username. Wish I could think of a good one for myself but it's been actual years of actual indecision!)
:@ABBW(R): Sorry, this is ''your'' Talk page. If you ever come back and edit useful stuff then I'm sure we'll all be very happy. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 13:58, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
:Just had two [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2246:_Christmas_Presents&oldid=225542 anonymous] [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2558:_Rapid_Test_Results&oldid=225543 vandalisms] (now re-reverted to sanity) that might have been bigblue here or an opportunist. More for your info, 256s, than bbw's, but I had to come back here to remember exactly which particular of the regular named accounts you were again... ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 01:50, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Countdown in header text

2022-01-24T17:23:53Z

172.70.91.126: /* The picture */

{{comic
| date = January 10, 2022
| title = Countdown in header text
| image = Countdown_in_header_text.png
| before = The countdown will probably last 21 days. After February 1st 2022 it is likely to have disappeared. See this [https://web.archive.org/web/20220110183238/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] archive version.
| ldomain = www
| lappend =
| extra = yes
}}
*Go directly to the list of [[Countdown in header text/images|images]].
**Or [[Countdown in header text/images#newestpicture|Jump to the newest picture]]
***The images can also be found [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ here] on munvoseli's page where comparison of two images and an animation can be seen.
{{TOC}}
==Explanation==
*On January 10th 2022, [[Randall]] added a countdown in the top right corner of the [[xkcd Header text]] on {{xkcd}}.
**This happened while the comic [[2565: Latency]] was up.
***First the xkcd Header text was [[xkcd_Header_text#2022-01-08_-_Back_to_standard_text|changed back]] to the [[xkcd_Header_text#Header_text|standard text]] for the first time in almost three years:
****xkcd updates every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
***But already while this Friday-comic was still up on the following Monday the [[xkcd_Header_text#2022-01-10_-_Standard_text_with_countdown|countdown]] was added.
****This was thus up when the Monday comic [[2566: Decorative Constants]] was released, drawing more people to the xkcd page.
*The first [[#Archived Versions|archived version]] from [https://web.archive.org/web/20220110183238/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] read 20d 20h 27m.
**It looks like it started on [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ 01-10 17:00 UTC].
***At that time it would have read 20d 21h 59 min. Just two hours and 1 minute short of 3 weeks.
*This countdown will reach zero on Monday 2022-01-31 at 14:59 (2:59 PM) {{w|UTC}}, or 9:59 AM in Boston, Randall's home town.
**If seconds will be added towards the end, it seems likely that it may end exactly at 15:00 UTC (10:00 AM in Boston).
***However, if it's using EST, introduced in comic [[1061: EST]], it would count backward for four hours before reaching zero, and end only at 2022-01-31 23:59 UTC
****This is extremely farfetched though!
****Though either way, it would fall on Monday 2022-01-31, and therefore the day comic 2575 should be released.
*The next day on [https://web.archive.org/web/20220111153818/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-11] a diagonal black bar appeared in the lower left-hand corner of the countdown box and started to move further into the image on following changes to the [[#Images|image]].
**This development called for the creation of this dedicated [[Countdown in header text]] page.
**The line had already moved further into the image at this time, but the latest version will never be available in the web archive.
***This development is reminiscent of the huge comic [[1190: Time]].
*As mentioned above, [https://munvoseli.github.io/ Munvoseli] is keeping [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ track of the changes] to the image on the countdown.
**Although there are (at 2022-01-12 12:35 UTC) thirteen different frames we know of, the first three looks the same (because the diagonal bar was not in the frame yet) and the seventh and the eighth also seems to be the same, even though the bar had already begun moving across the frame from the fourth. This is either on purpose, a slipup or means that The FrameTM might not be zooming out of a larger image.
***However, the images that look the same all have individual addresses on the xkcd server. See more under [[#Images|Images]] below.

Randall has previously made a comic simply called [[1159: Countdown]]. However, in that the roles are reversed. There we know that the countdown is for (Super Volcano) but not if it will happen soon or very much later. Here we know when, and it is rather soon, but not what.

==Images==
*Images will be put on [[Countdown in header text/images|this separate page]].
**The images can also be found [https://munvoseli.github.io/xkcd-countdown/ here] on munvoseli's page.
***It is possible to compare two images, chosen between those released, on that page!
***From 2022-01-14 it has also been possible to see an animation.
**See more details at the top of the image page.
*After a few days the black lines forming the image came into conflict with the clock, which has a rounded white frame around it. This can be seen in one of the earliest examples here:
[[File:Countdown in header text Clock Cover Black Lines.png]]
*Also at this time a new development happened after the "plane tail" moved forward it stopped on 2022-01-18 and started moving up (or zooming in). See for instance these two comparison from munvoseli's page showing the difference from the 8 pictures before today, and then after three out today:
[[File:Countdown in header text Compare 40 to 48.png]] [[File:Countdown in header text Compare 48 to 51.png]]

===Ongoing description===
** Frames 1-12: A diagonal line.
** Frame 13: A curve seems to begin at the top left of the line.
** Frame 18: The curve connects the diagonal line with a horizontal line.
** Frame 27-28: A new line appears in the bottom left corner.
** Frame 40-42: The new line turns out to be connected to the horizontal line, forming a corner which is not attached to any other line.
** Frame 49: The "camera movement" direction changes, while the object is still moving upward it stopped moving towards the left side, moving towards the right instead.
** Frame 54: A slight upward curve seems to appear in the right line, the left line seems to have a small bend downwards, though that could at that point just be a straight line that randall drew without a ruler.
** Frame 60-62: A new line appears in the bottom right corner, it turns out to be a continuation of the first original line which curves upward and has a positive slope at that point of the picture, between about 2 o'clock and 3 o'clock. The downward bend of the left line continues on straight in the same direction, it was probably an intentional bend and not an irregularity in drawing a straight line by hand.
** Frame 63: In the minimum of the right curved line a new line starts appearing, way thinner than the others (which were up to this point all rather part of one line) and going slightly downwards and very much to the left, at an angle somewhere between 8 o'clock and 9 o'clock.
** Frame 67: A possible feature becomes visible at the bottom edge of the image that might resolve the exact nature of the (currently presumed) aircraft, e.g. which particular aerodynamic surface we have been seeing and thus from which particular orientation we are viewing it.
** Frame 68-72 makes it clear this must be an aircraft by showing windows and a door and clearly the tail fin. As late as frame 69 some people argued that the tail fin could have been a wing.
** Frame 73-83 brings a horizontal stabilizer into view.

==Theories==
*Here are different theories for what the countdown is for and what the picture is going to reveal can be added.

===The picture===
*Theories about the picture:
**From 2022-01-21 it became certain that it was a plane! Passenger plane. Door and windows are visible.
***From 2022-01-22 it became clear that it was the rear end, so it was a tailfin that came into the panel to begin with. Up til the day before it was still a bit uncertain if it could have been a wing.
*** from 2022-01-24 a bottom line has appeared which doesn't fit well with a 'standard' airliner. perhaps the image is deliberately misleading (eg will transform into something else)
**What will this lead up to - theories about this.
***It could be an airplane with a banner like in [[1355: Airplane Message]].
****That would very soon be clear as the bottom part of the rear end seems to be coming into view during 2022-01-24, if the direction does not change again.
*****This is now ruled out, since the plane is clearly not towing a banner.
***It could end up landing in a city, perhaps with a skyline pinpointing where Randall will be or move.
****However, unlikely to manage this in real life as the count down ends.
****Also, very unlikely (1 in 60, or even 1 in 3600) that such a landing would occur exactly on the hour.
*****But it could also just be the time when he announces he has moved...
***Maybe Cueball will make a parachute jump, and Cueball could represent a real life Randall, as this could in principle be timed very accurately.
****This is something you would schedule a month or more ahead, want to tell people about in advance, want to make a big deal about on your website, is not quite as bizarre as zero-G and probably more fun {{citation needed}}, could be done with an adventurous wife, explains why it’s the tail of the plane in the image, and (assuming no mechanical, medical, or meteorological problems, a safe assumption), might go something like “on my mark, it’ll be 9:59:56 A.M. in Boston... mark. 3, 2, 1, JUMP!” Maybe it’ll be just Cueball/Randall, but could more likely include Megan representing his wife.
****However, it could very easily be that the weather in January could foil the attempt, or at least the timing.

====Early theories====
Many early theories were generated before the picture was decisively revealed to be a plane.

*It seems after two days and 12 pictures like either something is moving into the frame or that it is a zoom out from a white area of a large picture. Maybe it is the arm of Cueball that will come into view.
*The second line makes it look somewhat like the tail fin of an aircraft.
**Or the wing of an aircraft (left if looking down at it). Perhaps the plane is towing a banner that will fly through the frame.
***After almost a week this looks like the most promising suggestion so far. Now that the direction of the camera movement has changed, we might get to see the rest of the aircraft soon.
****From picture 63, it more and more seems like it was the tail fin of a plane and now we can see the body.
*****It's almost certainly the tail (and now a bit of the rear fuselage) of an aircraft.
******It could just as easily be the left wing and part of the fuselage (showing windows on the right side of an airliner), with the tail fin out of view to the rear, as being the tail fin from an angle where the left wing is out of view behind the fuselage.
*******judging by the relative size of the (presumed) windows, I think it's more likely to be the left wing than the tail fin.
*******Based on the way planes are drawn in [[1868: Eclipse Flights]]. [[1355: Airplane Message]] and [[1669: Planespotting]], plane wings have a point on their edge and tail fins have a flat side, and (if a line is present) a thick line separates wings from the body, whereas thin lines or no lines separate tail fins, so this is a tail fin.
*******In the bottom left there appears to be the top part of a horizontal stabilizer, implying this is the tail.
********It’s a tail fin, that’s finally clear, but that’s the underside of the stabilizer. Which means this would be the best angle to view Cueball/Randall parachuting out of that door, something that would be predictable to the exact minute (barring all kinds of things that could go wrong).
*******Appears to be a door to the left of the windows
*******It could be an airplane with a banner like in [[1355: Airplane Message]]
***Tail of a space shuttle, perhaps?
****While I think Randall would've also drawn in the signature black part of the rudder, the shape fits perfectly
****Timing is close (though not exact) to the Columbia disaster anniversary (2003-02-01 1359 UTC)
***I'm thinking the tail of a Zeppelin.
****Although those normally have longer tail fins.
*Maybe it is some kind of vehicle rolling into frame, like a car?
*Or the word xkcd? (or xkcd 2?)
*Could have been "Hangman", but it looks like it's zooming in on the diagonal instead of continuing to make a gibbet.
*With the new second line appearing in the corner as of frame 28 it looks like it's definitely zooming out of an image. It looks like it could be someone's arm in a running position.
*I think it could also be two legs of a reclining stick person.
*The lines suggest a shark fin and the movement would suggest it swimming across the frame.
**If it was a shark fin, then the most likely candidates would be the first dorsal fin and the pectoral fin, but both end in points rather than edges like in the pictures of the header puzzle. An aircraft tail fin still seems most likely.
*Maybe it's a two-dimensional shape viewed from a weird angle?
**Like a rectangle viewed from a floating, tilted perspective
**Or the top of the k in xkcd
**Or a boat dock?

===Countdown===
*Theories about the countdown:
*Several have already been mentioned in the discussion:
**Notice that as of now - 22-Jan-2022 7am PST - (not sure exactly when it happened) the countdown has disappeared. Temporarily (perhaps to make the image cleaner?) or permanently? [[User:Pharmacovigilant|Pharmacovigilant]] ([[User talk:Pharmacovigilant|talk]]) 15:38, 24 January 2022 (UTC) The next time I looked (Sunday?), the countdown was back. No idea if it was a glitch or what.
**Randall's next book, either the countdown is counting down to the start of promotion or it is released when the countdown ends.
***Usually Randall has made month long [[:Category:Book promotion|book promotions]] before release. So if it is the release day it is a new way to do it. But he will get a lot of attention. If it is just the start of promoting it, people might get disappointed…
****For instance he began promoting his [[xkcd_Header_text#2015-05-14_-_New_book_Thing_Explainer|new book Thing Explainer]] in the header text. That was in May 2015 and the book was first released [https://blog.xkcd.com/2015/05/13/new-book-thing-explainer/ late November 2015]. Most of this time the header text was promoting the book.
**{{w|James Webb Space Telescope}} (JWST) going into orbit about L2 {{w|Lagrange point}}.
***Randall has already made several comics about the telescope. The latest [[2564: Sunshield]] was released just five days prior to the countdown was started.
***But the telescope will not reach the point but rather go into a large orbit around it, so a precise timer counting down to it seems a bit farfetched.
***On NASA's page on JWST it seems like it will [https://www.jwst.nasa.gov/content/webbLaunch/deploymentExplorer.html#25 go into orbit] 29.5 days after its [[December 25th Launch]], on Christmas Day, so it should have already started the orbit by the 23rd or 24th of January - 8 days before the countdown.
***Also No based on the image.
**{{w|Lunar New Year}}
***In China it starts on February 1st and a [https://yourcountdown.to/chinese-new-year countdown for China] is 8 hours behind.
****The South Korean time zone is UTC+9, hence 14:59 UTC = 23:59 in South Korea, one minute to Feb 1.
*****But it's weird if Randall that has basically never mentioned this holiday suddenly makes a three week countdown for it, and why choose South Korea when most would think of China in this context…?
**Randall will stop making xkcd (Goodbye in the image).
***Hopefully not.
****Agreed, {{tvtropes|PoisonOakEpilepticTrees|to be avoided}}
***It might be a temporary stop (hiatus).
**[https://nationaldaycalendar.com/backward-day-january-31/ National Backward Day]
***This is not a day mentioned on Wikipedia at the time of release of the countdown, so seems unlikely.
**Maybe it will be an announcement of xkcd 2, a new and improved version for… some reason?
***Seems unlikely…
**{{w|Black History Month}}. The {{w|Greensboro sit-ins}} started on Feb 1 1960. Black History Month also begins on February 1st, also in 2022.
***But this countdown stops early on January 31st so seems unlikely.
***However, before changing the Header recently it was about [[xkcd_Header_text#2020-06-03_-_Black_Lives_Matter|Black Lives Matter]] for more than 1.5 years, first ending on December 20th 2021, less than a month before the countdown began. In between that there was a short Christmas sale reminder until a week into 2022. So it could just be another way of reminding of us the issues faced by black people in the US.
****If this was true, I feel like it would be simpler to just change back to the Black Lives Matter text at the top of the screen. Also, it seems increasingly likely as of Jan. 20th that the image is some kind of plane, which doesn't really have much to do with Black History Month (that I know of?)
**The accompanying header says specifically "xkcd updates Monday, Wednesday, and Friday"--maybe the countdown is to the reveal of a new update schedule?
***Very unlikely. This was the standard header for a long time. It was used when Randall had nothing better to say. But with all his books and the trouble in US with elections and BLM, he has used the header as a platform most of the time many years now. So the standard text is rare. But he did return it for two days before adding the count down, making it seem just like normal.
***A guess is that it returned to this, so the header text did not take any focus away from the countdown.
**[[:Category:Red Spiders|Red spider]] attack?
***Un-Likely
**He will become a father - could be a planned C-section.
***As this is unpredictable, and could go wrong, then this would be a dangerous countdown, people can be very superstitious, even if scientist.
**As it currently looks (after a [[1070: Words for Small Sets|few days]] into the countdown) it may be a trip he is taking by plane.
***Maybe going somewhere people could meet him.
****Book tour?
***Moving a long way from home (down under or the like).
****Maybe he's moving to Japan? Could be a plane, and the time zone would fit, at least.
*****Then the countdown would be until when the plane lands, not to midnight.
******What has time zones to do with this clock? It counts down to the same time all over the world, and will reach zero at the same time no matter what time zone you are in.
******Time zones have to do with where it will be midnight when the countdown reaches zero. If it's a countdown to when January ends (a moment before February begins), then it's until that moment in the time zone where the countdown reaches zero at that time.
****If it is a plane, then maybe it will land in a new city Randall moves to when the counter ends, and the skyline will be visible...
**Perhaps it's a start to a new series like [[1190: Time]].
***It is already a series that works like Time, so seems unlikely.
**Zero-G flight, really looks like plane to me.
***Could be time he will first go weightless which could be fairly well known except for bad weather
**A parachute jump by Randall. Could be predicted as well as the zero G.
**How about the [https://www.hitc.com/en-gb/2021/09/09/star-trek-picard-season-2-release-date-plot-cast/ new series of Picard]?
***{{w|Star Trek: Picard (season 2)}} is set to run from March 3 2022, which both Wikipedia (link before) and [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8806524/episodes?season=2 IMDb] agrees upon so bad to miss by more than a month, and what would the plane in the image have to do with this anyway?
***So No!
** The xkcd world tour!! I wish

===count-wimRikmef===
* The identifier of the script contains what is probably an acronym, but for what?
** count / wim (?) / Rik (name) & me f(light)
** Or it's just the output of whatever js minimizer was used.
** R = Randall?
* The "img" tag has a misspelled "heigth" attribute. Probably just a typo?

==Archived Versions==
;Seems like the links are (currently?) not working properly?
*Here is a list of the versions that has been saved to the web archive during the countdown.
**The counter in that version is written behind the date of the web archive.
**Note that the counter is active on the archived version counting minutes down from the start. Some of the versions almost changing the minutes just after loading. But it will always count from the time given here:
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220110183238/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] 20d 20h 27m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220110214138/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-10] 20d 17h 18m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220111011115/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-11] 20d 13h 48m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220112005828/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-12] 19d 14h 1m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220113044552/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-13] 18d 10h 14m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220114010759/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-14] 17d 13h 51m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220114195624/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-14] 16d 19h 3m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220115052737/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-15] 16d 9h 32m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220116074923/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-16] 15d 7h 10m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220116225217/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-16] 14d 16h 7m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220118050255/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-18] 13d 9h 57m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220118195259/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-18] 12d 19h 6m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220119213308/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-19] 11d 17h 26m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220120103559/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-20] 11d 4h 23m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220121102349/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-21] 10d 4h 36m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220122002328/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-22] 9d 14h 36m
#[https://web.archive.org/web/20220122223018/https://xkcd.com/ 2022-01-22] 8d 16h 29m

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Meta]]

Talk:2571: Hydraulic Analogy

2022-01-22T09:59:37Z

172.70.91.126:

Is it significant that the Cueball giving the prize just says "The Nobel Prize" without specifying which one? Did the Cueball who discovered this machine get all the Nobel Prizes? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.131.214|172.70.131.214]] 05:48, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
: I would assume the Nobel Prize for Physics, but who knows. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.26|172.70.211.26]] 06:14, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
::It can only be physics, and since they are both on stage and there are two prizes then of course Miss Lenhart also receives a prize, and they share the prize for their co-work. They probably worked together on the project after Cueball's idea. Even if not, it has been common that the professor shared the prize (or took it all) if one of their students (especially woman students) got the idea. That the one starting the teaching here is a woman here, just turns this around. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:33, 22 January 2022 (UTC)
:::That it was constructed implies more than just the out-of-thin-air novel theorisation by Cueball (a number of Physics prizes were won for things that couldn't be physically invoked - at least at the time) so I choose to believe that Miss L became an equal party (neither more ''nor less'' rightfully resposible for the eventual result) as it was developed from mad scribbling to (equally mad?) 'reality'. Well, that's my headcanon, but I'm sure that Randall wouldn't have any reason to disagree. (Especially if I'm pointing my headcannon at him at the time!) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 09:59, 22 January 2022 (UTC)

Do we need to pick apart the title text? Each initial bit is almost straight analogy ripped from the classic electrodynamic/hydronynamic comparison, though just as incompatible (and mixed up) as the diagram. Oh, and I linked wave-particle duality just for the awful second-order pun, but I was going to line up various other dualities (from electric/magnetic, to the T-/S-dualities of M-theory) and equivalences (esp. Mass-Energy) in an attempt to 'explain' what is somehow indicated to be going on. Doubtless future editors will oblige if they think they can do it better. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 09:59, 22 January 2022 (UTC)

2571: Hydraulic Analogy

2022-01-22T09:39:18Z

172.70.91.126: /* Explanation */ mssng wrd

{{comic
| number = 2571
| date = January 21, 2022
| title = Hydraulic Analogy
| image = hydraulic_analogy.png
| titletext = Current (water) running through the water (wires) causes it to boil, increasing the pressure (voltage), but resisting (impeding) the flow of hydroelectricity (water currents). This is the basis for Ohm's law.
}}
*This was the sixth comic to come out after the [[Countdown in header text]] started.

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a LIQUITRICITY DEVICE, mucn more on the watery version of Ohms law from the title text is needed. And more on the diagram drawn by Cueball - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

Electric flow is [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lvp_a_JkD2o commonly represented] by a "{{w|hydraulic analogy}}". In this analogy, the water pressure represents {{w|voltage}} and the flow of the water is the {{w|electric current}}. {{w|Electric resistance}} is represented by a constricted section of a pipe.

[[Miss Lenhart]], is teaching a class and starts to explain this analogy, when [[Cueball]] suddenly has an idea and changes her diagrams - connecting the electrical diagram and the hydraulic diagram. In doing this, he has envisioned what comes to be called a "liquitricity device", combining liquid water and electric current flows together and given a suitably {{w|portmanteau}} title.

The last panel shows that Miss Lenhart and Cueball eventually receive the {{w|Nobel Prize}}, presumably the {{w|Nobel Prize in Physics}}, for the design ''and construction'' of the device - indicating that rather than being [[:Category:Strange powers of Beret Guy|technically esoteric]] it has actually been practical to make this for real. The presenter handing them the medals [[:Category:Multiple Cueballs|looks like Cueball]].

The title text 'tries' to explain how this device works and references {{w|Ohm's Law}}, one of the fundamental laws of electricity, but strangely seems as much an incomprehensible mix of the two as the diagram in explaining whatever form of {{w|Wave–particle duality|possible duality}} it actually employs.

One of the featured [[:Category:Footer comics|Footer comics]], [[730: Circuit Diagram]], displays a ''very complex'' circuit diagram. Although no pump or direct water flow can be found here, it all ends up in a beaker with holy water. And there is a symbol labeled 3 liters, at the bottom close to the beaker. This is the symbol for an orifice or flow restriction used on plumbing or hydraulic diagrams. So [[Randall]] already mixed water flow and circuit diagrams almost 10 years ago.

==Transcript==
:[Miss Lenhart stands next to a white board with two diagrams while pointing to the first. While she is explaining Cueball interrupts her from off-panel as seen by his voice coming from the right side out of a starburst on the panels edge. The diagrams are a schematic circuit diagram and a water flow diagram. There is a battery (with labels on top and bottom) on the left and a resistor on the right of the circuit as well as labels on each of these and one at the top part of the wire. There is a pump to the left and a tighter section of the pipe to the right, as well as labels on these and on the top part of the pipe. At the bottom there is two arrow pointing in towards the pipe, this also has a label.]
:Miss Lenhart: Electric current is like water flowing in a pipe. The pressure represents-
:Cueball [off-panel]: Wait, hold on.
:Labels on circuit: + - V I R
:Labels on flow diagram: Pump F R D

:[The view changes so Miss Lenhart and the white board are seen from the side. She still stands next to the white board, arms now down, as Cueball approaches the board with a marker held in one hand. The diagrams can still be seen, but distorted from being viewed from the side, and no labels are readable.]
:Cueball: Do you mind if I just...

:[Zoom in on Cueball, who is drawing on the white board, which is the left edge of the panel, i.e. not visible in the panel. Noises from the marker drawing on the board comes up from the tip of the marker pen. The movement of the pen is indicated with small lines on either side.]
:''Scribble''
:''Scribble''
:''Scribble''

:[Miss Lenhart and Cueball, holding the marker pen down, stand on either side of the white board looking at Cueball's version with the merged diagram. He has connected the two, so instead of the wire going down after the resistor in the circuit diagram, it now is connected with water flowing to the right just below the resistor, and then up into the pump to the right of the resistor. At the bottom where the water pipe before bend up into the pump, the water now continues running to the left (the pipe was not been drawn around it by Cueball), and it now flows where the bottom part of the wire, from the circuit, was before, turning up below the battery and connect with it there. All the labels from before has been retained:]
:Labels on diagram: + - V I R Pump F R D

:[Miss Lenhart and Cueball stand on a podium with a Cueball like presenter. The presenter is holding two Nobel Prize medals up in his hands. He is holding them from the strings they are attached to, so the medals hangs below his hands.]
:Presenter: And for the design and construction of the liquitricity device, the Nobel Prize goes to...

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Miss Lenhart]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Physics]]
[[Category:Nobel Prize]]

2570: Captain Picard Tea Order

2022-01-22T04:04:09Z

172.70.91.126: Moriarty and the EMH, for the record.

{{comic
| number = 2570
| date = January 19, 2022
| title = Captain Picard Tea Order
| image = captain_picard_tea_order.png
| titletext = We can ask the Earl for his order once he's fully extruded from the dispenser.
}}
*This was the fifth comic to come out after the [[Countdown in header text]] started.

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by A VERY ATTRACTIVE BUT NEWLY FORMED 19th CENTURY BRITISH PRIME MINISTER- Please change this comment when editing this page. There would be way too many additional [[285: Wikipedian Protester|citations needed]] for it to work here. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

Captain {{w|Jean-Luc Picard}} is a primary character in the science fiction TV series ''{{w|Star Trek: The Next Generation}}'', which is focused on the crew of a starship. The ship is equipped with {{w|Replicator (Star Trek)|replicators}}, which can create virtually any object or material requested, including food and drink, and which respond to verbal commands.

In the show, Picard's beverage of choice is {{w|Earl Grey tea}}. His habitual method for ordering is to first specify what he wants (tea, in this case), then specify a particular type (Earl Grey), and then give specific instructions for how it is to be served (hot, as opposed to {{w|iced tea}}). Because this is his favored drink, he repeatedly places the exact order "[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iaAT6-dY1QI Tea. Earl Grey. Hot.]" The first picture in the strip implies that the display shows each part of the order, and provides a list of options for the next step.

[[Randall]] parodies this repeated order by suggesting [[#Other Words|other words]] that could follow "Tea. Earl Grey.", starting from ones he considers more "normal" moving to those he presumes increasingly "less normal" down a long and winding arrow.

The results of two examples from the normal/less-normal scale are also illustrated: Sticky tea and loud tea. Sticky is kind of obvious, though perhaps not immediately understandable, the loud version is a tea that screams "Teeee..." The vibrating and screeching teacup may be a reference to the various ''Star Trek'' episodes about {{w|tribble}}s, which behave in a similar way in the presence of Klingons.

The very last qualifying addition, the least normal is not a single word but "Tea for him, too." This reinterprets the meaning of the standard introductory words, suggesting that "tea", and "Earl Grey" are separate orders, which implies that he wants the replicator to produce tea, then replicate a human being named Earl Grey (either one of the {{w|Earl Grey|Earls Grey}} or a person surnamed Grey with the given name of Earl), then a second tea to serve to this newly created person. {{w|Earl Grey tea}} is named after the {{w|Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey}}, a 19th century British Prime Minister, and Captain Picard possibly wishes to have said Earl be generated to provide him with company.

In contrast to the often trivial use of a replicator as merely a potentially infinitely versatile vending machine, the comic sets up a number of quite esoteric options, culminating in Earl Gray himself potentially drinking (generic) tea, after both the tea and he have been replicated into existence by Picard.

In the title text, someone tells Picard that they should wait until the Earl has been fully extruded from the dispenser, and ''then'' ascertain what he would actually wish to drink. The presumption is that it could take some time to get a full living person out of the replicator. This sort of operation would be better suited for the holodeck, which has been used to create simulacra of other historical figures, including Stephen Hawking, Albert Einstein, and Sir Isaac Newton, with the limitations that they are mere simulations without their own autonomy and cannot exist beyond the limits of the fixed holotransmitters; though at least two seem to have gained full sentience, and granted (or be convinced they were granted) physical freedom.

In the various versions of ''{{w|Star Trek}}'', it's established that {{w|Replicator_(Star_Trek)#Origins_and_limitations|replicators aren't capable of producing living things}}, so canonically this version of the order could not be filled.

===Other Words===
{| border =1 width=100% cellpadding=1 class="wikitable"
! Word !! Explanation
|-
| Hot
| A fairly normal word to be used when ordering tea. Although that it even needs specifying is itself a clue that other variations (such as "Iced", below) are available. This is the chosen word of the five visible words Picard is potentially presented with in the first drawing. The act of requesting this is thus illustrated, though not of the appearance of the tea itself.
|-
| Iced
| {{w|Iced tea}} is a 'normal' variation of tea.
|-
| Decaf
| Traditional teas (from {{w|Camellia sinensis}}) tend to have caffeine in them. Asking for {{w|Decaffeination|decaffeinated}} tea is not particularly uncommon if the drinker requires it. In the series ''Picard'', set several decades after ''The Next Generation'', Picard does actually order "Tea, Earl Grey, decaf" in [https://tvline.com/2020/01/26/star-trek-picard-premiere-easter-eggs-earl-grey-decaf/ one scene].
|-
| Good
| A normal, subjective term. Most people drinking tea would want it to be good, but to specify it like this would perhaps be strange. This is one of the words in the first drawing, as a listed alternative to Hot.
|-
| Lukewarm
| While this is a temperature that tea can be at, most people (including Picard) do not want their teas to be lukewarm.
|-
| Tasty
| Similar to good, most people would want their tea to be tasty, or at least flavorsome.
|-
| Boiled
| Boiling the water used to make the tea is a common and normal way to increase the flavor and nutrients extracted from the tea leaves, though it is suggested that the actual ideal temperature of hot water is 75-98°C (167-210°F), according to whether it is a light tea or a dark one, and that perhaps it should be sipped at around 65°C/150°F-ish if desired 'hot'.
Having made a tea and ''then'' bringing it back to the boil (especially after adding milk/etc.) may destroy some of the desirable qualities previously imbued.
|-
| Watery
| Tea is a drink that often involves water, but this perhaps suggests over dilution or under infusion in some way.
|-
| Sour
| Many people do not enjoy a sour taste, which can accompany rot and is a strange thing to specify when ordering Earl Grey tea. Although lemon juice is often an additive used in the same way (but as a complete alternative) to milk.
|-
| Meaty
| Most teas are plant-based. While teas such as {{w|beef tea}} do exist they are more generally regarded as either a soup or a medicine. Furthermore, this kind of tea would be unlikely to be Earl Grey, making this statement less normal.
|-
| Solid
| Tea is usually drunk as a liquid. It would be strange to ask for solid tea, unless there was a situation where it could be rehydrated later.
|-
| Dry
| Tea is a liquid typically made with water and may have milk. A dry version might be either unmade (e.g. tea leaves in their un-infused form) or freeze-dried back into a dehydrated form.
"Dry" can also be used to describe {{w|Dryness (taste)|a "mouth feel"}} in a [https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2f1gxx/eli5_how_can_a_drink_taste_dry/ variety of drinks] ''or'' {{w|Prohibition|enforced alcohol-free scenarios}}. For the latter option, it can assume a default serving with an {{w|Hot_toddy#Variations|alcoholic component}}, or an entirely {{w|Long Island iced tea|alternate basis}} for the beverage, which the request needs to be specify it is not.
This is one of the five words Picard was seen presented with in the first drawing.
|-
| Raw
| This describes tea that has not been "cooked", so it would just be tea made with room-temperature water. This is {{w|Iced_tea#Sun_tea|possible}} but generally takes many hours.
|-
| Deep-fried
| Tea is not usually deep-fried. But you'll probably {{w|Deep-fried Mars bar|find someone}} who has tried it, [https://www.pitco.com/blog/deep-fried-liquids-trend one way or another].
|-
| Sticky
| Perhaps significantly dehydrated, or thickened with enough of a hydrophilic substance, this would produce something very unlike most teas that would usually be requested. For example, the addition of significant amounts of sugar may lead to a more viscous brew.
This scenario is illustrated to show a clearly messy product that awkwardly sticks to and drips from the replicator as well as Picard.
|-
| Grilled
| Tea is not usually grilled.
|-
| Fossilized
| Fossilizing leaves replaces their biological molecules with minerals. Brewing fossilized tea leaves would dissolve some of those and produce a beverage that resembles mineral water more than tea.
|-
| Magnetic
| Tea is not magnetic. Magnetic metals would have to be added to the tea, which would not be pleasant to drink. In addition, consuming more than one magnetic source may end up squeezing tissues in the intestines or bowels, with potentially lethal consequences. However, this would not be the {{w|Irn-Bru|first drink}} to be supplemented with iron.
|-
| Ballistic
| Usually, the replicated beverage is deposited in a stationary cup, but Picard could ask for it to be dropped or thrown out instead.
|-
| Unstable
| This word is often used to refer to radioactive or explosive materials, which hopefully is not a property that would apply to something meant to be ingested. Alternatively, this could imply that the receptacle into which the tea is delivered should be unstable - being unbalanced, or lacking a flat bottom. This is likely to lead to the tea being spilled.
|-
| Blessed
| Tea is a beverage, and it may be strange to ask a machine to create 'blessed' tea. However, if the machine were to use holy water, already blessed by a human, it is [https://www.quora.com/When-does-Holy-water-lose-its-Holiness-If-its-boiled-is-the-resulting-water-vapor-still-considered-Holy-Does-it-lose-its-Holy-property-when-it-transfers-into-a-gas-Is-it-still-Holy-when-it%E2%80%99s-frozen#:~:text=In%20other%20words%2C%20as%20long,else%2C%20it%20remains%20holy%20water.&text=a%20simple%20change-,Never.,He%20is%20faithful possible] for it to remain "blessed" after the water is used to make tea. It is also possible that this is a reference to tea which could be used in [http://www.archbishoplefebvre.com/blog/baptism-can-i-use-any-liquid baptism].
In role-playing games, items can be Blessed, i.e. having greater positive or lesser negative effects. This includes potions, a class of drinks that do not usually include any teas but could contain the "potion of water", which may also, therefore, be the basis of this blessed brew.
|-
| Blurry
| Being blurry is not a normal state for tea to have. Cloudy, on the other hand, is quite normal for certain brews.
|-
| Loud
| While molecules in tea (especially hot tea, and vitally so in an {{w|The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (novel)|Infinite Improbability Drive}}) do move vigorously, this does not usually result in distinct audible effects.
However, as illustrated, it seems the requested cup of tea is produced capable of emitting a high-pitched, high-volume whining sound that entirely dominates the vicinity. It actually appears to somewhat vocalize what it is, Teeeee...
|-
| Virtual
| Virtual tea cannot be produced physically, so asking a physical tea machine for it would be very strange. However, it might be useful on the holodeck, a device that can produce a virtual environment able to be interacted with.
|-
| Intravenous
| This means the tea would be injected directly into the customer's veins, likely a very painful experience if the tea comes out boiling. Instrument of choice would probably be a {{w|Infuser|''tea infuser''}}.
|-
| Expanding
| In a sense, most hot tea is expanding: as the water in the tea evaporates, it becomes much less dense, increasing in "size".
But most people would probably argue that the evaporated water is no longer part of the tea. Water, like most materials, usually expands as it increases in temperature—except between freezing and about 4° C, where it has the unusual property of {{w|Water_%28molecule%29#Density_of_water_and_ice|''contracting slightly''}} as temperature increases. If tea behaves similarly despite the extra dissolved compounds, then "expanding tea" would describe any tea between 4° C and boiling point. Possibly beyond, and explosively so, if {{w|Superheating|superheated}} and then nucleating points are introduced.
On the other hand, this tea may simply be tea spilled on the floor, which could then spread out as it evaporated.
|-
| Ironic
| How tea could be ironic will be a mystery if your culture has no understanding of irony. The irony of the most celebrated Frenchman in science fiction history delighting in a very British beverage is a nice touch of cosmopolitanism. There is also a possibility that the tea will speak or otherwise communicate in ironic terms. While this is very strange and unlikely, it can be considered, given the other scenarios on this list.
|-
| Segmented
| Tea is usually served in a cup. There is the simple explanation that the cup is divided into segments, though this is the cup, and not technically the tea itself. Tea tends to stick together and form one liquid making it hard to segment. Separating the tea into segments would not be possible without some form of an emulsifying gel.
|-
| Verbose
| This describes using lots of words and language, and would not likely be used for tea, because it cannot speak. Command-line computer programs often run in a 'silent' mode without displaying every step of what happens on the screen. Such programs may have a {{w|Verbose mode|''-verbose'' parameter}} that disables the silent mode. As the replicator is run by a computer, the verbose parameter could be applied to the process of tea-making, with the replicator providing an info-dump on the molecular arrangement of the tea, together with the cup of liquid.
|-
| Cursed
| As with "Blessed", above, items can be Cursed in role-playing games, i.e. having greater negative or lesser positive effects; while there are strategic uses for Cursed items, generally the player would prefer uncursed ones (neutral or blessed). Amongst curseable items are potions, a class of consumables that do not usually include any teas but does contain the "potion of water", which may therefore be the cause of this cursed cuppa.
Cursed items have featured in xkcd previously: [[2332: Cursed Chair]], [[2376: Curbside]], and [[:Category:Cursed Connectors]].

"Cursed items" are more vaguely defined in real life, making "cursed tea" something rare. However, it is possible for a drink to be [https://www.quora.com/How-do-I-know-if-my-drink-had-a-witchs-hex-potion hexed].
|-
| Unexpected
| By definition, Picard is asking for tea, expecting it promptly. Perhaps the request for it to be "unexpected" would cause it to be delivered at an unknown time in the future, or to have some alteration.
|-
| Bipedal
| Bipedal organisms have two feet. As tea does not walk, this would be a very strange term to use when describing tea.
|-
| Afraid
| Tea does not have feelings. Although water {{w|Water memory|may remember things}} (at least pseudo-scientifically) or [https://www.quotes.net/mquote/901305 consider some things to be unpleasant].
|-
| Infinite
| The scope of this request is unclear. It could mean endless production (a steady stream of tea, without obvious limits so long as servicing the request remains practical), an instantaneous production of an infinite volume of tea (possibly more immediately shown to be flawed in its method of execution), or tea which will exceed the heat death of the universe. Either could result in an infinitely ''dense'' tea (eventually?), but this may no longer be {{w|No-hair theorem|identifiable as tea}} so might be one of the less practical options, even amongst those on this list.
Indeed, Randall ranks it as the least 'normal', except for just ''one'' further named order.
|-
| Tea for him, too
| {{w|Earl Grey tea|Earl Grey}} is a tea blend. In Star Trek, Jean-Luc Picard often offers tea to other people, so it is unclear why this would be the least normal.
Taken along with the title text, this Replicator order is for "Tea" (not otherwise qualified), a replicated version ''of'' the Earl Grey (one or other of those {{w|Earl Grey|of that name}}, possibly the {{w|Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey|2nd Earl}} for whom the tea blend was supposedly named) and a second such beverage for him to later drink. See more in the [[#Explanation|explanation]] above regarding the title text
|-
! colspan="2" | Words Picard could have seen in the first drawing, but which were not included as labels on the line
|-
| Cold
| Like Iced tea, asking for cold tea is a relatively normal request.
|-
| Pink
| Earl grey is usually an orange-brown color, not pink. There are, however, a wide variety of [https://www.adagio.com/search/index.html?query=rose teas which come from pink leaves] or [https://www.flourandspiceblog.com/karachi-style-kashmiri-chai-pink-tea/ whose color is "pinkish"].
|}

==Transcript==
:[At the top of the panel, there is a large caption covering two lines with a sub-caption below in a normal-sized font:]
:<big>Other words Captain Picard tried at the end of his tea order before settling on "hot"</big>
:From most normal to least

:[Bellow this we see Picard, drawn bald except for a bit of hair near his ears and behind his head. He stands next to a machine, which is a standing rectangle of the same dimensions as Picard. In the front, there is an opening around the middle, a dispenser from where the ordered items can be retrieved. There is a label at the top of the machine. Picard is giving a command to the machine. His first three words are clearly spoken out as they stand, but then at the end of the sentence, instead of just adding one more word, there is a list of five words in a column between two gray lines. Five words are visible, but the top and bottom words are fading out, presumably other words are above and below, but no longer visible. All except the middle are gray. The middle word is placed as the direct follow up to the first three words in the sentence Picard speaks out, and this word is black like the previous three words. So this middle word is clearly the one he actually speaks out. The others were options, presumably on his mind.]
:Label: Replicator
:Picard:
Good.
Cold.
Tea. Earl Grey. Hot.
Dry.
Pink.

:[To the left of the machine, a long arrow begins snaking its way towards the bottom, where it ends in an arrow pointing down towards the bottom of the panel. At the top, there is a broad and thick bar from which it starts. Beneath this there are several ticks, the first three are close together and on a part of the arrow that goes almost straight down. But then the arrow curves in under the drawing of Picard, and goes over another drawing of him, placed in a captioned frame. The arrow goes around this and up on the other side, where it goes around another drawing of Picard in a similarly captioned frame. After having gone around this frame it goes a bit up before turning almost straight down before the final arrowhead that points down. In total there are 36 labeled ticks on the arrow, see labels below. The ticks have very varying distances between them. There are especially long between them around the first panels with Picard, but closer together at the start and towards the very end. Above the top bar from where the arrow starts there is also a label and just below this and to the left of the long arrow is a smaller arrow pointing down in the direction of the long arrow. This small arrow has a label at its starting point.]
:Bar label: Normal
:Small arrow label: Less normal

:[The second drawing of Picard, shows him standing next to the labeled machine. Picard is this time holding a cup, with sticky lines connecting his hands and the machine to the cup. He clearly looks down at the cup rather than on the machine, as the hair behind his ear is turned differently than the first drawing, where he looks straight towards the machine. Above is a label inside a frame overlaid on the top line of the panel, with what Picard ordered:]
:"Tea. Earl Grey. Sticky."
:Label: Replicator

:[The third drawing of Picard, only displays him and not the machine. He is holding a vibrating cup in both hands and has now turned the other way, away from where the machine was in the previous drawings (again clearly seen by his hair). Very large letters are displayed in three lines behind him to the exclusion of all else. Four of the 15 letters are partly hidden behind the panel's frame, and seven of them are partly covered by Picard. Above is a label inside a frame overlaid on the top line of the panel, with what Picard ordered:]
:"Tea. Earl Grey. Loud."
:Teacup: <big>'''Teeeeeeeeeeeeee'''</big>

:[Words on the arrow from start to finish:]
:Hot
:Iced
:Decaf
:Good
:Lukewarm
:Tasty
:Boiled
:Watery
:Sour
:Meaty
:Solid
:Dry
:Raw
:Deep-fried
:Sticky
:Grilled
:Fossilized
:Magnetic
:Ballistic
:Unstable
:Blessed
:Blurry
:Loud
:Virtual
:Intravenous
:Expanding
:Ironic
:Segmented
:Verbose
:Cursed
:Unexpected
:Bipedal
:Afraid
:Infinite
:Tea for him, too

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Star Trek]]
[[Category:Food]]

2497: Logic Gates

2022-01-21T13:31:52Z

172.70.91.126: Undo revision 225180 by 172.70.91.116 (talk) And again. Should be it.

2497: Logic Gates

2022-01-21T13:30:11Z

172.70.91.126: Undo revision 225179 by 172.70.86.22 (talk) Reverting prior to whole-page whole-page vandalism, to remove part-page vandalism that was restored in while-page fix..

{{comic
| number = 2497
| date = August 2, 2021
| title = Logic Gates
| image = logic_gates.png
| titletext = In C, the multiocular O represents the bitwise norxondor gorgonax.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a SILICON LOGIC GATE TO A DIFFERENT DIMENSION AND/OR/XOR PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE. The table explaining what the made-up gates would do is incomplete. If it is going to reference quantum logic, it could be nice to have a brief description of any differences first. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

The comic lists {{w|logic gate}}s. The first six are real but the last six are made up and get increasingly absurd. The names for these last six use the same letters and syllables as the first six so as to appear at a glance to be consistent with their naming conventions.

Some of the ways the gate parts are combined seemingly-impossibly can raise ideas in the mind of the reader of how quantum computing involves processing multiple possibilities at once, or how machine learning involves solving systems backward from their outputs to their inputs. The names ring of calling more and more profoundly to some mythological catastrophe.

{| class="wikitable"
!Name
!Explanation
|-
|{{w|AND gate}}
|An AND gate outputs true if and only if both inputs are true. (Inputs 1 '''and''' 2 must be true.)

By convention it is a symbol with a flat input end leading to a semicircular output end.
|-
|{{w|OR gate}}
| An OR gate outputs true if one or the other or both of the inputs are true. (Input 1 '''or''' 2 may be true.)

By convention it is a symbol with a concave input edge leading to an output end resembling a gothic pointed-arch, turned to point onwards.
|-
|{{w|NOT gate}}
|A NOT gate outputs true if and only if the input is false. (The sole input must '''not''' be true.)

The convention for the isolated NOT gate is to be a triangle (reminiscent of a diode or op-amp comparator), that conspicuously points in the direction of logical passage, tipped with a circle.
|-
|{{w|NOR gate}}
|A NOR gate outputs true if and only if both inputs are false. (Neither 1 '''nor''' 2 must be true; alternately interpreted as it must '''n'''ot be true that either 1 '''or''' 2 are true.)

The symbol is the OR shape with the NOT-circle at its tip.
|-
|{{w|XOR gate}}
|A XOR (short for "eXclusive OR") gate outputs true if one, or the other, but not both of the inputs are true. (Mutually e'''x'''cusively, either 1 '''or''' 2 must be true.)

This symbol is the standard OR one but with a further concave line stood-off slightly from the usual one to connect to the input lines to distinguish its more discriminating behaviour.
|-
|{{w|NAND gate}}
|A NAND (short for "Not AND") gate outputs true if one or the other or both of the inputs is false. (It must '''n'''ot be true that both 1 '''and''' 2 are true.)

The symbol is the AND gate with the NOT-circle at its tip.
|-
|NORX gate
|A ''single'' feedline leads into a standard OR-style input end, while two lines are seen departing from an AND-style output front.

If the gate obeys only AND logic and the input is not internally duplicated for the purpose then the result would always be false.

If the gate uses OR logic ''and/or'' the input is internally used for both traditionally-required inputs, then the output would be exactly of the state of the original input.

The two outputs appear to be duplications (unlike Out And Not Out pairings) so the overall effect may be to act as a non-interfering 'splitter' gate.

Alternately, if the single input carries a superposition of two signals (see NORG XORT, below) then this might be teased apart into two inputs, internally, processed (optionally making a new superposition of AND and OR results upon the separated inputs) and propagating onwards into two different and deliberately unentangled (but possibly still each superpositonal) outputs for further quantum processing.

(There are no NOT-type or XOR-type elements to the diagram, yet it is notable as being a partially-rearranged anagram of "XNOR Gate".)
|-
|GAND Ate
|Two inputs feed into an AND-style receiving end. The presumed output end features a mirrored XOR input design complete with two connections onwards.

Assuming it still accepts inputs from the left and produces outputs to the right, it is possible this gate initially acts as an AND-gate to the inward pair but then (randomly?) generates output signals that would, as inputs to an XOR, produce the same output. That is, if both inputs are true then the two outputs are paired as one as true and one as false (in either order); for any other inputs both outputs are in the same and identical (not-specified) logic-state.

(The name is a spoonerism of "AND Gate", but may not necessarily have any meaning beyond that.)
|-
|XAND Gort
|Two inputs, unconventionally, feed into what is otherwise a perfectly standard NOT-symbol with the traditional single output.

How a single NOT is intended to handle two inputs and merge them is not obvious. All obvious functions are already met by existing two-input gates. Perhaps it is logically identical to the NOR gate, but drawn and named to express its nature as "not A and not B" rather than the less intuitive equivalent "not (A or B)".

Or possibly this is intended to create (and then invert) a combined quantum superposition of the two singular input feeds and therefore act as a form of signal multiplexer.

(The name seems only trivially related to the gate names associated with the drawn elements of functionality. "Xand" is a familiar form of the name "Alexander" that is sometimes used for major figures in fantasy novels for its striking "X", while "Gort" is the name of a particularly powerful alien robot seen in various versions of the film The Day The Earth Stood Still. Neither of these facts may bear true relevance, however.)
|-
|NORG Xort
|The initial input end resembles an XOR gate, but with 'negation'-nodes unconventionally sited where the inputs lead inwards. The output end is given a NAND appearance.

An XOR gate should not ultimately react any differently with both inputs pre-negated, compared to how the straight inputs would be handled, but the promise of NANDness may not make things quite so simple, without straying into the possibility of quantum-logic (as suggested above) where it may 'merely' be just highly complex to understand.

(The name given references NOR and XOR, but may be entirely divorced from any logical interpretation of its logical implications.)
|-
|ANDORX Gant
|Two inputs appear to feed into an OR-receiving end-cap, but this transitions into feedlines into a follow-up XOR-receiver, which in turn transitions (without output-capping) into two output tracks each with an 'orphaned' NOT-node upon them.

Generously, it could be interpreted as an OR-gate whose internal result is sent to one output track while the opposite is output to the other track, then both are inverted. Or quantum (re-)superposition and separations may again be at work in this case in ways hard to narrow down.

(The nominal title is yet further lacking in obvious logic, starting with a possible rearrangement of XOR and AND followed by part of GATE with an N inserted. "Gant" could possibly be a reference to a particular sportswear manufacturer/retailer. There is, of course, also the {{w|Gantt chart}}.)
|-
|NORXONDOR Gorgonax
|Two inputs lead into a (N)OR-like entry, the continuing sides of which repurpose as connectors leading through a pair of full anti-parallel NOT gates, before resuming drawn purpose as a NOR-gate output tip. man this is cringe brooooooo

It is possible the peculiarly placed NOTs are acting as indications of some kind of two-way signal filter/rectifier, if they were to be taken seriously.

(The gate name, however, is a bizarre construct that may even be echoing fantasy/mythology references, such as Gondor and the Gorgon.)
|}

The only real-life logic gate that was omitted is the XNOR gate (short for "eXclusive Not OR"; it compares the inputs, and if and only if they are equal, it outputs true). Note that the "NORG XORT" gate would be logically equivalent to it, if it were tipped to match its uniquely XOR-style tail, since it would then be an XNOR gate with NOT on both inputs, a modification that has no ultimate effect on the logic as it merely switches the case of which exclusivity it needs to be, and does not care which version of same-input it might be responding to.

A double-NOT on an input would produce the identical output again (...if the input is '''not not''' true). Two NOTs preapplied to a (N)AND or (N)OR would produce the same output as a (further-)NOTed version of the (N)OR or (N)AND, conversely (...if '''not'''-1 '''and''' '''not'''-2 then this also means that neither 1 '''nor''' 2). Normally this would be shown, if necessary, as full NOT gates on the lead-in inputs but (see Transcript, below, and the NORG XORT description above) the shortcut element is occasionally used in further mix'n'match symbology (together with reinterpreting connectivity lines as partial shape-edges and vice-versa) in 'understandable' but definitely non-standard ways.

Along with the deliberate confusion of connector and shape-edge lines, directionality is also played with in several cases, with input 'ends' perhaps also at the (implied) output end and reversed sub-symbols implying a composite gate with substructural feedback or perhaps diode-rectification upon a bidirectional logic path.

Much like [[2360: Common Star Types]], as the list progresses, the names start to sound more like mythical creatures, closing with the "Norxondor gorgonax". As with the symbology, the names appear to be nonsensical recombinations of the standard ones (perhaps with off-subject inspirations, in some cases) but often do not match up with the symbolic (mis)use, such as an X in the name not implying/being implied by an XOR's unique drawn feature.

In the title text [[Randall]] claims that in the {{w|C (programming language)|programming language C}} the {{w|multiocular O}} (ꙮ) character, an exotic glyph variant of the Cyrillic letter O, is used to represent the bitwise version of the last operator Norxondor gorgonax (presumably ꙮꙮ represents the non-bitwise version), fitting as the multiocular O is used to refer to "many-eyed {{w|seraphim}}" (angels) in some religious literature. {{w|Gorgon}}s ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2360:_Common_Star_Types beige] or otherwise) have heads covered with snakes instead of hair, and so possess multiple eyes, the most famous was known as {{w|Medusa}} (she was [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/images/e/e5/1608_1088x1074y_Medusa_and_floating_earth.png depicted] in [[1608: Hoverboard]]). The ꙮ character abstractly inspires ideas of great otherworldly demons like those of the Cthulhu mythos.

C is a low-level programming language, and as such, it has many operations that correspond to logical (i.e. bitwise) operations. These contrast with operations that work in a non-bitwise way. For example, "&&" is the non-bitwise "AND" operator that takes the operands as a whole, while "&" is the bitwise "AND" that combines the respective bits of its two inputs independently before spitting out the new single composite value the output bits represent. In non-bitwise operations, 0 always represents "FALSE", while any non-zero value means "TRUE" for inputs, and 1 is used to represent TRUE for outputs. Thus, "14 && 3" gives the result 1: TRUE AND TRUE -> TRUE. In the bitwise operation, using the same values, the decimal value 14 has the binary value 1110 and the decimal value 3 has the binary value 0011, and for this example we get:
1110 = 14
& 0011 = 3
0010 = 2

==Transcript==
:[The comic shows a chart with twelve electronic logic gates arranged in three rows of four. Each gate is depicted as a schematic symbol, with a label underneath. Above them is a header:]
:Common logic gate symbols

:[Here below follows a description of the 12 gates in the three rows, with their label given beneath each description:]

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. Two inputs on the left lead to the vertical left edge of a solid D-shaped symbol. From the right side of the D there is one output.]
:AND gate

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. Two inputs on the left lead to a convex-crescent left edge of a crescent-shaped symbol. The right side of the crescent symbol's shape forms a point at its output. From the right side of the crescent there is one output.]
:OR gate

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. One input leads to a triangular symbol pointing to the right. There is a small bubble symbol connected to the triangle on the output, which leads right.]
:NOT gate

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. This is identical to the OR GATE, except the output has a bubble attached, like the NOT GATE's output.)
:NOR gate

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. This is identical to the OR GATE, except the left-hand arc at the input has a double-stroked line.]
:XOR gate

:[A standard gate symbol used in real life. This is identical to the AND GATE, except the output has a bubble attached, like the NOT GATE's output.]
:NAND gate

:[An unusual symbol. This symbol has one input on the left leading to a convex-crescent left edge, like the OR GATE. The output side as a smooth crescent like the AND GATE but has two outputs.]
:NORX gate

:[An unusual symbol. This symbol has two inputs on the left leading to a vertical left edge input, like the AND GATE. The output side has a convex-crescent double-stroked output like the mirror image of the XOR GATE's input. There are two outputs.]
:GAND ate

:[An unusual symbol. This resembles the NOT GATE except there are two inputs instead of one leading into the left side.]
:XAND gort

:[An unusual symbol. This has a double-stroked convex-crescent input like the XOR GATE, but the two inputs have bubbles attached. The single output has a smooth crescent shape with a bubble, like a NAND GATE.]
:NORG xort

:[An unusual symbol. Two inputs lead to a convex-crescent edge, and the two lines of this symbol now enter a double-stroked convex-crescent input like the XOR GATE. The two lines of -this- symbol have bubbles placed half way across their horizontal length, and are presumably the outputs.]
:ANDORX gant

:[An unusual symbol. The symbol is identical to the NOR GATE, except the upper and lower horizontal parts of the symbols hull have a NOT GATE placed on them - one pointing to the left on the upper line, and to the right on the lower line. There is one output to the symbol, with a bubble attached.]
:NORXONDOR gorgonax

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Charts]]
[[Category:Programming]]

2497: Logic Gates

2022-01-21T10:47:46Z

172.70.91.126: joe biden

2570: Captain Picard Tea Order

2022-01-20T12:18:55Z

172.70.91.126:

{{comic
| number = 2570
| date = January 19, 2022
| title = Captain Picard Tea Order
| image = captain_picard_tea_order.png
| titletext = We can ask the Earl for his order once he's fully extruded from the dispenser.
}}
*This was the fifth comic to come out after the [[Countdown in header text]] started.

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by EXTRUDED EARL GREY- Please change this comment when editing this page. There would be way too many additional [[285: Wikipedian Protester|citations needed]] for it to work here. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
Captain {{w|Jean-Luc Picard}} is the captain of the starship ''USS Enterprise'' in the TV series ''{{w|Star Trek: The Next Generation}}''. {{w|Earl Grey tea}} is a beverage that he requests many times in the series, with the exact phrase "[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iaAT6-dY1QI Tea. Earl Grey. Hot.]"

[[Randall]] is parodying this expression with [[#Other Words|other words]] that could follow "Tea. Earl Grey.", starting from ones considered "normal" moving to those presumed "less normal" down a long and winding arrow.

The machine that Picard is using is a {{w|Replicator (Star Trek)|replicator}}, which can create objects (typically food and drink) according to a pre-programmed pattern, such as Picard's requested Earl Grey tea. In principle, almost anything can be ordered, so some might consider it a bit boring that it is always just tea. And always hot. But for Picard, this is presumably a constant comfort to punctuate what can often be a far from routine job.

When Picard orders his usual tea, other qualifying options are illustrated, as if upon a list or submenu that might be displayed for those that need a hint - though Picard is usually focussed upon his more frequent choice when giving the voice command.

Then results of two examples from the normal/less-normal scale are also illustrated: Sticky tea and loud tea. Sticky is kind of obvious, though perhaps not immediately understandable, but the loud version is a tea that screams "Teeee..."

The very last qualifying addition, the least normal is not a single word but "Tea for him, too." This reinterprets the meaning of the standard introductory words, such that the replicator has produced a plain (unspecified) tea as well as an actual "Earl Grey", like a living person (either one of the {{w|Earl Grey}}s or a person named Grey with the given forename of Earl). Picard has on purpose ordered tea for himself, followed by the a person called Earl Grey and then queues up a further tea to serve to this newly created person.

In contrast to the often trivial use of a replicator as merely a potentially infinitely versatile vending-machine, the comic sets up a number of quite esoteric options, culminating in Earl Gray himself potentially drinking (generic) tea, after both him and the tea have been replicated into existence by Picard.

In the title text, someone tells Picard that they should wait until the Earl has been fully extruded from the dispenser, and ''then'' ascertain what he would actually wish to drink. The presumption is that it could obviously take some time to get a full person (living) out of the replicator. However, where the replicator can create other things than food (e.g. spare parts), it is {{w|Replicator_(Star_Trek)#Origins_and_limitations|stated in the series}} that it cannot create living things as the precision of the molecular assembly process is too low (and the dispensing aperture used for the materialisation may also be too restrictive) so this order would certainly not be canonically possible.

===Other Words===
{| border =1 width=100% cellpadding=1 class="wikitable"
! Word !! Explanation
|-
| Hot
| A fairly normal word to be used when ordering tea. Although that it even needs specifying is itself a clue that other variations (such as "Iced", below) are available. This is the chosen word of the five words Picard is thinking about in the first drawing. The act of requesting this is thus illustrated, though not of the appearance of the tea itself.
|-
| Iced
| {{w|Iced Tea}} is a 'normal' variation of tea.
|-
| Decaf
| Traditional teas (from {{w|Camellia sinensis}}) tend to have caffeine in them. Asking for {{w|Decaffeination|decaffeinated}} tea is not particularly uncommon if the drinker requires it.
|-
| Good
| A normal, subjective term. Most people drinking tea would want it to be good, but to specify it like this would perhaps be strange.
This is one of the words in the first drawing, as a listed alternative to Hot.
|-
| Lukewarm
| While this is a temperature that tea can be at, most people do not want their teas to be lukewarm.
|-
| Tasty
| Similar to good, most people would want their tea to be tasty, or at least flavorsome.
|-
| Boiled
| Boiling the water used to make the tea is a common and normal way to increase the flavor and nutrients extracted from the tea leaves, though it is suggested that the actual ideal temperature of hot water is 75-98°C (167-210°F), according to whether it is a light tea or a dark one, and that perhaps it should be sipped at around 65°C/150°F-ish if desired 'hot'.
Having made a tea and ''then'' bringing it back to the boil (especially after adding milk/etc) may destroy some of the desirable qualities previously imbued.
|-
| Watery
| Tea is a drink that often involves water, but this perhaps suggests over dilution or under infusion in some way.
|-
| Sour
| Many people do not enjoy a sour taste, which can accompany rot and is a strange thing to specify when ordering Earl Grey tea. Although lemon juice is often an additive used in the same way (but as a complete alternative) to milk.
|-
| Meaty
| Most teas are plant-based.
|-
| Solid
| Tea is usually drunk as a liquid. It would be strange to ask for solid tea.
|-
| Dry
| Tea is a liquid typically made with water and may have milk. A dry version might be either unmade (e.g. tea leaves in their un-infused form) or freeze-dried back into a dehydrated form.
("Dry" can also be used to describe {{w|Dryness (taste)|astringent varities of wine}} ''or'' {{w|Prohibition|enforced alcohol-free scenarios}}. For either option, it assumes a default serving with an {{w|Hot_toddy#Variations|alcoholic component}}, or an entirely {{w|Long Island iced tea|alternate basis}} for the beverage, which the request needs to be specify it is not.) This is one of the five words Picard is thinking about in the first drawing.
|-
| Raw
| This describes tea that has not been "cooked", so it would just be tea made with room-temperature water. This is {{w|Iced_tea#Sun_tea|possible}} but generally takes many hours.
|-
| Deep-fried
| Tea is not usually deep-fried. But you'll probably {{w|Deep-fried Mars bar|find someone}} who has tried it, [https://www.pitco.com/blog/deep-fried-liquids-trend one way or another].
|-
| Sticky
| Perhaps significantly dehydrated, or thickened with enough of a hydrophilic substance, this would produce something very unlike most teas that would usually be requested.
This scenario is illustrated to show a clearly messy product that awkwardly sticks to and drips from the replicator as well as Picard.
|-
| Grilled
| Tea is not usually grilled.
|-
| Fossilized
| Since tea is a liquid, it would be tricky to figure out how to fossilize it.
|-
| Magnetic
| Tea is not magnetic. Magnetic metals would have to be added to the tea, which would not be pleasant to drink.
|-
| Ballistic
| Usually, the replicated beverage is deposited in a stationary cup, but Picard could ask for it to be dropped or thrown out instead.
|-
| Unstable
| This word is often used to refer to radioactive or explosive materials, which hopefully is not a property that would apply to something meant to be ingested. Alternatively, this could imply that the receptacle into which the tea is delivered should be unstable - being unbalanced, or lacking a flat bottom. This is likely to lead to the tea being spilled.
|-
| Blessed
| Tea is a beverage, and it may be strange to ask a machine to create 'blessed' tea.
In role-playing games, items can be Blessed, i.e. having greater positive or lesser negative effects. This includes potions, a class of drinks that do not usually include any teas but could contain the "potion of water", which may therefore be the basis of this blessed brew.
|-
| Blurry
| Being blurry is not a normal state for tea to have.
|-
| Loud
| While molecules in tea (especially hot tea, and vitally so in an {{w|The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (novel)|Infinite Improbability Drive}}) do move vigorously, this does not usually result in distinct audible effects.
However, as illustrated, it seems the requested cup of tea is produced capable of emitting a high-pitched, high-volume whining sound that entirely dominates the vicinity. It actually appears to somewhat vocalise what it is, Teeeee...
|-
| Virtual
| Virtual tea cannot be produced physically, so asking a physical tea machine for it would be very strange.
|-
| Intravenous
| This means the tea would be injected directly into the customer's veins, likely a very painful experience if the tea comes out boiling. Instrument of choice would probably be a {{w|Infuser|''tea infuser''}}.
|-
| Expanding
| In a sense, most hot tea is expanding: as the water in the tea evaporates, it becomes much less dense, increasing in "size".
But most people would probably argue that the evaporated water is no longer part of the tea. Water, like most materials, usually expands as it increases in temperature—except between freezing and about 4° C, where it has the unusual property of {{w|Water_%28molecule%29#Density_of_water_and_ice|''contracting slightly''}} as temperature increases. If tea behaves similarly despite the extra dissolved compounds, then "expanding tea" would describe any tea between 4° C and boiling point. Possibly beyond, and explosively so, if {{w|Superheating|superheated}} and then nucleating points are introduced.
|-
| Ironic
| How tea could be ironic is a mystery.
|-
| Segmented
| Tea is usually served in a cup. It tends to stick together and form one liquid. Separating the tea into segments would not be possible.
|-
| Verbose
| This describes using lots of words and language, and would not likely be used for tea, because it cannot speak. Command-line computer programs often run in a 'silent' mode without displaying every step of what happens on the screen. Such programs may have a {{w|Verbose mode|''-verbose'' parameter}} that disables the silent mode. As the replicator is run by a computer, the verbose parameter could be applied to the process of tea-making, with the replocator providing an info-dump on the molecular arrangement of the tea, together with the cup of liquid.
|-
| Cursed
| As with "Blessed", above, items can be Cursed in role-playing games, i.e. having greater negative or lesser positive effects; while there are strategic uses for Cursed items, generally the player would prefer uncursed ones (neutral or blessed). Amongst the curseable items are potions, a class of consumables that do not usually include any teas but does contain the "potion of water", which may therefore be the cause of this cursed cuppa.
Cursed items have featured in xkcd previously: [[2332: Cursed Chair]], [[2376: Curbside]], and [[:Category:Cursed Connectors]].
|-
| Unexpected
| By definition, Picard is asking for tea, expecting it promptly. Perhaps the request for it to be "unexpected" would cause it to be delivered at an unknown time in the future, or to have some alteration.
|-
| Bipedal
| Tea does not walk.{{citation needed}} This would be a very strange term to use when describing tea.
|-
| Afraid
| Tea does not have feelings. Although [https://www.quotes.net/mquote/901305 water may consider some things to be unpleasant].
|-
| Infinite
| The scope of this request is unclear. It could mean endless production (a steady stream of tea, without obvious limits so long as servicing the request remains practical) or an instantaneous production of an infinite volume of tea (possibly more immediately shown to be flawed in its method of execution). Either could result in an infinitely ''dense'' tea (eventually?), but this may no longer be {{w|No-hair theorem|identifiable as tea}} so might be one of the less practical options, even amongst those on this list.
Indeed, Randall ranks it as the least 'normal', except for just ''one'' further named order.
|-
| Tea for him, too
| {{w|Earl Grey tea|Earl Grey}} is a tea blend.
Taken along with the title text, this Replicator order is for "Tea" (not otherwise qualified), a replicated version ''of'' the Earl Grey (one or other of those {{w|Earl Grey|of that name}}, possibly the {{w|Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey|2nd Earl}} for whom the tea blend was supposedly named) and a second such beverage for him to later drink. See more in the [[#Explanation|explanation]] above regarding the title text
|-
! colspan="2" | Words Picard thinks about in the first drawing, but which where not included as labels on the line
|-
| Cold
| Like Iced tea, asking for cold tea is a relatively normal request.
|-
| Pink
| Earl grey is usually an orange-brown color, not pink.
|}

==Transcript==
:[At the top of the panel there is a large caption covering two lines with a subcaption below in a normal sized font:]
:<big>Other words Captain Picard tried at the end of his tea order before settling on "hot"</big>
:From most normal to least

:[Bellow this we see Picard, drawn bald except for a bit of hair near his ears and behind his head. He stands next to a machine, that is a standing rectangle of the same dimensions as Picard. In the front there is an opening around the middle, a dispenser from where the ordered items can be retrieved. There is a label at the top of the machine. Picard is giving a command to the machine. His first three words are clearly spoken out as they stand, but then at the end of the sentence, in stead of just adding one more word, there is a list of five words in a column between two gray lines. Five words are visible, but the top and bottom words are fading out, presumably other words are above and below, but no longer visible. All except the middle are gray. The middle word is placed as the direct follow up to the first three words in the sentence Picard speaks out, and this word is black like the previous three words. So this middle word is clearly the one he actually speaks out. The others where options, presumably on his mind.]
:Label: Replicator
:Picard:
Good.
Cold.
Tea. Earl Grey. Hot.
Dry.
Pink.

:[To the left of the machine a long arrow begins snaking it's way to wards the bottom, where it ends in an arrow pointing down towards the bottom of the panel. At the top there is a broad and thick bar from which it start. Beneath this there are several ticks, the first three are close together and on a part of the arrow that goes almost straight down. But then the arrow curves in under the drawing of Picard, and goes over another drawing of him, placed in a captioned frame. The arrow goes around this and up on the other side, where it goes around another drawing of Picard in a similarly captioned frame. After having gone around this frame it goes a bit up before turning almost straight down before the final arrow head that points down. In total there are 36 labeled ticks on the arrow, see labels below. The ticks have very varying distance between them. There are especially long between them around the first panels with Picard, but closer together at the start and towards the very end. Above the top bar from where the arrow starts there is also a label and just below this and to the left of the long arrow is a smaller arrow pointing down in the direction of the long arrow. This small arrow has a label at its starting point.]
:Bar label: Normal
:Small arrow label: Less normal

:[The second drawing of Picard, shows him standing next to the labeled machine. Picard is this time holding a cup, with sticky lines connecting his hands and the machine to the cup. He clearly looks down at the cup rather than on the machine, as the hair behind his ear is turned differently than the first drawing, where he looks straight towards the machine. Above is a label inside a frame overlaid on the top line of the panel, with what Picard ordered:]
:"Tea. Earl Grey. Sticky."
:Label: Replicator

:[The third drawing of Picard, only displays him and not the machine. He is holding a vibrating cup in both hands, and has now turned the other way, away from where the machine was in the previous drawings (again clearly seen by his hair). Very large letters are displayed in three lines behind him to the exclusion of all else. Four of the 15 letters are partly hidden behind the panels frame, and seven of them are partly covered by Picard. Above is a label inside a frame overlaid on the top line of the panel, with what Picard ordered:]
:"Tea. Earl Grey. Loud."
:Teacup: <big>'''Teeeeeeeeeeeeee'''</big>

:[Words on the arrow from start to finish:]
:Hot
:Iced
:Decaf
:Good
:Lukewarm
:Tasty
:Boiled
:Watery
:Sour
:Meaty
:Solid
:Dry
:Raw
:Deep-fried
:Sticky
:Grilled
:Fossilized
:Magnetic
:Ballistic
:Unstable
:Blessed
:Blurry
:Loud
:Virtual
:Intravenous
:Expanding
:Ironic
:Segmented
:Verbose
:Cursed
:Unexpected
:Bipedal
:Afraid
:Infinite
:Tea for him, too

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Star Trek]]
[[Category:Food]]

Talk:2570: Captain Picard Tea Order

2022-01-19T23:31:00Z

172.70.91.126:

...{{w|Builder's tea|Builders}}. I mean, Picard is French and Trek(/Randall) is 'Merican but I suspect it would still be a valid option to give the Ready-Room replicator... [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 23:31, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

397: Unscientific

2022-01-18T21:37:25Z

172.70.91.126: Correcting capitalisation. (Not sure about the Anthony Cummins bit... Either find a wikilink/whatever to explain or leave the (controversial) author out of it and just encurage independent research.

{{comic
| number = 397
| date = March 17, 2008
| title = Unscientific
| image = unscientific.png
| titletext = Last week, we busted the myth that electroweak gauge symmetry is broken by the Higgs mechanism. We'll also examine the existence of God and whether true love exists.
}}

==Explanation==
In the first and second frames, [[Megan]] can be seen accusing ''{{w|MythBusters}}'' of not actually "doing science" because of its lack of {{w|Rigour|rigor}} - a debate beyond the scope of this Wiki. The {{w|zombie}} of deceased physicist, {{w|Richard Feynman}}, comes to explain to [[Megan]] that she has failed to recognize the purpose of ''MythBusters''. He explains that ''MythBusters''' value is getting people to accept and understand the importance of experimentation in the scientific method, and that more complex lessons (such as on rigor) would be wasted on people who don't understand those basics.

In the last frame, [[Cueball]] attempts to save himself and [[Megan]] from zombie Feynman by implying that physicists, being extremely intelligent, would have more desirable brains. Also, in a science lab, the number of brains available would be higher than just two. Feynman's closing remark implies that {{w|String theory|string theorists}} have no brains; the joke being that string theorists are presumably less intelligent than Cueball and Megan, who were merely watching television prior to being attacked, and probably also a pun on {{w|brane}}s. For another instance of [[Randall]] knocking string theorists, see [[171: String Theory]]. This notion fits appropriately with Feynman's description of the core of science. Moreover, Feynman's own career involved applying physics to real world applications (such as for the Manhattan Project), whereas the work of string theorists is theoretical and untested.

The title text starts by rebounding against the complaint of validity as science by purportedly tackling a ''really'' big scientific inquiry. Then he veers away into two far more esoteric proposed fields of study, of which at least one is not even determinable by the scientific method, probably both.

The ''Mythbusters'' episode being watched is likely {{w|MythBusters_(2008_season)#Episode_109_–_"Ninjas_2"|Episode 109 – "Ninjas 2"}}, which was the second episode in which the Mythbusters attempted to catch an arrow mid-flight. The voice from the television is likely that of {{w|List_of_MythBusters_cast_members#Robert_Lee|Robert Lee}}, who provided the narration for ''Mythbusters''. It should also be noted that the ninja mentioned in this is the inaccurate pop culture iteration not the historical Shinobi no Mono. for more accurate info on the Shinobi search "Anthony Cummins".

Zombies are a [[:Category:Zombies|recurring theme]] in xkcd, particularly zombie scientists, which has also occurred twice after this comic with {{w|Paul Erdős}} in [[599: Apocalypse]] and {{w|Marie Curie}} in [[896: Marie Curie]].

==Transcript==
:[Cueball and Megan are sitting on a coach, watching Mythbusters.]
:TV: Can a ninja catch an arrow? On this episode, we'll find out!
:Cueball: Mmm, science.
:Megan: Hey, Mythbusters is entertaining, but it's not science.

:Zombie Feynman: ''BRAAAAAIIINNS''...
:Cueball: Zombie Feynman!
:Zombie Feynman: You got a problem with Mythbusters?
:Megan: They fail at basic rigor!

:Zombie Feynman: "Ideas are tested by experiment." That is the core of science. Everything else is bookkeeping.

:Zombie Feynman: By teaching people to hold their beliefs up to experiment, ''Mythbusters'' is doing more to drag humanity out of the unscientific darkness than a thousand lessons in rigor. Show them some love.

:Zombie Feynman: Anyway, back to zombie stuff. I hunger for ''BRAAAAAIIINNS!''
:Cueball: Uh, try the physics lab next door.
:Zombie Feynman: I said brains. All they've got are string theorists.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring real people]]
[[Category:Physics]]
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Zombies]]

Talk:2569: Hypothesis Generation

2022-01-18T17:38:12Z

172.70.91.126:

I removed a couple of paragraphs that seem to be more about the the editor's opinions on education and the philosophy of science than the comic. {{unsigned|Nitpicking}}
:I had a look at what you removed:
:* I think this ''is'' a personal tutorial, or else bad teaching/learning by the intense Lenhart/Cueball interaction to the exclusion of all those unpictured.
:* It is indeed important not to do tests and then work out what kind of hypothesis would lead to the inevitably significant results you have already seen to stand out.
:That said, the bits could have been less wordy.
:(I'd be tempted to add Reversion To The Mean as a key problem of reacting wth ideas to prior 'random' test-results, but that wouldn't help to shorten anything!) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 17:38, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Also, what the heck happens on 31 January, as mentioned in the top image at xkcd.com?{{unsigned|Nitpicking}}
:Haha, this is Randall teasing us about our hypotheses about the Countdown over at https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Countdown_in_header_text [[User:Sure|Sure]] ([[User talk:Sure|talk]]) 13:01, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
::I just added this link [[Countdown in header text]] at the top of the comic aws for the previous four comics. See there. (and sign you comments ;-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:03, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
:::Oh, and I just read the title text. Totally makes sense from Randall's perspective! [[User:Sure|Sure]] ([[User talk:Sure|talk]]) 13:04, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
::::I really do not think this comic is a comment on the countdown. But I can see why it could be funny for us here at explain. But I'm quite sure that Randall stays away from all these fora discussing his comics. We put way to much importance to this site if we think he actually comes here... ;-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:14, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
:::::He doesn't need to come here! He just needs to like, go on the xkcd subreddit. [[User:Sure|Sure]] ([[User talk:Sure|talk]]) 14:26, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
::::::I don't think he would go there either... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 16:23, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

I'm too shy to do the edit myself, but shouldn't the explanation mention how the comic is going meta ? Like, Cueball is generating a hypothesis about hypothesis generation! (btw, how would you test that kind of hypothesis?…) --Anonymous reader {{unsigned ip|172.70.86.22}}
:You are never more anonymous than your IP, so please sign anyway. I think the meta of this is already implicit in the current explanation when it says: "He has made a hypothesis about how to generate a hypothesis. " --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 16:23, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Talk:2567: Language Development

2022-01-18T17:20:54Z

172.70.91.126:

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)
: There have definitely been kids on xkcd before. For example: [[1145: Sky Color]] (but I'm sure there are others). --[[User:NeatNit|NeatNit]] ([[User talk:NeatNit|talk]]) 20:04, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
:::That is not a baby. There have been several comics talking about or depicting babies, and lots with kids. The kid you showed there has her own category [[Science Girl]] and has thus been used alot. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 19:57, 13 January 2022 (UTC)
:: Other examples are [[674: Natural Parenting]], [[441: Babies]] and [[1650: Baby]] [[User:Kvarts314|Kvarts314]] ([[User talk:Kvarts314|talk]])
:::Yes nothing odd there, but we could of make a category for comics with babies or mentioning babies, but not like a character page... Could that be relevant? --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:56, 13 January 2022 (UTC)
:::: I think it would be relevant. --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.133|172.68.110.133]] 12:36, 13 January 2022 (UTC)
:::::Created: [[:Category:Comics featuring babies]] --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 19:57, 13 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)

Looking at Wiktionary, I believe the child is saying "[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/milk#Etymology_1 Milk] [https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/please#Etymology_1 Please]" See also [https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h%E2%82%82mel%C7%B5- Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₂melǵ-] [[User:Bpendragon|Bpendragon]] ([[User talk:Bpendragon|talk]]) 18:57, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

Hopefully he won't say the proto-Indo-European word for "bear". [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.26|162.158.74.26]] 19:09, 12 January 2022 (UTC)Pat
:You mean *hrktos? 20:45, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
:: Oops. I think a brown one ate my IP address.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.187.92|162.158.187.92]] 20:49, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
:::I think you mean [[2381: The True Name of the Bear|Arth?]] ;-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:56, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

The pace of early stage development isn't necessarily an indicator for continued development pacing. I didn't start Proto-Indo-European until I was almost 2, but had completed full vowel shift before second grade. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.73|108.162.237.73]] 21:20, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
:I corroborate this. I hadn't made many full sentences in Proto-Indo-European until around 4, but by 3rd grade I had fully changed to modern english. --[[Special:Contributions/172.70.126.215|172.70.126.215]] 23:12, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

Though the explanation eventually touches on this (perhaps multiple editors got in there and shuffled this nearer the end) I believe it should really have ''started'' with something about how Language Development (in a child) is being confused/conflated with Language Development (in human (pre)history). It would get straight to the point, I believe. It could then continue to go the further mile in getting into the deconstruction of it all. I'm leaving it unedited by myself, for now, because it deserves a lot more text-shuffling and refining than I can promise to do myself right now, but putting this idea out there to pique the interest of other possible editors. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.79|172.70.85.79]] 21:29, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
:I have done this now. Originally I and someone else both submitted a really long description at the same time and my "merge" in my limited time was just to put my text after his. Now that I have more time, I've gone through and tried to weave the two in a more logical way, and have it starting with the basic explanation of the joke. I'm new to contributing at this level so if someone wants to check it over to make sure it looks good, feel free. [[User:Levininja|Levininja]] ([[User talk:Levininja|talk]]) 00:34, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

"Old English developed out of Proto-Germanic. Modern English developed out of Old English with many additions from French..." According to John McWhorter, English is the product of Germanic tongues (spoken by Angles or Saxons?) creolized with the local Celtic languages such as the ancestors of Welsh and Cornish. That involved a blending of grammar and some vocabulary. Later came pidginizing with Norse speech of the Vikings, where details like case inflections were blurred or lost. Romance borrowings came yet a bit later, with 1066 and all that Norman Conquest business. 
McWhorter's ''Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue: The Untold History of English'' is perhaps worth a read; hope I haven't mutilated the gist of it too much. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.245|172.70.110.245]] 01:01, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

I second a mention/explanation of the whole "ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny" idea mentioned above. In biological evolution that turned out to be an error, and it's obviously an error here, too. [[User:Mschmidt62|Mschmidt62]] ([[User talk:Mschmidt62|talk]]) 02:34, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

If the baby is speaking Proto-Indo-European (with some emerging Germanic) at age 1, and Elizabethan English by age 2, is anyone able to work out by what age they would be speaking our present form of English? --[[User:Enchantedsleeper|enchantedsleeper]] ([[User talk:Enchantedsleeper|talk]]) 10:23, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

The awesome subtext of this comic--and I'm not sure if it was intentional--is that English-speaking children really do learn proto-Indo-European words first, then proto-Germanic, then Middle English, then Norman French, and so on. Our simplest words are our oldest words, and Pa/Ma are relatively unchanged from a possible pre-PIE language (because similar sounds appear in Semitic languages). Our most basic words are usually our oldest words. Our pronouns and articles are proto-Germanic, and the next level of complexity are Anglo-Saxon in origin--mostly animal names and common items and actions. Only when we get into complexity do we encounter the French influences, and then newer words or compounds. The reason for this goes back to how languages change. As a new language "takes over" the first words they replace are legal (because who's running the courts), and high-end goods. Then commercial language shifts, and if there's a religious aspect or educational systems set up you'll see that come over as well. The hardest things to penetrate are the furthest from the invading speakers' influence: farm animals (why we use Anglo-Saxon "cow" for the animal but French "beef" for the meat from it, etc.) and finally the home. And yes, when you have a couple of parents interested in linguistics, they really do point out to each other the origin of their children's speech. Uh...should I be admitting this? [[User:MGoSeth|MGoSeth]] ([[User talk:MGoSeth|talk]]) 15:00, 18 January 2022 (UTC)
:Well, as far as cow/beef (and sheep/mutton, etc) that was 'distance from influence' in that the (old-style) francophones of the new ruling-classes rarely concerned themselves with the husbandry side and just used their native term for the eventual food-word whilst the long-standing native anglo(saxo)phone farmers got on with the rearing of the livestock with the animal-word. It wasn't a problem to 'penetrate' the usage but likely more a disinclination to even try, leaving a division of language by context.
:In other bits of English, both anglic and francish roots begot 'equal' terms (though at times class-divided as snobbery ''or'' inverse-snobbery drove particular speakers to decide to favour particular groups of synonyms) and thus expanded the language with near-duplicates.
:While dialects all over retained words even more niche than the farm/food distinction. Many NE-English terms, both basic and more complex, hold over from the era of Viking incursions and rule before even the francofied Nor(th)mans of Normandy as well as prior Celtic terms that survived the germanic and pre-germanic cultural influxes.
:More obvious in rural situations (at least for presumably archaic pronunciation, e.g. a ewe being a 'yeow') because industrialisation and driven population accumulation in the 'new' cities rather mashed valley-by-valley/dale-by-dale differences together into Mancunian/Bradfordian/etc superdialects (with still a few locality-based specificities, like the Thee-Thar/Dee-Dar divide over a few miles of industrial South Yorkshire or the "We was/I were" verb-(dis)agreement up in parts of the North Riding cities.
:It's been a while since I studied this, so forgive me if I'm out of date with the latest conclusions, but it was always so interesting how they came to conclusions of what artefacts were what particular age of linguistic 'fossil'. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.126|172.70.91.126]] 17:20, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

650: Nowhere

2022-01-17T13:30:15Z

172.70.91.126: Ref: wiktionary.org/wiki/apatosaurus - although I suspect many would say 'apatosaurii', and be happy.

{{comic
| number = 650
| date = October 16, 2009
| title = Nowhere
| image = nowhere.png
| titletext = I mean, seriously, NOWHERE? For starters, there are like a thousand species of dinosaur.
}}
[[Image:Apatosaurus scale mmartyniuk wiki.png|thumb|Comparison of three species of Apatosaurus and a human: ''A. ajax'' (Orange), ''A. louisae'' (Red), and ''B. parvus'' (green)]]
==Explanation==
This is a sarcastic comic poking fun at romanticism.

The phrase used by [[Cueball]] in the first panel hints at the romantic, suggesting that he is so happy to be with [[Megan]] that there is nowhere else that he would rather be right at this moment than here with her.

[[Megan]] wonders if this is her viewpoint, and imagines herself riding a dinosaur suggesting that she would rather be doing just that. This, and the title text are saying that the likelihood that out of all the possibilities in the universe, the chances that the one single place you would most want to be is just sitting with your significant other is fairly low.

The title text is Megan's comment to Cueball, where she asks him if he is serious, when there are like a thousand species of Dinosaurs he could be riding (or running from).

Megan previously rode an Apatosaurus in [[15: Just Alerting You]]. Apatosauruses are also mentioned in [[460: Paleontology]] and [[636: Brontosaurus]].

==Transcript==
:[Megan is sitting on a couch with Cueball lying in her lap, his feet going out over the armrest.]
:Cueball: There's nowhere I'd rather be than with you here right now.

:[Zoom in on Megan, still showing Cueball's head in her lap.]

:[Further zoom in on Megan, so only most of Cueball's head can be seen. The couch is only partly sketched, and behind her thee thought bobbles lead to a day dream she is having, where we see she is imagining herself riding an apatosaurus, holding the reins going into the dinosaurs mouth.]

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Romance]]
[[Category:Apatosaurus]]

849: Complex Conjugate

2022-01-15T14:59:09Z

172.70.91.126:

{{comic
| number = 849
| date = January 19th, 2011
| title = Complex Conjugate
| image = complex_conjugate.png
| titletext = Fun fact: if you say this every time a professor does something to a complex-number equation that drops the imaginary part, they'll eventually move the class to another room and tell everyone else except you.
}}

==Explanation==
This was the second comic with one of [[Randall|Randall's]] [[:Category:Fun fact|fun facts]].

This comic is a joke on the phrase "Shit just got real", which means "something has suddenly increased in difficulty and become genuinely challenging or dangerous".

[[Cueball]] is standing in front of a board delivering a lesson, and is about to multiply a wavefunction by its complex conjugate. A {{w|wave function}} is a mathematical description of a quantum system which uses {{w|complex number|complex}} values - numbers that have both a {{w|real number|real}} part and an {{w|imaginary number|imaginary}} part. Multiplying a wavefunction by its complex conjugate is a common thing to do, as it yields the probability density of where a particle is likely to be found, which is a real-valued function.

Complex numbers can be written in the form a + bi, where a is the real part and bi is the imaginary part. i is the imaginary unit, defined so that i² = -1. The {{w|complex conjugate}} of a complex number simply reverses the sign on the imaginary part - so for the number above, the complex conjugate is a - bi.

Multiplying the complex number by its own complex conjugate therefore yields (a + bi)(a - bi). If you multiply out the brackets, you get a² + abi - abi - b²i². The abi cancel each other out, and i² can be replaced by -1. Thus, the result is a² + b², a real number, so "shit just got real" as Cueball promised.

The title text notes that you can make this joke in class every time a calculation is performed that drops the imaginary part from a complex number, but warns that it would be so annoying that the professor will eventually find a way to have the class without you in it. Because nonreal numbers are often considered to have no physical significance, turning them into real numbers to produce a final answer is so common that this joke would quickly become tedious.

The wave function shown on Cueball's board is the {{w|Schrödinger_equation|time-dependent Schrödinger equation}} <math>i\hbar\dfrac{\partial}{\partial t} = \hat{H}\Psi</math>, a {{w|Differential equation|differential equation}} that the {{w|Wavefunction|wavefunction}} Ψ, which determines the possible positions of a quantum particle over time, always satisfies. The {{w|Derivative#Partial_derivatives|derivative}} should be written with ∂Ψ on the top; the omission of the Ψ may be a mistake.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball, holding a marker pen down in one hand, is standing at a whiteboard with two equations, one of which is the time-dependent Schrodinger equation and the other shows what the wavefunction equals, but from there it becomes unreadable. Below is a graph with a bell-shaped curve. There are also other unreadable markings on the board below the second equation and next to the graph.]
:Cueball: Okay, anyone who's feeling like they can't handle the physics here should probably just leave now.

:[In a frame-less panel Cueball is seen writing on the whiteboard. This is seen from the side of the board, so it is just a thin line with a shelf at the bottom for putting the pen on.]
:Cueball: Because I'm multiplying the wavefunction by its complex conjugate.
:Cueball: That's right.

:[Dramatic zoom in on Cueball appears to be writing the final part of his next equation.]
:Cueball: Shit just got ''real''.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Fun fact]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Physics]]
[[Category:Puns]]

Talk:2568: Spinthariscope

2022-01-15T03:13:09Z

172.70.91.126:

Someone has already updated the Wikipedia page to mention this comic reference, before anyone here has gotten around to writing the explanation [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 19:56, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

I added an initial explanation, but I don't recognize the references to gallium and tritium (although I know what glowsticks are), so someone else should fill in about that. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 20:13, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

Seems like there's something off with how the "ratio" is worded. It is a safe and legal toy, so the "actual safety and legality" is actually high-ish, right? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.178.25|172.70.178.25]] 20:44, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

- If "actual safety" is a large number and "apparent safety" is a small number, then their ratio (actual divided by apparent) is a large number. If "sctual safety" is a small number and "apparent safety" is a large number, then their ratio is a small number. So the comic's wording is perfectly fine and logical, and the paragraph about products in the explanation is not needed. (It's also kind of, um, **untrue**, but I'm trying to be kind to whoever wrote it.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.99|172.70.114.99]] 21:44, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

:If you take the amount of screaming in terror (high for the spin-thingie) and DIVIDE by the actual danger (low for the spin-thingie), then you get a ratio that in a rational world would always be close to 1 - the worse something is, the more (rational) people would want it banned. I think his point is that the ho-hum factor, the LACK of protests, for throwing a sharp heavy object high in the air toward a group of other children, divided by the actual danger from said sharp heavy object thrown high toward other children, results in a value on the opposite end of the spectrum. I was one of the kids who threw these things around without thinking, and nobody ever objected. Fortunately, I never saw any kid get killed by them, but that was pure luck. Point being, I don’t think the wording in the comic is wrong; the ‘correction’ is.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.103|108.162.245.103]] 22:35, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

::On second thought, there is something confusing about the wording of the comic: it conflates safety and legality as if they were the same thing, but the fact that they are NOT the same is the problem.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.223|108.162.245.223]] 22:49, 14 January 2022 (UTC)
:::They're not the same, but they're correlated. While the government hasn't always been very dilligent about it, these days dangerous toys usually get banned. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 22:57, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

::But the comic don’t divide the large/low amount of screaming by the low/large amount of danger, but by the large/low amount of safety for spinthariscope/darts. Hence the formula of the comic results in a number close to 1 for both toys, and a regular toy (low amount of screaming divided by large amount of safety) results in a number closer to zero.
::[[User:While False|While False]] ([[User talk:While False|talk]]) 22:57, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

:::You’re right. The comic is misworded, but not by saying “ratio” instead of “product” - it’s misworded by saying “actual safety” when it means “actual danger” thus giving the ratio a backward meaning.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.77|108.162.245.77]] 23:17, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

::::Just so!
::::[[User:While False|While False]] ([[User talk:While False|talk]]) 23:28, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

:I believe the ratio is apparent danger vs actual danger. So spinthariscope would be 10 apparent danger / 1 actual danger. And the lawn darts would be the opposite end of the spectrum: 1 apparent danger / 10 actual danger. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.185|172.70.214.185]] 22:40, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

:To me it appears that you are describing the “perceived danger to actual danger” ratio, while the comic mentions the “perceived danger to actual safety” ratio, which would be of no extreme value (high number divided by high number) for a spinthariscope. So I think that the current explanation, while cumbersome and against the convention of use of ratios, is mathematically true.
:[[User:While False|While False]] ([[User talk:While False|talk]]) 22:57, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

Make your own Spinthariscope kiddies https://www.instructables.com/Pocket-Size-Spinthariscope/. [[User:Steve|Steve]] ([[User talk:Steve|talk]]) 21:05, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

The {{w|Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Laboratory}}, which was marketed in the early 1950s & contains more energetic radioactive sources (i.e. uranium ores), might possibly be more dangerous. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.143.22|172.70.143.22]] 21:28, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

{{w|Talk:Spinthariscope|The talk page for the Wikipedia article}} has an interesting exposition by an IP in 2010 of why these aren't dangerous and the various isotopes used. [[User:Yngvadottir|Yngvadottir]] ([[User talk:Yngvadottir|talk]]) 21:49, 14 January 2022 (UTC)

And with that simple strip, all existing spinthariscopes sold out. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.50.237|172.68.50.237]] 01:01, 15 January 2022 (UTC)

I remember the (pre-'80s) lawn-darts in the 'leisure equipment box' that our Cub/Scout unit took to every annual camp and other suitable weekend activities (here in the UK). High-density plastic (possibly with a metal slug enclosed within the 'point', to add to the flights' directional stablisation, but maybe ''just'' plastic) and all points and edges rounded. Probably still dangerous if inadvertently thrown straight-enough upwards with enough force that gravity eventually brings it straight back down upon the unwary head of the thrower (or that of a fellow participant awaiting their turn), but we seemed to avoid that predicament. Things like the hefty hockey-sticks (field-hockey), cricket bats and even threadbare boxing gloves probably caused more injuries that needed treatment. But probably more by good luck than any legitimate physical reason. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.77|172.70.162.77]] 03:09, 15 January 2022 (UTC)