Talk:3210: Eliminating the Impossible

2026-02-21T02:34:42Z

2604:3D09:84:4000:6FFB:F472:7679:FF75:

I’ve found that when looking for an item, I’ll search harder and more thoroughly in the places where the item is supposed to be, which is just frustrating and usually unsuccessful.
Then I realized that if the item isn’t where it’s supposed to be, then it’s somewhere ''it isn’t supposed to be'' - so I start looking in those places.
[[Special:Contributions/170.64.111.76|170.64.111.76]] 20:51, 20 February 2026 (UTC)

It also assumes exclusion of the middle.
[[User:MithicSpirit|MithicSpirit]] ([[User talk:MithicSpirit|talk]]) 20:59, 20 February 2026 (UTC)

These guys sure are some professors of logic (I'm not sure if they own any doghouses, is what I mean). [[User:Fephisto|Fephisto]] ([[User talk:Fephisto|talk]]) 21:07, 20 February 2026 (UTC)

As and when the Explanation gets written (I imagine that someone's right in the middle of that now), it must be noted that Sherlock Holmes's self-proclaimed "Deductive reasoning" is really {{w|Abductive reasoning}}. (I actually blame Sir Arthur, rather than Sherlock (or 'narrator' Watson), for that error... But then he also believed in fairies, so obviously he's less than perfectly rational.) [[Special:Contributions/81.179.199.253|81.179.199.253]] 21:17, 20 February 2026 (UTC)
:Well, nobody did do anything with it, in the last hour or so, so I scrawled something pretty basic for others to ruthlessly dismember and 'remember' in their own prefered fashion. [[Special:Contributions/81.179.199.253|81.179.199.253]] 22:27, 20 February 2026 (UTC)

I think its pretty nice how this comics number is a countdown from 3. [[User:Xkdvd|Xkdvd]] ([[User talk:Xkdvd|talk]]) 22:57, 20 February 2026 (UTC)

By the way, meant to say earlier... just today (well, the day just before the midnight just gone), I spent a few moments trying to help someone find a single glove. They'd looked various places, and I ''went out to look in the car'' (twice, actually, because first I just checked the 'normal' places, footwells, door-pockets... then realised I hadn't actually checked the glove-compartment itself (which I don't think I've ever used to store gloves, of course, but I'd have looked silly if I hadn't gone back and checked it once it had occured to me) so out I went again) in order to ''not'' find the glove. Cue, later, the revelation that it had been in a bag (in the house) all along. And this was all mere hours ''before'' Randall published this comic. So, as we all used to say on the now defunct Fora, "<abbr title="Get Out Of My Head, Randall">GOOMHR</abbr>!" [[Special:Contributions/81.179.199.253|81.179.199.253]] 00:24, 21 February 2026 (UTC)

It's also possible to miss an item in a space you've searched. For instance, as a 12- or 13-year-old I once concluded that something (I forget what it was) must not be in my room, because I'd partitioned the rectangular box defined by the walls, floor and ceiling and searched each of the partitions. It turned out to be outside that box but still inside my room, because it was on the windowsill. [[User:Promethean|Promethean]] ([[User talk:Promethean|talk]]) 00:39, 21 February 2026 (UTC)

I actually did find it in the car though.--[[Special:Contributions/2604:3D09:84:4000:6FFB:F472:7679:FF75|2604:3D09:84:4000:6FFB:F472:7679:FF75]] 02:34, 21 February 2026 (UTC)

explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:3210: Eliminating the Impossible