explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:789: Showdown

2013-03-28T12:58:54Z

50.29.196.15: Created page with "That's some killer weed, man! 8)_~~~~"

That's some killer weed, man! 8)_[[Special:Contributions/50.29.196.15|50.29.196.15]] 12:58, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

562: Parking

2013-03-01T21:40:59Z

50.29.196.15: /* Transcript */

{{comic
| number = 562
| date = March 30, 2009
| title = Parking
| image = parking.png
| imagesize =
| titletext = Police reported three dozen cheerful bystanders, yet no one claims to have seen who did it.
}}

==Explanation==
There are few things so annoying as when a parking lot is full, and someone has decided to build in a buffer-zone to their parking job like this. (Perhaps that someone wanted to excange the risk of someone accidentally scratching their car, for the risk of someone [[Keyed|doing it on purpose.]]) However, there are a few non-violent ways to tackle the problem; [http://www.threadless.com/product/187/I_Park_Like_an_Idiot politely leave a note], or if possible move their car. Of course, [[Black Hat]] takes the less traveled path involving a {{w|blow torch}} and what looks to be a {{w|circular saw}}.

He's [[496|admittedly]] done this kind of thing before.

==Transcript==
:[Black Hat is in a car driving around a parking lot]

:[Black Hat's car pulls up next to a red car, that's parked over a line at an angle that block two spaces]

:[Black Hat gets out of his car]
:''SLAM''

:[Black Hat is now holding an acetylene cutting torch (flamethrower?) and a rotary saw, He's also wearing goggles and fuel tanks on his back. The cutting torch (flamethrower?) is lit]
:''Fwoosh''

:[The badly parked car has been cut in half along a diagonal, and the half of the car that was in the second slot has been moved into the same slot as the rest of the car. Black Hat's car occupies the newly freed space.]

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

24: Godel, Escher, Kurt Halsey

2012-12-14T11:55:26Z

50.29.196.15: /* Trivia */

{{comic
| number = 24
| date = September 30, 2005
| title = Godel, Escher, Kurt Halsey
| image = godel_escher_kurthalsey.jpg
| imagesize =
| titletext = I love the idea here, though of course it's not a great-quality drawing or scan.
}}

==Explanation==
The name of the comic is a take on the book {{w|Gödel, Escher, Bach}}. The book is about "strange loops", self-reference, and recurring patterns, partially shown through the works of the three people in its title.

{{w|Kurt Gödel}} was a 20th century mathematician most famous for mathematically proving that there are some mathematical truths that can't be proven.

{{w|M. C. Escher}} was a 20th century artist most famous for mathematically-inspired engravings of tessellated animals, impossible scenes, distorted images that contained themselves, and so on.

{{w|Johann Sebastian Bach}} was a German composer and musician during the Baroque Period

[http://www.kurthalsey.com Kurt Halsey] is a comic artist from Oregon.

==Transcript==
:Drawn during an unending NASA lecture.
:[Two people are talking, one in a hat.]
:Hatless: it's just so hard to compare kids now with kids in the past. you can't help but to belong to one group or the other.

:Hatless: and of course every generation seems awful to the one before it. look at quotes from throughout history.

:Hatted: yeah, and it sure would be nice to have some perspective on some of this stuff. I just don't know what to make of it.
:[Circles are appearing--maybe snow?]

:Hatless: i guess you do what you can to help the people around you and hope it turns out okay.

:Hatless: in the end, what else can you do?

:Hatted: lead a crusade?

:[We can no longer see the people, just the circles.]
:it's presentism, man. the idea that historical context is irrelevant, that we understand it

:all that we need take no warnings from the follies of the past. that we're facing something new.

:socrates couldn't imagine the internet. but people don't change.
:[We can start to see the corner of a darker circle in the lower right.]

:(The borders between the three panels on this line are cracking.)
:have you seen those collections of historical pornography? talk about historical context.

:did you know the first porn photo was bestial in.
:[inside a circle:] nature?

:at least that stuff was out of the mainstream
:[each word in one circle:]
:no
:just
:in
:history

:(the three panels have merged into one on each row.)

:i don't know about you, but
:[circled] I
:[uncircled] never

:even once seen

:[The circles are highly variable in size now, and pressed up against a larger one on the right side.]

:[There is mass of circles of different sizes, with some dark fissures in between, against the side of a large circle which we can see part of in the right half of the panel. They look like cells. There's a tiny square in the center of the giant cell.]

:[We see only the tiny square, centered. It has a few marks inside it.]

:[Closer, the square is divided into rectangles of different sizes, each of which has text in it.]

:[Much closer, we can see fragments of the text. Some are sideways, some are cut off, some are too small to read.]
:machine language translated by principles of isomorphism it is a consequence of the Church-Turing thesis that ...
:but how do you select the channel you wish to se-
:thou ... shou ... palin ... stri ... it is a ... crab ...

:[Closer still, we can just see a huge sideways s and h.]

:[Those letters are faded and mixed with a faded version of the next panel.]

:girls take boys away ...
:never be further than a phone call and a goosebumped shiver away ...
:drove all night listening to mix tapes ...
:the past is just practice
:[There is a heart at the bottom and, in the lower left, the name Kurt.]

:[The same as the previous panel, but with the words blurred out to scribbles.]

:[Jagged, shaded shapes and strands start to fall. Faint panel borders appear again. There is a person on the far right.]

:(Back to three panels per row.)
:[A man and woman are standing amid the fragments.]

:Man: There's too much. And so little feels important.

:[The jagged edge of the shaded area is encroaching on the sides of the panel.]

:What do you do?

:[We see them from farther away through a rough hole in the shaded area. Bits continue to fall around them.]

:[She takes his hand.]

==Trivia==
* Original [[Randall]] quote: "One of a series of strips I drew during a long and boring NASA lecture. It careens wildly from intellectual to chaotic to Godel, Escher, Bach to Kurt Halsey to chaotic and sappy."
* The original comment on LiveJournal suggests that the actual image there was only part of this strip (and that the above is the whole series). Unfortunately, the image link in live journal is broken.
* Original title "Strip series"
* This is the sixth comic posted to livejournal. The previous comic was [[1: Barrel - Part 1]], the next is [[13: Canyon]].

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

21: Kepler

2012-12-14T11:46:53Z

50.29.196.15: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 21
| date = October 17, 2005
| title = Kepler
| image = kepler.jpg
| imagesize =
| titletext = Science joke. You should probably move along.
}}

==Explanation==
“Kepler” refers to {{w|Johannes Kepler}}, a German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer, best known for his laws of planetary motion. By observing our solar system each night at the same spot, Kepler was able to deduce that planets in the system do not move in a circular direction around the Sun, but rather in an elliptical way. According to {{w|Kepler's_laws_of_planetary_motion#Second_law|Kepler's Second Law}}, "A line joining a planet and the Sun sweeps out equal areas during equal intervals of time."

In the comic, the janitor Kepler also sweeps the same area, although in this case "area" is used in the sense of "location" rather than its mathematical definition.

== Transcript ==
:[Two people stand in an aisle in a store]
:Person 1: Nice store. How do you keep the floors so clean?
:Person 2: Oh, we hired this dude named Kepler, he's really good. Hard worker. Doesn't mind the monotony. Sweeps out the same area every night.

== Trivia ==
* [Original [[Randall]] quote]: "Another one which, if you don't get, you're probably better off."
* This is the twentieth comic posted to livejournal. The previous was [[20: Ferret]]. The next was [[44: Love]].

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal]]