explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:2668: Artemis Quote

2022-09-06T20:53:01Z

Mrienstra:

The first quote is self-referential (and confuses people, when quoted). The second plays unto the myth that the moon landing was staged. It is nice to be able to choose words, which are cited. A great opportunity to confuse people. --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.143|172.68.110.143]] 21:09, 5 September 2022 (UTC)

To those of you wondering [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2668:_Artemis_Quote&diff=294177&oldid=294176 why, "<tt>mankind" ,[emphasis</tt>," currently appears in the wikitext,] I would direct you to [[explain xkcd talk:Editor FAQ#Punctuation inside quotes and parentheses]]. I am discouraged by such pettiness. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.59|172.70.214.59]] 21:26, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
:Waitwhat? ...Quote-Space-Comma-OpenBracket..? Good job it isn't like that now, or I'd be rewriting it. (Probably put the <tt>[emphasis added]</tt> within the quotes, for starters, before worrying about the other punctuation.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.77|172.70.162.77]] 23:02, 5 September 2022 (UTC)

Perhaps the first Artemis astronaut to set foot on the moon will prefer to come with her own idea of what to say. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.142.75|172.71.142.75]] 21:55, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
:I'm hoping for interpretive dance. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.59|172.70.214.59]] 22:31, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
::I hope they do a couple cartwheels before saying anything. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.206.163|172.70.206.163]] 03:09, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
::: Endorsed: "two small cartwheels for women of color; two giant tumblings for people!" [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.59|172.70.214.59]] 05:07, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

The quote in the title text is factually true, adding to the confusion it would cause, as it does not actually claim that the Artemis astronaut is the first human to set foot on the Moon, only that it is a great honor to be the first. [[User:Bugstomper|Bugstomper]] ([[User talk:Bugstomper|talk]]) 22:34, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
:On a related note: It could also be interpreted as inviting the listener to fill in the unspoken continuation of "It is an honor to be the first human to set foot on the moon. To be the 13th is..." -- "meh"? "arguably bad luck"? "asking to be the butt of a 'baker's dozen' joke"? [[User:Mrienstra|Mrienstra]] ([[User talk:Mrienstra|talk]]) 20:53, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

It is not [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2668:_Artemis_Quote&diff=prev&oldid=294204 feeding trolls] to acknowledge that these <s>trolls</s> people exist (and are exactly the kind of people Randall [[690: Semicontrolled Demolition|likes to bait]]. But I won't 'unedit' that. (Someone else can either restore it or get rid of the silly compromise of being commented out with a confusingly 'inline' text-comment. Only by checking the precise version dif would it even make much sense.) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.141|172.71.178.141]] 22:57, 5 September 2022 (UTC)

I interpreted the second (alt text) option as being intended to cause a similar mis-hearing (or suspected mis-hearing) debate as was the case with the original man/a man quote. The word "human" could possibly be mis-heard as "woman" over a poor-quality audio transmission, leading to a debate about which was intended. (According to the comic, the intended word would in fact be "human", but if the person was female most listeners would likely assume that it is supposed to be "woman" as most people are aware that humans have been on the moon before but probably unsure of whether or not a woman has ever been on the moon.)

Questions: Has a woman ever been to the moon, and is NASA planning to choose a woman for the new mission? It wouldn't surprise me if they were planning to send a woman this time around for PC points. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.128|172.70.91.128]] 23:13, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
:Yes, I believe Artemis has announced that they intend to let a woman of color be the 13th on the Moon, but I'm not up to date on the official press releases. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.126|172.70.211.126]] 23:20, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
::I'm Hoping it will be an African-American woman chosen specifically as commander for identity purposes, who says "It's Great to be Black on the Moon!" [Obref Netflix _Space Force_][[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 23:23, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
:[Written before two other replies, above, appeared... One maybe answering an issue I raise below about the 'twofer'...] One of the main 'selling points' has been that the {{w|Artemis 3|first landing mission}} would definitely include a female crewmember, and a 'person of colour'. I've never been quite clear that this is to be the two identities of the two crew or if the intention is that there'll be one person fulfilling them both as a "twofer". So those worrying about (or applauding!) "PC points" are already happy to have their fears(/hopes) confirmed.
:As a side note, I find the "PoC" term a horrible phrase, in my mind, but I'm British and I know that whatever problems we have with what terminology to use (BAME, etc) are quite different from the US. And there are near-universally undeniably worse terms to use. And "of colour" (or "color", in Leftpondian) doesn't seem to mean much except not being pure-Saxon. Apparently Meghan, Duchess of Sussex (neé Markle) is mixed-race (some even say "black") but I wouldn't have known (and, now knowing, am not at all bothered by the fact) given that tanning salons output a steady stream of darker-skinned anglo-saxon or even celtic-heritage locals.
:Anyway, there'll be complaints by the anti-PC brigade regardless, not that I mind them being upset. So long as they have good individuals (no Iron Sky 'just send a model', purely as a vanity passenger) they should be able to pick and choose which of various suitable candidates works well in the grand scheme of things.
: (And I don't agree with the "human/woman confusion thing", seems far too clumsy. Even as deliberately awkward phrasing.) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.141|172.71.178.141]] 23:46, 5 September 2022 (UTC)

I don't understand <tt>because e.g., conflating "a" man with "mankind" is potentially self-contradictory</tt>. There's no conflation in "a man is an individual, but mankind is a group", and the issue is surely more that so seen in "man is an individual, but mankind is a group" where "man"=="mankind" in this respect so that the logic ends up as (A==B)&(A!=B) by trivial analysis... Whatever, I just don't think that explains what is 'wrong'. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.141|172.71.178.141]] 23:46, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
:Addressed in subsequent edits to the Explanation. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.33.231|172.69.33.231]] 03:04, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

If the astronaut removed his boot before saying "It is an honor to be the first human to set foot on the moon." He/she would technically be correct. [[User:SDSpivey|SDSpivey]] ([[User talk:SDSpivey|talk]]) 23:28, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
: It's a terrible idea to place an unclothed foot on {{w|lunar regolith}}, not only because of the vacuum and temperature, but it's like a layer of somewhat coarsely ground glass reasonably likely to cause puncture or laceration even from the diminished weight of any adult. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.206.213|172.70.206.213]] 23:44, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
:: I forget where, but I've seen a 'hard'/speculative SF treatment of future Moon tourism options that includes a run out of one handy airlock and almost immediately into another whilst suited and ''singly-''booted (an extremely tight ligature on the other lower leg, for the necessary duration) for those wishing to make their 'ultimate footprint' in the regolith. With a bit of practice beforehand, there is probably a (comparatively) safe hop-step gait that doesn't cause much more damage than the briefly decompressive coldness betwixt the portals connecting to the safer internal environment of the moonbase this all happens at. Still a 'thrill' activity, with inherent risks both in the execution and afterwards. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.33|172.70.85.33]] 23:58, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
:::I have no doubt that someone will leave their actual footprints on the Moon someday, but I hope they use crutches and some way to get their foot back into their pressure suit ASAP. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.210.49|172.70.210.49]] 02:34, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

Someone ''really'' likes to remove "redundant" words, in edits, amongst other minor adjustments (described similarly laconically) that I'm not sure are truly justified. I bet if I put some of them back (just the ones that I felt served a purpose, and I can imagine the original authors thought so too) they'd just be removed again. And no easy way to argue the toss, so I'll spare you the arguments and put up with the potential travesties. But I get the feeling that there's a particularly opinionated editor out there, active at this very moment, who is more pleased with themself than they rightfully have reason to be. There are valid rhetorical uses for emphasis, you know, and your 'perfection' might not be so universally agreeable despite your sniping. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.33|172.70.85.33]] 00:24, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
:Is there a Unicode glyph for saying wiki editors need to calm down? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.207.8|172.70.207.8]] 00:32, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
::There must be one for "copyedit". Which seems to just mean that an edit is being made, without any proper comment. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.33|172.70.85.33]] 00:47, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
::: ⛚✎ [[Special:Contributions/172.70.210.49|172.70.210.49]] 01:03, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

I just deleted this, because it doesn't make sense to me:
:''This joke could be taken in one of two ways: one, that it is a violation of the {{w|cooperative principle}} which states that what people say usually is of relevance to the current situation - in this scenario implying that the Artemis astronaut is the first person on the Moon when in fact they were simply discussing the topic in a disconnected bubble the same way one might make such a comment on Earth; alternatively it could simply be to mislead people into thinking Artemis was the first crewed mission to the Moon.''
Perhaps the author can go into more detail here on how this is a better explanation than the text it replaced, please? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.183|172.70.214.183]] 04:20, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
:Just a comment that personally the link to the cooperative principle looks quite helpful and relevant to both this and other comics, as well as recent politics. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.230.105|172.70.230.105]] 20:30, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
:I'm not the author of that, but I'm the one who put the lander-appearance paragraph under a Trivia field, and was about to do the same with the Artemis 1 paragraph when I find someone edited the Trivia away (mentioning it by name) and wants to talk about it... So, I don't know what you think you're doing (in the nicest way, I just think you're confused about what your 'partial reverts' are actually doing). But the editing is clearly busy, so <s>I'll probably come back to it later today anyway and see what we have.</s> ''...no, scratch that. Seeing the 'missing' paragraph improperly appended to another paragraph, both that and the Artemis 1 one are both now in Trivia as purely incidental to the comic but maybe interesting regardless. Until someone decides to do something stupid(er) with them, maybe.'' [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.4|172.70.86.4]] 04:31, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
::So if I understand you, the comment about how the drawing has people coming out of the base of the SpaceX Starship, while the contract NASA awarded them has an elevator, presumably with some sort of a backup like a winch or rope ladder, is trivial? You might also consider commenting on the content instead of the contributors. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.206.213|172.70.206.213]] 04:35, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
:::It's not trivial, but it's Trivia. Anyway, see above. Unless you already saw what I did and maybe rereverted it (but now I ''am'' staying away for several hours, so fill your boots...). [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.141|172.71.178.141]] 04:43, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
:::Ok, Trivia-proponent back here again, finally. Yes, it ''did'' get immediately/before-I-had-finished reverted (and compounded back to that other unrelated para) as predicted. And then someone came up with a other term that seems to have stuck.
:::Noting that the Artemis 1 para really is the main thing (of the asides), which I'd originally put at the top of the more ephemeral subsection, and that Trivia (or its otherwise-named direct alternative) is generally positioned below Transcript. But at least it's not a glaringly obvious directly unexplanatory intrusion in the explanatory flow, FFS. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.141|172.71.178.141]] 15:01, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

I wonder what other editors think about [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2668:_Artemis_Quote&diff=prev&oldid=294312 this deletion,] given the extent to which schwas and dialect have played in Xkcd recently. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.33.239|172.69.33.239]] 05:13, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

One small step for man'); DROP TABLE Quotes;-- [[Special:Contributions/172.70.135.92|172.70.135.92]] 06:58, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

Yet another xkcd where I learn something: I never realized there was any confusion on the "man / (a) man" part in Armstrong's quote. It did not even occur to me there was a missing article to begin with. American speakers do omit their articles from time to time in casual speech (e.g. "sorry I'm late, damn car broke"), not to mention that this is actually a feature in many non-English languages. [[User:Ralfoide|Ralfoide]] ([[User talk:Ralfoide|talk]]) 18:59, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
:You would otherwise have said "Sorry I'm late, '''a''' damn car broke"? No, I think you missed the "the" in "...'''the''' damn car...". Maybe you meant "...(it was a) jam on the interstate" (perhaps because a car, someone else's, broke; or just general congestion). On the whole, you can miss "the" a lot easier than "a". And "the words are funny"/the word is funny" has a different overall meaning (refering to specific words) to "words are funny" (covering the whole lexical gamut, it seems). "A word is funny" is potentially useful and coherent (a response to "What's the best thing to draw on someone's forehead when they're passed out drunk?"?), "word is funny" is Buffy-speak at best ("the word"? "a word"? Context required! (The context/A context/you choose.))
:There are cases to miss an indefinite article, or maybe in a patois, but they're rarer than with the definite one. And unarticulated "man" (distinguishing it as an uncountable version of the noun) is effectively the same as "mankind" which then makes the rest of the statement (which also lacks a qualifying conjunction; commonly decided to be "but", yet may be "and" or "or" or or others, further changing what the intent is) more useful for arguments such as this than as a guiding linguistic light.
:But then some people say "I could of", so there are worse misarticulations out there... [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.133|172.70.85.133]] 19:47, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
What is the large round flat thing on the surface of the moon? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.230.105|172.70.230.105]] 20:30, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

2668: Artemis Quote

2022-09-06T06:42:15Z

Mrienstra: Alternate alt text interpretation, wording could be better, I had a hard time figuring out how to convey the idea succinctly.

{{comic
| number = 2668
| date = September 5, 2022
| title = Artemis Quote
| image = artemis_quote.png
| titletext = Another option: "It is an honor to be the first human to set foot on the moon."
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|created by a COLLABORATIVE EFFORT. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

The {{w|Artemis program}} is a series of planned space missions that will land people on the Moon and begin to set up infrastructure for a permanent crewed presence. People first landed on the Moon in 1969 as part of the {{w|Apollo program}}. They have not been back since 1972.

When {{w|Neil Armstrong}} became the first person to walk on the Moon, he famously said, "That's one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind." However, he was intending to say, "That's one small step for '''''a''''' man; one giant leap for mankind [emphasis added]." [https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/Frase_de_Neil_Armstrong.ogg The audio recording] omits the word "a", making the sentence confusing, as "man" and "mankind" have the same meaning when referring to all people. That it was apparently elided by Armstrong in the excitement, changing the meaning of the historical phrase, is controversial and thus humorous. Subsequently, Armstrong and others have blamed insufficiently tuned {{w|voice activity detection}} hardware circuitry intended to save power in radio voice transmission, but NASA engineers, third-party historians and their hired experts have never been able to corroborate that explanation.[https://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/alsj/a11/a11.step.html][http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/003645.html] Armstrong later said he hoped, "history would grant me leeway for dropping the syllable and understand that it was certainly intended, even if it was not said," and, on p.126 of the June 1982 edition of ''Omni,'' "the 'a' is implied, so I'm happy if they just put it in parentheses."

[[Randall]] suggests that the first Artemis astronaut to set foot on the Moon has a duty to utter an even more confusing quote, saying the sentence, "This is one of my favorite historical quotes — the first words spoken by an Artemis astronaut on the moon," aloud as they step onto the Moon. That would be confusingly self-referential, as if they were alluding to something from the past. This is very unlikely, and funny merely as a recommendation. If it actually happened, it might be both hilarious and scandalous.

The title text suggests an alternate phrase by which the Artemis astronaut could say being the first (rather than 13th) person on the Moon is a great honor. People hearing this quote in the future could assume that Artemis was the first crewed mission to the Moon. It could feed into contemporary conspiracy theories that the Apollo landings were faked, or that previous moon landings had been done by non-humans, furthering the confusion. It could also be interpreted as inviting the listener to fill in the unspoken continuation of "It is an honor to be the first human to set foot on the moon. To be the 13th is..." -- "meh"? "arguably bad luck"? "asking to be the butt of a 'baker's dozen' joke"?

=== Esoterica ===
* The {{w|schwa}} indefinite article "a" is optional in certain contexts of most dialects of American English.[https://linguapress.com/grammar/article-in-english.htm]
* While the comic's lunar lander has similarities to the {{w|Starship HLS|current plans}} for the Artemis lander,[https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/as-artemis-moves-forward-nasa-picks-spacex-to-land-next-americans-on-moon] it's a generic drawing, perhaps in homage to classic space science fiction, with the exit portal at an unlikely position near the base of the {{w|SpaceX Starship}} lander.[https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-starship-moon-elevator-nasa-prototype/]
* This comic coincides with the canceled launch of {{w|Artemis 1}}, an uncrewed test mission which will serve as the start of the Artemis program. The mission was intended to launch on 29 August 2022, and later on 3 September 2022, but was repeatedly postponed due to a series of technical problems and will now take place no earlier than late September 2022.

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

:[The surface of the Moon, with characteristic craters and rocks across a landscape and a slightly curved horizon. In the foreground, a vertical rocket standing on four deployed legs. A short ladder, or set of steps, leads down from a hatch in the lower part of the rocket body. The figure of an astronaut has stepped forward onto the Moon's surface.]

:Astronaut: This is one of my favorite historical quotes — the first words spoken by an Artemis astronaut on the Moon.

:Caption: Neil Armstrong's "man"/"a man" quote created a lot of historical confusion, and I think it's our duty to expand on that legacy with Artemis.

{{comic discussion}}

2639: Periodic Table Changes

2022-06-29T22:58:12Z

Mrienstra: /* Explanation */ Explain Ytterby

{{comic
| number = 2639
| date = June 29, 2022
| title = Periodic Table Changes
| image = periodic_table_changes.png
| titletext = It's nice how the end of the periodic table is flush with the edge these days, so I think we should agree no one should find any new elements after #118 unless they discover a whole row at once.
}}

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

The [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Periodic_table periodic table] is a table used to arrange [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_element chemical elements] according to their chemical and physical properties. This comic proposes "changes" to the periodic table that would be more pleasant aesthetically or make the periodic table look more regular. However, some changes don't take into account that elements would stop being arranged by their properties and the periodic table would stop being useful after such changes.

Other modifications make up new elements or remove existing ones from the table, which would not be a reasonable decision given that the periodic table is supposed to include all existing elements, whether they make the table neater or they don't.

Four elements -- yttrium (Y), ytterbium (Yb), terbium (Tb) and erbium (Er) -- are named after [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ytterby Ytterby], a Swedish village. Scandium (Sc), thulium (Tm), holmium (Ho) and gadolinium (Gd) were isolated from minerals found in the same quarry.

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

{{comic discussion}}