explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

2957: A Crossword Puzzle

2026-01-10T15:36:38Z

SomeDee: /* Down */

{{comic
| number = 2957
| date = July 10, 2024
| title = A Crossword Puzzle
| image = a_crossword_puzzle_2x.png
| imagesize = 740x937px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = Hint: If you ever encounter this puzzle in a crossword app, just [term for someone with a competitive and high-achieving personality].
}}

==Explanation==
{{spoiler|The crossword clues comprise a single hidden joke, which you can figure out on your own. If you keep reading, you won't get the chance of discovering the joke yourself!}}
This crossword may seem extremely difficult, with questions covering a wide variety of trivia, linguistics, mathematics in various forms, alongside wordplay typical of crossword puzzles. But the joke is that every single letter of every single answer is "A". The name of this comic, "A Crossword Puzzle", is a {{w|double entendre}} which could, in itself, be considered a cryptic clue; the "A" can be interpreted both as the indefinite article "a" and as an identifier saying that this crossword puzzle is specifically an "A" puzzle, due to the answer being all "A"s.

The title text is a play on a "type A" personality. The term for someone with a competitive and high-achieving personality is "Type A". In the context of the title text, this answer is a hint that the entire puzzle can be completed in a crossword-solving app by typing the letter A repeatedly.

===Across===
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="margin: auto"
! # !! Clue !! Explanation !! Squares
|-
| 1 || Famous Pvt. Wilhelm quote || Reference to the {{w|Wilhelm scream}}, a widely used stock sound effect. || 10
|-
| 11 || {{w|IPv6}} address record || An IPv4 record is an "A" record; an IPv6 record is four times the length and is designated an "AAAA" record. || 4
|-
| 15 || "CIPHERTEXT" decrypted with Vigenère key "CIPHERTEXT" || A "{{w|Vigenère Cipher}}" translates the original text by the distance from A from the key, letter by letter. For instance, if the plaintext is "XK" and the key is "CD", the C shifts X 2 forward to become Z, and the D shifts K 3 forward to become N, yielding a ciphertext of "ZN". Since the ciphertext and the key are the same in this case, decryption just shifts all the letters back to A, akin to subtracting a number from itself and getting 0. || 10
|-
| 16 || 8mm diameter battery || An {{w|AAAA battery}} is a 1.5 V battery that measures 8.3 mm in diameter, 2.2 mm smaller than the more common AAA battery. || 4
|-
| 17 || "Warthog" attack aircraft || The {{w|A-10 Warthog}} is an attack aircraft. Here, A-10 has been turned into AAAAAAAAAA (ten As). || 10
|-
| 18 || '''E'''ve'''r'''y t'''h'''ir'''d''' le'''t'''te'''r''' in the word for "inability to visualize" || {{w|Aphantasia}} is the inability to experience mental images. Following the example of the pattern in the clue, taking the first letter and every third one after (rather than just every third letter) we determine that '''A'''ph'''a'''nt'''a'''si'''a''' gives us the word "aaaa". This clue is particularly mean because of how it instructs you to visualize the letters highlighted within the word in order to get the answer. || 4
|-
| 19 || An {{w|acrostic}} hidden on the first page of the dictionary || The first page of the dictionary (if you ignore the copyright page and the index) is the list of words starting with A. An acrostic of this page, taking the first letter of each line and arranging them in order, would just be a sequence of As. || 15
|-
| 21 || Default paper size in Europe || {{w|A4 paper}} (here written as AAAA) is the default size in Europe (and most of the world). At 210×297 mm, it is approximately 0.24″ narrower and 0.71″ longer than the 8.5″×11″ paper used in the United States, and due to having an aspect ratio of 1:sqrt(2), can be cut or folded in half to create two half-sized sheets (A5) with exactly the same aspect ratio. A4 is, itself, also a halving of A3 and of identical ratio, as is the case with all A-sizes higher and lower in the sequence up to A0, which has an area of exactly 1 square meter.|| 4
|-
| 22 || First four unary strings || A unary number system represents numbers using just one symbol. For example, 7 in unary would be 1111111. The first four strings in unary, if you used A as the first (and only) symbol, would be A, AA, AAA, AAAA. || 10
|-
| 23 || Lysine codon || {{w|Lysine}} is an amino acid, with codons AAA and AAG. || 3
|-
| 24 || 40 CFR Part 63 subpart concerning asphalt pollution || [https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-40/chapter-I/subchapter-C/part-63/subpart-AAAAAAA?toc=1 "40 CFR Part 63"] refers to federal air pollutant regulations in the Code of Federal Regulations. The subpart for "asphalt processing and asphalt roofing manufacturing" is AAAAAAA (also part LLLLL). || 7
|-
| 25 || Top bond credit rating || The highest {{w|credit rating}} for bonds is AAA. || 3
|-
| 26 || Audi coupe || First of three Audi references. {{w|List_of_Audi_vehicles|Audi's car models}} range from A1 (subcompact hatchback) to A8 (full-size luxury sedan); the A5, the one referenced here, is a compact executive {{w|coupe}}. || 5
|-
| 27 || A pair of small remote batteries, when inserted || Two {{w|AAA_battery|AAA}} batteries, which are often used to power remote controls for domestic devices. These have been combined to give AAAAAA — Usually, when you have to insert more than one AAA battery into a device's battery compartment, the batteries are put directly next to each other. That is shown here by putting two instances of AAA next to each other, thus "AAAAAA." || 6
|-
| 29 || Unofficial Howard Dean slogan || A reference to Howard Dean, an American Democrat who ran for the party's nomination in 2004. He famously [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6i-gYRAwM0 yelled at a rally] in a way that was thought to be bizarre and which, it is thought, doomed his campaign. || 7
|-
| 32 || A 4.0 report card || A 4.0 GPA, at least {{w|Academic_grading_in_the_United_States|in the USA}}, is all As. This clue assumes seven classes. || 7
|-
| 33 || The "Harlem Globetrotters of baseball" (vowels only) || The {{w|Savannah Bananas}}, the vowels for whom are aaaaaa. The {{w|Harlem Globetrotters}} are an exhibition basketball team, with the Savannah Bananas following a similar formula in baseball. || 6
|-
| 34 || 2018 Kiefer song || "[https://genius.com/Kiefer-aaaaa-lyrics AAAAA]". This is the only five-letter song title in Kiefer's 2018 album ''Happysad''. || 5
|-
| 35 || Top Minor League tier || The top {{w|Minor League Baseball}} tier is AAA. || 3
|-
| 36 || Reply elicited by a dentist || With your mouth open at the Dentist, the only reply a dentist can elicit from a patient is AAAAAAA || 7
|-
| 38 || Anaa’s airport || {{w|Anaa}} is an atoll in the {{w|Tuamotu archipelago}} of {{w|French Polynesia}}. AAA is the {{w|IATA}} code for its airport. || 3
|-
| 41 || Macaulay Culkin’s review of aftershave || In the movie ''{{w|Home Alone}}'', Kevin (played by {{w|Macaulay Culkin}}) puts on his father's aftershave lotion. The eight-year-old boy is not used to the lotion's antiseptic and screams as the stinging sensation kicks in. || 10
|-
| 43 || Marketing agency trade grp. || The {{w|American Association of Advertising Agencies}}, also called the 4As (here AAAA). An abbreviated word in a clue, here "grp.", is a common way to signal that the answer also should also be written as its abbreviation. || 4
|-
| 44 || Soaring climax of Linda Eder’s ''Man of La Mancha'' || Refers to [https://youtu.be/BWP7l0OTXJI?t=130 the 18-second-long wordless passage in Eder's opus], or possibly the final high note in the song "The Impossible Dream". || 15
|-
| 46 || Military flight community org. || The {{w|Army Aviation Association of America}}, or AAAA. || 4
|-
| 47 || Iconic line from ''Tarzan'' || Tarzan has a famous {{w|Tarzan yell|war cry}} he shouts, usually when swinging from a vine. || 10
|-
| 48 || '''E'''v'''e'''r'''y''' o'''t'''h'''e'''r letter of Jimmy Wales’s birth state || The birth state of {{w|Jimmy Wales}}, the co-founder of Wikipedia, is Alabama. Taking every other letter of '''A'''l'''a'''b'''a'''m'''a''' gives "Aaaa". || 4
|-
| 49 || Warthog’s postscript after "They call me ''mister'' pig!" || Pumba in ''{{w|The Lion King}}'' yells "aaaaaaaaaa" while charging at the hyenas who insulted him. || 10
|-
| 50 || Message to Elsa in ''Frozen 2'' || The call which Elsa hears in ''{{w|Frozen 2}}'' is a sequence of four notes which resemble the requiem music "{{w|Dies Irae#Music|Dies irae}}". The sequence is sung entirely with an open rounded vowel sound, or a soft "a" sound. || 4
|-
| 51 || Lola, when betting it all on Black 20 in ''Run Lola Run'' || In ''{{w|Run Lola Run}}'', Lola ({{w|Franka Potente}}) [https://youtu.be/OTSz1w-cuZM?si=2vc51WCWvn20Hjoo&t=116 screams loud enough to affect the outcome] of a roulette wheel where she has just bet all her money on Black 20. The scream could be transcribed as "AAAAAAAAAA" || 10
|}

===Down===
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="margin:auto"
! # !! Clue !! Explanation !! Squares
|-
| 1 || Game featuring "a reckless disregard for gravity" || ''{{w|AaAaAA!!! – A Reckless Disregard for Gravity}}'' - notably this is only the title's official abbreviation, in contrast to its full title, "''AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! — A Reckless Disregard for Gravity''". || 6
|-
| 2 || 1010101010101010101010102→16 || 10101010 10101010 10101010 in binary is equivalent to "AAAAAA" in hexadecimal. || 6
|-
| 3 || Google phone released July ’22 || The {{w|Pixel 6a}} was released in July 22. Stylized in this puzzle as "AAAAAA" ('A'×6) || 6
|-
| 4 || It’s five times better than that ''other'' steak sauce || Five times better than {{w|A1 steak sauce}} would be A5, stylized in this puzzle as AAAAA. || 5
|-
| 5 || ToHex(43690) || The decimal number 43690 converted to hexadecimal is AAAA. || 4
|-
| 6 || Freddie Mercury lyric from ''Under Pressure'' || A drawn-out 'Aaaaahhhh' rising in pitch, from a song by Queen and David Bowie. || 15
|-
| 7 || Full-size Audi luxury sedan || Second of three Audi references. As mentioned previously, the A8 referenced here is their full-size luxury sedan. || 8
|-
| 8 || Fast path through a multiple choice marketing survey || The "fast path" is just to select the first option over and over again. Usually the options are labeled A, B, C, and D (or more) - choosing the first option for every question would be answering entirely with As. || 7
|-
| 9 || 12356631 in base 26 || Randall is expressing base 26 using the letters of the alphabet with 1=A, in which case 1235663110 = AAAAAA26. (It's unclear how one would express the digit 026 this way.) || 6
|-
| 10 || Viral Jimmy Barnes chorus || A reference to the music video for Kirin J Callinan's song "{{w|Big Enough}}", which features rocker {{w|Jimmy Barnes}} in a cowboy hat screaming "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!" while in the sky over mountain scenes. || 15
|-
| 11 || Ruby Rhod catchphrase || Ruby Rhod is a radio host in the film ''{{w|The Fifth Element}}''; he has a scene with a memorable scream. || 5
|-
| 12 || badbeef + 9efcebbb || In hexadecimal, badbeef and 9efcebbb add together to equal AAAAAAAA (195,935,983, 2,667,375,547, and 2,863,311,530 in decimal respectively). || 8
|-
| 13 || In Wet Leg’s ''Ur Mum'', what the singer has been practicing || In the song "{{w|Ur Mum}}" by {{w|Wet Leg}}, the bridge starts with "Okay, I've been practicing my longest and loudest scream", which is apparently eight As long. || 8
|-
| 14 || Refrain from Nora Reed bot || The "Endless Scream" bot on social media, made by Nora Reed, posts "AAAAAAAAAAA" (with or without an h) at varying lengths. || 8
|-
| 20 || Mario button presses to ascend Minas Tirith’s walls || In ''Mario'' games you typically use the A button to jump. In games where you don't press a button to move (e.g., games with a joystick), then the button presses required to ascend a vertical structure would probably all be A. This clue might have been inspired by the {{w|Pannenkoek2012#A-button challenge|A-Button Challenge}} / [https://ukikipedia.net/wiki/A_Button_Challenge A Button Challenge], which tallies the number of A presses needed to beat ''Super Mario 64''. Additionally, {{w|Minas Tirith}} is a fictional city in ''{{w|The Lord of the Rings}}'' with seven concentric rings, each with a wall around it and higher than the last ring. Presumably, it takes seven jumps to get to the highest area of the city, so the answer is "AAAAAAA". || 7
|-
| 24 || Vermont historic route north from Bennington || {{w|Vermont Route 7A}}, or AAAAAAA. || 7
|-
| 26 || High-budget video game || A high-budget video game is usually referred to as a Triple-A game, or AAA. || 3
|-
| 28 || Unorthodox Tic-tac-toe win || {{w|Tic-tac-toe}} is usually won by getting either three Xs or three Os in a row, making XXX and OOO normal Tic-tac-toe wins. One could achieve a win of AAA by making the unorthodox choice of playing with the letter A instead of X or O. Alternatively, Randall is envisaging the grid as defined by rows 1, 2, 3, and columns A, B, C, so an AAA win would be simply playing in the first column each time - a strategy which should be obvious and easy to stop, even for young children who have not yet worked out that ''any'' route to winning can be blocked. || 3
|-
| 29 || String whose SHA-256 hash ends "…689510285e212385" || <code>printf AAAAAAAA <nowiki>|</nowiki> sha256sum</code> outputs <code>c34ab6abb7b2bb595bc25c3b388c872fd1d575819a8f55cc689510285e212385</code>.
Note that this 'clue' would be normally be ''particularly'' difficult, in isolation, as the nature of a {{w|hash function}} means that it is possible for multiple inputs to produce a given output, and that finding any of these (and definitely identifying ''all'' of them, to ensure you have the correct original) would require a {{w|brute-force attack}}; i.e. a test of all possible initial states to discover which of them might be viable candidates. Even more problematic is that we are only given a partial hash string, meaning we are possibly talking of a multiple of full hashes, each of them with a possible multiplicity of original plaintexts behind them. However, given the context of this puzzle, it's reasonable to guess that a sequence of 8 As might be the answer, and indeed its hash does match the clue given.
 The number of possible hashes in the clue is 1664/1616, i.e. 1648, or approximately 6x1054, although there really is no reason (aside from the fundamental impracticality) to try to solve this problem from each and every 'hash end'. Instead you would 'only' check every combination of 8 letters (presuming no digits, punctuation or whitespace would be inserted, that no "foreign"/accented characters are present and that uppercase is universally presumed, is 268; i.e. ~208 {{w|billion|short-scale billion}} possibilities) and discover which (one?) of these sufficiently matches the hash fragment given. Testing a hundred of these every second, it would take a little over 66 ''years'' to complete the task of checking every single possibility (rather than stopping at the first confirmed answer, which might well be the initial one in this particular case).
 In the context of a crossword such as this, however, you can significantly reduce this search by having established (or at least sufficiently narrowed down) the answers to the various across-clues which intersect with ever character of it (this form of crossword grid being of the {{w|Crossword#American-style crosswords|dense type}}, with no singly-clued spaces as with the more open lattice-types), reducing the necessary checks drastically. This could mean, having solved at least some of the perpendicular answers, that you have enough information to 'guess' at some likely answer, and then merely need to ''confirm'' that whatever guess(es) you make will resolve themselves into the clue-answer provided. (Much as you might with a more normally difficult clue, where you merely have to satisfy yourself that the surprise answer is at least justified as resulting from the original hint.)
| 8
|-
| 30 || Arnold’s remark to the Predator || A reference to [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsFYPVxHKdc this scene] from ''{{w|Predator (film)|Predator}}'', starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. || 8
|-
| 31 || The vowels in the fire salamander’s binomial name || The vowels in {{w|Salamandra salamandra}} are aaaaaaaa. || 8
|-
| 32 || Janet Leigh ''Psycho'' line || The iconic scene in ''{{w|Psycho (1960 film)|Psycho}}'' is the shower scene, in which {{w|Janet Leigh}} gives a long piercing scream as she is murdered. This can be written as 8 As if one wishes. || 8
|-
| 34 || Seven 440Hz pulses || A sound with a frequency of 440 Hz is a middle "A" note. Seven such pulses would be AAAAAAA. || 7
|-
| 37 || Audi luxury sports sedan || Third of three Audi references. The A6, the one referenced here, is their executive car. Actually, the A7, their executive liftback sedan, would fit the prompt of "luxury sports sedan" better, but 37 only has room for six As. || 6
|-
| 38 || A half-dozen eggs with reasonably firm yolks || Eggs can be [https://www.saudereggs.com/blog/egg-grading-system/ "graded on a variety of aspects"], with grades B, A, or AA. Eggs with a reasonably firm yolk are graded A, so having half a dozen of them gives you AAAAAA eggs. || 6
|-
| 39 || 2-2-2-2-2-2 on a multitap phone keypad || A "{{w|multi-tap|multitap keyboard}}" is a text entry system for mobile phones. Most numbers are associated with three letters, and tapping the same number multiple times in rapid succession selects the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd letter. 2 is "A", 22 is "B", 222 is "C", 3 is "D", etc. 2-2-2-2-2-2 translates to "AAAAAA". (If pressed quickly enough, this input may accidentally wrap around the letter list twice and simply result in a "C".) || 6
|-
| 40 || .- .- .- .- .- .- || .- is {{w|Morse Code}} for A. It reads out as AAAAAA. || 6
|-
| 42 || Rating for China’s best tourist attractions || China's Ministry of Culture and Tourism provides ratings for many tourist attractions in China on a scale from A to AAAAA, with AAAAA being the best. Examples of well-known tourist attractions with the AAAAA rating include the {{w|Forbidden City}}, sections of the {{w|Great Wall of China}}, and the {{w|Terracotta Army}}. || 5
|-
| 43 || Standard drumstick size || 5A is a common, middle-range size for drumsticks (the sticks used to play drums, not the drumsticks that get eaten). Here, it's written as AAAAA. || 5
|-
| 45 || "The rain/in Spain/falls main-/ly on the plain" rhyme scheme || An AAAA {{w|rhyme scheme}} means each of the four lines ends with the same sound. Furthermore, the sound in question is the standard vocalization of the letter A. {{w|The Rain in Spain}} is a song from the musical {{w|My Fair Lady}}. || 4
|}

==Transcript==
:[A square 15x15 crossword puzzle is shown. Only 21 of the 225 squares are black. The black squares are in a pattern that are 180 degree rotationally symmetrical. Three black squares down from the 11th column and similarly three black squares up from the 5th column. Three black squares out from the right in row 7 and then two more black squares diagonally up from the end. Similarly three black squares out from the left in row 9 with two more black squares diagonally down from the end. A single black square is three above the first black square on the diagonal going down to the right and similarly there is a black square three under the first of the diagonal squares going down to the left. (Row 6 column 12 and Row 10 column 4). Finally there are three black squares on a diagonal crossing over the central point by going up from the left through the central point (Row 8 column 8). There are numbers at the top of every column (except the one that is a black square) and similarly at the left edge of all rows (except the one that is a black square). There are also numbers at the bottom of every black segment (except the one that reaches the bottom) and all rows after black segments except the one that reaches the right edge. In total all numbers from 1 to 51 are written. They are written in reading order from 1 to 51.]
:1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51

:[Below the square there are two columns of clues for each number that belongs to across (rows) and to the right there is one column of clues for each number that belongs to down (columns). Both segments have an underlined and bold title above the clues. ]
:<big>'''Across'''</big>
:1. Famous Pvt. Wilhelm quote
:11. IPv6 address record
:15. "CIPHERTEXT" decrypted with Vigenère key "CIPHERTEXT"
:16. 8mm diameter battery
:17. "Warthog" attack aircraft
:18. '''E'''ve'''r'''y t'''h'''ir'''d''' le'''t'''te'''r''' in the word for "inability to visualize"
:19. An acrostic hidden on the first page of the dictionary
:21. Default paper size in Europe
:22. First four unary strings
:23. Lysine codon
:24. 40 CFR Part 63 subpart concerning asphalt pollution
:25. Top bond credit rating
:26. Audi coupe
:27. A pair of small remote batteries, when inserted
:29. Unofficial Howard Dean slogan
:32. A 4.0 report card
:33. The "Harlem Globetrotters of baseball" (vowels only)
:34. 2018 Kiefer song
:35. Top Minor League tier
:36. Reply elicited by a dentist
:38. ANAA's airport
:41. Macaulay Culkin's review of aftershave
:43. Marketing agency trade grp.
:44. Soaring climax of Linda Eder's ''Man of La Mancha''
:46. Military flight community org.
:47. Iconic line from ''Tarzan''
:48. '''E''''''v''''''e''''''r''''''y'''''' o''''''t''''''h''''''e''''''r''' letter of Jimmy Wales's birth state
:49. Warthog's postscript after "They call me ''mister'' pig!"
:50. Message to Elsa in ''Frozen 2''
:51. Lola, when betting it all on Black 20 in ''Run Lola Run''

:<big>'''Down'''</big>
:1. Game featuring "a reckless disregard for gravity"
:2. 1010101010101010101010102→16
:3. Google phone released July '22
:4. It's five times better than that ''other'' steak sauce
:5. ToHex(43690)
:6. Freddie Mercury lyric from ''Under Pressure''
:7. Full-size Audi luxury sedan
:8. Fast path through a multiple choice marketing survey
:9. 12356631 in base 26
:10. Viral Jimmy Barnes chorus
:11. Ruby Rhod catchphrase
:12. badbeef + 9efcebbb
:13. In Wet Leg's ''Ur Mum'', what the singer has been practicing
:14. Refrain from Nora Reed bot
:20. Mario button presses to ascend Minas Tirith's walls
:24. Vermont historic route north from Bennington
:26. High-budget video game
:28. Unorthodox Tic-Tac-Toe win
:29. String whose SHA-256 hash ends "...689510285e212385"
:30. Arnold's remark to the Predator
:31. The vowels in the fire salamander's binomial name
:32. Janet Leigh ''Psycho'' line
:34. Seven 440Hz pulses
:37. Audi luxury sports sedan
:38. A half-dozen eggs with reasonably firm yolks
:39. 2-2-2-2-2-2 on a multitap phone keypad
:40. .- .- .- .- .- .-
:42. Rating for China's best tourist attractions
:43. Standard drumstick size
:45. "The rain/in Spain/falls main-/ly on the plain" rhyme scheme

==Trivia==
*This comic got a [[Header_text#A_Crossword_Puzzle|comic-specific header text]] after the first day it was up.
**This was because one of the comics Randall lists as one of those he enjoys, [https://www.buttersafe.com/ Buttersafe], had already posted a similar comic back in 2011: [https://www.buttersafe.com/2011/02/17/crosswords/ Crosswords].
**Randall had forgotten this, but now pays tribute to this, stating that he must have been accidentally inspired by that comic.
*[[User:Elfakyn|Elfakyn]] posted a link to a picture of the solved crossword puzzle in the [[Talk:2957:_A_Crossword_Puzzle#Solved_puzzle_picture|comments]] and allowed it to be included here:
[[File:2957_A-Crossword_Puzzle-Solved.png|500px|center]]
*All the black squares are in a symmetrical pattern, which is generally the case for crossword puzzles in the US and UK. See description of the pattern in the [[#Transcript|transcript]].
*Crosswords have been mentioned previously in [[2896: Crossword Constructors]].
*Out of 60 clues in the puzzle, 10 are references to screaming or yelling, making the puzzle approximately 17% screams.
{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]
[[Category:Language]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Physics]]
[[Category:Songs]]
[[Category:Video games]]
[[Category:Games]]

Talk:2846: Daylight Saving Choice

2023-10-25T16:22:25Z

SomeDee: /* Average 39 minutes */

I instead suggest that we make the DST shift 12 hours. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.1.190|172.68.1.190]] 15:16, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

The terrorist plot wasn't thwarted by this kind of proposal. It was just due to the fact that DST laws differ between countries. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 15:31, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

== Average 39 minutes ==

While this figure makes sense (rather than 30 minutes) it was still slightly unexpected at first; as DST has a duration of 238 days, the average year-round time would be 238/365 hours ahead of Standard, or 39 minutes and 7.4 seconds. 
(Or, to factor in that a leap day occurs in 97 of every 400 years, 238/(365 ⁹⁷⁄₄₀₀) = 39 minutes and 5.8 seconds)

In fact, the original DST duration was set to actually be 6 months long (last Sunday of April to October), before being extended in 1987 and 2007 to reach its current 34 weeks.

[[User:SomeDee|SomeDee]] ([[User talk:SomeDee|talk]]) 15:23, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

Talk:2846: Daylight Saving Choice

2023-10-25T16:21:18Z

SomeDee: /* 39 minutes */

I instead suggest that we make the DST shift 12 hours. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.1.190|172.68.1.190]] 15:16, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

The terrorist plot wasn't thwarted by this kind of proposal. It was just due to the fact that DST laws differ between countries. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 15:31, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

== 39 minutes ==

While this figure makes sense (rather than 30 minutes) it was still slightly unexpected at first; as DST has a duration of 238 days, the average year-round time would be 238/365 hours ahead of Standard, or 39 minutes and 7.4 seconds. 
(Or, to factor in that a leap day occurs in 97 of every 400 years, 238/(365 ⁹⁷⁄₄₀₀) = 39 minutes and 5.8 seconds)

In fact, the original DST duration was set to actually be 6 months long (last Sunday of April to October), before being extended in 1987 and 2007 to reach its current 34 weeks.

[[User:SomeDee|SomeDee]] ([[User talk:SomeDee|talk]]) 15:23, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

Talk:2846: Daylight Saving Choice

2023-10-25T15:23:17Z

SomeDee: /* 39 minutes */

I instead suggest that we make the DST shift 12 hours. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.1.190|172.68.1.190]] 15:16, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

== 39 minutes ==

While this figure makes sense (rather than 30 minutes) it was still slightly unexpected at first; as DST has a duration of 238 days, the average year-round time would be 238/365 hours ahead of Standard, or 39 minutes and 7.4 seconds.
(Or, to factor in that a leap day occurs in 97 of every 400 years, 238/(365 ⁹⁷⁄₄₀₀) = 39 minutes and 5.8 seconds)

[[User:SomeDee|SomeDee]] ([[User talk:SomeDee|talk]]) 15:23, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

Talk:2846: Daylight Saving Choice

2023-10-25T15:22:41Z

SomeDee: /* 39 minutes */ new section

I instead suggest that we make the DST shift 12 hours. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.1.190|172.68.1.190]] 15:16, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

== 39 minutes ==

While this figure makes sense (rather than 30 minutes) it was still slightly unexpected at first; as DST has a duration of 238 days, the average year-round time would be 238/365 hours ahead of Standard, or 39 minutes and 7.4 seconds.
(Or, to factor in that a leap day occurs in 97 of every 400 years, 238/(365 ⁹⁷⁄₄₀₀) = 39 minutes and 5.8 seconds)

Talk:1878: Earth Orbital Diagram

2023-06-22T14:54:57Z

SomeDee: A little more Enceliopsis etymology

I guess first off, we should note the "solstice" is *not* the Bristish equivalent of "equinox" -- they are actually opposites. The equinoxes occur in April and September, when the day & night are equal length, and the solstices occur in June and December, when the length of daylight and nightime, respectively, are at their longest. [[User:JamesCurran|JamesCurran]] ([[User talk:JamesCurran|talk]]) 15:30, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

:Technically, the opposite of solstice is the other solstice. Solstice and equinoxes are orthogonal. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 00:01, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

Being picky but the Equinox/Solstice section refers to equinoxes marking the start of either spring or autumn, but actually both equinoxes mark the beginning of both spring and autumn in opposite hemispheres. [[User:ExternalMonolog|ExternalMonolog]] ([[User talk:ExternalMonolog|talk]]) 22:08, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

"Determinant of the date of Easter" refers to the fact that in the Catholic Church (and possibly other Christian denomiations) the date of Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon of Spring, which means it is an astronomical calculation, but completely unrelated to the indicated angle. [[User:JamesCurran|JamesCurran]] ([[User talk:JamesCurran|talk]]) 16:28, 18 August 2017 (UTC)
:Well, everyone celebrates Easter on the same day, right? So it's the first Sunday after the first full moon for everybody. [[User:Berets|Berets]] ([[User talk:Berets|talk]]) 23:20, 18 August 2017 (UTC)
::No, not all denominations agree on the date of Easter; a particular example being the Orthodox church, which usually has Easter a week after the Catholic church, but sometimes as much as five weeks later. The difference is caused by the two denominations using different idealized calendars, both lunar and solar, as well as a slight difference in the definition. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.69.57|162.158.69.57]] 18:41, 19 August 2017 (UTC)
"Astral planes" might as well be a Unicode reference, taking into account Randall's occasional mention of emoji, since emoji reside on one of the astral planes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plane_%28Unicode%29 {{unsigned ip|141.101.105.168}}
:That supplementary planes humorously refer also to {{w|Astral plane|Astral planes}} as mentioned in this explanation.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 19:54, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Solstice comes from the Latin ... Sol = Sun .. Sistere = Stand still. It literally means the day the sun stands still and refers to the longest day of the year (summer) and the shortest day of the year (winter). So how does the Sun "stand still". On those days the Earth reaches either end of orbital ellipse and returns around the other side. If you stick a pole in the ground and observe its shadow every day at Noon you will see the shadow grow longer every day from winter to summer and grow shorter every day from summer to winter. The shadow is shortest when the Sun is highest in the sky at mid-summer and the shadow is longest when the sun is lowest in the sky at mid-winter. The sun is either getting higher in the sky or lower in the sky every day. When the Earth is at the end of the ellipse and the transition takes place the shadow will not make any noticeable change from one day to the next and one could say that the "Sun has stood still". [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 19:36, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

I think that Solstice/Equinox thing is a reference to Randall having a hobby of spreading linguistic misinformation, as seen in 1677:Contrails.
[[Special:Contributions/172.68.26.251|172.68.26.251]] 00:32, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the labels of the planes are, but they certainly aren't Greek letters. They look like alchemical symbols to me.
[[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.243|162.158.74.243]] 00:56, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

Part of the humor of Declension is that it's a portmanteau of right ascension and declination. Right now only declination is mentioned. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.75.40|162.158.75.40]] 02:43, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

Arctangent is also a music festival in the UK, happening when this comic came out. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.234.46|162.158.234.46]] 22:30, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

Enceliopsis could use a little more detail, as there's a funny little redundancy there. The "[[wikt:apsis|-psis]]" suffix refers to the apex of an orbit, i.e., the apoapsis is the farthest orbit point and the periapsis is the closest. And the "[[wikt:aphelion|-helion]]" suffix in aphelion/perihelion is the same thing, but for the more specific case of orbits around the sun. So using both together in the case of "-elio-psis" effectively gives a suffix with the meaning "pertaining to an orbital apex and pertaining to an orbital apex around the sun".
[[User:SomeDee|SomeDee]] ([[User talk:SomeDee|talk]]) 14:54, 22 June 2023 (UTC)

Talk:2734: Electron Color

2023-02-07T17:00:12Z

SomeDee:

Electrons have no color?! BUt lIgHTnIng strIKeS aRe YEllOw, aND LigHTNing IS MaDe uP of eLECTrOns.[[Special:Contributions/172.71.254.115|172.71.254.115]] 22:43, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
: Actually most colors are emitted by electrons orbiting atoms after absorbing light. The color electrons emit depend on their kinetic energy and available places they can travel, a tiny bit similar to how things change color as they get hotter, but more extreme and general. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.198|172.70.114.198]]

It may refer to the Greek etymology of the word "electron". Originally it meant amber, a yellow gem. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.118.146|172.68.118.146]] 23:20, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

I can't do formatting, I'm new. Sorry! {{unsigned|No Idea If There's A Character Limit LMAO}}

To me, this is 1000% building on the idea of debating the colors of school subjects. I've added a bit of explanation to the text about it. I used my own color associations & reasons (science = green, history = red) as an example, and I'm sure people will disagree with me. Leave your color/subject associations in a reply to this comment, could be a fun little debate! (also, English = blue)
[[User:Zman350x|Zman350x]] ([[User talk:Zman350x|talk]]) 23:50, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
: SocStud is yellow, Math is red, Science is green?, ELA is gray, French is blue, and orange is my least favorite subject out of the rest. I have gotten into many arguments with my friends.
:[[Special:Contributions/172.70.230.157|172.70.230.157]] 00:10, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:: Science = Green (green flask bubbling)
:: Social Studies = Blue (blue and green globe, green is taking)
:: Math = Red (math is reliable, red is a strong color so i associate it with reliability)
:: English = Yellow (all other colors are taken)
:: Also electrons are blue
::[[User:Iffy|Iffy]] ([[User talk:Iffy|talk]]) 23:53, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
::: Hm! I've never heard of school subjects having any assigned colors; much less any debate about it! If we're identifying them by the folders they're kept in, my favorite subject was Ferrari & my least favorite was Porsche.
::: [[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 04:41, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::: I don't recall colour-coded (UK) schoolbooks, in particular (except the "red pirate, green pirate, blue pirate, etc" stories for young kids, the red pirate like only rubies, the green one emeralds, the blue probably sapphires, and had clothing/etc that matched, naturally), but I had (have still, somewhere!) a collection of Usborne Encyclopaedias at home with a veritable rainbow of colours. Mathematics was yellow, I think, Computers a shade of blue, one of the Red or off-Red (slightly pinker, but still deep red) might have been Physics (had geophysics in it, IIRC), I think History was a light-green. I'm sure I never had the whole set, but I had enough to arrange in as close to Richard Of York order as I felt most content to do, when on the bookshelf.
::::: Obviously there ''were'' colours involved with the school stuff. I'm sure different levels of SPMG (Scottish Primary Maths Group?) workbooks were colour-coded, perhaps more for the benefit of the teacher, though the later {{w|School Mathematics Project|SMP}} ones were probably more just identified as "13a", "5b", etc, to work through various sub-subjects and the increasingly advanced techniques thereof, perhaps coloured with highlights only to not be boring black-on-white monochrome covers.
::::: And there's so many other colour-classifications that I instituted for myself, over the years, showing just how useful a hue can be to represent and differentiate a class of something, such as various 3M-style "post-it"-like arrow stickers stuck into the pages of a book for quick reference to all instances of one particular thing or another. For which I suppose I'm grateful to not having any notable form of colour-blindness, to limit my options. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.114|172.70.91.114]] 08:20, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::::This is completely BS. This is about the diagrams used for drawing atoms where colors are used for different elementary particles. And Randall clearly explains that they do not have real color. And the jokes that people still have feelings for what colors are chosen based on the conventions used where people first learned about atoms. Have removed the color on subjects completely as it has nothing to do with this comic. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::::PS you cannot be more than 100% on anything :-D --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:46, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I believe this comic was made in response to a book talk Randall did in Seattle, where this question was actually asked to him in person! If you want to hear it yourself, someone recorded the talk here: https://www.reddit.com/r/xkcd/comments/xjuc4i/a_recording_and_autotranscript_of_randalls_latest/
[[Special:Contributions/172.71.142.6|172.71.142.6]] 00:45, 7 February 2023 (UTC) A random new user
: Was it the dorky randall with red hair or the photogenic one with brown hair and blue eyes or am I going wildly mad? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.198|172.70.114.198]] 00:51, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Am I crazy, I always thought of electrons as blue to contrast with the protons which are red[[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.89|172.70.211.89]] 04:47, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:You're all crazy! Elections are 2817.9am & protons are 1.5am. "Yellow" is over 557,000,000,000am! Maybe you've all got your displays' color gamut set too low? ;S
:[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I have also seen protons as red and neutons as white and electron as blue in the diagrams I remember. Never yellow electrons. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

"This comic appears to "elevate" that discussion to the college level." - considering that the students are considerably smaller than the teacher (notice the heads), I seriously doubt this is meant to be set in a college classroom - high school at most, IMHO. Also, "One common debate among schoolchildren is over the "color" of various subjects. Because of the brightly colored folders commonly used to separate subjects in the binder of a young student, the students tend to associate those colors with the subject." - well, not in any school I ever attended, nor with any school class I've ever worked with. I'd be inclined to dispute that this is at all common. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.46.85|172.70.46.85]]
: I agree that this is probably not supposed to be college-level, but the color-subject coordination is definitely real (albeit not a very common topic of debate). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.38|162.158.90.38]] 08:01, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I find it hard to believe Randall is referencing colors of school subjects without alluding to them in any way; to the contrary, I feel fairly certain he's directly referencing the various colors assigned to electrons, protons, quarks, etc, in diagrammatic illustrations of atomic structure. I think the whole first paragraph is way off base (though interesting tangentially).
::[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::I agree with all above here and have corrected the explanation to school class and pupils and diagram colors removing school subject color completely! --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::Was it also worth removing the synesthesia bit? Entirely unrelated to school-subject organisation-by-colour that I also think was an {{w|Red herring|incarnadine ''clupea harengus''}}, but very possibly relevent to "but I happen think it's obvious that <concept> is a <hue> thing!"... For consideration, or as a side-note, whether or not you restore that possible reference. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.203|172.71.242.203]] 10:42, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Electrons are blue, right? In all my textbooks (Germany) electrons are blue. Is this a generally accepted addition? [[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.166|198.41.242.166]] 07:13, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
: I stopped the explanation saying that electrons were (by implication, ''solely'') yellow. If green is used for a nucleon (neutron? red being proton?), they might choose blue for an electron, as contrast. Or black dot or white (black-outlined) small circle to contrast with whatever the nucleons are with their much bigger circles clumped in the middle.
: But, given other regular colour-conventions, I could imagine yellow as a popular 'electron' colour. Either in its own right (influencing the choices given to the other things depicted) or as the main obviously remaining option (the other things having been decided upon first). Horses for courses. And I can imagine cultural/national differences (e.g. what colours your household wiring was set up as, at least before EU standardisation but then red and black still exists in the mindset, despite blue and brown, or whatever it might have been) if not localised 'linguistic puns' to make some choices more 'obvious' than others. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.114|172.70.91.114]] 08:20, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::Indeed, yellow is sometimes indicative of electrical hazard, as opposed to red for flame... So many ways to draw associations!
::[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::Yes blue electrons, red protons and white neutrons are probably common on Europe, it is in Denmark. I'm a physicist and word with radioactive isotopes and teach about them. My drawings are red protons and white neutrons and blue electrons. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I don’t know what Ms. Lenhart is talking about. Electrons are blue, protons are red, and neutrons are definitely grey. Not sure how to sign my comment tho. Oh well {{unsigned ip|172.70.174.115|13:00, 7 February 2023}}
:(You sign your comments with a string of <code><nowiki>~~~~</nowiki></code> (as suggested by the comment at the top of many a comic-discussion page, when you start to edit it)... or you wait for someone else to do what I just did for you, but that's more effort than the four tildes on your part.)
:For what it's worth, I'm mostly with you. Red and grey/dark-grey/black in the centre, as you say. Light blue (or yer actual electric blue?) or (bluish?) white electrons. Depends what colour-pallettes are available to the illustrator/modeller, I imagine, and what else needs a distinct colour alongside the basic trio (e.g. yellow fission/fusion "sparky-flame energy things" or general labelling stuff). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.246|162.158.158.246]] 13:15, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I did some data collection on image searches for atom diagrams, and yes, the defacto color standard is protons red, neutrons grey (less commonly yellow or green), and electrons blue.
::I like this because it gives opposing colors to the opposing positive and negative charges, (the same color choices as the traditional magnet north and south ends, likely not coincidentally,) and a neutral color to the uncharged neutron.
::Which makes me think that when Lenhart says "electrons are yellow" she does not mean in the diagram sense, but rather in the sense "if you make an electron big enough to see, it is yellow".
::[[User:SomeDee|SomeDee]] ([[User talk:SomeDee|talk]]) 16:58, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Talk:2734: Electron Color

2023-02-07T16:59:39Z

SomeDee:

Electrons have no color?! BUt lIgHTnIng strIKeS aRe YEllOw, aND LigHTNing IS MaDe uP of eLECTrOns.[[Special:Contributions/172.71.254.115|172.71.254.115]] 22:43, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
: Actually most colors are emitted by electrons orbiting atoms after absorbing light. The color electrons emit depend on their kinetic energy and available places they can travel, a tiny bit similar to how things change color as they get hotter, but more extreme and general. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.198|172.70.114.198]]

It may refer to the Greek etymology of the word "electron". Originally it meant amber, a yellow gem. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.118.146|172.68.118.146]] 23:20, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

I can't do formatting, I'm new. Sorry! {{unsigned|No Idea If There's A Character Limit LMAO}}

To me, this is 1000% building on the idea of debating the colors of school subjects. I've added a bit of explanation to the text about it. I used my own color associations & reasons (science = green, history = red) as an example, and I'm sure people will disagree with me. Leave your color/subject associations in a reply to this comment, could be a fun little debate! (also, English = blue)
[[User:Zman350x|Zman350x]] ([[User talk:Zman350x|talk]]) 23:50, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
: SocStud is yellow, Math is red, Science is green?, ELA is gray, French is blue, and orange is my least favorite subject out of the rest. I have gotten into many arguments with my friends.
:[[Special:Contributions/172.70.230.157|172.70.230.157]] 00:10, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:: Science = Green (green flask bubbling)
:: Social Studies = Blue (blue and green globe, green is taking)
:: Math = Red (math is reliable, red is a strong color so i associate it with reliability)
:: English = Yellow (all other colors are taken)
:: Also electrons are blue
::[[User:Iffy|Iffy]] ([[User talk:Iffy|talk]]) 23:53, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
::: Hm! I've never heard of school subjects having any assigned colors; much less any debate about it! If we're identifying them by the folders they're kept in, my favorite subject was Ferrari & my least favorite was Porsche.
::: [[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 04:41, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::: I don't recall colour-coded (UK) schoolbooks, in particular (except the "red pirate, green pirate, blue pirate, etc" stories for young kids, the red pirate like only rubies, the green one emeralds, the blue probably sapphires, and had clothing/etc that matched, naturally), but I had (have still, somewhere!) a collection of Usborne Encyclopaedias at home with a veritable rainbow of colours. Mathematics was yellow, I think, Computers a shade of blue, one of the Red or off-Red (slightly pinker, but still deep red) might have been Physics (had geophysics in it, IIRC), I think History was a light-green. I'm sure I never had the whole set, but I had enough to arrange in as close to Richard Of York order as I felt most content to do, when on the bookshelf.
::::: Obviously there ''were'' colours involved with the school stuff. I'm sure different levels of SPMG (Scottish Primary Maths Group?) workbooks were colour-coded, perhaps more for the benefit of the teacher, though the later {{w|School Mathematics Project|SMP}} ones were probably more just identified as "13a", "5b", etc, to work through various sub-subjects and the increasingly advanced techniques thereof, perhaps coloured with highlights only to not be boring black-on-white monochrome covers.
::::: And there's so many other colour-classifications that I instituted for myself, over the years, showing just how useful a hue can be to represent and differentiate a class of something, such as various 3M-style "post-it"-like arrow stickers stuck into the pages of a book for quick reference to all instances of one particular thing or another. For which I suppose I'm grateful to not having any notable form of colour-blindness, to limit my options. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.114|172.70.91.114]] 08:20, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::::This is completely BS. This is about the diagrams used for drawing atoms where colors are used for different elementary particles. And Randall clearly explains that they do not have real color. And the jokes that people still have feelings for what colors are chosen based on the conventions used where people first learned about atoms. Have removed the color on subjects completely as it has nothing to do with this comic. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::::PS you cannot be more than 100% on anything :-D --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:46, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I believe this comic was made in response to a book talk Randall did in Seattle, where this question was actually asked to him in person! If you want to hear it yourself, someone recorded the talk here: https://www.reddit.com/r/xkcd/comments/xjuc4i/a_recording_and_autotranscript_of_randalls_latest/
[[Special:Contributions/172.71.142.6|172.71.142.6]] 00:45, 7 February 2023 (UTC) A random new user
: Was it the dorky randall with red hair or the photogenic one with brown hair and blue eyes or am I going wildly mad? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.198|172.70.114.198]] 00:51, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Am I crazy, I always thought of electrons as blue to contrast with the protons which are red[[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.89|172.70.211.89]] 04:47, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:You're all crazy! Elections are 2817.9am & protons are 1.5am. "Yellow" is over 557,000,000,000am! Maybe you've all got your displays' color gamut set too low? ;S
:[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I have also seen protons as red and neutons as white and electron as blue in the diagrams I remember. Never yellow electrons. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

"This comic appears to "elevate" that discussion to the college level." - considering that the students are considerably smaller than the teacher (notice the heads), I seriously doubt this is meant to be set in a college classroom - high school at most, IMHO. Also, "One common debate among schoolchildren is over the "color" of various subjects. Because of the brightly colored folders commonly used to separate subjects in the binder of a young student, the students tend to associate those colors with the subject." - well, not in any school I ever attended, nor with any school class I've ever worked with. I'd be inclined to dispute that this is at all common. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.46.85|172.70.46.85]]
: I agree that this is probably not supposed to be college-level, but the color-subject coordination is definitely real (albeit not a very common topic of debate). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.38|162.158.90.38]] 08:01, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I find it hard to believe Randall is referencing colors of school subjects without alluding to them in any way; to the contrary, I feel fairly certain he's directly referencing the various colors assigned to electrons, protons, quarks, etc, in diagrammatic illustrations of atomic structure. I think the whole first paragraph is way off base (though interesting tangentially).
::[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::I agree with all above here and have corrected the explanation to school class and pupils and diagram colors removing school subject color completely! --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::Was it also worth removing the synesthesia bit? Entirely unrelated to school-subject organisation-by-colour that I also think was an {{w|Red herring|incarnadine ''clupea harengus''}}, but very possibly relevent to "but I happen think it's obvious that <concept> is a <hue> thing!"... For consideration, or as a side-note, whether or not you restore that possible reference. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.203|172.71.242.203]] 10:42, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Electrons are blue, right? In all my textbooks (Germany) electrons are blue. Is this a generally accepted addition? [[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.166|198.41.242.166]] 07:13, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
: I stopped the explanation saying that electrons were (by implication, ''solely'') yellow. If green is used for a nucleon (neutron? red being proton?), they might choose blue for an electron, as contrast. Or black dot or white (black-outlined) small circle to contrast with whatever the nucleons are with their much bigger circles clumped in the middle.
: But, given other regular colour-conventions, I could imagine yellow as a popular 'electron' colour. Either in its own right (influencing the choices given to the other things depicted) or as the main obviously remaining option (the other things having been decided upon first). Horses for courses. And I can imagine cultural/national differences (e.g. what colours your household wiring was set up as, at least before EU standardisation but then red and black still exists in the mindset, despite blue and brown, or whatever it might have been) if not localised 'linguistic puns' to make some choices more 'obvious' than others. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.114|172.70.91.114]] 08:20, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::Indeed, yellow is sometimes indicative of electrical hazard, as opposed to red for flame... So many ways to draw associations!
::[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::Yes blue electrons, red protons and white neutrons are probably common on Europe, it is in Denmark. I'm a physicist and word with radioactive isotopes and teach about them. My drawings are red protons and white neutrons and blue electrons. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I don’t know what Ms. Lenhart is talking about. Electrons are blue, protons are red, and neutrons are definitely grey. Not sure how to sign my comment tho. Oh well {{unsigned ip|172.70.174.115|13:00, 7 February 2023}}
:(You sign your comments with a string of <code><nowiki>~~~~</nowiki></code> (as suggested by the comment at the top of many a comic-discussion page, when you start to edit it)... or you wait for someone else to do what I just did for you, but that's more effort than the four tildes on your part.)
:For what it's worth, I'm mostly with you. Red and grey/dark-grey/black in the centre, as you say. Light blue (or yer actual electric blue?) or (bluish?) white electrons. Depends what colour-pallettes are available to the illustrator/modeller, I imagine, and what else needs a distinct colour alongside the basic trio (e.g. yellow fission/fusion "sparky-flame energy things" or general labelling stuff). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.246|162.158.158.246]] 13:15, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I did some data collection on image searches for atom diagrams, and yes, the defacto color standard is protons red, neutrons grey (less commonly yellow or green), and electrons blue.
::I like this because it gives opposing colors to the opposing positive and negative charges, (the same color choices as the traditional magnet north and south ends, likely not coincidentally,) and a neutral color to the uncharged neutron.
::Which makes me think that when Lenhart says "electrons are yellow" she does not mean in the diagram sense, but rather in the sense "if you make an electron big enough to see, it is yellow".
[[User:SomeDee|SomeDee]] ([[User talk:SomeDee|talk]]) 16:58, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Talk:2734: Electron Color

2023-02-07T16:58:42Z

SomeDee:

Electrons have no color?! BUt lIgHTnIng strIKeS aRe YEllOw, aND LigHTNing IS MaDe uP of eLECTrOns.[[Special:Contributions/172.71.254.115|172.71.254.115]] 22:43, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
: Actually most colors are emitted by electrons orbiting atoms after absorbing light. The color electrons emit depend on their kinetic energy and available places they can travel, a tiny bit similar to how things change color as they get hotter, but more extreme and general. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.198|172.70.114.198]]

It may refer to the Greek etymology of the word "electron". Originally it meant amber, a yellow gem. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.118.146|172.68.118.146]] 23:20, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

I can't do formatting, I'm new. Sorry! {{unsigned|No Idea If There's A Character Limit LMAO}}

To me, this is 1000% building on the idea of debating the colors of school subjects. I've added a bit of explanation to the text about it. I used my own color associations & reasons (science = green, history = red) as an example, and I'm sure people will disagree with me. Leave your color/subject associations in a reply to this comment, could be a fun little debate! (also, English = blue)
[[User:Zman350x|Zman350x]] ([[User talk:Zman350x|talk]]) 23:50, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
: SocStud is yellow, Math is red, Science is green?, ELA is gray, French is blue, and orange is my least favorite subject out of the rest. I have gotten into many arguments with my friends.
:[[Special:Contributions/172.70.230.157|172.70.230.157]] 00:10, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:: Science = Green (green flask bubbling)
:: Social Studies = Blue (blue and green globe, green is taking)
:: Math = Red (math is reliable, red is a strong color so i associate it with reliability)
:: English = Yellow (all other colors are taken)
:: Also electrons are blue
::[[User:Iffy|Iffy]] ([[User talk:Iffy|talk]]) 23:53, 6 February 2023 (UTC)
::: Hm! I've never heard of school subjects having any assigned colors; much less any debate about it! If we're identifying them by the folders they're kept in, my favorite subject was Ferrari & my least favorite was Porsche.
::: [[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 04:41, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::: I don't recall colour-coded (UK) schoolbooks, in particular (except the "red pirate, green pirate, blue pirate, etc" stories for young kids, the red pirate like only rubies, the green one emeralds, the blue probably sapphires, and had clothing/etc that matched, naturally), but I had (have still, somewhere!) a collection of Usborne Encyclopaedias at home with a veritable rainbow of colours. Mathematics was yellow, I think, Computers a shade of blue, one of the Red or off-Red (slightly pinker, but still deep red) might have been Physics (had geophysics in it, IIRC), I think History was a light-green. I'm sure I never had the whole set, but I had enough to arrange in as close to Richard Of York order as I felt most content to do, when on the bookshelf.
::::: Obviously there ''were'' colours involved with the school stuff. I'm sure different levels of SPMG (Scottish Primary Maths Group?) workbooks were colour-coded, perhaps more for the benefit of the teacher, though the later {{w|School Mathematics Project|SMP}} ones were probably more just identified as "13a", "5b", etc, to work through various sub-subjects and the increasingly advanced techniques thereof, perhaps coloured with highlights only to not be boring black-on-white monochrome covers.
::::: And there's so many other colour-classifications that I instituted for myself, over the years, showing just how useful a hue can be to represent and differentiate a class of something, such as various 3M-style "post-it"-like arrow stickers stuck into the pages of a book for quick reference to all instances of one particular thing or another. For which I suppose I'm grateful to not having any notable form of colour-blindness, to limit my options. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.114|172.70.91.114]] 08:20, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::::This is completely BS. This is about the diagrams used for drawing atoms where colors are used for different elementary particles. And Randall clearly explains that they do not have real color. And the jokes that people still have feelings for what colors are chosen based on the conventions used where people first learned about atoms. Have removed the color on subjects completely as it has nothing to do with this comic. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::::PS you cannot be more than 100% on anything :-D --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:46, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I believe this comic was made in response to a book talk Randall did in Seattle, where this question was actually asked to him in person! If you want to hear it yourself, someone recorded the talk here: https://www.reddit.com/r/xkcd/comments/xjuc4i/a_recording_and_autotranscript_of_randalls_latest/
[[Special:Contributions/172.71.142.6|172.71.142.6]] 00:45, 7 February 2023 (UTC) A random new user
: Was it the dorky randall with red hair or the photogenic one with brown hair and blue eyes or am I going wildly mad? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.198|172.70.114.198]] 00:51, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Am I crazy, I always thought of electrons as blue to contrast with the protons which are red[[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.89|172.70.211.89]] 04:47, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:You're all crazy! Elections are 2817.9am & protons are 1.5am. "Yellow" is over 557,000,000,000am! Maybe you've all got your displays' color gamut set too low? ;S
:[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I have also seen protons as red and neutons as white and electron as blue in the diagrams I remember. Never yellow electrons. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

"This comic appears to "elevate" that discussion to the college level." - considering that the students are considerably smaller than the teacher (notice the heads), I seriously doubt this is meant to be set in a college classroom - high school at most, IMHO. Also, "One common debate among schoolchildren is over the "color" of various subjects. Because of the brightly colored folders commonly used to separate subjects in the binder of a young student, the students tend to associate those colors with the subject." - well, not in any school I ever attended, nor with any school class I've ever worked with. I'd be inclined to dispute that this is at all common. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.46.85|172.70.46.85]]
: I agree that this is probably not supposed to be college-level, but the color-subject coordination is definitely real (albeit not a very common topic of debate). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.38|162.158.90.38]] 08:01, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I find it hard to believe Randall is referencing colors of school subjects without alluding to them in any way; to the contrary, I feel fairly certain he's directly referencing the various colors assigned to electrons, protons, quarks, etc, in diagrammatic illustrations of atomic structure. I think the whole first paragraph is way off base (though interesting tangentially).
::[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::I agree with all above here and have corrected the explanation to school class and pupils and diagram colors removing school subject color completely! --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::::Was it also worth removing the synesthesia bit? Entirely unrelated to school-subject organisation-by-colour that I also think was an {{w|Red herring|incarnadine ''clupea harengus''}}, but very possibly relevent to "but I happen think it's obvious that <concept> is a <hue> thing!"... For consideration, or as a side-note, whether or not you restore that possible reference. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.203|172.71.242.203]] 10:42, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

Electrons are blue, right? In all my textbooks (Germany) electrons are blue. Is this a generally accepted addition? [[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.166|198.41.242.166]] 07:13, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
: I stopped the explanation saying that electrons were (by implication, ''solely'') yellow. If green is used for a nucleon (neutron? red being proton?), they might choose blue for an electron, as contrast. Or black dot or white (black-outlined) small circle to contrast with whatever the nucleons are with their much bigger circles clumped in the middle.
: But, given other regular colour-conventions, I could imagine yellow as a popular 'electron' colour. Either in its own right (influencing the choices given to the other things depicted) or as the main obviously remaining option (the other things having been decided upon first). Horses for courses. And I can imagine cultural/national differences (e.g. what colours your household wiring was set up as, at least before EU standardisation but then red and black still exists in the mindset, despite blue and brown, or whatever it might have been) if not localised 'linguistic puns' to make some choices more 'obvious' than others. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.114|172.70.91.114]] 08:20, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::Indeed, yellow is sometimes indicative of electrical hazard, as opposed to red for flame... So many ways to draw associations!
::[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 09:18, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
:::Yes blue electrons, red protons and white neutrons are probably common on Europe, it is in Denmark. I'm a physicist and word with radioactive isotopes and teach about them. My drawings are red protons and white neutrons and blue electrons. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:43, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I don’t know what Ms. Lenhart is talking about. Electrons are blue, protons are red, and neutrons are definitely grey. Not sure how to sign my comment tho. Oh well {{unsigned ip|172.70.174.115|13:00, 7 February 2023}}
:(You sign your comments with a string of <code><nowiki>~~~~</nowiki></code> (as suggested by the comment at the top of many a comic-discussion page, when you start to edit it)... or you wait for someone else to do what I just did for you, but that's more effort than the four tildes on your part.)
:For what it's worth, I'm mostly with you. Red and grey/dark-grey/black in the centre, as you say. Light blue (or yer actual electric blue?) or (bluish?) white electrons. Depends what colour-pallettes are available to the illustrator/modeller, I imagine, and what else needs a distinct colour alongside the basic trio (e.g. yellow fission/fusion "sparky-flame energy things" or general labelling stuff). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.246|162.158.158.246]] 13:15, 7 February 2023 (UTC)
::I did some data collection on image searches for atom diagrams, and yes, the defacto color standard is protons red, neutrons grey (less commonly yellow or green), and electrons blue.
I like this because it gives opposing colors to the opposing positive and negative charges, (the same color choices as the traditional magnet north and south ends, likely not coincidentally,) and a neutral color to the uncharged neutron.
Which makes me think that when Lenhart says "electrons are yellow" she does not mean in the diagram sense, but rather in the sense "if you make an electron big enough to see, it is yellow".
[[User:SomeDee|SomeDee]] ([[User talk:SomeDee|talk]]) 16:58, 7 February 2023 (UTC)