Editing 1417: Seven

{{comic
| number    = 1417
| date      = September 5, 2014
| title     = Seven
| image     = seven.png
| titletext = The days of the week are Monday, Arctic, Wellesley, Green, Electra, Synergize, and the Seventh Seal.
}}

==Explanation==
In this comic, [[Cueball]] (or perhaps [[Randall]]) says he can't distinguish between sets that have exactly seven objects. This leads him to exchange the items in the sets without noticing, to the point where, when attempting to list a single set, each item mentioned actually belongs to a different set.

This is shown in the comic when [[Megan]] asks Cueball to name the seven dwarfs from ''{{w|Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937 film)|Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs}}'', a task some people might find difficult, although they would not just choose words from other sets of seven to fill in the gaps.

The title text reveals that even a trivial set of seven items, like the days of the week, also goes completely wrong.

The comic may be related to the {{w|Set-theoretic definition of natural numbers#Oldest definition|oldest set-theoretic definition of the natural numbers}}, in which for each natural number, an equivalence class is defined over all sets which contain the same number of items. As Cueball is known for [[:Category:Math|mathematical thinking]], he could be presumed to have taken the underlying equivalence relation to heart, and (over)applying it to real life, genuinely judging sets to be identical if they all contain N objects.

The number seven being the number for when sets become indistinguishable is possibly a reference to {{w|The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two|Miller's law}}.  Especially considering that this is a law dealing with human memory, which Cueball is having issues with.  However, this law refers to elements ''within the same set'' becoming indistinguishable, rather than the indistinguishability of different sets of the same size - indeed, its original tests involved either distinguishing between the items, or repeating them back ''in the correct order''.  But then again, that might be part of the humor.

The number seven has culturally been {{w|7 (number)#Religion and mythology|regarded as a special, magical or holy number}}, which contributes to the large number of familiar sets of seven that make this comic possible. This proliferation of well-known sets of 7 items could be another reason why Randall chose to use the number {{w|seven}} in the comic.

In [[1554: Spice Girls]] the game continues with Cueball saying that it is now Megan's turn and then he asks her a similar question regarding the names of the Spice Girls. Her problem is then that she simply finds different sets of five and then just adds Spice behind each of the words of that set.

===Comic list===
For each of the seven lists below, the relevant item's traditional position within its own list of seven, according to Wikipedia, is '''not''' necessarily equal to its position on the list in the comic. For some lists the position is equal, but not for all. For instance Sneezy is traditionally never mentioned first amongst the dwarfs since the leader Doc normally comes first. But "phylum" is the second major taxonomic rank as is "phylum" the second item on the list in the comic.

The seven "dwarfs" mentioned and their relevant sets of seven are (items in the set are written in bold):
{| class="wikitable"
|
! 1
! 2
! 3
! 4
! 5
! 6
! 7
|-
!{{W|Seven Dwarfs#Disney Dwarfs|Disney's Dwarfs}} from ''{{w|Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937 film)|Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs}}''<ref group=c>The order is taken from the page about the movie, but Sneezy is never no. 1. On the other page, which is listed alphabetically, he is no. 5.</ref>
|Doc
|Grumpy
|Happy
|Sleepy
|Bashful
|'''Sneezy''' 
|Dopey
|-
!Major {{w|taxonomic ranks}}.<ref group=c>There are technically 8 on this list as {{w|Domain (biology)|domain}} has been included as the first in the list in 1990. It is, however, still normal to only list the 7 ranks in the table.</ref>
|kingdom
|'''phylum'''
|class
|order
|family
|genus
|species
|-
!{{w|Continents}}<ref group=c>Continents do not have a fixed order and can be ordered by several criteria. This table orders the continents by population, by which Europe is the third-largest and matches the position in Cueball's list.</ref>
|Asia
|Africa
|'''Europe'''
|North America
|South America
|Oceania
|Antarctica
|-
!{{w|Seven deadly sins|Deadly sins}}<ref group=c>List as on Wikipedia.</ref>
|lust
|gluttony
|greed
|'''sloth'''
|wrath
|envy
|pride
|-
!{{w|Seven-layer dip|Seven Layer Dip (recipe)}}<ref group=c>The list on Wikipedia is not in the order the dip should be made. The order used above is from this [http://allrecipes.com/recipe/seven-layer-dip-i/ recipe].</ref>
|refried beans
|cheese
|ground beef
|sour cream
|'''guacamole'''
|salsa
|chopped black olives/&#8203;tomatoes/&#8203;green onions
|-
!|Layers of the {{w|OSI model}}<ref group=c>The order above is in reverse. The numbers given on Wikipedia is from 7 to 1 as they stand above. However when showing them in a table they begin with no. 7. So it can be discussed if this is the correct order or the reverse. Since Data link is no. 2, the reverse above becomes the "correct" no. 6.</ref>
|application
|presentation
|session
|transport
|network
|'''data link'''
|physical
|-
!|{{w|Wonders of the World#Seven Wonders of the Ancient World|Wonders of the Ancient World}}<ref group=c>List as on Wikipedia.</ref>
|Great Pyramid of Giza
|Hanging Gardens of Babylon
|Statue of Zeus at Olympia
|Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
|Mausoleum at Halicarnassus
|'''Colossus of Rhodes'''
|Lighthouse of Alexandria
|}

<references group=c />

===Title text list===
The title text extends this saying he also does the same with the set of the seven days of the week. There are several sets of 7 featuring the name '''Electra''', which are all listed in the table below. Until [[Randall]] tells us which he meant, all are possible.

The sets Cueball's "days of the week" come from are:
{| class="wikitable"
|
! 1
! 2
! 3
! 4
! 5
! 6
! 7
|-
!{{w|Days of the week}}<ref group=t>In the US, the weekdays are usually mentioned with Sunday first, whereas the international {{w|ISO week date}} standard defines Monday as the first day of the week. Although Randall is from the US, he has previously expressed his preference for [[1179: ISO 8601|ISO 8601]] (among [[526: Converting to Metric|other international standards]]), so it's reasonable to assume he'd list the days of the week starting on Monday.</ref>
|'''Monday'''
|Tuesday
|Wednesday
|Thursday
|Friday 
|Saturday
|Sunday
|-
!{{w|Seven Seas#Modern|The Seven Seas (modern version)}}<ref group=t>There are many ways to lists 7 named bodies of water. The one used in the table uses the order from the Wikipedia article on the modern version, from the largest to the smallest of the seven. But at the top of the article on the {{w|Seven Seas}} another set of oceans are used. Here the two largest bodies of water (Pacific and Atlantic) are split in a north and a south part, and the Southern (or Antarctic) Ocean is included. They then displace the three smallest bodies of water mentioned in the table above. If that list is sorted in alphabetic order, using the name Antarctic Ocean instead of Southern Ocean, then "Arctic" would come second: Antarctic, '''Arctic''', Indian, North Atlantic, North Pacific, South Atlantic and South Pacific. "Arctic" could also be a reference to {{w|Climate zones}} - see [[#Trivia|Trivia]]. It could not, however, be a reference to {{w|Continents}}, because the Arctic is not a continent {{w|Continent#Number of continents|regardless of how they're counted}}.</ref>
|The Pacific Ocean
|The Atlantic Ocean
|The Indian Ocean
|The '''Arctic''' Ocean
|The Mediterranean Sea 
|The Caribbean Sea
|The Gulf of Mexico.
|-
!{{w|Seven Sisters (colleges)|Seven Sisters}}, historically women's colleges in U.S.<ref group=t>List as on Wikipedia.</ref>
|Mount Holyoke
|Vassar
|'''Wellesley'''
|Smith
|Radcliffe
|Bryn Mawr
|Barnard
|-
!Traditional {{w|spectral color}}s<ref group=t>On the list on Wikipedia there are only six colors but Indigo was used to get to seven colors by Newton - see [[#Trivia|Trivia]].</ref>
|Red
|Orange 
|Yellow
|'''Green'''
|Blue
|Indigo 
|Violet
|-
!{{w|Pleiades (Greek mythology)|Pleiades}}, Seven Sisters, nymphs and daughters of Atlas and Pleone in Greek mythology<ref group=t>List as on Wikipedia, with the oldest first and the youngest last (it's unclear whether the ones in the middle are also listed by age). In any case, only in reverse alphabetical order Electra would be no. 5: Taygete, Sterope, Merope, Maia, '''Electra''', Celaeno, and Alcyone.</ref><ref group=t>Electra is one of the septet of Pleiades sisters, one of the named stars in the Pleiades Star Cluster, and also of the septet of the complete extant plays by Sophocles.</ref>
|Maia
|'''Electra'''
|Taygete
|Alcyone
|Celaeno
|Sterope
|Merope
|-
!{{w|Pleiades|Pleiades}} Star Cluster <ref group=t>[[Randall]] names the Pleiades his favorite astronomical entity in the {{xkcd|about|"about" section}} on his website.</ref><ref group=t>In the order of stars named for the Seven Sisters starting from 12 o'clock position and counting clockwise.  This list does not include Atlas and Pleione, parents of the Seven Sisters, and the remaining two named stars in the Cluster, which would be the eighth and ninth stars, respectively.</ref>
|Sterope
|Maia
|Taygeta
|Celaeno
|'''Electra'''
|Merope
|Alcyone
|-
!|''{{w|Sophocles|Complete Plays}}'' by Sophocles<ref group=t>ibid</ref>
|Ajax/&#8203;Aias
|'''Electra'''
|Oedipus The King/&#8203;Oedipus Rex/&#8203;Oedipus Tyrannus
|Oedipus at Colonus
|Antigone
|The Trachinian Maidens/&#8203;The Women of Trachis
|Philoctetes
|-
!|''{{w|The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People}}'' by Dr. Stephen R. Covey<ref group=t>These seven habits are clearly named in order as they are listed as Habit 1 through Habit 7.</ref>
|Be proactive
|Begin with the end in mind
|Put first things first
|Think win-win
|Seek first to understand and then to be understood
|'''Synergize'''
|Sharpen the saw
|-
!|In the {{w|Book of Revelation}} in the {{w|New Testament}} there are {{w|Seven seals}}<ref group=t>''The Seventh Seal'' is also the name of a movie released in 1957, which belongs to a '''lot''' of sets of seven -- see the [[#Trivia|Trivia]] section.</ref>
|The First seal
|The Second seal
|The Third seal
|The Fourth seal
|The Fifth seal
|The Sixth seal
|'''The Seventh seal'''
|}

<references group=t />

==Transcript==
:[Megan and Cueball are talking.]
:Megan: Can you name all the dwarfs from Snow White?
:Cueball: Sure, there's, um...
:Cueball's thoughts: Sneezy, phylum, Europe, sloth, guacamole, data link, Colossus of Rhodes
:I have this problem where all sets of seven things are indistinguishable to me.

==Trivia==
*Arctic (no. 2 on the title text list) could also be a reference to {{w|Climate zones|climate zones}}: '''Arctic''', North Temperate, Northern Subtropical, Tropical, Southern Subtropical, South Temperate and Antarctic.
**There are however usually only five mentioned according to the {{w|Köppen climate classification}}. They are: Tropical, Dry, Temperate, Continental and Polar climate.
*Concerning the seven colours of the spectrum (no. 4 on the title text list) {{w|Indigo#Classification as a spectral color|indigo is stuck in}} by {{w|Isaac Newton}} to add up to the seven notes in the {{w|Scale (music)#Western music|Western musical scale}}.
**It should be noted that {{w|Indigo#Classification as a spectral color|Newton probably meant}} the colours {{w|cyan}} and {{w|blue}} as we think of it today, rather than blue and {{w|indigo}}.
**Also note that in a {{w|rainbow}} you usually {{w|Rainbow#Number of colours in spectrum or rainbow|cannot distinguish more than six colours}} with cyan melting in with green and blue and the same for indigo with blue and violet.
***{{w|Color term#Basic color terms|This is highly dependent on the language you speak.}} Russian, for example, has both sinij and goluboj to describe different blues that in English are both blue. Japanese, as another example, has blue and green together (kinda) in 青.
**These are also the traditional seven artists' pigments, {{w|Roy G. Biv|with the accompanying mnemonic "Roy G. Biv"}} (or the "Richard Of York..." counterpart mnemonic, for those indoctrinated by a different method). Indigo dye is a widely known and readily available colouring agent. The ongoing ubiquity of the ''pigment'' (think denim) gives it a unique prominence despite its uncertain status as a spectral colour.
*''The Seventh Seal'' (no. 7 on the title text list) could also refer to the 1957 film {{w|The Seventh Seal}} by Swedish director {{w|Ingmar Bergman}}. Indeed, we can put it in quite a few sets of seven.
**This was Bergman's seventh film with an English title beginning with the letter 'S' (ignoring articles). ''A Ship Bound for India'', ''Summer Interlude'', ''Secrets of Women'', ''Summer with Monika'', ''Sawdust and Tinsel'', ''Smiles of a Summer Night'', '''''The Seventh Seal'''''.
**Similary ''The Seventh Seal'' is also the seventh Bergman film whose Swedish title starts with 'S', although the list has some different members. ''Skepp till Indialand'', ''Sånt händer inte här'', ''Sommarlek'', ''Sommaren med Monika'', ''Sommarnattens leende'', ''Sista paret ut'', '''''Det sjunde inseglet'''''.
**''The Seventh Seal'' was also one of seven Bergman films submitted by Sweden for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film during the 1950s and 1960s.  '''The Seventh Seal''', ''The Magician'', ''The Virgin Spring'', ''Through a Glass Darkly'', ''The Silence'', ''Persona'', ''Shame''.
**According to the Wikipedia page on {{w|The Seventh Seal|The Seventh Seal}}, the Jesuit publication America wrote, "It also began a series of seven films that explored the possibility of faith in a post-Holocaust, nuclear age. In 'The Virgin Spring' (1960), 'Through a Glass Darkly' (1961), 'Winter Light' (1962) and 'The Silence' (1963), he poses traditional faith questions in identifiably religious language. The characters struggle self-consciously with their inability to believe in God and form relationships with one another. In 'Wild Strawberries' (1957) and 'The Magician' (1958), the issues are veiled in layers of metaphor. The theological questions become apparent only by placing them in the context of the other films of the period. With 'The Silence' he concludes that God is unknowable, and the human person must simply continue life's journey seeking understanding and happiness however one can. At that point, [http://americamagazine.org/node/148305 God-questions drop out of his films altogether].
*One way to remember the names of the Seven Dwarfs from the Disney film is: three emotions (Happy, Bashful, Grumpy), two S's (Sleepy, Sneezy), two D's (Dopey, Doc). Cueball assumes that Megan is asking in the context of the Disney film, but other works have named the dwarfs differently; see {{w|Seven Dwarfs}}.
*Megan's question uses the plural '''dwarfs'''. Astronomers also refer to the plural of {{w|dwarf star}}s as "dwarfs". The word "dwarves" is used in {{w|J. R. R. Tolkien}}'s works, but has been seen as far back as [http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/000293.html the early 1800s].

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