explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

1715: Household Tips

2016-08-06T11:51:48Z

108.162.240.36: /* Title text */ Changed a word so the sentence made sense: the sentence formerly contained 'as' and 'so', so I removed one.

{{comic
| number = 1715
| date = August 3, 2016
| title = Household Tips
| image = household_tips.png
| titletext = To make your shoes feel more comfortable, smell better, and last longer, try taking them off before you shower.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a continuation of [[1567: Kitchen Tips]], which had four kitchen tips and then a household tip in the title text.

The comic shows [[Cueball]] explaining many things one should already know (and are likely already doing without needing to be told), but telling them like most people usually never do it to comedic effect. Below is a list of the five household tips given:

=== In the bathroom ===

'''To conserve water, try turning off your shower before leaving home''': Implies that the shower would "normally" be on at all times, which would be very wasteful, since any excess water (or if the bath tub plug is not in place or in a shower stall, all water) would be drained away. The [[what if?]] article "{{what if|91|Faucet Power}}" illustrates similar wasteful and destructive water use. This may be a reference to the common recommendation that people should unplug appliances when they are not in use.

=== Extinguishing fires ===

'''Sick of changing those smoke detector batteries? Eliminate any fires in your home and the batteries can last for months or years!''': A smoke detector on standby consumes much less power than one constantly ringing, since standing by only requires that a detection circuit (which draws little current) be on and an LED flashes a few times a minute (which also consumes very little power), while a buzzer used to sound the alarm uses much energy by comparison. The sentence implies that some people keep their fire alarms beeping at all times, due to their ongoing fires, and then stop up to change the batteries when they stop working.

Of course, keeping one's house fire-free at (mostly) all times is usually done because of other benefits than just saving on batteries, such as preventing fire damage to valuable property, infrastructure, and human bodies. On top of the problems with smoke and fire, this would be a really noisy place to live, given how loud fire alarms usually are.

=== Toilet bowls ===

'''Tired of clogged toilets? Try leaving the lid on the upper chamber and use only the lower bowl!''': The "upper chamber", the toilet's cistern, delivers plain water to the lower bowl at speed to flush the latter. As such, the pipes that direct the water down are not wide enough for waste to pass. There is typically a lid on the upper cistern because it isn't intended to be used, but access is occasionally needed to fix or replace the flushing mechanisms. The lower bowl, as one should be familiar with, is the one intended to receive solid waste or defecation and is connected to the plumbing by pipes wide enough for this purpose. The comic seems to imply that some people defecate both on the "upper chamber" and the lower bowl and recommends to only do it in the lower bowl.

=== Near the window ===

'''Fresh air doesn't have to be expensive. Many windows can be slid up to create a temporary hole without the usual cost and cleanup!''': This suggests that the people he appeals to typically smash a window (or a wall) to get fresh air, hence the clean up and expensive replacement of the window once enough fresh air has been obtained.

=== Title text ===

'''To make your shoes feel more comfortable, smell better, and last longer, try taking them off before you shower.''': This talks about shoes lasting longer and being more comfortable when they are not worn into a shower. People typically remove all their clothing, including and/or especially shoes (except perhaps for some lightweight sandals to protect the feet in public showers), when showering, so while it is certainly true that removing one's shoes before showering will allow them to last longer and stink less (since getting them wet without methods of getting them fully dry would produce malodorous molds), this is not in any way a novel idea.

This comic is clearly related to the [[:category:Protip|Protip category]], but the exact word is not mentioned in this comic so it cannot itself be given this category.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is standing outside a bathtub with the shower curtains partly drawn aside hanging outside the tub. The shower head is dripping water as Cueball reaches in turning the closest of the two taps. Below these there is a faucet. There is water on the floor at the bottom of the tub and a pool of water behind Cueball.]
:Cueball: Hi everyone! I'm back with more household tips. To conserve water, try turning off your shower before you leave home.

:[Cueball is holding a bucket and pours water out of it to the right. The water still hangs in the air over a small fire with four flames on the floor. A similar fire is behind him to the left, except it seems thre is a burning item in this fire, and a single flame is on the floor between that and Cueball. A smoke detector (off-panel) goes off in the background as indicated with lines and sounds.]
:Cueball: Sick of changing those smoke detector batteries? Eliminate any fires in your house and the batteries can last for months or years!
:Smoke detector (off panel): Beep beep beep

:[A frame-less panel shows a a toilet with the toilet seat up and also the lid has been removed from the cistern at the top. It is hanging in the air above and behind the cistern. There is an X with an arrow pointing towards the cistern and a checkmark with an arrow pointing towards the toilet bowl.]
:Cueball (off-panel): Tired of clogged toilets? Try leaving the lid on the upper chamber and use only the lower bowl!
:X
:✔

:[Cueball holding a hand up is standing next to an open window where the bottom part has been slid almost up to the top.]
:Fresh air doesn't have to be expensive. Many windows can be slid up to create a temporary hole without the usual cost and cleanup!

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]

10: Pi Equals

2016-07-16T21:16:01Z

108.162.240.36: /* Trivia */

{{comic
| number = 10
| date = September 30, 2005
| title = Pi Equals
| image = pi.jpg
| titletext = My most famous drawing, and one of the first I did for the site
}}

==Explanation==
There are two possible references here. One is from the book ''{{w|Contact (novel)|Contact}}'' by Carl Sagan, where the existence of God was shown in the last chapter to be encoded in the digits of {{w|pi}}. The other is an old joke of a {{w|Fortune cookie|fortune cookie}} with a fortune that reads "Help! I'm trapped in a fortune cookie factory!" Similar jokes are often repeated for any mass-manufactured personalized item, often implying that the worker who made the item is working in a sweatshop somewhere or is literally trapped inside a factory and calling for help via the items they produce. This joke is also referenced in [[327: Exploits of a Mom]]'s title text, where [[Mrs. Roberts]] [[Elaine Roberts|daughter]]'s name is "Help I'm trapped in a driver's license factory."

The most literal interpretation of the joke would be that some being who helped to create the universe in a "universe factory" snuck a message into the digits of pi (a number that has an endlessly long decimal that never repeats) asking for help to get out. Mathematical concepts being manufactured in a factory is the main mental image here. One can't help but wonder if the [http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/TimeBandits.jpg primordial beings who labored on the universe] to produce things like the gravitational constant and pi have a labor union. Judging by the fact that they're calling for help, it seems they don't.

Since pi never ends and does not follow any sort of known pattern, if each number pair were assigned a letter from the alphabet, or if it was converted to base-26 (or preferably ASCII or some other form of text encoding, if you desire capitalization and punctuation), the entire works of Shakespeare, as well as any other expressible piece of information, including the message in this comic, could presumably be found (it is not really ''known'' that pi really has {{w|normal number|this property}}, but the absence of this property would in itself be a weird coincidence); although the probability of finding any given string of numbers within a calculable range of digits of pi [http://www.angio.net/pi/whynotpi.html diminishes rapidly as the string length increases].

In the novel {{w|Contact (novel)|Contact}} by {{w|Carl Sagan}}, he includes a "[http://goddoesnt.blogspot.dk/2013/10/pi-and-signature-of-god-from-carl.html Signature of God]". In brief the signature consists of a very long string of 1s and 0s far out (after some 10^20 seemingly random numbers) in the base-11 expansion of pi that when arranged in a square of a specific size yields a clear drawing of a circle with a diameter of several hundred digits. The existence of this pattern was hinted to the protagonist by a member of an advanced alien civilization as being encoded in physics by an even more advanced civilization with the ability to create universes.

Interestingly enough, this could also work for pictures: if you assign a set of nine numbers to equal an RGB hexadecimal color value, eventually you will find the Mona Lisa.

In the title text [[Randall]] notes that this became one of his most famous comics (at the time it was re-released on the new [[xkcd]] site on the 1st of January 2006.) He also notes that it was one of his first drawings for the site (it was the 11th posted originally). See [[#Trivia|trivia]] below.

==Transcript==
:[A huge π to the left, then a large equal-to sign, and then five rows of text.]
:'''π ='''
:::3.14159265
:::3589793help
:::imtrappedin
:::auniversefac
:::tory7108914...

==Trivia==
*This was the 11th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous is [[9: Serenity is coming out tomorrow]].
**The next is [[14: Copyright]].
*Comic #36 was originally posted as a duplicate of comic 10: Pi Equals. This was corrected some time between April 23, 2006 and July 5, 2006 when the current version showed up in the web archive (see the links).
*This comic kept its original title: "Pi Equals"
*There were no original [[Randall]] quotes for this comic.
*This was one of the [[:Category:First day on LiveJournal|thirteen first comics]] posted to LiveJournal within 12 minutes on Friday September 30, 2005.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].
*The book version of this comic (in ''[http://store.xkcd.com/products/xkcd-volume-0 xkcd: volume 0]'') has different title text:
**''"I've put rescue instructions in e. You'll need the cheat codes for your universe, which I hid in the square root of two."''
* "7108914" appears in position 13,709,690 of pi. If the string was instead "71089314", it would appear at position 2533.
{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 11]]
[[Category:First day on LiveJournal| 11]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Footer comics]]

1408: March of the Penguins

2015-10-23T20:41:01Z

108.162.240.36: /* Explanation */ Clarified that the penguins died suddenly.

{{comic
| number = 1408
| date = August 15, 2014
| title = March of the Penguins
| image = march_of_the_penguins.png
| titletext = You ARE getting older, though.
}}

==Explanation==
Several of the xkcd comics outline ways to make people feel older by referencing various pieces of popular culture which feel ingrained and "recent", and revealing the time that has elapsed since their release to be longer than expected (for instance, [[1393: Timeghost]] and [[891: Movie Ages]]). This appears to be what [[Black Hat]] is doing as he walks in on [[Megan]] to announce that all the penguins from a 2005 documentary ''{{w|March of the Penguins}}'' about {{w|emperor penguins}} are dead. Megan is familiar with these sorts of antics and assumes Black Hat is indicating that the film is so old that the lifespan of emperor penguins is less than the time since the documentary was released. Frustrated, Megan simply acknowledges Black Hat's statement by agreeing that everyone is aging. Black Hat, however, reveals that he is not trying to make her feel old, because the penguins were all alive "last night" and died of a cause other than time's passage. His announcement that he is "trying to apologize" creates the obvious inference that he killed the penguins. This gives the situation a much darker tone; especially since Black Hat likely is not truly apologizing, as he is very unapologetic in his [[72: Classhole|"classhole"]] tendencies.

Emperor penguins actually live about 20 years on average, so presumably, barring any intervention by Black Hat, most of the younger penguins and many of the older penguins in the movie are still alive as of this comic.

The title text emphasizes that whatever the penguins' fate, we do get and are getting older. The text may also be a further jab by Black Hat as he departs just to make Megan feel a bit worse.

==Transcript==
:[Black Hat walks in, Megan is at a desk.]
:Black Hat: All the birds from ''March of the Penguins'' are now dead.

:Megan: OK, I ''get'' it. We're all aging.
:Black Hat: What? No.

:Black Hat: I'm not trying to make you feel old. They were alive last night. I'm trying to apologize.
:[Megan turned around in her office chair and is facing Black Hat.]
:Megan: Oh God

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics to make one feel old]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

Talk:1432: The Sake of Argument

2014-10-16T11:18:14Z

108.162.240.36:

In my experience when someone begins a hypothetical with "for the sake of argument" The hypothetical being explored is almost always a direct exploration of the argument being put forward by the person they are speaking to, so to my mind the perfect response to the second panel would have been: "You admit you were wrong then, Excellent!" ;-) [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.211|108.162.250.211]] 07:05, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

:In contrast, it is often used alongs the lines of "OK, I see that you don't agree with my viewpoint, so for the sake of argument, pretend that you do agree with my viewpoint". I suppose this is an effort to try and get the other person to explore your views by stepping into them. For example: "Ok I know that you think that drink driving is fine, but for the sake of argument imagine that your dog had just been run over by a drunk driver" --[[User:Pudder|Pudder]] ([[User talk:Pudder|talk]]) 08:53, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

IMHO could be vaguely related to the [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQFKtI6gn9Y Monty Python's Argument Clinic] [[User:Jkotek|Jkotek]]
:IMHO "related" to, no matter how vaguely, would be a strong choice of word. At best, I could imagine "inspired by" - after all, Cueball has barely presented a connected series of statements, much less apparently one intended to establish a proposition, definite or otherwise - it's clearly the automatic gainsaying of anything Ponytail says... [[User:Brettpeirce|Brettpeirce]] ([[User talk:Brettpeirce|talk]]) 10:10, 10 October 2014 (UTC)
::No it isn't! ;-) [[User:MGitsfullofsheep|MGitsfullofsheep]] ([[User talk:MGitsfullofsheep|talk]]) 12:19, 10 October 2014 (UTC)
::: For the sake of argument, say it is. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.217.125|108.162.217.125]] 22:39, 12 October 2014 (UTC)BK

"Rather than getting frustrated at being derailed, Ponytail instead seizes on this and decides they should get a boat, and that the Devil can come too." - I'm reading the title text a bit differently: it's not Ponytail being not angry and chiming in, but actually having no words (indicated by '...') and then it's Cueball again taunting her even more with inviting the devil. [[User:Zefiro|Zefiro]] ([[User talk:Zefiro|talk]]) 09:03, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

:I just wanted to say that I agree with Zefiro here.--[[Special:Contributions/173.245.56.173|173.245.56.173]] 09:20, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

::On reading again, I agree. I missed that the ellipsis was a seperate section, rather than the beginning of 'For arguments sake we should get a boat' --[[User:Pudder|Pudder]] ([[User talk:Pudder|talk]]) 11:27, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

Could he possibly be making a pun? "For the sake of the 'ARGH' you meant," perhaps? [[User:Joehammer79|Joehammer79]] ([[User talk:Joehammer79|talk]]) 13:24, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

I think Cueball is taking the "for the sake of argument" too literally, as "in order to create more to argue on". Also "advocate". Also, "device" in the title text (literal physical transportation device vs rhetorical device). The explanation as of now doesn't seem to realize this. [[User:Matega|Matega]] ([[User talk:Matega|talk]]) 15:46, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

Regarding Devils advocate and copied from Wikipedia: "During the canonization process employed by the Roman Catholic Church, the Promoter of the Faith (Latin: promotor fidei), popularly known as the Devil's advocate (Latin: advocatus diaboli), was a canon lawyer appointed by Church authorities to argue against the canonization of a candidate.[2] It was this person’s job to take a skeptical view of the candidate's character, to look for holes in the evidence, to argue that any miracles attributed to the candidate were fraudulent, and so on. The Devil's advocate opposed God's advocate (Latin: advocatus Dei; also known as the Promoter of the Cause), whose task was to make the argument in favor of canonization. This task is now performed by the Promoter of Justice (promotor iustitiae), who is in charge of examining how accurate is the inquiry on the saintliness of the candidate." {{unsigned|Cobble}}

Are we sure this isn't just Beret Guy going casual? {{unsigned ip|173.245.56.164}}

The "oh, like a boat" is a reference to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.240.36|108.162.240.36]] 11:18, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Talk:1385: Throwing Rocks

2014-06-23T04:39:59Z

108.162.240.36:

Current explanation says the rock in the second panel is seen "possibly sinking the boat." Whoever typed this apparently didn't notice the undisturbed leaf boat, floating approximately 2 feet away from the splash. - [[Special:Contributions/108.162.240.36|108.162.240.36]] 04:38, 23 June 2014 (UTC)

Talk:1385: Throwing Rocks

2014-06-23T04:38:29Z

108.162.240.36: Created page with "Current explanation says the rock in the we one panel is seen "possibly sinking the boat." Whoever type this apparently didn't notice the undisturbed leaf boat, floating appro..."

Current explanation says the rock in the we one panel is seen "possibly sinking the boat." Whoever type this apparently didn't notice the undisturbed leaf boat, floating approximately 2 feet away from the splash. - [[Special:Contributions/108.162.240.36|108.162.240.36]] 04:38, 23 June 2014 (UTC)