explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

2249: I Love the 20s

2021-02-09T18:53:55Z

162.158.122.12: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2249
| date = January 1, 2020
| title = I Love the 20s
| image = i love the 20s.png
| titletext = Billboard's "Best of the 80s" chart includes Blondie's 1980 hit "Call Me." QED.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic was released on the first day of the year {{w|2020}}. It was the second of two [[:Category:New Year|New Year comics]] around the 2019-2020 New Year, after [[2248: New Year's Eve]].

The comic opens with [[Megan]], [[Cueball]], [[White Hat]], and [[Ponytail]] celebrating the new year and discussing their relief that the change of decade brings with it two beneficial side-effects; firstly, they can now unambiguously name the decade "the 20s", and secondly, since the decade has a well-defined name, any cultural trends that begin in the 20s can be attributed to the decade itself, and not to the generation that happens to coincide with it.

White Hat, however, tries a couple of times to raise a pedantic objection: he believes that the new decade does not "officially" start until 2021.

Ponytail corrects him on this, but he refuses to accept the correction until Megan cites an unlikely source: the fact that the {{w|VH1}} television show
{{w|I Love the '90s (American TV series)|''I Love the '90s''}} categorized MC Hammer's 1990 single "{{w|U Can't Touch This}}" as a 90s song, which supports Ponytail's definition of decade. The joke is that a pop culture documentary is not an authoritative source for definitions of time standards, yet for some reason everyone is willing to accept its authority on such matters anyway.

The disagreement over the definition of when decades start is due to the fact that there is more than one way to count decades. You could do it in one of the following two ways:
*By counting every span of ten years that has occurred since the start of year 1 in the Common Era (White Hat's definition)
*By taking the digit that is common to all years in a given ten-year span (Ponytail's definition)

White Hat's definition is an "ordinal" method, since it functions by counting the number of ten-year spans ''since the first one'', which is defined to have begun in the year 1. However, Ponytail's definition is the "cardinal" method, which simply groups years by their common most significant digits. For example, when we say "the 1980s", we mean "the span of ten years that all began with the digits 1-9-8".

Neither definition is wrong, however Ponytail's definition is the more common one, and she notes that this is not how decades are typically determined (the show isn't called "I Love the 200th Decade"), and the fact that we count centuries in an ordinal way does not mean that we should do the same with decades.

White Hat's objection (probably deliberately) recalls an issue that was frequently discussed around the year 2000. Because we ''do'' count centuries ordinally (eg. "1st century", "20th century", etc.), and the first century began on the year 1, the 21st century did not technically start until 2001. Much of the world, not understanding this (or not caring), celebrated the dawning of the year 2000 as the start of both a new century and a new millenium, ignoring those who point out the change wouldn't happen for another year. (Though it should be noted unlike decades this is a genuine mistake rather than two slightly different definitions.)

Megan's exclamation "Stop!" is similar to the line famously used by MC Hammer in "U Can't Touch This" ("Stop! Hammer time.").

"{{w|Aughts}}" and "Teens" were names suggested for the {{w|2000s_(decade)|2000s}} and {{w|2010s}} respectively; however, neither of those names managed to gain widespread acceptance.

{{w|Millennials}} is a name given to the generation which was born in the 80s and 90s, such that they began entering adulthood in the 2000s. The term was sometimes used pejoratively by older generations who view millennials as immature or complacent, particularly during the 2010s. The comic speculates that millennials may have been unfairly targeted due to the fact that the decade didn't have an easily-identifiable name; if it had, then people might have attributed their misgivings about modern culture to the decade itself, instead of singling out a demographic. This phenomenon was previously discussed in [[1849: Decades]].

Continuing the dubious "proof" offered by Megan, the title text goes on to use the {{w|Billboard (magazine)|Billboard}} [https://www.billboard.com/charts/greatest-billboards-top-songs-80s Best of the 80s] chart as proof that the 1980s started in 1980, as their chart includes {{w|Blondie (band)|Blondie's}} "{{w|Call Me (Blondie song)|Call Me}}", which was released in 1980. The title text ends with {{w|Q.E.D.|QED}} ("quod erat demonstrandum"), which literally means "because it was shown", and is traditionally used at the end of a mathematical proof to mean "thus it has been demonstrated", as if this second landmark piece of evidence proves Megan's point as conclusively as a mathematical proof.

==Transcript==
:[Megan walks in from the left greeting Cueball, White Hat, and Ponytail standing next to each other, the last two looking in her direction.]
:Megan: Happy new decade!
:Ponytail: Welcome to the '20s!
:White Hat: '''''Actually—'''''
:Ponytail: I'm excited we can name decades again.
:Ponytail: "Aughts" and "teens" never caught on.

:[Megan stops next to Cueball as White Hat has his finger raised.]
:White Hat: Actually, the new decade doesn't start-
:Ponytail: Mostly, I'm just glad we can go back to attributing cultural trends to decades instead of generations.

:[All four just stand normal.]
:Cueball: Yeah.
:Cueball: Decades were silly, but making everything about "millennials" turned out to be even worse.
:Ponytail: Seriously.

:[Only White Hat and Ponytail are shown, both with their arms held out to the sides.]
:White Hat: It's technically not a new decade until '''2021'''.
:Ponytail: OK, listen.
:Ponytail: If you're going to be pedantic, you should at least be right.
:White Hat: I '''''am''''' right!
:Ponytail: You're '''''not'''''.

:[Zoom in on White Hat and Ponytail's upper bodies as they gesture towards each other both raising their hands palm up. Megan interrupts them from off panel, as made clear in the next panel. Her voice comes out of a starburst on the left panel frame.]
:White Hat: See, the 20<sup>th</sup> century didn't start until--
:Ponytail: But decades aren't centuries. They're not cardinally numbered.
:White Hat: You don't get it. Let me draw a--
:Ponytail: No, '''''you''''' don't--
:Megan (off-panel): Stop!

:[All four characters are displayed again. Megan has raised a finger and all the others look at her.]
:Megan: I can resolve this.
:Megan: *Ahem*
:Megan: MC Hammer's ''U Can't Touch This'' (1990) was featured in '''''I Love the '90s''''', not ''''' '80s'''''.
:Ponytail: ...That settles that.
:White Hat: Yeah, I accept VH1's authority.
:White Hat: You win.

==Trivia==
* Millennials were also mentioned in [[1962: Generations]] and in [[2165: Millennials]]. Also, [[Randall]] himself is a millennial.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:New Year]]
[[Category:Pedantic]]

Talk:1948: Campaign Fundraising Emails

2018-01-29T17:23:54Z

162.158.122.12:

can someone make a table with all the emails and an explanation column? I'm shit at formatting. [[User:DPS2004|DPS2004'); DROP TABLE users;--]] ([[User talk:DPS2004|talk]]) 16:38, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

ActBlue is a political action committee aimed at helping people on the internet raise money for the Democratic party - there is no Jennifer ActBlue Heir to the ActBlue fortune. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.174.40|172.68.174.40]] 17:14, 29 January 2018 (UTC)Daniel Macintyre
*That's what Jennifer wants you to think.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.122.12|162.158.122.12]] 17:23, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

It's interesting to note that for three of the emails, the subject isn't bolded, indicating that those emails were read. All three refer to female candidates [[User:JamesCurran|JamesCurran]] ([[User talk:JamesCurran|talk]]) 17:20, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

Talk:1925: Self-Driving Car Milestones

2017-12-08T14:49:57Z

162.158.122.12:

This page is, without offense to the creator, a mess. We're gonna need a table for this. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.47.78|172.68.47.78]] 19:14, 6 December 2017 (UTC)
* Or at least a list. I have created one, but it could use fleshing out.[[User:WingedCat|WingedCat]] ([[User talk:WingedCat|talk]]) 19:55, 6 December 2017 (UTC)
::List is fine. You don't need a table for everything - especially if this table had only one or two columns...
: none taken, it's my first time (I only wrote the first three points from a blank page) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.111.61|162.158.111.61]] 09:08, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

I'm going to go with a [citation needed] on that "sex in a self-driving has probably already happened." Are there stats suggesting the amount of coitus per vehicle in the relevant counties?

"This a joke about Boolean satisfiability, as evaluating an arbitrarily complex bumper sticker and determining whether to honk is NP-complete." What? Determining whether to honk has nothing to do with the satisfiability problem; this is more of a joke about getting a computer to evaluate the truth of Boolean expressions that it may have no information about. [[User:Checkmate|Checkmate]] ([[User talk:Checkmate|talk]]) 22:07, 6 December 2017 (UTC)Checkmate

I believe the "Autonomous canyon jumping" is related to the self-loathing; a self-loathing is likely to autonomously jump off a cliff. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.212.179|108.162.212.179]] 22:30, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

"As of 2017, self-driving s require a human to be able to take over just in case, but any such trip where the human never actually took control would qualify for this milestone."
I seems like not all places require a human backup driver: https://www.theverge.com/2017/11/7/16615290/waymo-self-driving-safety-driver-chandler-autonomous [[Special:Contributions/172.69.22.146|172.69.22.146]] 23:19, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Time to start printing "Honk if this statement evaluates as 'do not honk!'" bumper stickers! [[Special:Contributions/162.158.63.28|162.158.63.28]] 01:24, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Is this related to the Vsauce Mind Field video about self-driving s and the trolley problem the literally released today, or is it just a weird coincidence?[[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.225|162.158.74.225]] 05:13, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

The likelihood of trolley-like problems is no lower for an autonomous car than a human-driven one, since it depends on external factors. It might be true that if a significant number of the ''other'' cars on the road were replaced with self-driving ones, that would reduce the occurrence of conflicts, and therefore the likelihood and severity of these problems would be lower, but it would be lower for self-driven and human-driven cars alike. The real issue with such debates is that they tend to make a false assumption that existing human drivers are good at solving these problems, when the whole thrust of these thought experiments is to demonstrate that there are no generally accepted solutions to these problems.[[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.239|141.101.104.239]] 09:33, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
:I don't think anyone would argue that human drivers are good at handling trolley-problem situations, and we don't tend to expect humans to make good decisions under pressure. The problem is that a self-driving car would need to be programmed to make decisions in these scenarios in advance, which would involve assigning absolute values to the different options in a trolley-problem scenario. As you said, there's no generally accepted solution to these problems, so the controversy arises from deciding how self-driving cars should be programmed to handle these situations. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.161|162.158.79.161]] 21:05, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
"Given the nature of human sexuality, it is possible this has already happened, but there has not been a public documentation of this milestone."
Rule 34 applies. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.89.133|162.158.89.133]] 12:44, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
:that part after the but is an edit from me, because the previous wording was even less plausible:
:"but no one recorded the incident." - I changed that to "but there has not been a public documentation of this milestone."
:because I didn't find any recording with a quick search on one of the more famous free sites for videos like that (not car videos...) [[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 16:58, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

"An empty car wandering the highways" - that doesn't seem so ridiculous; a car costs what, $9000/year? That's like an EC2 instance and not even the biggest one. [[User:Sabik|Sabik]] ([[User talk:Sabik|talk]]) 13:22, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
: Plus you have to factor in the potential for the cost of letting the car wander becoming cheaper than paying for a parking space, in which case it may become a deliberate choice.[[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.239|141.101.104.239]] 13:24, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
: Some stops will provide free electricity so an electric car could keep going that way. Its owner will notice it's missing but they could be sick in hospital or even dead - they may even die in the car from a medical issue if that then counts as an empty car. Why the car's journey never ends is a different question. Maybe it drives the deceased owner to work and back every day. Maybe it's searching for a parking space and charging point but cannot reach the former from the latter before it has to go back and charge again. Robert Carnegie rja.carnegie@excite.com [[Special:Contributions/141.101.105.6|141.101.105.6]] 16:09, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
::My first thought was of a woman who had died in her house, but wasn't found for many years because her bills were all auto-paid.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.122.12|162.158.122.12]] 14:49, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Added a bit more to the explanation and formatted everything into a table so it's more organized. --[[User:JayRulesXKCD|'''JayRules''XKCD''' ]]<sup>[[User talk:JayRulesXKCD|what's up?]]</sup> 13:26, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Are there any researchers working on cars that can find a parking space? (Instead of just park in one that the human driver finds?) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.111.145|162.158.111.145]] 14:53, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
: There is a parking space app and parking payment apps. I don't know if smart cars are allowed to use these without human supervision. Robert Carnegie rja.carnegie@excite.com [[Special:Contributions/141.101.105.6|141.101.105.6]] 16:11, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
:Tesla already has software to allow a Model S or X to park itself after dropping off human occupants at their destination. It's not yet released to owners but Tesla is testing it. ----

The first three milestones all come under the heading of recently achieved. 1.Volvo has an auto breaking system on imminent collision detection 2.lane keeping/warning systems are now relatively common. 3.Several models have automatic parking assist.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.165.16|162.158.165.16]] 04:28, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Perhaps commenters here are to young to remember Evel Knievel https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evel_Knievel but I feel very confident Randall was thinking of Evel and his Snake River Canyon jump when he wrote the "Autonomous Canyon Jumping" milestone----

1848: Glacial Erratic

2017-06-09T06:23:00Z

162.158.122.12: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1848
| date = June 9, 2017
| title = Glacial Erratic
| image = glacial_erratic.png
| titletext = "This will take a while, which sucks, because I'm already so busy chiseling out igneous intrusions from rock formations and watching Youtube loops of the Superman fault-sealing scene over and over."
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Early stuff.}}
[[Ponytail]] and [[Megan]] are walking along when they come across an {{w|Glacial_erratic|erratic rock}} (which differs from the surrounding geology and is brought there by glacial action). Not wishing to bow down to the forces of nature, Megan tries to take it back to its rightful place.
Megan seems to be treating the glacier like a [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ParentalAbandonment parent who abandoned one of its children], hence "And it just left it here? And everybody's OKAY with this?"

The title text furthers the absurdity by suggesting Megan is chiselling out {{w|Intrusive_rock|igneous intrusions}} which are another type of rock formation caused by solidification of {{w|magma}}.

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

:Ponytail: That rock is an igneous erratic--A glacier broke it off from those hills and placed it here.
:Megan: What? And just left it here? And everybody's okay with this?
::[pushes rock] Get...Back...
:Ponytail:Why are you doing that?
:Megan: Because fuck glaciers!

{{comic discussion}}

1848: Glacial Erratic

2017-06-09T06:20:01Z

162.158.122.12:

{{comic
| number = 1848
| date = June 9, 2017
| title = Glacial Erratic
| image = glacial_erratic.png
| titletext = "This will take a while, which sucks, because I'm already so busy chiseling out igneous intrusions from rock formations and watching Youtube loops of the Superman fault-sealing scene over and over."
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Early stuff.}}
[[Ponytail]] and [[Megan]] are walking along when they come across an {{w|Glacial_erratic|erratic rock}} (which differs from the surrounding geology and is brought there by glacial action). Not wishing to bow down to the forces of nature, Megan tries to take it back to its rightful place.
Megan seems to be treating the glacier like a parent who abandoned one of its children, hence "And it just left it here? And everybody's OKAY with this?"

The title text furthers the absurdity by suggesting Megan is chiselling out {{w|Intrusive_rock|igneous intrusions}} which are another type of rock formation caused by solidification of {{w|magma}}.

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

:Ponytail: That rock is an igneous erratic--A glacier broke it off from those hills and placed it here.
:Megan: What? And just left it here? And everybody's okay with this?
::[pushes rock] Get...Back...
:Ponytail:Why are you doing that?
:Megan: Because fuck glaciers!

{{comic discussion}}