explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:1962: Generations

2019-08-13T09:02:43Z

162.158.158.33: What do the young know?

Table guy! Maybe this could be a table with "Year", "Generation Name", "References" and "Speculation". Or something. [[Special:Contributions/198.41.230.172|198.41.230.172]] 17:31, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

The highlighted generations are clearly the ones Pew Research named, but I can't figure out why Randall's numbers don't seem to match Pew's here: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/05/11/millennials-surpass-gen-xers-as-the-largest-generation-in-u-s-labor-force/ft_15-05-11_millennialsdefined/ [[User:TheAnvil|TheAnvil]] ([[User talk:TheAnvil|talk]]) 17:37, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

—••— means X in Morse code [[User:Inexorably advancing wall of ice|Inexorably advancing wall of ice]] ([[User talk:Inexorably advancing wall of ice|talk]]) 18:21, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

But seriously, it was funny the first time. I'm sorry for the above incomplete tag in the comments{{Citation needed}},but it feels like most comics since maybe #1900 ([[1914: Twitter Verification]] comes to mind...) have this kind of thing for their incomplete tag. Maybe if it's spaced out more, instead of put into nearly every comic nowadays, it won't be so much of a problem. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.75.184|162.158.75.184]] 18:02, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
: If you can address this problem, please edit the user. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.155.26|162.158.155.26]] 23:04, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
::Removed the incomplete tag, changed the citation needed tag into the correct one. Dude, please don't do that again, it's not funny, just seriously annoying. The incomplete tag is not there for you to abuse. [[User:Herobrine|Herobrine]] ([[User talk:Herobrine|talk]]) 12:07, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
:::Oh, and now that I've finally caught up to you, 162.158.155.26, please check your talk page. [[User:Herobrine|Herobrine]] ([[User talk:Herobrine|talk]]) 12:07, 3 March 2018 (UTC)

Can someone help me? [[User:Halo422|Halo422]] ([[User talk:Halo422|talk]]) 20:20, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

What's the emoji 2000-2017? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.141.214|172.68.141.214]] 21:05, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
:I think I found it: 💅 [https://emojipedia.org/nail-polish/ "nail-polish"] (Comes up very different on different systems) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.233|162.158.79.233]] 21:20, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
:Couldn't this emoji, and hence the title "Generation 💅", refer to the rise of nail care salons or manicure salons during the recent years? I don't know about other countries, but at least in certain parts of Europe, Germany in particular, there seems to be such a boom of this kind of establishments that I often wonder how they survive and open even more such businesses, even though it appears there's more nail salons than (manicured) nails in town. [[User:Passerby|Passerby]] ([[User talk:Passerby|talk]]) 20:56, 4 March 2018 (UTC)

I have to believe the 1748 - 1765 generation is some form of "Long s" such as U+1E9C or U+1E9D [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.233|162.158.79.233]] 21:12, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

: It looks more like a forte ([https://www.fileformat.info/info/unicode/char/1d191/index.htm U+1D191]). I'm not sure why that would be funny—maybe because of [[Wikipedia:fortepiano|fortepiano]]s? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.214|172.69.69.214]] 21:43, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
::My position comes from the fact that documents written by this generation (i.e. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_s#/media/File:Long-s-US-Bill-of-Rights.jpg Declaration of Independance] and the US Constitution) are noted for having this letter form. The script form of the long s looks like what Randall has written, which, to your point, looks like a "forte" [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.233|162.158.79.233]] 22:51, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
::: Actually, it quite clearly is '''not''' long s. Long s only has the tic on the left side of the main stroke, not on both sides as is the case here. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.118|162.158.78.118]] 22:24, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
:::: I read it as an italic lower-case F, ''f'', as used to denote [https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Function_(mathematics) mathematical functions]. I think it looks more like one of those than a [https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Long_s long s], ſ, though I don't have an explanation for why that would be used to name a generation. [[User:Smylers|Smylers]] ([[User talk:Smylers|talk]]) 09:50, 5 March 2018 (UTC)

Hitler was born in 1889, about three years before the "Oops, one of us is Hitler" generation ... --[[Special:Contributions/141.101.105.240|141.101.105.240]] 21:37, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

Can someone who's a big Trekkie than I am help explain the dates for ''Star Trek: The Next Generation''? If we're going off of the events of the show + movies, it seems to start well before the events of the show and end before the last of the movies. [[User:PvOberstein|PvOberstein]] ([[User talk:PvOberstein|talk]]) 21:49, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
:Year 2378 may be explained by last episode of Voyager happening that year, but no idea about year 2360. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 00:59, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
::Year 2360 is when the humans who became adults (18) in 2378 were born. This time-span is probably when the majority of human TNG characters would have been born (not necessarily notable ones). This is similar to how people born in 1982 became the first new adults in the new millenium. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.46.143|172.68.46.143]] 05:02, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
:::William T. Riker was born in 2335, Jean Luc Picard 2305, Deanna Troi 2336, Data 2338, Guinan ... ehmmm ... well she was already adult in 1893. Even Wesley Crusher was born 2348. They don't allow children on bridge. Usually. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 23:49, 7 March 2018 (UTC)

Filled in most of the table with explanations (I'm pretty sure most of the latter generation names are references to potential transhumanist futures), but I'm not sure what "Second-Greatest" Generation refers to unless it's about the Civil War. Also, I'm not entirely certain whether the generation before the gilded one was cut a lot of slack. And I'll let someone more versed in standard sociological history fill in the common reasons for the core 20th century generations.[[User:WingedCat|WingedCat]] ([[User talk:WingedCat|talk]]) 22:49, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

;Paperclip machine
I think the paperclip machines refer to the browser game "Universal Paperclips", where paperclip machines take over the universe. [http://www.decisionproblem.com/paperclips/index2.html]. Best regards, [[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.10|172.68.110.10]] 11:55, 3 March 2018 (UTC)

The incomplete explination tag seemed to be a useless joke, so I deleted it.

;Ω
Wow that’s a lot of speculation on the Ω generation! 177 words of it! Who knew people could imagine so much inspired by a single character (and no historical context to extrapolate from). Personally, I tend to think of it as the “resistance generation” given my electronic background 😜. [[User:PotatoGod|PotatoGod]] ([[User talk:PotatoGod|talk]]) 15:11, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
:Ω may be a reference to Year Omega in the novel {{w|The Children of Men}}. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.172|172.69.69.172]] 18:04, 5 March 2018 (UTC)

Why is there an incomplete tag in the transcript? What's wrong with it? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.148|108.162.216.148]] 22:49, 4 March 2018 (UTC)

Millennials were *originally* called "Echo Boomers" (after the Baby Boomers, and because most of them are that generation's kids), "Generation Y" came later but before "Millennials" stuck as a non-snowclone name. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.63.100|162.158.63.100]] 01:56, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Generation X being the tenth generation of Americans seems a bit of a stretch. A generation is generally 35 years, and seems unlikely to be less than 20. And [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_X#Origin_of_term Douglas Coupland], who coined this use of the term, used "X" as lazy shorthand for alienation and a rejection of societal norms. If no one objects, I'll update the text. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.33|162.158.158.33]] 09:02, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2016: OEIS Submissions

2018-07-09T12:49:00Z

162.158.158.33: Signature

"All integers which do not appear in the example terms of another OEIS sequence" there is no paradox: it's pecified *another* sequence
[[Special:Contributions/162.158.154.133|162.158.154.133]] 17:52, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

I am so sorry that this comment is not related to the strip, but is the scaling for the explanation way off? Previously the scaling of the whole website was stretched, but now it is a bit too cramped for me. It happens to the previous strips too.Boeing-787lover 18:10, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Is it too much of a stretch to mention that Chris Hemsworth stars in the movie ''Blackhat'', which is also a nickname for an XKCD character? [[User:John at work|John at work]] ([[User talk:John at work|talk]]) 19:31, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

The Sub 59 one is also a paradox, it specifies that it should include all of the author's accepted submissions, so it would have to be on it's own list itself in order to be accurate? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.58.233|172.68.58.233]] 19:47, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
:No, it would not be paradoxical. If it is accepted, then the sequence contains its identification number. If it is not accepted, that number is not in the sequence. The sequence changes depending on its own status, but there is no contradiction. This is different from e.g. the set of sets that don't contain themselves. If that set contained itself, it shouldn't contain itself, and if it didn't contain itself, it should contain itself. Both alternatives are logically impossible, so the set itself is impossible. There is nothing impossible about submission 59. [[User:Howtonotwin|Howtonotwin]] ([[User talk:Howtonotwin|talk]]) 20:15, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
:If OEIS would bend their own rule and allow a sequence of one number, they could accept SUB[59] , and it will never be out of date as long as they never accept another RM submittal.[[User:GODZILLA|GODZILLA]] ([[User talk:GODZILLA|talk]]) 00:49, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

The Westside IRT stops sequence is a wonderful piece of trivia. I found [https://www.nytimes.com/1987/01/27/science/in-a-random-world-he-collects-patterns.html the NYT article], which gives as its reason that at that time only infinite sequences were included. I have failed to find the necessary third-party reference to the inclusion of the sequence in OEIS (this, being an open wiki, is unacceptable) to include the point in {{w|IRT Broadway–Seventh Avenue Line|the Wikipedia article on the West Side IRT}}. Can anybody supply one? [[User:Yngvadottir|Yngvadottir]] ([[User talk:Yngvadottir|talk]]) 20:35, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

I'm wondering about the comment "In UTF-16, a 9 takes up 2 bytes," about the 2 TB of 9s. Does OEIS store numbers in UTF-16 format? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.174.94|172.68.174.94]] 21:01, 6 July 2018 (UTC) nprz
: It seems unrelated to me, the comic says 2 terabytes of 9s not 2 terabytes of 9s in a string (UTF-16 or otherwise). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.33|162.158.158.33]] 12:49, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

Helvetica seems to be one of the fonts where all digits have the same width (so that columns of numbers line up). Strangely, there seems to be a kerning pair for "11" that some Software uses. "Helvetica Neue" does not seem to have that kerning pair. (Tested using the simple HTML page in https://gist.github.com/hn3000/bec217afe666b0ee0a0430e976df4d22#file-numbers-by-width-in-font-html ).
[[User:Hn3000|Hn3000]] ([[User talk:Hn3000|talk]]) 11:04, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

Such a coincidence! I've been working on my first submission all week and wrote an Emacs Lisp program that discovered the third integer pair the day this came out! You get to see it now that I have a number allocated ([https://oeis.org/A316587 A316587]): 12, 34, 56, 78, 6162, 7879. Can you find the next number in the sequence? Hint: my sequence is a proper subset of A001704. Still editing before I submit for approval. ''— [[User:Tbc|tbc]] ([[User talk:Tbc|talk]]) 18:11, 7 July 2018 (UTC)''

Digits do not have the same width in Helvetica, at least not in the version of Helvetica I have. Using the PHP function [http://php.net/imagettfbbox imagettfbbox] (part of the GD library), here is the bounding box width of single digits in 12pt size:
5 points: '1'. 8 points: '4', '7'. 9 points: '0', '2', '3', '5', '6', '8', '9'.
With a very large size (480pt) the differences ar more notable:
166 points: '1'. 302 points: '9'. 307 points: '6'. 308 points: '2', '8'. 309 points: '0', '5'. 311 points: '7'. 313 points: '3'. 318 points: '4'.

For 2-digit numbers in 480pt size I find: 522 points: '11'. 559 points: '61', '71'. 560 points: '91'. 562 points: '21'. 563 points: '51', '81'. 566 points: '41'. 568 points: '31'. 620 points: '19'. 623 points: '13'. 624 points: '10', '15', '18'. 625 points: '12'. 626 points: '16'. 629 points: '14', '17'. The rest range from 657 to 675 points.

In short, sub[44] makes sense, with all the caveats mentioned in the explanation. The phrases `1 to 9 in no particular order, 11, 10 and 12 to 19 in no particular order and so on' are exaggerated IMHO, the order within these subsets is not completely arbitrary.
Zetfr 10:22, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

I think that all nines sequence can be reference to Dilbert strip about random number generator which always returns 9 http://dilbert.com/strip/2001-10-25
[[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.77|141.101.104.77]] 19:41, 8 July 2018 (UTC)qbolec

Talk:2016: OEIS Submissions

2018-07-09T12:48:05Z

162.158.158.33: How many 9s?

"All integers which do not appear in the example terms of another OEIS sequence" there is no paradox: it's pecified *another* sequence
[[Special:Contributions/162.158.154.133|162.158.154.133]] 17:52, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

I am so sorry that this comment is not related to the strip, but is the scaling for the explanation way off? Previously the scaling of the whole website was stretched, but now it is a bit too cramped for me. It happens to the previous strips too.Boeing-787lover 18:10, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Is it too much of a stretch to mention that Chris Hemsworth stars in the movie ''Blackhat'', which is also a nickname for an XKCD character? [[User:John at work|John at work]] ([[User talk:John at work|talk]]) 19:31, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

The Sub 59 one is also a paradox, it specifies that it should include all of the author's accepted submissions, so it would have to be on it's own list itself in order to be accurate? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.58.233|172.68.58.233]] 19:47, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
:No, it would not be paradoxical. If it is accepted, then the sequence contains its identification number. If it is not accepted, that number is not in the sequence. The sequence changes depending on its own status, but there is no contradiction. This is different from e.g. the set of sets that don't contain themselves. If that set contained itself, it shouldn't contain itself, and if it didn't contain itself, it should contain itself. Both alternatives are logically impossible, so the set itself is impossible. There is nothing impossible about submission 59. [[User:Howtonotwin|Howtonotwin]] ([[User talk:Howtonotwin|talk]]) 20:15, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
:If OEIS would bend their own rule and allow a sequence of one number, they could accept SUB[59] , and it will never be out of date as long as they never accept another RM submittal.[[User:GODZILLA|GODZILLA]] ([[User talk:GODZILLA|talk]]) 00:49, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

The Westside IRT stops sequence is a wonderful piece of trivia. I found [https://www.nytimes.com/1987/01/27/science/in-a-random-world-he-collects-patterns.html the NYT article], which gives as its reason that at that time only infinite sequences were included. I have failed to find the necessary third-party reference to the inclusion of the sequence in OEIS (this, being an open wiki, is unacceptable) to include the point in {{w|IRT Broadway–Seventh Avenue Line|the Wikipedia article on the West Side IRT}}. Can anybody supply one? [[User:Yngvadottir|Yngvadottir]] ([[User talk:Yngvadottir|talk]]) 20:35, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

I'm wondering about the comment "In UTF-16, a 9 takes up 2 bytes," about the 2 TB of 9s. Does OEIS store numbers in UTF-16 format? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.174.94|172.68.174.94]] 21:01, 6 July 2018 (UTC) nprz
: It seems unrelated to me, the comic says 2 terabytes of 9s not 2 terabytes of 9s in a string (UTF-16 or otherwise).

Helvetica seems to be one of the fonts where all digits have the same width (so that columns of numbers line up). Strangely, there seems to be a kerning pair for "11" that some Software uses. "Helvetica Neue" does not seem to have that kerning pair. (Tested using the simple HTML page in https://gist.github.com/hn3000/bec217afe666b0ee0a0430e976df4d22#file-numbers-by-width-in-font-html ).
[[User:Hn3000|Hn3000]] ([[User talk:Hn3000|talk]]) 11:04, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

Such a coincidence! I've been working on my first submission all week and wrote an Emacs Lisp program that discovered the third integer pair the day this came out! You get to see it now that I have a number allocated ([https://oeis.org/A316587 A316587]): 12, 34, 56, 78, 6162, 7879. Can you find the next number in the sequence? Hint: my sequence is a proper subset of A001704. Still editing before I submit for approval. ''— [[User:Tbc|tbc]] ([[User talk:Tbc|talk]]) 18:11, 7 July 2018 (UTC)''

Digits do not have the same width in Helvetica, at least not in the version of Helvetica I have. Using the PHP function [http://php.net/imagettfbbox imagettfbbox] (part of the GD library), here is the bounding box width of single digits in 12pt size:
5 points: '1'. 8 points: '4', '7'. 9 points: '0', '2', '3', '5', '6', '8', '9'.
With a very large size (480pt) the differences ar more notable:
166 points: '1'. 302 points: '9'. 307 points: '6'. 308 points: '2', '8'. 309 points: '0', '5'. 311 points: '7'. 313 points: '3'. 318 points: '4'.

For 2-digit numbers in 480pt size I find: 522 points: '11'. 559 points: '61', '71'. 560 points: '91'. 562 points: '21'. 563 points: '51', '81'. 566 points: '41'. 568 points: '31'. 620 points: '19'. 623 points: '13'. 624 points: '10', '15', '18'. 625 points: '12'. 626 points: '16'. 629 points: '14', '17'. The rest range from 657 to 675 points.

In short, sub[44] makes sense, with all the caveats mentioned in the explanation. The phrases `1 to 9 in no particular order, 11, 10 and 12 to 19 in no particular order and so on' are exaggerated IMHO, the order within these subsets is not completely arbitrary.
Zetfr 10:22, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

I think that all nines sequence can be reference to Dilbert strip about random number generator which always returns 9 http://dilbert.com/strip/2001-10-25
[[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.77|141.101.104.77]] 19:41, 8 July 2018 (UTC)qbolec

Talk:2013: Rock

2018-07-03T10:40:38Z

162.158.158.33: Replicant

Wow, 3 paragraphs and still created by a “BOT”. Good self control today, explainers! 😂. If someone does change it, may I humbly suggest it be created by a “rock”? [[User:PotatoGod|PotatoGod]] ([[User talk:PotatoGod|talk]]) 19:40, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

Note: this explanation was written by someone who's not very good at skipping stones, if they think 1-2 skips is typical. A single skip is about the same as just throwing a rock in the water! (Just kidding around because it's Friday) [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 20:39, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

Anyone know if there could even be a rock that came from a volcano near the south pole when the world was frozen over before multicellular life began, and if so, when would that have occurred? [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 20:40, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

:Looking at {{w|Geologic temperature record}}, I suspect even the "world was frozen over before multicellular life began" is pretty bold statement not supported by actual evidence. Existence of specific volcano is likely even less supported. On the other hand, we can't disprove it either. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 22:21, 29 June 2018 (UTC)

::Likely, she is holding some sort of igneous rock found at one of the locations mentioned above. How she knows the age of the rock is the real mystery. Did she pick it up just now and she is guessing? Was it catalogued in a geoarchaeologic dig site? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.65.234|172.68.65.234]] 03:48, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

"philosophical perspective". Does mean that this is the philosophers' stone?
: Only outside the US. [[User:These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For|These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For]] ([[User talk:These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For|talk]]) 12:46, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

I don't think the assertion that the stone travelled from North Europe or South Africa is correct. I read it as Megan is at one of those locations, the stone's journey was from its birth at the south pole to meet her millions of years later and thousands of miles away. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.33|162.158.158.33]] 16:58, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

He had seen things people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. He watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like skip, skip, skip, skip, skip, plunk! Time to die.
: So it's a replicant stone! [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.33|162.158.158.33]] 10:40, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Talk:2013: Rock

2018-07-02T16:58:07Z

162.158.158.33: The stone's journey.

Talk:2004: Sun and Earth

2018-06-08T14:33:14Z

162.158.158.33: Lightning arresters

There seems to be a glitch with the bar at the top (the one with the previous comic button and so on), it displays in a messed up way. Is this just something with my browser, or have other people been seeing this too? [[User:VannaWho|VannaWho]] ([[User talk:VannaWho|talk]])
:I'm using K-Meleon76 in Win7x64 (in a non-Admin account), it looks good to me. It does help to sign with 4 tildes, it does this for you: [[Special:Contributions/172.68.2.106|172.68.2.106]] 11:31, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
::Thanks IP, by using the 4 tildes OR the sign button at the top also a timestamp will be shown.
::VannaWho: What is messed up? What happens? And what browser do you use? I also can't see any problems. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 12:19, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

The current explanation suggests that solar flares and volcanic eruptions are always quite benign. My interpretation of this comic, when I read it, was that volcanic eruptions can indeed be very deadly and potentially kill most humans (supervolcano, mini ice age... etc). But they are indeed rare enough that all humans currently alive and many generations to come are pretty safe from that risk.
Not sure if a solar eruption could actually threaten humanity, beyond damaging our satellites. {{unsigned ip|141.101.88.88}}
:A huge {{w|Coronal mass ejection}}, like the {{w|Solar storm of 1859}} that {{w|down Coronal_mass_ejection#First_traces|took down parts of the recently created US telegraph network}}, if occurring today would cause widespread disruptions and damage to a modern and technology-dependent society. It could simply melt down the transformers that distribute all electricity on Earth, potentially leaving us without electricity... Like no one has electricity. This would not be something we could fix, since the transformers are melted down. So yes mass starvation could occur when all refrigerators stop working. So potentially as lethal as a super volcano on the short term... Of course we can do absolutely nothing about this. Just like with super volcanoes. Only thing we are sure of is that both events will happen again sometime. Have a nice day ;-) [http://www.lloyds.com/~/media/lloyds/reports/emerging%20risk%20reports/solar%20storm%20risk%20to%20the%20north%20american%20electric%20grid.pdf] --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:10, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
::The problems with the burgeoning North American telegraph network were because the wires covered such a great distances. In forthcoming geomagnetic events it will be similar processes causing problems. I'm curious though, we have lightning arresters on transmission lines for literally breaking the circuit when the voltage is too high, is there nothing similar that would prevent damage from a solar storm? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.33|162.158.158.33]] 14:33, 8 June 2018 (UTC)