explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:2626: d65536

2022-05-31T00:46:07Z

162.158.78.109:

I wonder: can we even make a fair polyhedron with 65536 faces? In Randal's illustration, the faces seem to be irregular hexagons. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.105|172.70.130.105]] 21:37, 30 May 2022 (UTC)
: This is better than my question, which was simply if you could tile a sphere with these. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.36|172.70.211.36]] 23:01, 30 May 2022 (UTC)
:Definitely possible, just create two identical right pyramids with a 32768-gon base and glue the bases together. [[User:Clam|Clam]] ([[User talk:Clam|talk]]) 23:53, 30 May 2022 (UTC)

I don't know why it's so big? Seems like it should have a diameter of approx. 1 meter. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.105|172.70.130.105]] 21:37, 30 May 2022 (UTC)

Should the title and picture file use "d" or the comic's difficult to type "ᴅ"?
[[User:While False|While False]] ([[User talk:While False|talk]]) 21:55, 30 May 2022 (UTC)
:Since xkcd uses small caps as lowercase letters, the "ᴅ" should just be considered xkcd-font for "d", and as such need not be used on the title, which is not using the xkcd font.

If you really did want to generate a 16 bit integer with physical dice, it would be much simpler to roll a [https://www.thediceshoponline.com/impact-opaque-hexidice-d16-hexadecimal-dice hex die] four times. [[User:Clayot|Clayot]] ([[User talk:Clayot|talk]]) 23:30, 30 May 2022 (UTC)

I think the hardest part (or maybe second-hardest part) is figuring out which facet is the one on top. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.109|162.158.78.109]] 00:46, 31 May 2022 (UTC)

2623: Goofs

2022-05-24T02:17:50Z

162.158.78.109: list formatting

{{comic
| number = 2623
| date = May 23, 2022
| title = Goofs
| image = goofs.png
| titletext = The film is set in 2018, but when Commander Bremberly chases the hologram through Times Square, there's a billboard for Avengers: Age of Ultron. Depending on the date, that billboard would have been advertising either Infinity War or this movie.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a WILLING SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF- Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT think about how much of this stuff applies to Explain xkcd.}}
IMDb is the {{w|Internet Movie Database}}, a website that contains detailed information about movies and TV shows. One of the sections in many entries is "Goofs". This may list bloopers, inconsistencies, implausible actions, anachronisms, etc. in the movie. The comic makes fun of this with several goofs that simply point out differences between something in the movie and reality; but since the movie is fiction (in this case, a science fiction film that includes a space detective, a cybernetic dog, blimp drones, and a hologram kissing scene), it's not expected to exactly mirror reality.

In the first goof, the street doesn't actually exist in the city in which the movie is set. Unless the address is important to the plot (Manhattan has a number of streets with well-known characters, e.g. the main theatre district is on Broadway, Fifth Avenue is a major shopping district, and Wall Street is known for large financial institutions), screenwriters often just make up street names and it might actually be expedient to 'rename' a setting in many cases, to avoid the actual collision of fictional and actual setting such as having {{w|A_Nightmare_on_Elm_Street|"A Nightmare On <Your Streetname>"}}.

In the second example, they point out that there's no real harpoon store at the location where the characters obtain a harpoon in the movie, and the nearest actual harpoon store doesn't have a display window like the one in the movie. Movies usually take liberties with details like this for plot expediency, it's not considered a goof. Manhattan does not appear to have ''any'' notable harpoon stores,{{Citation needed}} with or without the kind of frontage described. 

In the third example, the background of a scene is of an apartment in Downtown Vancouver (a cheap and popular filming location that frequently stands in for other cities). The goof points out that the real-life apartment does not belong to the character who supposedly lives in it. Most movie characters do not exist in reality{{citation needed}}, and many scenes are set in fictional locations that are completely separate from their real-life filming locations. As such, this is only a "goof" if the scene is taken entirely literally.

The title text describes an actual anachronism. The film is set in 2018, but there's a billboard for the movie ''{{w|Avengers: Age of Ultron}}''. That movie came out in 2015, while the next Avengers film, ''{{w|Avengers: Infinity War}}'', came out in 2018. Assuming the movie was filmed before 2018, the filmmakers wouldn't have known what films would be current at the time it would be released, and certainly not the artwork they'd be using to promote them. They could have chosen to set it 3 years earlier, but again, unless the specific date is significant to the plot, it's common to set a film at about the same time it's released but with a bare minimum of fakery by trying not to show ''unimportant'' newspaper dates, etc, so that set-dressing and props-department budgets aren't excessive. Generic advertisements for fictional (or {{w|Last Action Hero|parody}}) films might be put over egregiously obvious existing material, physically or in post-production editing, as might references to major brands – perhaps replaced by those agreed with from {{w|product placement}} partners.

The title text also mentions the possibility of a self-reference – the billboard could be for this film itself since it's being released at the same time it's set. This assertion that {{w|Blazing Saddles|in-universe self-reference}} is plausible for a movie production is likely another example of the goof's writer failing to understand the basic "premise of fiction". Most movies do not exist within the fictional world they portray, and many audiences would find self-reference to be a far greater obstacle to suspending disbelief than an ad for the wrong Avengers movie.

===Goofs===
* There is no entry for a film featuring an agent Glennifer on IMDB. Randall is clearly failing to do basic research.
* On the real IMDb, each item in the Goofs section would be listed under a category such as "Errors in geography" (which might apply to the three goofs listed in the main cartoon) or "Anachronisms" (which might apply to the goof in the title text). However, no such category is displayed here.
* On real Goofs pages, the information below each entry includes a public feedback listing (X of Y found this interesting) and a link entitled "Share this". In the comic, only unintelligible squiggles are included in their place, which really breaks the immersion of the purported "webpage". Of course, on a real IMDb page, all of the text would also be in the Verdana font, not Randall's handwriting.
* The comic features two entries with a yellow background, which is impossible. On IMDb, entries alternate between having white and gray backgrounds and only turn yellow when the mouse hovers over them.
* On IMDb, the number of goofs is located in a navigation box between the header and the goofs list. In the comic, the number is placed in the header, and there is no navigation box at all.
* A similar Goofs section exists in the [[explain xkcd]] wiki's page for this comic, but it fails even more evidently to recreate the look of IMDb's Goofs page. Additionally, the last entry is self-referential, which is clearly improfessional.

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

:[An excerpt from an Internet Movie Database web page showing a list of goofs from a film. Each item has some small illegible text below it, which on the real IMDb would say something like "7 of 72 found this interesting | Share this". The first and third items have a faint yellow-tinted background. The third item is only partially visible at the bottom of the "screen".]
:[Heading:]
:'''Goofs (78)'''
:[List:]
:The space detective's office is on Chestnut Ave, but Lower Manhattan has no street by that name. Agent Glennifer pursues the cybernetic dog onto what is clearly Ludlow Street.
:The agents destroy the blimp drones in Union Square with harpoons from a store display rack. The nearest harpoon store is several blocks away and has no outdoor displays.
:The apartment in the background of the hologram kissing scene actually exists in downtown Vancouver. We called the owners, who confirmed they had no residents named [...]

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Sometimes the IMDB "Goofs" section really seems to struggle with the whole premise of fiction.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]

2623: Goofs

2022-05-24T02:16:13Z

162.158.78.109:

{{comic
| number = 2623
| date = May 23, 2022
| title = Goofs
| image = goofs.png
| titletext = The film is set in 2018, but when Commander Bremberly chases the hologram through Times Square, there's a billboard for Avengers: Age of Ultron. Depending on the date, that billboard would have been advertising either Infinity War or this movie.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a WILLING SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF- Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT think about how much of this stuff applies to Explain xkcd.}}
IMDb is the {{w|Internet Movie Database}}, a website that contains detailed information about movies and TV shows. One of the sections in many entries is "Goofs". This may list bloopers, inconsistencies, implausible actions, anachronisms, etc. in the movie. The comic makes fun of this with several goofs that simply point out differences between something in the movie and reality; but since the movie is fiction (in this case, a science fiction film that includes a space detective, a cybernetic dog, blimp drones, and a hologram kissing scene), it's not expected to exactly mirror reality.

In the first goof, the street doesn't actually exist in the city in which the movie is set. Unless the address is important to the plot (Manhattan has a number of streets with well-known characters, e.g. the main theatre district is on Broadway, Fifth Avenue is a major shopping district, and Wall Street is known for large financial institutions), screenwriters often just make up street names and it might actually be expedient to 'rename' a setting in many cases, to avoid the actual collision of fictional and actual setting such as having {{w|A_Nightmare_on_Elm_Street|"A Nightmare On <Your Streetname>"}}.

In the second example, they point out that there's no real harpoon store at the location where the characters obtain a harpoon in the movie, and the nearest actual harpoon store doesn't have a display window like the one in the movie. Movies usually take liberties with details like this for plot expediency, it's not considered a goof. Manhattan does not appear to have ''any'' notable harpoon stores,{{Citation needed}} with or without the kind of frontage described. 

In the third example, the background of a scene is of an apartment in Downtown Vancouver (a cheap and popular filming location that frequently stands in for other cities). The goof points out that the real-life apartment does not belong to the character who supposedly lives in it. Most movie characters do not exist in reality{{citation needed}}, and many scenes are set in fictional locations that are completely separate from their real-life filming locations. As such, this is only a "goof" if the scene is taken entirely literally.

The title text describes an actual anachronism. The film is set in 2018, but there's a billboard for the movie ''{{w|Avengers: Age of Ultron}}''. That movie came out in 2015, while the next Avengers film, ''{{w|Avengers: Infinity War}}'', came out in 2018. Assuming the movie was filmed before 2018, the filmmakers wouldn't have known what films would be current at the time it would be released, and certainly not the artwork they'd be using to promote them. They could have chosen to set it 3 years earlier, but again, unless the specific date is significant to the plot, it's common to set a film at about the same time it's released but with a bare minimum of fakery by trying not to show ''unimportant'' newspaper dates, etc, so that set-dressing and props-department budgets aren't excessive. Generic advertisements for fictional (or {{w|Last Action Hero|parody}}) films might be put over egregiously obvious existing material, physically or in post-production editing, as might references to major brands – perhaps replaced by those agreed with from {{w|product placement}} partners.

The title text also mentions the possibility of a self-reference – the billboard could be for this film itself since it's being released at the same time it's set. This assertion that {{w|Blazing Saddles|in-universe self-reference}} is plausible for a movie production is likely another example of the goof's writer failing to understand the basic "premise of fiction". Most movies do not exist within the fictional world they portray, and many audiences would find self-reference to be a far greater obstacle to suspending disbelief than an ad for the wrong Avengers movie.

===Goofs===
There is no entry for a film featuring an agent Glennifer on IMDB. Randall is clearly failing to do basic research.

On the real IMDb, each item in the Goofs section would be listed under a category such as "Errors in geography" (which might apply to the three goofs listed in the main cartoon) or "Anachronisms" (which might apply to the goof in the title text). However, no such category is displayed here.

On real Goofs pages, the information below each entry includes a public feedback listing (X of Y found this interesting) and a link entitled "Share this". In the comic, only unintelligible squiggles are included in their place, which really breaks the immersion of the purported "webpage". Of course, on a real IMDb page, all of the text would also be in the Verdana font, not Randall's handwriting.

The comic features two entries with a yellow background, which is impossible. On IMDb, entries alternate between having white and gray backgrounds and only turn yellow when the mouse hovers over them.

On IMDb, the number of goofs is located in a navigation box between the header and the goofs list. In the comic, the number is placed in the header, and there is no navigation box at all.

A similar Goofs section exists in the [[explain xkcd]] wiki's page for this comic, but it fails even more evidently to recreate the look of IMDb's Goofs page. Additionally, the last entry is recursive.

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

:[An excerpt from an Internet Movie Database web page showing a list of goofs from a film. Each item has some small illegible text below it, which on the real IMDb would say something like "7 of 72 found this interesting | Share this". The first and third items have a faint yellow-tinted background. The third item is only partially visible at the bottom of the "screen".]
:[Heading:]
:'''Goofs (78)'''
:[List:]
:The space detective's office is on Chestnut Ave, but Lower Manhattan has no street by that name. Agent Glennifer pursues the cybernetic dog onto what is clearly Ludlow Street.
:The agents destroy the blimp drones in Union Square with harpoons from a store display rack. The nearest harpoon store is several blocks away and has no outdoor displays.
:The apartment in the background of the hologram kissing scene actually exists in downtown Vancouver. We called the owners, who confirmed they had no residents named [...]

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Sometimes the IMDB "Goofs" section really seems to struggle with the whole premise of fiction.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]

2623: Goofs

2022-05-24T02:15:18Z

162.158.78.109:

{{comic
| number = 2623
| date = May 23, 2022
| title = Goofs
| image = goofs.png
| titletext = The film is set in 2018, but when Commander Bremberly chases the hologram through Times Square, there's a billboard for Avengers: Age of Ultron. Depending on the date, that billboard would have been advertising either Infinity War or this movie.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a WILLING SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF- Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT think about how much of this stuff applies to Explain xkcd.}}
IMDb is the {{w|Internet Movie Database}}, a website that contains detailed information about movies and TV shows. One of the sections in many entries is "Goofs". This may list bloopers, inconsistencies, implausible actions, anachronisms, etc. in the movie. The comic makes fun of this with several goofs that simply point out differences between something in the movie and reality; but since the movie is fiction (in this case, a science fiction film that includes a space detective, a cybernetic dog, blimp drones, and a hologram kissing scene), it's not expected to exactly mirror reality.

In the first goof, the street doesn't actually exist in the city in which the movie is set. Unless the address is important to the plot (Manhattan has a number of streets with well-known characters, e.g. the main theatre district is on Broadway, Fifth Avenue is a major shopping district, and Wall Street is known for large financial institutions), screenwriters often just make up street names and it might actually be expedient to 'rename' a setting in many cases, to avoid the actual collision of fictional and actual setting such as having {{w|A_Nightmare_on_Elm_Street|"A Nightmare On <Your Streetname>"}}.

In the second example, they point out that there's no real harpoon store at the location where the characters obtain a harpoon in the movie, and the nearest actual harpoon store doesn't have a display window like the one in the movie. Movies usually take liberties with details like this for plot expediency, it's not considered a goof. Manhattan does not appear to have ''any'' notable harpoon stores,{{Citation needed}} with or without the kind of frontage described. 

In the third example, the background of a scene is of an apartment in Downtown Vancouver (a cheap and popular filming location that frequently stands in for other cities). The goof points out that the real-life apartment does not belong to the character who supposedly lives in it. Most movie characters do not exist in reality{{citation needed}}, and many scenes are set in fictional locations that are completely separate from their real-life filming locations. As such, this is only a "goof" if the scene is taken entirely literally.

The title text describes an actual anachronism. The film is set in 2018, but there's a billboard for the movie ''{{w|Avengers: Age of Ultron}}''. That movie came out in 2015, while the next Avengers film, ''{{w|Avengers: Infinity War}}'', came out in 2018. Assuming the movie was filmed before 2018, the filmmakers wouldn't have known what films would be current at the time it would be released, and certainly not the artwork they'd be using to promote them. They could have chosen to set it 3 years earlier, but again, unless the specific date is significant to the plot, it's common to set a film at about the same time it's released but with a bare minimum of fakery by trying not to show ''unimportant'' newspaper dates, etc, so that set-dressing and props-department budgets aren't excessive. Generic advertisements for fictional (or {{w|Last Action Hero|parody}}) films might be put over egregiously obvious existing material, physically or in post-production editing, as might references to major brands – perhaps replaced by those agreed with from {{w|product placement}} partners.

The title text also mentions the possibility of a self-reference – the billboard could be for this film itself since it's being released at the same time it's set. This assertion that {{w|Blazing Saddles|in-universe self-reference}} is plausible for a movie production is likely another example of the goof's writer failing to understand the basic "premise of fiction". Most movies do not exist within the fictional world they portray, and many audiences would find self-reference to be a far greater obstacle to suspending disbelief than an ad for the wrong Avengers movie.

===Goofs===
There is no entry for a film featuring an agent Glennifer on IMDB. Randall is clearly failing to do basic research.

On the real IMDb, each item in the Goofs section would be listed under a category such as "Errors in geography" (which might apply to the three goofs listed in the main cartoon) or "Anachronisms" (which might apply to the goof in the title text). However, no such category is displayed here.

On real Goofs pages, the information below each entry includes a public feedback listing (X of Y found this interesting) and a link entitled "Share this". In the comic, only unintelligible squiggles are included in their place, which really breaks the immersion of the purported "webpage". Of course, on a real IMDb page, all of the text would also be in the Verdana font, not Randall's handwriting.

The comic features two entries with a yellow background, which is impossible. On IMDb, entries alternate between having white and gray backgrounds and only turn yellow when the mouse hovers over them.

On IMDb, the number of goofs is located in a navigation box between the header and the goofs list. In the comic, the number is placed in the header, and there is no navigation box at all.

A similar Goofs section exists in the [[explain xkcd]] wiki's page for this comic, but it fails even more evidently to recreate the look of IMDb's Goof page.

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

:[An excerpt from an Internet Movie Database web page showing a list of goofs from a film. Each item has some small illegible text below it, which on the real IMDb would say something like "7 of 72 found this interesting | Share this". The first and third items have a faint yellow-tinted background. The third item is only partially visible at the bottom of the "screen".]
:[Heading:]
:'''Goofs (78)'''
:[List:]
:The space detective's office is on Chestnut Ave, but Lower Manhattan has no street by that name. Agent Glennifer pursues the cybernetic dog onto what is clearly Ludlow Street.
:The agents destroy the blimp drones in Union Square with harpoons from a store display rack. The nearest harpoon store is several blocks away and has no outdoor displays.
:The apartment in the background of the hologram kissing scene actually exists in downtown Vancouver. We called the owners, who confirmed they had no residents named [...]

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Sometimes the IMDB "Goofs" section really seems to struggle with the whole premise of fiction.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]

2005: Attention Span

2022-05-21T01:28:45Z

162.158.78.109: Undo revision 271035 by Explain xkcd server admin (talk)

{{comic
| number = 2005
| date = June 11, 2018
| title = Attention Span
| image = attention_span.png
| titletext = I didn't even realize they MADE a novelization of "Surf Ninjas." How did you-- Oh my god, it's signed by the author?!
}}

==Explanation==
People often groan about their shrinking attention span, attributing it to an increased illiteracy. This allows for fond nostalgia about the times when they were supposedly more intelligent and focused. For instance, Nicholas Carr wrote [https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/07/is-google-making-us-stupid/306868/ this article] to compile both anecdotes (which are more abundant) and research (which is more useful) to describe this phenomenon.

[[Cueball]] does the same here, but [[Megan]] retorts that he spent six hours reading over a pointless (if disturbingly plausible) theory about a banal show based off a series of bedtime stories made to entertain small children. ''{{w|Thomas & Friends|Thomas The Tank Engine}}'' is a British children's series based off a series of books written by Wilbert Awdry. It follows the adventures of anthropomorphized train locomotives and other vehicles.

Cueball qualifies his statement: he has no attention span for anything good anymore. Megan, in reply, examines Cueball’s bookshelf, finding a book that cements Cueball’s status as a nerd who reads {{w|High fantasy|high fantasy}}. Cueball protests that the book is a classic, but Megan dismisses the fact.

To be fair to Cueball, many great fantasies have covers such as those in the comic (e.g. ''{{w|A Song of Ice and Fire}}'', ''{{w|The Lord of the Rings}}'', Randall's personal favorite ''{{w|Discworld}}''). To be fair to Megan, this book is apparently not one of them, being thicker than it is wide (like ''The Complete {{w|Miss Marple}}'' by {{w|Agatha Christie}}), a telltale sign of needless bombast and turgid prose.

Other possibilities for the dragon book are ''{{w|His Majesty's Dragon}}'' from the ''{{w|Temeraire (series)|Temeraire}}'' series or ''{{w|Dragonsbane}}'' from the Winterlands series.

If there was any doubt about Cueball’s dubious literary tastes before, Megan dispels them in the title text, refering to a novelization of the excoriated movie ''{{w|Surf Ninjas}}'', a movie that is exactly what it sounds like. Signed novelizations of a movie named “Surf Ninjas” are not typical fodder for great minds.{{Citation needed}}

The comic contains a hyperlink to an article with the same unfortunate content Cueball has apparently finished reading prior to this comic: [https://www.newyorker.com/culture/rabbit-holes/the-repressive-authoritarian-soul-of-thomas-the-tank-engine-and-friends The Repressive, Authoritarian Soul of “Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends”]. This article, the articles linked from it, further linked articles from those, links found by googling the topic, and other related [https://www.techopedia.com/definition/5199/surfing-world-wide-web web surfing] on the topic could easily add up to six hours or more of reading.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball and Megan are standing together.]
:Cueball: I haven't read any books in forever. I have no attention span anymore.

:[Zoom in on the faces of Cueball and Megan.]
:Megan: Didn't you literally '''''just''''' spend six hours obsessively reading about the theory that ''Thomas the Tank Engine'' is authoritarian propaganda depicting a post-apocalyptic fascist dystopia?

:[Cueball still standing there. Megan begins pacing away.]
:Cueball: OK
:Cueball: I mean I have no attention span for anything '''''good''''' anymore.
:Megan: Let's check out your bookshelf, shall we?

:[Cueball alone.]
:Cueball: What are you-
:Off-panel: I see a dragon holding a sword in its teeth on the cover of a book that's thicker than it is wide.
:Cueball: And? That's a '''''classic!'''''
:Off-panel: Just saying, I don't think this is a new development.

==Trivia==
2005 (the comic number) is also the year of the first XKCD comic.

The dragon described is very loosely similar to the legendary pokemon {{w|Zacian}}, whose game had been teased at the release of this comic.
{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

2172: Lunar Cycles

2022-05-15T21:22:56Z

162.158.78.109: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2172
| date = July 5, 2019
| title = Lunar Cycles
| image = lunar_cycles.png
| titletext = The Antikythera mechanism had a whole set of gears specifically to track the cyclic popularity of skinny jeans and low-rise waists.
}}

==Explanation==

This comic shows a mixture of real, scientific lunar cycles and cycles that are comedic or fictional in nature.

*'''Nodal precession:''' The Moon's orbital plane is tilted slightly compared to the Earth's orbital plane around the sun (the {{w|ecliptic}}). This tilt is why we don't constantly see eclipses; most of the time, the Moon's orbital plane is tilted higher or lower than the Sun, so they generally don't cross each other. The two points at which these planes ''do'' cross are called {{w|lunar nodes}}. {{w|Nodal precession}} is the gradual rotation of these nodes over time, a gyroscopic consequence of Earth's equatorial bulge. For the Moon this follows an 18.6 year cycle.

*'''Apsidal precession:''' All orbits have two points where the orbiting body is either closest to, or furthest away from, the thing they are orbiting. These points are called {{w|apsides}}, and the imaginary line between them is called the ''line of apsides''. {{w|Apsidal precession}} is the gradual rotation of this line over time, which occurs in cycles of around 8.9 years for the Moon.

*'''Phase:''' {{w|Lunar phase}} describes the change in shape of the sunlit side of the Moon as viewed from the Earth's surface, which is caused by the changing angle between Moon and Sun as the Moon revolves around the Earth. The cycle of lunar phases takes 29.5 days, a figure referred to as the ''synodic month''.

*'''Distance:''' Because the Moon's orbit around the Earth is elliptical, its distance from the Earth varies slightly over the course of an orbit. This means that the moon's distance also follows a cycle which is the same as the length of one lunar orbit: approximately 27.5 days. This figure is referred to as the ''anomalistic month''. Note that the synodic month is (perhaps counterintuitively) two days ''longer'' than the sidereal month — or to put it another way, it takes 2 more days for the Moon's phases to cycle than it does for the Moon to go around the Earth. This is due to the fact that the Earth is also moving ''around'' the Sun while the phases are going on, which means that the Moon has to spend 2 extra days "catching up" to the point at which the lunar phase cycle can restart.

*'''Earth-Moon relative size''': This is a joke cycle; the Earth and Moon do not physically change size, nor does the Moon ever become larger than the Earth. This may be playing on the idea that the Moon often ''appears'' to change size to viewers on Earth, due to various factors; most commonly, this is due to the {{w|Moon illusion}}, which tricks the brain into perceiving the Moon as much larger than it really is. There are also so-called {{w|supermoon}}s, which occur when the full moon coincides with the Moon's closest approach to Earth; these actually do increase the Moon's apparent size, although by a relatively insignificant amount.

*'''Lunar shape:''' Again, this is a joke cycle; the Moon does not actually change shape. A shape intermediate between circle and square is known as a {{w|squircle}}, a subclass of the {{w|superellipse}}.

*'''Lunar mood:''' The moon does not have a mood, although humans can have moods that fluctuate over time, sometimes with a regularity akin to a cycle. Ironically, the section of the graph that shows a good (i.e. happy) mood has the graph line curving up then down like the mouth of a frown, and for the bad (unhappy) mood it curves down and then up, as in the mouth of a smile.

* The final diagram shows many different cycles superimposed on each other, highlighting areas where several cycles are coinciding. This is likely satirizing the media trend of overhyping astronomical coincidences and giving them grand-sounding names:
:*The light gray "phase × distance" plot does not correspond to the product of periods given for phase and distance, which [https://i.imgur.com/0i0mcPn.png look like this] instead.
:*A [[wikipedia:harvest moon|harvest moon]] is the traditional name for the full moon closest to the autumnal equinox, but there is nothing astronomically significant about it.
:*A [[wikipedia:Supermoon|supermoon]] is a full or new moon when the Moon is closest to the Earth, resulting in a slightly larger-than-usual apparent size. A full supermoon is roughly 14% larger in diameter than when the Moon is furthest away. See also [[1394: Superm*n]].
:*A [[wikipedia:blue moon|blue moon]] was originally a description of the very rare occurrence of atmospheric conditions that gave the Moon a bluish tinge, hence the expression "once in a blue moon" for something that happens only rarely. However, the actual blue-hued appearance of the moon is so rare that it the phrase "blue moon" has been reinterpreted as referring to a merely uncommon event: the occurrence of two full moons in a single calendar month. That kind of "blue moon" naturally does not look any different from a regular full moon.
:*A [[wikipedia:blood moon|blood moon]] refers to the moon during a lunar eclipse.
:*While the popularity of '''skinny jeans''' ([[wikipedia:Slim-fit pants|slim-fit pants]]) does change over time, the idea that this is connected to a lunar cycle is also a joke.
:*The [[wikipedia:Golden Age of Television|Golden Age of Television]] is said to have occurred in the 1940s and 50s, and the 2000s.
:*'''Pork''' {{w|Mooncake|'''moon'''cakes}} have been prepared in the rural areas west of Shanghai since more than a thousand years ago, for the Chinese {{w|Mid-Autumn Festival}}.
:*[https://scryfall.com/card/m20/120/vampire-of-the-dire-moon "The Vampire of the '''Dire Moon'''"] is a recently introduced, uncommon card from the {{w|Magic: The Gathering}} card game.
:*{{w|Astrology}} is a pseudoscience which claims that the positions of the celestial bodies can be used to predict human affairs. The chart jokingly suggests that astrology actually ''does'' work, but only within a very specific two-week timeframe.
:*Finally, while the idea of a '''total eclipse of the sea''' seems absurd, [https://www.deepseanews.com/2017/08/what-happens-in-the-sea-during-a-solar-eclipse/ an eclipse was famously used to explain the migration of maritime animals]:
:::''biologists were beginning to unravel the mystery of this ‘false bottom’–a layer in the ocean that looks the the sea floor on the sounder but isn’t–which covered much of the ocean. This false bottom rises in up at night and sinks down during the day. This rising and falling is in fact caused by the largest migration of animal on Earth–everything from fish, shrimp and jellyfish, moving hundreds of meters in unison up and down each day.... the moon moved into its place in front of the sun, daylight rapidly faded, and the scientists solved the migration mystery: the deep layer of animals began to rise. Bioluminescent creatures started to shine, and nocturnal creatures started a frantic upward thrust. As the world grew darker, they swam upward nearly 80 meters. But this frantic migration didn’t last long. As the moon receded and the sun revealed itself, the massive animal layer did an about-face, scrambling back into the safety of the darkness.''
:: (Backus, Clark, and Wing (1965) [https://sci-hub.tw/10.1038/205989a0 "Behaviour of certain marine organisms during the solar eclipse of July 20, 1963"] ''Nature'' '''4975:'''989-91.)
The '''{{w|Antikythera_mechanism|Antikythera mechanism}}''' mentioned in the title text is an ancient Greek machine, rediscovered in 1901, designed to calculate astronomical positions. The title text jokes that there is a set of gears on said mechanism that is used to predict the popularity of "skinny jeans" and "low-rise waists." Since it was likely created in the 1st or 2nd century B.C., it is impossible for the creators to have had any knowledge of skinny jeans or low-rise waists - both are modern-day clothing fashions{{citation needed}}.

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

:Understanding lunar cycles

:Nodal precession
:[A diagram showing a broad cosine-like wave with wavelength labelled as 18.6 years. To the right are two diagrams showing an orbital cycle moving in and out of plane.]

:Apsidal precession
:[A diagram similar to the one above but with a slightly shorter wavelength, labelled as 8.9 years. To the right are two diagrams showing an elliptical orbit around a planet and the same orbit rotated.]

:Phase
:[A diagram similar to those above with a shorter wavelength, labelled as 29.5 days. To the right is a diagram showing four phases of the moon: New, Waxing crescent, Waxinf gibbos, Full.]

:Distance
:[A diagram similar to those above with a shorter wavelength, labelled as 27.5 days. To the right is a diagram showing the distance of the moon from the Earth over time, with distances marked by arrows.]

:Earth-Moon relative size
:[A wave with long wavelength with an arrow pointing to the minimum labelled 'Earth bigger' and an arrow pointing to the maximum labelled 'Moon bigger'. To the right are two diagrams of the moon and Earth, one showing the Earth bigger than the Moon and the other showing the Moon bigger than the Earth.]

:Lunar shape
:[A wave with long wavelength with an arrow pointing to the minimum labelled 'Circle' and an arrow pointing to the maximum labelled 'Square'. To the right is a diagram showing a circle, a circle transforming into a square with outward arrows at each corner and a square transforming into a circle with inward arrows.]

:Lunar mood
:[A wave with long wavelength with an arrow pointing to the minimum labelled 'Bad' and an arrow pointing to the maximum labelled 'Good'. To the right are four emojis: :), :|, :(, :|]

:[A superimposed graph of all the above waves. Different points on the graph are labelled: Harvest moon, Supermoon, Blue moon, Skinny Jeans popular, Super blood moon, Golden age of TV, Dire moon, Pork moon, Two week window in which astrology works, Total eclipse of the sea.]

[[Category:Astronomy]]

{{comic discussion}}