explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

2191: Conference Question

2019-09-08T15:24:20Z

172.68.110.64: Fixed typo

{{comic
| number = 2191
| date = August 19, 2019
| title = Conference Question
| image = conference_question.png
| titletext = I also have an utterance. Less of an utterance and more of an incantation. Less of an incantation and more of a malediction. Less of a malediction and more of a Word of Power. Less of a Word of Power and more of an Unforgivable Curse.
}}

==Explanation==
Usually at a conference or other event involving a speaker addressing a crowd, members of the crowd are given the chance to ask questions. This is intended so that people can perhaps ask the speaker to elaborate on a point they've made, or to ask the speaker's opinion on a topic related to their talk.

Occasionally, people at such an event will use (or, rather, abuse) the opportunity to ask a question to instead provide their own (unsolicited) opinion or statement. Such statements are often preceded with something along the lines of "I have a question. Well, less of a question and more of a comment." This formulation in particular has attracted [https://jamesmendezhodes.com/blog/2019/4/30/less-of-a-question-more-of-a-comment a lot of criticism] for not adding anything to the discussion and for pulling focus away from the speaker.

In the comic, this idea is taken to an extreme, with [[Beret Guy]] not only transforming the opportunity to ask a question into an opportunity to make a statement, but through successive transformtions, turning this into an opportunity to show off a bug he has found. This is accomplished by using a multitude of synonyms in a ''continuum'': "question" and "comment" are similar, as are "comment" and "utterance", but the two difference in the two extremes in the entire set (in this case "question" and "friendly bug") is profound. In a way, it is similar to how the color red fades into yellow: gradually, and with no clear definitive point.

:'''Question.''' A {{w|question}} is what the crowd member is expected to provide, such that the speaker or a panel member could provide a related answer.

:'''Comment.''' A {{w|Topic and comment|comment}} by a crowd member, is when they just say something they believe, without expecting an answer, giving the speaker or panel members nothing to do. This may be seen as annoying by everyone else, as the crowd did not come to hear the opinion of other crowd members. But answers to relevant questions would be interesting to the crowd and the panel.

:'''Utterance.''' An {{w|utterance}} is just making a noise, which may or may not be actual words, or if actual words it may not be a complete sentence.

:'''Air Pressure Wave.''' {{w|Sounds}} are literally pressure waves in the air. So this could be a simple sound, or not a sound at all depending on the severity of the wave. It might be the person simply blowing.

:'''Friendly Hand Wave.''' Now instead of using his mouth to generate an air pressure wave, he's producing it with his hand, in a manner intended to be interpreted as "friendly". Many times hand waves are done in a friendly manner, designed more for the visual appeal than the amount of air pressure waves they generate.

:'''Friendly Bug.''' Now he is no longer doing anything himself, except to point out the fact that he has found a bug or {{w|insect}}, which he {{w|anthropomorphizes}} as being friendly.

:'''Want to meet it?''' He has decided that he and the friendly bug are actual friends, and ironically comes full circle by finally asking a question, though presumably whether the speaker wants to meet a bug is not related to the topic of the speaker's talk.

The title text takes the opposite route of Beret Guy, and each step instead refers to successively worse forms of magic spells which would, presumably, have a negative effect upon the listener. Starting from a mere utterance and then using Beret Guy's "it is less than" scheme, it progresses over worse and worse curses, ending with an unforgivable curse!

:'''Utterance.''' It begins with utterance which was also used by Beret Guy. See above.

:'''Incantation.''' {{w|Incantation}}, or a spell, is a magical formula intended to trigger a magical effect on a person or objects. It is not necessarily with evil intent.

:'''Malediction.''' A malediction is another word for {{w|curse}} (the prefix "mal" being a Latin root meaning "evil"). This is always with evil intent.

:'''Word of Power.''' "Word of Power" could refer to the dragonish form of magic in ''{{w|The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim}},'' or the [https://dungeonsdragons.fandom.com/wiki/Power_word early 1st edition Dungeons & Dragons high level spells].

:'''Unforgivable Curse.''' The term "{{w|Magic_in_Harry_Potter#Unforgivable_Curses|Unforgivable Curse}}" refers to a set of three spells from the {{w|Harry Potter}} series, said to be so evil that their use on another person is unforgivable and illegal. The three spells are able to mind control (''Imperius curse''), torture (''Cruciatus curse''), and kill (''Killing curse'') their target. It is unclear which spell is implied, though if it was accurate to call it a singular word of power, it is unlikely to be the killing curse.

The title text can be interpreted as a reply by [[Hairy]] (the speaker) to Beret Guy, indicating his annoyance at the topic being derailed. It could also be representative of [[Randall|Randall's]] feelings towards those who abuse the opportunity to ask a question in order to make a statement. Randall has recently done some book tours and was at {{w|San Diego Comic-Con}} [https://blog.xkcd.com/2019/07/15/san-diego-comic-con/ last month] where he served on various panels, so he probably has had personal first-hand experience with these kinds of circuitous non-questions.

==Transcript==
:[Hairy stands on a podium having just addressed a crowd of seated people. Beret Guy stands in the middle of the crowd, addressing Hairy. One of Beret Guy's hands is raised at chest height. The front row consists of Cueball, Ponytail, another Hairy, Megan, Hairbun, Danish and another Cueball.]

:Beret Guy: I have a question.
:Beret Guy: Well, less of a question and more of a comment.
:Beret Guy: I guess it's less of a comment and more of an utterance.
:Beret Guy: Really it's less an utterance more an air pressure wave.
:Beret Guy: It's less an air pressure wave and more a friendly hand wave.
:Beret Guy: I guess it's less a friendly wave than it is a friendly bug.
:Beret Guy: I found this bug and now we're friends. Do you want to meet it?

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Hairy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Beret Guy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Hairbun]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Danish]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Public speaking]]
[[Category:Animals]]
[[Category:Fiction]]
[[Category:Harry Potter]]

Talk:2198: Throw

2019-09-04T21:40:31Z

172.68.110.64:

I created this page as it seem DgbrtBOT fails because it is interactive. So far it still won't shown on the front page or with a button to it from the previous comic or the "newest" comic button. Maybe it just takes some time? It is now in the [[List_of_all_comics]] but still no luck getting it to work... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:58, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Maybe it is because it was published on a tuesday? --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::No it is not unusual that a comic does not come out on MWF. For instance the Sunday comic recently. Here is the list of Tuesday comics: [[:Category:Tuesday_comics]]--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Also it doesn't display my comment below the explanation. Something is very broken here...--[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:It appears now. [[User:PkmnQ|PkmnQ]] ([[User talk:PkmnQ|talk]]) 08:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
How did he get an estimate for Carly Rae Jepson, anyway? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.34|162.158.255.34]] 09:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgwAywJlo1M [[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.221|172.68.142.221]] 09:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::Alternatively he could have worked together with her, as with Serena Williams. I will look it up in the afternoon, when I have my preordered book :) --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 10:22, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

By the transitive property of Worthiness, if Capt America can throw Thor's Hammer, surely George Washington is Worthy!{{unsigned ip|172.69.68.141}}

I got this data from the code:
{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| microwave
| A microwave oven
| false
| true
| 0.406
| 0.406
| 10.591
| 0.8
|
|-
| basketball
| a basketball
| false
| true
| 0.243
| 0.243
| 0.624
| 0.3
|
|-
| blender
| a blender
| false
| true
| 0.203
| 0.203
| 5.216
| 0.8
|
|-
| gold_bar
| a gold bar
| false
| true
| 0.0535
| 0.0535
| 12.4
| 0.8
|
|-
| cake
| a wedding cake
| false
| true
| 0.51
| 0.51
| 13
| 0.8
|
|-
| pingpong
| a ping pong ball
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.003
| 0.5
|
|-
| quarterback
| an NFL quarterback
| true
| false
| 1.905
| 0.584
| 102.058
| 0.6
| 20
|-
| acorn
| an acorn
| false
| true
| 0.0191
| 0.0191
| 0.0045
| 0.3
|
|-
| hammer
| thor's hammer
| false
| true
| 0.5
| 0.15
| 2000
| 0.4
|
|-
| javelin
| a javelin
| false
| true
| 1.8
| 0.0254
| 0.8
| 0.1
|
|-
| george
| George Washington
| true
| true
| 1.829
| 0.562
| 90.718
| 0.6
| 15
|-
| pikachu
| Pikachu
| true
| true
| 0.4
| 0.3
| 5.9874
| 0.4
| 10
|-
| car
| A car
| false
| true
| 4.5
| 2.134
| 1179.34
| 0.25
|
|-
| silver_spin
| a silver dollar (spinning)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.011
| 0.027
| 0.5
|
|-
| silver_tumble
| a silver dollar (tumbling)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.027
| 0.66
|
|-
| carly
| Carly Rae Jepsen
| true
| false
| 1.575
| 0.46
| 49.895
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| thor
| thor, god of thunder
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10000
|-
| chris hemsworth
| chris hemsworth
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| squirrel
| A squirrel
| true
| true
| 0.203
| 0.096
| 0.454
| 0.6
| 10
|}
(Sorry if this table messes the talk page.)[[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.136|162.158.78.136]] 13:51, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Nah its great. Not sure how to use it in the explanation yet, but guess it will go in there somehow later.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

:{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| you
|
|
|
|
| (mass^(1/3))/8
|
| 0.6
| 5/10/15/20
|}
:Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 09:17, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The comic looks different on my screen, not displaying multiple possible selections next to each other, but all below each other. Quite dynamic... --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 14:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:If I zoom out I can make it shown only one item each line, but if I zoom in two is maximum. But it should go in the explanation when we get there.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The suggestion to litteraly throw a party in the air could be a reference to The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy in which there is a flying building with a party in it, and there's even Thor partying in it when the protagonists are coming there. --Roger 15:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Any reason why George Washington has 50% more throw power than Christ Hemsworth? Some reference? ~TK

Interesting, there appears to be additional units of measurement in the source code that were not used in the comic: "wiffles" and "light-nanoseconds" [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 16:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:I'm going to try to add those to the table; I know where nano-light seconds are, but could you give an example length that's converted to wiffles? --[[User:Account|Account]] ([[User talk:Account|talk]]) 16:41, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Does it seem... excessive to anyone else that the NFL quarterback can throw a silver dollar almost two football fields?[[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.161|172.68.142.161]] 17:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The explanation for Manhattan block conversion appears to be wrong. They mention that their calculation for how large one block is was made with 4 numbers ignoring George Washington as an outlier. However there are 6 total examples of Manhattan block to use and George Washington's is not an outlier. I calculated the mean with all of the data to be 79.9142 meters.--[[User:Szeth|Szeth]] ([[User talk:Szeth|talk]]) 17:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

We need a table with a brief description of each thrower. [[User:DKMell|DKMell]] ([[User talk:DKMell|talk]]) 17:14, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

How do we know how old George Washington was when he throws a squirrel? Speaking of age, this format kind of reminds me of the Magnus comic: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1628:_Magnus [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 17:41, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I think we need to add something about the myth that George Washington threw a silver dollar across the Potomac River [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.40|108.162.241.40]] 19:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
: I agree it adds to the appreciation of the humor and have added that myth to the explanation. I have also added the fact that football quarterbacks are specialists at throwing the ball. [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 13:55, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Pretty sure that the ping-pong ball distances are severely overestimated due to air resistance slowing them very rapidly. Someone with lab facilities might want to check... --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Sorry, never mind, I think I saw a very early version of the actual page that had the distances much greater - seems reasonable now. --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
The buttons look to be failing simply because [[Template:LATESTCOMIC]] hasn't been updated with the lastest comic number - the page is protected so needs someone with higher powers than I. [[User:Dresken|Dresken]] ([[User talk:Dresken|talk]]) 19:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
'Worthiness' was only a thing in the comics. In the myths Thor had a belt of strength and a couple other things. --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.33.125|172.69.33.125]] 21:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Unless I am missing something there is a unit conversion error for pound and kilogram. For instance if you enter 1.83m and 90.7kg for "YOU" the throw distance by Thor is 137m. However, if you enter the equivalent weight of 200lb you get a throw distance of 183m.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.206.28|172.68.206.28]] 23:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

: That is correct! The mass gets converted twice from pounds to kg. The intermediate mass (after one conversion, i.e. the correct mass) is used for deducing the diameter - so the same results cannot be easily obtained. Clearly a bug! Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.82|172.68.110.82]] 13:47, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

"An American football field (where Randall comes from) is 100 yards or 91.44 m long" Please rewrite. I don't think (and I humbly reserve the right to be wrong) that Randall did not come from a football field. [[User:OtterlyAmazin|OtterlyAmazin]] ([[User talk:OtterlyAmazin|talk]]) 23:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
: I attempted a rewrite per your request - hopefully I have addressed the issue without making things worse. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 01:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
::I've substituted another explanation - American Football (the game with the field implied to be measured here) is ''not'' only played in North America, and Canadioan Football fields, in North America, have different measurements. No doubt someone else will replace my edit in turn.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.210.238|108.162.210.238]] 03:02, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Should images of the throwers and objects be included? As the comic image is not interactive as the full comic, one cannot see what Randall's version of e.g. Thor or Chris H. looks like, without of visiting the actual comic and using it. Similar things have been done with other interactive comics (IIRC). --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 06:13, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
: I tried to do just that. However, apparently, only special users are allowed to upload files: "Upload error - You do not have permission to create new pages." An uploaded image file seems to count as a "page" for MediaWiki. I prepared a 7zip file with all of this comic's thrower/item images from xkcd, already properly renamed. It's [https://ufile.io/qq1klu37 available for download here]. In case some mighty editor comes along and would want to upload the images and insert them on this page, please feel free to do so. --[[User:Passerby|Passerby]] ([[User talk:Passerby|talk]]) 20:20, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Could somebody figure out the equation he's using from the book and post it in the explanation? --[[User:Account|Account]] ([[User talk:Account|talk]]) 14:57, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Instead of Carly Rae Jepsen, he should have used Kelsey Plum who throws t-shirts like a cannon! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NeO2BSHj36I] [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 15:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Used Formulas:

g = 9.805;

A = (3 * thrower_length * thrower_throwPower * thrower_mass / (object_mass + thrower_mass / 1000))^(1 / 3);

B = sqrt(2 * object_mass * g / (PI * (object_diameter / 2)^2 * 1.2041 * object_dragC));

Result = A^2 * sqrt(2) / (g * sqrt(A^4 / B^4 * 0.8 + A^2 / B^2 * 3 + 2));

Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 15:39, 4 September 2019 (UTC), slightly corrected on --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 21:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

: 1,2041 is in units of kg/m³ and is the density of air at sea level; both A and B are in units of speed m/s; throwPower is in m²/s³, or equivalently in m/s * N/kg. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.82|172.68.110.82]] 21:22, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I posted this yesterday but it didn't "take." The alternative distance-units used are entirely a function of the distance thrown in meters:
light-nanoseconds (1.00-1.06m), atto-parsecs (1.07-2.69m), rack units (2.70-6.67m), feet (6.68-16m), smoots (16-36m), horses (36-75m), manhattan blocks (75-131m), football fields (132-201m), furlongs (201m+). It's not true that only Thor uses furlongs; a sufficiently large and athletic custom thrower can throw a javelin 206 furlongs. To get light-nanometers, trying having a minimally-athletic "You" 0.2m tall and 129kg throw a gold brick.
-[[User:Jojo|Jojo]] ([[User talk:Jojo|talk]]) 18:44, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Er, I meant "to get light-nanoseconds." (It's my first post. Obviously I had to make a mistake.) --[[User:Jojo|Jojo]] ([[User talk:Jojo|talk]]) 18:48, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Should the hotlinking/embedding image at https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/throw.png be referencd somehow? [[User:Kyuuhachi|Kyuuhachi]] ([[User talk:Kyuuhachi|talk]]) 20:17, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2198: Throw

2019-09-04T21:37:21Z

172.68.110.64:

I created this page as it seem DgbrtBOT fails because it is interactive. So far it still won't shown on the front page or with a button to it from the previous comic or the "newest" comic button. Maybe it just takes some time? It is now in the [[List_of_all_comics]] but still no luck getting it to work... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:58, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Maybe it is because it was published on a tuesday? --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::No it is not unusual that a comic does not come out on MWF. For instance the Sunday comic recently. Here is the list of Tuesday comics: [[:Category:Tuesday_comics]]--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Also it doesn't display my comment below the explanation. Something is very broken here...--[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:It appears now. [[User:PkmnQ|PkmnQ]] ([[User talk:PkmnQ|talk]]) 08:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
How did he get an estimate for Carly Rae Jepson, anyway? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.34|162.158.255.34]] 09:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgwAywJlo1M [[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.221|172.68.142.221]] 09:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::Alternatively he could have worked together with her, as with Serena Williams. I will look it up in the afternoon, when I have my preordered book :) --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 10:22, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

By the transitive property of Worthiness, if Capt America can throw Thor's Hammer, surely George Washington is Worthy!{{unsigned ip|172.69.68.141}}

I got this data from the code:
{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| microwave
| A microwave oven
| false
| true
| 0.406
| 0.406
| 10.591
| 0.8
|
|-
| basketball
| a basketball
| false
| true
| 0.243
| 0.243
| 0.624
| 0.3
|
|-
| blender
| a blender
| false
| true
| 0.203
| 0.203
| 5.216
| 0.8
|
|-
| gold_bar
| a gold bar
| false
| true
| 0.0535
| 0.0535
| 12.4
| 0.8
|
|-
| cake
| a wedding cake
| false
| true
| 0.51
| 0.51
| 13
| 0.8
|
|-
| pingpong
| a ping pong ball
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.003
| 0.5
|
|-
| quarterback
| an NFL quarterback
| true
| false
| 1.905
| 0.584
| 102.058
| 0.6
| 20
|-
| acorn
| an acorn
| false
| true
| 0.0191
| 0.0191
| 0.0045
| 0.3
|
|-
| hammer
| thor's hammer
| false
| true
| 0.5
| 0.15
| 2000
| 0.4
|
|-
| javelin
| a javelin
| false
| true
| 1.8
| 0.0254
| 0.8
| 0.1
|
|-
| george
| George Washington
| true
| true
| 1.829
| 0.562
| 90.718
| 0.6
| 15
|-
| pikachu
| Pikachu
| true
| true
| 0.4
| 0.3
| 5.9874
| 0.4
| 10
|-
| car
| A car
| false
| true
| 4.5
| 2.134
| 1179.34
| 0.25
|
|-
| silver_spin
| a silver dollar (spinning)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.011
| 0.027
| 0.5
|
|-
| silver_tumble
| a silver dollar (tumbling)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.027
| 0.66
|
|-
| carly
| Carly Rae Jepsen
| true
| false
| 1.575
| 0.46
| 49.895
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| thor
| thor, god of thunder
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10000
|-
| chris hemsworth
| chris hemsworth
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| squirrel
| A squirrel
| true
| true
| 0.203
| 0.096
| 0.454
| 0.6
| 10
|}
(Sorry if this table messes the talk page.)[[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.136|162.158.78.136]] 13:51, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Nah its great. Not sure how to use it in the explanation yet, but guess it will go in there somehow later.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

:{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| you
|
|
|
|
| (mass^(1/3))/8
|
| 0.6
| 5/10/15/20
|}
:Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 09:17, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The comic looks different on my screen, not displaying multiple possible selections next to each other, but all below each other. Quite dynamic... --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 14:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:If I zoom out I can make it shown only one item each line, but if I zoom in two is maximum. But it should go in the explanation when we get there.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The suggestion to litteraly throw a party in the air could be a reference to The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy in which there is a flying building with a party in it, and there's even Thor partying in it when the protagonists are coming there. --Roger 15:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Any reason why George Washington has 50% more throw power than Christ Hemsworth? Some reference? ~TK

Interesting, there appears to be additional units of measurement in the source code that were not used in the comic: "wiffles" and "light-nanoseconds" [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 16:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:I'm going to try to add those to the table; I know where nano-light seconds are, but could you give an example length that's converted to wiffles? --[[User:Account|Account]] ([[User talk:Account|talk]]) 16:41, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Does it seem... excessive to anyone else that the NFL quarterback can throw a silver dollar almost two football fields?[[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.161|172.68.142.161]] 17:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The explanation for Manhattan block conversion appears to be wrong. They mention that their calculation for how large one block is was made with 4 numbers ignoring George Washington as an outlier. However there are 6 total examples of Manhattan block to use and George Washington's is not an outlier. I calculated the mean with all of the data to be 79.9142 meters.--[[User:Szeth|Szeth]] ([[User talk:Szeth|talk]]) 17:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

We need a table with a brief description of each thrower. [[User:DKMell|DKMell]] ([[User talk:DKMell|talk]]) 17:14, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

How do we know how old George Washington was when he throws a squirrel? Speaking of age, this format kind of reminds me of the Magnus comic: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1628:_Magnus [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 17:41, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I think we need to add something about the myth that George Washington threw a silver dollar across the Potomac River [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.40|108.162.241.40]] 19:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
: I agree it adds to the appreciation of the humor and have added that myth to the explanation. I have also added the fact that football quarterbacks are specialists at throwing the ball. [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 13:55, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Pretty sure that the ping-pong ball distances are severely overestimated due to air resistance slowing them very rapidly. Someone with lab facilities might want to check... --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Sorry, never mind, I think I saw a very early version of the actual page that had the distances much greater - seems reasonable now. --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
The buttons look to be failing simply because [[Template:LATESTCOMIC]] hasn't been updated with the lastest comic number - the page is protected so needs someone with higher powers than I. [[User:Dresken|Dresken]] ([[User talk:Dresken|talk]]) 19:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
'Worthiness' was only a thing in the comics. In the myths Thor had a belt of strength and a couple other things. --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.33.125|172.69.33.125]] 21:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Unless I am missing something there is a unit conversion error for pound and kilogram. For instance if you enter 1.83m and 90.7kg for "YOU" the throw distance by Thor is 137m. However, if you enter the equivalent weight of 200lb you get a throw distance of 183m.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.206.28|172.68.206.28]] 23:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

: That is correct! The mass gets converted twice from pounds to kg. The intermediate mass (after one conversion, i.e. the correct mass) is used for deducing the diameter - so the same results cannot be easily obtained. Clearly a bug! Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.82|172.68.110.82]] 13:47, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

"An American football field (where Randall comes from) is 100 yards or 91.44 m long" Please rewrite. I don't think (and I humbly reserve the right to be wrong) that Randall did not come from a football field. [[User:OtterlyAmazin|OtterlyAmazin]] ([[User talk:OtterlyAmazin|talk]]) 23:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
: I attempted a rewrite per your request - hopefully I have addressed the issue without making things worse. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 01:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
::I've substituted another explanation - American Football (the game with the field implied to be measured here) is ''not'' only played in North America, and Canadioan Football fields, in North America, have different measurements. No doubt someone else will replace my edit in turn.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.210.238|108.162.210.238]] 03:02, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Should images of the throwers and objects be included? As the comic image is not interactive as the full comic, one cannot see what Randall's version of e.g. Thor or Chris H. looks like, without of visiting the actual comic and using it. Similar things have been done with other interactive comics (IIRC). --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 06:13, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
: I tried to do just that. However, apparently, only special users are allowed to upload files: "Upload error - You do not have permission to create new pages." An uploaded image file seems to count as a "page" for MediaWiki. I prepared a 7zip file with all of this comic's thrower/item images from xkcd, already properly renamed. It's [https://ufile.io/qq1klu37 available for download here]. In case some mighty editor comes along and would want to upload the images and insert them on this page, please feel free to do so. --[[User:Passerby|Passerby]] ([[User talk:Passerby|talk]]) 20:20, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Could somebody figure out the equation he's using from the book and post it in the explanation? --[[User:Account|Account]] ([[User talk:Account|talk]]) 14:57, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Instead of Carly Rae Jepsen, he should have used Kelsey Plum who throws t-shirts like a cannon! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NeO2BSHj36I] [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 15:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Used Formulas:

g = 9.805;

A = (3 * thrower_length * thrower_mass * thrower_throwPower / (object_mass + thrower_mass / 1000))^(1 / 3);

B = sqrt(2 * object_mass * g / (PI * (object_diameter / 2)^2 * 1.2041 * object_dragC));

Result = A^2 * sqrt(2) / (g * sqrt(A^4 / B^4 * 0.8 + A^2 / B^2 * 3 + 2));

Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 15:39, 4 September 2019 (UTC), slightly corrected on --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 21:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

: 1,2041 is in units of kg/m³ and is the density of air at sea level; both A and B are in units of speed m/s; throwPower is in m²/s³, or equivalently in m/s * N/kg. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.82|172.68.110.82]] 21:22, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

I posted this yesterday but it didn't "take." The alternative distance-units used are entirely a function of the distance thrown in meters:
light-nanoseconds (1.00-1.06m), atto-parsecs (1.07-2.69m), rack units (2.70-6.67m), feet (6.68-16m), smoots (16-36m), horses (36-75m), manhattan blocks (75-131m), football fields (132-201m), furlongs (201m+). It's not true that only Thor uses furlongs; a sufficiently large and athletic custom thrower can throw a javelin 206 furlongs. To get light-nanometers, trying having a minimally-athletic "You" 0.2m tall and 129kg throw a gold brick.
-[[User:Jojo|Jojo]] ([[User talk:Jojo|talk]]) 18:44, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Er, I meant "to get light-nanoseconds." (It's my first post. Obviously I had to make a mistake.) --[[User:Jojo|Jojo]] ([[User talk:Jojo|talk]]) 18:48, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Should the hotlinking/embedding image at https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/throw.png be referencd somehow? [[User:Kyuuhachi|Kyuuhachi]] ([[User talk:Kyuuhachi|talk]]) 20:17, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2198: Throw

2019-09-04T15:40:20Z

172.68.110.64:

I created this page as it seem DgbrtBOT fails because it is interactive. So far it still won't shown on the front page or with a button to it from the previous comic or the "newest" comic button. Maybe it just takes some time? It is now in the [[List_of_all_comics]] but still no luck getting it to work... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:58, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Maybe it is because it was published on a tuesday? --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::No it is not unusual that a comic does not come out on MWF. For instance the Sunday comic recently. Here is the list of Tuesday comics: [[:Category:Tuesday_comics]]--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Also it doesn't display my comment below the explanation. Something is very broken here...--[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:It appears now. [[User:PkmnQ|PkmnQ]] ([[User talk:PkmnQ|talk]]) 08:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
How did he get an estimate for Carly Rae Jepson, anyway? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.34|162.158.255.34]] 09:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgwAywJlo1M [[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.221|172.68.142.221]] 09:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::Alternatively he could have worked together with her, as with Serena Williams. I will look it up in the afternoon, when I have my preordered book :) --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 10:22, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

By the transitive property of Worthiness, if Capt America can throw Thor's Hammer, surely George Washington is Worthy!{{unsigned ip|172.69.68.141}}

I got this data from the code:
{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| microwave
| A microwave oven
| false
| true
| 0.406
| 0.406
| 10.591
| 0.8
|
|-
| basketball
| a basketball
| false
| true
| 0.243
| 0.243
| 0.624
| 0.3
|
|-
| blender
| a blender
| false
| true
| 0.203
| 0.203
| 5.216
| 0.8
|
|-
| gold_bar
| a gold bar
| false
| true
| 0.0535
| 0.0535
| 12.4
| 0.8
|
|-
| cake
| a wedding cake
| false
| true
| 0.51
| 0.51
| 13
| 0.8
|
|-
| pingpong
| a ping pong ball
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.003
| 0.5
|
|-
| quarterback
| an NFL quarterback
| true
| false
| 1.905
| 0.584
| 102.058
| 0.6
| 20
|-
| acorn
| an acorn
| false
| true
| 0.0191
| 0.0191
| 0.0045
| 0.3
|
|-
| hammer
| thor's hammer
| false
| true
| 0.5
| 0.15
| 2000
| 0.4
|
|-
| javelin
| a javelin
| false
| true
| 1.8
| 0.0254
| 0.8
| 0.1
|
|-
| george
| George Washington
| true
| true
| 1.829
| 0.562
| 90.718
| 0.6
| 15
|-
| pikachu
| Pikachu
| true
| true
| 0.4
| 0.3
| 5.9874
| 0.4
| 10
|-
| car
| A car
| false
| true
| 4.5
| 2.134
| 1179.34
| 0.25
|
|-
| silver_spin
| a silver dollar (spinning)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.011
| 0.027
| 0.5
|
|-
| silver_tumble
| a silver dollar (tumbling)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.027
| 0.66
|
|-
| carly
| Carly Rae Jepsen
| true
| false
| 1.575
| 0.46
| 49.895
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| thor
| thor, god of thunder
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10000
|-
| chris hemsworth
| chris hemsworth
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| squirrel
| A squirrel
| true
| true
| 0.203
| 0.096
| 0.454
| 0.6
| 10
|}
(Sorry if this table messes the talk page.)[[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.136|162.158.78.136]] 13:51, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Nah its great. Not sure how to use it in the explanation yet, but guess it will go in there somehow later.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

:{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| you
|
|
|
|
| (mass^(1/3))/8
|
| 0.6
| 5/10/15/20
|}
:Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 09:17, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The comic looks different on my screen, not displaying multiple possible selections next to each other, but all below each other. Quite dynamic... --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 14:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:If I zoom out I can make it shown only one item each line, but if I zoom in two is maximum. But it should go in the explanation when we get there.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The suggestion to litteraly throw a party in the air could be a reference to The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy in which there is a flying building with a party in it, and there's even Thor partying in it when the protagonists are coming there. --Roger 15:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Any reason why George Washington has 50% more throw power than Christ Hemsworth? Some reference? ~TK

Interesting, there appears to be additional units of measurement in the source code that were not used in the comic: "wiffles" and "light-nanoseconds" [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 16:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Does it seem... excessive to anyone else that the NFL quarterback can throw a silver dollar almost two football fields?[[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.161|172.68.142.161]] 17:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The explanation for Manhattan block conversion appears to be wrong. They mention that their calculation for how large one block is was made with 4 numbers ignoring George Washington as an outlier. However there are 6 total examples of Manhattan block to use and George Washington's is not an outlier. I calculated the mean with all of the data to be 79.9142 meters.--[[User:Szeth|Szeth]] ([[User talk:Szeth|talk]]) 17:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

We need a table with a brief description of each thrower. [[User:DKMell|DKMell]] ([[User talk:DKMell|talk]]) 17:14, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

How do we know how old George Washington was when he throws a squirrel? Speaking of age, this format kind of reminds me of the Magnus comic: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1628:_Magnus [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 17:41, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I think we need to add something about the myth that George Washington threw a silver dollar across the Potomac River [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.40|108.162.241.40]] 19:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
: I agree it adds to the appreciation of the humor and have added that myth to the explanation. I have also added the fact that football quarterbacks are specialists at throwing the ball. [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 13:55, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Pretty sure that the ping-pong ball distances are severely overestimated due to air resistance slowing them very rapidly. Someone with lab facilities might want to check... --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Sorry, never mind, I think I saw a very early version of the actual page that had the distances much greater - seems reasonable now. --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
The buttons look to be failing simply because [[Template:LATESTCOMIC]] hasn't been updated with the lastest comic number - the page is protected so needs someone with higher powers than I. [[User:Dresken|Dresken]] ([[User talk:Dresken|talk]]) 19:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
'Worthiness' was only a thing in the comics. In the myths Thor had a belt of strength and a couple other things. --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.33.125|172.69.33.125]] 21:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Unless I am missing something there is a unit conversion error for pound and kilogram. For instance if you enter 1.83m and 90.7kg for "YOU" the throw distance by Thor is 137m. However, if you enter the equivalent weight of 200lb you get a throw distance of 183m.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.206.28|172.68.206.28]] 23:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

: That is correct! The mass gets converted twice from pounds to kg. The intermediate mass (after one conversion, i.e. the correct mass) is used for deducing the diameter - so the same results cannot be easily obtained. Clearly a bug! Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.82|172.68.110.82]] 13:47, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

"An American football field (where Randall comes from) is 100 yards or 91.44 m long" Please rewrite. I don't think (and I humbly reserve the right to be wrong) that Randall did not come from a football field. [[User:OtterlyAmazin|OtterlyAmazin]] ([[User talk:OtterlyAmazin|talk]]) 23:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
: I attempted a rewrite per your request - hopefully I have addressed the issue without making things worse. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 01:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
::I've substituted another explanation - American Football (the game with the field implied to be measured here) is ''not'' only played in North America, and Canadioan Football fields, in North America, have different measurements. No doubt someone else will replace my edit in turn.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.210.238|108.162.210.238]] 03:02, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Should images of the throwers and objects be included? As the comic image is not interactive as the full comic, one cannot see what Randall's version of e.g. Thor or Chris H. looks like, without of visiting the actual comic and using it. Similar things have been done with other interactive comics (IIRC). --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 06:13, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Could somebody figure out the equation he's using from the book and post it in the explanation? --[[User:Account|Account]] ([[User talk:Account|talk]]) 14:57, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Instead of Carly Rae Jepsen, he should have used Kelsey Plum who throws t-shirts like a cannon! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NeO2BSHj36I] [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 15:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Used Formulas:

g = 9.805;

A = (3 * thrower_length * thrower_mass * thrower_throwPower / (thrower_mass + object_mass / 1000))^(1 / 3);

B = sqrt(2 * object_mass * g / (PI * (object_diameter / 2)^2 * 1.2041 * object_dragC));

Result = A^2 * sqrt(2) / (g * sqrt(A^4 / B^4 * 0.8 + A^2 / B^2 * 3 + 2));

Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 15:39, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2198: Throw

2019-09-04T15:39:02Z

172.68.110.64:

I created this page as it seem DgbrtBOT fails because it is interactive. So far it still won't shown on the front page or with a button to it from the previous comic or the "newest" comic button. Maybe it just takes some time? It is now in the [[List_of_all_comics]] but still no luck getting it to work... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:58, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Maybe it is because it was published on a tuesday? --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::No it is not unusual that a comic does not come out on MWF. For instance the Sunday comic recently. Here is the list of Tuesday comics: [[:Category:Tuesday_comics]]--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Also it doesn't display my comment below the explanation. Something is very broken here...--[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:It appears now. [[User:PkmnQ|PkmnQ]] ([[User talk:PkmnQ|talk]]) 08:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
How did he get an estimate for Carly Rae Jepson, anyway? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.34|162.158.255.34]] 09:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgwAywJlo1M [[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.221|172.68.142.221]] 09:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::Alternatively he could have worked together with her, as with Serena Williams. I will look it up in the afternoon, when I have my preordered book :) --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 10:22, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

By the transitive property of Worthiness, if Capt America can throw Thor's Hammer, surely George Washington is Worthy!{{unsigned ip|172.69.68.141}}

I got this data from the code:
{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| microwave
| A microwave oven
| false
| true
| 0.406
| 0.406
| 10.591
| 0.8
|
|-
| basketball
| a basketball
| false
| true
| 0.243
| 0.243
| 0.624
| 0.3
|
|-
| blender
| a blender
| false
| true
| 0.203
| 0.203
| 5.216
| 0.8
|
|-
| gold_bar
| a gold bar
| false
| true
| 0.0535
| 0.0535
| 12.4
| 0.8
|
|-
| cake
| a wedding cake
| false
| true
| 0.51
| 0.51
| 13
| 0.8
|
|-
| pingpong
| a ping pong ball
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.003
| 0.5
|
|-
| quarterback
| an NFL quarterback
| true
| false
| 1.905
| 0.584
| 102.058
| 0.6
| 20
|-
| acorn
| an acorn
| false
| true
| 0.0191
| 0.0191
| 0.0045
| 0.3
|
|-
| hammer
| thor's hammer
| false
| true
| 0.5
| 0.15
| 2000
| 0.4
|
|-
| javelin
| a javelin
| false
| true
| 1.8
| 0.0254
| 0.8
| 0.1
|
|-
| george
| George Washington
| true
| true
| 1.829
| 0.562
| 90.718
| 0.6
| 15
|-
| pikachu
| Pikachu
| true
| true
| 0.4
| 0.3
| 5.9874
| 0.4
| 10
|-
| car
| A car
| false
| true
| 4.5
| 2.134
| 1179.34
| 0.25
|
|-
| silver_spin
| a silver dollar (spinning)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.011
| 0.027
| 0.5
|
|-
| silver_tumble
| a silver dollar (tumbling)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.027
| 0.66
|
|-
| carly
| Carly Rae Jepsen
| true
| false
| 1.575
| 0.46
| 49.895
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| thor
| thor, god of thunder
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10000
|-
| chris hemsworth
| chris hemsworth
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| squirrel
| A squirrel
| true
| true
| 0.203
| 0.096
| 0.454
| 0.6
| 10
|}
(Sorry if this table messes the talk page.)[[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.136|162.158.78.136]] 13:51, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Nah its great. Not sure how to use it in the explanation yet, but guess it will go in there somehow later.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

:{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| you
|
|
|
|
| (mass^(1/3))/8
|
| 0.6
| 5/10/15/20
|}
:Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 09:17, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The comic looks different on my screen, not displaying multiple possible selections next to each other, but all below each other. Quite dynamic... --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 14:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:If I zoom out I can make it shown only one item each line, but if I zoom in two is maximum. But it should go in the explanation when we get there.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The suggestion to litteraly throw a party in the air could be a reference to The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy in which there is a flying building with a party in it, and there's even Thor partying in it when the protagonists are coming there. --Roger 15:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Any reason why George Washington has 50% more throw power than Christ Hemsworth? Some reference? ~TK

Interesting, there appears to be additional units of measurement in the source code that were not used in the comic: "wiffles" and "light-nanoseconds" [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 16:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Does it seem... excessive to anyone else that the NFL quarterback can throw a silver dollar almost two football fields?[[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.161|172.68.142.161]] 17:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The explanation for Manhattan block conversion appears to be wrong. They mention that their calculation for how large one block is was made with 4 numbers ignoring George Washington as an outlier. However there are 6 total examples of Manhattan block to use and George Washington's is not an outlier. I calculated the mean with all of the data to be 79.9142 meters.--[[User:Szeth|Szeth]] ([[User talk:Szeth|talk]]) 17:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

We need a table with a brief description of each thrower. [[User:DKMell|DKMell]] ([[User talk:DKMell|talk]]) 17:14, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

How do we know how old George Washington was when he throws a squirrel? Speaking of age, this format kind of reminds me of the Magnus comic: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1628:_Magnus [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 17:41, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I think we need to add something about the myth that George Washington threw a silver dollar across the Potomac River [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.40|108.162.241.40]] 19:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
: I agree it adds to the appreciation of the humor and have added that myth to the explanation. I have also added the fact that football quarterbacks are specialists at throwing the ball. [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 13:55, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Pretty sure that the ping-pong ball distances are severely overestimated due to air resistance slowing them very rapidly. Someone with lab facilities might want to check... --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Sorry, never mind, I think I saw a very early version of the actual page that had the distances much greater - seems reasonable now. --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
The buttons look to be failing simply because [[Template:LATESTCOMIC]] hasn't been updated with the lastest comic number - the page is protected so needs someone with higher powers than I. [[User:Dresken|Dresken]] ([[User talk:Dresken|talk]]) 19:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
'Worthiness' was only a thing in the comics. In the myths Thor had a belt of strength and a couple other things. --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.33.125|172.69.33.125]] 21:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Unless I am missing something there is a unit conversion error for pound and kilogram. For instance if you enter 1.83m and 90.7kg for "YOU" the throw distance by Thor is 137m. However, if you enter the equivalent weight of 200lb you get a throw distance of 183m.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.206.28|172.68.206.28]] 23:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

: That is correct! The mass gets converted twice from pounds to kg. The intermediate mass (after one conversion, i.e. the correct mass) is used for deducing the diameter - so the same results cannot be easily obtained. Clearly a bug! Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.82|172.68.110.82]] 13:47, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

"An American football field (where Randall comes from) is 100 yards or 91.44 m long" Please rewrite. I don't think (and I humbly reserve the right to be wrong) that Randall did not come from a football field. [[User:OtterlyAmazin|OtterlyAmazin]] ([[User talk:OtterlyAmazin|talk]]) 23:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
: I attempted a rewrite per your request - hopefully I have addressed the issue without making things worse. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 01:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
::I've substituted another explanation - American Football (the game with the field implied to be measured here) is ''not'' only played in North America, and Canadioan Football fields, in North America, have different measurements. No doubt someone else will replace my edit in turn.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.210.238|108.162.210.238]] 03:02, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Should images of the throwers and objects be included? As the comic image is not interactive as the full comic, one cannot see what Randall's version of e.g. Thor or Chris H. looks like, without of visiting the actual comic and using it. Similar things have been done with other interactive comics (IIRC). --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 06:13, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Could somebody figure out the equation he's using from the book and post it in the explanation? --[[User:Account|Account]] ([[User talk:Account|talk]]) 14:57, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Instead of Carly Rae Jepsen, he should have used Kelsey Plum who throws t-shirts like a cannon! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NeO2BSHj36I] [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 15:16, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Used Formulas:
g = 9.805,
A = (3 * thrower_length * thrower_mass * thrower_throwPower / (thrower_mass + object_mass / 1000))^(1 / 3);
B = sqrt(2 * object_mass * g / (PI * (object_diameter / 2)^2 * 1.2041 * object_dragC));
Result = A^2 * sqrt(2) / (g * sqrt(A^4 / B^4 * 0.8 + A^2 / B^2 * 3 + 2));
Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 15:39, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

2198: Throw

2019-09-04T13:53:42Z

172.68.110.64: pound conversion bug

{{comic
| number = 2198
| date = September 3, 2019
| title = Throw
| image = throw.png
| titletext = The keys to successfully throwing a party are location, planning, and one of those aircraft carrier steam catapults.
}}
*To experience the interactivity of this game, visit the {{xkcd|2198|original comic}}.
==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by Thor, God of Thunder. Table for all combinations should be made, maybe with clear marking of those that cannot be thrown. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This is an interactive comic made to celebrate the release of [[Randall|Randall's]] new book, ''[[How To]]''. The comic is based on a chapter in the book.

As the comic celebrates the book, which was released on Tuesday, September 3rd, 2019, the comic was thus also released on a [[:Category:Tuesday comics|Tuesday]] to coincide with the release day and probably replacing that week's normal Wednesday release. This was the same timing used for another of Randall's book releases, when [[1608: Hoverboard]] came out on the Tuesday when [[Thing Explainer]] came out. Although the Hoverboard comic is much more complex than this one, they are both [[:Category:Dynamic comics|dynamic]] and [[:Category:Interactive comics|interactive]], with [[:Category:Comics with animation|animations]] a part of them.

In this comic the viewer can select a person/{{w|Pikachu}}/god/squirrel as the thrower and an object (including a person, Pikachu, or squirrel) to be thrown, and get an animation of how the selected throw would work out, along with an estimated distance of the throw (both in SI units and in other very arbitrary units; see [[#Table of distance units|table]] below) if the throw was possible. Impossible throws include ones in which the thrower is smaller than the thrown object. The formula/guideline is apparently based on a chapter from the book. One special case to the calculations is Thor's hammer, which is enchanted such that only those deemed "worthy" are able to lift it. As such, despite its mass being liftable by many of the characters, only Thor, God of Thunder (who is canonically worthy), and self-created characters who are well over the human records for height ({{w|List of tallest people|272 cm}}) and/or weight ({{w|List of heaviest people|635 kg}}) are shown to actually be able to throw it. Also Thor is the only one who uses {{w|furlongs}} to measure his distances.

There are 7 throwers + 1 open option and 15 + 1 things to throw, giving a total of 105 different combinations for the static elements; see the [[#Table of throw distances|table]] below plus those for the open option. The open option can be defined by height, weight and a 1-4 scale of atleticism. But only Thor (or an unrealistically tall and heavy custom character) can throw all 15, with three of the objects (George Washington, hammer, and car) unthrowable by any of the other premade characters. The smaller critters can throw only a few things, so the total number of throws is much less than 100. Still there is an animation for all 105 combinations, but with no throw distance for some. An object with negative weight (you probably) flies backwards.

The athleticism scale does not define the character used for the animation.

The title text refers to throwing a party (a colloquial synonym of hosting a party) and first makes the assumption of actually giving hints for giving a party, and then switching to suggest a mechanism to literally throw a huge object, such as a house with a party going on inside. An {{w|Aircraft_catapult#Steam_catapult|aircraft steam catapult}} is a mechanism to launch aircraft from ships, typically used on aircraft carriers.

==Throwers and throw items==
George Washington, Pikachu, and a squirrel are both throwers and throw items.

* '''An NFL {{w|quarterback}}''' is the average American's perception of a highly athletic individual; gridiron football is a full-contact sport that requires durability, speed, and precision. One of the primary skills required of quarterbacks is to be able to throw the football far with precision accuracy.
* '''{{w|George Washington}}''' was the first president of the United States of America. There is a myth that a young George Washington threw a silver dollar across the Potomac River which is more than a mile wide for much of its length. Or alternatively that he would throw rocks across the Rappahannock River which was about 300 feet wide near George's boyhood home. http://kenmore.org/education/kidstuff/legends.html. He is also used as a throwing item to represent the likelihood of a thrower distance with an average human as the projectile.
* '''{{w|Pikachu}}''' is a species of Pokémon, and the mascot of the Pokémon franchise as a whole. Although Pikachu are not normally shown to throw things, the ''Super Smash Bros'' series shows they are perfectly capable of picking things up that do not significantly out-size them. That said, Pikachu is capable of throwing a wide variety of objects through the move Fling, which allows the user to deal damage by throwing it's held item (and, incidentally, a Fling TM). Its presence as a throwing item appears to reference the most recently released Pokémon games as of the comic's release, ''Pokémon Let's Go Pikachu'' and ''Pokémon Let's Go Eevee'', where the partner Pokémon of the respective title is not kept in a Poké Ball but thrown into battle when deployed.
** According to Pokédex entries throughout the series, the average Pikachu is 1'04" (0.4m) tall and weighs 13.2 lbs (6kg). Randall appears to have done his research, as a custom thrower with these stats and default athleticism will have near-identical results to Pikachu for both thrower and thrown item.
* '''{{w|Carly Rae Jepsen}}''' is a Canadian music artist.
* '''{{w|Thor}}''' is the god of thunder in Norse mythology, wielding a hammer that returns to its wielder when thrown. He is also {{w|Thor (Marvel Comics)|featured in Marvel comics}}, and is portrayed by Chris Hemsworth (listed below) in the Marvel Cinematic Universe series of films. Thor was previously referenced in [[2097: Thor Tools]].
* '''{{w|Chris Hemsworth}}''' is an Australian film actor, best known for his role as Thor in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
* '''A {{w|squirrel}}''' is a small mammal of the family ''Sciuradae'', known for hoarding acorns. Squirrels have been a [[:Category:Squirrels|recurring topic]] on xkcd, and have been used in ''What if?'' in lieu of a subject that Randall really doesn't want to draw. Due to their small size, a squirrel is also selectable as a throwing item.
* '''{{w|human|You}}''' (the viewer) may also choose to create a custom thrower, inputting name, height, weight, and general level of athleticism, as measured on a scale from "[[Black Hat]]" to "championship athlete" (a swimmer is pictured). The custom thrower is also selectable as a throwing item, presumably to provide more variety compared to the fixed values of George Washington.
* '''A {{w|microwave oven}}''' is a common household appliance in most American homes, used to heat or reheat food for consumption.
* '''A {{w|basketball (ball)|basketball}}''' is an inflated sphere used as a projectile in the sport of the same name.
* '''A {{w|blender}}''' is a common household appliance in most American homes, used to shred food or ingredients into a slush for consumption or baking.
* '''A {{w|gold bar}}''' is the form in which gold is cast for storage.
* '''A {{w|wedding cake}}''' is traditionally a layer cake used for wedding receptions with copious amounts of frosting and figurines of the bride and groom standing upon the top layer. The figurines appear to have been removed before the cake is thrown, as they are before the cake is cut and served.
* '''A {{w|ping pong ball}}''' is a small sphere designed to bounce, used as a projectile in the sport of table tennis or "ping pong".
* '''An {{w|acorn}}''' is a small nut which serves as a squirrel's primary form of nourishment.
* '''Thor's hammer''' refers to {{w|Mjolnir (comics)|Mjolnir}}, an enchanted hammer in Marvel comics which can only be lifted, much less thrown, by those deemed worthy. In this case it appears to simply be incredibly heavy, though this is more to allow the custom thrower to make use of it instead of any sort of commentary on canonicity.
* '''A {{w|javelin}}''' is an aerodynamic polearm thrown in Olympic sport.
* '''A {{w|Dollar coin (United States)|silver dollar}}''' is a silver coin representing one (1) US dollar in value. The coin is given two trajectories to choose from when thrown; '''spinning''', as one would properly throw a discus, and '''tumbling''', as might result from flipping a coin to make a decision.
* '''A {{w|car}}''' is the most common form of long-distance transport in several well-developed countries.

==Table of throw distances==
{| class="wikitable"
!Item / Thrower
!NFL Quarterback
!George Washington
!Pikachu
!Carly Rae Jepsen
!Thor
!Chris Hemsworth
!Squirrel
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Microwave oven'''
|10.32 m
|7.76 m
|N/A
|3.67 m
|181.57 m
|6.15 m
|N/A
|-
|33.85 feet
|25.46 feet
|N/A
|82.65 rack units
|1.99 football fields
|138.40 rack units
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Basketball'''
|40.18 m
|33.22 m
|2.34 m
|19.11 m
|113.67 m
|27.99 m
|N/A
|-
|16.74 horses
|19.54 smoots
|75.90 attoparsecs
|11.24 smoots
|1.42 Manhattan blocks
|16.46 smoots
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Blender'''
|16.58 m
|12.45 m
|N/A
|5.89 m
|333.25 m
|9.86 m
|N/A
|-
|9.75 smoots
|40.85 feet
|N/A
|132.51 rack units
|1.66 furlongs
|32.34 feet
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Gold bar'''
|9.73 m
|7.23 m
|N/A
|3.36 m
|549.28 m
|5.69 m
|N/A
|-
|31.93 feet
|23.73 feet
|N/A
|75.65 rack units
|2.73 furlongs
|128.11 rack units
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Wedding cake'''
|8.96 m
|6.75 m
|N/A
|3.2 m
|146.25 m
|5.35 m
|N/A
|-
|29.40 feet
|22.14 feet
|N/A
|72.00 rack units
|1.60 football fields
|120.45 rack units
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Ping-pong ball'''
|11.8 m
|11.63 m
|9.28 m
|11.25 m
|12.53 m
|11.41 m
|4.95 m
|-
|38.72 feet
|38.17 feet
|30.46 feet
|36.92 feet
|41.10 feet
|37.44 feet
|111.37 rack units
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Acorn'''
|83.00 m
|75.84 m
|28.16 m
|62.85 m
|135.98 m
|67.91 m
|6.53 m
|-
|1.04 Manhattan blocks
|0.95 Manhattan blocks
|16.57 smoots
|26.19 horses
|1.49 football fields
|28.30 horses
|146.85 rack units
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Thor's Hammer'''
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|19.32 m
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|11.36 smoots
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Javelin'''
|56.10 m
|42.04 m
|N/A
|20.12 m
|3028.75 m
|33.09 m
|N/A
|-
|23.37 horses
|17.51 horses
|N/A
|11.84 smoots
|15.06 furlongs
|19.46 smoots
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''George Washington'''
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|136.65 m
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|1.49 football fields
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Pikachu'''
|15.22 m
|11.41
|N/A
|5.39 m
|332.52 m
|9.03 m
|N/A
|-
|49.94 feet
|37.45 feet
|N/A
|121.18 rack units
|1.65 furlongs
|29.63 feet
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Car'''
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|27.22 m
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|16.01 smoots
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Spinning dollar'''
|177.09 m
|143.96 m
|16.91
|92.63 m
|1331.21 m
|115.89 m
|2.20 m
|-
|1.94 football fields
|1.57 football fields
|9.95 smoots
|1.16 Manhattan blocks
|6.53 furlongs
|1.45 Manhattan blocks
|71.41 attoparsecs
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Tumbling dollar'''
|58.17 m
|53.77 m
|13.92 m
|44.08 m
|84.82 m
|49.03 m
|2.14 m
|-
|24.24 horses
|22.41 horses
|45.67 feet
|18.37 horses
|1.06 Manhattan blocks
|20.43 horses
|69.42 attoparsecs
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Squirrel'''
|58.64 m
|46.92 m
|2.92 m
|25.44 m
|256.54 m
|38.50 m
|N/A
|-
|24.43 horses
|19.55 horses
|65.71 rack units
|14.97 smoots
|1.28 furlongs
|16.04 horses
|N/A
|}

==Table of distance units==
*Table of other distance-units and their length in meters:
{| class="wikitable"
!Unit name
!Length in comic
!Explanation
|-
|{{w|Foot (unit)|Feet}}
|0.3048 m
|One foot is defined as 0.3048 meter. In customary and imperial units, the foot comprises 12 inches and three feet compose a yard.
|-
|{{w|Rack units}}
|0.4445 m
|A rack unit (abbreviated U or RU) is a unit of measure defined as 1 3⁄4 inches (44.45 mm). Mainly used to measure the overall height of the likes of {{w|19-inch rack}} frames or the equipment put in there.
|-
|{{w|American football field|Football fields}}
|91.44 m
|An American Football field is 100 yards or 91.44 m long.
|-
|{{w|Horses}}
|2.4 m
|The length of a horse varies a lot with the horse type, breed, age and genes. In the Wikipedia article on horses the length of a horse is not even mentioned, only the height and weight. But Randall has used horses for measurements before. A {{w|horse length}} is approximately 8 feet (2.4 m).
|-
|{{w|Smoots}}
|1.7000 m
|The smoot is a nonstandard, humorous unit of length created as part of an MIT fraternity prank. One smoot is equal to Oliver Smoot's height at the time of the prank, 5 feet 7 inches (1.70 m). Mr. Smoot was used to measure the length of the Harvard bridge (connecting Boston and Cambridge) by being repeatedly laid down along the length of the bridge; the markings indicating distances in smoots along the bridge have been maintained by the fraternity.
|-
|{{w|Furlongs}}
|201.168 m
|A furlong is a measure of distance in imperial units and U.S. customary units equal to one eighth of a mile. It should thus give that one furlong is 201.168 metres. However, the United States does not uniformly use this conversion ratio. Older ratios are in use for surveying purposes in some states. Only Thor's distances are given in furlongs.
|-
|{{w|Manhattan}}-{{w|City block|blocks}}
|80.0 m
|The numbered streets in Manhattan run east-west, and are generally 60 feet (18 m) wide, with about 200 feet (61 m) between each pair of streets. With each combined street and block adding up to about 260 feet (79 m), there are almost exactly 20 blocks per mile. The typical block in Manhattan is 250 by 600 feet (76 by 183 m). When driving in a grid like city the {{w|Manhattan distance}} between two points is a concept, although it is also called {{w|Taxicab geometry}}. It seems like it is indeed the combined street and block distance. Also there is an error. The number has been found by taking four numbers not three, but then leaving out George Washington's distance which would give a block length of only 72,05 m.
|-
|{{w|Atto-}}{{w|parsecs}}
|0.03086 m
|The parsec is a unit of length used to measure large distances to astronomical objects outside the Solar System. A parsec is defined as the distance at which one {{w|astronomical unit}} subtends an angle of one {{w|arcsecond}}. One parsec is equal to about 3.26 light-years or 31 trillion kilometers (31×1012 km) or 19 trillion miles (19×1012 mi). Atto- is a unit prefix in the metric system denoting a factor of 10−18 or 0.000000000000000001. Together the two unit exponents will almost cancel out, as 31 trillion kilometers can be written as 3.1×1018cm, meaning that an attoparsec is 3.1 cm. The unit is only used three times: once for Pikachu and twice for the squirrel.
|}

==Transcript==
:[As this is an interactive comic, not all possible text should be given in this transcript. Also it is not possible to see all the different throwers or objects in one image. This transcript here includes only the text that can be found when loading the page, without changing the thrower or object (the default), but also includes the text that can be found by scrolling in the two select "windows" as that would be similar to a long comic where you need to scroll. For further differences that occur by changing the objects refer to a table of all combinations.]

:[A heading with a subheading is above a line, beneath which are a sentence, that is generated by the selections in the two windows beneath this sentence:]
:<big>'''Throw Calculator'''</big>
:This calculator implements the approximate throwing distance estimation model from ''How To'' Chapter 10: ''How to throw things''.

:How far could George Washington throw a Microwave oven?

:[Beneath this sentence are two "windows" with a frame around them, one to the left and one to the right, each with a heading breaking the top frame. Each also has a scroll bar to the right, which allows one to scroll down through 7 different possible selections in the left window and 15 in the right window. There are two selections on each line, leaving one alone at the bottom left of each list as there are uneven numbers in both lists. Here below each windows' content is given under their respective headings. Each possible selection is a drawing with a caption beneath it.]
:Select a thrower

:*You
:*An NFL Quarterback
:*George Washington
:*Pikachu
:*Carly Rae Jepsen
:*Thor, God of Thunder
:*Chris Hemsworth
:*A squirrel

:Select an object to be thrown
:*You
:*A microwave oven
:*A basketball
:*A blender
:*A gold bar
:*A wedding cake
:*A ping-pong ball
:*An acorn
:*Thor's Hammer
:*A javelin
:*George Washington
:*Pikachu
:*A car
:*A silver dollar (spinning)
:*A silver dollar (tumbling)
:*A squirrel

:[Below the two windows is the result of the animation that will happen when a selection has been made. An animation of the selected thrower throwing (or failing to throw) the selected object is shown, and the object's traveling distance is measured out both in meters (SI units) and in some other unit in brackets below. If the distance is not too long compared to the size of the object and thrower, then both can be seen, and in case the object is soft it may break from the throw.]

:[In the pre-selected version George Washington throws a microwave oven, which ends up several meters from him lying on a corner broken with its wire lying beneath it. The distance is given under the ruler along which the throw has occurred, with markings for approximately every meter. In this case there are seven steps even though the distance is above 7 meters:]
:7.76 meters
:(25.46 feet)

==Trivia==
*The comic refers to Thor as the character from the Marvel comics and movies (and other media), who is himself a reference to the ancient Norse god. In Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, Thor is played by Chris Hemsworth.
*Thor's hammer, Mjölnir, bears an enchantment that prevents any living being from lifting it unless they are "worthy." This is reflected in the simulation by giving Mjölnir a mass of 2,000 kg.
**Technically, Thor's hammer weighs [https://urbandud.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/detail-128-thors-hammer.jpg?w=550 42.3 pounds].
*The option to customize your own character was added to the comic later.
*Due to a bug, the calculations for the customized person ('you') are incorrect when the mass is specified in pounds

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with animation]] 
[[Category:Dynamic comics]]
[[Category:Interactive comics]]
[[Category:Physics]] 
[[Category:American football]] 
[[Category:Comics featuring politicians]] 
[[Category:Pokémon]]
[[Category:Comics featuring real people]] 
[[Category:Religion]] 
[[Category:Squirrels]]
[[Category:Food]] 
[[Category:Basketball]]
[[Category:Sport]] 
[[Category:Book promotion]]

2198: Throw

2019-09-04T09:24:34Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2198
| date = September 3, 2019
| title = Throw
| image = throw.png
| titletext = The keys to successfully throwing a party are location, planning, and one of those aircraft carrier steam catapults.
}}
*To experience the interactivity of this game, visit the {{xkcd|2198|original comic}}.
==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by Thor, God of Thunder. Table for all combinations should be made, maybe with clear marking of those that cannot be thrown. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
The "comic" is an interactive comic made to celebrate the release of [[Randall|Randall's]] new book, ''[[How To]]''. The comic is based on a chapter in the book.

As the comic celebrates the book, which was released on Tuesday, September 3rd, 2019, the comic was thus also released on a [[:Category:Tuesday comics|Tuesday]] to coincide with the release day and probably replacing that week's normal Wednesday release. This was the same timing used for another of Randall's book releases, when [[1608: Hoverboard]] came out on the Tuesday when [[Thing Explainer]] came out. Although the Hoverboard comic is much more complex than this one, they are both [[:Category:Dynamic comics|dynamic]] and [[:Category:Interactive comics|interactive]], with [[:Category:Comics with animation|animations]] a part of them.

In this comic the viewer can select a person/{{w|Pikachu}}/god/squirrel as the thrower and an object (including a person, Pikachu, or squirrel) to be thrown, and get an animation of how the selected throw would work out, along with an estimated distance of the throw (both in SI units and in other very arbitrary units; see [[#Table of distance units|table]] below) if the throw was possible. Impossible throws include ones in which the thrower is smaller than the thrown object. The formula/guideline is apparently based on a chapter from the book. One special case to the calculations is Thor's hammer, which is enchanted such that only those deemed "worthy" are able to lift it. As such, despite its mass being liftable by many of the characters, only Thor, God of Thunder (who is canonically worthy), and self-created characters who are well over the human records for height ({{w|List of tallest people|272 cm}}) and/or weight ({{w|List of heaviest people|635 kg}}) are shown to actually be able to throw it. Also Thor is the only one who uses {{w|furlongs}} to measure his distances.

There are 7 throwers + 1 open option and 15 + 1 things to throw, giving a total of 105 different combinations for the static elements; see the [[#Table of throw distances|table]] below plus those for the open option. The open option can be defined by height, weight and a 1-4 scale of atleticism. But only Thor (or an unrealistically tall and heavy custom character) can throw all 15, with three of the objects (George Washington, hammer, and car) unthrowable by any of the other premade characters. The smaller critters can throw only a few things, so the total number of throws is much less than 100. Still there is an animation for all 105 combinations, but with no throw distance for some. An object with negative weight (you probably) flies backwards.

The athleticism scale does not define the character used for the animation.

The title text refers to throwing a party (a colloquial synonym of hosting a party) and first makes the assumption of actually giving hints for giving a party, and then switching to suggest a mechanism to literally throw a huge object, such as a house with a party going on inside. An {{w|Aircraft_catapult#Steam_catapult|aircraft steam catapult}} is a mechanism to launch aircraft from ships, typically used on aircraft carriers.

==Throwers and throw items==
George Washington, Pikachu, and a squirrel are both throwers and throw items.

* '''An NFL {{w|quarterback}}''' is the average American's perception of a highly athletic individual; gridiron football is a full-contact sport that requires durability, speed, and precision.
* '''{{w|George Washington}}''' was the first president of the United States of America. Although seen as a capable leader, there is nothing {{Citation needed}} to indicate that he was an exceptional thrower. He is also used as a throwing item to represent the likelihood of a thrower distance with an average human as the projectile.
* '''{{w|Pikachu}}''' is a species of Pokémon, and the mascot of the Pokémon franchise as a whole. Although Pikachu are not normally shown to throw things, the ''Super Smash Bros'' series shows they are perfectly capable of picking things up that do not significantly out-size them. Its presence as a throwing item appears to reference the most recently released Pokémon games as of the comic's release, ''Pokémon Let's Go Pikachu'' and ''Pokémon Let's Go Eevee'', where the partner Pokémon of the respective title is not kept in a Poké Ball but thrown into battle when deployed.
** According to Pokédex entries throughout the series, the average Pikachu is 1'04" (0.4m) tall and weighs 13.2 lbs (6kg). Randall appears to have done his research, as a custom thrower with these stats and default athleticism will have near-identical results to Pikachu for both thrower and thrown item.
* '''{{w|Carly Rae Jepsen}}''' is a Canadian music artist.
* '''{{w|Thor}}''' is the god of thunder in Norse mythology, wielding a hammer that returns to its wielder when thrown. He is also {{w|Thor (Marvel Comics)|featured in Marvel comics}}, and is portrayed by Chris Hemsworth (listed below) in the Marvel Cinematic Universe series of films. Thor was previously referenced in [[2097: Thor Tools]].
* '''{{w|Chris Hemsworth}}''' is an Australian film actor, best known for his role as Thor in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
* '''A {{w|squirrel}}''' is a small mammal of the family ''Sciurade'', known for hoarding acorns. Squirrels have been a [[:Category:Squirrels|recurring topic]] on xkcd, and have been used in ''What if?'' in lieu of a subject that Randall really doesn't want to draw. Due to their small size, a squirrel is also selectable as a throwing item.
* '''You''' (the viewer) may also choose to create a custom thrower, inputting name, height, weight, and general level of athleticism, as measured on a scale from "[[Black Hat]]" to "championship athlete" (a swimmer is pictured). The custom thrower is also selectable as a throwing item, presumably to provide more variety compared to the fixed values of George Washington.
* '''A {{w|microwave oven}}''' is a common household appliance in most American homes, used to heat or reheat food for consumption.
* '''A basketball''' is an inflated sphere used as a projectile in the sport of the same name.
* '''A {{w|blender}}''' is a common household appliance in most American homes, used to shred food or ingredients into a slush for consumption or baking.
* '''A {{w|gold bar}}''' is the form in which gold is cast for storage.
* '''A {{w|wedding cake}}''' is traditionally a layer cake used for wedding receptions with copious amounts of frosting and figurines of the bride and groom standing upon the top layer. The figurines appear to have been removed before the cake is thrown, as they are before the cake is cut and served.
* '''A {{w|ping pong ball}}''' is a small sphere designed to bounce, used as a projectile in the sport of table tennis or "ping pong".
* '''An acorn''' is a small nut which serves as a squirrel's primary form of nourishment.
* '''Thor's hammer''' refers to {{w|Mjolnir (comics)|Mjolnir}}, an enchanted hammer in Marvel comics which can only be lifted, much less thrown, by those deemed worthy.
* '''A javelin''' is an aerodynamic polearm thrown in Olympic sport.
* '''A {{w|Dollar coin (United States)|silver dollar}}''' is a silver coin representing one (1) US dollar in value. The coin is given two trajectories to choose from when thrown; '''spinning''', as one would properly throw a discus, and '''tumbling''', as might result from flipping a coin to make a decision.
* '''A car''' is the most common form of long-distance transport in several well-developed countries.

==Table of throw distances==
{| class="wikitable"
!Item / Thrower
!NFL Quarterback
!George Washington
!Pikachu
!Carly Rae Jepsen
!Thor
!Chris Hemsworth
!Squirrel
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Microwave oven'''
|10.32 m
|7.76 m
|N/A
|3.67 m
|181.57 m
|6.15 m
|N/A
|-
|33.85 feet
|25.46 feet
|N/A
|82.65 rack units
|1.99 football fields
|138.40 rack units
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Basketball'''
|40.18 m
|33.22 m
|2.34 m
|19.11 m
|113.67 m
|27.99 m
|N/A
|-
|16.74 horses
|19.54 smoots
|75.90 attoparsecs
|11.24 smoots
|1.42 Manhattan blocks
|16.46 smoots
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Blender'''
|16.58 m
|12.45 m
|N/A
|5.89 m
|333.25 m
|9.86 m
|N/A
|-
|9.75 smoots
|40.85 feet
|N/A
|132.51 rack units
|1.66 furlongs
|32.34 feet
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Gold bar'''
|9.73 m
|7.23 m
|N/A
|3.36 m
|549.28 m
|5.69 m
|N/A
|-
|31.93 feet
|23.73 feet
|N/A
|75.65 rack units
|2.73 furlongs
|128.11 rack units
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Wedding cake'''
|8.96 m
|6.75 m
|N/A
|3.2 m
|146.25 m
|5.35 m
|N/A
|-
|29.40 feet
|22.14 feet
|N/A
|72.00 rack units
|1.60 football fields
|120.45 rack units
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Ping-pong ball'''
|11.8 m
|11.63 m
|9.28 m
|11.25 m
|12.53 m
|11.41 m
|4.95 m
|-
|38.72 feet
|38.17 feet
|30.46 feet
|36.92 feet
|41.10 feet
|37.44 feet
|111.37 rack units
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Acorn'''
|83.00 m
|75.84 m
|28.16 m
|62.85 m
|135.98 m
|67.91 m
|6.53 m
|-
|1.04 Manhattan blocks
|0.95 Manhattan blocks
|16.57 smoots
|26.19 horses
|1.49 football fields
|28.30 horses
|146.85 rack units
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Thor's Hammer'''
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|19.32 m
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|11.36 smoots
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Javelin'''
|56.10 m
|42.04 m
|N/A
|20.12 m
|3028.75 m
|33.09 m
|N/A
|-
|23.37 horses
|17.51 horses
|N/A
|11.84 smoots
|15.06 furlongs
|19.46 smoots
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''George Washington'''
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|136.65 m
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|1.49 football fields
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Pikachu'''
|15.22 m
|11.41
|N/A
|5.39 m
|332.52 m
|9.03 m
|N/A
|-
|49.94 feet
|37.45 feet
|N/A
|121.18 rack units
|1.65 furlongs
|29.63 feet
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Car'''
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|27.22 m
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|N/A
|16.01 smoots
|N/A
|N/A
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Spinning dollar'''
|177.09 m
|143.96 m
|16.91
|92.63 m
|1331.21 m
|115.89 m
|2.20 m
|-
|1.94 football fields
|1.57 football fields
|9.95 smoots
|1.16 Manhattan blocks
|6.53 furlongs
|1.45 Manhattan blocks
|71.41 attoparsecs
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Tumbling dollar'''
|58.17 m
|53.77 m
|13.92 m
|44.08 m
|84.82 m
|49.03 m
|2.14 m
|-
|24.24 horses
|22.41 horses
|45.67 feet
|18.37 horses
|1.06 Manhattan blocks
|20.43 horses
|69.42 attoparsecs
|-
|rowspan="2"|'''Squirrel'''
|58.64 m
|46.92 m
|2.92 m
|25.44 m
|256.54 m
|38.50 m
|N/A
|-
|24.43 horses
|19.55 horses
|65.71 rack units
|14.97 smoots
|1.28 furlongs
|16.04 horses
|N/A
|}

==Table of distance units==
*Table of other distance-units and their length in meters:
{| class="wikitable"
!Unit name
!Length in comic
!Explanation
|-
|{{w|Foot (unit)|Feet}}
|0.3048 m
|One foot is defined as 0.3048 meter. In customary and imperial units, the foot comprises 12 inches and three feet compose a yard.
|-
|{{w|Rack units}}
|0.4445 m
|A rack unit (abbreviated U or RU) is a unit of measure defined as 1 3⁄4 inches (44.45 mm). Mainly used to measure the overall height of the likes of {{w|19-inch rack}} frames or the equipment put in there.
|-
|{{w|American football field|Football fields}}
|91.44 m
|An American Football field is 100 yards or 91.44 m long.
|-
|{{w|Horses}}
|2.4 m
|The length of a horse varies a lot with the horse type, breed, age and genes. In the Wikipedia article on horses the length of a horse is not even mentioned, only the height and weight. But Randall has used horses for measurements before. A {{w|horse length}} is approximately 8 feet (2.4 m).
|-
|{{w|Smoots}}
|1.7000 m
|The smoot is a nonstandard, humorous unit of length created as part of an MIT fraternity prank. One smoot is equal to Oliver Smoot's height at the time of the prank, 5 feet 7 inches (1.70 m). Mr. Smoot was used to measure the length of a bridge by being repeatedly laid down along the length of the bridge; the markings indicating distances in smoots along the bridge have been maintained by the fraternity.
|-
|{{w|Furlongs}}
|201.168 m
|A furlong is a measure of distance in imperial units and U.S. customary units equal to one eighth of a mile. It should thus give that one furlong is 201.168 metres. However, the United States does not uniformly use this conversion ratio. Older ratios are in use for surveying purposes in some states. Only Thor's distances are given in furlongs.
|-
|{{w|Manhattan}}-{{w|City block|blocks}}
|80.0 m
|The numbered streets in Manhattan run east-west, and are generally 60 feet (18 m) wide, with about 200 feet (61 m) between each pair of streets. With each combined street and block adding up to about 260 feet (79 m), there are almost exactly 20 blocks per mile. The typical block in Manhattan is 250 by 600 feet (76 by 183 m). When driving in a grid like city the {{w|Manhattan distance}} between two points is a concept, although it is also called {{w|Taxicab geometry}}. It seems like it is indeed the combined street and block distance. Also there is an error. The number has been found by taking four numbers not three, but then leaving out George Washington's distance which would give a block length of only 72,05 m.
|-
|{{w|Atto-}}{{w|parsecs}}
|0.03086 m
|The parsec is a unit of length used to measure large distances to astronomical objects outside the Solar System. A parsec is defined as the distance at which one {{w|astronomical unit}} subtends an angle of one {{w|arcsecond}}. One parsec is equal to about 3.26 light-years or 31 trillion kilometers (31×1012 km) or 19 trillion miles (19×1012 mi). Atto- is a unit prefix in the metric system denoting a factor of 10−18 or 0.000000000000000001. Together the two unit exponents will almost cancel out, as 31 trillion kilometers can be written as 3.1×1018cm, meaning that an attoparsec is 3.1 cm. The unit is only used three times: once for Pikachu and twice for the squirrel.
|}

==Transcript==
:[As this is an interactive comic, not all possible text should be given in this transcript. Also it is not possible to see all the different throwers or objects in one image. This transcript here includes only the text that can be found when loading the page, without changing the thrower or object (the default), but also includes the text that can be found by scrolling in the two select "windows" as that would be similar to a long comic where you need to scroll. For further differences that occur by changing the objects refer to a table of all combinations.]

:[A heading with a subheading is above a line, beneath which are a sentence, that is generated by the selections in the two windows beneath this sentence:]
:<big>'''Throw Calculator'''</big>
:This calculator implements the approximate throwing distance estimation model from ''How To'' Chapter 10: ''How to throw things''.

:How far could George Washington throw a Microwave oven?

:[Beneath this sentence are two "windows" with a frame around them, one to the left and one to the right, each with a heading breaking the top frame. Each also has a scroll bar to the right, which allows one to scroll down through 7 different possible selections in the left window and 15 in the right window. There are two selections on each line, leaving one alone at the bottom left of each list as there are uneven numbers in both lists. Here below each windows' content is given under their respective headings. Each possible selection is a drawing with a caption beneath it.]
:Select a thrower

:*You
:*An NFL Quarterback
:*George Washington
:*Pikachu
:*Carly Rae Jepsen
:*Thor, God of Thunder
:*Chris Hemsworth
:*A squirrel

:Select an object to be thrown
:*You
:*A microwave oven
:*A basketball
:*A blender
:*A gold bar
:*A wedding cake
:*A ping-pong ball
:*An acorn
:*Thor's Hammer
:*A javelin
:*George Washington
:*Pikachu
:*A car
:*A silver dollar (spinning)
:*A silver dollar (tumbling)
:*A squirrel

:[Below the two windows is the result of the animation that will happen when a selection has been made. An animation of the selected thrower throwing (or failing to throw) the selected object is shown, and the object's traveling distance is measured out both in meters (SI units) and in some other unit in brackets below. If the distance is not too long compared to the size of the object and thrower, then both can be seen, and in case the object is soft it may break from the throw.]

:[In the pre-selected version George Washington throws a microwave oven, which ends up several meters from him lying on a corner broken with its wire lying beneath it. The distance is given under the ruler along which the throw has occurred, with markings for approximately every meter. In this case there are seven steps even though the distance is above 7 meters:]
:7.76 meters
:(25.46 feet)

==Trivia==
*The comic refers to Thor as the character from the Marvel comics and movies (and other media), who is himself a reference to the ancient Norse god. In Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, Thor is played by Chris Hemsworth.
*Thor's hammer, Mjölnir, bears an enchantment that prevents any living being from lifting it unless they are "worthy." This is reflected in the simulation by giving Mjölnir a mass of 2,000 kg.
**Technically, Thor's hammer weighs [https://urbandud.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/detail-128-thors-hammer.jpg?w=550 42.3 pounds].
*The option to customize your own character was added to the comic later.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with animation]] 
[[Category:Dynamic comics]]
[[Category:Interactive comics]]
[[Category:Physics]] 
[[Category:American football]] 
[[Category:Comics featuring politicians]] 
[[Category:Pokémon]]
[[Category:Comics featuring real people]] 
[[Category:Religion]] 
[[Category:Squirrels]]
[[Category:Food]] 
[[Category:Basketball]]
[[Category:Sport]] 
[[Category:Book promotion]]

Talk:2198: Throw

2019-09-04T09:21:03Z

172.68.110.64:

I created this page as it seem DgbrtBOT fails because it is interactive. So far it still won't shown on the front page or with a button to it from the previous comic or the "newest" comic button. Maybe it just takes some time? It is now in the [[List_of_all_comics]] but still no luck getting it to work... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:58, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Maybe it is because it was published on a tuesday? --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::No it is not unusual that a comic does not come out on MWF. For instance the Sunday comic recently. Here is the list of Tuesday comics: [[:Category:Tuesday_comics]]--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Also it doesn't display my comment below the explanation. Something is very broken here...--[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:It appears now. [[User:PkmnQ|PkmnQ]] ([[User talk:PkmnQ|talk]]) 08:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
How did he get an estimate for Carly Rae Jepson, anyway? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.34|162.158.255.34]] 09:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgwAywJlo1M [[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.221|172.68.142.221]] 09:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::Alternatively he could have worked together with her, as with Serena Williams. I will look it up in the afternoon, when I have my preordered book :) --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 10:22, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

By the transitive property of Worthiness, if Capt America can throw Thor's Hammer, surely George Washington is Worthy!{{unsigned ip|172.69.68.141}}

I got this data from the code:
{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| microwave
| A microwave oven
| false
| true
| 0.406
| 0.406
| 10.591
| 0.8
|
|-
| basketball
| a basketball
| false
| true
| 0.243
| 0.243
| 0.624
| 0.3
|
|-
| blender
| a blender
| false
| true
| 0.203
| 0.203
| 5.216
| 0.8
|
|-
| gold_bar
| a gold bar
| false
| true
| 0.0535
| 0.0535
| 12.4
| 0.8
|
|-
| cake
| a wedding cake
| false
| true
| 0.51
| 0.51
| 13
| 0.8
|
|-
| pingpong
| a ping pong ball
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.003
| 0.5
|
|-
| quarterback
| an NFL quarterback
| true
| false
| 1.905
| 0.584
| 102.058
| 0.6
| 20
|-
| acorn
| an acorn
| false
| true
| 0.0191
| 0.0191
| 0.0045
| 0.3
|
|-
| hammer
| thor's hammer
| false
| true
| 0.5
| 0.15
| 2000
| 0.4
|
|-
| javelin
| a javelin
| false
| true
| 1.8
| 0.0254
| 0.8
| 0.1
|
|-
| george
| George Washington
| true
| true
| 1.829
| 0.562
| 90.718
| 0.6
| 15
|-
| pikachu
| Pikachu
| true
| true
| 0.4
| 0.3
| 5.9874
| 0.4
| 10
|-
| car
| A car
| false
| true
| 4.5
| 2.134
| 1179.34
| 0.25
|
|-
| silver_spin
| a silver dollar (spinning)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.011
| 0.027
| 0.5
|
|-
| silver_tumble
| a silver dollar (tumbling)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.027
| 0.66
|
|-
| carly
| Carly Rae Jepsen
| true
| false
| 1.575
| 0.46
| 49.895
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| thor
| thor, god of thunder
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10000
|-
| chris hemsworth
| chris hemsworth
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| squirrel
| A squirrel
| true
| true
| 0.203
| 0.096
| 0.454
| 0.6
| 10
|}
(Sorry if this table messes the talk page.)[[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.136|162.158.78.136]] 13:51, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Nah its great. Not sure how to use it in the explanation yet, but guess it will go in there somehow later.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

:{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| you
|
|
|
|
| (mass^(1/3))/8
|
| 0.6
| 5/10/15/20
|}
:Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 09:17, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The comic looks different on my screen, not displaying multiple possible selections next to each other, but all below each other. Quite dynamic... --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 14:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:If I zoom out I can make it shown only one item each line, but if I zoom in two is maximum. But it should go in the explanation when we get there.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The suggestion to litteraly throw a party in the air could be a reference to The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy in which there is a flying building with a party in it, and there's even Thor partying in it when the protagonists are coming there. --Roger 15:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Any reason why George Washington has 50% more throw power than Christ Hemsworth? Some reference? ~TK

Interesting, there appears to be additional units of measurement in the source code that were not used in the comic: "wiffles" and "light-nanoseconds" [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 16:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Does it seem... excessive to anyone else that the NFL quarterback can throw a silver dollar almost two football fields?[[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.161|172.68.142.161]] 17:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The explanation for Manhattan block conversion appears to be wrong. They mention that their calculation for how large one block is was made with 4 numbers ignoring George Washington as an outlier. However there are 6 total examples of Manhattan block to use and George Washington's is not an outlier. I calculated the mean with all of the data to be 79.9142 meters.--[[User:Szeth|Szeth]] ([[User talk:Szeth|talk]]) 17:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

We need a table with a brief description of each thrower. [[User:DKMell|DKMell]] ([[User talk:DKMell|talk]]) 17:14, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

How do we know how old George Washington was when he throws a squirrel? Speaking of age, this format kind of reminds me of the Magnus comic: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1628:_Magnus [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 17:41, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I think we need to add something about the myth that George Washington threw a silver dollar across the Potomac River [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.40|108.162.241.40]] 19:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Pretty sure that the ping-pong ball distances are severely overestimated due to air resistance slowing them very rapidly. Someone with lab facilities might want to check... --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Sorry, never mind, I think I saw a very early version of the actual page that had the distances much greater - seems reasonable now. --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
The buttons look to be failing simply because [[Template:LATESTCOMIC]] hasn't been updated with the lastest comic number - the page is protected so needs someone with higher powers than I. [[User:Dresken|Dresken]] ([[User talk:Dresken|talk]]) 19:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
'Worthiness' was only a thing in the comics. In the myths Thor had a belt of strength and a couple other things. --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.33.125|172.69.33.125]] 21:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Unless I am missing something there is a unit conversion error for pound and kilogram. For instance if you enter 1.83m and 90.7kg for "YOU" the throw distance by Thor is 137m. However, if you enter the equivalent weight of 200lb you get a throw distance of 183m.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.206.28|172.68.206.28]] 23:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

"An American football field (where Randall comes from) is 100 yards or 91.44 m long" Please rewrite. I don't think (and I humbly reserve the right to be wrong) that Randall did not come from a football field. [[User:OtterlyAmazin|OtterlyAmazin]] ([[User talk:OtterlyAmazin|talk]]) 23:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
: I attempted a rewrite per your request - hopefully I have addressed the issue without making things worse. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 01:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
::I've substituted another explanation - American Football (the game with the field implied to be measured here) is ''not'' only played in North America, and Canadioan Football fields, in North America, have different measurements. No doubt someone else will replace my edit in turn.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.210.238|108.162.210.238]] 03:02, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Should images of the throwers and objects be included? As the comic image is not interactive as the full comic, one cannot see what Randall's version of e.g. Thor or Chris H. looks like, without of visiting the actual comic and using it. Similar things have been done with other interactive comics (IIRC). --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 06:13, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2198: Throw

2019-09-04T09:17:09Z

172.68.110.64:

I created this page as it seem DgbrtBOT fails because it is interactive. So far it still won't shown on the front page or with a button to it from the previous comic or the "newest" comic button. Maybe it just takes some time? It is now in the [[List_of_all_comics]] but still no luck getting it to work... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 07:58, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Maybe it is because it was published on a tuesday? --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:16, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::No it is not unusual that a comic does not come out on MWF. For instance the Sunday comic recently. Here is the list of Tuesday comics: [[:Category:Tuesday_comics]]--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:29, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Also it doesn't display my comment below the explanation. Something is very broken here...--[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:25, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:It appears now. [[User:PkmnQ|PkmnQ]] ([[User talk:PkmnQ|talk]]) 08:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
How did he get an estimate for Carly Rae Jepson, anyway? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.34|162.158.255.34]] 09:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgwAywJlo1M [[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.221|172.68.142.221]] 09:55, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
::Alternatively he could have worked together with her, as with Serena Williams. I will look it up in the afternoon, when I have my preordered book :) --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 10:22, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

By the transitive property of Worthiness, if Capt America can throw Thor's Hammer, surely George Washington is Worthy!{{unsigned ip|172.69.68.141}}

I got this data from the code:
{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| microwave
| A microwave oven
| false
| true
| 0.406
| 0.406
| 10.591
| 0.8
|
|-
| basketball
| a basketball
| false
| true
| 0.243
| 0.243
| 0.624
| 0.3
|
|-
| blender
| a blender
| false
| true
| 0.203
| 0.203
| 5.216
| 0.8
|
|-
| gold_bar
| a gold bar
| false
| true
| 0.0535
| 0.0535
| 12.4
| 0.8
|
|-
| cake
| a wedding cake
| false
| true
| 0.51
| 0.51
| 13
| 0.8
|
|-
| pingpong
| a ping pong ball
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.003
| 0.5
|
|-
| quarterback
| an NFL quarterback
| true
| false
| 1.905
| 0.584
| 102.058
| 0.6
| 20
|-
| acorn
| an acorn
| false
| true
| 0.0191
| 0.0191
| 0.0045
| 0.3
|
|-
| hammer
| thor's hammer
| false
| true
| 0.5
| 0.15
| 2000
| 0.4
|
|-
| javelin
| a javelin
| false
| true
| 1.8
| 0.0254
| 0.8
| 0.1
|
|-
| george
| George Washington
| true
| true
| 1.829
| 0.562
| 90.718
| 0.6
| 15
|-
| pikachu
| Pikachu
| true
| true
| 0.4
| 0.3
| 5.9874
| 0.4
| 10
|-
| car
| A car
| false
| true
| 4.5
| 2.134
| 1179.34
| 0.25
|
|-
| silver_spin
| a silver dollar (spinning)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.011
| 0.027
| 0.5
|
|-
| silver_tumble
| a silver dollar (tumbling)
| false
| true
| 0.04
| 0.04
| 0.027
| 0.66
|
|-
| carly
| Carly Rae Jepsen
| true
| false
| 1.575
| 0.46
| 49.895
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| thor
| thor, god of thunder
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10000
|-
| chris hemsworth
| chris hemsworth
| true
| false
| 1.91
| 0.59
| 91
| 0.6
| 10
|-
| squirrel
| A squirrel
| true
| true
| 0.203
| 0.096
| 0.454
| 0.6
| 10
|}
(Sorry if this table messes the talk page.)[[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.136|162.158.78.136]] 13:51, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Nah its great. Not sure how to use it in the explanation yet, but guess it will go in there somehow later.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

:{| class="wikitable"
! id
! name
! canThrow
! canBeThrown
! length
! diameter
! mass
! dragC
! throwPower
|-
| you
|
|
|
|
| (mass^(1/3))/8
|
| 0.6
| 5/10/15/20
|}
Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 09:17, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

The comic looks different on my screen, not displaying multiple possible selections next to each other, but all below each other. Quite dynamic... --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 14:26, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:If I zoom out I can make it shown only one item each line, but if I zoom in two is maximum. But it should go in the explanation when we get there.--[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:28, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The suggestion to litteraly throw a party in the air could be a reference to The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy in which there is a flying building with a party in it, and there's even Thor partying in it when the protagonists are coming there. --Roger 15:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Any reason why George Washington has 50% more throw power than Christ Hemsworth? Some reference? ~TK

Interesting, there appears to be additional units of measurement in the source code that were not used in the comic: "wiffles" and "light-nanoseconds" [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 16:52, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Does it seem... excessive to anyone else that the NFL quarterback can throw a silver dollar almost two football fields?[[Special:Contributions/172.68.142.161|172.68.142.161]] 17:08, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

The explanation for Manhattan block conversion appears to be wrong. They mention that their calculation for how large one block is was made with 4 numbers ignoring George Washington as an outlier. However there are 6 total examples of Manhattan block to use and George Washington's is not an outlier. I calculated the mean with all of the data to be 79.9142 meters.--[[User:Szeth|Szeth]] ([[User talk:Szeth|talk]]) 17:12, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

We need a table with a brief description of each thrower. [[User:DKMell|DKMell]] ([[User talk:DKMell|talk]]) 17:14, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

How do we know how old George Washington was when he throws a squirrel? Speaking of age, this format kind of reminds me of the Magnus comic: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1628:_Magnus [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.52|108.162.241.52]] 17:41, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

I think we need to add something about the myth that George Washington threw a silver dollar across the Potomac River [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.40|108.162.241.40]] 19:42, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Pretty sure that the ping-pong ball distances are severely overestimated due to air resistance slowing them very rapidly. Someone with lab facilities might want to check... --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:49, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
:Sorry, never mind, I think I saw a very early version of the actual page that had the distances much greater - seems reasonable now. --[[User:Marcus Rowland|Marcus Rowland]] ([[User talk:Marcus Rowland|talk]]) 19:53, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
The buttons look to be failing simply because [[Template:LATESTCOMIC]] hasn't been updated with the lastest comic number - the page is protected so needs someone with higher powers than I. [[User:Dresken|Dresken]] ([[User talk:Dresken|talk]]) 19:59, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
'Worthiness' was only a thing in the comics. In the myths Thor had a belt of strength and a couple other things. --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.33.125|172.69.33.125]] 21:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Unless I am missing something there is a unit conversion error for pound and kilogram. For instance if you enter 1.83m and 90.7kg for "YOU" the throw distance by Thor is 137m. However, if you enter the equivalent weight of 200lb you get a throw distance of 183m.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.206.28|172.68.206.28]] 23:20, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

"An American football field (where Randall comes from) is 100 yards or 91.44 m long" Please rewrite. I don't think (and I humbly reserve the right to be wrong) that Randall did not come from a football field. [[User:OtterlyAmazin|OtterlyAmazin]] ([[User talk:OtterlyAmazin|talk]]) 23:24, 3 September 2019 (UTC)
: I attempted a rewrite per your request - hopefully I have addressed the issue without making things worse. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 01:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
::I've substituted another explanation - American Football (the game with the field implied to be measured here) is ''not'' only played in North America, and Canadioan Football fields, in North America, have different measurements. No doubt someone else will replace my edit in turn.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.210.238|108.162.210.238]] 03:02, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Should images of the throwers and objects be included? As the comic image is not interactive as the full comic, one cannot see what Randall's version of e.g. Thor or Chris H. looks like, without of visiting the actual comic and using it. Similar things have been done with other interactive comics (IIRC). --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 06:13, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2186: Dark Matter

2019-08-07T19:59:00Z

172.68.110.64:

If dark matter were squirrels, they ''wouldn't'' set off the bird feeders because dark matter can't interact with feeders at all! Especially since it's not to the squirrels' advantage to set them off. Unless, of course, the dark matter squirrels do exist and steal from our feeders freely, but we can't notice because dark matter is unobservable at this scale. In fact, it's entirely plausible that some squirrels evolved to be dark matter for this specific advantage, so I wouldn't rule that out. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.244.174|172.68.244.174]] 12:12, 7 August
2019 (UTC)
:Well if they can't interact with the feeders, they won't be able to steal the food either.[[Special:Contributions/141.101.107.66|141.101.107.66]] 13:28, 7 August 2019 (UTC)
::Not with that attitude. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.126.4|162.158.126.4]] 14:10, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

I have never seen a spinning bird - can they turn peanuts into gold?
:Yes, but the gold would be radioactive. The much more impressive reaction is to turn gold into peanuts, other than by paying a farmer for peanuts using the gold. [[User:Nutster|Nutster]] ([[User talk:Nutster|talk]]) 14:36, 7 August 2019 (UTC)
::Would I be allowed to pay a merchant for peanuts using the gold? --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 14:38, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

I had to google what a spinning bird feeder is. I had never seen one of these before (I live in Germany). Maybe a link to one of these funny videos should be added. Frank [[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 19:59, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

2181: Inbox

2019-07-26T22:10:24Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2181
| date = July 26, 2019
| title = Inbox
| image = inbox.png
| titletext = Rome's declaration of war against Carthage was sent from a no-reply address, so Hannibal had to cross the Alps to deliver his "UNSUBSCRIBE" response in person.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by an ANCIENT ROMAN. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

{{w|Email}} differs from "snail" mail, in that it usually demands a reply. And replying to an email, may lead to another email response, thus leading to a "loop" of constant replies and responses.

[https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/inbox-zero Inbox Zero] is a recent organizational approach to email inbox management, with the idea that an inbox should be empty or as close to empty as possible. This would involve replying to all incoming emails immediately, and then filing them away when replied to. If the receiver also implements Inbox Zero, conversations never stop. As Megan mentions in the comic, this could lead to a lot of work if you receive a lot of daily emails.

The {{w|ancient Romans}} are one of the model historical societies, well revered for their culture and life. Megan claims that they were able to accomplish a lot because they did not have the Inbox Zero philosophy. This is a reference to the common misconception that Romans did not have a concept of the number Zero. The Romans were aware of the concept of zero, but there is no {{w|Numeral}} for 0 in the {{w|Roman Numeral}} system. Of course, email also did not exist at the time either.

The title text refers to {{w|Hannibal's crossing of the Alps}}, a famous military campaign by Hannibal against the Romans. Randall claims that Hannibal needed to invade Rome to tell them to stop sending him so many emails. The reason for this was that Rome's email was sent from a "[https://www.mailjet.com/blog/news/the-noreply-dilemma-going-from-no-to-yes/ no-reply]" email address, so Hannibal had no way of replying and had to tell them in person.

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

[Megan and Cueball are sitting at a desk, facing each other, each working on their laptop computers.]
:Megan: Answering email is the worst. It just leads to getting more email.
:Cueball: Yeah, email is a trap.

[Beat panel.]

[Megan looks up from her work on the computer.]
:Megan: I bet the reason the Ancient Romans got so much done was that they had no concept of Inbox Zero.
:Cueball: ''That'' explains it.

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

2139: Email Settings

2019-04-19T16:55:36Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2139
| date = April 19, 2019
| title = Email Settings
| image = email_settings.png
| titletext = What are all these less-than signs? What's an HREF? Look, we know you live in a fancy futuristic tech world, but not all of us have upgraded to the latest from Sun Microsystems.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by someone who can't use e-mail. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

The comic shows some email settings with a few less than helpful options.

'''Default Reply Behavior:''' Normal reply behavior would be to reply to the person who sent the original email. Reply all would be to reply all emails at once (with the same reply text). Typically in email programs there is an option to Reply TO All other recipients of an email in addition to the sender. Depending on the email usage pattern this is a potentially useful or a potentially annoying option. Forward to address book takes this one step further by sending your reply to every person who is in your address book, whether they received the original email or not.

'''Vacation Autoresponder:''' This is a message that is automatically sent out in reply to an email to let them know that you are away and won't be replying until you return. While on vacation is the usual behavior, but since email systems typically have no way of knowing that you're on vacation other than this setting itself, it won't be able to comply. Always is a less useful option.

'''Reply to all newsletters with "thank you for the newsletter!":''' This option is completely unnecessary, in that newsletters are usually automated and shotgunned out to thousand of addresses at once, often with a do-not-reply from address.

'''Attachment limit:''' These attachment limits are all pretty small, with 300 kilobytes being fairly useless for anything, 1.4 megabytes being the size of an old floppy disk, and 5 megabytes, while better, is smaller than most high resolution cell phone camera pictures. It being in beta means that it might not be as dependable. However, setting the maximum attachment size would likely not be a user setting; it would be a setting the email system enforces on the user. In the past with slow connections and very limited mailbox sizes, this option was useful to keep the message size in check.

'''Default email format:''' plain text is self explanatory; plain text with no special formatting options. HTML means that it can have markup to allow for bold text, colors, etc. CSS is in reference to cascading style sheets, which is a styling option often combined with HTML, but useless on it's own. With emails it is typically used as inline CSS.

'''Reply to HTML emails with "Whoa, buddy, what's all this code?":''' HTML email is a format for sending email with rich-text contents, which may include images and links. If your email client isn't configured for HTML, the content may look like text interspersed with a bunch of weird code. Since HTML email is a common format, replying this way to every HTML email you receive can be an effective way to annoy people. This may be a "throwback" option: a few years ago, email systems didn't always recognize HTML emails, so if you sent an HTML email you might very well receive this kind of reply.

'''Character set:''' ASCII is the character group containing all of the letters in the English alphabet, as well as the digits and common symbols. The Non-ASCII set contains all of the non-English alphabets and the rest of they (lesser used) symbols. Lacking the ASCII characters however, would make the second option useless for most European languages.

'''Smart autocomplete:''' Some email platforms, including Gmail, have the ability to use machine learning to suggest possible, usually short reply options for you to choose from. If the original email asks if you want to go to dinner, the auto-complete replies might be, "Yes", "No", "How about Friday?" and then you could choose one, or type your own reply. The third option to automatically respond to all emails with suggested reply is putting a lot of faith in the computer, and is likely to backfire quickly, even more so, if your recipients also have activated this option.

'''Important emails:''' Showing important emails is the expected behavior, and hiding only them would be a very strange thing to want to do.

'''Show unread email count...:''' Seeing your unread email count is normal behavior, and a good way to see what a failure you are at reading your email. A projected unread email count based on when the system expects you to die, and how well you do at reading your email on a day to day basis is probably going to be depressing or in the extreme could be so overwhelming to be the actual cause of death on the projected date.

'''Signature:''' A signature is a bit of canned text that gets added to the end of an email, often containing your name, and sometimes a bit of other information like a title and other contact information. Having the choices being None and "That's my email. Hope you liked it!" is less useful. Less useful signatures somewhat came into vogue after Apple used it for cheap iPhone advertisement and others made fun of the Apple users who kept those default signatures, by using quite creative signatures themselves.

The title text also references HTML email, in which angle brackets (i.e, less-than and greater-than symbols) are used to show the opening and closing tags of elements. "href" is a common attribute in HTML elements denoting the location a hyperlink will take you to upon being clicked. This is likely another "throwback" reference, Sun Microsystems being a former maker of Unix workstations popular in the late 1980s and 2000s (now part of Oracle Corporation). The message could also be written by someone receiving an HTML email which is not recognized as one and directly shown on the screen.

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

:EMAIL SETTINGS
:[A list of controls with radio buttons and checkboxes]
:Default reply behavior
::( ) Reply
::( ) Reply All
::(*) Forward to address book

:Vacation autoresponder
::(*) While on vacation
::( ) Always

:[x]Reply to all newsletters with "Thank you for the newsletter!"

:Attachment limit
::( ) 300 KB
::(*) 1.4 MB
::( ) 5 MB (Beta)

:Default email format
::(*) Plain text
::( ) HTML
::( ) CSS

:[x]Reply to HTML emails with "Whoa, buddy, what's all this code?"

:Character set
::( ) ASCII (Unicode 0-127 only)
::(*) Non-ASCII (Unicode 128+ only)

:Smart autocomplete
::( ) Do not suggest replies
::( ) Suggest replies
::(*) Automatically respond to all emails with suggested reply

:Important emails
::(*) Show
::( ) Hide

:Show unread email count...
::(*) Now
::( ) On my projected day of death

:Signature
::(*) "That's my email. Hope you liked it!"
::( ) None

{{comic discussion}}

2139: Email Settings

2019-04-19T16:53:03Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2139
| date = April 19, 2019
| title = Email Settings
| image = email_settings.png
| titletext = What are all these less-than signs? What's an HREF? Look, we know you live in a fancy futuristic tech world, but not all of us have upgraded to the latest from Sun Microsystems.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by someone who can't use e-mail. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

The comic shows some email settings with a few less than helpful options.

'''Default Reply Behavior:''' Normal reply behavior would be to reply to the person who sent the original email. Reply all would be to reply all emails at once. Typically there is an option to Reply TO All other recipients of an email in addition to the sender. Depending on the email usage pattern this is a potentially useful or a potentially annoying option. Forward to address book takes this one step further by sending your reply to every person who is in your address book, whether they received the original email or not.

'''Vacation Autoresponder:''' This is a message that is automatically sent out in reply to an email to let them know that you are away and won't be replying until you return. While on vacation is the usual behavior, but since email systems typically have no way of knowing that you're on vacation other than this setting itself, it won't be able to comply. Always is a less useful option.

'''Reply to all newsletters with "thank you for the newsletter!":''' This option is completely unnecessary, in that newsletters are usually automated and shotgunned out to thousand of addresses at once, often with a do-not-reply from address.

'''Attachment limit:''' These attachment limits are all pretty small, with 300 kilobytes being fairly useless for anything, 1.4 megabytes being the size of an old floppy disk, and 5 megabytes, while better, is smaller than most high resolution cell phone camera pictures. It being in beta means that it might not be as dependable. However, setting the maximum attachment size would likely not be a user setting; it would be a setting the email system enforces on the user. In the past with slow connections and very limited mailbox sizes, this option was useful to keep the message size in check.

'''Default email format:''' plain text is self explanatory; plain text with no special formatting options. HTML means that it can have markup to allow for bold text, colors, etc. CSS is in reference to cascading style sheets, which is a styling option often combined with HTML, but useless on it's own. With emails it is typically used as inline CSS.

'''Reply to HTML emails with "Whoa, buddy, what's all this code?":''' HTML email is a format for sending email with rich-text contents, which may include images and links. If your email client isn't configured for HTML, the content may look like text interspersed with a bunch of weird code. Since HTML email is a common format, replying this way to every HTML email you receive can be an effective way to annoy people. This may be a "throwback" option: a few years ago, email systems didn't always recognize HTML emails, so if you sent an HTML email you might very well receive this kind of reply.

'''Character set:''' ASCII is the character group containing all of the letters in the English alphabet, as well as the digits and common symbols. The Non-ASCII set contains all of the non-English alphabets and the rest of they (lesser used) symbols. Lacking the ASCII characters however, would make the second option useless for most European languages.

'''Smart autocomplete:''' Some email platforms, including Gmail, have the ability to use machine learning to suggest possible, usually short reply options for you to choose from. If the original email asks if you want to go to dinner, the auto-complete replies might be, "Yes", "No", "How about Friday?" and then you could choose one, or type your own reply. The third option to automatically respond to all emails with suggested reply is putting a lot of faith in the computer, and is likely to backfire quickly, even more so, if your recipients also have activated this option.

'''Important emails:''' Showing important emails is the expected behavior, and hiding only them would be a very strange thing to want to do.

'''Show unread email count...:''' Seeing your unread email count is normal behavior, and a good way to see what a failure you are at reading your email. A projected unread email count based on when the system expects you to die, and how well you do at reading your email on a day to day basis is probably going to be depressing or in the extreme could be so overwhelming to be the actual cause of death on the projected date.

'''Signature:''' A signature is a bit of canned text that gets added to the end of an email, often containing your name, and sometimes a bit of other information like a title and other contact information. Having the choices being None and "That's my email. Hope you liked it!" is less useful. Less useful signatures somewhat came into vogue after Apple used it for cheap iPhone advertisement and others made fun of the Apple users who kept those default signatures, by using quite creative signatures themselves.

The title text also references HTML email, in which angle brackets (i.e, less-than and greater-than symbols) are used to show the opening and closing tags of elements. "href" is a common attribute in HTML elements denoting the location a hyperlink will take you to upon being clicked. This is likely another "throwback" reference, Sun Microsystems being a former maker of Unix workstations popular in the late 1980s and 2000s (now part of Oracle Corporation). The message could also be written by someone receiving an HTML email which is not recognized as one and directly shown on the screen.

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

:EMAIL SETTINGS
:[A list of controls with radio buttons and checkboxes]
:Default reply behavior
::( ) Reply
::( ) Reply All
::(*) Forward to address book

:Vacation autoresponder
::(*) While on vacation
::( ) Always

:[x]Reply to all newsletters with "Thank you for the newsletter!"

:Attachment limit
::( ) 300 KB
::(*) 1.4 MB
::( ) 5 MB (Beta)

:Default email format
::(*) Plain text
::( ) HTML
::( ) CSS

:[x]Reply to HTML emails with "Whoa, buddy, what's all this code?"

:Character set
::( ) ASCII (Unicode 0-127 only)
::(*) Non-ASCII (Unicode 128+ only)

:Smart autocomplete
::( ) Do not suggest replies
::( ) Suggest replies
::(*) Automatically respond to all emails with suggested reply

:Important emails
::(*) Show
::( ) Hide

:Show unread email count...
::(*) Now
::( ) On my projected day of death

:Signature
::(*) "That's my email. Hope you liked it!"
::( ) None

{{comic discussion}}

Talk:2121: Light Pollution

2019-03-12T16:13:13Z

172.68.110.64:

Small error in this comic. It's not possible to tile a sphere with just hexagons. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/749264/covering-earth-with-hexagonal-map-tiles
[[User:AlanKilian|AlanKilian]] ([[User talk:AlanKilian|talk]]) 16:03, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Six triangles form a hexagon - just an explanation for people with less mathematical or geometric knowledge. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 16:17, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
::but a indefinite large group of triangles doesn't automatically transform to hexagons, since it could be overlapping hexagons, or hexagons with their interim spaces filled up by triangles?--[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 16:29, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:::Look at that hexagons (consisting of six triangles), each fitting to the next, and you will understand that this is only possible in a plane but not in a sphere. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 16:37, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
::::Yes, but if the triangles are not actually equilateral then they could form a sphere. And if the sphere is big enough (I think solar-system-surrouding or bigger counts) then you probably wouldn't be able to see it with the naked eye. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 17:08, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:::::But can it form a [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1365:_Inflation basketball?] [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:24, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Your eyes are making the hexagons up. Some triangles would be left over if you tried to make every group of 6 triangles a hexagon. Triangle arrays like this are commonly used in computer graphics, as they are the closest approximation to a sphere: https://mft-dev.dk/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/icosahedron_frame_sub3.gif [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.185|162.158.79.185]] 17:25, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
::Not really. On a plane, there are only three {{W|tesselation|tesselations}} made only of identical regular polygons: {{W|triangular tiling}}, {{W|square tiling}} or {{W|hexagonal tiling}}. But since a regular hexagon can be divided into six equilateral triangles, the tiling in the picture can be seen as both triangular and hexagonal. The leaving out you write about may have come from another tesselation which uses hexagons and triangles, the {{W|trihexagonal tiling}}. On a sphere, there's a completely different discussion as there's no tesselations, only approximations of them. {{unsigned|Malgond}}
There is no way to know that the triangles shown are equilateral (in fact, as drawn here they're quite ''un''even). All 3D renderings are in fact assembled from uneven-sided triangles, including renderings attempting to approximate rounded surfaces. And yes, you can buy a ball tiled only with triangles; they're not even-sided, but you can't tell with the naked eye. Also, there ''is'' one roughly spherical shape tiled only with equilateral triangles: It's the shape found on a 20-sided die. Skyboxes intended to minimize viewing angle distortions use triangles that are very nearly, but not quite equilateral. In fact, ''all shapes'' that use flat planes to tile a sphere can be broken down into triangles of one degree of asymmetry or another. Your argument is invalid.
[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 22:51, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Y'all need to stop arguing about the geometry and look at this picture of a (approximation of a) sphere made out of triangular pyramids: https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjvhZHLoPTgAhXmhVQKHRLnDSwQjRx6BAgBEAU&url=http%3A%2F%2Fblog.zacharyabel.com%2Ftag%2Fspheres%2F&psig=AOvVaw2-zrroG1RBFI-t2GHyHt-9&ust=1552193238617042 [[User:Tplaza64|Tplaza64]] ([[User talk:Tplaza64|talk]]) 04:50, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

::Also note that we see just small part of sky there, so it's fully possible the few deformed/missing triangles are outside of what we see. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 23:49, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

: An interactive sphere divided into hexagonals - where is the trick? [http://pub.ist.ac.at/~edels/hexasphere/ Hexagonal tiling of the two-dimensional sphere] Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 16:11, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

Oh man where are the conspiracy nuts from a few weeks ago ;-) [[User:Cgrimes85|Cgrimes85]] ([[User talk:Cgrimes85|talk]]) 17:03, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Hey, I think this works like Beetlejuice. Shush. Don’t jinx it. [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:24, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

Ok, I know most of the discussion is focused on the lattice, but are the ships a reference to something? LOTR maybe? Also there’s nothing about the title text at all, and the (more probable than LOTR) Lovecraft reference, considering the mentions of insanity, cosmic horror, and color. (I believe the book was Cool Air?) [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:24, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

I think it's notable that the world actually works this way. The sky is full of drones, satellites, {{w|Mesosphere#Exploration_and_uses|nearcraft}}, and we basically can't see them, but they can freely observe us, transmit things to us, and drop things on us. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.185|162.158.79.185]] 17:34, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:While there are drones, satellites and various tools astronauts dropped all around the sky, the reason we can't see them is simply size (they are too small), not light pollution. The features mentioned in strip are gigantic. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 23:49, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

I may be too nerdy, but my mind went to Spelljammer on this. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.62.160|172.69.62.160]] 18:44, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

:My thoughts exactly! it perfectly fits Spelljammer crystal spheres. I think it should be included in the explanation (and if not, then at least the source of the whole concept- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crystal_Spheres) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.92.34|162.158.92.34]] 00:13, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

I went to the sky at the end of [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0139809/ Thirteenth Floor]. But the one image I can find suggests that was rectangular. [[User:Jordan Brown|Jordan Brown]] ([[User talk:Jordan Brown|talk]]) 21:47, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

Anybody understands relationship between singular lattice and plural spheres? Is there any lattice that holds the spheres in ancient astronomy?
: Suddenly penny dropped: it is crystal lattice!!!!!11

By the way, the way the lattice really works is that it's a geodesic sphere - sometimes, five triangles meet in a vertex to ensure that the surface closes on itself to form a sphere. It's actually impossible to get a sphere with only 6 triangles in a vertex, aka a "hexagonal tiling": http://www.alaricstephen.com/main-featured/2016/8/15/eulers-gem-applied-to-geodesic-domes.
[[Special:Contributions/173.245.48.63|173.245.48.63]] 21:28, 10 March 2019 (UTC)
: Only if you restrict yourself to using equilateral triangles. If you're allowed to vary the lengths of the edges, then the sum of angles at the center of each "hexagon" will be less than 360 degrees, causing the "hexagon" to flex into a non-planar shape. If you're using these to construct cosmic structures, the difference needed would be minuscule and undetectable to the naked eye. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 13:03, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

Note that you *would* see regular patterns in the cosmic Big Bang remnant radiation in some cosmological models (think of Arcade scrollers, just in 3D). Citation needed no longer: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature01944 [[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.46|198.41.242.46]] 10:29, 11 March 2019 (UTC)

'''Earth Temperature Timeline in the foot of the page'''

Has anyone noticed that the Earth Temperature Timeline is in the list of the classic comics at the bottom? I looked on the wayback machine and it looks like it appeared on March 1, but i didnt see anybody mention it on the other talk pages since. Maybe I just missed it though. [[User:Choochoobob123|Choochoobob123]] ([[User talk:Choochoobob123|talk]]) 13:59, 11 March 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2121: Light Pollution

2019-03-12T16:12:23Z

172.68.110.64:

Small error in this comic. It's not possible to tile a sphere with just hexagons. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/749264/covering-earth-with-hexagonal-map-tiles
[[User:AlanKilian|AlanKilian]] ([[User talk:AlanKilian|talk]]) 16:03, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Six triangles form a hexagon - just an explanation for people with less mathematical or geometric knowledge. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 16:17, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
::but a indefinite large group of triangles doesn't automatically transform to hexagons, since it could be overlapping hexagons, or hexagons with their interim spaces filled up by triangles?--[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 16:29, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:::Look at that hexagons (consisting of six triangles), each fitting to the next, and you will understand that this is only possible in a plane but not in a sphere. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 16:37, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
::::Yes, but if the triangles are not actually equilateral then they could form a sphere. And if the sphere is big enough (I think solar-system-surrouding or bigger counts) then you probably wouldn't be able to see it with the naked eye. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 17:08, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:::::But can it form a [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1365:_Inflation basketball?] [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:24, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Your eyes are making the hexagons up. Some triangles would be left over if you tried to make every group of 6 triangles a hexagon. Triangle arrays like this are commonly used in computer graphics, as they are the closest approximation to a sphere: https://mft-dev.dk/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/icosahedron_frame_sub3.gif [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.185|162.158.79.185]] 17:25, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
::Not really. On a plane, there are only three {{W|tesselation|tesselations}} made only of identical regular polygons: {{W|triangular tiling}}, {{W|square tiling}} or {{W|hexagonal tiling}}. But since a regular hexagon can be divided into six equilateral triangles, the tiling in the picture can be seen as both triangular and hexagonal. The leaving out you write about may have come from another tesselation which uses hexagons and triangles, the {{W|trihexagonal tiling}}. On a sphere, there's a completely different discussion as there's no tesselations, only approximations of them. {{unsigned|Malgond}}
There is no way to know that the triangles shown are equilateral (in fact, as drawn here they're quite ''un''even). All 3D renderings are in fact assembled from uneven-sided triangles, including renderings attempting to approximate rounded surfaces. And yes, you can buy a ball tiled only with triangles; they're not even-sided, but you can't tell with the naked eye. Also, there ''is'' one roughly spherical shape tiled only with equilateral triangles: It's the shape found on a 20-sided die. Skyboxes intended to minimize viewing angle distortions use triangles that are very nearly, but not quite equilateral. In fact, ''all shapes'' that use flat planes to tile a sphere can be broken down into triangles of one degree of asymmetry or another. Your argument is invalid.
[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 22:51, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Y'all need to stop arguing about the geometry and look at this picture of a (approximation of a) sphere made out of triangular pyramids: https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjvhZHLoPTgAhXmhVQKHRLnDSwQjRx6BAgBEAU&url=http%3A%2F%2Fblog.zacharyabel.com%2Ftag%2Fspheres%2F&psig=AOvVaw2-zrroG1RBFI-t2GHyHt-9&ust=1552193238617042 [[User:Tplaza64|Tplaza64]] ([[User talk:Tplaza64|talk]]) 04:50, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

: An interactive sphere divided into hexagonals - where is the trick? [http://pub.ist.ac.at/~edels/hexasphere/ Hexagonal tiling of the two-dimensional sphere] Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 16:11, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

::Also note that we see just small part of sky there, so it's fully possible the few deformed/missing triangles are outside of what we see. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 23:49, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

Oh man where are the conspiracy nuts from a few weeks ago ;-) [[User:Cgrimes85|Cgrimes85]] ([[User talk:Cgrimes85|talk]]) 17:03, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Hey, I think this works like Beetlejuice. Shush. Don’t jinx it. [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:24, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

Ok, I know most of the discussion is focused on the lattice, but are the ships a reference to something? LOTR maybe? Also there’s nothing about the title text at all, and the (more probable than LOTR) Lovecraft reference, considering the mentions of insanity, cosmic horror, and color. (I believe the book was Cool Air?) [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:24, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

I think it's notable that the world actually works this way. The sky is full of drones, satellites, {{w|Mesosphere#Exploration_and_uses|nearcraft}}, and we basically can't see them, but they can freely observe us, transmit things to us, and drop things on us. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.185|162.158.79.185]] 17:34, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:While there are drones, satellites and various tools astronauts dropped all around the sky, the reason we can't see them is simply size (they are too small), not light pollution. The features mentioned in strip are gigantic. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 23:49, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

I may be too nerdy, but my mind went to Spelljammer on this. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.62.160|172.69.62.160]] 18:44, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

:My thoughts exactly! it perfectly fits Spelljammer crystal spheres. I think it should be included in the explanation (and if not, then at least the source of the whole concept- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crystal_Spheres) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.92.34|162.158.92.34]] 00:13, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

I went to the sky at the end of [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0139809/ Thirteenth Floor]. But the one image I can find suggests that was rectangular. [[User:Jordan Brown|Jordan Brown]] ([[User talk:Jordan Brown|talk]]) 21:47, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

Anybody understands relationship between singular lattice and plural spheres? Is there any lattice that holds the spheres in ancient astronomy?
: Suddenly penny dropped: it is crystal lattice!!!!!11

By the way, the way the lattice really works is that it's a geodesic sphere - sometimes, five triangles meet in a vertex to ensure that the surface closes on itself to form a sphere. It's actually impossible to get a sphere with only 6 triangles in a vertex, aka a "hexagonal tiling": http://www.alaricstephen.com/main-featured/2016/8/15/eulers-gem-applied-to-geodesic-domes.
[[Special:Contributions/173.245.48.63|173.245.48.63]] 21:28, 10 March 2019 (UTC)
: Only if you restrict yourself to using equilateral triangles. If you're allowed to vary the lengths of the edges, then the sum of angles at the center of each "hexagon" will be less than 360 degrees, causing the "hexagon" to flex into a non-planar shape. If you're using these to construct cosmic structures, the difference needed would be minuscule and undetectable to the naked eye. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 13:03, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

Note that you *would* see regular patterns in the cosmic Big Bang remnant radiation in some cosmological models (think of Arcade scrollers, just in 3D). Citation needed no longer: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature01944 [[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.46|198.41.242.46]] 10:29, 11 March 2019 (UTC)

'''Earth Temperature Timeline in the foot of the page'''

Has anyone noticed that the Earth Temperature Timeline is in the list of the classic comics at the bottom? I looked on the wayback machine and it looks like it appeared on March 1, but i didnt see anybody mention it on the other talk pages since. Maybe I just missed it though. [[User:Choochoobob123|Choochoobob123]] ([[User talk:Choochoobob123|talk]]) 13:59, 11 March 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2121: Light Pollution

2019-03-12T16:11:10Z

172.68.110.64:

Small error in this comic. It's not possible to tile a sphere with just hexagons. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/749264/covering-earth-with-hexagonal-map-tiles
[[User:AlanKilian|AlanKilian]] ([[User talk:AlanKilian|talk]]) 16:03, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Six triangles form a hexagon - just an explanation for people with less mathematical or geometric knowledge. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 16:17, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
::but a indefinite large group of triangles doesn't automatically transform to hexagons, since it could be overlapping hexagons, or hexagons with their interim spaces filled up by triangles?--[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 16:29, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:::Look at that hexagons (consisting of six triangles), each fitting to the next, and you will understand that this is only possible in a plane but not in a sphere. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 16:37, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
::::Yes, but if the triangles are not actually equilateral then they could form a sphere. And if the sphere is big enough (I think solar-system-surrouding or bigger counts) then you probably wouldn't be able to see it with the naked eye. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 17:08, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:::::But can it form a [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1365:_Inflation basketball?] [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:24, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Your eyes are making the hexagons up. Some triangles would be left over if you tried to make every group of 6 triangles a hexagon. Triangle arrays like this are commonly used in computer graphics, as they are the closest approximation to a sphere: https://mft-dev.dk/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/icosahedron_frame_sub3.gif [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.185|162.158.79.185]] 17:25, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
::Not really. On a plane, there are only three {{W|tesselation|tesselations}} made only of identical regular polygons: {{W|triangular tiling}}, {{W|square tiling}} or {{W|hexagonal tiling}}. But since a regular hexagon can be divided into six equilateral triangles, the tiling in the picture can be seen as both triangular and hexagonal. The leaving out you write about may have come from another tesselation which uses hexagons and triangles, the {{W|trihexagonal tiling}}. On a sphere, there's a completely different discussion as there's no tesselations, only approximations of them. {{unsigned|Malgond}}
There is no way to know that the triangles shown are equilateral (in fact, as drawn here they're quite ''un''even). All 3D renderings are in fact assembled from uneven-sided triangles, including renderings attempting to approximate rounded surfaces. And yes, you can buy a ball tiled only with triangles; they're not even-sided, but you can't tell with the naked eye. Also, there ''is'' one roughly spherical shape tiled only with equilateral triangles: It's the shape found on a 20-sided die. Skyboxes intended to minimize viewing angle distortions use triangles that are very nearly, but not quite equilateral. In fact, ''all shapes'' that use flat planes to tile a sphere can be broken down into triangles of one degree of asymmetry or another. Your argument is invalid.
[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 22:51, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Y'all need to stop arguing about the geometry and look at this picture of a (approximation of a) sphere made out of triangular pyramids: https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjvhZHLoPTgAhXmhVQKHRLnDSwQjRx6BAgBEAU&url=http%3A%2F%2Fblog.zacharyabel.com%2Ftag%2Fspheres%2F&psig=AOvVaw2-zrroG1RBFI-t2GHyHt-9&ust=1552193238617042 [[User:Tplaza64|Tplaza64]] ([[User talk:Tplaza64|talk]]) 04:50, 9 March 2019 (UTC)
: A sphere divided into hexagonals - where is the trick? [http://pub.ist.ac.at/~edels/hexasphere/] Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 16:11, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

::Also note that we see just small part of sky there, so it's fully possible the few deformed/missing triangles are outside of what we see. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 23:49, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

Oh man where are the conspiracy nuts from a few weeks ago ;-) [[User:Cgrimes85|Cgrimes85]] ([[User talk:Cgrimes85|talk]]) 17:03, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:Hey, I think this works like Beetlejuice. Shush. Don’t jinx it. [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:24, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

Ok, I know most of the discussion is focused on the lattice, but are the ships a reference to something? LOTR maybe? Also there’s nothing about the title text at all, and the (more probable than LOTR) Lovecraft reference, considering the mentions of insanity, cosmic horror, and color. (I believe the book was Cool Air?) [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:24, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

I think it's notable that the world actually works this way. The sky is full of drones, satellites, {{w|Mesosphere#Exploration_and_uses|nearcraft}}, and we basically can't see them, but they can freely observe us, transmit things to us, and drop things on us. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.185|162.158.79.185]] 17:34, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
:While there are drones, satellites and various tools astronauts dropped all around the sky, the reason we can't see them is simply size (they are too small), not light pollution. The features mentioned in strip are gigantic. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 23:49, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

I may be too nerdy, but my mind went to Spelljammer on this. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.62.160|172.69.62.160]] 18:44, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

:My thoughts exactly! it perfectly fits Spelljammer crystal spheres. I think it should be included in the explanation (and if not, then at least the source of the whole concept- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crystal_Spheres) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.92.34|162.158.92.34]] 00:13, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

I went to the sky at the end of [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0139809/ Thirteenth Floor]. But the one image I can find suggests that was rectangular. [[User:Jordan Brown|Jordan Brown]] ([[User talk:Jordan Brown|talk]]) 21:47, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

Anybody understands relationship between singular lattice and plural spheres? Is there any lattice that holds the spheres in ancient astronomy?
: Suddenly penny dropped: it is crystal lattice!!!!!11

By the way, the way the lattice really works is that it's a geodesic sphere - sometimes, five triangles meet in a vertex to ensure that the surface closes on itself to form a sphere. It's actually impossible to get a sphere with only 6 triangles in a vertex, aka a "hexagonal tiling": http://www.alaricstephen.com/main-featured/2016/8/15/eulers-gem-applied-to-geodesic-domes.
[[Special:Contributions/173.245.48.63|173.245.48.63]] 21:28, 10 March 2019 (UTC)
: Only if you restrict yourself to using equilateral triangles. If you're allowed to vary the lengths of the edges, then the sum of angles at the center of each "hexagon" will be less than 360 degrees, causing the "hexagon" to flex into a non-planar shape. If you're using these to construct cosmic structures, the difference needed would be minuscule and undetectable to the naked eye. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 13:03, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

Note that you *would* see regular patterns in the cosmic Big Bang remnant radiation in some cosmological models (think of Arcade scrollers, just in 3D). Citation needed no longer: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature01944 [[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.46|198.41.242.46]] 10:29, 11 March 2019 (UTC)

'''Earth Temperature Timeline in the foot of the page'''

Has anyone noticed that the Earth Temperature Timeline is in the list of the classic comics at the bottom? I looked on the wayback machine and it looks like it appeared on March 1, but i didnt see anybody mention it on the other talk pages since. Maybe I just missed it though. [[User:Choochoobob123|Choochoobob123]] ([[User talk:Choochoobob123|talk]]) 13:59, 11 March 2019 (UTC)

2120: Brain Hemispheres

2019-03-08T07:21:44Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2120
| date = March 6, 2019
| title = Brain Hemispheres
| image = brain_hemispheres.png
| titletext = Neurologically speaking, the LEFT hand is actually the one at the end of the RIGHT arm.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by an AUTONOMOUS LEG and a CHICKEN. The links "these", "two", and "left" are nonsense for a reader, please explain the content and provide a link-text revealing the title ot something similar of the linked article. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

As a general rule, each cerebral hemisphere (half of the brain) innervates (feeds/supplies/controls) the contralateral (opposite side) portion of the body. So things on the left half of the body are controlled by the right side of the brain and vice-versa. As previously noted however, this is simply a rough approximation. As all things biology, God (or evolution, or pick your deity/creator of choice) enjoys unnecessary convolution [citation needed]; as always to most biology "rules" there are exceptions.

A notable exception are the cranial nerves; some do not decussate (cross over) as would be predicted from the rule above and directly innervate the ipsilateral (same side) side (eg abducens CN6). And of course, many cranial nerves innervate both ipsilateral and contralateral sides. This phenomenon is often seen, when everything is working properly, in things like the pupillary reflex (when you shine a bright light in one eye, both eyes' pupils constrict)

While the motor and sensation aspects of nerve innervation have been relatively well-established from studies, experiments, and dissections, (mostly through knockout(what happens to function if I damage/remove this part of the brain?) or stimulation studies) there is probably always going to be an exception, as you might imagine. Any number of factors may cause deviation from the normal physiology: trauma, disease, congenital birth defects, brain plasticity, etc.

With less concrete aspects of human brain function, such as logic, emotion, language processing, and creativity, establishing which brain hemisphere has control is obviously more complicated. Because a lot of these are higher order functions (these are things you tend to learn, develop, and obtain as you grow into an adult from a neonate), establishing which hemisphere has control of which function are obviously more complicated. Due again to brain plasticity or other factors, different developing brains may grow to wire control of these functions differently. So while studies have established which hemisphere is more likely to be involved with which function (eg left with language processing), again mostly through knockout studies, these generalizations are not necessarily true for every individual.

Randall spoofs these by suggesting that the right brain instead controls the upper torso, while the left brain still controls the right side. The product of this partitioning in two dimensions gives four areas of the human body (upper left, upper right, lower left, lower right) and would eventually suggest that your left leg moves independently of your brain. To explain the areas of the body controlled by both halves of the brain, Randall declares those sections "disputed," echoing a note added on maps that must display a border which is part of a {{w|territorial dispute}}. This suggests that the halves of your brain fight for control of the region, and is also described similarly to two countries disputing territory. Alternatively, he states there would be cooperative shared control (= {{w|Dual control}}). His (fun) theory would explain, why most people are more skilled with their hands than their feet and with their right side than their left.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Cueball is shown with the right half of his brain (on the viewer's left) colored in orange and the left half (on the viewer's right) in iris blue. An iris blue box is overlaid over the right half of the body (on the viewer's left), and an orange box is overlaid over the top half. The boxes are overlapping in a greenish color on the upper right quarter of the body (on the viewer's left).]
:'''Neuroscience Fact:'''
:[An arrow pointing to the iris blue rectangle on top with the text above:]
:The ''left'' half of the brain actually controls the ''right'' half of the body...
:[An arrow pointing to the orange rectangle at the right, the text reads:]
:...while the ''right'' half of the brain actually controls the ''top'' half of the body.
:[An arrow pointing to the overlapping area (the top left body from the viewers perspective) with the text below:]
:Disputed/dual control
:[An arrow pointing to Cueball's left leg area (on the viewer's right), not highlighted by any color, and the text is:]
:This leg is fully autonomous

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Biology]]

Talk:2118: Normal Distribution

2019-03-02T00:00:25Z

172.68.110.64:

Is there a statistician in the house? [[User:Hawthorn|Hawthorn]] ([[User talk:Hawthorn|talk]]) 15:32, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
I think they all got annoyed at the graph and left. [[User:Margath|Margath]] ([[User talk:Margath|talk]]) 15:46, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
Of course there is! [[Special:Contributions/162.158.214.22|162.158.214.22]] 15:44, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

As an example: When measuring the height of people in the same age bracket, then you'll expect the number of people at each height to look like this graph. There will be a lot of people around the average height, fewer a foot shorter/taller, some (but very few) exceptionally tall people, and some (but very few) exceptionally short people. The x-value represents the height, the y-value essentially represents the amount of population that share that height. When we measure the middle 50% of the population using vertical bars, then people at a certain height are either inside '''OR''' outside the middle. Randall uses horizontal bars here, which means some people at a certain height will be counted in the middle 50%, but other people with the same height won't be. In fact, some people with the exact average height of the whole population would fall outside the middle. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.214|108.162.241.214]] 16:01, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Feel free to rip me apart for referring to it as the "number of people at each height", since y-axis is more complicated than a simple count. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.214|108.162.241.214]] 16:03, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Just to say, Randall's horizontal slice isn't entirely meaningless. It's a calculation I've had to do, where I have a series of binned samples of a population (say I knew how many fell in -10..10, how many fell in -5..5, how many fell in -2..2) and wanted to combine them with an appropriate weighting to approximate a Gaussian. I was using it for filtering, but it's logically similar. [[User:Fluppeteer|Fluppeteer]] ([[User talk:Fluppeteer|talk]]) 16:19, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
::Also, the slice sampler for MCMC is a trick for sampling from a distribution by "turning it on its side". But I don't think the 50% figure would be meaningful in that context. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.136|172.68.54.136]] 21:16, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Pedant: etymologically, there *is* actually a connection between a normal (to a surface or line) and the normal distribution; the former comes from the Latin for a set square (giving you perpendicular), and it later came to mean "standard". The "tangential distribution" certainly fits the etymology of "odd/unusual" though. [[User:Fluppeteer|Fluppeteer]] ([[User talk:Fluppeteer|talk]]) 16:26, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

This reminds me of the difference between Riemann(-Stieltjes) and Lebesgue integration. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.160|172.68.54.160]] 20:16, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

As the axis are not labeled (see comic 833) we could consider this a multivariate distribution where one parameter is uniform and the other is normal. That was my first thought when I saw this. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.34.88|172.68.34.88]] 18:43, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Is there any meaning to midpoint: 52.7%? Maybe that is the arbitrary center he formed the horizontal bounds around? Maybe it relates to data? Is this a reference to something? It's certainly reminiscent of how normal distributions produce statistically meaningful numbers that have weird decimals in them (like the % represented by being within so many standard deviations). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.178|162.158.78.178]] 19:45, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
::Maybe it's because the meaning of "50% of the chart lies between these lines" specifically becomes roughly useless for discerning error if the lines are not centered around the origin. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.178|162.158.78.178]] 19:52, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
::I might get it!!! The area between the lines is 52.7% of the total area: which means that 50% is technically included in what lies between them. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.220|162.158.78.220]] 23:07, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

The correct way to do this is to have the topmost vertical line equal to or above the top of the normal plot. Then the bottom-most line would represent the same values as vertical lines would. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.220|162.158.78.220]] 23:32, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Say I want to build a diverse team or a representative council. And it is more important that the selection is representative of several subpopulations (who should not be voted down by the majority) than that it gives an equal fair chance to anybody. I would cut away the absolute outliers and reduce the weight of the most abundant group - this gives just the area between the two lines. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.70|172.68.110.70]] 23:40, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Has somebody measured or calculated (by assuming normal distribution) the areas? It seems that the upper area is way smaller than the lower one, but both having the same 'height' in the middle. Is the 52.7% graphically correct? I tried half of the height at 0: .398942 and integrated, then I get 52,6% for the white area and 47,4% for the gray area. On the y-axis it seems that the three visible ticks are .1, .2, .3, then the gray area would be a bit broader than .2 and centered at .1. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.70|172.68.110.70]] 23:40, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Got [[356:_Nerd_Sniping|Nerd Sniped]] by the number "52.7%", but failed on an analytic solution and settled for a quick and dirty numerical integration instead, which suggested that the exact number might be somewhere between .5268 and .5269, so I think I'm not far from the truth. As I see it, the shaded area is vertically centered around the vertical midpoint, with a relative vertical width chosen such that the shaded area is exactly 50% of the total area under the curve. Just as usual, only with vertical instead of horizontal binning, which of course is the twist that makes this graph puzzling, funny, and completely useless for meaningful interpretation.
The label "52.7%" is not an addition to the Midpoint label but instead gives the width of the vertical bin, as a percentage of the vertical height of the curve.
Oh, and you are certainly right in that the marginal distributions at the top and the bottom are asymmetric, as is the gaussian when viewed sideways. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 23:56, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2118: Normal Distribution

2019-03-01T23:58:35Z

172.68.110.64:

Is there a statistician in the house? [[User:Hawthorn|Hawthorn]] ([[User talk:Hawthorn|talk]]) 15:32, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
I think they all got annoyed at the graph and left. [[User:Margath|Margath]] ([[User talk:Margath|talk]]) 15:46, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
Of course there is! [[Special:Contributions/162.158.214.22|162.158.214.22]] 15:44, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

As an example: When measuring the height of people in the same age bracket, then you'll expect the number of people at each height to look like this graph. There will be a lot of people around the average height, fewer a foot shorter/taller, some (but very few) exceptionally tall people, and some (but very few) exceptionally short people. The x-value represents the height, the y-value essentially represents the amount of population that share that height. When we measure the middle 50% of the population using vertical bars, then people at a certain height are either inside '''OR''' outside the middle. Randall uses horizontal bars here, which means some people at a certain height will be counted in the middle 50%, but other people with the same height won't be. In fact, some people with the exact average height of the whole population would fall outside the middle. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.214|108.162.241.214]] 16:01, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Feel free to rip me apart for referring to it as the "number of people at each height", since y-axis is more complicated than a simple count. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.214|108.162.241.214]] 16:03, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Just to say, Randall's horizontal slice isn't entirely meaningless. It's a calculation I've had to do, where I have a series of binned samples of a population (say I knew how many fell in -10..10, how many fell in -5..5, how many fell in -2..2) and wanted to combine them with an appropriate weighting to approximate a Gaussian. I was using it for filtering, but it's logically similar. [[User:Fluppeteer|Fluppeteer]] ([[User talk:Fluppeteer|talk]]) 16:19, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
::Also, the slice sampler for MCMC is a trick for sampling from a distribution by "turning it on its side". But I don't think the 50% figure would be meaningful in that context. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.136|172.68.54.136]] 21:16, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Pedant: etymologically, there *is* actually a connection between a normal (to a surface or line) and the normal distribution; the former comes from the Latin for a set square (giving you perpendicular), and it later came to mean "standard". The "tangential distribution" certainly fits the etymology of "odd/unusual" though. [[User:Fluppeteer|Fluppeteer]] ([[User talk:Fluppeteer|talk]]) 16:26, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

This reminds me of the difference between Riemann(-Stieltjes) and Lebesgue integration. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.160|172.68.54.160]] 20:16, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

As the axis are not labeled (see comic 833) we could consider this a multivariate distribution where one parameter is uniform and the other is normal. That was my first thought when I saw this. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.34.88|172.68.34.88]] 18:43, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Is there any meaning to midpoint: 52.7%? Maybe that is the arbitrary center he formed the horizontal bounds around? Maybe it relates to data? Is this a reference to something? It's certainly reminiscent of how normal distributions produce statistically meaningful numbers that have weird decimals in them (like the % represented by being within so many standard deviations). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.178|162.158.78.178]] 19:45, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
::Maybe it's because the meaning of "50% of the chart lies between these lines" specifically becomes roughly useless for discerning error if the lines are not centered around the origin. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.178|162.158.78.178]] 19:52, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
::I might get it!!! The area between the lines is 52.7% of the total area: which means that 50% is technically included in what lies between them. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.220|162.158.78.220]] 23:07, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

The correct way to do this is to have the topmost vertical line equal to or above the top of the normal plot. Then the bottom-most line would represent the same values as vertical lines would. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.220|162.158.78.220]] 23:32, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Say I want to build a diverse team or a representative council. And it is more important that the selection is representative of several subpopulations (who should not be voted down by the majority) than that it gives an equal fair chance to anybody. I would cut away the absolute outliers and reduce the weight of the most abundant group - this gives just the area between the two lines. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.70|172.68.110.70]] 23:40, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Has somebody measured or calculated (by assuming normal distribution) the areas? It seems that the upper area is way smaller than the lower one, but both having the same 'height' in the middle. Is the 52.7% graphically correct? I tried half of the height at 0: .398942 and integrated, then I get 52,6% for the white area and 47,4% for the gray area. On the y-axis it seems that the three visible ticks are .1, .2, .3, then the gray area would be a bit broader than .2 and centered at .1. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.70|172.68.110.70]] 23:40, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
:: Got [[356:_Nerd_Sniping|Nerd Sniped]] by the number, but failed on an analytic solution and settled for a quick and dirty numerical integration instead, which suggested that the exact number might be somewhere between .5268 and .5269, so I think I'm not far from the truth. As I see it, the shaded area is vertically centered around the vertical midpoint, with a relative vertical width chosen such that the shaded area is exactly 50% of the total area under the curve. Just as usual, only with vertical instead of horizontal binning, which of course is the twist that makes this graph puzzling, funny, and completely useless for meaningful interpretation.
::The label "52.7%" is not an addition to the Midpoint label but instead gives the width of the vertical bin, as a percentage of the vertical height of the curve.
::Oh, and you are certainly right in that the marginal distributions at the top and the bottom are asymmetric, as is the gaussian when viewed sideways. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 23:56, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2118: Normal Distribution

2019-03-01T23:56:35Z

172.68.110.64: meaning of the number "52.7%"

Is there a statistician in the house? [[User:Hawthorn|Hawthorn]] ([[User talk:Hawthorn|talk]]) 15:32, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
I think they all got annoyed at the graph and left. [[User:Margath|Margath]] ([[User talk:Margath|talk]]) 15:46, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
Of course there is! [[Special:Contributions/162.158.214.22|162.158.214.22]] 15:44, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

As an example: When measuring the height of people in the same age bracket, then you'll expect the number of people at each height to look like this graph. There will be a lot of people around the average height, fewer a foot shorter/taller, some (but very few) exceptionally tall people, and some (but very few) exceptionally short people. The x-value represents the height, the y-value essentially represents the amount of population that share that height. When we measure the middle 50% of the population using vertical bars, then people at a certain height are either inside '''OR''' outside the middle. Randall uses horizontal bars here, which means some people at a certain height will be counted in the middle 50%, but other people with the same height won't be. In fact, some people with the exact average height of the whole population would fall outside the middle. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.214|108.162.241.214]] 16:01, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Feel free to rip me apart for referring to it as the "number of people at each height", since y-axis is more complicated than a simple count. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.214|108.162.241.214]] 16:03, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Just to say, Randall's horizontal slice isn't entirely meaningless. It's a calculation I've had to do, where I have a series of binned samples of a population (say I knew how many fell in -10..10, how many fell in -5..5, how many fell in -2..2) and wanted to combine them with an appropriate weighting to approximate a Gaussian. I was using it for filtering, but it's logically similar. [[User:Fluppeteer|Fluppeteer]] ([[User talk:Fluppeteer|talk]]) 16:19, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
::Also, the slice sampler for MCMC is a trick for sampling from a distribution by "turning it on its side". But I don't think the 50% figure would be meaningful in that context. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.136|172.68.54.136]] 21:16, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Pedant: etymologically, there *is* actually a connection between a normal (to a surface or line) and the normal distribution; the former comes from the Latin for a set square (giving you perpendicular), and it later came to mean "standard". The "tangential distribution" certainly fits the etymology of "odd/unusual" though. [[User:Fluppeteer|Fluppeteer]] ([[User talk:Fluppeteer|talk]]) 16:26, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

This reminds me of the difference between Riemann(-Stieltjes) and Lebesgue integration. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.160|172.68.54.160]] 20:16, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

As the axis are not labeled (see comic 833) we could consider this a multivariate distribution where one parameter is uniform and the other is normal. That was my first thought when I saw this. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.34.88|172.68.34.88]] 18:43, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Is there any meaning to midpoint: 52.7%? Maybe that is the arbitrary center he formed the horizontal bounds around? Maybe it relates to data? Is this a reference to something? It's certainly reminiscent of how normal distributions produce statistically meaningful numbers that have weird decimals in them (like the % represented by being within so many standard deviations). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.178|162.158.78.178]] 19:45, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
::Maybe it's because the meaning of "50% of the chart lies between these lines" specifically becomes roughly useless for discerning error if the lines are not centered around the origin. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.178|162.158.78.178]] 19:52, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
::I might get it!!! The area between the lines is 52.7% of the total area: which means that 50% is technically included in what lies between them. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.220|162.158.78.220]] 23:07, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

The correct way to do this is to have the topmost vertical line equal to or above the top of the normal plot. Then the bottom-most line would represent the same values as vertical lines would. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.220|162.158.78.220]] 23:32, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Say I want to build a diverse team or a representative council. And it is more important that the selection is representative of several subpopulations (who should not be voted down by the majority) than that it gives an equal fair chance to anybody. I would cut away the absolute outliers and reduce the weight of the most abundant group - this gives just the area between the two lines. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.70|172.68.110.70]] 23:40, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Has somebody measured or calculated (by assuming normal distribution) the areas? It seems that the upper area is way smaller than the lower one, but both having the same 'height' in the middle. Is the 52.7% graphically correct? I tried half of the height at 0: .398942 and integrated, then I get 52,6% for the white area and 47,4% for the gray area. On the y-axis it seems that the three visible ticks are .1, .2, .3, then the gray area would be a bit broader than .2 and centered at .1. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.70|172.68.110.70]] 23:40, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
:: Got [[356:_Nerd_Sniping|Nerd Sniped]] by the number, but failed on an analytic solution and settled for a quick and dirty numerical integration instead, which suggested that the exact number might be somewhere between .5268 and .5269, so I think I'm not far from the truth. As I see it, the shaded area is vertically centered around the vertical midpoint, with a relative vertical width chosen such that the shaded area is exactly 50% of the total area under the curve. Just as usual, only with vertical instead of horizontal binning, which of course is the twist that makes this graph puzzling, funny, and completely useless for meaningful interpretation.
::The label "52.7%" is not an addition to the Midpoint label but instead gives the width of the vertical bin, as a percentage of the vertical height of the curve.
Oh, and you are certainly right in that the marginal distributions at the top and the bottom are asymmetric, as is the gaussian when viewed sideways. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 23:56, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

2117: Differentiation and Integration

2019-03-01T10:09:20Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2117
| date = February 27, 2019
| title = Differentiation and Integration
| image = differentiation_and_integration.png
| titletext = "Symbolic integration" is when you theatrically go through the motions of finding integrals, but the actual result you get doesn't matter because it's purely symbolic.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BESSEL FUNCTION? Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This comic provides a {{w|flowchart}} purporting to show the process of differentiation, and another for integration.

{{w|Derivative|Differentiation}} and {{w|Antiderivative|Integration}} are two major components of {{w|calculus}}. As many Calculus 2 students are painfully aware, integration is much more complicated than the differentiation it undoes.

However, Randall dramatically overstates this point here. After the first step of integration, Randall assumes that any integration can not be solved so simply, and then dives into a step named "????", suggesting that it is unknowable how to proceed. The rest of the flowchart is (we can assume deliberately) even harder to follow, and does not reach a conclusion. This is in contrast to the simple, straightforward flowchart for differentiation. The fact that the arrows in the bottom of the integration part leads to nowhere indicates that "Phone calls to mathematicians", "Oh no" and "Burn the evidence" are not final steps in the difficult journey. The flowchart could be extended by Randall to God-know-where extents.

It should be noted that Randall slightly undermines his point by providing four different methods, and an "etc", and a "No"-branch for attempting differentiation with no guidelines for selecting between them.

===Differentiation===
'''{{w|Chain rule}}'''

For any <math> \frac{d}{dx}f(x)=f'(x)</math> and <math> \frac{d}{dx}g(x)=g'(x) </math>, it follows that <math> \frac{d}{dx}(f(g(x)))=f'(g(x))*g'(x)</math>.

'''{{w|Power Rule}}'''

For any <math> f(x)=x^a </math>, it follows that <math> \frac{d}{dx}f(x)=a*x^{a-1} </math>.

'''{{w|Quotient rule}}'''

For any <math> \frac{d}{dx}f(x)=f'(x)</math> and <math> \frac{d}{dx}g(x)=g'(x) </math>, it follows that <math> \frac{d}{dx} \frac{f(x)}{g(x)}=\frac{f'(x)g(x)-f(x)g'(x)}{(g(x))^2}</math> if <math>g(x)\ne 0</math>.

'''{{w|Product rule}}'''

For any <math> \frac{d}{dx}f(x)=f'(x)</math> and <math> \frac{d}{dx}g(x)=g'(x) </math>, it follows that <math> \frac{d}{dx}(f(x)*g(x))=f'(x)*g(x)+f(x)*g'(x)</math>.

===Integration===
'''{{w|Integration by parts}}'''

The "product rule" run backwards. Since <math>(uv)' = uv' + u'v</math>, it follows that by integrating both sides you get <math> uv = \int u dv + \int v du</math>, which is more commonly written as <math>\int u dv = uv - \int v du</math>. By finding appropriate values for functions <math>u, v</math> such that your problem is in the form <math>\int u dv</math>, your problem ''may'' be simplified.

'''{{w|Integration by substitution|Substitution}}'''

The "chain rule" run backwards. Since <math> d(f(u)) = (df(u))du</math>, it follows that <math>f(u) = \int df(u) du</math>. By finding appropriate values for functions <math>f, u</math> such that your problem is in the form <math>\int df(u) du</math> your problem ''may'' be simplified.

'''{{w|Cauchy's integral formula|Cauchy's Formula}}'''

Cauchy's Integral formula is a result in complex analysis that relates the value of a contour integral in the complex plane to properties of the singularities in the interior of the contour. It is often used to compute integrals on the real line by extending the path of the integral from the real line into the complex plane to apply the formula, then proving that the integral from the parts of the contour not on the real line has value zero.

'''{{w|Partial_fraction_decomposition#Application_to_symbolic_integration|Partial Fractions}}'''

Partial fractions is a technique for breaking up a function that comprises one polynomial divided by another into a sum of functions comprising constants over the factors of the original denominator, which can easily be integrated into logarithms.

'''Install {{w|Mathematica}}'''

Mathematica is a modern technical computing system spanning most areas. One of its features is to compute mathematical functions. This step in the flowchart is to install and use Mathematica to do the integration for you.

'''{{w|Riemann integral|Riemann Integration}}'''

The Riemann integral is a definition of definite integration. <math>\sum_{i=0}^{n-1} f(t_i) \left(x_{i+1}-x_i\right).</math> Elementary textbooks on calculus sometimes present finding a definite integral as a process of approximating an area by strips of equal width and then taking the limit as the strips become narrower. Riemann integration removes the requirement that the strips have equal width, and so is a more flexible definition. However there are still many functions for which the Riemann integral doesn't converge, and consideration of these functions leads to the {{w|Lebesgue Integral}}. Riemann integration is not a method of calculus appropriate for finding the anti-derivative of an elementary function.

'''{{w|Stokes' Theorem}}'''

Stokes' theorem is a statement about the integration of differential forms on manifolds. <math>\int_{\partial \Omega}\omega=\int_\Omega d\omega\,.</math> If you're in this deep, there's a good chance that you're just randomly applying any analytical technique you can think of at this point.

'''{{w|Risch Algorithm}}'''

The Risch algorithm is a notoriously complex procedure that, given a certain class of symbolic integrand, either finds a symbolic integral or proves that no elementary integral exists. (Technically it is only a semi-algorithm, and cannot produce an answer unless it can determine if a certain symbolic expression is {{w|Constant problem|equal to 0}} or not.) Many computer algebra systems have chosen to implement only the simpler Risch-Norman algorithm, which does not come with the same guarantee. A series of extensions to the Risch algorithm extend the class of allowable functions to include (at least) the error function and the logarithmic integral. A human would have to be pretty desperate to attempt this (presumably) by hand.

'''{{w|Bessel function}}'''

Bessel functions are the solution to the differential equation <math> x^2 \frac{dy^2}{dx^2}+x \frac{dy}{dx}+(x^2-n^2)*y=0</math>, where n is the order of Bessel function. Though they do show up in some engineering, physics, and abstract mathematics, in lower levels of calculus they are often a sign that the integration was not set up properly before someone put them into a symbolic algebra solver.

'''{{w|Symbolic integration}}'''

Symbolic algebra is the basic process of finding an antiderivative, as opposed to numerically integrating a function. Randall plays off the joke that integration might as well be a symbol, like in a novel, because he can't get any meaningful results from his analysis.

'''Phone calls to mathematicians'''

This step would indicate that the flowchart user, desperate from failed attempts to solve the problem, contacts some more skilled mathematicians by phone, and presumably asks them for help. The connected steps of "Oh no" and "Burn the evidence" may suggest the possibility that this interaction might not play out very well and could even get the caller in trouble.
Specialists and renowned experts being bothered - not to their amusement - by strangers, often at highly inconvenient times or locations, is a common comedic trope, also previously utilized by xkcd (for example in [[163: Donald Knuth]]).

'''Burn the evidence'''

This phrase parodies a common trope in detective fiction, where characters burn notes, receipts, passports, etc. to maintain secrecy. This may refer to the burning of one's work to avoid the shame of being associated w/ such a badly failed attempt to solve the given integration problem.

Alternatively, this could be an ironic hint to the fact that in order to find the integral, it may even be necessary to break the law or upset higher powers, so that the negative consequences of a persecution can only be avoided by destroying the evidence.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Two flow charts are shown.]

:[The first flow chart has four steps in simple order, one with multiple recommendations.]
:DIFFERENTIATION
:Start
:Try applying
::Chain Rule
::Power Rule
::Quotient Rule
::Product Rule
::Etc.
:Done?
::Yes
::No
:Done!

[The second flow chart begins like the first, then descends into chaos.]
:INTEGRATION
:Start
:Try applying
::Integration by Parts
::Substitution
:Done?
:Haha, Nope!

:[Chaos, Roughly from left to right, top to bottom, direction arrows not included.]
::Cauchy's Formula
::????
::???!?
::???
::???
::?
::Partial Fractions
::??
::?
::Install Mathematica
::?
::Riemann Integration
::Stokes' Theorem
::???
::?
::Risch Algorithm
::???
::[Sad face.]
::?????
::???
::What the heck is a Bessel Function??
::Phone calls to mathematicians
::Oh No
::Burn the Evidence
::[More arrows pointing out of the image to suggest more steps.]

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Analysis]]

2109: Invisible Formatting

2019-02-08T18:37:05Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2109
| date = February 8, 2019
| title = Invisible Formatting
| image = invisible_formatting.png
| titletext = To avoid errors like this, we render all text and pipe it through OCR before processing, fixing a handful of irregular bugs by burying them beneath a smooth, uniform layer of bugs.
}}

==Explanation==

A''' '''fast''' '''way''' '''to''' '''select''' '''a''' '''word''' '''in''' '''many''' '''systems''' '''is''' '''to''' '''double-click''' '''it,''' '''which''' '''also''' '''selects''' '''the''' '''following''' '''space.''' '''After''' '''applying''' '''formatting,''' '''one''' '''may''' '''select''' '''only''' '''the''' '''word''' '''to''' '''remove''' '''this''' '''formatting,''' '''by''' '''clicking''' '''and''' '''dragging''' '''with''' '''the''' '''mouse,''' '''which''' '''leaves''' '''the''' '''space''' '''formatted.''' '''Since''' '''in''' '''most''' '''fonts''' '''the''' '''word''' '''space''' '''looks''' '''identical''' '''between''' '''the''' '''bold''' '''and''' '''the''' '''regular,''' '''this''' '''has''' '''no''' '''effect''' '''on''' '''how''' '''the''' '''end''' '''user''' '''will''' '''read''' '''the''' '''document,''' '''but''' '''could''' '''theoretically''' '''cause''' '''a''' '''problem''' '''on''' '''later''' '''occasions.''' '''[[Randall]]''' '''worries''' '''about''' '''this.

In the pictured case, he does not appear to have selected the word by double-clicking, since the cursor is depicted past the end of the word instead of on top of it. It appears instead that he has clicked and dragged the mouse cursor to select it, a method which also makes it easy to accidentally select a trailing space. The word space is a relatively thin character, which makes it hard to avoid and to notice, and most people don’t worry about whether they selected it. Therefore, selecting a trailing space is a common behavior, regardless of the method used.

If later the same word is highlighted to have the bold removed, but this time without including the space, the space would retain its bold formatting. Since it is an invisible character, there is no easy way to tell it is still bold—even if it is slightly longer in the bold font, this may be hard to notice. This is the situation the comic is highlighting—[[559: No Pun Intended|no pun intended]].

Occasions where a hidden bold space may be a problem include:
*Wikis. In the first paragraph of this article, every space is a hidden bold space. From the editing view, all the spaces look <code><nowiki>like''' '''this</nowiki></code>. This will annoy all future editors of this article, due to the hidden apostrophes which are formatting the spaces. They may also accidentally introduce bold words.
**By default, MediaWiki attempts to prevent this by not including the trailing spaces in the bold formatting when you click the “bold” button, so someone has to manually type the formatting apostrophes to do this.
*Editing that adds some text at the location of the space will make this text bold.
*A situation where formatted text is not allowed, and is rejected, but the user failed to strip formatting from the spaces, and this is noticed.
*If a font has the word space look different between the bold and the regular, perhaps to make it so bold words are spaced closer to each other, the spacing will look inconsistent if there is a hidden bold space.
*Unnecessary extra formatting will usually unnecessarily increase file size, which may put the document above some maximum file size threshold.
*It can be later revealed that Randall considered to format parts of the text in bold. As the title text tells it is really important to Randall to control all information he publishes. Real-world examples are governments changing the impact of reports for political reasons. Attempted tampering of this kind can be revealed by bold spaces. Another example would be a casual and short one-sentence reply e.g. to a romantic interest, which one takes one hour to formulate to sound as natural as possible.

Randall’s background in {{w|computer programming}} could be what makes him more attentive to these types of technical problems, and therefore the reason for his worries.

In the title text, Randall says that he “fixes” this by running the text through {{w|Optical character recognition|OCR}}, which turns physical copies or images into text. This would usually ruin even more formatting, and add inaccuracies to the text. This way, no one can tell which bugs were introduced by him and which ones by the OCR, which he thinks is better somehow.

Popular modern word processing programs have features which may make it easier to notice improperly formatted invisible characters. In the tutorials linked here, one may learn how to view invisible characters in [https://support.office.com/en-us/article/show-or-hide-formatting-marks-c2d8a607-5646-4165-8b08-bd68f9d172a0 Microsoft Word], [https://support.apple.com/kb/PH23650?locale=en_US&viewlocale=en_US Pages] and [https://help.libreoffice.org/Writer/Nonprinting_Characters LibreOffice Writer]. In the older word processor {{w|WordPerfect}}, one could do this with the “Reveal Codes” feature, which showed you character codes in place of the characters.

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

:[A text editor, with [...]. The word "not ", including the following space, is highlighted in blue. There is a cursor below it.]
:Text: ...ere, but would not have to mo...
:Action: Select

:[The cursor is on the bold option and the selected word is bolded.]
:Text: ...ere, but would '''not '''have to mo...
:Action: Click

:[The cursor is next to the "to".]
:Text: ...ere, but would '''not '''have to mo...
:Thought bubble: ...Nah, the bold is too much.

:[The word "not" is highlighted.]
:Text: ...ere, but would '''not '''have to mo...
:Action: Select

:[The cursor is on the bold option and the selected word is not bolded.]
:Text: ...ere, but would not''' '''have to mo...
:Action: Click

:[The cursor is gone. There is an arrow pointing to the bolded space with a dashed box around it.]
:Text: ...ere, but would not''' '''have to mo...
:Arrow: Hidden bold space

:[Caption below the panel:]
:When editing text, in the back of my mind I always worry that I'm adding invisible formatting that will somehow cause a problem in the distant future.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]

2106: Sharing Options

2019-02-02T18:40:16Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2106
| date = February 1, 2019
| title = Sharing Options
| image = sharing_options.png
| titletext = How about posts that are public, but every time a company accesses a bunch of them, the API makes their CEO's account click 'like' on one of them at random so you get a notification.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by 300 or a billion BOTs. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This comic is a satire of social media's presence in our lives and its vulnerabilities. [[Cueball]] is flying in an atmosphere that resembles a VR cyberspace, and he is talking to a screen that may be a smartphone with an advanced virtual assistant installed. [[Ponytail]] and other characters also fly in the background, so this cyberspace may be the social network's cyberspace where everyone interacts. The clouds represent the cloud server where the data of the social network is stored. The advanced virtual assistant seems to have a virtual face and have very advanced AI, which can even be arrogant by assuming that it already knew the information about the "option in between".

Many social media sites allow users to control who is able to see data (posts, pictures etc.) that they share online, ranging from immediate friends to all other users (public). The settings for controlling the sharing of data are not always obvious to the user and several high profile social media sites have sparked controversy by having default settings that allow user data to be widely shared.

As most social media sites are free to use, the business model for these companies involves a mixture of selling advertising space on their website and selling data on its users to other companies, who may be interested in using it for marketing purposes. Targeted advertising takes data on users' past behavior and things that they have liked, and uses this to predict what adverts they may be interested in or be most vulnerable to. Targeted adverts are more valuable to advertisers as they avoid paying to show adverts to individuals who are unlikely to be interested in their products; but can lead to users feeling that they are being spied on. Whilst the terms and conditions for social media websites will include details of how data will be used, the length of these documents and legal terminology may deter some users from reading them, meaning that they may be unaware that their data is being exploited in this way. Government legislation has so far been slow to catch up with changing online trends; however, the European Union have recently introduced {{w|General Data Protection Regulation|General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR)}} which aims to regulate how user data can be shared. GDPR was featured in comic [[1998: GDPR]].

Randall, who might have never heard of the Facebook option to share with "friends of friends" as well, is making a point that there ought to be some option between sharing posts only with your friends and making them completely public. The title text shows that he would specifically like to know when corporations read his posts.

Randall might be interested in [https://www.scuttlebutt.nz/ scuttlebutt] or [https://secushare.org/ secushare].

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Cueball floating in midair is communicating with a small floating screen that resembles a smartphone. Other people and clouds visible floating by in background.]
:Screen: Welcome to social media! When you put stuff here, you have two options: (1) You can make it available to a small set of 300 or so approved friends.
:Screen: Or (2) you can share permanent copies of it all with billions of people, including internet scammers, random predatory companies, and hostile governments.

:Cueball: Why would anyone pick option two?
:Screen: Two is the default.
:Cueball: Yikes.

:Cueball: So those are the only two options? There's nothing in in between?
:Screen: I don't understand. Like what?

:Cueball: I mean...there are numbers between 300 and a billion.
:Screen: Huh? Name one.
:Screen: ''Pretty'' sure I would have heard of those.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Social networking]]

2104: Biff Tannen

2019-01-28T17:42:36Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2104
| date = January 28, 2019
| title = Biff Tannen
| image = biff_tannen.png
| titletext = I can't help myself; now I want to read a bunch of thinkpieces from newspapers in Biff's 1985 arguing over whether the growth of the region into a corporate dystopia was inevitable.
}}

==Explanation==

This comic is based on ''{{w|Back to the Future II}}''. In this movie, the character Biff Tannen steals the time machine, which is the main plot device, and uses it to go back in time from 2015 to 1955. He then gives Marty MacFly’s sports almanac, containing the outcomes of 50 years (1950–2000) worth of sporting events, to his younger self. His younger self uses this sports almanac to make millions by successfully betting on {{w|horse races}}. He then forms a company, and calls it [https://backtothefuture.fandom.com/wiki/BiffCo BiffCo]. While in the movie the protagonists reverse this, by stealing the almanac back, Cueball imagines the universe where BiffCo. exists as continuing to exist in parallel. This is consistent with the {{w|multiverse}} theory.

The movie is set in the fictional town of Hill Valley, California. When the protagonists return to 1985, they find that Biff has turned the town’s “Courthouse Square” into a 27-story casino, and generally taken over Hill Valley. Cueball interprets this as “the decline of the city, and general social decay”.

''[https://www.amazon.com/Hillbilly-Elegy-Memoir-Family-Culture/dp/0062300547 Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis.]'' is a book, published in June 2016, that gives an account of growing up in a poor Rust Belt town, and offers a broader, probing look at the struggles of America’s white working class. This comic is a play on the title of this book, which has been described as explaining the “social, regional, and class” issues in white working-class America. The white American working class was a key factor in the election of U.S. President Donald Trump, and many critics have interpreted the book as an explanation of his election, which was deemed improbable by many analysts before it happened.

Cueball is proposing a similarly-titled book, set in the ''Back to the Future II'' universe where BiffCo. exists, that would describe the supposed factors leading to the rise of Biff Tannen in Hill Valley. In that universe, while the rise of Biff—and the subsequent decay of the city—is the result of his using a future sports almanac to cheat at sports betting, the rest of the population would have to guess at the structural societal issues that might have caused Biff’s otherwise inexplicable success. Thus, Cueball compares such blind guessing with the analysis contained in ''Hillbilly Elegy''.

This makes White Hat Guy angry, because it’s such a painfully long setup for a really stupid pun. There is also a decent chance that the book White Hat Guy is currently reading is ''Hillbilly Elegy'', which would make the joke more insulting to him, as it compares the book to useless theorizing about an event which was really caused by time traveling. After seeing similar symptoms in our society, perhaps he would consider that we are living in such a world predetermined to negative effects. It would probably frustrate him that being optimistic for the future and hoping for a changing society would be an effort in vain, when the universe is similarly tampered with by time-travellers.

Randall is known to have [[1756: I'm With Her|supported the opposing candidate before Trump was elected]], having made a comic just to promote her, and particularly [[1756:_I'm_With_Her#Sad_comics|sad comics]] following his election. Therefore, he may have made this comic as an insult to a book which supposedly explains the election of the candidate he opposed, by comparing it to useless (and wrong) theorizing. It may also be intended as an insult to Trump himself, by comparing the dystopian universe where Biff rose to power (albeit not as President) to the actual universe where Trump rose to power.

The title text continues this comparison by mentioning thinkpieces from newspapers that would appear in the ''Back to the Future II'' universe where BiffCo. exists. Various thinkpieces did appear in real life newspapers in an attempt to explain Trump’s rise to power after his election, and asking whether it was inevitable.

==Transcript==

[Cueball talks while walking up to White Hat, who is reading in an armchair.]

Cueball: You know, in the universe where Biff Tannen took Marty McFly’s sports almanac back in time, the people wouldn’t have any counterfactuals to work with.

Cueball: Their world would be ''the'' world.

[White Hat turns to look at Cueball as he keeps talking.]

Cueball: They would have spent decades debating which structural problems enabled the rise of BiffCo, the decline of the city, and general social decay.

Cueball: Everyone would find reasons it confirmed their pet theory.

Cueball: I'm going to write a book set in that universe. I'll call it ''Hill Valley Elegy''.

[White Hat turns away in disgust.]

White Hat: ... I ''hate'' you.

{{comic discussion}}

2100: Models of the Atom

2019-01-19T12:34:21Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2100
| date = January 18, 2019
| title = Models of the Atom
| image = models_of_the_atom.png
| titletext = J.J. Thompson won a Nobel Prize for his work in electricity in gases, but was unfairly passed over for his "An atom is plum pudding, and plum pudding is MADE of atoms! Duuuuude." theory.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a COMPLAINING EQUATION. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic humorously describes the changing view of what an {{w|atom}} is.

;Small hard ball model
The first model shown, in 1810, is said to be a "small hard ball model." Around this time, {{w|John Dalton}} came up with the most famous maxim of chemistry: "All stuff is made of atoms." Dalton used the idea to explain what is today known as {{w|stoichiometry}}. Thus humans thought up the idea of atoms – but in lieu of any ideas of how they work, the scientific community likely thought of them as "hard round balls"; thus the name described here. Nowadays, people generally assume that atoms are small hard balls when first exposed to them, because they have seen diagrams of molecules where atoms are universally represented as small, hard, round balls connected by sticks.

;Plum pudding model
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the study of these "atom" things faced a crisis: where would the newly discovered "{{w|electron}}s" go? In 1904, physicist {{w|J. J. Thomson}}, who discovered electrons, had an idea: maybe the electrons were small point charges moving around in a big mass of positive charge. This was the "{{w|plum pudding model}}", the second model on the comic, called this because people imagined the positively charged mass as a "{{w|Christmas pudding|plum pudding}}". (The title text references Thomson as well, along with the humorous observation that plum puddings themselves are made of atoms.) The problem with this approach is that same charges generally repel, resulting in the more mobile or unbalanced charges forming a surface shell around the others, attempting to escape, rather than being content to being randomly distributed among them.

;Tiny bird model, Rutherford model
This was one of many competing ideas in the formative years of what-are-atoms-made-of-ology, where [[Randall]] claims a 1907 "tiny bird model" (the third model shown) would fit in well. But ultimately, the tentative winner in the battle was the model of Thomson's student {{w|Ernest Rutherford}}, who discovered from electrostatic scattering experiments that the positive charge seemed to be concentrated in the center of the atom, and put down his {{w|Rutherford model}}, or "planetary model", in 1911, where electrons orbit a very concentrated positive charge. This model has often been compared to the orbit of the planets around the sun. This is the fourth model put down.

;Bohr model
The Rutherford model could not explain the discrete spectral lines in absorption and emission spectra. {{w|Niels Bohr}} patched the model up with the newfangled idea of beginning quantum mechanics, creating his "{{w|Bohr model}}", the fifth model shown here, in 1913. Bohr proposed that electrons could only exist in distinct "energy levels" at discrete distances from the nucleus: proposing that physics behaves differently at the small scale of atoms than the large scales we are comfortable with. This turns out to be true.

;Nunchuck model, Chadwick model
If this sounds like today's model, you didn't pay enough attention; note that at this time, nobody thought of splitting up the nucleus into {{w|proton}}s and {{w|neutron}}s. But pretty soon people noticed that protons and neutrons existed; Randall facetiously suggests a "{{w|Nunchaku|nunchuck}} model", the sixth model shown, of a packet of protons swinging a packet of electrons around. But more seriously, {{w|James Chadwick}}, who discovered the neutron, figured that the atom had a nucleus of neutrons and protons, along with a bunch of electrons orbiting around it in a Bohrish manner. This is what the layman today often thinks of as an atom, and is thus the seventh model shown here. One can imagine a handle filled with electrons bonded by the strong nucleur force to a chain made of neutrons, bonded again by the strong nuclear force to a handle made of protons. The heavier protonic handle acts loosely as an orbital center as the electron-filled opposite handle swings wildly around it, attempting to resolve its electrostatic attraction within the restraints of its chain.

;538 Model
The eighth model shown is a "538 model" in 2008. {{w|FiveThirtyEight|538}} is a statistical analysis website that gained fame in 2008 for predicting every race but 2 correctly in the {{w|2008 United States presidential election|US presidential election}} and predicting every state and Obama's win in the 2012 election. Unlike most other media and polling institutes it saw a rather high probability of 29% for Trump to win the 2016 election by summing up the uncertainties in all the battle states. It has since been known for making mathematical models for everything; the model jokingly suggests that 538 has modeled and presumably made predictions about the atom. The {{w|pie chart}} shows the statistical composition of neutrons, protons and electrons, 38%, 31%, and 31% respectively. This could either be the average of a massive body with several isotopes or represent gallium-69, the most abundant {{w|Isotopes of gallium|isotope of gallium}}, with 31 protons, 31 electrons and 38 neutrons. FiveThirtyEight has previously been mentioned in several xkcd comics, including in [[477: Typewriter]], [[500: Election]], [[635: Locke and Demosthenes]], [[1130: Poll Watching]], [[1779: 2017]], and [[2002: LeBron James and Stephen Curry]].

;Quantum model
But is the Chadwick model what scientists endorse today? No!
{{w|Maxwell's equations}} complained, for instance, saying that accelerated (here: flying on the circle instead of a straight line) charges like the electrons would lose energy emitted as electromagnetic waves and would quickly orbit into the nucleus. Bohr only postulated that this would not happen, but his model could not explain, why. Another problem is that atoms, even the hydrogen atom are not flat - which they were, if a single electron orbited in a circular or elliptical trajectory.
Today (i.e. actually since 1926, 29 years after the discovery of the electron) physicists subscribe to a quantum model, which is the ninth model shown here. Instead of electrons with fixed location and momentum (~speed), there are quantum clouds, or more simply, the parts of the atom aren't in any particular point, but rather a probability field of possible locations and momentums. The changes in momentum probability normally cancel each other out, so there is no electromagnetic radiation. This is very abstract, and in the last model, the model is postulated to get so abstract that it is just a "small hard ball surrounded by math" model, the last model shown. This then is remarkably similar to the model we started out from, the "small hard ball model" (without the math).

;“Small hard ball surrounded by math” model
The picture for the "small ball surrounded by math" depicts a circle with several numbers around it. While the numbers seem to symbolize the "surrounding math" in a general sense, some of them suggest constants used in actual mathematical equations or other numbers related to the quantum model. The shapes and densities of the atomic orbitals are calculated with the {{w|Schrödinger_equation}}, which is complex and difficult to solve. Or with string theory, which does not make it easier. For this reason atoms are generally precisely considered in only very simple simulations, and the details of interactions of many atoms at large scales that form our daily lives are incredibly hard to precisely understand and predict on an atomic level. It comes down to "these roundish things we call atoms are moving around in these approximate ways obeying this complex equation with too many numbers involved in most situations to accurately model, so let's use a different, empirically derived formula that describes the behavior of the system in general."

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Number !! Explanation
|-
| 18 || Maximum number of electrons in the third (M) {{w|electron shell}}
|-
| 0.1 || 1/10th, a simple decimal
|-
| π || The {{w|Pi|number pi}} present in many physics equations, often as its double value (2π); also in the definition of the {{w|Planck_constant#Value|reduced Planck constant}} present in quantum-mechanical equations.
|-
| 173 || Possibly a typo (could be 137) referring to the fine structure constant which value is approximately 1/137
|-
| √2 || An irrational constant, the square root of two, which comes up frequently
|-
| 4i || A simple complex number; i is considered the square root of -1 and using it can provide for more complex mathematics
|}

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[One large panel with a caption centered on top and ten small drawings in two rows. Each drawing has a description below it.]

:'''Models of the Atom'''
:over time

:[A somewhat imperfectly drawn circle.]
:1810 Small hard ball model

:[A rounded-corners trapezoid inside which there are four small plus signs and four small circles with minus signs inside them.]
:1904 Plum pudding model

:[A bigger circle, with four birds on the surface and music notes above.]
:1907 Tiny bird model

:[A small circle with dots circling around it, drawn with paths.]
:1911 Rutherford model

:[A circle with a plus sign with three circles around it, each with a dot.]
:1913 Bohr model

:[A nunchuck swinging, with the left stick filled with circles with plus signs and the right stick filled with circles with minus signs.]
:1928 Nunchuck model

:[A nucleus with three circles around it, each with a dot.]
:1932 Chadwick model

:[A pie chart, where a part of it has a circle, a part of it has a circle with a minus sign and a part of it has a circle with a plus sign.]
:2008 538 model

:[A circle, with (...)]
:Today Quantum model

:[A circle with surrounded with numbers.]
:Numbers: 18, 0.1, π, 173, √2, 4i
:Future "Small hard ball surrounded by math" model

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Physics]]

2100: Models of the Atom

2019-01-19T08:10:59Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2100
| date = January 18, 2019
| title = Models of the Atom
| image = models_of_the_atom.png
| titletext = J.J. Thompson won a Nobel Prize for his work in electricity in gases, but was unfairly passed over for his "An atom is plum pudding, and plum pudding is MADE of atoms! Duuuuude." theory.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a COMPLAINING EQUATION. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic humorously describes the changing view of what an {{w|atom}} is.

;Small hard ball model
The first model shown, in 1810, is said to be a "small hard ball model." Around this time, {{w|John Dalton}} came up with the most famous maxim of chemistry: "All stuff is made of atoms." Dalton used the idea to explain what is today known as {{w|stoichiometry}}. Thus humans thought up the idea of atoms – but in lieu of any ideas of how they work, the scientific community likely thought of them as "hard round balls"; thus the name described here. Nowadays, people generally assume that atoms are small hard balls when first exposed to them, because they have seen diagrams of molecules where atoms are universally represented as small, hard, round balls connected by sticks.

;Plum pudding model
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the study of these "atom" things faced a crisis: where would the newly discovered "{{w|electron}}s" go? In 1904, physicist {{w|J. J. Thomson}}, who discovered electrons, had an idea: maybe the electrons were small point charges moving around in a big mass of positive charge. This was the "{{w|plum pudding model}}", the second model on the comic, called this because people imagined the positively charged mass as a "{{w|Christmas pudding|plum pudding}}". (The title text references Thomson as well, along with the humorous observation that plum puddings themselves are made of atoms.) The problem with this approach is that same charges generally repel, resulting in the more mobile or unbalanced charges forming a surface shell around the others, attempting to escape, rather than being content to being randomly distributed among them.

;Tiny bird model, Rutherford model
This was one of many competing ideas in the formative years of what-are-atoms-made-of-ology, where [[Randall]] claims a 1907 "tiny bird model" (the third model shown) would fit in well. But ultimately, the tentative winner in the battle was the model of Thomson's student {{w|Ernest Rutherford}}, who discovered from electrostatic scattering experiments that the positive charge seemed to be concentrated in the center of the atom, and put down his {{w|Rutherford model}}, or "planetary model", in 1911, where electrons orbit a very concentrated positive charge. This model has often been compared to the orbit of the planets around the sun. This is the fourth model put down.

;Bohr model
The Rutherford model could not explain the discrete spectral lines in absorption and emission spectra. {{w|Niels Bohr}} patched the model up with the newfangled idea of beginning quantum mechanics, creating his "{{w|Bohr model}}", the fifth model shown here, in 1913. Bohr proposed that electrons could only exist in distinct "energy levels" at discrete distances from the nucleus: proposing that physics behaves differently at the small scale of atoms than the large scales we are comfortable with. This turns out to be true.

;Nunchuck model, Chadwick model
If this sounds like today's model, you didn't pay enough attention; note that at this time, nobody thought of splitting up the nucleus into {{w|proton}}s and {{w|neutron}}s. But pretty soon people noticed that protons and neutrons existed; Randall facetiously suggests a "{{w|Nunchaku|nunchuck}} model", the sixth model shown, of a packet of protons swinging a packet of electrons around. But more seriously, {{w|James Chadwick}}, who discovered the neutron, figured that the atom had a nucleus of neutrons and protons, along with a bunch of electrons orbiting around it in a Bohrish manner. This is what the layman today often thinks of as an atom, and is thus the seventh model shown here. One can imagine a handle filled with electrons bonded by the strong nucleur force to a chain made of neutrons, bonded again by the strong nuclear force to a handle made of protons. The heavier protonic handle acts loosely as an orbital center as the electron-filled opposite handle swings wildly around it, attempting to resolve its electrostatic attraction within the restraints of its chain.

;538 Model
The eighth model shown is a "538 model" in 2008. {{w|FiveThirtyEight|538}} is a statistical analysis website that gained fame in 2008 for predicting every race but 2 correctly in the {{w|2008 United States presidential election|US presidential election}} and predicting every state and Obama's win in the 2012 election. Unlike most other media and polling institutes it saw a rather high probability of 29% for Trump to win the 2016 election by summing up the uncertainties in all the battle states. It has since been known for making mathematical models for everything; the model jokingly suggests that 538 has modeled and presumably made predictions about the atom. The {{w|pie chart}} shows the statistical composition of neutrons, protons and electrons, 38%, 31%, and 31% respectively. This could either be the average of a massive body with several isotopes or represent gallium-69, the most abundant {{w|Isotopes of gallium|isotope of gallium}}, with 31 protons, 31 electrons and 38 neutrons. FiveThirtyEight has previously been mentioned in several xkcd comics, including in [[477: Typewriter]], [[500: Election]], [[635: Locke and Demosthenes]], [[1130: Poll Watching]], [[1779: 2017]], and [[2002: LeBron James and Stephen Curry]].

;Quantum model
But is the Chadwick model what scientists endorse today? No!
{{w|Maxwell's equations}} complained, for instance, saying that accelerated (here: flying on the circle instead of a straight line) charges like the electrons would lose energy emitted as electromagnetic waves and would quickly orbit into the nucleus. Bohr only postulated that this would not happen, but his model could not explain, why. Another problem is that atoms, even the hydrogen atom are not flat - which they were, if a single electron orbited in a circular or elliptical trajectory.
Today physicists subscribe to a quantum model, which is the ninth model shown here. Instead of electrons with fixed location and momentum (~speed), there are quantum clouds, or more simply, the parts of the atom aren't in any particular point, but rather a probability field of possible locations and momentums. The changes in momentum probability normally cancel each other out, so there is no electromagnetic radiation. This is very abstract, and in the last model, the model is postulated to get so abstract that it is just a "small hard ball surrounded by math" model, the last model shown. This then is remarkably similar to the model we started out from, the "small hard ball model" (without the math).

;“Small hard ball surrounded by math” model
The picture for the "small ball surrounded by math" depicts a circle with several numbers around it. While the numbers seem to symbolize the "surrounding math" in a general sense, some of them suggest constants used in actual mathematical equations or other numbers related to the quantum model. The shapes and densities of the atomic orbitals are calculated with the {{w|Schrödinger_equation}}, which is complex and difficult to solve. Or with string theory, which does not make it easier. For this reason atoms are generally precisely considered in only very simple simulations, and the details of interactions of many atoms at large scales that form our daily lives are incredibly hard to precisely understand and predict on an atomic level. It comes down to "these roundish things we call atoms are moving around in these approximate ways obeying this complex equation with too many numbers involved in most situations to accurately model, so let's use a different, empirically derived formula that describes the behavior of the system in general."

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Number !! Explanation
|-
| 18 || Maximum number of electrons in the third (M) {{w|electron shell}}
|-
| 0.1 || 1/10th, a simple decimal
|-
| π || The {{w|Pi|number pi}} present in many physics equations, often as its double value (2π); also in the definition of the {{w|Planck_constant#Value|reduced Planck constant}} present in quantum-mechanical equations.
|-
| 173 || Possibly a typo (could be 137) referring to the fine structure constant which value is approximately 1/137
|-
| √2 || An irrational constant, the square root of two, which comes up frequently
|-
| 4i || A simple complex number; i is considered the square root of -1 and using it can provide for more complex mathematics
|}

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[One large panel with a caption centered on top and ten small drawings in two rows. Each drawing has a description below it.]

:'''Models of the Atom'''
:over time

:[A somewhat imperfectly drawn circle.]
:1810 Small hard ball model

:[A rounded-corners trapezoid inside which there are four small plus signs and four small circles with minus signs inside them.]
:1904 Plum pudding model

:[A bigger circle, with four birds on the surface and music notes above.]
:1907 Tiny bird model

:[A small circle with dots circling around it, drawn with paths.]
:1911 Rutherford model

:[A circle with a plus sign with three circles around it, each with a dot.]
:1913 Bohr model

:[A nunchuck swinging, with the left stick filled with circles with plus signs and the right stick filled with circles with minus signs.]
:1928 Nunchuck model

:[A nucleus with three circles around it, each with a dot.]
:1932 Chadwick model

:[A pie chart, where a part of it has a circle, a part of it has a circle with a minus sign and a part of it has a circle with a plus sign.]
:2008 538 model

:[A circle, with (...)]
:Today Quantum model

:[A circle with surrounded with numbers.]
:Numbers: 18, 0.1, π, 173, √2, 4i
:Future "Small hard ball surrounded by math" model

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Physics]]

2100: Models of the Atom

2019-01-19T07:59:20Z

172.68.110.64:

{{comic
| number = 2100
| date = January 18, 2019
| title = Models of the Atom
| image = models_of_the_atom.png
| titletext = J.J. Thompson won a Nobel Prize for his work in electricity in gases, but was unfairly passed over for his "An atom is plum pudding, and plum pudding is MADE of atoms! Duuuuude." theory.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a COMPLAINING EQUATION. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic humorously describes the changing view of what an {{w|atom}} is.

;Small hard ball model
The first model shown, in 1810, is said to be a "small hard ball model." Around this time, {{w|John Dalton}} came up with the most famous maxim of chemistry: "All stuff is made of atoms." Dalton used the idea to explain what is today known as {{w|stoichiometry}}. Thus humans thought up the idea of atoms – but in lieu of any ideas of how they work, the scientific community likely thought of them as "hard round balls"; thus the name described here. Nowadays, people generally assume that atoms are small hard balls when first exposed to them, because they have seen diagrams of molecules where atoms are universally represented as small, hard, round balls connected by sticks.

;Plum pudding model
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the study of these "atom" things faced a crisis: where would the newly discovered "{{w|electron}}s" go? In 1904, physicist {{w|J. J. Thomson}}, who discovered electrons, had an idea: maybe the electrons were small point charges moving around in a big mass of positive charge. This was the "{{w|plum pudding model}}", the second model on the comic, called this because people imagined the positively charged mass as a "{{w|Christmas pudding|plum pudding}}". (The title text references Thomson as well, along with the humorous observation that plum puddings themselves are made of atoms.) The problem with this approach is that same charges generally repel, resulting in the more mobile or unbalanced charges forming a surface shell around the others, attempting to escape, rather than being content to being randomly distributed among them.

;Tiny bird model, Rutherford model
This was one of many competing ideas in the formative years of what-are-atoms-made-of-ology, where [[Randall]] claims a 1907 "tiny bird model" (the third model shown) would fit in well. But ultimately, the tentative winner in the battle was the model of Thomson's student {{w|Ernest Rutherford}}, who discovered from electrostatic scattering experiments that the positive charge seemed to be concentrated in the center of the atom, and put down his {{w|Rutherford model}}, or "planetary model", in 1911, where electrons orbit a positive charge. This model has often been compared to the orbit of the planets around the sun. This is the fourth model put down.

;Bohr model
The Rutherford model could not explain the discrete spectral lines in absorption and emission spectra. {{w|Niels Bohr}} patched the model up with the newfangled idea of quantum mechanics, creating his "{{w|Bohr model}}", the fifth model shown here, in 1913. Bohr proposed that electrons could only exist in distinct "energy levels" at discrete distances from the nucleus: proposing that physics behaves differently at the small scale of atoms than the large scales we are comfortable with. This turns out to be true.

;Nunchuck model, Chadwick model
If this sounds like today's model, you didn't pay enough attention; note that at this time, nobody thought of splitting up the nucleus into {{w|proton}}s and {{w|neutron}}s. But pretty soon people noticed that protons and neutrons existed; Randall facetiously suggests a "{{w|Nunchaku|nunchuck}} model", the sixth model shown, of a packet of protons swinging a packet of electrons around. But more seriously, {{w|James Chadwick}}, who discovered the neutron, figured that the atom had a nucleus of neutrons and protons, along with a bunch of electrons orbiting around it in a Bohrish manner. This is what the layman today often thinks of as an atom, and is thus the seventh model shown here. One can imagine a handle filled with electrons bonded by the strong nucleur force to a chain made of neutrons, bonded again by the strong nuclear force to a handle made of protons. The heavier protonic handle acts loosely as an orbital center as the electron-filled opposite handle swings wildly around it, attempting to resolve its electrostatic attraction within the restraints of its chain.

;538 Model
The eighth model shown is a "538 model" in 2008. {{w|FiveThirtyEight|538}} is a statistical analysis website that gained fame in 2008 for predicting every race but 2 correctly in the {{w|2008 United States presidential election|US presidential election}} and predicting every state and Obama's win in the 2012 election. Unlike most other media and polling institutes it saw a rather high probability of 29% for Trump to win the 2016 election by summing up the uncertainties in all the battle states. It has since been known for making mathematical models for everything; the model jokingly suggests that 538 has modeled and presumably made predictions about the atom. The {{w|pie chart}} shows the statistical composition of neutrons, protons and electrons, 38%, 31%, and 31% respectively. This could either be the average of a massive body with several isotopes or represent gallium-69, the most abundant {{w|Isotopes of gallium|isotope of gallium}}, with 31 protons, 31 electrons and 38 neutrons. FiveThirtyEight has previously been mentioned in several xkcd comics, including in [[477: Typewriter]], [[500: Election]], [[635: Locke and Demosthenes]], [[1130: Poll Watching]], [[1779: 2017]], and [[2002: LeBron James and Stephen Curry]].

;Quantum model
But is the Chadwick model what scientists endorse today? No!
{{w|Maxwell's equations}} complained, for instance, saying that accelerated (here: flying on the circle instead of a straight line) charges like the electrons would lose energy emitted as electromagnetic waves and would quickly orbit into the nucleus. Bohr only postulated that this would not happen, but his model could not explain, why. Another problem is that atoms, even the hydrogen atom are not flat - which they were, if a single electron orbited in a circular or elliptical trajectory.
Today physicists subscribe to a quantum model, which is the ninth model shown here. Instead of electrons with fixed location and momentum (~speed), there are quantum clouds, or more simply, the parts of the atom aren't in any particular point, but rather a probability field of possible locations and momentums. The changes in momentum probability normally cancel each other out, so there is no electromagnetic radiation. This is very abstract, and in the last model, the model is postulated to get so abstract that it is just a "small hard ball surrounded by math" model, the last model shown. This then is remarkably similar to the model we started out from, the "small hard ball model" (without the math).

;“Small hard ball surrounded by math” model
The picture for the "small ball surrounded by math" depicts a circle with several numbers around it. While the numbers seem to symbolize the "surrounding math" in a general sense, some of them suggest constants used in actual mathematical equations or other numbers related to the quantum model. The shapes and densities of the atomic orbitals are calculated with the {{w|Schrödinger_equation}}, which is complex and difficult to solve. For this reason atoms are generally precisely considered in only very simple simulations, and the details of interactions of many atoms at large scales that form our daily lives are incredibly hard to precisely understand and predict on an atomic level. It comes down to "these roundish things we call atoms are moving around in these approximate ways obeying this complex equation with too many numbers involved in most situations to accurately model, so let's use a different, empirically derived formula that describes the behavior of the system in general."

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Number !! Explanation
|-
| 18 || Maximum number of electrons in the third (M) {{w|electron shell}}
|-
| 0.1 || 1/10th, a simple decimal
|-
| π || The {{w|Pi|number pi}} present in many physics equations, often as its double value (2π); also in the definition of the {{w|Planck_constant#Value|reduced Planck constant}} present in quantum-mechanical equations.
|-
| 173 || Possibly a typo (could be 137) referring to the fine structure constant which value is approximately 1/137
|-
| √2 || An irrational constant, the square root of two, which comes up frequently
|-
| 4i || A simple complex number; i is considered the square root of -1 and using it can provide for more complex mathematics
|}

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[One large panel with a caption centered on top and ten small drawings in two rows. Each drawing has a description below it.]

:'''Models of the Atom'''
:over time

:[A somewhat imperfectly drawn circle.]
:1810 Small hard ball model

:[A rounded-corners trapezoid inside which there are four small plus signs and four small circles with minus signs inside them.]
:1904 Plum pudding model

:[A bigger circle, with four birds on the surface and music notes above.]
:1907 Tiny bird model

:[A small circle with dots circling around it, drawn with paths.]
:1911 Rutherford model

:[A circle with a plus sign with three circles around it, each with a dot.]
:1913 Bohr model

:[A nunchuck swinging, with the left stick filled with circles with plus signs and the right stick filled with circles with minus signs.]
:1928 Nunchuck model

:[A nucleus with three circles around it, each with a dot.]
:1932 Chadwick model

:[A pie chart, where a part of it has a circle, a part of it has a circle with a minus sign and a part of it has a circle with a plus sign.]
:2008 538 model

:[A circle, with (...)]
:Today Quantum model

:[A circle with surrounded with numbers.]
:Numbers: 18, 0.1, π, 173, √2, 4i
:Future "Small hard ball surrounded by math" model

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Physics]]

Talk:1918: NEXUS

2017-11-20T17:05:17Z

172.68.110.64:

My first idea -- this is so draft I'm not even going to submit it into the Explanation: Could Cueball be associating NEXUS with the FernGully villain Hexxus? And the Cisco company/brand of IT products with Commander/Captain Benjamin Sisko from ''ST:DS9'' and Crisco vegetable shortening? I don't have time to look into the other things referenced, and I don't immediately recognize them, but feel free to build on this if you want. Or don't; I don't have time to care right now. '''--BigMal''' // 13:00, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

But Sisko saved Deep Space Nine! [[Special:Contributions/141.101.105.18|141.101.105.18]] 13:02, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Ciscoes are a whitefish in the Salmonid family --13:08, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

The "Thong Song" is sang by an artist named "Sisqo". And ''The Caballero's Way'' written by O.Henry features a character named "the Cisco Kid". [[Special:Contributions/162.158.150.82|162.158.150.82]] 13:14, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Cisco Kid went on to feature in Comics, films and a Depp Purple Song

Cisco Kid also a Sublime song. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.154|108.162.216.154]] 15:52, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

What is interesting: Cueball does not refuse all that food and cultural phenomena, because of their association with Cisco, but the other way round! So it is by sheer chance that Cueball hates similar sounding things. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.64|172.68.110.64]] 17:05, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

== a few more ==

o henry:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cisco_Kid

fish
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cisco_(fish)

incan
http://emperorsnew.wikia.com/wiki/Kuzco

brak
http://brak.wikia.com/wiki/Sisto
[[Special:Contributions/141.101.76.202|141.101.76.202]] 13:14, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

----

I was really looking forward to coming over to ExplainXKCD.com and seeing the explanation "We don't get it, either." Disappointed again! [[User:Jpd|Jpd]] ([[User talk:Jpd|talk]]) 14:15, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

== Other Nexuses ==

I'm surprised Cueball didn't also refer to [http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Nexus The Nexus] from Star Trek Generations. That's definitely something I wouldn't want to sign up for. Sure, it will speed up your travel, but that assumes you can get out in the first place. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 14:59, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Nexi*

Also - how about the Google Android phone? [[User:Brettpeirce|Brettpeirce]] ([[User talk:Brettpeirce|talk]]) 15:53, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

== Broader context ==

People sometimes really engage in boycotts because of confusion that's almost that silly. In 2008, some people wanted to boycott [https://www.cbsnews.com/news/boycott-arizona-iced-tea-wait-a-second/|boycott Arizona Iced Tea] over an Arizona immigration law, even though the company is based in New York. [[User:Gmcgath|Gmcgath]] ([[User talk:Gmcgath|talk]]) 16:49, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Talk:672: Suggestions

2017-08-07T19:59:24Z

172.68.110.64:

What is the icon in the third panel supposed to be? --[[User:NeatNit|NeatNit]] ([[User talk:NeatNit|talk]]) 13:40, 26 June 2014 (UTC)
: Two people being warm against each other. --[[User:Bedunkel|BD]] ([[User talk:Bedunkel|talk]]) 01:14, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
::So we have a multi millionaire with no life, no respect for anyone's privacy and no moral scruples that has been running this make-believe world since he was a pimply kid and offering the full Monty to any would be Faust.
::HTF did we let that happen? :~D
::Oh yes, sexual persuasion. Why do I get the impression this is all going to end badly for everyone involved?

How is Susie "drawn as a sexy version of Megan"? That seems to be a bit of a reach to me.

[[User:Weatherlawyer| I used Google News BEFORE it was clickbait]] ([[User talk:Weatherlawyer|talk]]) 00:09, 28 January 2015 (UTC)