explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:3046: Stromatolites

2025-02-04T17:31:50Z

172.68.23.217:

Yay, another Beret Guy appearance! '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 03:46, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

I'm not sure if I'm trying to remember Bloom County and the penguin (Opus) or Snoopy by Schulz because of the last panel. Shrug. Prolly both. Warm is good. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.175.208|172.70.175.208]] 06:08, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
:Add Zonker to this list? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.39|108.162.245.39]] 17:29, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

How can anybody be related to rock formations? Stomatolites are not organisms, they are the product of organisms. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.105.88|141.101.105.88]] 08:12, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
:This might be one of Randall's weaker offerings in terms of scientific accuracy. I think that "stromatolites" as here used refers to the cyanobacterial component of stromatolites, which is the component detected in ancient fossils and is the one responsible for oxygen-evolving photosynthesis (responsible for what was perhaps the {{w|Great_Oxidation_Event|first global environmental catastrophe}} - an element of ancestry of which it might be wise not to boast). Modern stromatolites have both cyanobacteria (ancestors of plastids) and alpha-proteobacteria (ancestors of mitochondria) in their microbial mats, and it's reasonable to assume that alpha-proteobacteria were present in the fossils. So the "cousins" would be of cyanobacteria in the stromatolites, not the stromatolites themselves (in which both were, presumably, cohabiting). Beret Guy also appears to be confused about the proposed sequence of events leading to the origins of mitochondria and eukaryotic cell nuclei. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.39|108.162.245.39]] 17:29, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
:I've seen the surviving microbial mats in Australia referred to as "stromatolites" as well.[[User:Nitpicking|Nitpicking]] ([[User talk:Nitpicking|talk]]) 12:39, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

I wonder if he is related to any specific dinosaurs or whether he bypassed that branch of the tree completely. 09:48, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

I think there's a joke (or at least a reference) here about the relatedness of life. All currently-known organisms are related by descent from a common ancestor, which in English makes us all cousins, of various distances. Mitochondria in plants and animals, for instance, must descend from the same bacterium-like organism that became an endosymbiont in a proto-eukaryote.[[User:Nitpicking|Nitpicking]] ([[User talk:Nitpicking|talk]]) 12:39, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
:Since mitochondria and chloroplasts were both originally distinct organisms that were absorbed into the host cells, that makes most modern life descendants of cannibals. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 15:37, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
::By that logic, eating pretty much any food except salt (and maybe dairy?) is cannibalism. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.70.87|172.68.70.87]] 16:09, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

I immediately thought of [https://fabpedigree.com/ Fabulous Pedigree], which ''does'' include ancestry (and side-branches) going back to (and past) mitochondria, though from a quick check it doesn't seem to specifically include stromatolites. Obviously the listing has lots of (mostly implied) gaps. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.217.72|162.158.217.72]] 13:55, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

== The [[What If? chapters|What If? article index]] project ==

Hey everyone,

I'm not sure if you noticed the banner of the site, but for the last few weeks a group of [[Talk:What If? chapters|incredibly talented editors]] have been redesigning the [[What If? chapters|'''index of ''What If?'' articles''']] from the ground up. Among other things, we've merged two huge tables, added a TON of additional info, created complex templates, and made [[What If? chapters|dozens and dozens of other improvements]]. I believe that, as a wiki, we should have a complete and detailed index of all what if? articles, [[List of all comics (full)|just like we do for the comics]], and we're getting so close to that goal! We mostly only need to add the missing explanations, improve the existing ones, and add the questions and answer summary from the books (plus other things).

We would love your help (especially if you have the first book)! We've prepared a [[What If? chapters|to-do list]] at the top of the page, containing everything that needs to be done, if you're interested. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 07:00, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

==Clicking and clicking and clicking==

I've added a bit about the length of time it would need to take to click that far back in the past. I'm sure I have got the amount out by several orders of magnitude, so I would appreciate it if anyone fancies a go at estimating how long Beret Guy would have taken. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.241.27|172.71.241.27]] 10:49, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

3045: AlphaMove

2025-02-01T06:37:00Z

172.68.23.217: Stockfish explanation

{{comic
| number = 3045
| date = January 31, 2025
| title = AlphaMove
| image = alphamove_2x.png
| imagesize = 500x526px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = It struggles a little with complex positions, like when there are an even number of moves and it has to round down, but when run against itself it's capable of finding some novelties. At one point I saw six knights on the board at once; Stockfish rarely exceeds four.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by THE SEVENTH KNIGHT, WAITING IN ANTICIPATION. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic shows a new {{w|chess engine}}, presumably created by Randall, which takes a list of all legal moves (in {{w|Algebraic notation (chess)|algebraic notation}}) in alphabetical order and chooses the median. Algebraic notation begins with a symbol for which piece is being moved, which is always the first letter of the piece name except for knights (N) and pawns (nothing). This is then followed by the square that the piece is being moved to. (Rc4 would indicate a move that moved a rook to c4.) Other symbols include a lowercase x before the destination, indicating that the move is a capture; a plus sign (+) after the destination, indicating that the move places the opposing king in check; and a pound sign (#) after the destination, indicating that the move places the opposing king in checkmate, thus winning the game. There is also O-O and O-O-O, which indicate that a player is castling kingside or queenside, respectively.

In practice, this algorithm runs into a few issues. As seen in the comic, the algorithm rarely moves bishops and rooks due to their relative lack of moves in the early game, and their tendency to inhabit the edges of any list when they do have sortable moves. Among basic moves, only pawns destined to move in the first two files of a board can ever sort higher than bishops, and nothing other than another rook can be closer to the far end than a rook. AlphaMove can never {{w|Castling|castle}} due to the notation for it (0-0 or 0-0-0) being the only one to start with a number, and thus (if ever possible) always being the first in the list. (It's also not possible to create a board state where it's the only legal move, both because the king or rook moving without castling is a legal move, and because castling cannot be done while in check.) The algorithm instead favors knight and king moves, with entries starting with the most alphabetically middling "K" and "N" list entries, and (to a lesser extent) pawns destined to move up the right side of the board, the "h"-file pawn generally having the greatest statistical chance.

The ''actual'' middle of the list might vary away from the usual alphabetic median if the moves (and the pieces removed by the opponent) are heavily biased to a particular subset of player-pieces. It is conceivable that an opponent could identify the AlphaMove strategy as being used, and then use their foreknowledge of the algorithm's 'developing game' to strategically make (normally non-optimal?) moves designed explicitly to force the algorithm down their own choice of paths, such as targeting undefended rooks and queens (either capturing them with impunity, or just strategically restricting their movements by moving into contact with them in such a way as to normally be a suicidal sacrifice), in order to make certain other pieces take their own moves. Although, given the established failings of uncritically sticking to the algorithmic plan, it is probably ''vastly'' more effort to precisely engineer a given game-state than to merely play properly, and respond with half-decent responses to the overwhelmingly sub-optimal series of moves.

This engine may be named for and inspired by the real chess engine, {{w|AlphaZero}}. Another real name, mentioned in the title text, is {{w|Stockfish (chess)|Stockfish}}, a widely used (and powerful) chess engine.

See also [[3036: Chess Zoo]].

On this board, Black can win the game instantly with ...Bb4{{w|Checkmate|#}}. Rather than do anything to defend against this, White just moves an unrelated piece, almost certainly losing right afterward.

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

:My new AlphaMove chess engine, which sorts the list of legal moves alphabetically and picks the middle one, was quickly defeated by stronger engines.

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

Talk:3036: Chess Zoo

2025-01-22T01:25:24Z

172.68.23.217: Discussion on whether promoting pawns make noise

For the transcript, I’m thinking of saying that “there are alternating white and grey squares, with smaller black squares imposed on them. The pattern of squares goes ''[something like GWBWGWBWGBW]''“. Would that work? Or is it too confusing? '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 19:03, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
:Re: "GWBWGWBWGBW", knowing who we are here, I presume people might want to distinguish black-on-white from black-on-gray. We'd probably have to have a full markup system for background (gray/white) and foreground (empty, human, barrier, white pawn, gray pawn...). Maybe something like {[gE][wE][gB][wQg]}... Hrm... Because, of course, it has to be as complicated and precise as possible. :) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.46.135|172.70.46.135]] 19:15, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
::I don’t really like the current transcript because I believe that it’s more confusing to read than my version. Anyone have thoughts? '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 23:28, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
:::Although I do have a suggestion for the transcript: instead of having “H” as a representation of a human, we can have C for [[Cueball]], H for [[Hairy]], P for [[Ponytail]], W for [[White Hat]], D for [[Danish]], M for [[Megan]], and K for [[Knit Cap]]. We could also have Unicode black squares instead of the “#” and color the pieces with span. Thoughts? '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 00:14, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't think it's safe to allow people to go into the bishop enclosure, especially with high aggression in that area since both colors are able to look at each other there but not capture. One of those bishops is eventually going to take it out on someone. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.210|162.158.90.210]] 19:34, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
:I don't know how dangerous they are to visitors in general, but I wouldn't leave children with them unattended. Maybe the enclosures with the knights would be good petting zoos. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 19:49, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
:Thank you for reporting the bishop feeding gate being open, as this was the fifteenth time the one responsible failed to close it after feeding, he has been summarily fired.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.47.106|172.70.47.106]] 20:02, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
:Depends - they're only dangerous in the proselytising season.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.186.43|172.68.186.43]] 14:41, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

The zoo seems to be missing an area for knights and bishops to interact. (It has a knight/queen area, a knight/rook area, and a rook/bishop area. It can't have queen/rook or queen/bishop areas if it wants to have areas for rooks or bishops that exclude queens, because nothing blocks queens without blocking rooks and bishops. But it could have a knight/bishop mingling area, accessible to knights via wall-jump and to bishops via a diagonal corridor, and it doesn't.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.187.84|162.158.187.84]] 20:07, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
:Similarly, couldn't the pawn promoting zones be more centrally located each side, and have passages respectively for queens/rooks and for knights? Of course then those could enter and interact with promoting pawns, but why would that be deemed a problem? --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.222.164|172.69.222.164]] 20:41, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
::No because it a promoted queen can come into a zone with rooks then it can also get into the bishops room and then enter the opposing bishops room and take them and then get to take opposing rooks and knights as well. It would also be hard to keep knight's out of the opposing side if they get into the bishops area, it would take a lot of wall space. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 10:52, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
:I believe a knight-knight interaction zone of opposing colors is also possible if correctly designed (such as a 2xn corridor with a particular entrance [[Special:Contributions/162.158.154.52|162.158.154.52]] 03:11, 11 January 2025 (UTC)
::It would have to be a very restrictive zone. In the case of the 3x3 of [[839: Explorers]], any knight not on the centre-tile could technically take (or be taken by) any other such knight of that was also there (and not on the centre-tile). Though any knight in imminent danger could of course move to not be (the knight that posed the danger could then move to repose that danger, and they dance around the board in {{w|octagram}}ish 'circuits'.
::I would propose, though, that a limited-jump entry from two adjoining enclosures to land knights onto a 2x3 'shared enclosure' could work, such that they can't jump to any more thn their two opposite corners (thus also never jump out of it into the other's 'normal' enclosure). And, in my head, I'm imagning a form of zig-zagging diagonal that might extend the area without overlapping the (though intermingling, as with bishops) the viable landing zones. The following is a quick (and probably incorrect, if you spot the probable errors I've not handled correctly) method of mingling two sets of knights (1 & 2, mostly given free reign to top left and bottom right) between walls (#) and various other 'open' squares (.) that could be something else.
2222###........
2222#######....
#2###21#####...
#####122#1##..#
#.####212######
....###221###1#
.....###122#111
......###21##11
.......#####111
........#.#1111
.........###111
::In fact, with a narrower corridor, I believe I could constrain two sets of knights to travelling mutually non-antagonistically across a nominally intermingled diagonalised 'neutral-zone', ''plus'' send a viable 'bishop corridor' (in fact multiple bishop-corridors!) across in the other diagonal, but then it'd have to be a far less generous pseudo-shared area for the knights, and wouldn't look even as good as the above. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.205.123|172.68.205.123]] 00:11, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
:: You can have some interesting shaped-areas for knights too, not just corridors; you can trivially put two knights together by blocking one of them from moving at all, the interesting question is how to give them both the most freedom of movement, safely, and/or the minimum number of 'blocks' for a given area. e.g. [https://output.jsbin.com/wegelanuci] [[User:JeffUK|JeffUK]] ([[User talk:JeffUK|talk]]) 11:24, 13 January 2025 (UTC)
:You can't have same-coloured knights also enter into an opposites-of-bishop shared space, because for all the wish to have shared (overlapping but not congruent) spaces for pieces of the same colour but different limitations, the presence of the anti-bishops would mean contention with the pro-knights.
:The fact tht the pawn-enclosures are totally without any same-set pieces (well, apart from the knight, but that was from a promotion) ''does'' seem to suggest there's a lack of possible mixing going on, I know. But, the way I read it, if heterochromic pieces can be 'mixed', then they can (which effectively is just the two different ecclesiastical compliments), with homochomic ones then also being allowed to mix if they can do so in a way such that they have ''all'' of an "A and B" area, an "A-only" area and a "B-only" area (it's a bit more complicated than that with the kings and queens, as they can traverse all of the same areas as each other, plus the lobe of knight-area which overlaps, but you have "knight+royal", "royal-only" and "knight-only").
:Though I ''can'' think of one such sharing-situation I would mark down as missed: i.e. a pawn sharing a space with bishops and/or knights with a bishop-/knight-proof corridor 'directly forward' (and, of course, no sideways movement allowed by the pawn), giving the pawn both its unique space and shared space and only-the-other-piece spaces off to the sides. Though, the whole promotion prospects means that just about anything could 'suddenly' be in the pawn-only space, thus sending potential knights/bishops into that 'by proxy'.
:...or maybe I've not extrapolated Randall's precise methodology here, but I believe I've accounted the general limitations he seems to have worked to. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.33.215|162.158.33.215]] 00:57, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't have permissions to upload an image to this wiki, but if anyone who does would like to copy it over, I illustrated each piece's range of movement here[https://pasteboard.co/64VsBMA5af8l.png]. [[User:D5xtgr|D5xtgr]] ([[User talk:D5xtgr|talk]]) 20:09, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
:I have put the picture in a [[3036:_Chess_Zoo#Trivia|trivia]] section --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:03, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

The plan of the zoo looks like opposing Lewis Chess Men! [[User:Nicholasbailey87|Nicholasbailey87]] ([[User talk:Nicholasbailey87|talk]]) 23:28, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

the transcript needs to be descriptive rather than a text-based diagram so it's screenreader accessible. if someone thinks it's necessary they can move the ascii art to the description. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.71.101|172.68.71.101]] 23:40, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

A knight recently escaped. When asked for comment, the director of the zoo said "!?" [[Special:Contributions/172.68.70.134|172.68.70.134]] 01:07, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

This is actually a sokoban chess puzzle, where the pieces can push the blocks. White to move and mate in 47.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.205|172.70.214.205]] 02:40, 11 January 2025 (UTC)NickM

In the UK there is a famous zoo called "Chester Zoo", comic readers from the UK will think there is a pun.--[[User:Doctormo|Doctormo]] ([[User talk:Doctormo|talk]]) 03:46, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

In Russian, chess knights and bishops are literally called horses and elephants. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.148.59|172.71.148.59]] 10:40, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't think that the 'same portals that block bishops' can block knights, not without being longer. A knight could get through the 'petting zoo' portal to the bishop paddock. But there's another example below and to the left of a similar portal but much longer that DOES prevent the knights from passing. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.194.90|172.71.194.90]] 14:21, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

Do I need new glasses or did the black king escape? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.95.97|162.158.95.97]] 17:15, 11 January 2025 (UTC)
:Look at the third visitor along at the 'top', then go straight down. Maybe less obvious as the dark pieces hide their internal details more, leaving just their fuzzy (depending on zoom level) outlines. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.79.164|172.69.79.164]] 21:10, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

It looks like the transcript has switched the K's and Q's. The king is the piece with the cross on his crown. See {{w|Staunton chess set}}. --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.157|172.68.54.157]] 22:01, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

It’s too bad it couldn’t have somehow allowed castling, or maybe it could’ve just pretended it did. I would’ve appreciated title text that mentioned an incident involving a king escaping its enclosure despite their best efforts due to emergent behavior from unanticipated interaction between differing pieces and Jeff Goldblum saying that nature will find a way. {{unsigned|SammyChips}} SammyChips 18:00, 13 January 2025 (UTC)
:If castling is only blocked by pieces and not walls, Black could still do it if neither the king not bishop to the right of it had moved previously [[Special:Contributions/162.158.41.72|162.158.41.72]] 18:04, 13 January 2025 (UTC)
::I believe the problem would be with the rook, which would need to occupy the wall space that the king skipped over, unless the process of castling was generalized some to allow different magnitudes of jumps, even if the requirement for lack of movement was ignored. {{unsigned|SammyChips}} SammyChips 18:23, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

There has been some contention about the sentence in the pawn promotion paragraph: "Alternatively, perhaps the pawn promotion process produces some sort of cute noise, and if visitors are quiet they are more likely to hear it."
This edit has been added and reverted [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=3036%3A_Chess_Zoo&type=revision&diff=363085&oldid=363001 multiple times].
What is the reasoning for wanting it added vs removed? I would like to hear some comments about it.
Jan 22, 2021 1:21AM (UTC)