explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

369: Dangers

2015-03-18T02:26:29Z

173.245.50.71: /* Explanation */ - added Spinal Tap reference

{{comic
| number = 369
| date = Jan 11, 2008
| title = Dangers
| image = dangers.png
| titletext = Zero results: 'snake charming' and 'haberdashery'. (Things like 'car' and 'boating' and such are of course the highest, by a huge margin.)
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a chart of the frequency of certain phrases in Google search results, based on the format "died in a ______ accident". If you enclose search terms in quotation marks, Google will look up the exact phrase rather than the individual words in any order.

"Gardening accident" is a reference to the mockumentary ''[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/This_Is_Spinal_Tap This Is Spinal Tap]'', in which one of the band's many ill-fated drummers died in this fashion.

"Died in a blogging accident" was very rare in Google {{w|Observer effect|until this comic appeared}}. It now can be found on [http://google.com/search?q=%22died+in+a+blogging+accident%22 over 10000 web pages]. Similarly, both snake charming and haberdashery accidents also return hundreds of Google results.

==Transcript==
:Dangers
:Indexed by the number of Google results for
:"Died in a _____ Accident"
:<nowiki>[[A bar chart showing "Type of Accident" vs "Google Results" each with a bar representing a number]]</nowiki>
:Skydiving: 710
:Elevator: 575
:Surfing: 496
:Skateboarding: 473
:Camping: 166
:Gardening: 100
:Ice Skating: 94
:Knitting: 7
:Blogging: 2

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Charts]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Google Search]]

Talk:1477: Star Wars

2015-01-26T20:53:48Z

173.245.50.71: Math.

Hope the transcript matches normal presentation mores. And I thought I'd keep the title text explanation simple - so I haven't wasted much time if it gets utterly changed. [[User:Mattdevney|Mattdevney]] ([[User talk:Mattdevney|talk]]) 12:55, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Does anyone else notice a weird white line through the dates? [[User:Djbrasier|Djbrasier]] ([[User talk:Djbrasier|talk]]) 14:39, 23 January 2015 (UTC)
:I came here to ask about that. [[User:Linea alba|Linea alba]] ([[User talk:Linea alba|talk]]) 16:13, 23 January 2015 (UTC)
::Haha, your username is linea alba. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.87|199.27.128.87]] 19:23, 23 January 2015 (UTC)
:Same here. I'm wondering if it's stylistic somehow (futuristic-looking?) or just a mistake.--[[User:Piratejabez|Piratejabez]] ([[User talk:Piratejabez|talk]]) 17:26, 23 January 2015 (UTC)
::It looks as if he tried to move the labels down, but didn't select the whole line: [http://imgur.com/a/EZSYT]. But it seems odd that he wouldn't notice it right away, since it cut ALL the digits in half. [[User:Linea alba|Linea alba]] ([[User talk:Linea alba|talk]]) 18:47, 23 January 2015 (UTC)
:::Thanks for sharing. Yes, that's very plausible. Strange that he wouldn't notice it, though...--[[User:Piratejabez|Piratejabez]] ([[User talk:Piratejabez|talk]]) 19:51, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

If anyone's interested, I just used http://timeanddate.com to calculate the Star Wars Trilogy Tipping Point, i.e.- the date starting on which ''The Phantom Menace'' will have released closer to ''A New Hope'' than to the present day: May 13, 2021. --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.50.140|173.245.50.140]] 18:23, 23 January 2015 (UTC)
::Thanks! I was wondering. That is a bit more hopeful.--[[User:Piratejabez|Piratejabez]] ([[User talk:Piratejabez|talk]]) 19:51, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Be sure to get "Comics to make one feel old" in those categories. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.138|199.27.128.138]] 19:31, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Shouldn't the alt text say "A *long* time ago (...) in a galaxy far, far..."?
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.238.157|108.162.238.157]] 00:46, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Damn, so close to May 4th, i wonder if there is anyway to prove that this can technically be the right day ("May the fourth be with you") [[User:Jack1197|Jack1197]] ([[User talk:Jack1197|talk]]) 05:08, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Is anyone else here getting tired of these 'this event is closer to another event than to today' things? :/ [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.25|141.101.99.25]] 10:06, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

:Not yet for me. We are further away from the new millennium than the new millennium seemed like in 1984. Ooooh! c. June 1, 2000 is the Nintendo NES/now midpoint. Ooooh! Most of the 80s is now over 30 years old. Ooooh! The women that were barely 18 in all of it are now post-menopausal! Ooooh! Early 80s sorority girls could now have great-grandchildren old enough to like giiiirls! [[Special:Contributions/108.162.215.94|108.162.215.94]] 17:58, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

::Wait, what? No. Grandchildren, maybe, but not great-grandchildren. The oldest person meeting the description "early 80's sorority girl" would be someone who was 18 in 1980. Their child, assuming they had one right away, would be 18 in 1998. If that child had a child (the sorority girl's grandchild) immediately upon turning 18, that grandchild would be 18 in 2016. In this model, 2016 is the earliest year in which the great-grandchild could be born. Assuming that by "like girls" you mean "hit puberty," and since the average onset of puberty is close to 12 years, the soonest the sorority girl's great-grandchild could "like girls" would be 2028, thirteen years from now. Even if we allow for the possibility of teen pregnancies, and we assume that each generation gave birth to the next at age 15 (...shudder...) instead of age 18, we're still looking at a date in 2022. And, even if the original sorority girl gave birth at age 15 (three years prior to becoming an "early 80's sorority girl"), it would still be 2019 before her great-grandchildren would enter puberty. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.50.71|173.245.50.71]] 20:53, 26 January 2015 (UTC)

1417: Seven

2014-09-05T19:51:16Z

173.245.50.71: /* Trivia */

{{comic
| number = 1417
| date = September 5, 2014
| title = Seven
| image = seven.png
| titletext = The days of the week are Monday, Arctic, Wellsley, Green, Electra, Synergize, and the Seventh Seal.
}}

==Explanation==
In this comic, [[Cueball]] (or perhaps [[Randall]]) says he can't distinguish between sets that have exactly seven objects. This leads him to exchange the items in the sets without noticing, to the point where, when attempting to list a single set, each item mentioned actually belongs to a different set.

This is shown in the comic when Cueball tries to enumerate the seven dwarfs from ''{{w|Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937 film)|Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs}} (a task some people might find difficult, although they would not just chose words from other sets of seven to fill in the gaps...)

The title text also makes it clear that even a simple set of seven items, like the days of the week, also goes completely wrong.

The comic is a reference to the oldest {{w|Set-theoretic_definition_of_natural_numbers#Oldest_definition|set-theoretic definition of the natural numbers}} in which for each natural number, an equivalence class is defined over all sets which contain the same number of items. As Cueball is known for mathematical thinking he could be presumed to have taken the underlying equivalence relation to heart, and (over)applying it to real life, genuinely judges sets to be identical if they both contain N objects.

The number seven being the number for when sets become indistinguishable is possibly a reference to {{w|The_Magical_Number_Seven,_Plus_or_Minus_Two|Miller's law}}; however, this refers to elements within the same set becoming indistinguishable, rather than indistinguishability of different sets of the same size, as the original tests involved either distinguishing between the items or repeating them back <em>in the correct order</em>.

===Comic list===
For each of the seven lists below, the relevant item's traditional position on its own list of seven is equal to its position on the list in the comic. So, since "phylum" is the second major taxonomic rank, "phylum" is the second item on the list in the comic.

The seven "dwarfs" mentioned and their relevant sets of seven are (each item's position in its set is written in brackets before the item):
# Disney's Dwarfs from the movie ''{{w|Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937 film)|Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs}}''): (1) '''Sneezy''', Dopey, Bashful, Sleepy, Grumpy, Happy and Doc
# Major {{w|taxonomic ranks}}: kingdom, (2) '''phylum''', class, order, family, genus and species
# Continents: Asia, Africa, (3) '''Europe''', North America, South America, Australia and Antarctica
# {{w|Seven deadly sins|Deadly sins}}: lust, gluttony, greed, (4) '''sloth''', wrath, envy and pride
# {{w|Seven-layer dip|Seven Layer Dip (recipe)}}: refried beans, cheese, ground beef, sour cream, (5) '''guacamole''', salsa and chopped black olives/chopped tomatoes/chopped green onions
# Layers of the {{w|OSI model|Open System Interconnection (OSI) data transmission model}}: application, presentation, session, transport, network, (6) '''data link''' and physical
# {{w|Wonders of the World|Wonders of the Ancient World}}: Great Pyramid of Giza, Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Statue of Zeus at Olympia, Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, Lighthouse of Alexandria and (7) '''Colossus of Rhodes'''

===Title text list===
The title text extends this saying he also does the same with the set of the seven days of the week. However, the lists found so far (here below) does not follow the same pattern as the dwarfs. The item number does not fit with that of our lists. So where no. 4 spectral colour has Green as no. 4 in the list, this is not the case with no. 5 on the list the Pleiades - here Electra is mentioned as no. 2 in {{W|Pleiades_(Greek_mythology)#The_Seven_Sisters|the wikipedia list}}. (However, this could maybe be discussed?) There is, however, reason to belive we do not yet have the complete understanding of the comic.

The sets Cueball's "days of the week" come from are (the relevant items number in the set is written in brackets before the item):
# {{w|Days of the week}}: (1) '''Monday''', Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday
# {{w|Seven_Seas#Modern|The Seven Seas (modern version)}}: Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, (4?) '''Arctic''', Mediterranean, Caribbean, and the Gulf of Mexico.
## This could also be a reference to {{w|Climate zones}}. See [[#Trivia|Trivia]].
## This could also be a reference to {{w|Continents}}. See [[#Trivia|Trivia]].
# {{w|Seven Sisters (colleges)|Seven Sisters}}, historically women's colleges in U.S.: Mount Holyoke, Vassar, (3) '''Wellesley''', Smith, Radcliffe, Bryn Mawr and Barnard
# Traditional {{w|spectral color}}s: red, orange, yellow, (4) '''green''', blue, indigo and violet
## However {{w|Indigo#Classification_as_a_spectral_color|indigo is stuck in}} by {{w|Isaac Newton}}. See [[#Trivia|Trivia]].
# {{w|Pleiades (mythology)|Pleiades}}, Seven Sisters, nymphs and daughters of Atlas and Pleone in Greek mythology: Maia, (2?) '''Electra''', Taygete, Alcyone, Celaeno, Sterope and Merope
# ''{{w|The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People}}'' by Dr. Stephen R. Covey: Be proactive, Begin with the end in mind, Put first things first, Think win-win, Seek first to understand and then to be understood, (6) '''Synergize''' and Sharpen the saw
# {{w|Seven_Seals|Seals}} in the Book of Revelation in the New Testament: First seal, Second seal, Third seal, Fourth seal, Fifth seal, Sixth seal and (7) '''Seventh seal'''
## Although '''very''' unlikely, ''The Seventh Seal'' could also refer to the 1957 film by {{w|Ingmar Bergman}}. See [[#Trivia|Trivia]].

==Transcript==
: [Megan and Cueball are talking]
: Megan: Can you name all the dwarves from Snow White?
: Cueball: Sure, there's, um...
: Cueball's thoughts: Sneezy, phylum, Europe, sloth, guacamole, data link, Colossus of Rhodes
: Caption: I have this problem where all sets of seven things are indistinguishable to me.

==Trivia==
*Arctic (no. 2 on the title text list) could also be a reference to {{w|Climate zones|climate zones}}: '''Arctic''', North Temperate, Northern Subtropical, Tropical, Southern Subtropical, South Temperate and Antarctic.
** There are however usually only five mentioned according to the {{w|Köppen climate classification}}. They are: Tropical, Dry, Temperate, Continental and Polar climate.
** There are seven continents of the world. Africa, Antarctica (2), Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, South America. Since the picture of the 2nd dwarf is not a dwarf, but resembles another cartoon character "Fievel", the second item in the hover list "Arctic" was a purposeful mistake as well.
*Concerning the seven colour of the spectrum (no. 4 on the title text list) {{w|Indigo#Classification_as_a_spectral_color|indigo is stuck in}} by {{w|Isaac Newton}} to add up to the seven notes in the {{w|Scale_(music)#Western_music|Western musical scale}}
** It should be noted that {{w|Indigo#Classification as a spectral color|Newton probably meant}} the colours {{w|cyan}} and {{w|blue}} as we think of it today, rather than blue and {{w|indigo}}.
** Also note that in a {{w|rainbow}} you usually {{w|Rainbow#Number_of_colours_in_spectrum_or_rainbow|cannot distinguish more than six colours}} with cyan melting in with green and blue and the same for indigo with blue and violet.
*** {{w|Color term#Basic color terms|This is highly dependent on the language you speak.}} Russian, for example, has both sinij and goluboj to describe different blues that in English are both blue. Japanese, as another example, has blue and green together (kinda) in 青.
** These are also the traditional seven artists' pigments, {{w|Roy_G._Biv|with the accompanying mnemonic "Roy G. Biv"}}. Indigo dye is a widely known and readily available colouring agent. The ongoing ubiquity of the ''pigment'' (think denim) gives it a unique prominence in spite of its uncertain status as a spectral colour.
*Although '''very''' unlikely, ''The Seventh Seal'' (no. 7 on the title text list) could also refer to the 1957 film by Ingmar Bergman.
**This was Bergman's seventh film with an English title beginning with the letter ‘S’ (ignoring articles). ''A Ship Bound for India'', ''Summer Interlude'', ''Secrets of Women'', ''Summer with Monika'', ''Sawdust and Tinsel'', ''Smiles of a Summer Night'', '''''The Seventh Seal'''''.
**Similary ''The Seventh Seal'' is also the seventh Bergman film whose Swedish title starts with ‘S’, although the list has some different members. ''Skepp till Indialand'', ''Sånt händer inte här'', ''Sommarlek'', ''Sommaren med Monika'', ''Sommarnattens leende'', ''Sista paret ut'', '''''Det sjunde inseglet'''''.
**''The Seventh Seal'' was also one of seven Bergman films submitted by Sweden for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film during the 1950s and 1960s. '''The Seventh Seal''', ''The Magician'', ''The Virgin Spring'', ''Through a Glass Darkly'', ''The Silence'', ''Persona'', ''Shame''.

{{comic discussion}}

Talk:1382: Rocket Packs

2014-06-24T07:43:11Z

173.245.50.71: add comment

I think long fall boots (from Portal) would probably help with this.
[[Special:Contributions/173.245.56.65|173.245.56.65]] 04:34, 16 June 2014 (UTC)
:-Not so much, they're designed for a completely different purpose. That's like expecting a kevlar vest to protect you against a sword. (They would, however, help if you ran out of fuel in midair.) [[Special:Contributions/173.245.55.83|173.245.55.83]] 12:53, 16 June 2014 (UTC)
::A kevlar vest would protect you from a sword, if you're stabbed or hit in the chest.[[Special:Contributions/173.245.52.198|173.245.52.198]] 19:37, 16 June 2014 (UTC)
:::Kevlar vests do not protect against even relatively small knives. If wearers of Kevlar body armor expect to come in close contact with hostile people, they add metal or ceramic strike plates to their armor specifically designed to upgrade it to be able protect against being stabbed with a knife or sword. {{unsigned ip|199.27.133.11}}
I was thinking a chair design with the legs pulled out in front might help out. {{unsigned ip|199.27.133.174}}

Wear the jet pack on your chest, avoid calf-burn. But don't mention the genitals. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.61|141.101.104.61]] 05:13, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

Is it really so hard to invent calf shields? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.30|108.162.221.30]] 07:53, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

Where is the problem? just reverse front and rear :=)
http://www.thefind.com/apparel/info-batwing-chaps
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.254.199|108.162.254.199]] 10:10, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

The logic and humor of this comic could be extended to the notion of "free" medical care, in a world where people are inclined to try things like rocket packs. {{unsigned ip|173.245.50.73}}

Most practical rockets have the thrust in line with the center of gravity. A jetpack like the one depicted will tend to nose over unless the user sticks his lower legs up into the exhaust to deflect it. Not a great way to travel. Real jetpacks have the nozzles either side to get around this problem. They still have the difficulty of being unable to glide if the engine cuts. If this happens too low to use a parachute, that will spoil the user's day. [[User:Jim E|Jim E]] ([[User talk:Jim E|talk]]) 16:03, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

Why do people keep talking about running out of fuel in midair? When was the last time you ran out of fuel in your car, in between gas stations? Sure, the consequences aren't quite as catastrophic, but my point is that usually people refill their tanks before they run out...[[User:Diszy|Diszy]] ([[User talk:Diszy|talk]]) 21:30, 16 June 2014 (UTC)
:Running out of fuel isn't the only reason your car might stall or stop in the middle of nowhere. Sometimes the engine overheats and stops or the accelerator just stops working for no (apparent) reason. If something similar happens to your jetpack when you are 30m in the air, you can expect a few medical bills, if not a visit to your neighborhood mortician. Any good jetpack should come equipped with emergency boosters, but how effective they may be at low heights is still an issue. {{unsigned ip|103.22.201.239}}
:I've run out of fuel in a car twice, due to faults. The first was a loan car - it smelt of petrol, but the owner said it was OK. Turned out it had a hole in the fuel tank, which meant that the petrol leaked out and left me stranded. The other time was my car - fuel tank had rusted (I was unaware of this), and when I went over a rough bit of road, it disintegrated, shedding fuel. Not all "out of fuel" errors are caused by driving until you run out. [[User:Farnz|Farnz]] ([[User talk:Farnz|talk]]) 13:55, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

Real life rocket packs have flight times as short as 30 seconds in some cases, so running out if fuel and falling to the ground is a very real concern. [[User:Jim E|Jim E]] ([[User talk:Jim E|talk]]) 22:54, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

I think the title text may also refer to how free health care sometimes sounds just as far-fetched in the US as practical jetpacks becoming commonplace. It was something that always almost came up when people were comparing countries on the Internet these last few years. Especially when Canadians compared their country to the States... [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.162|141.101.98.162]] 12:58, 17 June 2014 (UTC)
:There's no such thing as "free health care". TANSTAAFL, and TANSTAFH. Wherever you are, you and your country's economy pay for it one way or another (barring some novel method of enslaving providers of healthcare and medical supplies). Canadians pay about as much per capita for healthcare as most other industrialized nations, and incur intangible costs such as increased wait times, rationed care, and so on. I wish people would start using a less misleading term than "free healthcare", which falsely implies that magic fairies are making the costs and trade-offs disappear. If "free health care" seems "far-fetched" in the US, it's because most of us haven't lost sight of the fact that it isn't free, and (thanks to government intrusion, restrictions, and mandates) in a lot of ways it's much less free in the other sense of the word [[Special:Contributions/173.245.50.71|173.245.50.71]] 07:43, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

Talk:642: Creepy

2014-03-30T03:05:56Z

173.245.50.71:

Is the real-life example unwarranted? [[User:Greyson|Greyson]] ([[User talk:Greyson|talk]]) 15:26, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

:Admirably done. I like the link. In future, though, the wiki-engine doesn't know what single returns means, so if you want a paragraph break hit enter twice. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]<span title="I'm an admin. I can help.">_a</span> ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 16:07, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

A hint for girls, we all have the SAME fears, don't be afraid to find out who we are on the inside :) - [[User:E-inspired|E-inspired]] ([[User talk:E-inspired|talk]]) 04:46, 3 March 2013 (UTC)

:Uh...men typically don't have to worry about getting harassed, assaulted, or killed like women do. At least not to the same degree. Your nervousness about being turned down is not the same as the woman's fear of being attacked. [[Special:Contributions/15.211.201.83|15.211.201.83]] 20:57, 14 June 2013 (UTC)

::Thank you for making this comment. It perfectly outlines the exact type of conceited, one sided views that are being used by tumblr feminists in their crusade for "safety" and "equality". The idea that men are all some sort of all powerful being, incapable of being abused or raped is not only factually wrong, but actually perpetuates the abuses against them as more and more men stop coming forward for fear of looking weak. You speak as if you have knowledge in this field, but that just can't be the case. If you did, you would be much better educated as to the real breakdowns of sexual violence per gender, and know just how ridiculous your claims are. [[Special:Contributions/205.211.113.69|205.211.113.69]] 20:11, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

:What girl wants to be with a guy who is so introspective and nervous that he can't talk to girls? A hint for guys, grow a pair. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.58|108.162.219.58]] 02:29, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

It seems pretty obvious to me that the comic intends to point out the paralyzing paranoia men can have about interacting with women, and the description as it is seems to refuse to explain the comic out of sheer disagreement. {{unsigned ip|207.98.247.127}}

The comments here, with the call for men to "grow a pair" combined with the (false) claim that women are at greater danger of being attacked than men (seemingly offered as justification for unreasonable female caution or hostility toward men), are a perfect illustration of why this anomie exists.[[Special:Contributions/173.245.50.71|173.245.50.71]] 03:05, 30 March 2014 (UTC)