explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:3230: Overton

2026-04-09T19:18:23Z

Jeremyp: Signature

4 January 1960 – 30 June 2003 {{unsigned ip|77.87.241.9|18:34, 8 April 2026}}

Someday this cartoon will be politically inappropriate. [[Special:Contributions/64.201.132.210|64.201.132.210]] 19:16, 8 April 2026 (UTC)
: ^ Absolutely. [[Special:Contributions/66.154.219.123|66.154.219.123]] 21:16, 8 April 2026 (UTC)

randall posting a politics-related comic? which could be construed as discontent with the current political landscape? inb4 somebody <s>bashes</s> complains at kynde again - [[User:Vaedez|Vaedez]] ([[User talk:Vaedez|talk]]) 22:15, 8 April 2026 (UTC)

I think it's worth noting that the window keeps updating to the right. [[Special:Contributions/50.47.108.55|50.47.108.55]] 02:22, 9 April 2026 (UTC) Ale10ander

: Only if you consider dates to go from left to right instead of any other direction. [[Special:Contributions/2A02:C7C:7344:4C00:BC19:A5A4:14E8:E888|2A02:C7C:7344:4C00:BC19:A5A4:14E8:E888]] 08:27, 9 April 2026 (UTC)

What's the next death date? 2027? (Just guessin) [[User:Cream Starlight|Cream S.L.]] ([[User talk:Cream Starlight|talk]] / [[Special:Contributions/Cream_Starlight|contribs]]) 03:33, 9 April 2026 (UTC)

Does he keep dying because he's gone over a ton? (1 ton = 2000 lbs) {{unsigned ip|2607:fb91:bd8a:8e2f:858d:1e1b:f461:5f6e|04:35, 9 April 2026 (UTC)}}
:Too heavy even the time is altered, i see [[User:Cream Starlight|Cream S.L.]] ([[User talk:Cream Starlight|talk]] / [[Special:Contributions/Cream_Starlight|contribs]]) 05:53, 9 April 2026 (UTC)
:F.Y.I.: 1 ton = 2,000 ''or'' 2,204.6 ''or'' 2,240 pounds, at least.
:Also it can be 40, 42 or 60 cubic feet (amongst others). Or 12,000 British Thermal Units-per-Hour. And, at least colloquially, I might use it to describe 100 ''miles per hour'' or GB£100. [[Special:Contributions/82.132.238.115|82.132.238.115]] 16:02, 9 April 2026 (UTC)

Reincarnation - Can someone suggest a suitable Buddhist or Hindu text as citation for them multiple lifes? [[Special:Contributions/87.129.222.20|87.129.222.20]] 06:39, 9 April 2026 (UTC)

:The windows are overlapping, so no this is not a reference to reincarnation. [[User:Zmatt|Zmatt]] ([[User talk:Zmatt|talk]]) 16:00, 9 April 2026 (UTC)

For what it's worth, though Wikipedia currently describes Overton as a "political scientist," that is likely to shift soon. (That is to say, unless someone makes a compelling case on the Talk page, I'm going to change his description to "political activist," which I think is more accurate to someone who never had a political science degree, never had academic employment, and worked as an electrical engineer before working at an activist think tank.) [[Special:Contributions/38.69.197.145|38.69.197.145]] 12:33, 9 April 2026 (UTC)
: Does that mean that the Overton Window Overton Window has moved? [[Special:Contributions/82.13.184.33|82.13.184.33]] 13:16, 9 April 2026 (UTC)

;Significance of the Dates

Many of the dates in listed correspond to major geopolitical events concerning US military and diplomatic policy. They may also correspond to milestone events in US domestic politics. This is an attempt to compile some of the key events that the comic may be referencing.

*1965:
**The beginning of Operation Rolling Thunder, the US ground invasion of Vietnam.
**President LBJ signs the Voting Rights Act of 1965
*- 2011:
**US special forces kill Osama Bin Laden
**NATO forces without the US intervene in the Libyan Civil War leading to the ouster of Muammar Gaddafi.
**More widely, protests spread accross the Middle East and North Africa, dubbed the Arab Spring
**The last of the US combat forces stationed in Iraq are withdrawn.
**The Occuppy Wall Street movement begins.
*1973:
**The United States signs the Paris Peace Accords, withdrawing from the Vietnam conflict and claiming the war was over
**The United States Congress overrides a presidential veto to pass the War Powers Resolution, limiting the ability of future presidents to wage war without Congressional approval
**The Watergate Scandal breaks.
**Roe v Wade.
*- 2018:
**President Donald Trump unilaterally withdraws the United States from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, aka the Iran Nuclear Deal.
**Congress reverses many of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act's reporting and compliance requirements for all but the largest US banks.
*1982:
**Israel violates a 1981 U.S. Brokered ceasefire agreement and invades Lebanon. In response the United States spearheads the establishment of a peacekeeping force to protect Beirut, the Multinational Force in Lebanon.
{{unsigned|In-Sanity|22:16, 8 April 2026}}
:Unfortunately, I suspect that you could easily find such events for absolutely ''every'' year across that range... Unless you narrow down the choices to just something current (i.e. specifically the ones related to current Middle East events, I suppose), which are going to be less frequent but perhaps specifically in Randall's mind.
:(Oh, and I slightly re-reformatted your amended contribution, presuming that you meant it to look a bit more like it is now.)
:I was wondering if there was a mathematical pattern to the numbers, myself. [[Special:Contributions/81.179.199.253|81.179.199.253]] 23:00, 8 April 2026 (UTC)

In case anyone wants to check: [https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/122681438/joseph_paul-overton/photo#view-photo=94839436 Here's a pic of his grave]

Just want to say that I think the title text is true. Randall will probably find that, in a few months time, the Sun will no longer be in his face, but the cycle will repeat on an annual basis. I have a similar window. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 19:18, 9 April 2026 (UTC)

Talk:3230: Overton

2026-04-09T19:17:16Z

Jeremyp: Title text and the Earth's tilted axis.

Talk:3189: Conic Sections

2026-01-05T14:18:08Z

Jeremyp:

Isn't the base of a cone, just a circle? How would this have "corners"? [[User:SDSpivey|SDSpivey]] ([[User talk:SDSpivey|talk]]) 01:41, 3 January 2026 (UTC)
:The cone upon which a conic section exists doesn't actually ''have'' a base, it's just arbitrarily large (possibly infinitely so) in order for the section to only ever lay along the 'curve' of the cone part.
:But, here, the base is wwhere you give up on plotting how far 'down the cone' you go, of the sufficiently large ellipse (or possibly parabolic/hyperbolic curve), which is indeed round but has an sharp (i.e. acute) angle between its flat (and incidentally circular) plane-section and the 'wrapped' pseudo-euclidean plane of the conic-section it intersects with. [[Special:Contributions/92.23.2.208|92.23.2.208]] 01:50, 3 January 2026 (UTC)

Bring a jacket and spoon for orbits that go through the ice cream.[[User:Lordpishky|Lord Pishky]] ([[User talk:Lordpishky|talk]]) 01:43, 3 January 2026 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure this is the shape of the flat bottom of a cake cone. [[Special:Contributions/71.212.56.254|71.212.56.254]] 03:02, 3 January 2026 (UTC)
:They REALLY hate the flat-bottom cone orbits and the waffle cones make for a bumpy ride.[[User:Lordpishky|Lord Pishky]] ([[User talk:Lordpishky|talk]]) 18:57, 3 January 2026 (UTC)

It appears to be a cut-off section of an ellipse, so basically a regular orbit with a sharp line. ([https://www.desmos.com/3d/xnaihdegst Desmos]) [[User:Tanner07|Tanner07]] ([[User talk:Tanner07|talk]]) 04:29, 3 January 2026 (UTC)

https://media.licdn.com/dms/image/v2/D5622AQH3CYoPXy1cqg/feedshare-shrink_2048_1536/feedshare-shrink_2048_1536/0/1727242249609?e=1769040000&v=beta&t=UdAX9TH3joo-vpvj4pRWXoCQyF6JVUPVmyONWghcj5E --[[User:PRR|PRR]] ([[User talk:PRR|talk]]) 05:06, 3 January 2026 (UTC)

I feel like there needs to some explicit acknowledgement that the cone in question is an ice cream cone.[[Special:Contributions/99.239.23.54|99.239.23.54]] 00:11, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
:But ice-cream cones have the 'flat bit' (actually the opening; give or take the scoop of ice-cream, which is a ball, or else the soft-served 'twirly-dollop', which another more convoluted form of inverted cone) at the top. Which just really doesn't fit with ''anything'' the comic says about the conic. Unless you see some obscure connection that I'm just not getting out of it. (Beyond that both are considered 'cones', which is as tenuous as if I suggested traffic cones was the ultimate reference, for example.)
:But if you can give any better referencing connection, you look like you should know how to edit things to enlighten those of us who are missing it. Explain away, as that's the point of this site... [[Special:Contributions/82.132.236.68|82.132.236.68]] 01:39, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
:It's not obvious to me why anybody would think an ice cream cone is implied. Ice cream cones do not have flat bases - there's a hole to put the ice cream in. Furthermore, they are significantly smaller than the Earth. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 14:18, 5 January 2026 (UTC)

Shouldn't the people from the title text also be following the same orbit? [[User:Cobl703|Cobl703]] ([[User talk:Cobl703|talk]]) 18:35, 4 January 2026 (UTC)
:Might depends on if they share the same precise centre of gravity (the Explanation goes into some detail about that sort of thing).
:Or if the effective orbit obeys the idential 'cone-based' rules. At any given time (depending on where you last positioned yourself), you might effectively be floating in a very similar elliptical orbit (could be the same period, same semi-major, same semi-minor, same periapsis, same periapsis, inclination, etc, but in a ''very'' slightly rotated orientation), so hit the change to the 'conic-baseline' section at a different time.
:That's if the orbit equation defines the location of the transition into the conic-base (e.g. effectively when hitting the "semi-parameter" 'width', but on the non-focuse side of the original ellipse), or there's always some particular definite absolute (or proportional?) distance between the hypothetical cone's tip and when the normal orbital effect 'runs out'.
:Too many little questions need to be asked about what is forcing the orbit to be off-elliptical. And if it's not a mere function of reality, but a deliberate manoeuvre by the craft, then ''of course'' the occupants will feel the sudden change in motion that the accompanying thruster-kick invokes. [[Special:Contributions/92.23.2.208|92.23.2.208]] 21:03, 4 January 2026 (UTC)

How far the cone extends and where these effect occur depends on the units of distance used and the number of digits & format used to represent the length of the cone on the computer. Larger units avoid cone-end effects but make for a bumpier ride, especially when the exponent changes.[[User:Lordpishky|Lord Pishky]] ([[User talk:Lordpishky|talk]]) 05:58, 5 January 2026 (UTC)

Kinda reminds me of [https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-1778 SCP-1778]. --'''''[[User:DollarStoreBa'al|DollarStoreBa'al]][[User Talk:DollarStoreBa'al|Converse]] 14:08, 5 January 2026 (UTC)

Talk:3161: Airspeed

2025-11-01T13:53:22Z

Jeremyp:

must be a heated competition [[Special:Contributions/79.78.17.137|79.78.17.137]] 21:34, 29 October 2025 (UTC)
:badum-tss! [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 22:17, 29 October 2025 (UTC)
: The record has been given an inflated importance. [[Special:Contributions/82.13.184.33|82.13.184.33]] 10:58, 30 October 2025 (UTC)

It's actually worth noting that a quick google says that land speed records for hot air balloons are actually fairly fast, wikipedia claiming it clocks in at around 245 mph. Jet streams allow them to go pretty fast! [[Special:Contributions/45.78.106.197|45.78.106.197]] 23:42, 29 October 2025 (UTC)

Airspeed is relative to the vehicle, and a balloon has no "front", so a gust in one direction is in theory indistinguishable from a lull in the opposite direction; both will appear as a momentary increase in airspeed until the balloon accelerates (in whichever direction) to match the local air movement. (I say "in theory" because if you consider your gusts and lulls relative to the overall movement of the airmass, it's plausible that one or the other will tend to be sharper.) The "gust that allowed them to coast", and the whole notion of "coasting", isn't really right. A non-zero airspeed means that the balloon hasn't re-stabilized with the local air movement, in whichever direction. In fact, "coasting", defined here as momentarily moving differently from the airmass as a whole, is actually an unlikely source of the 2MPH airspeed, because it requires that the balloon accelerate to match local air movement, before returning to the movement of the airmass as a whole. More likely is a localized change (a gust or lull), that causes the local air to be moving differently from the airmass as a whole, while the balloon is still moving with the airmass. Such a localized change might be present for a very small amount of time, not long enough to appreciably change the balloon's movement. But I'm not feeling like spending enough effort to distill that down into one sentence to update the explanation. [[User:Jordan Brown|Jordan Brown]] ([[User talk:Jordan Brown|talk]]) 23:59, 29 October 2025 (UTC)

You don't need a mine shaft to go for the minimum-altitude record, if you're measuring against MSL. Just make sure that your lines and your balloon are really strong, and your basket is really heavy, and your basket is water-tight, and go for {{w|Challenger Deep}}. [[User:Jordan Brown|Jordan Brown]] ([[User talk:Jordan Brown|talk]]) 00:21, 30 October 2025 (UTC)

3161 demonstrates a commonly held fallacy - the balloon has NO actual "airspeed" because it moves passively with the surrounding air mass; it has no method for generating lateral force on its own, to either vector add/subtract airspeed from the moving wind surrounding it. The balloon is never actually being "blown". This isn't just semantics - it has real relevance to powered aircraft flight. {{unsigned ip|2603:7000:9c07:5749:cfe:67ca:4e99:71f8|01:38, 30 October 2025}}/Aviator Joe, CFII
:Sure it does, transiently. It just can't cause itself to have a non-zero airspeed. An abrupt change in the movement of the local air - a gust, horizontal wind shear - would register as a non-zero airspeed, until either the local air goes back to matching the overall airmass (and the balloon), or the balloon accelerates (via drag) to match that moving air. Consider: you're cruising along in your airplane at an indicated airspeed of 100kt, and you get a 10kt gust from the front. Your airspeed indicator momentarily jumps to 110kt until the airplane restabilizes at an IAS of 100kt again, and then when the gust goes away the reverse happens; your IAS drops to 90kt for a while, then returns to 100kt. The exact same thing can happen in a balloon, except that the base IAS is zero - the balloon that you were passing as the gust hit you sees an IAS of 10kt as the gust hits it, then zero as it restabilizes, then 10kt in the opposite direction as the gust fades, then zero again. [[User:Jordan Brown|Jordan Brown]] ([[User talk:Jordan Brown|talk]]) 02:42, 30 October 2025 (UTC)
::Ah, but that is IAS. IAS increase in the situation you describe is an artifact of the measurement - transient increase in ram pressure on the Pitot tube. The actual airspeed of the balloon is zero (or close, if you neglect inertia/drag). I refer you to Chapter 5 of of "Stick and Rudder" {{unsigned ip|2603:7000:9c07:5749:cfe:67ca:4e99:71f8|13:37, 30 October 2025}}
:::"...or close". And ''that's'' what the comic is saying. Agree/disagree?
:::"...if you neglect inertia/drag" Why would you neglect inertia and drag? Real balloons don't magically not have inertia and drag. If you get a sudden gust of wind, the inertia of the balloon will cause its speed to slightly lag the speed of the wind for a few moments. This is precisely what the comic is about [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 13:53, 1 November 2025 (UTC)
:::(Indented and 'unsigned' you, BTW. You don't need to do anything more to the above, but try to add the proper signing, and any useful indentation, in future edits...) [[Special:Contributions/82.132.244.58|82.132.244.58]] 15:23, 30 October 2025 (UTC)

Actually, there can be significant wind shear near the earth. If the basket is only a few feet above the ground, you can feel substantial “wind” because the ballioon, being higher up, is being pushed by a faster wind and dragging the basket through the lower, slower, air. If you mount your airspeed indicator on the basket, you can have a significant ‘speed’ relative to the air through which you’re being dragged. When I experienced this the first times, I said, “what the?” The pilot politely explained…… {{unsigned ip|73.162.95.226|03:18, 30 October 2025 (UTC)}}

Couldn't one just break this air speed record by tying the balloon to the ground? --[[Special:Contributions/2001:638:807:507:4EB7:9F4B:6CF9:57A1|2001:638:807:507:4EB7:9F4B:6CF9:57A1]] 07:50, 30 October 2025 (UTC)
: Split the record into positive and negative value records? [[Special:Contributions/2A02:2455:1960:4000:E0C5:65BB:8741:E289|2A02:2455:1960:4000:E0C5:65BB:8741:E289]] 07:56, 30 October 2025 (UTC)
:: A balloon doesn't really have a front/back, so there's not really a positive or negative airspeed. [[Special:Contributions/163.116.254.55|163.116.254.55]] 14:06, 30 October 2025 (UTC)

Replaced the 'many comics about hot air balloons' line with links to the two examples I could find. Suggest if people can find more, these should be placed in a category, and a link to that category given. NB - there are other comics about ''balloons'' of various types, but these are the only two I identified about hot air balloons specifically (and even then one is a partial reference - although the main thrust of the joke - and the other is only by inference). [[Special:Contributions/82.13.184.33|82.13.184.33]] 12:14, 31 October 2025 (UTC)

Talk:3154: Physics Insight

2025-10-16T10:41:46Z

Jeremyp:

Avrayter 9:55 am oct. 13 2025: okay, I assume you write these comments with html. can y'all please just implement the standing on the soldiers of giant joke into the first paragraph? [[User:Avrayter|Avrayter]] ([[User talk:Avrayter|talk]]) 13:56, 13 October 2025 (UTC)

I'm reminded of science fiction like Star Trek where children learn "advanced" physics like quantum mechanics in high school. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 14:44, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
:There's something to this, tbh. To use just one example, there was a time in history when NEGATIVE NUMBERS were considered a bizarre innovation to the world of mathematics, boggling even expert mathematicians (since, how can you have -3 apples? A hole in the universe where three apples ought to be? It's quite an abstract concept when you think about it!) Yet nowadays, every high school graduate is expected to understand them intuitively and use them proficiently. I really do wonder what it's doing to us, where what was "advanced" in bygone years is considered "fundamentals" today. Our brains don't evolve THAT quickly. [[User:MeZimm|MeZimm]] ([[User talk:MeZimm|talk]]) 17:49, 13 October 2025 (UTC)

Is the drawing of Cueball and White hat the exact same of 3148? [[Special:Contributions/140.77.177.211|140.77.177.211]] 16:52, 13 October 2025 (UTC) divicarpe
:No, the angle of Cueball's arms is slightly different... [[User:CalibansCreations|'''Caliban''']] ([[User talk:CalibansCreations|talk]]) 18:20, 13 October 2025 (UTC)

Cue ball drops two weights and injures '''several''' tourists? Impressive. [[User:Fephisto|Fephisto]] ([[User talk:Fephisto|talk]]) 19:03, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
:Maybe one of the tourists fell on someone else? Maybe people panicked and stampeded? {{unsigned ip|2600:4041:798b:a100:693e:f092:d39a:36fc|21:20, 13 October 2025}}
:You should never do just one interation of an experiment... It really needs several attempts. (Different hands for the different weights, etc.) [[Special:Contributions/2.98.65.8|2.98.65.8]] 21:34, 13 October 2025 (UTC)
:: Plus the results kept getting invalidated when the objects hit people of different heights, necessitating further runs of the experiment. [[Special:Contributions/82.13.184.33|82.13.184.33]] 08:21, 14 October 2025 (UTC)
:to clear up some confusion regarding "several", see [[1070]]. [[user:lett‪herebedarklight|raeb]] 10:09, 14 October 2025 (UTC)

Did anyone else notice this comic about discovering came out on Columbus Day? [[Special:Contributions/2405:9800:B560:E3E:5D49:405F:31F1:A98C|2405:9800:B560:E3E:5D49:405F:31F1:A98C]] 02:09, 14 October 2025 (UTC)
:The person who no-one took seriously when he set out to reach asia. (And who didn't.) [[Special:Contributions/2.98.65.8|2.98.65.8]] 13:19, 14 October 2025 (UTC)
::Well, he also kept incorrectly insisting that he had actually reached Asia, unlike Amerigo Vespucci who figured out there was actually a brand new continent there. --[[Special:Contributions/185.223.180.2|185.223.180.2]] 08:13, 15 October 2025 (UTC)

As it happens, I just found out it's not the first time Randall talks about Galileo's Leaning Tower of Pisa experiment: it was [https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/10/science/question-randall-munroe-bobsled-gravity.html the subject of a "What if?" back in March 2020] (the top illustration has Cueball dropping bobsleds off the tower while Ponytail's calling security). --[[Special:Contributions/185.223.180.2|185.223.180.2]] 08:13, 15 October 2025 (UTC)
:When was anyone going to tell me about that site?! [[Special:Contributions/128.4.83.81|128.4.83.81]] 13:34, 15 October 2025 (UTC)
::Well, I agree. At first I thought IP was joking, then I realized there's a [https://www.nytimes.com/column/good-question-randall-munroe-xkcd whole bunch of What If's] exclusive on NY Times! Not even mentioned on [[What_If_(disambiguation)]] or [[What_If%3F_chapters]]! (edit: I just found that there's a page on the wiki: [[New York Times: Good Question]]) [[User:BytEfLUSh|BytEfLUSh]] ([[User talk:BytEfLUSh|talk]]) 08:10, 16 October 2025 (UTC)

"I could play "Stairway To Heaven" when I was 12. Jimmy Page didn't actually write it until he was 22. I think that says quite a lot." (Vim Fuego in "Bad News") [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 10:41, 16 October 2025 (UTC)

Talk:2920: Survey Marker

2024-04-17T09:09:51Z

Jeremyp:

"datums." [[User:JohnHawkinson|JohnHawkinson]] ([[User talk:JohnHawkinson|talk]]) 14:38, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

FWIW, there is a marker at the end of my street, and I have seen others. I know "in the ground" is a figure of speech; all I have seen were set in rock (often with molten Lead/Zinc) so they didn't travel. My road we have boulders nobody is likely to move. Other places like Appalachian Trail, set in the mountain stone. In sandy South Jersey they set a couple tons of concrete and set the marker in that. --[[User:PRR|PRR]] ([[User talk:PRR|talk]]) 23:41, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

I like to think our myriad calendars & leap days & time zones & daylight savings time & mapping coordinate offsets, are all orchestrated specifically to complicate time travel. Have fun materializing halfway into the ground, or entirely out of the ecliptic, time travel wankers.
[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 06:30, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

This reminds me of the prime meridian that's laid out on the ground at the Greenwich Royal Observatory for tourists to stand on. Unfortunately, it uses an old datum and the actual prime meridian under WGS84 is about 100 metres to the East. Fortunately, the British Isles are moving slowly North East so the two meridians will coincide at some point. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 09:09, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Talk:2697: Y2K and 2038

2022-11-13T15:32:00Z

Jeremyp:

Y2K issues solved back in 1996. Even wrote a letter to the Board of Trustees.
2038 Problems are not-my-concern. Retired 9/30/2022.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.236|172.70.110.236]]
:Many of the people who helped solve the Y2K problem were pulled out of retirement. Lots of the issues were in old COBOL software, and there weren't enough active programmers who were competent in COBOL. So keep your resume ready. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 20:07, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

this is so weird I just finished a research assignment on the Y2038 problem [[Special:Contributions/172.71.166.223|172.71.166.223]] 18:27, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

Somewhere there is an essay about the unexpected synergy between the Y2K bug and the burgeoning open source movement, which may or may not be useful for the explanation. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.243|172.70.214.243]] 20:18, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
:https://www.livehistoryindia.com/story/eras/india-software-revolution-rooted-in-y2k is a fascinating essay too. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.151|172.70.214.151]] 21:03, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
:I wouldn't be surprised if there's such an essay, but I suspect it's more of a coincidence. The late 90's was also when the Internet was really taking off, and that may be more of a contributor. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 23:04, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
::All involved what epidemiologists call coordinated or mutually reinforcing causes, IMHO. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.158.231|172.71.158.231]] 01:41, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

Speaking of which, what comes after Generation Z? Generation AA? ZA? Z.1? Help! [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.243|172.70.214.243]] 07:24, 12 November 2022 (UTC)
:{{w|Generation Alpha}} [[Special:Contributions/172.69.34.53|172.69.34.53]] 07:27, 12 November 2022 (UTC)
::[[1962|Zuckerbergs Army.]] --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 15:18, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

I've been unable to confirm this so I'm moving it here: A major problem had struck IBM mainframes on and after August 16, 1972 (9999 days before January 1, 2000) that caused magnetic tapes that were supposed to be marked "keep forever" instead be marked "may be recycled now."{{Actual citation needed}} [[Special:Contributions/172.71.158.231|172.71.158.231]] 07:37, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

Does the arrow move over time? ... should it? (I think so!) It could be done server side and only regulars would [see, sic] that it changes over time. Then... perhaps we could see different versions of the strip cached on the Internet. --[[Special:Contributions/172.71.166.158|172.71.166.158]] 08:30, 12 November 2022 (UTC)
It isn't, of course, but if it was a .GIF with ultralong replace-cycles then only those who ''kept the image active'' would see the arrow move in real-time. (It would reset to ''now's'' "now" upon each (re)loading, so it would have an even more exclusive audience, aside from those that cheat with image(-layer) editing. ;) ) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.57|172.70.162.57]] 13:32, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

Should we mention anything about that it is that specific year in a specific calendar? As far as I know there was also {{w|Japanese_calendar_era_bug|fear of a similiar bug in Japan}} recently. However Wikipedia seems not to be up to date about it. --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 15:18, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

Does anyone know of an actual program or OS that stored the year as two characters instead of a single byte? I have (and had back then) serious doubts that any problems existed. Even the reported government computers had people born prior to 1900 entered, so they already had to have better precision than "just tack on 1900." Even using a single signed byte would still have been good for another 5 years from now. [[User:SDSpivey|SDSpivey]] ([[User talk:SDSpivey|talk]]) 17:22, 12 November 2022 (UTC)
:In my experience (I lived and worked through the Y2K preparations) it wasn't so much "an actual program", or necessarily a fundemental limitation of an entire OS (though the roots of the problem effectively date back to key decisions surrounding the developmet of the IBM System/360 in the 1960s), but a matter of how data was held in human-readable but space-saving format. Someone in the '70s (or even up into into the '90s) may have decided their system could store some date as the six characters representing DDMMYY (or ay of the other orders) secure in the knowledge that the century digits were superfluus - and would have perhaps sent the footprint of a standard record over some handy packable length for the system, say 128 bytes. Which was a lot in those days.
:(If the year ''value'' had been recorded in 16bit binary, or even 2x7bit or doubled 6-bit, it could have been as good for the computer, but ''oh the fuss'' to convert to and from a human-orientated perspective. And it worked neatly enough, right?)
:And a useful implementaion might be used, in some form or other for a long time... Sometimes the storage system is upgraded (kilobytes? ha, we have megabytes of space now!) and the software to handle it might be ported and even rewritten, but at each stage the extra data has to match the old program, and the new program has to read and write the current data, however kludged it actually is. And it works, at least under the care of those who dabble in the dark arts of its operation. And not many others are bothered or even have any idea of what ;ies beneath the surface.
:Until somebody starts to audit the issue and asks everyone to poke around and check things... Thenthings get sorted in-situ ''or'' a much needed (YMV!) change of process is swapped in, in the place of old and (possibly) incorrect hacks. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.79.133|172.69.79.133]] 20:00, 12 November 2022 (UTC)
::Sometimes the "savings" of storing data in a compact form are exceeded by the "cost" of having to convert it between the convenient-to-use form and the compact form. I used to work on a system that used 32-bit words for all data types: characters, shorts, longs. When we started running out of space, we "manually" packed our data, stuffing multiple shorts and bytes into words. But in some cases, the additional code needed to pack/unpack would have taken more space than what we'd have saved in the data, without even looking at the processing time cost. [[User:BunsenH|BunsenH]] ([[User talk:BunsenH|talk]]) 05:52, 13 November 2022 (UTC)
:The first computerised passport system for the UK had a y2K issue. In fact, it was designed in, because it was supposed to be replaced before 1999. Unfortunately, progress with its replacement was running late. We thought that we could get away with two digits for certain dates because the software was going to be thrown away before the end of 1999. And yes, two digit years were common in COBOL programs because decimal numbers coded using ASCII or EBCDIC were the default for numeric data. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 15:32, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

1. Having done programming since 1966, I know that much data was stored on 80-character cards (and way before that year and the IBM System/360) and using 2 characters (2.5% of the card) to store the "19" was not acceptable. As processes moved into the tape and disk world, human nature tended to not expand the field to 4 characters (the future is a long way off until, suddenly, it isn't). [[Special:Contributions/172.70.178.65|172.70.178.65]] 07:57, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

2. I actually saw a Y2K failure. It occurred at the beginning of 1999 when a job scheduling program scheduled a job for the year 1900 because it was always keeping the schedule active a year in advance. The scheduling software had actually been fixed but the upgraded version had not been installed yet, so there was no significant outage. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.178.64|172.70.178.64]] 08:02, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Talk:2599: Spacecraft Debris Odds Ratio

2022-03-29T15:33:59Z

Jeremyp:

correct me if i'm wrong, but i believe 300 - 30 is 270, not 280? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.50.85|172.68.50.85]] 22:50, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
:something something percentage points maybe? idk [[Special:Contributions/172.70.134.91|172.70.134.91]] 22:56, 28 March 2022 (UTC)Bumpf
:Most likely there is an unstated chance of death by not going outside... presumably ~10% but there's no way to know the breakdown (could be nearly all cardio, could be nearly all ursine if they live in a cave next bears) [[Special:Contributions/172.69.70.127|172.69.70.127]] 23:02, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
::300% increase is multiplying by (1+3), 30% decrease is multiplying by (1-0.3) , %increases are multiplicative so the increase is by a factor of 4*0.7=2.8, which is 280% of the original value (or a 180% increase). {{unsigned ip|162.158.146.69}}
:::Yeah, barring a total mistake, that must be where the number came from, but it seems odd by the inconsistent way it is expressed, as it assumes the 300% increase for the bear attack is added to the initial value for a final amount of 400%, along with a similar treatment for the 30% decrease, but the 280% is simply the final value skipping past that step to the conclusion afterwards that is not even shown for the previous numbers. But with the improper grammar, if it's not an actual typo, it may be trying to show the speaker acting dumb or irrational, as it doesn't make sense to end with "increased" instead of "increase" without changing part of the words before that number. Someone thinking that poorly though likely wouldn't be able to multiply things properly to produce that 280% number though.--[[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.153|172.70.130.153]] 01:13, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
::::Someone who do understand this method of getting to 280% should add that to the explanation. I'm not quite sure what is meant here above, so an even better explanation would be preferable. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 08:28, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:::Joke proof: ''Assume'' that every year 400 people are killed by bears in the world, of which 100 are killed inside and 300 are killed outside. Then, indeed, by going outside, the probability that you will be killed by bears increases from 100 to 300: that is 300%. On the other hand, we know that walking outside every day will reduce your risk of death from cardiovascular disease by 30%. Therefore, by walking outside properly, 30% of the above-mentioned 400 people, i.e. 120 people, could in theory avoid death from the said disease, ''if'' not attacked by bears. This implies that, even if everyone in the world walked outside every day, only 120 out of the 400 bear attack victims would be potentially saved, while 280 would die anyway. Since by hypothesis only 100 are killed inside by bear attacks, going outside will clearly increase the probability of deadly bear attacks, from 100 to 280: that is 280%. —[[User:Yosei|Yosei]] ([[User talk:Yosei|talk]]) 09:52, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:::As said above, 300% increase and 30% decrease gives a factor ×2.8 which is a +180% increase (not 280%) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.50.176|162.158.50.176]] 10:38, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
::::It's a joke :) Since the title text is obviously a joke, maybe we shouldn't over-analyze it, except we can enjoy ourselves by “analyzing” it half-jokingly. Seriously, though, there is also some ambiguity in a natural language itself: e.g. by “one-and-a-half times larger than”, one may mean “one-and-a-half times as large as” (150%), or one may mean “150% larger than” (250%). When spoken informally, this kind of ambiguity is not uncommon. Another example would be “five hundred one thousandths” which may mean 501/1000 or 500/1000. Take it easy & take care :) — [[User:Yosei|Yosei]] ([[User talk:Yosei|talk]]) 11:38, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:::This is what I love about XKCD, the jokes come with proofs. Does it depend on what order you apply them in? If you decrease the risk by 30%, you have 70%, then increase it by 300%, you get... 210%? Or 270%? Percentage points vs. percent again isn't it. Why is life so complicated? --[[User:192·168·0·1|192·168·0·1]] ([[User talk:192·168·0·1|talk]]) 12:46, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:It doesn't really matter because the whole thing is complete nonsense. You can't combine the risks unless you know how big they are relative to each other. Let's say 1,000 people stay inside. 2 are killed by a bear and 10 die of cardiovascular disease - 12 people in total. With the given percentage changes, of 1,000 people who go outside, 8 get killed by bears (300% increase) and 7 die of heart disease (30% decrease), a total of 15. It's more dangerous to go outside than stay in. However, if 250 of the people who stay inside die of heart disease, then we have 252 deaths in total for staying in and only 175+8=183 for going out [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 15:33, 29 March 2022 (UTC).

"That's a 280% increased" has a typo/grammaro. The last word should be "increase". [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 23:04, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
:I think the actual typo is the "a" so should be "That's 280% increased" {{unsigned ip|162.158.146.69}}

Also what's an odds ratio?? ~~Bumpf {{unsigned ip|172.70.38.41}}
:I assume something like "million to one". But the units of the horizontal axis clearly don't correspond to that. I don't know what those units are, they're not a percentage, either. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 00:40, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:: if you say "this is 4 times as likely" then "4" is the "odds ratio", this is the type of number appearing on the horizontal axis {{unsigned ip|162.158.146.69}}
:An odds-ratio is a way of reporting the results for predictions of binary outcomes. It's a transformation of the (not easily interpretable) regression coefficient. For example, if the OR for "males" (vs females) is "0.70", they're 70% as likely to have the outcome as females; if it's "1.32", then males are 1.32x as likely (equivalently: 32% more likely) to have that outcome as females. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.75|108.162.249.75]] Gye Greene

Did something happen to the size of the image after the initial posting? [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 00:40, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

What's with the asterisks on the right side? [[User:Jordan Brown|Jordan Brown]] ([[User talk:Jordan Brown|talk]]) 00:50, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:I think the asterisks denote that the value at this range is "significant" because its error bars do not overlap with the baseline. If you stay outdoors 5 hours or more in a day, there is a nonzero chance that you will be hit by flying space debris. [[User:Laura|Laura]] ([[User talk:Laura|talk]]) 08:15, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

There should probably be an explanation of what "Monte Carlo Simulation" means, as many people who would actually want an explanation of this strip would likely be unfamiliar with that term.--[[Special:Contributions/172.70.131.122|172.70.131.122]] 01:02, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:Yes, exactly! I got as far as finding {{w|Monte Carlo method}} via a redirect but have no idea how the bars are supposed to work, what the reference point is supposed to mean, or why the columns get skinnier toward the right. Not dumb, but next to no statistics education. [[User:Yngvadottir|Yngvadottir]] ([[User talk:Yngvadottir|talk]]) 07:51, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

::Yes, I added some links to try to make the graph a little more explore-friendly for folks willing to click and read what's beyond, but I don't have the smarts to really explain it. [[User:Laura|Laura]] ([[User talk:Laura|talk]]) 08:00, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

Why is the x-axis of the chart in logarithmic spacing? Any particular reason for this, or is it part of the joke? [[User:Captain Nemo|Captain Nemo]] ([[User talk:Captain Nemo|talk]]) 09:29, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

I wonder if it's deliberate that there's actually less risk if you go outside 1 hour per day. --[[User:192·168·0·1|192·168·0·1]] ([[User talk:192·168·0·1|talk]]) 12:46, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

==Odds ratio confusion?==
I am very confused by the X axis of this comic, I feel like I must be misunderstanding how this works, but I thought I understood how odds ratios worked. Maybe not.
The graph "reads" that "In the reference situation, with zero hours spent outside, the odds ratio for head injuries from falling spacecraft debris is 1.0 ± 0." A 1.0 odds ratio means 1.0:1.0, or that either possibility is 50% likely. That is, there's an even chance your head will be injured by spacecraft debris or that it will not, ''if you stay indoors.'' That does not seem like it could be right, so can someone point me to my error? Thanks! [[User:JohnHawkinson|JohnHawkinson]] ([[User talk:JohnHawkinson|talk]]) 09:34, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:As best I can tell, this is taking odds as a ratio between ''any'' two events. Rather than the usual "success : failure" (or "happens : doesn't happen"), it's "this scenario happens : control scenario happens". By definition, the control scenario is set at 1.0, and something at a ratio of (say) 2.0 is twice as likely to happen. -- [[User:Peregrine|Peregrine]] ([[User talk:Peregrine|talk]]) 10:50, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

I definitely think we need to put something explaining what an odds ratio is. But since I feel the need to have it explained, I'm not going to be the one to explain it. --[[User:192·168·0·1|192·168·0·1]] ([[User talk:192·168·0·1|talk]]) 12:46, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

== Per day ==

Looks like the comic has been updated to clarify that the number of hours is per day. I'll leave it to someone more experienced with this website to update it, but in any case it makes the note "It is very difficult to avoid being outside for more than four hours in a total lifetime" moot. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.147|172.70.114.147]] 12:31, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

Talk:2599: Spacecraft Debris Odds Ratio

2022-03-29T15:33:32Z

Jeremyp:

correct me if i'm wrong, but i believe 300 - 30 is 270, not 280? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.50.85|172.68.50.85]] 22:50, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
:something something percentage points maybe? idk [[Special:Contributions/172.70.134.91|172.70.134.91]] 22:56, 28 March 2022 (UTC)Bumpf
:Most likely there is an unstated chance of death by not going outside... presumably ~10% but there's no way to know the breakdown (could be nearly all cardio, could be nearly all ursine if they live in a cave next bears) [[Special:Contributions/172.69.70.127|172.69.70.127]] 23:02, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
::300% increase is multiplying by (1+3), 30% decrease is multiplying by (1-0.3) , %increases are multiplicative so the increase is by a factor of 4*0.7=2.8, which is 280% of the original value (or a 180% increase). {{unsigned ip|162.158.146.69}}
:::Yeah, barring a total mistake, that must be where the number came from, but it seems odd by the inconsistent way it is expressed, as it assumes the 300% increase for the bear attack is added to the initial value for a final amount of 400%, along with a similar treatment for the 30% decrease, but the 280% is simply the final value skipping past that step to the conclusion afterwards that is not even shown for the previous numbers. But with the improper grammar, if it's not an actual typo, it may be trying to show the speaker acting dumb or irrational, as it doesn't make sense to end with "increased" instead of "increase" without changing part of the words before that number. Someone thinking that poorly though likely wouldn't be able to multiply things properly to produce that 280% number though.--[[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.153|172.70.130.153]] 01:13, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
::::Someone who do understand this method of getting to 280% should add that to the explanation. I'm not quite sure what is meant here above, so an even better explanation would be preferable. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 08:28, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:::Joke proof: ''Assume'' that every year 400 people are killed by bears in the world, of which 100 are killed inside and 300 are killed outside. Then, indeed, by going outside, the probability that you will be killed by bears increases from 100 to 300: that is 300%. On the other hand, we know that walking outside every day will reduce your risk of death from cardiovascular disease by 30%. Therefore, by walking outside properly, 30% of the above-mentioned 400 people, i.e. 120 people, could in theory avoid death from the said disease, ''if'' not attacked by bears. This implies that, even if everyone in the world walked outside every day, only 120 out of the 400 bear attack victims would be potentially saved, while 280 would die anyway. Since by hypothesis only 100 are killed inside by bear attacks, going outside will clearly increase the probability of deadly bear attacks, from 100 to 280: that is 280%. —[[User:Yosei|Yosei]] ([[User talk:Yosei|talk]]) 09:52, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:::As said above, 300% increase and 30% decrease gives a factor ×2.8 which is a +180% increase (not 280%) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.50.176|162.158.50.176]] 10:38, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
::::It's a joke :) Since the title text is obviously a joke, maybe we shouldn't over-analyze it, except we can enjoy ourselves by “analyzing” it half-jokingly. Seriously, though, there is also some ambiguity in a natural language itself: e.g. by “one-and-a-half times larger than”, one may mean “one-and-a-half times as large as” (150%), or one may mean “150% larger than” (250%). When spoken informally, this kind of ambiguity is not uncommon. Another example would be “five hundred one thousandths” which may mean 501/1000 or 500/1000. Take it easy & take care :) — [[User:Yosei|Yosei]] ([[User talk:Yosei|talk]]) 11:38, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:::This is what I love about XKCD, the jokes come with proofs. Does it depend on what order you apply them in? If you decrease the risk by 30%, you have 70%, then increase it by 300%, you get... 210%? Or 270%? Percentage points vs. percent again isn't it. Why is life so complicated? --[[User:192·168·0·1|192·168·0·1]] ([[User talk:192·168·0·1|talk]]) 12:46, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:It doesn't really matter because the whole thing is complete nonsense. You can't combine the risks unless you know how big they are relative to each other. Let's say 1,000 people stay inside. 2 are killed by a bear and 10 die of cardiovascular disease - 12 people in total. With the given percentage changes, of 1,000 people who go outside, 8 get killed by bears (300% increase) and 7 die of heart disease (30% decrease), a total of 15. It's more dangerous to go outside than stay in. However, if 250 of the people who stay inside die of heart disease, then we have 252 deaths in total for staying in and only 175+8=183 for going out.

"That's a 280% increased" has a typo/grammaro. The last word should be "increase". [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 23:04, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
:I think the actual typo is the "a" so should be "That's 280% increased" {{unsigned ip|162.158.146.69}}

Also what's an odds ratio?? ~~Bumpf {{unsigned ip|172.70.38.41}}
:I assume something like "million to one". But the units of the horizontal axis clearly don't correspond to that. I don't know what those units are, they're not a percentage, either. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 00:40, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:: if you say "this is 4 times as likely" then "4" is the "odds ratio", this is the type of number appearing on the horizontal axis {{unsigned ip|162.158.146.69}}
:An odds-ratio is a way of reporting the results for predictions of binary outcomes. It's a transformation of the (not easily interpretable) regression coefficient. For example, if the OR for "males" (vs females) is "0.70", they're 70% as likely to have the outcome as females; if it's "1.32", then males are 1.32x as likely (equivalently: 32% more likely) to have that outcome as females. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.75|108.162.249.75]] Gye Greene

Did something happen to the size of the image after the initial posting? [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 00:40, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

What's with the asterisks on the right side? [[User:Jordan Brown|Jordan Brown]] ([[User talk:Jordan Brown|talk]]) 00:50, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:I think the asterisks denote that the value at this range is "significant" because its error bars do not overlap with the baseline. If you stay outdoors 5 hours or more in a day, there is a nonzero chance that you will be hit by flying space debris. [[User:Laura|Laura]] ([[User talk:Laura|talk]]) 08:15, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

There should probably be an explanation of what "Monte Carlo Simulation" means, as many people who would actually want an explanation of this strip would likely be unfamiliar with that term.--[[Special:Contributions/172.70.131.122|172.70.131.122]] 01:02, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:Yes, exactly! I got as far as finding {{w|Monte Carlo method}} via a redirect but have no idea how the bars are supposed to work, what the reference point is supposed to mean, or why the columns get skinnier toward the right. Not dumb, but next to no statistics education. [[User:Yngvadottir|Yngvadottir]] ([[User talk:Yngvadottir|talk]]) 07:51, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

::Yes, I added some links to try to make the graph a little more explore-friendly for folks willing to click and read what's beyond, but I don't have the smarts to really explain it. [[User:Laura|Laura]] ([[User talk:Laura|talk]]) 08:00, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

Why is the x-axis of the chart in logarithmic spacing? Any particular reason for this, or is it part of the joke? [[User:Captain Nemo|Captain Nemo]] ([[User talk:Captain Nemo|talk]]) 09:29, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

I wonder if it's deliberate that there's actually less risk if you go outside 1 hour per day. --[[User:192·168·0·1|192·168·0·1]] ([[User talk:192·168·0·1|talk]]) 12:46, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

==Odds ratio confusion?==
I am very confused by the X axis of this comic, I feel like I must be misunderstanding how this works, but I thought I understood how odds ratios worked. Maybe not.
The graph "reads" that "In the reference situation, with zero hours spent outside, the odds ratio for head injuries from falling spacecraft debris is 1.0 ± 0." A 1.0 odds ratio means 1.0:1.0, or that either possibility is 50% likely. That is, there's an even chance your head will be injured by spacecraft debris or that it will not, ''if you stay indoors.'' That does not seem like it could be right, so can someone point me to my error? Thanks! [[User:JohnHawkinson|JohnHawkinson]] ([[User talk:JohnHawkinson|talk]]) 09:34, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
:As best I can tell, this is taking odds as a ratio between ''any'' two events. Rather than the usual "success : failure" (or "happens : doesn't happen"), it's "this scenario happens : control scenario happens". By definition, the control scenario is set at 1.0, and something at a ratio of (say) 2.0 is twice as likely to happen. -- [[User:Peregrine|Peregrine]] ([[User talk:Peregrine|talk]]) 10:50, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

I definitely think we need to put something explaining what an odds ratio is. But since I feel the need to have it explained, I'm not going to be the one to explain it. --[[User:192·168·0·1|192·168·0·1]] ([[User talk:192·168·0·1|talk]]) 12:46, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

== Per day ==

Looks like the comic has been updated to clarify that the number of hours is per day. I'll leave it to someone more experienced with this website to update it, but in any case it makes the note "It is very difficult to avoid being outside for more than four hours in a total lifetime" moot. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.147|172.70.114.147]] 12:31, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

Talk:2518: Lumpers and Splitters

2021-09-21T10:18:35Z

Jeremyp:

Lumping and splitting doesn't just apply to groups of people. It describes the way people categorize things in general. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 00:13, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

I really thought this was about the different focus in individuals and other systems (notably AI research), to either pay attention to individual diverse detail, often involving great memory, or form patterns to generalize everything, often involving great ingenuity. It is the latter path ("lumping") where one used to imagine an AI transfering learning to its own processes ("meta"), and then taking off as a hyperintelligence that improves itself exponentially more rapidly. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.173|172.70.110.173]] 00:16, 21 September 2021 (UTC)
:Whereas this could be a goid example for lumping and splitting, there are many. It is really about top-down vs. bottom-up with the added twist to emphasize the subjects doing those approaches and (in the main comic) applying those self-referentially. This meta aspect you mentioned makes it a more interesting fit, hmmmhh. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.88.5|162.158.88.5]] 06:37, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

I've been a lurker here for many years but I've never edited, so I don't know what's appropriate. Is it notable that the term "splitter" is used in the same sense in the movie "Monty Python's Life of Brian"? Maybe not, but if so, it would say something like "A notable use of the term splitter is in [LoB] when the 'People's Party of Judea' is used to satirize contemporary (1970s) factional communist parties." I've never heard the term lumper before this comic.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.133.139|172.68.133.139]] 03:14, 21 September 2021 (UTC)
:I say that if you think it should be in there, Explain away in your own words. (The only firm advice I have for editing is to learn the difference between a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Link generic link] and an {{w|Link|interwiki link}} and do the latter wherever appropriate, because too many times the messier first type gets needlessly used.)
:That said, I'd say LoB's "Splitter" is applied upon someone who allegedly splits ''themselves'' off from the (otherwise) common group of the person flinging the term around, rather than something someone could classify anyone (including themself) based upon how they treat memberships in general (with or without personal involvement). As such, I would say that a Judean 'splitter' is a different creature from an xkcdean one. I don't think by saying this I would significantly become a splitter in the former sense, unless I had significant opinion otherwise from which I was differentiating, but I would in the latter.
:I'll also happily label myself with the second (indeed, now even unto the meta- level; if not N-meta- by dint of this potentially recursive aside!) but it would be entirely up to others to argue my status in the first sense. Never mind that I, too, have never heard of a 'lumper' in this sense (nor the counterpart usage of 'splitter'). I understand the terms - holism vs reductionism, in part..? - but this is the first time I've been exposed to the term. Immediately got the joke, though. Or at least thought I did. ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.134.131|172.70.134.131]] 08:47, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

: "Splitter" in Life of Brian is used in the sense of "traitor" or somebody who creates a schism. In context, it is definitely pejorative. "Splitter" her is somebody who likes to take a category and make it into several smaller categories. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 10:18, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

Talk:2518: Lumpers and Splitters

2021-09-21T10:18:09Z

Jeremyp:

Lumping and splitting doesn't just apply to groups of people. It describes the way people categorize things in general. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 00:13, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

I really thought this was about the different focus in individuals and other systems (notably AI research), to either pay attention to individual diverse detail, often involving great memory, or form patterns to generalize everything, often involving great ingenuity. It is the latter path ("lumping") where one used to imagine an AI transfering learning to its own processes ("meta"), and then taking off as a hyperintelligence that improves itself exponentially more rapidly. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.173|172.70.110.173]] 00:16, 21 September 2021 (UTC)
:Whereas this could be a goid example for lumping and splitting, there are many. It is really about top-down vs. bottom-up with the added twist to emphasize the subjects doing those approaches and (in the main comic) applying those self-referentially. This meta aspect you mentioned makes it a more interesting fit, hmmmhh. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.88.5|162.158.88.5]] 06:37, 21 September 2021 (UTC)

I've been a lurker here for many years but I've never edited, so I don't know what's appropriate. Is it notable that the term "splitter" is used in the same sense in the movie "Monty Python's Life of Brian"? Maybe not, but if so, it would say something like "A notable use of the term splitter is in [LoB] when the 'People's Party of Judea' is used to satirize contemporary (1970s) factional communist parties." I've never heard the term lumper before this comic.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.133.139|172.68.133.139]] 03:14, 21 September 2021 (UTC)
:I say that if you think it should be in there, Explain away in your own words. (The only firm advice I have for editing is to learn the difference between a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Link generic link] and an {{w|Link|interwiki link}} and do the latter wherever appropriate, because too many times the messier first type gets needlessly used.)
:That said, I'd say LoB's "Splitter" is applied upon someone who allegedly splits ''themselves'' off from the (otherwise) common group of the person flinging the term around, rather than something someone could classify anyone (including themself) based upon how they treat memberships in general (with or without personal involvement). As such, I would say that a Judean 'splitter' is a different creature from an xkcdean one. I don't think by saying this I would significantly become a splitter in the former sense, unless I had significant opinion otherwise from which I was differentiating, but I would in the latter.
:I'll also happily label myself with the second (indeed, now even unto the meta- level; if not N-meta- by dint of this potentially recursive aside!) but it would be entirely up to others to argue my status in the first sense. Never mind that I, too, have never heard of a 'lumper' in this sense (nor the counterpart usage of 'splitter'). I understand the terms - holism vs reductionism, in part..? - but this is the first time I've been exposed to the term. Immediately got the joke, though. Or at least thought I did. ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.134.131|172.70.134.131]] 08:47, 21 September 2021 (UTC)
: "Splitter" in Life of Brian is used in the sense of "traitor" or somebody who creates a schism. In context, it is definitely pejorative. "Splitter" her is somebody who likes to take a category and make it into several smaller categories.

Talk:2362: Volcano Dinosaur

2020-09-22T08:57:42Z

Jeremyp:

The nearest living relative of any 125 million-year-old dinosaur is all living birds. They are all descended from the same "stem bird," which was a dinosaur of a different group. [[User:Nitpicking|Nitpicking]] ([[User talk:Nitpicking|talk]]) 02:08, 22 September 2020 (UTC)
: But some living birds will be fewer generations removed from that dinosaur than others [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 08:57, 22 September 2020 (UTC).

Talk:2362: Volcano Dinosaur

2020-09-22T08:57:28Z

Jeremyp:

Talk:2292: Thermometer

2020-04-12T18:40:14Z

Jeremyp:

First non-Covid post other than April fools?[[Special:Contributions/162.158.107.167|162.158.107.167]]
23:04, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
:Since a fever is a common symptom of Covid-19, I'd say this is as much about Covid-19 as all the previous comics on the topic. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 02:59, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
::I'd disagree. Fevers aren't inherently related to COVID-19, and while it's certainly easy to draw a connection based on current events, at no point is the connection made explicit. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.34.104|172.69.34.104]] 10:29, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
:::Seriously? Fever is associated with 88% of COVID-19 cases! I'd say that's inherently related, and I'm drawing a connection based on that fact. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 12:59, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
::::Fevers are associated with almost all infectious diseases. By that logic, this could be about the flu, mono, or a hundred other conditions. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 17:24, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
:::::I, too, think calling this a Covid-19 comic is excessive. Sure, thermometers for measuring body temperature are sold out at my local drugstore, and pandemic likely inspired the comic, but if it had been published a year ago, we wouldn't infer any connection to a specific disease or global epidemic. - Ada in New Hampshire, USA [[Special:Contributions/172.69.6.22|172.69.6.22]] 07:56, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
::The comic doesn't mention a fever. For all we know Cueball is trying to measure the outside air temperature, or how hot his coffee is. We can rule out the idea that he is trying to measure the temperature of some liquid helium only because he skipped past the kelvin scale. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 18:39, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

A common practice in schools and the like prior to quarantine was temperature taking upon arrival. So it's like that this comic continues that to the home setting. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.112|162.158.78.112]] 23:19, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

A pessimist would guess that this means someone in Randall's household has a fever. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.52|108.162.219.52]] 23:26, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

> The Physician Ducks[[Special:Contributions/172.69.62.94|172.69.62.94]] 23:32, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Personally I'd welcome a home thermometer marked off in Kelvin, avois all the "twice as cold" sort of confusion you can get with an arbitrary zero as used in Celsius and Fahrenheit. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.210|162.158.34.210]] 23:21, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

I might have enjoyed a "Degrees of Kevin Bacon" joke in this comic somewhere. :-) [[Special:Contributions/172.69.68.143|172.69.68.143]] 23:42, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Double-plus-dissapointed we didn't get the Delisle measure referenced at all... [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.202|162.158.34.202]] 01:17, 11 April 2020 (UTC) ...and now added. It would be better in any Trivia section, but we don't have one so hoping it's no more out of place in the explanation as Fahrenheit. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.202|162.158.34.202]] 02:02, 11 April 2020 (UTC) ...''aaaand'' someone removed it (as pure trivia, of course), fair enough. Anticipated. Anyone still interested in what I put just needs to check this IP, at about this timestamp, in Page History, though, so not going to argue the point. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.202|162.158.34.202]] 02:08, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

No temperature scale is defined using melting or boiling points of water anymore. Since 2019 Kelvin is defined via the Boltzmann constant, and all other temperature scales have been (re-)defined relative to the Kelvin scale for quite a while. --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.63.103|172.69.63.103]] 01:24, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Randall forgot the Réaumur scale.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.123.97|162.158.123.97]] 03:00, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

I'm not sure why some people seem to look for any opportunity to take a dig at the US, but I removed the line in the explanation about US-based readers not being familiar with the Celsius temperature scale. I'm sure most Americans are familiar with it but prefer the Fahrenheit scale instead. I don't understand why anyone holds that against us. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 03:04, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
:Hey, let's assume good faith. Chances are, some rando just genuinely had no idea how that kind of stuff works here. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.34.104|172.69.34.104]] 10:22, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Regarding USA Fahrenheit and non-USA Celsius preference, I was in Niagra Falls a few years back, listening to a Canadian station on the radio (ok, more than a few years ago...) and the DJ gave a weather report, saying “The current temperature is 25 degrees, that’s 77 on the understandable scale.” [[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.201|173.245.54.201]] 04:22, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

I guess if you wanted to use the Newton scale you'd need to have Newton's original "degrees of heat" measuring device. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.67|108.162.250.67]] 04:31, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Nitpicking alert : the correct writing is "kelvin", not "Kelvin".

100°F is "really hot"? Maybe on a stripper... [[Special:Contributions/162.158.190.106|162.158.190.106]] 13:00, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Randall, as a physicist, should know about the equipartition theorem. It states that all degrees of freedom will carry the same average amount of energy in thermal equilibrium, not only the translational kinetic ones (but also rotational, and potential energies). It is technically not false to exclude some of these, but an arbitrary choice. I guess he just wanted to include the terms “translational” and “kinetic” to make sure it sounds ridiculously over-specific (which works well). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.91.213|162.158.91.213]] 15:07, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Well, it has Fahrenheit after a fashion. Just substract 460 from Rankine. It's even easier than converting Kelvin to Celsius!
:I find it much quicker to subtract 0.01C° 27,315 times than to subtract 0.01F° 45,967 times, personally. I think you're quite barmy to suggest otherwise, Unsigned... :P [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.222|162.158.34.222]] 16:17, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
::Now that I, the formerly Unsigned, think of it, I must agree with you - but for an entirely different reason. 273.15 in binary is a nice, round 100010001.001(00101) with 3 1's in the integer and 4+2n 1's for every 3+5n fractional digits, whereas 459.67 is much messier: 111001011.10110001111110... , with 6 1's in the integer alone. The more 1's there are in a number, the more operations you have to do for each addition or subtraction. So in binary, Kelvin-to-Celsius is much easier to convert than Rankine-to-Fahrenheit. Yet another point in favor of the glorious metric master system, da? [[User:Osato|Osato]] ([[User talk:Osato|talk]]) 19:57, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

I removed the weasel words, indicating that Fahrenheit is "generally appreciated" because 0 means very cold and 100 very hot. I adjusted it to "some claim" and adjusted the text to fit.

Make the scale in Celsius 0 to 200, and I think you would have a system much more relatable to Fahrenheit users.

Talk:2292: Thermometer

2020-04-12T18:39:37Z

Jeremyp:

First non-Covid post other than April fools?[[Special:Contributions/162.158.107.167|162.158.107.167]]
23:04, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
:Since a fever is a common symptom of Covid-19, I'd say this is as much about Covid-19 as all the previous comics on the topic. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 02:59, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
::I'd disagree. Fevers aren't inherently related to COVID-19, and while it's certainly easy to draw a connection based on current events, at no point is the connection made explicit. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.34.104|172.69.34.104]] 10:29, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
:::Seriously? Fever is associated with 88% of COVID-19 cases! I'd say that's inherently related, and I'm drawing a connection based on that fact. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 12:59, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
::::Fevers are associated with almost all infectious diseases. By that logic, this could be about the flu, mono, or a hundred other conditions. [[User:Shamino|Shamino]] ([[User talk:Shamino|talk]]) 17:24, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
:::::I, too, think calling this a Covid-19 comic is excessive. Sure, thermometers for measuring body temperature are sold out at my local drugstore, and pandemic likely inspired the comic, but if it had been published a year ago, we wouldn't infer any connection to a specific disease or global epidemic. - Ada in New Hampshire, USA [[Special:Contributions/172.69.6.22|172.69.6.22]] 07:56, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
::The comic doesn't mention a fever. For all we know Cueball is trying to mention the outside air temperature, or how hot his coffee is. We can rule out the ides that he is trying to measure the temperature of some liquid helium only because he skipped past the kelvin scale. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 18:39, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

A common practice in schools and the like prior to quarantine was temperature taking upon arrival. So it's like that this comic continues that to the home setting. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.112|162.158.78.112]] 23:19, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

A pessimist would guess that this means someone in Randall's household has a fever. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.52|108.162.219.52]] 23:26, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

> The Physician Ducks[[Special:Contributions/172.69.62.94|172.69.62.94]] 23:32, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Personally I'd welcome a home thermometer marked off in Kelvin, avois all the "twice as cold" sort of confusion you can get with an arbitrary zero as used in Celsius and Fahrenheit. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.210|162.158.34.210]] 23:21, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

I might have enjoyed a "Degrees of Kevin Bacon" joke in this comic somewhere. :-) [[Special:Contributions/172.69.68.143|172.69.68.143]] 23:42, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Double-plus-dissapointed we didn't get the Delisle measure referenced at all... [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.202|162.158.34.202]] 01:17, 11 April 2020 (UTC) ...and now added. It would be better in any Trivia section, but we don't have one so hoping it's no more out of place in the explanation as Fahrenheit. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.202|162.158.34.202]] 02:02, 11 April 2020 (UTC) ...''aaaand'' someone removed it (as pure trivia, of course), fair enough. Anticipated. Anyone still interested in what I put just needs to check this IP, at about this timestamp, in Page History, though, so not going to argue the point. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.202|162.158.34.202]] 02:08, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

No temperature scale is defined using melting or boiling points of water anymore. Since 2019 Kelvin is defined via the Boltzmann constant, and all other temperature scales have been (re-)defined relative to the Kelvin scale for quite a while. --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.63.103|172.69.63.103]] 01:24, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Randall forgot the Réaumur scale.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.123.97|162.158.123.97]] 03:00, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

I'm not sure why some people seem to look for any opportunity to take a dig at the US, but I removed the line in the explanation about US-based readers not being familiar with the Celsius temperature scale. I'm sure most Americans are familiar with it but prefer the Fahrenheit scale instead. I don't understand why anyone holds that against us. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 03:04, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
:Hey, let's assume good faith. Chances are, some rando just genuinely had no idea how that kind of stuff works here. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.34.104|172.69.34.104]] 10:22, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Regarding USA Fahrenheit and non-USA Celsius preference, I was in Niagra Falls a few years back, listening to a Canadian station on the radio (ok, more than a few years ago...) and the DJ gave a weather report, saying “The current temperature is 25 degrees, that’s 77 on the understandable scale.” [[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.201|173.245.54.201]] 04:22, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

I guess if you wanted to use the Newton scale you'd need to have Newton's original "degrees of heat" measuring device. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.67|108.162.250.67]] 04:31, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Nitpicking alert : the correct writing is "kelvin", not "Kelvin".

100°F is "really hot"? Maybe on a stripper... [[Special:Contributions/162.158.190.106|162.158.190.106]] 13:00, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Randall, as a physicist, should know about the equipartition theorem. It states that all degrees of freedom will carry the same average amount of energy in thermal equilibrium, not only the translational kinetic ones (but also rotational, and potential energies). It is technically not false to exclude some of these, but an arbitrary choice. I guess he just wanted to include the terms “translational” and “kinetic” to make sure it sounds ridiculously over-specific (which works well). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.91.213|162.158.91.213]] 15:07, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Well, it has Fahrenheit after a fashion. Just substract 460 from Rankine. It's even easier than converting Kelvin to Celsius!
:I find it much quicker to subtract 0.01C° 27,315 times than to subtract 0.01F° 45,967 times, personally. I think you're quite barmy to suggest otherwise, Unsigned... :P [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.222|162.158.34.222]] 16:17, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
::Now that I, the formerly Unsigned, think of it, I must agree with you - but for an entirely different reason. 273.15 in binary is a nice, round 100010001.001(00101) with 3 1's in the integer and 4+2n 1's for every 3+5n fractional digits, whereas 459.67 is much messier: 111001011.10110001111110... , with 6 1's in the integer alone. The more 1's there are in a number, the more operations you have to do for each addition or subtraction. So in binary, Kelvin-to-Celsius is much easier to convert than Rankine-to-Fahrenheit. Yet another point in favor of the glorious metric master system, da? [[User:Osato|Osato]] ([[User talk:Osato|talk]]) 19:57, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

I removed the weasel words, indicating that Fahrenheit is "generally appreciated" because 0 means very cold and 100 very hot. I adjusted it to "some claim" and adjusted the text to fit.

Make the scale in Celsius 0 to 200, and I think you would have a system much more relatable to Fahrenheit users.

Talk:2218: Wardrobe

2019-10-22T13:54:42Z

Jeremyp:

I did a change to the explanation, rewriting every E.U. and U.K. as EU and UK. Now I noticed that Randall writes E.U. in the comic itself. I (as a resident of the EU) have never seen it with the E.U. writing before (at least I think so). Should we use Randall's version in the explanation? Should we mention this in Trivia? --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 09:11, 22 October 2019 (UTC)

;Title text
While it's clearly referring to the time remaining before 31/10, it ''could'' also be referring to the Government's proposed schedule for getting the withdrawal agreement bill through the House of Commons. (It'd still have to go through the House of Lords, and they may very well take their time.) [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.64|141.101.98.64]] 22:41, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

;Background
Not sure if this is relevant or should make its way onto the main page - I'm a newbie. However ... the "How To" book tour visited Oxford on 11 Oct. Oxford was the home of C.S.Lewis, the Sheldonian Theatre is maybe 200m from ''The Eagle and Child'' pub, which was the Inklings' watering hole. And during the interview, Randall was asked about Brexit. Could these things have come together to provoke this comic? [[User:Exilefromgroggs|Exilefromgroggs]] ([[User talk:Exilefromgroggs|talk]]) 23:15, 21 October 2019 (UTC)
:That could be relevant, if not elsewhere in the trivia section. Please refrain from starting new sections in the discussion. (Another had already done so, but I also removed that) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:29, 22 October 2019 (UTC)

Love when he makes comics about Narnia :-) And sooo funy, if the whole brexit situation was not sooo sad... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 09:29, 22 October 2019 (UTC)

I'm bookmarking this. This is one of the best explanations of the NI border problem with respect to Brexit I have seen [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 13:54, 22 October 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2217: 53 Cards

2019-10-22T13:39:32Z

Jeremyp:

"This page was last edited [tomorrow]." Okay, good to know. Tomorrow starts three hours from now, my time. This comic reminded me of this article: https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/10/corkscrewing-bouncy-ion-drive-would-provide-thrust-in-different-universe/ [[Special:Contributions/172.68.38.88|172.68.38.88]] 00:44, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

I can do this, but my flowchart would be different and involve secretly inserting a joker, using the shuffling as cover for the move.
Collect a deck of 52 cards and have a spectator count the cards. - Secretly hide a joker from the deck in your off-hand (the one without the deck). - Shuffle the cards, letting the hidden card drop on top of the deck. - Keep shuffling, so the inserted joker is well mixed into the deck. - Have a spectator count the cards, looking only at the backs. - 53.
[[User:Nutster|Nutster]] ([[User talk:Nutster|talk]]) 04:56, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Actually this is also what encryption scientists have to face talking to not so few encryption enthusiasts who just invented their own encryption method[[Special:Contributions/162.158.234.112|162.158.234.112]] 07:01, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
:Ohg V unir na haornnoyr pvcure! [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.253|162.158.158.253]] 13:52, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
:The difference is that those "own excryption methods" usually work ... not well, but at least little. Now, the algorithms which claim to compress ANY input to smaller size, those tend to be suspicious ... -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 22:15, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Wait, isn't perpetual motion (w.r.t. a inertial reference frame) possible, at least according to Newtonian mechanics? Just launch something into space at high enough speed and "watch" it wander away forever. Extracting (an unbounded amount of) energy from that object is a totally different story... --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.234.94|162.158.234.94]] 10:11, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
:Not really, as even in vacuums particles randomly come into existence. Eventually enough would be in the path to slow it to a stop. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.62.151|162.158.62.151]] 17:37, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
::Not in Newtonian mechanics. Those random particles are result of quantum physics - and in quantum physics, EVERYTHING is possible, just unlikely (there is extremely small but nonzero probability that all particles in macroscopic object would exhibit tunneling effect moving them in same direction, for example). -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 22:15, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
:::Even in Newtonian mechanics, the energy would be sapped from the object eventually. Space isn't completely empty. The object will occasionally hit particles that will alter its kinetic energy. Also, as it encounters gravitational fields, there will be stresses and strains in the material of the object and the objects creating the gravitational fields. As an example, think of the Earth rotating in space. It's actually slowing down because of the tidal effect caused by the Moon. Some of the rotational energy is being imparted to the Moon, but some of it is let as heat through friction from the movement of tides. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 13:39, 22 October 2019 (UTC)
:Vacuum fluctuation (particles), i.e. quantum weirdness, cannot cause trouble. This is because all working QFT, where these vacuum fluctuations appear, take as assumption the strict local conservation of energy-momentum 4-vector, which is the generalisation of what our OP is asking about. This is a fundamental backbone of all modern physics, not just Newtonian mechanics, and the only known violation is in cosmology. Needless to say, when we talk about perpetual motion machines, we have to start by omitting this trivial class. That is, we do not call systems that achieve perpetual motion by exploiting the conservation of linear or angular momentum alone, as perpetual motion machines. Some machines of that form that convert the energy and momentum from one part to the other could be a perpetual motion machine, because in those cases it is possible for the efficiency of conversion to be imperfect, in which case it will always practically be imperfect, leading to the eventual failure. Luckily, on Earth and in practice, there is no need to be careful, because even the linear or angular momentum special case, would be interacting with air---the best vacuum we can get, are still not perfect; it is not perfect even in actual space outside Earth. It just doesn't exist anywhere. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.165.118|162.158.165.118]] 20:49, 21 October 2019 (UTC) Uhhh, and what about ''Ptolemaic'' Mechanics? SOMETHING is keeping the spheres rotating. Seems Randall hasn't really thought this comic through. Someone should challenge him to prove that his comic is true in all idealistic conceptions of the real world.

Getting a 53 card deck from a 52 card deck is easy. First, cut the deck twice. Then, shuffle all parts together; be sure to suffer thoroughly. Finally, take off the top 5 cards, sneak in the Joker on the bottom while nobody's looking, and put the five cards at the "middle". Because of skewed philosophy, you will have gotten a 53 card deck![[Special:Contributions/162.158.122.186|162.158.122.186]]

“The amount of energy necessary to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it.” -Alberto Brandolini [[User:Menoshe|Menoshe]] ([[User talk:Menoshe|talk]]) 22:03, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Note that while it shouldn't be possible to obtain energy from nowhere, there ARE methods which makes hard to find where the energy comes from, and some may be useful (say, perhaps as a new kind of battery?). Also, anything involving not-completely-understood phenomena, like black hole for example, might actually generate energy from source we don't know about yet (parallel universe or something like that). Meanwhile, lot of theoretical designs of perpetual motion machines without working prototype only contain steps which can't possibly get energy anywhere and are completely useless ... -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 22:15, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
: Black hole physics are one of the best understood. No part of understanding them requires parallel universes. The thing that is really a headache in General Theory of Relativity is that we still do not have a good, localised, way to express the energy stored in the gravitational field. Landau-Lifshitz pseudo-tensor is proved to be unique given the assumptions, but starts with a subtraction of the matter stress-energy tensor, and violates precisely this comic---it says that some gravitational wave situations don't carry away energy, when in fact we know those have to carry away energy. Better defined notions, like ADM energy, are global energy, not localised energy, so that we do not know what they mean, practically. However, even though we are still not fully understanding what mathematical quantity would correctly map to gravitational field energy in the theory, we still do know that it has to be gravitational field energy, and that it has nothing to do with parallel universes. Just to hammer down the singular mistake in your nice comment. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.165.118|162.158.165.118]] 21:01, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

In the picture it seems that he cuts the cards into a pile of 21 cards and 38 cards (thus making 59 cards) I'm sure that helps his argument (or he can't count.
: Yeah, I noticed that mismatch too! Actually, I interpreted the "cut" as referring to that one old trick where rectangular objects (usually banknotes) would be cut in half and then rearranged with small pieces missing, making one more object than there used to be. This of course would not be a case of "rearranging and shuffling". (If you're wondering why this doesn't work for ''actual'' banknotes, that's because the existence of serial numbers makes this trick far harder, and the ''repeated'' serial numbers on most modern notes make it effectively impossible. But back in the 19th century this actually used to be a problem.) --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.54.33|172.69.54.33]] 19:26, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Perpetual motion is so easy that we've already done it. The universe isn't going to stop expanding anytime soon, afterall. Also, Voyager (and some other space probes). Everything is perpetual motion in space at solar escape velocity until/unless it hits something. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.214.88|162.158.214.88]] 18:35, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
: This case is by definition excluded from the discussion of perpetual motion. See above for my longer version on it. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.165.118|162.158.165.118]] 21:03, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

You can always rearrange the matter making up the 52 cards, into 53 smaller cards. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.212.17|108.162.212.17]] 19:21, 20 October 2019 (UTC)

It's easy to prove, using the Banach-Tarski theorem [[User:Cellocgw|Cellocgw]] ([[User talk:Cellocgw|talk]]) 12:39, 21 October 2019 (UTC)
:If you show me how to dissolve the cards into subatomar theoretical dots by shuffling, I agree. --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 13:36, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Sigh... I really don't like having to keep challenging Kynde, who I believe is a well-intentioned contributor... but as soon as I saw the rewritten explanation with confusing phrasing and broken English, I knew that it was him who did it, and honestly... it just makes the article worse. It's harder to read and comprehend, contains irrelevancies, and swings between explanatory points incoherently. It was, honestly, okay as it was (specifically [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2217:_53_Cards&oldid=181494 this version]). I don't really know what to do about it. I'm of the "be bold in making edits" school of wiki-ing, but I don't want to just flush away other people's well-meant contributions. [[User:Hawthorn|Hawthorn]] ([[User talk:Hawthorn|talk]]) 15:01, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Unfortunately, plenty of physicists make the same mistake, losing sight of the fact that math is only a model that must conform to reality, a-la Zeno's Paradox. That's how you end up with silly claims of "if you can [go faster than light] [travel through a wormhole between two distant points in an expanding universe] you'll go backward in time". Or how about the pseudoscience of explaining failed models by assuming that there must be "dark" matter or energy, instead of acknowledging that the model, itself, must be fundamentally wrong the way an actual scientist would. — [[User:Kazvorpal|Kazvorpal]] ([[User talk:Kazvorpal|talk]]) 16:53, 21 October 2019 (UTC)
: What are the chances that the global scientific community, who are setup to attack each other to win funding, would require outsiders to tell them that dark matter and dark energy are indications that their models are "fundamentally wrong"? It just goes to show how rarely you talk to scientists. Cosmologists are always apologising for not knowing what dark energy is, treating them only as the cosmological constant (other alternatives are always explored, but none offer significant improvements upon cosmological constant simplicity). But the dark matter situation already merit a few observational wins, and are starting to look more and more like postulating neutrinos, which is a winning precedent. For two examples, firstly, we have observed localised dark matter causing gravitational lensing. Secondly, we see some galaxy collisions that have dark matter in the wrong place due to the collisions. These evidences are enough to convince most astrophysicists that the basic picture seems correct. Other than this, you should also work on understanding more about how theory and experiment interact in physics, before commenting more upon the matter. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.165.118|162.158.165.118]] 21:17, 21 October 2019 (UTC)
::You fail to understand: Even if something eventually turned up that they could claim is the equivalent of dark energy or matter, it would be an accident, and change nothing about how anti-scientific they had been. The methodology they use is not only wrong, but essentially identical to that used by advocates of the geocentric model when prosecuting Galileo. Dark matter and energy are epicycles and deferents, ridiculous tweaks to models that fail to naturally match observation. Any model that can't hold up to the simplest, barely-scientific benchmark of simply matching observation naturally is a failure. Any adjustments made are a departure from its fundamental premises. At that point it might as well be astrologers tweaking star sign analyses. — [[User:Kazvorpal|Kazvorpal]] ([[User talk:Kazvorpal|talk]]) 01:26, 22 October 2019 (UTC)
:::Well, do ''you'' have a model that matches reality better than what we have? Please enlighten us. Even the geocentric model matched observations and was regarded as ok for a few centuries until we got a better model. Since we don't have a better model, we should try to find evidence or otherwise for the model/s we currently have.

Well, since it's a non-closed system that is receiving energy... and matter is just solidified energy... :) I'm going to say that Cueball is right so long as his flowchart also contains a StarTrek replicator somewhere. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.90.64|172.68.90.64]] 20:08, 21 October 2019 (UTC)SiliconWolf

Where's the Banach–Tarski reference! There should totally be an earth-shattering Banach–Tarski reference. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.58.219|162.158.58.219]] 21:36, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Agreed: There should totally be some sort of Axiom of Choice joke here as well.

See also Sam Loyd's "Get Off The Earth" puzzle (and similar illusions where shifting pieces of a larger picture changes the number of objects by redistributing pieces of each one).

Talk:2217: 53 Cards

2019-10-22T13:38:39Z

Jeremyp:

"This page was last edited [tomorrow]." Okay, good to know. Tomorrow starts three hours from now, my time. This comic reminded me of this article: https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/10/corkscrewing-bouncy-ion-drive-would-provide-thrust-in-different-universe/ [[Special:Contributions/172.68.38.88|172.68.38.88]] 00:44, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

I can do this, but my flowchart would be different and involve secretly inserting a joker, using the shuffling as cover for the move.
Collect a deck of 52 cards and have a spectator count the cards. - Secretly hide a joker from the deck in your off-hand (the one without the deck). - Shuffle the cards, letting the hidden card drop on top of the deck. - Keep shuffling, so the inserted joker is well mixed into the deck. - Have a spectator count the cards, looking only at the backs. - 53.
[[User:Nutster|Nutster]] ([[User talk:Nutster|talk]]) 04:56, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Actually this is also what encryption scientists have to face talking to not so few encryption enthusiasts who just invented their own encryption method[[Special:Contributions/162.158.234.112|162.158.234.112]] 07:01, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
:Ohg V unir na haornnoyr pvcure! [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.253|162.158.158.253]] 13:52, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
:The difference is that those "own excryption methods" usually work ... not well, but at least little. Now, the algorithms which claim to compress ANY input to smaller size, those tend to be suspicious ... -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 22:15, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Wait, isn't perpetual motion (w.r.t. a inertial reference frame) possible, at least according to Newtonian mechanics? Just launch something into space at high enough speed and "watch" it wander away forever. Extracting (an unbounded amount of) energy from that object is a totally different story... --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.234.94|162.158.234.94]] 10:11, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
:Not really, as even in vacuums particles randomly come into existence. Eventually enough would be in the path to slow it to a stop. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.62.151|162.158.62.151]] 17:37, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
::Not in Newtonian mechanics. Those random particles are result of quantum physics - and in quantum physics, EVERYTHING is possible, just unlikely (there is extremely small but nonzero probability that all particles in macroscopic object would exhibit tunneling effect moving them in same direction, for example). -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 22:15, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
:::Even in Newtonian mechanics, the energy would be sapped from the object eventually. Space isn't completely empty. The object will occasionally hit particles that will alter its kinetic energy. Also, as it encounters gravitational fields, there will be stresses and strains in the material of the object and the objects creating the gravitational fields. As an example, think of the Earth rotating in space. It's actually slowing down because of the tidal effect caused by the Moon. Some of the rotational energy is being imparted to the Moon, but some of it is let as heat through friction from the movement of tides.
:Vacuum fluctuation (particles), i.e. quantum weirdness, cannot cause trouble. This is because all working QFT, where these vacuum fluctuations appear, take as assumption the strict local conservation of energy-momentum 4-vector, which is the generalisation of what our OP is asking about. This is a fundamental backbone of all modern physics, not just Newtonian mechanics, and the only known violation is in cosmology. Needless to say, when we talk about perpetual motion machines, we have to start by omitting this trivial class. That is, we do not call systems that achieve perpetual motion by exploiting the conservation of linear or angular momentum alone, as perpetual motion machines. Some machines of that form that convert the energy and momentum from one part to the other could be a perpetual motion machine, because in those cases it is possible for the efficiency of conversion to be imperfect, in which case it will always practically be imperfect, leading to the eventual failure. Luckily, on Earth and in practice, there is no need to be careful, because even the linear or angular momentum special case, would be interacting with air---the best vacuum we can get, are still not perfect; it is not perfect even in actual space outside Earth. It just doesn't exist anywhere. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.165.118|162.158.165.118]] 20:49, 21 October 2019 (UTC) Uhhh, and what about ''Ptolemaic'' Mechanics? SOMETHING is keeping the spheres rotating. Seems Randall hasn't really thought this comic through. Someone should challenge him to prove that his comic is true in all idealistic conceptions of the real world.

Getting a 53 card deck from a 52 card deck is easy. First, cut the deck twice. Then, shuffle all parts together; be sure to suffer thoroughly. Finally, take off the top 5 cards, sneak in the Joker on the bottom while nobody's looking, and put the five cards at the "middle". Because of skewed philosophy, you will have gotten a 53 card deck![[Special:Contributions/162.158.122.186|162.158.122.186]]

“The amount of energy necessary to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it.” -Alberto Brandolini [[User:Menoshe|Menoshe]] ([[User talk:Menoshe|talk]]) 22:03, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Note that while it shouldn't be possible to obtain energy from nowhere, there ARE methods which makes hard to find where the energy comes from, and some may be useful (say, perhaps as a new kind of battery?). Also, anything involving not-completely-understood phenomena, like black hole for example, might actually generate energy from source we don't know about yet (parallel universe or something like that). Meanwhile, lot of theoretical designs of perpetual motion machines without working prototype only contain steps which can't possibly get energy anywhere and are completely useless ... -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 22:15, 19 October 2019 (UTC)
: Black hole physics are one of the best understood. No part of understanding them requires parallel universes. The thing that is really a headache in General Theory of Relativity is that we still do not have a good, localised, way to express the energy stored in the gravitational field. Landau-Lifshitz pseudo-tensor is proved to be unique given the assumptions, but starts with a subtraction of the matter stress-energy tensor, and violates precisely this comic---it says that some gravitational wave situations don't carry away energy, when in fact we know those have to carry away energy. Better defined notions, like ADM energy, are global energy, not localised energy, so that we do not know what they mean, practically. However, even though we are still not fully understanding what mathematical quantity would correctly map to gravitational field energy in the theory, we still do know that it has to be gravitational field energy, and that it has nothing to do with parallel universes. Just to hammer down the singular mistake in your nice comment. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.165.118|162.158.165.118]] 21:01, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

In the picture it seems that he cuts the cards into a pile of 21 cards and 38 cards (thus making 59 cards) I'm sure that helps his argument (or he can't count.
: Yeah, I noticed that mismatch too! Actually, I interpreted the "cut" as referring to that one old trick where rectangular objects (usually banknotes) would be cut in half and then rearranged with small pieces missing, making one more object than there used to be. This of course would not be a case of "rearranging and shuffling". (If you're wondering why this doesn't work for ''actual'' banknotes, that's because the existence of serial numbers makes this trick far harder, and the ''repeated'' serial numbers on most modern notes make it effectively impossible. But back in the 19th century this actually used to be a problem.) --[[Special:Contributions/172.69.54.33|172.69.54.33]] 19:26, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Perpetual motion is so easy that we've already done it. The universe isn't going to stop expanding anytime soon, afterall. Also, Voyager (and some other space probes). Everything is perpetual motion in space at solar escape velocity until/unless it hits something. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.214.88|162.158.214.88]] 18:35, 20 October 2019 (UTC)
: This case is by definition excluded from the discussion of perpetual motion. See above for my longer version on it. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.165.118|162.158.165.118]] 21:03, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

You can always rearrange the matter making up the 52 cards, into 53 smaller cards. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.212.17|108.162.212.17]] 19:21, 20 October 2019 (UTC)

It's easy to prove, using the Banach-Tarski theorem [[User:Cellocgw|Cellocgw]] ([[User talk:Cellocgw|talk]]) 12:39, 21 October 2019 (UTC)
:If you show me how to dissolve the cards into subatomar theoretical dots by shuffling, I agree. --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 13:36, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Sigh... I really don't like having to keep challenging Kynde, who I believe is a well-intentioned contributor... but as soon as I saw the rewritten explanation with confusing phrasing and broken English, I knew that it was him who did it, and honestly... it just makes the article worse. It's harder to read and comprehend, contains irrelevancies, and swings between explanatory points incoherently. It was, honestly, okay as it was (specifically [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2217:_53_Cards&oldid=181494 this version]). I don't really know what to do about it. I'm of the "be bold in making edits" school of wiki-ing, but I don't want to just flush away other people's well-meant contributions. [[User:Hawthorn|Hawthorn]] ([[User talk:Hawthorn|talk]]) 15:01, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Unfortunately, plenty of physicists make the same mistake, losing sight of the fact that math is only a model that must conform to reality, a-la Zeno's Paradox. That's how you end up with silly claims of "if you can [go faster than light] [travel through a wormhole between two distant points in an expanding universe] you'll go backward in time". Or how about the pseudoscience of explaining failed models by assuming that there must be "dark" matter or energy, instead of acknowledging that the model, itself, must be fundamentally wrong the way an actual scientist would. — [[User:Kazvorpal|Kazvorpal]] ([[User talk:Kazvorpal|talk]]) 16:53, 21 October 2019 (UTC)
: What are the chances that the global scientific community, who are setup to attack each other to win funding, would require outsiders to tell them that dark matter and dark energy are indications that their models are "fundamentally wrong"? It just goes to show how rarely you talk to scientists. Cosmologists are always apologising for not knowing what dark energy is, treating them only as the cosmological constant (other alternatives are always explored, but none offer significant improvements upon cosmological constant simplicity). But the dark matter situation already merit a few observational wins, and are starting to look more and more like postulating neutrinos, which is a winning precedent. For two examples, firstly, we have observed localised dark matter causing gravitational lensing. Secondly, we see some galaxy collisions that have dark matter in the wrong place due to the collisions. These evidences are enough to convince most astrophysicists that the basic picture seems correct. Other than this, you should also work on understanding more about how theory and experiment interact in physics, before commenting more upon the matter. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.165.118|162.158.165.118]] 21:17, 21 October 2019 (UTC)
::You fail to understand: Even if something eventually turned up that they could claim is the equivalent of dark energy or matter, it would be an accident, and change nothing about how anti-scientific they had been. The methodology they use is not only wrong, but essentially identical to that used by advocates of the geocentric model when prosecuting Galileo. Dark matter and energy are epicycles and deferents, ridiculous tweaks to models that fail to naturally match observation. Any model that can't hold up to the simplest, barely-scientific benchmark of simply matching observation naturally is a failure. Any adjustments made are a departure from its fundamental premises. At that point it might as well be astrologers tweaking star sign analyses. — [[User:Kazvorpal|Kazvorpal]] ([[User talk:Kazvorpal|talk]]) 01:26, 22 October 2019 (UTC)
:::Well, do ''you'' have a model that matches reality better than what we have? Please enlighten us. Even the geocentric model matched observations and was regarded as ok for a few centuries until we got a better model. Since we don't have a better model, we should try to find evidence or otherwise for the model/s we currently have.

Well, since it's a non-closed system that is receiving energy... and matter is just solidified energy... :) I'm going to say that Cueball is right so long as his flowchart also contains a StarTrek replicator somewhere. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.90.64|172.68.90.64]] 20:08, 21 October 2019 (UTC)SiliconWolf

Where's the Banach–Tarski reference! There should totally be an earth-shattering Banach–Tarski reference. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.58.219|162.158.58.219]] 21:36, 21 October 2019 (UTC)

Agreed: There should totally be some sort of Axiom of Choice joke here as well.

See also Sam Loyd's "Get Off The Earth" puzzle (and similar illusions where shifting pieces of a larger picture changes the number of objects by redistributing pieces of each one).

Talk:2170: Coordinate Precision

2019-07-02T12:05:24Z

Jeremyp:

The coordinates seem to show a NASA building, so in the end you're still soing something space related. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.55.196|172.69.55.196]] 19:47, 1 July 2019 (UTC)Some random European.
:The more precise coordinates are actually in the middle of the Rocket Garden at the Visitor's Center of the Kennedy Space Center complex. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 19:58, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

The atom-level coordinates are obtained by appending digits of e and pi to the Rocket Garden coordinates. [[User:Ichoran|Ichoran]] ([[User talk:Ichoran|talk]]) 20:21, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

I always find it very funny to see all those decimals. Regular GPS devices have an uncertainty of 3 meters if there is no interference from trees, buildings or whatever. That puts you at about 4 to 5 decimals I guess. [[User:Palmpje|Palmpje]] ([[User talk:Palmpje|talk]]) 20:26, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
:A Google Maps webpage URL includes coordinates to seven decimal places. [[User:EmuSam|EmuSam]] ([[User talk:EmuSam|talk]]) 20:48, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
::Sure but out there with your handheld GPS or normal consumer device that includes a GPS receiver you won't get more precision than about 3 meters. And when your at the higher latitudes you're probably not getting that. [[User:Palmpje|Palmpje]] ([[User talk:Palmpje|talk]]) 20:52, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

So combining this comic with #2169, is Randal suggesting he'll be at the Rocket Garden on July 28th (much as he did in #240)? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.208|108.162.216.208]] 20:47, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
:It says ''June'' 28th. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.126.22|162.158.126.22]] 20:52, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
::No, the date of that comic is June 28, but the title text says: [AT THE JULY 28TH MEETING] --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 21:51, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
:::Ah, that makes sense. For some reason my app only showed the first part of the tirle text --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.126.94|162.158.126.94]] 23:04, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Regrettably, there are two dimensions missing, Z and T. Without Z (elevation)+/- you could be in space or in a neutrino detector. T is only relevant for dynamic objects, but there again, the Americas are going West at a measurable rate! [[User:RIIW - Ponder it|RIIW - Ponder it]] ([[User talk:RIIW - Ponder it|talk]]) 21:30, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

The seventh row is likely a reference to comic number 1358 where two stick figures try to find waldo via satellite. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.226.125|172.69.226.125]] 21:44, 1 July 2019 (UTC) kisara, 21:42, 1 July 2019 (utc)

10^-40 degrees on the surface of the earth translates to about 0.7 planck lengths. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.106.234|162.158.106.234]] 21:50, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Do the coordinates 28.5234°N, 80.6830°W really correspond to the tip of the Delta rocket? I checked and it was pointing to a small patch of ground next to the rocket, not the tip of the rocket itself. [[User:Herobrine|Herobrine]] ([[User talk:Herobrine|talk]]) 00:20, 2 July 2019 (UTC)
:No, you need to go to five decimal places to get the rocket. In that respect, I think he might be off by one digit of precision in his descriptions. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 12:04, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

I would like to mention that neither number seems to fit into a standard double float value. I made a fiddle showing this. [https://dotnetfiddle.net/k7yK0Y#] [[User:Ansarya|Ansarya]] ([[User talk:Ansarya|talk]]) 01:48, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2170: Coordinate Precision

2019-07-02T12:04:52Z

Jeremyp:

The coordinates seem to show a NASA building, so in the end you're still soing something space related. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.55.196|172.69.55.196]] 19:47, 1 July 2019 (UTC)Some random European.
:The more precise coordinates are actually in the middle of the Rocket Garden at the Visitor's Center of the Kennedy Space Center complex. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 19:58, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

The atom-level coordinates are obtained by appending digits of e and pi to the Rocket Garden coordinates. [[User:Ichoran|Ichoran]] ([[User talk:Ichoran|talk]]) 20:21, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

I always find it very funny to see all those decimals. Regular GPS devices have an uncertainty of 3 meters if there is no interference from trees, buildings or whatever. That puts you at about 4 to 5 decimals I guess. [[User:Palmpje|Palmpje]] ([[User talk:Palmpje|talk]]) 20:26, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
:A Google Maps webpage URL includes coordinates to seven decimal places. [[User:EmuSam|EmuSam]] ([[User talk:EmuSam|talk]]) 20:48, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
::Sure but out there with your handheld GPS or normal consumer device that includes a GPS receiver you won't get more precision than about 3 meters. And when your at the higher latitudes you're probably not getting that. [[User:Palmpje|Palmpje]] ([[User talk:Palmpje|talk]]) 20:52, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

So combining this comic with #2169, is Randal suggesting he'll be at the Rocket Garden on July 28th (much as he did in #240)? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.208|108.162.216.208]] 20:47, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
:It says ''June'' 28th. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.126.22|162.158.126.22]] 20:52, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
::No, the date of that comic is June 28, but the title text says: [AT THE JULY 28TH MEETING] --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 21:51, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
:::Ah, that makes sense. For some reason my app only showed the first part of the tirle text --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.126.94|162.158.126.94]] 23:04, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Regrettably, there are two dimensions missing, Z and T. Without Z (elevation)+/- you could be in space or in a neutrino detector. T is only relevant for dynamic objects, but there again, the Americas are going West at a measurable rate! [[User:RIIW - Ponder it|RIIW - Ponder it]] ([[User talk:RIIW - Ponder it|talk]]) 21:30, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

The seventh row is likely a reference to comic number 1358 where two stick figures try to find waldo via satellite. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.226.125|172.69.226.125]] 21:44, 1 July 2019 (UTC) kisara, 21:42, 1 July 2019 (utc)

10^-40 degrees on the surface of the earth translates to about 0.7 planck lengths. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.106.234|162.158.106.234]] 21:50, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Do the coordinates 28.5234°N, 80.6830°W really correspond to the tip of the Delta rocket? I checked and it was pointing to a small patch of ground next to the rocket, not the tip of the rocket itself. [[User:Herobrine|Herobrine]] ([[User talk:Herobrine|talk]]) 00:20, 2 July 2019 (UTC)
:No, you need to go to five decimal places to get the rocket. In that respect, I think he might be off by one digit of accuracy in his descriptions. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 12:04, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

I would like to mention that neither number seems to fit into a standard double float value. I made a fiddle showing this. [https://dotnetfiddle.net/k7yK0Y#] [[User:Ansarya|Ansarya]] ([[User talk:Ansarya|talk]]) 01:48, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2123: Meta Collecting

2019-03-14T10:45:32Z

Jeremyp:

RIP {{w|List of collectables}} and grammar. It’s collectable. Not collectible, collectable. [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 16:07, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
:You may disagree, but collectable is also correct. https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/collectable [[Special:Contributions/108.162.242.23|108.162.242.23]] 16:21, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
:I think we’re agreeing here? I also use collectable, and said so in my comment. At least it should be used in this case, because it’s what Wikipedia uses on said page. [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 16:26, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
:My understanding was that the words had different meanings. Something is collectible if it would have a place in a collection; a Harley is collectible because it would have a place in Cueball's collection of items. Something is collectable if it can be collected; a court judgement may be collectable if the person ordered to pay has enough money to make the payment. [[User:D5xtgr|D5xtgr]] ([[User talk:D5xtgr|talk]]) 17:33, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
::Suspiciously enough, that’s the exact example I got when I googled it, but thank you for the collection. I only say this because of the article in question discussed. [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:41, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
:::Yes, I was having a hard time wording my original example - it's rather easier to show why a debt or court judgement ''wouldn't'' be collectable than to explain why one ''would'' be. [[User:D5xtgr|D5xtgr]] ([[User talk:D5xtgr|talk]]) 18:54, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
: Googling "collectible define" or "collectable define", we get that both seem to be correct. https://writingexplained.org/collectible-vs-collectable-difference says collectable is typically the British spelling of the word.

First time posting here, so my format might be terrible. But looking at the list of collectables; Maytag is listed, and the reference is for antique scales, so definitely not dryers. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.7|173.245.54.7]] 16:13, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
:Antique washer models to scale? Fixed it. On a serious note, it’s just one source, there are probably people who would collect washers, or, the more likely option, they just saw Maytag and thought “washers” EDIT: As a formatting nerd, it’s good. [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 16:20, 13 March 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia intern: "Mr. Sanger? Randall made a comic about us again." Larry Sanger: "Godammit, what page do we have to lock this time?" [[User:GreatWyrmGold|GreatWyrmGold]] ([[User talk:GreatWyrmGold|talk]]) 04:21, 14 March 2019 (UTC)

I already suggested this [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2099:_Missal_of_Silos before] that I think we can have a new collected page of xkcd Wikipedia edit wars. I doubt the trivia in 2099 is the full list, or is it? Are there not that many cases as I think to be worth it? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.118.22|162.158.118.22]] 04:48, 14 March 2019 (UTC)

As of right now, Randall has got his wish: the page is protected. Unfortunately, it's protected with "yachts" on it and, of course, it can't be reverted because of the protection. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 10:45, 14 March 2019 (UTC)

Talk:2109: Invisible Formatting

2019-02-08T20:26:18Z

Jeremyp:

This reminds me of the person who used l (lower-case "L") instead of 1 for data entry at some business. Amazingly, the computer accepted it (BAD programming!) and it wasn't found out until the end of the tax year, when all heck broke loose! [[Special:Contributions/162.158.75.136|162.158.75.136]] 14:50, 8 February 2019 (UTC)
:Some programming puzzles are often solved with stuff like this: AΑ [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 15:19, 8 February 2019 (UTC)
:"l" (lower-case "L") is a valid suffix to integer literals in C and derived languages. It indicates the number is of the "long int" type as opposed to a plain "int". Because C automatically upconverts the "int" type into "long int" when needed, the "l" suffix is rarely used. The result: "long int a = 1;" and "long int a = 1l;" mean exactly the same thing, and both statements are perfectly standard and won't raise any warning from compilers. "ll" (double el) is also a valid suffix, this time for the "long long int" type. [[User:GuB|GuB]] ([[User talk:GuB|talk]]) 15:39, 8 February 2019 (UTC)

I went to this page, expecting it to be self-referential. Was not disappointed. [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 15:19, 8 February 2019 (UTC)

Some markup conversion tools don't handle hidden bold spaces correctly. This HTML to Markdown converter is an example: https://anthonychu.github.io/to-markdown/ It converts <code><nowiki>a </nowiki></code> to <code>**a **</code> instead of <code>**a** </code>. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.62.10|172.69.62.10]] 15:40, 8 February 2019 (UTC)
:Hah, this comment is not mine! Somehow I have your IP now. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.62.10|172.69.62.10]] 17:47, 8 February 2019 (UTC)

Were the periods in the beginning there for a specific reason? [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:42, 8 February 2019 (UTC)
:The user 108.162.245.16 thought it was a good idea for some reason. Glad you fixed it. I finished the job [[Special:Contributions/172.69.62.10|172.69.62.10]] 17:46, 8 February 2019 (UTC)

I've had this happen when writing papers. Bold. Unbold. Later backspace into the hidden bold space and everything typed after gets put in bold. If a professor gives you a page count instead of a word count, you can make the punctuation in your paper bold (or increase the font) to add some extra padding that might go unnoticed. Don't actually do this if you can't convey your thesis in fewer words. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.210.52|172.69.210.52]] 18:11, 8 February 2019 (UTC)

I hated when Microsoft Word took over and lacked a real "Reveal Codes" like WordPerfect used to have. I'm kind of like Randall, I think about those behind-the-scenes things that lots of companies like to try to hide from the user, and I like the power to do something about them. [[User:N0lqu|-boB]] ([[User talk:N0lqu|talk]]) 18:58, 8 February 2019 (UTC)
:When I saw the strip, I immediately thought of Word Perfect because its brain dead way of inserting formatting as special codes inline with the text. Hit "reveal codes" and it would reveal a string of bold on / bold off codes because it wasn't clever enough to optimise them away. I assume Word does it differently, perhaps with attributed strings and so doesn't need the reveal codes function so you can manually fix the mess the program has a made.

Talk:2028: Complex Numbers

2018-08-06T10:26:06Z

Jeremyp:

I assume this is strictly a coincidence, but in reference to the title-text, I'll just mention that Caucher Birkar [the mathematician whose Fields Medal was stolen minutes after he received it in Rio de Janeiro on Weds (1Aug2018)] received the award for work in algebraic geometry. [[User:Arcanechili|Arcanechili]] ([[User talk:Arcanechili|talk]]) 16:34, 3 August 2018 (UTC)
* Perhaps it's causal not coincidental. Medal theives and perhaps Randall might read the news also. [[https://scholar.google.com/scholar?cluster=8941732171299849045&hl=en&as_sdt=0,39&sciodt=0,39]] [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.209|162.158.79.209]] 00:34, 4 August 2018 (UTC)

I've added a basic description of Abelian groups in the title text, and that's about as much as I know about such topics. I'm not sure what a "meta-Abelian group" is, is that an Abelian group of other groups? Also, could someone add basic descriptions of algebreic geometry and geometrical algebra? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.94.40|172.68.94.40]] 18:42, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

In the title text, since groups are a concept within mathematics, it seems odd to consider mathematics as a whole forming any sort of group within itself, which I suspect is the first part of the pun. Secondly, since groups involve the commutative property, I think the last part is a pun about the order of the words algebra and geometry, as if they're commutative themselves! [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 19:19, 3 August 2018 (UTC)
: I meant to say 'abelian' groups involve the commutative property, and the meta prefix is referring to the fact that it's about the names rather than the mathematical details - i.e. commutative in metadata only. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 19:24, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

: I guess the joke is that informally mathematicians form a ''group'' (a number of people classed together), what would strictly be a ''set'' in mathematics. While in mathematics, a group is an algebraic structure consisting of a set of elements equipped with an operation that combines any two elements to form a third element and that satisfies specific conditions. --[[User:JakubNarebski|JakubNarebski]] ([[User talk:JakubNarebski|talk]]) 21:18, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

It's a false dilemma. Complex numbers ''are'' vectors (<math>\mathbb{C}</math> is a two-dimensional <math>\mathbb{R}</math>-vector space, and more generally every field is a vector space over any subfield), but that doesn't change anything about the fact that <math>i</math> is by definition a square root of -1. [[User:Zmatt|Zmatt]] ([[User talk:Zmatt|talk]]) 20:38, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Fun factoid: not only is <math>\mathbb{C}</math> the unique proper field extension of finite degree over <math>\mathbb{R}</math> (since <math>\mathbb{C}</math> is algebraically closed), but the converse is true as well: <math>\mathbb{R}</math> is the only proper subfield of finite index in <math>\mathbb{C}</math>. They're like a weird married couple. [[User:Zmatt|Zmatt]] ([[User talk:Zmatt|talk]]) 20:53, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Altho there are no "meta-abelian" groups there are metabelian groups. If xy=yx then the commutator [x,y]=xyx^{-1}y^{-1}=1. The group generated by the commutators -- the commutator subgroup -- is thus a measure of how far a group is from being abelian. A metabelian group is a nonabelian group whose commutator subgroup is abelian. Thus a metabelian group is one made of a stack of two abelian groups. It is "meta-abelian" in that sense. A standard example is the group of invertible upper-trianglular matrices. The commutators all have 1s on the diagonals.

:One should note that the concept of complex numbers actually is older than vector spaces. So while it is true that complex numbers are a cool variant of vectors, historically that's not true, because vectors were more or less unknown when complex numbers were used for the first time. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.6|162.158.90.6]] 09:59, 4 August 2018 (UTC)

Shouldn't the description of a group involve ''two'' operations? There is a binary operation that gloms two things together to make a new thing, but there's also a unary operation that takes only one thing and makes a new thing -- the inverse. Without the unary operation, you only have a {{w|semigroup}}.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.215.160|108.162.215.160]] 09:40, 5 August 2018 (UTC)
: No. The inverse operation arises as a consequence of the fact that it's a group. A group satisfies four conditions: 1. it is closed under the operation, 2. the operation is associative 3. there is an identity e such that a op e = e op a = a. 4. For every element a, there is a unique element b such that a op b = b op a = e. The inverse function falls out as a result of conditions 3 and 4 [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 10:26, 6 August 2018 (UTC)

Talk:1957: 2018 CVE List

2018-02-19T10:26:36Z

Jeremyp:

[[First]] post!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Anyway, the explanation looks like a train wreck, and I'm not sure if a rearranging it into a table or just adding bullet points to everything is better. I'm guessing that a table would be better, but I don't know how I can rearrange it. Can somebody help? [[User:Herobrine|Herobrine]] ([[User talk:Herobrine|talk]]) 06:35, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
: Added a table layout to the [[explain_xkcd:Sandbox|sandbox]]. Might be of some use to another editor. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.45|162.158.74.45]] 07:32, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
:: Thanks, I think a table is a good way to go. I'm adding it to the article as a place to start. Rather than format the original explanation into the table, I'm leaving the cells blank. The original poorly formatted text can be a starting point, but isn't directly adaptable. --[[User:Quantum7|Quantum7]] ([[User talk:Quantum7|talk]]) 09:55, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
Never ever have I heard anyone pronounce SQL as "sequel" - Is that a reqional dialect? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.93.15|162.158.93.15]] 07:41, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
: I heard it's common among MS-SQL users.--[[Special:Contributions/162.158.91.137|162.158.91.137]] 08:02, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
:: Oh BTW, look at our IPs. Are you an easybell customer? :-) --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.91.137|162.158.91.137]] 08:09, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
: Some people pronounce it that way, yes. Don't know if it is "common among MS-SQL users", though. The only person I encountered saying "sequel" never used MS-SQL. [[User:LordHorst|LordHorst]] ([[User talk:LordHorst|talk]]) 09:54, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

I want to take a moment to congratulate the dedication of whomever wrote the original explanation. Second languages are hard, bro. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.215.10|108.162.215.10]] 07:48, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Has someone tried contacting Randall about "extploit"? If not, what would be the best way? [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 08:22, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
:Hack his computer to display a message demanding he fix it if he wants his hard drive decrypted.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.155.26|162.158.155.26]] 09:24, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
::Thanks, will do.

::how to hack complooter
::why does google not work
::how to delete text
::[[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 09:44, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Regarding "Factor a prime": Factoring a prime is easy: The prime itself is the only factor, so it's sufficient to use [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AKS_primality_test AKS] or whatever to check that. Public-key encryption relies on how hard it is to factor the product of two primes, which is a much harder problem. Maybe this is a typo in the comic?
--[[Special:Contributions/162.158.134.214|162.158.134.214]] 10:09, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Can I edit some spelling errors? There seems to be some spelling errors here and there.Boeing-787lover 10:19, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

I think the explanation of the one about injecting arbitrary text onto a page with the comments box is overthinking the joke. I think it really is just about the fact that you can write whatever you like in a comment. Look, I just hacked this page to display the word "penguin". [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 10:26, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

1957: 2018 CVE List

2018-02-19T10:23:34Z

Jeremyp: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1957
| date = February 19, 2018
| title = 2018 CVE List
| image = 2018_cve_list.png
| titletext = CVE-2018-?????: It turns out Bruce Schneier is just two mischevious kids in a trenchcoat.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a HACKING THIS WIKI VIA THE EDIT BOX - The explanation looks like a list. Explain the comic and put the security vulnerabilities in a table. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

{|class="wikitable"
!Security vulnerability
!Notes
|-
|Apple products crash when displaying certain Telugu or Bengali letter combinations.
|This refers to a current vulnerability in MacOS and iPhones. This new text bomb crashes most Mac and iOS apps with a single Unicode symbol (techcrunch.com FEb 15, 2018).
|-
|An attacker can use a timing attack to extploit[sic] a race condition in garbage collection to extract a limited number of bits from the Wikipedia article on Claude Shannon.
|Timing Attack to explit a race condition in garbaje collection refers to Meltdown and Spectre CPU flaws that can be exploited in cloud server like the ones in wikipedia
|-
|At the cafe on third street, the post-it note with the wifi password is visible from the sidewalk.
|This could refer to the hawaian missile alert incident
|-
|A remote attacker can inject arbitrary text into public-facing pages via the comments box.
|Describes a common feature on news sites or social media sites like Facebook. The possibility for users to "inject" text into the page is by design. This is a humorous reference to the relatively common security vulnerability "[[Wikipedia:Cross-site_scripting|persistent cross-site scripting]]", where input provided by the user is displayed to other users in a dangerous fashion that allows attackers to inject arbitrary HTML or Javascript code into e.g. a comment section. It might also be a humorous reference to the events before, during and after the 2016 US Presidential elections where Internet Research Agency employees based remotely in St. Petersburg, Russia, but disguised as US citizens, "injected" arbitrary text in the form of political propaganda into comments on multiple web sites, according to an indictment returned by a federal grand jury on February 16, 2018.
|-
|MySQL server 55.45 secretly runs two parallel databases for people who say "S-Q-L" and "sequel."
|Some people pronounce "SQL" like "sequel", after SQL's predecessor "SEQUEL (Structured English Query Language)". MySQL is an open-source relational database management system, the latest version is MySQL 5.6.
|-
|A flaw in some x86 CPUs could allow a root user to de-escalate to normal account privileges.
|This vulnerability refers to DOM0 attacks on Virtualization CPUs, regulary escalate from normal(few privileges) to root (full privileges), this is the inverse.
|-
|Apple products catch fire when displaying emoji with diacritics.
|This is taking the first CVE to an extreme conclusion by combining it with the Samsung exploding phones
|-
|An oversight in the rules allows a dog to join a basketball team.
|This likely refers to the movie Air Bud. It's a movie about a dog playing basketball {{w|Air Bud}}. This has been a common theme in xkcd comics, see [[115: Meerkat]], [[1439: Rack Unit]], [[1819: Sweet 16]], [[1552: Rulebook]]
|-
|Haskell isn't side-effect-free after all; the effects are all just concentrated in this one. Computer in Missouri that no one's checked on in a while.
|Haskell is a functional programing language, funcional programing is characterized by using functions that dont have side effects in other parts of the program.
|-
|Nobody really knows how hypervisors work.
|Virtualization programing is hard, Meltdown and Specter are related to this
|-
|CRITICAL: Under Linux 3.14.8 on System/390 in a UTC+14 time zone, a local user could potentially use a buffer overflow to change another user's default system clock from 12-hour to 24-hour.
|Jokes about arcane systems that are running linux, that have bugs that nobody can replicate because there are no more machines on this type where reproduce the bug to fix it.
|-
|x86 has way too many instructions.
|This is a joke account for random acronyms of processor assembled language many of them are overspecialized version of general ones
|-
|Numpy 1.8.0 can factor primes in O(log n) time and must be quietly deprecated before anyone notices.
|NumPy is the fundamental package for scientific computing with Python. If something can factor primes that fast, there are attacks to break many crypto functions used in internet security, then must be deprecated because there are not replacements
|-
|Apple products grant remote access if you send them words that break the "I before E" rule.
|another joke on the first CVE and a common english writing rule. That's weird.
|-
|Skylake x86 chips can be pried from their sockets using certain flathead screwdrivers.
|Skylake x86 chips are a line of microprocesors, yes, you can remove forcefully any procesador from his socket with a screwdriver , there are many reports from people not using common sense.
|-
|Apparently Linus Torvalds can be bribed pretty easily.
|Linux Torvals is the benevolent dictator of the Linux kernel codebase, normally it is hard to pass a change because he has the last word about what merge to the code base because that code is replicated in all linux instalations, but apparently he is easy to bribe, that is a severe creitical vulnerability to all linux server and machines
|-
|An attacker can execute malicious code on their own machine and no one can stop them.
|This is a common CVE description
|-
|Apple products execute any code printed over a photo of a dog with a saddle and a baby riding it.
|This could refer to a CVE vulnerability of JPG files where javascript is executed by some application, only this time is in a printed photo instead of a file .
|-
|Under rare circumstances, a flaw in some versions of Windows could allow Flash to be installed.
|This is another common CVE description, Flash was discontinued because is abismal security record. All security experts advise against install.
|-
|Turns out the cloud is just other people's computers.
|This refers to a computer meme where replace "cloud" with "another people's computer" must be used in all marketing presentation to CEOs and not computer literate persons to evaluate the security impact of using "Cloud services"
|-
|A flaw in Mitre's CVE database allows arbitrary code insertion.[~~CLICK HERE FOR CHEAP VIAGRA~~]
|Mitress CVE database is the database where all CVE are listed, this is a joke between the 4th CVE in this list pointing that the site is also vulnerable
|-
|It turns out Bruce Schneier is just two mischevious kids in a trenchcoat. (title text)
|
|}

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

LEAKED LIST OF MAJOR 2018 SECURITY VULNERABILITIES

CVE-2018-????? Apple products crash when displaying certain Telugu or Bengali letter combinations.

CVE-2018-????? An attacker can use a timing attack to extploit[sic] a race condition in garbage collection to extract a limited number of bits from the Wikipedia article on Claude Shannon.

CVE-2018-????? At the cafe on third street, the post-it note with the wifi password is visible from the sidewalk.

CVE-2018-????? A remote attacker can inject arbitrary text into public-facing pages via the comments box.

CVE-2018-????? MySQL server 55.45 secretly runs two parallel databases for people who say "S-Q-L" and "sequel."

CVE-2018-????? A flaw in some x86 CPUs could allow a root user to de-escalate to normal account privileges.

CVE-2018-????? Apple products catch fire when displaying emoji with diacritics.

CVE-2018-????? An oversight in the rules allows a dog to join a basketball team.

CUE-2018-????? Haskell isn't side-effect-free after all; the effects are all just concentrated in this one. Computer in Missouri that no one's checked on in a while.

CVE-2018-????? Nobody really knows how hypervisors work.

CVE-2018-????? CRITICAL: Under Linux 3.14.8 on System/390 in a UTC+14 time zone, a local user could potentially use a buffer overflow to change another user's default system clock from 12-hour to 24-hour.

CVE-2018-????? x86 has way too many instructions.

CVE-2018-????? Numpy 1.8.0 can factor primes in O(log n) time and must be quietly deprecated before anyone notices.

CVE-2018-????? Apple products grant remote access if you send them words that break the "I before E" rule.

CVE-2018-????? Skylake x86 chips can be pried from their sockets using certain flathead screwdrivers.

CVE-2018-????? Apparently Linus Torvalds can be bribed pretty easily.

CVE-2018-????? An attacker can execute malicious code on their own machine and no one can stop them.

CVE-2018-????? Apple products execute any code printed over a photo of a dog with a saddle and a baby riding it.

CVE-2018-????? Under rare circumstances, a flaw in some versions of Windows could allow Flash to be installed.

CVE-2018-????? Turns out the cloud is just other people's computers.

CVE-2018-????? A flaw in Mitre's CVE database allows arbitrary code insertion.[~~CLICK HERE FOR CHEAP VIAGRA~~]

{{comic discussion}}

Talk:1726: Unicode

2016-08-30T09:33:49Z

Jeremyp:

# Proposal by Courtney Milan - 3 dinosaurs: [http://unicode.org/L2/L2016/16072-jurassic-emoji.pdf http://unicode.org/L2/L2016/16072-jurassic-emoji.pdf]
# Feedback by Andrew West - 13 dinosaurs: [http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2016/16103-jurassic-fdbk.pdf http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2016/16103-jurassic-fdbk.pdf]
# Article by Becky Ferreira - they should have feathers: [http://motherboard.vice.com/read/dinosaur-emojis http://motherboard.vice.com/read/dinosaur-emojis]

Sebastian [[Special:Contributions/162.158.83.168|162.158.83.168]] 12:14, 29 August 2016 (UTC)--
:Regarding the brontosaurus reference, there is also some material in the intro of the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brontosaurus wikipedia page]. [[User:Chtit draco|Chtit draco]] ([[User talk:Chtit draco|talk]]) 14:33, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
:Comic could be a reference to WE’RE ALL USING THESE EMOJI WRONG - http://www.wired.com/2015/05/using-emoji-wrong/ where the 😪 emoji is supposed to be a sleepy emoji and not a side-tear emoji - http://emojipedia.org/sleepy-face/ - see facebook's interpretation vs Samsung's{{unsigned ip|162.158.49.60}}

I thought it was funny that the two people in the upper left (who, at the time of this comment, were noted to be "helping" Cueball) are actually impeding the quixotic quest by arguing amongst themselves. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.222|108.162.237.222]] 23:38, 29 August 2016 (UTC)

Personally, I'm still dumbfounded by the lack of a marijuana leaf. There are pills, a syringe, a cigarette, rice wine, plus *multiple* Emoji for both wine & beer. I hate the fact that Emoji are *not* implemented in a sensible, standardized fashion: For instance, the guy Emoji may or may not have a mustache, or gray hair. The "short hair" female may be blonde, or brunette & may even have a coiffure instead of short hair! I think they should be far more specific with their definitions. Personally, I'm sticking with emoticons until they get this sorted out. ; P As for dinosaur Emoji, contrary to my previous statement about specificity, I believe you only need three dinomoji: Carnivore head (raptor or T-rex, non-specific), long-neck herbivore in profile, & winged. Anything more specific than that should probably be expressed with, y'know, WORDS. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.87|108.162.221.87]] 07:35, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
:Words? Weird concept ;) [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 07:47, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
:There's already a winged dinosaur emoji and has been since 2010 http://emojipedia.org/bird/ [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 09:33, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

There is a good amount of detail regarding why/how the Unicode people are arguing over Emojis (In reference to the title text) but there is not much information provided regarding what Randall is referring to in the main strip, e.g. an example of what kind of language regulations the Unicode group try to impose. While the current explanation does a good job of explaining why there is a lot of drama regarding a Brontosaurus Emoji, the meat and potatoes of the article is in reference to language itself. I have never encountered anyone trying to communicate in English using letters that are not part of the current alphabet. Since English uses predefined Roman symbols for sound representation, and the Unicode people only deal with the representation of symbols, I am having a difficult time comprehending how the group in charge of rendering English into text would have any part in the changes that (at least English) is undergoing (which are largely related to spelling and grammar, not the symbols itself). [[User:Snowblinded|Snowblinded]] ([[User talk:Snowblinded|talk]]) 08:19, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

Talk:1701: Speed and Danger

2016-07-02T13:05:08Z

Jeremyp:

;Worst Comic
I think this might be a strong contender for worst comic on xkcd. Although [[1384: Krypton]] definitely makes for stiff competition. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.102|108.162.216.102]] 14:28, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
:Perhaps "in worst taste" might be a better term than simply "worst". Certainly the fatality '''rate''' (in fatalities/crash) for rocket crashes is higher, but placing motor sports crashes to the extreme end of the safety-danger axis is a bit suspect in light of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driver_deaths_in_motorsport . [[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.242|108.162.237.242]] 02:25, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
::This is a great comic, but taste differs. It's not like he is making a joke of people who die in NASCAR crashes, but on this scale it is just not dangerous compared to crashing with a rocket heading for space. This is exactly the same as if he had put in the coconut in on of his most controversial comics, and another scatter plot [[388: Fuck Grapefruit]]. In the title text of that comic he mentions that the whole charts would have lost meaning if he included the coconut. But here he did put it in (the rocket) since he likes rockets and will not use the F word on those like he did with grape and coconuts. It may not be one of the best, but I like it :-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:55, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

The worst? Have you looked at the first few hundred? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.246.119|108.162.246.119]] 15:09, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

I think this comic is actually enlightening on a certain (albeit narrow level). People frequently lack a proper sense of perspective, and this comic illustrates this fact. While we might say "Wow, that Indy car is really moving fast!", it pales in comparison to other vehicles that some fortunate few travel in. {{unsigned|BobTheMad}}
:And I totally wanted to learn that from a '''comic''' that's supposed to be humorous... --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.7|108.162.219.7]] 16:50, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

[[1699]] and [[1680]] would like to have a word with you. Also [[1675]].
Actually, all of the last 25 or so comics would. I really don't know how the xkcd forums put up with being 500x smarter than all the comics they praise every day. [[User:Youforgotthisthing|Youforgotthisthing]] ([[User talk:Youforgotthisthing|talk]]) 17:18, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

; Referencing Something?
Is there something this is referencing? [[User:Saklad5|Saklad5]] ([[User talk:Saklad5|talk]]) 14:41, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

I believe this is in response to the recent crash of a Tesla car while running on autopilot - possibly the first recorded fatality of an autonomous car. {{unsigned ip|108.162.249.156}}
:Seems unlikely, as there is no mention of normal cars or Tesla. And although Elon Musk also do rockets launches (so far without humans as far as I know), there seem to be no relation to Tesla. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:55, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

;Sarcasm
Is sarcasm to be encouraged in explanations? “Here, Randall makes the '''truly astounding''' observation that the danger of a crash is directly proportional to its speed….” [Emphasis mine.] ''— [[User:Tbc|tbc]] ([[User talk:Tbc|talk]]) 15:29, 1 July 2016 (UTC)''
:In this case it's definitely warranted...Jesus Randall, this wouldn't exactly have been hard to make funny/interesting. --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.7|108.162.219.7]] 15:51, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
:No it should not be in the explanation. Keep the sarcasm here ;-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:55, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Well a rocket to achieve orbit hits about 18,000 MPH http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/reference/basics/launch.html
Where as NASCAR is only ~200 MPH https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stock_car_racing
Formula 1 is only ~257 MPH https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formula_One_car#Top_speeds
[[Special:Contributions/162.158.68.71|162.158.68.71]] 16:51, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

I'm kinda shocked Randall didn't reference Star Trek for this comic, considering the number. - Michael C. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.85|141.101.98.85]] 17:00, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

;Why only 4 examples?

Why not put things like biking, driving a regular car, WWI planes, WW2 planes, supersonic jets, satellites, Apollo, New Horizons... {{unsigned ip|108.162.244.67}}
:It was not interesting as they would all overlap and there would be not enough place for labels. The whole idea is that any sport bound to Earth is slow compared to a rocket launch. 100 m dash or Formula one is on the same scale when comparing. Reminds me of when he compared the speed of New Horizon to the speed of a bullet, which would also have been in the left side if New Horizon had been entered... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:55, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

;Sports or Sports Cars?
I don't think the comic intended to say "Normal Sports CARS," as the explanation currently says, I think it means what it says, "Normal SPORTS" like foot ball, or hockey. On the linear scale of 0-to-rocket, running or walking is close to race car speed, compared to how fast a rocket is, and the graph illustrates that. Also, crashing a normal sports CAR is far more dangerous than crashing a professional race car because of all the safety equipment, so a sports car would be more toward the dangerous side. {{unsigned ip|108.162.219.81}}
:Agreed. I was assuming the reference was to various contact sports such as football, hockey, and quidditch where collisions between players regularly happen. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.132|108.162.237.132]] 20:52, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
::Yes of course. My bad, I just read the three dots like different types of car, and did not think further about it. For sure I see now that it is any sports not using motor powers (maybe also not anything about going fast down-slope like bobsleigh etc.) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:55, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

;What is the point of this comic and where is the fun

I don't know, I feel like people is missing the point of the comic, where is the funny on it.

I think finding Formula one on the slow an secure quadrant of the chart is surprising, so near to regular sports, until you understand that it is only compared to a rocket launch. People sure think of F1 as fast and dangerous, so this comic plays with our expectations.

Not exactly hilarious, but neither the worst XKCD comic.

[[User:Inconexo|Inconexo]] ([[User talk:Inconexo|talk]]) 20:19, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

<hr>
One thing I think it might be interesting to indicate is how this is the first one of these plots where everything is in only two quadrants. There is no slow but dangerous crash nor fast but safe crash. Usually at least one these quadrants would have an entry, and probably a facetious one.
:True but there has only been three (with this) comic with a four quadrant scatter plot, the other being [[388: Fuck Grapefruit]] and [[1501: Mysteries]]. The other scatter plot are either in one square or not really scatter plots that can be compared to this one. So it may be too slim a data set to say this is special for xkcd. But still interesting enough that there are no fast safe or slow dangerous crashes. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 12:22, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

I also think the part about scale could be expanded to more than just the "relative to the speed of light." Something like "While we tend to speak of race cars as going fast, they are slow compared to rockets." --[[User:Trlkly|Trlkly]] ([[User talk:Trlkly|talk]]) 22:27, 1 July 2016 (UTC)
:Please feel free to improve with better examples. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:55, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Fatality rate is not 100% as shown by [[wikipedia:List_of_spaceflight-related_accidents_and_incidents#Non-fatal_incidents_during_spaceflight|Non-fatal incidents during spaceflight]] [[User:Wyrme|Wyrme]] ([[User talk:Wyrme|talk]]) 03:22, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
:None of those events resulted in a crash. All crashes have been fatal as far as I can see. A crash involves the rocket hitting something. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 12:04, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
::By that definition, has there ever been a fatal rocket crash (excluding rockets fired as weapons hitting their target)? Thinking of the US space program: Apollo 1 was a fire in the capsule on the ground, not a crash. Challenger was an explosion in mid air, not a crash. Columbia was a break up on re-entry, not a crash. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 13:05, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

When I saw this comic, I immediately though of Little Bobby Tables (https://xkcd.com/327/)

1658: Estimating Time

2016-03-21T12:39:22Z

Jeremyp: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1658
| date = March 21, 2016
| title = Estimating Time
| image = estimating_time.png
| titletext = Corollary to Hofstadter's Law: Every minute you spend thinking about Hofstadter's Law is a minute you're NOT WORKING AND WILL NEVER FINISH! PAAAAAANIIIIIIC!
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Appart from a note on title text this has been Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page.}}

The title text refers to {{w|Hofstadter's Law}} which is a non-scientific law that states: "Things will always take longer than you think, even when taking into account Hofstadters Law."

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail is sitting back from her a laptop lifting her hands of the keyboard, having presumably just paused work on a project.]
:Ponytail: Aaaa! I'm so bad at estimating how long projects take.

:[Danish walks into the panel towards Ponytail who seems to relax back against the chair.]
:Danish: Don't panic-there's a simple trick for that:
:Danish: Take your most realistic estimate and double it.
:Ponytail: Okay, but-

:[A frame less panel with only Danish holding a hand up.]
:Danish: Now double it again. Add five minutes.
:Danish: Double it a third time.
:Ponytail (from off panel): Okay...

:[Danish raises her arms above her head in mock hysteria. Ponytail runs away from her desk screaming.]
:Danish: 30 seconds have gone by and you've done nothing but double imaginary numbers! You're making no progress and will never finish!
:Ponytail: <big>''Aaaaaa!''</big>
:Danish: ''Paaaniic!''
:Ponytail: <big>''Aaaaaaa!''</big>

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Danish]]

Talk:1572: xkcd Survey

2015-09-02T13:46:01Z

Jeremyp:

Mildly interesting to note that the ordering of most of the checkbox/radiobutton lists randomise each time the survery is loaded. Also, there is at least one other comic where Randall comments about not having figured out HTML imagemaps. Anyone remember which? --[[User:Pudder|Pudder]] ([[User talk:Pudder|talk]]) 10:52, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
:It was in one of his "under the logo" news bars, about him starting What If, iirc --[[User:Aescula|Aescula]] ([[User talk:Aescula|talk]]) 11:28, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
I wonder how many people, on reading 'Type "cat" here:', typed '"cat" here:'? I know I did... [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.214|141.101.98.214]] 11:58, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
:Guilty...--[[User:Pudder|Pudder]] ([[User talk:Pudder|talk]]) 12:08, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
: Me too... However you could have typed '"cat" here:', as well... (/edit: I wonder how many different entries the survey's result will reveal) (/edit2: I did not read properly... sorry. I typed '"cat"' not '"cat" here:' -.-)[[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 12:27, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
: I typed meow -[[Special:Contributions/141.101.105.86|141.101.105.86]] 12:41, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
Not sure if it was just me, but the comic wasn't a link at all! The cursor changed into a No cursor for me everytime I mouseover'd the comic. I went to survey using the "Bonus Link!" below the comic page. [[User:Brilliantnut|Brilliantnut]] ([[User talk:Brilliantnut|talk]]) 12:01, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
:Never mind, this was probably due to the WebComics reader extension that I have in my browser. [[User:Brilliantnut|Brilliantnut]] ([[User talk:Brilliantnut|talk]]) 12:03, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
From hearing people on reddit comment about not being able to completely fill the text box (not just the visual box) with the error "Answer too long", it's caused by a 10k character limit. Presumably by Google Docs. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.192|108.162.249.192]] 13:18, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

The validation choices are interesting.
* "Enter a number between 1 and 100" rejects numbers outside this range (e.g. -1) but also reject valid responses (e.g. π).
* "Enter your age" and "Enter the number of $SIBLING" accept invalid responses such as -1. [[User:Paddles|Paddles]] ([[User talk:Paddles|talk]]) 13:29, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

"it's possible that someone may be able to identify you by looking at your responses"
Then why send those informations to Google ? I find the idea of thee survey interesting but why Google doc ? There are other options like Lime Survey. [[User:Seipas|Seipas]] ([[User talk:Seipas|talk]]) 13:37, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

==Not a transcript==
This is mildly interesting, but it is not a transcript. Transcripts are meant mainly for blind people and search engines. Different letter sizes and a frame are not needed. [[User:Xhfz|Xhfz]] ([[User talk:Xhfz|talk]]) 12:54, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
:{| style="text-align:center; border:1pt black solid;"
|| Introducing '''THE XKCD SURVEY''' A search for weird correlations Note: This survey is anonymous, but all responses will be posted publicly so people can play with the data. '''Click here to''' '''take the survey''' Or click here, or here. The whole comic is a link, because I still haven't gotten the hang of HTML imagemaps. 
|}
I wonder how many people included "battery, horse, staple, correct" in the five random words box.
:I typed ');drop table survey; -- at the end of the random characters text box. I must have been the first person to think of that because the survey was still working. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 13:46, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

== Tables Vs Bulleted List ==

The list of questions and possible responses has been added to the explanation by myself and xhfz, in different formats. I went for a wikitable, xhfz used a bulleted list. Rather than just overwrite each other, I think we need to have a discussion on which is the best choice. The reasons I believe a wikitable is the best option:
:*Far better expandability, in anticipation of survey results
:*More structured and neater presentation
In general I tend to lean towards tables, but it is probably a constructive discussion to have for the wiki as a whole. I would be interested to hear opinions of bulleted list vs tables in these types of situation.--[[User:Pudder|Pudder]] ([[User talk:Pudder|talk]]) 13:42, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

If we have a table we need colspan. On the other hans a table is very difficult to maintain. [[User:Xhfz|Xhfz]] ([[User talk:Xhfz|talk]]) 13:44, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

Talk:1394: Superm*n

2014-07-14T09:54:54Z

Jeremyp: /* Wildcard */

==Wildcard==
Excellent description, but minor niggle: In "Superm*n' , the '*' is a wildcard. This isn't a regular expression that would match 'Superman' and Supermoon'. A regexp could be "Superm.*n" - the '.' means 'any character' and the '*' means 'as many times as you like'. (More selective regexps exist) If you were to interpret 'Superm*n' as a regular expression, it would match 'Supern' , 'Supermn', "Supermmn', Supermmmn' etc. So you could describe 'Superm*n' as a 'wildcard search that would match superman and supermoon'. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.184|141.101.99.184]] 05:11, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
:You're approaching this from a very specific context. You may be correct in that context, but there are plenty of different programs, protocols, languages, etc which use wildcards in various ways. I once worked as a 411 operator, and in the search software we used at the time, a search on "SUPERM*N" would have found both "Superman" and "Supermoon" if both of those were names in listings (although our supervisors would consider that too many keystrokes and would suggest "SUP*N" instead). - [[Special:Contributions/108.162.242.10|108.162.242.10]] 05:58, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
::Oops, looks like I read the initial comment too quickly, didn't realize you were kind of making the same point I wanted to, you were just being more technical about it. Either way, I think the explanation of the wildcard in the article itself should be made vague enough to avoid further threads like this. - [[Special:Contributions/108.162.242.10|108.162.242.10]] 06:03, 14 July 2014 (UTC)
:It's clearly a Unix shell file glob. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 09:54, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

==Colour==
If a Trivia section is warranted for this comic, I think it should definitely be pointed out this is one of the rare strips that uses a colour other than black or white. Is there an available statistic on use of colour in xkcd? - [[Special:Contributions/108.162.242.10|108.162.242.10]] 05:58, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

In a similar tune to the supermoon, could the sun at perihelion be called a "superstar"? [[Special:Contributions/103.22.201.239|103.22.201.239]] 08:36, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

Talk:1194: Stratigraphic Record

2013-04-05T11:56:46Z

Jeremyp:

{{w|Zircon}} --[[User:JakubNarebski|JakubNarebski]] ([[User talk:JakubNarebski|talk]]) 06:58, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

See? THIS is how professionals shred evidence. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 09:12, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm more curious if stuff from beginning of earth is still suspended in water somewhere. Think about it, can there really be 100% settlement of materials on the bottom of the ocean? Then again the light from that time is still traveling somewhere, we just need faster then light travel and very good sensor. - [[Special:Contributions/50.143.22.159|50.143.22.159]] 20:58, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

Interesting that the Earth's replies come from the {{w|Canadian Shield}}? Also, what with the coquettish tone of the Earth, and the detective story tone of the alt-text, could Randall be referencing the {{w|Giant impact hypothesis}}? --[[Special:Contributions/68.173.54.150|68.173.54.150]] 23:17, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

The line "I'll never tell" rings in my head from some movie, a little girl repeating it over and over, possibly just from a trailer for the movie. Maybe "Don't Say a Word" (2001) but I'm at work so I don't want to play the trailer.... Did this happen to anyone else? --[[User:DanB|DanB]] ([[User talk:DanB|talk]]) 14:14, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure it comes from an old commercial, perhaps for Oil of Olay, where an actress talks about how it keeps her looking young and the the camera pulls in closer until she says "How old am I? I'll never tell." That would also fit the context. --RB

The current explanation isn't an explanation at all, it just restates stuff that's in the comic's transcript. I'd improve it, but the only reason I'm here is because I didn't understand the point. Presumably the last two panels refer to some thing from popular culture. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 11:56, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

Talk:1193: Externalities

2013-04-01T11:38:02Z

Jeremyp:

[[Special:Contributions/199.48.226.89|199.48.226.89]] 10:18, 1 April 2013 (UTC) I put in "caltech.edu" and hashed a lot of words, and "Twilight Sparkle is best pony." was the best result I managed, only off by 496 bits.

All I see is a blank white 780x969 image. Nothing appears when I hover over stuff. [[Special:Contributions/109.65.100.208|109.65.100.208]] 09:04, 1 April 2013 (UTC)
:Sometimes it does that. It takes a while to generate, and it doesn't always render correctly. Try updating your browser or refreshing. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 09:06, 1 April 2013 (UTC)
The person who provided the shopped image either isn't using a modern browser or is using IE. The font is supposed to be "xkcd-Regular", which I assume is a font that gets downloaded from XKCD's server. Loading the same page in IE 9 gave me that Times New Roman-esque font instead (Chrome, Firefox, and Opera use the special font, although it's rendered a little fuzzy in Firefox). [[Special:Contributions/129.21.119.153|129.21.119.153]] 09:25, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

The dog part now shows "FREEPRIME@AMAZON.COM" underneath the sliders for me. --[[User:Gefrierbrand|Gefrierbrand]] ([[User talk:Gefrierbrand|talk]]) 09:50, 1 April 2013 (UTC)
:I think it matches the company in the first panel? (Currently CAREERS@XLINX INC for me.) --[[Special:Contributions/81.138.95.57|81.138.95.57]] 10:53, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

The page where the company name is supposed to be fetched from is "Sith" now, but I checked and the company is not there. I think this will take some time to decipher ... -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 11:12, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

: .... uh, remember few pages ago where we JOKED about being used as distributted computer? Now we ARE used to crack the provided hash ... -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 11:15, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

: It's April 1st. Maybe the idea that the company is sourced from a Wikipedia page is not true. That would explain the link to the Wikipedia fund raising page as an apology for the fact that there will be many XKCD readers vandalising the Sith page [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 11:38, 1 April 2013 (UTC).

Talk:1193: Externalities

2013-04-01T11:37:09Z

Jeremyp:

Talk:1093: Forget

2012-08-13T10:35:34Z

Jeremyp:

How far off the top of that list is the death of JFK? [[User:SteveBell|SteveB]] ([[User talk:SteveBell|talk]]) 10:55, 10 August 2012‎ (UTC)
: Looking at the time table, my guess would be around 2000. ~[[User:Jjhuddle|JJ]] ([[User talk:Jjhuddle|talk]]) 11:01, 10 August 2012‎ (UTC)
Ah, the seventies. Bell Bottoms. The Bicentennial. The Munich Olympics. The original Star Wars movie. Except for Star Wars, I suppose much of that ''could'' be forgotten. Especially {{explain|1072|Bell Bottoms}}.-- [[User:IronyChef|IronyChef]] ([[User talk:IronyChef|talk]]) 13:50, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Lorena Bobbitt is misspelled in the comic. It should have two "t's." Source: http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-500185_162-4207517.html [Goingtotryscience, 10 Aug 2012] --[[User:Goingtotryscience|Goingtotryscience]] ([[User talk:Goingtotryscience|talk]]) 14:59, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

The cold war was after World War II, not World War I. --[[User:Ralfoide|Ralfoide]] ([[User talk:Ralfoide|talk]]) 16:18, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

: He didn't say the cold war was after World War I, he said the Soviet Union began after World War I and was the advesary of the United States during the cold war. --[[User:Enginesoul|Enginesoul]] ([[User talk:Enginesoul|talk]]) 18:10, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Let's not forget 2035 when the majority of people will not remember a world berift of XKCD! [[User:Loeb|Loeb]] ([[User talk:Loeb|talk]]) 17:17, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

When Coca-Cola change the formula to New Coke, they kept the name "Coca-Cola" for the reformulated beverage, and discontinued the old formula. Because of the backlash, they reintroduced the old formula as "Coca-Cola Classic" and kept the new formula as "Coca-Cola". After a while, with "Coca-Cola Classic" being by far the biggest seller, the new formula was rebranded "Coke II", and eventually discontinued (I believe). The can I have in front of me is marked simply "Coca-Cola", so I guess "Coca-Cola Classic" was eventually rebranded back to the original name. --[[User:Blaisepascal|Blaise Pascal]] ([[User talk:Blaisepascal|talk]]) 17:55, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Am I the only one who thinks that there are some other things needing explaining here? I have no idea what "Forgot About Dre" or "Baby Got Back" are about. (Well, not without a little googling.) And Pluto still exists, even if it's not currently classified as a planet (last I heard, they were considering classifying it and Charon as a twin planet system) so people are unlikely to forget about the name.--[[User:Joe Green|Joe Green]] ([[User talk:Joe Green|talk]]) 07:26, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Oh and if Chernobyl is considered worthy of explanation, surely so is Challenger? Columbine too. Jeff's initial selection seems a little arbitrary, and while he justifiably never claims to provide a comprehensive explanation, we usually fill in the gaps.--[[User:Joe Green|Joe Green]] ([[User talk:Joe Green|talk]]) 07:34, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

:Gaps: Filled. By the way, none of the explanation was actually Jeff's. It's the collaboration of multiple users (feel free to pitch in). For example, I made the {{diff|6133|first revision}} of the article, with a basic explanation, [[Special:Contributions/Jjhuddle|Jjhuddle]] {{diff|6157|added}} information about the title text (which I skipped over, as I wasn't sure about it), [[Special:Contributions/Jilkscom56|Jilkscom56]] {{diff|6190|added}} the bit about Eyjafjallajökull, [[Special:Contributions/IronyChef|IronyChef]] {{diff|6199|added}} eight more years, [[Special:Contributions/MrFlibble|MrFlibble]] {{diff|6218|fixed}} an error in one of the dates, [[Special:Contributions/AHT|AHT]] {{diff|6253|expanded}} the Berlin Wall section, and I {{diff|6256|filled in the rest of the blanks}}. {{User:Omega/sig}} 08:18, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

The Berlin Wall was constructed by East Germany, not the USSR and it preceded the reunification of Germany. I've sort of fixed it, but it could do with more work. [[User:Jeremyp|Jeremyp]] ([[User talk:Jeremyp|talk]]) 10:35, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

Talk:1093: Forget

2012-08-13T10:34:43Z

Jeremyp:

Talk:1093: Forget

2012-08-13T10:34:18Z

Jeremyp:

How far off the top of that list is the death of JFK? [[User:SteveBell|SteveB]] ([[User talk:SteveBell|talk]]) 10:55, 10 August 2012‎ (UTC)
: Looking at the time table, my guess would be around 2000. ~[[User:Jjhuddle|JJ]] ([[User talk:Jjhuddle|talk]]) 11:01, 10 August 2012‎ (UTC)
Ah, the seventies. Bell Bottoms. The Bicentennial. The Munich Olympics. The original Star Wars movie. Except for Star Wars, I suppose much of that ''could'' be forgotten. Especially {{explain|1072|Bell Bottoms}}.-- [[User:IronyChef|IronyChef]] ([[User talk:IronyChef|talk]]) 13:50, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Lorena Bobbitt is misspelled in the comic. It should have two "t's." Source: http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-500185_162-4207517.html [Goingtotryscience, 10 Aug 2012] --[[User:Goingtotryscience|Goingtotryscience]] ([[User talk:Goingtotryscience|talk]]) 14:59, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

The cold war was after World War II, not World War I. --[[User:Ralfoide|Ralfoide]] ([[User talk:Ralfoide|talk]]) 16:18, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

: He didn't say the cold war was after World War I, he said the Soviet Union began after World War I and was the advesary of the United States during the cold war. --[[User:Enginesoul|Enginesoul]] ([[User talk:Enginesoul|talk]]) 18:10, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Let's not forget 2035 when the majority of people will not remember a world berift of XKCD! [[User:Loeb|Loeb]] ([[User talk:Loeb|talk]]) 17:17, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

When Coca-Cola change the formula to New Coke, they kept the name "Coca-Cola" for the reformulated beverage, and discontinued the old formula. Because of the backlash, they reintroduced the old formula as "Coca-Cola Classic" and kept the new formula as "Coca-Cola". After a while, with "Coca-Cola Classic" being by far the biggest seller, the new formula was rebranded "Coke II", and eventually discontinued (I believe). The can I have in front of me is marked simply "Coca-Cola", so I guess "Coca-Cola Classic" was eventually rebranded back to the original name. --[[User:Blaisepascal|Blaise Pascal]] ([[User talk:Blaisepascal|talk]]) 17:55, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Am I the only one who thinks that there are some other things needing explaining here? I have no idea what "Forgot About Dre" or "Baby Got Back" are about. (Well, not without a little googling.) And Pluto still exists, even if it's not currently classified as a planet (last I heard, they were considering classifying it and Charon as a twin planet system) so people are unlikely to forget about the name.--[[User:Joe Green|Joe Green]] ([[User talk:Joe Green|talk]]) 07:26, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Oh and if Chernobyl is considered worthy of explanation, surely so is Challenger? Columbine too. Jeff's initial selection seems a little arbitrary, and while he justifiably never claims to provide a comprehensive explanation, we usually fill in the gaps.--[[User:Joe Green|Joe Green]] ([[User talk:Joe Green|talk]]) 07:34, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

The Berlin Wall was constructed by East Germany, not the USSR and it preceded the reunification of Germany. I've sort of fixed it, but it could do with more work.

:Gaps: Filled. By the way, none of the explanation was actually Jeff's. It's the collaboration of multiple users (feel free to pitch in). For example, I made the {{diff|6133|first revision}} of the article, with a basic explanation, [[Special:Contributions/Jjhuddle|Jjhuddle]] {{diff|6157|added}} information about the title text (which I skipped over, as I wasn't sure about it), [[Special:Contributions/Jilkscom56|Jilkscom56]] {{diff|6190|added}} the bit about Eyjafjallajökull, [[Special:Contributions/IronyChef|IronyChef]] {{diff|6199|added}} eight more years, [[Special:Contributions/MrFlibble|MrFlibble]] {{diff|6218|fixed}} an error in one of the dates, [[Special:Contributions/AHT|AHT]] {{diff|6253|expanded}} the Berlin Wall section, and I {{diff|6256|filled in the rest of the blanks}}. {{User:Omega/sig}} 08:18, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

1093: Forget

2012-08-13T10:30:38Z

Jeremyp:

{{comicbox
| number = 1093
| date = August 10, 2012
| title = Forget
| image = forget.png
| titletext = 'Baby Got Back' turned 20 this year. My favorite nostalgia show is VH1's 'I Love The Inexorable March of Time Toward the Grave That Awaits Us All.'
| explanation =
The median age in {{w|USA}} is about 35 years. This means that anything that happened longer ago than that (less the first five or six years of one's life, where they're too young to remember cultural events) will be remembered by a minority of people. For example, here in 2012, the majority of Americans are too young to remember the 1970s.

'''2013: The Carter presidency''' {{w|Jimmy Carter}} was the {{w|President of the United States}} from 1977-1981. He lost all popularity after he controversially boycotted the {{w|1980 Olympics}}, in {{w|Moscow}} (at which time the {{w|United States}} and {{w|USSR}} were in the bitter arms race of the {{w|Cold War}}).

'''2014: The Reagan shooting''' References the 1981 {{w|Reagan assassination attempt|assassination attempt}} on the then American president, {{w|Ronald Reagan}}.

'''2015: The Falkand Islands War''' This is in reference to the {{w|Falklands War|brief outbreak of hostilities}} between the {{w|UK}} and {{w|Argentina}} over a small patch of rock off the shore of Argentina claimed by both but controlled by the UK. Even to this date, tensions remain high over the ownership of these islands, and while a majority of people alive weren't alive to remember it ''first hand'', it nevertheless remains present in the collective psyche of both nations.

'''2017: The first Apple Macintosh''' The {{w|Macintosh}} was a line of computers created by {{w|Apple Inc.|Apple}}, first introduced in 1984, with the introduction of the {{w|Macintosh 128K}}.

'''2018: New Coke''' References a public relations blunder that the Coca Cola corporation undertook in attempting to reformulate its cola recipe, naming it {{w|New Coke}}. The public backlash so shook the company that even to this date, the reinstated original recipe is referred to as {{w|Coke Classic}}.

'''2019: Challenger''' The {{w|Space Shuttle Challenger|Challenger}} was a {{w|NASA}} space shuttle, which was launched in 1986, but {{w|Space Shuttle Challenger disaster|exploded}} 72 seconds into its flight, killing everyone aboard, including {{w|Christa McAuliffe}}, a teacher selected to be the first teacher in space.

'''2020: Chernobyl''' Refers to the 1986 meltdown of a {{w|Chernobyl|nuclear power plant}} in the {{w|Ukranian SSR}} (then a part of the Soviet Union). The meltdown forced the nearby city of {{w|Pripyat}} to be abandoned, and it remains a ghost town today.

'''2021: Black Monday''' Refers to the 1987 {{w|Black_Monday_(1987)|day}} of the largest one-day {{w|stock market}} drop in history.

'''2022: The Reagan presidency''' {{w|Ronald Reagan}} was an American president from 1981 to 1989, and was a generally well received president known for ending the Cold War, oversaw the {{w|Iran–Contra affair}}, {{w|Invasion of Grenada|invading Grenada}}, and issuing forth a number of new {{w|Reaganomics|economic policies}}.

'''2023: The Berlin Wall''' Refers specifically to the tearing down of a {{w|Berlin Wall|barrier}} through the {{w|Germany|German}} city of {{w|Berlin}} erected by the {{w|East Germany|German Democratic Republic}}, up to then divided into soviet-controlled {{w|East Germany|east}} and western-controlled {{w|West Germany|west}} portions. With the gradual wane of the {{w|Soviet Union}}, the wall was torn down by people on both sides of the division and was an antecedent of the reunion of Germany.

'''2024: HammerTime''' Refers to a refrain in {{w|MC Hammer|MC Hammer's}} 1990 hit song {{w|U Can't Touch This}}; [[Randall Munroe]] makes reference to this song elsewhere in his comics, too (specifically {{explain|108}} and {{explain|210}}).

'''2025: The Soviet Union''' Refers to the cold-war adversary of the United States, emerging after the end of {{w|World War I}} and only collapsing in 1991.

'''2026: The LA Riots''' Refers to the {{w|1992 Los Angeles riots|massive riots}} occuring at the release of the verdict acquitting the officers accused of the {{w|Rodney King}} beatings in 1992.

'''2027: Lorena Bobbit''' Refers to the {{w|John and Lorena Bobbitt|woman}} who {{w|emasculated}} her husband in 1993.

'''2028: The Forrest Gump release''' {{w|Forrest Gump}} was a 1994 drama starring {{w|Tom Hanks}} as a mentally disabled man, telling his spectacular life story. The movie had a highly successful release, and remains one of the greatest films of all time.

'''2029: The Rwanda Genocide''' Refers to the 1994 {{w|Rwandan genocide}}, where an estimated 800,000 people were killed.

'''2030: OJ Simpson's Trial''' The {{w|O. J. Simpson murder case|O.J. Simpson trial}} was a famous criminal case during which {{w|O.J. Simpson}}, a professional football player, was {{w|acquitted}} of the murder of {{w|Nicole Simpson}} and {{w|Ronald Goldman}}. He was later arrested and jailed for other crimes, including armed robbery and kidnapping.

'''2031: Clinton's reelection''' {{w|Bill Clinton}} was the American president from 1993 to 2001. He won his second term in the {{w|United_States_presidential_election,_1996|1996 presidential election}}. During his second term, he faced controversity during an {{w|impeachment}} trial, for which he was acquitted, and a large number of pardons he made on his last day of office. Clinton was a generally favoured president, which exiting his presidency with a high approval rate.

'''2032: Princess Diana''' {{w|Princess Diana}} was a famous {{w|Commonwealth}} princess who made headlines after her 1997 {{w|Death of Diana, Princess of Wales|death}} in a car crash.

'''2033: Clinton's impeachment''' In 1998, the American {{w|Congress}} voted to {{w|Impeachment_of_Bill_Clinton|impeach}} then-president Clinton, based on allegations that he {{w|Lewinsky scandal|lied}} about relations with a {{w|Monica Lewinsky|White House intern}}. He was later acquitted.

'''2034: Columbine''' Refers to the 1999 {{w|Columbine High School massacre}}, where 13 people were killed by a {{w|Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold|pair of shooters}}.

'''2034: Forgot About Dre''' Refers to the {{w|Grammy}} winning 2000 song, {{w|Forgot About Dre}}, by the rapper {{w|Dr. Dre}}.

'''2036: 9/11''' Refers to the {{w|9/11}} event, in 2001, where terrorists crashed two planes into the {{w|World Trade Center}} towers, in {{w|New York}}.

'''2037: VH1's I love the 80s''' {{w|I Love the '80s (U.S. TV series)|I Love the '80s}} was a 2002 nostalgia TV series by {{w|VH1}}.

'''2038: A time before Facebook''' Refers to the online social media site, {{w|Facebook}}, launched in 2004.

'''2039: VH1's I love the 90s''' {{w|I Love the '90s (U.S. TV series)|I Love the '90s}} was a TV series airing in 2004.

'''2040: Hurricane Katrina''' {{w|Hurricane Katrina}} was a devastating 2005 hurricane that hit {{w|New Orleans}}, killing almost 2000 people and causing 81 billion dollars in damage.

'''2041: The planet Pluto''' {{w|Pluto}} is a {{w|dwarf planet}} in our solar system. Up until 2006, Pluto was considered to be a planet.

'''2042: The first iPhone''' {{w|Apple}}'s first iPhone was released in 2007.

'''2043: The Bush presidency''' {{w|George W. Bush}} was the American presidency from 2001 to 2009. He was criticized for the wars on {{w|War_in_Afghanistan_(2001%E2%80%93present)|Afghanistan}} and {{w|Iraq_War|Iraq}}, poor handling of Hurricane Katrina, and seeing the United States enter a recession. His approval peaked after the 9/11 attacks, but had fallen to historical lows by the end of his second term, making him one of the least liked US presidents.

'''2044: Michael Jackson''' Refers to the {{w|Michael Jackson|pop singer}} who died of drug overdose in 2009.

'''2045: Trying to say Eyjafjallajökull''' Is a reference to a volcano in {{w|Iceland}} that {{w|Eyjafjallajökull#2010 eruptions|erupted}} in 2010. The eruption threw volcanic ash several kilometres up in the atmosphere, which led to air travel disruption in northwest Europe for six days.

'''2046: The Arab Spring''' Refers to the {{w|Arab Spring|wave of revolutions}} that began in late 2010, where many Arabic nations overthrew leaders and started civil wars, with many nations converting to democracies.

'''2047: Anything embarrassing you do today''' Refers to the fact that in 35 years, the majority of Americans will not have been around on this date.

The title text is in reference to the vastly over-saturated programming on VH1 dedicated to the history of the TV universe.
}}

{{Comic discussion}}

1093: Forget

2012-08-13T10:29:56Z

Jeremyp:

{{comicbox
| number = 1093
| date = August 10, 2012
| title = Forget
| image = forget.png
| titletext = 'Baby Got Back' turned 20 this year. My favorite nostalgia show is VH1's 'I Love The Inexorable March of Time Toward the Grave That Awaits Us All.'
| explanation =
The median age in {{w|USA}} is about 35 years. This means that anything that happened longer ago than that (less the first five or six years of one's life, where they're too young to remember cultural events) will be remembered by a minority of people. For example, here in 2012, the majority of Americans are too young to remember the 1970s.

'''2013: The Carter presidency''' {{w|Jimmy Carter}} was the {{w|President of the United States}} from 1977-1981. He lost all popularity after he controversially boycotted the {{w|1980 Olympics}}, in {{w|Moscow}} (at which time the {{w|United States}} and {{w|USSR}} were in the bitter arms race of the {{w|Cold War}}).

'''2014: The Reagan shooting''' References the 1981 {{w|Reagan assassination attempt|assassination attempt}} on the then American president, {{w|Ronald Reagan}}.

'''2015: The Falkand Islands War''' This is in reference to the {{w|Falklands War|brief outbreak of hostilities}} between the {{w|UK}} and {{w|Argentina}} over a small patch of rock off the shore of Argentina claimed by both but controlled by the UK. Even to this date, tensions remain high over the ownership of these islands, and while a majority of people alive weren't alive to remember it ''first hand'', it nevertheless remains present in the collective psyche of both nations.

'''2017: The first Apple Macintosh''' The {{w|Macintosh}} was a line of computers created by {{w|Apple Inc.|Apple}}, first introduced in 1984, with the introduction of the {{w|Macintosh 128K}}.

'''2018: New Coke''' References a public relations blunder that the Coca Cola corporation undertook in attempting to reformulate its cola recipe, naming it {{w|New Coke}}. The public backlash so shook the company that even to this date, the reinstated original recipe is referred to as {{w|Coke Classic}}.

'''2019: Challenger''' The {{w|Space Shuttle Challenger|Challenger}} was a {{w|NASA}} space shuttle, which was launched in 1986, but {{w|Space Shuttle Challenger disaster|exploded}} 72 seconds into its flight, killing everyone aboard, including {{w|Christa McAuliffe}}, a teacher selected to be the first teacher in space.

'''2020: Chernobyl''' Refers to the 1986 meltdown of a {{w|Chernobyl|nuclear power plant}} in the {{w|Ukranian SSR}} (then a part of the Soviet Union). The meltdown forced the nearby city of {{w|Pripyat}} to be abandoned, and it remains a ghost town today.

'''2021: Black Monday''' Refers to the 1987 {{w|Black_Monday_(1987)|day}} of the largest one-day {{w|stock market}} drop in history.

'''2022: The Reagan presidency''' {{w|Ronald Reagan}} was an American president from 1981 to 1989, and was a generally well received president known for ending the Cold War, oversaw the {{w|Iran–Contra affair}}, {{w|Invasion of Grenada|invading Grenada}}, and issuing forth a number of new {{w|Reaganomics|economic policies}}.

'''2023: The Berlin Wall''' Refers specifically to the tearing down of a {{w|Berlin Wall|barrier}} through the {{w|Germany|German}} city of {{w|Berlin}} by the {{w|East Germany|German Democratic Republic}}, up to then divided into soviet-controlled {{w|East Germany|east}} and western-controlled {{w|West Germany|west}} portions. With the gradual wane of the {{w|Soviet Union}}, the wall was torn down by people on both sides of the division and was an antecedent of the reunion of Germany.

'''2024: HammerTime''' Refers to a refrain in {{w|MC Hammer|MC Hammer's}} 1990 hit song {{w|U Can't Touch This}}; [[Randall Munroe]] makes reference to this song elsewhere in his comics, too (specifically {{explain|108}} and {{explain|210}}).

'''2025: The Soviet Union''' Refers to the cold-war adversary of the United States, emerging after the end of {{w|World War I}} and only collapsing in 1991.

'''2026: The LA Riots''' Refers to the {{w|1992 Los Angeles riots|massive riots}} occuring at the release of the verdict acquitting the officers accused of the {{w|Rodney King}} beatings in 1992.

'''2027: Lorena Bobbit''' Refers to the {{w|John and Lorena Bobbitt|woman}} who {{w|emasculated}} her husband in 1993.

'''2028: The Forrest Gump release''' {{w|Forrest Gump}} was a 1994 drama starring {{w|Tom Hanks}} as a mentally disabled man, telling his spectacular life story. The movie had a highly successful release, and remains one of the greatest films of all time.

'''2029: The Rwanda Genocide''' Refers to the 1994 {{w|Rwandan genocide}}, where an estimated 800,000 people were killed.

'''2030: OJ Simpson's Trial''' The {{w|O. J. Simpson murder case|O.J. Simpson trial}} was a famous criminal case during which {{w|O.J. Simpson}}, a professional football player, was {{w|acquitted}} of the murder of {{w|Nicole Simpson}} and {{w|Ronald Goldman}}. He was later arrested and jailed for other crimes, including armed robbery and kidnapping.

'''2031: Clinton's reelection''' {{w|Bill Clinton}} was the American president from 1993 to 2001. He won his second term in the {{w|United_States_presidential_election,_1996|1996 presidential election}}. During his second term, he faced controversity during an {{w|impeachment}} trial, for which he was acquitted, and a large number of pardons he made on his last day of office. Clinton was a generally favoured president, which exiting his presidency with a high approval rate.

'''2032: Princess Diana''' {{w|Princess Diana}} was a famous {{w|Commonwealth}} princess who made headlines after her 1997 {{w|Death of Diana, Princess of Wales|death}} in a car crash.

'''2033: Clinton's impeachment''' In 1998, the American {{w|Congress}} voted to {{w|Impeachment_of_Bill_Clinton|impeach}} then-president Clinton, based on allegations that he {{w|Lewinsky scandal|lied}} about relations with a {{w|Monica Lewinsky|White House intern}}. He was later acquitted.

'''2034: Columbine''' Refers to the 1999 {{w|Columbine High School massacre}}, where 13 people were killed by a {{w|Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold|pair of shooters}}.

'''2034: Forgot About Dre''' Refers to the {{w|Grammy}} winning 2000 song, {{w|Forgot About Dre}}, by the rapper {{w|Dr. Dre}}.

'''2036: 9/11''' Refers to the {{w|9/11}} event, in 2001, where terrorists crashed two planes into the {{w|World Trade Center}} towers, in {{w|New York}}.

'''2037: VH1's I love the 80s''' {{w|I Love the '80s (U.S. TV series)|I Love the '80s}} was a 2002 nostalgia TV series by {{w|VH1}}.

'''2038: A time before Facebook''' Refers to the online social media site, {{w|Facebook}}, launched in 2004.

'''2039: VH1's I love the 90s''' {{w|I Love the '90s (U.S. TV series)|I Love the '90s}} was a TV series airing in 2004.

'''2040: Hurricane Katrina''' {{w|Hurricane Katrina}} was a devastating 2005 hurricane that hit {{w|New Orleans}}, killing almost 2000 people and causing 81 billion dollars in damage.

'''2041: The planet Pluto''' {{w|Pluto}} is a {{w|dwarf planet}} in our solar system. Up until 2006, Pluto was considered to be a planet.

'''2042: The first iPhone''' {{w|Apple}}'s first iPhone was released in 2007.

'''2043: The Bush presidency''' {{w|George W. Bush}} was the American presidency from 2001 to 2009. He was criticized for the wars on {{w|War_in_Afghanistan_(2001%E2%80%93present)|Afghanistan}} and {{w|Iraq_War|Iraq}}, poor handling of Hurricane Katrina, and seeing the United States enter a recession. His approval peaked after the 9/11 attacks, but had fallen to historical lows by the end of his second term, making him one of the least liked US presidents.

'''2044: Michael Jackson''' Refers to the {{w|Michael Jackson|pop singer}} who died of drug overdose in 2009.

'''2045: Trying to say Eyjafjallajökull''' Is a reference to a volcano in {{w|Iceland}} that {{w|Eyjafjallajökull#2010 eruptions|erupted}} in 2010. The eruption threw volcanic ash several kilometres up in the atmosphere, which led to air travel disruption in northwest Europe for six days.

'''2046: The Arab Spring''' Refers to the {{w|Arab Spring|wave of revolutions}} that began in late 2010, where many Arabic nations overthrew leaders and started civil wars, with many nations converting to democracies.

'''2047: Anything embarrassing you do today''' Refers to the fact that in 35 years, the majority of Americans will not have been around on this date.

The title text is in reference to the vastly over-saturated programming on VH1 dedicated to the history of the TV universe.
}}

{{Comic discussion}}

Category:Comics

2012-08-03T09:10:13Z

Jeremyp: Fixed the closing nowiki tag

This is the Category page for all the comics, sorted by number. To sort by number, please use the format <nowiki>[[Comics|xxxx]]</nowiki>, where "xxxx" is the comic number. It needs to be four digits for the sorting to work, so Comic 73 is sorted as 0073.