https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/api.php?action=feedcontributions&user=129.176.151.14&feedformat=atomexplain xkcd - User contributions [en]2024-03-28T19:21:05ZUser contributionsMediaWiki 1.30.0https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1277:_Ayn_Random&diff=50716Talk:1277: Ayn Random2013-10-16T14:04:01Z<p>129.176.151.14: </p>
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<div>I think that should be /(\b[plurandy]+\b ?){2}/i.<br />
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[[Special:Contributions/173.66.108.213|173.66.108.213]] 05:12, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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I agree. I was confused for a while about what the b's were doing.<br />
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[[Special:Contributions/99.126.178.56|99.126.178.56]] 06:57, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Maybe it's time to have an Ayn Rand category? --[[Special:Contributions/141.89.226.146|141.89.226.146]] 07:34, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Can someone explain to the mathematically challenged *how* the list of names fits the regular expression? [[Special:Contributions/141.2.75.23|141.2.75.23]] 09:14, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
: Agreed, I would like to understand what the hell is going on with that. --[[User:Zagorath|Zagorath]] ([[User talk:Zagorath|talk]]) 09:20, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
: How specific do you want it? Basically it matches two words consisting of the letters plurandy. The list of names is just a random selection of two part names that only consists of these letters. More specifically it matches: Two groups ({2}), each consisting of a word boundary (\b), followed by a non-empty sequence of the letters plurandy ([plurandy]+), followed by a word boundary (\b), finally followed by an optional space ( ?). [[User:Pmakholm|Pmakholm]] ([[User talk:Pmakholm|talk]]) 09:33, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
::Also, the /'s on the end delimit the regex proper, and the `i` on the end denotes case insensitivity. --[[Special:Contributions/75.66.178.177|75.66.178.177]] 09:39, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
:Some examples: <br />
:* "Ru Paul" would match, because it is two sequences, each containing only capital or lowercase versions of the listed letters.<br />
:* "Randall Flagg" would not match, because the letters F and G are not in the bracketed list.<br />
:* "Aura Anaya Adlar" would not match; even though the letters are all in the list, there are more than two sequences.<br />
:Hope this helps!<br />
:[[User:Swartzer|Swartzer]] ([[User talk:Swartzer|talk]]) 20:24, 15 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
[[Special:Contributions/209.132.186.34|209.132.186.34]] 09:26, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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I do not think Randal would make such mistake, he would probably use \< \> anyway... unless, he wants us<br />
to think he did mistake, or that backslash was eliminated in html/javascript... thus poining ut to<br />
source code of the page... is there something interesting?<br />
: I skimmed over the source and didn't see anything unusual. The '\'s are absent from the source too. I think it's just that Randall (or a tool he's using) was so affraid of [[327|Bobby Tables]] that he stripped all backslashes from the alt text. {{unsigned|Jahvascriptmaniac}}<br />
::The title text at xkcd.com now has the missing backslashes. Do you normally update the comic here to reflect updates?--[[Special:Contributions/108.17.2.71|108.17.2.71]] 16:14, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
:::Already updated. You were saying?<br />
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Can someone explain to me where "In their view, if some humans are born more capable of satisfying their desires than other people, they deserve to reap greater rewards from life than others" comes from? I'm somewhat familiar with objectivist philosophy and I've never heard this put forward as an actual principle. [[Special:Contributions/50.90.39.56|50.90.39.56]] 14:14, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
:Objectivism is the target for much scorn and ridicule in the intellectual world, for its being an inconsistent philosophy that has the sole objective of justifying selfishness and elevating it towards moral righteousness. It's used as the basis for libertarian thought and other radical capitalist economical theories and political stances which promote shameless exploitation (and this attracts further hatred). Randall is no exception to this trend of detractors, and I'd say rightfully so. Ayn Rand's writings are particularly awful, both aesthetically and content-wise, yet in the US a relatively large group of philosophers still adhere to her maxims and the debate continues.{{unsigned ip|37.221.160.203}}<br />
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Most people would write the regexp as /(\b[adlnpruy]+\b ?){2}/i. Using "plurandy" makes it look like a word, which is more confusing than using the letters' natural order. --[[User:Ralfoide|Ralfoide]] ([[User talk:Ralfoide|talk]]) 15:58, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Would it be better to identify Alan Alda not for his role as Hawkeye Pierce in MASH, but for his role in The West Wing as Arnold Vinick, a fiscally-conservative Republican presidential candidate? [[Special:Contributions/193.67.17.36|193.67.17.36]] 16:03, 14 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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:Depends, are we trying to remind him to general audience (I think MASH is more known) or find out why he was included in list? -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 08:50, 16 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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There is probably an additional joke or three in that the regex is the minimum needed to capture the first three names together (hinted at by "plurandy" eg plural rand) , but also captures the others. on top of which all of the listed people are considered "intrinsically better" (by virtue of fame if nothing else)[[Special:Contributions/74.213.201.51|74.213.201.51]] 03:14, 15 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Alan Ladd may have been a founding member of the Secret Council of /(\b[plurandy]+\b ?){2}/i. [[Special:Contributions/71.190.237.117|71.190.237.117]] 07:15, 15 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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It's probably obvious to most programmers, but is it worth pointing out that part of the pun is that the random number generator function is called rand() in most C-family languages? [[Special:Contributions/130.60.156.183|130.60.156.183]] 14:07, 15 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Another member of this secret society is Randall P [[Special:Contributions/79.182.178.53|79.182.178.53]] 16:45, 15 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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From above: "Objectivism is the target for much scorn and ridicule in the intellectual world, for its being an inconsistent philosophy that has the sole objective of justifying selfishness and elevating it towards moral righteousness. It's used as the basis for libertarian thought and other radical capitalist economical theories and political stances which promote shameless exploitation (and this attracts further hatred). Randall is no exception to this trend of detractors, and I'd say rightfully so. Ayn Rand's writings are particularly awful, both aesthetically and content-wise, yet in the US a relatively large group of philosophers still adhere to her maxims and the debate continues." OK, but a few comments: All philosophies are inconsistent when looked at closely enough, refer Godel and others. Others do not see the inconsistency in Objectivism quite so plainly as in the quoted comment. Ayn Rand and Objectivism are not "the" basis of libertarian thought, there are far more highly thought of libertarian thinkers, a list of whom should come readily to mind to any of those occupying "the intellectual world" (sic), whether or not they have sympathy with libertarian ideas. It is also unfair to characterise Objectivism as having as its "sole" objective that as stated. Further, as a general principle, one ought not to take someone poking fun at a concept as *proof* that they are quite as opposed to it as you are. Now, whereas I would not categorise myself quite as a fellow traveller, a much fairer view of Objectivism is found at WP: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objectivism_(Ayn_Rand) [[Special:Contributions/81.135.136.159|81.135.136.159]] 11:22, 16 October 2013 (UTC)<br />
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:Other philosophies are no more consistent, agreed. But other philosophies do not claim perfect "objective" consistency as their fundamental principle. Attacking Objectivism/Objectivists for lack of internal consistency--or for not recognizing that at some, very fundamental, level it is all stacked on top of some assumptions (just like every other philosophy, and even the scientific method)--is the equivalent of attacking Christianity/Christians for lacking compassion and forgiveness. [[Special:Contributions/129.176.151.14|129.176.151.14]] 14:04, 16 October 2013 (UTC)</div>129.176.151.14https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1196:_Subways&diff=33154Talk:1196: Subways2013-04-10T18:06:33Z<p>129.176.151.14: </p>
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<div>I think the comic is making fun of the ridiculous scale-inaccuracies found in public transport plans, including subway plans, which make it hard to estimate actual distances and travel times. {{unsigned|130.60.152.125}}<br />
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I think it's deffently a factor. <that one editor who always forgets to login><br />
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: (Let's try again, dodgy internet link, here, and someone's editing in parallel it seems.) I don't personally find the scale-inaccuracies ridiculous. Take a scale-consistent map of a "city-and-its-suburbs" and it's way too busy/cramped in the centre and very sparse at the fringes. Personally I like the way that [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Moscow_metro_map_en_sb.svg Moscow] treated this problem. But my favourite is of course the classic London Underground maps. Or, for fun, [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Bear_%28lithograph%29 this variant] (image link available there, but I've already got a copy on my wall anyway). In fact, what ''I'' take from Randall's Subways image is something akin to what I like about this latter. Instead of playing with identity, playing with connectivity. Anyone want to add the Tube/Paris Metro/Berlin U&S-Bahn, etc, onto the edges of Randall's effort? ;) [[Special:Contributions/178.99.244.212|178.99.244.212]]<br />
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Evocative (perhaps far too?) of the frontispiece of [http://www.amazon.com/Transit-Maps-World-Mark-Ovenden/dp/0143112651 "Transit Maps of the World"]. A stylized representation of all of the world's subway maps connected together.<br />
[[Special:Contributions/199.167.121.226|199.167.121.226]] 18:38, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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What does it mean "(with respect to geography)"? As a non US citizen I don't know what is odd about this map. Is this actually how the lines connect up? Are these real stations/lines? Can you really go from san fransisco to new york on subway? {{unsigned|31.221.13.140}}<br />
:Of course not. These are all different subway systems, only connected on this map because their official individual maps use the same colors for different lines. I expect this explanation will be updated to list all the different systems seen here, including Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) and the New York Subway. [[Special:Contributions/75.37.205.50|75.37.205.50]] 09:30, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
::"I expect this explanation will be updated to list all the different systems seen here" As a New Yorker, I can say that while most of the map is quite accurate, some lines cannot be named because each color belongs to multiple lines (with some exceptions) and Randall has taken some serious liberties at the connections to other systems. (E.g. there is no blue line with one end in Hoboken and the other end at 34th Street, as shown on this map) [[User:Bdemirci|Bdemirci]] ([[User talk:Bdemirci|talk]]) 12:17, 8 April 2013 (UTC) EDIT: That blue line might be part of the NJ Transit, but including a New Jersey line in with the Subway is quite heretical. [[User:Bdemirci|Bdemirci]] ([[User talk:Bdemirci|talk]]) 12:25, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
:::That blue line is part of PATH, a subway between NJ and NYC. It's not part of NJ Transit; it's run by the Port Authority, an agency created by a bi-state compact between NY and NJ. And its official map does indeed use blue for the line from hoboken to 33rd street. [[Special:Contributions/66.202.132.250|66.202.132.250]] 13:57, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
::::[Insert standard New Yorker response about how we're not expected to know anything having to do with New Jersey, and that Path and NJ Transit are all the same crap blah blah blah]. Regardless, is it any less heretical? [[User:Bdemirci|Bdemirci]] ([[User talk:Bdemirci|talk]]) 07:28, 10 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
:Also, the comic is using an extremely loose definition of "subway". (Chicago and Cleveland, for example, do not have anything that would fit a normal, dictionary definition of the word. And no, what they do have is certainly not connected in any case -- unless you count highways, in which case the map is ridiculously incomplete.) [[User:Jonadab|Jonadab]] ([[User talk:Jonadab|talk]]) 11:17, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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:It's often hard to realize the distances involved when one is talking about a country or region one is unfamiliar with. In the case of North America, and this semi-fictitious subway system, the distances between the furthest points is about 3,000 miles (about 5,000km); it would generally take about 2 days of highway driving, with no stops, to get from any one end to the opposite other. Randall took real subway maps from different cities, already not to scale, and fictitiously joined them together as if the cities were right next door to each other and really connected. They are not. In most cases, you have to fly, drive, take a bus, or take a regular (non-subway) train if you wanted to go from one city's subway system to another's. [[User:N0lqu|-boB]] ([[User talk:N0lqu|talk]]) 14:47, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Hmmm, there is no mention of the 7 or so underground stations in Edmonton, Canada. It is classified as light rail as opposed to heavy rail but still meets the "pedantic rail enthusiasts" definition included under the comic.<br />
Quote: For the pedantic rail enthusiasts, the definition of a subway used here is, with some caveats, "a network containing high capacity grade-separated passenger rail transit lines which run frequently, serve an urban core, and are underground or elevated for at least part of their downtown route." For the rest of you, the definition is "a bunch of trains under a city.[[Special:Contributions/220.239.66.60|220.239.66.60]] 10:10, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
:I suspect the Edmonton, Alberta system got left out for the same reason as the (similarly sized) Buffalo, NY system got left out. The Buffalo system consists of a single line connecting a dozen or so stations below ground and about 5-6 above ground. It fits the "pedantic rail enthusiasts" definition, with the possible exception of being a "network". But more importantly, since it is a single line, I don't think they color-coded it. Without a color-code, where would it hook into Randal's map? [[User:Blaisepascal|Blaisepascal]] ([[User talk:Blaisepascal|talk]]) 14:14, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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In Montreal, the Longueuil station is misspelled as "Longueil". --[[User:Prooffreader|Prooffreader]] ([[User talk:Prooffreader|talk]]) 15:32, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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I don't know the other cities' subway maps well enough, but the NYC map has several jokes in it. The "G" line is listed as having "Random service", which is pretty accurate (it's extremely unreliable). The blue and orange lines in Jamaica (a former independent city now part of the boro of Queens) are listed as coming together in "Kingston", which not in NYC, it's the capital of the island nation of Jamaica. There is a fictional "Puerto Rico Submarine" listed as a complement to the real Staten Island Ferry. The (non-existent) connection from Staten Island NY to DC is listed as the "Robert Moses High speed line", in other words, a freeway such as Robert Moses was known for (presumably I-95, although Moses had nothing to do with that). [[Special:Contributions/66.202.132.250|66.202.132.250]] 13:57, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
:Just realized that the green line extending north from Hoboken to "Green" is supposed to be the Green Line of the {{w|Hudson-Bergen Light Rail}} which has elevated and subway segments (the rest of the system is at-grade). The real line ends at the Tonnelle Avenue parking lot in North Bergen. It only has service during weekdays (not nights). [[Special:Contributions/66.202.132.250|66.202.132.250]] 14:56, 9 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
:Strange why the Jay-Z doesn't extend to "Kingston"; they end at Jamaica Center just like the E. Maybe this is a reference to Kingston's actual public transit? I tried looking it up, thinking that maybe Kingston has two subway lines (blue and orange for the E and F), but I got nothing. [[User:Bdemirci|Bdemirci]] ([[User talk:Bdemirci|talk]]) 08:27, 10 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Looks like Randall goofed with one of his jokes. West Trenton is one of the final stops on one of Philadelphia's passenger rail lines (SEPTA). SEPTA isn't really a subway as it's only underground in the city center. But he happened to draw it in the "Cleveland" area of the map, and ended up connecting it to Boston's Cleveland Circle. That doesn't make sense since there's no west Trenton in Cleveland. [[Special:Contributions/66.202.132.250|66.202.132.250]] 13:57, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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The comic leaves out the Newark Light Rail (formerly known as the Newark Subway). It's only one line with about 15 stops, but it does connect with the PATH system (which is in the comic) {{unsigned}}<br />
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Good couple of jokes in the Boston area: 1) The real station of Braintree is accompanied by the fictional stations of Bonevine and Skinflower; 2) Ashmont-Mattapan High Speed Line has conveniently become Ashmont-Manhattan High Speed Line; 3) The Green Line extension currently under development has been rerouted to Canada; 4) The Cleveland Circle Station has become the departure point for the shuttle to Cleveland. [[Special:Contributions/209.6.46.147|209.6.46.147]] 14:26, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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The downtown area has the Caribbean Metromover. It's not visible on this map because by scale, the Metromover system's tiny; the stops are only a couple blocks apart. Its actual shape is similar to the icon on weather maps for a hurricane but mirrored horizontally. There is no mention of the unused ghost station at Government Center, surprisingly. [[Special:Contributions/75.95.79.214|75.95.79.214]] 20:32, 8 April 2013 (UTC) <br />
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I wasn't aware of a town called Sunnydale in the USA.<br />
However, whilst researching whether this was a pun to the Buffy Television series it turned out the metro station named Sunnydale actually exists: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunnydale_Avenue_Station ...<br />
[[User:Kaa-ching|Kaa-ching]] ([[User talk:Kaa-ching|talk]]) 15:44, 8 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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The map shown in this comic is the BART system (Bay Area Regional Transit), not the San Francisco Muni. So, I suspect this is meant as a Buffy reference. Also, Sunnyvale (note the V) is a real town in the SF Bay Area, but it does not have BART service. {{unsigned|Armckoe}}<br />
:Nope, Randall conflates both Muni and BART in this (which is what the whole comic is, really...) On the western part of the SF map, the purple is the the L-Taraval, the Green is the M-OceanView , the blue is the N-Judah, the Red appears to be the T-Third, the orange the J-Church. On the eastern side, tho, the chart looks more BART-ish. Hmmm, I'm going to have to take the N-Judah to the end of the line some day (or at least farther along.) I've always wanted to go back to Vancouver. -> [[Special:Contributions/64.7.70.234|64.7.70.234]] 04:49, 9 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
:: (The Muni route map is [http://transit.511.org/static/providers/maps/SF_712200722226.pdf here]) -> [[Special:Contributions/64.7.70.234|64.7.70.234]] 04:49, 9 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Curious that the Sunnydale line connects to San Francisco instead of Los Angeles, considering that the latter is actually depicted in the show and is the setting for the Angel spinoff. [[Special:Contributions/71.211.186.75|71.211.186.75]] 00:56, 9 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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I'm not sure what prevented the St. Louis MetroLink from making the cut. There are 2 lines (Red and Blue - yes, it's only two, but isn't that still a network?). It's got grade separation in the urban core and other high-traffic areas, it's high-traffic, runs frequently (every 10-20 minutes) and is underground in downtown St. Louis. The only reason I can think of is insufficient grade-separation, but Randall doesn't define a threshold for that. {{unsigned|66.148.130.2}}<br />
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Pittsburgh Light Rail, or "The T", currently has only 2 lines as well, and parts of it are above ground, but I still would have liked to see it make the cut. It gets heavy usage in downtown Pittsburgh. {{unsigned}}<br />
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The "Morgantown WV Automated Line is clearly a reference to the WVU Personal Rapid Transit system. The PRT goes underground for all of about 15', but the whole lower half is elevated. It's also nice that the area attributed to it is approximately the route the PRT does take. An interesting side note - the PRT is not rails. Its a wheeled system that runs on pavement. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morgantown_Personal_Rapid_Transit Having said that, I'd also like to echo that the Pittsburgh and Newark subways should have been included. I suspect a v 2.0 in the future. {{[[Special:Contributions/98.236.92.146|98.236.92.146]] 23:34, 8 April 2013 (UTC)|hewhocaves}}<br />
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Atlanta's subway map is found at http://www.itsmarta.com/rail-schedules-or-route.aspx [[Special:Contributions/134.24.147.160|134.24.147.160]] 13:53, 9 April 2013 (UTC)Max<br />
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I just noticed that the plane icon for the MIA airport is a paper airplane as opposed for the typical icon used for the other airports. Is this a reference to something? [[Special:Contributions/107.205.37.99|107.205.37.99]] 18:39, 9 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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:Sounds like a reference to the song Paper Planes by M.I.A. (sometimes written MIA), aka Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam. I think it is her most popular (in a Billboard sense) so far and has charted in countries scattered all over the world. [[Special:Contributions/129.176.151.14|129.176.151.14]] 18:06, 10 April 2013 (UTC) <br />
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You must not have left the house during all of 2007. I envy you. http://youtu.be/ewRjZoRtu0Y 22:18, 9 April 2013 (UTC)<br />
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The Seattle monorail is not a loop, so the "Springfield Monorail" is not a reference to it. Also, Randall neglected to include Seattle's own subway that connects downtown to the airport. [[Special:Contributions/50.46.145.200|50.46.145.200]] 05:33, 10 April 2013 (UTC)</div>129.176.151.14https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1189:_Voyager_1&diff=31486Talk:1189: Voyager 12013-03-28T13:30:52Z<p>129.176.151.14: </p>
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<div>Uh, not all tally marks are Doctor Who references. [[User:Alpha|Alpha]] ([[User talk:Alpha|talk]]) 05:49, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Is it just me, or is Randall getting lazy? Most of the past comics have been simplistic, easy-to-draw charts. {{unsigned|98.172.117.132}}<br />
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Oh, was he talking about the glove? I though it was referring to "running the gauntlet" for some reason. --[[Special:Contributions/123.243.217.72|123.243.217.72]] 07:17, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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No, that's "running the gantlet." Two words which are often confused for each other. Plus you could run a gantlet of people whacking you with their gauntlets. [[Special:Contributions/63.241.174.129|63.241.174.129]] 13:21, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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: "Running the gantlet" and "running the gauntlet" are both acceptable uses, since both gantlet and gauntlet can be used for the punishment (however, "dropping the gantlet" would be incorrect, since gantlet ''only'' refers to the punishment, while gauntlet can refer to both the punishment and the glove). [[Special:Contributions/72.178.88.37|72.178.88.37]] 01:30, 23 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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He almost certainly meant 'gantlet'; I think Randall just got the two words confused (it happens frequently. At this point, dictionary.com lists both spellings as synonymous.) The medieval punishment makes much more sense in context (ie: lots of things that could potentially hit Voyageur.)[[Special:Contributions/24.70.188.179|24.70.188.179]] 13:31, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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: Well, I saw a straight wordplay belt→glove there. --[[User:Mormegil|Mormegil]] ([[User talk:Mormegil|talk]]) 14:21, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
: Gauntlet and gantlet are both fitting and humorous in the context. Homophones are great. [[Special:Contributions/98.240.130.17|98.240.130.17]] 17:41, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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There were several stories two days ago saying it had left, then a correction from NASA saying it didn't.<br />
http://science.time.com/2013/03/20/humanity-leaves-the-solar-system-35-years-later-voyager-offically-exits-the-heliosphere/<br />
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2416867,00.asp<br />
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/voyager/voyager20130320.html<br />
[[User:Bugefun|Bugefun]] ([[User talk:Bugefun|talk]]) 07:21, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Is it just me or is it unclear why are there sixteen leaving events described in the title text but twenty-two tally marks on the comic? [[Special:Contributions/188.221.199.135|188.221.199.135]] 07:39, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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I just keep hoping that my children will be interested in space. Too late for me, NASA wouldn't want me, but surely my genes are still ok, I hope. To follow voyager down the rabbit hole of our expectations, what else can father ever ask? [[Special:Contributions/166.147.120.177|166.147.120.177]] 08:05, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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No it is not just you why there are 22 tick marks, and only 16 countable exits.[[Special:Contributions/192.231.124.16|192.231.124.16]] 12:03, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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The Crystal Sphere may refer to a David Brin story used to explain the fermi paradox of why we have had no alien contact: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crystal_Spheres [[User:Schmammel|Schmammel]] ([[User talk:Schmammel|talk]]) 14:37, 22 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
:Crystal Sphere could also be a reference to the old Spelljammer D&D setting where systems/galaxies were contained in crystal spheres. [[Special:Contributions/146.146.7.2|146.146.7.2]]<br />
::Which in turn is a reference to (well, really, direct borrowing from) the Ptolemaic astronomical concept, so it still comes back to the same thing. [[Special:Contributions/129.176.151.14|129.176.151.14]] 13:30, 28 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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"US Census Bureau Solar System statistical boundary – a fictive boundary defined by": I'm capable of reading 'fictive' as 'conventional' in this sentence; as in "the real census bureau really invented it, like they really invented census areas". I would not have been confused by 'fictional', or by 'a boundary fictively invented', but I'm not sure that the second one is good English. I may have studied too much sociology. [[Special:Contributions/121.73.5.66|121.73.5.66]] 07:38, 23 March 2013 (UTC)</div>129.176.151.14https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1187:_Aspect_Ratio&diff=30632Talk:1187: Aspect Ratio2013-03-20T22:46:17Z<p>129.176.151.14: </p>
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<div>Oh man, I haven't read Animorphs since I was a pre-teen. That takes me back. The aspect-ratio joke made me giggle mildly, but that was secondary to me. [[Special:Contributions/76.106.251.87|76.106.251.87]] 06:10, 18 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
- The problem I see here is that the vertical black bars are pillarbox and not letterbox. How did Randall manage to goof on this? [[User:Cybertronic|Cybertronic]] ([[User talk:Cybertronic|talk]]) 06:25, 18 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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"''causing the image to be horizontally squeezed and including the matte bars.''" I'd like elaboration on this bi, I'm not quite sure what's being said... Though it sounds like it'd appease Cybertronic's complaint. - Zergling_man [[Special:Contributions/58.96.88.83|58.96.88.83]] 07:11, 18 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Hey, uhm, I'm not familiar with the format I'm supposed to use here or anywhere, but I'd like to point out that in the comic image, it looks like that car is being transformed from a 16:9 format to a 4:3 format, and the black poles on the ends are like the black parts a widescreen user would get while watching a 4:3 video. {{unsigned|62.65.213.175}}<br />
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:Yeah, I got the impression this had to do with the 'Postage Stamp' problem. Something that was originally made in widescreen is converted to 4:3 using a 'hard matte' process: it's actually converted into a 4:3 signal, and the black bars are part of the signal. This contrasts with the 'anamorphic widescreen' process, where the full widescreen signal is included, without the black matte bars, which are added by the television if needed, and only if needed. An anamorphic widescreen video would show up on a 4:3 television letterboxed, with the black matte bars on top and bottom: on a widescreen television, it would instead fill the TV, assuming the aspect ratio was the same<br />
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:A hard matted letterbox, on the other hand, shows up the same on a 4:3 television as the anamorphic would, but when shown on a widescreen television, is still shown in 4:3, with additional matte bars (black or grey) on the sides, in addition to the 'hard' mattes on top and bottom. This leaves your widescreen television showing a widescreen signal at only a fraction of the television's full size, with most of the screen wasted on needless matte bars. -Graptor [[Special:Contributions/74.215.2.247|74.215.2.247]] 22:29, 18 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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::Having thought about it a bit while microwaving dinner, I thought of another explanation that makes more sense, and I can recall seeing this one on youtube. Rather than just adding matte bars to the top and bottom to the original 16:9 video to make it fit in 4:3... they actually rescale it to 4:3. This compresses the horizontal axis and makes everything look a bit squeezed. In numerical terms, you'd be taking, say, a 1920x1080 video, and crushing it down to 1436x1080, and not by chopping the sides off. You just compress the whole image down to fit, and the end result looks terrible. Like the car. -Graptor [[Special:Contributions/74.215.2.247|74.215.2.247]] 22:48, 18 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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I'm new to this wiki editing. Love this site; love XKCDs comics. I believe that there is a typo in the description, "...denoted in a radio of..." should be "...denoted in a ratio of...". {{{unsigned|66.60.247.180}}<br />
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Quibble: I'm pretty sure that the term "fullscreen" as a description for a 4:3 aspect-ratio screen is a rarely-used back-formation. It was originally a marketing term for video sources (such as a recording of a movie), coined to describe wider-ratio films that had been chopped, compressed, or otherwise modified to fit on a 4:3 TV without letterboxing, thus filling the full screen. My impression was that it was partly about having a succinct label (to differentiate from letterboxed videos); partly about trying to disempower cinephiles and movie reviewers, who generally lambasted studios for releasing a different version to home video than had been shown in the theater; and partly about newspeak, trying to obscure the fact that it was in fact letterboxing that gave you the whole film by pretending that you were getting "more movie" with fullscreen versions. I'd never heard the term "fullscreen" used to describe a physical screen, only its use, prior to this explanation. Wikipedia/wiktionary seem to concur that using it to describe the physical screen is a new thing (based on its absence in the wiktionary entry, and existing only as a redirect in wikipedia). [[Special:Contributions/129.176.151.14|129.176.151.14]] 22:41, 20 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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Oh, and others are correct: the comic very specifically refers to "rescaled" video--that is, in fact, the practice of distorting the video to the new aspect ratio, and '''not''' adding matting bars on any side. It used to be actually done--though I've never seen it for a whole movie, only select scenes in a movie--and it's horrible. [[Special:Contributions/129.176.151.14|129.176.151.14]] 22:46, 20 March 2013 (UTC)</div>129.176.151.14https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1187:_Aspect_Ratio&diff=30631Talk:1187: Aspect Ratio2013-03-20T22:41:44Z<p>129.176.151.14: </p>
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<div>Oh man, I haven't read Animorphs since I was a pre-teen. That takes me back. The aspect-ratio joke made me giggle mildly, but that was secondary to me. [[Special:Contributions/76.106.251.87|76.106.251.87]] 06:10, 18 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
- The problem I see here is that the vertical black bars are pillarbox and not letterbox. How did Randall manage to goof on this? [[User:Cybertronic|Cybertronic]] ([[User talk:Cybertronic|talk]]) 06:25, 18 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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"''causing the image to be horizontally squeezed and including the matte bars.''" I'd like elaboration on this bi, I'm not quite sure what's being said... Though it sounds like it'd appease Cybertronic's complaint. - Zergling_man [[Special:Contributions/58.96.88.83|58.96.88.83]] 07:11, 18 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Hey, uhm, I'm not familiar with the format I'm supposed to use here or anywhere, but I'd like to point out that in the comic image, it looks like that car is being transformed from a 16:9 format to a 4:3 format, and the black poles on the ends are like the black parts a widescreen user would get while watching a 4:3 video. {{unsigned|62.65.213.175}}<br />
<br />
:Yeah, I got the impression this had to do with the 'Postage Stamp' problem. Something that was originally made in widescreen is converted to 4:3 using a 'hard matte' process: it's actually converted into a 4:3 signal, and the black bars are part of the signal. This contrasts with the 'anamorphic widescreen' process, where the full widescreen signal is included, without the black matte bars, which are added by the television if needed, and only if needed. An anamorphic widescreen video would show up on a 4:3 television letterboxed, with the black matte bars on top and bottom: on a widescreen television, it would instead fill the TV, assuming the aspect ratio was the same<br />
<br />
:A hard matted letterbox, on the other hand, shows up the same on a 4:3 television as the anamorphic would, but when shown on a widescreen television, is still shown in 4:3, with additional matte bars (black or grey) on the sides, in addition to the 'hard' mattes on top and bottom. This leaves your widescreen television showing a widescreen signal at only a fraction of the television's full size, with most of the screen wasted on needless matte bars. -Graptor [[Special:Contributions/74.215.2.247|74.215.2.247]] 22:29, 18 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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::Having thought about it a bit while microwaving dinner, I thought of another explanation that makes more sense, and I can recall seeing this one on youtube. Rather than just adding matte bars to the top and bottom to the original 16:9 video to make it fit in 4:3... they actually rescale it to 4:3. This compresses the horizontal axis and makes everything look a bit squeezed. In numerical terms, you'd be taking, say, a 1920x1080 video, and crushing it down to 1436x1080, and not by chopping the sides off. You just compress the whole image down to fit, and the end result looks terrible. Like the car. -Graptor [[Special:Contributions/74.215.2.247|74.215.2.247]] 22:48, 18 March 2013 (UTC)<br />
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I'm new to this wiki editing. Love this site; love XKCDs comics. I believe that there is a typo in the description, "...denoted in a radio of..." should be "...denoted in a ratio of...". {{{unsigned|66.60.247.180}}<br />
<br />
Quibble: I'm pretty sure that the term "fullscreen" as a description for a 4:3 aspect-ratio screen is a rarely-used back-formation. It was originally a marketing term for video sources (such as a recording of a movie), coined to describe wider-ratio films that had been chopped, compressed, or otherwise modified to fit on a 4:3 TV without letterboxing, thus filling the full screen. My impression was that it was partly about having a succinct label (to differentiate from letterboxed videos); partly about trying to disempower cinephiles and movie reviewers, who generally lambasted studios for releasing a different version to home video than had been shown in the theater; and partly about newspeak, trying to obscure the fact that it was in fact letterboxing that gave you the whole film by pretending that you were getting "more movie" with fullscreen versions. I'd never heard the term "fullscreen" used to describe a physical screen, only its use, prior to this explanation. Wikipedia/wiktionary seem to concur that using it to describe the physical screen is a new thing (based on its absence in the wiktionary entry, and existing only as a redirect in wikipedia). [[Special:Contributions/129.176.151.14|129.176.151.14]] 22:41, 20 March 2013 (UTC)</div>129.176.151.14https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1145:_Sky_Color&diff=22550Talk:1145: Sky Color2012-12-12T14:44:56Z<p>129.176.151.14: </p>
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<div>Of course with '''''vertical''''' mirror vertical axis is selected: perceived switching of left and right (really close with far to mirror surface). When '''standing on''' '''''horizontal''''' mirror we will perceive switching bottom from top. --[[User:JakubNarebski|JakubNarebski]] ([[User talk:JakubNarebski|talk]]) 09:09, 10 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
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You're certainly correct, but I think that the original question is not really asking about text (or other things) which are perpendicular to the mirror, but rather text which is parallel to it (and thus the close vs. far doesn't come into it). For example, when reading signs in your rear view mirror or holding a book in front of your chest while looking in a mirror. I've added a little bit to the explanation to attempt to help clarify what's happening in that situation. I'm not sure if it really helps or not. [[User:KeithyIrwin|KeithyIrwin]] ([[User talk:KeithyIrwin|talk]]) 10:00, 10 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
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Easier way to describe it: Imagine you hold a piece of glas. Write on the glass and hold it in front of the mirror, so that you can see both the original text and the mirrored text. Both versions of the text will look identical. So the mirror doesn't change anything. [[Special:Contributions/62.220.2.194|62.220.2.194]] 11:10, 10 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
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Another way: draw a line between the real object and its reflection. Things are reflected around that line. If that line is going up & down (relative to your eyes), then things are reflected left/right (relative to your eyes). If that line is horizontal (again relative to your eyes), then things are reflected top/bottom. So it's not so much whether the mirror is horizontal or vertical, but rather what direction you are looking into the mirror (although that can be influenced a lot by the mirror's orientation).[[User:CityZen|CityZen]] ([[User talk:CityZen|talk]]) 04:17, 11 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
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I always wonder: Since the sky goes from red to blue to red and the optical spectrum goes from red to green to blue. How come the sky is never green?<br />
: Because of human color perception. You only perceive green in polychromatic light when said light is stronger in the middle wavelengths than the low or high wavelengths; in other words, you would need a process in the sky that removed ''both'' the high and low wavelengths from white light. As the sun sets, only the lower wavelengths are removed, so you perceive yellows and reds -- this perception of color is "one-sided", i.e. it is not interfered with by even longer wavelengths. By the way, sometimes you do see green briefly in the sky, it's called a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_flash Green Flash]. --[[User:Prooffreader|Prooffreader]] ([[User talk:Prooffreader|talk]]) 16:41, 10 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
::I used to go outside after a rain storm during the day, and sometimes the sky would seem very green. The effect could last for hours. [[Special:Contributions/76.122.5.96|76.122.5.96]] 12:15, 12 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
: The sky ''is'' green, at times. Growing up in the Upper Midwest (USA), I quickly learned that green sky means it's time to watch out for tornadoes. I don't know the actual connection between the two situations--I would guess from the previous comment that whatever atmospheric conditions create tornado conditions also "edit out" both high and low wavelengths, at least to a degree. [[Special:Contributions/129.176.151.14|129.176.151.14]] 14:44, 12 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
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This sentence doesn't make sense: "(from "his" right to left instead of from "his" left to right)" [[User:Trek7553|Trek7553]] ([[User talk:Trek7553|talk]]) 15:15, 10 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
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Repeat Character Watch: The girl has appeared previously in [[842: Mark]], [[892: Null Hypothesis]], [[1058: Old-Timers]], and [[1104: Feathers]] (A similar looking character also appears in [[635: Locke and Demosthenes]] but this is actually the character Valentine from the book Ender's Game). The mother is seen in comics [[806: Tech Support]] and [[813: One-Liners]]. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]<span title="I'm an admin. I can help.">_a</span> ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 18:12, 10 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
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About [http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1145:_Sky_Color&diff=22416&oldid=22414 this edition]: 1/(x^4) does not look like a root to me. IMHO the forth root of x would be more like x^(1/4) but it's not the formula from the comic. (I'm too lazy to try to type lambda). [[User:Lmpk|Lmpk]] ([[User talk:Lmpk|talk]]) 19:00, 10 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
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:You are correct. It's been fixed. The editor that made that edit was probably confusing <i>1/x<sup>4</sup></i> with <i>x<sup>1/4</sup></i>, the latter of which would indeed be the fourth root. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]<span title="I'm an admin. I can help.">_a</span> ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 19:53, 10 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
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[http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/General/BlueSky/blue_sky.html This page], linked from the explanation says that "the most strongly scattered indigo and violet wavelengths stimulate the red cones slightly as well as the blue, which is why these colours appear blue with an added red tinge." -- this seems rather strange. Assuming the cones are simulated based on frequency/wavelength, ultra-blue colors shouldn't stimulate the red cones because the electromagnetic spectrum is linear, not circular, despite the appearance of similarity between violet and red. Or am I missing something? --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 16:14, 11 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
: If you look at the response curve (middle of cited page) you'll see that red receptors have two peaks, one in the red wavelengths, and another (very tiny one) in the violet. That's why purple (which is red + blue) looks so similar to violet, and why the "color wheel" works. [[Special:Contributions/207.225.239.130|207.225.239.130]] 21:59, 11 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
:: PS: "first years" is an idiom. Wouldn't that be "first year students" to be proper English? [[Special:Contributions/207.225.239.130|207.225.239.130]] 22:05, 11 December 2012 (UTC)<br />
:::Idioms are "proper English" too. There is no doubt about what is meant here (or at least, I hope there isn't, but perhaps there are regional differences that mean some English speakers don't say "first years" to talk about students in their first year), and the register is not unduly colloquial for this kind of a site. 14:00, 12 December 2012 (UTC)</div>129.176.151.14