https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/api.php?action=feedcontributions&user=172.70.130.213&feedformat=atomexplain xkcd - User contributions [en]2024-03-29T05:34:19ZUser contributionsMediaWiki 1.30.0https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:282:_Organic_Fuel&diff=224396Talk:282: Organic Fuel2022-01-14T20:05:06Z<p>172.70.130.213: </p>
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<div>Hilarious joke but Thyme isn't actually a spice, it's a herb.[[Special:Contributions/70.161.237.63|70.161.237.63]] 18:51, 17 July 2013 (UTC)<br />
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And Mussolini didn't make the trains run on time either (There were improvements in the railway system, but most were before he came to power). {{unsigned ip|108.162.221.223}}<br />
:It's a propaganda campaign, they aren't exactly the most truthful things ever... --[[User:Legoman5746|Legoman5746]] ([[User talk:Legoman5746|talk]]) 18:07, 3 February 2017 (UTC)<br />
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How do we know that the guy at the PC is Cueball - it could just as well be Cueball that makes the terrible pun? He is just as often the one delivering terrible Your Mom joke, as the one telling people off for such behavior (since he is not the same character in Randall's XKCD but many different). [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:28, 7 March 2014 (UTC)<br />
:Yeah, the official transcript only defines them as 'Standing man' and 'Man at computer'. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] ([[User talk:Alex|talk]]) 16:28, 3 May 2014 (UTC)<br />
I have never understood the hate for puns. I like puns, they are great. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.215.129|108.162.215.129]] 21:51, 17 July 2014 (UTC)<br />
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--I agree with you, but to others, they grate.{{unsigned ip|108.162.221.64}}<br />
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In what way are '''time''' and '''thyme''' ''near'' homophones? In what dialect are they not complete homophones? [[User:RyanofTinellb|RyanofTinellb]] ([[User talk:RyanofTinellb|talk]]) 23:50, 4 January 2015 (UTC)<br />
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I am sure there are at least some people who pronounce "th" in thyme the same way as "th" in "thing" making the two words sound slightly distinct... [[Special:Contributions/198.41.243.241|198.41.243.241]] 00:15, 18 September 2015 (UTC)<br />
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I would wager that the apology could also be Randall breaking the 4th wall, as he is the one to actually use the pun. [[User:Flewk|Flewk]] ([[User talk:Flewk|talk]]) 10:57, 26 December 2015 (UTC)<br />
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[[file:he-who-would-pun.jpg]]—[[User:Kazvorpal|Kazvorpal]] ([[User talk:Kazvorpal|talk]]) 16:06, 1 November 2019 (UTC)<br />
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My father, who grew up in England before and during WWII told a different version - that Mussolini made the trains run on time because if they were late, his blackshirts would haul the engineer and conductor off the train and shoot them against a wall. A more cynical take on fascist efficiency...<br />
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______________<br />
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"engines that can burn organic matter" The early internal combustion engines burned moss-spore powder. <br />
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyr%C3%A9olophore<br />
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lycopodium_powder<br />
-PRR [[Special:Contributions/172.68.206.118|172.68.206.118]] 02:44, 4 May 2021 (UTC)</div>172.70.130.213https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=456:_Cautionary&diff=223864456: Cautionary2022-01-10T04:21:35Z<p>172.70.130.213: Linux is a "productivity" OS for a lot of people now.</p>
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<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 456<br />
| date = July 30, 2008<br />
| title = Cautionary<br />
| image = cautionary.png<br />
| titletext = This really is a true story, and she doesn't know I put it in my comic because her wifi hasn't worked for weeks.<br />
}}<br />
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==Explanation==<br />
[[Cueball]]'s cousin decides to install {{w|Linux}} on her new PC, and calls Cueball, whom she views as her personal Linux expert. The overarching joke revolves around the fact that Linux, especially home PC-based GNU/Linux, was (at the time of this comic's publication in 2008) much more often used as a "hobby" OS, as compared against a "productivity" OS such as {{w|Windows}} or {{w|macOS}}. Large numbers of people use Windows or Mac by default, because it came with their computer hardware when they bought it, and it already had the software suite they wanted to use installed along with it. Linux, on the other hand, rarely comes pre-installed on PC hardware and generally must be deliberately chosen and acquired. While it can be set up to achieve efficient and productive workflow in virtually any area on PCs, because it often must be consciously selected, installed, and configured by users, it tends to either attract or, in a few cases, create individuals who take disproportionate pleasure in, and derive self-identification from, hacking the operating system itself. Thus, many people who are {{w|Linux}} {{w|Hacker (hobbyist)|enthusiasts}} began by not really knowing anything about it other than that it's {{w|Gratis|free of cost}}, but the process of actually building Linux on their machines gradually led them to take an increasing interest in it, which the comic humorously likens to substance addiction.<br />
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Xorg (officially {{w|X.Org Server|X.Org}}) is an implementation of the X Window System, a program responsible for the graphical display used on Linux. If it has configuration problems, which was quite common with some video card drivers back in 2008 (especially {{w|fglrx#Linux|those for ATI Radeon cards}}), it is often difficult and/or painful to fix (see [[963: X11]]). {{w|man page|Man pages}} are manual pages for Unix-based operating systems and software, usually accessible online but also bundled with the software itself. Considered helpful and clear by the sorts of advanced computer users who typically run Linux, the text-only documentation requires a bit of a learning curve and is not generally adequate for less-technical users. Here, the joke starts to build in that Cueball's cousin, a computer novice who just wanted something to work out of the box, is now having to learn how to understand Linux documentation in order to fix her ongoing Xorg problem (likely an inability to start a graphical environment, something a novice user would depend on).<br />
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In the third panel, we see that the cousin has had new problems. Though she likely has been able to fix Xorg, she is now having problems with Ubuntu's auto-configuration tools. She suggests that she is considering switching to a more advanced Linux distro in order to sidestep the failing autoconfig issues. A Linux "distro" (distribution) is a suite of tools and applications that provides a specific user experience on top of the core Linux operating system. Each distro has a different look and feel and different feature sets and design philosophies. {{w|Ubuntu (operating system)|Ubuntu}} is a very popular "beginner" version of Linux, designed to "just work" and be familiar and usable to people fresh out of Windows. {{w|Debian}} is a popular but somewhat more "advanced," traditionally "{{w|Unix-like}}", distro, with a huge and diverse base of supported software that generally requires more Linux know-how to configure and use. In fact, Ubuntu is based on Debian, and under the hood they have similar features, so that it would not be considered much of a leap for a competent Ubuntu user to switch. {{w|Gentoo Linux|Gentoo}}, on the other hand, is a very advanced distro allowing for extreme customization and optimization, but requiring extensive install and setup time. It is generally considered to be complex and beginner-unfriendly (to the point that its difficulty has become somewhat memetic in the Linux world), a trade-off for providing a powerful and versatile set of tools for advanced system hacking. It appears that during the past four weeks, Cueball's cousin has started to consider that solving her problem would require complex tweaking.<br />
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In the fourth panel, it appears that the cousin has indeed switched to Gentoo, because a hallmark of that distribution is that the kernel (the basic core of the operating system) must be compiled from source code upon installation. Source code is a computer program expressed in human-readable text; however, source code cannot be run directly by a computer, and instead needs to be compiled into low level machine instructions the computer can understand. This means that with Gentoo, instead of downloading an already functional Linux system to install and run, users download the source code for the system, customize it to their own needs, then compile the code into a executable version of the OS, all before they can begin to use the system. Reasons that the cousin may want to do this include needing the kernel to be compiled in a non-standard way that is not supported by more mainstream distros, or incorporating third-party code or even her own modifications into the kernel. Compiling a kernel with the aforementioned modifications is a tricky affair, since any mistake or oversight can render the kernel, and thus operating system, non-functional, requiring the custom kernel to be anew. This panel implies that this has indeed happened, with the cousin compiling the kernel over and over again for days without sleep. To many such advanced users, their installation of Linux is like a hobby car: a project to be constantly tweaked and adjusted to fit one's exact needs, that spends as much time sitting around with its hood open as it is actually used for its ostensible purpose. By week 12, it is likely that Cueball's cousin has totally forgotten about her original plans for the computer and has become obsessed with Linux in a way that Randall compares with drug addiction for comic effect.<br />
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Similarly, in the fifth panel, Randall riffs on the old anti-drug message "Parents, talk to your kids about drugs before someone else does," with the meaning being if a responsible adult does not educate their kids about the dangers of drugs (or Linux), then someone else (likely a peer) might convince them that drugs (or Linux) is a good idea. There is an additional call to the theory of {{w|gateway drugs}}, where mild drugs like alcohol or cannabis will lead to harder drugs like cocaine and heroin. In the comic, Cueball's cousin starts out with Ubuntu, a "gateway" version of Linux, which leads to Gentoo, a harder, more niche version, with the end result being her vanishing for weeks inside her house, compiling her kernel, like a junkie hopelessly hooked on drugs.<br />
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The title text continues the joke about Linux's poor support for many {{w|Wi-Fi}} cards common in 2008, a device that is not only well supported on Windows, but was typically seen as making networking easy for less technical users.<br />
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While the comic sarcastically pokes fun at the difficulties in using Linux (circa 2008), it also indirectly shows some of its advantages. The first one is that it is a freely available alternative to Windows; the second is that it provides users the tools to make fixing problems possible, whereas with Windows, the only problems that are fixed are the ones Microsoft chooses to fix; and the third is that it can increase one's knowledge of one's own computer, as the cousin, who barely seems to know how computers work past very basic end-user functionality, has become extremely advanced after several weeks. The comic is also somewhat anachronistic, as over time, hardware support in Linux has become much more robust; it is currently unlikely that Cueball's cousin would experience broken graphics or wind up in kernel compile hell to enable basic functions such as Wi-Fi.<br />
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==Transcript==<br />
:Linux: A True Story:<br />
:[Cueball talks on a cell phone.]<br />
:Week One:<br />
:Cousin: Hey, it's your cousin. I got a new computer but don't want Windows. Can you help me install "Linux"?<br />
:Cueball: Sure.<br />
<br />
:[Cueball's cousin sits in an office chair with her laptop on her lap. She is on the phone.]<br />
:Week Two:<br />
:Cousin: It says my XORG is broken. What's an "XORG"? Where can I look that up?<br />
:Cueball: Hmm, lemme show you man pages.<br />
<br />
:[Cueball's cousin crouches on the floor with the laptop on her lap. She is still on the phone.]<br />
:Week Six:<br />
:Cousin: Due to auto-config issues, I'm leaving Ubuntu for Debian.<br />
:Cueball: Uh.<br />
:Cousin: Or Gentoo.<br />
:Cueball: Uh oh.<br />
<br />
:[Cueball's cousin lies on her stomach with the laptop on the floor. On the floor are several pieces of paper and a book. Cueball stands to her left.]<br />
:Week Twelve:<br />
:Cueball: You haven't answered your phone in days.<br />
:Cousin: Can't sleep. Must compile kernel.<br />
:Cueball: I'm too late.<br />
<br />
:[Box with text:]<br />
:Parents: talk to your kids about Linux... Before somebody else does.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]<br />
[[Category:Linux]]<br />
[[Category:Man pages]]</div>172.70.130.213https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2563:_Throat_and_Nasal_Passages&diff=2236252563: Throat and Nasal Passages2022-01-05T10:40:57Z<p>172.70.130.213: </p>
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<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 2563<br />
| date = January 3, 2022<br />
| title = Throat and Nasal Passages<br />
| image = throat_and_nasal_passages.png<br />
| titletext = I always felt like what the 'you are now aware of your tongue' thing neeeded in order to be truly enjoyable was an element of mortal peril.<br />
}}<br />
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==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by A PANIC-INDUCING ROUTINE NON-COVID SINUSITIS with longness of breath, icy skin, frenzied energy, and an incredibly wet cough. Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
This comic is another in a [[:Category:COVID-19|series of comics]] related to the {{w|COVID-19 pandemic}}. <br />
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[[Randall]] has even before the corona pandemic complained about sore throat caused by the cold, see [[1612: Colds]], more than once just a few weeks apart, see [[1618: Cold Medicine]]. See also [[1896: Active Ingredients Only]]. So every year during the cold/flu season, he has been forced to think about his sore throat and stuffed nasal passages. But during the last two years he has been thinking about them much more, even when he has not been ill because of the pandemic. <br />
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In the graph a black solid line displays how much he has been thinking about this since 2000 and up until 2022. The first 20 years the graph oscillate up and down once every year, and every spike represents the cold and flu season. Autumn and winter causes the spike, while spring and summer clearly drops. Perhaps this is indicating no tendency to suffer from hayfever, which might at least produce mini-spikes at the times of of maximum grass-pollen, tree-pollen and/or other similar atmospheric flotsam. There is basically a spike for every year, although some years it looks a bit different which could be variations induced by complex socialical or meteorological drivers - meeting more or fewer people inside stuffy buildings rather than in the open air. But all in all the peaks seem low, especially when compared to how much time he has thought about it since the COVID-19 pandemic broke out around March 2020. Each summer since there has been a dip, but not anywhere close to the tops of the previous years, and around New Year 2022 the graph peaks (likely due to the {{w|SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant|Omicron variant}}). <br />
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The peaks in 2020 and 2021 (2022) are about 6 times higher than those the year before 2020. So if the Y-axis begins at zero, this is how much more he thinks of his throat now than during the times when he actually had a cold.<br />
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There seems to be no way of knowing if Randall has had COVID-19, but from his comics it seems safe to assume he is fully vaccinated. At the time of release the Omicron variant of COVID-19 seems to by-pass the protections given by vaccines for about 50% of those vaccinated, although vaccinated people generally do not experience severe symptoms.<br />
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The joke is in the dotted line at the very bottom of the graph which either is just above zero, or is actually supposed to be the zero line (which would not change the above assumption about 6 times more thinking). This line reflects how much time he actually wishes to think about them, which is probably not at all. But even before corona Randall seems to have spent way too much time pondering his sore throat.<br />
<br />
In the title text Randall references the trick known as "You are now aware of your tongue", which is a self-fulfilling prophecy because it will make anyone hearing it involuntarily think and be aware of their tongue. In a much earlier comic, [[972: November]], this trick was the topic, see more about it there. <br />
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Randall sarcastically remarks that the tongue trick needed an element of mortal peril to be truly enjoyable, as with the corona pandemic making him (and other) aware of their throat and nasal passages. His actual opinion is probably the opposite, that it was annoying before and that it only became worse now that it contains the danger of death. Being aware of your tongue is annoying, but not dangerous. Being aware of you throat and imagining it being sore during the COVID-19 pandemic, may leave you fearing for your life, also when there is nothing wrong with your throat!<br />
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==Transcript==<br />
:[A graph with two curves are shown. The Y-axis ends in an arrow, but has no units or ticks. The X-axis has no arrow but has 23 ticks with every fifth longer and every tenth labeled. The first tick extends the Y-axis below the X-axis. Both curves start over the second tick and end over the last tick. One curve is a dotted straight line running along the bottom of the graph just above the X-axis. The other start a bit higher and oscillate a bit up and down with 19 sharp peaks and 19 troughs, where some of the troughs have extra features, and not all are equidistant. After this a 20th small peak just starts to drop down again, before the curve goes in to a very steep rise almost all the way to the top of the graph. There is a small dip on the way before it reaches a maximum. Then a deep drop followed by a smaller rise before an even deeper drop. But then at the end, the graph rises almost vertically to the highest point where the graph stops over the last tick. At the top left of the graph the two lines are explained showing a solid and a dotted line with text to their right. Below this, above the solid curve midway between the first two labels on the X-axis, is a label from which 5 arrows points to 5 consecutive peaks.]<br />
:- How much Time I have spent thinking about my throat and nasal passages, over time<br />
:┅ How much I want to think about them<br />
:Label:Cold/Flu Season<br />
:X-axis: 2000 2010 2020<br />
<br />
==Trivia==<br />
*New Year happened two days before the release of this comic, and it was the first released in 2022. <br />
**As neither this or the previous comic [[2562: Formatting Meeting]], the last from 2021 released on New Years Eve 2021-12-31, are [[:Category:New Year|New Year comics]], this marks the first year in a long time without an official New Year comic!<br />
**Last time neither of the comics around the New Year was not a New Year comic was the New Year from 2010 to 2011. <br />
***So after 10 years in a row with such a comic Randall did nothing to celebrate that it became 2022.<br />
**The first New Year comic came out on 2007-12-31, and one more followed the year after, before two years without. <br />
***So this is only the third time out of 15 without such a comic since the first came out 14 years ago.<br />
*In the title text the word needed is spelled ''neeeded'' with three consecutive ''e''s.<br />
**It is expected that this error will be fixed, but that did not happen immediately!<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:COVID-19]]<br />
[[Category:Charts]]</div>172.70.130.213https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2563:_Throat_and_Nasal_Passages&diff=223466Talk:2563: Throat and Nasal Passages2022-01-03T18:34:36Z<p>172.70.130.213: Added comment about comic title text may be related to.</p>
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<div><!--Please sign your posts with ~~~~ and don't delete this text. New comments should be added at the bottom.--><br />
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at time of publishing, the title text contained a typo ("neeeded"). Im pretty sure it is going to be corrected soon though. <br />
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[[Special:Contributions/162.158.233.115|162.158.233.115]] 13:08, 3 January 2022 (UTC)<br />
:Hasn't yet been corrected, but I'm sure it will be. Anyways I added a transcript and although I did try my best I doubt it's good, so if you can improve it, I won't exactly be mad. *[[User:256.256.256.256|256.256.256.256]] ([[User talk:256.256.256.256|talk]]) 15:30, 3 January 2022 (UTC)<br />
::I have added a [[2563:_Throat_and_Nasal_Passages#Trivia|Trivia]] about the error. When/if it gets corrected this should be mentioned here. I also changed the transcript. Not so much the content more the order. Also I believe that all text written in the picture should be written beneath explanations of the image. And try to leave out any explanations or theories, leaving that part to the explanation above. The transcript should help people that cannot see the comic well enough to get the idea, so they can form their own ideas, before reading what others think ;-) But always great when people fill in the transcript. So thanks for the effort. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 16:54, 3 January 2022 (UTC)<br />
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I think the title text might be related to [[972: November]], since that also dealt with people being made aware of their tongue. Should it be added in the explanation (I know that editors should be at least somewhat bold, but it seems a bit of a tenuous connection, so I want an opinion from a more experienced editor). --[[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.213|172.70.130.213]] 18:34, 3 January 2022 (UTC)</div>172.70.130.213https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2560:_Confounding_Variables&diff=2231402560: Confounding Variables2021-12-27T16:40:24Z<p>172.70.130.213: /* Explanation */</p>
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<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 2560<br />
| date = December 27, 2021<br />
| title = Confounding Variables<br />
| image = confounding_variables.png<br />
| titletext = You can find a perfect correlation if you just control for the residual.<br />
}}<br />
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==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a MISLEADING DATASET - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
If you don't control for confounding variables, they'll mask the real effect and mislead you.<br />
But if you control for too MANY variables, your choices will shape the data and you'll mislead yourself.<br />
Somewhere in the middle is the sweet spot where you do both, making you doubly wrong. <br />
Stats are a farce and truth is unknowable. See you next week!<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>172.70.130.213https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2498:_Forest_Walk&diff=2231092498: Forest Walk2021-12-26T07:03:15Z<p>172.70.130.213: /* Explanation */</p>
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<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 2498<br />
| date = August 4, 2021<br />
| title = Forest Walk<br />
| image = forest_walk.png<br />
| titletext = The only other person to walk by was a linguist back in the 80s, but she just spent a while dissecting the phrase 'help me down' before getting distracted by a squirrel and wandering off.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
[[Megan]] is walking through a wide landscape with [[Beret Guy]] who owns a big part of it. Megan is surprised that he owns such a big property, however, Beret Guy is known for his inexplicable businesses such as in [[1493: Meeting]] and from [[1032: Networking]]; we know he probably has enough resources to be able to buy it. Alternatively, he might have simply inherited it from his mom [[502: Dark Flow]], or may not really understand the concept of actually owning it. Nevertheless he walks here everyday, and from the context of the comic it seems pretty much no one else comes here.<br />
<br />
They meet a rather disheveled-looking bearded man hanging from a parachute caught in a tree. The man shakes a stick at them and demands to be helped down to the ground. Beret Guy simply addresses him as "Mister Cooper" and asks if he promises to return the money he took. The man angrily refuses, and Beret Guy casually says he'll see him again tomorrow, suggesting that this conversation has become a daily routine.<br />
<br />
Megan asks if the man was D. B. Cooper, which Beret Guy immediately confirms. He then comments on an owl nest as another bit of "neat stuff" found on his land, suggesting that he finds Cooper's presence to be just another mildly interesting part of this land.<br />
<br />
{{w|D. B. Cooper}} is the identity given to a man who hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft in 1971. He collected a $200,000 ransom (equivalent to $1,250,000 in 2020) and famously donned a parachute and jumped from the plane over the state of Washington. He was never seen or heard from again. Despite lengthy FBI investigations and nation-wide publicity, the hijacker was never identified. A few thousand dollars of the ransom money was found in a river, nearly 10 years after the hijacking, but the remainder has never been recovered. The only things known about him are a police composite drawing and the name "Dan Cooper", under which he had purchased his airline ticket (he was called "D.B." as a result of a miscommunication with the media, and the name stuck).<br />
<br />
The high-profile case followed by the never-solved mystery has led to a massive amount of speculation as to his identity, background, and what became of him. Many consider the most likely scenario to be that he didn't survive the parachute jump, and simply crashed somewhere that his body was never found. Others imagine that he escaped with the money, and simply managed to evade capture.<br />
<br />
The comic is insinuating that, after leaping from the plane, he got entangled in a tree in Beret Guy's land, and has been there ever since. <br />
<br />
Uncanny situations are nothing new to Beret Guy, since he himself possesses [[:Category:Strange_powers_of_Beret_Guy|many strange powers]]. Hence, the concept of a famous criminal hanging from a tree for nearly 50 years doesn't seem any more interesting to him than an owl's nest. In keeping with the typical bizarre-ness of Beret Guy's life, it isn't explained how a man could survive for half a century hanging from a tree, why he'd choose to remain trapped there for his entire life rather than return money that he's in no position to spend, or why Beret Guy wouldn't simply report his whereabouts to the police. All of these are simply accepted as unremarkable realities of life, for him. <br />
<br />
D. B. Cooper was already referenced by Randall in [[1400: D.B. Cooper]], [[1501: Mysteries]] and [[2452: Aviation Firsts]].<br />
<br />
The title text may reference to the linguist from [[2390: Linguists]] who is more interested in the linguistic nuances that people use than in actually responding to their call for assistance. It is not known how many others have walked through Beret Guy's land, in the interim, or whether it is their own nature or the general aura from Beret Guy, but the linguist clearly did not much more than ponder the phrase "help me down". Megan also seems in no particular hurry to intervene.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[Megan and Beret Guy are walking through a landscape with spread out trees and grass and puddles on the ground.]<br />
:Megan: Wow, this is all yours?<br />
:Beret Guy: Yeah! All the way back to the river!<br />
:Beret Guy: I walk here every day.<br />
<br />
:[Megan still walks towards Beret Guy who has now stopped and is looking up while speaking to a man hanging in a tree in front of them. The man has long wild hair and a large beard. He hangs from his parachute which has been folded around a large branch sticking out from beneath the top of the tree. He is holding a long stick of some sort, seemingly attempting to threaten Beret Guy, as the stick and his legs are vibrating as indicated with small lines.]<br />
:Beret Guy: Morning, Mister Cooper!<br />
:Cooper: You help me down '''''this instant!'''''<br />
<br />
:[Pan down to show only Beret Guy and nothing else. Cooper replies from off-panel from the top corner.]<br />
:Beret Guy: Do you promise to give back all the money you took?<br />
:Cooper [off-panel]: '''''Never!'''''<br />
:Beret Guy: Okay! See you tomorrow!<br />
<br />
:[Megan and Beret Guy continue walking through the landscape with three small trees behind them, as well as grass, rocks and a small puddle. Megan looks back over her shoulder towards where Cooper is hanging.]<br />
:Megan: Was that D.B. Cooper?<br />
:Beret Guy: Yeah, and up ahead there's an owl nest!<br />
:Beret Guy: There's so much neat stuff here.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Beret Guy]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring D. B. Cooper]]<br />
[[Category:Animals]] <!-- Owls nest --><br />
[[Category:Squirrels]] <!-- Title text --><br />
[[Category:Language]] <!-- Title text --><br />
[[Category:Strange_powers_of_Beret_Guy]] <!-- Arguable. But indefinitely sustaining the life of a suspended and exposed fugitive from justice could be one. Persuading at least one (or now two) other visitors to be unconcerned, to the extent of probably never speaking of it to anyone else, might be another. --></div>172.70.130.213https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2559:_December_25th_Launch&diff=223054Talk:2559: December 25th Launch2021-12-25T07:45:52Z<p>172.70.130.213: </p>
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Santa delivers his presents on Christmas Eve. The launch is scheduled for 9:20am French Guiana time, so Santa should be long gone during the final countdown. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 06:05, 25 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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I feel like the way it's written and also the "update" in the title text is a reference to the NORAD Santa Tracker (or maybe the Google one). I'd do it myself but it's 2AM, so can someone fact check me and possibly add it to the article assuming I'm not misremembering. Thanks, [[User:Zman350x|Zman350x]] ([[User talk:Zman350x|talk]]) 07:20, 25 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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Launches have been stopped many times at less than 8 seconds, and Randall would be familiar with this fact. The "unavoidable" bit of the explanation can safely (and preferably) be dropped. Given Randall's demonstrated frustration with Webb delays, the joke about the RSO shooting down Santa is almost certainly attributable to intolerance of another delay. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.213|172.70.130.213]] 07:45, 25 December 2021 (UTC)</div>172.70.130.213https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2557:_Immunity&diff=222941Talk:2557: Immunity2021-12-22T16:36:06Z<p>172.70.130.213: </p>
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well, if you look at society as a whole it makes more sense. the reason we have so many mutations is that we have a significant portion of the populous with no immunity [[Special:Contributions/172.68.110.125|172.68.110.125]] 20:49, 20 December 2021 (UTC) mark ifi<br />
:But the mutations come about from the virus replicating a lot, i.e in people with the virus. It still doesn't make sense to catch it, because you have a chance of your infection being the one that produces a terrible mutation [[Special:Contributions/141.101.77.130|141.101.77.130]] 22:02, 20 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
::That isn't how mutations work. Mutations are able to propagate strongly only in environments where there is something killing off the parent species, and where the mutation provides better survivability. Like a functioning immune system attacking the parent virus, but a mutation allows something to slip by. Thus, people with the partial immunity provided by either vaccines or infection, are the ones more likely to create a mutation than new patients with no inherent immunity, or people with natural immunity from previous bouts with related diseases.[[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 14:11, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
:::Even immune system without vaccine or prior infection is killing Covid a lot, providing plenty of opportunities for more effective mutation. And infection typically last LONGER if patient is not vaccinated, providing more TIME for virus to mutate. So, mutation can occur in both vaccinated or unvaccinated, with hard to compare probabilities. It's true that mutation from someone vaccinated has higher CHANCE to be vaccine-resistant, but on the other hand, seems omikron is from unvaccinated population ... -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 23:32, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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I can see this one annoying a lot of people. It's the lot of people who can already be annoying, so I don't think that's a big problem. (A few, who misread it as about ''vaccination'' giving immunity, may actually think it supports them. I'm not sure we can do anything about that either.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.85|162.158.159.85]] 21:51, 20 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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Would you kindly provide a link to the "Mount Stupid" comic for reference.{{unsigned|172.70.174.119}}<br />
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To be fair, if the vaccination would only protect you for ONE infection it wouldn't be worth it. The idea about immunity is that immunity trained by either vaccination or infection will then protect you from '''multiple''' following infections. The problem with it is that in case of covid (or flu), the immunity wanes off with time AND the virus mutates into new variants the immunity doesn't work as well against. Sure, it still makes sense to vaccinate, but just because the virus spread so much you are very likely to catch it. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 22:32, 20 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
:Are you making the mistake (without the other baggage) I mentioned above about misreading the comic? This comic isn't about the vaccination at all. It's about infection. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.22|172.70.86.22]] 22:51, 20 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
::Infection is the normal method of vaccination. Until recently with mRNA vaccines, almost all vaccines were about infection- either with the disease itself, a weakened version of the disease, or a related disease.[[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 14:11, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
:::As far as I know, while some vaccines do use a weakened live virus, many use essentially sliced-up spike proteins that are unable to spread. However, historically, the first true vaccination (as well as the earlier variolization), did use an unweakened live virus (smallpox for variolization, cowpox for the first vaccination). Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, though. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.213|172.70.130.213]] 16:36, 22 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
:(And, to add, if the vaccine just protected against ONE infection, where that one infection was sufficiently dangerous, it would indeed be worth it. Better than chancing the infection on a naïve immune system and hoping to come out the other side with a similarly infection-specific immune effect (c.f. annual flu waves) but without the QC and care given to the vector.) ((See, I knew it'd spark response, didn't intend to say much. Maybe I should just stay out of this until it blows over.)) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.79|172.70.85.79]] 23:01, 20 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
::Of course it is about the vaccination - this supports Randall's earlier statements for being pro vaccine, that you should get the immunity from vaccination and not from infection! --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 08:24, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
:::Hmmm, no. It's about COVID (and that by inference). It doesn't mention the vaccine. The conversation ''might'' have been about the vaccine, but the comic (and its discussion of what it is sensible to do, or not) is vaccine free. It's "anti-infection", but not directly "pro-vaccine". (He, I and you ''are'' all sensibly pro-vaccine, I think. The comic itself is only vocal on that subject by omission and a chain of logic that will never occur to those stuck at the original fallacy.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.73|172.70.85.73]] 13:06, 21 December 2021 (UTC) <br />
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People who know a lot about the immune system could also be referring to people who are aware of possibilities like the varicella zoster virus which causes chickenpox, but stays dormant in your body after you recover and can come back later as shingles. This is less likely to happen if you get the vaccine to prevent chickenpox in the first place. --[[User:Norgaladir|Norgaladir]] ([[User talk:Norgaladir|talk]]) 00:32, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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A vaccination doesn't necessarily give you immunity, e.g. with the Covid or influenca vaccines, so you still can get infected. But being vaccinated reduces the risk of suffering complications like death that can ruin your and other peoples' life.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.94.229|162.158.94.229]] 07:59, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
:...''significantly'' reduces the risk, in fact. It likely also (though it's a harder thing to establish) reduces the catch-and-transmit rate, thus yet another thing to do to help others, even those you'll never meet directly, who are unable or (ugh!) unwilling to think this far ahead. Unmitigated (and, especially, sought-after) 'natural' infection as represented in the comic just helps spread the thing further and faster and does a gross disservice to onward contacts, contacts-of-contacts, etc, etc. Excuse my preaching to the choir here, but it needs to be said. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.73|172.70.85.73]] 13:06, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
::You're not preaching to the choir exclusively, plenty of lurkers (like me) are reading along. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.143|108.162.241.143]] 17:01, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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While trying to update the explanation for 'neutrality of tone' and address some infectious disease history, I came across this [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7120728/#!po=44.6721|Highly Infectious Diseases in Critical Care] article<br />
from the NIH published January 3 of 2020 which includes a comparison of smallpox, measles, SARS-1, and MERS-cov illustrating how significantly vaccination has reduced global infections. Check out the graph of measles from 1980. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.227|172.70.110.227]] 13:46, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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My hero is the person who added the citation needed to "Diseases are bad", as well as those who realize that vaccination is largely a form of infection on purpose (within one of the following five options: infection by the disease itself, infection by a weakened disease, infection by a killed and inactive version of the disease, infection by a related less dangerous disease that shares some characteristics with the original disease, infection by a laboratory created RNA strands that mimic the disease being attacked). Therefore, catching the disease on purpose, is a form of vaccination. Israel did a study on infection by the disease itself and found 6.7 times stronger immune response than other forms of COVID-19 vaccination. [https://www.science.org/content/article/having-sars-cov-2-once-confers-much-greater-immunity-vaccine-vaccination-remains-vital] [[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 14:11, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
:This should indicate that a better (at preparing your immune system to resist future infection) vaccine (process) may be possible. Without saying that current vaccines are ineffective. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.97|108.162.241.97]] 17:06, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
:I like how you make sure to use the "laboratory created" modifier for the RNA vaccine, but not the other types. As if they all grew on trees or something. Here's a hint: all vaccines were created in a lab, though many were created more directly by modifying an existing virus, in that lab. [[User:PotatoGod|PotatoGod]] ([[User talk:PotatoGod|talk]]) 21:15, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
I would like to add that the comic criticizes only a part of ''anti-vaxxers'' population that show the circular logic presented. There are other parts, e.g. those who are not quite sure if the cost/benefit (or rather risk/risk) calculus is right for the rapidly developed and hastily officially approved (in comparison to long-established vaccines against other diseases) and/or novel (mRNA) vaccine products, fearing long-time side effects of the vaccine. On the other hand, long-term effects of the disease itself are also not known yet, even if some middle-term ones are known or being investigated already. There are still other parts like those who oppose governmental obligations or pressure to vaccinate against covid and related restrictions, and take the refusal as a personal freedom stance. There may be others. -- [[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.219|198.41.242.219]] 15:09, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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This very much feels like a straw man. I get that it's a webcomic, but can we talk about this? The description says that natural immunity is "short lived" (as in, how short-lived, and how much compared to vaccination?) but meanwhile I hear like one in five COVID hospitalizations were vaccinated patients. Are there studies on reinfection with COVID in vaccinated vs non-vaccinated patients? It seems to me from the latest comics that Randall is frustrated. I think everyone is frustrated. Citation needed, haha. But I get tired of reading "haha the other side is dumb" from both sides of every damn issue these days, and the bigger the impact an issue has, the more furious the mudslinging. One could, for example, make the same "circular argument" jab at trusting the FDA in this example, or in a more agnostic case, the value of a college degree or a certification: Ex. "we're qualified to make decisions about what's right or smart for the populace because we're a bunch of people who say so, and we have a pretty looking seal to prove it, and also please keep giving us a lot of money." I mean, for those of us who have been to college, haven't we all churned our way through that just to get into the workforce and discover that it's completely different than what we actually needed to know? Would we call people "anti-uni's" and laugh at their incompetence for questioning the system? Even at the unlikely minimum of "anti-vaxxers (or x-person who disagrees with me) are 100% dumb and wrong and that's a fact", isn't the discourse important? I understand that the opposite extreme is "I'd rather let my child die of Polio than trust another human being", but isn't that just another straw man? When are we going to stop polarizing? Thoughts?[[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.147|108.162.237.147]] 16:28, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
:It might be Randall is (intentionally or accidentally) touching on your point by making this comic's thesis ambiguous. People who aren't thinking deeply about the topic on both sides will initially think it confirms their worldview, until they see more discussion on the matter. So the comic's ambiguity might prompt more discussion by and between both sides. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.143|108.162.241.143]] 17:18, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
:Re: "I hear like one in five COVID hospitalizations were vaccinated patients." ....if less than one in five people are vaccinated, this is a problem. Either it means there is a problem with the vaccine (unlikely) or that the vaccinated are putting themselves more at risk thinking they are more 'virusproof' than they are. If more (and hopefully significantly more) than 20% of the populace are vaccinated then this is actually a positive sign for the whole issue - even if there's still social hubris underestimating the precautions they still may need to take.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.73|162.158.159.73]] 17:34, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
::At least in the US, significantly more than 1 in 5 people are vaccinated. It's a little over 3 in 5 fully vaccinated. But I would suggest that even that isn't necessarily the statistic to look at - pretty sure covid is still more likely to be serious for older people and folks with preexisting conditions, all else being equal, and those populations have an even higher vaccination rate. 78% of folks 50-64 are fully vaccinated, and 84% 65+, per the CDC. So that makes the 1 in 5 represent *even less* risk.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.45|172.70.110.45]] 18:30, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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(Re: The "Why does my IP keep changing?" asked as an Edit-comment (see page history)... Because your gateway/pathway between yourself and the site goes through a limited and shared ''set'' of possible IPv4s. There's no guarantee you'll get the same IP (or even obvious range!) between edits, nor that your current IP won't be used by someone else in a few minutes. It's just a technical thing that greases the wheels of the Internet, even if it has funny repurcussions for some things like this.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.73|162.158.159.73]] 17:34, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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"However, what Cueball (and by extension Randall) fail to note is that bad or not, there are plenty of instances where someone has already recovered, and therefore already in possession of natural immunity." - Isn't that what the comic is about? I'm confused as to why this is on the explanation page? --[[User:Enchantedsleeper|enchantedsleeper]] ([[User talk:Enchantedsleeper|talk]]) 19:45, 21 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
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I think people are overcomplicating this. A common anti-covax trope you sometimes see is that natural immunity is "better than" the immunity provided by a vaccine. But it is a total non sequitur The *only way* the vaccine could prevent you from acquiring the coveted "natural" immunity would be if it saved you from getting infected in the first place. If you never end up infected, then I guess you didn't need the natural immunity after all. If you do get infected, well now you have it. There is no sense rushing out to get infected on purpose, which is the equivalent of refusing a vaccine. Of course, people can have many other reasons for not vaccinating, but this particular "reason" truly makes no sense.</div>172.70.130.213