Talk:2312: mbmbam

So ... what would the MMMbop unit be?

the power of love

This has gotta be at least the third or fourth time he's referenced MBMBaM. https://what-if.xkcd.com/155/ and https://xkcd.com/1836/ I know are two more examples, but there might be more. 162.158.107.13 00:54, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Am I the only one thinking that mbmbam should be a unit of work, not energy? Force x distance... High school physics was a long time ago though. Philosophicles (talk) 03:15, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Work is energy 172.69.62.154 05:28, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

The only difference could be absolute or relative energy, comparable to height above sea level vs. distance. Sebastian --141.101.69.193 06:36, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

My first instinct was "that´s a torque". But of course angles have no unit, and so torque and energy must have the same. --162.158.88.74 07:15, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Please forgive my ignorance here: Is not a "degree" an angular unit?

ProphetZarquon (talk) 17:20, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

The concept that a plane angle is a dimensionless unit is a tenet of the International System of Units (SI). It works something like this. "Degrees" and "Radians" are two ways of expressing the same thing, the size of an angle. If you have an angle and you draw an arbitrary circle with the angle's vertex as the circle's center, so that your angle now "subtends" an arc of the circle, then the size of your angle in radians is defined to be the length of that arc divided by the length of the radius of the circle. The circumference of the whole circle has length 2π·r, so an angle of 360 degrees is also an angle of 2π·r/r radians. The numerator and the denominator are dimensionally both lengths. Dividing a length by a length yields a dimensionless quantity, i.e. one with no "unit". Consequently radians are dimensionless, and so are degrees. JohnB (talk) 19:52, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Is my vision going blurry, or does that second panel say "milliibarn"? -- Peregrine (talk) 09:09, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Yes, two 'i' before the barn. That must be a mistake. --108.162.229.192 10:28, 28 May 2020 (UTC) <-- Either that or it's milli - i*barn, going into imaginary dimensions. Cellocgw (talk) 11:58, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

MBMBaM's tagline is "an advice show* for the modern era", not an advice podcast.

Reminds me of how this symbol: "μ" means both "micro" (micrometer is μm.), and "friction" (frictional constant of X would be μ = X), and the population statistical average (the average acceleration due to gravity on the surface of earth is μ_gravity), and something like 20 other things according to this wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mu_(letter)#Use_as_symbol Tsumikiminiwa (talk) 15:53, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Reminds me of the old joke: Several kittens have found their way up onto a sloping roof, which one falls off first? The one with the lowest μ... 162.158.155.218 21:52, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

"It's an advice show for the modren era", not modern. 162.158.79.15 19:35, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

I went ahead and removed the statement that "mbar" is more common than "mb," since the preferred abbreviation depends on the field. In atmospheric science, "mb" is nearly universal. 162.158.187.201 17:19, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

anyone following that podcast who can shed light on the arrangement of the dashes? why is there non between "and" and "me" but between all the other words? (my-brother-my-brother-and (how do I emphasize a space?) me) --Lupo (talk) 06:40, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Can anyone please explain (to me) the role of white hat in this comic? He is not part of the conversation and just makes more or less random statements, concluding in "I hate you". What am I missing here? Bischoff (talk) 19:54, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

I really think that this comic would be better without White Hat in it. His actions do seem like a complete non-sequitar.

For most of the dialogue, Megan and Cueball are discussing some oddities of dimensional units and making puns, while White Hat struggles to keep up. His utterances can be seen as 1) True but lacking insight ("UNITS ARE WEIRD") 2) A valid pun but out by about 10^50 ("ONE PODCAST") 3) Freaking out because it is all too weird for him ("PLANCK YEAST!") 4) Final breakdown due to some very high level punning by Cueball and Megan ("...I HATE YOU")

In the last panel, Cueball and Megan link Planck yeast (not a thing) and unleavened (yeast-free) bread to several concepts in theoretical physics: Quantum foam, the curvature of space time, and M-theory. M-theory suggests that space-time has eleven ("unleavened") dimensions, and is described by Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory) as a unification of superstring theories. The five consistent versions of superstring theory apparently suggests that space-time has only ten dimensions, so this may be a rare error by Randall. Or I may just have misunderstood. --Paul Seed 21:34, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

What about millibuckets? PoolloverNathan^[talk]U•T•S•c 17:54, 24 September 2021 (UTC)

mbar

I cite wikipedia:

The unit's official symbol is bar; the earlier symbol b is now deprecated and conflicts with the use of b denoting the unit barn, but it is still encountered ...

I wonder since when, und who still uses *mb*, since I have never encountered that in my life. --162.158.88.92 04:05, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

never seen it either. But the comic doesn't state that it is common, just that it is possible. See also comment above on atmospheric science. --Lupo (talk) 06:40, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Here's a link to a page with multiple uses of mb with the meaning millibarn. It's in the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics (97th ed., 2016), a "comprehensive one-volume reference reasource for scientific research". JohnB (talk) 13:28, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

172.68.51.107 09:56, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

mb • mb [millibar times millibarn] is not mbmb - it is ubb [microbarbarn]. Such a gabing plot hole...