Honesty Quiz - February

[3iff]

Honesty Quiz - Feb 2010

No research is allowed after seeing the questions. They must be answered solely with the information currently in your head.
One point per correct answer with no penalty for incorrect or unanswered questions. If you don't know an answer, it's worth guessing. I will accept ONLY your first answer list (send to me via PM). Spelling accuracy is not required for person names. You may freely use pen, paper and simple calculators.

Answers provided when entries close which will be in 2-3 weeks time.

After the over-difficult quiz for January, this one should be easier.
Please let me know what you think of the question spread. Too hard, too easy?

If you missed the January quiz, don't worry, you can still participate as we have a category for your best 6 scores of the year.

Highlight below to see the questions.

1. Of the 4 Beatles, John, Paul, George and Ringo, which was born first?

2. What type of creature is a Corvus Corax?

3. Name 2 of the 3 countries bordering Vietnam?

4. What are the 5 colours of the Olympic Rings? (I need all 5)

5. Who played Johnny Cash in the 2005 film "Walk the Line"?

6. When was the Empire State building opened? (you must be within 2 years)

7. What is the home planet of the Daleks?

8. Where is Deimos?

9. What is the area of a right angled triangle with sides 5, 12 and 13 units?

10. The Canary Islands (off the west coast of Morocco) are named after which animal?


Good Luck.

[Zag]

The difficulty looks pretty good, though I thought that the last one was OK, too (just really hard).

Here's an idea, which you might even want to apply retroactively (to mitigate the other retroactive change): Make each question worth 5 points, but give partial credit. So, for the melting point of gold, for instance, you might say that you get 5 points minus the floor of the difference over 20, so within 20 got 5 points, 21-40 away got 4 points, etc. You might have worded the question, Say what you know about the musical composition 4'33" and given 2 points for the composer, 1 point for the year (within 5), etc.

It's noticeably more work for you, so I have no problem if you just want to keep it simple.

[3iff]

Nice idea...although that then leads to "how close" the answer is and may lead to more arguments as to how accurate a given answer is to the real answer...and it's changing the scoring system after the start.

Hopefully I can get the quiz back on track by making the questions have definitive answers or have well defined ranges of acceptable answers.

One thing I did mean to ask, I suspect that most entrants are either UK or US based (or have a general range of knowledge comparable to those areas). If anyone is from another area, I'd appreciate a PM letting me know the approx area you're from so I can include some fair questions for you too. If you're happy with a general UK/US question mix then fine.

[Lepton]

Sent. I think I got a better score than last month. Personally, I am opposed to any US or UK bias.

[3iff]

[Quailman]

Maybe next month he'll ask all about Ghengis Khan. and Curling.

[3iff]

[Lepton*]

My point is that a number of us (a) were not raised in a country where US or UK history is taught, other than as sample cases; (b) were exposed to different cultural paradigms; and (c) live in different political and social climates. I'm used to "this must be a reference to a UK kids show from the 80s" or "sounds like an American soap opera" questions -- they are just annoying.

[Quailman]

Sheesh! What a newfie!

[Zag]

That was his original point. He wants to know if there are people for whom a US/UK bias would be a distinct disadvantage, and he intends to compensate for it somewhat. That's why he asked the original question.

[referee]

Well, sent. We'll see.
_________________
Jan 21st, 2008: The pillaging continues.
Mar 4th, 2008: Rest in Peace, Gary Gygax. May your dice always roll a natural 20 wherever you are.

Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!

[3iff]

[Lepton*]

Yeah, if I'm the only one, it's no issue. I'm doing acceptably with these questions.

[PuzzleScot]

When will results be available from February's round?

[3iff]

There's one or two people (from last month) who have yet to have a go at this quiz. I'll give them a shout and publish answers on Friday.

So Cordelia - Zag - Lexprod - Azu...if you want to have a go at the quiz this month, submit entries.

Anyone else is welcome to have a go.

[3iff]

Last call for entries. Answers will appear here in about 4 hours from now.

[3iff]

Honesty Quiz - Feb 2010 - Answers

Bracket numbers after the answer indicate how many got the correct answer.

1. Of the 4 Beatles, John, Paul, George and Ringo, which was born first?
That's Ringo, born 7th July 1940 (6/13)

2. What type of creature is a Corvus Corax?
A common raven but "bird" was acceptable (6/13)

3. Name 2 of the 3 countries bordering Vietnam?
China, Laos and Cambodia (10/13)

4. What are the 5 colours of the Olympic Rings? (I need all 5)
Red, Green, Black, Blue and Yellow (10/13)

5. Who played Johnny Cash in the 2005 film "Walk the Line"?
Joaquin Phoenix (8/13)

6. When was the Empire State building opened? (you must be within 2 years)
1st May 1931 - so 1929 to 1933 was acceptable (3/13)

7. What is the home planet of the Daleks?
Skaro (2/13) Not many Dr Who fans out there.

8. Where is Deimos?
Orbiting Mars (12/13) The one wrong answer suggested Greece.

9. What is the area of a right angled triangle with sides 5, 12 and 13 units?
30 units. Half the base * height (5 * 12 / 2) (12/13)

10. The Canary Islands (off the west coast of Morocco) are named after which animal?
Dog. The name Islas Canarias is likely derived from the Latin term Insula Canaria, meaning "Island of the Dogs", not Canary and not duck (from Canard) which was suggested by a few entries. (5/13)

The March quiz will appear early March.

Totals
17 Scurra (9)
14 Puzzlescot (8)
12 Lepton (7)
9 Duke Gnome (5)
9 Jesternl (7)
8 Courk (5)
8 Undercover Monk (5)
7 Cordelia (-)
6 Quailman (6)
6 Referee (6)
5 JDTAY (5)
5 Raekuul (4)
4 Zag (-)
4 Milkshake (1)
4 Internet Stranger (4)
3 Lexprod (-)
3 Azu (-)

Trailing number in brackets is the score for this round, (-) means no entry submitted.
Some players have had 2 entries, some only 1, but as we're also grading on percentage correct and best 6 results being at the bottom of the table is not necessarily a disadvantage. On current form it looks like Scurra, Puzzlescot and Lepton are going to be the ones to beat.

[Scurra]

As I said in my answer submission, I found it slightly amusing that I only knew the answer to the Empire State Building question because I was a Doctor Who fan though...
_________________
_{still Quiz Olympiad champion. Must get a life.
New definitions: COFFEE - someone who is coughed upon}

[3iff]

Entirely coincidental that those two questions appeared in the same quiz. I would not have given any thought about the two items being related.

[Quailman]

w00t! Six right, and I missed two stupid ones - My first thoughts were 1933 (close enough) and dogs, but after further thought I said 1935 and ducks. I think I got 1935 because it's on 35th Street. As it turns out, it's between 33rd and 34th, so even that was wrong.

BTW, Lepton - sorray about the Newfie remark.

[Zag]

Darn! I meant to get mine in. Well, I would only have gotten 3.25 right, anyway (counting .25 as the chance of a correct guess for Ringo). (Empire State building, Olympic rings, and the triangle, would have been correct.)

[PuzzleScot]

Since this is an honesty quiz, I think you should give Zag his 3 points (if he wants them).

Mind you, he could be non-playing this round tactically though...

[3iff]

[Zag]

Oh! and Diemos. 4.25

In fact, I was planning to say something along the lines of "riding a horse alongside his master, the god of War, unless you you were referring to Diemos, the moon of Mars (along with the other moon, Phobos)."

Here's an interesting fact about the moons of Mars: If you were standing on the surface of Mars observing the moons, Diemos and the Sun both seem to travel east to west, due to Mars turning on its axis. (Diemos seems to do so more slowly, because it is actually travelling west to east, just like our moon.)

However, Phobos actually seems to travel west to east, because it is inside the Areo-synchoronous orbit (the Mars equivalent of geo-synchronous). That is, it is traveling west-to-east faster than Mars is spinning under it, so a martian would see it moving in that direction, though not nearly as fast as it really is doing so.

But don't give me the points. I missed the deadline, and that's that. I was actually waiting until I happened "accidentally" to see the Olympic rings on TV, just to confirm that I was correct in their colors (I was). Then I missed your "last chance" post.

[PuzzleScot]

A more interesting fact about the moons of Mars...

Since the gravitional equillibrium between mars and each of its moons lies nearer the centre of each moon than its surface, you cannot stand on the Mars side of either moon! You would be slowly sucked off the surface into Martian atmosphere!!

(awaiting smart-arse response...)

[Zag]

I find this frighteningly hard to believe, PS, and I looked (for all of 2 minutes) for some mention of it and didn't find it. I can't believe that it wouldn't just rip Phobos apart if that were the case. (It does say that this will happen when Phobos drops another 2000km closer to Mars, and it is dropping by about 20 meters per century.)

Do you have dome documentation of this anywhere? Or were you just being facetious?

Also, in the course of reading about Phobos, I learned that Diemos and Phobos were Mars' sons, not his henchmen.

[PuzzleScot]

No, I'm not joking. I'm just dashing out, so no time to list the maths..

quick search yields: "The reason Phobos may not have as much dust and debris on its surface is because of its close orbit to Mars where the planet's gravity would tend to pull debris off the moon." ( http://starryskies.com/solar_system/mars/mars_moons.html )

F ~= m/r^2. Calculate 'sweet spot' where F is same each way.

I make it 1128 metres from Deimos Cof G and 1213 metres from Phobos CofG. Both have radius greater than these. (using Mass/Radii from Wiki)

[Zag]

You're ignoring the illusionary centrifugal force because, while you are standing on Phobos, you are orbiting Mars. That is, the point you calculated is the point that would be a gravitational equilibrium if Mars and Phobos were relatively stationary, and some giant hand were holding the two apart from each other.

For any object on the surface of Phobos to fall towards Mars, it not only has to overcome Phobos' gravity, it also has to overcome the impressive velocity it has perpendicular to the gravitational force from Mars.

It is probably true that it wouldn't take a whole lot to fire a rocket off of Phobos and escape its gravity well into Mars'. But then the rocket would orbit Mars at only a slightly lower orbit than Phobos was, and perhaps significantly more elliptical, depending on the direction you fired it.

[Dread Pirate Westley]

According to wikipedia, the escape velocity at the surface of Deimos is 5.6 m/s and 11.3 m/s for Phobos. The world record in the 100 m is less than 10 s, so it should be possible to "run off" Deimos even for an average person. On Phobos, if you run in the direction of its rotation, you get a "push" of about 3.1 m/s at the equator. However, a stationary body on the surface of either will not "fall off." Anything that gets ejected from the surface (by a meteor impact, for instance) would almost certainly not fall back to the moon.

[MatthewV]

I thought I submitted. I would have gotten 2, 3, 6, 8, and 9 right. #6 was somewhat lucky. I guessed Crow/bird for #2 (and raven was my second guess, bah!)

[PuzzleScot]

@Zag: I thought about that, and assumed that since the moon is in a stable 'free-fall' state, we could ignore all other imaginary forces (except perhaps Coriolis), and do the calculation relative to the bodies themselves.

F = G m1 m2 / r^2. Mass of Phobos = 1.072x10^16 kg. Mass of Mars = 6.4185x10^23 kg. C-C distance = 9377km. Radius of Phobos = 11.1km.

At the surface, Force to Phobos = Gm x 8.7x10^7 N
Force to Mars = Gm x 7.3x10^9 N. (100 times as strong).

But I think it turns out that on this scale, Coriolis is extremely significant, and anything that left the surface of Phobos would actually orbit Mars in its own right, slightly more elliptically than Phobos itself, and maybe even bump back into Phobos. I guess this will be why wiki says: "Faint dust rings produced by Phobos and Deimos have long been predicted but attempts to observe these rings have, to date, failed."

@DPW: Escape velocity is what you need to permanently escape it's gravity. The more relevant number here is surface gravity - c. 2 - 8 mm/s^2. (1200-5000 times weaker than Earth's surface gravity)
An uncited Wiki source says Mars' tidal forces have a huge effect on Phobos' surface gravity, but leave the gravity still +ve all over (just).

Whichever way the final figures fall it's still pretty amazing.

[PuzzleScot]

Quick Follow up... I appears I have got something wrong in my calculations, since I have found a few references to the "Lagrange Points L1 and L2 being 2.5km above Phobos' surface". eg http://www.liftport.com/forums/index.php?topic=1006.0

[Zag]

That sounds more like it. Still, 2.5km is darned tiny, especially considering what little gravity Phobos has to begin with. You could probably throw a baseball that high.

[PuzzleScot]

I wouldn't be surprised if you could JUMP that high! (You could throw a shot put at escape velocity after all!)

[3iff]

MatthewV:
Rechecked my inbox and no entry from you...

Think in future I'll add the condition that entrants must submit answers to get a score...should be obvious really. I'll also add an alert system so I can PM you if I'm waiting for your answers!

[3iff]

[Duke Gnome]

I would say that any kind of non-immediate answering could be considered cheating. Yes you may not be actively seeking the answer, but conversation fragments etc. that would have passed you by become much more noticeable.

[milkshake]

[MatthewV]

[referee]

30 square units, actually. But the idea is the important thing.
_________________
Jan 21st, 2008: The pillaging continues.
Mar 4th, 2008: Rest in Peace, Gary Gygax. May your dice always roll a natural 20 wherever you are.

Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!