Not Too Arbit

forced sabbatical

2008-06-09T06:51:00.001+05:30

Due to the exams.. U can expect a period of inactivity in this blog until July. Cya later!

Stage deux

2008-06-05T17:58:00.005+05:30

You read it.. It's a stage 2. Kinda easy-hard question... The previous ones were being cracked left, right and center..

1) Identify which humanism movement this is a logo of....

2) What breed is this dog?

3) The Origin of this term can be traced to 1889, when Hugo de Vries in his book Intracellular Pangenesis coined the term "pangen" for "the smallest particle [representing] one hereditary characteristic". Which term?

4) John Keats was visibly frustrated with certain advancements in science when he wrote the following lines of a famous poem. Fill in the missing line.

Do not all charms fly

At the mere touch of cold philosophy?

There was an awful rainbow once in heaven:

We know her woof, her texture; she is given

In the dull catalogue of common things.

Philosophy will clip an Angel's wings,

Conquer all mysteries by rule and line,

Empty the haunted air, and gnomed mine –

----------fill in this line-----------------

5) Stage Deux? (a.k.a Connect all the answers)

Answer: Went unattempted

1) Is the logo of Brights movement... started by skeptics world over. Wiki for more details.

2) Rottweiler

3) Is the term "gene"

4) "Unweave the Rainbow"

5) Stage 2 is Richard Dawkins - He's one of the biggest supporters of the Brights movement. He's popularly called Darwin's Rottweiler for his support to the evolutionary theory. His famous books include "The Selfish Gene" and "Unweaving the Rainbow". In the latter, he specifically attacks this poem from Keats to argue that science has increased the beauty of the rainbow.

a leetle arrbit

2008-06-04T06:56:00.005+05:30

The following map depicts a few countries with numbers. France and Italy are in black because they are relevant so many times that i didn't want to assign numbers to them. To the best of my knowledge, the map is accurate. All countries which need to be assigned numbers may not have been assigned one, but sufficient and the important ones have been covered.

ID what the map is about. Click on map to enlarge. Clue below.

Clue: Think comics.

Answer: Went uncracked, this one..

These are the countries visited by Asterix and Obelix during their adventures, the number indicating the number of the book in which they visited...
eg: Book 21 was Asterix and he Magic Carpet in which they visit India.

connect 2

2008-06-01T00:33:00.002+05:30

Connect an image processing free software, a Pakistani fashion label, and the following pics:

A:

B:

C:

D:

With specific reason for pic D connect!

Answer: Cracked by Srikanth.

Karma.. Sharon Stone connect being her opinion of Chinese earthquake at Cannes. I'd say she went too far.. the Chinese common man didn't need it, but those human-right snatching leaders of theirs need to be whipped.

mathemagic

2008-05-28T04:50:00.005+05:30

A:

B:

pic A a 1621 edition of Arithmetica of Diophantus, which didn't have enough space in some particular region of a page (enough said!).

This point is expilicitly stressed by a person X (whose name is blanked out by black) in pic B in the section i've highlighted in grey, in the 1670 edition of Arithmetica. Also, a further extension of the problem in A has been proposed, which troubled mathematicians for a very long time (and still continues to trouble them to a certain extent).

I'd pay special attention to the word in yellow. Click on the images to enlarge.

Put ID on X. Which is the troublesome problem?

Answer: Cracked by Srikanth

Fermat and his last theorem.. too many give away clues, i gather :(

another onomatopoeia!

2008-05-26T06:17:00.003+05:30

This could probably have been triggered by the Chinese diplomatic tactic of extending Leah Neuberger's visa to her country's entire team. But more probably, it might have been triggered by the meeting of American sportsman Glenn Cowan and his Chinese counterpart Zhuang Zedong.

The story goes: Cowan had been practicing for 15 minutes with the Chinese player, Liang Geliang, when a Japanese official came and wanted to close the training area. As Cowan looked in vain for his team bus, a Chinese player waved to him to get on his Chinese team bus. Moments after his casual talking through an interpreter to the Chinese players, Zhuang Zedong came up from his back seat to greet him and presented him with a silk-screen portrait of Huangshan Mountains, a famous product from Hangzhou. Cowan wanted to give something back, but all he could find from his bag was a comb. The American hesitantly replied with "Jesus Christ, I can't give you a comb. I wish I could give you something, but I can't.” When it was time for them to get off the bus, hordes of photographers and journalists were waiting for them. With the political climate that existed in the 1960s, the sight of an athlete of Communist China with an athlete of the United States was sure to garner attention.

Glenn Cowan later bought a T-shirt with a red, white and blue, peace emblem and the words "Let It Be," which he presented to Zhuang Zedong at another chance meeting.
When a journalist asked Cowan, "Mr. Cowan, would you like to visit China?"
He answered, "Well, I'd like to see any country I haven't seen before--Argentina, Australia, China, ... Any country I haven't seen before."
"But what about China in particular? Would you like to go there?"
"Of course," said Glenn Cowan.

Forrest Gump is also supposed to have been a member of this U.S team.. because he "just kept his eyes on the ball".

Which historical occurrence did all this lead up to?

Answer: Cracked by Srikanth.... somebody else try too!

Ping Pong Diplomacy

Finally, back :)

2008-05-25T04:47:00.004+05:30

1. ID the book: Pulitzer winner which follows the efforts of Data General Corporation to build a better computer than Digital Equipment Corporation's VAX

2. A bit of a trivia: (sorry) ... In Jonathan Swift's novel Gulliver's Travels, the name of a race of horses is "Houyhnhnm".. Gimme funda behind name!

3. Connect the Carnatic Raagas: Gaula, Varali, Aarabhi, Shri and Naata :)

Answers: Cracked by the sincere Srikanth :)

1. The Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder

2. The word is onomatopoeic - sounds like neigh of a horse! And yes, it's the opposite of a more human like race called Yahoo.

3. This is arbit for people who don't listen to Carnatic music :) These ragas are the ones in which Thyagaraja has composed the famous Pancharatna Kritis.. Hence they are called Ghanapanchakas

:(

2008-05-24T04:55:00.002+05:30

Am a bit tied up so the next question will come up after 2-3 days, maybe .. Thanks for checking in. In the meanwhile i think this year's edition of KQA'a mahaquizzer can keep you occupied.
It can be found at www.kqaquizzes.org/quizzes

Happy quizzing :)

weekend gen qs 2

2008-05-18T10:41:00.006+05:30

1. Simple.. ID the painting and artist. Give me the funda behind the name :) (It's not Mona Lisa.. duh.. i'm not THAT bad ;) )

2. Doodle for which occasion?

3. Painting depicts an engraved painting of a monument around 70CE

The present day monument is 187 feet wide and 62 feet high (approx). In reality, it stretches 488 m wide but is hidden by other buildings ans shopping complexes. It consists of 45 course stones, 28 of them above ground and 17 underground. The first seven visible layers are from the Herodian period.This section of wall is built from enormous stones, most of them weighing between two and eight tons each. Each of these stones is surrounded by fine-chiseled borders. The margins themselves measure between five and twenty centimetres wide, with their depth measuring 1½ centimetres. In the Herodian period, the upper ten metres of wall were one meter thick and served as the other wall of the double colonnade the plateau. This upper section was decorated with pilasters, the remainder of which were destroyed at the beginning of the seventh century by the Byzantines.The next four layers were added by Umayads in the seventh century. The next fourteen layers are from the Ottoman period. The top 3 layers were added before 1967.

Which monument? (Sorry about a lot of extra and unwarranted info in the questions.. Quizzing in RV does that to people :D )

Answers: Cracked by Srikanth (2/3 anyway)

1. LHOOQ by Marcel Duchamp. Wiki it for the french pun in the name. You wont regret it :)

2. Doodle for the birthday of Walther Gropius. It was the doodle ON the day of the question

3. Wailing Wall, Jerusalem

put ID

2008-05-16T05:32:00.004+05:30

A French philosopher X was visiting Russia to the court of Catherine the Great. However, the Empress was alarmed that X's atheistic remarks were influencing a majority of her court. She promptly asks Y to take care of the situation. X was later informed that a learned mathematician had proved the existence of God. X agreed to view the proof as it was presented in court. Y appeared, and told X, and in a tone of perfect conviction announced, "Sir, ^{(a + bⁿ)}⁄_z = x" (not X), hence God exists—reply!". X, to whom (says the story) all mathematics was gibberish, stood dumbstruck as peals of laughter erupted from the court. Embarrassed, he asked to leave Russia, a request that was graciously granted by the Empress.

X and Y?

Answer: Cracked by Srikanth and Nikhil..

X = Denis Diderot

Y = Euler

general qs 2

2008-05-12T20:40:00.004+05:30

All sitters. Don't google. :)

1. ID the animal. All clues in the pic

2. " I remember when my daddy gave me that gun. He told me that I should never point it at anything in the house; and that he'd rather I'd shoot at tin cans in the backyard. But he said that sooner or later he supposed the temptation to go after birds would be too much, and that I could shoot all the blue jays I wanted - if I could hit 'em; but to remember it was a sin to ----------blank1-------- . Well, I reckon because ----------blank2------ don't do anything but make music for us to enjoy. They don't eat people's gardens, don't nest in the corncrib, they don't do one thing but just sing their hearts out for us."

Very famous quote. Blank 2 is a subset of blank 1 (i.e blank 1 contains the phrase blank 2). Give me blank 1.

Answers: Cracked by Srikanth

1. Komodo Dragon

2. To kill a mockingbird

SVC (short visual connect) , Non exhaustive.

2008-05-11T06:39:00.008+05:30

A:

B:

C:

D:

E:

F:

In Chronological Order: (from earliest to latest) : A(considered with special attention to the blacked/blanked details) -> A (considered without special attention to the blacked/blanked details) -> D -> E-> B -> C (this is one of a few other possible clues, but it should suffice) -> F.

No reason as to why this order was chosen.. just that it's a pain to reload all pics in the right order.

Connect 'em all. Clue below if required.

Clue: Know your current affairs. And their past.

Answer: Cracked by Srikanth

A = Bhola/ Bangladesh

B = Gonu (pam leaves)

C = Sidr (eye)

D = Orissa

E = Mala (garland)

F = Nargis (Daffodil)

These are cyclones in and around North India

cumul-ative!

2008-05-06T19:33:00.005+05:30

Crack this! :)

The journey is supposed to have started at what is now the modern day Ramtek, a place near Nagpur and been about 650 miles long. It could have just followed a straight northward path from the starting hill. However, it was (deliberately?) complicated. Some parts of the journey are described:

It proceeded over villages where people lived so that the journey could be seen. A few villagers were scared by pelting of hail. It passed over what is today the Amarkantak mountain range, then through Vidisha, a district in Madhya Pradesh, and to Ujjain, along the banks of the Shipra river. The journey proceeded through Devagiri - the abode of Shiva and Parvati after paying homage to them, then along the banks of the Sindhu river to Kurukshetra, where the Mahabharta war was fought. After encountering the Jamuna river, the journey proceeded through evergreen forests full of deodar trees to the Himalayas. Mount Kailas and Manas Sarovar (whose holy water was drunk to quench thirst) are visited before reaching the final destination, which is fabled to be the wealthiest person's capital.

Map depicts the path of the journey. Begin and end are depicted and a few places blanked out. (click to enlarge)

What journey am i talking about?!

Answer:
Cracked by Srikanth and Rajaram.. good one
This is the journey of Megaduta, the cumulus cloud in the work by Kalidasa..

monstrous

2008-05-04T10:18:00.004+05:30

Simple enough... Whose pic comes second? Sorry about the quality of the 3rd pic.. best i could do.

Answer:

The second pic should be that of Sir Anthony Hopkins.. these are the different people who have played Hannibal Lecter

bright and clean

2008-05-01T22:53:00.004+05:30

Easy one.. try not googling

"How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!
The world forgetting, by the world forgot.
--------------Fill in this line-------------
Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd."

Answer:

Cracked by Rajaram and Srikanth

"Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind"

high n low

2008-05-01T01:24:00.006+05:30

1. On April 19, 1943, X intentionally ingested 250 ug of Y, which he hypothesized would be a threshold dose, based on other ergot alkaloids. After ingesting the substance X was struggling to speak intelligibly and asked his laboratory assistant, who knew of the self-experiment, to escort him home on his bicycle, due to the lack of available vehicles during wartime restrictions. On the bicycle ride home, X's condition became more severe and in his journal he stated that everything in his field of vision wavered and was distorted, as if seen in a curved mirror. X also stated that while riding on the bicycle, he had the sensation of being stationary, unable to move from where he was, despite the fact that he was moving very rapidly. A doctor was called and saw no reason to prescribe medication and instead sent him to his bed. At this time X said that the feelings of fear had started to give way to feelings of good fortune and gratitude, and that he was now enjoying the colors and plays of shapes that persisted behind his closed eyes. X mentions seeing "fantastic images" surging past him, alternating and opening and closing themselves into circles and spirals and finally exploding into colored fountains and then rearranging themselves in a constant flux.He also stated that he had a sensation of well being and renewed life and that his breakfast tasted unusually delicious. Upon walking in his garden he remarked that all of his senses were "vibrating in a condition of highest sensitivity, which then persisted for the entire day".

ID X and Y. As a consequence, 19th April of every year is known as what?

2. Z said: "I want the (people of X) to know that if I'm the president, we will attack X". Also, "In the next 10 years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Y, we would be able to totally obliterate them. That's a terrible thing to say but those people who run X need to understand that because that perhaps will deter them from doing something that would be reckless, foolish and tragic."

ID X, Y and Z!!

3.

What are these students of Millikin University doing?

Answers:

1. Hoffman the guy who invented LSD.. He died recently.

2. Hillary Clinton about Iran attacking Israel

3. Muggle Quidditch

General qs

2008-04-29T20:16:00.003+05:30

1. Quite simple: Sources suggest that the might be a corruption of root, shouted by hackers when they obtain root-level access in a targeted system. Still others suggest a portmanteau wow and loot, as might be uttered in (for example) online gaming when a cache of treasure or another valuable item is discovered. Which word?

2. 14 litres of India Ink, 30 brushes, 62 soft pencils, 1 hard pencil, 27 rubbers, 1984 sheets of paper, 16 typewriter ribbons, 2 typewriters and 366 pints of beer went into the creation of what?

3. Connect:

Clue: The people pics are a direct connect

Answer: Jith cracked most of it..

1. w00t
2. Asterix and Cleopatra
3. This question was set rather incompletely (was in hurry :P ) so apologies. The connect is Foot in Mouth award winners - Richard Gere, Naomi Campbell, Steve Mclaren, Alicia Silverstone, and Gordon Brown.

Reactive!

2008-04-28T19:03:00.003+05:30

Very very cheap question today:

X stated for the first time the Law of Conservation of Mass, recognized and renamed Oxygen and Hydrogen, disproved Phlogiston theory, introduced the metric system and chemical nomenclature.
Lagrange said about him being decapitated: "It took them only an instant to cut off his head, but France may not produce another like it in a century." Who?

Answer:

Is Lavoisier. Cracked by Abhijith Sagar and kingofkings (gotta step up the level of questions now what he's here :P )

The Weekend Mini-Quiz - 1

2008-04-27T06:02:00.006+05:30

Here goes:

1. The meaning of X is uncertain. Some plausible theories include: One theory of the "fair lady" who has been "locked away" refers to an old practice of burying a dead virgin in the foundations of the bridge to ensure its strength through magical means. Another theory was the people building the bridge were afraid the water spirits would not approve of a bridge being built, as it was invading their territory. To prevent an invasion from the water spirits, they made human sacrifices to the water spirits. This usually meant killing a child and burying it in the bridge. The more plausible reference of the fair lady was to Queen Elanor of Aquitaine. One theory of origin is that X relates to the destruction of 'something' by Olaf II of Norway in 1014. ID X?

2. This dude was in the news recently because of an incident involving Arsenal F.C. (rather tangentially related to the event).
(In case you think this is too arbit, do notice he's wearing his country's shirt..)
Put funda.

3. X was the name of the antagonist in Lewis Carroll's 1854 short story "Wilhelm von Schmitz."
X was also a slang term for marijuana in the 1920s and 1930s, associated with the jazz scene.
X was a tune recorded by Louis Armstrong and his orchestra in 1928.
X was a character from Carol Kendall's first Minnipins novel "The Gammage Cup".
X was a race in "RAH" (later retitled "The Legend of Rah and the X"), a 1984 book by Nancy Stouffer. Recently Stouffer claimed unsuccessfully that she owned the trademark for "X", causing quite a stir among millions of people in the world, who knew of X only in a context that was, and still is, a big rage.

ID X.

(I'd concentrate on the last line)

4. Y said: "It is alarming and also nauseating to see X, a seditious Middle-Temple lawyer, now posing as a fakir of a type well-known in the East, striding half-naked up the steps of the Vice-regal palace...to parley on equal terms with the representative of the King-Emperor."

ID X and Y!!!

5. Whose tombstone?

Is anyone visiting this site still? If you are, at least try guessing :P

:( :( Answers:

1. The rhyme "London Bridge is Falling Down"

2. This is Marijan Buljat... The guy whom Eduardo Da Silva injured in a very similar way to which he got injured..

3. The word "muggle"

4. Winston Churchill about Gandhi

5. Teresa Bond, wife of James Bond (see the last scene of OHMSS and first scene of For your eyes only)

make a choice!

2008-04-25T06:03:00.004+05:30

The up and down, The circular swing, The whip, Drunk style, The half-circle or V, The figure eight, The side to side, The whiplash, The Two up, Two down, The all-out, The thrust, The hammer, The breakdown, The low-profile, The full body, The gallop, The half body

What am i talking about?

Answer:
These are the types of headbanging..

Neptune is kind

2008-04-24T05:13:00.003+05:30

I'm proud of this question: Try not to google

The villagers of a place near Kanyakumari in TN have found an interesting method for irrigating their crops since 1966, when a solution was facilitated by their CM K. Kamaraj, and implemented for a distance of just over 1 km. This method is necessitated due to the undulating land terrain of the area, which is also adjacent to the hills of the Western Ghats. The irrigation water feeds the taluks Vilavancode and Kalkulam. Irrigation Water flows through for a major part of the year, except in the summer (from February to May). There is also a huge flight of stairs (made in recent times) that allows one to climb from the level of the Pahrali river (the source of the water) to see the method work. It is now a popular tourist destination.

What method have the villagers adopted to irrigate their crops?

Answer:

All hail the Indian aqueduct :-o It's called the Mathur aqueduct.. The Romans would be proud!

Connect:

2008-04-23T06:38:00.004+05:30

A:

B:

D1:

D2:

Connect A to E. D1 and D2 are a now and WWII times pic of the same place.

Answer:

This one went uncracked.

A is the satellite named juno

B is Jennifer Garner, who plays one of the lead roles in Juno (I thought an Ellen Page pic would give it away too easy :P)

C is a band called Juno

D1 and D2 are photos of a beach called Juno beach.. famous for landing of the troops..

E is the mythological Juno, after whom the girl in the movie was named

The connect i was looking for was Juno

skateboard philosophy

2008-04-21T20:31:00.002+05:30

The last scene (blanked out) has the skatebaord crash with someone other people on a skateboard who're well known for skateboard philosophies. Who?

Answer:

Pnyiva naq Uboorf

Cracked by Srikanth

hmmmm

2008-04-21T20:27:00.001+05:30

ok will post a few interesting questions every now and then :)

if anbody bothers answering, kindly rot13 your answers to not spoil it for others

cheers