Friday, March 27, 2015

10Q (March 27, 2015)

[Most images can be clicked on for larger versions]

1. In the 18th century, 'redhand' was a legal term used in Scotland meaning 'in the act of crime', but it was this particular author who used that to coin the phrase 'caught red-handed'. He is generally credited as being second only to Shakespeare as an individual source of English neologisms, with such now-common phrases as 'cold shoulder', 'blood is thicker than water', 'go berserk', 'lock, stock and barrel' and a whole range of others emanating from his pen. Who?

2. In February 1840, the Governor of New Zealand, William Hobson, named the new capital that he set up after the Earl of Auckland, then Viceroy of India. In what way – topical these days – does the family name of the Earl of Auckland connect the NZ city to the city that was the Earl's base in India?

3. This person has an avid interest in cosmology, and participated in BBC coverage of the opening of the Large Hadron Collider in September 2008. He has also played Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman in the play QED. This is a sound clip of him talking about the Emmy win that he was personally most pleased about (he has won six in all). Identify him.

4. According to legend, passing blacksmiths at work one day, this person found that the sounds emanating from their anvils being hit were beautiful and harmonious. He went to the blacksmiths to learn how this had happened by looking at their tools, he discovered that it was because the anvils were "simple ratios of each other, one was half the size of the first, another was 2/3 the size, and so on". This led to his applying scientific law to music. Who?


5. The Dvorak layout, patented in 1936 by Dr. August Dvorak and his brother-in-law, Dr. William Dealey, was an attempt to improve what now-ubiquitous design?

6. This is the logo of the Mumbai branch of which organisation, established in 1969 by Meera Mahadevan after she witnessed "the plight of neglected children… on the site of the Gandhi Centenary Exhibition in Delhi"?


7. 'Fylfot' (meaning 'four-footed'), tetragammadion ('four gammas'), 'sun wheel' and 'tetaskelion' ('four-legged') are all alternative names for what symbol?

8. After calling Prince Charles a "little grovelling bastard" on live television in 1994, he later faxed the prince, "I suppose a knighthood is out of the question?" In reality he and the Prince were very close friends, and he was made a Knight Commander of the British Empire (KBE) (honorary because of his Irish citizenship) in 2000. He had once quipped that he wanted his headstone to bear the words "I told you I was ill." He was buried at St Thomas's Church cemetery in Winchelsea, East Sussex, but the Chichester Diocese refused to allow this epitaph. A compromise was reached with the Irish translation, and additionally in English, "Love, light, peace" [see picture below]. Name this irreverent comedian.


9. In 2010, Stephen Hughes a physicist at the University of Queensland in Australia surprisingly uncovered an error in dictionary definitions that had stood uncorrected for almost a century. He found the word described thus in the Oxford English Dictionary – "noun: a tube used to convey liquid upwards from a container and then down to a lower level, the flow being maintained by atmospheric pressure" – but pointed out that the flow is maintained not by atmospheric pressure but by gravity. It's a very basic principle, but the definition had stood uncorrected for 99 years! What is the word in question?

10. This is a shloka from the Bhagavad Gita: "Ananyas chintayanto mam ye janaha paryupasathe thesham nithyabhiyukthanaam yogakshemam vahamyaham" (meaning: "For those who are always absorbed in thoughts of me, and who worship me with single pointed devotion by every means, I myself carry their necessities and take care of their well being"). What organisation takes its motto 'Yogakshemam Vahamyaham' ('I shall take care of the well being') from this verse?

Answers
1. Sir Walter Scott
2. The Earl of Auckland was George Eden, and his family name links Auckland's cricket ground Eden Park to Kolkata's Eden Gardens. 
3. Alan Alda, who won a writing Emmy for an episode of M*A*S*H to go with his five acting/directing awards.
4. Pythagoras
5. Typewriter keypad (and now computer keyboard) layouts. 
Dvorak proponents claim the Dvorak layout uses less finger motion, increases typing rate, and reduces errors compared to the QWERTY keyboard. 
6. Mobile Creches
7. The swastika
8. Spike Milligan
9. Siphon
10. Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC)

7 comments:

  1. 1. Edgar Allan Poe
    2. Eden Gardens & Eden Park
    3. Allan Alda
    4. Mozart?
    5. Computer keyboards
    6. CRY?
    7. The 'command' key on Mac keyboards?
    8. George Carlin?
    9. Siphon
    10. LIC

    ReplyDelete
  2. 1. Lewis Caroll
    2. Wellington town in Tamilnadu ?
    6. UNESCO ?
    7. Swastika
    9. Siphon
    10. LIC

    -Delson

    ReplyDelete
  3. 2. Eden park in Auckland and eden gardens in kolkata
    5. Layout on a keyboard (qwerty)
    7. Swastika
    9. Siphon
    10. Iskcon

    ReplyDelete
  4. 4. Pythagoras
    5. QWERTY
    6. Swastika

    ReplyDelete
  5. 1. Sir Walter Scott
    2. Dalhousie
    3. Benedict Cumberbatch
    4. Leonardo Da Vinci
    5. The QWERTY keyboard
    6. Teach a Child Foundation
    7. Swastika
    8. Spike Milligan
    9. ?
    10. LIC

    ReplyDelete
  6. So here are some wild guesses
    1. Robbie Burns
    2. Auckland Aces
    4. Tschaicovsky
    5. Olympic Rings
    8. Spike Milligan
    9. Barometer
    Paul Gatward. Have a go, that's my motto!

    ReplyDelete
  7. 4. Pythagoras
    5.keyboard layout
    7. peace symbol
    9. siphon

    ~Julian

    ReplyDelete