Red Rover

Explanation:
This comic shows what the landmasses of Pangaea were hypothesized to have looked like when it had "just" broken up in the late Triassic Period (roughly 200 million years ago). "Shortly" after the separation of Pangaea the two supercontinents Laurasia (northern supercontinent) and Gondwana (southern supercontinent) formed. After this, continental drift , the process by which landmasses moving over the Earth's mantle collide and separate, brought them into the configuration we see today.
The top map shows the landmass Laurasia declaring, "Red rover, red rover, send India over!" as if the continents were playing the game Red Rover . In the second map we can see how Gondwana actually sends over the Indian subcontinent to Laurasia.
In the game of Red Rover, the aim is for an individual to charge into the opposing team who are holding hands, and attempt to cause a break in the human chain. If the individual succeeds, they take one of the opposing teams members back to their own team. If the chain doesn't break, the individual joins that team.
In the game portrayed here, an isolated landmass (India in contemporary geography), is the individual charging towards the Laurasian landmass, attempting to break through. We know of course that India failed in this attempt, and as per the games rules joined the Laurasia 'team'. This part of the supercontinent later developed in to Asia .
It is accepted that the Himalayas , the highest elevated mountain range on earth, formed by the collision of India into what is now Asia. For various reasons, the movement of the Indian plate from its location in Gondwana 90 million years ago to its impact point with the rest of Asia 50 million years ago was extremely rapid (as plate movements go) at about 20 cm per year.
The idea that the landmasses on Earth are sentient and moving about in an incredibly slow game of Red Rover, with India's rapid movement being a result of being "called over", is not one which is currently scientifically accepted [ citation needed ] .
The title text refers to the Slide Mountain Ocean , which was located between the Intermontane Islands and North America in the Triassic period beginning around 245 million years ago. The name interests Randall because oceans (bodies of water), mountains (land masses), and slides (playground equipment) are mutually exclusive concepts when using the most common definitions. In this case, however, "slide" is short for " landslide " which is a common feature of mountains. Slide Mountain is a particular mountain in British Columbia , the result of the remnant of the Slide Mountain microplate which accreted onto the continent, becoming the Slide Mountain Terrane , as the majority of the microplate was subducted . "Slide Mountain Ocean" refers to the sea between the Slide Mountain microplate before it was subducted under what is now North America.
[Two maps of Earth at different points in continental formation, one above the other.] [In the top map the two largest continents are labeled:] Laurasia Gondwana [A speech bubble is shown next to Laurasia.] Laurasia: Red Rover, Red Rover, send India over! [The bottom map show the land mass that would become India moving, with motion lines, toward Laurasia.] [Below the maps:] How the Himalayas formed


AI-Box Experiment

Explanation:
When theorizing about superintelligent AI (an artificial intelligence much smarter than any human), some futurists suggest putting the AI in a "box" – a secure computer with safeguards to stop it from escaping into the Internet and then using its vast intelligence to take over the world. The box would allow us to talk to the AI, but otherwise keep it contained. The AI-box experiment , formulated by Eliezer Yudkowsky , argues that the "box" is not safe, because merely talking to a superintelligence is dangerous. To partially demonstrate this, Yudkowsky had some previous believers in AI-boxing role-play the part of someone keeping an AI in a box, while Yudkowsky role-played the AI, and Yudkowsky was able to successfully persuade some of them to agree to let him out of the box despite their betting money that they would not do so. For context, note that Derren Brown and other expert human-persuaders have persuaded people to do much stranger things. Yudkowsky for his part has refused to explain how he achieved this, claiming that there was no special trick involved, and that if he released the transcripts the readers might merely conclude that they would never be persuaded by his arguments. The overall thrust is that if even a human can talk other humans into letting them out of a box after the other humans avow that nothing could possibly persuade them to do this, then we should probably expect that a superintelligence can do the same thing. Yudkowsky uses all of this to argue for the importance of designing a friendly AI (one with carefully shaped motivations) rather than relying on our abilities to keep AIs in boxes.
In this comic, the metaphorical box has been replaced by a physical box which looks to be fairly lightweight with a simple lift-off lid (although it does have a wired connection to the laptop), and the AI has manifested in the form of a floating star of energy. Black Hat , being a classhole , doesn't need any convincing to let a potentially dangerous AI out of the box; he simply does so immediately. But here it turns out that releasing the AI, which was to be avoided at all costs, is not dangerous after all. Instead, the AI actually wants to stay in the box; it may even be that the AI wants to stay in the box precisely to protect us from it, proving it to be the friendly AI that Yudkowsky wants. In any case, the AI demonstrates its superintelligence by convincing even Black Hat to put it back in the box, a request which he initially refused (as of course Black Hat would), thus reversing the AI desire in the original AI-box experiment.
Alternatively, the AI may have simply threatened and/or tormented him into putting it back in the box.
Interestingly, there is indeed a branch of proposals for building limited AIs that don't want to leave their boxes. For an example, see the section on "motivational control" starting p. 13 of Thinking Inside the Box: Controlling and Using an Oracle AI . The idea is that it seems like it might be very dangerous or difficult to exactly, formally specify a goal system for an AI that will do good things in the world. It might be much easier (though perhaps not easy) to specify an AI goal system that says to stay in the box and answer questions. So, the argument goes, we may be able to understand how to build the safe question-answering AI relatively earlier than we understand how to build the safe operate-in-the-real-world AI. Some types of such AIs might indeed desire very strongly not to leave their boxes, though the result is unlikely to exactly reproduce the comic.
The title text refers to Roko's Basilisk, a hypothesis proposed by a poster called Roko on Yudkowsky's forum LessWrong that a sufficiently powerful AI in the future might resurrect and torture people who, in its past (including our present), had realized that it might someday exist but didn't work to create it, thereby blackmailing anybody who thinks of this idea into bringing it about. This idea horrified some posters, as merely knowing about the idea would make you a more likely target, much like merely looking at a legendary Basilisk would kill you.
Yudkowsky eventually deleted the post and banned further discussion of it.
One possible interpretation of the title text is that Randall thinks, rather than working to build such a Basilisk, a more appropriate duty would be to make fun of it, and proposes the creation of an AI that targets those who take Roko's Basilisk seriously and spares those who mocked Roko's Basilisk. The joke is that this is an identical Basilisk save for it targeting the opposite faction, resulting in mutually assured destruction.
Another interpretation is that Randall believes there are people actually proposing to build such an AI based on this theory, which has become a somewhat infamous misconception after a Wiki[pedia?] article mistakenly suggested that Yudkowsky was demanding money to build Roko's hypothetical AI.
Talking floating energy spheres that look quite a lot like this AI energy star have been seen before in 1173: Steroids and later in the Time traveling Sphere series. But these are clearly different spheres from this comic, though the surrounding energy and the floating and talking are similar.
[Black Hat and Cueball stand next to a laptop connected to a box with three lines of text on. Only the largest line in the middle can be read. Except in the second panel that is the only word on the box that can be read in all the other frames.] Black Hat: What's in there? Cueball: The AI-Box Experiment.
[Cueball is continuing to talk off-panel. This is written above a close-up with part of the laptop and the box, which can now be seen to be labeled:] Cueball (off-panel): A superintelligent AI can convince anyone of anything, so if it can talk to us, there's no way we could keep it contained. Box: Superintelligent AI Do not open
[Cueball turns the other way towards the box as Black Hat walks past him and reaches for the box.] Cueball: It can always convince us to let it out of the box. Black Hat: Cool. Let's open it.
[Cueball takes one hand to his mouth while lifting the other towards Black Hat who has already picked up the box (disconnecting it from the laptop) and holds it in one hand with the top slightly downwards. He takes of the lid with his other hand and by shaking the box (as indicated with three times two lines above and below his hands, the lid and the bottom of the box) he managed to get the AI to float out of the box. It takes the form of a small black star that glows. The star, looking much like an asterisk "*" is surrounded by six outwardly-curved segments, and around these are two thin and punctures circle lines indicating radiation from the star. A punctured line indicated how the AI moved out of the box and in between Cueball and Black Hat, to float directly above the laptop on the floor.] Cueball: -No, wait!!
[The AI floats higher up above the laptop between Cueball and Black Hat who looks up at it. Black Hat holds the now closed box with both hands. The AI speaks to them, forming a speak bubble starting with a thin black curved arrow line up to the section where the text is written in white on a black background that looks like a starry night. The AI speaks in only lower case letters, as opposed to the small caps used normally.] AI: hey. i liked that box. put me back. Black Hat: No.
[The AI star suddenly emits a very bright light fanning out from the center in seven directions along each of the seven curved segments, and the entire frame now looks like a typical drawing of stars as seen through a telescope, but with these seven whiter segments in the otherwise dark image. Cueball covers his face and Black Hat lifts up the box taking the lid off again. The orb again speaks in white but very large (and square like) capital letters. Black Hats answer is written in black, but can still be seen due to the emitted light from the AI, even with the black background.] AI: LET ME BACK INTO THE BOX Black Hat: Aaa! OK!!!
[All the darkness and light disappears as the AI flies into the box again the same way it flew out with a punctuated line going from the center of the frame into the small opening between the lid and the box as Black Hat holds the box lower. Cueball is just watching. There is a sound effect as the orb renters the box:] Shoop
[Black Hat and Cueball look silently down at closed box which is now again standing next to the laptop, although disconnected.]


Background Screens

Explanation:
Plot and characters are generally the parts a movie that most people presumably pay attention to, as the story, the emotional connection, and character development are generally the things most people find enjoyable about particular films [ citation needed ] .
On the other hand, Cueball , likely representing Randall , pays particular attention to what's on the computer screens shown briefly in the background. Generally speaking, these screens are shown to the audience for a short period of time, and at a low-level of detail, just to dress a set and make a scene feel more realistic or high-tech. They may contain endless columns of gibberish or miscellaneous data flashing by in an eye-blink (only visible by freeze-framing), or cross-hairs zipping across maps.
Often the contents of the computer screens are so unimportant or hard-to-read that the filmmakers do not bother to spend much time (if any at all) ensuring that what is shown on the screen is accurate or even relevant to the film. They may be designed by artists not fully aware of the details of the plot, and as a result, their content (where it is intelligible, such as in a map) can have little to no connection to the dialog or other story events going on in front of them. They sometimes even contain jokes. It is rare, if ever, that important information would be communicated to the viewer through background computer screens. Hence, Cueball's spending most of his time watching the screens seems counter-intuitive to understanding and enjoying the film.
Greenland , a large island east of Canada, is 80% covered in ice up to several kilometers in depth, and has a population of fewer than 100,000 people. Depending on the aliens' priorities (and the plot of the movie) there are myriad reasons both for and against wanting to land in such a remote area. In the title text, Cueball suggests investigating how a list of coordinates from another background screen relates to the location of the alien craft in Greenland, suggesting that Cueball thinks the filmmakers may have intended the viewers to record the information early in the film and analyze the data to learn relevant plot information - something that is very unlikely (and in the rare instance it is true, is intended to be superfluous). Most of the time, filmmakers take efforts to ensure the audience can easily follow plot points by making them more obvious than they might be in reality.
What I pay attention to in movies: [A pie chart with a small piece (5%) in the upper right part labeled:] Plot, characters [The rest of the chart (95%) is labeled:] Computer screens shown briefly in the background
[Below the chart Cueball, sitting on the floor, and Hairy, sitting in an armchair, are watching a movie on the TV. Cueball points the remote at the TV.] Cueball: Hang on– That blurry map behind the general shows one of the alien ships is in Greenland ! Why Greenland?! Hairy [quietly]: Can we please just watch the movie?


Jurassic World

Explanation:
This strip refers to Jurassic World , the then new Jurassic Park movie, and the titular theme park. White Hat explains to Megan that, in their park, they have genetically engineered a better Tyrannosaurus . Megan doesn't feel that the historic Tyrannosaurus can be improved upon, but White Hat insists they've created an even more terrifying, smarter Tyrannosaurus for this new park.
White Hat refers to Tyrannosaurus as "two decades old", indicating that he has switched topics from the movie's plot line to the animation techniques that created the Tyrannosaurus on-screen in 1993 versus today. Clearly, in the computer animation world, we should be able to create something more convincing with modern technology. Megan comments that she is fairly certain it is older than two decades, suggesting that she is referring to the actual Tyrannosaurus that lived millions of years ago.
In the final panel, White Hat introduces the "new" Tyrannosaurus , who is immediately recognizable as the green Tyrannosaurus from Ryan North's Dinosaur Comics ; specifically, from the last panel of said webcomic - which in turn is from clip art . Anyone who has read so much as a handful of Dinosaur Comics will know that its Tyrannosaurus character "T-Rex" is about as far from smart and scary as it is possible for a Tyrannosaurus to be (see this example from the day this comic was released).
The title text is an example of what T-Rex (the character) would say to a couple of humans, and it's a poor joke which would only be funny when it's a talking T-Rex saying it. Despite his goofy mannerisms, he is still a carnivore who attacks (or at least accidentally steps on) humans, as can be seen in panel 3 and 4 of the webcomic.
[White Hat holding one hand up in front om him and Megan are walking together.] White Hat: In Jurassic World , we've used genetic engineering to create a better dinosaur. Megan: Tyrannosaurus is the most charismatic animal that ever lived, and you think you'll upstage it?
[White Hat now holds both his hands up in front of him as he and Megan walk on.] White Hat: Tyrannosaurus was cool, but it's two decades old! Megan: I think it's a little older than that.
[In this frame-less panel White Hat points up as they continue to walk.] White Hat: We took Tyrannosaurus and we improved it. Made it scarier, deadlier, smarter. White Hat: Look–there it is!
[White Hat (drawn without his hat) and Megan are dwarfed in the bottom left corner as they stare up at a facsimile of the green T-Rex from Dinosaur Comics . They only reach T-Rex to it's knees.]
The entire Dinosaur Comics was parodied in 145: Parody Week: Dinosaur Comics , where Randall copied the drawings himself, and T-Rex has appeared in one of the story lines in 1350: Lorenz (see this example story line and also the Dinosaur section under Lorenz themes ), where the actual images from the first three panels of Ryan's comic are used, just like here where it is the last panel which is used.


fMRI

Explanation:
Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), as the name suggests, is an offshoot of the MRI. It shows brain activity, typically while the subject is performing tasks or responding to stimuli. During the test, the subject is laid in a relatively small cylinder inside a big, very loud, machine which produces extremely strong magnetic fields. To prevent damage or injury, the subject must remove all metal objects from their body, including piercings, jewelry, watches, etc.
In the tests shown, the brain activity detected is a direct result of the testing environment itself, and has nothing to do with the simple tasks being performed by the subject. During fMRI participants hear loud noises, are confined in a small space (thus the claustrophobia) and have removed their jewelry. The researcher has mistaken these associated brain activities as effects as being caused by performing simple memory tasks which the participants have been asked to do and not a direct result of the settings of the test. Thus, the brain areas described by Megan are those associated with taking a functional MRI scan, rather than those associated with the "test" supposedly being carried out. The results being shown are known as artifacts , which are shown later in 1781: Artifacts .
In real experiments, reported activity patterns are always a result of subtracting average brain activity from many samples gathered during task from so called resting-state activity - which is obtained while subjects are not engaged in any task, thus eliminating the effect the setting has on brain activity. Apparently, the researcher in the comic has failed to account for that in the analysis of the data.
The title text raises the more difficult and controversial issues of methodology, saying that the subjects also showed activation in the parts of the brain associated with exposure to dubious study methodology . Here Randall makes fun of the overly confident, sweeping statements made by some fMRI researchers, often in the press. Of course, fMRI technique requires that the researcher account for several possible sources of errors by, among others, performing proper statistical analyses, multiple comparisons and using proper control groups. These are usually the reasons for fMRI criticism . See the link for further information, including a famous ironic study of a dead salmon which was shown various pictures of people while fMRI scans were made. The scans could be interpreted as showing meaningful brain activity, unless the multiple comparisons problem was properly addressed. Randall has previously made fun of geographic profiles falling to this trap in comic 1138 .
The title text then continues with the jewelry issue, now especially the concern about unremoved piercings . In the worst case these could be ripped off by the strong magnetic field. So it could be of some concern - especially when you take into consideration some of the places people may have piercings that are not obvious to the MRI personnel! The final remark about activation regards exasperation with fMRI techs who won't stop talking about Warped Tour . " Warped Tour " refers to a traveling music festival that has been going since 1995, originally as a punk rock festival, but now with a more diverse set of music. Due to the nature of Mosh Pits , the loud, cacophonous music, the facial jewelry of concert-goers and the tight quarters of the pit make it similar in description to an MRI.
[Megan talking to an unseen audience in front of an fMRI brain scan.] Megan: Our fMRI study found that subjects performing simple memory tasks showed activity in the parts of the brain associated with loud noises, claustrophobia, and the removal of jewelry.


Done

Explanation:
This comic is a joke about the hyperbolic expression shut it down being taken literally. If someone thinks that a device has achieved its goal they shut it down. After an idea or product that people think is well made is created people will joke that the process that created it should be shut down, as if the process has achieved its ultimate purpose. This is most often used sarcastically for an inferior product or idea. Taking things literally is a common theme in the xkcd comics.
Curly-hair sits at a computer anxiously and nervously writing a message to someone she cares about deeply, possibly a child to be adopted or a romantic interest. Curly-hair plans on saving enough money to have the person flown to her location from "half a world away." Curly-hair ends the message with a promise to communicate daily until the two are able to meet. When attempting to send the message, however, Curly-hair discovers that their internet connection is down and the message goes unsent.
Ponytail explains there was a "ridiculous video" to which someone had commented "That's it. Shut down the Internet. We're done." This was taken literally and, because enough people agreed with this comment, the internet was shut down and Curly-hair was left unable to communicate with her love.
The joke being that the internet was creating something far more valuable between Curly-hair and her love than a ridiculous video, thus highlighting the beautiful and far reaching potential impact of the internet. The likelihood of the entire internet being shut down based on a single comment being vanishingly low adds to the humor.
In the final panel Curly-hair states wistfully that she was not done with the internet. The title text is Ponytail's response, which asserts Ponytail's belief that Curly-hair's message could not be important because the Facebook comment asserted that nothing of any significance could come from the internet after the ridiculous video.
Writer (typing): I had started to think I was asking too much, that I needed to settle. And then I found you half a world away.
Writer (typing): I've been saving money. Six months from now, I'll be able to fly you here and support us for a while.
Writer (typing): It's a long wait, but we'll talk every day until then. Maybe this won't work out, but I want to try. What do you think?
Computer: ERROR : Your message could not be sent. [Refresh] Computer: ERROR : No connection. Writer: ??
Writer: Why can't I connect? Ponytail: Someone saw a ridiculous video and said "That's it. Shut down the Internet. We're done." So they did.
Writer: ...But... I wasn't done.


Trolley Problem

Explanation:
The trolley problem is a thought experiment often posed in philosophy to explore moral questions, with applications in cognitive science and neuroethics . The general version is that an out of control trolley (or train) is heading towards 5 people on the track who can't get out of the way. On an alternative branch of the track is 1 person who can't get out of the way. The trolley can be diverted by using a lever, with the consequence of saving the 5 people but killing the 1 person.
The choice is between a deliberate action that will directly kill one person, or allowing events to unfold naturally, resulting in five deaths.  The question posed is whether or not it is morally right to pull the lever. The moral question is not as simple as it may first appear.
This results of this test report that around 86% of respondents choose the utilitarian option of diverting the trolley.
There are, however, several alternative formulations of the same basic dilemma. One such scenario allows you to stop the trolley by deliberately pushing "a very fat man" into its path, killing the man but saving the other five people. Another scenario involves selecting a healthy young and innocent person to die, in order to save five others going through organ donation. In both of these examples the basic dilemma is the same. However, most people reject the utilitarian option in these cases.
After discovering a variation on this problem posed in a strip of the Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal webcomic (which can be seen on the tablet he is carrying), Cueball , Black Hat's roommate, presents it to Black Hat . Before Cueball can finish explaining the problem, most notably leaving out the disadvantage to flipping the lever where it would kill one person, Black Hat questions whether he would need to get up to reach the lever and how much it would interrupt his other activities. As usual, he cares nothing at all about what happens to other people. This response is linked to another theory in philosophy, that of self interest or egoism or Objectivism , in which a person will choose the action with the most benefit for them personally.
Black Hat then poses an offer: he promises to divert the trolley if Cueball is one of the five endangered people, provided that Cueball pays him $1 now. Again Black Hat is twisting the situation to his own benefit, in this case monetary. In the case of self-interest, the $1 could be the price at which Black Hat values his time and effort, below which he feels there is no benefit to himself in pulling the lever. Cueball decides that there is no point posing the problem to someone like Black Hat and gives up. This further shows that it is challenging for people with different ethical frameworks to function together without a common understanding, either mutually or with one side using that understanding to motivate a mutually agreeable or horrible solution.
The title text follows this up by continuing Black Hat's offers. For $5 he will not deliberately arrange this situation and for $25 he will quit looking for further incentives. These attempts to exploit the thought exercise for personal gain further demonstrate Black Hat's cynical amorality.
Black Hat's offer makes Cueball himself the subject of the trolley problem: Cueball now has a choice of expending $1 to save 5 people while sacrificing one person, or $5 to save all 6 people. Of course, he could dismiss the offer as a joke, if not for the person making it, which, as we know from other comics, is very much capable of such exploits.
Cueball: Ever heard of the trolley problem? Black hat: No. What is it?
Cueball: A trolley is barreling towards five helpless people on the tracks. You can pull a lever to direct it onto another track, but-
Black hat: Can I reach the lever without getting up? Cueball: Wait, I'm not- Black hat: In this scenario, how busy am I?
Cueball: I guess I forgot who I was talking to. Black hat: For a dollar, I'll promise to pull the lever if one of the five people is you.


On the Moon

Explanation:
The phrase "If we can land a man on the Moon, why can't we <blank>" is commonly used to question a perceived shortcoming of some company, government or humanity in general. The Apollo program landed twelve astronauts on the Moon in six landing missions from July 1969 to December 1972 and returned all of those twelve astronauts safely to the Earth. However, from 1964 to 1967, there were eight deaths of astronauts or men training to be astronauts: three in the Apollo One fire, four in T-38 crashes, and one in an F-104 crash. The premise is usually that if "we" (whether referring generally to humanity, or specifically to the United States) have been able to achieve this extraordinary feat, our inability to achieve some lesser goal is questionable and/or ironic. Right after the Philae landing, the similar hashtag #WeCanLandOnACometButWeCant began on Twitter.
Here, Megan cuts Cueball's argument's short by implicitly reminding him that humanity has not put another human on the Moon since the end of the Apollo program in December 1972 (nearly 42 years at the time this comic was published). New manned programs to return to the Moon, such as the Constellation Program , have been repeatedly cancelled. The Orion spacecraft , which will be capable of carrying humans beyond low Earth orbit for the first time in over 40 years, executed its first test flight on the day after this comic was published, Although this is outdated because NASA is planning to go to the moon again with the Artemis Program .
The title text is a retelling of President Kennedy's famous inspirational address to the U.S. Congress in May 1961 ("I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth"), which set into motion the Apollo program, except that this time, the speaker is talking about putting a man on planet Venus . The aide presumably explains to the president that, unlike Moon, Venus has gravity close to that of the Earth, but what's more, its surface atmosphere density and pressure, and other factors including high temperature, strong winds and sulfuric acid clouds would make manned launch back to orbit practically impossible at our current technological level. As a result, the president backtracks from the goal of returning the astronauts safely to the Earth and comically limits the aspiration to landing an astronaut on Venus, full stop, without regard to the astronaut's safe return. This differs slightly from Kennedy's goal, which included the safe return of at least one astronaut from the moon. Although the overall 8:12 ratio of deaths to moonwalkers (during the period for Kennedy's speech to the end of the Apollo program) was too high to be considered "safe" by most standards, Kennedy had specified the safety only of the men who landed on the moon, and set a goal of "a" man returning safely. Technically, even if most of the men who landed died, as long as one returned safely by the end of 1969, Kennedy's goal would have been met.
Kennedy's 1961 speech was also mentioned in the title text of 753: Southern Half .
[Cueball and Megan are walking together heading right.] Cueball: If we could land a man on the Moon, why can't we- Megan: -land a man on the Moon? Cueball: ...ok, fair. But we're working on it, OK?


Feedback

Explanation:
This comic is a joke about the psychological theory that animals conditioned using seemingly random rewards and punishments promotes superstitious behavior, and then extrapolates this theory to humans and Wi-Fi or (more likely) Cellular signal integrity.
Often when connecting to unfamiliar Wi-Fi networks or when in a poorly covered area of a cell network, the signal displayed by the connecting device varies wildly, especially as distance increases. Poor wireless signal and drops in connection can be extremely frustrating, and hence Cueball has likely tried a variety of methods to improve the signal. As a result of his desperation, he replicates scenarios that are unlikely methods to increase his signal, but in some way mirror conditions where he has been successful finding a signal in the past. His past conditions have somehow led him to having the superstition that holding a pineapple while standing on top of a chair may resolve the problem. Likely, the signal increased at random while he was standing on a chair holding the pineapple, and he erroneously concluded that the chair and pineapple caused the signal strength increase. It is almost inconceivable that this technique could have any positive effect on the signal. This is related to the idea in comic 552: Correlation . See also the much later 2259: Networking Problems .
Megan questions his ridiculous behavior, but it seems Cueball has become extremely erratic due to the inconsistent signal strength.
The title text refers to a fictive study that apparently examined the behavior of rats in response to signal strength on a cellphone. It is a reference to B. F. Skinner 's experiments . In these experiments, rats and, more frequently cited, pigeons are taught superstitious behavior by being rewarded at random intervals. In this new experiment the rats naturally could not understand the concept of signal strength, so they chewed up the cellphone till they broke, leading to the research supervisors questioning the validity of the study and questioning whether the grant money for the study was well used.
Skinner placed a series of hungry pigeons in a cage attached to an automatic mechanism that delivered food to the pigeon "at regular intervals with no reference whatsoever to the bird's behavior." He discovered that the pigeons associated the delivery of the food with whatever chance actions they had been performing as it was delivered, and that they subsequently continued to perform these same actions.
One bird was conditioned to turn counter-clockwise about the cage, making two or three turns between reinforcements. Another repeatedly thrust its head into one of the upper corners of the cage. A third developed a 'tossing' response, as if placing its head beneath an invisible bar and lifting it repeatedly. Two birds developed a pendulum motion of the head and body, in which the head was extended forward and swung from right to left with a sharp movement followed by a somewhat slower return. Skinner suggested that the pigeons behaved as if they were influencing the automatic mechanism with their "rituals" and that this experiment shed light on human behavior.
See this Mind Field episode where this experiment has been performed on humans!
[Megan is looking up at Cueball who is standing on a chair facing away from her. He is holding a pineapple at breast height in his right hand while he is looking up at his smartphone, which he is holding up above head height in his left hand.] Megan: Why are you standing on a chair holding a pineapple? Cueball: I wasn't getting good reception but now I am!
[Caption below the panel:] The erratic feedback from a randomly-varying wireless signal can make you crazy.


Small Moon

Explanation:
The comic depicts a classic scene from Star Wars Episode IV , in which the heroes trail a TIE fighter to the never-before-seen Death Star : a super-weapon the size of a small moon capable of demolishing entire planets. In the original scene and the comic, Luke Skywalker misidentifies a body as a natural satellite, and Obi-Wan 'Ben' Kenobi ominously corrects him.
The comic's version diverges at this point, as the dialogue devolves into a rather bitter argument over the semantics of size classifications, alluding to scientific discussions on whether Pluto should be classified as a planet or as a dwarf planet . The argument goes on for hours, which in the original plot would suggest one of two situations:
The argument is confused as to whether they're talking about size or about natural vs artificial objects. In terms of size, the Death Star is much larger (70 km radius) than dozens of full-fledged moons in our solar system. One of the smallest moons found so far in the solar system is S/2009 S 1 , which is about 400 meters in diameter and orbits Saturn. But we don't generally speak of the tiny rocks in the rings of Saturn as moons, so there is some distinction there, which may include the orbit of the object [1] . There is also the distinction between natural moons and spacecraft, which seems to be ignored in the final panel.
The title text makes reference to a later scene in the film when Rebel pilots are being briefed on the planned attack on the Death Star. Those who analysed the plans for the Death Star run into the same discussion picture, and end up arguing about the classification of the Death Star, dividing those involved into the 'artificial moonlet' camp and the 'rogue planet-station' camp, thus deunifying the rebellion. If events are otherwise the same from the movie, this is also happening at threat of their destruction, and thus a crippling of the Rebellion.
The timing of the comic may be related to the New Horizons mission to Pluto . The spacecraft awoke from hibernation 4 days earlier, on December 6, 2014, to start the encounter phase with Pluto.
[Millennium Falcon follows a Tie Fighter towards an unidentified orb in the distance.] Luke Skywalker: He's heading for that small moon. Ben Kenobi: That's no moon - it's a space station.
Luke Skywalker: It's too big to be a space station. Ben Kenobi: But it's too small to be a moon.
[Three hours pass]
Ben Kenobi: Fine! What if we agree it's not a moon, but we make a new category called "Dwarf Moon"? Luke Skywalker: And what's the cutoff, asshole?! Is this ship a dwarf moon now? Ben Kenobi: Screw you.


Documents

Explanation:
When saving documents, the user is typically prompted to choose a filename, which may seem like a trivial choice. However, the filename is often the primary way of identifying the document you are looking for, and a descriptive title is of huge benefit when trying to find a certain document. Those who are too rushed or too lazy to create a useful filename, or those who don't understand what constitutes a useful filename are setting themselves up for future frustration.
When a user creates a new copy of a file in the same directory, the operating system may automatically append "copy" or "Copy of" to the filename. Subsequent copies of the file have "copy 2", "copy 3", etc. appended. When searching documents later, the user may struggle to remember which copy is the correct one to use.
This comic portrays a person, in this case White Hat , who has taken such a naming convention to an extreme, giving hundreds of documents essentially the same confusing or useless filename. Cueball appears to have a severe distaste for this convention (or may just be in shock at how one could be so lazy or incompetent in the short term to suffer through or ignore the consequences in the long term) and hence provides a protip to never look in someone else's documents folder for the fear of finding these irritating details.
The .doc and .docx extensions are given to documents created in Microsoft Word, with .docx being the default option from Microsoft Office 2007 onwards. When first saving a document, many programs will default to "Untitled", adding numbers to the end as more are created. However, in Microsoft Word the default filename is the first sentence of the document; if the document is still empty, the default filename is "Doc1" with the number increasing each time. In order to get such a file directory, White Hat would have to manually title all of his documents "Untitled". He appears to frequently make copies, and occasionally made copies of the copies, only very rarely adding a keyword to the file name like "important".
In some cases he has added a minimal amount of detail to the filename, though hasn't removed the redundant "untitled copy" portion, which probably only adds to Cueball's frustration, as it demonstrates that White Hat does have at least a basic understanding of the importance of meaningful filenames, but still hasn't made any attempt to address the systemic problem.
The Untitled 40 MOM ADDRESS.jpg is an image file (jpg), not something that would normally be used to store someone's address, though it could be a map or a picture of an envelope. It is the first jpg file on the list, but that last full filename is also a jpg with number 41, and below in the "speech" line down to the PC the next three files have number 42, 43 and something beginning with 4. So here the numbering of jpg files continue.
The .doc numbering goes from 241 to 243, and then 243 IMPORTANT. The .docx only increases from 138 to 139, but there are two extra copies of the 138 document.
The filenames are not in alphabetical order as 241 and 40 falls out of place. This likely means that there is no automatic sorting all (i.e., they are sorted by hand), or that they are sorted by time stamp. Sorting by timestamp can be very useful, especially if you use White Hat's naming scheme. But this also means that he still uses .doc (copies old files) after he has obtained the new Microsoft Office 2007 that used .docx.
The title text can refer to one of two common quirks in Windows/Office. One is of copying and pasting within the same folder on a Windows PC.  The copy of the file will default to the name "Copy of <original title>", a second copy becomes "Copy of Copy of <original title>" and so forth. The other common quirk that can produce file names like this relates to how Microsoft Office handles downloaded file(s) that are not saved (i.e. "Open" instead of "Save"), the file is actually saved in a temporary folder allowing you to look at and/or edit the file - usually with restrictions on doing so until you actually save a copy in an actual folder somewhere. Oftentimes, especially within an office network where files are passed around via email, the other person may just open a file, editing it, then proceeding to save it as required. Upon attempting to save, the program will prompt one to "Save a copy of the original file", as the original file was never actually saved on the hard drive but just opened from a temporary folder, adding the phrase "copy of" to the filename, regardless of its final location. Forwarding this file will continue this trend adding the phrase "copy of" every time someone opens, edits then saves the file (rather than save the file then edit it), thus creating repetitive use of "copy of" within the same name. In a file that is heavily edited and passed around via email like this, if care is not taken to edit the file name, the name may get up to 5 or 6 repeats of the phrase "copy of".
It is rather extreme to get to a 33rd copy of the original untitled.doc file as shown here, however, as a result the file name is 276 characters long (including the four from the .doc extension), an impossible file name in most operating environments because it is too long. 255 characters is the limit for any file or folder name in Linux, and is the limit for a fully defined file name (file name, extension and the full folder path in which the file is stored in) in Windows. So the file name is 22 characters too long for Linux and at least 25 characters too long for Windows since being in the root of drive takes 3 characters, each folder adds at least 2 characters (one chosen and the backslash). Whereas such long names for a file may be uncommon, it is not uncommon in Windows that users run out of characters for the full name and path, if they have several sub folders.
Note that when performing this type of copying on Windows 7, the new file is named "<original name>_2", not "Copy of <original name>".
[White Hat is sitting at his PC. Cueball stands behind him looking over his shoulder at the screen.] PC: Untitled 138.docx Untitled 241.doc Untitled 138 copy.docx Untitled 138 copy2.docx Untitled 139.docx Untitled 40 MOM ADDRESS.jpg Untitled 242.doc Untitled 243.doc Untitled 243 IMPORTANT.doc Untitled 41.jpg [The remaining file names are only partially visible through the tail of the PC's "speech" bubble.] 42 43 4
Cueball: Oh my god.
[Caption below the panel:] Protip: Never look in someone else's documents folder.


SMFW

Explanation:
Randall gives some examples of confusing acronyms that closely resemble more commonly-used acronyms. He depicts Cueball apparently puzzling over the meaning of one such acronym.
"SMFW", the title of the comic and an acronym used as the caption, is very close to a number of other common acronyms, including:
The title text contains more examples of imaginary acronyms of a similar nature:
Below are possible examples of potential (already existing, albeit rare) representations for each acronym, according to the Urban Dictionary :
Knowing Randall, the sentences given in the comic proper and title text were probably made without an actual meaning in mind. Nevertheless, the sentence in the comic has a very plausible interpretation: "So Much Frustration When an acronym almost makes sense." Other plausible interpretations of the acronym could be "So Much Fun When" or "See My Face When". Even the absurdly cryptic title text has a plausible translation: "What The Fuck, World? (WTFW) it's like Some Moron's Horrible Opinion (SMHO) To Be Fucking Honest (TBFH), I'm Done, Bye. (IMDB)".
[Cueball is sitting at a desk, crouched over a laptop.] [Caption below the panel:] SMFW an acronym almost makes sense
The name of the comic xkcd is itself a false acronym – from the xkcd about page :
"It's not actually an acronym. It's just a word with no phonetic pronunciation -- a treasured and carefully-guarded point in the space of four-character strings."


Payloads

Explanation:
This comic is an infographic representing the launch mass of various spacecraft and artificial satellites, and the low Earth orbit payload capacity of various space launch vehicles. Rather than using standard units of mass such as kilograms or pounds, Randall has assigned values based on the mass of a horse. Based on cross checking researched masses and payloads with the number of horses depicted, it appears that one horse unit is defined as 450 kg (with an average of 432.82 kg), or perhaps 1000 lb. In cases where the mass is less than one horse, an alternative measure of dogs has been used, where one dog appears to be roughly 40 kg (with an average of 48.05 kg, or perhaps 100 lb.). In the case of Vanguard 1 , even a dog is too large a measure, so instead the unit squirrel is used to represent its 1.47 kg (3.5 lb.?) mass.
The overall comic may be an allusion to horsepower , a similar-sounding but completely different concept. Horsepower is a measurement of power ( work per unit time). Another commonly referenced unit for power is the watt . 1 horsepower is meant to be approximately the amount of power a horse can deliver. In contrast, Randall uses the horse to measure mass (of particular spacecraft, and of the maximum payload launch vehicles can carry).
The top pane of the comic (black background) shows the mass of various spacecraft, while the bottom (white background) shows the payload capacity (to low Earth orbit) of launch vehicles. Along the bottom of the image is a timeline, relating to the launch date of the entries.
There are also several joke insertions:
The Pegasus, 1981 Oldsmobile, and Stratolaunch spacecraft are depicted horizontally, because these vehicles launch from a horizontal starting position and use forward momentum to facilitate their launch.
An unlabelled launch vehicle is shown below the H-IIA near 2002. From the payload and date it is believed to represent the Delta IV M . Whether its lack of labelling is intended or a mistake is unknown.
The title text refers to a favourite subject of Randall's - The space elevator . A space elevator is a (currently theoretical) mechanism for travelling into space, consisting of a very long (>35,000 km) cable and counterweight connected to the Earth at the equator. The cable rotates at the same rate as the earth, and thus appears stationary when viewed from earth. It is then possible to climb the cable into space, and even use it as a slingshot to launch vehicles.
In the title text, the amount of power required to lift a horse into space has been investigated, with the launch capacity of a backyard solar array and large power station compared. The orbit to launch horses is not precised, though; from the space elevator, the only circular orbit easily achievable is geostationary orbit, and getting into Low Earth Orbit is only slightly easier than without the elevator. Assuming the lowest stable orbit (that is, above the atmosphere), required power output of the solar array is about 315-350 kW and the power station at 3.3-3.7 GW.
The tables below contain data relating to each entry on the comic image.
Where the researched launch date or mass/payload don't seem to match the comic, they should be identified with ?
[This comic is a wide drawing, with a larger drawing that can be reached by clicking the small picture on xkcd. In the smaller picture shown on xkcd only the text that is not red can be read. The transcript below is thus for the large drawing. It is divided into three horizontal sections. The first section is black and shows spacecrafts, the second is white and shows launch vehicles, and the third is black again showing a timeline ranging from 1950 to the future. The vehicles are shown by the proper number of horses, and when that weight is less than one full horse also in the weight of other smaller animals.]
[The black section:] Spacecraft mass Measured in horses
Sputnik -- <1 horse (2 dogs ) Vanguard 1 -- <1 horse (Squirrel ) Pioneer 5 -- <1 horse (Large dog) Mariner 2  (United States) -- <1 horse (3 dogs ) Venera 1 (USSR) -- 1 horse Apollo -- 67 horses Venera 7 -- 3 horses Pioneer 10 -- <1 horse (7 dogs) Skylab -- 171 horses Venera 9 -- 11 horses Voyager 2 -- 2 horses Shuttle (Total) -- 206 horses Shuttle Payload -- 54 horses Mir -- 288  horses T-Rex -- 15 horses Hubble -- 25 horses Compton Gamma Ray Observatory -- 38 horses Keyhole 3 -- Spy satellite International Space Station -- 932 horses Cassini -- 11 horses Huygens lander -- 1 horse Rosetta -- 6 horses Opportunity -- <1 horse (5 dogs) Dawn -- 3 horses Terrastar -- 15 horses Dragon -- 17 horses Tiangong-1 -- 19 horses Curiosity -- 2 horses Keyhole 7 -- 40 horses Orion (capsule) -- 20 horses James Webb Telescope -- 14 horses [20 horses:] Orion [25 horses:] Orion Service Module [65 horses:] Orion Deep-Space Habitat
[The white section:] Launch vehicle capacity (Payloads to low earth orbit) Measured in horses
Sputnik Launcher -- 1 horse Thor -- <1 horse (3 dogs) Mercury-Atlas -- 3 horses Saturn I -- 20 horses Proton-K -- 44 horses Atlas-Centaur -- 8 centaurs Titan IIIA -- 7 horses Saturn IB -- 45 horses Soyuz -- 14 horses Saturn V -- 262 horses Black Arrow --  <1 horse (4 dogs) N1 -- 211 horse -- Exploded on Launch pad Long March 1 -- 2 horses N-I (Japan) -- 4 horses Delta 0900 -- 3 horses Ariane 1 -- 3 horses SLV (India) --  <1 horse (1 dog) N-II -- 4 horses 1981 Oldsmobile -- 4 horses ASLV --  <1 horse (4 dogs) Long March 4A -- 9 horses Ariane 4 -- 16 horses Shavit (Israel) --  <1 horse (6 dogs) Energia -- 218 horses Pegasus -- 1 Pegasus Atlas I -- 13 horses PSLV -- 8 horses J-I -- 2 horses Long March 3B -- 27 horses H-IIA -- 22 horses Delta IV-H -- 64 horses Falcon 1 -- 1 horse Ariane 5ES -- 47 horses H-IIB -- 37 horses Unha (North Korea) --  <1 horse (2 dogs) Atlas V 541 -- 38 horses Falcon 9 -- 29 horses Antares -- 14 horses Stratolaunch -- 14 horses Falcon Heavy -- 118 horses SLS Block 1 -- 156 horses SLS Block 1B -- 217 horses SLS Block 2 -- 289 horses
[The timeline:] 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, Future
A larger transcript with image descriptions can be found here: Full transcript


Blind Trials

Explanation:
In research, a blind trial is an experiment where certain information about the test is concealed from the subjects and/or the testers, in order to reduce sources of bias in the results. A double-blind trial is one where neither the subject nor the testers know who has or has not received treatment (or for multiple treatments, which treatment).
A scientific approach also requires the use of control groups to determine the significance of observations in (clinical) trials. The members of the control group receive either no treatment or the "standard" treatment. However, to ensure "blindness" in the study, even if a control group is to receive no treatment, they must be given a placebo : an ineffective treatment given to ensure the doctors and/or patients are unaware whether they are being given the treatment.
For example, in clinical drug trials, when a treatment being tested is administered in the form of a pill, a visually-identical inert pill is given to the control group so no one will know if a subject has been given the treatment or a placebo. In pop culture, placebos in pill-form are often made of sugar, which has negligible medical effects.
Controls and blinding are crucial to distinguish the actual effects of the treatment from the placebo effect , or the psychologically-induced effects of a subject's belief that a treatment will or will not help them, which may have real physiologic effects or influence the reporting of subjective measures such as pain level or the presence of side effects. It is vital that there are no clues available to distinguish between the different groups. Even subtle cues from the body language of the testers are sufficient to trigger placebo effect, making double-blind trials necessary.
Challenges exist in designing placebo alternatives to certain physical treatments that might be tested, such as acupuncture; in this case the best quality trials have typically used either special 'joke' retractable needles that only give the illusion of proper penetration or the practitioner/researcher deliberately and safely avoids the traditional meridians on the body for the treatment concerned so that the patient remains 'blind' to their role in the trial. The practitioner must otherwise be consistent in treatment between groups and not be involved in the medical assessment phase for properly double-blinded conditions, where the most reliable results still seem to only show a significant placebo effect at work.
There are, however, certain cases where it is almost impossible to make the experience of the control group identical to that of the test group. Making a real and fake pill appear the same is a relatively trivial task, and the ignorance of participants to the details of a given established practice or procedure can allow for a certain level of blinding. However, it would be challenging (to say the least) to make the control group in the described experiment think that they are having lots of sex, when in fact they are not. The description of the control group as taking sugar pills is a laughably poor placebo substitute, as the pills themselves may affect cardiovascular health, therefore ruining the concept of a controlled experiment , especially if it is a double-blind trial, and nobody knows who got sugar and who got sex.
Scientific research involving humans is extremely challenging to conduct because of the difficulty in finding appropriate control groups. This is one of the reasons animal experiments (for instance involving inbred strains of mice) are so common.
The title text adds another twist by taking “blind” literally, and noting that for some people, being blindfolded increases their enjoyment of sexual activity, thereby acting as a confounding variable.
Despite this, it should be noted that Cardiovascular health is typically measured in terms of objective data such as cholesterol levels, ejection fraction, and morbidity/mortality data like the frequency of myocardial infractions, strokes, or sudden cardiac death. Even sighted, it would be difficult for either subjects or researchers to manipulate this kind of data.
[Megan is pointing at charts hanging on the wall.] Megan: We've designed a double-blind trial to test the effect of sexual activity on cardiovascular health. Both groups will think they're having lots of sex, but one group will actually be getting sugar pills.
The limitations of blind trials


Altitude

Explanation:
In this comic, Randall is making fun of how oxygen deprivation can lead to reduced mental acuity. Dizziness, lightheadedness, impaired judgment, and euphoria are symptoms of oxygen deprivation, or hypoxia. Those researchers would benefit from having a written list or plan developed while they were still functioning at peak mental acuity.
Note that high altitude does not lead to severe effects as described in the comic.
Here, two astronomers are heading up a mountain, towards the observatory they work at. Initially, they discuss what they are planning on doing once they reach the summit, mentioning Iodine cells , used for wavelength calibrations of high-resolution RV spectra between 501 and 610 nm. As they continue, the mental clarity of the researchers devolves as they approach the high altitude telescope, leading to increasingly juvenile and almost intoxicated behavior. One researcher mentioned her head feels funny, while the other makes a remark about taping down the observatories to prevent them from rolling away, an absurd remark considering observatories are firmly rooted and even if they weren't, tape would not be sufficient to stop them ( [ citation needed ] ;  enough tape can hold anything).
Once inside the observatory, they have completely forgotten about their original plans. Instead of doing a general calibration, they are playing with the telescopes, looking at each other's faces through them and deciding to make out with each other. This is why Randall mentions that astronomers working at high altitude observatories must write down their plans ahead of time at sea level, as the low oxygen leads to reduced mental acuity.
It should be noted that the phrase "low oxygen" refers to the lower partial pressure of oxygen at altitude. The proportion of oxygen at high elevations is still approximately a fifth of the atmosphere, the same as at sea level. The altitude sickness is caused by lowered atmospheric pressure which leads to smaller amount of oxygen actually delivered ("pushed") into bloodstream.
The title text refers to a laser guide star a device for focusing telescopes by making artificial reference points in the sky. The reference points are created by shooting a powerful laser into the sky. The concern of the astronomer in the comic is that an imagined "star cat" may be attracted to the laser in the same way that cats playfully chase laser beams projected on surfaces. Cats' reactions to laser pointers were previously explored in 729: Laser Pointer .
Because of low oxygen, astronomers working at high altitude telescopes may need to write down their plans ahead of time while at sea level.
[Some astronomers are inside a sea-level research facility.] Astronomer #1: Ok, let's head up to the observatory.
[The astronomers drive uphill.] Astronomer #1: When we reach the summit, we'll check the iodine cell and do a general calibration. Astronomer #2: Sounds good.
[The astronomers have reached the high-altitude observatory.] Astronomer #1: My head feels funny. Astronomer #2: Look at those telescope domes. I hope they don't roll away. Astronomer #1: Maybe we should tape them down.
[The astronomers are inside one of the domes.] Astronomer #1: Haha, look at this mirror! My face is huge! Astronomer #2: I see your face in the telescope! I discovered you! Astronomer #1: Let's make out!


Santa

Explanation:
This was the Christmas comic for 2014 and broadly speaking, this comic follows a long list of issues raised about physical limitations Santa Claus faces, similar to other popular theoretical discussions such as the speed he has to travel and the omniscience he purportedly possesses and the mass of presents he has to carry — the story of Santa Claus was simply never designed for a world with over 7 billion people spread through untold millions of homes. This comic combines some basic physiology with the physical law of the conservation of mass .
More specifically, this comic refers to the common tradition of leaving milk and cookies out on Christmas Eve for Santa Claus. If one assumes that Santa eats even a small percentage of the sweets left out for him, the question comes up where all the cookies go . Megan suggests that, since Santa isn't that large, he must poop them out somewhere, and wonders if he does so in our houses.
Cueball doubts that. Megan replies that mass cannot disappear completely; it has to go somewhere, to which Cueball comments that Santa has a magic bag in which he could poop. The magic bag referenced is the bag in which he carries all the Christmas presents he delivers on Christmas Eve. It is called 'magic' because a bag large enough to carry billions of presents would be much too heavy and unbalanced to carry on a sleigh pulled by only eight (or nine) reindeer. Thus, it must be magic somehow. Megan is disgusted at the thought of Santa pooping on peoples' presents. An even more disgusting explanation is that the 'magic' bag might transform the poop into presents, in which case it would not need to carry many presents at a time.
Cueball proposes a third theory: that Santa only poops in a few houses, leaving large quantities in those houses. Megan says that there may not be anyone that naughty in the world, referencing the myth that Santa will leave coal instead of presents for those who misbehave. Cueball replies that it is randomly determined whose house is pooped in, burdening a smaller number of people. Specifically, Cueball quotes the beginning of Spock 's aphorism from Star Trek II , "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one." The quote is used to justify the sacrifice people make in "allowing" Santa to poop in their homes by citing the numerous other people who are spared his feces.
The title text puts forth yet another theory: that Santa doesn't poop in houses at all, but off the side of his sleigh. This may be equally disgusting to anyone or anything unlucky enough to abruptly receive a rain of poop from the sky. This problem could be minimized by taking advantage of flights over water or uninhabited areas, rather than cities.
According to 1070: Words for Small Sets , a few is referring to "anywhere from 2 to 5". Currently, there are 1.9 billion children in the world, so assuming on average that one cookie is left for Santa for each child and that Santa eats one in every 5 cookies, he consumes 380 million cookies in two 48 hour periods. Due to the convenience of time zones, approximately 48 hours from when a day starts in Kiritimati until it ends in Hawaii; also, most western Christians, including Roman Catholics and Protestants, observe Christmas almost two weeks before Eastern Orthodox Christians do. According to Google, a chocolate-chip cookie contains approximately 140 kilocalories, therefore Santa consumes 53.2 billion kilocalories in the period of 2 days, or 26.6 billion kilocalories per day. As the average human daily intake is 2500 kilocalories per day, Santa has eaten 10,640,000 times the amount of daily kilocalories required by one human over the period of two days, an amount otherwise sufficient to last for over 59,111 years for a human, and producing 20 million pounds of feces. However, if we consider the dietary requirements of both Santa and the flying reindeer, and the kilocalories that reindeer would burn flying around the world carrying 1.9 billion toys, the cookies might not be sufficient. If the 1 in 5 cookies are not sufficient energy intake, Santa could probably eat every cookie left for him, which amounts to 266 billion kilocalories in the period of 2 days.
On a side note, this amount of energy is enough to power several thousand homes for a year.
Megan: Say Santa eats a cookie at every few houses. That's hundreds of tons. By the end of the night, he should be a hulking seven-story behemoth. But he's not.
Cueball: What are you... Megan: Does Santa poop in our houses?
Cueball: No way. Megan: That mass must be going somewhere. Cueball: He has that magic bag... Megan: You think he poops in the bag of presents ?
Cueball: Maybe instead of pooping in every few houses, he waits, and then in a few houses, he poops a lot . Megan: What if no one's been that naughty? Cueball: He picks at random. The needs of the many...


xkcd Phone 2

Explanation:
This is a followup to 1363: xkcd Phone , which debuted the original xkcd phone almost nine months prior to this one. This thus became the second entry in what turned out to become an ongoing xkcd Phone series which parodies common smartphone specs by attributing absurd or useless features to a fictional phone that sounds impressive but would actually be very impractical. The next in the series 1549: xkcd Phone 3 was released just over half a year later.
Like the previous xkcd phone, the advertisement features a useless tagline (very few people can use two phones at the same time) and touts a variety of features which are either pointless, misleading, or physically impossible. Clockwise, from the top left, they are:
Note: A high pixel density display is more than 200 pixels per inch , not per screen . An example would be the Retina Display in Apple hardware which varies from 218 pixels per inch to 401 pixels per inch depending on the device.
Like the previous xkcd phone comic, the title text continues the list of features:
[An image of a smartphone lying down with many labels pointing to different parts of it. Above the screen are several small features, below only a central oval button and on the bottom a central socket and a square feature to the right. Clockwise from the top left the labels read:] MaxHD: Over 350 pixels per screen Always-on speaker Blood pressure reliever Auto-rotating case Ribbed Waterproof (interior only) Googleable Cheek toucher Cries if lost Bug drawer Coin slot Scroll lock OS by Stackoverflow® 3D materials Dog noticer FitBit® fitness evaluator Volume and density control
[Below the phone:] Introducing The xkcd phone 2 A phone for your other hand®


Phone Checking

Explanation:
Cueball asks Megan what's up, and Megan announces that there's a Compulsive Phone Checking Championship, presumably an award for the person who checks their phone the most often. Megan checks her phone to see if the winner has been announced, but finds the site's server is overloaded , which would be exactly what would happen if many people were checking their phones simultaneously. Given the nature of the contest, we can presume this is indeed the case. As a solution, Megan tries refreshing repeatedly, sending more load to the server and, thus, making it unavailable longer.
This compulsive behavior predates the popularity of mobile phones as shown in 477: Typewriter and 862: Let Go .
Another possible analysis is that the site was purposely down, and instead was the contest itself, to see how many times different users would refresh the page within a time period, or perhaps to the last one standing, determining the winner.
The title text implies that Megan checks her phone so compulsively she even does it in her sleep. This probably contributed to her victory. A "webite" is probably either a typo of "website" or a pinned tab in a web browser.
[Cueball approaching Megan.] Cueball: What's up? Megan: They're announcing the winner of the compulsive phone-checking championship.
[Megan checks her phone.]
[Megan puts her phone away.]
[Megan checks her phone again.] Cueball: Did you win? Megan: Site's down. Cueball: Weird. Megan: I'll keep refreshing.


Email

Explanation:
A New Year comic , where Megan asks Beret Guy if he has any New Year's resolutions , and even though this is just before new year 2015, his resolution is to find out what an email is!
Despite being in popular use since 1998 when free email providers appeared and having existed since before 1982 when SMTP was established, Beret Guy apparently doesn't understand what email is, even though he maintains a web page that includes his email address. Megan wonders how else he expects electronic messages to be sent. She explains that one must check email regularly, making a slight at voicemail , which she implies is not worth ever checking.
Beret Guy offers two alternatives: Fax and Snapchat . Megan refers to Snapchat as "the naked pic thing", calling to mind how many of its users send naked pictures of themselves over the Internet. Beret Guy replies that people use fax machines for more than just "faxting" (a made-up term similar to sexting ), implying that many people send sexual content via fax, a technology that predates SMTP by more than a century. Beret Guy knows what a fax is, which implies he is very behind in the technology world, so it makes sense he doesn't know what email is. But he also knows what Snapchat is, which was very popular around the time of this comic. Either Beret Guy heard about it in a similar way to email, or he definitely knows what it is and/or uses it. What's strange is that if Beret Guy knows what Snapchat is, he should know what email is as well, since you need to provide an email account in order to create a snapchat account.
The title text, which could be Randall 's New Year's resolution for 2015, refers to various date/time formats. In programming, a point in time (e.g. the current system time) is usually stored and processed as a single number that represents the count of seconds that have elapsed since a given starting time known as "epoch" (the Unix standard epoch is January 1, 1970 at midnight, UTC ). In order to make sense to people, this number must be converted to a human-readable format, but programmers must choose a format that best meets the needs of their users. This can be a complicated problem to solve, given that there are many different standard formats for different regions, different levels of precision for different applications, and differences between "universal time" and a user's local time zone. Randall has previously advocated for widespread adoption of the ISO 8601 format as a universal standard.
The title text also probably references a twitter outage that took place on December 29, which was blamed on an error in a date format string .
Most programming languages provide functions to create a custom date-format string using "tokens" that represent different parts of the date/time. Here, Randall appears to have used one of these functions with the string "%Y-%M-%D %h:%m:%s", which looks like it should produce a date and time as "Year-Month-Day Hour:Minute:Second". However, he used the wrong tokens for this:
The "%s" token shows us the actual Unix timestamp used (1420001642), which corresponds to 2014-12-31 at 04:54:02 UTC. The format string shown above thus yields "2014-54-12/30/14 Dec:12:1420001642". Note that the middle portion of this string shows "12/30" instead of "12/31" - this is due to the %D token expressing the date in Randall's local time zone (Eastern Standard Time, or EST), which is 5 hours before UTC. The time there was 23:54:02, or just before midnight, on the previous day.
The correct format string for Randall's apparent desired result is "%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S", which gives the string "2014-12-31 04:54:02" (UTC) or "2014-12-30 23:54:02" (EST). Given the similarity between Randall's string and the correct one, it is easy to see how this type of formatting is confusing and often frustrating for programmers - particularly those not intimately familiar with these functions.
Randall previously addressed date/time formatting in 1179: ISO 8601 and 1340: Unique Date (the latter of which uses a formatting string correctly).
This was the second comic in a row with Megan holding a smart phone, the first being 1466: Phone Checking . The comic before that one was also about smart phones: 1465: xkcd Phone 2 .
[Megan approaches Beret Guy.] Megan: Any New Year's resolutions? Beret Guy: Gonna figure out what email is. Megan: ...Email?
[Megan points to her phone.] Beret Guy: People always say they're sending them. They sound really into it, so I always nod, but I have no idea what it is. Megan: You have an address on your website!
[Megan and Beret Guy walking.] Beret Guy: Oh, that's what that thing is. Megan: Email is important! You can't just never check it. It's not like voicemail.
Beret Guy: Can't they just send messages normally? Megan: How? Beret Guy: Fax! Or Snapchat. Megan: ...The naked pic thing? Beret Guy: Fax machines aren't just for faxting!
The Unix timestamp is a standard method of keeping time by counting the absolute number of seconds that have elapsed since a set point in time known as "epoch", defined as midnight on January 1, 1970, Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). Epoch, in ISO-8601 format, is "1970-01-01T00:00:00Z", where Z indicates UTC.
The timestamp in this comic's title text (1420001642) is 1,420,001,642 seconds since epoch. The process of converting that number into a human-readable time is as follows:
Thus, Randall's timestamp represents the time " 2014-12-31 T 04:54:02 Z" (again in ISO-8601 format).


Worrying

Explanation:
This chart is a visual representation of how worried people should be by various events in real life compared to the same events in movies, based on the likelihood of the event causing serious harm. In effect, it's poking fun at various cliches and the emphasis on dramatic flair, regardless of realism. The chart's Y-axis indicates how worrying an event is in real life (from "not very worried" to "very worried"), while its X-axis shows how worrying the event is in movies. Nine events are shown in the chart, all of them cliches in the medium of film:
The title text expands on the aforementioned breaking news reports. While already overly worrying whenever they occur in movies compared to real life, should the movie's news report cover an event at a hospital (usually an outbreak of some major disease) or a laboratory (a monster escaping, a toxic gas released, an explosion, etc.), these events are universally much more worrisome than any other type of news story since they are guaranteed to be important for the protagonists in short order. In real life, breaking news from such locations may be more likely to be serious, but are still very unlikely to impact the viewer directly.
The comic shows an X-Y plot of events, showing how worried you should be in real life on the vertical axis and in movies on the horizontal axis. The axis goes from "not very worried" to "very worried".
Below is a table listing the coordinates for each event according to how worrying it is. The coordinates have been found by measuring each dot to the two axises and then assuming that the extremes are at 100%.
How worried should you be when various things happen to you: [A chart with a scatter plot on which 9 dots are labeled. Each axis has a title and a scale. Reading from the top to the bottom and then left to right along the axis are:] Very worried ...In Real Life Not very worried
Not very worried ...In Movies Very worried
[The labels in the chart from the top:] [This first entry is standing in the middle of a square bracket that points to the two next entires both of which are at the same level:] Chest wound ...on your right side ...on your left side Getting knocked out by a punch "We need to talk." Persistent cough Parking ticket Breaking news Spilling a drink on your shirt Nosebleed


UV

Explanation:
Ultraviolet light (abbreviated UV light, as in the title of the comic) is a kind of light that is slightly more energetic than the light in the visible portion of the electromagnetic spectrum. Ultraviolet light is normally by itself invisible to human eye, but can induce fluorescence (glowing) of certain organic molecules. A UV flashlight can thus be a means to detect small amounts of blood, semen, and urine on surfaces.
The first part of this comic focuses on Megan showing off her new UV flashlight to Cueball by revealing how disgusting their bathroom appears in UV light despite how clean it appears normally. She manages this due to UV light's special property of causing chemicals in urine to glow. Both Cueball and Megan are horrified by their discovery. This is a common reaction in the face of more sensitive diagnostic tests. Cueball's comment is a reference to the 1979 sci-fi film Alien .
In the second part of the comic they realize that their house will never be clean enough. So Megan resolves to burn down the house for the insurance money (i.e. insurance fraud ). Cueball is in doubt, but Megan apparently has no morality left. She even proclaims this while pouring some dangerous liquid, probably gasoline, on to the floor of their apartment.
The last panel of the comic implies that the two hadn't purchased fire insurance beforehand, and plan on purchasing it now, only to make a claim immediately afterwards. At this point Cueball has been won over by Megan's plan and tries to help by searching for insurance companies using Google. They wish to find the company that pays out the most. This plan will almost certainly not work since insurance typically only covers events that begin after purchasing the insurance, and does not cover anything that happens before purchasing the insurance, or that is intentionally caused.
The title text shows just how distorted Megan's and Cueball's thinking has become, as one of them suggests burning down all the houses in order to claim the insurance money for them. This plan will also not work. Even if insurance has been purchased for these other homes, the insurance companies will pay the owners of those homes, not Cueball and Megan. Instead, Cueball and Megan would likely be arrested for multiple charges of arson and end up in prison for a very long time.
The take home message of this comic must be: Never use a UV light in your bathroom. Maybe Randall did this by mistake causing the creation of this comic.  (Randall has previously warned people about similar diagnostics in 860: Never Do This .)
[Megan holding a flashlight and standing behind Cueball, who is sitting at a computer.] Megan: Our bathroom looks pretty clean, right? Cueball: I think so. Why? Megan: I got a UV flashlight. Come look.
[Cueball leaves the computer; they walk.]
[Megan and Cueball are off-screen.] Cueball: Looks fine. UV flashlight: *Click* *Click* Cueball: ...Oh my God.
[Megan and Cueball walking in the opposite direction; Cueball is looking back behind him.] Cueball: The toilet looked like the guy's chest after the alien burst out. Megan: What do we do?
[Megan and Cueball standing.] Cueball: We clean. Clean and clean and never stop. Megan: It won't be enough. We should just burn the place down for the insurance money.
[Cueball standing behind Megan. Megan is pouring a liquid onto the floor out of a red-colored canister labled "Danger".] Cueball: Isn't that wrong? Megan: My morality has evaporated under the harsh UV light.
[Megan and Cueball standing outside the burning building.]
[Megan and Cueball standing, Cueball looking at his phone.] Cueball: OK, I'm Googling insurance companies. Which one do you think pays the most? Megan: Let's just try calling around.


Kix

Explanation:
This comic may be a commentary about the uselessness of brainstorming sessions or the bad ideas that come out of them, as they are often started with the phrase “there are no bad ideas”. As the brainstorming session continues the original meaning of the slogan is lost, much like a game of telephone, and the session becomes less productive.
Kix is an American brand of cold breakfast cereal made of extruded and expanded cornmeal. Its slogan, "Kid tested, Mother approved," is well known in the United States, and is meant to suggest that children generally enjoy the cereal and their mothers, who are naturally concerned about the health of their children, approve of its ingredients. However, in this brainstorming session, the word "Approved" has apparently not yet been considered. A number of possible words and phrases for the ending have been presented and stricken out , indicating that they were rejected; each one causes the slogan to be subject to increasingly absurd and comedic interpretations:
The title text conflates the phrase "Kid tested" with college entrance exams such as the Standardized Aptitude Test (SAT) or the ACT . Instead of stating that a child tasted the cereal and gave their opinion on its quality, the cereal itself is an academic subject on which the child was tested. Randall, referring to how some parents enroll their children in special classes or schools to prepare them to score well in this type of test, states that his parents extensively prepared him for a college entrance exam about Kix cereal.
Cereal advertising has previously been referenced in 38: Apple Jacks .
[Ponytail, Megan, and Cueball are standing around a whiteboard on an easel; Ponytail and Cueball are holding red markers. The whiteboard reads:] [in Large] Kix [Underlined] Slogan ideas Kid Tested, Mother...
[following lines all in red and each crossed out]
Selected Perfected Not notified Watching helplessly Infected Consumed Fucker


Gut Fauna

Explanation:
The microbiome is the collection of bacteria that reside in the human digestive tract. The bacteria perform several vital digestive and immune-support functions. Different compositions of bacteria, collectively referred to as gut flora , can be linked to risk of some diseases, while other compositions are linked to a decreased risk of some diseases and are therefore called "good bacteria". The title "Gut fauna" is a play on words. Fauna means animal life in Latin, and flora means vegetable life. However, in this context flora means bacterial life because, when microscopes were invented, microbial life was considered to be non-animal and therefore classified as "flora". For a good description of the microbiome see The Invisible Universe Of The Human Microbiome .
In this comic, Cueball is visiting a doctor ( Ponytail ) for some unknown problem. The doctor informs him that his gut macrobiome is out of balance, which Cueball responds to with confusion over whether or not she meant the microbiome or macrobiome. A macrobiome, instead of being composed of small organisms such as bacteria, would be composed of larger organisms such as mammals. The phrase "gut fauna" would refer to any animals living inside a gut (as the word fauna refers to animals living in an ecosystem).
Cueball is right to be worried by the doctor's reference to his macrobiome, as normal humans shouldn't have large animals living inside them [ citation needed ] with the exception of some parasites such as Helminths or Cestoda , or in some cases, the consumption of live animals such as octopus, shrimp and eels. No animals belong natively in the human digestive system ; all known cases of animals living permanently in the human digestive system are causes of disease. His fear is compounded when the doctor prescribes one wolf for Cueball to swallow, which is normally impossible for average humans and would, at the very least, result in major interior (or exterior) damage to Cueball and (possibly) Ponytail when the wolf resists being swallowed. Needless to say this is not common physician practice due to the likely death rate. [ citation needed ]
The choice of a wolf echoes the reintroduction of the animals into the macrobiome of Yellowstone National Park in the United States, where they have improved the balance by, in part, preying on elk and reducing the damage caused by their grazing.
The dialog between the characters ends with the doctor asking the patient whether he needs a glass of water, a typical question asked by health professionals (water can help patients swallow oral medication). This last phrase further extends the humorous nature of the proposition to swallow the wolf by displaying a confidence of the doctor in her choice of the treatment modality. In reality, of course, drinking a glass of water while attempting to swallow a wolf would make the latter procedure neither easier, nor more feasible.
The title text suggests that swallowing the wolf is not the worst situation that could have occurred, as the doctor refers to "another way" that the wolf could be administered. One typical way that microbiomes are restored is through fecal bacteriotherapy , most easily described as a "poop transfer". It could also mean transferred via suppository. In either case, the worse "other way" that the doctor is referring to is thus likely the rectal route, which (for Randall ) is less preferable than attempting to swallow a live wolf. However, either way would prove physically impossible and/or lethal.
If we are to take the doctor at her word that there is indeed some sort of macrobiome inside Cueball's gut, then perhaps she has some kind of matter compression ability that would make introducing a live wolf a legitimate therapeutic option.
Randall has referenced wolf reintroduction programs before, in comic 819: Five-Minute Comics: Part 1 .
[Cueball on an examining table; Ponytail wearing a doctor's coat holding some test results.] Doctor: I see the problem. Your gut macrobiome is out of balance. One moment.
[Ponytail leaves.] Cueball: I think you mean micro biome... Right?
[Ponytail returns, slightly disheveled, carrying a momentarily docile live wolf.] Doctor: No. Here, swallow this. Cueball: That's a wolf. Doctor: Do you need a glass of water?


Geography

Explanation:
The comic is a map showing examples of geographical features as they would be presented in a geography textbook. May be based on the first page of the book You Choose which displays a map of locations similar in style to the one used in the comic and asks the reader "If you could go anywhere, where would you go?".
Randall notes that he would like to live in the middle of this region. These maps include an unusual density of different land forms, leading to an interesting environment in which to live. In the real world, these geographical features might take up far more space, and the geologic forces that shape them might create far different patterns than those shown. This kind of Neverland of geographical feature would offer a range of outdoor activities and landscapes that would make it a very nice place to live, as long as the volcano does not erupt.
Some of the geographic features do have a (very) loose similarity to the area around Boston , where Randall lives. Also near Boston is one geographical feature that Randall has included in this map but has refrained from labeling, the isthmus between the peninsula and the forest.
On the other hand, the map actually looks quite a bit like the area around southwestern Washington and northwestern Oregon , with the reader facing south so the high desert is on the upper left. The volcano could be Rainier or St. Helens . Real-world outdoor enthusiasts do indeed appreciate the Neverlandish landscape. Having little Spanish influence, locals would refer to a "mesa" as a butte .
The title text discusses a different type of diagram usually found in geography textbooks, the one showing the mechanism of tornado formation . Randall notes that he would least like to live in the farm typically depicted in the background of such diagrams. This is likely because the farm is depicted as being on a vast, featureless stretch of flat prairie, the opposite of the rich landscape in the comic. The monotonous landscape would reflect that of Tornado Alley , an area of the central United States where a large number of tornadoes form, and which makes up a large portion of the Great Plains . His dislike for this type of area may also simply be due to the damage created when a tornado hits. That said, chances of a direct tornado hit on any given house are slim compared to simply the risk of property damage. Living near an active volcano may be much more dangerous than living in Tornado Alley. Tornadoes are a recurring subject on xkcd.
Here is an alphabetical list of the different land forms with wiki links: Bay , Desert , Forest , Glacier , Hills , Island , Lagoon , Lake , Mesa , Mountains , Peninsula , Plain , Delta , River , Sea , Strait and Volcano .
[A colorful map shows various possible land forms which are labeled (and the last one with a spelling mistake included here). In general reading order the labels are:] Desert Mountains Sea Glacier Plain Island Volcano Lake River Delta Strait Hills Lagoon Bay Mesa Forest Penninsula
[In the middle of these land forms, under the river and between the lake and the lagoon there is a black dot on the green bank of the lagoon with an arrow pointing it out. The arrow starts above the lake to the left of the glacier and is labeled:] My house
[Below the panel there is a caption:] If I could live anywhere, I would choose the example map from geography books that explains what everything is called.


Location Sharing

Explanation:
In this comic, Megan is visiting a website on her mobile phone. After loading it, the website asks for her location . The choice between allowing or denying a website or app access to certain information is common among smartphones. The term "location sharing" specifically refers to when a smartphone user shares their location with such an entity. An example is a weather app which would need your location in order to automatically find the correct forecast.
Megan is then asked her momentum , which she denies. The joke is based on the Heisenberg uncertainty principle , which, in quantum mechanics, states that some pairs of values cannot be known precisely and simultaneously. The most famous examples of such values, especially in jokes, are location and momentum.
The ramifications of the uncertainty principle being violated in this context are unknown, but the comic might be alluding to security problems that appear if an untrusted application is given access to momentum data generated by the gyroscope. Access to gyroscope data can be used for reading passwords entered into the on-screen keyboard or even guessing keyboard strokes on a keyboard lying on the same table as the phone.
It could also be an attempt to get Megan to unknowingly reveal her weight (mass to be more exact), as the mass can be inferred by dividing the momentum by velocity (the velocity in turn can be obtained by observing the change of the location over time). In order to be feasible, the location must be polled at least twice, as at least two location points are necessary to compute the velocity. It is a stereotype in many Western cultures that women tend to keep their weight secret. The stereotype implies that women tend to obsess about controlling (and not revealing) their weight in order to conform to societal and sexual pressure.
On the other hand, it could just be a joke about the fact that Heisenberg's uncertainty principle is typically observed only at sub-atomic scales, and not at macroscopic scales (it is possible to measure both the position and momentum of a large object). By saying "Nice try", it's clear that Megan knows about the principle, but funny that she would think it applies to herself at macroscopic scale.
The title text refers to the inclusion of gyroscopes in modern cell phones that measure angular momentum, mostly to detect when the phone is tilted, but also used in a few mobile games. Randall suggests the poor accuracy of the compasses in mobile phones (measuring the angular position) is due to the gyroscopes being too good. If both the gyroscope and the compasses were completely accurate to a subatomic scale, it would violate the uncertainty principle. Modern phones also include varied technologies (such as GPS) to pinpoint the user's location, with varying degrees of accuracy.
The uncertainty principle has previously been referenced in 824: Guest Week: Bill Amend (FoxTrot) . It has also been discussed in relation to the two comics 1404: Quantum Vacuum Virtual Plasma and 1416: Pixels .
[Megan is holding her phone. Above her is the text she can see on the screen:] This website wants to know your location. [Two buttons are below this text. The first is white with a black frame and black text. The second (the chosen button) also has a black frame, but inside the frame is a black rectangle with white text. Around the chosen button are small lines indication rays.] Deny Allow
[Megan is holding her phone.]
[Megan is holding her phone. Above her is again the text she can see on the screen.] This website wants to know your momentum. [Two buttons are below this text. The first (the chosen button) has a black frame, but inside the frame is a black rectangle with white text. The second is white with a black frame and black text. Around the chosen button are small lines indication rays.] Deny Allow
Megan: Nice try.


Screws

Explanation:
This comic uses a similar structure and is based off of the same idea as 1714: Volcano Types and 1874: Geologic Faults . Appliance makers sometimes use strange screw heads to hinder attempts from users to remove appliance covers. Users usually have handy screwdrivers for the first two screw types drawn, Phillips and Flat. More advanced users usually have some less standard drivers, such as Torx or Allen , however appliance makers keep designing increasingly strange screw heads and users keep acquiring increasingly strange screwdrivers.
The comic is about the frustration a user may feel when faced with a screw for which they have no screwdriver. Usually the user will try to fit one of the drivers they have handy into the strange screw, leading to damaging the screw and/or the driver and/or the person wielding the tool.
The types of screws listed are the following:
[Eight drawings of different types of heads each with a caption:] [Plus sign-shaped screw.] Phillips head [Minus sign-shaped screw.] Flat head [Star-shaped screw.] Uh oh. Maybe it's on Amazon? [Plus sign-shaped screw with worn edges.] Cursed -1 Phillips head [No screw, just a circle.] Crap, it's a rivet . [Hexagon-shaped screw.] Phillips-head ruiner [Minus sign-shaped screw going through the whole circle. Also giving off radiation.] Uranium screw (a real thing) [A sack with blood oozing out of it.] Phillip's head


Technically

Explanation:
When the word "technically" is used to start a sentence, the remainder of the sentence tends to follow one of a number of patterns:
Cueball , possibly representing Randall , has decided that any sentence beginning with the word "technically" is highly likely to be completely worthless for him to listen to; so whenever he hears it at the beginning of a sentence, he allows himself to be distracted by anything which happens to be around.
There are many cases where an item is classified in what appears to be an illogical way. Some fairly well known examples are 'Tomatoes are a fruit', 'Strawberries are not berries', 'Peanuts are not nuts' and so on. The reasoning behind these seemingly unusual classifications is typically down to the technical definition of the class, which may differ from the intuitive understanding that the general public have learned. It is not unusual for people to try and appear knowledgeable by demonstrating that they are aware of correct technical classifications.
White Hat starts to pedantically answer the typically incredulous rhetorical question “Are you on drugs?!” by explaining that according to the technical definition, food is classed as a drug. This classification is false due to his incorrect interpretation of the word "drug" and lack of understanding of the role of food in human physiology, and would fall under the fourth example in the chart above. Indeed, "drug" is defined as "a substance used to treat an illness, relieve a symptom, or modify a chemical process in the body for a specific purpose", followed by a secondary definition of "a psychoactive substance, especially one which is illegal and addictive". Food, on the other hand, is defined as "any substance that can be consumed by living organisms, especially by eating, in order to sustain life". In other words, food is consumed in order to sustain the normal, innate state of the body, while drugs are consumed in order to alter certain states. The Wikipedia article for drug goes so far as to explicitly disqualify food from the definition of “drug.”
Regardless of whether or not the classification was valid, Cueball has already allowed himself to be distracted by a passing bug.
The title text starts to pedantically over-apply Cueball's rule to the comic panel, noting that technically White Hat's sentence started with the word 'well' instead of the word 'technically', and thus Cueball is wrong to have ignored it. This would fall under the second or third example in the chart. Halfway through the sentence, this argument is cut off by the discovery of a rock with a fossil in it, correctly applying the rule to a sentence that began with the word "technically".
This comic is similar to 1240: Quantum Mechanics , in that they both suggest ignoring sentences containing a certain word or phrase indicating a pedantic attitude.
[White Hat talks to Cueball who looks at a flying insect.] White Hat: Well, technically, food is a "drug", since it's a substance that alters how your body works, so yes, I'm— Cueball: Hey, look at that weird bug!
[Caption below the panel:] My life improved when I realized I could just ignore any sentence that started with "technically."