General Knowledge Quiz

[cjp]

Short sight, I am thinking. No, hang on - that's myopia. How about long sight?

Close but not quite...

 

[Marton]

Age related sight changes so one needs reading glasses.

Presby as in elder as in Presbyterian

Opia as in sight.

Open floor If correct.

 

[cjp]

Quite right. It indeed age related deterioration in vision. If you have not yet got it you will

So open floor then.

 

[Calthrop]

Which kind of creatures -- in fairly broad terms -- belong in the following zoological divisions (which are not all in the same category of such divisions)?

lagomorphs

monotremes

alcids

 

[Marton]

lagomorphs Hares

monotremes Hedgehogs

alcid Auks

 

[cjp]

lagomorphs Hares

monotremes Hedgehogs

alcid Auks

Sounds better than my guess which would have been slugs n snails!

 

[Calthrop]

lagomorphs Hares

monotremes Hedgehogs

alcid Auks

A tick apiece for two of the above (lagomorphs, actually, comprise as well as hares: rabbits, and the North American animal the pika). Monotremes, though -- there is a distant, tenuous sort-of connection with hedgehogs; but "hedgehogs" isn't the right answer -- correct answer, still sought.

Sounds better than my guess which would have been slugs n snails!

And how about those puppy-dogs' tails, then?

 

[DerekC]

I have a feeling that the spiny anteater is a monotreme.

 

[Calthrop]

I have a feeling that the spiny anteater is a monotreme.

Indeed it is. Monotremes -- the order of egg-laying mammals -- comprise four species of spiny anteater aka echidna (Australasia's version of hedgehogs / porcupines); and the duck-billed platypus.

@Marton -- with "passes" for you on two out of three, I see it as appropriate for the floor to be yours.

 

[martinsh]

Remember Mumford's Monotreme !
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id...EIKDAA#v=onepage&q=mumfords monotreme&f=false

 

[Marton]

@Marton -- with "passes" for you on two out of three, I see it as appropriate for the floor to be yours.

Thank you.
Continuing the biological theme.

To what is Vespa velutina a particular threat?

 

[Calthrop]

Remember Mumford's Monotreme !
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=wJZDoE5Hz0MC&pg=PA5&dq=mumfords+monotreme&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjo_9m91aXhAhVRSxUIHZziDOIQ6AEIKDAA#v=onepage&q=mumfords monotreme&f=false

Thanks for that gem -- had never previously heard of R.A. Lafferty. Worth investigating...

Thank you.
Continuing the biological theme.

To what is Vespa velutina a particular threat?

Without Googling -- no idea, I fear.

 

[Strat-tastic]

Wasps.

 

[Marton]

Fortunately not wasps as they are a vital part of the natural system as carnivores which eat aphids.

Although v velutina wouldn’t object to a few on the side it isn’t it’s main prey which is a popular species with the public.

 

[Strat-tastic]

Bees then.

 

[Marton]

Bees then.

Correct. Specifically honeybees.

This Hornet is smaller than the European one and hawks honeybees.

They want the bees wing muscles to feed their larvae.

It arrived in France in 2004 and has spread throughout the country and is now in Italy SpIn and the Low Countries.

Found in southern England in the last couple of years it doesn’t seem to have overwintered here. Yet.

See https://www.bbka.org.uk/pages/faqs/category/asian-hornet-faqs

https://www.bbka.org.uk/Handlers/Download.ashx?IDMF=ee9d78fc-8672-4b86-808c-30795be72953


Your floor

 

[Strat-tastic]

Thank you.

D, H, and T symbolise what?

 

[Marton]

Thank you.

D, H, and T symbolise what?

The isotopes of hydrogen

 

[Strat-tastic]

The isotopes of hydrogen

Being...?

 

[Spoorslag '70]

Being...?

Deuterium, Protium and Tritium.

 

[Strat-tastic]

Deuterium, Protium and Tritium.

2 out of 3, so I declare the floor yours.

H is of course hydrogen.

Over to you.

 

[Spoorslag '70]

Then they are not all isotopes of hydrogen - H is of course the symbol for hydrogen and Protium being the "standard" hydrogen atom with just one proton in it's core.

Nevertheless a question about German history - concerning roads. The NS regime is often cited to have brought the first motorway to Germany. However, a motorway did already exist in Germany.
I am looking for at least the (modern) day number and the two major cities it links. Virtual bonus points for any further comments, especialy on how the NS regime still had the valid claim of building the first motorway

 

[DerekC]

I did read that there was a kind of autobahn prototype near Berlin, built in 1913. However as I understand it the first proper autobahn (now No 555) was between Cologne and Bonn and was opened (by Konrad Adenauer) in 1932, prior to the Nazi takeover in 1933. Not sure about the claim for building the first motorway, though.

 

[Spoorslag '70]

I did read that there was a kind of autobahn prototype near Berlin, built in 1913. However as I understand it the first proper autobahn (now No 555) was between Cologne and Bonn and was opened (by Konrad Adenauer) in 1932, prior to the Nazi takeover in 1933. Not sure about the claim for building the first motorway, though.

You are very right indeed. The Nazis simply demoted it into a "Landstraße" (comparable to British B roads).
The Berlin road might be the "AVUS" which was a race track till 1940.

Your floor.

 

[DerekC]

OK. A three-part question for which all the parts are needed. First, where might you see every day "standing on the shoulders of
giants" written? Second, who said it and why? Third, why might the statement not have been as generous as it sounds?

 

[Marton]

£2 coin

Isaac Newton

The carried see further when on the shoulders

 

[DerekC]

First two right, but try again for the third. Who was Newton talking about?

 

[Marton]

The dwarf on the giants shoulders

Open floor if I’m correct.

 

[DerekC]

Hmm - not really, although you are on the right lines so I'll give you it. Newton's work on gravitation and the inverse square law of planetary motion was based to a considerable degree on work by Robert Hooke (1635 - 1703) which Newton (in Hooke's view) failed to acknowledge properly. There was a major dispute between the two of them. The point is that Hooke was very small - so Newton was probably being sarcastic.

Open floor it is.

 

[d9009alycidon]

Try this one...

Many of you will have watched the Lord of the Rings and will be familiar with the Ents - trees that could walk. Totally fiction? Actually not, as there is a tree that can physically move position on the ground (only about 15cm per year though) - name the type of tree!