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The All New All New Groundspeak UK Pub Quiz


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Posted
I think that's the one with one enormously long finger for picking its nose out grubs

DING!

 

It also uses that finger for finding its prey. It taps the trunks of trees with that finger and listens with its very large and sensitive ears for the right type of noise, then it chews away the bark and wood over the grub's home, and finally picks out the grub with that finger.

 

Over to MartyBartfast.

Posted

Leaving natural history behind and enterring another realm altogether:

 

What was the name of the individual who was tasked to push a boulder up a hill, but it would roll down before reaching the top, thus he was condemed for ever to push the boulder up the hill.

 

Ding for the name, and a Dong for the correct speeeling !!!!

Posted

Leaving natural history behind and enterring another realm altogether:

 

What was the name of the individual who was tasked to push a boulder up a hill, but it would roll down before reaching the top, thus he was condemed for ever to push the boulder up the hill.

 

Ding for the name, and a Dong for the correct speeeling !!!!

 

Sisyphus!

Posted

Leaving natural history behind and enterring another realm altogether:

 

What was the name of the individual who was tasked to push a boulder up a hill, but it would roll down before reaching the top, thus he was condemed for ever to push the boulder up the hill.

 

Ding for the name, and a Dong for the correct speeeling !!!!

 

Sisyphus!

 

 

DING DONG

Posted

A five tonne, 20-year-old satellite has fallen out of orbit and is expected to crash somewhere on Earth on or around 24 September, according to Nasa.

 

But.....what's the height of the lowest sustainable Earth orbit - and what velocity would a satellite need to stay there?

Posted

I don't think this is a pub question as it'd take more than a minute or so to calculate. Nonetheless (and making lots of simplifications):

 

Limit of Earth's atmosphere is normally reckoned to be circa 200 km, which is the minimum altitude a spacecraft would need to be to avoid speed loss due to friction with the atmosphere. The diameter of Earth about is about 12,750 km. So a satellite in circular orbit would need to travel at a speed at which the centripetal force of gravity is equal to the centrifugal force due to angular acceleration. That is:

 

mg = mrw
2
;or

g = rw
2

Therefore w = sqrt(g/r)

Now the radius is 6375+200 km = 6575000 m, so w (the angular velocity) = sqrt(9.81 ms-2 / 6575000 m) ~ 0.00122 radians per second.

 

Thus the speed is rw = 6575000 x 0.00122 = 8,030 ms-1

 

Summarising: Minimum orbital height is approximately 200 km, with orbital speed approximately 8,030 ms-1 which is equivalent to a velocity of approximately 0.00122 radians per second!

 

(Phew!)

Posted

I don't think this is a pub question as it'd take more than a minute or so to calculate. Nonetheless (and making lots of simplifications):

 

Limit of Earth's atmosphere is normally reckoned to be circa 200 km, which is the minimum altitude a spacecraft would need to be to avoid speed loss due to friction with the atmosphere. The diameter of Earth about is about 12,750 km. So a satellite in circular orbit would need to travel at a speed at which the centripetal force of gravity is equal to the centrifugal force due to angular acceleration. That is:

 

mg = mrw
2
;or

g = rw
2

Therefore w = sqrt(g/r)

Now the radius is 6375+200 km = 6575000 m, so w (the angular velocity) = sqrt(9.81 ms-2 / 6575000 m) ~ 0.00122 radians per second.

 

Thus the speed is rw = 6575000 x 0.00122 = 8,030 ms-1

 

Summarising: Minimum orbital height is approximately 200 km, with orbital speed approximately 8,030 ms-1 which is equivalent to a velocity of approximately 0.00122 radians per second!

 

(Phew!)

 

Not the answer I've got, unfortunately. But impressive workings out nonetheless..... :)

Posted (edited)

Trick question as it depends entirely on the drag co-efficient of the body and its mass. Even 150 miles up there's enough drag to bring big things down 'eventually'. The usual figure given is 100 miles/160km or 200km but 200 miles/320Km is probably more realistic, unless the object was able to 'power' itself against drag long-term, perhaps by sunlight-driven ion propulsion.

 

As for speed, it's about 7km per second or 4.5 miles per second, relative to the Earth's surface. That gets more complicated if the object is in a polar orbit, but you wanted a general figure so... :)

 

Edit - I didn't see this had moved onto another page. Lucky the correct (tbc!) answer hasn't yet been given :laughing:

Edited by Simply Paul
Posted (edited)

Hmmm ... I've just googled and the method of most people's calculation seems to be similar to mine. However, the answer depends a lot on just where you take the minimum altitude for negligible atmospheric drag. Wikipedia suggests this is much higher than the figure I gave and claims this to be the minimum altitude for a stable orbit. However, a quick check shows that Sputnik was placed into an elliptical orbit at an altitude of 215km with an orbital velocity of ~ 18,000 mph (8,046 m-1), the excess velocity giving rise to the ellipse. That fact that the Russians actually put a satellite into a lower orbit than Wikipedia suggests to be the minimum very strongly suggests they're wrong! :o

 

Edited to add:

 

... unless the object was able to 'power' itself against drag long-term, perhaps by sunlight-driven ion propulsion.

... In which case the orbital height an velocity are a lot less than you might suspect because Pathfinder can stay up indefinitely at a very low speed as most of its 'anti-gravitational' force is aerodynamic lift rather than centrifugal! (Although few would consider Pathfinder to be a satellite)

Edited by Pajaholic
Posted
..That fact that the Russians actually put a satellite into a lower orbit than Wikipedia suggests to be the minimum very strongly suggests they're wrong! :o
It was light though, so came down after just three months. A far from sustainable Earth orbit!
Posted

Stable LEO (Low Earth Orbit) is generally accepted to be around 350km altitude. Anything below 200km is going to decay relatively quickly due to atmospheric drag. Orbital velocity for satellites in LEO is approximately 7,800m/s although that's going to vary with altitude as it's the angular velocity that matters (as Pajaholic pointed out). Truly stable satellites are placed in geostationary orbit at an altitude of 35,780km and an orbital velocity of a shade over 3km/s. Even in geostationary orbit corrections still have to be made for the effects of precession though.

Posted

As there seem to be so many differences of scientific opinion (boundary of "space" varying from 100 to 200km, definition of "sustainable, etc) in the interests of keeping things moving, I'm going to give the ding to...................... (drum roll)

 

Simply Paul!

Posted (edited)

Back to music.

 

The band The Specials used to have AKA the end of their name (The Specials AKA) on their early releases...what does AKA mean?

 

Also known as.

 

And it was The Special AKA, not The Specials AKA :)

Edited by keehotee
Posted

@ irisisleuk

 

Ding! over to you

 

@ keehotee

 

You get the Pedantic Award ;) I was only a young lad at the time...I should have googled it first though :(

 

 

Posted (edited)

@ irisisleuk

 

Ding! over to you

 

@ keehotee

 

You get the Pedantic Award ;) I was only a young lad at the time...I should have googled it first though :(

 

M'eh :)

Edited by keehotee
Posted

This thread looks like it might die (some might say about time).

 

Since irisisleuk doesn't look likely to come up with a new question can I suggest the Eusty nominates someone else for the next question...

 

Mark

Posted (edited)

I wasn't expecting that!

 

Something topical...

 

Dan Crowley, John Eales, Tim Horan, Phil Kearns, Jason Little. Who's next on the only other member of this exclusive list?

 

Mark

 

[Edited to clarify the question]

Edited by MTH
Posted (edited)

Not captains.

 

And, although these are all Australian, the one you're after isn't...

 

Mark

Edited by MTH
Posted

DING!

 

The Australians won in 1991 and 1999. Os Du Randt won with SA in 1995 and 2007.

 

Hopefully there will be a few Englishmen joining them this time :laughing:

 

Seriously though, the "northern" half of the draw is very open and any of the four teams could make the final. England will have to improve considerably if they're to beat France and either Wales or Ireland.

 

The favourites have to come from the "southern" half. Dan Carter's injury has no doubt weakened NZ, but they should still have more than enough firepower to win (unless they choke again :ph34r:). Australia or SA could still spoil the party, and we've seen both are far from invincible.

 

Mark

Posted

Well I know (now) having looked it up, but that's cheating :unsure:

 

Great player, great captain. If you count playing for the Lions you could argue he was the 1st to 80 caps.

Posted

Hey hey im back....i know its been a while...had a shocking time with getting my tooth out 2 weeks ago :( been in constant agony this whole time n wasnt interested in doing ANYTHING......so Natty....Bring on the question :)

Posted

Going back to 2006 the original thread said:

 

"I'm going to ask a question, whoever answers correctly can post the next question and so on...

 

Rule 1 - No googling!

 

Rule 2 - Try and keep your question at the level someone in a pub quiz might be able to answer..."

 

I think we may at times be drifting away from "the level someone in a pub quiz might be able to answer"!

Posted

Hey hey im back....i know its been a while...had a shocking time with getting my tooth out 2 weeks ago :( been in constant agony this whole time n wasnt interested in doing ANYTHING......so Natty....Bring on the question :)

Hi jady! Welcome back, was wondering where you were, thought you had just got busy with change in weather/ new term. Sorry to hear your tooth was giving you so much trouble - sounds nasty! Glad you're better now!

Posted

Hey hey im back....i know its been a while...had a shocking time with getting my tooth out 2 weeks ago :( been in constant agony this whole time n wasnt interested in doing ANYTHING......so Natty....Bring on the question :)

Hi jady! Welcome back, was wondering where you were, thought you had just got busy with change in weather/ new term. Sorry to hear your tooth was giving you so much trouble - sounds nasty! Glad you're better now!

 

Ooo its been shocking! it took him 20 mins to pull the thing and whilst he was pulling me all over the room he ended up messing up the muscles in my jaw so ive been going to a massage person at the hospital to try get it back to normal :( Didnt like it at all !!!

 

Soooo what mensa question am i attempting then ??? x

Posted

Going back to 2006 the original thread said:

 

"I'm going to ask a question, whoever answers correctly can post the next question and so on...

 

Rule 1 - No googling!

 

Rule 2 - Try and keep your question at the level someone in a pub quiz might be able to answer..."

 

I think we may at times be drifting away from "the level someone in a pub quiz might be able to answer"!

 

Who knows, since you can't smoke in pubs anymore, maybe they've become full of non-smoking intellectual Mensa gurus trying to get away from the washing up?

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