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70 Falmouth Street Portland, Maine 04103
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Founded January 1970
Julian date: 2457662.16
"Who ISN'T in their own world?"
THE DAILY ASTRONOMER
Friday, September 30, 2016
Quiz V: Brain of Portland Level 1
"What's this?" one might ask, if one has just arrived.
"Brain of Portland" is a nifty -at least to us- quiz series that we offer throughout the school year. It culminates in early August with the behemoth "Brain of Brains"quiz that, this year, will offer at least 200 and at most 500 questions. (We'll see how ambitious we feel this summer when we're hastily composing the Brain of Brains quiz.) Based on BBC Radio 4's "Brain of Britain" quiz, "Brain of Portland" quizzes can involve any and every topic from astronomy to zoology and every single eggheaded endeavor betwixt them. This year, each "Brain of Portland" quiz will be assigned a level. The first, outlandishly enough, has been designated level 1: it contains only 10 questions. Each subsequent quiz will contain more questions than the one preceding it.
So, away we go
1. What craft just deliberately crashed into a comet?
a. Rosetta
b. Dawn
c. Icarus
d. Majimoto
d. Majimoto
2. Sphere A has a diameter of 4 inches. Sphere B has a diameter of 8 inches. How much larger is sphere B than sphere A?
a. twice as large
b. four times as large
c. eight times as large
d. sixteen times as large
3. Which 20th century novel features two pigs named "Napoleon" and "Snowball?"
a. Animal Farm
a. Animal Farm
b. 1984
c. Watership Down
d. Charlotte's Web
4. To which country would you have to travel if you wanted to visit the "Giant's Causeway?"
a. France
b. Canada
c. Ireland
d. Australia
5. Where is the Arctic Circle?
a. Within 20 miles of the North Pole
b. At 66.5 degrees north latitude
c. At 66.5 degrees south latitude
d. The Arctic Circle is a region around the North Pole with vaguely defined boundaries
6. What is the definition of a "polymath?"
a someone who speaks three of more languages
a someone who speaks three of more languages
b. someone who has an extensive knowledge about a wide variety of topics
c. someone who has a photographic memory
d. someone who can perform complex calculations mentally without a calculator or even paper
7. In Greek mythology, who was condemned to experience eternal thirst and hunger in Tartarus as a punishment for trying to feed his children to the gods?
a. Prometheus
b. Tantalus
c. Sisyphus
d. Medusa
8. Which constellation contains the stars named "Regulus" and "Denebola?"
a. Leo the Lion
b. Virgo the Maiden
c. Cygnus the Swan
d. Sagittarius the Archer
9. If you double a moving object's velocity, which of the following is also doubled? (Could be more than one.)
a. the object's momentum
b. the object's kinetic energy
c. the object's mass
d. the wind resistance the object experiences
10. Who was president during the War of 1812?
a. Thomas Jefferson
b. James Madison
c. James Monroe
d. John Quincy Adams
ANSWERS
1. a. Rosetta
The European Space Agency's Rosetta craft just completed a successful mission by crashing into the comet it had been orbiting. We recall that the Rosetta craft deployed Philae, the first vessel to land on a comet.
2. c. eight times as large
The formula to calculate a sphere's volume is
4/3(pi)*(radius cubed)
The radius is half the diameter. The radius of sphere A is 2 inches. The radius of sphere B is 4 inches. The radius cubed for A is 2 x 2 x 2 = 8; the radius cubed for B is 4 x 4 x 4 = 64. We don't actually have to calculate the sphere volumes to now know that volume of B is 8 times larger than the volume of A.
3. a. Animal Farm
George Orwell's disturbing "fairy story" about animals that take over a farm from its corrupt owner, only to create a dystopia
4. c. Ireland
The Giant's Causeway is a natural formation consisting of 40,000 basalt column created by volcanic activity. Often called the Eighth Wonder of the World, the Giant's Causeway is one of Ireland's most popular attractions, as it is visited by more than 500,000 people each year.
5. b. At 66.5 degrees north latitude
The Arctic Circle is 66.5 degrees north latitude and the Antarctic Circle is 66.5 degrees south latitude
6. b. someone who has an extensive knowledge about a wide variety of topics
7. b. Tantalus
8. a. Leo the Lion
Leo is jut now emerging into the pre-dawn eastern sky
9. a. its momentum
An object's momentum is the product of its mass and velocity.
An object's kinetic energy is equal to 1/2 times the mass times the square of the velocity.
An object's mass does increase with speed, but this is only measurable for speeds approaching that of light. Moreover, the relation between speed and mass increase is not linear.
The air resistance on a moving object increases with the square of the object's velocity.
10. b. James Madison