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xkcd #2865: The Wrong Stuff (imgs.xkcd.com)

submitted 11 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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https://xkcd.com/2865

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The phantom found Edward Everett Hale a century too early; by the time we invented satellites, the specifics of his 'brick moon' proposal were dismissed as science fiction.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 11 months ago (5 children)

Does Randall also work on explainxkcd? Because the explanation for the Trojan Horse seems to be pretty far fetched. Although I can't think of a better explanation either.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Trojan Horse - A mythological, giant wooden horse, supposedly used by the Greeks to invade the city of Troy. Actual horses are composed, like any other animal, out of meat, bone, and other tissues and bodily fluids.[citation needed] In addition, the interior of the Trojan Horse was composed of Greek warriors rather than horse innards.

Lmao

[–] [email protected] 9 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I love the variety of places explainxkcd editors find to slip in a "citation needed".

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

You can find those in the what if series too.

“Outer space is a lot higher up than Niagara Falls,[citation needed] so the plunge down into the atmosphere at the bottom of Earth's gravity well adds a lot more than 0.1 degrees worth of heat.”

Source

[–] [email protected] 12 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I think explainxkcd is unofficial and crowdsourced?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Correct. I won't say that Randall has no input, but we can check the revision history to see all the different people that made edits.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago

I guess the idea is that if a competent engineer had been in charge of the Trojan Horse project, the ancient Greeks would've used an aluminum frame with a mylar fabric covering.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

What's wrong with it?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

That was the same explanation I came up with.