[313]

Yahweh was an ancient god of the Israelite kingdoms of Israel and later of Judaism.
Yahweh’s name is continued to be taken today through the term X, which literally means ‘praise to Yahweh’.
The term X can be found in Christian prayers & through songs of Jeff Buckley & Leonard Cohen.
Identify the term.

Show Answer
Hallelujah, or 'praise to Jah->Yah->Yahweh'
Listen to Jeff Buckley's song of the same name.

[312]

Concept of X originated in Japan pre-17th century (perhaps originating from China even earlier).
X most commonly consists of 3 characters: Mizaru, Kikazaru, Iwazaru and in some variations, even a fourth one called Sezaru.
X entered the Indian culture when it was gifted to Mahatma Gandhi by a Japanese monk named Nichidatsu Fujii.
What am I talking about?

Picture Hint
A Japanese scroll depicting X
Koshinscroll
Show Answer
Three Wise Monkeys
Mizaru "does not see evil", covering his eyes
Kikazaru "does not hear evil", covering his ears
Iwazaru "does not speak evil", covering his mouth
Also sometimes Sezaru "does no evil", covering his privates
Read about the Origin of the philosophy.

monk

[311]

Seen in the visual is St Brides Church, located on Fleet Street in London. Legend has it that a certain baker drew inspiration from the design of the church and created something which became a tradition across the world. What did he create?
St brides church london

Show Answer
(Tiered) Wedding Cake
The wedding cake is said to date back to 1703 when Thomas Rich, a baker's apprentice fell in love with the daughter of his employer and asked her to marry him. He wanted to make an extravagant cake, and drew on the design of St Bride's Church for inspiration.
Read More.
kay

[310]

The name of this video game comes from a type of crime committed.
Some of the stories that the games have followed are:
Protagonist returning home after the murder of his mother and finding his friends & family in disarray.
An Eastern European immigrant seeking a fresh start and the American Dream.
A mobster recently released from prison, who’s sent to oversee a drug deal.
Identify the game.

Show Answer
Grand Theft Auto
Ever since the release of Grand Theft Auto III in 2001, the Grand Theft Auto series has been a major success, both critically and financially. It has shipped more than 425 million units, making it one of the best-selling video game franchises of all time.
Did you watch the GTA 6 Trailer yet?
Also see the Story of each GTA released so far.

[309]

Harry Beck devised this with the following simple realization – because most of the system was underground, the physical locations themselves were largely irrelevant to the common person.
Hence, he used lines running only vertically, horizontally, or on 45° diagonals. This is similar to (though not inspired by) the electric circuit diagrams.
What did Harry Beck create, which is considered a standard across the world now?

Show Answer
The line diagram for the London Underground transport system
Since then, the concept has been used for almost all the metro/transport systems across the world.
Watch the Impact of Beck's map on the world around him.
Pre-Beck
prePost-Beck
final scaled

[308]

This star recently launched his YouTube channel named UR. The philosophy behind the name is that symbolizes inclusivity and a sense of family. It is also supposed to showcase more than his accomplishments, aiming to present a more intimate and authentic portrayal of the renowned icon.
UR

Show Answer
Cristiano Ronaldo, who recently launched his channel UR Ronaldo.
Obviously the channel blew up instantly, breaking multiple records. Just 1 hour 29 minutes after launching, the channel had topped 1 million subscribers, become the fastest in history to hit that milestone. Two days after the launch, and breaking another record, UR had more than 30 million subscribers.
Read More.

[307]

Tesla posted the following job description on their website. Which division/product is this required for?
Must be able to walk 7+ hours a day while carrying up to 30 lb
Height between 5’7″ and 5’11″
Must have the ability to stand, sit, walk, stoop, bend, reach, crouch, and twist throughout the day
Ability to travel up to 25% of the time and daily regional driving

Show Answer
Tesla Bot, Data Collection Operator for their humanoid robot
The company is betting huge on humanoids, predicting it will be bigger than their automotive business.
Goldman estimates the humanoid to be a $38b industry by 2035.

[306]

In 1880s, Wilbur Atwater conducted experiments burning food items. A highly simplistic outcome of this experiments was the following equation:
X = 4*Carbohydrates + 9*Fat + 4*Protein
This output is followed the food industry till date.
What is this equation supposed to measure?

Show Answer
Calories in the food (including the number found on the label)
The experiment burned different food stuffs (while subtracting some fudge factors) to calculate the calories in our food. For every gram of Carbohydrates & Protein, 4kcal is released & for every gram of Fat, 9kcal is released. While not being super accurate, these results give a good indication of calories in food.
Watch this great video by Howtown on the subject.

[305]

In this novel, there are 3 superpowers which are fighting a perpetual war and contesting for territories.
Which novel is this from?
1Q

Show Answer
1894 by George Orwell
The book is based in Oceania, however all the information about the world comes from the Party. So it is difficult to ascertain how the world powers came to be or their motives.
Read about the Political Geography of 1894.

[304]

Is it ever too late to start? Can you identify these successful people who started late in life.
1 – She wrote her first book at the age of 31 while living on public assistance between stints as a French teacher
2 – At the age of 35, his first idea was to create a platform for experts to write about topics. Seeing this not work, he created a product where anyone could contribute
3 – He created his first hit comic at the age of 39 and went on to have a Marvelous career in the entertainment industry
4 – He was selling milkshake machines, at the age of 52. He became a Founder of one of the most successful fast-food company
5 – He developed a secret recipe at the age of 65 and became a mascot for his own business

Show Answer
1 - JK Rowling (Harry Potter)
2 - Jimmy Wales (Wikipedia)
3 – Stan Lee (Marvel)
4 - Ray Kroc (McDonald’s)
5 – Harland Sanders (KFC)
Here's Forbes advice for late starters.

[303]

Due to years of aging & darkened canvas, this painting came to be called XY. However, in reality both X & Y are incorrect. The painting is supposed to be a day time scene & the subjects are a civic guard.
The original name of the painting ‘Militia Company of District II under the Command of Captain Frans Banninck Cocq’ and is one of the most famous Dutch Golden Age paintings.
Identify the painting.

Show Answer
The Night Watch, a 1642 painting by Rembrandt van Rijn
Watch a Nerdwriter Video on why it is so popular.
Or Zoom Infinitely into the painting to see its aging.
nw

[302]

In The Social Network, during one of the depositions, it is mentioned that the invention of Facebook made Mark Zuckerberg “the biggest thing on a campus that included nineteen Nobel Laureates, fifteen Pulitzer Prize winners, two future Olympians, and a movie star.
When asked, “Who was the movie star?” the response is “Does it matter?“.
This movie star was, in fact helped screenwriter Aaron Sorkin by providing him insider information.
Identify the movie star.

Show Answer
Natalie Portman
She invited Aaron Sorkin to a dinner party with her Harvard friends to provide him insider information on the school's social life at the time Facebook was created.
Read More.

[301]

Around 10% humans & most of the kangaroos show this attribute.
In humans, it is thought to give advantage in certain fields such as music, sports, etc. Some famous personalities known to have this attribute are Oprah, Sir Paul McCartney, Lady Gaga & Bart Simpson.
13th August is celebrated for this.
What am I talking about?

Show Answer
Left Handedness
In humans, handedness is thought to be related to genetics, hormones or our language development.
People have also studied its correlation to multiple factors. Read More.

[300]

The exact meaning of the number has been a topic of hot debate. It is commonly considered to denote Emperor Nero, who was cruel to Christians.
Symbolically, the number 7 has been thought to represent completeness. Hence, this number (in question) in contract signifies incompleteness and imperfection. Or alternatively, a quality of being complete in sinfulness.
Which number am I talking about?

Show Answer
666 or the number of the Beast
This is in contrast to the Angelic 777.

Revelation 13:18 says, “Here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for the number is that of a man; and his number is 666.”. Hence marking any person with this number to be devil incarnate.
Read More about the (deep) Interpretation of the number.

[299]

In 1992, a paper titled “A fair result in foul weather” was presented at the Royal Statistical Society. This was in response to the rather farcical ending of sports semi final match.
The method introduced the concept of ‘resources’ in making score estimations for truncated games – X & Y. Simply put, a team with more X & Y would have a higher scoring potential.
Give me the Sport, the Method and X & Y. 5 points for each.

Show Answer
The sport is Cricket, Duckworth-Lewis Method, X - number of overs (balls) yet to be bowled, Y - number of wickets in hand The DL method converts all possible combinations of balls and wickets in hand to a combined “resources remaining” figure, which is expressed in percentage — full 50 overs, and 10 wickets in hand means 100% resources available.
Take a look at the table of Published Score for each combination of wickets & overs left.

[298]

The conflict between Russia & Ukraine has been cited as the first large scale use of this technology in warfare. The ability to neutralize a multi million dollar equipment such as a tank with a $500 weapon has been a game changer.
Looking this trend the Ukrainian government has even created an ‘Unmanned System Forces’ earlier in 2024 to specialize on this front.
Which technology am I talking about?
operator

Show Answer
(Warfare) Drones
The war in Ukraine has been characterized by drone deployment of unprecedented scale, with thousands of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) used to track enemy forces, guide artillery and bomb targets.
Read more about use of Drone in Ukraine & State of Drone Warfare.
operator ans

[297]

X is a concept makes an act of error impossible to occur, by ensuring a right place for everything. The concept was formalized & adopted, by Shigeo Shingo as part of the Toyota Production System.
Today the concept is widely used in manufacturing, consumer electronics design, safety & many other fields.
Which concept am I talking about?

Show Answer
Poka Yoke
Shingo recognized three types of poka-yoke for detecting and preventing errors in a mass production system:
1. The contact method identifies product defects by testing the product's shape, size, color, or other physical attributes.
2. The fixed-value (or constant number) method alerts the operator if a certain number of movements are not made.
3. The motion-step (or sequence) method determines whether the prescribed steps of the process have been followed.

Read More.

[296]

Gerald Holtom used a combination of the semaphore symbols for the letters ‘N’ and ‘D’, standing for nuclear disarmament to create it.
Over the years, the symbol became popular & came to symbolize more that it was intended to. Its Unicode symbol is U+262E.
What am I talking about?
ND

Show Answer
The Peace Symbol
The symbol was created in 1958 as a symbol for Britain's campaign for nuclear disarmament. It went on to be widely adopted in the American anti-war movement in the 1960s and was re-interpreted as generically representing world peace.
Read More about Peace Symbols in history.
peas

[295]

The name of a tribe mentioned in the Rig Veda and notable for participating in the Battle of the Ten Kings.
The name of the king who was the son of King Dushyanta of Hastinapur and Queen Sakuntala. He was also an ancestor of the Pandavas and Kauravas.
These are two of the possible origin stories for which word?

Show Answer
Bharat
Both the tribe & the king were named Bharat. The Mahabharata itself is named after the king.
Over the years, there were many more names given to India - Jambudvipa, Gyagar, Phagyul, Tianzhu. Read More.

[294]

X is a network technology indirectly funded by the US military. It works on the principle of Onion routing, used to hide the one’s identify on the internet. X even has an onion for its logo.
Due to its anonymous nature, X is commonly used for accessing the ‘dark web‘ and sites dealing with illicit activities.
Identify X.

Show Answer
TOR or The Onion Router
Underground illegal-drugs marketplace Silk Road, which was shut down, was a hidden site only accessible through Tor, as was another store called Black Market Reloaded which has been accused of facilitating illegal arms dealing as well as drug purchases.
Read the Introduction to TOR by Guardian.