19 replies to this topic

[toejam]

hi guys

just found this on the internet and felt the urge to share it with you

Cheers!!!



Questions

1. Yeasts have been around much longer than humans and although we are pleased to have them make alcohol for us, we may not be so pleased to have others as 'house guests' (along with bacteria, fungi, parasitic worms etc.) What percentage of your cells are human? (a) 90% ( 50% © 30% or (d) 10%


2. Put a handful of ice cubes in a pint glass. Add water till the ice floats. Wait until the ice melts. Will the level of the water (a) rise ( fall or © stay the same?


3. Alcohol is made by fermenting grapes, barley malt, sugar etc. from plants. But where do plants get most of their food? (a) out of the soil ( out of manure © out of chemical fertilisers (d) out of thin air?


4. Time, ladies and gentlemen, please! If you took a grandfather (pendulum) clock to your favourite pub on the moon ('The Half Earth Tavern'?) would it (a) gain ( lose or © keep the same time?


5. According to Isaac Walton (`The Compleat Angler', 1653) "Hops and turkeys, carps and beer, Came into England all in a year". Hops are used (a) to make beer bitter ( to increase its alcohol content or © to preserve it?


6. In the bar of 'The Jolly Sailor' the patrons know very well that about 75% of our planet's surface is covered by oceans and seas. These produce vast quantities of seaweed and microscopic plants (phytoplankton). How much of the world's vegetation? (a) three quarters ( one third or © one tenth ?


7. "Water, water everywhere nor any drop to drink." It is thought, by some, but maybe not the Ancient Mariner, that Neptune provided us with more water than our local water company does. Might they be right? Yes or no?


8. Back in the bar of 'The Jolly Sailor' a cry went up- "Up spirits, hands of the mess for grog" Like naval rum, all spirits are diluted with water before they are dispensed or sold. Is 'proof' spirit (a) 100% alcohol ( 60% or © less than 60%?


9. What weighs 10 tonnes, covers 36 acres and has lived for 1,500 years?

(a) The roots of a Giant Redwood tree ( Prickly Pear, an Australian cactus used to make a drink called 'Southern Cross' © a recently studied 'toadstool'.


10. Beer mats, such as these, have six equal angles (i.e. they are hexagonal). They share this feature with a World Cup football and the Nobel Prize winning "Bucky Ball" (a form of carbon) both of which are structures based on a number hexagons and pentagons. How many hexagons?


11. Being a well run house, no-one who frequents 'The Jolly Sailor' has yet been subjected to genetic finger-printing. The DNA underlying this process is spiral in shape. What, in this regard, does DNA have more in common with hops and wood screws?


12. Merry Christmas!

If you could join two atoms of carbon together and add six atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen. What might you get?

Answer: Lucky.


There are many alcohols but the one that you would buy in a pub or off-licence is ethyl alcohol (ethanol) and its chemical formula is CH3CH2OH. Cheers!


13. A Happy New Year to you!

Champagne is called 'bubbly' because it gives off so many bubbles of carbon dioxide (CO2) when opened. Would a bubble of CO2 weigh...

(a) the same as a bubble of oxygen of equal volume

( more or

© less? If you have drunk a glass or two by now you probably don't care but have a guess anyway!


14. Despite his famous green fingers, the landlord of 'The Jolly Sailor' hasn't had much luck growing (a) Agave tequilana ( Oryza sativa © Saccharum officinarum (d) Hordeum vulgare. Which spirits are made from these plants?


15. In 1847, at the age of 24, Louis Pasteur looked down his microscope at the crystalline material from the bottom of wine bottles. This lead him to one of the defining moments in science. What was it...


(a) pasteurisation

( "the germ theory"

© stereochemistry

(d) vaccination?


16. Not in the original quiz but added because of its topicality.

If you run a mile at ten miles an hour you 'burn' more calories than if you walk the same distance at 2 miles an hour. How much more?

a) about 15% more

( about 45% more

© about 75% more

[gebirgsziege]

Finally a thread for the ones missing all alcohol word chains in the "words, words, words" thread

tj are Brithish pubs that educational

[toejam]

as you can see, pubs are educational indeed

[casandra]

...hmm..there's really a lot of science there tj cos I failed abysmally...what a shame for the canucks...but then I don't drink either...the only alcohol I know is the one for disinfecting the hands in preparation for the flu season....really educational, hombre.....


Question: how much alchohol flows thru all the pubs in the UK...daily? and how much of this diverted to tj's veins?.......cheers.....

Edited by casandra, 07 October 2009 - 07:35 AM.

[GeorgeWolff]

Rather silly stuff.

btw for #1 - yeasts ARE fungi and the answer is currently considered to be < 5%.

[toejam]

hi George,
precise and professional as usual, i didn't know the answer to that one, probably when this quiz was published (i'd say quite a few years ago) knowledge was not as advanced as today.... thanks for the observation. as you might deduce, english is not my first language, so i would appreciate if you could explain me where it says the opposite or where is the mistake.
regards.

[GeorgeWolff]

Mistake - considering "yeasts" and fungi as separate groups. In fact, yeasts are not even a taxonomic group - the term refers to a fungal morphology found in many taxonomic groups from ascomycetes to basidiomycetes to zygomycetes and it's assumed by many mycologists that any fungus can grow as a yeast under the right conditions.

The < 5% is based on projected culturable and nonculturable and your point is a good one.

And while I'm being grumpily pedantic - the data for #9 being a huge fungus (if that's the answer) are overhyped. The fact that fungal tissue spread across a large area has the same genetic profile doesn't mean contiguous growth - it could well have come from dispersal of spores, soil particles bearing mycelium, etc.

Edited by GeorgeWolff, 07 October 2009 - 02:30 PM.

[toejam]

i see now thanks, however (and this is just my assumption) there might be different kinds of fungi on humans, right? also, parasitic worms are not a taxonomic group either, and most importantly, i don't think people solving a pub quiz on a thursday night will be fussy about fungal taxonomy, particularly after a couple of pints

[GeorgeWolff]

Gasp - a few pints would dull ones precision of fungal taxonomy?!! Not where I drink!!

But maybe I'm advised to seek better company. I've sadly noted that (my) consmuption of even a large number of pints does nothing to improve the looks of my taxonomically-correct distaff colleagues.

Edited by GeorgeWolff, 07 October 2009 - 02:36 PM.

[toejam]

[casandra]

good handling tj.......so now do we understand why alcohol is present in every civilisation? It not only promotes social coherence but also improves a grumpy disposition, eh George (gosh, there's that word again- distaff...but all in all that was funny)......we should have more pub parties here....

[gebirgsziege]

GeorgeWolff, on Oct 8 2009, 12:18 AM, said:

And while I'm being grumpily pedantic - the data for #9 being a huge fungus (if that's the answer) are overhyped. The fact that fungal tissue spread across a large area has the same genetic profile doesn't mean contiguous growth - it could well have come from dispersal of spores, soil particles bearing mycelium, etc.

George, this time it is me who has to correct you The researchers who investigated the Humungous Fungus - an exemplare of Armillaria bulbosa (I am not sure if it is still called bulbosa to stay taxonomically correct) went along the (connected) rhizomorphs formed by species of this genus. But there are two gigant Armillaria described...too lazy to look up for which one the data are correct For the non-mycologists among us: Armillaria rhizomorphs are black, app. 2mm-1.5cm diam. solid structures formed by the fungus to transfer nutrients etc. from one place to another.
But I agree with the overhype; as fungi spread with their mycelium in soil, so you can bet more than one pint, that there are much larger ones out there, but those are not easily described because of the above mentioned reasons.

GeorgeWolff, on Oct 8 2009, 12:31 AM, said:

Gasp - a few pints would dull ones precision of fungal taxonomy?!! Not where I drink!!

But maybe I'm advised to seek better company. I've sadly noted that (my) consmuption of even a large number of pints does nothing to improve the looks of my taxonomically-correct distaff colleagues.

Your word in gods ear But it is really sad that taxonomy is not getting the attention it deserves; without proper taxonomic knowledge we are ending up beliving in clone-libraries and OTUs to be true and (to get the discussion back to alcohol) end up like the global beer market dominated by one single universal taste....

Edited by gebirgsziege, 08 October 2009 - 12:43 AM.

[eberthella]

georgie was correct - and i read the stuff on the "huge fungus." The so-called tracing of mycelium was pretty self serving and without validation, In any case failed to rule out anastomoses of distinct mycelial units.


geberg...... is right and I'm sure georgie will agree. The romance of mycology is gone. Taxonomy has been taken over by a bunch of analytical chemists/molecular engineers. doubt if many of those folks even drink and if they do it's at TGIF.

[gebirgsziege]

eberthella, how would you define "one organism" when it comes to "complex" (or should I better say poorly understood) lifeforms like fungi??? I think the study which was done on the huge fungus is quite good, although you are right has some methodical shortcomings. It is the best possible way to do such studies until now, maybe we will develope methods which can satisfy your expectations as well
But when it comes to fungi we have even to learn what is an individual or how to define what is one individual. This is still a hot debated topic whith lots of room for discussion! Another thing which seems to get lost more and more lost: discussing concepts and problems....there are so many studies done just to proove somebody elses (or own) work.....

[eberthella]

One mycelial colony as these folks concluded in the study we're discussing. How else would they have gotten so much press? If it were so "poorly understood" they were even less advised for such a certain conclusion but what do you think "poorly understood" is in reference to this observation? Can you direct us to some of these discussions?