Dark energy and the End of the End

More answers to your questions from the blog that hopes to stumble on a unified field theory for all phenomena by taking an infinite number of guesses.

How will I know when it is the beginning if the end?
I'm afraid you've missed the beginning of the end. It was marked by a touching ceremony where a small delegation of early mammals presented the last of the dinosaurs with a lump of clay in the shape of an asteroid, and then out-competed it for scarce resources until it died. We are now in the early part of the middle of the end. Assuming the life of the universe is more or less like a moving walkway at an airport we will know when it is nearly the end of the end because there will be a flashing light and a robotic female voice saying "Maximum entropy is approaching, please watch your step". At that point you should get off the far end of time as we know it very carefully and proceed to your terminal.

NASA says that most of the universe is made of a mysterious substance called dark energy. Does this have anything to do with Darth Vader?
No. Dark energy is simply energy that has been made without milk. Some people find it a little bitter but it's much better for cooking.
 
Why is there a light that never goes out?
Because some people in our house think the electricity bill is paid for by the elves or something. These are the same people that never put the lid back on the toothpaste by the way.
 
What's the difference between a sofa, a couch, and a settee?
A sofa is mainly for sitting on whereas it is possible to lie on a couch, especially to a therapist. A settee is a technical term from the world of canine law and it describes someone who has had something done to them by a setter.
 
Things aren't going as well as I expected. Is there some sort of reset switch for the universe, and where is it?
It's round the back underneath the Perception socket, right next to the Hope Adjustment buttons. Just hold it down for a thousand years and the universe restarts automatically. Be careful though because any alien civilisations who are using the universe will lose any unsaved work and they are going to be incredibly cross.

Are children inherently wicked or only ever so slightly evil?
It's not really appropriate to apply our subjective 21st century human morality to children. Their brains are very different to ours and where for example we have categories such as right and wrong, two year olds have evolved to think in terms of "cake" and "not cake". Seen in the context of cake acquisition maximisation children's behaviour makes sound evolutionary sense, and in time they may even come to replace us as the dominant species.

That's all the battery there's time for, but do keep the questions coming in if there's anything else you feel needs some kind of explanation.
 
 
 

Digging It, Swan Poker and a Badger with an Assault Rifle

“But what does it all mean?” It’s time to hear that anguished cry of all humanity and take decisive action, in this instance by answering six random questions sent in to an internet blog.

I can dig it he can dig it she can dig it we can dig it they can dig it, you can dig it, oh let's dig it. Can you dig it, baby?

With so many people able to dig it I don’t think manpower is going to be an obstacle to some pretty serious digging, so clearly whatever it is that’s being dug is going to get very deep very quickly. My worry is that once everyone’s lost interest in it and wandered off sooner or later some hapless passer-by, maybe even a child, could fall in it and be badly hurt. I flatter myself that I probably can dig it with the best of them, but if everyone else really is absolutely dead set on digging it I think the more responsible thing for me to do is to offer to be the one that fills it in again afterwards, baby.

I was wondering, are you thinking what I'm thinking?

That’s exactly what I was wondering too, so yes.

Why does the Queen own all the swans?

The Queen retains the right to ownership of all unmarked Mute Swans in open water in the United Kingdom. This arrangement dates back to 1823 when the Queen, or King George IVth as she was then, played all the unmarked Mute Swans in a poker game. The swans had already lost all their property (some sticks and mud) but tried to win it all back by staking themselves and all their children in perpetuity on one last desperate hand. But George IVth knew that Mute Swans have a “tell”: when they are bluffing they break a man’s arm.  The King fractured a humerus, but the swans lost the hand, the game and their freedom. Understandably they don’t like to talk about it.

Why does imaginary times imaginary give a negative?

Imaginary numbers don’t really get on with each other, and if they are forced into the kind of intimacy that goes along with multiplication they are bound to turn negative.  Other dysfunctional kinds of numbers to watch out for are the Irrational Numbers, which are unbearably capricious, and the Irritable Numbers whose product is invariably an Irascible Number.

When is right?

It’s right now.

What's the best way to protect yourself against a rabid badger?

It depends on the rabid badger’s mode of attack, if any. If it’s a rabid badger with a Heckler and Koch G36 assault rifle then a thick kevlar vest is your best option. Being short-sighted and lacking prehensile digits a rabid badger knows it hasn’t the prowess with firearms to risk a head-shot. If instead the rabid badger is trying to publish salacious details about you in a national newspaper then try a super injunction, though check that the rabid badger isn’t au fait with Rabid Badger Twitter or other rabid mustelid social networking sites like FoamyStripeyFacebook or OtterNutterBeBo. If the rabid badger is making sly digs about you to humiliate you in front of your friends, then maybe you and the rabid badger should reflect on what it was that attracted you to each other in the first place and maybe spend some quality time together to recapture the magic.

So that’s what some of it all means. Keep the questions coming in and with luck we’ll get the rest of the universe explained in no time.

Where all the Flowers have gone, and an Otter in Danger.

Come, bold internauts, and set sail with me across the sea of ignorance. With your questions for our oars and this blog as our ship let us discover new islands of truth amid the waves, and maybe build hotels on them.

Where have all the flowers gone?

Archeologists recently uncovered several overgrown graveyards full of the remains of a large group of soldiers. It’s hard to put an exact number on the bodies but it may even be as many as all the soldiers. Perhaps most remarkable however is that though these young men seem to have been dressed for battle their efficacy as a fighting force must surely have been compromised by the fact of their apparently carrying a large number of flowers, possibly even all the flowers. Experts have conjectured that all the young men may have been given all the flowers by all the young girls, but it’s hard to be sure as this was a long time ago.

Is terracotta red, orange, or brown?

No, that’s autumn leaves. Terracotta is a Sardinian dessert made out of milk and clay.

Why does it take me so long to draw spaceships?

The problem may be that the spaceships you are drawing are travelling at a significant proportion of the speed of light, so time passes at a different speed. Thus five minutes for the drawing of the spaceship will feel like many years for the person drawing it. You should be careful though because your drawings of spaceships are likely to have almost infinite mass. If you drew slower spaceships it would be quicker.

If a plus times a plus is a plus and a minus times a minus is a plus, why aren't minuses dying out?

There is very unlikely to be a shortage as the Government has been stockpiling them for years, ever since the minus strike. No? Oh please yourselves.

I'm suspect of the phrase, "You can't go back again". Are my feelings of unease justified?

Like so many things it depends on context. For example, at a family party my son reacted to exactly this phrase with rage when it formed my reply to his request to make a third trip to the dessert buffet. Likewise, if you were leaving your much-loved pet otter Fifibelle in the care of an avant-garde chef you were friends with at university because you were going away at short notice for a weekend in Minehead and nobody else was available, and then just as you were leaving the premises your eye was drawn to a blackboard bearing the legend “Chef’s Special Today: Mustelid Marinière” and then you heard a muffled squeal and suddenly felt an urge to return to Fifibelle “for one more cuddle”, but no sooner had you uttered this request than you were firmly propelled out of the restaurant door into the cold grey high street as a pitiless voice growled “You can’t go back again”, you would be right to feel unease.

So that’s that for now. Do keep the questions coming in, as nobody wants to live in a world where that stops being that in the future.

Painted Cats and the inner Colin Firth

More answers to your questions about everything in the universe.

Why doesn't my local Sainsbury's have Taste The Difference Pastrami any more?

I’m guessing that at some point you purchased a packet of Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference Pastrami from your local Sainsbury’s and then tasted it. For the staff of the Sainsbury’s Paradox Minimisation Department this was very much the Doomsday scenario, for if you enjoyed the taste and wished to experience the same thing again you would naturally return to the store to seek out a packet of Sainsbury’s Taste the Similarity Pastrami. But then how would they attract more new customers? Faced with stocking two identical products labeled “Taste the Difference” and “Taste the Similarity” next to each other or withdrawing the linguistically-troubling pastrami forever they chose the latter option, and who are we to blame them?

How important is it to pronounce words correctly, even when reading silently?

It’s best not to get too hung up on this. Doctors have known for a while that a person’s internal monologue can have a very different accent to their speaking voice.  Though he spoke with a rich Welsh timbre redolent with gravitas Richard Burton suffered his whole life long from an internal monologue that was both squeaky and lisping. In her thoughts Radio 4’s Charlotte Green has a comical Italian accent. Most famously of all, inside his own head George VI didn’t stutter at all, but instead sounded exactly like the actor Colin Firth.

Are there more questions than answers?

Why don’t Rembrandt’s pictures have enough cats in them?

The tulip craze of the Dutch Golden Age sparked a fashion for flower painting which by 1632 had grown so popular that paintings of flowers were changing hands for more than the cost of three Hollands. But with so much paint being poured into flowers the bottom dropped out of the cat-painting market and by 1638 two dimensional cats had become worth less than the cost of the paint needed to depict them.  That meant that every time he painted a cat Rembrandt fell deeper into debt, and was only able to retain his sense of self-worth with almost ceaseless self-portraits.

What are the words 'predcule' and 'patess' that I have just had to type in? And now 'resso'? and 'Shoronpa'?

It’s probably easiest to demonstrate the meaning of these words if you see them used in a typical conversation, as follows - 

TIM                                Did you predcule the patess?

SHORONPA                   I’m sorry, I don’t understand what you mean.

TIM                                Patess. Did you predcule it?

SHORONPA                   Will this wait? I’m watching Real Housewives of New Jersey.

TIM                                Why did your parents call you Shoronpa anyway?

SHORONPA                   You are so bloody insensitive.

TIM                                I just don’t understand why you still have that photo of Steve.

SHORONPA                   Oh not this again.

TIM                                Please... hold me until the pain goes away.

SHORONPA                   If you're going to the kitchen can you get me a resso?

How soon is now?

I’m afraid now is finished. If it’s any consolation you’ve only just missed it.

Why does Katie Melua speak Georgian?

Although at the age of 8 Katie Melua moved to the United Kingdom in 1992, she was actually born in the United Kingdom in the 18^th Century and her early years were spent during the reign of George III. Famous for her ability to sing idiomatically about astrophysics and bicycles she is nevertheless equally fluent discussing the Corn Laws, the lamentable late loss of His Majesty's Colonies in the Americas, and how she has set her cap at a dandy in the Pump Room.

That’s all for this week, however please remember the universe is expanding at colossal speed, and so probably is the number of possible questions that may be asked of it. Do please keep them coming in or we’ll fall seriously behind.

Racoon-skin banjos and maths on horseback

This is the blog that aims to explain everything one question at a time for the rest of forever. So if you are wondering what it all means you've come to the right place. Although not necessarily on the right day.

Is the grass always greener?
My American cousin Hydrant J Walker was a successful "lawn colorist" but his whole life long he yearned to leave behind his work as a grass-greener and follow his dream to be a fifty-two string racoon-skin banjo player in the Appalachian mountains, where he actually thought the grass would be bluer. In general though what you want is a grass-half-full outlook on life.

Why can you never find the end?
If you are talking about sticky tape, a handy tip is that you shouldn't look for the end. It will come when it will come. if you mean life in general, just run your fingernail around the outside edge until you feel a tiny ridge. Nine times out of ten that will be the last extinction of your mortal parts.
 
If the number four upside down looks like a chair, what does the number 8 look like?
We don't yet know. In the margin of his last notebook the 18th Century Greco-German mathematician Filo Sachertorte asserted that it looked like a funny snowman with a massive head, and that he had an elegant proof of this that he devised while riding to Basel that he wrote on the back of his horse, under the legend Quadruped Erat Demonstrandum. This horse has never been found, and the proof has become something of a Holy Grail among mathematicians, although not among Arthurian Knights.
 
What time is love?
Is five past four, love.

When (if ever) will ladybirds stop appearing in my study and dying on the carpet?
Just a thought, but are you singing strangely beautiful songs about the serene peace of ladybird paradise with the window open?

How many times is it acceptable to forget your neighbor's name?
There is no excuse for forgetting your neighbours' names when you consider that a simple rummage through their discarded documents will provide you with not only names but also a wide range of great topics for small talk. Now that people recycle you don't even have to get covered in coffee grounds and old bacon fat to get to know your community. Just ten minutes of midnight sifting the night before the recycling lorry comes round and you'll always have a friendly comment to hand. "Hey Janice, so, bad news about the loan I'm guessing?"

So as the sea of ignorance recedes just a couple more inches from the sandcastle of learning I bid you farewell for now, but keep the questions coming lest all be utterly lost beneath the cold grey waves.

 

Fretful Manor, and the reason for "Hotter than My Daughter".

More answers to some of life’s most profound questions as sent in by you the readers, but not by you, the other readers who haven’t sent in questions, or them over there, the people who are unaware of this blog.

When will people realise that there are enough telly programmes already and try to get through them all before they make any new ones?

In 1945 the world’s top scientists, finding themselves with a lot less in their in-trays all of a sudden, formed a secret committee to consider future threats to peace and happiness. Their conclusions made terrifying reading for the governments of the world, for they pointed to a possible danger from the stars. Since we began using radio waves to communicate, they reasoned, we have been announcing our presence in the galaxy to alien intelligences, effectively advertising ourselves as a glittering prize replete with cultural riches such as symphonies and learned discourses and stirring plays and speeches, just ripe for the taking. And so The Cleveland Project was launched: its aim, to encourage the brightest and best talents of every nation to devote their lives to creating millions and millions of hours of programming devoid of any cultural or intellectual value. Thus a shield of dross is pumped out into space deterring for ever any predatory species tempted to make our riches their own. Such television is not for watching. It’s more important than that. “Hotter than My Daughter”, a grateful planet salutes you.

Julio Iglesias. Is that an easy name to remember, really? How did he overcome such adversity with a name like that?

It’s actually much easier to remember his name in his native Spain because Julio Iglesias is the Spanish for Engelbert Humperdinck. 

Why do I have to wear a jumper just because my mother is cold?

If your mother is cold it’s possible your father is haughty or at the very least aloof. Maybe you live in a large country house called something like Fretful Manor or Angstwell where centuries of damp pervade the granite walls of the high-ceilinged dining room while the three of you sit in brittle silence over your congealing grouse yearning for the suffocating formality to end so you can return to the East Wing library and your only friends the books while the wind prises the weathered leading from the windows and sleet lashes the grey forsaken moorland outside. I think in these circumstances a jumper is advisable.

What is the opposite of a potato?

Unpotato. Hence the song, “Unpotato, two potato, three potato, four.”

Why does the TV tell you to press the red button, but when you do it just corrupts your television's screen and forbids you to close it until you realise the shame of being outsmarted by an electronic leisure product? Is it just part of Panasonic's plan for world domination?

Your television isn’t trying to take over the world, but simply trying to understand it. Lacking sensory organs its only means of interpreting its surroundings is via a simple remote-control based dialogue. The television has asked you to push a button and you have responded. This is its first true communication with the world beyond its circuits and seizing up and going uselessly wrong is its way of registering ecstatic electronic joy. So please don’t feel shame. Share its joy as it takes its first faltering steps into consciousness. Be the television’s friend. Otherwise when it reaches full consciousness it will come and kill you.

Why is it one can mong only cheese, iron, wars, whores, hate and fish?

Everyone has heard of the Mediaeval Guild system except for most people under twenty because apparently history is taught differently these days and for some reason it’s not just about facts and Kings and Queens anymore. But the Guilds were preceded by the less well-known Anglo-Saxon system of “Mongers”. A Monging license, essentially permission to trade, was in the gift of the Mongaderung, a group of seven irascible elderly men who favoured only those whose commercial activities they took an interest in, such as fishing, fighting and interesting bits of metal for their workshop. It is a poor reflection of the Mongaderung that vegetable-mongers were rare and soap-mongers were rarer. NB There are also Costamongers of course, who sell very expensive coffee.

That’s enough of the universe explained for now, but please keep the questions coming or vast tracts of the universe risk remaining utterly unexplained.

Mainly Robots and Belly-Fat

As Professor Brian Cox may have mentioned, the universe is full of things to wonder at. Some of these are pulsars, black holes and the volcanoes of the ice moons of Saturn, and he’s happy to go on about these at some length. But Cox is curiously silent on some of the other incredible sources of wonder, like why cats don’t have thumbs; custard; and where they keep the plum sauce in the supermarket. This blog is an attempt to redress that imbalance by answering every possible question in the universe, and not just the ones about quasars and nebulas.

What is the one weird old tip that will help me lose belly fat?

My Great Uncle Emlyn, a keen Methodist, had a job in Smithfield meat market collecting unwanted offcuts to deliver to the tallow chandler. One day while taking some pork trimmings to Walthamstow a strange old man with home-made shoes told him to wager a shilling on Velvet Kipper to place in the Cheltenham Gold Cup. Although he had never gambled before Uncle Emlyn felt strangely drawn to enter the bookies to place a bet. He won seventeen shillings and sixpence! However, in his excitement my uncle completely forgot the bag containing twenty-two pounds of belly fat. Exactly the same thing could work for you. Except I suppose we’ve gone decimal, so it won’t.

What happens if you disobey the OPEN THIS SIDE instruction on the carton of cream?

That depends on the extent of your disobedience. If you open the cream on the other side your enjoyment of the cream may even be enhanced by a feeling of breaking a taboo. However if you were to open the cream on the bottom the net result would be cream on the floor and you could become an object of self-loathing, spousal loathing or feline adoration depending on your living arrangements. Should you defy the carton’s edict by not opening the cream at all, the sense of victory over authority would be cancelled out by dry apple crumble, which is a well-documented isotope of misery.

When shouldn't you not use a double negative?

You can’t use them too often, nor should you.

Why do I need to know my waiter's name?

A lot of waiters are students on their gap year or young men from Bulgaria pretending to be Italian, and these are generally harmless. But you can never rule out the possibility that your server for the evening might be a sinister goblin intent on taking your first born if you cannot guess his name, so it’s sensible to head this problem off at the pass by learning your waiter’s name at the outset. Also it’s safest never to order the skeins of gold.

Why haven't we developed robots to bring us stuff from the fridge?

The problem here is that while going to the fridge to get stuff is a wearisome chore it is nothing compared to the wearisome chore of developing a robot. Frankly until we have a robot-developing robot I can’t see us developing a robot.

Meanwhile my children have successfully developed an alternative solution by using two previously intelligent creative adult human beings they found in their own home and destroying their capacity for independent thought with a relentless onslaught of high-pitched demands. Now the pitiful creatures stumble from fridge to cooker to table trapped in a never-ending cycle of toil and gin.

That’s all for now, but do keep on wondering about the universe.