The Sphinx's Lair

Mike Q

4:01 PM

Maybe it's first->A, or I... but I can't find any words that fit

Rubio

those aren't abbreviations though

Forklift

lost cool -> raised temperature? -> abbrev for heat or entropy?

n_palum

There isn't an indicator, something directly equals an abbreviation

No. That's not what abbreviation means

Like Oehm said, cold/hot = C/H, or ring = O

Crossword abbreviations

Cryptic crosswords often use abbreviations to clue individual letters or short fragments of the overall solution. These include: Any conventional abbreviations found in a standard dictionary, such as: "current": AC (for "alternating current"); less commonly, DC (for "direct current"); or even I (the symbol used in physics and electronics) Roman numerals: for example the word "six" in the clue might be used to indicate the letters VI The name of a chemical element may be used to signify its symbol; e.g., Tungsten for W Country codes: "Switzerland" can indicate the letters CH ICAO spelling alphabet...

Forklift

"in" as inches?

n_palum

We need one of the words in the CC that an abbreviation will take the place of in the solution.

Not make one of them longer. It'll be a single letter we get.

Forklift

4:08 PM

ok. so, potential for that: j for jerk (physics)
I don't see any other single indicators for an abbrev

Avantgarde

Pounds as lbs. Who the hell came up with that?!

Forklift

lol Rome

same guys who thought Iron might be better as Fe, buncha jokers

n_palum

J for jerk isn't bad

dcfyj

@Forklift well Fe comes from the latin so...

M Oehm

I think that abbreviations can be a mixed bag. For example, in many British crosswords, S, D and H are clued by son, daughter and husband on the grounds that these abbreviations are used in geneaology. Once you know that, it's fine, but it seems a bit unfair if you don't know it.

Forklift

4:10 PM

seriously, tho, those abbrevs are shoutouts to their latin roots

Avantgarde

Ag for silver. Seriously?!

Forklift

bro, do you even Latin?

Avantgarde

nah, I Greek

or Sanskrit, rather. I did Sanskrit for a few years in school.

Forklift

some of these are the Periodic Table symbols, many of which are callouts to the Latin word origin.

Avantgarde

yes I know

Forklift

4:12 PM

Lead = Pb
Calcium = Na
Iron = Fe
Gold = Au... lots of weird ones

Avantgarde

Calcium is Ca

Sodium is Na

Sid

Actually sodium=Na

Forklift

yes, sorry

got my salts mixed up

Avantgarde

HHeLiBeBCNOFNeNaMgAlSiPSClArKCa...

still remember the first few elements from this mnemonic

Forklift

whats the device? I never had a Periodic Tabler mnemonic

Techidiot

4:15 PM

I wish I had met you years back @MOehm :)

M Oehm

What's so mnemonic about that?

Mike Q

From one of MOehm's previous comments, do we know that "Jerk lost" -> ?

Forklift

all we know from him is that there's a single letter and it's an abbreviation, not a word snippet

Avantgarde

nothing at all. Just mnemonicized the elements' symbols into a comprehensible long word

Forklift

you and I use comprehensible differently :)

Avantgarde

4:17 PM

:)

Forklift

although I do see a "gal sips clark" in there.

lol

O_O

oosh

anyone here likes Bieber?

dcfyj

4:23 PM

There's a reason I call him the Shame of Canada

Rubio

I like him . . . as far away from me as possible.

dcfyj

lol

Forklift

the production quality on his first album was good, but that's because they spent a fortune on it. as a person, he's less savory, I think

Avantgarde

What do you mean?

dcfyj

His singing (in my opinion) is subpar, and his character is even further below that.

Techidiot

4:25 PM

His recent concert in India was charged for 76000/- per ticket i.e. $1180.58 :O

Avantgarde

Woahhhh

Seriously?!

dcfyj

Overpriced much? lol, You couldn't pay me to go to his concerts

Avantgarde

that's a ton

dcfyj

Anyhow, why are you bringing up Bieber?

Forklift

I'd go for free, definitely. he's a professional entertainer. they're bound to put on something visually interesting and there's always good people watching at concerts

Avantgarde

4:27 PM

80s Remix: Justin Bieber - What Do You Mean it's 1985?

►

Because of that :P

dcfyj

@Forklift meh too loud, and usually too filled with idiots

Avantgarde

It's so good

dcfyj

Somehow I doubt it'll meet my criteria of good, but I'll give it a listen.

Forklift

@dcfyj yeah not for everyone, but if you like concerts and people watching, I would say you don't have to like the artist to have a good time

Techidiot

@Avantgarde Yes

Avantgarde

4:28 PM

@dcfyj hope you like it

@Techidiot Did you go?

Techidiot

Me? No ways. :p I have life to live :D

dcfyj

So far it's really boring

M Oehm

@Techidiot In TSL, at that! :)

Avantgarde

But, Bieber is life

Forklift

I saw NSYNC back in 2001, I regret nothing

Avantgarde

4:30 PM

@dcfyj What kind of music do you like?

dcfyj

Almost anything, just not this crap

Forklift

lol

Avantgarde

what about some psychedelic black metal?

Techidiot

I liked him when he was a kid. A couple of his first songs were too good. May be the child-super-star thing was something new to me.

dcfyj

I literally listen to practically any style of music, but everything of Bieber's I've heard sounds bad one way or another.

Techidiot

4:31 PM

@MOehm That too :)

Avantgarde

heh, understandable

dcfyj

I grew up on Oldies (50s-80s) but I listen to just about anything now. For the most part I don't like rap or screamer metal but everything else is fair game.

Avantgarde

Okay. What are your fav artists?

n_palum

^^ second half

dcfyj

@Avantgarde I don't have favorites of anything, except people and that's reserved for my wife.

Forklift

4:33 PM

@dcfyj I think if you listen to his first album with an ear for critical appreciation rather than "do I like it" you can find that it holds up very favorably in a musical sense to what's on pop radio. his current stuff is a bit thin as I believe theyve scaled back on production costs and are sailing on his repuation

Avantgarde

@dcfyj haha alright :)

Forklift

keep in mind he is not a creator by trade, but rather an entertainer. all of his body of work is created for him; he simply performs.

dcfyj

@Forklift While I have listened to "pop music" it is by no means my preferred medium of auditory entertainment.

@Forklift Probably why I don't like him

aside from the stupid stunts he pulls

Forklift

yes. I find that he is no longer adding anything positive to society. there was a time when his story of youtube to mainstream was inspiring but now he has outworn that charm.

dcfyj

lol, yeah

n_palum

4:36 PM

@dcfyj clever

Forklift

my "I'll listen to anything but _____" is country music

dcfyj

@n_palum true statement though.

n_palum

I don't doubt it

dcfyj

@Forklift I used to feel that way, hated country, but I have found some good stuff (mostly because of my wife that likes it)

n_palum

^ (cept she's not my wife)

Sphinx

4:37 PM

0

Q: Which screws go first?

Humans are not always accurate at measurements. I recently got a table top that came with an attachment. Table top and attachment are nearly of same size and rectangular with four screw holes near corners to attach, although the holes are little disoriented(same size but at slightly different pos...

Avantgarde

Putin - Shooting Stars

►

Forklift

I went to a Taylor Swift concert a couple years ago. that's as country as I get. Although I do insist on country only when driving my pickup.

dcfyj

I think the major source of my ability to like other kinds of music (especially the ones I used to dislike/hate) is anime.

@Avantgarde lol, what?

Avantgarde

:D

n_palum

All of the shooting star meme videos are objectively amazing

dcfyj

4:40 PM

The song that was playing there was ok, the video was weird

Avantgarde

So much

Donald Trump - Shooting Stars

►

That's the most popular one I think

dcfyj

People are strange. Especially internet people.

n_palum

The dude tackling him is the best part

Avantgarde

These memes are genius

dcfyj

Sure? Not really.

n_palum

4:43 PM

You should show all the LoTR fans the saruman one

Avantgarde

yeah, of course. Takes creativity to be random and good

@n_palum That's amazing too :P

dcfyj

Not necessarily, but sure...

Mike Q

That reminds me - maybe "Jerk" refers to a specific person?

dcfyj

lol

@MikeQ Maybe even The Jerk?

Mike Q

I mean, if Jerk -> J, what "cleansing" or "solution for cleansing" starts with J?

Or maybe Jerk is the def?

Forklift

4:46 PM

no synonyms for either that I found. perhaps a brand name?

dcfyj

solution for cleansing = Jalapeño? :P

Forklift

LOOOOOOOOOOOL

dcfyj

Although the spice in those hardly counts

n_palum

Spicy ccs

Forklift

hey, that was a good joke. don't try to break it down now

dcfyj

4:48 PM

@Forklift Logic took over

Forklift

what about a morbid interpretation of "cleansing" like ethnic or otherwise?

any j words there?

Sid

ethnic cleansing sounds too non-Oehm-like.

So, that shouldn't be it.

Forklift

right, but anything in a similarish interpretationthat isn't like a cleaning supplies answer?

dcfyj

Wh

Forklift

like meditation for example

ethnic was a lazy example, sorry

Mike Q

4:57 PM

I actually considered that, but couldn't apply the entire clue

ffao

5:19 PM

@n_palum only if they're easy, if they're not trivial they get closed as off-topic

n_palum

Mehh

ffao

but it seems like really easy questions get HNQd to oblivion

Sid

@ffao now that you are here, Shiro is sick!

Deusovi

Yup, they do. :/

Mike Q

5:43 PM

HNQ?

Deusovi

@MikeQ "Hot Network Questions", the little thing in the sidebar.

Mike Q

Then I don't understand @ffao's comment - usually the more difficult questions are popular. (Unless I am wrong about that)

n_palum

They may be more popular among puzzlers in here, but they draw attention from other sites

Forklift

I think "simple but clever" probably describes a lot of HNQs I've seen from here

Deusovi

Agreed, but take out the "but clever" part.

ffao

5:57 PM

rofl

n_palum

Brutal

Also the titles

Sid

Lol

Mike Q

I'm not following. What's an example?

Avantgarde

6:11 PM

dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/example

Mike Q

Guess I kinda walked into that one. What's an example of a simple but not clever puzzle that gets HNQ'd?

Sid

There were a lot around this time last year

which led to the highly controversial sandbox

Deusovi

"Highly controversial" is an understatement.

Avantgarde

What are some other games that are played here, like Spyfall?

Sid

Codenames and contact.

There is a meta-post on them, if I am not wrong.

Avantgarde

6:20 PM

Ok, do you have their links

?

Sid

6

Q: What are these chatrooms with names like 'Codenames', 'Contact', and 'Spyfall'? What are they for?

I see there are several rooms hosted on Puzzling on chat.SE that have strange, one-word titles, like: Contact Codenames Spyfall What are these rooms for? Who owns them?

support chat

@Avantgarde ^

Avantgarde

@Sid Great, thank you.

Rand al'Thor

7:02 PM

@Deusovi Given this site's history, I'd say it's an overstatement.

TMBMP was highly controversial. The Sandbox was only moderately controversial.

Sid

What is TMBMP?

I keep hearing that. And I still have no idea what it was.

Rand al'Thor

-3

Q: Is it time for us to disallow challenge-only questions?

While it is somewhat out of form to edit a question with these kinds of notes, this is designed to clear up potential confusion. status-declined's tag wiki reads: Indicates that a request (usually a feature request) has been considered, but will not be implemented. Generally speaking... / .....

discussion status-declined question-quality challenges close-reasons

TL;DR: mods decided to ban 90% of the site's content; users rose up in rebellion; SE high-ups squashed the plan, but the site remained a battlefield for the next month or so.

It was a crazy period.

And there was way more to it than could fit in a TL;DR.

Sid

Wait, what?

90% of the site content?

Mithrandir

(stands for 'The Mods' Big Meta Post' IIRC)

Rand al'Thor

People were creating puzzles with solutions like "the mods are arseholes". A few people were even supporting the plan to ban challenge questions.

Sid

7:08 PM

Shouldn't there be some sort of consensus before doing something like that?

Deusovi

This was back before Puzzling was for challenge questions.

Rand al'Thor

@Sid The pro-tem mods on this site weren't very good at getting consensus on stuff :-/

Deusovi

Originally, it was just for asking about puzzles.

But questions about solving strategies became questions about solutions, which became questions asking for solutions that the asker already knew.

I don't agree with what the pro-tem mods did, but I can see their reasoning. If the site got too off-topic, it was possible that SE would deem Puzzling a failure (since it's not a Q&A site like most of the other site son the network) and shut it down.

Rand al'Thor

Notice that several of the site's most draconian policies - deleting lateral-thinking answers to non-lateral-thinking questions, deleting plagiarised puzzles, deleting answers without explanation - aren't supported (afaik) by any meta consensus anywhere. It's just what the mods here have been doing for years.

@Deusovi Remember that PPCG was already well-established and working fine at this point.

Deusovi

That's why I said "most" instead of "all". And PPCG was explicitly made to be an exception. Puzzling was not.

ffao

7:12 PM

But I'm fairly certain those specific policies would be strongly supported if anyone were to ask

Sid

^

Rand al'Thor

@ffao Actually creating meta posts for these is on my to-do list.

Sid

Exactly. We could in theory build a meta consensus for these things.

But, I don't see how it would be much useful when practically everyone supports it.

Rand al'Thor

Although the existing canonical meta post about plagiarism has a highly-voted answer from an SE employee saying they shouldn't be deleted outright but instead should have attribution edited in.

So ... what can you do.

@Sid It's always useful to have policies clearly documented. That way, when some poor sod gets their post deleted, we can say "look, here's why" and they can read the reasoning and add their own thoughts there if they want, rather than just "BECAUSE I SAY SO ♦".

Sid

Oh, so, this site has actually changed from a simple Q&A site to a challenges to people to solve their puzzles.

the SE overlords agreed to that?

Deusovi

7:18 PM

Yeah. It used to be pure Q&A.

Rand al'Thor

@Sid Yes - see the top answer on TMBMP.

Deusovi

I'm not sure if they've ever explicitly said "being an exception is okay". I think it just sorta happened.

Rand al'Thor

@Deusovi If they hadn't, this site wouldn't be here now.

Deusovi

Oh, that answer was from a CM!

I had forgotten that it was.

Never mind, ignore me.

Sid

Wow.. the story of Puzzling could be made into a movie as well.

Rand al'Thor

7:23 PM

@Deusovi puts Deusovi on ignore

:-P

Sid

puzzling.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/1601/… - Wow, @Rand . That comment.

Rand al'Thor

@Sid It's a Hunger Games reference.

(Also, you should see some of the deleted comments.)

Sid

You sound like a revolutionary there..

Deusovi

Yes, the deleted comments are certainly interesting.

To put it lightly, Rand was not pleased.

Rand al'Thor

Oh, btw, don't be fooled by the title of TMBMP. It was edited to make it sound like they were seeking consensus, but the original title was more like an edict: "We hate fun, and it's time to disallow challenge questions" (no question mark).

@Deusovi :-P

None of us (the active PSE community) were.

ffao

7:29 PM

I wasn't here, but some answers for it are upvoted

Mithrandir

7:49 PM

@Randal'Thor ...wow, that revision history.

Rubio

hey @Randal'Thor

I had most of a Contact How-To written up but your post preempted it, and is pretty good. Do you mind if I edit in some corrections and additional info to it?

ffao

I just noticed, were all steganography questions solved while I was sleeping? O_o

@Rubio just edit it then comment "BECAUSE I WANTED TO ♦"

Rubio

Mine was. I really wanted you to solve it :)

n_palum

@ffao I'm sorry D:

ffao

Gah, I wasn't thinking anywhere close to those lines

Still, a very deserved upvote for you

Rubio

8:05 PM

@ffao ... must ... resist .... urge .... to ... do ... this .....

n_palum

Do eet

@ffao It's gotten some downs too since it's "mean" and "not a puzzle" and "jokes aren't cool man" and "why you do dis" etc etc

Jamal's is at the top of the FTC I believe

Deusovi

@n_palum Rubio's puzzle has zero downvotes.

n_palum

Oh I thought he meant myself

Whoops

Deusovi

And your puzzle isn't being downvoted because it's mean. It's likely because of the complaints I mentioned (useless information, out-of-story info being used to solve an in-story problem...)

n_palum

Same difference ;)

OH NO!

D: ;_; :( cries dies

Deusovi

8:14 PM

?

n_palum

I spilled water on my drawing............

D:

D: D:

D: D: D:

It's over... isn't it

Forklift

8:17 PM

what, like in real life?

Rubio

21

Q: The Legend of Sally the Cow

I was looting exploring Pelagia Farm and I stole found this note in a locked chest on the ground. It seems that one of the farmhands had tried their hand at poetry. I want to know how it ends but some ink bottles next to the note had spilled and obscured the last words. While I look for my next t...

visual computer-puzzle

Beastly Gerbil

@n_palum its not over. You should know by now you can make a puzzle out of anything :P

Forklift

that is shockingly topical, @rubio

n_palum

Yeah I've been working on a big drawing to turn into a puzzle and I've been working on it a bunch today to see if I can get it done for the ftc

And I just spilled water all over it.....

Forklift

ugh, man, that stinks. I'm sorry.

ffao

8:20 PM

Puzzle: figure out what the drawing was before water ruined it

n_palum

@BeastlyGerbil Considering I draw in pencil mostly, water doesn't play well

You can't even tell D: D: D: I'm so upset

Beastly Gerbil

ah yeah

thecoder16

ouch... really lookingn forward to seeing it :(

n_palum

It's "drying" but it's completely ruined.... sighs

Avantgarde

:(

n_palum

8:23 PM

The question now is... do I try again

@ffao a lot of people seem to be agreeing with your comment and we're now at 14-3

@n_palum about what?

My "puzzle"

which one

recent

the one about being naked?

n_palum

8:28 PM

Yee

Beastly Gerbil

9:14 PM

night all

o/

\o

Buenas noches

9:44 PM

Buenos nachos to you too

thecoder16

9:56 PM

berries nightwings

Sphinx

10:38 PM

0

Q: Where is he Hiding?

My friend Bob is an alien, and he is evading capture by the United States government. His native alien language is one in which the letters of each word in a sentence are superimposed on each other, with each word beginning one letter to the right of the previous word. Though he is learning Engli...

word language

Sphinx

11:08 PM

0

Q: How does the hit-man assassinate his target using only two questions?

You are a hit-man undercover at a dinner party. You are in a conversation with three people. One of them is your target. You get to ask two questions before they get tired and leave. You know that one person always says yes because he is mute, the other always no, and the other says a relative an...

logical-deduction word-problem

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