The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

Q: Comic where telekinetic teenagers with super powers roam an island 'disconnected' from the mainland

5:59 AM

I read a fairly lengthy comic series (or maybe a webcomic) about 5 years ago which I forgot the name of. The comic follows half a dozen or so teenagers/young adults all with similar telekinetic powers on a dystopian island overgrown with vegetation (possibly one of Britains?). The island somehow ...

story-identification comics telepathy

Q: Question about Short Circuit 2 (1988)

In Short Circuit 2, when they are trying to call people with the calculator, why does the calculator randomly start playing "Help me Rhonda"?

plot-device

1 hour later…

Babel fish

7:07 AM

Q: True motivation of superman in Man of Steel

Man of steel develops the Superman mythos in a very interesting way. The film asks a question on why Clark should save humanity, why should he choose to be earth's champion but it never truly explains what's Clark's true motivation to be a hero. Did I miss something in the movie and if yes where ...

dc-extended-universe batman-v-superman-dawn-of-justice man-of-steel justice-league-2021

2 hours later…

Feeds

9:21 AM

Darths & Droids: Episode 2029: I Travel the Woods Like the Pevensies

posted on August 01, 2021

Q: Why didn't Ar-Gimilzôr make his second son Gimilkhâd throne heir?

Ar-Gimilzôr's oldest son who eventually became King Tar-Palantir was faithful to the Valar and a friend of the elves, unlike his younger brother Gimilkhâd who was like his father. Since Ar-Gimilzôr didn't care about tradition anyway during his reign, why didn't he make his younger son crown heir?...

tolkiens-legendarium the-silmarillion numenor

1 hour later…

Q: Missed shot hazards after space battles?

10:37 AM

sorry if this is answered elsewhere, which my search didn't turn up: Lots of shots, be they objects (kinetic rounds, missiles, etc.) or rays miss their (moving) targets in a space battle and leave the battle space, IMHO. Aren't those a kind of lots of small-scale moving hazard to passing ships in...

space

11:18 AM

I wonder if this answer could be split up into what we expect in a decent answer and what would be nice to make an excellent answer? I often drop comments to new ID answerers pointing to this post, but sometimes I feel bad because this makes it look as though we require an awful lot, whereas it can be fine not to include all the things you've listed: sometimes a Goodreads link and quoted synopsis is enough for a good answer. — Rand al'Thor ♦ 39 secs ago

Thoughts? (cc @Jenayah @DavidW @FuzzyBoots as the story-ID people in chat)

11:34 AM

The August topic challenge is The Elder Scrolls, run jointly with Arqade SE. Any questions about the Elder Scrolls can be posted on one of the two sites: lore/universe questions here, gameplay questions on Arqade.

@Randal'Thor good point.

I'd say that the bare minimum is title, year, and any indication of why it might fit, either through a synopsis, or a point by point list of what does and does not match.

I'd also accept Wikipedia as a source.

Linking to a source would be good, and should be required if quoted from.

Also author should be required for written works, while director and main actors should be mentioned for films.

Artist(s) for comics.

So basically, what is it and why is it (the answer).

12:06 PM

@SQB Yes, linking to a source isn't a universal requirement, as sometimes the source is just "I remember reading this story" even if it can't be found online.

@SQB Agreed on the first part, not sure about the second. As long as the film is clearly identified, for which a name and year might be enough.

Anyway, I'm adding an answer there.

12:19 PM

There you go, @Randal'Thor.

12:32 PM

Ah, I see I'm 16 answers away from a silver story ID tag badge.

Since I've enough rep already for it, I guess I could game it by just adding 16 random answers, but that would be... not very nice.

1:01 PM

Indeed.

Wolfie Smith has just 5 answers, already over 1200 rep, and two 500-point bounties probably headed their way. Not too bad.

FuzzyBoots

1:12 PM

@Randal'Thor Forgive me for morning muzziness, but which answer?

1:26 PM

@FuzzyBoots The meta answer on good story-ID answers. The "39 secs ago" link at the end of the comment takes you there, even from a chat onebox :-)

Q: Why didn't the freed humans who entered the Matrix wear disguises so that the agents wouldn't recognize them?

I am wondering why the freed humans didn't wear a different disguise on each visit to the Matrix so that the agents would not recognize them or would at least have a hard time recognizing them. For example, whenever Neo, Morpheus, and Trinity entered into the Matrix and before they went out into ...

the-matrix

Spencer

I wonder if it would be productive to ask the MathOverflow mods "What were you thinking"?

@Spencer Hm? What happened at MathOverflow?

Spencer

1:43 PM

@Randal'Thor Trying to migrate that math puzzle here.

Oh, I just noticed it.

I'll ping the mod who migrated it.

Spencer

It doesn't matter now, it got returned.

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal: Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal - Robot

Just to find out what was going on, maybe if he meant to send it somewhere else.

Pinging him wouldn't help to return it anyway, that happens just when we close it on our side.

DavidW

2:48 PM

@Randal'Thor I agree; not all of that is required. I would say that would be the recipe for a story-id answer that would be a good dupe target, but more than typically necessary to get acceptance.

Cover images, in particular, while they make a pretty post, are hit-and-miss for older works with many reprintings, and are hard to add if you're not on the full site.

2 hours later…

Cereal Bot

4:24 PM

posted on August 01, 2021 by tech

Click here to go see the bonus panel!Hovertext: Please show yourself out of the building, using this efficient navigation system. Today's News:

3 hours later…

7:04 PM

@Spencer which one?

@DavidW yeah, I usually only include one if it matches the description the querent gave.

If not, I'll just link to the covers on ISFDb if applicable.

Does anyone know, if I backordered and paid something on Amazon while having Prime, is delivery still free if I cancel Prime?

Ah, found the migrated one.

It was MathOverflow instead of Mathematics.

I had forgotten the former existed.

And someone with an account on MO should suggest to migrate it to Puzzling.

Mithical

7:43 PM

It'd be closed on Puzzling as a textbook-style pure mathematics question.

@SQB I suggested migrating it to Mathematics, but informally, as I don't know their policies well enough to know whether they'd accept it there.

@Mithical wait, are those not allowed on Puzzling?

A: Are math-textbook-style problems on topic?

Math puzzles are on topic, math problems are not Let me first give some examples to illustrate the distinction I mean. Math problems: Solve for $x$: $2x+3=7$. My friend gave me a riddle: She went to the store and bought some apples. Then, she went to the store and bought an equal n...

8:11 PM

Hm. I see why this might be considered more of a maths problem than a maths puzzle.

Q: Short story where the stars are eyes

A short story I read several years ago in either Analog or Asimov's Science Fiction, probably between 2011 and 2013. In the story there's a 4th spatial dimension whose axes are skew, so that things get closer together the higher up you go in the 4th dimension. Spaceships travel faster by making j...

story-identification short-stories

2 hours later…

AncientSwordRage

10:46 PM

> their goal is to test comprehension of the material, not ingenuity.

That's a good distinction