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Sam Howison's MPLS quiz: the answers

1.

(a) Engineering, on a gable of the Jenkins building; see https://victorianweb.org/sculpture/giles/13.html.

(b) Chemistry: the Aldrichian Praelector is a statutory Readership.

(c) Chemistry again: by Cyril Hinshelwood.

(d) Maths (the Penrose tiling).

(e) Plant Sciences (a specimen in the Herbaria was collected by Linnaeus).

(f) Earth Sciences (ambAFROGer = A FROG in amber; displayed in the foyer).

(g) Physics (the oldest continuously-running battery in the world, from 1840, said to have rung its little bell over ten billion times).

(h) Statistics: Florence Nightingale Fellows (usignol is the name for a nightingale in Florence or anywhere else in Italy for that matter).

(i) Maths foyer: the diameters of the pillars form an arithmetic progression.

(j) Computer Science – it is a mechanical calculator, on display in their main entrance lobby.

 

2.

(a) Zoology (animal behaviour).

(b) Computer Science (automatically generated taxonomies).

(c) Earth Sciences (rocks).

(d) Materials Science (Imaging via analysis of diffracted waves).

(e) Maths (Morse theory: ‘theory’ in Morse code).

(f) Physics.

(g) Maths again.

h) Statistics (p-value, Q-Q plot, Software R replacing S+, t-statistic (or distribution), Uniform distribution.

(i) Plant Sciences: the study of ferns.

 

3.

(a) Maths (Sedleian).

(b) Physics (Dr Lee).

(c) Zoology (Hope: last out of Pandora’s box; more in hope than expectation).

(d) Zoology again (Luc Hoffmann).

(e) Materials (Vesuvius - the first Plinian eruption observed by Pliny).

(f) Plant Sciences (Wood professorship of Forest Science).

(g) Maths (Savilian Professors of Astronomy had lodgings in New College Lane near the Turf).

(j) Physics (Savilian Professors of Astronomy had lodgings in New College Lane or at the Radcliffe Observatory).

(k) Maths (Wallis, inventor of the symbol for infinity).

(l) Engineering (Donald Pollock).

 

4.

(a) The zenzic is the square: 32 = 9. As 42 = (22)2 the zenzizenzic is the square of the square, i.e. the fourth power. Likewise the zenzizenzizenzic is the square of the zenzizenzic, i.e. the 8th power so the answer is 28 = 256. Similarly for cubic, quartic etc.

(b) The equals sign.