Arcane knowledge
Nov. 12th, 2013 12:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shewhomustMonday night is quiz night: University Challenge followed by Only Connect.
The students on University Challenge know all sorts of unexpected things. Oh, yes, there are surprising gaps in their general knowledge, too - they're only young. But I'm often impressed by their familiarity with technical details of things which are outside their actual studies.
Question-master Jeremy Paxman is harder to impress; you have to know something pretty remarkable to make him exclaim, as he did last night, "How on earth did you know that?"
And the feat that produced this outburst? A contestant had identified, from the list of ingredients (4oz flour, 4oz butter, 4oz sugar, 2 eggs) that the end product was a Victoria sponge.
This thought brought to you courtesy of the interviewer on the Today programme who seemed to take it for granted that women's sports are inherently less interesting than men's...
The students on University Challenge know all sorts of unexpected things. Oh, yes, there are surprising gaps in their general knowledge, too - they're only young. But I'm often impressed by their familiarity with technical details of things which are outside their actual studies.
Question-master Jeremy Paxman is harder to impress; you have to know something pretty remarkable to make him exclaim, as he did last night, "How on earth did you know that?"
And the feat that produced this outburst? A contestant had identified, from the list of ingredients (4oz flour, 4oz butter, 4oz sugar, 2 eggs) that the end product was a Victoria sponge.
This thought brought to you courtesy of the interviewer on the Today programme who seemed to take it for granted that women's sports are inherently less interesting than men's...
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Date: 2013-11-12 12:50 pm (UTC)How I loathe Jeremy Paxman.
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Date: 2013-11-12 01:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-11-12 02:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-11-12 02:09 pm (UTC)Collecting himself after that little outburst, he confirmed: "Yes, Victoria sponge - a plain sponge," so revealing that he can't actually distinguish between a Victoria sponge and a true sponge recipe.
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Date: 2013-11-12 04:22 pm (UTC)Ummm.....no, actually- he's a bloody whig!
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Date: 2013-11-12 09:55 pm (UTC)