The Quizbowl Resource Center

A lot of questions had content repeats. I think Hecatoncheires came up twice in the tournament - I can't remember the other examples off the top of my head but others may be able to bring examples up.

Muriel Axon wrote:The question of whether the clue is "negbait" is trickier, and we would want to know if more people made the same neg before deciding on that. Of course, the adjustment you suggest isn't hard to make, but it would perhaps set a bad precedent for tournament writers allow themselves to be subjected to whims of individual players like that.

The Quest for the Historical Mukherjesus wrote:

Muriel Axon wrote:The question of whether the clue is "negbait" is trickier, and we would want to know if more people made the same neg before deciding on that. Of course, the adjustment you suggest isn't hard to make, but it would perhaps set a bad precedent for tournament writers allow themselves to be subjected to whims of individual players like that.

I would have done the same thing Will did were I playing. The issue isn't misremembering what Gauss-Markov says, the issue is that at any given time you only have a part of that sentence. Your question starts "The Gauss-Markov theorem states that OLS estimators have the lowest value of this quantity", so at game speed you have "Gauss-Markov" and "lowest value", and if you know that the Gauss-Markov theorem concerns unbiased estimators, this is a reasonable buzz to make (especially if you hear an extra "that" in there). I'm not saying this alone is a reason to edit it (you could be a stickler), but I think some empathy is in order.

I wrote:The HIC (H-I-C) gene down•regulates the development of these structures in carbon-rich environments. Regulation of these structures in response to water potential can be iso•hydric or an•iso•hydric. The Ball-Berry-Leuning model couples carbon assimilation rates to the conductance of these structures, which can be measured with por•o•meters. Export of protons causes cells surrounding these structures to take up potassium ions from subsidiary cells. These structures are inactive during the day in (*) CAM plants. Root-released abscisic acid decreases the turgor of the guard cells surrounding these structures, causing them to close. Through these structures, which are primarily on the leaf underside, water is lost to transpiration and carbon dioxide is taken in. For 10 points, name these pores that control gas exchange through leaf surfaces.

Inifinite Jest wrote:The "Lost Tribes of Israel settling in America" tossup is a godawful idea for a tossup. But like at the very least you need to drastically expand the number of things accepted in the answerline, my teammate Finn buzzed really early and gave the completely right answer of the "Nephites being from America" and was negged.

Cheynem wrote:I interpreted the given answer as something like saying "the Pilgrims from Massachusetts," i.e. identifying the important thing is saying the Nephites came to America.

Cheynem wrote:I don't know what makes it inherently godawful.

Auks Ran Ova wrote:I have to imagine a protest on those lines would've been resolved favorably.

Make sure your seatbelt is fastened wrote:I'm pretty sure that camels do not have nucleated red blood cells, contrary to what the tossup on camels claims.

Inifinite Jest wrote:The "Lost Tribes of Israel settling in America" tossup is a godawful idea for a tossup. But like at the very least you need to drastically expand the number of things accepted in the answerline, my teammate Finn buzzed really early and gave the completely right answer of the "Nephites being from America" and was negged.

Itamar wrote:I was a big fan of the set's creative art answerlines, which seem mostly attributable to Andrew Hart - it was exciting not to hear a single tossup on a painter or a specific work until Round 5. In particular, I enjoyed the questions about the prodigal son, New Mexico, and pools.

I'm pretty sure that camels do not have nucleated red blood cells, contrary to what the tossup on camels claims.

I noticed more bonus variability in literature than in other categories: for instance, there were bonuses like Oates / Monroe / Foer, Rocinante / Cervantes / Dapple, and Babel / Gorky / jews next to bonuses with hard parts like My Struggle and Tsvetaeva.

Bonus #6 in Packet 9 on Alexander Nevsky was identically repeated as Bonus #3 in Packet 12.

Sic Semper Fidelis wrote: Caleb's misremembering this a little bit, the answer I gave was "the historicity of the Book of Mormon," and after prompting I think I said something about it actually happening in America, but I never specifically mentioned the Nephites or Native Americans. My main beef with the tossup is that I don't know that the clue I buzzed on, the limited geography model, is uniquely identifying for an answerline this specific. As I understand it, the model refers to the work as a whole, not just the whole Nephites/Indians thing.

Make sure your seatbelt is fastened wrote:I was a big fan of the set's creative art answerlines, which seem mostly attributable to Andrew Hart - it was exciting not to hear a single tossup on a painter or a specific work until Round 5. In particular, I enjoyed the questions about the prodigal son, New Mexico, and pools.

I noticed more bonus variability in literature than in other categories: for instance, there were bonuses like Oates / Monroe / Foer, Rocinante / Cervantes / Dapple, and Babel / Gorky / jews next to bonuses with hard parts like My Struggle and Tsvetaeva.

armitage wrote:I was mistakenly given points for saying "hospital" on the "children's hospital" tossup instead of being prompted; I don't think I would have pulled the answer if I had been prompted (it seems like this happened to others). I think the wording should be adjusted so people don't reflexively buzz on WCW without knowing that he specifically interned at what seems to be a rather obscure children's hospital.

theMoMA wrote:Cool. Obviously, if you do remember anything that came up in a way that presented a repeat issue (i.e. some substantive piece of information was mentioned previously and was later asked about, or vice versa, in a way that either allowed a player to answer based on information that already came up, or the repeated information was something so distinctive that it just felt odd), please do let us know. (This goes for anyone, not just Will!) When there are several writers all pitching in questions, it's often hard to police things like that, especially across categories.

setophaga wrote:It came off to me as a neg-draw to people who know that a Mannheim Rocket was used in the Classical period to followers of the Mannheim School in Germany and Austria, especially since Prokofiev was using the technique outside of his usual and mature style.

Periplus of the Erythraean Sea wrote:

setophaga wrote:It came off to me as a neg-draw to people who know that a Mannheim Rocket was used in the Classical period to followers of the Mannheim School in Germany and Austria, especially since Prokofiev was using the technique outside of his usual and mature style.

"Mannheim rocket" just means an ascending pattern of broken chords, to my understanding, so I don't see why you can't say that the opening of the "Classical" symphony is a Mannheim rocket outright. I think part of the point of Prokofiev's "Classical" Symphony is that it uses classical-era forms like that. It's not negbait because it's not asking where the Mannheim rocket is from or even implying that, even if the words "Mannheim Rocket" come first.

African Shoebill wrote:...I just wanted to say how excited I was about the lead-in to the Beethoven 5 tossup. I've had to read Hoffmann's review in both of the music history classes I've taken this year, and it's one of the most significant pieces of writing about Romantic music from the time. I didn't expect to hear it get mentioned, but it was great to have it come up.

Make sure your seatbelt is fastened wrote:I noticed more bonus variability in literature than in other categories: for instance, there were bonuses like Oates / Monroe / Foer, Rocinante / Cervantes / Dapple, and Babel / Gorky / jews next to bonuses with hard parts like My Struggle and Tsvetaeva.

Silverman wrote:Could I see the tossup on integrating over time? Our opponents negged with "integration" fairly early and couldn't figure out the time part; I don't remember the exact wording but I'd like to make sure the first clue was uniquely identifying.

Ben Salter wrote:

Silverman wrote:Could I see the tossup on integrating over time? Our opponents negged with "integration" fairly early and couldn't figure out the time part; I don't remember the exact wording but I'd like to make sure the first clue was uniquely identifying.

I and at least one other person ended up doing the same thing at our site and were negged for it. If I recall correctly, the clue was something like "Applying this function to the Dirac delta function yields the unit step function". Whilst the Dirac delta can be used to model a unit impulse, in which case a time variable would be used, this isn't the case in general; the Dirac delta is a more general concept in mathematics. Indeed, I personally have never seen it with a time variable - all of my textbooks just use x as a generic variable. I assume the previous clue applied specifically to "time integral", but requiring "time" after the Dirac clue is misleading at best.

African Shoebill wrote:I'm not qualified to comment on most things, but in the effort to voice more of our positive reactions to questions sets, I just wanted to say how excited I was about the lead-in to the Beethoven 5 tossup. I've had to read Hoffmann's review in both of the music history classes I've taken this year, and it's one of the most significant pieces of writing about Romantic music from the time. I didn't expect to hear it get mentioned, but it was great to have it come up.

I thought that the cluing for a lot of the music was well done. For example, the opening to the Sibelius bonus from packet 2 was a very on-point and, dare I say, evocative description of those particular passages of the Second Symphony. The description of the opening of Schubert's Death and the Maiden was similarly well-executed. Thanks to Shan and whoever else was involved in producing the music!

I had a fun time playing this set overall and really appreciate the work that all of the contributors put into writing it.

Packet 4 wrote:5. Computing the expected value of this operation, when it defines a stochastic process, can be done by solving a partial differential equation, as in the Feynman-Kac formula for Brownian motion. When applied to the Dirac delta function, this operation yields the unit step function. This operation applied to the difference between kinetic and potential energy yields a functional that any system “minimizes” when it follows a path. The voltage in a capacitor is equal to the reciprocal of capacitance (*) times this operation applied to the current, plus the voltage at time zero. When this operation is applied to the Lagrangian, it gives the action; for momentum, it gives the force; for power, it gives the energy. This operation can be used to find the displacement by finding the area under a curve on a graph of velocity versus this operation's namesake variable. For 10 points, name this operation that is performed on a function with respect to “d t”.
ANSWER: _time integral_ [or _integral_ with respect to _time_; prompt on “integral”]

Unicolored Jay wrote:Time integral tossup: So at the mirror I ran back in April, I actually had a game-deciding protest on this question about the exact same issue people are bringing up (that integrating the Dirac delta function isn't specific to any particular variable). I remember talking briefly about it to Rob, then resolving the protest in the protesting team's favor, so I'm kinda disappointed this wasn't fixed since then.

19. Damage will occur if this process takes place above or below the optimal rate, according to the “two-factor hypothesis” of Peter Mazur. The ability of certain animals to withstand this process was studied by P. F. Scholander and Art DeVries, whose research led to the discovery of a small alpha-helical Type I protein found in sculpins. Proteins that confer resistance to this process may function because their threonine side chains can form hydrogen bonds. Christopher Polge devised a way to utilize this process in cattle breeding. Converting glycogen to blood glucose and foregoing (*) urination for several months to preserve built-up urea in their bodies allows wood frogs to survive this process, which plants withstand after undergoing a process called “hardening”. AFPs are proteins that confer resistance to, for 10 points, what process that Listeria bacteria can survive, which enables Listeria to contaminate ice cream?
ANSWER: freezing [accept answers mentioning frozen or below-zero or turning to ice] <Hart>

theMoMA wrote:I don't want to mount a comprehensive defense of that question (although I guess I did), but I will note that, when I read it to Wisconsin, it drew a solid buzz on "wood frogs" (which is something that I knew prior to writing this question and suspected others did as well).

I also think that the criticism of the threonine clue is misplaced; the best guess as to how AFPs work is that the hydrogen bonds interfere with the formation of ice crystals. Obviously, as you pointed out, threonine does form hydrogen bonds, but knowing that this is the mechanism by which AFPs are theorized to work was the conceit of this clue. In other words, it seems to me that saying "threonine always does that" doesn't diminish the clue, because it's saying that because threonine has that property, it confers resistance to freezing. It's not specific enough as written, as you point out, but I think that was a function of copy editing removing a "those" on the beginning of that sentence, or simply my failure to include it there in the first place, as intended.

I also don't really understand your complaint about the Listeria clue. Yes, Listeria can contaminate many types of food, but the clue is only about its ability to survive freezing temperatures, which is fairly unique among bacteria (and is in the news because of the Blue Bunny litigation, although perhaps this is too Popular Science-y to the purist's sensibility).

I did receive input from Shan on this question, and I believe Cody looked it over as well. I didn't include those other clues simply because I wasn't aware of them, or discarded them in favor of writing on what I thought was interesting, but I don't think this was a particularly glaring omission, given that the question was already the appropriate length, and didn't seem to need yet more clues about proteins. The second half of the question has to do with more applied science/natural processes, in any event, and I don't think it's a fatal decision to decide to talk about one class of proteins that are involved in freezing rather than another.