The nearest galaxy is NOT four light years away. That is the nearest solar system. The nearest galaxy is a whopping 2.5 million light years away. Not to be finicky. I just throw that out there.
@Selinor578 Near (adj & adv): Located a short distance away.
You're not 'near' to the Milky Way, you're inside of it. When your mother was pregnant with you, your foetus wasn't a short distance away. It wasn't sat next to her on the bus. Very glad you 'know what I mean' but the nearest galaxy to our own is Andromeda.
@WillofIceandIron ...continuation...then nearest G. is Andromeda. But if you were in London and someone asked what is the nearest city to you now, you might get away with saying "London". Are you "part" of the city you are currently in? Maybe a lot of meaning breaks down or becomes ambiguous and possibly meaningless when you boil down meanings to their constituent parts.
@Selinor578 And just to clarify even further, since c.2.5 million light years doesn't seem that 'near' -- Nearest: superlative of near. Literally the 'most near'. Just like something that is dearest is the thing that is 'most dear'. Once again, the galaxy that is 'most near' to our own is Andromeda. It doesn't pay to get pedantic with QI fans!
@WillofIceandIron I can't remember what they said on that particular pt of the show. Did they say which galaxy is nearest to "us"...or nearest to "our galaxy". If they said the latter, then it's definitely Andromeda. I jumped thru different pts of show just now. Culdn't find it. "us" could, at it's simplest mean you and I. Or anybody assembled in this room. Or more likely in this case, all human beings. If you consider any human being that is in a galaxy to be part of it...pto
@Selinor578 John Lloyd claimed the nearest galaxy was 4 light years away, while that is the nearest solar system. You should have just scrolled to my first comment. And that 'ambiguity of language' thing is such an old textbook cop out. If a tourist in London asked you what the nearest city was and you replied, 'London', he'd look at you like you were a twat, and if you followed up with 'the constituent parts of a language are possibly meaningless' excuse he'd probably call you one.
@WillofIceandIron How the tourist would look at me could be as much a comment on his not understanding me as it is on my reasoning. Even if he did call me a twat. Many intelligent people have been called perjorative names B4 by people who just don't think about what they are saying or by people who think the right way to treat people who have different opinions to them is to call them a twat.
If there's any QI fans out there in search of something QI-ish to read, pick up a copy of the QI edition of The Idler. It really is a rather wonderful book.
@gavwyb He appeared to be all at sea on this show tho. He said he had a mnemonic for remembering which was his left hand and which was his right. I think he said when he was a child or something. Still, a mnemonic to remember left and right?? He seemed pretty muted most of the rest of the time too. He gave me the impression he didn't really know what was going on. Just saying that's the way he came across to me.
@patricksname What would you say is the ideal line-up of 4 guests on QI? I'd go for Sean Locke, Jimmy Carr, Clive Anderson, John Sessions. I know you'd have to have Alan Davies too, but there you go. What would your ideal 4 be?
@Selinor578 I like Clive Anderson, but I think I'd have to replace him in an all time great panel, apart from that I like your line up. Have to think about my final guest.
@Selinor578 I've thought about it again and I was going to say Dara Ó Briain, however I have reconsidered and I think Clive Anderson brings a better balance to the panel.
Sound is the transmission of a vibration through matter. In other words, it is the movement of an oscillation through matter. This occurs regardless of our existence, let alone our ability to audibly hear it (as sounds do exist outside of our very limited audible range of roughly 20 -20,000 Hz). The answer to the philosophical question involving a tree falling in a forest making a sound is not a moot point, but a resounding (pun intended), yes.
The stupid question of "if a tree falls, does it make a sound?" pisses me off. Philosophical questions like that are pointless. John's answer of sound not being a wave is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. The fact that sound is a wave is how we know where the sound came from. It's also why it's harder to tell where low frequency sounds come from. Our ears don't turn sound into a wave.
@TheBrontolith I think that fellow was trying to be interesting a bit too hard.Don't let it get to you.In fact, I'm pretty sure that the fact with the birds flying of the truck and the truck being the same weight is actually wrong as well.
Johnny Vegas usually comes across as a bit dumb, but here he showed up John Llyod quite well with his comment about the speed of sound. There cannot be ANY such thing as a "speed of sound" unless "sound" is the wave in the air, NOT the sensation of the listener. The same goes for John Llyod's comment about light. Light is the wave, not the mental sensation it produces, otherwise "speed of light" cannot be a thing to measure, and we couldn't talk about a "light year".
Point to the ceiling. Extend your thumb. Your left index and thumb make an L. Obviously that wouldn't work with aliens, as they would probably not know our alphabet, but it's the mnemonic I was taught.
@Iamgercornholio How can anything be spinning right, or left. If one part of it is spinning from your right to your left, then the opposite side of it must be spinning from your left to your right. People always say spinning to the right when they should say "clockwise".
I've never got the 'tree falling doesn't make a sound cuz no one's there to hear it' bit cuz even if sound isn't physical, it's still there to travel from the source till it dissipates. To me i've always looked at it like 'Well then does it work on other condiments? Like is a Pie still a pie if no one's there to eat it?' Bad analogy i know but it just irks me slightly.
@Psycho5275 I never fully grasped the significance of Schroedinger's cat. They say at any one point while the cat is inside, he can be considered to be both alive and dead. No he can't. He's either dead or alive at any point, even though right at that point we outside the box don't know which.
Jeez people, stop arguing over the definition of "sound". There are multiple definitions of the word that are correct. Just because you like one definition best doesn't mean it's the only one.
Quite apart from the fact that sound is the vibration of air, regardless of experience, the whole question just reeks of Human arrogance. Just because YOU didn't hear it didn't mean that NOBODY heard it. How many thousands of bugs heard that tree crashing down on them? Birds? Mice? Lizards?
What about all the animals in the forest. Just because no human is around to hear the tree fall doesn't mean no one hears it. Typical human arrogance.
Yes. The sound still exists. Dog whistles. We can't hear them but we know they do in fact make a sound. If you say 'no', then ultraviolet light doesn't exist. After all, its not really light if nobody sees it, right?
i agree with your 'sound exists' answer, but you can't really compare sound to light. sound is waves caught by hairs, while light is... either particle or wave, both invisible themselves, but capable of reflecting(thereby forming color).
@homerfromhelI True. While not directly comparable I still think it serves as a good example to show the fallacy of "If humans don't observe it, then it doesn't exist" which always annoys me. :D
Every time I’ve watched this episode, short version or long, John’s arrogance that he’s right about sound and any other answer is wrong has bugged me. So I love Stephen disagreeing with him and I LOVE Johnny's response. "Go on, Steve! Go on! You've got him!" John doesn't look particularly pleased but I am so, oh well. :)
@KalypticBass Does that mean sound waves of certain frequencies are only sound depending on who listens to them? There are certainly some sounds which older ears cannot hear, or even sounds which are audible to different species but not to us. And then what about recorded sound waves, does that register as interpretation to you?
@shimauma when i said some kind of Brain, i should have said anything that interprets them, as in an animal or a recording device which interprets waves as sound.
Sound is the interpretation of vibrations. We call those vibrations SOUND waves simply because that's how we interpret them . The question isn't about "Sound waves" it is about sounds .And yes it may sound different for every person who hears it.
You dont know if the colour green looks the same to you as it does to everyone else.
@KalypticBass No. Sound is the vibrations, not interpretation of the vibration. The frequency of the vibration must be from 20 Hz to 20 kHz and the amplitude over 1 dB. The tree in the forest most certainly produces sound whether or not there is someone to hear it.
Johnny Vegas what a character :)
Ferxis 1 week ago
Haha, this is the best episode I've seen!
My cat may or may not have been totally confused at my laughter!
TuahShinguru 2 weeks ago
The nearest galaxy is NOT four light years away. That is the nearest solar system. The nearest galaxy is a whopping 2.5 million light years away. Not to be finicky. I just throw that out there.
WillofIceandIron 4 weeks ago
@WillofIceandIron Surely the nearest galaxy is The Milky Way, the one we exist in. But I think I know what ye mean.
Selinor578 2 weeks ago
@Selinor578 Near (adj & adv): Located a short distance away.
You're not 'near' to the Milky Way, you're inside of it. When your mother was pregnant with you, your foetus wasn't a short distance away. It wasn't sat next to her on the bus. Very glad you 'know what I mean' but the nearest galaxy to our own is Andromeda.
WillofIceandIron 1 week ago
@WillofIceandIron ...continuation...then nearest G. is Andromeda. But if you were in London and someone asked what is the nearest city to you now, you might get away with saying "London". Are you "part" of the city you are currently in? Maybe a lot of meaning breaks down or becomes ambiguous and possibly meaningless when you boil down meanings to their constituent parts.
Selinor578 1 week ago
@Selinor578 And just to clarify even further, since c.2.5 million light years doesn't seem that 'near' -- Nearest: superlative of near. Literally the 'most near'. Just like something that is dearest is the thing that is 'most dear'. Once again, the galaxy that is 'most near' to our own is Andromeda. It doesn't pay to get pedantic with QI fans!
WillofIceandIron 1 week ago
@WillofIceandIron I can't remember what they said on that particular pt of the show. Did they say which galaxy is nearest to "us"...or nearest to "our galaxy". If they said the latter, then it's definitely Andromeda. I jumped thru different pts of show just now. Culdn't find it. "us" could, at it's simplest mean you and I. Or anybody assembled in this room. Or more likely in this case, all human beings. If you consider any human being that is in a galaxy to be part of it...pto
Selinor578 1 week ago
@Selinor578 John Lloyd claimed the nearest galaxy was 4 light years away, while that is the nearest solar system. You should have just scrolled to my first comment. And that 'ambiguity of language' thing is such an old textbook cop out. If a tourist in London asked you what the nearest city was and you replied, 'London', he'd look at you like you were a twat, and if you followed up with 'the constituent parts of a language are possibly meaningless' excuse he'd probably call you one.
WillofIceandIron 1 week ago
@WillofIceandIron How the tourist would look at me could be as much a comment on his not understanding me as it is on my reasoning. Even if he did call me a twat. Many intelligent people have been called perjorative names B4 by people who just don't think about what they are saying or by people who think the right way to treat people who have different opinions to them is to call them a twat.
Selinor578 1 week ago
@Selinor578 Ok. You come off a bit nuts. Conversation over.
WillofIceandIron 1 week ago
If there's any QI fans out there in search of something QI-ish to read, pick up a copy of the QI edition of The Idler. It really is a rather wonderful book.
gavwyb 1 month ago
Amy Winehouse died age 27.
DontTouchMyVicodin 1 month ago
At around 19:00
You can see that Stephen Fry is so amazing and smart that he can even top trump the person who gives him all his information :D
SuperLamarrio64DS 1 month ago in playlist ...Q..I... Season 8, Series H XL
Stephen Fry is so amazing and smart that he can even top trump the person who gives him all his information :D
SuperLamarrio64DS 1 month ago in playlist ...Q..I... Season 8, Series H XL
"He lost one eye--he wasn't careless, he was ill..." HAH.
poodlepoodle777 3 months ago 3
Worst cast not only in the history of QI but the Universe.
patricksname 3 months ago
@patricksname If it wasn't for John Lloyd, there'd b no QI @ all. The man's a leg-end.
gavwyb 1 month ago
@gavwyb Doesn't mean he should be in front of the camera.
patricksname 4 weeks ago
@gavwyb He appeared to be all at sea on this show tho. He said he had a mnemonic for remembering which was his left hand and which was his right. I think he said when he was a child or something. Still, a mnemonic to remember left and right?? He seemed pretty muted most of the rest of the time too. He gave me the impression he didn't really know what was going on. Just saying that's the way he came across to me.
Selinor578 1 week ago
@patricksname What would you say is the ideal line-up of 4 guests on QI? I'd go for Sean Locke, Jimmy Carr, Clive Anderson, John Sessions. I know you'd have to have Alan Davies too, but there you go. What would your ideal 4 be?
Selinor578 1 week ago
@Selinor578 I like Clive Anderson, but I think I'd have to replace him in an all time great panel, apart from that I like your line up. Have to think about my final guest.
patricksname 1 week ago
@Selinor578 I've thought about it again and I was going to say Dara Ó Briain, however I have reconsidered and I think Clive Anderson brings a better balance to the panel.
patricksname 1 week ago
@Selinor578 Sean Locke, Bill Bailey, Phill Jupitus, David Mitchell. and Alan off course
khasab 6 days ago
Comment removed
patricksname 3 months ago
1 siamese cat escaped from the fridge and didn't like this video
StevenBee2 3 months ago
Sandy Toksvig is the best :)
annalouisekennedy 3 months ago
@annalouisekennedy I think you mean worst, perhaps English is not your first language.
patricksname 3 months ago
@annalouisekennedy Sandy Toksvig??? Best??? Not even close.
Selinor578 1 week ago
ohhh god learning has never been sooo fun! :D
pravkdey 4 months ago
Sound is the transmission of a vibration through matter. In other words, it is the movement of an oscillation through matter. This occurs regardless of our existence, let alone our ability to audibly hear it (as sounds do exist outside of our very limited audible range of roughly 20 -20,000 Hz). The answer to the philosophical question involving a tree falling in a forest making a sound is not a moot point, but a resounding (pun intended), yes.
HotblackDesiat042 4 months ago 4
The stupid question of "if a tree falls, does it make a sound?" pisses me off. Philosophical questions like that are pointless. John's answer of sound not being a wave is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. The fact that sound is a wave is how we know where the sound came from. It's also why it's harder to tell where low frequency sounds come from. Our ears don't turn sound into a wave.
TheBrontolith 4 months ago 3
@TheBrontolith I think that fellow was trying to be interesting a bit too hard.Don't let it get to you.In fact, I'm pretty sure that the fact with the birds flying of the truck and the truck being the same weight is actually wrong as well.
IsaakTheGreek 4 months ago
that butter side up law only works if the table is high enough. if you let it fall from a higher or lower table, it doesnt work
beex85 4 months ago
Mr Producer Man is so damn serious... what an ass
TheMrEllipsis 5 months ago
and now Amy Winehouse
khasab 5 months ago
Doh, was so ready to find a siamese cat and toss it in the firdge. But then he said it would take weeks :\
I'd deal with a couple days, but weeks? I'm not cruel.
knuckleskills 6 months ago
There's an enormous number of moles in Ireland. In fact there's an enormous number of moles in everything.
Oh, maybe he meant the animal.
dunbar9finger 6 months ago
Johnny Vegas usually comes across as a bit dumb, but here he showed up John Llyod quite well with his comment about the speed of sound. There cannot be ANY such thing as a "speed of sound" unless "sound" is the wave in the air, NOT the sensation of the listener. The same goes for John Llyod's comment about light. Light is the wave, not the mental sensation it produces, otherwise "speed of light" cannot be a thing to measure, and we couldn't talk about a "light year".
dunbar9finger 6 months ago 5
Point to the ceiling. Extend your thumb. Your left index and thumb make an L. Obviously that wouldn't work with aliens, as they would probably not know our alphabet, but it's the mnemonic I was taught.
franglaise 6 months ago
can't you tell right from left by the spin of electrons in different states?
Iamgercornholio 6 months ago
@Iamgercornholio How can anything be spinning right, or left. If one part of it is spinning from your right to your left, then the opposite side of it must be spinning from your left to your right. People always say spinning to the right when they should say "clockwise".
Selinor578 1 week ago
And newest in the 27 club is Amy Winehouse,wow
edwardhjt 7 months ago
Comment removed
Adii30 7 months ago
I've never got the 'tree falling doesn't make a sound cuz no one's there to hear it' bit cuz even if sound isn't physical, it's still there to travel from the source till it dissipates. To me i've always looked at it like 'Well then does it work on other condiments? Like is a Pie still a pie if no one's there to eat it?' Bad analogy i know but it just irks me slightly.
JakenJragin 7 months ago 3
@JakenJragin I think you're right there.
You can [i]feel[/i] sound. It's how some deaf people can enjoy music.
And of course light is invisible. It's part of the Electromagnetic Spectrum, all of which are invisible like X-Rays or Radio Waves. Silly John.
doctortehe 7 months ago
I think Johnny's thought on the tree would be close to Schrodinger's cat
Psycho5275 8 months ago
@Psycho5275 I never fully grasped the significance of Schroedinger's cat. They say at any one point while the cat is inside, he can be considered to be both alive and dead. No he can't. He's either dead or alive at any point, even though right at that point we outside the box don't know which.
Selinor578 1 week ago
@Selinor578
Well Exactly, Schrodinger did this as a thought experiment. He was using it to sort of disprove the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics.
Psycho5275 1 week ago
what type of heartless bastard would say no to a last request like that?
Piatasify 8 months ago
"nearest galaxy is 4 lightyears away"? lmao! try 25,000 lightyears (Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy)
the nearest galaxy similar to the Milky Way (spiral in shape) is Andromeda which is about 2.4million lightyears away
nikobrown1990 8 months ago
One of my favorite things in QI is that zenlike stillness that descends whenever Johnny Vegas says something.
ELuhn 8 months ago 10
would an animals ear count as receiving the noise? so the tree would actually make a noise
LightbulbExploded 9 months ago
minus 27?!?!?!
theoriginalshaun 9 months ago
Um, hate to say this, but I think Vegas' idea would actually work, pretty well actually.
tangent272 9 months ago
Has series I even started yet?
Syrick 9 months ago
This is one special episode! Not overly entertaining, but quite interesting. :)
darijoe 9 months ago
And thank you again for posting!!
ffabris 9 months ago
Jeez people, stop arguing over the definition of "sound". There are multiple definitions of the word that are correct. Just because you like one definition best doesn't mean it's the only one.
Preeemo 9 months ago 3
Quite apart from the fact that sound is the vibration of air, regardless of experience, the whole question just reeks of Human arrogance. Just because YOU didn't hear it didn't mean that NOBODY heard it. How many thousands of bugs heard that tree crashing down on them? Birds? Mice? Lizards?
artgoat 9 months ago 3
I didn't know Sandi Tosvig was a Hufflepuff.
doctortehe 9 months ago 9
@doctortehe ha ha, well spotted ;)
emmaskov 9 months ago
This is possibly the best theme a QI episode ever had.
StKildaFan 9 months ago
telling an alien left and right. use 2-d map compass.
danspawn85 9 months ago
The nearest galaxy? The nearest star?
Vynjira 9 months ago
love vegas
everything he says sounds completely mental :P
digydigdogdead 9 months ago
they just don't stop comming into the box! i'm fricking loving it!!! thx from a belgian guy who is so happy he can watch qi on youtube!
ishopinamsterdam 9 months ago 2
What about all the animals in the forest. Just because no human is around to hear the tree fall doesn't mean no one hears it. Typical human arrogance.
aliejoseph1 9 months ago
@aliejoseph1 you are so right i've been thinking that since i first heard that question :p
ishopinamsterdam 9 months ago
sleep for school...or Qi.....Qi.
digydigdogdead 9 months ago
Yes. The sound still exists. Dog whistles. We can't hear them but we know they do in fact make a sound. If you say 'no', then ultraviolet light doesn't exist. After all, its not really light if nobody sees it, right?
ikpts 9 months ago
@ikpts
i agree with your 'sound exists' answer, but you can't really compare sound to light. sound is waves caught by hairs, while light is... either particle or wave, both invisible themselves, but capable of reflecting(thereby forming color).
homerfromhelI 9 months ago
@homerfromhelI True. While not directly comparable I still think it serves as a good example to show the fallacy of "If humans don't observe it, then it doesn't exist" which always annoys me. :D
ikpts 9 months ago
I tested Johnny's statement the other day, I lost 300 grams.
fritspas 9 months ago
haha I love Sandy's glass-eye story :D
alittlehorse 9 months ago 7
Every time I’ve watched this episode, short version or long, John’s arrogance that he’s right about sound and any other answer is wrong has bugged me. So I love Stephen disagreeing with him and I LOVE Johnny's response. "Go on, Steve! Go on! You've got him!" John doesn't look particularly pleased but I am so, oh well. :)
Punatik 9 months ago 5
What about smells?
shimauma 9 months ago
A duck's quack does indeed echo... It just sounds so similar to a normal quack, that it can't be distinguished by the human ear :)
(Thank you Mythbusters!)
Zugrim 9 months ago
Bless you John Lloyd!
richiebabe24 9 months ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
Johnny Vegas ruins every episode he's in.
He's right about sound. Sound is interpreted vibrations. It has to be interpreted by some form of brain.
They call them sound waves because that's how they are interpreted.
KalypticBass 9 months ago
@KalypticBass Does that mean sound waves of certain frequencies are only sound depending on who listens to them? There are certainly some sounds which older ears cannot hear, or even sounds which are audible to different species but not to us. And then what about recorded sound waves, does that register as interpretation to you?
shimauma 9 months ago
@shimauma when i said some kind of Brain, i should have said anything that interprets them, as in an animal or a recording device which interprets waves as sound.
Sound is the interpretation of vibrations. We call those vibrations SOUND waves simply because that's how we interpret them . The question isn't about "Sound waves" it is about sounds .And yes it may sound different for every person who hears it.
You dont know if the colour green looks the same to you as it does to everyone else.
KalypticBass 9 months ago
@KalypticBass No. Sound is the vibrations, not interpretation of the vibration. The frequency of the vibration must be from 20 Hz to 20 kHz and the amplitude over 1 dB. The tree in the forest most certainly produces sound whether or not there is someone to hear it.
anttipk 9 months ago
@anttipk Sound is like an image. Light when interpreted becomes an image Image Vibrations when interpreted become Sound
KalypticBass 9 months ago
Surely you can distinguish right from left by reference to a common chiral molecule?
Visionism 9 months ago
Haha I loved Allan at the beginning lol Clapping half heatedly for himself.
bullseyegurl 9 months ago
It seems to be, every time I come back from the pub, and new episode is up. No wonder i keep waking up spooning my laptop.
MaZonrcb 9 months ago 5
johnny is the greatest person on this show EVER
Jimmy171194 9 months ago
WOOP WOOP put all else to a side and chill with fry and allan :)
thelemur 9 months ago 31
@thelemur sounds better if you rap that like a gangsta as they say WOOP WOOP put all else to the side--and jus kick it with alan and fry hahaha
SoundscapeRising 6 months ago
and another... well I am not going to get any sleep... :D
tubewontletmepost 9 months ago 66
@tubewontletmepost don't think i could sleep after the horrible on 8-0
CairoDuqane 9 months ago