# ­xkcd thread **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** comic-strips\ **Created:** [May 28, 2020, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574 "2020-05-28T00:57:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 177
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2024, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3523 "2024-10-16T01:33:10Z")
I am glad there are chemo-wackos in the world. I would not choose to be one as much as I enjoy reading of their energetic exploits. ---
**Author:** ![GaryM](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/garym/32/241_2.png) [@GaryM](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GaryM)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2024, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3524 "2024-10-16T12:59:13Z")
> [@74westy](#): > > Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should The premise of many Sci Fi movies. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2024, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3525 "2024-10-16T13:26:48Z")
And one hell of a lot of real life. ---
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2024, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3526 "2024-10-16T13:29:32Z")
> [@74westy](#): > > Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should. Just so long as the don’t say, “And to think, they called me mad!” or “Fools! I’ll show them!” ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2024, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3527 "2024-10-16T23:35:46Z")
One of my kids is getting a doctorate in “Mad Scientist”. So I say things like this… > [@74westy](#): > > Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should … in ‘Fifties Sci-Fi Narrator Voice’. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2024, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3528 "2024-10-16T23:41:32Z")
> **[A Tall Tail - Reactor](https://reactormag.com/a-tall-tail/)** > > This year for Tor.com's birthday, we're initiating a tradition of Rocket Stories! For this inaugural year, enjoy an exclusive read of "A Tall Tail" by Charles Stross a week before it appears on the site! (One of the perks of being a registered user... > “First, there’s an oxidizing agent that’s even nastier than chlorine trifluoride.” Dr Hansen grinned. “It’s called FOOF, dioxygen difluoride. You make it by reacting liquid fluorine and liquid oxygen in a cryogenic steel reaction vessel under X-ray bombardment. I say ‘you’ make it because I’m not stupid enough to go anywhere near the stuff myself. I hear they cancel your life insurance if they catch wind that you’re working with it. FOOF is unstable and tends to explode if you let it get much warmer than the boiling point of liquid nitrogen, or if you look at it funny. It’s mostly used in producing uranium hexafluoride from—” he coughed. “Well, anyway, it’s a _great_ oxidizing agent!” > > Jim nodded wisely. “Happy fun stuff. But you’d need a fuel to burn in it, right?” > > “Yes! And we had just the stuff sitting on the shelf in the glove box, so to speak. Dimethylmercury.” ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3529 "2024-10-17T00:13:31Z")
I _love_ that book. And IANA chemist. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3530 "2024-10-17T00:38:21Z")
> **[Bad Map Projection: The United Stralia](https://xkcd.com/2999/)** > > This projection distorts both area and direction, but preserves Melbourne. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3531 "2024-10-17T13:04:49Z")
Sounds like the next invasive species destined for the Everglades is the Tasmanian Devil. I hope they’re good at eating snakes. Unrelated second idea: I wonder what the night sky looks like from that country? Or maybe it’s always both day and night there. And also always both winter & summer. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3532 "2024-10-17T13:06:52Z")
I am uneasy about the intrusion of the Northern Territory into Saskatchewan. I like my boundaries nice and straight, thankyouverymuch. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3533 "2024-10-17T13:17:29Z")
That is a suspiciously large salient, isn’t it? OTOH, perhaps you can view it another way, where that tip-top cape east of Darwin is actually at the current Canadian border and you nice folks have suddenly got a big slice west-south-westward all the way to the Pacific into what was previously northern Washington and Montana. Plus a monstrous big southward bite to the east into the traditional Michigan, Ohio, New York area. Heck, some of your new territory might be far enough south to not freeze at all year round. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3534 "2024-10-17T14:39:08Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > I am uneasy about the intrusion of the Northern Territory into Saskatchewan. No worries, then. Canada got squeezed into New Guinea (New Guinada?). ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3535 "2024-10-17T14:40:08Z")
Complete with palm trees and cute Asian people. What’s not to like? ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3536 "2024-10-17T14:48:23Z")
A couple more hurricanes and Florida is going to look like it does on that map. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3537 "2024-10-17T15:07:15Z")
With the Tampa Strait in-between. 😁 ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3538 "2024-10-17T15:51:13Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > A couple more hurricanes and Florida is going to look like it does on that map. If Bugs Bunny doesn’t get there first. ---
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3539 "2024-10-17T17:31:11Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Sounds like the next invasive species destined for the Everglades is the Tasmanian Devil. I hope they’re good at eating snakes. Let me check: > [@Looney Toons](#): > > A strong murderous beast, jaws as powerful as a steel trap - has ravenous appetite - eats tigers, lions, elephants, buffaloes, donkeys, giraffes, octopuses, rhinoceroses, moose, ducks, and rabbits. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3540 "2024-10-17T17:49:17Z")
Rabbits!!! Oh shiiiiit! Or at least so says Bugs. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3541 "2024-10-17T18:52:09Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Complete with palm trees and cute Asian people. What’s not to like? No snow! Deal-breaker, right there. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2024, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574/3542 "2024-10-17T19:35:40Z")
I don’t think typhoons go that far south. Perth is north of LA? Nope. South of LA, north of San Diego, close to Long Beach. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574.md?page=176) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/xkcd-thread/854574.md?page=178)