This month, we have again snared the talent of guest cruciverbalist Roy Arnott. As a result, the May 2012 Skeptical Crossword comes in two versions: with standard clues and with cryptic clues. There’s an unusually large crop of Mixed Bag questions to mark Trivia month at Skeptics Café, and seven new Picture Puzzles. Click on the Puzzles tab at the top of the page.
1. a. Basic / sick bay; b. Welfare / farewell; c. Zero / rosy d. Germaine / manger
2. a. 6 Strings on a guitar; b. 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover; c. 4 Suits in a deck of cards; d. 1 Giant Leap for Mankind; e. 9 Lives of a Cat
3. Keeps an eye out for police
4. a hermit
5. John Stonehouse
6. Barbara Cartland
7. Prince Charles
8. Pnom Penh
9. Holding / storing liquids (oil or wine)
10. Jimmy Carter
11. Jimmy Hoffa
12. Fear of the number 13
13. Phar Lap (Australia’s most famous race-horse)
14. The Harbour Bridge
15. Wooden Heart
16. Five
17. Calculus
18. Aluminium
19. Octavian a.k.a Augustus
20. The Melbourne Cup
21. 1966
22. A free shot which your opponent allows you after you’ve made a bad shot
23. Bravo
24. Belgian
25. Tyro
Mixed Bag Puzzles, Picture Puzzles and the Crossword puzzle for April have been posted.
1. Benjamin Disraeli said “Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics“
Joseph Stalin said “One death is a tragedy. 10,000 deaths is a statistic“
Groucho Marx said “I wouldn’t want to join any club that would have me as a member”
Winston Churchill said “The honourable member has much to be modest about“
Neville Wran said “Balmain boys don’t cry“
Paul Keating said “This is a beautiful set of numbers“
2. (a) Letters (b) They are a musical quartet
3. Peter Finch, Geoffrey Rush
4. The Defenders
5. Paracetamol
6. I’ve Never Been to Me
7. a. excited
8. horse
9. Up Pompeii
10. Tightrope walking
1. Middle Age Spread
2. Friday the Thirteenth
3. Black Hawk Down
4. Point blank range
5. Cantankerous
6. No mucking around
7. Gear Shift
1. Assaulted Peanut
2. Melancholy Baby
3. Encyclopedia
4. Parting company
5. Split second timing
6. Bestiality
7. Paradox
1. Suspended Animation
2. Reigning Cats & Dogs
3. Snowboarders
4. Loose Lips Sink Ships
5. Dandelions
6. Palm Pilot
7. Hurry up and settle down
When naturalists started examining the Earth in the 18th century for evidence of its age, they were to a large extent seeking to confirm the suggestion of the Bible that the Earth was several thousand years old; but the closer they looked, the less certain they were that this was the correct answer.
Geologists examined the rocks across Britain, and noted that the same sequence of rocks occurred in different places, suggesting that the rocks had a common source. They also noticed that different levels of rocks contained different groups of fossils, including fossils of animals different from those of today, and not mentioned in the Bible. Yet the fossils were in similar orders in different locations. Rocks were also classified according to how they were made, and by the order in which they’d been created. In the first case, rocks were classified as sedimentary, igneous or metamorphic. Sedimentary rocks are rocks created by grains of mud or sand laid down over the years on lake or sea floors, and compressed into rock by the weight of material lying above them. Igneous rocks are rocks of volcanic origin. Some are from lava which has cooled solid on the surface of the Earth (such as basalt), while others have cooled while still inside the Earth (such as granite), and emerged after they’d solidified. Metamorphic rocks are rocks (usually sedimentary) which have been altered by heat or pressure (such as limestone being converted to marble). View More A Skeptic’s Guide to The Age of the Earth
