Clues for the Clueless Trivia Quiz

Answer: One

Unlike the hearts of mammals and birds, a fish's heart pumps only oxygen-depleted blood and thus has only one atrium and one ventricle. From the heart, the blood is routed first to the gills where it is oxygenated before being circulated to all other organs.

Answer: Tabitha

In spite of the little direct information we have about Abigail, she's the first kitten whose age we can find out: Behemoth, Tabitha and Jupiter are all explicitly ruled out of being the youngest. Church's age is even (thus not 3), Heacate can't be youngest or oldest ("between") and if Greebo were 3, Abigail would need to be 5. Thus, Abigail is 3 and Greebo is 5.

Now for 4: Since the 3 is neither Church nor Tabitha, Heacate can't be 4. Neither can Church, because Behemoth must be younger. Thus, Behemoth is 4.

This leaves 6 or 8 for Church and 7, 8 or 9 for Jupiter. Tabitha can't be 7 since this would not leave any "between" for Heacate.

Heacate can't be 6 or 9 (due to the "between" clause) nor 8 (since that would leave only 7 or 9 for Jupiter). Thus, Heacate is 7 and Jupiter is 9.

Finally, Church must be closer in age to Jupiter than to Tabitha, thus he is 8 and Tabitha is 6.

The picture clue was sneaky: The name Tabitha is the Aramaic word for gazelle.

Answer: Initials

The common link between these four celebrities are the initials J L: The Beatle is John Lennon (Oct 8, 1940 - Dec 8, 1980), the game show host was Jim Lange (August 15, 1932 - Feb 25, 2014), "Let's Get Loud" was a mostly European hit for Jennifer Lopez (born July 24, 1969) and "White Fang" is one of the most famous novels of nature-loving author Jack London (January 12, 1876 - November 22, 1916).

While the last three are all Americans, John Lennon was English through and through.

Answer: Six correct

Did you notice the track shape of the rollercoaster? Even if not, German Lotto, like many European lotteries, uses the "6 of 49" formula - you pick six numbers and need to match all six to get a big prize - for the jackpot, you will additionally match to have the correct last digit of the ticket. Seven correct numbers were required in the "7 of 38" formula played on Wednesdays for several years. 10 out of 13 (currently) or 9 out of 11 (previously) are the minimum to win anything at the soccer-based Toto - you need to correctly predict the winner (home, away or tie) on that many games to even gain the smallest payoff.

Answer: A team

You do not need a ball to play ice hockey which uses a puck instead - although the summer sport field hockey, a similar game played on natural or artificial turf, uses a ball. Cycling can be fun in a team and you would need to be in one to take part in some professional races. Tennis is not a team sport, there are only singles (one player per side) and doubles (two players per side).

Answer: Comment

The Latin word "commentum" - itself derived from "cum" (with) and "mens" (mind) - covers a significant spectrum of different meanings, all related to things created by the human mind. It expresses concepts from fiction in the literary sense all the way to designs and technological inventions.

The image shows some well-commented software - in professional software development, you can often find more lines of comments than of actual code; that way, later coders looking at something done by a different person can (hopefully) understand it quickly.

Answer: Global

I hope you didn't choose "building" just because of the picture - it actually shows the reconstruction of William Shakespeare's Globe Theatre. The most common scales used in describing geographical phenomena are the local, regional, national, continental and global scales. As geography only deals with our own planet, the cosmic scale is too large to fit this particular science.

Answer: 7

The ancient Roman kings were quite long-lived for the time, having had a reign averaging almost 35 years - and that in spite of the last two of them having been assassinated. The shortest reign, of Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, the last of the kings, lasted 25 years while his predecessor, Servius Tullus, lasted 44 years on the throne before being assassinated.

Answer: Challenge

While I suppose you could throw down a gauntlet to indicate a Scrabble challenge, the common way to declare one is simply to say the word "challenge". If the word so challenged is actually illegal, the player must take it back and loses the turn while the consequences for a wrong challenge (made against a legal word) vary according to agreed upon rules: The standard rules indicate no penalty, but this has proven to cause excessive challenges in tournaments. Thus, tournaments tend to either give a points penalty (5 or 10) for an unsuccessful challenge or even apply the loss of turn penalty to the challenger.

The latter however results in a high reluctance to challenge and thus players sometimes try "bluff" words which they actually know to be illegal but look plausible enough to possibly go unchallenged.

Answer: Profile

Portraits are classified as full face (frontal and symmetrical), three-quarter view (showing the face from diagonally forward, with both eyes visible) or profile (showing the side of the face, centering on the cheek, and having only one visible eye). Most artistic portraits use the three-quarter view which allows the artist to create a lively, asymmetric composition, while still well showing the facial expression.

Some portrait paintings combine all three possible views in a so-called triple portrait; those were often commissioned not so much for their own value but to provide a reference for a sculptor to work from.

Answer: Thread

Pern was colonized by space travelers who were looking to leave behind technology and start a simpler life on a new world in a pseudo-medieval feudal society. The world seemed habitable and friendly at first, but every four hundred years, the constellation of planets in the system led to a fungus-like, aggressive life form called Thread transferring from a gas giant onto Pern where it would fall from the skies, rapidly burning soil and plants if it touched the ground. To combat this menace, the Pernese settlers bred and modified a race of small indigenous fire-breathing flying lizards into dragons large enough to carry a rider and burn the falling Thread out of the sky.

Answer: Halloween

Originally conceived and directed by horror genius John Carpenter, the "Halloween" franchise began in 1978 and has since then seen ten movies done by eight different directors. Rick Rosenthal, director of "Halloween II" in 1981, returned 21 years later to direct the eighth installment "Halloween: Resurrection" which also ended the original story arc.

The ninth film, directed by the aptly named Rob Zombie and published in 2007, was a remake of the very first installment, also simply titled "Halloween". Zombie produced a "Halloween II" which, in spite of some similarities, did not closely follow the 1981 movie but represents a rather different continuation.

Answer: Score

The word "score" is derived from the old English "scora" meaning "notch", hinting back at the early ways to notate music - the shape of musical notes, evolved from the early square and rectangular heads, still traces its origins these earliest notations as well.

A conductor's score showing all parts is often also referred to as a "full score" to distinguish it from other notation that do still use several staves but do not show every single voice, such as shortened scores (each important melodic line is given a staff, but instruments playing in unison are combined) or piano scores (which keep vocal parts intact but reduce the orchestral parts to music playable by a reasonably competent solo pianist).

Answer: Titles

In spite of often being thought of as a ruthless ruler (an error caused by the term "Macchiavellian"), Niccolò Machiavelli (3 May 1469 - 21 June 1527) was actually neither a ruler nor ruthless. He was actually an advisor to and officer in the Republican Florentine government.

His work "The Prince", from which the term "Macchiavellian ruler" is derived, was actually a review and critique of Cesare Borgia, who, after coming to power through the influence of his father, Pope Alexander VI, ruled his duchy in a style that was popular with the common subjects yet ruthless and cruel towards anyone who opposed him.

Answer: exactly

Psalm 50 is a short address from God to the people of the Earth, split into two sections, one to the virtuous and the other to the wicked. In the first part, addressing the Israelites, God speaks about the offerings (animal sacrifices) and how they are to be seen - not as something needed for God, but as a sign of thankfulness and adherence to the vows.

In the second part, from which the quoted passage was taken, he addresses the sinners by recounting their sins and then stating that just because evil acts were not immediately met with a reaction, this does not mean God would condone or tolerate them.

Answer: 38 seconds

While the winning times for the relay fluctuated quite a bit across the 44 years covered by the questions - from the slowest time of 38.33 seconds achieved in 1976 (Montreal) to the fastest of 36.84 seconds achieved in 2012 (London), third place times remained far more constant with all of them being in the 38s.

The fastest bronze medal in these years was attained at Sydney 2000 with 38.04 seconds by the Cuban quartet and the slowest was 38.79 seconds, run at the 1972 Munich games by the West German squad.

Answer: The last digit

Just from knowing that 6 x 6 = 36 and any multiple of 10 ends in -0, we can actually do a formal proof of this using a very simple application of an important principle:

First, we notice that if we take any number that ends in -6, it can be written as 10x + 6. If we multiply that by 6, we get 60x + 36 which also ends in 6.

With this step (assuming something is true for one number and proving it for the next one in a sequence), we can now apply a principle called complete induction: If we can prove something (a) for the first element in a sequence and we can also prove (b) that if it is true for one element, it will also be true for the next one, we have proven it for all elements. So by observing that (a) 6^1 = 6 ends in 6 and (b) 6 times any number ending in 6 ends in 6, we have fulfilled both induction requirements.

This is an extremely simple example for complete induction, but the principle can also be used to successfully prove very complex theorems.

Answer: Cake

"Cake Boss" is a TLC reality show following the actual events at a bake shop in New Jersey. It began its run in 2009 and saw six seasons (of significantly varying episode counts from 13 to 38) up to February 2014. The series then went on hiatus for more then a year, but was renewed for two additional seasons beginning September 2015.

A spin-off entitled "Next Great Baker" invited candidates to compete in a format similar to casting shows for cash prizes and appearances in the main show. There have been four seasons of this show up to 2014 and the first three runs' winners have all appeared in regular "Cake Boss" episodes.

Answer: Three

Up to the early 1980s, most arcade video games had their settings controlled by DIP switches - small hardware switches located on the main circuit board. These settings were difficult to change in the field as a change meant powering down the game, opening the case, potentially disconnecting cables to reach the switches and then changing them. Thus, most games were run at the manufacturer-provided default settings and it was extremely rare to see a Ms. Pac Man with a number of lives other than 3 or the bonus life awarded later than the default 10,000 points. It was however possible to increase lives to 5 or decrease them to 2 or even 1.

Later games provided a software setup menu with the configuration stored in a small battery-powered storage chip. These were more easily changed, so it became far more common to see games set up for different difficulties, pricing and average game length.

Answer: Five stars

For a long time, the French hotel classification system only included 1-star to 4-star ratings. It was expanded to add a fifth star in 2012 to allow better differentiation in the luxury range. Five stars are a high honor by themselves and the corresponding rating plaque at the entrance bears gold stars instead of the red ones used at the four lower tiers to set apart these top establishments.

"Palace" is a rare designation awarded to hotels that fulfill all the criteria for the 5-star tier as well as providing at least one exceptional feature. These additional features could for example be a highly acclaimed restaurant, a luxurious spa or an unusual degree of personal service by top staff.