How Fast? Trivia Quiz

Answer: 1674 km/hr

To calculate this, we need to know the circumference of the earth at the equator. This is 40,070 km. The earth makes a revolution once a day. A day is 24 hours (to be exact, 23 hours 56 minutes 04. 09053 seconds). Once we know the circumference and time required for one revolution, we can simply divide 40,070/24. This gives us 1674.66km/hr.

So even when you're standing still you are breaking the sound barrier (but not relative to the earth which is your frame of reference).

The next time you get asked "Did the Earth move for you?" you can truthfully answer, "As always".

Answer: 1,225 km/hr

Sound is carried on pressure waves set up in the air (or another medium) by some sort of vibration generator (Mother-in-Law's vocal cords, stereo speakers etc). This means that the speed of sound will vary according to air pressure which, in turn, is influenced by altitude, barometric pressure and air temperature. The higher the pressure the faster sound will travel.

The speed of sound was first broken in an aeroplane by Chuck Yeager (USA) on October 14, 1947. The speed of sound was first broken in a ground vehicle on 15 October 1997, in a vehicle driven by Briton Andy Green. The vehicle was called the ThrustSSC ("Super Sonic Car"). I referred to it as a "vehicle" as the idea of a jet engine on wheels stretches the concept of a car too much for me. The speed of sound is measured in Mach number after the Czech/Austrian physicist and philosopher Ernst Mach.

Answer: He can run the pants off a kangaroo.

It's probably not going to make it onto anyone's list of the best tunes of all time, but "Old Man Emu" is certainly a catchy tune.

"Well the kookaburra laughed and said It's true, oom ba da little da da da,
Ha Ha Ha Ha Hah Hoo, He can run the pants off a kangaroo"

A wombat is a slow moving, burrowing marsupial. A Holden Commodore is the wombat of the automotive world- slow moving, heavy and clumsy unless you spend megabucks on customisation and don't attempt to go around corners. They sell a variant in the US as a Pontiac (well they did until GM went belly up and dropped the Pontiac brand).

"Like a rat up a drainpipe" is an Australianism for fast. "He bolted like a rat up a drainpipe" means he left rather quickly. Not to be confused with "He shot through like a Bondi tram", which means pretty much the same thing but is more localised to Sydney.

Answer: The Hubble Constant

We do not know for sure what the value of the Hubble constant is. All of the estimates that astronomers make contain uncertainties. It's not like we can stand outside of the universe with a metre stick and stop-watch and measure it after all. Generally, we assume the value to be between 50 and 100 km/s/Mpc, which means that for each Megaparsec (Mpc), galaxies appear to be receding at 50-100 km/s, one Mpc being equivalent to 3.2 million light years. The Hubble Constant is a pretty big number.

Avogadro's number is the number of atoms or molecules (depending on the structure of the matter being examined) in one mole of matter. From the definition of the mole, it is the number of atoms in exactly twelve grams of carbon-12. It's a very big number.

Quantum mechanics depends on energy existing in quanta of fixed size. The Planck Constant is a physical constant used to describe the sizes of these quanta (after Max Planck). It's a really small number.

When Einstein developed his field equations to determine the rate at which the universe is expanding, they didn't really work unless he included "The Cosmic Constant". It bothered him for the rest of his life that he had had to resort to such jiggery-pokerey. Recent work in the area of dark matter and dark energy tends to support the value old Albert assigned to his constant. So he knew it was needed but he didn't know why. I'm not sure how big a number this is though I am fairly certain it is bigger than a breadbox.

Answer: The sailfish

The sailfish has been clocked at 110 kph. Dolphins are good for about 40 kph and blue whales poke along at around 10 - 20 kph unless they are frightened when they might get up to 50 kph. Which raises the question - what on earth scares a blue whale? Maybe a sailfish swimming at 110 kph and poking the whale in the backside with its pointy nose.

I've got no idea how fast a cheetah can swim, but I doubt that it's very fast given that they are adapted for running not swimming (or Intelligently Designed for the religionists).

Answer: Alvin Lee

In 1969, the New Musical Express nominated Alvin Lee as the fastest guitarist in the world. At Woodstock, Alvin and his band, 10 Years After, blew everyone away with the machine gun riffs of I'm Going Home.

In my opinion, and nearly everyone else's, Jimi Hendrix was the best rock/blues guitarist of all time. Who can forget his two hour set early on Monday morning? Jimi was fast, but he was more known for his over driven amps, 'wah wah' and bends. Listen to "Are You Experienced?" and you keep asking yourself who the other two guitarists playing with Jimi are. The truth is that it's just Jimi with one guitar on a single track.

Pete Townsend and The Who put on a major theatrical performance at Woodstock. Flying microphones, Pete's windmilling arms and Keith Moon's manic drumming. Pete was known for his chord work rather than his speed.

Eric Clapton did not play at Woodstock although Paul McCartney says he was in the audience and tuned Jimi Hendrix' guitar. Sounds like an Internet myth to me. At the time, Eric would have been too busy chasing after Pattie Boyd Harrison.

Answer: Vincent Black Shadow

The Vincent Black Shadow was designed by Australian Phil Irving and had a 1000cc v-twin engine. Top speed was approaching 150 mph - on girder forks and drum brakes. Only a few hundred were made and you'll need deep pockets to buy one these days and lots of guts to ride the thing at speed.

Harley Davidsons are known for a lot of things, but speed ain't one of them.

The Speedtwin was a good reliable 500cc parallel twin. It was more of a Gentleman's Motorcycle than anything else. The "speed" in its name was more marketing than reality.

Indians were sort of "Harleys for the connoisseur" until they went broke. The brand survived for a while in the US when Royal Enfields were imported from England and branded as Indians. Unfortunately Royal Enfield itself went broke in the 1960s and that was the end of that. Interestingly the Royal Enfield stock and tooling was bought by a concern in India (the real India next door to Pakistan) who still makes Enfields to this day. They are known as "Indian Enfield" and should not be confused with the Royal Enfields branded as Indian for the US market. Like Harleys, Indians weren't particularly fast unless seriously worked and even then they were only good in a straight line. Royal Enfields were also not particularly fast but they could go round corners.

Answer: They have blunt claws.

Cheetahs have evolved as very specialised runners and their claws do not retract in the manner of other cats' claws. This gives them improved traction when accelerating and changing direction on the run. It also means their claws wear down and lose any sharpness they may have had to start with.

Lions and leopards are ambush hunters and, as such, have evolved for stealth with retractable claws. This means they are good climbers. Leopards usually take their dead prey up a tree so that they don't get ripped off by lions or hyenas.

I doubt that cheetahs are afraid of heights. You need intelligence to be afraid, and cheetahs are cats and, by definition, lack any form of intelligence (when compared to any other multi-celled animal and most single celled ones).

Answer: Pronghorn

The Pronghorn (called an antelope, though strictly speaking not one) of North America can average speeds of up to 100 kph over a mile. A racehorse can average about 50 kph over a mile (but not the ones I bet on). A greyhound can get up to about 70 kph, but starts to slow down markedly after 500 metres or so (it takes them that long to realise the rabbit ain't real).

A cheetah is evolved for short and extremely fast bursts. They are anaerobic runners; that is, they do not use the oxygen they breathe while they are running. Human 100 metre sprinters are similar.

The cheetah can do 0 to 100 kph in under three seconds. This is faster than most sports cars and way faster than any Holden Commodore or Harley Davidson. So while a cheetah is the fastest runner, its average speed over a mile is lower than that of a pronghorn.

Answer: All of these answers are correct.

Einstein's famous equation, E=mc^2, tells us that energy (E), mass (m) and the speed of light (c) are directly related. It also tells that the speed of light is more than just a measurement, it is a constant built into the very fabric of the universe.

As we speed an object up close to light speed, its mass will increase rapidly; this means we will have to increase the energy we need to add to gain extra speed. At close to light speed, the whole thing goes exponential so that mass approaches infinity as light speed nears. If mass is going to infinity, then the energy needed to accelerate it also approaches infinity.

Another feature of relativistic speed is time dilation. As we approach light speed, time slows down for us. That means that if we have a pair of twins and send one off in a space ship, when he/she returns they will be younger than the twin that stayed behind. This was proven by sending an atomic clock across the Atlantic and back in Concorde. On its return, it showed a different time to its mate that stayed behind in England.

Freaky stuff, eh?