What Moves the World Trivia Quiz

Answer: Hunger and Love

"Hunger and love are what move the world", wrote Friedrich von Schiller (1759-1805) in his poem "The Philosophers", and Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) quoted him to postulate his theory of two major drives in human sexuality. The Austrian psychiatrist first mentioned the concept of hunger and love in "The Interpretation of Dreams", the ground-breaking work he published in 1899. Hunger - the drive for self-preservation - he claimed to be synonymous with the libido or sexual need of the individual, whereas love represented the impulse of conservation of species, with the focus on the search for satisfaction and pleasure rather than on an act of reproduction.

Answer: Alexander Calder

The use of the word "mobile" for Alexander Calder's kinetic sculptures originated with French artist Marcel Duchamp in 1931.
A pioneering figure in modern art, Calder (1898-1976) explored the aesthetic resources of all possible materials, using them to create free-moving, hanging compositions of all dimensions, from miniature objects to monumental installations. They are set in motion variously by air currents or engines, and assume a different shape at every new movement.
Calder created a great number of non-moving sculptures as well, called "Stabiles".

Answer: Axel

Among the six different types of jumps that are common in competitive figure skating, the Axel is considered the most difficult, because it requires great physical power and the ability to turn very fast.
It is the only jump which begins facing forward. It can also be done as a double jump with two and a half revolutions in the air, or as a triple jump with three and a half revolutions.
Some skaters need years to master an Axel, but cleanly landed double or triple Axels are indispensable requirements in world-class competitions.
So far, no skater has ever landed a quadruple Axel in competitions, though some have tried it during practice.

Answer: Galileo Galilei

"E pur si muove!" ("And yet, it moves!") Whether or not Galileo would have been bold enough to threaten such a powerful body as the Roman Inquisition has not been proved. He was tired and ill, and an accusation of heresy might have meant a death sentence.

He pled guilty to a lesser charge, abjured his heliocentric statements, and offered to refute in a new book the theories of Nicholas Copernicus that he had defended in his "Dialogue on the Two Chief Systems of the World". In return, his jail sentence was commuted to house arrest. Galileo (1564-1642) was an astronomer, physicist, mathematician and philosopher.

His investigative methods laid the foundations for modern science in many fields. Not only did he formulate the laws of inertia and falling bodies, but he also invented the thermometer, as well as building the first complete astronomical telescope, with which he made many significant discoveries.

Answer: Popemobile

It is well-known that Pope John Paul II disliked the word "Popemobile", which he considered "undignified" (and one can't really blame him). Nevertheless, today the term has become familiar everywhere, with slight variations in other languages: "Papamobile" in Italian and French, "Papamobil" in German, "Pausmobiel" in Dutch, "Papamóvil" in Spanish, etc.
All cars used during the pope's public appearances are especially designed to allow maximum visibility, many of them with a special platform for him to sit or stand on. Some popemobiles have bullet-proof glass, others are open-air, the choice depending on the degree of security required, and on the speed of travel.
Many popemobiles have been manufactured by Mercedes Benz, but other car companies have contributed as well, such as Fiat, Ford, and Range Rover.

Answer: Castling

During castling, the player moves the king two squares toward either rook, and the rook is advanced to the square on the other side of the king.
Castling is a special defence strategy. Its goal is to put the king in a more secure position, while giving the rook a more active role in the centre of the board.
Castling is permitted only once in a game for each side, and must meet precise conditions. It is only possible if the king and the rook haven't been previously moved from their original positions; if no other pieces are between the king and the rook; if the king is not in check; or if it would not be in check after castling.

Answer: Swan Lake

One of the most beloved ballets ever created, "Swan Lake" by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky tells the story of young Prince Siegfried and his love for Odette - a beautiful princess who is doomed by the spell of a wicked sorcerer to live as a swan during daylight. Only the love of a truthful man can end the enchantment. Siegfried's attempts to rescue his beloved are hindered by Odile, Odette's perfidious and seductive double, who makes him break his vows of faithfulness, causing Odette's death
The roles of Odette, the white swan, and Odile, the black swan, are traditionally performed by the same prima ballerina. A virtuosistic high point of the ballet is Odile's execution of 32 "fouettés en tournant" in the coda of what is generally known as the "Black Swan Pas de Deux".
A turning fouetté - from the French "to whip" - is a classical ballet step in which a quick whipping movement with an upraised leg makes the body turn around.

Answer: A long enough lever

"Give me a lever long enough and a place to stand, and I will move the world", famously stated Archimedes (285 BC-212 BC). After countless experiments, he proved beyond doubt the power of the lever: an elementary machine consisting of a rigid bar pivoted on a fixed point - the fulcrum - which can be used to move an object at one end by applying a force on the other end. Archimedes' inventions and discoveries are innumerable, and countless also are the stories recounting how he came about them. One of the most famous legends reports that he discovered the principle of buoyancy while taking a bath, and was so excited that he ran naked down the streets of Syracuse shouting: "Eureka!" (I have found it!)

Answer: Maelstrom

It was Edgar Allan Poe who introduced this Nordic word into the English language, in his tale "A Descent into the Maelstrom".
The term "maelstrom" is borrowed from the Dutch "maalstrom", meaning "grinding current". The original maelstrom, which excited the imagination of Poe and many other authors, is the Moskstraumen, a powerful tidal whirlpool in the Lofoten Islands, off the northern coast of Norway.
Many fictional descriptions romanticised and exaggerated the violence of the Norwegian current, transforming it into a terrifying vortex. One example is to be found in Jules Verne's "Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea", where the author describes the Lofoten Maelstrom as "a whirlpool from which no vessel ever escapes".

Answer: Konstantin Stanislavsky

Konstantin Stanislavsky (1863-1938) founded the Moscow Art Theatre, the first ensemble theatre in Russia. He was one of the greatest pioneers of modern theatre, and invented the concept of "stage direction".
His method aimed at the development of a total identification on the part of the actors - both emotional and intellectual - with the characters they had to embody. This required the ability to recall their personal experiences and emotions, the achievement of a strict inner discipline, and a perfect control of their physical movements and voices.
Stanislavsky's theories and his perspective on acting have been a primary source of inspiration for many famous teachers and actors of our days, such as Lee Strasberg, Marlon Brando, Robert de Niro, Dustin Hoffman and many others.

Answer: Marlin

Marlins are large game fishes of the genera Makaira and Tetrapterus. They are related to sailfish and spear-fish, and are, with them, the fastest creatures of the seas. There are several species of marlin, the most common ones being the blue, the black, the striped and the white.
"The Old Man and The Sea" by Ernest Hemingway - a novella written in Cuba and published in 1951 - recounts a three-day struggle between a giant marlin and the ageing Cuban fisherman Santiago in the Gulf of Mexico. It is a mythic fight that has been primarily interpreted as the fight of every human being against fate.
As for any great work of literature, though, critics have proposed all manner of interpretations of Hemingway's tale, and have meticulously explored all its symbols and metaphors.

Answer: Robert Brown

Robert Brown (1773-1858) was one of the pre-eminent botanists of his time, but he is best remembered for a physical phenomenon he discovered in 1827: the so-called Brownian motion. Providing proof of the existence of molecules and atoms for the first time, his discovery was a historical event.
While examining under a microscope some pollen grains immersed in water, Brown noticed that the tiny particles jiggled about in a continuous irregular motion. He observed other substances as well - both living and inert - and the movement remained the same, so he concluded the motion had to be caused by a physical occurrence. He was unable, however, to explain what he saw.
It was Albert Einstein who first managed to do that, in his paper "On the Movement of Small Particles Suspended in Stationary Liquids Required by the Molecular-Kinetic Theory of Heat". Einstein suggested that the movement was due to invisible molecules of water colliding with the particles, and his conclusions were later confirmed in experiments by the French physicist Jean-Baptiste Perrin, Nobel prize winner for Physics in 1926.

Answer: Scherzo

The term "Scherzo" was first used in Italy at the beginning of the 17th century to denote a light and playful composition, either vocal or instrumental. In form, the Scherzo often resembled a Minuet, but with a quicker tempo and more vigorous character.

In the 18th century, it gradually came to replace the Minuet as the second or third movement of a symphony, sonata, or chamber work, and it was widely used by Beethoven, Schubert or Bruckner through the entire 19th century. Later, other composers such as Brahms and Chopin began to write Scherzi as independent pieces, greatly stretching the boundaries of the genre. Frédéric Chopin's well-known examples for piano are so forceful and dramatic that they prompted Robert Schumann to ask, "How is gravity to clothe itself if jest goes about in dark veils?"

Answer: Indonesia

Indonesia's transmigration program, called "Transmigrasi", started under President Sukarno, and was intensified by his successor, President Suharto.
The stated aim of the project was to alleviate poverty on overcrowded islands of the Indonesian archipelago, such as Bali and Java, and to encourage landless people to move into more remote and sparsely inhabited areas, in order to better exploit their natural resources, and to contribute to their economic development. Some million people transmigrated during those years.
The initiative, though, was criticised by many sides, and created numerous conflicts between indigenous populations and the new settlers. Moreover, the resulting wide deforestation of many areas has been considered an environmental disaster.

Answer: Everything flows

All things are in a state of flux, nothing stands still, said Heraclitus, one of the most significant pre-Socratic philosophers.
Born in Ephesus around 540 BC to an aristocratic family, Heraclitus was known in the Greek world as "The Obscure" because of the cryptic and epigrammatic style of his statements. His melancholia, his pessimistic attitude, and his contempt for mankind additionally earned him the sobriquet of "weeping philosopher".
Heraclitus used the river as a metaphor for all things, and described the universe as a succession of transitory states. He viewed fire as both a symbol of this constant change and the primordial form of matter, and considered all other elements to be transformations of it.