The Science of the Dark Trivia Quiz

Answer: Hadal zone

The euphotic zone is the highest zone of the ocean and usually less than 100 meters deep. The twilight zone actually is a zone in the ocean, also referred to as the disphotic zone, because of the low amounts of light that get through. The abyssal zone is in the aphotic zone 3,000-6,000 meters deep. And only in deep trenches will you find the 6,000-11,000 meters deep hadal zone, where very few creatures exist and generally in pure darkness (except for bioluminescence).

Answer: Umbra

The umbra is the darkest part of a shadow. In order for a shadow to occur you need to have a light source, a screen, and an object to cast the shadow. The penumbra is a partial shadow (partial eclipse) and the antumbra is farther behind the shadow where the penumbra crosses behind the umbra. The conumbra doesn't exist.

Answer: Melanism

Melanism gets its name from melanin, which is responsible for giving skin its color. People with a high concentration of melanin are shown to be less likely to develop skin cancer.

Answer: Bose-Einstein condensate

The Bose-Einstein condensate is a state of matter predicted by Einstein that would occur at extremely cold temperatures. Typical states of matter (from coldest to hottest) are: Bose-Einstein condensate, solid, liquid, gas, plasma, quark-gluon plasma. Other states of matter are odd, in-between states (amorphous solid) and highly exotic states difficult to recreate (degenerate matter).

Scientists in Germany have been able to stop light in a crystal for over a minute. This kind of technology could lead to quantum computing and advancing of the qubit. The qubit may replace typical 1's and 0's from ordinary computers and include a third position, which would make use of quantum effects, having 1&O in a state of superposition. This, theoretically, increases the speed of computing exponentially.

Answer: Dark matter

The universe is estimated to consist of 27% dark matter, far more than the observable matter that we are aware of. Dark matter's curious origins made it difficult to define, beginning with a collective agreement on what it is not. It has been ruled out to be ordinary matter such as planets and other non-luminous types of matter.

Answer: Event horizon

One way of detecting a black hole is from the gravitational lens effect, in which it is possible to detect farther celestial objects, magnified from the lensing effect of light being bent around a black hole. The photon sphere is the boundary where light orbits the black hole.

The ergosphere is the boundary where it is impossible to stay still near a black hole. Hawking radiation emits from a black hole and its limit was a term I made up.

Answer: Dark energy

Although dark energy has not been directly observed, it is still thought to account for approximately 70% of the universe. Part of the evidence for dark energy is to account for inconsistencies in the cosmic microwave background (CMB).

Answer: Olbers paradox

The paradox is named after Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers. The generally accepted answer is that the universe is not infinitely old and we can only see light that has reached us since the beginning of the universe, coupled with the fact that the universe is expanding, stretching out light to be outside of the visible light spectrum. Russel's paradox has to do with sets of numbers in mathematics. Epiminides paradox states that "everything I say is a lie".

The omnipotence paradox asks if God can create a rock so big that even God can't lift it.

Answer: False

This is my attempt to bust this myth. It goes all the way back to Aristotle. This has been empirically studied and it has been confirmed as a myth. There is no better clarity gained. The bright blue of the sky still makes it too difficult to make out stars. However, you can see stars during the day time with a strong enough telescope.

Answer: The Allegory of the Cave

The Allegory of the Cave has inspired many theories of reality and is a good model for higher dimensional analysis. Perception of reality does not match the existence of reality as exemplified by the vast majority of all things that exist beyond our human senses.

It used to be believed that anything that can't be seen or directly sensed in any way doesn't exist. However, we have learned that micro-organisms exist as well as the vast majority of the light spectrum, which is outside human perception.

It turns out that our perceptions are only fine tuned for a human scale, most of reality is outside that narrow range.