Answers? Questions! Questions? Answers!

Answers? Questions! Questions? Answers! (Which every prog fan should know is a track by Focus)

Just a bit of fun - here's some questions where the answer is also a question. Some are easy, some are tough but the answers are interesting!

If anybody can think of any other interesting questions that fit the criteria please post them.

1. What was the final question asked of Major Ingram which would have earned him £1M on "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?"?
2. What was the question In "The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" to which the answer was reputed to be 42?
3. What sarcastic response did Basil Fawlty give to the deaf guest who complained about the view from her window?
4. What did Jeremy Paxman famously ask Michael Howard 14 times in an interview without getting a straight answer?
5. What line was The Who's Roger Daltrey singing at Live Aid in 1985 just as the satellite link broke and all UK TV screens went blank?
6. What was the title of the 1976 Supertramp album that was taken from a famous newspaper headline in that year?
7. What was the third question asked of King Arthur by the bridge keeper in "Monty Python & the Holy Grail"?
8. What was Arthur's answer to the answer to the previous question? (which was also a question!)
9. What were the last words of Gertrude Stein?
10. What did Victor Hugo write in a telegram to his publishers to find out how his new novel "Les Miserables" was selling? (Clue: it's short)
11. To what question did Lieutenant Frank Drebin in "Police Squad" answer "I'm a locksmith, and, I'm a locksmith."
12. What response did Michael Faraday reputedly give when asked by Gladstone what use electricity was?
13. What did the Cat say to Dave Lister in "Red Dwarf" when told Lister was his God?
14. What question could you not possibly give a truthful answer to?
15. What question could you ask where the answer would be identical to the question?
16. Which one of the above questions is actually incorrect?

Answers later... (Remember every answer is also a question!)

Edited by ElwoodHerring

Concerning Hitch-Hiker and 42, there are some people who think that Douglas Adams got the number from Lewis Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland". In the courtroom scene, the queen states "Rule 42. Any person more than a mile high must leave the courtroom" etc. And that's not the only time Carroll mentions 42 - it crops up all through his writings and even his personal life. (See "The Annotated Alice"). For example - from the day the Rev. Dodgson decided to call himself Lewis Carroll, he lived for 42 years under that pseudonym!

Wikipedia has a page devoted to the number: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/42_(number)

Edited by ElwoodHerring

Phil wrote: ElwoodHerring wrote: 7. What was the third question asked of King Arthur by the bridge keeper in "Monty Python & the Holy Grail"? What is your favourite colour? (a previous Knight changes his mind and is cast into the pit! WRONG - Into the pit you go too!

Edited by ElwoodHerring

Okay, it was the king! I was typing from memory and wasn't sure whether it was the king or queen, but foolishly thought nobody would notice!

(I'm also a Carroll nut: I wrote a "Snark"-like poem which you can read if you like: http://www.herring.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/poetry/cautionary.ht m]

Also a Jabberwocky sequel: http://www.herring.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/poetry/jabberwocky.h tm

(Why does this text editor always put a space in long URLs? I type "htm" and it comes up as "h tm". Oh well, the links seem to work. )

Edited by ElwoodHerring

If you want the answers, go to the bottom of page http://www.herring.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/mazes.htm - but not until you've had a good think about the questions!

And please feel free to suggest new ones.

6. What was the title of the 1976 Supertramp album that was taken from a famous newspaper headline in that year? Crisis, what Crisis?

7. What was the third question asked of King Arthur by the bridge keeper in "Monty Python & the Holy Grail"? Something like: "What's the average speed of a swallow"

8. What was Arthur's answer to the answer to the previous question? (which was also a question!) An African or an Europian?

15. What question could you ask where the answer would be identical to the question?
What question could you ask where the answer would be identical to the question?

ElwoodHerring wrote: Concerning Hitch-Hiker and 42, there are some people who think that Douglas Adams got the number from Lewis Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland". In the courtroom scene, the queen states "Rule 42...

And of course Carroll also used alternative number systems toward the end of that book

My answer to question 14 is: "Would you be making a false statement if you answered yes to this question?"

If you answered "yes" you would be stating that your answer would be a false statement if you had answered "yes" (which in this case you did), but by doing so you would actually be making a true statement, so therefore the statement is false and your answer must be wrong.

If you answered "no" you would in effect be stating that your answer would be a true statement if you had answered "yes" (which in this case you did NOT), but as we have already seen, by answering "yes" the statement becomes false and your answer would be wrong. So you lose again!

Of course, any answer other than "yes" or "no" is irrelevant and neither true nor false.

Edited by ElwoodHerring

BaldFriede wrote: daghrastubfari wrote: 15. What question could you ask where the answer would be identical to the question? What question could you ask where the answer would be identical to the question? This question reminds me of a philosophy exam, in which the question "Think of a question fit for a philosophy exam and then answer it" appeared. The only candidate that got an A+ simply copied the question twice.

Lateral thinking - you can't knock it, not even sideways!

I've heard a similar rumor about a philosophy exam that simply bore the question "Why?"

The answer which got the only A in the class was "Why not?"