Episode 18 University Challenge

University Challenge.

Asking the questions - Jeremy Paxman.

Hello. Last time, we saw Pembroke College, Cambridge, take the first of the eight places

in the quarter-finals.

The next place goes to whichever team wins tonight.

The University of York beat the Trinity Laban Conservatoire by 185 points

to 105 in their first round match.

They knew about cravings for food, the composition of the Chimera and the use of the guillotine

and they were especially strong on things that are coloured green. Let's meet them.

Hi, my name is Alex Leonhardt. I'm from South Wales

and I'm studying for a Masters degree in Political Philosophy.

I'm Robin Virgo from Lincolnshire and I'm studying Chemistry.

-And their captain.

-Hi, I'm Rebecca Woods from Chester

and I'm studying for my MA in Psycholinguistics.

I'm Edward Haynes from Warwickshire

and I'm studying for a PhD in Biology.

APPLAUSE

New College, Oxford, scored 230 points against the 145 of Homerton College, Cambridge,

in a barnstorming performance in which they knew a lot about Greek mythology,

Pythagoras' Theorem and the War of Jenkins' Ear.

Just about their only Achilles heel was the career of the late Ken Russell. Let's meet them again.

Hi, I'm Remi Beecroft from Hertfordshire

and I'm studying Psychology and Philosophy.

I'm India Lenon from London and I'm studying Classics.

-Their captain.

-I'm Andy Hood from Warwickshire

and I'm studying Philosophy, Politics and Economics.

I'm Tom Cappleman from Berkshire and I'm studying Mathematics.

APPLAUSE

OK, you all know the rules by now. Here we go then. First starter for ten.

Three prizes awarded each year for writing in different media are named after which British author

who aspired to make political writing into an art and who died in 1950?

The prize was founded in 1993 by Bernard Crick

and funded in part from the royalties of his biography of the author.

-Orwell.

-George Orwell is correct, yes.

Your bonuses are on philosophy and literature, New College.

Which Latin-derived philosophical term was popularised by Turgenev's 1862 novel Fathers And Sons

where it was used to describe the crude scientism espoused by the character Bazarov?

-Reductionism?

-No, nihilism. The anarchist Sergey Nechayev became the model for a self-described nihilist

in The Possessed, sometimes called The Devils, a novel of 1872 by which Russian writer?

-Dostoyevsky.

-Correct. Written in 1880, Vera; Or, The Nihilists

was the first stage work of which Irish literary figure?

-George Bernard Shaw.

-Oscar Wilde. Ten points for this.

The oncoviruses, lentiviruses and foamy viruses belong

to which family of enveloped, single-stranded RNA viruses?

They all possess the enzyme reverse transcriptase

which allows integration of pro-viral DNA into the host genome.

-Retroviruses.

-Correct.

Your bonuses are on Foreign Secretaries

in the words of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office website.

In each case, name the Labour Prime Minister in whose Cabinet the following served.

Patrick Gordon Walker - a good linguist, he was one of the few Foreign Secretaries this century

who could converse in German with a German Foreign Minister.

-Ramsay MacDonald.

-No, that was Harold Wilson.

Secondly, Arthur Henderson - known affectionately as Uncle Arthur, he was a teetotaller,

a non-smoker and a Methodist lay preacher, an unusual combination in the Foreign Office.

WHISPERING

-Ramsay MacDonald.

-Ramsay MacDonald, yes. Herbert Morrison - did not quite have the diplomatic touch.

He once joked, "Foreign policy would be OK except for the bloody foreigners!"

WHISPERING

-Clement Attlee.

-Correct. Ten points for this.

What Anglicised surname was shared by two explorers? The father became a Venetian citizen in 1476,

but later helped lay the groundwork for the British claim to Canada.

His son, born in Bristol or Venice, was a cartographer to Henry VIII

and drew a map of the world now in the National Library of France.

-Columbus.

-No.

-Cabot.

-Cabot is correct, yes. John and Sebastian Cabot.

So, your bonuses are on diseases named after islands, New College.

Malta or Maltese fever is another name for which contagious disease,

usually contracted by drinking infected milk or through close contact with infected animals?

-Hepatitis B?

-Brucellosis or undulant fever.

Tangier disease, a rare, inherited, genetic condition characterised by very low HDL cholesterol levels,

takes its name from an island in which North American bay, bounded by Maryland and Virginia?

-Chesapeake.

-Correct. Causing symptoms including fever and chest pain,

Bornholm disease is an infection named after an island of which Nordic country

where it was first observed in the 1930s?

-Norway.

-Denmark. Ten points for this. Listen carefully.

In his "we shall fight on the beaches" speech of June 4th, 1940,

Churchill named four other general locations as places where "we shall fight".

For ten points, name three of them.

-Towns, streets, fields?

-No.

One of you buzz from New College.

-Skies, towns...

-No, it was landing grounds, fields, streets and hills. Ten points for this.

What is the three-letter stage name of the London-born musician of Sri Lankan descent, Mathangi Arul...

-MIA.

-MIA is right, yes.

These bonuses are on pairs of names.

In each case, the surname of the first person described is the given name of the second,

for example, Jane Austen and Austen Chamberlain.

Your answer must include the given name and surname of both people described.

Firstly, the 18th century inventor of the marine chronometer H4

and the actor whose film roles include John Book in Witness and Rick Deckard in Blade Runner?

-That's Harrison Ford.

-Harrison Ford.

-John Harrison and Harrison Ford.

-Correct. Secondly, the author of The World According To Garp

and the composer of White Christmas?

-Bing Crosby and...?

-I'm thinking Chandler.

-Chandler Bing and Bing Crosby.

-No, it's John Irving and Irving Berlin.

Finally, the broadcaster and author whose works include Cultural Amnesia

and the navigator who landed at Botany Bay in 1770?

James Cook?

-Do you know what the...?

-Henry James?

-Henry James and James Cook?

-No, it's Clive James and James Cook.

For your picture starter on this picture round, you'll see a map showing some historic trade routes.

Ten points if you can tell me the name by which these routes are most commonly known.

-The Silk Road?

-They are silk roads, yes.

For your picture bonuses, three more maps showing significant historic trading routes.

I want you to identify the commodity principally traded along the route and after which the route is named.

Firstly for five, this trading route in Europe?

WHISPERING

-Timber?

-No, that's salt.

Secondly?

WHISPERING

-Amber.

-That is amber, from the Baltic to Venice.

Finally, the commodity after which this route is named?

WHISPERING

-Frankincense.

-I'll accept that. Incense I would have taken too. Ten points for this.

In ornithology, what is the common name of the distinctively patterned black-and-white wader

of the Recurvirostra genus, characterised by an upturned bill?

-Avocet.

-Avocet is correct, yes.

Your bonuses are on zoology, York.

What name is that of a 19th century British naturalist

and has been given to the boundary between the regions of Oriental and Australian fauna?

-I think it's Wallace.

-Sorry?

-Wallace.

-Wallace.

-Correct, the Wallace Line.

Having awarded the Darwin-Wallace Medal for advances in evolutionary biology every 50 years from 1908,

what organisation announced that it would start giving the award annually from 2010?

WHISPERING

-The Royal Zoological Society.

-No, it's the Linnean Society of London.

Absent in the original edition and first used in publication by Herbert Spencer,

Wallace encouraged Darwin to incorporate what four-word phrase

into later editions of The Origin Of Species?

-"Survival of the fittest."

-Correct. Ten points for this starter.

The first British cyclist in 46 years to win the World Road Racing...

-Mark Cavendish.

-Correct.

Your bonuses, New College, are on women astronomers.

Hired to work in his observatory by the Harvard Professor of Astronomy Edward Pickering

for whom she worked as a housekeeper, Williamina Fleming is credited with numerous discoveries,

including, in 1888, that of which nebula in the constellation of Orion?

-Horsehead.

-Correct. What two words complete the mnemonic for star classification,

devised by Annie Jump Cannon,

Fleming's successor as Curator of Astronomical Photographs at Harvard? It begins, "Oh, be a fine girl..."

-Sorry, we don't know.

-It's "kiss me".

Henrietta Leavitt discovered the variable period-luminosity relationship

of what class of stars, making it possible to measure the distance between these stars and the Earth?

-Quasars.

-No, it's Cepheids. Ten points for this.

The name of which type of popular cuisine begins place names denoting a region of the Karakoram Mountains,

the largest city of Maryland and a sea of northern Europe that is almost land...

-Balti.

-Balti is correct, yes.

These bonuses are on philosophical views, York. Which concept holds that there are no universals

and that truth, morals and culture can only be understood in their own socio-historic context?

Relativism, it could be.

-Relativism.

-Correct. What term describes any philosophy that magnifies the role

played by unaided reason in the acquisition and justification of knowledge?

Adherents include Descartes and Leibniz.

-Rationalism.

-Correct. What is the view that experience, especially of the senses,

is the only source of knowledge? It is associated with Locke, Berkeley and Hume.

-Nominate Leonhardt.

-Empiricism.

-Correct. Ten points for this starter question.

Rayleigh-Taylor, Kelvin-Helmholtz and Rayleigh-Benard are all types of what general physical phenomenon,

characterised by the unbounded growth of small disturbances?

-Butterfly effect?

-No.

Anyone want to buzz from New College?

It's instability. Ten points for this.

To which nearby island in the Venetian lagoon

were the glassmaking factories of Venice transferred at the end...

-Murano.

-Murano is correct, yes.

These bonuses are on world rulers.

I'll read a list of rulers who were in power during the first year of a century of the Common Era.

I simply want the century. Firstly, Robert III of Scotland, Charles VI or the Well-Beloved of France

and the Asian conqueror Tamerlane?

WHISPERING

-1600s?

-No, it's the 15th century.

Raja Raja the Great of the Chola Empire of South India,

Boleslav the Valiant of Poland, and Aethelred the Unready of England?

-10th century?

-No, the 11th century.

And finally, Emperor He of the Eastern Han Dynasty,

Pacorus II of Parthia and the Roman Emperor Trajan?

WHISPERING

-3rd century?

-No, it's the 2nd century.

Time for a music round. Your starter is a piece of popular music.

Ten points if you can name the band.

# Well, this is a good idea... #

-Arctic Monkeys?

-It is, Leave Before The Lights Come on.

The band members of The Arctic Monkeys were raised in Sheffield.

For your bonuses, you'll hear three more pieces of music by artists or bands associated with Sheffield.

Five points for each act you can name. Firstly, this band?

# If it seems a little time is needed

# Decisions to be made

# Hey, hey, hey, hey

# The good advice of friends unheeded

# For the best of plans mislaid... #

-Human League?

-It was indeed Human League. Secondly, this artist, please?

# Open up your door

# I can't see your face no more

# Love is so hard to find... #

Sorry, we don't know.

That's Richard Hawley. Finally, can you identify this band?

# Do you remember the first time...? #

-Pulp.

-That is Pulp, yes.

Ten points for this starter. Described as "the first world war"

by Winston Churchill in A History Of The English-Speaking Peoples,

which war was fought in Europe, North America and Asia from 1756...

-Seven Years' War.

-Seven Years' War is correct, yes.

New College, these bonuses are on a symbol.

Seen to represent self-reflexivity or the cyclical nature of life,

the symbol known by the Greek term Uroboros takes the form of a serpent or dragon doing what?

-Eating its own tail.

-Correct.

A self-eating, legless, spherical animal may have been the first living thing in the Universe,

according to Timaeus in the dialogue by which Greek philosopher?

-Plato.

-Correct. The German chemist August Kekule sometimes claimed

that a day-dream of a snake seizing its own tail inspired him in his discovery

of the structure of which molecule?

-Benzene.

-Benzene is correct.

Ten points for this. Level-pegging.

Listen carefully. Of the 118 elements of the Periodic Table,

two have symbols which, when read as ordinary English words, become personal pronouns.

One is iodine. What's the other?

-Helium.

-Helium is correct, yes.

These bonuses are on mathematics. Given the following real-valued functions of a real variable,

give the values of X at which they are not differentiable.

F of X equals the absolute value of X?

-Zero.

-Correct. F of X equals X-squared?

WHISPERING

-Nominate Cappleman.

-There are none.

-Yes, the empty set, correct.

F of X equals 1 when X is rational and 0 when X is irrational?

-Everywhere.

-Everywhere.

-Yes, all X, correct.

Ten points for this. Also noted for the Berners Street Hoax and for sending the first picture postcard,

the Victorian eccentric Theodore Hook launched which weekly publication in 1820,

noted for its invective and High Toryism?

-Punch?

-No. York, one of you have a go.

-Spectator.

-No, it's John Bull Magazine. Ten points for this.

In the following approximations, how many zeroes follow the number given

if the Earth's circumference in metres is 40, the number of seconds in a year is 31

and the number of identified insect species is one?

-Seven.

-Anyone like to have a go from New College?

-Six.

-Six is correct, yes.

Your bonuses are on homonyms - pairs of words that are spelt and pronounced the same,

but have different meanings and etymologies. In each case, give the word from the definition.

All three have five letters. Firstly, "to pursue or approach stealthily",

"a slender support or stem of an object or of part of an organism"

and "to stride in a stiff or pompous way"?

-Stalk.

-Correct. "Thin or diaphanous" and "to swerve or change course quickly"?

-WHISPERING

-Come on, let's have it.

-Veer?

-No, the answer is "sheer".

Finally, "rhythmic throbbing of the arteries" and "edible seed of a leguminous plant"?

-Pulse.

-"Pulse" is correct. Ten points for this.

Slightly larger than the UK, which oil-rich African country has a flag

with three horizontal bands of green, yellow and blue, the yellow being said to symbolise the Equator?

-Angola?

-No. York, have a buzz?

-Central African Republic?

-No, it's Gabon. Ten points for this.

What single-digit number links the element boron, the fourth root of 625 and the planet...

-5.

-5 is correct, yes.

Your bonuses this time are on place names.

In English place names, the name of which tree follows Burnt in Barnet, Gospel in Camden...

-Oak.

-..and Seven in Kent? Correct.

Four English rivers, including one that flows through Derby and another in the Lake District,

share what name meaning "where oak trees grow"?

-Sorry, we don't know.

-That's Derwent. And finally, designated a World Heritage Site,

which port in south-eastern Croatia has a name meaning "grove of oak trees"?

-Dubrovnik.

-Correct. Time for a picture round again.

You'll see a portrait depicting an Impressionist painter for your starter. Ten points if you name him.

-Monet?

-No. One of you buzz from York?

-Manet?

-No, it's Degas.

So, picture bonuses shortly. Ten points at stake. Fingers on the buzzers. Here's a starter.

In early 2012, two US states marked the centenary of their admission to the union.

For ten points, name either of them.

-Texas.

-No.

New College?

-Alaska?

-No, they were New Mexico and Arizona. Another starter question.

Answer as soon as you buzz.

In an urn containing five balls all of different colours,

how many different combinations of colours are possible if you draw out three?

15?

Anyone like to buzz from New College?

-Ten?

-Ten is correct, yes.

Which means we revert to the picture bonuses.

You saw for that starter question a portrait of Degas,

painted by Marcellin Desboutin, one of the lesser known Impressionists.

Picture bonuses, three more portraits by Impressionist painters of their contemporaries.

I want the name of the artist depicted and the artist who painted it in that order. Firstly for five?

WHISPERING

-Seurat by Monet?

-No, it's Monet painted by Manet. Secondly?

-Manet by Degas?

-No, that's Sisley by Renoir.

Finally, the figure on the left and the artist who's painted him?

-Is that Toulouse-Lautrec by Degas?

-No, it's Manet by Degas.

Ten points for this. Used by the poet Baudelaire to describe the writer

as a detached, mocking dandy in a city crowd,

what seven-letter word comes from the French for "to saunter" or "stroll aimlessly"?

-Flaneur.

-Flaneur is correct, yes.

Your bonuses are on Louis Pasteur. In 1885, Louis Pasteur's treatment of the nine-year-old Joseph Meister

saw the first successful inoculation against which deadly disease?

WHISPERING

-Smallpox.

-No, it's rabies.

Pasteur discovered that which microbe caused puerperal fever?

He named it after the Greek for a bunch of grapes in reference to its appearance under a microscope.

WHISPERING

-Anything?

-I can't think of anything.

-Come on.

-No idea.

-It's staphylococcus.

Pasteur gives his name to what laboratory equipment used for liquids?

-Pipette.

-Pipette.

-Pipettes is correct. Five minutes to go. Another starter question.

Directed by Lu Chuan, the 2009 film City Of Life And Death

deals with the 1937 massacre by the Imperial Japanese...

-Nanjing.

-Nanjing is correct, yes.

And your bonuses are on cinema. Name the British director of the following films.

Firstly, A Life Less Ordinary, 28 Days Later and Sunshine?

-Danny Boyle.

-Correct.

Welcome To Sarajevo, A Cock And Bull Story and The Killer Inside Me?

WHISPERING

-Let's have it.

-Sorry, we don't know.

-That's Michael Winterbottom.

Finally, Twenty Four Seven, Dead Man's Shoes and This Is England?

-Shane Meadows.

-Correct. Another starter question.

Taxing To Prevent Inflation, Price Theory and A Program For Monetary Stability

are among the works of which US economist...

-Milton Friedman.

-Correct. Your bonuses are on the legislative assemblies of EU member states.

Name the city in which the following parliament buildings are located.

Firstly for five points, the Binnenhof?

-Vienna?

-No, that's in The Hague.

Secondly, Toompea Castle?

-Let's have it, please.

-Denmark?

-No, that's Tallinn.

And finally, the Grand Master's Palace?

-Come on.

-Sorry, we don't know.

-That's in Valletta.

Ten points for this. Who was President of France

when Denmark, Ireland and the UK joined the Common Market?

-Valery Giscard d'Estaing.

-No. Anyone want to buzz from New College?

-Georges Pompidou.

-Correct.

Your bonuses are on counties of the Republic of Ireland.

In an alphabetical list of the 26 counties of the Republic of Ireland, which comes first?

WHISPERING

-Quickly!

-Armagh?

-No, that's not in the Republic of Ireland. It's Carlow.

Three counties in the Republic of Ireland have a name beginning with M. Name two of them.

-Come on!

-Monaghan and...Mull.

-Mull?!

That's an island off Scotland. Mayo and Meath are the other ones.

Finally, only one county in the Republic of Ireland has a name beginning with S. What is it?

Sorry, we don't know.

That's Sligo. Ten points for this.

What quantity increases from 6,357 to 6,378 kilometres as latitude decreases?

Distance to the centre of the Earth.

I'll accept that. Earth's radius is the more precise term I was looking for, but I'll accept that.

Your bonuses are on years. What multiple of three is the year in which Henry VIII came to the throne?

WHISPERING

-Come on, come on, come on!

-1530.

-No, it's 1509.

What multiple of four is the year in which Edward VIII abdicated?

Nineteen-thirty...nine?

-1938.

-No, it's 1936.

Which English king came to the throne in August of the year whose factors include 3, 5, 99 and 297?

-Henry II.

-Henry VII. Ten points for this.

Who, in 1705, predicted an event of 1758 based on observations made in 1456...

-Halley.

-Edmond Halley is correct, yes.

Your bonuses are on mathematics.

For each of the following sets of real numbers, I want you to tell me their supremum or least upper bound.

Firstly, the set of fractions in the form N divided by N plus 1 where N is a positive integer?

-2.

-No, it's 1. The set of real numbers whose square is less than 2?

-1.

-No, the square root of 2. The set of real numbers whose logarithm is at most zero?

-The empty set.

-It's 1. Ten points for this.

In the Cartesian RGB system of colour, what would be seen

if red, green and blue were of equal value and at their maxima?

-White.

-Correct. Bonuses on Scottish dukes. The holder of which dukedom is the Premier Peer of Scotland

and hereditary keeper of the Palace of Holyroodhouse?

-Argyll?

-Come on.

-Argyll.

-No, Hamilton.

Floors Castle in the Scottish Borders is the family seat of which Scottish dukedom?

-Glamis.

-No, Roxburghe. The holder of which dukedom is the only man in Britain permitted

to have a private army, an honour bestowed by Queen Victoria?

-Argyll.

-Atholl. Ten points for this.

Give the US city and state that is the location of the third oldest

of the Ivy League universities, founded in 1746?

-Cambridge, Massachusetts.

-No. Quickly, New College, somebody buzz.

-Stanford, California.

-No, Princeton, New Jersey. The mean population...

-GONG

-At the gong, York University have 145, New College, Oxford, have 215.

We'll have to say goodbye to you, York. You didn't give up. That was great fun.

New College, a terrific performance. We shall look forward to seeing you

in the latter stages of the competition.

-Join us next time for the next match in this series, but until then, it's goodbye from York.

-Goodbye.

-Goodbye from New College, Oxford.

-Goodbye.

-And goodbye from me.

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