Episode 5 University Challenge

APPLAUSE

University Challenge. Asking the questions, Jeremy Paxman.

Hello, it's time to frack with the student mind.

Whichever team yields the more riches will return

to play in the second round.

Making its debut in this competition, St Peter's

is a babe in arms compared to most Oxford colleges, having been

founded fewer than 100 years ago as a hostel by Francis Chavasse,

the former Bishop of Liverpool,

to provide a university education for students of limited means.

It became a full college of the University in 1961

and admitted women from 1979.

Former Peterites include

the Governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney,

the TV cook Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall,

and that glorious figure of English literature,

the Reverend W Awdry, creator of Thomas The Tank Engine.

Its Master is the former controller of Radio 4, Mark Damazer,

who viewers may remember captained the winning team

in our Christmas series for grown-ups.

Plenty for tonight's team to live up to, then.

Representing around 470 students, with an average age of 20,

let's meet the St Peter's team.

Hello, I'm John Armitage from Lancaster

and I'm currently reading Mathematics.

Hi, I'm Ed Roberts, I'm from London, and I'm studying History.

And their captain.

Hello, I'm Gabriel Trueblood, I'm from London,

and I'm studying Medicine.

Hello, I'm Spike Smith,

I'm from Maidenhead and I'm reading Mathematics.

APPLAUSE

The University of Sussex has done well in this

contest in the past, having been series champions twice,

although, as the second occasion was 45 years ago,

their attempt to secure a hat-trick has lacked some sense of urgency.

With a campus designed by Sir Basil Spence it was

one of the wave of new universities established in the 1960s

and quickly earned itself

a reputation for radicalism, which it appears to have retained with

stories of student protests

and subsequent arrests appearing in the press in recent months.

Past students include the novelists Ian McEwan

and Philippa Gregory,

the politicians Hilary Benn, Ben Bradshaw and Peter Hain,

and the comedians Bob Mortimer and Frankie Boyle.

With an average age of 30,

representing around 12,000 students, let's meet the Sussex team.

Hello, my name is Tom Whitehurst, I'm from Rhyl in North Wales,

and I'm studying for an MSc in Cognitive Neuroscience.

Hello, I'm David Spence, I'm originally from Leicester,

and I'm studying for an MSc in Scientific Computation.

And this is their captain.

Hello, I'm Joss Macdonald, I'm from Romsey in Hampshire,

and I'm studying for a BA in History and Politics.

Hello, my name is Matthew Dean, I'm from Birmingham,

and I'm studying for a BA in Philosophy.

APPLAUSE

Usual rules. Ten points for starters,

15 for bonuses. Fingers on the buzzers.

Here's your first starter for ten.

What short adjective links a tea lighter in body than green tea,

the Beatles ninth official album...?

BELL

White.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

The first set of bonuses are on the sun and the moon, St Peter's.

"And God made two great lights, great for their use to man,

"the greater to have rule by day, the less by night altern."

These are lines from which epic poem originally published in 1667?

THEY CONFER

Paradise Lost.

Correct. In Shakespeare's The Tempest,

which character reminds Prospero that he once taught him how

to name the bigger light and how the less, that burned by day and night?

Caliban.

Correct. In which of Charles Dickens' novels

does the oleaginous preacher Chadband speak of

the light that is "the ray of rays,

"the sun of suns, the moon of moons, the star of stars.

"It is the light of Terewth?"

Bleak House.

Correct. Ten points for this.

Ismet Inonu became the second president of which country in 1938?

His predecessor had introduced a modified Latin alphabet in place...

BUZZER

Turkey.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

He succeeded Ataturk. And your first set of bonuses, Sussex,

are on a prime minister.

"Safety first" is a slogan associated with which prime minister

born in Worcestershire in 1867?

THEY CONFER

Stanley Baldwin.

Correct. According to the Dictionary of National Biography,

"safety first" is the least appropriate slogan for his career.

He did not play safe over the Coalition in 1922, tariffs in 1923,

the political levy and coal subsidy in 1925, and which event of 1926?

-General Strike.

-The General Strike.

Correct. The DNB notes that the slogan "safety first" was intended

to contrast with the poor reputation of which earlier prime minister?

THEY CONFER

Andrew Bonar Law.

No, it was David Lloyd George. Ten points for this.

In fluid mechanics, what term denotes the formation of vapour

bubbles in a fluid whose pressure is less than the vapour pressure,

as caused for instance...?

BUZZER

Cavitation.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

These bonuses are on cloud types, Sussex.

A rare form of stratospheric cloud mainly observed in Scotland

and Scandinavia, iridescent clouds have what alternative name

after the inner layer of the shell of some molluscs?

THEY CONFER

-Mantle.

-Yeah. Mantle.

No, it's mother of pearl or nacreous clouds.

Sometimes described as a stack of pancakes,

what word describes cloud formations in the troposphere that have

been offered as an explanation for some UFO sightings?

THEY CONFER

No?

Don't know?

Sorry, no idea.

Lenticular, lens like.

Polar mesospheric clouds are luminous clouds

occasionally seen at night in summer in high altitudes

and are also known by what name from the Latin for night and shine?

THEY CONFER

-Noctilucent.

-Noctilucent.

Correct.

Right, ten points for this.

"They had on their side three things

"that the English public never forgives -

"youth, power and enthusiasm."

These words of Oscar Wilde refer to which group of artists

and writers formed in the 1840s?

BELL

Pre-Raphaelites.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

Right, St Peter's,

you get three bonuses on terms used in critical theory.

Firstly, a general term denoting a decline in cultural standards,

which word was first used in its aesthetic sense in Theophile Gautier's

1868 preface to Baudelaire's collection Les Fleurs Du Mal?

THEY MOUTH

Degeneration.

No, it's decadence.

Adding the "de" prefix to a Freudian term gives a word denoting which

process whereby art is rendered banal and powerless?

It was explored by Herbert Marcuse in his 1964 work

One-Dimensional Man.

THEY CONFER

Deconstruction.

No, it's desublimation.

And finally, in his sceptical approach to the possibility of coherent meaning,

Jacques Derrida adapted the name of the reading strategy deconstruction

from terms used by which German philosopher born in 1889?

THEY CONFER

Wittgenstein.

No, it's Heidegger. We are going to take a picture round now.

In a moment you will see a map of northern England.

For ten points give me

the name of the confectionery associated with the marked location.

BUZZER

Eccles cake.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

For your bonuses you're going to see three more locations

in northern England associated with a cake or confection.

For five points name the product in each case.

Firstly for five, A.

THEY CONFER

Kendal Mint Cake.

Correct. Secondly, B.

THEY CONFER

Bakewell tart.

Correct. And finally.

THEY CONFER

I don't know. We don't know.

Pontefract cakes. Ten points for this.

What ductile and malleable mineral is a naturally occurring alloy

primarily of gold, usually with at least 20% silver...?

BELL

Electrum.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

This set of bonuses, St Peter's, are on an artistic medium.

Citing David Octavius Hill

and Julia Margaret Cameron among others, the critic Walter Benjamin

claimed that the prime of which artform occurred in its first decade?

THEY CONFER

Poetry.

No, it's photography.

In the Ontology Of The Photographic Image, the film critic

Andre Bazin claimed that what artform had been forced to

offer us illusion,

but now its practitioners had been freed from the resemblance complex.

THEY CONFER

Painting.

Correct. Which French literary critic claimed that

while writing Camera Lucida he was overcome by an ontological desire

and wanted to learn at all costs what photography was in itself?

THEY CONFER

Pass.

It's Roland Barthes. Ten points for this.

Which Babylonian king was overthrown by the Persians in 539 BC?

The eve of his...

BELL

Belshazzar.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

That gives you the lead, St Peter's, and these bonuses are on cosmology.

In cosmology a constant named after which astronomer relates

the proper distance to a galaxy to its recessional velocity?

THEY CONFER

Hubble? Hubble.

Correct.

Observations of what kind of astrophysical object provided

evidence in 1998 that the expansion of the universe is accelerating?

THEY CONFER

Quasars.

No, it's supernovae.

Usually denoted by the Greek letter lambda, what term in the Einstein

field equations can explain this expansion?

THEY CONFER

Redshift.

No, it's the cosmological constant.

Ten points for this.

Which physicist gives his name to a law stating that the

rate of cooling of a body is proportional to the

temperature difference between the body...?

BELL

Isaac Newton.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

These bonuses are on monoliths, St Peter's.

Thought to be one of the largest monoliths in Asia,

Savandurga in Karnataka State is around 60 kilometres west of which major city?

THEY CONFER

Delhi.

No, it's Bangalore. To the nearest whole kilometre what is the circumference of Uluru,

or Ayers Rock, in Australia's Northern Territory?

You can have a kilometre either way.

THEY CONFER

Six.

No, it's nine.

Men Omborth or the Logan Rock is a large granite rocking stone

near Treen in which British county?

Any suggestions?

Lincolnshire.

No, it's Cornwall. Ten points for this.

"How he lives beggars belief,

"constantly nicking old foreign necklaces."

This sentence begins a mnemonic for the symbols of which

well-known scientific progression?

The number of words in the mnemonic totals 118.

BUZZER

Chemical elements.

Anyone like to buzz from St Peter's?

BELL

Periodic Table.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

These bonuses are on religious movements, St Peter's.

In his System Of Positive Polity published in the 1850s,

which French pioneer of sociology attempted to institute

a religion of humanity without God or the supernatural?

THEY CONFER

Pass.

It's Auguste Comte.

Secondly, respecting the freedom of the individual,

which spiritual science was founded in the years

before the First World War by the Austrian thinker Rudolf Steiner?

Would that be humanism? Do you have any better ideas? Humanism?

Any better ideas?

Humanism.

No, it's anthroposophy. And finally,

called the wickedest man in the world by the British press,

which English occultist founded the cult of Thelema in the early 20th century?

-(Aleister Crowley.)

-Aleister Crowley.

Correct. We are going to take a music round now.

For your music starter you will hear a piece of classical music.

Ten points if you can name the German composer.

MUSIC PLAYS

BELL

Bach.

Bach is right.

APPLAUSE DROWNS SPEECH

That was a Yo-Yo Ma performance

of the prelude to Bach's Cello Suites.

It has received more than ten million hits on YouTube.

For your bonuses, three more pieces of classical music

that have exceeded the million mark on YouTube.

In each case I want the piece and the composer.

Firstly, the name usually given to this specific concerto

by an Italian composer, with over 5.7 million hits.

MUSIC PLAYS

Spring by Vivaldi.

Correct.

Secondly the precise name of this movement by a French composer

with over 1.8 million hits.

MUSIC PLAYS

THEY CONFER

Saint Saens, Aquarium.

Correct. And finally this song by an Austrian composer,

with over 20 million hits.

SONG PLAYS

THEY CONFER

Schubert, Ave Maria.

Correct. Ten points for this.

What does the novelist Justin Cartwright describe as

"a respite from being human."

To Coleridge it's "a gentle thing beloved from pole to pole,"

while to Shakespeare it's "nature's soft nurse."

BELL

Opium.

Nope. Sussex, one of you buzz?

BUZZER

Love.

No, it's sleep. Ten points for this.

Chestnut-mandibled and yellow-ridged are

among species of which tropical bird whose prominent bills

can comprise up to one third of their length?

BELL

Toucan.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

These bonuses are on climatic types, St Peter's.

Which sea gives its name to a climate type that prevails

on the western side of continents at around latitude 35 degrees?

It's characterised by mild, wet winters and hot, dry summers.

THEY CONFER

Mediterranean.

Correct. Usually described as having a Mediterranean climate,

the region known as the Matorral

spans the central parts of which South American country?

Brazil.

No, it's Chile. Which major city of South Africa has a climate type

usually identified as Mediterranean?

THEY CONFER

Cape Town.

Correct. Ten points for this.

Called the Moirae in Greek mythology...?

BELL

The Fates.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

These bonuses, St Peter's, are on August 1914.

In August 1914, which country went to war with Plan XVII,

aimed at the recovery of lost territories?

It was notably unsuccessful.

THEY CONFER

France.

Correct. Repassing an attack on their territory, the Battle of

Mount Cer in mid-August 1914 was a decisive victory for which country?

THEY CONFER

Austria Hungary.

No, it was Serbia, their opponents.

Which country declared war on Germany on August 23, 1914?

Was that Russia? Do you think it's Russia?

Russia.

No, it was Japan. Ten points for this.

Give the two-word name of the short-lived republic

founded in 1819 by Simon Bolivar that included

much of present-day Panama, Venezuela, Ecuador and Colombia.

BUZZER

Gran Canada.

No, I'm afraid that's wrong.

BELL

Gran Colombia.

Correct.

And I'm afraid I'm going to have to fine you five points.

You just, as they say in America, misspoke.

You get the points, St Peter's, you get the bonuses.

They're on 16th-century monarchs.

In each case listen to the pair of rulers

and give the unique full decade during which both

were on the thrones of their respective countries.

Firstly, James IV of Scotland and Louis XII of France.

THEY CONFER

-1580s?

-Yeah.

1580s.

No, it's the 1500s.

Secondly Gustav I, or Gustav Vasa of Sweden,

and Henry VIII of England?

THEY CONFER

1520s.

No, it's the 1530s.

Finally, Henry IV of France and Elizabeth I of England.

THEY CONFER

1570s.

No, it's the 1590s. Ten points for this.

Among the leptons of the standard model of particle physics

which has the shortest name and the greatest mass?

BUZZER

Tau.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

These bonuses are on a given name, Sussex.

Located at the site where

he was murdered in 1393 by King Wenceslas IV, a statue

of St John of Nepomuk stands on the Charles Bridge in which capital?

THEY CONFER

Prague.

Correct.

Born in 1778, Johann Nepomuk Hummel is noted for a Concerto in E Major

that is part of the standard repertoire of which instrument?

THEY CONFER

Cello.

No, it's the trumpet. Clemens Wenzel Nepomuk were the given names of which Austrian

statesman, a prominent figure at the Congress of Vienna in 1815?

THEY CONFER

Metternich.

Correct. We're going to take a picture round.

For your picture starter you'll see a photo of a scientist and inventor.

Ten points if you can give me his name.

BELL

Thomas Edison.

No. One of you like to buzz from Sussex?

BUZZER

Niels Bohr.

No, it's John Logie Baird.

Ten points for this starter question. Picture bonuses in a moment or two.

Three-letter words meaning transgression against divine law...

BELL

Sin.

No. You lose five points.

..Space, interval, or difference, and source of a metal,

together form the name of which small densely populated country?

BUZZER

Singapore.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

John Logie Baird appears on a list of famous Glaswegians

compiled by Glasgow City Council.

For your bonuses, three more names from that official list.

Five points for each figure you can name.

Firstly, can you identify this architect and designer?

THEY CONFER

Rennie Mackintosh.

Charles Rennie Mackintosh is right. Secondly, this literary figure.

THEY CONFER

No idea.

That's Liz Lochhead. And finally, this politician.

THEY CONFER

Donald Dewar.

Correct. Ten points for this.

The name of the car manufacturer Fiat originated as an acronym

incorporating the name of which Italian city?

BUZZER

Turin.

Torino is correct.

Here's a set of bonuses on Latin America for you, Sussex.

Which South American country

is home to the highest mountain in the Western Hemisphere?

I need the name of the country and the mountain.

THEY CONFER

Nominate Dean.

Aconcagua in Chile.

No, it's in Argentina, I'm afraid.

You only got half of it right. Situated in Ecuador,

what is the world's highest active volcano?

THEY CONFER

Nominate Dean.

Cotopaxi.

Correct.

More than 5,400 metres in height, Popocatepetl is an active

volcano around 70 kilometres from which Latin American capital?

THEY CONFER

Mexico City.

Correct. Ten points at stake and five minutes to go.

In the Old Testament, who was successively the wife of

Uriah the Hittite, the wife of King David...?

BELL

Bathsheba.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

These bonuses, St Peter's, are on zoology.

The duckbilled platypus and the spiny anteater are both

classified in which order of animals?

Mammals.

No, they're monotremes, monotremata.

-To which class do monotremata belong?

-Mammals.

Correct. What feature of the reproductive process distinguishes

monotremes from other mammals?

They lay eggs.

Correct.

Ten points for this.

In material science, what term is used to describe a fracture

that takes place in a specimen without plastic deformation?

BUZZER

Crack.

No, anyone like to buzz from St Peter's?

BELL

Hairline.

No, it's brittle. Ten points for this.

Durdle Door and Lulworth Cove are features on which 95-mile-long

stretch of coastline named after a...?

BUZZER

Jurassic Coast.

Correct.

These bonuses, Sussex, are on Olympic venues.

Named after a third-century emperor, which ancient

baths in Rome were the venue for the 1960 Olympic gymnastic events?

THEY CONFER

Constantine.

No, it's Caracalla.

Secondly, the diving events of the 1992 Olympics were

staged in a venue on the Montjuic hill, giving commanding

views of which host city below it?

THEY CONFER

Barcelona.

Correct. Horse Guards Parade at the end of St James's Park in Central London was

the venue for which event at the 2012 Olympics?

THEY CONFER

Beach volleyball.

Correct. Ten points for this.

What links Winston Smith's residence in 1984, May 8th 1945,

and Nelson's flagship at the Battle of Trafalgar?

BELL

The letter V.

Yes, we were looking for the word, but you're quite right.

V does link them all. V for Victory. Well done.

You get a set of bonuses, St Peter's. They're on a descriptive term.

What name is given to a musical note that is raised or

lowered by one or two semitones from the key signature

marked by a sharp, flat or natural sign?

Accidental.

Correct. Whose accidental death appears in the title of a 1970 play

by the Nobel Prize winning author Dario Fo?

THEY CONFER

Pass.

It's an anarchist. In the title of the work, by 2001 whom did the US journalist

David Kaplan describe as The Accidental President?

THEY CONFER

George W Bush.

Correct. Ten points at stake for this.

Answer as soon as your name is called.

How many litres are there in one cubic metre?

BUZZER

1,000.

Correct. You get a set of bonuses this time

on pre-20th century works of practical philosophy.

Firstly for five points, an exponent of stoic philosophy,

which Roman emperor of the second century used imperfection

and the acceptance of things as they are as the theme of his meditations?

THEY CONFER

Marcus Aurelius.

Correct. In the 1841 essay Self-Reliance,

which US literary figure advised, "Insist on yourself, never imitate?"

THEY CONFER

-No. Don't know.

-It was Ralph Waldo Emerson.

In his autobiography, which US Founding Father argued that

a person's character could become noble

through constant self-assessment?

THEY CONFER

Franklin.

Benjamin Franklin is right. Ten points for this.

What general type of structure links the titles of novels

by Iain Banks, Thornton Wilder and Robert James Waller?

BELL

Bridge.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

These bonuses are on country code top level domain names,

for example, .uk.

In each case give the six-letter word formed by concatenating

the two-letter internet TLDs of the three countries listed.

Firstly, Sierra Leone, Indonesia and Spain?

THEY CONFER

Slines.

No, it's slides.

Slines isn't a word. Secondly, Germany, Mauritius and Reunion.

THEY CONFER

GONG

And at the gong, Sussex have 150,

St Peter's College Oxford have 205.

I thought you could have taken that at one point in this contest,

but 150 may well, Sussex, be a high enough score to come

back as one of the highest scoring losers. Who knows?

We'll have to wait and see what happens in the rest of the contest.

St Peter's, many congratulations to you. That's a terrific score.

We look forward to seeing you in round two.

Thank you for joining us. Congratulations.

I hope you can join us next time for another first-round match,

but until then, it's goodbye from Sussex University.

ALL: Goodbye.

It's goodbye from St Peter's College Oxford.

ALL: Goodbye.

And it's goodbye from me. Goodbye.

APPLAUSE