Episode 7 University Challenge

APPLAUSE

Asking the questions, Jeremy Paxman.

Hello. Two more teams of students are preparing to show true grit

and whichever of them is the grittier will get through to the second round.

The losers will fall by the wayside

unless their score is among the four highest losing scores

from these first-round matches.

Balliol College, Oxford, was founded

in the 13th century by John de Balliol,

an adviser to Henry III.

The college has made several appearances on this series,

but winning the trophy has so far eluded them.

Perhaps they've been distracted by seeking glory in other fields

of public life, with three of their alumni, Asquith,

Macmillan and Heath, becoming Prime Minister.

The Labour bigwig Denis Healey went to Balliol,

as did the economist Adam Smith and the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins.

JM Barrie sent Captain Hook there and it's where Dorothy L Sayers

educated her sleuth, Lord Peter Wimsey.

Representing around 615 students and with an average age of 23,

let's meet the Balliol team.

Hi. I'm Freddy Potts.

I'm from Newcastle and I'm reading history.

Hello, I'm Jacob Lloyd.

I'm from London and am reading for a DPhil in English.

And their captain.

Hi, I'm Jay Goldman, I'm from London

and I'm reading for a degree in philosophy and theology.

Hi, I'm Ben Pope,

I'm from sunny Sydney and I'm doing a DPhil in astrophysics.

APPLAUSE

Now, their opponents represent Imperial College London,

which won this series in 1996 and 2001.

Imperial was founded in 1907 and was part of the University of London

for much of its existence,

becoming independent again on its centenary in 2007.

Its main campus is in South Kensington,

where the area's skyline is dominated

by its copper-domed Queen's Tower,

saved from demolition by Sir John Betjeman.

With over 16,000 students,

its past high achievers include the writer HG Wells,

the inventor of penicillin, Sir Alexander Fleming,

and Darwin's bulldog, the biologist Thomas Huxley.

With an average age of 21, let's meet the Imperial team.

Hello, I'm Rupert Belsham,

I'm from London and I'm studying physics.

Hi, I'm Lottie Whittingham.

I'm from Tincleton in Dorset and I'm studying medicine.

And this is their captain.

Hello, I'm Jasper Menkus, I'm from San Francisco, California

and I'm reading physics.

Hi, I'm Nas Andriopoulos, I'm from Bradford-on-Avon in Wiltshire

and I'm studying chemistry with molecular physics.

APPLAUSE

Well, you all know the rules, so I won't bother reciting them.

Fingers on the buzzers. Here's your first starter for ten.

"Books always speak of other books

"and every story tells a story that has already been told."

These are the words of which writer, who died in 2016?

They appear in the postscript to his debut novel...

Umberto Eco.

Umberto Eco is correct, yes. APPLAUSE

Right, you get a set of bonuses. The first lot are on Germany,

Imperial College. Firstly for five points,

a founder of the Christian Democratic Union

who was instrumental in negotiating West Germany's membership of NATO,

who was the first Chancellor of the Federal Republic?

-We don't know. Sorry.

-That's Konrad Adenauer.

Secondly, born Herbert Frahm, which Chancellor took

Norwegian citizenship for the duration of World War II?

He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1971

for his work on improving relations between East and West Germany.

-Best guess?

-No.

-Anything?

-No.

We don't know that either.

That was Willy Brandt. And finally, which Christian Democrat

served as the first Chancellor of the reunited Germany

and became the longest-serving Chancellor after Bismarck?

-Anything?

-No, I can't remember any German Chancellors.

-No, sorry.

-It's Helmut Kohl.

Ten points for this.

In an act of the same name,

a 1713 Parliament voted to provide a public reward for such person

or persons as shall discover within...

-Longitude?

-Correct.

APPLAUSE

Your first bonuses, Balliol College, are on internet encyclopaedias.

Firstly, the wiki community and online wiki encyclopaedia,

known by the acronym Ganfyd, G-A-N-F-Y-D,

was founded in 1925 by a group of British people working in

or training for which profession?

It sounds sort of Welsh.

No, it's not something Welsh.

What do we think?

-Mining.

-No, it's medicine.

It stands for "get a note from your doctor". LAUGHTER

Secondly, also known as Hudong,

which social network includes China's largest wiki?

It's name means encyclopaedia.

Chinese.

Could be.

-What's it?

-Is it Weibo or something? I can't remember.

Weibo?

No, it's Baike.

And Memory Alpha is a wiki encyclopaedia

devoted to the universe of which science-fiction franchise?

-Star Trek.

-Correct.

Ten points for this. APPLAUSE

The packaging for a perfume launched in the 1930s

by the designer Elsa Schiaparelli

is the origin of the two-word name of which colour,

described in a contemporary publication

as a crude, cruel shade of rose?

Chanel pink?

No. Anyone like to buzz from Balliol?

One of you can buzz. You can't confer but one of you can buzz.

-Flame red.

-No, it's shocking pink.

Ten points for this. Considered a global threat

and one of the key indicators of social development

by the World Health Organization,

which illness is an acute intestinal infection caused by the ingestion

of food or water...

E. coli.

No, you lose five points.

Contaminated with various strains of the Vibrio bacterium.

-Cholera?

-Cholera is correct, yes.

APPLAUSE

Right, your bonuses are on the French author and poet

Christine de Pizan.

Firstly, for five points, after the death of her husband,

a royal secretary,

Christine de Pizan turned to writing to support her family.

Her prose work The Book Of The City Of Ladies

is based on a work by Boccaccio

and appeared in the first decade of which century?

18th?

18th or 19th, I'm not sure.

I'd go with 18th.

18th.

No, it's the 15th century, the 1400s.

Christine wrote a noted biography of which French king,

known as the wise?

He led a recovery after the disasters of the early part

of the Hundred Years' War.

It's not like Henri I or something? Henri II?

-Henri I.

-No, it's Charles V.

And finally, written in 1429,

Christine's last work is a celebration of the early victories

of which contemporary military figure?

Martel? No, it's too late, isn't it?

-Which century are we talking?

-14.

Martel?

-Martel.

-No, it was Joan of Arc. We're going to take a picture round.

For your picture starter,

you'll see a map of the world

with four countries highlighted.

The two-letter ISO codes

of these countries can be combined

to form the name of a capital city.

Ten points if you can work out which one.

Vilnius?

No, anyone like to buzz from Balliol?

Oslo.

No, it's Brussels.

It's Brazil, the United States,

Sweden and Lesotho.

So, picture bonuses in a moment or two,

ten points at stake for this starter question.

"There might not be a presenter as gleefully unselfconscious

"working today. He got his job because undiluted joy for railways

"radiates from his very being."

These words refer to which broadcaster?

In the 1990s, he was chief secretary...

Michael Portillo.

Correct. Yes. APPLAUSE

Right, you get a set of picture bonuses, three more maps.

Again, in each case, the two-letter ISO codes

of the countries highlighted can be combined

to give the name of a capital city.

Five points for each you can work out.

Firstly, for five...

Morocco. It's like M-O.

What's that - Cambodia? CA?

C-A-M-O-H.

Yeah, M-O-N-I.

-Is it Honduras or something? Or Nicaragua?

-Yeah.

Nimoca?

-I don't know.

-Monaco?

-Yeah, that could be.

-If it's M-O.

-Monaco?

No, it's Manila.

It was Morocco, Nicaragua -

and Laos was one you failed to identify in Southeast Asia.

Secondly...

Bolivia. Gabon.

-Mauritania. Or Niger.

-B-O-G-A.

-What's that one? That's...

-Did you say B-O-G-A?

Niger.

Bolivia, Niger...Bulgaria?

-Romania.

-Romania, sorry.

And Gabon.

Ga-nig-ro-ni-ga.

Gaborone? No.

-Gaborone?

-Nominate Andriopoulos.

-Gaborone?

-Correct, well done. APPLAUSE

Gabon, Bolivia, Romania and Niger.

And finally...

Australia.

Namibia or Mozambique?

Namibia.

-Australia.

-Or South Sudan.

S-S-A-U-N-A.

Nassau.

Nassau.

Correct. Well done. APPLAUSE

Ten points for this. In biology,

what Greek-derived term denotes the process

sometimes known as self-digestion?

That is the destruction of...

Autophagy?

No, you lose five points.

That is the destruction of cells or tissues

by enzymes present within them.

Endophagy.

No, it's autolysis.

Ten points for this. Located in the West Bank near the River Jordan,

which city is among those claiming to be

the world's oldest continually-inhabited city?

In biblical history,

it was the first town attacked by the Israelites...

-Jericho.

-Jericho is correct.

APPLAUSE

Your bonuses are on astronomy, Balliol.

Which celestial body was discovered on July 23rd 1995,

later known as the Great Comet of 1997?

Its home page became the first NASA website

to receive over one million hits a day.

-Haley-Bopp.

-No, it's Hale-Bopp, but you've identified the right comet.

Hale-Bopp reached its closest point to the sun on April 1st 1997,

at a distance of 0.91AU.

By what term is this point known?

-Periapsis.

-Perihelion, perihelion.

-Distance to the sun, right?

-Yeah.

OK, the perihelion.

Perihelion is right.

At the time of its discovery by two amateur astronomers,

Hale-Bopp was at a distance of over seven astronomical units from the sun.

That is between the orbits of which two planets?

-Jupiter and Saturn?

-Correct.

Ten points for this.

Which public figure shares a surname with the Irish-born author of

A Modest Proposal, while her first...

Swift.

I'm afraid you lose five points.

..while her first name is the surname of the actress

who won Academy Awards for performances in Butterfield 8

and Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?

Taylor Swift.

Taylor Swift is correct, yes.

Right, your bonuses are on cultural studies in Britain, Balliol.

Which Jamaican-born sociologist and theorist was associated with

Britain's first cultural studies programme at Birmingham University from 1964?

He's noted for his paper Encoding, Decoding.

He's one of the New Left Review guys.

Just pass.

Williams?

No, it's Stuart Hall.

For his thinking on race,

Stuart Hall is often called the godfather of which body of thought

in political philosophy?

It centres on the proper way to respond

to cultural and religious diversity.

THEY CONFER QUIETLY

Multiculturalism.

Correct. Hall is often said to have coined what term?

He used it in an article in Marxism Today in January 1979

to denote the politics of a specific politician born in 1925.

In '75 of someone born in '25.

So I'm presuming he's opposed to it?

Do you think it's some sort of...

1925.

No, cos I think it's a reference to a person.

Let's go for that. Neoliberalism?

No, it's Thatcherism.

-Oh.

-Ten points for this.

Which group of five or six species

form the largest of the perissodactyls,

an order of hoofed mammals that includes horses and zebras?

All are either threatened or endangered, and are restricted to

Eastern and Southern Africa, and to parts of tropical Asia.

Rhinoceros.

Correct.

These bonuses are on novels published in 2015.

Punished as a child by her mother for her midnight-black skin,

Lula Ann Bridewell is the central character in God Help The Child,

the 11th novel by which Nobel prize-winning author?

Best guess? Anything.

Zora Neale Hurston, but it's not.

-Nominate Whittingham.

-Zora Neale Hurston.

No, it's Toni Morrison.

Secondly, set in 1994 during the Balkan wars,

Love, Sex And Other Foreign Policy Goals is the debut novel

of which author and co-writer of the television comedies

Peep Show and The Thick Of It?

THEY CONFER QUIETLY

Armando Iannucci?

No, it's Jesse Armstrong.

And finally, concerning Teddy,

a would-be poet and bomber pilot in the Second World War,

A God In Ruins is the companion piece to which author's

bestselling 2013 novel, Life After Life?

-Oh, God.

-I don't know.

Smith.

Kate Atkinson.

Right, we're going to take a music round now.

For your music starter, you'll hear a piece of classical music

by a German composer. Ten points if you can identify the composer.

PIANO MUSIC PLAYS

VIOLIN JOINS IN

Beethoven.

It was Beethoven, yes.

Part of his Violin Sonata, Opus Number 12.

He dedicated that violin sonata to the composer Antonio Salieri,

with whom he studied between 1800 and 1802.

Salieri was an influence on the careers of many now well-known composers.

For your music bonuses, works by three more of them.

Five points for each composer you can identify.

Firstly for five, this Austrian composer.

PIANO AND STRINGS PLAY

Mozart?

No, that's Schubert.

Salieri brought him to the Imperial Seminary.

Secondly, the German composer of this operatic overture.

ORCHESTRAL MUSIC PLAYS

Hindemith?

No, that's Meyerbeer.

He was an adviser to Meyerbeer early in his career.

And finally, this Central European composer?

PIANO MUSIC PLAYS

Dvorak.

No, that's Liszt. Salieri taught him at one point.

Ten points for this. The son of the King of Thessaly,

which Greek hero was the only one of his father's children

to survive when his uncle, Pelias, usurped the throne?

Given the centaur...

Achilles.

I'm afraid you lose five points.

..given to the centaur Chiron to tutor,

his later desertion of Medea is the subject of a play by Euripides.

One of you can buzz, Imperial.

Heracles.

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

In North America, what specific Latin-derived adjective is used

to describe an election for the Chief Executive Officer of a

US state and to refer generally...

Gubernatorial?

Gubernatorial is correct, yes.

These bonuses, Balliol, are on the sciences.

In physics, the Cyclotron Principle involves using an electric field

to accelerate charged particles across a gap between two magnetic field regions

in the shape of what letter?

An O?

No, it's a D.

In Earth science, the D double prime layer

is a two-hundred-kilometre-thick layer

in which part of the Earth between the crust and the core?

Mantle.

Correct.

In 1570, John Dee edited the first English translation

of which Ancient Greek mathematical treatise?

I need the title and the author.

-Euclid's Elements?

-That's geometry. No.

Hm? Euclid's Elements? Well, it could be.

Euclid's Elements?

Correct. Ten points for this.

Born in western Germany in 1820,

who moved to Manchester to work for his family business in 1840...?

Friedrich Engels.

Correct.

Balliol, these bonuses are on painters described by the art historian EH Gombrich

as "Three desperately lonely men".

All three were born in the mid-19th century.

Firstly, "Proud to be called a barbarian"

is Gombrich's description of which former stockbroker?

Feeling himself misunderstood in Europe,

he spent several years living in the South Sea Islands.

It's Gauguin. Gauguin?

Correct.

"He had decided to start from scratch as if no painting had been done before him."

Gombrich wrote those words of which French artist,

whom he described as "The father of modern art"?

THEY CONFER QUIETLY

Cezanne?

It is Cezanne, yes.

And finally, according to Gombrich,

which Dutch artist used brushstrokes "To convey his excitement

"and to tell us something of the state of his mind?"

THEY CONFER QUIETLY

Van Gogh?

Correct.

Right, we're going to take another picture round.

For your picture starter, you're going to see a still from a film.

For ten points, I want you to identify the film, please.

Metropolis.

It is Metropolis, yes.

That was Fritz Lang's expressionist work.

It was made in 1927, and it features an early example

of that staple of science fiction, the robot.

For your bonuses, stills from three more films,

each depicting robots, androids, or synthetic people.

Five points for each, if you can identify the film.

Firstly...

Lost In Space?

No, that's Forbidden Planet. Secondly...

Blade Runner.

Correct. And finally...

Ex Machina?

Correct.

Right, ten points for this.

What object features in the artwork Black Kites by Gabriel Orozco,

forms a pyramid in a painting by Paul Cezanne,

and can be seen in anamorphic form at the base of...

A skull.

Skull is correct, yes. Human skulls.

These bonuses, Balliol College, are on Britain and Japan.

Which decade saw the signing of the Anglo-Japanese Treaty Of Amity And Commerce?

The start of the Second Opium War and the suppression of the Indian Mutiny

occurred earlier in the same decade.

1850s.

Correct.

Which decade saw the signing of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance in London?

The terms of the treaty would discourage French participation

in the Russo-Japanese War which began two years later.

THEY CONFER QUIETLY

1900s.

Correct. The Anglo-Japanese Alliance lapsed during which decade?

The same decade saw the Washington Naval Conference

and the Locarno Treaties.

THEY CONFER QUIETLY

1920s.

Correct. Ten points for this.

In zoology, Mollusca and Chordata are examples of which tax...

Phyla.

Yes, I'll accept that.

That's the plural of phylum, which is what I was getting towards,

so, yes, that's fine. Your bonuses are on people whose lives spanned

a similar period to that of Sir Winston Churchill,

who lived from 1874 to 1965.

In each case, name the person from the description.

Firstly, the 31st President of the United States.

Before his political career,

he'd been a mining engineer in China and organised relief work in Europe

during the First World War.

Truman? No.

-Herbert Hoover.

-Yeah.

Hoover.

Correct.

Secondly, a Polish-American business magnate,

the company that bears her name is a leading manufacturer and distributor

of beauty products.

Polish-American. What was her name?

Could be Bulgari, I don't know.

Oh, yeah. Bulgari?

No, it's Helena Rubinstein.

And finally, a writer who won a record four Pulitzer Prizes for poetry.

Associated with New England, his works include Dust Of Snow,

A Winter Eden and The Road Less Travelled.

Robert Frost.

Correct. Four and a half minutes to go, ten points at stake for this.

The Zone Of Interest is the second Holocaust-themed novel by which

British writer whose Booker shortlisted work, Time's Arrow...

Martin Amis.

Correct.

Your bonuses are on chemistry, Balliol.

In each case, give the oxidation state of the named element in its

given compound. Firstly, what is the oxidation state of silicon

in a molecule of silicon dioxide?

THEY CONFER QUIETLY

Plus four.

Plus four is correct.

What is the oxidation state of carbon in a molecule of ethane?

THEY CONFER QUIETLY

We'll go plus four again.

No, it's minus three.

And finally, what is the oxidation state of oxygen in a molecule

of hydrogen peroxide?

This is an unusual one.

It's...

-Minus one, I think.

-Yeah, that sounds good.

Minus one?

Correct.

Ten points for this. In chemistry, what term denotes the number of

atoms, ions or molecules that a central atom or ion holds

as its nearest neighbours in...

Valence?

No, I'm afraid you lose five points.

..as its nearest neighbours in a complex or crystal.

Coordination number?

Correct.

Imperial, your bonuses are on philosophy in the early 20th century.

In each case, name the author of the following.

All were originally published in English.

Firstly, Democracy And Education and Experience And Nature.

Quickly. Anything.

Wittgenstein?

-Nominate Belsham.

-Wittgenstein?

No, it's John Dewey.

Secondly, Principia Ethica and A Defence Of Common Sense.

THEY CONFER QUIETLY

Russell.

No, it's GE Moore.

And finally, On Denoting, The Problems Of Philosophy

and The Analysis Of Mind.

THEY CONFER QUIETLY

Russell again.

That was Russell, yes. Bertrand Russell.

Ten points for this. For what the letters R, E, F stand

when describing a system for assessing the quality...

Research Excellence Framework.

Correct.

It determines how universities get money.

Right, your bonuses are on oases, Balliol College.

Al-Hasa is the largest oasis in which country?

Incorporated into the principality of Najd before World War I,

it lies close to Al-Dammam, its country's main oil-producing area.

Saudi Arabia.

Correct.

In which country is the Siwa Oasis?

In antiquity it was the location of the Oracle Temple of the god Amun,

visited by Alexander the Great.

Egypt?

Correct.

Rising in the Karakoram Mountains, the River Yarkand irrigates

a large oasis south-east of Kashgar in the far west of which country?

-China.

-Kashgar?

It's in Xinjiang.

OK.

China.

China is correct.

Ten points for this.

What surname links the English scientist who, in 1774,

claimed to have discovered dephlogisticated air...

Priestley.

Priestley is correct, yes.

Your bonuses this time, Balliol,

are on seven-letter terms in the sciences.

In each case, give the term from the definition.

All three begin with the same letter.

Firstly, in physics,

a term from an SI-derived unit that denotes the potential difference

in a direct current circuit.

Voltage.

Correct.

In chemistry, a word that may follow blue, green, white, or rose

in the trivial names of metal sulphates.

Pass.

It's vitriol. And finally, in medicine,

a substance used clinically for immunisation against a pathogen?

Vaccine.

Correct. Ten points for this.

The Strait of Belle Isle and the Cabot Strait

link which Gulf to the Atlantic Ocean?

The Gulf shares its name with the river that's...

Hudson?

No, you lose five points.

..that is the outlet of the North American Great Lakes.

It's the St Laurence. GONG

And at the gong, Imperial College, London, have 55.

Balliol College, Oxford, have 220.

Well, you were a bit unlucky with the fall of questions.

I can see you kicking yourselves at some of the science questions that they got that you didn't get.

But I'm afraid we're going to have to say goodbye to you, Imperial.

Balliol, that was a terrific performance.

We shall look forward to seeing you in round two.

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

but until then, it's goodbye from Imperial College, London.

ALL: Goodbye.

It's goodbye from Balliol College, Oxford.

ALL: Goodbye.

And it's goodbye from me. Goodbye.