2005 Walton Academic Challenge Prelims Round 3

TU: 1. In 1995, General Giap[jee yap] disavowed this August 4 event in a statement that supported Captain Herrick’s report attributing it to “an over-eager sonar-man.” Giap, however, did confirm an accidental attack two days earlier on the USS Maddox in the body of water in question. FTP, identify this 1964 incident which escalated the Vietnam War.

Gulf of Tonkin Incident (prompt on “Pueblo”)

B: Identify these things related to the Vietnam War:

1. Although most consider this offensive beginning on 30 January 1968 to be a military failure, it was a massive psychological victory for the Viet Cong, after which popular support turned decisively against the war.

Tet Offensive

2. The American General in charge of military operations in Vietnam from 1964-68, his reports to the public concerning the progress of the war have become infamous for their misleading positivity.

William Westmoreland

______

TU: 2. This lighter-than-air, colorless, odorless gas is commonly produced in swamps and is a byproduct of petroleum refining. It is a major constituent of the atmospheres of Jovian planets, and is a more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. FTP, name this simplest alkane with the formula CH4.

Methane

B: Identify these organic molecules from the chemical formula:

  1. H2 O2

Hydrogen Peroxide

  1. CH3 COOH

Acetic acid or ethanal

______

TU: 3. After Irving, Mailer, and Updike criticized his novel about Charlie Croker, he struck back with an essay entitled “My Three Stooges.” Recent career highlights include the 2001 collection Hooking Up, as well as an award from the Literary Review in 2004 for the most tasteless sex scene of the year. FTP, the aforementioned award-winning rape scene in I Am Charlotte Simmons was written by what man, author of the controversial novel A Man in Full?

Tom Wolfe (prompt on “Wolfe”)

B: Answer these questions about the works of Tom Wolfe.

  1. The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test was a journalistic account of the Merry Pranksters, led by what author of One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest?

Ken Kesey

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  1. What novel, later made into a 1983 Philip Kaufman film, tells of the contrasting fates of the Mercury Seven astronauts and test pilot Chuck Yeager?

The Right Stuff

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TU: 4. Karl Marx and Goethe[ger ta] both called this man’s most important work, “the greatest accomplishment of the human intellect in history.” That work, The Phenomenology of Spirit, lays out a comprehensive philosophical system through the concept of “Geist.” FTP, identify this German philosopher famous for his “dialectic.”

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

B: Identify these branches of philosophy.

  1. This branch of philosophy concerns morality and the assessment of human behavior

Ethics

  1. This branch of philosophy, whose name comes from the Greek for ‘science,” is the study of the nature and origins of knowledge

Epistemology

______

TU: 5. Ironically this man served in the Imperial Japanese Army until 1911 when he returned to his native country to participate in the Wuchang Uprising, which, though unsuccessful, would lay the ground for the Chinese Nationalist Party, or Kuomintang. FTP, identify this man who later led China after the death of his mentor, Sun-Yat Sen.

Chang kai-shek or Jiang Jieshi [jyong jay shu]

B: Identify these Chinese dynasties.

  1. Roughly contemporary with the Roman Empire, this dynasty witnessed a flourishing of the arts as well as the official introduction of Confucianism to China

Han

  1. A golden age of Chinese literature and art, the system of civil service examinations was perfected during this dynasty ousted in 907 AD.

Tang

______

TU: 6. This piece’s composer left instructions that the pedal must be depressed for the entire first movement because it must be played “as delicately as possible.” Dedicated to Italian countess Giulietta Guicciardi,[jee oo card ee] it gained its popular name when the poet Rellstab compared the composition to the beauty of LakeLucerne at nighttime. FTP, Beethoven’s Piano Sonata Number 14 is better known by what two-word nickname?

Moonlight Sonata

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B: Identify these Beethoven symphonies by number.

  1. The Heroic Symphony, originally dedicated to Napoleon Bonaparte.

Number 3

  1. In 1990, this hypothetical symphony in E Major was put together using Beethoven’s sketches and notes.

Number 10

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TU: 7. Blackstone cites its first recorded invocation in 1305, during the reign of Edward I, but the procedure was only codified by its namesake act of 1679. In England it was most recently suspended during World War II, and in America by Lincoln during the Civil War. FTP, identify this writ, Latin for “you may have the body.”

Habeas Corpus

B: Identify these things related to Habeas Corpus:

1. Enacted by Congress after September 11, many consider this act to undermine a number of areas of the Constitution, including habeas corpus.
Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001 (or The USAPatriot Act)

2. Given royal assent on 11 March 2005, this British counterpart of the Patriot Act allows the Home Secretary to impose “control orders” on anyone suspected of terrorist activity.

The Prevention of Terrorism Act of 2005

______

TU: 8. They contain circular DNA and divide via binary fission independently of their hosts. Similar in structure to primitive prokaryotes, they are vital in cell function and create ATP via the Krebs cycle. FTP, name this cell organelle, also known as the “powerhouse of the cell.”

Mitochondria

B: Identify the cellular process from the chief catalyst

  1. Rubisco

Calvin Cycle
2. Glucokinase

Glycolysis

______

TU: 9. The writer of this play was a huge fan of Buster Keaton and the Marx Brothers, but one critic certainly did not find it funny, however, writing, “Nothing happens, nobody comes, nobody goes, it's awful!” This is not exactly true, however, as the boy comes and goes twice, as do Pozzo and Lucky. FTP, what is this masterpiece of Samuel Beckett?

Waiting for Godot [ga doh]

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B: Show off your knowledge of Balzac[ ball zack] by answering these questions:

  1. His novel Mercadet[ mer ca day]features a man waiting for financial salvation in the form of his business partner Godeau [goo doe]. Within 25 years, in what year was this novel published?

1851 (accept anything 1826-1876)

  1. In what language did Balzac primarily write?

French

TU: 10. A 1917 book of poetry by Aldous Huxley carries this man’s name, and a sermon in the opening chapters of Moby Dick concerns him, the son of Amittai[ ah mit aye]. He flees to Joppa and boards a ship bound to Tarshish, thereby ignoring God’s word to go to Nineveh to preach against it. FTP, who is this Biblical prophet, who is cast overboard on the way to Tarshish and swallowed by a great fish?

Jonah

B: Answer these questions about a couple of Biblical fishermen.

  1. What first Pope was a fisherman before becoming a “fisher of men”?

Peter

  1. Name Peter’s brother, also a fisherman, who is believed to have been crucified on an X-shaped cross.

Andrew

______

TU: 11. It is formally defined in terms of the triple point of water, and was proposed in the 19th century by William Thomson as an alternative to the existing temperature scales which were based on the freezing and boiling points of water. FTP, name this temperature scale which begins at absolute zero.

Kelvin

B: Identify these things relating to temperature:

  1. Defined as the heat capacity per unit mass of a substance, it is expressed joules per kilogram Kelvin

Specific heat

  1. These are the terms for the three methods of heat transfer: across matter, through a fluid, and electromagnetically

Conduction, Convection, and Radiation (in any order)

______

TU: 12. Of the ten figures featured in this painting, six are female, three are male, and one is a dog. The men, one of which is the painter himself, are all dressed in black and seem to skulk around the back of the painting, whereas the female title characters are dressed in white and occupy the centre foreground. FTP, identify this 1656 painting by Diego Velazquez.

Las Meninas or The Maids of Honor

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B: Given works, identify the artist:

  1. Lion Hunt, The Abduction of the Daughters of Leucippos, and a rather corpulent Bacchus

Peter Paul Rubens

  1. Death of the Virgin, The Conversion of St. Paul, The Calling of St. Matthew

Michelangelo Merisi de Caravaggio

______

TU: 13. Paper and pencil ready. The position of a particle along the x-axis is defined by x(t) = 4t2 + 3t – 6 + cos(πt) [x of t equals four t squared plus three t minus six plus cosine of pi t] . FTP, find the acceleration of the particle at t = 2.

8 -π2

B: Find the derivative of the following functions with respect to X:

  1. sin(3x ^2) [sine of three X squared]

6xcos(3x ^ 2) [six X times the cosine of three X squared]

  1. (3x ^ 2 + 2x) / 5x [the quantity three X squared plus two X divided by the quantity five X]

3/5

______

TU: 14. This author’s publication of “The Captive of the Caucasus” brought him political trouble, as his works became associated with the Decembrist Uprising. This upset Nicholas I so much that he could not find a publisher for his 1825 play about a 16th-century tsar [sar]. FTP, who is this father of modern Russian literature, the author Boris Gudonov?

Aleksandr Pushkin

B: Answer these questions about the plays of Pushkin.

  1. “The Stone Guest” concerns what legendary Spanish playboy?

Don Juan

  1. Pushkin wrote a play about these two men, one the composer of Don Giovanni and the other his alleged killer.

Mozart and Salieri

______

TU: 15. This work attacks two of the major tenets of Mercantilism: that protectionist tariffs and large reserves of gold bullion serve the economic interests of the nation. Instead, it argues for free trade, asserting that acting in one’s own self interest serves the public good, “as if by an invisible hand.” FTP, identify this 1776 work by Adam Smith

An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of The Wealth of Nations

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B: Identify these economists from clues:

  1. Building on Adam Smith’s views of free trade, this slightly later economist developed the invaluable principle of “comparative advantage.” He is also responsible for the Labor Theory of Value and the Iron Law of Wages.

David Ricardo

  1. An advocate of deficit spending and an important influence on FDR’s New Deal, this British economist’s works include The Economic Consequences of the Peace, about the Versailles settlement, and The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money.

John Maynard Keynes

______

TU: 16. Observations of this planet have indicated the presence of water ice at its north pole. Because the surface temperature of this planet can vary from 90 to 700 Kelvin, this ice must reside within permanently shaded craters. FTP, name this planet, whose surface contains many craters and appears similar to that of the Moon, the first planet from the Sun.

Mercury

B: Identify these moons of the Solar System:

  1. The largest moon in the Solar System by diameter, just edging Saturn’s Titan, it was first called Jupiter III, as it was the third discovered of that planet’s moons

Ganymede

  1. The largest moon of Neptune, its name was proposed by Camille Flammarion [flam marion] in 1880 but not used until the discovery of another moon, Nereid [ner re id], in 1949.

Triton

TIE-BREAKERS

  1. What Greek mathematician, whose school was the first to consider a primitive heliocentric idea, went on to discover an important theorem which describes the relationship between the sides of a right triangle?

Pythagoras

  1. Arrested by Robert E. Lee, what abolitionist led a raid on the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, VA in 1859 in order to support a slave uprising?

John Brown