Packet by No Eric, No Crown (Aaron Rosenberg and Eric Mukherjee)

BARGE 2012

Edited by Chris Ray

Packet by No Eric, No Crown (Aaron Rosenberg and Eric Mukherjee)

1. It's not salt, but this substance can be thrown at the Aswang, a winged demon from Filipino folklore in order to cause its skin to become irritated. In Zoroastrian legend, the death of Gayomart caused this substance to fall to the ground which after forty years of exposure to sunlight gave rise to two rhubarb plants. In Hindu myth, the exchange of this substance between Mitra and Varuna results in the waxing and waning of the moon. Enki once ate plants contaminated with this substance causing his mouth and lips to swell up until this substance was taken by Ninhursag resulting in the (*) birth of eight gods. In order to best Set, Horus once dressed a lettuce leaf with this substance and got Set to consume it. In another myth, Pasiphae cursed her husband Minos to produce scorpions and spiders instead of this substance in order to curb his adulterous ways. For 10 points, identify this natural substance which mixed with sea foam to create Aphrodite, presumably after coming from Uranus’ severed testicles.
ANSWER: semen or sperm [accept any and all hilarious equivalents] Editor's Note: Jeremy Eaton has struck againe!

2. One industrial method of liberating this compound along with carbon black from biogas utilizes a plasma burner and known is the Kvarner process. Bioreactors for producing this compound use genetically altered Chlamydomonas reinhardtii that’s deprived of sulfur, while dark fermentation using Rhodobacter spheroides on wastewater is another promising method. The half-reaction for producing this compound is set as the zero of the (*) table of standard reduction potentials. A particularly energetically intensive method of producing this compound is the electrolysis of water, which is the basis behind the basic fuel cell. The addition of this compound to unsaturated hydrocarbons is used to create saturated ones. For 10 points, identify this compound with atomic mass 2.02 grams per mol, a diatomic molecule containing two atoms of the lightest element.
ANSWER: Hydrogen gas or H2

3. A Harper’s Weekly cartoon about this event shows a devil standing behind a man holding a piece of paper that says “ruined”. Horace Porter’s refusal to participate in this scandal managed to tip off the president. One perpetrator of this event was killed by Edward Stokes after he and Josie Mansfield attempted to extort him. The perpetrators of this scandal approached Abel Corbin to help them get closer to the (*) president, who agreed to appoint Daniel Butterfield to a very high post in order to tip them off. The perpetrators of this event had also won the Erie War against Cornelius Vanderbilt. James Garfield led the investigation into this scandal, though first lady Julia Grant was not allowed to testify. For 10 points, identify this scandal in which James Fisk and Jay Gould attempted to corner the market on gold, leading to a massive stock market crash on the last day of the working week.
AN SWER: Black Friday [accept the Gould-Fisk scandal before mention]

4. In one of this man’s novels, the protagonist takes up lodging with Dick and Martha Thompson, and gets raped while drunk towards the end but decides to continue her relationship with her attacker. In another, a poet returns to his native Wales to join three aging couples before that man, Alan Weaver, drinks himself to death. This author of The (*) Green Man wrote about Patrick Standish, who attempts to seduce the attractive but prudish primary school teacher Jenny Bunn, in Take a Girl Like You. In the first novel by this author of The Old Devils, the title character dumps Margaret for Christine and gets a well-paying job in London from Christine’s uncle, far better than his previous job as a junior lecturer in medieval history under the uptight Professor Welch. For 10 points, name this father of xenophobic lunatic Martin, the English author Lucky Jim..
ANSWER: Kingsley Amis

5. The first movement of this man’s flute sonata features the slightly oxymoronic tempo marking “Allegro malinconico,” while his clarinet sonata opens with a similarly odd “Allegro tristamente.” The influence of the cabaret is illustrated by such piano works as his Mouvements perpetuels. Following the death of his friend Pierre-Octave Ferroud in an auto accident he entered a more religious phase marked by such works as the (*) Litanies a la Vierge Noire. He first rose to prominence with the music for a ballet based on the paintings of Watteau, which depicted the sexual games of loose young women, and though he’s not Manuel de Falla, he composed the Concert champetre for harpsichord for Wanda Landowska. For 10 points, name this member of Les Six who composed Les Biches, best known for the operas The Breast of Tiresias and Dialogue of the Carmelites.
ANSWER: Francis Poulenc

6. The Sathon business district in this city is home to the ‘Robot Building.’ This city’s main shopping district is known as Slam Square, and in the city’s center is the recreational area Lumphini Park. The country’s Truth and Reconciliation commission has recently approved large compensation for those involved in a recent major protest in this city. That protest began after a military leader gave the first of many impromptu street interviews and declared he would be teaching the (*) “throwing a hand grenade dance,”and saw “red shirts” turn this city's central market district into a fortified bunker. Though prostitution is officially illegal, this city is home to the red light district Soi Cowboy, while its more mainstream landmarks include the home of a giant reclining Buddha, Wat Pho, as well as Wat Arun, or “The Temple of Dawn.” For 10 points, name this city located on the Chao Praya wracked by major floods in 2011, the capital of Thailand.
ANSWER: Bangkok or Krung Thep Maha Nakon

7. One song of this title was requested, along with the song “409,” by kids during a concert accompanied by the Maharishi. In another with this title, the speaker laments that “they come on like squares/then get off like squirrels” and has “planned my grand attacks/I will stand behind their backs/With my brand-new battle ax/Then they will taste my wrath.” A more famous song with this title was conceived during an (*) LSD trip and describes how a certain group’s kisses “keep[s] their boyfriends warm at night.” The Magnetic Fields wrote a song whose speaker hates the title figures, who prove a class above the “Mid-West farmers' daughters” in another song . For 10 points, name these females from a Beach Boys song, who have “daisy dukes/bikinis on top” and “sun-kissed skin” in more recent song by Katy Perry.

ANSWER: “California Girls”

8. The axiom of choice indicates that each of these mathematical objects has an algebraic closure which contains it, and For a polynomial over one of these, the “splitting” one is the smallest extension to one of these that allows the polynomial to factor into linear factors. Finite ones must have order equal to a power of a prime, and the fact that the constructible numbers form one of these structures is used to prove that (*) doubling a cube and trisecting an angle are impossible. These objects by definition have a Krull dimension of zero, and the fact that polynomials of degree higher than four have no closed solutions is proved using extensions of these objects, which are the subject of Galois theory. These objects are closed, associative, and commutative over both addition and multiplications, and are thus less general than rings. For 10 points, name these algebraic structures.
ANSWER: Fields

9. The principal biography of one saint with this name was written by Raymond of Capua. Another saint with this name had a vision of the Virgin Mary crushing a snake underfoot as she stood atop a globe, which inspired her to create the Miraculous Medal. The first saint with this name won a series of debates with scholars of Emperor Maxentius, converting them in the process. That figure was then (*) beheaded after an attempt to execute her on a breaking wheel caused the wheel to shatter. In addition to one surnamed Laboure, this name is held by a saint who convinced Pope Gregory XI to move the papacy back to Rome, and along with St. Francis of Assisi is the patron saint of Italy. For 10 points, give this name shared by several saints, including one from Alexandria and one from Siena.
ANSWER: St. Catherine

10. This man’s brother Rifaat attempted to overthrow him in a 1984 coup, fifteen years before this leader killed a bunch of Rifaat’s supporters in Lataika. After an assassination attempt on this man, one of his defense companies massacred several occupants of Tadmor Prison. This man’s government constructed the strategically vital Thrawa dam. After serving as defense minister and participating in the 8th of May coup, this man finally came to power after defeating (*) Salah Jadid in the Corrective Revolution. After a series of assassinations at an artillery school and three-year uprising, this man quashed the Muslim Brotherhood in the bloody Hama Massacre. This head of the Ba’ath party was succeeded in 2000 by his son, whose recent exploits have been so horrible that even the Arab League has turned its back on him. For 10 points, name this figure who in 1971 came to power in Syria, where his son Bashar still holds power.
ANSWER: Hafez al-Assad

11. In one story by this man, the expert marksman Silvio rushes off to finish a duel he started years ago only to call it off yet again when the Count’s wife stumbles onto the scene, shooting a painting instead. This author of “The Shot” also wrote a novel in which Pyotr Andreyich is rescued from a blizzard by a mysterious man who turns out to be the historical leader of a rebellion against the Empress. In addition to The (*) Captain’s Daughter, he wrote a short story in which the protagonist writes fake love letters to Lizaveta Ivanovna in order to gain access to her house; he then causes an elderly countess to die of fright but later acquires a secret gambling trick from her ghost, only to go insane when it fails. For 10 points, identify this Russian author of The Tales of Belkin, “The Queen of Spades,” and Eugene Onegin.
ANSWER: Alexander Pushkin

12. One museum designed by this man consists of three intersecting “volumes”: one of wood, one of concrete, and one of metal, corresponding to different periods of the artist whose work is displayed there. He collaborated with artist Barbara Weil to create a studio for her in Majorca, and designed another museum based around the concept of a globe shattered into three and then (*) reassembled. This architect of the Felix Nussbaum Haus and the Imperial War Museum North also designed a building whose main exit leads to 49 pillars comprising the “Garden of Exile,” while the building itself is permeated by a large “Void” and is shaped like a warped Star of David. For 10 points, name this American architect who designed the Jewish Museum of Berlin and won the competition to redesign the World Trade Center
ANSWER: Daniel Liebeskind

13. A “deep boom, like the rolling of an ocean wave” is heard after this novel’s protagonist recognizes a wink as a symbol of solidarity. Near the end, the protagonist goes through “My Best Bread” and other writings by her mother while trapped inside a house with a bird. That character opens a cupboard to find a cigarette butt burned breadboard, which she raises above her head as a weapon. The protagonist of this novel, in which Dr. (*) Courtland fails to keep his patient alive, is named for the state flower of West Virginia and is upset with the idiotic Texan relatives that show up to her father’s funeral at Mount Salus. That father dies during an operation to fix his detached retina and has his belongings desecrated by his widow Fay. Laurel McKelva Hand is the title character of, for 10 points, what novel by Eudora Welty?

ANSWER: The Optimist’s Daughter

14. This battle began after one side refused to allow the opposing commander to make a sacrifice at the temple of Melkart. The tactics used in this battle were used in the same year against Batis at the Battle of Gaza. 2000 members of the defeated army were nailed to crosses on the beach at the end of this battle, though King Azemilcus was spared. During this battle a ship full of (*) combustible materials were launched against two gigantic towers with catapults on top and ballistas on the bottom. The victorious side in this battle created a one-kilometer long causeway upon which gigantic siege engines bombarded the target city. For 10 points, name this 6-month battle in 332 BCE in which Alexander the Great besieged and captured a Phonecian city.

ANSWER: Siege ofTyre

15. Though not atheism, the experiments of John Needham were cited extensively as evidence for this theory in The System of Nature by Baron d’Holbach. William James coined the idea of a “soft” version of this view in his book The Dilemma of this. One thought experiment that relies on this theory involves an entity that knows the momentum and position of every particle, though the (*) Heisenberg uncertainty principle refutes that possibility in favor of a fundamental probability. Exemplified by Laplace’s Demon, the “hard” form of this view holds that free will is false, while compatabilism attempts to reconcile free will with this view. For 10 points, identify this philosophical position which holds that future events are entirely dependent on prior events.
ANSWER: determinism

16. The causative agent of this disease contains the HPI pathogenicity island, which codes for a protease that activates plasminogen and phospholipase D. Its causative agent uses the yadBC adhesin to attach to cells, and uses a type three secretory system to inject a series of Yop factors into the cytoplasm. Hemochromatosis or high iron levels increase susceptibility to this disease, which uses a murine toxin and a hemin storage system to live inside the (*) GI tract of its reservoir species. Prairie dogs are the primary reservoir of this disease, which is cause by a gram-negative, intracellular rod-shaped bacterium. The hallmark of this condition is a series of swollen lymph nodes, especially in the inguinal areas and the armpits. For 10 points, name this disease caused by Yersinia pestis, which killed millions in the Black Death.
ANSWER: plague [accept bubonic plague, pneumonic plague, septicemic plague or black plague; accept Yersinia pestis before mentioned]