Question for June 30th - Dev

Apologies for the late late post...

Identify X. From the book:

"There was only one ____ and that was X, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Y was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Y would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to. Z was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of X and let out a respectful whistle."

Bonus points for identifying Y and Z.

The practice of X? -- June 29

In ancient economies X was in the form of people helping each other. X, in the mordern sense of distributing risk, was practised by Chinese and Babylonian traders as early as 2000 BC.

"Chinese merchants travelling treacherous river rapids would redistribute their wares across many vessels to limit the loss due to any single vessel's capsizing. The Babylonians developed a system which was recorded in the famous Code of Hammurabi, c. 1750 BC, and practised by early Mediterranean sailing merchants."

Benjamin Franklin helped to popularize and make standard the practice of X. He also started a company for the same.

What's X?

Question for June 28 - PS

In keeping with the soccer fever, here's today's question:

West Germany v Austria (25 June, 1982) was a 1982 FIFA World Cup game held in El Molinón, Gijón, Spain, that changed the rules of future World Cup tournaments ever since. In German the match is known as Nichtangriffspakt von Gijón or Schande von Gijón. In Algeria it is known as the Anschluss.

What happened in the game, and what was the subsequent rule change introdued by FIFA, to prevent such an event ever occurring again?

Question for Jun 25

What is the claim to fame of the location shown in the visual?

Question for 24th Jun, 2010

The company X was formed in 1902, at the dawn of the twentieth century. Its founder, Henry Leland, named the company after his ancestor, Antoine de la Mothe _____, the founder of Detroit. Antoine is also the inspiration for the company’s crest, which is based on his family’s historic coat of arms. X is first of it's kind from America to win the prestigious Dewar Trophy in England and adopt the slogan “Standard of the World”.

X=?

To June 23rd, with stars

Connect the following-

1. The video clip below, taken from a recent episode of the TV show Glee.


2. An Ex-RAF Engineer of West-Indian origin teaches high school in a difficult neighbourhood in London.

3. The Academy Awards for Best Actor in 1963 and "in recognition of his remarkable accomplishments as an artist and as a human being" in 2002.

Question for June 22, 2010

The X index is an informal measure to determine the purchasing power parity (PPP) between two currencies by using a slightly unusual measure of the relative cost of goods in those two countries. X was chosen as a measure because it is availabile in many countries, and the raw materials needed for creating X encompass a wide enough basket of goods to be reliable enough to atleast provide a ball-park figure of PPP. This theory was later expanded to include the amount of time an average worker has to work to earn enough to buy one X. This method fails for certain countries because the social status of X is different in different nations (for example, higher in India than USA). Also, in some countries, X has been modified to adapt to local preferences making a direct comparision of PPP difficult.

The five most expensive X are from Norway, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden and France. The five least expensive X are from India, Hong Kong, China, Thailand and Malaysia.

Identify X.