- She currently teaches at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at
UT-Austin. After attending Boston University law school, she began a
career in the Texas Senate, later representing Texas in the House of
Representatives. She was appointed to the Judiciary committee and her
15-minute nationally televised speech on elected officials' duty to defend
the Constitution brought her national attention during the Watergate
hearing. For 10 points--name this orator, perhaps best known as the
keynote speaker at the 1976 Democratic National Convention.
answer: Barbara Jordan
- The Torino Scale quantifies the hazards associated with these
phenomena, assigning a number from 0 to 10 on the basis of both
probability and kinetic energy. It has been 91 years since the last time
the Level 8 criteria of being "capable of causing localized destruction"
was satisfied. The last Level 10, assigned to events "capable of causing
a global climate catastrophe", occurred 65 million years and now defines
the KT boundary. For 10 points--name either type of solar system body
whose impacts can be gauged thusly.
answer: Asteroid or Comet impacts
- To file all day, to be a yes man, to be underappreciated, to claw up to
middle management, to be replaced on a whim, to be forced into early
retirement, and to have a brown nose are some of the career goals of the
little kids in the commercial of--for 10 points--what career placement web
site, where they might find that "there's a better job out there"?
answer: Monster.com
- When he was 13, his mother committed suicide by drowning. When the body
was recovered, she was almost completely nude, except for part of her night
dress which had somehow wrapped itself around her face. This may explain why
he often depicted veiled women as well as nude women who were segmented or
headless. The two themes are united in his classic portait of a woman's head
which replaces the subject's facial features with a nude headless female
body, a painting entitled The Rape. For 10 points--name this renowned
Surrealist, also famous for Time Transfixed.
answer: René Magritte
- In a 1999 book, he tells of being rescued by a lifeguard at a riverside
beach in Dixon, Illinois; of attending a small nearby college with that
lifeguard; and of doctoring the script of the movie International Squadron in
1941--which, by the way, was the first leading role of his classmate. All of
which is very odd, since in actuality this author wasn't born until 1940.
For 10 points--name this biographer, who controversially decided to insert a
fictional version of himself into his recent "memoir" of Ronald Reagan,
Dutch.
answer: Edmund Morris
- This biblical prophet of doom's career is set in the time of two 8th
century B.C. kings, Uzziah of Judah and Jeroboam II of Israel, although his
book is our only historical source for his life. This book ends with a Book
of Visions which details his confrontation with Amaziah, priest of Bethel.
For 10 points--name this man, the first prophet whose name goes with a book
entirely concerned with his life and message and the first alphabetically.
answer: Amos
- Its main character, the author of a successful novel, keeps four
journals: a personal diary, one for recollections of past experiences, one
for her political views, especially about her disillusionment with Communism,
and one on her experiences in Africa. This heroine, Anna, falls in love with
an American, reaches the brink of insanity, and tries to bring threads of her
four books together into the title work of the novel. For 10 points--name
this 1962 book, a landmark in feminist literature by Doris Lessing.
answer: The Golden Notebook
- Pencil and paper might be useful. 1923, 1927 and 1928, 1932, 1936 thru
1939, 1941, 1943, 1947, 1949 thru 1953, 1956, 1958, 1961 and 1962, 1977 and
1978, 1996, 1998, and finally, 1999. These are the 25 years in which--for 10
points--what team has won the World Series?
answer: New York Yankees
- He was denied tenure at Princeton, but in 1953, he was granted a chair
at the Institute for Advanced Study. Originally known for technical
results, for the last 30 years of his life, he concentrated more on
philosophical concerns, some quite farfetched. His strict diet and mental
problems led to his 1978 death by starvation. For 10 points--name this
Austrian-American mathematician who established the consistency of the
continuum hypothesis, proving the completeness of first-order logic and
the incompleteness of systems like Peano Arithmetic.
answer: Kurt Gödel
- Located around 10 degrees north latitude and 67 degrees west longtitude,
this city is considered to have the finest modern architecture on its
continent. City districts include Petares, El Rosal, La Floresta, and Las
Mercedes, and attractions include Santa Capilla, Palacio de Miraflores, and
the birthplace of Simon Bolivar. For 10 points--name this city of 3.5
million, the capital and most populous city of Venezuela.
answer: Caracas
- Born in Moscow in 1888, as a youth he was frequently imprisoned and by
1911 he was exiled. After the 1917 revolution he returned to Moscow. During
the post-Lenin power struggle, he opposed Kamenev, Zivonyev, and Trotsky in
favor of Stalin. Later, though, he fell out of favor with Stalin and was
convicted of Trotskyist activity in a 1937 purge trial. For 10 points--name
this revolutionary leader whose story inspired Arthur Koestler's Darkness
at Noon.
answer: Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin
- Important thinkers in the school of thought he founded included
Porphyry, Iamblichus, and Proclus. Born in Egypt in the early third
century, he moved to Rome where he taught a doctrine of emanation. He
claimed that the object of life was to escape the material world of the
senses. His works, in Greek, are now called the Enneads because of how
they were grouped. For 10 points--name this founder of Neoplatonism.
answer: Plotinus
- This signature phrase is spoken after the speaker witnesses a phone booth
fall out of the sky, after he himself skydives as an undercover agent, after
he is lowered down an elevator shaft, after he realizes his meeting the devil
was a dream, and after he watches Morpheus leap from one skyscraper to the
next. For 10 points--what four-letter word is said in each of these film
scenes by Keanu Reeves?
answer: "Whoa" (prompt on Keanu Reeves with: "What does he say?")
- His 1975 book Animal Liberation, which espoused his belief that animals
should be treated like people, is widely regarded as the touchstone of the
animal rights movement. His unorthodox utilitarianism often results in
extreme views on topics such as euthanasia; for example: "Killing a disabled
infant is not morally equivalent to killing a person. Very often it is not
wrong at all." For 10 points--name this professor of bioethics whose recent
hiring caused tremendous controversy at Princeton University.
answer: Peter Singer
- His career as a dramatist is eclipsed by his career as a novelist, to
which he turned after Robert Walpole's Licensing Act of 1737 ended the use of
the stage for political satire. For 10 points--name this man, also once a
"Bow Street Runner," who parodied a famous epistolary work of his day in both
Apology for the Life of Mrs. Shamela Andrews and Joseph
Andrews, and is perhaps best known for Tom Jones.
answer: Henry Fielding
- In the Iliad, his image is mostly negative: he is brazen, ferocious,
"insatiable with war," his cry sounds like that of "9 or 10 thousand men", he
is hated by Zeus and sides with the Trojans. For 10 points--name this god,
the son of Zeus and Hera, whose attendants are Fear and Panic and whose
dalliance with Aphrodite is described in the 8th Book of the Odyssey.
answer: Ares (do NOT accept Mars)
- This element is distinguished by nuclear instability and its most durable
isotope has a half-life of only 21 minutes. Its chief isotope is Actinium-K,
with mass 223, which results from the radioactive decay of Actinium. For 10
points--name this element, a heavy alkali metal, discovered by Marguerite
Perey, with atomic number 87, located on the Periodic Table at the bottom of
Column 1A.
answer: Francium
- Based on the work of Heinrich Heine, it premiered in Paris in 1841 and
originally starred Carlotta Grisi in the title role. It takes place in the
Rhine wine country, where the title character is pursued by a huntsman and a
duplicitous count disguised as a peasant. When her engagement with Count
Albrecht is broken off, the heroine dies of a broken heart and becomes a
Wili, a vengeful spirit that traps men in her domain at night. For 10
points--name this ballet with choreography by Jean Coralli, Jules Perrot, and
Marius Petipa, and music by Adolphe Adam.
answer: Giselle
- Written in 1845, it is perhaps its author's harshest indictment of the
practice and philisophical justifications of mid-19th Century industrialism.
Its two main characters are siblings Tom and Louisa, whose father, Thomas
Gradgrind, is famous for saying, "Facts, facts alone are wanted in life."
For 10 points--name this novel whose title underscores Dickens' condemnation.
answer: Hard Times
- The infrared camera NICMOS and the imaging spectrograph STIS were
added in February of 1997. There's always been a Faint Object Camera
and some type of Wide Field/Planetary Camera, but the High Speed
Photometer was sacrificed for the Corrective Optics Axial Replacement
in December of 1993 when four shuttle astronauts corrected for the
flawed primary mirror of--for 10 points--what orbiting telescope?
answer: Hubble Space Telescope
- This country's recorded history begins in the 7th or 8th century BC with
the Kiratis, who arrived from the east. In 1768, the Ghorkhas, from the
eastern part of the country, captured the capital of the Mallas, establishing
the Shah dynasty. The Shah ruled strongly until the Kot massacre of 1846,
after which the Ranas ruled until World War II. Since then, there has been a
quasi-democratic state, currently ruled by King Birendra. For 10
points--name this Hindu nation, whose ethnic groups include the Khas, Magar,
Sherpas, and numerous Tibetans, and whose capital is Katmandu.
answer: Nepal
- In the 1930s, he was one of the Seven Pillars of Granite, Fordham
University's famed defensive line. After working as an assistant at Army, he
got his first pro job as the New York Giants offensive coach, but neither he
nor his rival, defensive coach Tom Landry, were ever promoted. His last pro
job was as head coach of the Washington Redskins, but he died before having a
chance of duplicating the five NFL championships, including two Super Bowls,
that he won with his previous team. For 10 points--name this man who was
best known as head coach of the Green Bay Packers.
answer: Vince Lombardi
- It is expected to open in 2005, on a lush island west of a major world
city. Its 311 acres will feature trilingual performances, and attractions
already familiar in Japan, France, and the United States, as well as some
attractions specific to its location. For 10 points--name this $3 billion
construction, recently celebrated by Tung Chee-hwa and Mickey Mouse.
answer: Hong Kong Disneyland
(prompt for "Hong Kong" if "China" is given as part of the answer)