ST. LOUIS OPEN II
– 2000
Round Sixteen
Toss-Up Questions
1. This novel was the result
of the author’s tenure as secretary to the Maharajah of Dewas.
Some of its more ridiculously intolerant characters include the Superintendent
of Police, Mr. McBryde, and the civil surgeon Major Callendar, direct
superior to the main character. The conflict centers on a trip
to the Marabar Caves, where Ronny Heaslop’s betrothed Adela Quested
believes she has been sexually assaulted by Dr. Aziz, an Indian.
Racial prejudice abounds, but Adela reverses her testimony in court
and Aziz is acquitted in, FTP, what final novel of E. M. Forster that
takes place in a former British colony?
Answer: A
Passage to India
2. Composed of a modified form
of adenine, they were discovered in the 1940s in coconut milk by Johannes
van Overbeek. The most common variety of this class of hormones
is zeatin, so named because it was discovered in Zea mays, and
they are usually synthesized in the roots of plants and transported
to other organs. These hormones are responsible for root growth and
differentiation, as well as cell division, germination, and flowering.
FTP, identify this class of plant hormones that takes its name from
the fact that it induces cytokinesis in cells.
Answer: cytokinins
3. The prohibition of second
terms for presidents, and the prohibition of embargos on U.S. ships
for more than sixty days were among its seven proposed amendments to
the Constitution. Among its important delegates were John Lowell
and Timothy Pickering, who proposed secession, and George Cabot, who
presided over the convention. However, the 1815 Treaty of Ghent
made its recommendations dead letters. FTP, identify this body
that met in Connecticut towards the end of the War of 1812 to redress
the grievances of New England.
Answer: Hartford Convention
4. He is sometimes referred
to as Kur-Gal, which means “great mountain,” and his greatest temple
was in the city of Nippur. Born of the union of An and Ki, he
holds possession of the Tablets of Destiny, which give him power over
the entire cosmos and the affairs of men. His five children include
Nanna, Nerigal, Ningirsu, Ninurta, and Nisaba, and his wife is Ninlil.
He sent for the great flood that killed all humanity except for Utnapishtim.
FTP, identify this Mesopotamian deity, the god of air, wind and storms.
Answer: Enlil
5. It evolved from the thesis
of Aristotle that all reality consists of individual things. During
medieval times, its proponents debated against the realists, spawning
an intermediate theory known as conceptualism. This philosophy
holds that abstractions known as universals that are without essential
or substantive reality, and that only individual objects have real existence.
FTP, identify this medieval Scholastic doctrine that comes from the
Latin for “of or pertaining to names.”
Answer: nominalism
6. The title character for
this novel was based on the author’s childhood friend Annie Sadilek,
and the author’s short story Peter was later incorporated into
it. The narrator proclaims himself to be the novelist, and his
recollections of the title character and her Bohemian Nebraska family
are highly romanticized and idealized. Jim Burden’s account
of her differs from the rest of the Shimerda family and is probably
spoiled by his love for her. FTP, identify this novel that centers
on the Shimerda daughter by Willa Cather.
Answer: My Ántonia
7. The products of two norms
of these numbers give the Euler four-square identity, and their individual
components follow Euler parameters. Their operations are consistent
at the expense of permanence. For example, when working with these
kinds of numbers one must either give up the role that zero plays or
multiplicative commutativity. The creator of these numbers developed
the equation that governs them: i2 = j2 = k2
= -1. FTP, identify these four-dimensional complex numbers developed
in 1843 by William Hamilton.
Answer: quaternions
8. It has been identified as
a place of execution where malefactors were flung from cliffs or stoned
to death. It owes its name either to the perception that it resembled
a human skull or that the skull of Adam was found there. The road
towards this site is called the Via Dolorosa and is lined with representations
of suffering known as Stations of the Cross. FTP, identify this
skull-like hill outside Jerusalem thought to be the site on which Jesus
was crucified.
Answer: Calvary or
Golgotha
9. The hundreds of characters
that it depicts are mostly teenage girls, between the ages of 13 and
15, who engage in poetry contests and painting. The boys of the
large family play games and go to school occasionally. These household
members of the Chia family are run by the beautiful woman Phoenix.
The hero of this 120-chapter novel is a young man bored with Confucian
officialdom and interested in only writing poetry. FTP, identify
this 18th century Chinese novel that centers on Paoyü, written
by Ts’ao Hsüeh-ch’in.
Answer: The
Dream of the Red Chamber
10. Ethylenediaminetetraacetic
acid, or EDTA, is a common type of this compound, and is usually used
to reversibly bind with iron in order to slowly release it into culture
media. The process known as sequestration often forms them by
creating coordination complexes of an ion in solution. From the
Greek for “crab’s claw,” examples of them include the bidentate
ligand diaminoethane and hemoglobin. FTP, identify type of inorganic
complex in which a ligand is coordinated to a metal ion at two or more
points so as to form a ring around the metal atom.
Answer: chelate (prompt
on coordination complex on early buzz)
11. Instead of the normal basilical
plan of most large churches, this one bears a centralized pattern.
Plaques of red, yellow, and green marble blend with its many mosaics
and these are further embellished by the capitals, imposts, architraves,
and friezes. Amazingly, it was built in just under five years,
though its massive dome had to be rebuilt after a 563 CE earthquake.
Commissioned by Justinian and designed by Isidoros and Anthemios, this
church became the pinnacle of Byzantine architecture. FTP, identify
this building whose name means “Holy Wisdom.”
Answer: Hagia Sophia
12. He served in the Russian
Revolution chiefly as an underground soldier in the Caucasus, later
becoming a high official in the Communist Party of the Caucasian region.
He found favor under Stalin, a fellow Georgian, and was made deputy
premier in 1941, joining the Politburo in 1946. He was made first
deputy premier under Stalin’s successor Malenkov, though he was later
convicted of treason and executed. Under Stalin, he became responsible
for the Soviet labor camps and torturing people and falsifying evidence.
FTP, identify this former leader of the Soviet secret police organization.
Answer: Lavrenty Pavlovich
Beria
13. They include the Professor,
whose area of expertise is the thermodynamics of dough and fudge viscosity;
Buckets, who enjoys doing belly-flops from a high board into Fudge River;
Roger, who invented the GIRO Transmogrifier that makes rainbow-colored
cookies; and of course Elmer, the young baker in training. They
live in their namesake tree and make baked goods such as E.L. Fudge
Sandwich Cookies and Elf Grahams. FTP, identify these diminutive
TV commercial bakers that live in a tree.
Answer: Keebler Elves
[Editor’s Note: This question topic graciously donated by David Kanon.]
14. The birth of the first
daughter heralds a terrible famine, while the second daughter is smothered
at birth because there is not enough food. The main character
tricks his uncle and aunt into becoming opium addicts in order to relieve
his debt to them. The prostitutes Lotus and Pear Blossom figure
in this novel, as does the powerful land-owning Hwang family.
The story centers on the Chinese peasants O-Lan and Wang Lung and their
relationship with their land. FTP, identify this best-known work
of Pearl Buck.
Answer: The
Good Earth
15. Twenty-six governments
endorsed this document at a Washington, D.C. conference in 1942.
It recognized the right of all nations to have access to the earth’s
natural resources, and urged economic cooperation among nations and
improved living conditions for working people. It also recognized
the principle of freedom of the seas. Signed aboard a warship
off the coast of Newfoundland, most importantly, it affirmed the need
for disarmament after the Allied victory over Nazi aggression.
FTP, identify this 1941 joint declaration between the U.S. and Great
Britain formed by Roosevelt and Churchill.
Answer: Atlantic Charter
16. It was founded in 1895
with funds from a trust left by Samuel J. Tilden, which made possible
the consolidation of the Astor and Lenox Institutes. In 1901,
Andrew Carnegie provided the funds to open its first 39 branches.
It contains the Science, Industry and Business Library, located on Madison
and 34th, and the Schomburg Center for Research in Black
Culture, located in Harlem. Its main building, however, is the
Central Research Building, with its imposing marble façade, covering
two blocks from 40th to 42nd streets on Fifth
Avenue. FTP, identify this huge library located in New York City.
Answer: New York Public
Library
17. Rising in the Valday Hills,
its importance as a commercial artery declined when ships grew larger
and were unable to navigate the rapids above Zaporizhzhya. Some
of this river’s major tributaries include the Berezina, Desna, and
Pripyat’ rivers, and some of the major cities lying on it are Mahilyow,
Belarus, and Smolensk, Russia. However, its largest port by far
is on the Black Sea, where it empties at Kiev. FTP, identify this
third longest river in Europe, behind the Volga and the Danube.
Answer: Dnieper River
18. It can be used to calculate
transport coefficients, such as conductivity. First proposed in
1872, it describes a function that gives a mathematical description
of a state and how it is changing. This function depends on a
position vector, a velocity vector, and time; this equation thus provides
a statistical statement about the positions and velocities of the particles
at any time. FTP, identify this equation named after a 19th
century Austrian physicist that is used in the study of a collection
of particles in non-equilibrium statistical mechanics.
Answer: Boltzmann equation
19. He was one of the ten Athenian
generals at the Battle of Marathon. Along with Cimon he shared
command of the allied Greek fleet that was sent to Asia Minor to free
the colonies from Persian domination. In 483 BCE, he was banished
from Athens for disagreeing with the naval policy of Themistocles, but
was recalled when the Persians invaded under Xerxes I. He led
the Athenians to victory against the Persians at the Battle of Plataea
in 479 BCE. FTP, identify this Athenian statesman known as “the
Just,” who played an instrumental role in the formation of the Delian
League.
Answer: Aristides
20. The title character is
the recipient of the unwelcome attentions of the local sheriff, who
is hunting for a local bandit named Ramerrez. The title character,
who runs a saloon in a gold-prospecting camp, falls in love with Ramerrez,
whose real name is Dick Johnson, and hides him in her loft when he’s
wounded. Sheriff Jack Rance plays poker for his life and loses,
and Minnie saves her love from the gallows and they ride off into the
sunset. The bel canto style was dropped, as the composer adopted
the Wagnerian style of singing for this opera. FTP, identify this
western opera by Giacomo Puccini.
Answer: La Faniculla
del West or The Girl of the Golden West
ST. LOUIS OPEN II
– 2000
Round Sixteen
Bonus Question
1. Identify the following concerning
the San Juan boundary dispute FTPE.
The San Juan boundary
dispute occurred between the U.S. and Great Britain due to the imprecise
wording in the Oregon Treaty of 1846 regarding island territories in
this strait.
Answer: Strait of Juan
de Fuca
The dispute came
to blows in the conflict that went by this name when an American on
San Juan Island killed a type of animal, the conflict’s namesake,
owned by a British settler.
Answer: Pig War
The San Juan boundary
dispute was finally mediated in 1872 by this German monarch, who awarded
the San Juan archipelago to the U.S.
Answer: William I
2. Identify the following concerning
the history of education FTPE.
Created by William
Albert Wirt, this system of education involved a plan of work-study-play
known by this name, alternatively the “platoon system.” This
plan, which took its name from the Indiana town where it was developed,
was once used in New York public schools and many midwestern cities.
Answer: Gary Plan
This plan of education
was named after the Massachusetts town in which it was first implemented.
Created by Helen Parkhurst in 1913, this curriculum modifies the Montessori
method by turning classrooms into laboratories where children can work
at their own paces.
Answer: Dalton Plan
This educational
movement took its name from its first school in New York, which Methodist
Bishop John Heyl Vincent set up in 1874. This movement was a summer
program instituted to combine education, recreation, and religion.
Answer: Chautauqua
3. Identify these British authors
from a list of their works FTPE. Note that the only thing they
have in common is that I have trouble remembering who these cats are.
The Four Ages
of Poetry; Headlong Hall; Nightmare Abbey
Answer: Thomas Love
Peacock
The Expedition
of Humphrey Clinker; The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom;
The Adventures of Roderick Random
Answer: Tobias Smollett
Mr. Norris Changes
Trains; Sally Bowles; Goodbye to Berlin
Answer: Christopher
Isherwood
4. Identify these modern spy
novelists from works FTSNOP.
(5 points) The
Cardinal of the Kremlin; The Sum of All Fears
Answer: Tom Clancy
(10 points) Sole
Survivor; The Eyes of Darkness; Icebound
Answer: Dean Koontz
(15 points) Los
Alamos; The Prodigal Spy
Answer: Joseph Kanon
5. Identify the following about
a certain religion FTPE.
The city of Hialeah,
Florida, reacted to this religion by banning the practice of animal
sacrifice in 1987, though the Supreme Court ruled against this decision.
This religion originated in West Africa and now bears strong Cuban influences.
Answer: Santería
Followers of Santería
worship this figure as their supreme God.
Answer: Olodumare
Followers of Santería
typically focus their interaction with the divine on this particular
spirit. It is particular to every individual and during worship
it may possess the body of the believer.
Answer: orisha
6. Identify these stormy paintings
from descriptions FTPE.
Flashes of lightning
rage over a city in the background, partially obscured by foliage.
A woman holds a baby protectively on the right foreground, while a shepherd
watches from the left.
Answer: The
Tempest
The title city is
built on a series of rolling green hills in this painting. Roiling
clouds fill a dark sky in that covers the top third of the canvas.
Answer: View of Toledo
Okay, maybe this
painting isn’t exactly “stormy,” but it’s how it would look
probably right before or after one. A locomotive traverses a bridge
over a fog-enshrouded lake either at dawn or sunset. A soft, golden
glow permeates the bottom of this painting.
Answer: Rain, Steam
and Speed
7. Identify these works of
Nathanael West FTPE.
This parody of Horatio
Alger’s works centers on the innocent Lemuel Pitkin and his rags to
riches story.
Answer: A Cool Million
This novel tells
of a man who writes an advice column. He is eventually killed
by a man who he tried to help.
Answer: Miss Lonelyhearts
This novel centers
on Tod Hackett, a Yale graduate lured to California by the prospect
of learning costume and set design.
Answer: The
Day of the Locust
8. Identify these fractals
from descriptions FTPE.
This fractal is
constructed by removing the middle third from a closed interval, and
then removing successive thirds from the remaining intervals.
Answer: Cantor set
This is a two-dimensional
analogue of the Cantor set made by the center one-ninth of a square
of side equal to 1. Then, the centers of the eight smaller remaining
squares are removed, and so on.
Answer: Sierpinski
carpet
Perhaps the most
famous of all fractals (need I say more?), this is based off of the
equation z sub n plus 1 equals z sub n squared plus c, where c and z
are complex numbers and z begins at the origin.
Answer: Mandelbrot
set
9. Identify these false gods
that appear in the Bible FTPE.
He was the sun god
of the Canaanites in old Palestine. This entirely malevolent being
demanded the sacrifice of first-born children in the Valley of Hinnom,
also known as Gehenna.
Answer: Moloch
This false god was
a personification of wealth and greed. He was a Syrian god of
riches that was used in the New Testament in opposition to the Christian
god.
Answer: Mammon
The central god
of Canaanite mythology, this god had shrines to him built near Yahweh’s
temples. The Israelites were commanded to destroy his altars,
but worship of this god did not cease until the rule of King Hezekiah
in the 7th century BCE.
Answer: Baal
10. Identify these various
song cycles FTPE.
This 1840 song cycle
by Robert Schumann is a series of settings based on a collection of
poems by Heinrich Heine.
Answer: Dichterliebe
or Poet’s Love
Perhaps the most
famous song cycle of Gustav Mahler, this work is based on the translation
of a set of poems by Li Po and is much a symphony as a song cycle.
Answer: Das Lied
von der Erde or The Song of the Earth
This group of songs
by Wagner took their name from the poet who inspired them, a woman Wagner
was in love with for a time. These songs exist in both piano and
orchestral versions.
Answer: Wesendonck
Lieder
11. Identify the following
concerning a certain U.S. Supreme Court decision FTPE.
In 1795, the legislature
of Georgia granted a large portion of the state’s western territory
to four land companies that went by this collective name after a river
that crossed a significant portion of the land.
Answer: Yazoo companies
In 1796, a newly
elected Georgia legislature repudiated the land grant to the Yazoo companies
under the suspicion that members of the previous legislature were company
shareholders. The shareholders took the case, which went by this
name, to the Supreme Court in 1810.
Answer: Fletcher
v. Peck
This Supreme Court
Chief Justice rendered the decision in Fletcher v. Peck in favor
of the claimants, declaring a state could not arbitrarily interfere
with an individual’s property rights.
Answer: John Marshall
12. Identify this country,
30-20-10.
This country’s
name means “Land of the Thunder Dragon” in its native language of
Dzongkha.
This country has
been ruled by the Wangchuck family since 1907. Heavily influenced
by Tibetan Buddhism, some of this nation’s cities include Phuntsholing,
Paro, and Tongsa.
The capital of this
Himalayan country is Thimphu.
Answer: Bhutan
13. Identify these 20th
century Japanese writers from descriptions FTPE.
His name graces
a special award for aspiring writers in Japan. Among his works
are In a Grove and Rashōmon, after which Akira Kurosawa
based his film.
Answer: Akutagawa
Ryūnosuke
Considered by many
to be Japan’s greatest novelist, some of his works include Diary
of a Mad Old Man and The Key. His most famous works
include Some Prefer Nettles and The
Makokia Sisters.
Answer: Tanizaki
Jun’ichirō
Son of a noted traditionalist
sculptor, this poet was a pioneer in modernist literature. His
Journey ranks as Japan’s first colloquial anthology of poetry.
His most famous work is Chieko’s Sky, a verse record of his
wife’s descent into madness.
Answer: Takamura
Kōtarō
14. Identify the following
about a certain idea in mathematics FTPE.
In 1900, this German
proposed 23 pressing problems of mathematics, one of which urged mathematicians
to find formal logical foundations for every theory.
Answer: David Hilbert
This logician ruined
Hilbert’s dream of a completely formal logic for mathematics by publishing
his Incompleteness theorem, which states that some parts of mathematics
are based on ideas that cannot be proven within the system of mathematics.
Answer: Kurt Gödel
Hilbert attempted
to show algorithmically whether any given statement belonged in a theory.
These two mathematicians also took part in disproving the Incompleteness
theorem by showing that this idea must fail. Identify them both
FFPE.
Answer: Alan Turing
and Alonso Church
15. Identify these kings of
Rome FTSNOP.
(15 points) He is
believed to have established the class of plebeians from among his Latin
prisoners settled on the Aventine Hill and to have built the port of
Ostia. He was the fourth king of Rome.
Answer: Ancus Marcius
(5 points) After
his son raped the Roman matron Lucretia, the citizens of Rome deposed
him and the Roman Republic was proclaimed in 509 BCE. He was the
last king of Rome.
Answer: Lucius Tarquinius
Superbus or Tarquin the Proud
(10 points) This
legendary second king of Rome was a Sabine who is thought to have instituted
the office of the Vestal Virgins. His peaceful reign lasted from
715 BCE to 673 BCE.
Answer: Numa Pompilius
16. Identify the following
about the philosophy of Baruch Spinoza FTPE.
Spinoza’s philosophy
was described in this thin work, his magnum opus. Modeled after
Euclid’s Elements, this work describes the nature and origin
of the human mind, emotions, and God.
Answer: Ethics
At the core of Spinoza’s
Ethics was this doctrine that identifies God with the entirety of
the physical universe.
Answer: pantheism
Central to Spinoza’s
pantheistic beliefs was this idea that states that the intelligent and
creative force or being that governs the universe pervades the natural
world. It is viewed as the antithesis of transcendence.
Answer: immanence
17. Identify these non-dramatic
works of Anton Chekhov FTPE.
This long story
depicts the gradual disintegration of Dr. Andrey Ragin, the head of
a mental hospital.
Answer: Ward No.
6
Perhaps the most
successful story of Chekhov’s mature period is this work, which describes
a long trip across the plains as experienced by a young boy on his way
to school in a distant town.
Answer: The
Steppe
Subtitled From
the Notebook of an Old Man, this story marks the beginning of Chekhov’s
mature period. It is about the old man Stepanovich, who reviews
his life and finds it meaningless. His young ward, Katya, also
feels the same but neither can communicate with the other.
Answer: A
Dreary Story
18. Identify the following
concerning phase diagrams FTPE.
The gas-liquid coexistence
curve does not continue indefinitely, but instead terminates at this
point.
Answer: critical
point
This is the point
at which solid, liquid, and gas phases exist simultaneously in equilibrium.
Answer: triple point
Phase diagrams are
normally plotted against these two variables, both physical properties
of the substance in question. Identify them both FFPE.
Answer: pressure
or P and temperature or T
19. Identify these European
royal families from descriptions FTPE.
The first monarch
of this royal family was Afonso I of Portugal, who took the name from
ducal house from which he was descended. Other notable rulers
in this line include Carlos I and Pedro II of Brazil.
Answer: Braganza
The first king of
this dynasty was Stephen I, later known as Saint Stephen, who began
his rule in 997 CE. Until rule by the Habsburgs, this dynasty
was the major ruling power in Hungary.
Answer: Árpád
This royal family
shares its name with Roger’s high school AP biology teacher.
However, it might be more useful to know that this is the name of the
royal family of Monaco.
Answer: Grimaldi
20. Identify these genetic
disorders from descriptions FTSNOP.
(5 points) Mental
retardation, eyes with an epicanthic fold, and a mean life expectancy
are the major characteristics of this disorder, which is caused by trisomy
of gene 21.
Answer: Down syndrome
(10 points) The
characteristics of this disease include a harelip, a small head, “rockerbottom”
feet, and a mean life expectancy of 130 days. It results from
trisomy of gene 13.
Answer: Patau syndrome
(15 points) This
disease is caused by trisomy of gene 18, and results in “faun-like”
ears, a small jaw, rockerbottom feet, and a life expectancy of about
3 weeks. It is the third of three known trisomy disorders.
Answer: Edwards
syndrome