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It's wonderful to be creative with language. While I have never actually heard of a resident (in good standing) named Texticles (
pronounced:
text'-e- kleez) living atop the famed
Mt. Olympus (in the same neighborhood as
Zeus and the rest of those characters of legend), it would seem to make sense. This is not actually a
Lingovation -- it is a comedic mockery of the structure and sound of language. It brings to mind
Hercules,
Damocles,
Demosthenes, but it sounds a tad racy. I don't have to say it - it is funnier when left to the imagination
Speaking of these sound-alikes, I almost fell out of my seat in school when our Philosophy professor mentioned 'Balzac'. It sounded rather similar to something else. This word mimicry ("sound-alikes" seems so juvenile) is a sort of patterning behavior, usually involving the number of syllables and a certain cadence.
If I could do it with a straight face, and if I delivered the message rapidly enough, I could introduce my daughters by ridiculously inappropriate names (remember
Tony Orlando's song, "
Candida"?). I would say something like, "This is my sixth-grader, a future
Olympic gymnast, Chlamydia, and my beautiful twins - Alopecia and
Disthymia. Alopecia has to leave to practice her viola now, and I think (eying the other young lady, mischievously) her sister has some homework to do. C'mom, Dee-Dee. Let's get to it." For some reason, the best of these contemporary-sounding phony names tend to be comprised of four syllables, and are usually the names of medical conditions.
A
true Lingovation would be
texticle, which would mean a very terse
text message sent in great haste. But I've misdirected you; I've gotten into something interesting and verbal when this post (which has a deliberately tantalizing title) is a continuation of something dull and mathematical.
Notwithstanding the aforementioned, regarding the previous
Braintenance post, I'll provide you with a briefing (a de-briefing would require that you dispense with your underwear) of how I arrived at our answers. More accurately, I'll show you the patterns that
I recognized in order to arrive at
my answers. Welcome back to
Pattern Recognition, Cranial Comrades!
A) 1, 3, 6, 10, 15, ?
21 -- the difference between 3 and 1 is 2; the difference between 6 and 3 is 3; the difference between 10 and 6 is 4, and so forth. The pattern is an increase in the amount of the difference between the consecutive by the addition of 1.
B) 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, ?
21 -- Fibonacci Sequence, anyone? Add any two consecutive numbers and you'll find the next one.
C) 1000, 0100, 0010, 0001, 1000 ?
0100 -- This is actually a repetitive "cycling" in the position of the "1" from the left to the right.
D) 1, 4, 9, 16, 25 ?
36 -- Each number is the square of a number in a simple arithmetic series; for example 1x1=1; 2x2=4; 3x3=9, and so on.
E) 200, 3000, 40000, 500000, ?
6000000 -- This one is quite basic. Each integer is following by a number of zeros equal to itself; for example 200 is 2 followed by two zeros; 3000 is 3 followed by three zeros, and so forth.
F) 1, 100, 2, 99, 3, 98, 4, ?
97 -- This one is a curiosity, indeed. It is actually a converging pattern, with the lowest number being 1 and the highest 100. Starting with 1, every other number is just increased by 1. Starting with 100, every other number is just decreased by 1. It is really two intertwined alternating sequences. Sort of reminds me of the double helix structure of DNA (the famed Watson-Crick model).
G) 1.21, 2.32, 3.43, 4.54, ?
5.65 -- This one is best determined by superficial observation, and not by the relationship of each number to the one preceding it. The pattern is visual more than mathematical. Each number is [n]decimal point[n+1][n]. Just increase n by 1 to find the next number at any position in the sequence.
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Douglas E Castle [
http://aboutDouglasCastle.blogspot.com]
p.s. Stay tuned for some mind-twisting analogies.
Braintenance - "Unchain Your Brain!" Braintenance - "Because Grey Matters!"
