Question 1: Why is Spanish sometimes referred to as Castilian?
Question 2: The programming language 'Python' was named after a comedy series from which country?
Python, the popular programming language was named after the comedy series "Monty Python's Flying Circus" from the United Kingdom. The creator of Python, Guido Van Rossum, was a fan of the show.
Question 3: Why does the human body have an appendix?
The exact function of the appendix in the human body remains unknown, though some studies suggest that the organ may play a role in the immune system. Historically, the appendix is often regarded as a "vestigial organ," or an organ that was necessary in some way during the course of evolution but is no longer needed for survival or function in modern humans.
Question 4: Who wrote the lyrics for the musical "Cats"?
Though the music for "Cats" was composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber, the lyrics are primarily taken from "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats" by T. S. Eliot. This is a collection of whimsical poems by Eliot about feline psychology and sociology.
Question 5: In which year was the World Wide Web invented?
The World Wide Web was invented in 1989 by British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee while employed at CERN, the European nuclear physics research center.
Question 6: The composition "Four Seasons" was written by which classical music composer?
"The Four Seasons" is a group of four violin concertos by Italian composer Antonio Vivaldi, each of which gives a musical expression to a season of the year. They were written around 1716-1717 and were published in 1725 in Amsterdam.
Question 7: The friendship between which two characters is the central focus in the TV show "Sherlock"?
"Sherlock," a British television series created by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, modernizes the classic Sherlock Holmes detective stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, setting them in 21st-century London and focusing largely on the intriguing friendship and partnership between Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John Watson.
Question 8: Which famous Broadway musical features the song "Defying Gravity"?
"Defying Gravity" is a signature song from the musical "Wicked", sung by the character Elphaba. It marks a pivotal moment in the story as Elphaba chooses to stand against what she perceives as a corrupt society.
Question 9: What is the value of Pi rounded to the second decimal place?
Pi is an important mathematical constant and is the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter. Its value is roughly 3.14159, or 3.14 when rounded to two decimal places.
Question 10: Which language is the most widely spoken first language in the world?
Mandarin Chinese is spoken by more than a billion people as their first language, making it the most widely spoken first language in the world.
Spanish, or Castilian, originates from a dialect spoken in the Castile region of Spain during the Middle Ages. This dialect, called Old Castilian, eventually gained the most prestige and became the official language of Spain.