#992: Mnemonics explain

XKCD Presents:

Some New Science Mnemonics

[Pattern of each given situation goes:

*[Within panel frame]

**Subject

**Elements

**Traditional mnemonic(s)

**Illustrated contents of frame

*[Below panel frame]

**New mnemonic(s)

…there are three rows with two situations in each, unequally sized as required for respective widths of contents.]

Order of Operations

Parentheses, Exponents, Division & Multiplication, Addition & Subtraction

Traditional: Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally

[Cueball, pointing at his laptop, with Ponytail carrying a shark.]

Please Email My Dad A Shark

People Expect More Drugs And Sex

SI Prefixes

[In this section, the final words (and preceding comma) are given in a roughly halftone gray for the two given lists of terms and each respective mnemonic.]

Big: Kilo, Mega, Giga, Tera, Peta, Exa, Zetta[Halftone:], Yotta

Milli, Micro, Nano, Pico, Femto, Atto, Zepto[Halftone:], Yocto

Traditional: [Text in square-brackets:] I never learned one.

[Graph of the declining profits of the Zune.]

[Karl Marx delivering a number of zeppelins to a bunch of confused proletarians.]

[Proletarians (off-screen):] Er. What do we do with them?

[Karl Marx:] Rise!

Big: Karl Marx Gave The Proletariat Eleven Zeppelins[Halftone:], Yo.

Small: Microsoft Made No Profit From Anyone’s Zunes[Halftone:], Yo.

Taxonomy

Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species

Traditional: King Philip Came Over For Good Sex

[Katy Perry standing.]

[Katy Perry:] I’m not sure who doubts this, really.

Katy Perry Claims Orgasms Feel Good Sometimes

Kernel Panics Crash Our Family Game System.

Geologic Periods

(Precambrian), Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous, Permian, Triassic, Jurassic, Cretaceous, Paleogene, Neogene

Traditional: [Text in square-brackets:] I never learned one.

[A month’s set of birth control pills.]

PolyCystic Ovarian Syndrome Does Cause Problems That Judicious Contraceptves [sic] Partially Negate

Resistor Color Codes

Black Brown, Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Violet, Gray, White

Traditional: [Text in square-brackets:] none I care for

[Glenn Beck holding the traditional “Nanobot Vaccine Chemtrail 9/11” sign.]

“Big Brother Reptilian Overlords”, yelled Glenn, “Brainwashing Via Ground water!!”;

Be Bold, Respect Others; You’ll Gradually Become Versatile, Great Wikipedians!

Planets

Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune

Traditional: My Very Excellent Mother Just Served Us Nachos

[A pregnant Mary attempting to explain things to an incredulous Joseph with black hair and full beard]

[Joseph:] Uh huh.

Mary’s “Virgin” Explanation Made Joseph Suspect Upstairs Neighbor.