QR–Cure–Quizzing Realms–364

Two quick questions about a certain mathematician for today.

First: Lewis Carroll, the creator of Alice In Wonderland, was actually a mathematician in real life, and had a real stutter. What character in the Alice series did he name after how he used to pronounce his name with a stutter?

And the second: As a mathematician, Carroll was famous for what he called nonsense logic. According to him, which of the two watches – one that slowed that by a minute every hour or one that had stopped altogether – was better? and Why?

Happy Quizzing, and have a nice life, folks!

PS: I have been writing quite a few things, the latest being a later-than-usual piece about the cartoons that irked our politicians, published in the New Delhi edition of The Financial World. You can find it here. If you have any opinion about it, please send an email to fwletters@gmail.com.

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Four replies, of which three give the correct answer to Question 1, while one nails Question Two. Great going!

The first answer is the Dodo bird. Lewis Carroll was his pet name, the real name being Charles Lutwidge Dodgson. His stutter, combined with his surname gave us the bird.

The answer to the second one is the watch that has stopped altogether. According to Mr Dodgson’s brand of logic, the other watch would take several days to show the correct time at least once, while the watch that had stopped showed the correct time at least twice a day!