"Lots of sports change their rules, so it seems legit to discuss this until we start attacking people with rusty knives." I understand that, I'm making my point about allowing them but I guess you didn't realize that! Rusty knives eh? I didn't realize taking a couple years off of quizbowl would automatically deem me an old-timer. Would you like to say the same thing to all the people who've graduated college, have families, and still participate in the chats? Are they too "rusty" for you as well? "It's not luck because certain items and subject areas come up consistently. Yes, a question can include one of the few areas of science that I know, but the law of averages dictates that it won't happen that often." It is luck in a particular match. You do one match and there are some categories that one team just can't answer (let's assume it's a "humanities" majority team) like bio, nuclear physics etc. It's just this team's "luck" that they end up with a match of questions like that, whereas the team they play is more of a "science" team and clean up. Doesn't mean the other team is less experienced or anything, because if the situation were reversed, the science team would be majorly screwed with humanities questions. (I am not making the suggestion that humanities teams cannot be balanced, etc., but I'm just making a point because there are teams like that.) So yes, I do admit there is skill involved and I said that before, but luck is a factor. "Your final point also seems incorrect: US history is usually a specific requirement, while questions on rugby and cricket (and soccer, to some extent), aren't nearly as prevalent as those on baseball and (American) football. Literature also includes a fair amount of questions on US authors rather than on many European authors of similar stature." My last point may seem incorrect but it isn't: just think about all the science questions...how many American scientists are you going to find as answers? Sure you got your Salks and your Listers and whatnot, but there are many more Pasteurs, Lavoisiers, Curies, etc. Also, with the whole literature I wholly disagree...more material is written about Hugo or Moliere or Shakespeare, or Robert Frost, Shaw, and Lord Byron as opposed to John Grisham, Rita Dove, Ralph Ellison, etc. Let's throw that out there....how many people think that a lot of the questions involve more "world" material as opposed to "US" material? How many people that the U.S. is just as prevalent if not more in QB questions? Bea
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