Thorough Analysis
Thorough Analysis
[The comic panel consists of the beginning of a research paper written in gray, with the last line being slightly cut at the bottom by the panels frame indicating that the text continues below.] 1. Introduction
The December 1811 earthquake near New Madrid, Missouri reportedly caused church bells to ring in Charleston, South Carolina.
But did it?
The original bell tower has been lost, but a computer model of the church building was created from archival plans and forensic masonry analysis. Genetic testing of the timber from local trees related to those used in the bell tower shows a weakness in the
[Caption below the panel:] My favorite genre of scientific papers are exhaustive 100-page treatises that answer some minor question with the obsessive thoroughness of the 9/11 Commission Report.

This comic remarks on how obsessively some scientific papers investigate some insignificant, obscure things. It gives the example of an investigation into whether an earthquake in 1811 caused church bells 600 miles away in Charleston, South Carolina to ring, which, although mildly interesting, is of minimal scientific importance. The earthquake itself is of enormous scientific interest, as an earthquake of the same magnitude in the same area today could cause enormous damage, but Charleston is not in the area considered at significant risk.
An explicit comparison is made to the 9/11 Commission Report , a study that was undertaken to, broadly, answer the question of how the September 11 attacks were able to occur (and by extension, what errors in security and communication needed to be addressed to improve detection of and response to other terrorist acts).
This paper describes the researchers going as far as to genetically test local trees, likely to find those most closely related to the trees used for construction, so as to measure their structural properties and extrapolate the likely structural properties of the original building.  Such extrapolation might require its own study to back its validity.  It is likely in real life that the small differences such research would reveal would end up being too unsubstantial to have actually warranted any searching.
The title text is a continuation of this paper, which researches into the bells' shapes, and then goes on to note that the entire interview is provided in Appendix VII, indicating that this paper has a substantial amount of additional information considered distracting from the main body.
The Tower of London would be a strange place to seek expertise on church bells: even its Bell Tower contains warning bells rather than church-style bells (explain xkcd's transcript with the Tower of London officials on this manner can be viewed in Appendix B).  Until 2017, the nearby Whitechapel Bell Foundry would have been a much better (arguably the best possible) source of information. Whites of Appleton (in Oxfordshire) or John Taylor & Co (in Loughborough) would be current alternatives.  Closer to home for the paper's author, the McShane Bell Foundry in Maryland is likely to offer far more relevant expertise certainly than the Tower of London, and may in addition be able to offer relevant insights specific to the history of bellfounding in the USA.
In keeping with the meta thorough analysis theme of the original comic and this explanation, the comic starts with "The December 1811 earthquake near New Madrid, Missouri..."  The town of New Madrid existed in 1811, but Missouri Territory did not exist until June 4, 1812, and the State of Missouri not until August 10, 1821.
[The comic panel consists of the beginning of a research paper written in gray, with the last line being slightly cut at the bottom by the panels frame indicating that the text continues below.] 1. Introduction
The December 1811 earthquake near New Madrid, Missouri reportedly caused church bells to ring in Charleston, South Carolina.
But did it?
The original bell tower has been lost, but a computer model of the church building was created from archival plans and forensic masonry analysis. Genetic testing of the timber from local trees related to those used in the bell tower shows a weakness in the
[Caption below the panel:] My favorite genre of scientific papers are exhaustive 100-page treatises that answer some minor question with the obsessive thoroughness of the 9/11 Commission Report.
