Moon landings, light-minutes and Duran Duran’s three Taylors – take the Thursday quiz

Two of Duran Duran live in Florida – but their names are going to be part of today’s quiz so we’ll keep them under wraps for now. Photograph: Larry Marano/Shutterstock

The quiz master is away, so once again the Thursday quiz is pre-written by him on an obtuse and capricious theme – this week: song titles by Duran Duran. Fifteen questions on general knowledge, all of them tenuously tied to a song by one of the greatest British pop acts of the 1980s and beyond. Make Simon and company happy by letting us know how well you got on in the comments. They’ve got a new single out and everything.

The Thursday quiz, No 124

1. 

   HUNGRY LIKE THE WOLF: Hungry Like the Wolf was one of Duran Duran's earliest hits, but what is the Latin name for a grey wolf?

   1. Consilio anamis

   2. Feliformia herpestoidea

   3. Canis lupus

   4. I, Claudius

2. 

   UNION OF THE SNAKE: The Thursday quiz is still saddened by the death of Sinéad O'Connor. What was her debut album called?

   1. The Lion and the Viper

   2. The Lion and the Python

   3. The Lion and the Rattlesnake

   4. The Lion and the Cobra

3. 

   NOTORIOUS: In what year was The Notorious B.I.G. killed?

   1. 1995

   2. 1997

   3. 1999

   4. 2001

4. 

   THE CHAUFFEUR: Lewis Hamilton shares the record for the most F1 world titles. Who does he share the record with?

   1. Ayrton Senna

   2. Michael Schumacher

   3. Juan Manuel Fangio

   4. Alain Prost

5. 

   NEW MOON ON MONDAY: Where did Apollo 11 land on the moon?

   1. Fra Mauro formation

   2. Sea of Tranquility

   3. Taurus–Littrow

   4. Plain of Descartes

6. 

   ORDINARY WORLD: The standard atmosphere is a unit of pressure defined as 101,325 what …?

   1. Newtons

   2. Webers

   3. Pascals

   4. Bakers

7. 

   PLANET EARTH: The astronomical unit (au) is defined as roughly the mean distance of the Earth from the sun. Since 2012 it has been fixed as how many light-minutes?

   1. 5.7 light-minutes

   2. 7.1 light-minutes

   3. 8.3 light-minutes

   4. 9.6 light-minutes

8. 

   GIRLS ON FILM: Who won best actress earlier this year at the Oscars?

   1. Cate Blanchett for Tár

   2. Michelle Williams for The Fabelmans

   3. Michelle Yeoh for Everything Everywhere All at Once

   4. Andrea Riseborough for To Leslie

9. 

   CARELESS MEMORIES: When did the House of Congress adopt two articles of impeachment against Bill Clinton while he was in office as the 42nd president of the United States?

   1. 19 December, 1995

   2. 19 December, 1996

   3. 19 December, 1998

   4. 19 December, 1999

10. 

    A VIEW TO A KILL: Duran Duran provided the theme tune to the 1985 James Bond movie A View to a Kill, the last to feature Roger Moore in the role. How many James Bond movies did Moore star in?

    1. Five

    2. Seven

    3. Nine

    4. Eleven

11. 

    IS THERE SOMETHING I SHOULD KNOW?: The song with the immortal line "Don't say you're easy on me, you're about as easy as a nuclear war". "Little Boy" was the name of the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima. What was the name of the one dropped by the US on Nagasaki?

    1. Tiny titan

    2. Daughter

    3. Big bopper

    4. Fat man

12. 

    SAVE A PRAYER: Everybody knows that Saint Peter is credited as being the first Bishop of Rome, starting the line of popes. But who succeeded him, and is generally recognised by the Catholic church as the second pope?

    1. St Peter II

    2. St Linus

    3. St Clement

    4. St Evaristus

13. 

    RIO: What is the name of the male Spix's macaw played by Jesse Eisenberg in the 2011 Disney animated movie Rio?

    1. Gru

    2. Red

    3. Blu

    4. Ron

14. 

    ELECTRIC BARBARELLA: Duran Duran got their name from the character Durand-Durand in the movie Barbarella. Who played him in that 1968 film?

    1. Milo O'Shea

    2. Claude Dauphin

    3. Marcel Marceau

    4. Léon Colbert

15. 

    WILD BOYS: And finally, a question about the band. Which of the three Duran Duran boys had the surname Taylor?

    1. John, Nick and Roger

    2. Nick, Simon and Roger

    3. Roger, John and Andy

    4. Andy, Roger and Nick

Solutions

1:C - More than thirty subspecies of Canis lupus have been recognised, including the dog and the dingo., 2:D - It included the frankly epic track Troy, which the quiz recommends you go and listen to after you've finished the questions., 3:B - Christopher Wallace, better known as Notorious BIG and Biggie Smalls, was murdered on 9 March 1997., 4:B - Schumacher and Hamilton both have seven titles to their name. Fangio won the title five times, Prost four and Senna three., 5:B - They are all locations where Apollo missions landed, but Tranquility base in the Sea of Tranquility was the first., 6:C - Named after Blaise Pascal, one pascal is equivalent to 1 newton (N) of force applied over an area of 1 square metre., 7:C - It takes that length of time for light from the sun to reach the Earth, covering a distance of 149,597,870,700 metres. Extensive mathematical calculations have revealed that this is an awful lot of ancient Sumerian cubits., 8:C - Born in Malaysia, Yeoh became the first person of south-east Asian descent to win the best actress Oscar for her role as laundromat manager Evelyn Wang, who stumbles across a “multiverse” of alternative realities. , 9:C - Clinton's impeachment came after a formal inquiry launched in the October of 1988, and the trial began on 7 January 1999., 10:B - Moore's run began with Live and Let Die in 1973., 11:D - "Little Boy" was an enriched uranium gun-type fission weapon, and "Fat Man", a plutonium implosion-type nuclear weapon. Enola Gay was the name of the plane that dropped "Little Boy" on Hiroshima, and was a hit for OMD, not Duran Duran., 12:B - While the line of succession and dates of handover of the see of Rome in the early days are a little bit sketchy to say the least, the Roman Catholic church recognises St Linus as the second pope, from AD 67-76. That isn't St Linus in the picture, by the way, that's the quiz master. And the Papal Basilica of Saint Peter, obviously., 13:C - In the story Blu was born in Rio de Janeiro but raised in Moose Lake, Minnesota, after he was smuggled., 14:A - O'Shea reprised the role to play the villain in Duran Duran's not entirely successfully executed "concept concert video film" Arena (An Absurd Notion) that the band released in 1985., 15:C - Roger Taylor on drums, John Taylor on bass and Andy Taylor on guitar were part of the classic five-piece line-up of the band's early 80s heyday.

Scores

1. 0 and above.

   Please please tell us now – how did you get on?

If you really do think there has been an egregious error in one of the questions or answers, feel free to email martin.belam@theguardian.com, but remember the quiz master’s word is final and he is on holiday in cool places.