This is something I've been wondering about for a while. These days, when a person (let's say a man, to keep the pronouns simple) joins the army, he has regular time off and is able to visit family if he so wishes. When he is deployed to a warzone, he is still able to keep in contact whilst at base (through internet, but also by a regular postal service). Also, in the event that he is killed in action, his family are notified (fairly quickly). Now, how does this compare to a soldier in the 19th Century? Again, to keep it simple, let's say he's a British soldier. He enlists as a teen. How often would he be able to go back to his family's residence whilst still stationed in the UK? Whilst on active service abroad, would he be able to communicate at all with his family back home? I know that some of them had wives, sons, and daughters waiting for them. Then there is the question of if he was killed in action, or died of sickness, had a fatal accident, or disappeared without trace. How would his family be informed (if at all?) and how long would this normally take? --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 01:08, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I can only answer a small part of the question, but I have seen ample references to letters to and from soldiers travelling frequently and with unexpected ease in the military system. Steewi (talk) 04:11, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, British soldiers were given leave when stationed in the UK. The British Forces Post Office has its origins in the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-13). Additionally, married soldiers were sometimes allowed to take their wives with them, especially on postings to India, which were generally for 7 years in the 19th Century. The downside was that the wives were sometimes put in danger, notably in Afghanistan. Alansplodge (talk) 07:14, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As I understand it, those soldiers had to buy their own ticket home from India. Officers had to buy their own uniforms, horses and equipment, which is why most were of the nobility and had money to support them. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 16:58, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that can be right (about buying your own ticket home). A history of British troopships is here1. My Cornish grandmother used to tell a story about a troopship arriving in Plymouth from India when she was a girl (in the 1890s?). The soldiers disembarked and made merry in the pubs of Union Street as you would expect after 7 years abroad; however they started a major brawl and as a punishment set sail back to India the next day, for another 7 years. Alansplodge (talk) 17:52, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, cheers! Now I just need to find some of those letters.... Thanks a lot! --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 18:16, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi...Years ago, I remember hearing "an old proverb":

"Two hungry beggars each receiving a coin from a compassionate passerby...one of the beggars bought a bowl of rice, the other a flower...The beggar who bought the rice asked the other, "Why would you waste your coin on a flower when we are starving and need rice to live?"

The other beggar replied "Rice may give us life but a flower makes life worth living..."

My question is: Is there an attribute for this saying?...and do you know the full and correct version?...

Thanks in advance, CDE —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.188.117.209 (talk) 01:21, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You might find this interesting: Forum discussion However this gives a different attribution. --TammyMoet (talk) 08:17, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

And with any luck, maybe he bought a flower that's edible. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:39, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

So, sodomy is forbidden under the Uniform Code of Military Justice in the United States.

But isn't the UCMJ inferior to the Constitution and thus bound by its limitations too?

The US Supreme Court recognised in Lawrence v. Texas that sodomy is "part of the liberty protected by the substantive component of the Fourteenth Amendment's due process protections." Surely that means that sodomy in the military cannot be forbidden as well, as long as it's not happening on duty and other sensible exceptions? Or is it just that no-one has sued for being discharged with this argument?

--Sam 01:37, 10 July 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by SamUK (talk • contribs)

For historical and practical reasons, military law is largely independent of civilian law (though obviously they overlap considerably). Clearly the military legal system must respond at some level to the civilian system, but it is not automatically subject to precedents established in civilian courts. --Ludwigs2 03:38, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Members of the armed forces certainly give up some 1st amendment rights (e.g. their right to express opinions critical of the Commander-in-Chief), and I would expect that they also give up certain 14th amendment protections, in terms of the privacy of their personal effects while serving. So I would not necessarily assume that serving members of the armed forces automatically enjoy the 14th amendment protections identified in that case. -- Coneslayer (talk) 03:45, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, so who decides which rights from the Bill of Rights members of the armed forces enjoy? Is it generally based on legal precedent? -- SamUK (talk)

That would likely be a matter of policies that have accumulated and evolved over many generations. Think of the military as being kind of like a company. If you work for a company, you might have to give up some "freedoms". For example, openly criticizing your manager or harassing your co-workers could result in disciplinary action up to and including termination. And if you work for, say, a petroleum company, participating openly in a demonstration against that company could also result in discipline or termination. As far as "private life" stuff is concerned, any organization might have policies about private life where it's thought that knowledge of that private life could be bad for morale. For example, if a Catholic priest were cohabiting with a woman and the children they had had together, there's a good chance they would dump him, regardless of how good a priest he was otherwise. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:05, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Also it's important to keep in mind that policies do evolve. The "bad for morale" blanket has been used to cover a lot of things. Originally, troops were racially segregated. Harry Truman put an end to that, and the military survived. Then there was the matter of women in combat, which was also argued to be bad for morale, among other things, but women are commonplace in the combat zones now, as soldiers as opposed to just caregivers. The last stronghold, perhaps, is gays in the military. It wasn't too many years ago that that was considered extremely bad for morale. But that attitude seems to have softened in the last decade or two, and relaxing that rule further is probably just around the corner. Hence the "sodomy" question, which could have been used to "prove" someone was gay and subject to ejection from the military, would likely become irrelevant, unless they were doing it on duty or out of doors or something. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:22, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Another factor to consider in terms of "freedom of speech" is that while it may be forbidden to criticize your manager, there is typically a process that can be followed if you think your manager has violated policy in some way. Let's supposed your manager (or you company commander) is taking a night class and orders you to do his homework for him. Just saying "no" flat-out could get you in trouble, but there would typically be a process for bringing this up to human resources or whatever the equivalent authority would be, because doing someone's homework for them is not likely to be something they can require. And rather than you "taking the law into your hands", you turn the matter over to the experts and let them decide the "legality" of the order. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:31, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Talking to yourself again, I see, Baseball Bugs. How about you not mindlessly indent your later thoughts when nobody else has intervened. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 21:50, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Getting snippy with the regulars again, I see. How about you keep your trap shut unless you have some potential thoughts in regards to the OP's question? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 02:19, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I guess I asked for that. But really, your wayward ways with indenting do cause confusion, which is unnecessary. Worse than that, counterproductive. Fortunately, such confusion is easy to avoid by following some simple rules. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 02:47, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Feel free to fix the indentions. I find that multiple responses with the same indention are hard to follow, so I indent further. But maybe that's not standard procedure. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:44, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I fear not. I know not. Definitely not. I've withdrawn "mindlessly". Indenting around here means some sort of response to the immediately preceding post; so it follows that if you're providing multiple responses to the same post, all those responses will be at the same level, unless someone else has come along in the meantime and you're now responding to them. See Wikipedia:Indentation, point 2. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 05:26, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If you weren't in such a hurry to reply, you could compose a proper response and bypass the need for multiple replies altogether. Matt Deres (talk) 17:43, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Even if he combined all his "answers," they would still be nothing but a bunch of random unsourced BS he conjured out of thin air, with no substantive relation whatsoever to the OP's original question and not much re the follow-up. So here's a real answer, as opposed to just making stuff up: the fact that a behavior is a "liberty protected by due process" does NOT mean that it can't be forbidden. Rather, it means that the behavior may be forbidden only if (to quote an actual WP article, Due process) "there is a compelling state interest being furthered by the violation of the right, and ... the law in question is narrowly tailored to address the state interest" -- i.e., strict scrutiny applies. Lo and behold, another SOURCE (as opposed to random musings pulled out of one's butt), the WP article Sodomy laws in the United States, states that "In the U.S. military, the United States Army Court of Criminal Appeals has ruled that the Lawrence v. Texas decision applies to Article 125 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the statute banning sodomy. In both United States v. Stirewalt and United States v. Marcum, the court ruled that the 'conduct falls within the liberty interest identified by the Supreme Court.' However, the court went on to say that despite Lawrence's application to the military, Article 125 can still be upheld in cases where there are 'factors unique to the military environment' which would place the conduct 'outside any protected liberty interest recognized in Lawrence.' Examples of such factors could be fraternization, public sexual behavior, or any other factors that would adversely affect good order and discipline." So THAT is the answer to the OP's question (and suggests answers to the follow-up). 63.17.80.31 (talk) 03:41, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The Supreme Court is deferential to national security and military issues. Korematsu v. United States, upholding the constitutionality of internment camps for Japanese-Americans during WWII, contains beautiful, sweeping language covering the protections of the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause. Propaganda and racial prejudice trumped the fundamental right described. Dred Scott and Korematsu are almost always mentioned as travesties of justice that hurt the Court and the country. Please forgive the spacing error.75Janice (talk) 00:33, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Tintin is popular throughout the world, but not in the US. Why an world-famous classic comics character like Tintin is not popular in the US??? Just curious. --Tintin rules (talk) 04:52, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Did you actually read the article you cite, which discusses that exact question? --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 05:10, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, but I'm not convinced. The argument that portraying US negatively in Tintin in America is the reason behind this - i don't find this argument convincing. Does anyone have any other idea? --Tintin rules (talk) 05:17, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I won't buy that crap, man. I think the wonder-boy is loved all over  Jon Ascton  (talk) 05:28, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Try reading past the fourth paragraph of the article; it suggests a number of reasons. The correct answer, of course, is a matter of opinion. --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 06:13, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Never heard of Tintin (apparently not to be confused with Rin Tin Tin), but I had never heard of Winnetou either, until a few years ago. Books may be successful in one country and unknown in another, for any number of reasons, not the least of which would be marketing (or lack thereof). Harry Potter and Babar, for example, have been fairly well known here. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:37, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I too have never heard of Tintin (I'm American). Falconus^{p t c} 16:23, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Growing up in here in rural Virginia 40 years ago, I chanced upon some Tintin comics in a doctor's office and begged for the rest. There is a company named Objectif Lune (Destination Moon) in Montreal that I used to work with— their techs were surprised that I had heard of Tintin. But, I have to agree that many Americans never heard of Tintin. I had never heard of Asterix until I lived in Germany. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 16:50, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Asterix the Gaul was very rude about us Brits in "Asterix in Britain", but it is, apparently, the best selling Asterix book in English[1]. Alansplodge (talk) 17:31, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Tintin, Asterix, and the Smurfs - culturally superior to Mickey Mouse? 92.15.13.115 (talk) 19:36, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Not bloody likely! ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:00, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think more Americans will heard of Tintin after the release of The Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn by Steven Spielberg. --Tintin rules (talk) 03:00, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

American, and don't know Tintin, what the hell is happening, I CAN'T BELIEVE IT (I know CAPs mean shouting, I am shouting).Christ on bike ! This is perhaps what he meant when a certain, yes, a very certain philosopher said - spiritual hollowness at the core of American civilisation. That explains why you killed a Sikh after 11 September, that's like killing a jew to avenge Auschwitz war crimes ! (Sikhs are biggest victims of islamists !) I remember one hungarian matron who was so fed up with American culture's invasion of her land - my kids don't know who King Stephen was, she cried, but they know who Stephen King is... Jon Ascton  (talk) 06:50, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm an American, and I grew up reading Tintin. I first encountered it when I was in the first grade, my teacher had Tintin comics for us to read. My parents bought us more. And Asterix as well. Now I buy them for all my friend's kids. Crypticfirefly (talk) 02:48, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Does Japan have anything similar to fair use? --138.110.206.99 (talk) 12:56, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I am not a lawyer (Japanese or otherwise), but our (somewhat sketchy) article on Japanese copyright law has a section on exceptions which sound an awful lot like fair use sorts of things. If you Google "Japan fair use" you'll see there are a lot of stories from 2008 saying that Japan was thinking of adopting US-style fair use provisions, but I don't see anything that says what happened to that proposal. --Mr.98 (talk) 14:04, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm wondering if even the most militant religious ones still watch American movies? I'm thinking they might not see the violence as a fantasy, but be taught by the movies that that is the way to do things. 92.15.5.169 (talk) 14:12, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As are Americans, don'cha know. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:37, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think looking towards cinema violence as an explanation for terrorist behavior is going to be pretty much a dead end. Looking at US cinema exports (along with other cultural exports) as a way in which the rest of the world "knows America" and has perceptions about it is probably more fruitful. In any case, people living in the Middle East in general have plenty of "real life" examples of violence being "the way to do things"— the entire region has been in different types of local wars for ages, now. The average Afghan, Iranian, or Iraqi almost certainly has far more direct experience with violence—its advantages and limitations—than the average American. --Mr.98 (talk) 14:47, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Looking at the backgrounds of many terrorists, many are from well-educated, sometimes affluent families. Think of the Christmas bomber over Detroit, for example. Chances are, with that kind of upbringing and such, he was plenty smart enough to know. I can't say for sure, of course. Think of the 9/11 pilots, too. They lived in the US, met the regular folk. i doubt they took the movies as reality. Aaronite (talk) 15:34, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Which is not to say that these people don't understand what it means to be cinematic. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed seems to have taken particular inspiration from Hollywood special effects, how to create a real spectacle. People get flack for saying so—because it isn't pretty—but the 9/11 attacks were brilliant from a media-management point of view. --Mr.98 (talk) 17:04, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Brilliant indeed from the strategic standpoint. It caught the USA flatfooted. But at the time it generated a lot of sympathy for the USA and put us on the moral high road, so I'm not so sure it was good from media-management. Unfortunately, our own politicians took us down from that high road. In general, though, movies are often blamed for "giving people ideas", especially in the area of violent crimes; but if those folks were already predisposed towards violent behavior, they would find a way to channel it eventually, movies or no movies. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:25, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It depends whose sympathies you want. Bin Laden is not interested in the liberal democracies. He was interested in impressing those who were already opposed to the US, which I think he did a pretty good job of. He was also interested in having his organization positioned as the "ultimate terrorists" (that was KSM's motivation, anyway), which he did an excellent job of. --Mr.98 (talk) 16:55, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm still wondering if for example militant religious terrorists would have watched US movies, or if they would not watch them because it is forbidden. 92.15.13.115 (talk) 19:27, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You're asking how likely is it that the average suicide bomber is also a movie buff? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:59, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That is not what I asked. 92.15.3.130 (talk) 11:21, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The IP will want to read Media violence research and judge the extent to which examples in media unequivocally provoke violence in any audience.--Wetman (talk) 15:02, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

People keep misinterpreting the question. All I want to know is: have people who become religious terrorists watched American movies, or are they banned by their religion, in which case they will not have seen them? I once saw a photo of the young Osama Bin Laden wearing flared trousers in the seventies, which suggests that he watched movies as well. I understand that the Taliban forbade watching television or movies. Where does the average religious terrorist fit on this dimension? 92.15.3.130 (talk) 16:24, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

One reason people keep failing to answer your question is that it asks for a general answer that can not be given. There is not one homogeneous group of people who become religious terrorists. They come from a variety of different backgrounds. Many will have watched these moves, some have not. Whether they are banned to by their religion depends mostly on the individual situation. There is not one interpretation of the rules, not even one set of rules. /Coffeeshivers (talk) 17:57, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It's more likely that the reason is that the information is not available. 92.28.255.202 (talk) 09:54, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think its fair to say that virtually everyone in the younger generation that has grown up in the Gulf countries (regardless of political and religious views) have consumed a fair share of American music, movies and tv shows, and are well aware of American society and culture. In Afghanistan this might be a little different, where Bollywood is far more popular than Hollywood and where kids (especially in rural areas) didn't have access to cinemas/videos whilst growing up. --Soman (talk) 16:03, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

According to the 9/11 report, KSM purchased "a few movies depicting hijackings" when planning the 9/11 attacks, and was fairly well-aware of Western culture. This is notable because many of those who flew the planes were not; KSM was considerably better educated and intellectually far more active than the "muscle" on the planes. (Who were themselves distinct from the pilots, in terms of education and upbringing.) The report doesn't specify which movies, or whether they were Hollywood products or not. --Mr.98 (talk) 16:59, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I keep hearing he was a pedophile. Where does this come from? Is it true? ScienceApe (talk) 16:22, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

He married one of his wives when she was six or seven and consummated at age nine. Standards change; by the standards of his time, this wasn't unusual. See Criticism_of_Muhammad#Aisha. Vimescarrot (talk) 16:52, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I would expect that they consummated as soon as she was capable of bearing children. That's from the ancient times, when the primary purpose of sex was considered to be reproduction. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:55, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Bugs, is there a reason you feel capable of generalizing about attitudes towards sex in 7th century Arabia? The idea that in "ancient times," sex was just about reproduction is ridiculous and false on the surface of it. Ever hear of the Greeks or the Kama Sutra or any of the other bajillion complicated sexual expressions that have existed as long as we have human records for? The idea that people in the 8th century, or the 1st, or the 15th, somehow lacked complicated sexual lives and attitudes is obviously false if you look for even a minute at the complicated history of human sexuality. --Mr.98 (talk) 17:07, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Prior to the 20th century, there was little knowledge about contraception, and indeed having large families was considered a good thing. Having multiple wives made for an even larger family. The social changes and attitudes separating procreational and recreational sex have been relatively recent. Trying to apply current standards even to the 1950s is risky, let alone hundreds of years earlier. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:18, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You're generalizing wildly about a subject you clearly don't know much about. Really, honestly, just read the article I linked to, for an introduction. It is not the case, at all, that people were having sex just for reproduction and having massive families prior to 1950. That's a blatantly ignorant statement. While it's true that the pill certainly changed a things, especially in the United States, to over-exaggerate about its effects or the prurient state of the world beforehand is just ignorant, and an insult to the large, large body of historical research on this topic which has been going on for decades. --Mr.98 (talk) 17:36, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In my family tree, which we know back to the 1600s in some cases, there are a number of instances of cousins marrying - all before 1900. Cousins marrying is kind of frowned upon now but was common in those days. We also have instances of brides being 14, 15, 16 - which is kind of frowned upon nowadays also. I am not totally ignorant of this subject, sir or madam. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:58, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

all that notwithstanding, early marriage (for both girls and boys) was a broadly accepted cultural norm in almost every region of the world. the modern 'late marriage' model in the west is a function of a number of different trends: aristocratic/bourgeois politics (where marriage between children was often used to seal political/financial alliances), the development of a professional class (where women actually had options in life aside from making a good marriage), increasing levels of literacy and education driven by technological demands, Christian ethics that put an emphasis on chastity and patience (and made it a matter of personal damnation rather than social embarrassment).

but whatever. the whole "Muhammed was a pedophile" thing is just a bit of tawdry Islamophobic idiocy. you'll hear the same thing about almost any religious figure in any faith, from some lowbrow fool (e.g. Jesus: an unmarried adult male who lacks sexual interest in women, but shows numerous examples of his fondness for children... suffer those children, baby.). --Ludwigs2 17:39, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Having sex with 9-year old girls has not been the broadly accepted and unquestioned norm throughout most human societies and cultures over the course of history, and trying to justify it by asserting the contrary would seem to be little more than the most simplistic and cheaply cynical form of unintelligent moral ultra-relativism. Furthermore, the basic accusation against Muhammad is based on Muslim sources which the vast majority of Islamic legal-religious scholars accepted (and did not see as problematic) until the matter became caught up in Muslim-Christian religious debates in the 20th century. Therefore your attempted analogy with Jesus is lacking in any relevance or interest, since there there are no comparable simple factual assertions in the Bible which would directly lead to the conclusion that Jesus had an abnormal sexuality, without resort to elaborate exegesis and interpretation... AnonMoos (talk) 01:29, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Unfortunately for your argument, 'getting married' and 'having sex' are distinct ideas. did you know, for instance, that Mahatma Gandhi was married at 13 (to a 14 year old girl), though each continued to live with their parents for years afterward? children might get engaged by their parents as young as 6 in many traditional cultures (where marriages are arranged by parents with the best interests of the children in mind). and they will happily live in marital bliss without sex until their parents decide it's time for them to begin living as man and wife. so do you think Gandhi was a pedophile as well, or would that have been his wife; or maybe you think it was their parents that were pedophiles for forcing their children to get married?

With Muhammed, we know that he had sexual interest in adult women (that is rare among true pedophiles, who usually have difficulty forming mature attachments). can you say the same for Jesus? --Ludwigs2 02:07, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

First off, for roughly a century or so widespread child marriage has been recognized by many people genuinely concerned about human rights as a pernicious practice which very often has many negative effects (including by many social critics within societies which practice frequent child marriage). When people in modern societies read about a 6-year old boy being engaged to a 4-year girl, we may think that it sounds somewhat quaint and picturesque (though we don't choose to live that way ourselves), but when we read about a 30-year old man having sex with a 9-year old girl, then our reaction is much more likely to be one of visceral disgust -- and I really don't see what the point of your attempt to blur and confuse this useful distinction is. Second, Muhammad doesn't seem to have been averse to using divine revelations to get what he wanted on occasion (the point of Qur'an verse 33:50 is that it gives Muhammad the right to take an unlimited number of simultaneous wives, while his male followers were restricted to four simultaneous wives, etc.), and the clear testimony of the Ahadith is that Muhammad wanted Aisha. Frankly, it would have been nice if the replies to this question could have gone a just a little bit beyond cheaply-cynical "moral equivalence" ultra-relativism (which really explains nothing and resolves nothing). AnonMoos (talk) 10:54, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The pseudo-scholarly pedophile, formerly pædophile, was coined by the German psychiatrist Krafft-Ebing who coined the term pedophilia in 1886. In English the word is so recent it doesn't appear in my Shorter Oxford English Dictionary: new words for new views. For the former approach, look no further than your local Roman Catholic Church--Wetman (talk) 17:49, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The attempted analogy between Muhammad and pedophile priests really fails to offer any relevant insight, and also fails as an attempt at crude "moral equivalence" reasoning -- the Islamic religion holds up Muhammad as the ideal human being, whose behavior all other humans should emulate and imitate, but no one holds up pedophile priests as a model for imitations. AnonMoos (talk) 01:34, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Tangentially related to the OP´s question is the research of Harvard researcher Susan Clancy on pedophilia. From a recent lengthy article on Ms Clancy (read in German / no link available), I may summarise: 1) The general public concept of pedophilia (as a rape of infants) is mostly incorrect. There may be no / limited trauma initially involved in children. 2) The situation of the adult "victim" of a pedophile act to cope with this memory is therefore much more complicated.

If we apply Dr (?) Clancy´s findings to historical periods (classical Greece, Aisha bint Abu Bakr) we may , indeed, come to conclusions which do not fit current values. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 20:18, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Social norms vary with time. RC priests (who may or may not be pedophiles) are certainly held up as models for imitation, though not so to me personally either. Neologisms are not coined until they become necessary, one major usefulness of etymology.--Wetman (talk) 14:58, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Even more recently, girls have become pregnant at a very young age. Lina Medina, for example. ~AH1^(TCU) 15:17, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I neither know or care anything about football, but could Team A prevent Team B from ever scoring by all members of Team A staying near Team B's goal, so that any member of Team B that approached Team A's goal would be offside and could not score? Ignoring for the sake of arguement very long kicks from one end of the pitch to the other. Thanks 92.15.13.115 (talk) 19:33, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No, it would only take one player who could run more quickly than the other team's closest player to kick the ball part way up the pitch, chase it down and repeat until they were close enough to shoot.Prokhorovka (talk) 20:28, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Add in that you cannot be offside in your own half and that instantly makes half the pitch 'free' in terms of movement. ny156uk (talk) 20:46, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Following on from Prokhorovka's point you are only offside if the ball is played forward to you - so it doesn't just take one faster person, it could be 2,3, 4 or more players all bursting forward and provided the ball is played backwards (the player that receives it can move forward with the ball) then there's no offside. Basically there's nothing stopping your team A trying this tactic but it would be a shocking tactical mistake. ny156uk (talk) 20:48, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Following up on the OP's question somewhat: Presumably you're talking soccer here. Just so we're clear, if you yourself are dribbling the ball, you can pretty much go anywhere you like with it, as long as your teammates don't precede you into the "attacking zone", right? (pardon the hockey terminology) Now, let's suppose it's the World Cup final and you have a 1-goal lead with roughly a minute left to play in the match. Could you legally stack all your players in your own zone in a kind of "prevent defense" to try and hold off any attackers in that final minute? I'm not saying that would be good strategy, but would there by any rule against it? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:16, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The player with the ball can go anywhere (within the pitch obviously). Players without the ball can be in offside positions provided they are not 'interfering' with play. If you've got a 1 goal lead with a minute left to play yes you put 11 men behind the ball and make it difficult for them to get through -it's not illegal but then it's nothing to do with the offside rule either (you wouldn't put 11 men in-front of the ball to try catch them offside as that would be a stupid tactic). ny156uk (talk) 23:15, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

And having re-re-read the question I understand it now, and the point was already made that the simple answer is "no", because you can't be called for offside in your own zone of the field. Interestingly, this strategy does work in basketball, in a different way, i.e. you have ten seconds to get out of your half of the court, and a properly-stacked defense can prevent that and force a turnover, although it doesn't happen very often. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 02:17, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

What is the name, in Greek, of the rhetorical device wherein we use a verb normally associated with a certain noun for a different one, for which it is strictly speaking inappropriate. (you can think of a million examples, just read my definition carefully. Here is one example: buildings and such things are "erected", so if you say "there Nature erected a placid lake", you are using the Greek rhetorical device to which I refer.) Or you can think of any technical verbs, a verb you use for milling steel or setting type or whatever, applied to something, for rhetorical effect, to which the verb does not normally apply. 84.153.185.122 (talk) 21:05, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That's just your plain old metaphor, I am fairly sure. "He mined that book for facts" is a metaphor ("book are mines", in the terms that linguists use for conceptual metaphors). --Mr.98 (talk) 21:34, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

(op) it has a specific name when you use a verb like apprehend with a noun that we don't see with it - the horizon apprehended the sun. or the rain burned through the desert air. yes metaphor, but it has a specific Greek name, when you use "burn" with water, which doesn't. what is that Greek word? 92.230.68.108 (talk) 23:43, 10 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Catachresis? That's more general, as is metonymy. I can't think of a word which means only what you're saying. --ColinFine (talk) 00:13, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Metonymy is something quite different. I'm not sure there is a specialized Greek term for what the original poster wants... I suspect he/she is confused and is misremembering/associating something else (like metonymy, or synecdoche, or simile). There are a lot of specific types of metaphor but none that I can see relate only to verbs and nouns. --Mr.98 (talk) 02:40, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

ColinFine has hit it with catachresis.--Wetman (talk) 14:53, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Today, I visited the Hopewell Culture National Historical Park and purchased a small book (the plates from Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley) at the visitor center; besides the purchase price, I paid 70¢ of state and local sales tax. How is this consistent with McCulloch v. Maryland? Is it simply that the tax is paid by me, rather than by the National Park Service, or is there some other reason? Nyttend (talk) 03:09, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't follow your question. What is your reasoning or presumption/assumption? Why do you think that paying state/local sales tax is inconsistent with McCulloch v. Maryland? If you offer that insight, it will be easier for editors here to answer your question. Thanks. (64.252.65.146 (talk) 14:57, 11 July 2010 (UTC))[reply]

Nyttend is asking why states may require sales tax be paid on goods sold by the federal government in a national park, even though in McCulloch, the Supreme Court disallowed Maryland from taxing a federal bank, on the grounds that if a state is allowed to tax the operations of the federal government, the state is effectively allowed to destroy such operations within state boundaries (by taxing at a rate of a billion dollars per day). In the opinion, the Court noted that states' right to tax is definitely limited by implication in the Constitution, else they could unilaterally eject any federal government function from their borders. I would very hesitantly venture that Nyttend's sales tax may be allowed because (a) the federal government is not necessarily running that store, or (b) the sales from that store are treated the same as sales from some local private vendor; but I really don't know the answer to this interesting question. Comet Tuttle (talk) 16:31, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

OK, so I am totally confused. Isn't taxing the federal government itself (i.e., the McCulloch bank) a wholly separate issue from taxing an individual citizen (i.e., the consumer of a book at the federal park)? I don't see what one has to do with the other, to be honest. What am I missing? In the first scenario, the State is "forcing" (requiring) the feds to pay a tax. In the second, the State is "forcing" (requiring) an individual (who is not the federal government) to pay a tax. I guess I just don't see the conflict with that Supreme Court case at all. It's comparing apples with oranges, no? The "apples" are the feds ... the "oranges" are just citizens/consumers who happen to live in the USA. And, I am missing what makes this an "interesting" question. Please help! Thanks. (64.252.65.146 (talk) 21:56, 11 July 2010 (UTC))[reply]

Also, I would think that the State in question can impose on federal goods sold the same tax as applies to any other goods sold in that State. The State cannot arbitrarily tax federal goods at "a billion dollars a day" (per Comet Tuttle's example), while taxing all other goods at, say, five percent. Even if there were some conflict with the federal government – which I don't see – as Comet Tuttle points out, the gift shop may be a private vendor operating at the national park (as opposed to being operated by the feds proper). Thanks. (64.252.65.146 (talk) 22:28, 11 July 2010 (UTC))[reply]

CometTuttle understands me correctly. It's definitely not a private vendor — both of the workers behind the counter were wearing official National Park Service uniforms, and one of them went into the building just before I did, immediately after exiting an official NPS vehicle; as well, they answered my questions by looking at official NPS databases. Nyttend (talk) 23:15, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The OP's question misinterprets the court's holding on the tax issue (which is independent of another important holding, i.e. the feds had a right to establish the bank even though there's nothing about "banks" in the Constitution -- this involved the "necessary and proper clause"). The holding on the tax issue was NOT that "states can't tax anything done by the feds." It was THIS (based mostly upon the Supremacy Clause): "The states have no power, by taxation or otherwise, to retard, impede, burden, or in any manner control, the operations of the constitutional laws enacted by congress to carry into execution the powers vested in the general government." In other words, this was a STAMP tax applicable to the defining "banking" activities of the bank (as opposed to, say, a sales tax) -- a tax that imposed on the very justification for the bank's existence: "this is a tax on the operations of the bank, and is, consequently, a tax on the operation of an instrument employed by the government of the Union to carry its powers into execution. Such a tax must be unconstitutional." However, "This opinion does not ... extend to a tax ... imposed on the interest which the citizens of Maryland may hold in this institution, in common with other property of the same description throughout the state" -- explicitly, the opinion does NOT forbid any and all state taxes on federal operations. A tourist shop in a national park can pay state taxes without destroying the purpose for the national park's existence. (Presumably, an exorbitant tax on the shop would be struck down following a suit brought by the feds against the state.) 63.17.80.31 (talk) 04:59, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion made me think of this related question. If the federal government owns a building within a State, do the feds pay property tax just as any private landowner would? I never thought of this before. Let's say that there is a federal office building located in New York City. Do the feds pay property taxes on that building to the State of New York or to the City of New York, etc.? I am guessing not ... but I am curious about this now. If not, why not? Thanks. (64.252.65.146 (talk) 22:37, 11 July 2010 (UTC))[reply]

• The Feds definitely do not pay property tax. I live in DC, and it's one of the timeless fights in local politics -- we constantly ask the Feds to start paying property tax, and they ("they" being the General Services Administration, or the Senate's DC Committee) respond that they don't pay property tax to anyone, anywhere in the USA, so why start with DC? --M@rēino 00:04, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In Canada, the Federal government will often make payments in lieu of taxes in such a situation (see here [2]). This practice preserves the principle that the Federal governement is not liable for local taxes, but compensates the local authority for the loss of property taxes simply because the building's owner is the federal government. Such grants are often limited in duration and serve to ease the transition when the the Federal government acquires a piece of property that used to generate significant tax income for the local authority. And, jeez, we have an article !: PILOT_(finance) --Xuxl (talk) 17:18, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

DC's a bad example because it's already federal, but no, the federal government, constitutionally, does not have to pay taxes to the states. That said, it's possible that there may be some arrangement for them to do so.

I'm not sure about the OP's question and the IP's suggestion that the distinction is because the tax is on a citizen and not the government. That doesn't seem right (think of the post office as an analogy). There's probably something else at play here, either state involvement in the store, or perhaps a federal deal to allow state sales tax or something similar. Shadowjams (talk) 05:24, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The McCulloch holding on the tax issue was NOT that "states can't tax anything done by the feds." McCulloch states: "This opinion does not ... extend to a tax ... imposed on the interest which the citizens of Maryland may hold in this institution, in common with other property of the same description throughout the state" -- explicitly, the opinion does NOT forbid any and all state taxes on federal operations. See fuller answer above, under the first question. 63.17.93.127 (talk) 02:21, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Can someone explain to me how China can control the exchange rate between US dollar and the Yuan. While USA cannot control the exchange rate between US dollar and the Yuan.

From a symmetry point of view,considering country A and country B. Neither country should have an advantage in controlling the exchange rate between the two countries. Because no matter what trick country A uses, country B can counter with the same trick. 122.107.192.187 (talk) 13:42, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Banks under effective Chinese government control are willing to exchange Renminbi for dollars at a government-approved exchange rate, even if by doing so the Chinese banks pay more than they would under a hypothetical free-market floating exchange rate. By contrast, the U.S. is not willing to allocate government funds to engage in an effort to drive down the value of the Renminbi -- something which would be interpreted as a hostile act by China. AnonMoos (talk) 15:40, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

An effort to drive down the value of the Renminbi??? Can you please explain me that reasoning? Flamarande (talk) 16:31, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I guess most speculative currency manipulations are attempts by outsiders to drive down the value of another country's currency, and I echoed that in the phrasing of my comment, although in this particular case the U.S. would be hypothetically trying to drive down the value of its own currency. AnonMoos (talk) 12:41, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Read the article Renminbi. You can only exchange certain quantities. Basicly the goverment of China was selling its own currency lower than its real value. Let us only use round numbers and a bit of imagination: the Chinese banks were exchanging 1 US dollar for 5 yuan while one US dollar was truly worth 3 yuan.

By fixing this exchange rate (1 US = 5 yuan) the Chinese gov is making sure that a product from China whose price was 100 yuan was sold abroad for 20 US dollars (instead of its true value of 33.33 US dollars). This way Chinese products were simply cheaper and sold in large quantities.

If the US goverment had followed your (frankly naive) proposal it would had fixed its own exchange rate at 1 US dollar to 3 Yuan, right?

But if the US gov had done that utter folly lots of speculators would have bought Chinese currency from the US banks and exchanged in Chinese banks only to later exchange it again in US banks, and so forth...

Example: I would have bought 1000 US dollars and exchanged it in a Chinese bank getting 5000 yuan (1 US dollars to 5 yuan). Then I would go to a US bank and exchanged my 5000 yuan for US dollars getting 1666 US dollars (1 US dollar to 3 yuan). Then I would go to a Chinese bank and exchanged my 1666 US dollars getting 8330 yuan (1 to 5). Then I would go to a US bank... and so forth and so forth.

In the end I would be stinking rich and the Chinese and US treasury would be bankrupt. Remember that with modern global communications there is not even a need to travel from country to country anymore. It's all done with the pressing of a couple of buttons.

The Chinese trick (lowering the value of one's own currency) only works if your country sells large quantities to other countries (other ppl have to really buy large quantities of your stuff). It doesn't work if your country buys more than it sells (or even if it buys as much it sells). AFAIK the USA buys more than it sells.

Don't ask me about good counter-measures against China or about negative side-effects for the Chinese economy (probably lots of inflation?). Flamarande (talk) 16:06, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It must be added that the Renminbi is not a fully convertible currency. As such trading the currency is not as simple as walking to Barclays with your piggy bank. See also foreign exchange market. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 22:13, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

While the technical arguments are sound –- Chinese banks’ ability to set the rate; lack of free convertibility; etc -– the underlying principles are being ignored. It is politicians, and really only politicians (and the economists they get to back them up), who argue that the Renminbi is undervalued. In fact, many independent observers consider the Rmb to be quite fairly valued, even after the recent 20% appreciation..

Among other things usually ignored, about 55-60% of China’s foreign trade is conducted by foreign-invested enterprises, who not only have no interest in making “China” rich, but also are not likely to be enthusiastic about enforcing a trade policy from Beijing. Further, the closed capital account leaks like a sieve (if you can’t get money out of China, you aren’t really trying). Finally, even if Congress got everything it is asking for (40% appreciation), the net effect would be to drive up the prices at Wal-Mart without any benefit at all to the US economy. Indeed, there would very likely be a net loss of jobs under such a scenario. Full disclosure: this kind of policy analysis is my job, and so the above should be considered original research. DOR (HK) (talk) 09:15, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"Finally, even if Congress got everything it is asking for (40% appreciation), the net effect would be to drive up the prices at Wal-Mart without any benefit at all to the US economy." Sure in the short term, but longer term the higher prices would encourage either more production of the items in the US, or else the importation of these items from another country. In either case, the price increase at Wal-Mart might be high in the short term, but would not endure at more then a small increase. Googlemeister (talk) 16:34, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Googlemeister, what part of "importation of these items from another country" -- at a worse price / quality ratio (if it wasn't worse, importers wouldn't buy products made in China) -- benefits anyone in the US? As for the generosity of alternative suppliers reducing their prices, that hasn't happened in the history I've read, so I'll be a bit cautious in assuming it would happen under this scenario. Finally, the notion that the plastic kitchen utensils and cotton socks bought from China are going to be made in the US strikes me as an alternative reality scenario.DOR (HK) (talk) 02:16, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

China is not undercutting prices on socks or kitchenware from Thailand or Indonesia by huge margins, but only by a small amount. If China's currency appreciated 40%, then with even moderately efficient markets, Thailand or Indonesia or wherever would be competitively priced. Now in the short term, this will cause an increase in prices both because those countries would not be able to instantly supply the volume of goods, but while demand holds and China has priced itself out of the market, these other factories would expand increasing the amount of goods they can deliver. This will help bring the price down to the 10% above China's original price was. Because of the new expansions they have completed, these new factories are going to get more economy of scale, and the end result, while higher then China, will be only marginally higher. Googlemeister (talk) 14:52, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

And, you reinforce my point: higher prices and zero benefits to the US economy. DOR (HK) (talk) 06:39, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In Romeo and Juliet, is there some reason for which Capulet advances Juliet's wedding (to Count Paris) by one day? It is originally scheduled for Thursday, but then Capulet makes a big deal about moving it up one day to Wednesday. Is there any reason for this? I did not exactly follow why he did this. I do know that he wanted to help console Juliet in her (supposed) grief over the death of Tybalt. But would one day really make any difference? That line of reasoning did not seem to make sense. Also, I was wondering if this one-day advancement of the wedding somehow tied into "ruining" (or, at least, impacting) the scheme of the Friar by which Juliet drank the sleeping potion? Thanks for any insights! (64.252.65.146 (talk) 15:02, 11 July 2010 (UTC))[reply]

Just to clarify ... if I remember the details correctly: Capulet proposed the wedding date for Wednesday; then said "no, that's too soon, let's make it Thursday instead". Then, later on in the play in another scene, he again shifted it from Thursday back to Wednesday. Thanks. (64.252.65.146 (talk) 15:13, 11 July 2010 (UTC))[reply]

It's been a while since I read the play, but my brain is whispering to me that Juliet's father hoped that the wedding would distract and cheer Juliet after the death of her cousin Tybalt. Bear in mind, my brain doesn't always give me good information, so we'll see if someone else comes along with a better answer in a bit. -FisherQueen (talk · contribs) 16:26, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It might help to keep in mind that R&J was Shakespeare's version of an earlier story. One of the changes he made was to shorten the time frame of everything. There are a number of items which don't quite make sense in the shortened time, but are perfectly reasonable for a story taking place over a longer period of time. I'm not intimately familiar with all the preceding works, so I can't say for certain, but the movement of the wedding date may have been one of those items which was time compressed. Shakespeare was a populist playwright (as opposed to a literary/scholarly one), so probably wouldn't have been too concerned with such minor inconsistencies. -- 174.24.195.56 (talk) 17:46, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Does it have anything to do with banns being published? Maybe he thought the banns wouldn't be done by Wednesday so he proposed Thursday, then realized Wednesday would be ok? Just speculating. Everard Proudfoot (talk) 19:51, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To summarize this part of the play: Paris wants to marry Juliet, and seeks Capulet's permission. Capulet thinks she is too young, but says that if Paris gains her consent, then he has Capulet's as well. No date is set (Act 1, scene 2). When Tybalt is killed, Capulet sets the date for Thursday (Wednesday being too early) to console her, thinking that Juliet will obey him. He decides to keep the wedding small, in light of Tybalt's death (Act 3, scene 4). Juliet is told of the wedding, but refuses to marry Paris, to Capulet's anger (Act 3, scene 5). Juliet goes to Friar Lawrence to ask for help, where he gives her the potion (Act 4, scene 1). Juliet returns to her father and consents to the marriage, at which point Capulet moves the wedding to Wednesday (Act 4, scene 2). So for the moving of the wedding, it seems to me that Capulet was glad that Juliet consented, and wanted the wedding sooner, before Juliet could change her mind.

As for their plan, Romeo and Juliet were married at the end of Act 2, but Romeo's killing Tybalt at the beginning of Act 3 was what threw their plan off, since that caused Capulet to set a date in the first place. At Juliet's request for help, the Friar gave her the potion, and sent a letter to Romeo, who never received it. Romeo then heard of Juliet's "death", and returned, killing himself at her tomb. – Psyche825 (talk) 20:32, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

So, Psyche825, you are saying that the move from Thursday to Wednesday was to foreclose Juliet changing her mind? Is that what you think motivated Capulet? Thanks. (64.252.65.146 (talk) 22:43, 11 July 2010 (UTC))[reply]

That's what it looks like to me, yes – Psyche825 (talk) 03:41, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy of haste. Whatever motivation can be noted for Capulet, tragic misunderstandings ensue from his decision. That's the major structural purpose. --Wetman (talk) 18:14, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks to all! Much appreciated! (64.252.65.146 (talk) 19:05, 17 July 2010 (UTC))[reply]

Did ninjas always wear all black when doing missions, or did they wear normal clothes for missions during the day? --138.110.206.101 (talk) 23:59, 11 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

They did not always wear black. "They" are a very much larger and more diverse bunch of people than their film stereotype. See also Ninja. --Tagishsimon (talk) 00:05, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

*Ninjas could wear whatever got the job done. The first ninja ever dressed like a housemaid to kill his rivals. --M@rēino 00:11, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Then why do fictional ninjas (almost) always wear all black? --138.110.206.101 (talk) 00:17, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

For the same reason that fiction dresses vampires, witches, Lord Voldemort, Nazis, John Travolta and James Dean characters, and the bad guys of old westerns in black: it's de rigueur for the sophisticated, stylish villain. I mean, come on: would you be terrified by a vampire who dressed like Tom Selleck? --Ludwigs2 00:37, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

An urban legend for which I have no source says that the modern look of ninjas in fiction came from a play where the ninjas were dressed as stagehands. People were use to ignoring the stagehands dressed in all black as they changed the set, so when one of them walked up to a character in the play and killed him, the audience was like "WTF!?". 142.104.215.119 (talk) 00:44, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Unreliable source for that. It links to its own sources, which I haven't checked. Vimescarrot (talk) 10:45, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Question Removed by OP

This is not a reference desk question as it is basically a request for an opinion on an opinion. --Saddhiyama (talk) 08:17, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

What you think about this, is this not too a "request for opinion for...etc" i.e. unsuitable for Refernece desk ?

One was a request to know the purpose of poetry. The other was espousing an untenable and ridiculous opinion and inviting us to buy into the said opinion by way of suggesting reasons why it was so. The only nodding points of correspondence were that both questions were on reference desks and both were related to poetry. In all other respects they were light years apart. Paraphrasing your question as "did poetry end in 1945" would move us to answer no. I'm sorry you do not appreciate anything more contemporary, but it's your loss. Here, should anyone be interested, is the original question. As it turns out, it is not so Very Important after all, or, if so, only in the most pooh bear sort of a way. --Tagishsimon (talk) 15:30, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The "purpose of poetry" question was posed by 88.104.91.80, who's an Elsie sock. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 15:43, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, what's "sock" and what's this 88.104.91.80 business ? Jon Ascton (talk · contribs)

88.104.91.80 is the IP address of a user who was not logged in when they posted. "Sock" is an abbreviated form of sockpuppet, a second (or greater) user account for an individual, one which is often associated with trollish behaviour. Bugs is known not to be keen on users who do not log in, and not keen either about sockpuppets; that the best explanation I have for his gratuitous vouchsafing of the information. I'm not sure one would conventionally term an IP address as a sock, but it's a minor point. --Tagishsimon (talk) 16:11, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If you were to actually bother looking into this instead of taking your typical ignorant potshots, you would discover that the admin User:TenOfAllTrades has determined that the 88.104 IP range is one of the realms of the banned user noted above. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:22, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As Khanlar and Xanlar redirect to Goygol, I think that it should be useful to include, in the latter article, the various Azerbaijani spellings as well as the Azebaijani and English spelling and pronunciation. According to Azerbaijani alphabet and [3], I think the Cyrillic spelling is "Ханлар" and the pronunciation is [xanlar], but I found no authoritative source. Apokrif (talk) 12:59, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

do criminals automatically lose all their money if convicted for life, or can a mass murderer serve for life while remaining rich? 84.153.234.184 (talk) 13:56, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No, a person may still have money while in prison, (especially if they were good at hiding it). But seriously, while most people in prison for life are fairly poor since they spent a ton of money on fines, restitution, lawsuits, lawyers etc... and they most often did not have a lot of money to begin with, there is nothing that confiscates their wealth automatically, so if one were sufficiently rich enough before committing their crime, and their wealth was not related to their crime (they did not steal money to get rich), then it would be feasible that they might maintain some wealth. And as a side note, at least in the USA, convicted for life does not always mean they are in prison until they die. It is not terribly rare for prisoners sentenced to "life" to be paroled after 15 or 20 years. Googlemeister (talk) 14:03, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We have an article (Life_imprisonment) which describes the eligibility for parole in various countries. I believe that US prisoners serve, on average, a longer "life sentence" than Western European ones. Many U.S. jurisdictions have a sentence of life without possibility of parole and the federal government requires a prisoner to serve 85% of their sentence. Not sure how they compute 85% of a life. Note also that the International Criminal Court would grant even those convicted of genocide a parole hearing after 25 years (not that they have had the chance yet, having just stopped their very first trial). Rmhermen (talk) 14:18, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The article on life imprisonment was very short on specifics, which I can understand since for even just the USA it would need to have different rules for each of the 50 states and a separate set of rules for federal cases. The OP has not specified a country or jurisdiction within a country, so my answer was based on the US. I can see some countries using a life sentence as a nice excuse to confiscate the finances of their prisoner as a matter of course, but I am not aware of specifics as to where this might apply. Googlemeister (talk) 16:28, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

A story Myron Cohen used to tell: A guy is sent to prison for bank robbery, but most of the money was never found. He gets a letter from his wife, "I'm going to dig up the back yard and plant a garden." The husband replies, "Don't dig up the back yard!" The wife answers back, "The FBI came out today and dug up the back yard." The husband writes, "Now you can plant a garden!" ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:11, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Under some situations, the state can seize assets and sell them off at auction. In some jurisdictions, the state can require the inmate to pay for their own incarceration. But there's no generalized rule that says that someone should be made destitute just because they are imprisoned. It doesn't sound like a good idea, either, as a general rule. In some situations you want the victims to be compensated (e.g. if someone has defrauded them), but as a general rule, there's no reason that committing a crime should equate with losing one's assets, or the ability to have them disposed of as you wish after you have died. --Mr.98 (talk) 14:22, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Not only can people have money whilst imprisoned, they can also earn money (although, rarely legally) in jail. Prisons development their own economical structures between the inmates, and some that become quite wealthy. --Soman (talk) 15:55, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In Ireland the Criminal Assets Bureau was set up to target the money of criminals and has had relative success in taking illegal earnings from the criminals. Mo ainm~Talk 18:09, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

On a related note ... you should be aware that some states in the USA require inmates to pay for the cost of their incarceration. So, if they calculated the cost for all of the many years of a life sentence, the prisoner can end up owing the State quite a bit of money ... and it can easily "wipe out" his riches. Of course, most prisoners will "hide" their money somehow, so as to avoid the State taking it. Thanks. (64.252.65.146 (talk) 20:26, 12 July 2010 (UTC))[reply]

(ec) In the US, a criminal's property does not automatically revert to the state, or anything, when he is convicted. All of his money remains his. There are three major reasons I can think of that the criminal would lose some or all of his money. (A) Some crimes carry a fine as well as a jail sentence. To pick a crime from California as an example, money laundering, first offense, can get the criminal a year in jail plus a fine of US$250,000 or twice the value of the amount he laundered, whichever is greater. That alone might wipe him out financially. The state could and would use all its means to identify all the assets of the criminal if necessary to collect this judgment. (B) Whoever is victimized can file a civil lawsuit to collect damages; for example, Fred Goldman obtained a judgment against O.J. Simpson for over US$33 million, over the murder of Goldman's son. (Civil suits have a better chance of succeeding against a criminal after he's been found guilty in court. OJ's case was unusual in that (among a thousand other unusual things) he was found not guilty in criminal court, but was found liable in civil court.) This also could wipe out the criminal financially. (C) Asset forfeiture occurs against money that the criminal possesses which is the proceeds of crime. If an illegal heroin distributor accumulates US$1 million in money, houses, and cars as the proceeds of his illegal heroin distribution business, then the state or federal government may seize it, legally. To go back to your original example of a mass murderer, I would think that point (B) above would probably bankrupt any given mass murderer. Comet Tuttle (talk) 20:35, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have seen a lot of really obese people of both gender. But I have not seen really obese old people. Where are all the really obese old people hiding? 122.107.192.187 (talk) 14:18, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You're not looking hard enough. For example, have you seen Aretha Franklin lately? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:26, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, there are potentially a few things going on here. One is that obesity may influence life expectancy. Another is that it may be a generational thing—people who are currently in their 80s may have grown up before the current high obesity trends really set in. And another is your own exposure to the elderly. How many really elderly people do you regularly see? I imagine if you were at a rest home, you'd see far more variety in body weight, especially when one factors in decreased overall mobility as both something that goes with age and obesity. --Mr.98 (talk) 14:28, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There have been plenty of porkers in all generations past. Typically the very old might tend to become frail and lose weight, so there probably aren't all that many really heavy ones in their 90s. But I can think of several instances of my parents' generation and earlier generations where the folks were quite large. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:36, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the plural of anecdote is not data, Bugs. Your assertion that obesity rates have been fairly constant in the past does not, I don't think, hold very much water in and of itself. --Mr.98 (talk) 15:48, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not claiming so. I'm just saying obesity is nothing new. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 15:57, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The pertinent question is the rates, which may (depending on who you believe) be new. Obesity in an individual is obviously not new. But the question of whether the rates are higher is obviously related to how many you'd see when walking about. --Mr.98 (talk) 18:44, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Somehow, I have the feeling that when the name of a country is not explicitly stated, people simply assume that the discussion is about the U.S.? Do note that the IP OP is an aussie. --Soman (talk) 16:10, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Speaking as someone who works in a day centre, I would say the obese old people are at home. It takes an amzing amount of effort to move if you are grossly overweight, even more if the weather is hot (which it can be most of the time in Aus). If you can get your groceries delivered, why bother to go anywhere? --TammyMoet (talk) 17:39, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We need to define what "old people" means. To a child, a person aged 30 is old. To me, Aretha Franklin is not yet old, but she is starting to get on a bit. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 19:45, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To illustrate the above: two days ago an 18-year old client of mine was relating an incident that had occurred in her workplace between herself and another woman she described as "really old". I asked her what she meant by "really old", and was told "Oh, she's at least 50". I, being almost 10 years older than that, replied in mock horror "At least 50? That old?". It went completely over her head. Next time I see her I must ask her how old she thinks I am. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 12:07, 16 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The obese usually die before they reach old age, that's why. 92.28.252.50 (talk) 21:40, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Which is Shakespeare's longest work? How many characters does it contain? That is, if we would save the text as a pure ASCII file, how many bytes would we need? --Andreas Rejbrand (talk) 14:49, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hamlet is Shakespeare's longest play. I feel it would be difficult for any of his other plays to have more characters of text than Hamlet because Hamlet is ridiculously long. There are many links to the text at the end of the article so you can see how many bytes long those files are. -- kainaw™ 15:00, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Project Gutenberg's ASCII text version is 188 KB, 12 KB of which is is the PG license, so 176 KB seems to be your answer. Sticking the text into MS-Word provides the following stats:

• 5317 Paragraphs
• 6770 Lines
• 31903 Words
• 140329 Characters
• 167171 Characters (with spaces)

--Tagishsimon (talk) 15:02, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Here is some relevant information, according to The Essential Shakespeare Handbook (ISBN: 0-7894-9333-0). Shakespeare's shortest play is The Comedy of Errors at 1,786 lines. Shakespeare's longest play is Hamlet at 4,024 lines. Thanks. (64.252.65.146 (talk) 16:18, 13 July 2010 (UTC))[reply]

I wouldn't rush to figure out the number of ASCII characters in a work by That Man from Stratford, since the number implies a precision we can't have. Original editions differ, and there's no end to the number of doctorates arguing about the Bad quartos, the First Quartos, and the First Folio. The section on the various texts of Hamlet notes that the 1601 quarto has only half the text of the 1604 quarto, which in turn lacks 85 lines that appear in the First Folio. The Folio appeared seven years after Shakespeare died, so we don't know what words or lines he actually wrote. --- OtherDave (talk) 01:55, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If we look at ancient Greek civilization (or earlier), then what did they have in terms of technology that could be compared with USB? Thank you. 92.229.13.2 (talk) 19:34, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Do you mean general information transfer methods? I suppose writing is in the most vague sense analogous to USB, but honestly it's a real stretch of the imagination. Googlemeister (talk) 19:55, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It's not clear what you are asking. The USB is an information transfer device attached to electronic devices. The ancient Greeks did not have any electronic devices. If you are interested in technologies aiding information transfer, then of course there was writing. As for the actual media allowing transfer, they had scrolls, typically made of papyrus. If it is standardization is what you are after, the ancient Greeks had some standardized sizes (and shapes) for certain kinds of amphorae, particularly wine amphorae. Marco polo (talk) 20:01, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No, I know that they had standardized shapes. (For example the equilateral triangle). I was asking not from a standards point of view, but the hot-pluggable, serial bus connected to a host point of view. Like, USB you can just plug into, and it becomes part of the system, then hot-plug out of. To make a scroll analogy you would have to have one giant scroll which you could hot-plug little scrolls into or something. Obviously not appropriate. So my question is if they had anything like a host "device" (by any stretch of the imagination) that, like USB, could be expanded on the fly. wheels, gears, turbines, anything at all can qualify, as long as it has this hotpluggable expandability thing. sorry I wasn't more clear earlier. 92.229.13.2 (talk) 21:10, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It's hard to envisage any kind of 'technology' known to have been generally available to the Ancient Greeks that would function in this way: the nearest analogy that springs to mind would be a cart or chariot to which one could harness an additional pair of oxen or horses. However, there are hints that at least some Greeks of the period had access to mechanical technology that might possibly have accommodated some "add-on expansion": see the Antikythera mechanism. 87.81.230.195 (talk) 21:27, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Not even cold-pluggable. Until the invention of interchangeable parts, most of the technological artefacts humans made were one-offs, bespoke built to the specific job at hand. By and large even watchmakers would make all the components of their watches - they wouldn't buy a type 143 watch wheel from another watchmaker. While some things were moderately mass produced, things that had to work as part of other things were made by the same person who was making the whole macro-thing. So a shipbuilder would build all the parts of the ship, bar maybe buying in the nails and rope (and even then maybe not). This is vertical integration, of a rather inefficient species. -- Finlay McWalter • Talk 21:27, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Pheidippides? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:17, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Wax tablets could be considered a similar thing. You can write smallish chunks of information on them and send them to someone else. They're not very secure unless they're encrypted, and you can erase and rewrite the information a number of times. They're also not a very good long-term information storage method. They were relatively new technology, too. Apparently in Greek they were called 'deltoi'. Steewi (talk) 01:36, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Spears in a phalanx, perhaps, when the ones sticking out of the shield wall shattered. --- OtherDave (talk) 01:58, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Have there been any expeditions, to perhaps ruins or lost cities or something exciting, where the group have documented discoveries of the remnants of previous expeditions, from perhaps several centuries previously? Fascinating stuff. S.G.^(GH) _ping! 20:03, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps Franklin's lost expedition may interest you, I don't know if it meets your criteria sufficiently. -- Finlay McWalter • Talk 20:15, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You might also look at Percy Fawcett. --rossb (talk) 22:36, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You might even look for Percy Fawcett. 87.81.230.195 (talk) 08:43, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I seem to recall incidents of this sort in the Scramble for Africa, at least according to Pakenham's book. Sadly I don't have it to hand. And if of any use, there's always Stanley finding Livingstone. You'd also expect to find this occurring in maritime history; the beached being found years later. --Tagishsimon (talk) 22:43, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In the Arctic (or Antarctic), where there are not much people, and natural conditions helps preservation somewhat, I think this has happened quite often. For example, the remains of S. A. Andrée's Arctic balloon expedition of 1897 were found by another expedition in 1930, according to the article. They even recovered the film from the camera and processed the pictures. Fascinating. Jørgen (talk) 18:06, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks guys, that is the kind of thing I was hoping to find. Cheers S.G.^(GH) _ping! 21:28, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks also to Finlay McWalter for bringing to mind Lord Franklin, sometimes called Lady Franklin's Lament.

Through cruel hardships they vainly strove

The ship on mountains of ice was drove

Only the Eskimo in his skin canoe

Was the only one who ever came through...

--- OtherDave (talk) 02:10, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The remains of Mallory from the British Mount Everest Expedition 1924 were found in 1999 but not his camera or the picture of his wife he was going to leave on the summit. So it still isn't certain if he made it to the top. 75.41.110.200 (talk) 22:44, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, I like to smell my wife's armpit, what does that mean? Am I pervert? Urgent, sos. 92.229.13.2 (talk) 20:33, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Simple answer: Yes, you're a pervert. And what's wrong with that? :) ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:39, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Liking the smell of your wife's armpit is unlikely to be considered a perversion by many; nor does it "mean" anything in particular. You may, though, be a troll. It's hard to say. --Tagishsimon (talk) 22:05, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps this quote from Woody Allen will put things in perspective for the OP:

Q: Is sex dirty?

A: Only if you're doing it right.

←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:10, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I was all excited when I saw we had an article Armpit odor, but then I realized that it's only a re-direct to Body odor, an article that could certainly be expanded. Anyways, Perversion is a very slippery term, but in general, I would say that liking a certain person's body odor, while probably not normal, probably isn't considered deviant enough by most people to consider it a perversion. Buddy431 (talk) 22:43, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Huh?? Not normal?? Liking a person's body odour is an essential part (not the only part, but still an essential part) of being attracted to them. Or, to put it another way, if you're attracted visually (or otherwise non-olfactorily), and then get up close and like what you smell, your attraction is heightened immeasurably. If you dislike what you smell, that might be a temporary and easily correctable glitch, or it might spell the end of the road. -- 202.142.129.66 (talk) 02:00, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't believe that I'm qualified to answer your question literally. But as a layman, is it causing a problem? If not, I fail to see any issue. Human sexuality is quite complex. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:06, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

According to the Joy of Sex by Alex Comfort, body odour is an important part of sexual attraction, whether consciously or sub-consciously. He implies at one point that this is why French women don't wash as assiduously as US or UK women - because they know it attracts men. Chacon a son gout, you might say. So don't worry, you're just one of those who are conscious of its effect on you. --TammyMoet (talk) 14:34, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

What are the most readable ancient classics non-fiction narrative prose texts, that can be read for pleasure rather than study? I mean work written hundreds or thousands of years ago. Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.29.123.193 (talk) 23:15, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It depends on what you're interested in. "Non-fiction narrative" pretty much restricts you to works of history, doesn't it? I think both Herodotus and Xenophon are readable and interesting. Deor (talk) 23:44, 12 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In addition to Xenophon's historical work, he also wrote the horse-training manual On Horsemanship which I (though not a rider) found quite interesting. 87.81.230.195 (talk) 08:40, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War will reward you well. -- Paulscrawl (talk) 05:27, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It could also be philosophy or biography. For the latter, anything by Plutarch, but mainly his Parallel Lives are very entertaining to read. It could also be Diogenes Laertius or Cornelius Nepos. For philosophy there are the many dialogues of Plato, although strictly speaking they are most likely fictive. It could also be oratory, by the likes of Demosthenes, Isocrates, Isaeus or the Roman Cicero. If your are so inclined the Amarna letters from ca 1400 BC is also very interesting, and you could say each letter contain "non-fiction narrative". --Saddhiyama (talk) 09:07, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, autobiography or something written in the first-person would be my preferance. I've already read the Autobiography by Benvenuto Cellini, and The Alexiad by Anna Komnene. They are likely to be listed here: List of Penguin Classics. I see there is a List of autobiographies and mention of some early ones at Autobiography. 92.24.189.3 (talk) 09:20, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We only have few extant autobiographies from the Mediterranean antiquity. The classic is of course the Confessions of Augustine of Hippo. Otherwise they usually exist in the form of speeches or short inscriptions (like the Res Gestae Divi Augusti of the emperor Augustus). The genre only really takes off during the renaissance. --Saddhiyama (talk) 09:53, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If you really want to learn about the personal thoughts of the Greeks or Romans then there is an extensive literature of letters. Like the letters of Cicero, Pliny the Younger or Julian the Apostate. Or letters from mostly unknown people as published in the 3 volumes of Select Papyri in the Loeb Classical Library (which by the way is one of the best series of English translations of classics that you will find. They have a lot of works not available in translations anywhere else). --Saddhiyama (talk) 09:57, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I just remembered that the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius are written in first person, although a collection of random thoughts, they are very moving and gives an incredible insight into the mind of a Roman emperor. It is also interesting to combine them with the depiction of him we get from the letters of his tutor Marcus Cornelius Fronto (also in the Loeb series) --Saddhiyama (talk) 10:05, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Portions of the Bible are extremely readable. I particularly recommend Genesis (feel free to skip over the genealogies) and the Gospel of Luke. John M Baker (talk) 11:19, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've already read a lot of it when forced to do so at school. And the stories are already very familiar, although I can never find the chapter about Santa Claus. 92.24.184.61 (talk) 13:34, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Some more ancient stuff is The Gallic Wars by Julius Caesar, especially the parts where he is an accidental ethnographer. But what is the definition of "ancient" here? (I am just wondering, because Anna Komnene and especially Cellini are not "ancient".) If you also want to read medieval and Renaissance works then the list would be almost endless. Adam Bishop (talk) 11:20, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm looking for things over 200 years old. I have read some already - I've already read Aurelius's Meditations and (not mentioned yet) Franklin's Autobiography. I'm mostly after a good read rather than necessarily reading about well-known figures from the past, since the drawback about reading the best known is that you already know the plot. Thanks again. 92.24.184.61 (talk) 13:31, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

From the 17th and 18th centuries, Pepys's diaries are pretty readable and interesting (at least at some points), and Defoe's A Journal of the Plague Year, though fictionalized, is heavily based on real accounts, and is both fascinating and fun. --Mr.98 (talk) 16:51, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Casanova's History of My Life may be the most irresistibly readable work I've ever encountered. Deor (talk) 21:03, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The Secret History of Procopius is fascinating. If you're a fan of classic SF, you may be surprised to see its influence on De Camp's Lest Darkness Fall. John M Baker (talk) 02:03, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

A couple of years ago (ancient history in Wikipedia-time) the refdesk discussed "readable classics" here. Be aware that many will interpret "classics" as Classics, i.e. Ancient Greece and Rome. When you refer to mere hundreds of years ago, you widen the field somewhat. Mark Twain defined a classic as a book everyone wants to have read and nobody wants to read. BrainyBabe (talk) 19:36, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No one has mentioned Eastern classics, such as The Pillow Book or Matsuo Bashō's Oku no Hosomichi, which have the advantage of being less well known in the West and hence being fresh and new for the reader. Are there any others that are outside the Roman/Greek/Western cannon? Its nice to step outside the familiar stuffy Western culture. Is there anything from outside bloth the Western and Eastern cultures? 92.15.9.213 (talk) 08:24, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Some Eastern (i.e. Asian) books were mentioned in the "readable classics" discussion I linked immediately above. Another find from the refdesk archive is Enjoyable eastern and other non-western ancient classics?.BrainyBabe (talk) 14:12, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

One not mentioned there which I found very readable was Ibn Battuta's Rihla. Warofdreams talk 14:48, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Travel literature also lists some interesting things, as do the See Also links from Diary. Some day I will read the Epistulae (Pliny). The Ascent_of_Mont_Ventoux by Petrarch is good, although I do not know if anything else of his is equally enjoyable. 92.24.182.219 (talk) 12:53, 16 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Or lack of it. I was under the impression that Extradition between states like Switzerland and the United States was pretty much a given in most cases. However, the Swiss have declined to extradite Polanski [4]. Was there some sort of extenuating or unusual circumstance in this case, or is extradition a lot less automatic than I thought? I can certainly understand Swiss authorities not putting much effort into catching the guy, but once they had him, I don't understand why they wouldn't ship him back. There are some general exceptions listed in the "extradition" article, but none of them seem to immediately apply in this case (it's not like Polanski's a political opponent, or anything). I realize it's a bit early to get a lot of specific insight into this particular instance, but if anyone knows about extradition in general between the U.S. and the Swiss (or other nations), I'd be interested to hear it. Buddy431 (talk) 01:48, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Apparently in circumstances where someone drugs and rapes a child, and then does a deal to avoid going to jail, and then jumps bail and flees the country, this particular Swiss judge wasn’t completely convinced the original jail avoidance deal would be honored. And, that was determined to be the most important aspect of the case. DOR (HK) (talk) 02:22, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Extradition requests aren't automatically accepted. I don't know the Swiss situation very well, but in Australia they are refused if the crime isn't recognised here, if the accused is likely to face extreme forms of punishment which we don't recognise (such as a death penalty), or if there are technical problems with the request (for example, recently someone was not extradited on appeal as he was not technically charged with a crime, but was being requested for questioning). In this case I gather it is the third option: the defence argued that Polanski had already served his time, and therefore the extradition request was invalid - why extradite someone who has already served his time? The US was unwilling to provide the documents that the Swiss requested, I gather on confidentiality grounds, so with nothing to counter the defence's claims the Swiss found for Polanski. - Bilby (talk) 02:37, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

According to The New York Times, Polanski's lawyers argued that sealed, confidential testimony given by the prosecutor in the original case would prove that the case's original judge had planned to sentence Polanski to no more than 90 days' psychological examination. California officials refused to hand over this testimony, and the Swiss said they wouldn't extradite Polanski without getting it. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 02:39, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep in mind that extradition between different nations is a matter of treaty (an agreement between sovereign states), and like any treaty is subject to legal/diplomatic processes within each state. For instance (if I remember correctly) Canada has full extradition agreements with the United States, but the internal Canadian legal system has determined that it will not honor extradition requests where capital punishment is the likely outcome. There's not much that one nation can do about it except (a) file legal actions in the other nation to demand that extradition be honored, or (b) take diplomatic or military action against the other nation. Since I doubt that the US is going to diplomatically censor Switzerland over Polanski, and I really, really doubt they are going to send in a military team to extract him, it will just have to get worked out in Swiss courts. --Ludwigs2 03:28, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The L.A. officials were engaged in some serious "C.Y.A." by refusing to cooperate, so the Swiss judge said, "See ya!" The L.A. people made the choice for them. If they wanted Polanski badly enough, they would have cooperated. Apparently they didn't. So dat's dat. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:37, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It doesn't always work that way. Einhorn did pretty much the same thing by skipping bail and hiding in Europe and then using expensive lawyers to fight extradition. The U.S. refused to cut ridiculous deals. The only "deal" made was an agreement to let him give a defense testimony and be resentenced. Even when being extradited, he continued to argue that his rights were being abused, but he ended up in prison for life anyway. -- kainaw™ 11:59, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure which Einhorn you're referring to, but if his was essentially a capital crime, that could have some bearing on the matter. The fact is, in the Polanski case there appears to have been some malfeasance going on in with the L.A. courts, and their lack of cooperation now serves to confirm that suspicion, whether it's true or not. They had to decide how badly they wanted Polanski. And apparently covering themselves was more important to them than getting Polanski. They made their choice. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:10, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There's only one Einhorn that I know of who famously skipped bail and fought extradition back to the United States. -- kainaw™ 12:17, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Obviously a very dangerous character. I suspect no country in Europe was all that anxious to have him residing there. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:18, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It was less of a case of them wanting him there than it was a case of not necessarily wanting to send him to the US. The Einhorn case was very odd in many ways, legally, because they convicted him in absentia years earlier. Even in the US, being convicted based on evidence you do not have the opportunity to confront is considered Constitutionally shady. (But, of course, skipping bail is also considered pretty shady. But two wrongs don't make a right and so on.) Anyway in the end, France did decide to ship him to the US, but it took awhile to work its way through the system, the appeals, etc. --Mr.98 (talk) 16:45, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To be clear, skipping bail is not just "pretty shady" but is an actual crime. Comet Tuttle (talk) 18:02, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Right, but an entirely separate one from that which he was convicted. Anyway, I'm certainly not defending Einhorn, just pointing out what made the case complicated from an extradition point of view. --Mr.98 (talk) 19:18, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That's one guy that they maybe should have let stay in France. Kind of like a favor for all the help they've given us in the War on Terror. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 18:07, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The alleged French lack of cooperation is highly exaggerated. --Mr.98 (talk) 19:18, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Does anyone know what a hat like this is called? I've only ever seen it worn by Orthodox rabbis on special occasions... Thanks! ╟─TreasuryTag►sheriff─╢ 08:01, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

From Hasidic Judaism: "Various forms of felt open-crown (a type of hat with a rounded top) are worn by many Hasidim. Affiliation can sometimes be identified by whether there is a pinch in the middle of the top or not, as well as the type of brim. This is called a shtofener hat in Yiddish. Ger and Slonimer Hasidim wear a round hat, while Stolin and Emunas Yisrael wear a pinched hat." There is no photo, and web searches for shtofener return variants of the article text. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 12:29, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think this refers to the broad-brimmed hat worn by Hasidim. The headgear in the picture would be better described as a cap (a hat usually has a brim all the way round). Alansplodge (talk) 14:12, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That's like no other hat I've ever seen -- I'd say it's not related to anything any Hasid would wear, but rather, perhaps, something more related to R' Sacks being the chief religious leader, regardless of religion. It looks like something his official office would have him put on -- in other words, perhaps a focus on CHIEF and not RABBI would be more appropriate. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 03:11, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Rabbis of certain Synagogues in England wear a similar style of hat on Sabbaths and Festivals during the Synagogue services, although the colour of these hats is black rather than blue. Simonschaim (talk) 06:43, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I understand that a hazzan (chazan, chazzan) will sometimes wear "large, puffy hat that vaguely resembles a chef's hat." I also found this item (from an online discussion) which refers to "hazanishe yarmulke," "tzilinders" worn by a synagogue president, and a "Litvishe yarmulke" worn by a rabbi. --- OtherDave (talk) 17:01, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

One of the objectives of social democratic parties is to create a more equal society. What evidence is there that Britain became a more equal society under the Labour government of 1997-2010? I'm thinking particularly of the distribution of wealth, but other observations are welcome as well. Many thanks, --Viennese Waltz ^talk 08:41, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This report may have all the information you need. Changes over time are set out from p.277 onwards. A summary on p.294 states: "Taken as a whole, inequality (as measured by the 90:10 ratio) declined slightly between the two three year periods 1995-1997 and 2006-2008, so far as hourly and weekly earnings and individual incomes were concerned. However inequality in equivalent incomes was the same at the end of the period as at the start. These fairly small changes disguise much more complex (and often offsetting) underlying changes in inequality between and within different population groups." Ghmyrtle (talk) 08:58, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Great, thanks for that. --Viennese Waltz ^talk 06:18, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have an art print that features four mustangs, led by a palomino, racing through the desert at an angle that's almost toward the viewer, but at an angle that sort of veers to the right, with a rainbow in the background, parts of a mesa on the left side of the frame, a palmetto plant on the left hand corner and trees at the right side. It's dimensions are 53X28 1/8, but it lacks a name or anything that might identify it's artist. Has anyone seen this painting before? Would you know who made this and if it's worth anything? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.202.134.73 (talk) 08:43, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Can you scan etc. it and put it up online for us to see ? -- Jon Ascton  (talk) 09:49, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I feel sure I've seen this image or similar before. I tried searching and Google's "Find similar images" feature gave some promising results. However, it would be much easier if you took a photo (it's probably too big to scan), posted it online somewhere, and provided a link so we can all see which specific art print you mean. Astronaut (talk) 11:41, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You may want to do a search for paintings by Frederic Remington (and check the article); his depictions of the Old West are immensely popular and frequently reprinted. Matt Deres (talk) 13:59, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Can federal laws be repealed by referendum? If so, how? --138.110.206.101 (talk) 12:50, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Which country's laws are you asking about? Googlemeister (talk) 13:15, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If you mean in the US, then referendum#United States says "There is no provision for the holding of referendums at the federal level in the United States ... A constitutional amendment would be required to allow it." Gandalf61 (talk) 13:17, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Among other things, a referendum under the current Constitution would probably be considered a violation of states' rights. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:56, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No, it wouldn't, because, as Gandalf61 noted with a reference, there's simply no provision for one. The referendum A "federal referendum" might purport to have some binding effect, but it would be unconstitutional on the face of it, and have no effect. "States' rights" are beside the point. Comet Tuttle (talk) 17:07, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

well, not entirely. If a state with a legal referendum process passed a law that opposed some federal law, then it would be a states rights issue. SR issues only raise the question of whether the federal gov or the state has the last word over a particular area of law, and since referendums are legitimate forms of creating law in states where they exist... --Ludwigs2 17:21, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I should have specified "A federal referendum" above instead of "The referendum"; I've struck and amended accordingly. Comet Tuttle (talk) 18:01, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

A state referendum to overturn a federal law would be a form of nullification. Everard Proudfoot (talk) 18:28, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The authors of the U.S. constitution in 1787 didn't set up a national referendum process for the same reason that they didn't set up a national presidential election process with direct popular vote -- they thought that vast geographical distances involved and the relatively slow communications available meant that the U.S. couldn't be governed like a city-state (e.g. ancient Athens or republican Rome), but only through indirect representative democracy. So the electoral college was created in part because they were skeptical that most people in a state would know enough about politicians from other states to be able to have any kind of informed opinion about them, and a national referendum would be subject to similar problems of coordination. The basic idea of the original 1787 U.S. constitution was actually that the people in each state should focus on electing good men from their own state (to congress, to the electoral college, and to the state legislature to elect senators), and those good men would assemble in various ways to figure out how to deal with national and international issues... AnonMoos (talk) 02:14, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Australia's Constitution, but not any of its other laws, can be and has been amended by a process that includes a referendum. Of 44 proposals over the past 110 years, 8 have been passed. See Referendums in Australia. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 20:48, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It sort of works like that in Canada too, Referendums in Canada (we just don't have them very often). Adam Bishop (talk) 02:59, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

How can Qnexa be patented? It's just a mix of two generic drugs. Even if they could prevent other manufacturers from making the same mix (can they?), wouldn't doctors just prescribe the two generics individually to patients to save them money? Can they really patent the concept of diving these two drugs in combination? I glanced at the patents mentioned in [5] and they seem absolutely unpatentable to me. Ariel. (talk) 21:37, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

look, I can literally patent YOUR personal bodily organs, Ariel, specifically a portion of your genes if I figure out what they do. Gien that I can patent YOU, what makes you think there is anything requiring work to figure out that you couldn't patent? I could probably patent navigating by te stars. 92.230.233.146 (talk) 21:58, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I see that 92 has not been keeping up with the news. Comet Tuttle (talk) 22:43, 13 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Eh, it's still working its way through the courts. I suspect Myriad will win in the end. SCOTUS has a history of giving extremely wide leeway in such cases and saying, "if you don't want X to be patentable, just pass a law that says it isn't, don't try to do this at the patent office level." And you can patent someone else's cells, if you take them out of their body (Moore v. Regents of the University of California). --Mr.98 (talk) 00:32, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the link to that article, as it has annoyed me more than any other article has annoyed me in the past month at least. Comet Tuttle (talk) 00:37, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know enough about the specifics of drug patents to say anything with any authority, but it would seem to me in general that 1. the patent in question would likely say, "using X and Y drug together to treat Z disease," and 2. if doctors prescribed X and Y together to treat Z disease, they would probably be violating the patent and liable to be sued (and thus their HMO and etc. would not allow them to do this). Anyway glancing at the page, it seems that they are doing that in #1. There's no reason why you could not patent something just because it is composed of novel use of prior art. A television is just a fancy use of an electron gun, a phosphor screen, and a magnet (more or less). That the components were once patented (or not) does not matter; it is the new use that is patentable, and if the final product is itself a composition of matter (as would be mixing two drugs), I suspect that particular composition would be patentable as well. --Mr.98 (talk) 00:35, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Percocet is merely oxycodone and acetaminophen, but it's patented. So are many others. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 03:12, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

How might an inmate be informed of the death of relatives, and if they are informed of the death, are they allowed to leave the workhouse to attend the funeral? Kayau Voting IS evil 02:29, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see why people who lived there shouldn't be informed in the usual way, i.e. by visitors or a message, and they would certainly attend funerals. Workhouses were not prisons, and "inmates" could come and go as they pleased.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 07:24, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Actually I'm asking because I remember reading in workhouses.org that inmates are not allowed to read things that are not allowed. Kayau Voting IS evil 08:07, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

...Also, are you sure that they can go in and out as they pleased? According to workhouses.org, the inmates will be accused of stealing if they go without permission because they are going out with the uniform, their only piece of clothing. Kayau Voting IS evil 08:13, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

A workhouse is described in Dicken's Oliver Twist, so read that for background. I think they were like prisons in character, to deter the poor from using them. You can see why not much aid, by modern standards, went to Ireland during the Famine - the poor were routinely starving in mainland Britain. 92.29.122.49 (talk) 11:20, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The support of the poor was the responsibilty of each Parish. They only had a certain budget which was raised through Tithes, a tax on agricultural land. If there were lots of starving people, there wasn't enough to support all of them properly. There was no mechanism for support from county or national government, which is part of the reason why the famine in Ireland went so badly wrong. Originally support was in the form of a dole or Outdoor relief, but if there were many poor to support it was cheaper to put them in a workhouse. Several parishes would often form a union to run a workhouse between them. Alansplodge (talk) 13:11, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I googled "workhouse rules" and found many different examples, including[6], [7], [8] and [9]. Reading these, it seems clear that inmates could certainly not come and go freely; they had the right (and indeed the obligation) to go to church on Sundays, but had to ask permission from the house master or mistress for leave to go out on other business, which would be granted only for "Necessary and reasonable Occasions". A funeral, being Church business, probably would have been deemed reasonable, but there's nothing to specify that it was, and permission would have been at the discretion of the authorities. There's no mention of any right for paupers to receive visitors or messages, and again I suspect a visitor would have had to approach the authorities for permission to leave a message or speak to an inmate, even for something as important as breaking the news of a death. There is mention of a right to leave the workhouse with three hours' notice, but this is about moving out, not just going out on an errand. Those who chose to leave had to take their families with them, and could not re-enter without going through the whole application and readmission process again. There's confirmation of the clothing rule too: paupers gave up their own clothes on admission, which were cleaned and stored for them until they left, and wore clothing provided by the workhouse while in residence. There is indeed a record of a pauper being prosecuted for theft, having left in the workhouse clothing issued to her, within the documents linked above. Karenjc 13:49, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm looking for the name of the movement of art typified by these TV posters. The most common phrases I see describing this style are "minimalist" and "iconic", but I was hoping somebody might have a more specific or more formal genre name. Alternatively, who are the most notable artists of this movement? --NilsTycho (talk) 03:25, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Don't know what you'd call it but I would say Kim Hiorthøy is one of the notable artists/designers exemplifying this style. --Viennese Waltz ^talk 06:17, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Can it be classified as a "movement"? Never seen anything like this before and they don't appear to be official. --mboverload@ 07:31, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I thought of Stefan Kanchev. Also, via poster, I just found Tom Eckersley, who seems to have done the same kind of thing. 81.131.59.12 (talk) 07:53, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've given up on finding a name for the movement. I guess it's not big enough or specific enough to be a movement. In addition to Albert Exergian, modern designers who have done similar work include Jamie Bolton, Olly Moss, Dario Emmy, Dan Stiles, and Noma Bar. As for lions of the "movement", Saul Bass looks like a good candidate. However, it looks like the person who did the most to popularize this "iconic" style is Germano Facetti. And I think that's about as good an answer as I'm going to get. Thanks for your help, guys! --NilsTycho (talk) 21:38, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There's a local court case where someone has been charged with two counts of murder. His lawyer is claiming that, due to idiosyncratic alcohol intoxication, he was not in control of himself and therefore not guilty. Are there any laws or court decisions in Washington State that cover this? --67.185.169.164 (talk) 03:42, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Bear in mind, Wikipedia does not give legal opinions, so any answer given here will be of a very speculative (and not authorative) nature. For the latter you should consult professional legal counsel. Gabbe (talk) 07:37, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Generally in the USA, intoxication is not a defense because the concept of "intent" can include the unintended results of intended actions (e.g., firing a bullet in the air can still lead to a manslaughter or reckless homicide conviction); if someone gets so drunk as to black out and commit a crime, the intent to get drunk "includes" the possible result of blacking out and doing something criminal. The word "idiosyncratic" implies that somehow the defense is suggesting that the physiological response to drinking (for this particular defendant) was greater than a reasonable person could reasonably have imagined, and hence negates the "intent" element of the crime. In any case, ANY "intoxication"-related defense will relate to the "intent" element of the crime. 63.17.82.101 (talk) 09:25, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Also remember that lawyers can claim anything they wish in mounting a defense for their client. There is no "off-limits" arguement for defense lawyers. The prosecution is also free to poke holes in the defense arguements. It is ultimately up to the jury to decide if the defendant's arguement holds water. "He didn't do it" is a common defense, but "He did it, but didn't mean to" is probably almost as common. This is just a varient on the latter defense. Just remember that nothing is technically off-limits here, and just because the defense tries to make a claim, doesn't mean there has to be an overriding legal principle supporting it. This may just be an "idiosyncratic" defense, and not a sign of greater legal principles. --Jayron32 23:11, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Why is it that when the subject is the law, RD contributors feel free to just make stuff up based on nothing but their own half-baked presumptions, or (usually) something they saw on TV? This happens over and over and over again in respect to legal questions. For the record, it is NOT TRUE that "lawyers can claim anything they wish in mounting a defense." A defense requires evidence; evidence requires admissibility; admissibility has definite limits. Only in the opening statement could a lawyer conceivably get away with making an argument for which no admissible evidence exists; and even then, if the argument is obviously unsupportable, opposing counsel can object and oblige the opening statement to be partially stricken and no further mention made of the stricken element. The closing statement may not include anything that has not been arguably supported by evidence, except arguments against the strength of the opposition's evidence. In most jurisdictions, virtually every crime falls into a category which has specifically permissible *(and by implication, impermissible) defenses; the impermissible defenses will not have any evidentiary support, because such evidence will be inadmissible. 63.17.93.127 (talk) 02:46, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Let me ask this again with more detail, in the hopes of getting a useful answer:

• I am not involved in this or any other legal action. This is not a request for legal advice. I am looking for factual information about the state of the law.
• Idiosyncratic alcohol intoxication (which Wikipedia does not have an article on) is a recognized medical condition where someone has an atypical reaction to small amounts of alcohol, typically consisting of extreme belligerence (in this case, apparently accompanied by complete anterograde amnesia).
• Some state courts or legislatures (Colorado being the one I'm familiar with) have ruled that idiosyncratic alcohol intoxication is not a defense to criminal charges. Others, although I am not aware of any, may have ruled that it is.

Has either the Washington State court system or the legislature ruled either way about the admissibility of idiosyncratic alcohol intoxication as a defense? --67.185.169.164 (talk) 00:31, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Under Title 9A, chapter 16, section 30 of the Revised Code of Washington (state), "No act committed by a person while in a state of voluntary intoxication shall be deemed less criminal by reason of his condition, but whenever the actual existence of any particular mental state is a necessary element to constitute a particular species or degree of crime, the fact of his intoxication may be taken into consideration in determining such mental state." The OP's question refers to murder, i.e. homicide, which in Washington falls into five categories: "(1) murder, (2) homicide by abuse, (3) manslaughter, (4) excusable homicide, or (5) justifiable homicide." Here, the question must refer to either #1 or #3. The intent element for manslaughter is either "recklessly" (1st degree) or "negligently" (2nd degree). The intent element for 1st degree murder is either intent with premeditation, or that by "extreme indifference to human life, he or she engages in conduct which creates a grave risk of death" (and, also, certain types of felony murder -- i.e., during rape, armed burglary, etc.). The intent for 2nd degree murder is intent without premeditation (and various felony murder categories). So, to defend against murder AND manslaughter, idiosyncratic intoxication would have to negate intent AND not amount to recklessness or negligence. Chapter 16 section 10 states: "INTENT. A person acts with intent or intentionally when he or she acts with the objective or purpose to accomplish a result which constitutes a crime.... RECKLESSNESS. A person is reckless or acts recklessly when he or she knows of and disregards a substantial risk that a wrongful act may occur and his or her disregard of such substantial risk is a gross deviation from conduct that a reasonable person would exercise in the same situation.... CRIMINAL NEGLIGENCE. A person is criminally negligent or acts with criminal negligence when he or she fails to be aware of a substantial risk that a wrongful act may occur and his or her failure to be aware of such substantial risk constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of care that a reasonable person would exercise in the same situation." Idisyncratic intoxication is VOLUNTARY intoxication (no one forced the drink down their throat) but the disproportionate result might negate the element of "a gross deviation from the standard of care that a reasonable person would exercise in the same situation" if the defendant was unaware that he/she was susceptible to idiosyncratic intoxication; however, although someone unaware he has e.g. epilepsy will have a defense for e.g. crashing a car ONCE during a seizure, after becoming aware he has epilepsy the defense will no longer apply (as cases have established). The same probably applies to idiosyncratic intoxication; hence, criminal negligence is probably the least severe result possible, presuming it wasn't the very first time the defendant drank alcohol. Have Washington courts addressed idiosyncratic intoxication? The OP is free to search a century-plus of decisions at mrsc dot org slash wa slash courts slash index_dtsearch dot html. 63.17.93.127 (talk) 03:43, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Due to the inferior search engine at the court-opinions site, it's hard to say for sure what the law is in 2010. However, as of 2003 the leading case apparently was one from 1987 (about a stabbing, not a murder), which states in regard to intoxication and criminal negligence (which in regard to murder amounts to 2nd-degree manslaughter in Washington): "Because this mental state is based on a reasonable person standard, evidence of defendant's voluntary intoxication cannot work in any way to negate or obviate the mental state. Because of his intoxication, a particular defendant may not act with intent or knowingly inflict grievous bodily harm. Nonetheless, if a reasonable person would have avoided the wrongful act, and the defendant's failure to do so is a gross deviation from this reasonable course of conduct, the defendant has acted with criminal negligence. In the present case, the 'wrongful act' was the stabbing. Defendant's claimed reason for failing to be aware that the victim was being stabbed was evidently defendant's own intoxication. A reasonable person would not have stabbed the victim, and defendant's action was a gross deviation from the reasonable course of conduct. Consequently defendant was criminally negligent despite his intoxication. This is the proper interpretation to be given the definition of criminal negligence. The trial court did not err in precluding the jury from considering voluntary intoxication as a defense to the charge of third degree assault." STATE v. COATES, 107 Wn.2d 882, 735 P.2d 64 (1987). This strongly implies that criminal negligence (2nd degree manslaughter) will apply even to idiosyncratic intoxication, because the negligent act is the stabbing, not the intoxication -- i.e., for criminal negligence in Washington, it doesn't matter if the defendant drank a drop of beer and unexpectedly went out of his mind; all that matters is that he committed the "wrongful act," drunk or otherwise. So it's no defense to 2nd degree manslaughter, whether or not it's idiosyncratic. Clearly, however, intoxication of ANY sort is an admissible (if not necessarily successful) defense to murder and first-degree manslaughter, in negating the requisite mental state. 63.17.47.118 (talk) 04:20, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Flex shampoos and conditioners were Revlon products. Have they been discontinued, or are they being sold under a different name?24.90.202.208 (talk) 08:02, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In the U.S., you can apparently buy Flex shampoo at Wal-Mart, so I'd say they haven't been discontinued here. --- OtherDave (talk) 17:05, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There is a famous photograph of the him with his tongue protruding out of his face. Is it real ? I mean why will such a great scientist pose so ? -- Jon Ascton  (talk) 09:43, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Not a fake.. Why not? Kittybrewster ☎ 09:57, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• Image:Einstein tongue.jpg The (in)famous tongue image

It's real. See Albert Einstein in popular culture. From [10]:

Albert Einstein and the Aydelottes were just returning from an event which had taken place in honour of Einstein. Einstein was, though already sitting in the car, still bullied by reporters and photographers. They didn’t let him be and he is said to have shouted: "That’s enough, that’s enough!" However, these words didn’t hinder the photographers from taking some more pictures of Einstein and his companions. And when he still was asked to pose for a birthday picture he really grew tired of the journalists and the photographers and as encouraging words didn’t help any more, he stuck out his tongue to his "prosecutors". The photographer Arthur Sasse pressed the button of his camera in just this moment.

Einstein liked the picture very much. He cut it into shape so only he can still be seen. Then he had made several copies of it and sent the thus "manipulated" picture as a greeting card to friends later on.

Zain Ebrahim (talk) 10:01, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Einstein was not a robot. He was a very human guy, and I'm sure that fact was no small part of his public appeal. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:34, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Einstein was funny, passionate, philosophically deep, and intensely politically motivated against fascism, war, segregation, and racial intolerance. That he is today regarded as a genius with his "head in the clouds" is more a P.R. thing than anything related to who he actually was as a human being. For his trouble he got denounced in his home country, and investigated relentlessly by the FBI in his adopted country. No good deed goes unpunished, as they say... --Mr.98 (talk) 14:45, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Is it unsafe to swim in an outside pool during a thunder storm? Kittybrewster ☎ 09:55, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

List of Personal Lightning Safety Tips published by the US National Lightning Safety Institute says "If outdoors - Avoid water ... Avoid open spaces ...". Gandalf61 (talk) 10:11, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

... and googling "lightning swimming pool" returns many pages of advice which are mostly variations on "at the first sign of lightning, get out of the water". Gandalf61 (talk) 10:30, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I can remember at least one case of a guy drowning while swimming in a lake during a heavy shower. The problem is, all of the sudden you have water not only under you but all around you - from the heavy raindrops and from the splashing water of the lake and it's difficult to breathe properly. I don't think a pool would be too dangerous, but swimming in a deep lake during a storm I'd definitely try to avoid. TomorrowTime (talk) 10:34, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think a worse risk is that your head is the highest point on the surface of the pool and you are perfectly earthed: ZAP!!! Alansplodge (talk) 13:01, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

At Center Parcs in Germany last year, the outdoor section of the pool had big notices warning that it would be closed for safety reasons whenever there was a thunderstorm. This article is quite interesting on the possible effects on lightning on someone in the water, and also warns about the not-so-obvious dangers, such as current travelling through pipes and conduits associated with a lightning-struck pool to affect those who are not actually swimming at the time. Karenjc 13:22, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Do we have any stats on people actually getting struck by lightning in this manner? I think the answer must be "yes, it's unsafe", but a quick Google yielded no data, for me. Comet Tuttle (talk) 17:01, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The best I can come up with is this site with the US Weather Service's data, which is interesting if limited. Looking at the stats for the years 2005-2008 inclusive, there were 155 deaths from lightning strike in the US, of which 28 were people on or next to water (including those in boats and on jetskis) and two were actually in the water (one swimmer and one scuba diver). Karenjc 18:28, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

When I was younger I remember a local news story about a pool that was zapped by lightning with people in it. One or two got injured. --mboverload@ 05:52, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Diwan Bahadur Sir T. Vijayaraghayacharya visited [[Toronto, Ontario] and Brampton, Ontario in 1926, actually officiating at the opening of the Canadian National Exhibtion. Previously, he "represented All India at the British Empire Exhibition". Despite all this, and his knighthood in the Indian system, there's not a spot of information about him on the Internet. Not a single reference to anyone with the last name Vijayaraghayacharya. The reference comes from two issues of a Brampton newspaper of the time, so it's possible they misspelled his name.

Can anyone figure out who he might have been? This is a question from the Peel Heritage Complex, and we have contacted the High Consulate of India in Ottawa with the same question. Anyone know if there's a full list of Diwan Bahadurs? -- Zanimum (talk) 15:28, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

According to this he was also at the British Empire Exhibition. According to this (the link may not work outside U.S.) he was "of the Madras Civil Service."--Cam (talk) 17:33, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Aha! I found a 1935 biographical essay about him here.--Cam (talk) 18:31, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To clarify, it looks like the usual spelling of his name is Vijayaraghavacharya instead of Vijayaraghayacharya.--Cam (talk) 00:15, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you so much, Cam! I never cease to be amazed by the people that answer the Reference desk, to be able to figure out where the spelling mistake was and find period references to him. This will make our search for information on this particular 1926 visit so much easier, actually having a context of who he was, and why he'd be invited over. Merci! -- Zanimum (talk) 15:17, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Um, might this be the C. Vijayaraghavachariar on whom we have an article? BrainyBabe (talk) 15:36, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Strike that -- our article on Mr CV gives his life as 1852-1944, whereas the retirement bio kindly found by Cam states a DOB in 1875. Still, they might be relatives. BrainyBabe (talk) 15:53, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Moore gave tissue samples to the doctors because they had falsely led him to believe that not doing so would carry the risk of him dying. Why wasn't this intentional misrepresentation considered in the case, given that Moore never signed the form consenting to letting them use his cells?

Also, if your cells now belong to a company, can they stalk you and take more of your cells whenever they like, because you're technically stealing? --138.110.206.101 (talk) 19:22, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

What is your source for the claim that the reason given by the doctors was false? As I understand it, the samples were taken for the purposes of treating Moore but were then used for other purposes afterwards. --Tango (talk) 21:34, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Moore consented to the tissues being taken from him for the purposes of his treatment; the consent form didn't say "you can also use my tissues to patent chemicals that happen to be there and consequently invent billion dollar drugs". Comet Tuttle (talk) 21:40, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

(ec) The intentional misrepresentation — and I agree about that; the doctors sound like thieves, frankly, in this article — was considered by the court. The PDF version of the ruling that's linked at the bottom of the article starts discussing on page 5 whether there was a "conversion", or theft (including the theft of the proceeds of the cells, i.e. the patent), in this case. The ruling states that California's conversion law had never been applied to medical tissues, and the decision was that it was up to the legislature to create a law about this rather than having a court just apply the conversion law to it; one cited reason was that the court imagined that if a cell line went through the hands of many medical researchers, each of them might be liable; and the court was hesitant to cause such unexpected consequences by applying a set of laws that had not been written with this subject in mind. I do recommend reading the PDF file; it's good reading. As for your second question, I think you know the answer to that. Comet Tuttle (talk) 21:40, 14 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not really sure about the second question; the doctor in Next used that justification to hire bounty hunters to attack the hero and take forcibly take marrow samples from him. --138.110.206.101 (talk) 01:12, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Personally I agree with the court. The bits were taken for valid medical reasons, what's done with them otherwise is nothing to do with the original patient. The only problem I have with it is if there is an easily traced record linking the two, that should only be available by very special permission rather than blatted to the world. Dmcq (talk) 10:54, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Is there scholarly consensus on who has been the most influential American VP? By influential, I mean with respect to White House policy and decisionmaking. Among recent administrations, my gut tells me that Dick Cheney loomed unusually large, but I'm no political scientist. 218.25.32.210 (talk) 01:51, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Before Dick Cheney came along, Al Gore was often described as "the most influential Vice President in history". If you search for "most influential Vice President" while excluding "Cheney", you get a lot of hits for Gore. see google books, e.g.. I suspect the office's realm of influence has changed from back when John Nance Garner described it as "not worth a bucket of warm piss." The article Office of the Vice President of the United States mentions some of its varying spheres of influence throughout history. ---Sluzzelin talk 06:08, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thomas Jefferson was the second VP and was a very influential individual, but how much of that influence was tied to his later presidency, I don't really know. Googlemeister (talk) 13:41, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Which Asian nations receive snow as the precipitation during the Winter season? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.14.119.254 (talk) 02:32, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This is kind of tricky to answer. There are many countries in Asia we typically think of as hot that get quite a bit of snow in certain areas due to altitude - for example India has a variety of mountains that are snow-capped year-round. China gets plenty of snow (in places) during the winter. I think anything south of China is probably too southern and too low (altitudinally) to get snow. 218.25.32.210 (talk) 03:02, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

For sure - China, Korea, Mongolia, Japan, Bhutan, Nepal, India, Pakistan, Iran, Georgia, Armenia, Russia and probably also parts of Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kirghizstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Steewi (talk) 06:31, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

And I remember reading reports of occasional snowfall even in Israel, although this is obviously a rarity. — Kpalion^(talk) 10:56, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Plus Turkey, Syria, Lebanon. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 11:21, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There is snow in Jordan almost every winter, including in the capital Amman. The mountains will do that. Same for the mountainous regions of northern Iraq. --Xuxl (talk) 14:53, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Even hot countries where you wouldn't expect it. Vietnam, for example, in its mountainous north -- see the resort town of Sa Pa. BrainyBabe (talk) 14:58, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I am not sure how accurate that map is. It lists Malta as having snow only above 1000m, but the highest point on Malta is only like 250m. Also, I don't know if there is value in having Lesotho in magenta, because the entire country is above 1000m. Googlemeister (talk) 20:35, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've searched all over the Florida's revenue website, and I could not find what the Florida Sales and Use Tax pays for. What government service is paid for by the Florida Sales and Use Tax? 66.176.245.57 (talk) 06:16, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure, but I assume that Florida doesn't earmark their taxes. If they don't it would mean that all taxes go into the general state budget, so that it's impossible to say "this tax pays for this specific expenditure". Gabbe (talk) 09:53, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Lest I am accused of soapboxing, there's certainly some published opinion suggesting it might fall. Given that the US, to this day, is a larger economy than the Eurozone, and with lower higher levels of inequality, why does the dollar seem to work better?--Leon (talk) 09:25, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

First of all, the Gini coefficient for the EU is lower than for the US meaning that there is (according to the Gini measure) less inequality in the EU than there is in the US. Secondly, I'm not sure what you mean by "the dollar seem to work better". The performance of the US economy doesn't solely depend on the US having one currency instead of several, so measures like the Gini coefficient and the size of the GDP are influenced by many different factors besides whether there's a single currency or not.

I realize this, but I've read nothing to suggest that the dollar is too strong/weak for any particular region to prosper.

There are many differences between Europe and the US. For one, labour motility in the US is greater due to the fact that most Americans speak English. This means that it's (arguably) easier for a typical family in Alabama to move to Idaho in search of work than it is for a typical family in Portugal to move to Finland.

That makes sense.

Or are you wondering why the Euro is at risk to be replaced by sub-Eurozone currencies while the dollar doesn't seem to risk the same fate? In that case, one difference between the two is that the dollar has been the currency for the US for far longer than the Euro has been the currency for the Eurozone. While a politican in France might argue in favour of bringing back the franc it would be unthinkable for a politician in California to argue in favour of adopting a new currency for that state. The dollar is a big part of US national identity, even if there could be big benefits (as well as big drawbacks) in implementing different currencies for different subdivisions of the US.

If that doesn't answer your question, could you be more specific as to what your question is? Gabbe (talk) 10:33, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think the OP meant to say higher inequality in the US than the Eurozone (that kinda jibes with his question). Zain Ebrahim (talk) 10:38, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I did!--Leon (talk) 11:04, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In addition to the reasons already given, it is easier to maintain the dollar effectively than the euro because the US federal budget is a much larger portion of US public spending than the EU budget is a portion of EU public spending. This means fiscal policy can be used to reinforce monetary policy. --Tango (talk) 11:12, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Leon: So you mean that since the US has a higher Gini coefficient, that means that the US dollar seems to work better, and you're wondering why that is? Gabbe (talk) 11:26, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that is quite what Leon is saying. I think he means that higher inequality ought to make it harder to maintain a single currency (since the interests of different regions are more varied), so the dollar appears to be doing a better job under more difficult circumstances. There is a point that should be raised here: The Geni coefficient doesn't specify whether there are rich areas and poor areas or just a mix of rich and poor in all areas. Only the former is relevant to this discussion since you can only have separate currencies within a certain geographic region, you couldn't have separate currencies for the rich and for the poor in one city. --Tango (talk) 11:33, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That is exactly what I mean, sorry for not being clearer. You're dead right about the Gini not measuring regional inequality, though a glance at this suggests that the US has a similar (though arguably lesser) degree of that. But in any case, thanks greatly for all your help, I think I understand better.--Leon (talk) 11:55, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, I see. That makes much more sense... :) Gabbe (talk) 13:48, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Leon -- Part of it is because in the U.S. there's a higher level of the type of labor mobility where the migrant's skills and qualifications are easily transferred, so that he or she doesn't have to start at the bottom in the new location. Also, U.S. states are less autonomous than EU member countries, and their economies are less compartmentalized in a number of ways. For example, the majority of U.S. states are required to fully balance their budget every year, so national economic policies determine the degree of government deficits etc. AnonMoos (talk) 12:03, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think one of the key points from that last are the different types of political structure. The US is a country, the EU isn't.

ALR (talk) 12:28, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think that oversimplifies it. The US is a federation, as is the EU. I think the main thing that determines that the US is a country and the EU isn't is that there is a US army and there isn't an EU army. The existence of a single army doesn't really make any difference to whether a single currency will work (although defence spending is a big part of the US federal budget so plays a big role in my point above about fiscal policy). --Tango (talk) 12:46, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The biggest difference from the point of view of fiscal policy is probably that the US can impose federal taxes on its citizens, while the EU cannot. — Kpalion^(talk) 14:27, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think it fundamentally changes the legal relationship between the entities. The relationships between the various levels of governance in the US have a very clear basis, and there is a broadly similar legal system across the US where there are significant differences between individual countries in the EU. There is also the issue of how EU directives are implemented in law, and the ability of countries to challenge one anothers implementations. A fairly common issue in cross border trade is the matter of state-aid; the UK and Germany are quite a bit more rigorous than, say, Italy.

The combined effect is that internal trade within the US has a lot less operational friction adding costs and inefficiencies.

I would agree with your pint about relative levels of public sector expenditure, although once one takes into account national budgets across the EU that difference probably closes quite a lot. The nature of that public sector spend is also a factor.

ALR (talk) 15:00, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

How much did slaves cost in the US during the 1840s, roughly? I am thinking in Atlanta, and New Orleans. Also, how much were wages for unskilled farm labor from white people? Googlemeister (talk) 13:48, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

• I can't find the info on the price of slaves. However, according to this research paper, white male USA wages in 1840 were as follows: $10.40/month plus board for farmhands, $0.85/day for non-farm unskilled labor. (I think these are in nominal dollars for median wages, but I just skimmed the paper, so I'm not fully sure). This study does not appear to account for regional wage differences, but the fact that white farmhands earned board is important, since that was the only thing that slaves 'earned'. --M@rēino 14:04, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

According to OpenYale HIST119, the price was around US$ 1000 for a healthy young male adult. For purchasing power, David Blight compared this to the price of a new car today. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 14:50, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think the price tended to slowly increase during most of the 1840s and 1850s. ... AnonMoos (talk) 17:13, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds like roughly 8 years wages, assuming equal work from a slave and a normal laborer. I am of two minds if the board would cost less for a slave or a laborer though. On the one hand, you have a lot of $ tied up in the slave and you don't want him to get sick whereas with the regular laborer, it really will not impact you much if he gets sick, but on the other hand, the white laborer would be free to leave if he thinks he can get better food at the next farm over. Googlemeister (talk) 18:29, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The white labourers also would not breed with other white labourers to give you free little white labourers, which I suppose must have entered the slave owners' minds. To continue Blight's analogy, at first glance the comparison seems to be between hiring taxis versus buying a car, but in fact, the comparison is more like investing in two cars and waiting for them to make little cars for you to use or sell. What a lovely thought. Matt Deres (talk) 19:55, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Did the relative price of slaves increase once the US finally outlawed slave importation, or would the larger population of slaves, meaning more were being born, counteract that? Everard Proudfoot (talk) 20:05, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think the population was increasing despite no importation being allowed, but the amount of land under cultivation, and hence the demand for labor, increased at a far faster rate, driving up the cost. Googlemeister (talk) 20:52, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Can someone give me or point me towards an outline of UK history for the preiods 1900-1914 and 1945-1990? The article on it here seems mostly about the wars and Ireland, I have tried looking through the list of prime ministers of that time as well, and that was not much more helpful. I only want a list of the few major events and issues of the time, hopefully if I feel any deserve further study I can find out more once I know what to look for.

80.47.234.85 (talk) 16:33, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

BBC timeline --TammyMoet (talk) 16:58, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If you're happy with a little more detail, the articles on 1900 in the United Kingdom, etc, give a decent outline of the main events of each year. Warofdreams talk 17:10, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

OK, that done, I have a new question. I have heard that there were a few times in the early years of last century when the discontent workers rose up against their governemnts, though with limited success in most cases. Other than the two Russian revolutions, and a vague recollection of one in England in possibly 1911 or 1912, which I can't seem to find anything about, I cannot think of any more right now. Can anyone else suggest some more?

80.47.234.85 (talk) 20:55, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The Strange Death of Liberal England by George Dangerfield deals with the period 1910-1914 and the labour unrest. You might also be interested in the General Strike of 1926.--Britannicus (talk) 21:16, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Labour revolts may be of interest. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 21:17, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

...one example (in Scotland, not England) being the Battle of George Square in 1919, and another (in Ireland, part of the UK at that time) being the Dublin Lock-out of 1913. In relation to the specific years mentioned, there was the 1911 Liverpool general transport strike (very brief article though). Historically, the biggest strike in the UK was the 1926 general strike already mentioned. Looking at the later years covered by the original question, one of the biggest and most politically important was the UK miners' strike (1984–1985). See also List of strikes. Ghmyrtle (talk) 21:32, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Men are allowed to go on the altars to perform daily functions in the temples but whenever a woman has her monthly cycle she is banned from going on the altar. Even if she is taking care of a baby she is considered unclean and therefore not allowed to go "on the altar". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.131.122.184 (talk) 16:56, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There is a start at Menstrual_taboo#In_religion. It is possible that the same prohibitions may apply to Breastfeeding. BrainyBabe (talk) 17:09, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Does anyone know a Web site that contains year-by-year information for United States tax rates for the past few decades? I've tried searching for things on Google but I've only found general popular-history articles, and I need detailed statistics. Thanks. 76.204.127.175 (talk) 19:15, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Is it likely that the European Union will ever increase in power from a loose federation to an actual national government, merging Europe into one country? --138.110.206.100 (talk) 21:21, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We don't do speculation. There are plenty of people who want that to happen, think it will happen or fear that it will happen, but there is no way to know other than to wait and see. --Tango (talk) 21:31, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You may be interested in the articles on European integration, Federal Europe, and (the hypothetical) United States of Europe. Ghmyrtle (talk) 21:36, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I was reading "Same-sex marriage in Israel". The seconde sentence in the article states that all marriages in isreal are done by religious establishments. So my question is, how would a athiest couple get married?--SelfQ (talk) 22:32, 15 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]