Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2008 December 30

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December 30

Bengali-Burmese Ancient Battles

Did the Bengali people and the Burmese ever fight each other in ancient times? What was the battle called? 72.136.111.205 (talk) 05:56, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

The Bengali people probably did not exist as such in truly "ancient" times. The ancient period in South Asia ended no later than the 13th century. At this time, the Old Bengali language was spoken in Assam and much of Orissa and was still very close to the language of neighboring Bihar. It is unlikely that Bengalis had a strong identity as a separate people at this time. During ancient times, the ancestors of the Bengalis, in the basin of the lower Ganga and Brahmaputra Rivers, were separated from the Bamar or Burmese people by a belt of mountains and forests inhabited by many other peoples, such as the Meitei, Mizo, and Chin, such that the territories ruled by the ancient Burmese never or almost never shared a border with those ruled by the ancestors of the Bengalis. As such, it is unlikely that they fought a battle against each other in ancient times. Marco polo (talk) 21:06, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Are you saying that the Bengalis and the Burmese never fought against each other? Did the Bengalis and the Burmese even fight against each other after the ancient period of South Asia? 72.136.111.205 (talk) 04:27, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Why is there war?

Even in a perfectly engineered society where all people would have equal property, equal worth, equal desires and would unquestionably obey all thier leader's commands would there still be war? --Mark L. Dowry (talk) 06:55, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Few would say that a robotically obeying populace is part of a perfectly engineered society; but in any case, Jerry Pournelle would answer "yes" to your question, having published 11 volumes of "There Will Be War". Tempshill (talk) 06:59, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Unquestioning obedience to a leader makes war more likely, not less. —Tamfang (talk) 09:16, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Sounds like a recipe for war everybody having the same. Some people want more and are aggressive, if what they have doesn't match their wants or expectations then they will fight for it. With a single despot like Stalin or Mao wouldn't you have less likelihood of war? I think there would be widespread disaffection and unhappiness in anything like a society with equal property worth{?) and desires, any practical social engineering would cater for and arrange differences. Dmcq (talk) 11:28, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Just to note War can be quite a specific technical term. I agree that in the above scenario I would anticipate war to be more likely. I recall it was common to say that the best way to prevent a war between 2 countries was for both of them to open a McDonalds (is it MacDonalds? I can never remember) as there was this saying that no 2 countries that have McDonalds had been 'at war' with one another (I suspect it's not strictly true). 194.221.133.226 (talk) 11:33, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

See Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention and Dell Theory of Conflict Prevention. NByz (talk) 02:37, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

War tends to happen for 3 general reasons (very simplistic, but a reasonable basic model): resources, defense, and status. Unless you can either shift human's desire for resources and status to something non-physical (so that they'd battle for status in say the intellectual pursuits) or remove the human's desire for increased resources and status. I highly doubt you will be able to remove something so ingrained on human nature. War for defense can happen even if there is no real threat, so you'd need to ensure that people have perfect information, perfect rationality (so that the tit-for-tat game theoretic strategy is used or a general disinterest in their safety. I suspect the first is impossible and that the second and third will be either difficult or (more likely) impossible.

The focus on unquestioning obedience toward the leaders is very troublesome. You've now removed the issue of corruption to a small group of people with no mechanism for removal of that group from power. Unless you've grafted on a huge chunk of DNA involved in the behavior of ants, you're going to have problems (although drone ants can kill offspring of the queen that is increasingly unrelated to it).

Basically, I think you will not remove war from the list of behaviors humans take part in. Your best bet is making war so that it is minimally damaging and not undertaken easily.--droptone (talk) 12:59, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

I read somewhere recently an idea that absolute war with genocide quite possibly has been a major factor in the evolution of human cooperation and the advance of civilization. Not that I advocate war as desirable! Dmcq (talk) 13:10, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Surely as long as people have some kind of opinion and will, they will desire power and land and will therefore no doubt at some point... war.91.111.67.44 (talk) 13:09, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

If I may point to Dunbar's number, which I, personally, think may be of interest. It's difficult to wage "war" with a smaller or larger Dunbar number - either you scale it down to bar fights, or you scale it up so that "everyone" is one of "us," making finding a "them" to take "stuff" - status, resources, strategic advantage as above - from rather difficult. I'm not suggesting this is an iron law - plenty of filicide (?) in history - just that another neo-cortical explosion has the advantages of being both fairly likely, and fairly (but not thoroughly) effective. 98.169.163.20 (talk) 14:38, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

I haven't seen it yet, but a recent episode of Penn & Teller's Bullshit! documentary TV show "argues that the idea of utopian world peace is naïve and incompatible with human nature. Also argues that free trade and economic interdependence are the best means to achieve peace." 216.239.234.196 (talk) 16:32, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

I'd note that one desire that most people have is to have more stuff than the people around them. So if people obeyed their leader unquestionably, the leader is likely to say "give me most of your stuff", and you'll no longer have equal property and worth. (You'll find this is what tends to happen even in situations of unequal wealth distribution - the rich leaders take money from the poor people to make themselves even richer.) I'll also note that you draw a distinction between property and worth. One thing that makes people feel worth more is power over others. In your situation people don't have equal worth, because the leaders have so much more power than their underlings, who obey them unquestionably. The "obey leaders unquestionably" isn't really going to happen with humans, anyway. You'd likely have a small group of people who want more power and money (and always will, regardless of how much they already have), and gang up to take it from others. Certainly, if humans didn't have desire for money or power or sex, who didn't have any unreasonable desires, and were pious creatures who obeyed their intrinsically good leader, there wouldn't be wars, but they wouldn't be humans either - they'd be angels. "If men were angels, no government would be necessary." - James Madison -- 128.104.112.113 (talk) 19:24, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Part 1 of Penn & Teller's episode on war and world peace can be viewed here [1]. 67.184.14.87 (talk) 06:05, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Consider the case of North Korea (as far as we can tell): all people have equal property, equal worth, equal desires and unquestionably obey all their leader's commands. While there may not be internal war, there is very high external tension. DOR (HK) (talk) 04:26, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Boys leading troops

Tropic Thunder brought to mind the news feature stories from about 7 or 10 years ago about twin brothers, if memory serves, who were in Southeast Asia somewhere, leading a sizable group of armed rebel troops. They were always smoking in the photos, and the legend was that they could not be harmed by bullets, and supposedly the troops were loyal to these two leaders for, partly, that reason. Can anyone point me to who they were? Googling has not helped. Thanks - Tempshill (talk) 07:01, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Johnny and Luther Htoo. Adam Bishop (talk) 08:12, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you! Tempshill (talk) 15:42, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Legend has it they were also a gas to work for. Clarityfiend (talk) 19:35, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Costs of inactive company

How much costs does an inactive company generate? --88.27.176.105 (talk) 12:13, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Where? US, UK or rest of the world?--Mr.K. (talk) 12:34, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Where, it should be noted, is not simply enough classification -- likely a good answer can only be provided on a case-by-case basis (and it's likely that the specific cases don't make the information known). If my home-based freelance web design company goes inactive, I continue to pay a webhost fee (perhaps $10/month) but little else. When Chrysler closes their factories for a month, many high-value costs are not fully mitigated. Other examples likely fall into some sort of middle ground. — Lomn 15:26, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

You're looking at costs, according to jurisdiction, such as auditing the annual accounts and filing such documents with the proper authorities. In many places, this is a smaller cost than actually closing the company, hence the abundence of "shelf companies." DOR (HK) (talk) 04:29, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Ponzi game

Are Ponzi games punished more severely than illegal lotteries?--Mr.K. (talk) 12:49, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

As a Ponzi scheme is fraud, I'd expect so, yes. However, illegal gambling is sometimes punished as a form of tax evasion, which can also have severe penalties. StuRat (talk) 15:44, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Leni Riefenstahl and slave labor

Leni Riefenstahl is critized for making Nazi propaganda and for using slave labor in at leasts one of her movies. While I understand the former, I'm not sure I agree with the latter. Wouldn't conditions on a movie set be better than a Nazi concentration camp? 216.239.234.196 (talk) 20:38, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

The article says: "After the Nuremberg rallies trilogy and Olympia, Riefenstahl began work on the movie she had tried and failed to direct once before, Tiefland. On Hitler's direct order the German government paid her 7 million reichsmarks in compensation. From September 23 until November 13, 1940 she filmed in Krün near Mittenwald. The extras playing Spanish women and farmers were drawn from gypsies (Sinti) detained in a camp at Salzburg-Maxglan who were forced to work with her. Filming at the Babelsberg Studios near Berlin began 18 months later in April 1942 and lasted into summer. This time Sinti and Roma from the Marzahn detention camp near Berlin were compelled to work as extras. A surviving document from camp Marzahn shows a list of 65 inmates who were ordered to serve in the production. 50 stills from the filming in Krün near Mittenwald were later found and from these, surviving prisoners were able to identify 29 camp inmates who worked for Riefenstahl and were then deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau in the first weeks of March 1943 following Himmler's December 1942 decree. To the end of her life, despite overwhelming evidence that stated that concentration camp occupants had been forced to labor unpaid on the movie, Riefenstahl continued to maintain all the film extras survived and that she had met them after the war." It's a matter of opinion whether you regard that as slave labour or not. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 21:01, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

(I'm the OP on a different computer.) I read the article on Leni Riefenstahl and Tiefland (film) and I don't think they address my question. My question isn't about whether you call them slave labor (or whatever term you want to use) it's about the relative conditions on Riefenstahl's movie set versus conditions in a Nazi concentration camp. It seems to me that Riefenstahl (probably unitentionally) might have done them a favor as I cannot imagine that being forced to work on one of her movies would be as bad as being in a camp. 67.184.14.87 (talk) 22:23, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't be so sure. This wasn't a fab Hollywood production. These people were still slave labor, still considered less than human by their captors. While Riefenstahl herself may or may not have mistreated them, it's of little doubt that they were mistreated by their Nazi handlers. Consider that while they were used as extras, I'd be shocked if they weren't also used for construction of sets and other physical labor. And, in the end, they went right back to the concentration camps. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 02:47, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Slave labor is slave labor. Do we say that blacks who got to work in the manor house were actually being given a big break because they weren't working in the cotton fields? Do we suggest that those who toiled in the camp had a big break because at least they weren't summarily executed right from the beginning? You can say something is "not as bad" as something else but that doesn't get anywhere close to saying the original thing was "not bad" or was in any way any less unethical. Hey man, I only robbed you of your wallet at gunpoint—at least I didn't crack your skull open too! --98.217.8.46 (talk) 15:09, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Why does the (US) Work Opportunity Credit exclude hires over 40 years of age?

In the US, employers qualify for a Work Opportunity Credit if they hire a person who receives food stamp benefits, and is at least 18 years old but not over 40 years.

Why oh why are hires over 40 excluded? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Boomerpdx (talk • contribs) 21:26, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

My initial reaction to this question is that it might be something to do with preferences to those with young children. You are more likely to have a young child (say under the age of 10) whilst you are younger than 40 than you are to have a young child after this age. I'm not sure of the purpose of this credit (is it padi to the employer or does it get throught to the employee?) but that age restriction seems to fit around what I would consider a 'normal' age for an adult to have children that don't require (near) constant supervision. 194.221.133.226 (talk) 10:46, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

You need to read the legislative history, especially any committee reports, for the Act. I don't have time to do so now.Thomas, the Library of Congress' site, FindLaw, WestLaw and Lexis/Nexis should have the proceedings. 75Janice (talk) 22:21, 31 December 2008 (UTC)75Janice