Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2008 May 5

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May 5

Bhumibol Adulyadej

It says on the main page that he succeeded power in 1950, that means he's only been on the job for 58 years, how would that make him the longest serving monarch? 99.226.26.154 (talk) 01:48, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps you saw a version briefly vandalised by a member of the British royal family? I see "Having reigned since June 9, 1946.." which would indeed make him the longest-serving monarch. It would also mean that he's been on the job since before Israel, India or the People's Republic of China even existed. --Relata refero (disp.) 02:18, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

India didn't magically appear out of thin air in 1947, you know. It's been there for many thousands of years, as the Mughals, the East India Company and the Empress of India would attest, were they alive to do so. Malcolm XIV (talk) 08:44, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Ah well, the very idea of a politically unified India didn't really exist till the modern era...--Relata refero (disp.) 09:04, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

The Tin Drum - Exactly What did Oskar's Mother Eat

In the film version of the book, The Tin Drum, can you tell us what Oskar's mother died of over-eating from a barrel? We have two different opinions here: one of eels and one of sardines.```` —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.166.99.246 (talk) 03:42, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

According to a user review on the film's imdb page, the eels were in another scene. You could also ask your question there. WikiJedits (talk) 13:22, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

It was neither eels nor sardines, 203.166; it was herrings (either that or very big sardines!) Clio the Muse (talk) 23:11, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Shautaraw

After a friend mentioned he was reading Anna Karenina, another person suggested he should try "Shautaraw". This is all we know, and we can't track down the other person to ask. A Google search turns up 0 results. I'm assuming it's a gross misspelling. Does anyone know what "Shautaraw" could refer to?

Kuanche (talk) 03:51, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

I've done quite a thorough search and come up with nothing, :( sorry. I've also tried a few alternative spellings, but none of them seem to come close to anything you're looking for. Maybe another volunteer here has more luck. PeterSymonds | talk 06:58, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

What was their accent like? Could it be Tolstoy's works After The Ball or The Kreutzer Sonata? Mhicaoidh (talk) 09:22, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Sholokhov? Solzhenitsyn? Does anything in Category:Russian novelists ring a bell? (edit - sorry, that was me. WikiJedits (talk) 13:28, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

I am wondering if your friend was being a little facetious, and recommending Shotaro manga, the prolific manga author Shotaro Ishinomori or else Japanese author of Tales of Murder, Shotaro Ikenami. (Both o's in the name Shotaro are long) SaundersW (talk) 18:49, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

If I'm born with that ethnicity, I will be that ethnicity forever in my lifetime?

If I'm born with that ethnicity, I will be that ethnicity forever in my lifetime? I know ethnicity is not a race. I'm dominant Thai, tiny Chinese, and maybe Indian. I suffer discouragement because my dominant ethnicity, Thai is not recognized (classified as 'Other Asian', no separate category) and there is no userbox on Wikipedia for 'Thai'. What can I do about it? Jet (talk) 04:58, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Create your own Thai or Thai+ userbox? They're not handed down by God (or Jimbo) and set in stone. Clarityfiend (talk) 06:54, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

People can hold multiple ethnicities and, in fact, create whole new ethnic identities. (See Ethnogenesis.) So your ethnicity is definitely not fixed at birth. --D. Monack | talk 07:06, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Ethnicity is not etched in stone. It depends both on how you define yourself and on how others define you. How others define you depends a lot on environment. I see from your user page that you live in Southern California. In Southern California, there are numerous Asian ethnic groups, each of them with a distinct community and identity. In other parts of the United States, especially outside of the major cities, there are very few Asians and not much in the way of Asian community institutions. In these parts of the United States, you will be seen as Asian or "Oriental" because of your appearance, but if you speak English with an American accent, many people will accept you as American. Even in many parts of California, non-Asians will not care which Asian country was home to your family. They may just see you as "Asian" and accept you as another Californian if you speak with a typical California accent. Of course, other Asians may see that you are not part of their ethnic group or wonder which group you belong to. You can always answer, "I just think of myself as American", and many people will accept that, again unless you have a non-American accent. A non-American accent will mark you as an immigrant, and non-Asian Americans will consider you ethnically Asian. More sophisticated non-Asians and many Asians may want to know the ethnic origin of your family and may consider you part of that ethnic group because your accent helps to mark you as a member of that group. On the other hand, if you grew up in the United States and then went to some other country, you may well be perceived in that country as American. Even if you went to Thailand and said that your parents were Thai, you might be perceived as American. You can certainly change how you define yourself. If you change your cultural environment, you can change your perceived ethnicity. Marco polo (talk) 19:00, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

specific name for girls who have black hair.

just like we have the names such as blondes and brunettes do we have any specific name for girls having black hair? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.99.18.202 (talk) 11:49, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

The article black hair states that it's called "jet-black" or "raven black", so there's nothing like "brunette". I've also heard somewhere that brunette can also describe black hair, but rarely. PeterSymonds | talk 12:05, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

"Melanie"? --Milkbreath (talk) 12:27, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

No, She is a brunette. --LarryMac | Talk 13:32, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Both "blonde" and "brunette" are loan words from French. The equivalent for a black-haired woman with olive skin would be "une brune". SaundersW (talk) 16:00, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

There is "la noiraude" (from noir=black) but that's talking about a cow. 200.127.59.151 (talk) 17:44, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Writing System

Why is writing an important feature in ancient civilisations? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Invisiblebug590 (talk • contribs) 11:50, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

This probably has many different answers, so I'm only going to pick the communication aspect. In the ancient world, communication outside the immediate circle was nearly impossible, and therefore writing would be used in the same way as today's email. Messengers would send messages from, say, the Roman Imperial court to the Turkish court, conveying messages from the Emperor etc. Writing was important in books as well; for example, the poems of Homer would've been read like any other book today. The importance of the written word was, in short, extremely important, but I'll let others expand on specifics. PeterSymonds | talk 12:02, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

One of the most important functions of writing in ancient and modern times has been its use for record keeping. Writing helped merchants keep track of their inventories and their deals, and it helped rulers keep track of their territories, persons and properties subject to taxation, and so on. Peter Symonds mentions the poems of Homer, which were almost certainly memorized and recited by illiterate bards for centuries before they were written down. However, the advent of writing allowed the poems to be recorded permanently so that they no longer risked alteration or embellishment by oral bards. Writing also made possible the accumulation of large libraries. Writing also made communication more efficient. PeterSymonds also mentions messengers. Before the invention of writing, there were very likely messengers, but they would have had to memorize their messages and to deliver them by speaking them. Writing allowed messengers to carry messages more numerous, lengthy, and detailed than they could possibly memorize. In these ways, writing facilitated the growth of trade and of the state. Marco polo (talk) 18:40, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Writing is essential to our own civilisation, everything from our laws, to our religions, are codified within specific texts. And so, our historians thus consider the developement of language as a prerequisite of civilisation, we can't imagine life without the written word, thus, life without the written word is unimaginable - the developement of text thus serves as a convenient starting point for 'civilisation'. Ninebucks (talk) 20:35, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

And without people writing about stuff, we would know almost nothing about what actually happened during history.HS7 (talk) 19:48, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

HS7, that observation comes close to being a tautology! Almost by definition history is the recording of events. Before there was history there was, well, pre-history! Clio the Muse (talk) 23:08, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

When writing was first invented, the people of that time were just as intelligent as modern people. As most people were illiterate, they compensated with other methods such as heroic poetry as mentioned by PeterSymonds or singing songs. I can only think of two large ancient libraries, the Babylonian cuniform tablets and the library of Alexandria on papyrus. So, large libraries are rare.
Sleigh (talk) 04:21, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

We often joke about the internet as an external memory bank. Likewise, the invention of writing and then books enabled humanity to achieve its first externally stored memories. Before that, people may have been illiterate (a word we associate with ignorance), but they had fantastic memories. Patrick Leigh Fermor spent years with the Greek resistance in World War II, and months hanging out in damp caves with Cretan shepherds. He describes how he would go to sleep to the sound of them reciting the Odyssey, and wake up the next morning to hear them continuing it. Or check out the Manas cycle of Central Asia. You may want to look at Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond. BrainyBabe (talk) 17:37, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I meant it in the sense that other forms of archaeology usually don't reveal as much about the past as reading what they wrote back then, so we know very little about the peoples that didn't write. The ancient civilizations we know more than just a very little about all wrote, so it is important to us that they did, as well as important to them.HS7 (talk) 20:36, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

the definition of TOLLYWOOD

the film-industry at kolkata (India)is nick-named and normally referred as TOLLYWOOD. Why? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.99.18.202 (talk) 12:00, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Our Kolkata article says the Bengali film industry is dubbed Tollywood from the suburb of Tollygunj plus Hollywood. However, the Tollywood article says the term refers to Telegu plus Hollywood, meaning the Telegu film industry based not in Kolkata, but farther south in Andhra Pradesh. Maybe there are simply two Tollywoods. Perhaps someone who knows how to do this could consider renaming or otherwise disambiguating the pages Tollywood and Bengali cinema? WikiJedits (talk) 13:35, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Done. --Relata refero (disp.) 13:54, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Cool, thanks! WikiJedits (talk) 14:03, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

India also has Bollywood. Similar constructions include Lollywood and Wellywood. Gwinva (talk) 20:08, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Not to forget Nollywood. Angus McLellan (Talk) 23:21, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Isn't there a Dollywood too?HS7 (talk) 19:44, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

And the article on that also mentions a Dhallywood. But I don't think this is the point of the question.HS7 (talk) 19:46, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

School

What is the longest time that one generation of a family has been at a particular school? Interactive Fiction Expert/Talk to me 12:07, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Good question. I'm not sure of any notable examples (there's no record or anything from what I can find), but I should think that many families, especially in the aristocracy or nobility, would've spent hundreds of years attending the same school. For example, Edward VII, George V, George VI and Prince Charles all went to the University of Cambridge, and that's a longevity of at least 120 years. PeterSymonds | talk 12:22, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

The OP said 'one generation'. I don't know where you'd find such information, but FWIW various members of my family attended the same school continuously for 16 years. Algebraist 14:10, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Oh, sorry :S misread the question. PeterSymonds | talk 14:11, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Both of my brothers went to the Winchester, but taken together their time there (allowing for the overlap) still falls some four years short of Algebraist's total. However, if you add my father, my grand-father and my great-grandfather the line goes all the way back to the early years of the twentieth century! Clio the Muse (talk) 23:20, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

My generation of my family was going (continiously) to the same primary school for 21 years AFAIK. But I doubt that's even close to a record Nil Einne (talk) 16:40, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Between me, my younger sister and my brother, we will have been at the same school for 17 years by the time he leaves. However, this doesn't really answer the question. if we look at it mathematically, assuming a woman has their first child at 18, and their last at 45, and all the children attend the same school for seven years each, with no gaps between them, that would be (45-18)+7years, which is 34 years. That's should be about the maximum possible, but the problem then is proving that a family has done that.HS7 (talk) 19:37, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Although that doesn't include cousins, who are members of the same generation of the same family, or second cousins, and given that, for example, I have a cousin about the same age as my parents, and more being born all the time, the range then is much more. A big family in a little village might hold the record, but I doubt anyone will ever find it. sorry.HS7 (talk) 19:40, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I guess it depends how far you want to go. Do you include 2nd cousins? 3rd cousins? If you include half-siblings but no cousins, it strikes me as likely that a polygamist somewhere would hold the record. For example men in some of the polygamist cults in the US seem to have have like 10 wives or so and because they are isolated communities, most of their children probably go the the same 'school' (if you count whatever they attend as school). I'm not sure but I believe sometimes the men are having children into their 60s or later. You could easily see their children being at the same school for 50 years Nil Einne (talk) 17:04, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

The Weasleys at Hogwarts?hotclaws 02:14, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I think I remember that Jeremy Clarkson's fathers entire extended family made up most of the population of a tiny village somewhere, so maybe they would hold the record. At least, I doubt you would be likely to find out about any other families like that, that can beat them.HS7 (talk) 19:16, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

IIRC there has been a member of the Indo-French Fanthome family at La Martiniere Lucknow for at least the past half-century. --Relata refero (disp.) 11:38, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

EC law (moved from WP:HD)

I have this assignment on EC law nd I am really confused with the EClaw. I know i need to look at the EClaw status and see what conflicting between the provisions of EC law and the UK statue, also i need to find out weather the UK provisions can post date treaty articles. Lisafoden (talk) 13:15, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Law of the European Union will help you. Xn4 23:42, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Dresden

Were there no objections to the plan to bomb Dresden? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.42.104.148 (talk) 13:20, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Not at the time, it would seem. This page gives a lot of information. It was not until a few weeks later that MPs started to say "we shouldn't have done it", and then even Churchill said the same. But when it was carried out, it was thought that it would be a swift end to the war. PeterSymonds | talk 13:24, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

That particular raid may not have been intensively discussed, as I do not believe anyone thinks that it was intended to cause particularly severe loss of life. The internal objections to the nature of the bombing campaign, however, were considerable. The scientific establishment in particular viewed it both as immoral - though they did not waste time on that argument - and a waste of resources. (The latter, they thought paradoxically, might be better spent on researching the atomic bomb.) Some of the big wheels, including Patrick Blackett and Henry Tizard disagreed vehemently with dehousing. IIRC, C.P. Snow dramatises some of the tension between the scientists and the others (who read Greats, perhaps?) in Strangers and Brothers. --Relata refero (disp.) 13:51, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

As our article points out (Bombing of Dresden in World War II), the raid was similar in size of attack, weight of bombs and loss of life to other attacks carried out in 1945 against the other large German cities. So there was little reason for anyone to have objected specifically to the Dresden attack. Rmhermen (talk) 17:28, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

There is a sinister logic to the attack. If bombings were confined only to the industrial cities, then those Germans not from the industrial cities would not feel at any personal risk, and thus would not have any reason to oppose the Nazi war plans. If the Allies were to create a climate of fear, in which no German could feel completely safe from Allied attack, then Hitler's government would very quickly lose the confidence of the people, and thus, Germany would be brought to surrender. Ninebucks (talk) 20:41, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Ninebucks, I hardly think these points make all that much sense in the context of the times. By February 1945 Germany was weeks away from total defeat. There is no evidence at all that the attack on Dresden advanced this goal by even a single day. Clio the Muse (talk) 00:31, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, 217.42, there was an objection to the planned bombing. It came from Wing-Commander James Rose, head of the air section at Bletchley Park, who was appointed Deputy Director of Operational Intelligence at the Air Ministry in February 1945, shortly before the execution of Operation Thunderclap. As a general principle Rose took the view that there was little to be gained from further indiscriminate attacks now that the war was coming to an end. He raised particular objections to attacks on poorly defended cultural centres, and was particularly disturbed by a proposed raid on Bonn, the birthplace of Beethoven, even though it only contained a single clothing factory.

Soon after he heard of the planned joint Allied offensive against Dresden-the Americans by day and the British by night-he wrote "It was the only important city in Germany that has never been bombed. It seems to me tragic that this beautiful city should be destroyed. We are getting near the end of the war." He telephoned Carl Andrew Spaatz, head of the USAF in Europe, to ask if the American attack was going ahead. He was told that it was, with the agreement of the British. When asked why Spaatz said that it was because the Sixth SS Panzer Division was being moved east through Dresden, on its way to defend the Hungarian oil-fields. Rose said that ULTRA intelligence revealed that the division in question was nowhere near Dresden, but was being routed west of Prague. Spaatz replied that he had no wish to bomb Dresden and would call his attack off if the British agreed.

Rose then rang Bomber Command to speak to Sir Arthur Harris. Instead he was put through to Air Marshall Robert Saundby, telling him of his conversation with Spaatz, adding his own view that Dresden was of no importance to the advancing Red Army. Saundby dismissed his objections, "I don't care what you say. We are going to bomb Dresden."

You will find some of the details of this story in Fall Out: World War II and the Shaping of Postwar Europe by Peter Calvocoressi, where the author recalls discussing the movements of the Sixth Panzer Division with Rose. Calvocoressi concludes that the Dresden raids were illegal because of the disproportionate force used. Clio the Muse (talk) 00:31, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, Clio. I didn't know any of that. --Relata refero (disp.) 09:08, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

She delights, Relato refero, in the role of educator! Clio the Muse (talk) 23:10, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Status of Women

Can someone verify the accuracy (or inaccuracy) of the following statements :

• 1) In countries where women's literacy is high or higher than in poor countries, abortion rates are also higher while infanticides are down.

• 2) The Soviet Union was the first country to fully educate the large mass of women.

• 3) Nations that have aging and non renewable populations are almost always those same nations where the woman has been sexually liberated.

• 4) During the 60s and 70s, the woman's rights movement was immediately accompanied by the gay liberation movement.

• 5) Emancipation of women has meant the utter disapperance of the patriarch male and its replacement by a more equalitarian counterpart.

• 6) The emancipation of women is corollary to the decline of religion in the West.

• 7) A grave economic crisis involving large and long-term inflation might paralyse the job market and freeze the liberation of women.

• 8) More women on the job market has often been translated by more government taxes.

• 9) Female presence in modern armies has decreased the possibilies of war.

• 10) The phenomemnon of judicial activism is often directly linked to the women's rights movement.

• 11) The massive presence of both men and women in universities has ultimaltely led to a deflation of the value of a Bachelor's Degree, which is now devalued to the profit of a PHD. In contrast, men still earn more PHDs than women.

• 12) The philosophy of organicism teaches that social ills occur when society goes beyond its natural and ultimately organic functionalities. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.157.243.164 (talk) 13:52, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

• 13) One of the last unregulated sectors of the economy is prostitution, where women and men do not yet earn equal pay, because of offer and demand laws which precede any kind of government legislation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.157.243.164 (talk) 15:28, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

69.157.243.164 (talk) 13:44, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Some of those look really weird. Where did you get these statements from?

4) everywhere I know of gay rights legislation lagged many decades behind women's rights legislation.

6) Even if they were contemperaneous doesn't mean one is a 'corollary' of the other.

9) looks like complete speculation if only because it isn't the female soldiers (or any soldiers) who decide to go to war; it's usually their civilian leaders. Female soldiers are a relatively recent phenomenon (last couple of decades) and I certainly haven't noticed a reduction in wars over that period.

10) I'm pretty sure this is entirely wrong, because there are a lot of countries where 'judicial activism' is not an issue, and yet women have plenty of rights.

11) I see no way there could be a link. Whatever forces are driving the alleged deflation of degrees they are nothing to do with gender.

13) Prostitution is frequently regulated. In some places it's forbidden in some places it can't advertize, in some it is legal but you can't base in in a building; in other places it's legal. Other activities regulated to a similar degree (depending on location) include drug dealing, insider trading, copyright piracy. Also why would you think that male prostitutes make less money than female ones? DJ Clayworth (talk) 20:33, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

DJ Clayworth (talk) 14:53, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

5) The patriarch male is still quite visible in every society, even ones that are supposedly quite liberated. One cannot say there has been an "utter disappearance" of said trope, though a decline, sure.

9) I don't see the connection. Wars have been fought by female leaders, wars have been fought with female soldiers. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 15:04, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Ah, the fun and peril of statistics. Should we add to the list that there is statistical proof that our measures against dragon attacks are highly successful. Statistics prove that storks deliver babies in Podunk because the fluctuations in stork population is directly reflected in the local birth rate. When Jill moved into the house there was a 100% increase in the female population there. :-)Lisa4edit (talk) 19:45, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Could you please confirm, Lisa, if there is a positive correlation between the problem of evil, female emancipation, and the consumption of apples? It's something I've been troubled by for quite a while now. Clio the Muse (talk) 00:43, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

;-} I'm absolutely certain that, given enough time and computing power, one could draw positive correlations between apple related facts, such as number and distribution of apple orchards, ownership of apple computers, apple juice consumption and number of females with the first name Apple; and emancipation related topics like percentage of female company managers, ratio of female university graduates in "male dominated subjects" and pantsuit sales figures; and established measures of evil like spousal homicide rates, number of females accused of violent crimes and a detailed numerical study of evil female attempts to seduce males from following the path of pure good. Proper selection of suitable populations, geographical areas, time periods and statistical methods should guarantee the desired outcome. Just think of the increase in urban violence, clearly mirroring the fact that emancipated single mothers are sending their kids to school with an apple instead of investing the effort of preparing a PB&J sandwich. Thereby inciting social peer pressure, resentment towards females and authority, and limiting their kids ability to communicate (Who wants to talk about apples?). The feeble attempt to hide the sheer malicious evil intent behind nutrition claims only compounds their obvious guilt. There should be no problem with proving this fact with selective analysis of statistical data and survey results. :-) Sorry to anyone taking offense at this digression from desired ref:desk quality levels, but it may tell people to handle statistical results with a pot (instead of a grain) of salt. 71.236.23.111 (talk) 05:26, 6 May 2008 (UTC)oops Lisa4edit

While the physical sciences use a significance threshold of p<1%, in the social sciences a threshold of p<5% is often acceptable. This means that the given correlation or a higher correlation would occur by chance in less than 5% of cases. Now, if you take 7 variables and cross-correlate them, you will have 21 correlations, of which one is likely to be acceptable by social science criteria. It is a well known peril of statistical investigation of multivariate problems. SaundersW (talk) 12:44, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Most statistical results in peer-reviewed papers are aware of the problem of Degrees of freedom (statistics) and take that into account. --Relata refero (disp.) 11:17, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Excellent answer, Lisa. I'm truly impressed by your understanding of the semiotics of the apple, a truly dangerous fruit...or is it the fig?! Clio the Muse (talk) 23:13, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Right.

• Nos (1) and (2) are generally correct. For the first, see any recent Human Development Report. For the second, see this recent paper and this overall study.
• If you accept the standard assumptions of the demographic transition, and the link between literacy, education, and smaller families current in the literature, then (3) is indeed true.
• I can't speak for (4) in detail. My knowledge of the rhetoric of the gay rights revolution suggests that it was more inspired by the civil rights movement than women's liberation.
• (5) is almost certainly over-stated.
• (6) is considered to be true in the literature, but it is also believed that some causation runs in the opposite direction. As the Encyclopedia of Women and Religion in North America puts it, "the emancipation of women meant that they no longer needed to turn to religious life in order to realise the professional and personal accomplishments that it afforded previous generations."
• (7) is not generally considered true. It might reduce the number of women in the job market, though.
• (8) doesn't seem to make sense to me at all.
• (9) Impossible to tell, too many other factors.
• (10) Judicial activism was necessary for many civil rights advances, so this is true of America. Not elsewhere.
• (11) The returns to education decrease with the number of individuals possessing it, regardless of gender. In countries which had more female PhDs than male (the old USSR for a time) there were no changes in the returns to that degree. --Relata refero (disp.) 11:33, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

French Socks of Long Ago

What sort of socks would a well-off lady in medieval France have most likely worn? And would peasants of that period have had access to socks? 96.233.8.220 (talk)Perenelle —Preceding comment was added at 15:43, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Here is a nice site on mediaeval underwear, from which I quote the following:

Women's Hosen

It is rare that a clothed woman is portrayed in medieval artwork with her feet or legs exposed, beyond /perhaps/ the point of her toes sticking out of her gown. The exceptions tend to be laborers (and even in the field, women's legs are often covered to the ankles) and full nudes (Rebecca caught bathing, for instance). There is a 14th c illustration of a musician playing something akin to a hurdy-gurdy, with her ankles & lower shins visible (gasp!); her two dancing musician girlfriends however have their ankles fully covered! (The seated musician has parti-colored hosen, by the way.)

From all of this, we can safely surmise that women's hosen /never/ rose to or above calf-length. Lower, and they won't stay up. Higher, and they waste material. If the multiple dress layers (sufficient to keep the body warm) aren't enough to keep the legs warm, well, young lady, perhaps you ought'n't be lifting your skirt up!

Les Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry: février

As always, there are also health and hygiene considerations. No wool on the inner thighs is a good thing, for obvious reasons of comfort, and doubly so for the lady who might very well own only one pair throughout the month.

There is slim proof of this theory that women always wore short-hosen, in depictions of couples in flagrant delecto.

Similarly, since the ankles are rarely visible, there is little reason to envision a separate styling for women's and men's hosen below the calf. Also, since garters suffice nicely, there is little reason to suppose any other method was ever used by women, rendering what became for men a mostly decorative nicety, an essential part of the feminine wardrobe. This neatly answers all of the problems from the knees on up, in fitting the hosen! SaundersW (talk) 15:57, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't believe that site! Skirts do *not* keep the legs warm – socks have nothing on stockings in this regard.

Nevertheless, Google thinks that knee-high is period-correct. Have a look at these:

*a pair of silk stockings from 14th century Germany

*the stockings of Eleanor of Toledo (16th century Tuscany)

*link collection: medieval underwear research

Google also pulls up a Museum of Hosiery, though I get an error message trying to access it. WikiJedits (talk) 18:02, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

See also the bottom left hand corner of the picture to the right

SaundersW (talk) 18:14, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

• You could always try actually looking at our articles in Category:History of clothing (Europe) (by century), which have a good deal on this, or Hose (clothing). Johnbod (talk) 15:20, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Metal use in antiquity.

Are there any estimates on the proportions use metals used militarily as opposed to domestically? For example the amount of iron or bronze used for armor and weapons instead of pots and pans etc. thanks, Czmtzc (talk) 16:04, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

This strikes me as a hard task, but for anyone to have a chance with it you'd need to be more specific on the place and period you have in mind. Of course, we know swords could be beaten into ploughshares, so the two uses you outline aren't exclusive of each other. No doubt a lot of ancient iron was recycled... and perhaps a good many pots and pans have been used for killing people! Xn4 23:35, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Metal was uncommon enough in the Middle Ages, even though far more iron was produced than in earlier times. There was more iron around in the Early Middle Ages (aka Dark Ages) than during Antiquity. What kind of metal artefacts would ordinary people have? A knife, perhaps an axe or an adze, possibly a spit and a skillet, but that's more or less it. No iron ploughs, not even iron-shod ones. Cranes and other "machines", carts and ships(carvel-built, held together by wooden tenons or ropes or both) contained little or no metal. Apart from bronze statuary, and other decorative uses, the main uses of iron and bronze must have been weapons and armour. The only mention of iron in connection with civil machinery that I could find in a cursory look through Landel's Engineering in the Ancient World was the lewis, used when lifting stone blocks into place.

Roll forward to the Viking Age and clinker-built ships could contain up to 80 kg of iron nails and rivets. Horses, sometimes even oxen, were shod. Iron domestic artefacts became more common as time went on. Especially in northern Europe, where bog iron was a renewable resource if managed, iron production in the "Dark Ages" was on quite a large scale. The area around Møssvatn (in Hardanger I think), perhaps not very typical, is reckoned to have produced 4 tons of iron a year in Viking times and production only ended when there were no more trees for charcoal. Even so, wooden and earthenware domestic objects were far more common than metal ones. But in "antiquity" some places had more iron than others. Han China, for example, had cast iron, poor quality it's true, but suitable for cheap(ish) domestic objects. Angus McLellan (Talk) 00:54, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually, a great many murders in the Middle Ages were caused by the violent misuse of agricultural implements, just as peasants in rebellion used pitch-forks and the like! Indeed, the very weapon that brought the English victory over the Scots at the Battle of Flodden in 1513, the brown bill, was originally designed as an agricultural tool. Clio the Muse (talk) 01:01, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Pots and pans were made of pottery not iron. Bronze was more expensive than iron and was used for jewellery and mirrors. As Angusmclellan said, metal was used for knives, axes and other tools but not ploughs (which were made of wood).
Sleigh (talk) 05:31, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

crude oil consumption

Where can I find out which candidate has used the most crude oil during their campaign so far? --Schaum 17:54, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd say that is a pretty impossible task and likely to yield highly biased results. Where do you want to put the cut-off for using crude oil. For their own transportation? Including staff transportation? Hotel room heating/cooling? etc. Are you going to count the crude oil expended in transporting their breakfast fruit? How about the crude oil that the farmer used to grow and harvest it? ... As you can see this list is endless. Crude oil is also processed into various products with varying efficiency, so how would you quantify that? Lisa4edit (talk) 19:23, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm using the same standard which the candidates are using to promote a reduction in crude oil price. --Schaum 00:51, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm unaware of any such "standard." Care to point it out? -- Kesh (talk) 21:50, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

A picture of the world?

Thank you for your brilliant answer to my question on Epicurus, Clio. I now return to Wittgenstein. Can you, or anyone else, tell me where exactly he gets the notion, used in the "Tractatus", that language gives us a picture of the world? I'm not even sure that I fully understand his argument. Jet Eldridge (talk) 18:40, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Hello, again, J E. Wittgenstein derived the idea from a newspaper report about a court case, where model cars were used to represent an accident. In other words, they pictured what had happened. More important, they shared the same logical form, in that both obeyed the rules of logic. So, the model cars (language) could also be used to describe all possibilities, everything that had built up to that particular outcome. But they could not describe two cars occupying the same space at once, or one car occupying two separate spaces at once. Logical form prevented this-both in reality and in language. Language, then, consists of pictures of reality, when analysed down to its atomic proportions. It is in this way that propositions can represent the whole of reality, all facts, because propositions and reality have the same logical form. Clio the Muse (talk) 01:12, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Edward II and Gaveston

Beyond popular prejudice is there any evidence that Edward and Piers Gaveston had a homosexual relationship?86.157.195.94 (talk) 19:19, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

In short, no. This is a very interesting section from the ODNB:[1]

"Contemporary chronicles describe the prince of Wales's love for Gaveston in such terms as ‘immoderate’, ‘excessive’, and ‘beyond measure’, and it has been generally assumed that the two men developed a homosexual relationship. Recently, however, it has been suggested that they had entered into a compact of adoptive brotherhood. The extant records will bear either interpretation, although neither can be proved; in any case it is clear that by early 1307 the future Edward II was emotionally bound to Piers Gaveston more deeply than he was ever to be to any other person. This bond of affection was to have grave consequences for both men, and for the kingdom as a whole."

PeterSymonds | talk 20:23, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

There's no conclusive evidence that they had sexual relations, and there's no conclusive evidence that they didn't. It's hardly "prejudice" to suspect that the greatest affectional commitment in Edward's life might have had a sexual component. One could as easily impute prejudice to those who are skeptical as to those who are not - indeed, more easily, as their prejudice comports with the prejudices most generally found. - Outerlimits (talk) 23:29, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

The Humanities Desk is a becoming a little like the Eternal Recurrence! Anyway, this is another road I have travelled in the past, and here is what I said. Clio the Muse (talk) 01:25, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Ah, beloved Piers! I said recently with reference to a later king that the question of his alleged homosexuality was one that could not be subject to any test of evidence; that it was essentially unknown and unknowable. This is also true of Edward II, though to a far lesser degree, and there is enough material to make out a good circumstantial case, if one were so minded. So, at my peril, here it is.

Piers was introduced into Edward's household by his father, seemingly as a suitable role model for the young prince. Later the Chronicle of the Civil Wars of Edward II was to claim that an immediate bond formed between the two; that Edward felt such regard that "he tied himself against all mortals with an indissoluble bond of love." The first contemporary reference we have is from a letter written by Edward himself in 1305, after the King had reduced his household, separating him from Gaveston and Gilbert de Clare, another young knight. In this he urges his sister Margaret to persuade Queen Margaret their step-mother, to intervene with the King to allow both men to return-"If we had those two, along with others we have, we would be greatly relieved of the anguish which we have endured and from which we continue to suffer from one day to the next."

Both were eventually restored, but in 1306 Gaveston was banished for unspecified reasons. He was only allowed to return after the King's death in the summer of 1307. It is now that expressions of disquiet become ever more evident in the sources, including that given by the Vita Edwardi Secundi. Robert of Reading goes even further in the Flores Historiarum, saying that Edward entered into 'illicit and sinful unions', rejecting the 'sweet embraces of his wife.' In the Chronicle written by John of Trokelowe, Edward no sooner brought his new bride, Isabella of France, to England after their marriage at Boulogne in 1308, than he rushed to greet Gaveston, showering him with 'hugs and kisses.' During the Queen's coronation Edward's attentions to Gaveston, and his neglect of his bride, caused her uncles, Louis de Everaux and Charles de Orleans to storm out in anger. That same summer Isabella wrote to Philip the Fair, her father, complaining of ill-treatment.

The final piece of evidence comes in the spring of 1312 when Edward fled in the company of Gaveston from the Baronial forces of Thomas of Lancaster, abandoning jewels, plate and his pregnant wife in his haste.

None of this amounts to a conclusive case-and one always has to be mindful of the bias in Medieval sources-, but it shows both an astonishing lack of judgement and degrees of intimacy with a single individual that exceeds all reasonable fraternal bonds; a degree of intimacy that would seem to go beyond mere considerations of personal loyalty. Edward was a king who came close to losing his throne not for the love of a woman but for his love of a man, in whatever form that was expressed. Clio the Muse (talk) 01:25, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Archaeology

Comment on the view that iron technology is not indigenous to sub-Saharan Africa.82.206.239.131 (talk) 20:34, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Iron_Age#Sub-Saharan_Africa would indicate that that's not true. Corvus cornix_talk 21:55, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, what is different in s-S Africa is that they skipped the Bronze Age and went straight to iron. Johnbod (talk) 15:23, 6 May 2008 (UTC)