Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2009 March 29

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March 29

Copperheads and heads on pieces of copper

Abraham Lincoln's head appears on the obverse of the Cent (United States coin). This is somewhat ironic, given that the Copperheads (politics) were not exactly Lincoln's friends.

Was this intentional, or is it just one of those ironies of history? SDY (talk) 00:45, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

It's less irony than just wordplay. The referent for the term copperhead is not a head on a copper coin. It's a poisonous snake. Nobody uses the term to refer to heads on a one-cent. Anyway, it was surely not intentional. --98.217.14.211 (talk) 02:09, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

But, of course, the link between poisonous snakes and politicians is a natural one. :-) StuRat (talk) 16:24, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that's a natural link (and is why the politicians got called that!)—but the link between the snakes and the coin... not so natural (it requires the intermediary snakes-politicians link, then needs a politicians-coins link, so three links in all, a perfect recipe for a mixed metaphor). --98.217.14.211 (talk) 00:04, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Lincoln's head first went on a cent in 1909. Query: How vivid, now in 2009, are your own reactions to, say, "John Birch Society", to pick an example equally distant in time from today? Would a reference to "birch" today bring up that phrase for you?--Wetman (talk) 08:02, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

We don't know what he did, but he's our hero just the same. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 19:13, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Speculation

After referencing speculation in a recent refdesk post, I realized that it was an article sorely in need of being taken under my wing. I re-wrote the introduction and am looking for input on the rest. I've created a new discussion on the talk page. Please give me any input you can! NByz (talk) 03:28, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Convention and the Queen's power

If she completely ignored convention and decided to become a supervillain, how much power could the Queen wield? If she had a loyal battalion of troops or some other such cliche, could she close down Parliament and become a tyrannical despot? 90.192.223.188 (talk) 03:32, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Technically all laws in Canada have to be signed by the Governor General, the Queen's representative. In practice she (the GG) is largely an independent figure, but in theory, the Queen could exert her influence and stop a law until the constitution could be re-written. NByz (talk) 03:57, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes but in reality Canada and presumably the rest of the Commonwealth would simply cease to recognize her as the head of state. I assume the question is referring to what would happen if she tried that in Britain itself. In which case, there are numerous precedents for getting rid of her. Adam Bishop (talk) 08:01, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I think that claiming the Queen to be unfit to rule would be far more likely. - Jarry1250 ^{(t, c)} 09:08, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

The Bill of Rights 1689 limits the role of the monarch: she can't set up her own courts or legal system, impose taxes, set the army on the population (except in time of war; you might want to check this limitation out in more detail), or interfere with elections and parliament. So she couldn't close down parliament, raise any tax revenues, imprison people without trial or try people in her own courts. --Maltelauridsbrigge (talk) 11:18, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

It's a bit tricky to "simply cease to recognize her as the head of state", Adam. In Australia's case, although the term "head of state" is not mentioned anywhere in our Constitution, it would mean amending the Constitution by referendum; and if we did that alone, we may as well go the whole hog and get rid of the monarchy entirely and become a republic. While she remains the legitimate "heir and successor" of Queen Victoria (the person named in the Constitution as the monarch), she remains our monarch. Even if she goes out and becomes a serial killer, she remains our monarch, because the succession laws say so. The only ways she could cease to be our monarch are: to die; to abdicate (which requires the agreement of all 16 Commonwealth realms); for all 16 realms to agree to an amendment to the succession laws to have her deemed no longer the monarch; or for us to become a republic (which does not need the agreement of the other realms, but does need the agreement of the voters of Australia, and they've already had a say on this question, namely "No"). -- JackofOz (talk) 21:52, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah...my answer was stupid and hasty. Sorry all! Adam Bishop (talk) 22:39, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Building Confidence For Dummies

If I buy and read this book "Building Confidence For Dummies", would I be a very confident dummy afterwards? 122.107.207.98 (talk) 06:29, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

In short, no. The series as a whole is designed to assume no prior knowlege, so technically, all you're supposed to learn is how to be self-confident, without actually being so. Dummy here refers to that particular field, so you'd stop being one of them as well. - Jarry1250 ^{(t, c)} 16:22, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Daniel Asamota's novella 'Cricket Man'

I've seen Daniel Asamota's novella online at his site www.cricketman.net and I want to know if his book is a relevant book on the fine very fine sport of cricket or just some sort of romance novella? His book is only available online and the company does not provide returns so before I buy it, I'd like to know more about what it's about. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.247.5.56 (talk) 06:44, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

It's fiction, so I don't know how relevant it can be on the sport itself -- and in any case, your standards of relevance may not be the same as mine. (In fact, I can pretty much guarantee that they aren't, since I don't follow cricket or much care about it.) Anyway, I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that it's not a very good book. It's published by Xlibris, which does print-on-demand and is uncomfortably close to being a vanity publisher. Furthermore, judging by the excerpts available online, it's kind of obvious that not only is it in desperate need of editing, but it's also pretty ridiculous. That said, people who demand stories about great baseball players who can't catch a break because they're really meant to be playing cricket and get consoled with a little back door action are probably right in the target audience. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 09:33, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Judging from page 4, it's actually fairly bad porn dressed up as fairly bad fiction. --Dweller (talk) 14:19, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, it's certainly a possibility, but I wouldn't say that based on page 4 (by which I assume you mean page 16, at least going by the notation the pages themselves have). If badly written sex scenes were the same thing as porn, a lot of writers would be pornographers. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 16:48, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

What is currency trading and how does it work

I am a student with money sitting in a bank account. After reading through wikipedia a little on currency trading it seems like an interesting idea. Especially more if i can make more than the standard 5% interest the bank gives me off the money but it all seems to be a very confusing concept with a whole set of different numbers to keep track of at one time.

It works something like this right:
I buy 1000 Neptunian Quarks with 1200 Pluto Protons
[this is where the confusion sets in]
At that time the 1000 Neptunian Quarks were worth 1200 in my currency

So i basically sell them back when they're worth more in my currency?
Is that the general gist of it?

A while back (im Australian) i could get 95 american cents (little more than that but this makes math easier) for 1 australian dollar (100 cents). So say i walked into the currency exchange shop (should i even use those shops for this sort of thing) and laid down 1000 australian dollars and asked for american money i would get 995 american dollars. Im right so far?

Even more confusion so many different numbers and rates and bleh..

Now according to xe.com..something..something australian = 1.44 something.. Im assuming it means 1 american dollar is equal to 1.44 australian dollars. So if i kept my 995 american dollars in the sock drawer untill now and sold them at this moment i would make (995*1.44) 1432.8 Australian Dollars? (30% profit i think..)

So say the currency is graphed in this fashion Australian dollars over Currency X (AUD/X) the basic idea is to BUY Currency X when the graph is high and sell currency X when the graph is low? Is that idea reversed when its the other way Currency X over Australian Dollars (X/AUD) Buy when the peaks are low and sell when the peaks are high? Like in this one?

(So, im basically betting on my countries economy tanking(going to hell)? Sounds a bit evil for me lol)

Cheers for the help mates. Kingpomba (talk) 07:55, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, you are basically buying another currency, and hoping that when you go to buy money back the other way, the exchange rate has changed. You can do this by just going to most shopping centeres and buying physical currency. But you are better going with an forex online company, then you can do what is called leveraging. Leveraging works like this: You have $100 AUD, but they will let you leverage an extra $900, to effectively have $1,000. So what happens is if the dollar goes from 1.0 say, to 1.5, instead of making $50 (100 to 150) you will make $500 (becaues the $1000 went to $1500). The downside of this is that if the dollar goes to 0.9 you loose your $100 completely, not just $10. So you can use leveraging to buy more money than you really have, but you are at a much higher risks. Some places let you leverage as high as 200:1. So for example you could by 200*100 = 20,000 USD with $100 Australia. Of course you leave yourself open to massive risk - if it goes against you it takes a change of just 0.05% and you loose the $100, on the plus side if it changes 0.05% in favour, you have doubled your $100. The online systems will work automatically, so if the price drops you may be 'forced out' (they will force cell the money back so you don't end up owning anything. I would recommed 10:1 leveraging and trading your money day by day (ie follow runs that go over weeks/months). Some people can make considerable money leveraging really high if they get on the side of a good run. Imagine $100 leverage 200:1 when the dollar went from 1 USD to 0.65 USD cents. You would make 200 * 35 cents = $70 for every initial dollar invested! Most online sites for forex (google it) will offer free accounts for practive mode with play money. If you can earn money in play money consistently, you can earn money in the real market too. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.111.141.192 (talk) 12:17, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

So say i have 100 dollars and the currency goes from 1.0 to 0.5 and i leveraged 1000 does this mean i owe them $400 more? Kingpomba (talk) 13:54, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Probably even more, as they likely charge a hefty interest rate and fees, too. The interest and fees can make the average return lower for leveraged trading, as they must be subtracted from any gains (or added to any loss). StuRat (talk) 16:14, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

You're actually the second person to ask about currency trading in the last couple of days (See "Let's make lots of money" on the Misc Desk). We discuss triangular arbitrage and bid-ask spreads.

All currencies are traded in pairs. When you trade the pair, you're implicitly both buying one currency and selling another. This results in language like either going "long" (buying the base) or "short" (selling the base) a pair.

Currency markets move very fast and are the most liquid markets in the world. They are technically over-the-counter markets and have no real 'exchange'. In practice, there are always enough people on the buy and sell side that a small individual speculator could treat them like an exchange. They operate 24 hours a day, so you can trade around a regular job. You may, however, find that bid-ask spreads get wider during 'off-peak' times for the countries' currencies being traded.

Most retail speculators access the market through a service like forex.com. These services make money by offering you a slightly wider 'spread' between the bid price (the price you can sell the pair) and the ask price (the price you can buy it). There will always be a spread between bid and ask offers. If there wasn't, transactions would clear at the overlapping price. These consumer services just widen it a bit.

There are two 'business'y kinds of currency players. First, there are banks with customers who want to make transactions in other currencies or to hedge currency exposure (they have a contract that pays out in another currency in several months, and want to lock in today's price). These banks do the most volume of trade on the forex market. Secondly, there are large institutional investors (like pension funds, insurance companies and mutual funds) who want to hedge investments that are either denominated in another currency, or derive their revenue in another currency.

There are also two basic kinds of currency speculators. First, there are 'day-traders' who try to read the momentum of the market. They look for pressures caused by imbalances of supply and demand left by the aforementioned 'big players'. These big players usually aren't as sensitive to price as they are to just getting their client's order filled or hedging their position. Day-traders take advantage of these swings in momentum by riding currencies for periods of anywhere from a few seconds to a few hours. They learn about technical analysis.

The second type of currency speculator tries to make longer-term guesses about currency movements. They look at things like trade imbalances, monetary policy and other government or private actions to determine a long-term direction for a currency. These people mostly learn about fundamental analysis.

Both of these speculative methods are highly dubious for someone who hasn't worked in banks, government policy-making or is a particularly well-educated investor. I recommend using currency markets in the way that businesses and investment managers use them: to hedge investments. I see regular currency day-trading as somewhat a casino - only one you can access 24 hours a day from your own home. If you have a susceptibility to gambling addiction, for example, do not start trading currencies.NByz (talk) 16:55, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

OP, currency trading is one of the fastest-paced, high-risk speculations around. If you are serious, do this: make a log of what trades you would have made, if you were actually trading. Do this for a few months, maybe a year. If, at the end of that time you are pleased with the results, then you might consider risking real money (and, not with a cash money changer). DOR (HK) (talk) 04:04, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

International Waters

Are people allowed to commit 'illegal' acts in international waters? For example can a ship drive to international waters and commit an illegal act, then drive back and be free of presecution free from presecution? Particulary lets say someone transmitts copyright work while in international waters. can they sued once they returned to a country by the owners of there work, or normally would such an act have to take place within that country? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.111.141.192 (talk) 12:08, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Here is the relevant 'straight dope' article

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2250/in-international-waters-are-you-beyond-the-reach-of-the-law

Basically - no you are not free to commit illegal acts. ny156uk (talk) 12:32, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

See also extraterritoriality, although there's not much relevant in that article. --Anonymous, 22:50 UTC, March 29, 2009.

Areas of International law are murky, and I doubt you could be prosecuted by an international authority. Therefore, it will depend on the laws of your country of origin (and which flag you fly on your ship.) If you were to take a ship into international waters and declare yourself a sovereign power (for which I think you'd have to drop anchor, which would be difficult at 24+ miles out) you could write your own laws to say anything you want. The Principality of Sealand has done this. However, you now have a whole new set of problems. For instance, any country in the world could declare war on you and invade. You'd be at the mercy of pirates (but make yourself a pirate haven, featuring such amenities as beast-on-beast combat.) Taggart.BBS (talk) 01:59, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Women in Ancient World

Is there any website that shows a comparison of women in Paleolithic Age, Neolithic Age, Ancient Egypt, Ancient Mesopatamia, Ancient Athens, Ancient Sparta, Hellenistic Period and Ancient Rome? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.14.117.252 (talk) 15:08, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

We have an article on Women in Ancient Rome, including two references. An interesting reference may be Women in Prehistoric Indo European Society, by Paul Proulx (a fellow Canadian?), which can be downloaded from (oops, this is blacklisted, but you will find it via Google). --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 15:59, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't know if you're interested in National Geographic Magazine's interpretation of Neanderthal woman, but...[1] Bus stop (talk) 01:54, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Whenever comparisons are being made anachronically, across time and space, removed from context, inevitable value distinctions like "better"/"worse" "free"/"unfree" are going to be made. This is neither good ethnology nor good history. Tell that to your teacher.--Wetman (talk) 07:56, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

To take just two options of the many possibles, are you interested in what they wore or in their role in their society? And in either case, do you mean rich or poor? Married or unmarried? --Dweller (talk) 14:15, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Who is "Vascavus" ?

I came across a lovely quotation, but I can't find any trace of the author, "Vascavus," anywhere.

"History shows us that when religion and science have a scuffle, religion either is reinterpreted, backs down, or is destroyed."

I've Googled and searched otherwise. The only place I find that name is in one guy's quotations file and as a .sig line another guy uses in a web forum. It doesn't appear in any book digitized by Google or listed by Amazon. It isn't in anything indexed by Google scholar or any of the other search engines I've tried. Wikipedia doesn't know him.

Any clues? Pretty please? Thank you! Cyn 20:24, 29 March 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by TechnoMom (talk • contribs)

Doesn't show up in World Biographical Information System Online, Britannica, Lexis-Nexis, JSTOR or other databases. I think either you have the name wrong, the name is usually much different in English, or it's merely a username someone had and not a real historical person. (There's a "Vaus, John (c.1484–c.1539), grammarian" in the ODNB who they say is also known as John Vascus. Could that be him?) zafiroblue05 | Talk 01:31, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I suggest you sign up the the baptist blog and ask DocStrange where he got his sig from. Two words in the sentence bother me: "scuffle" seems an odd choice for an ancient text or for a translation thereof. And "either" followed by three alternatives, does not work well. There may be an element of chinese whispers going on. --Tagishsimon (talk) 01:49, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Added a link in your posting.

One thing the Internet is very bad for is researching the correct form or author of a quotation. It may be out there, but typically so are many incorrect versions, and usually there's no way to tell what's what. As to this one, I do not believe it is ancient; both the sentiment and the wording have a 20th/21st century feel to them. --Anonymous, 05:30 UTC, March 30, 2009.

This quotation cannot have originated in a classical language, and I suspect it is in fact of very recent origin, in English, in its present form. (The use of 'science' in that sense is a very much post-medieval concept, and the idea that it opposes religion is substantially mid 18th-century or later.) AlexTiefling (talk) 09:40, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

My money would be on Vascavus being another member of the same internet forum. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.18.23.2 (talk) 12:54, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for all your help!Cyn 23:27, 1 April 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by TechnoMom (talk • contribs)