Humanities desk
< May 9	<< Apr \| May \| Jun >>	May 11 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Humanities Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

May 10 edit

Carlist and the Pragmatic Sanction of 1830 edit

Was the Pragmatic Sanction of 1830 created with a mind to the tradition of Spanish male-preference cognatic primogeniture?--The Emperor's New Spy (talk) 01:51, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

According to our article, yes. The succession of the Bourbon monarchs of Spain was an open question; Spanish tradition allowed daughters of the King to inherit if there was no sons; in fact the various Spanish kingdoms had numerous regnant queens throughout history. The problem came when the Bourbons (a French dynasty) inherited. The French did not allow women to inherit (or even to trace a line of inheritance through a woman). It wasn't a problem until Ferdinand had two daughters and became very sick; he didn't want his brother to inherit, so he made explicit that he would follow Spanish (not French) tradition in the matter. --Jayron32 02:24, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Kangar paintings edit

Ok folks, any art experts up for a challange?

Recently, I took another look at File:Shamirpu1.jpg

and found an identical artwork was mentioned here:

http://blog.artoflegendindia.com/2010/12/kangra-paintings-painting-art-of-kangra.html

Is the image a specfic work, if so whose the artist? Sfan00 IMG (talk) 08:16, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

You'll find the details you need here: http://www.artoflegendindia.com/summer-p-4293.html

From the description: "This beautiful Indian painting "Summer"of Kangra style, depicts ... an illustration from a baramasa (the twelve months) series of the month of March-April, which is the first month of the traditional Indian calendar. The verses describe the splendor of the blossoming spring landscape and the sexually exhilarating effect of the season on peacocks and maidens. The painting depicts Krishna standing on a garden terrace with Radha who is trying to persuade the blue skinned lord to stay with her rather then goes traveling during the month. In the background of the painting is a landscape."

You will see that the painting is attributed to a Mr Gopal, and is described as being in the style of Kangra painting. I suspect that it's simply a modern painting in a classical style, rather than an original piece from the 17th-19th century.

RomanSpa (talk) 09:40, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

You will note that the description is wrong, as the picture does not actually contain any peacocks, sexually exhilarated or otherwise. RomanSpa (talk) 09:41, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

RomanSpa, the description doesn't say the picture contains any peacocks, just that the poem it accompanies does. Rojomoke (talk) 11:54, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Excellent point. I was obviously too exhilarated myself. :-) RomanSpa (talk) 11:56, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

OK Tagged the file above as F7 (given that it's not an old image.), There are presumably public domain examples of Kangara paintings? Sfan00 IMG (talk) 10:07, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Schools making kids tour hardened Correctional facilities edit

I've been reading and watching videos about crime and punishment especially in the U.S. And I can't help wondering, if kids from neighborhoods with a history of youth delinquency were made to see these facilities for themselves, surely the experience would deter them. In particular just imagine being made to tour a facility such as Angola, in Louisiana. Perhaps this would solve the problem of 'black ghettos' which have a reputation of broken families leading to a cycle of youth pregnancy, gangs, narcotic abuse etc that seems to repeat generation after generation.

So my question is are as follows.

1) Have trips to correctional facilities been organised before?

2) Does it offer a deterrent to individuals especially in areas with a history of juvenile gang violence, homicides, robberies etc.

3) Would shipping kids off to see how bad it is getting locked up really be a feasible deterrent.

4) Would it likely have the support of voters. This might be a bit more complicated though in areas with racial tensions.

5) What loop hole could be used to justify such trips (part of humanities classes, or some other class)

If all else fails, it begs the question. What is prison in the U.S. If it's not a deterrent then it's simply punishment. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.6.96.72 (talk) 10:15, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Students studying Legal Studies at the higher levels in Australian high schools do such visits, but that's a somewhat special subset of students.— Preceding unsigned comment added by HiLo48 (talk • contribs)

As for 3) the problem is that kids are really poor at risk assessment, especially when it comes to things that might happen in the far future. If you tell kids that smoking might kill them ten or twenty years in the future, it wont stop them from smoking. But tell them that smoking damages your complexion right away, and it will have an effect. I'm sure that we have an article on that, but my wikipediasearch-fu has failed me. Sjö (talk) 10:45, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

For (1), you want them to be Scared Straight! and Beyond Scared Straight. Clarityfiend (talk) 10:50, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

With America having 24% of the world's prison population, you might consider that putting so many people behind bars is part of the problem. See United States incarceration rate and list of countries by incarceration rate. Ssscienccce (talk) 11:51, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

15-25% of America's prisoners are unfazeable psychopaths physiologically incapable of feeling fear or anxiety who would literally disembowel a child with a chainsaw if it's the easiest way to get a dollar and feel that's normal. Only if they don't think that they're going to get caught, though. Some amount of the rest are sadists, who do have empathy but their victims' pain of sodomy causes the same feelings in them as our love's affection or cunnilingus reaction does to us. Remember that American who caught teen boys and killed them with injections of acid into their conscious brains? Clearly we are doing a good job. Despite having the same genes as everyone else we have more broken homes than industrialized Europe and East Asia because they didn't have slaves which they never helped enough and are more advanced. Many of the rest are only in for drug addiction and should be in rehab. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 12:51, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

1. Got a source for the claim in that first sentence, and for "we are doing a good job"? 2. Europe had slaves for much longer than the USA. HiLo48 (talk) 17:59, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

1. The very fact that such numerous parasitic intraspecies predators are not in public means we are doing a good job. We can simulataneously be doing a bad job in other areas (even the remaining intraspecies predators). 2. Europe didn't have slaves, they sent them to colonies. The land was developed, they didn't need them. If you mean pre-Columbian slaves, now bear with me but this is why descendants of European nations' slave are much different than many (most?) others': Many soldiers who were stationed in a war zone on the Empire's edge for years gained a desire for marriage. The pale, light haired, light eyed natives were considered exotic and angelic ("they're not Angles they're angels") So they married them and introduced genes for those things. Even if they were all slaves and for some reason she isn't freed for decades after marriage (doubt it), the head of the household was in a respected social class of freemen. Who would want their child to be their slave? So I think for the sake of the father the children would not be slaves, thus removing the last ways to tell by sight if someone was a slave descendant for discrimination purposes. For different reasons, both the non-slaves (except for the luckiest) and the slaves became serfs, apparently Christians freed their slaves by 1000 and the Slavery in the British Isles1100s in England]]. Europe isn't well known for Jim Crow-type "former slave as opposed to former peasant" laws. If some felt like discriminating against them they would have to go through the effort to keep tabs on who was born from whom and prevent fusation by intermarriage. I think even power-obsessed pagan Romans who looked down on slaves didn't discriminate against their descendants as much as America did. Anyway the two groups probably completely fused from intermarriage. And most people still lived close to the subsistence level. (farming) It did not effect things that the free had a 10,000 year head start. Descendants of US slaves however had middle class whites to catch up to, were strictly subjugated till the 60s (see Jim Crow), and some were still serfs for crying out loud. (Though controlled — (the general population would choke you to death if you killed or raped a white person)). Then they were suddenly "freed" without help during a social revolution (against "the Man") and maybe like a sixth or something became criminals. Many left the Jim Crow area then. The median net worth of black households is $4,955 in 2010, or about 4.5% of whites ($110,729). [1] Without socialism, inequalities persist forever, as edges are the edge to gain a bigger edge. Do you play chess? When I had slightly more than a player that's hard to beat (he started with 1 bishop), it doesn't seem overwhelming at first, but he started to lose stuff faster than me until finally I had way more. I could've taken every piece if that was the winning condition. It's like that, except with gain instead of attrition. (G-d, even my dad has 4 times the usual black household's money, and he buys $1,825/yr of lotto and tries his obsession with contrarian stock shorting whenever he has much more than now)

That figure still leaves (up to) two thirds you're not sure about, just in the quarter you seem to be sure about. That's about 230,000 individual brains you deemed not worth counting with one hyphen. If a source does exist to back that up, it's not worth much. InedibleHulk (talk) 22:32, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

HiLo48, InedibleHulk: From the University of Chicago article Psychopaths are not neurally equipped have concern of others: "20 percent to 30 percent of the male and female U.S. prison population." (maybe jailing of drug users getting less favor has increased the number?). This is remarkably effective as the source says psychopaths are only 1% of the general population and the extreme concentration would be higher were it not for those able to get lots of cash with less risk from law, politics, or business. Can't gain or enjoy cash/power/belt notches in jail. (That's all they live for.) 120 IQ suffices for those jobs. (Where do you think so many criminal defense lawyers come from? The very fact that such numerous parasitic intraspecies predators are not in public means we are doing a good job. We can simulataneously be doing a bad job in other areas (even the remaining intraspecies predators).

You want sources? I got sources. [2] In 2012, there were 1,341,797 state prisoners. Of these, 222,738 were in for drug offenses, 55,013 who were only convicted for possession. 717,861 serving time for violent offenses, 249,574 for property offenses (like stealing, embezzling etc. I guess), 142,230 for public order offenses (which include weapons, drunk driving, court offenses, commercialized vice, morals and decency offenses, liquor law violations, and other public-order offenses), and 9,392 for other/unspecified.

There were 196,574 federal prisoners. Of which 99,426 were in for drug offenses, 11,688 for violent offenses, 11,568 for property offenses, and 72,519 for public order offenses (of which 23,700 were sentenced for immigration offenses, 30,046 for weapons offenses, and 17,633 other public order offenses). Out of 1,538,371. It doesn't say who's in for "possession and buying only" or selling un-violence tainted pot (i.e. Holland seeds). So, assuming every "other/unspecified", immigrant, and drug inmate should be set free (even the drug lords) gives an unrealistic upper bound of 355,256 who don't deserve to be there (all the others seem deserved to me). Assuming only the immigrants and 55,013 state "possessers only" an unrealistic lower bound of 78,713. So the amount of American prisoners who shouldn't be there is only somewhere between 5-23 percent, I'd guess about 14. What did misplaced liberal sympathy really cause you to think our backwards safety net and drug laws cause an overwhelming % of the inmates?

As a further help to my position, the police here touch you about 12 times a year if you're young, black, male and live in a high crime area (only with the back of the hand though). They often find drugs. But they also attempt to buy drugs. If he falls for it, they arrest the drug dealer (after multiple buys). And the dealer is in many more sales than the user, and has to be in the street with drugs for hours while the addict goes home. So he is more likely to get caught. Also, when drug dealers get incarcerated, desperately poor men looking to get rich take their place, planting a new crop of deserving drug prisoner. The only limit is running out of ballsy people with sufficiently low empathy. That's never happened.

Even more no one is in state prison for an event that happens in more than one state (say, selling drugs online), and I guess the federal drug police is more likely to arrest big producers/dealers/importers than people who only buy and use, so the percentage of federal drug inmates who are just users is probably lower. What, did misplaced liberal sympathy really cause you to think that our backwards safety net and drug laws cause a huge percent of inmates? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 12:30, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I personally have no sympathy for guilty prisoners. (except victimless crimes) There's emergency rush food stamp application processing, no ID needed, just your fingerprint to prevent milking the people, and no immigration checks). And homeless shelters that try to find you a job. It's not like you're going to starve to death in America if you don't rob someone. Most criminals know that the amount of suffering they cause is more than the amount to how much suffering they feel, often way/outrageously out of proportion, enough to be called intraspecies predators and/or parasites and thus human garbage. I really doubt all those who defraud every day and make mothers cry are so sensitive they would literally cry all their life if they had to work, for example. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 12:30, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I did consider (most of) what you said. Rather than get into it, I surrender, retaining my distrust of statisticians. Perhaps if we'd met on YouTube, we'd have had an epic chat. But somebody's trying to learn the other thing here. InedibleHulk (talk) 05:49, 14 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Are you including the citizenry of North Korea in that count? There, pretty much the entire nation is incarcerated. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:53, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

As for the effectiveness of long prison terms, it does seem to work in one respect, "removal from society". That is, while incarcerated, most criminals are unable to commit crimes on society outside the jail. They can, of course, still attack each other and the guards, and could theoretically commit wire fraud, but there are protections against that. A drug kingpin could also arrange killings and such from behind bars. But, your average house thief won't be breaking into any homes while incarcerated. StuRat (talk) 21:22, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sure the Aztecs before us could give many an explanation for how their sacrifices made the Sun rise each day. Much the same thing, for the same reasons, by people thinking the same way. Perhaps the same things will end it. Wnt (talk) 22:02, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The one theory has nothing to do with the other. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:08, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I'll admit, I'm not an expert on the ancient Aztecs ... but I bet that a lot of their ideas about the merits of forced sacrifice and the sort of smug satisfaction in imposing it on the lower races would seem very familiar to American judicial tradition. Prison is ultimately a religion - it doesn't teach anything, doesn't do anything, costs a fortune, we know full well other countries do without it, but nobody cares, because it's some kind of divine moral duty to inflict pain on people. Wnt (talk) 22:17, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I should add that the OP's suggestion sort of plays into this - its something done to those people from those neighborhoods for their "own good", in the futile expectation that teaching kids to expect prison as normal for their class - and race - won't inure them to the idea. Meanwhile, no government has the money to offer basic support to the hookers they find on the street, or immediate access to drug rehabilitation, or to offer equal (let alone better) patrols for the poor neighborhoods as for the wealthy; but they can afford to put people who sell "look alike substances" in jail so that you can count on your right to drive into a slum where you've never been before and probably the person selling you dope is selling the real thing. Not to mention, of course, the broader range of funds to keep the drugs illegal and the neighborhoods run by gangs in general. Nobody really cares about what those people have to deal with - they care about their own crooked bottom line, their employment in the industries that the present system creates, and keeping their own neighborhood nice. So it's like any cruel pagan rite, all unreasoning belief in magic around a rotten core of privilege and deception. Wnt (talk) 22:24, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

1. doesn't teach anything: Teaches them exactly how inconvenient or not society's punishment for their crimes (convicted or not) feels like to them personally, an amount you philosophically have to experience to be sure. (they already know how good the crimes made them feel). Then they can compare. While useful lessons in themselves (most rookie criminals estimate this balance to their favor) Hopefully it's not worth it enough to dissuade them completely. Also teaches them what their victims felt. 2. doesn't do anything: Keeps them from fucking raping your child 3. we know full well other countries do without it: No countries have 0 prisons. Maybe Vatican City. I'm sure you mean macrostates. I'm being called out for inaccuracies that look like 2<4 compared to how ridiculous that statement is. Also, America has the highest crime rate of any industrialized country so other countries can do with less. 4. it's some kind of divine moral duty to inflict pain on people: who being the most stoic humans would otherwise would have no incentive to not inflict pain first, nor way to stop them. I once read that it is impossible to punish a psychopath. They only be punished by pain in the present. He would defraud again the second it stopped hurting bad. (Only if he thinks he won't get caught.) (Their motto) (And mantra). Also, they have very high pain tolerance. I read a book by a poker cheat. "What to do if you get caught" starts with "It is very hard to beat a man to death, only six men can geometrically beat you up at the same time and it takes ten minutes. Scream, beg, exaggerate, do anything to get them to stop, if there is blood, let them see it" and then says that a beating means you haven't practiced your cheating enough, how to know when it's about to happen, throw anything behind you when you run away, say that you'll call the police cause beatings are punished more than fraud, how to position your car to escape fastest, and abandon property in view (buy fake car keys) to try to get them to think you're not escaping.

5. patrols: Bear with me: I spent 2013 where I didn't want to go outside without sun at first and ended up sliding to 45,50 minutes after sunset. Otherwise, I got off at the part of the train that allowed me to stay in a stream of people all the way to the lobby and didn't even do this after 10. At first, the lobby lock was a decades old magnet so huge it looked like it could stop a car. The public areas are almost 100% covered by cameras. A man was murdered 150 feet from my bed only 7 years before. There are When I bought a TV, I held it such that the only ways to grab and run were forcing 8 fingers open or pulling it out the side. An average build man assertively/no nonsense grabbed my TV (still sealed) without hesitation, did a uniform rather hard pulling force for half a flight of stairs while repeating "packajay" (like I'm supposed to know what that means), before making a sigh of exasperation and giving up. (I don't get it, if he turned his back to run up (weighed down by 16 lb, no less), I would've lunged and grabbed his ankles. The faster he was, the harder he would slam to the stairs from momentum, giving me enough time to give a punch to his balls then a kick to be sure, regained my entire non-computer wealth and moved out. Maybe he wanted a dollar to porter for the skinny Asian?) Someone across the courtyard tossed his trash up to 20 pounds at a time from very high windows. Then he got even lazier. As soon as I heard a second of "bag air resistance sounds" I thought "OMG, even the wind will be loud. This one's gonna be big." BOOM! (He had found larger bags and stuffed the to I would guess 40 pounds) Bottles from that height sound like pistols followed by 0.2-0.3 seconds of glass sounds. Landlord stopped this cause he had to pick up hundreds of pounds of "garbage explosion fields" and finely broken glass. (But not the person who poured fluid out the window every night). The moderately small supermarket had plainclothes security and wouldn't let you in without holding your bags. Because too many people would steal. This made the prices higher.

Okay, Brownsville would make this look nice, (Look here in Google SV.. depressing), but that's a poor neighborhood, right? However, if I walked a mile (round trip) I usually saw two (occupied) police cars. Sometimes one. Once I saw three, (but only cause 1 stayed still). This was the only place I ever saw a police van. The only time I attempted to be out after 10, I ran to a garbage can 125 feet away at 1:30 Saturday night constantly looking for persons exiting and was going to abort if I saw a human. In those 0.4 minutes of observation I saw a police armored truck that looked straight out of Iraq. The lights reminded me of this

, the windows looked.. military, bulletproof. (small, rectangular, and thick as hell). It looked almost like a police tank. That's alot stronger patrolling than the poorest law-abiding newer immigrant neighborhoods in Queens, a deimmigranting gentrifying one like Astoria, the upper middle class Upper West Side, or the rich Upper East Side. They put the polices where they are needed. In the 90s they doubled the police in the exploding garbage neighborhood, purged many crooked cops, and overhauled their strategy. As a result, I didn't see crack selling where it used to be easy and murdering is down like 80%. And as police nationwide like to copy the NYPD's success they might patrol the poor near you, too.

Remember my slave comment? The worst immigrant neighborhoods are made of people descended from slaves. The room broker the room broker with a share of a business has to put toilet paper in a garbage bin because it clogs her toilet. So did my second place there. (the shit survives two flushes) Her landlord never fixes it or she doesn't ask. She doesn't mind. And they're only partly descended from slaves. (The only country founded by a slave master massacre is almost 100% former slaves and is the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere, though probably richer than the slaves were) Worst than that are people descended from U.S. slaves. At least immigrants are not a random sample of their country (though some are illegal or evaded conviction at home, the government won't allow persons of bad moral character to immigrate. G-d, you have to jump through so much hoops to come here legally, I think many criminals would give up). The poorest safe neighborhoods are made of new school immigrants not descended from slaves. (old school=Italian, Irish..) I never felt unsafe walking at 3am there. This is why America has so much crime, their former slaves have to spend when a brain is deplasticizing in a slum with no father, a slutty mother and beatings from her thuggish boyfriends and/or own mother, making them hate women. All this crap reduces empathy or makes them sadists/masochists/sadomasochists depending on genes. It seems reasonable that many others would be traumatized (I don't know) but no one seems to talk about that. (Maybe I can't get past my post-5 year old brain paradigm of what would happen). Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 12:30, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Back to the original question - an educational charity in the UK called The No Way Trust organises some limited prison visits for children over 13,[3] so the idea is not unprecedented. Alansplodge (talk) 22:46, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

It seems if it can be made possibly reasonable regarding psychological consequences it's because of the particularity of Uk schools (School uniforms in England). --Askedonty (talk) 09:20, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

This question is an example of something teachers aren't fans of. Society has a problem it didn't used to have. Families are dysfunctional. Let's ask the schools to fix it. But what do we want the schools to spend less time on? Mathematics? HiLo48 (talk) 09:27, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

No, math isn't redundant to four or five entire TV channels. Get rid of American history, and everything else on the Discovery network. Nobody needs to know who Thomas Jefferson was. That's hobby info, like knowing how nautiluses work. Got your whole life to learn that, no rush. If they still teach animals in school, scratch that, too. Discovery's got you covered, even in prison. InedibleHulk (talk) 10:27, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

1. What's wrong with giving people a variety of enriching experiences, from the personal interests of a variety of people, that they might never have again? You can never get the childhood wonder again. There is just so much stuff I'm glad I saw that I never would've known or even cared about if they didn't insist on showing it to me. 2. Two times more math will not teach them math twice as fast, or do you want less school to balance? 3. An educated populace is a more informed populace. They teach history because they don't want it to repeat itself and they want them to be able to recognize parallels with the events and politicians of the next 50-70 years (after that they'll be dead). Do they teach NHL trivia in Canada? Also, you get all the more important trivia like who Thomas Jefferson was out of the way early so that you can move on to more obscure trivia like what's a Sasquatch, what the Halifax explosion was and what's a Tridentine Mass. You learn the islands of the world starting from the biggest until you know Flores, and can point out Tambora on a line drawing of coastlines. Learn the water bodies in order until the Bay of Bohai does not feel obscure anymore and you can name it's bays. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 17:34, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't want more math, just thought it would be better gone than history, since they don't teach math on TV. A bit too much of that in school already, too, but kids need the basics. "They" thrive on history repeating itself, and teaching it to hasn't stopped the prisons filling up. We need more (good) music. InedibleHulk (talk) 07:53, 15 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

More music, good idea. The point of music is to improve their taste and creativeness right? I've listened to a lot of Youtube. So I would have things like (the commonest Beethoven most can't name), Vivaldi masterpiece, I just Died In Your Arms Tonight remix, Good for tweens, 60s-like innovation, to expand their mind beyond rap. (If they're too "gangster" for that try more intelligent hardness like this: hard part starts at 0:55) Listen to three minutes of the third one if nothing else. All have new parts till like 50-90%. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 10:57, 15 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Saying that this sort of program would lower crime rates assumes that the reason people commit crimes is because they aren't aware that prison sucks. You mention a "reputation of broken families leading to a cycle of youth pregnancy, gangs, narcotic abuse," and it seems to make a lot more sense to tackle those problems directly. Katie R (talk) 12:35, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, right after posting I realized this was more of a debate/discussion type of response... Feel free to hat this, especially if it triggers more of a debate that doesn't really answer the question. Katie R (talk) 12:37, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I imagine that when a 250lb rapist is aroused by your 8th grade male butt (yech!) and "makes it impossible to not know" that's gotta make a normal person say I'm never going to live here. But if the studies show it increases crime then they're righter than me. (Maybe by tightening what seems realistic away from the good and bad ends?) Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 10:57, 15 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Anyone have access to the following Italian source? edit

I don't know if this is the correct place to ask this, but here it goes. Does anyone have access to the following Italian source?

Zamagni, V (ed), Come Pedere la Pace e Vincere la Guerra, Il Mulino, Bologna, 1997

An editor (developing a reputation for fabrication, plagiarism, and misusing sources) has input information into an article from this source, but refuses to provide any additional information or verify what exactly has been said. From what I can make out, as I do not speak Italian and was only able to find the intro online, the book is a collection of six essays each from different authors.

The editor claims that on page 53, one of the historians states "Italy's limited incursion into south-eastern France had been, despite initial setbacks, relatively successful from a military, strategic and political point of view." (pulled from the article, so I do not know if it was a direct quote from the book).

If anyone has access to this source, can they please clarify:

If the above was stated on page 53
If so, why (what is the greater context)
Which of the six historians actually stated the above

Thanks for your timeEnigmaMcmxc (talk) 11:12, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Resource exchange might be a good place to ask. --ColinFine (talk) 11:05, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks very much Colin, I will try there.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 21:15, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The references state that the first article in the collection, Un’analisi macroeconomica degli effetti della guerra, by V. Zamagni, is on pp 13-54. --Pp.paul.4 (talk) 05:57, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

UK Base rate vs lending rates edit

Hi there, I am trying to find historical information on banks' (mortgage) lending rates vs the base rate. For instance if the base rate rises up to 2-3% I am interested in what kind of lending the banks will offer based on old data. I am also interested in anecdotal evidence from anyone (obviously knowing this does not constitute advice in any way) Thanks 82.17.99.92 (talk) 12:09, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A couple of links with what I think you are looking for, the first one has a nice graph too. Base rates and bank interest rates, Graphs > UK Interest Rates - HousePriceCrash.co.uk. DuncanHill (talk) 15:42, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Venetian ceremonial galley of the 1700s edit

I've been working on galley for quite a while and I've looked a lot at images of the bucentaur. In many paintings in from the 1700s, there is a very large, bright-red galley moored bow first in front of the Molo on Saint Mark's Square. It's on paintings from the 1730s up to the 1780s and is always depicted covered (as though not unused at the time). In seems to be the same vessel in each of the paintings, or at least the same design. Here are the paintings:

Considering it's size and position, it's obviously not a normal war galley or anything like that, but rather a vessel of official improtance. Does anyone know the identity of this particular galley?

Peter ^Isotalo 13:23, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Who was David Murdoch referenced on page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_frontier#Prostitution edit

On the above page there was a quote attributed to "David Murdoch" and I am curious who he is / was. The quote: "No other nation has taken a time and place from its past and produced a construct of the imagination equal to America's creation of the West". Again, the source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_frontier#Prostitution 71.57.135.253 (talk) 18:33, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

David Hamilton Murdoch, who Amazon identifies as "Principal Teaching Fellow in the School of History at the University of Leeds". The book was published in 2001; a search of Leeds' website suggests he no longer works there. -- Finlay McWalterᚠTalk 19:18, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I was about to answer this with: "Well, David Murdoch is just this guy, you know?" :>) Blueboar (talk) 20:22, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

He was born 1937, which suggests probably now retired: VIAF. Publications seem to be heavily about American history, and that book in particular seems to have been well-regarded. Andrew Gray (talk) 13:26, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Female United States Navy SEALs edit

Am I correct in reading that only males are eligible to be in the United States Navy SEALs? That's what it says in United States Navy SEAL selection and training. If that's the case, how does the federal government get around the discrimination laws against females? Has this situation ever arisen (i.e., a female contesting this rule), or not as of yet? Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 22:57, 10 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I googled "why are navy seals only men", and it came up with a Navy FAQ[4] which says that it's a legal restriction. And if you check out some of the additional references, you'll find justifications along with the fact that it's under discussion. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:17, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. What "additional references" are you referring to? Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 00:54, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The references you can see when you google "why are navy seals only men". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 02:01, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, OK. You mean the other "hits" that come up in that Google search. I thought you meant that there were references in that Navy FAQ article; and I did not see any there. Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 04:02, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, that's what I meant. You get a reasonable cross-section of opinions on the matter. The bottom line seems to be that the nature of the SEALs is not conducive to having women in the mix. And one site pointed out that at least 99.9 percent of American men aren't qualified to be SEALs either. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:38, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know if there has ever been an actual case of a woman challenging the regulation... but for what it's worth, there has been a fictional account (See: G.I. Jane). Blueboar (talk) 13:46, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The question would come down to whether there's a constitutional right to be a SEAL, or at least to try out for the job. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:23, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Congress has the constitutional authority “To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces.” U.S. Constitution, Article 1, Section 8, clause 14. Capitalismojo (talk) 15:39, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Here is a good overview of the issue from the Congressional Research Service. Capitalismojo (talk) 15:41, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The British are debating at this very time; weather or not to allow women to do combat.[5] And why not? I'll stay a block or two away from the wife when she is waving her rolling pin at me. Forget John Wayne and The Green Berets (film). Had she been 20 years older and sent to Vietnam, she would have soon had Hồ Chí Minh begging for forgiveness and promising to buy her a new evening gown. During the Second World War, some of the most fearsome Italian and French resistance operatives were female. So don't think that a woman can't do what a mans got to do (as John Wayne liked to say every time he just got shot in the shoulder and said ah, it just a scratch) (why did he not get shot any were else?).--Aspro (talk) 23:44, 11 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Going into combat is one thing, being a SEAL is another. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:05, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

What is your point?--Aspro (talk) 21:18, 12 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

SEALs are "Special Operations" and many times complete missions that are not 'public record', the SEALS were created with the intent that the President may if he/she wishes disavow them as US military personnel, not to mention deny that any mission or even the SEALs themselves on that mission even exist. SEALs unlike "combat troops" aren't designed have a planned and co-ordinated backup/support/reinforcement force, they may very well be left on the battlefield without even an official claim by Washington.^{Market St.⧏}_{⧐ Diamond Way} 06:14, 13 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Honestly? Is all of that true? Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 15:59, 13 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

That was the original intent, and since many missions are beyond classified one has to ask why?^{Market St.⧏}_{⧐ Diamond Way} 18:47, 13 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Baseball Bugs' "point", such as it is, is that women may be OK as regular combat troops but they are too weak, too indecisive, too damn female to cut it as Navy SEALs. --Viennese Waltz 15:08, 14 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, all. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 15:01, 14 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2014 May 10

Contents