Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2017 September 10

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September 10

House arrest

Due to the hurricanes, a few places in the US has issued mandatory evacuation orders. What about people under house arrest? Seems like they would be facing two conflicting orders from the government: "leave your house, or else" and "don't leave your house, or else". Mũeller (talk) 02:04, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

This question was asked on Reddit recently here and here. Someone found a link to this page from 2015 which says that in this situation they should seek instructions from their parole officer. I have no idea of how reliable that source is, though. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.159.60.147 (talk) 02:59, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

Common sense dictates that the "government" cannot force a citizen to remain in a life-threatening situation, much less one that is imminently life-threatening. And should this rule ("don't leave your house, or else") be violated, no one in the judicial system will care or will "prosecute" or enforce it. One, the government has limited resources; two, the government enjoys prosecutorial discretion; and three, the government has that pesky Constitution to worry about and to uphold. In the USA, that is. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 04:23, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

Parallel situation - when prisoners are being transported by sea and the ship is in danger of foundering the captain will give the order to release the prisoners. This will also happen if fire is raging through a jail. 81.159.253.212 (talk) 08:01, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

Depends what you mean by "release". (And I guess it also depends on what country you are referring to.) If there were a fire in a prison in the USA, I doubt very much that the officials would "release" the inmates. So, the distinction is in the meaning of the word "release". In my view, the word "release" would mean "let these prisoners out of the dangerous area and into some other safer area". I do not think it would mean "let the prisoners leave prison altogether and have their prison sentences ignored or voided". Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 08:18, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

Another thought. If prisoners did indeed get "released" due to a fire, the prisoners themselves would be starting fires left and right all over the prison, in the hopes of getting out. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 15:12, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

• Arrest merely refers to any loss of liberty of movement imposed by the state. You don't stop being under arrest merely because the state has to move you because of an emergency. --Jayron32 12:42, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

Prisons usually have specific plans to deal with fires. Evacuation is not very practical in many prisons, even when the issue of prisoners escaping is put to the side. To go around unlocking hundreds of individual cells takes precious time, so plans usually focus on fast containment of any threat. As to house arrest, there is presumably some plan in place to let the "inmate" know what they're expected to do, and where to go once they evacuate.

For an actual case, Derryn Hinch spent time in home detention whilst awaiting a liver transplant, which was liable to arrive at any time. In that case, he had obviously reached an agreement with the corrections department as to what he would do when "the call" came informing him that a liver had arrived (and it did indeed come during his time in detention). Eliyohub (talk) 14:11, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

Very stupid. One prisoner set fire to bedding in his cell. The air - conditioning system spread the smoke and fumes to other cells. The jailers didn't unlock the doors (they were maybe unaware of the problem) and people died. 92.8.216.51 (talk) 16:29, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

Exactly. Prisoners are not exactly known for being intelligent and having a lot of forethought. Correct? Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 17:03, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

PRINCE2 governance

In U.K. delivery organisations which have Assistant Project Managers, where do they sit on the PRINCE2 governance structure? In my opinion, they are team managers. Am I correct? 90.198.254.50 (talk) 23:33, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

This image: (PRINCE2 Governance Structure) shows where the Project Manager is in the structure, presumably the Assistant would be directly below the Project Manager (in same box). 2606:A000:4C0C:E200:E47B:CDC9:8A2E:CA14 (talk) 02:43, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

Pre-Modern Knowledge of What Was Underwater

What did pre-modern (before the Industrial Age) people know about the sea under the water? What culture or civilization had the most knowledge of the deep sea before modern times?--KAVEBEAR (talk) 23:59, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

Pretty well nothing further than they could dive. Does Deep-sea exploration help at all? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.122.61.201 (talk) 03:04, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

Strange creatures from the deep have been poking above the surface and washing ashore for eons. Whichever culture invented fishing had a good start on marine biology. Who they were, nobody knows. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:28, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

Depth sounding has a history dating back to ancient times. --Jayron32 12:39, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

It's relevant only to the shallower seabed, not the deep, but we have even ancient records (see quotes in our articles about the 426 BC Malian Gulf tsunami and 365 Crete earthquake#Tsunami) noting the bare seabeds that are temporarily visible soon before the arrival of a tsunami; the description of the seabed is particularly detailed in the bit by Ammianus Marcellinus talking about the Crete earthquake. Nyttend (talk) 22:55, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

We allegedly have an old-timey Pliny the Elder account of fish and frogs flying inland in bad weather. Not sure if those were freshwater or saltwater (we don't have sea frogs today), but I'd wager some (maybe most) landlocked tribes would've figured those were underwater denizens, not literally from the heavens, and learned a thing or two about gills and tentacles. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:25, 11 September 2017 (UTC)