Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2010 October 16

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October 16

Where to buy U.S.Army Uniform

Where can I buy an U.S.Army Uniform for Parades and so forth. As a Chaplian for Amvets I would like to have an Army Uniform. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.17.208.20 (talk) 00:15, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Get yourself a phone book and look up your local surplus store. Or go to an online retailer such as US Cavalry. Dismas|^(talk) 00:35, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

do not try to mug a marine for his duds. it's likely that would not work out well for you. --Ludwigs2 03:46, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Correct sir, his clothes might not fit you properly, and it would be a Marines uniform in any case. Googlemeister (talk) 16:02, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

98.17.208.20, as a member of AMVETS, I assume that you are a veteran. By your "Chaplain" mention, are you implying that you are a retired army officer? Do you have access rights to a PX? I understand that there are regulations (10USC771 and 772) which cover the appropriate wearing of uniforms by veterans. Given the nature of your organization, don't you have information officers to help veterans with questions such as this? -- 124.157.218.5 (talk) 07:02, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Jet Putt game

What information is known about the Jet Putt Miniature Golf game produced by Kenner Toys in Cinncinnati Ohio? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Myusernamewho (talk • contribs) 03:21, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia has an article about the toy company. I find no information on the Jet Putt mini golf game which appears to be from 1960-1970. The name is similar to that of the Jet-Putt-Putt speedboay toy made by Alden Novelty (it's not relevant but here is a picture). Cuddlyable3 (talk) 10:13, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Habitability

The St Louis Gateway Arch is described as the tallest habitable structure in Missouri. What criteria are used to determine whether a structure is habitable, as the arch was certainly not designed for anyone to live in it? Rojomoke (talk) 16:14, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

List of tallest buildings and structures in the world defines "habitable" as "frame structures made with floors and walls throughout" (at the bottom of the "Tallest buildings" section); it cites the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat definitions here - that doesn't seem to define "habitable" per se, but does define "Highest occupied floor" - I don't know if "occupied" and "habitable" mean the same. You might like to bring that up on the talk page of that article. -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 16:34, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

I suppose it distinguishes it from radio masts et al which really aren't "habitable" in any sense. Alansplodge (talk) 20:10, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Why the hate?

Have any of you wondered why there's so much hate in the world? I have a YouTube account. When I started exploring that website, I couldn't believe the amount of hate I saw. I wasn't surprised, but I was taken aback by it. It's also strange as to why YouTube/Google would allow the vile hatred to exist. It's their website. How can you hate someone for something they had no control over? I had no control over being born a black male in Brookyn, New York, United States on June 16, 1986 AD. That's how, where, and when God made me. So, how can someone hate me for something I had no control over? It's really sad. B-Machine (talk) 16:49, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

You ask a very deep sociological and anthropological question. I'm sure that you could fill many university courses on such a topic. One book that I would recommend for this question is The Third Chimpanzee by Jared Diamond. It's a really wide ranging book on what makes us human, but there is a section talking about why humans are so xenophobic, why we do terrible things to each other. Basically, it's a trait that's not unique to humans. Other great apes are also observed to kill other members of the species that aren't in the same tribe. There's an evolutionary pressure to assure that your family members survive, and unrelated individuals, even of the same species, do not. It's written from a scientific standpoint, but it's pretty easy for the lay-person to understand (it's also a bit out of date, being written in 1991, but much of it is still valid). Buddy431 (talk) 18:46, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

As Darwin noted, nature is red in tooth and claw. You might almost better wonder why there is so much good in the world! And perhaps our Evolution of morality article is a starting point toward one way of understanding this very complex issue (and yes see also Buddy's book, too!:) WikiDao ☯ (talk) 19:03, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

"Nature red in tooth and claw" is more of a Spencerian sentiment than a Darwinian one, but anyway, the point stands, of course. -- Mr.98 (talk) 21:09, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Nature is actually fairly peaceful; you won't see a fraction of the violence and bloodshed in nature that you see in human interactions. --Ludwigs2 02:40, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Darwin cited Tennyson's line in Origin somewhere, didn't he...? Can't seem to find that right now, but seem to recall Darwin himself using that line, or one like it, somewhere... WikiDao ☯ (talk) 03:42, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Ridiculous. Nature is filled to the brim with violence and bloodshed - all those predators and parasites gotta eat, you know. What's lacking is immorality and hatred. Matt Deres (talk) 04:02, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Can't find it; I guess I must have been thinking of something else, and made that comment in that state of confusion about it. It is a good point, though, about that notion, "survival of the fittest", not being really the way that Darwin would have put it himself. That phrase certainly gets terribly misused and misunderstood, doesn't it? It was the thought that Darwin held a more complex and profound understanding of things that then led me to make the rest of my comment. WikiDao ☯ (talk) 04:05, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Ludwigs speaks as if humanity was something separate from nature. It's not. Whatever humans do, that's natural. If humans happen to constitute the most violent and bloodthirsty species, so be it; some species has to be the worst. But I doubt we are. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 04:16, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

sorry jack, humanity reinvents nature as it goes along; do you think there's anything in nature that remotely reflects warfare, or genocide, or rape, or high school bullying? Our blessing and our curse as a species is that we can consider the world in abstract terms and create fabrications that we convince ourselves are real. And from those fabrications springs a world of joy and pain undreamt of by any other species. --Ludwigs2 05:49, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

• Warfare#Evolutionary psychology: Jane Goodall in 1974 documented what she called a war between groups of wild chimpanzees in the Gombe National Park of Tanzania.
• The challenge of genocide: Genocide, he also notes, is quite common among animal groups – especially in social carnivorous species like lions, wolves, hyenas and ants ...
• Sociobiological theories of rape#Rape as an adaptation among animals: It has long been observed that some animals appear to show behavior resembling rape in humans, such as combining sexual intercourse with violent assault ...
• Dominant Female Mongooses Bully to the Max: Mongoose bullies torture pregnant relatives until victims are forced to leave.

Remote resemblance?-- 124.157.218.5 (talk) 08:24, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Indeed. Ludwigs2, are you saying that the things you mentioned are examples of humans acting extra-naturally? or super-naturally? or even unnaturally? -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 12:15, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

So, you've both just tried to argue that human classification of the acts of animals in terms of human activities means that those activities are factually in the same category. The last place I read that type of argument was in a psych journal article about bestiality, where a subject was explaining how he and his dog were in a mutually committed and consensual relationship because he knew that his dog desired him in the same way that he desired her. Are you sure this is the approach you want to take?

I understand sociobiology, and the discipline does have some interesting things to say. Unfortunately, non-scientists who read sociobiology often make the same mistakes as non-scientists who read Freudian psychology - they assume that low-level inceptive elements determine high-level functioning completely. One can try to define the existence, form, and all the various contents of the internet by referencing the innately biological social vocalizations of Madagascar lemurs and Oklahoma prairie dogs (and I'll confess that lemurs and prairie dogs make more sense than some forums I've seen on the 'net), but one can only do it in such a vastly and grossly distorted way that it becomes effectively meaningless. For the most part, non-scientsts use sociobiology as an excuse from moral cognition (a kind of "look, see? animals do this sometimes, so it must be 'natural'" approach).

• Yes, chimpanzees occasionally fight in small groups, but chimpanzees do not define territory or ideological groups, do not organize different troops together into larger fighting forces, do not programmatically seek out and destroy or subjugate others. They simply fight in groups under certain conditions.
• Yes, social animals will occasionally indulge in drastic breeding strategies (male lions, for instance, will kill or drive off a dominant male from a pride and then kill that male's offspring as well). but no lion would decide that (say) short-maned lions are inferior, and systematically roam the veldt looking for and killing off all short-maned lions.
• Yes, some animals have violent or sneaky forms of sexuality (usually an outgrowth of physical competition between males, or of subordinate males sneaking past dominant males to get at females). But there is no indication that females of these species object to this activity on moral grounds, or that these species have fantasies or fears about such behavior, or that any psychological trauma occurs from such acts, or that these behaviors in any way reflect the conventional understanding of rape used in human societies.
• And yes, lots of animals drive out pregnant females or young males under many circumstances. This is not 'bullying' (a conscious act of tormenting another in order to boost one's own self-esteem), but rather an innate mechanism for population control (groups that drive off excess members will have a higher chance of survival in environments with limited resources, and thus be more likely to pass on their genes).

I mean seriously, folks... the nature of human cognition is that we build overarching conceptual structures that supplant/incorporate whatever inbuilt biological tendencies we have; the essence of moral theory is the investigation into how our inbuilt biological tendencies should be supplanted/incorporated. Rape, warfare, and genocide are all clearly high-level abstract concepts with limited connection to simple biological urges towards sex, self-defence, and genetic inheritance. Are trying to make the argument that rape, war and genocide are morally excusable because of some deeply seated biological mandate? Because that's really the only place this kind of argument can lead, either to moral exculpation for immoral acts or to completely amoral nihilism which claims that anything you 'want' to do is intrinsically moral because of the 'wanting'.

Bit long, that, sorry. --Ludwigs2 18:08, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

You make good points, Ludwigs. I agree in general with what you are saying and with the points Jack et al. are making.

It is not just "biology vs. culture" here, though (although Freud's Civilization and Its Discontents remains worth reading as far as it goes, yes).

There is "good" hard-wired into us, just the same way any other instinct is. See eg. Altruism#Scientific viewpoints: there has been evolutionary pressure for humans to be "good" and that is closely intertwined with cultural pressure toward the same (ie. causality goes both ways, epigenetic behavior is expressed with some plasticity according to cultural environment, etc). WikiDao ☯ (talk) 18:51, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

I think it's fairly clear that being civilized and accepting other people who are different is the "unnatural" state for humans. It takes a lot of work to get to that state. Even in our modern age, when one would think we'd have ever reason and example of the evils of such tribalisms and bigotries, the sentiments still seem to be extremely prevalent, even if in some countries (e.g. America and Western Europe and a few other places) one isn't supposed to raise them in polite company.

As for the internet, it gives people masks. Once hidden behind such masks, people are often eager and willing to do things they wouldn't do if there was some accountability involved. As for YouTube/Google — they will remove posts if they are flagged enough times, but it's a huge problem. Hundreds of thousands of comments are being posted every day — how can they review them all? Should they rely on "dumb" word blacklists? People will just find ways around those and always have. Should they try and make some sort of "authenticated" identification that requires all users to have their "real" identities confirmed and displayed? You'd probably kill the site outright if you tried. It's a non-trivial problem to imagine an effective speech police over so many millions of people, even if one doesn't worry about the problem of deciding what types of speech are to be allowed, how the borderline cases will be handled, and so on. --Mr.98 (talk) 21:09, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

I think the answer is simple: stupid parents produce children who hate various groups. Either explicitly or using subtle means, parents convey to children that they should hold negative feelings to other groups of people—be they the disabled, those of different sexual orientation, those of different religion/no religion at all, those of different nationality etc. Children are disadvantaged in life by their parents inculcating in them negative attitudes, and this is especially so in times when the society in question is trending towards greater open-mindedness in these matters. I think it could be said that America at this time is as fair-handed as it has ever been. At times like these the stupidity of disliking people for irrelevant facts about them is especially stark. My point though is that the origin of the prejudice goes back to the parents, or at least to a narrow, insular society that a child was brought up in. A narrow, insular society can be counteracted by parents who speak out about it—so it still comes back to parenting skills that leave much to be desired. Bus stop (talk) 12:10, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Blaming an endless stream of parents hardly seems to account for the cross-cultural, transhistorical nature of the phenomena. --Mr.98 (talk) 13:35, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Mr.98 - parents are products of their society and more likely a mechanism of transfer, not its source. It is very debatable what power a parent has to "speak openly" about the narrow society that they have to bring up their kids in. Most parents want their children to be happy and successful within societal norms whatever they may be (and even if they are unhappy about the nature of these norms themselves, very few parents would be willing to raise their children in a way which would alienate them to those around them). Having said that, "hate" is an ideological construct and as such is almost never perceived as wholly negative by people who hold these feelings (hate crimes are usually seen as acts of self-defense by those who commit them, everywhere in the world). I suppose sociologically we always need something to hate for a great variety of reasons, and if you took out the human tendency to hate out of the equation, most politicians would be out of their jobs. In addition (and especially when it comes to the Internet), what you call "hate" is also just a very pragmatic solution for people to explain to themselves why their opinion is different from other people's. In other words, hateful comments save a whole lot of energy which would otherwise be invested in broadening one's views, and they also nicely play into the western norms of our society which teaches us that not only are we all allowed to our opinions (which paradoxically is often interpreted to entail the right to ignore everyone else's) no matter how ignorant we may be - but also that freedom is actually defined as the ability to stay that way as long as possible. In other words, "freedom of speech" is defined as "freedom of talking crap" in the 21st century. Which then puts us back to square one as all you can then do is ignore them and find friends who are more like you, therefore becoming a bit like them. Timbouctou 14:56, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Within almost all species, there is a sense of "us" and "them" with "us" generally fighting "them" (even found in migratory birds, ants, bees, almost all wildlife) so why should humans be different? I suspect it is far more innate than "taught" despite the popular song from South Pacific. It is likely simply a survival system in the long run. Even babies seem to distinguish on this basis - a tad frightening to those who think that it is "taught." Collect (talk) 17:21, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Let's not use the word "taught." Let's use the word "conveyed"—it's more vague. Parents don't sit their children down at a blackboard and teach them to be prejudiced. But such a key attribute of personality in the modern world is hardly chosen by accident. Parents have the responsibility to take a stand on the issue of how others are regarded. It is not only a modern parenting responsibility. It has been in the consciousness of humanity for countless generations. Nor can all types of people who are different from the identity of parents and other people with significant input into the lives of the children be lumped together. Parents (and other people with significant input) can certainly be accepting of one grouping of people and disdainful of another. These issues are acute elements in the thinking processes of parents (in their own lives as adults, and apart from their roles as parents). Especially in the modern world, if they want their children to be free of such hindrances as prejudices against various other groups of people—they have to clearly articulate a message conveying the wrongness of such attitudes. The failure to take a stand against prejudice can be interpreted by children as equating to the condoning of it. Bus stop (talk) 17:50, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

We are not Dr. Spock. What we have to deal with is actual innate qualities which have a possible survival benefit. Nothing to do with any preaching at all, alas. Collect (talk) 20:46, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

I'm not "preaching". Those free of prejudices fare better in the modern world. You mention survival benefits. In the modern world the advantage is given to those who function with an open mind to all people. It sounds preachy but I think it is a clear fact.

The OP's question was primarily a wondering aloud as to why anyone would possibly harbor a negative sentiment about him based on particulars that are irrelevant to any of the forms of expression that that hatred may manifest itself as. I am sure that the OP does nothing to provoke such sentiments, therefore it is a very good question, even though hard to answer. My response is to focus squarely on the parents and the general upbringing of such an individual that is a vector of unfounded hate or any negative expressions even of a milder nature. Bus stop (talk) 21:27, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

@Bus stop, see the article Martyr which probably has something for whichever is your belief system. Their unpleasant fates dispel the naive hope that "Those free of prejudices fare better in the modern world". A parent teaching the famed Beatitudes of the christian persuasion would be wrong to pretend that the various rewards they mention are promised in this modern world. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 09:04, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Cuddlyable3—I don't know that I have a "belief system." But you and others are not responding to the OP's question. Most of you are speaking of violence. The OP mentions online hatred. These are sentiments. These are not wounds to the body. Why are so many of you focussing on violence? The OP mentions no bloodshed. The question posed concerns why anyone would hate anyone for utterly irrelevant reasons. I think my answer is so obvious that maybe you can't see it: These people learned this from their parents. Or, their parents failed to deter them from thinking this way. Certainly our society contains negative tendencies about how members of one "group" regard members of another "group" (however one defines "group"). But good parenting might involve taking a proactive stance in order to anticipate that the child might fall into such a trap, and providing the child with the wise advice that avoidance of the trap of negatively stereotyping and stigmatizing others will pay off in the long term for the child if the child learns to stand up for open-mindedness in such matters. Bus stop (talk) 16:15, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

As noted - social differentiation occurs in almost all species, and , within the human species, on all inhabited continents, over all eras, regardless of any other factors one could check. Thus it is clear that there is no parental fault for innate factors. Collect (talk) 22:02, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Of course there is. Cultural factors are passed down from parents (and grandparents, and many others) to children. Humans are perfectly capable of education, are they not? Education is also indoctrination. When children are indoctrinated not to hate, such indoctrination offsets any factors tending to turn children into bigots. I fail to see why you are so content to accept the negative without recognizing the all-too-real human capacity to regard all people open-mindedly. When children are taught this, they tend to carry it with them all through life. I don't think parents should be let off the hook if they choose to raise their kids in any way that bypasses the addressing of issues of how to relate to people who fit into categories that seem different from the category that you fit into. There is a cultural solution to a problem and parents are to blame if they fail to avail themselves of the solution. It is very simple—the world would be a better place if people were accepting of people unlike themselves. Bus stop (talk) 22:43, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

The world might be a better place if stuff that is innate were not innate. Alas - that is pretty much impossible. Studies of animals show that parents have zero to do with all this, and such studies as have been made of human infants seem solid that what is true for animals is true for humans. Not really a debateable topic here, though. Collect (talk) 22:53, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Nature vs. nurture. Well, it's a combination of the two. But what it comes down to is whether one develops a conscience, or empathy for others; or whether their view of life is narcissistic and uncaring. I don't think kids are born with a conscience; it has to be taught. But it helps if the parents also have that trait, or it's kind of hard to teach their kids about it. Since you reference animals, there is little doubt that a dog raised with meanness is more likely to be mean, and a dog raised with love is more likely to be gentle. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:04, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

The gentle dog still sniffs that tree. Right now, the psych studies are strongly on the side of "nature." Collect (talk) 23:09, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Thus absolving parents of all responsibility. How convenient. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:12, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

An overstatement. But Teuber won compared to Skinner in the end. We can "teach" some stuff -- but the basis for "social differentiation" remains innate. We can try to raise a boy as a girl (noted Johns-Hopkins failure) but the result showed innate beats hormones and teaching. David Reimer Collect (talk) 23:21, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Who said anything about raising a boy as a girl? Bus stop (talk) 23:24, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Bugs raised the old "nature v. nurture" argument. The argument was pretty much settled years ago - nature is a very strong force. The sex example - where a Johns Hopkins researcher fudged data to make "nurture" seem more important was quite inconveniently exposed as fudging facts - is one splendid example. I commend you to read up on Teuber's work in physiological psychology, and the current opinions regarding Skinner's work on behavioural psychology. Also the work done on human infants and cognition of differences between people. And, of course, the myriad studies on identical twins raised separately. Collect (talk) 00:05, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

The Nature versus nurture article says, "The concept embodied in the phrase has been criticized for its binary simplification of two tightly interwoven parameters" and that criticism is valid in my view. Most interesting things about humans are some complex combination of both "nature" and "nurture". As is this issue. There are many "environmental" factors involved in the OP's question. There are also a lot of "heritable" issues. There are complex checks and balances and interplays of forces within and between these two sets of factors. WikiDao ☯ (talk) 00:18, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

The part which I dealt with above is the issue of "social differentiation" which decidedly appears to be innate. Clearly calculus is "taught" but seeing people as "us" or "them" is far too basic in animal nature (even for "gentle dogs"). Collect (talk) 00:27, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

People are routinely raised to be accepting of people of other races. Unfortunately not all people are raised this way. That is all I was talking about. Bus stop (talk) 00:24, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Fully agree with that, Bus Stop. There are a range of "biological" issues that come into play in this general discussion, though, too.

Collect: social differentiation → role theory, which is perhaps not what you meant? In any case – social, familial, peer-group, etc., environments can have complex effects on how the underlying biologically-encoded "behavioral phenotypes" of a human being get expressed and developed. There are many different "levels" of this on which different kinds of explanations are at least partially valid and informative. WikiDao ☯ (talk) 01:03, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

I have a feeling that some people are attracted to belief systems that tell them they are genetically superior to others. Also, people don't like feeling that their ancestors ever did anything wrong, and believing that blacks or Jews deserved poor treatment in the past absolves racists of any of that ancestral guilt. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 03:26, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Bugs said above that he believes that "kids aren't born with a conscience, it has to be taught." I wanted to point out that Conscience is both innate and "learned". It's sort of like Language that way, actually. And in that sense, one need not teach "conscience" any more than one needs to teach language, but there is a similar variety of results when one does. WikiDao ☯ (talk) 16:22, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Babies are born needing a great deal, so naturally they are self-centered. Being other-centered, giving and loving, have to be taught. They are not inherent. Neither is language. The capacity for both of those things is there, but they have to be learned. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:35, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Bugs, I know it is a lot of reading, but I would really recommend most of the Language article (and it's good readin';). I think my analogy between language and conscience is a good one, and is something I have in fact given a lot of thought to. And I'd like to discuss that further with you and others here from time to time, perhaps. The analogy I am making would be clearer with an understanding first of all the thought and work that has been put into understanding Language, so if you get a chance... Regards, WikiDao ☯ (talk) 16:48, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

The point I'm making is that while you are born with the capacity to learn Hindi, French, Mandarin and Swahili, you're not going to know those languages inherently, they have to be learned. Likewise, while you born with the capacity to both love and hate, you are not born with the specific behaviors, they have to be learned. And the idea that parents play no role in this learning is as ludicrous as would be the idea that parents play no role in kids learning language. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:02, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Yes. Note that my comments to others in this thread above already agree with that – but note also that I am saying it is all very complex. WikiDao ☯ (talk) 17:08, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Of course it's complex. We are not flatworms. (Most of us aren't anyway.) I'm reminded of these two quotes:

"To me, nature is spiders eating insects, big animals eating little animals, big fish eating little fish... basically, nature is a gigantic restaurant." -- Woody Allen in Love and Death

"I'm sure we all agree we should love our fellow man. I know there are people that do not love their fellow man, and I hate people like that! -- Tom Lehrer introduction to "National Brotherhood Week"

←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:11, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Ok, sure. I guess I was thinking of Language (and, by analogy, conscience) as "complex" in the sense of the usage of eg. Pinker, Chomsky, etc... WikiDao ☯ (talk) 17:23, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

I think the entire hate thing has to do with many people's narrowmindedness. Some people are narrow minded and refuse to see anything but what they want, leading to them not liking things that are different. That's my opinion. 70.241.18.130 (talk) 13:04, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

Globalisation

.there is a huge section on Globalisation and the impact on the bigger picture as a whole, yet it fails to narrow the scope on the manager who ultimately is in the forefront. I am looking for how the cultural differences are a huge barrier in managing global companies. what impact does this have on global management with regards to culture, employee behaviour,management style and the organisational change.41.182.156.252 (talk) 08:35, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

.the next question I have to think about and is also very difficult to find is what varies ways can a company enter the foreign market and indicate the advantages and disadvantages of each approach. I am not seeking for someone to give this to me on a silver platter, but rather point me in the correct direction. 41.182.156.252 (talk) 08:35, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

.the other area of expertize is trying to determine what risk is involved when a company enters a foreign country. This is a broad stroke scenio based question, yet one that is not easy to grasp as countries situations change the end result. what I'm looking for is the one size fits all kinda answere.41.182.156.252 (talk) 08:35, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

my last question is based on south africa and the scene is described as a norwegian company that intends to manufacture fish products to sell throughout africa. what i'm looking for is the legal implications and aspects of such a venture and what must be taken into consideration by the company and the manager when thinking of dealing with the African market.41.182.156.252 (talk) 08:35, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

i am not a university nor a colleage studen. I am 46 years old and am the general manager of two hotels. I work for the largest hotel group in Africa and am a long distant student looking to gain a bigger insite in Globalisation and knowing its strengths and weaknesses, I am better able to master where we can visualize the next location. We are all students, yet some sit and listen to the preach, others live, feel, touch and smell the class. the class is more on the outside of 4 walls and how you apply it, will make a difference. please help so that I am better able to address issues close to home. Economisation is bliss for the same race and culture that created and was the root cause for africa to be in this mess in the first place. first through slavery, then appartheid and we will be suffering this redicule for many more years if we do not do something to catch up.Guide me on the correct path so that i may collect my own data. I do not have books, we do not have the most up to date library and the books were donations from hayday.

Questions reformatted to separate them. --ColinFine (talk) 13:18, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

The way to answer this is to go through the notes you wrote in class, as well as the textbook that was assigned to you, and try to formulate an answer. A large part of education is learning to think critically about the information that you have been taught in class, and provide your own answers to these questions. It is quite likely that this question was already answered for you in the lecture in class, either in bits and pieces, or explicitly. --Jayron32 23:51, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Tabs

I just watched a DVD commentary in which the answer to the question "how did they make you look 25 years younger in this scene" was "tabs". (At least, it sounded like "tabs"; no subtitles or closed captioning were available.) But the tabs disambiguation page doesn't list anything for making actors look younger, and a Google search doesn't easily turn up some kind of stage cosmetic technique, either. What the heck are "tabs" in this context? Red Act (talk) 23:39, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Tab (soft drink) maybe? It would help to know what the DVD was. Clarityfiend (talk) 02:22, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

The DVD was Fringe, season 2, disk 4. In the episode "Peter," John Noble, who has quite wrinkly facial skin, was made to look as if he had much smoother skin, in order to play a roughly 25-year-younger version of his character. In the audio commentary for that episode, John Noble says he was made to look younger by using "tabs." John Noble is Australian, so it's conceivable that it's an Australian meaning for the word. But Fringe is currently produced in the U.S., so the make-up department would presumably mainly consist of Americans. Red Act (talk) 03:28, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Maybe tabs means small tabs of tape behind the ears? Just a WAG, but one common way of getting rid of wringles is to pull the facial skin back behind the ears, making it taught. this google search turns up plenty of links to the product. --Jayron32 03:34, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

None of the first ten hits in that Google search uses the word "tab", and that remains true even if I add the word "tab" to the search. Nevertheless, that does seem like a quite reasonable guess. I could totally see John Noble's make up person saying "I'm just going to put a tab here and a tab there", as a shortcut for the more verbose "I'm just going to put a tab of tape here and a tab of tape there", which could lead John Noble to think that the name of the stuff was "tabs", especially since he's used to picking up weird words the Yanks use that are different from what he would call things back home in Australia. And that's quite interesting that they actually use tape like that. Thanks. Red Act (talk) 04:15, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

I "taut" I taw the wrong word being used. Clarityfiend (talk) 05:50, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

"Tab" is also a common contraction of "tablet", which of course could imply almost anything. —— Shakescene (talk) 17:01, 17 October 2010 (UTC)