Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2011 October 29

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October 29

List of Muslim-majority countries excerpt Bosnia

How come you didn't mention Bosnia in the list of Muslim Majority countries article? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.92.153.77 (talk) 01:18, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Talk:List of Muslim-majority countries is where you need to raise this question.

Btw, it's already been raised there and the answer seems to be that Bosnia is not a country with a Muslim majority. But any further discussion should be conducted on that page, not here. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 01:39, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Religion_in_Bosnia_and_Herzegovina has the answer. Only 43%-45% of the population is Muslim. Quest09 (talk) 01:51, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Who celebrates Thanksgiving in the US?

Do all Americans do it? Since it originally comes from the first settlers, Spanish or English, is it possible that some minorities do not identify with it? Quest09 (talk) 01:33, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Just about everybody does it. Here in the U.S., we like any excuse for a party. Loads of people who have not a drop of Irish blood in them merrily drink green beer and wear leprechaun hats on St. Patrick's Day. In recent years, Cinco de Mayo has gotten to be a popular excuse for a celebration of some kind all over the country, even among people with no Hispanic background at all. Likewise with Mardi Gras, originally connected with the observance of Ash Wednesday, now very popular among all kinds of non-religious people who have no idea what or when Ash Wednesday is. As to Thanksgiving, there might be some few people somewhere who have no interest in "celebrating" it for some political or religious reason - and the celebration consists of a big family dinner with a turkey at the center, so what's not to like? - but it's not something I'm aware of as being controversial. Most people get a 4-day weekend out of the Thanksgiving holiday every year, and a trip home to see the family or vice versa, so nobody's complaining. Textorus (talk) 02:20, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Mardi Gras (literally "Fat Tuesday") is Shrove Tuesday in English, but Ash Wednesday IS the following day, so I'm just being pedantic. Alansplodge (talk) 14:41, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Yeah but for Anglicans all Shrove Tuesday gets you is a plate of prim and proper pancakes in the back of the parish hall, whoop-te-do. Those Catholics, though, know how to party.  :) Textorus (talk) 15:07, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanksgiving and Christmas are about the only holidays during the year in America in which virtually EVERYTHING is closed except for a very few stores, and emergency or essential services. I don't know if "celebrating" is quite the right term. It's more of just "getting together". Someone once said that Thanksgiving is the one holiday that doesn't get screwed up by the things that can screw up the other holidays. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:01, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

When I lived in Los Angeles, there were quite a few shops open on Christmas Day. My friend would get triple pay for working! In Ireland, however, eveything would be closed as well as the day after (St. Stephen's Day).--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 05:35, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) The bigger the urban area, the more stores might be open on Xmas, but as a general rule (in smaller cities and towns of Texas, at least) only convenience stores and major drugstore chains like CVS are open 24/7 every day of the year, along with gasoline stations on major highways/interstates, and some, but not all, fast food places. Oh, and some urban movie theaters do a big business on Christmas Day too. All of the above generally applies to Thanksgiving and the Fourth of July as well, but big box stores are more likely to be open then than on Xmas, in my experience. Textorus (talk) 06:28, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Some Native Americans regard versions of stories about the "First Thanksgiving" as being somewhat whitewashed and sanitized, and may overall have mixed feelings about the holiday. Otherwise, Thanksgiving in the U.S. is vaguely associated with ceremonial deism, but is non-sectarian and non-denominational, and you should only have a problem with it if your beliefs forbid you to celebrate the gathering-in of the crops (harvest festival). AnonMoos (talk) 06:19, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

As BB said above, almost everyone gets the day off, most places are closed (or close early), lots of people get a 4 day weekend and travel to be with family, and it's late November thus, in much of the US, chilly or quite cold, and gets dark early. In short, even if you don't "celebrate" it or "identify" with it, you'll be effected by it. I've sometimes passed Thanksgiving without doing much of note, but it was still impossible to not know it was Thanksgiving. And as AnonMoos said, it is basically a harvest festival. It doesn't demand much. If fact it doesn't really demand anything. Sure there are some traditions, like having turkey and watching football, but these are far from required. For several years when I was a teenager in Buffalo my immediate family took to "celebrating" in a funny way. We would drive over the Peace Bridge, into Canada, where it wasn't Thanksgiving, and go to a Chinese restaurant. Turkey and football get can get really boring. And I've always hated cranberry sauce! Pfly (talk) 09:33, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Pfly refers to Buffalo, New York. Nyttend (talk) 14:03, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Of course there are are some (probably few) Americans who don't observe Thanksgiving, but probably the only ethnic group likely to abstain would be Native Americans, because the holiday commemorates the survival of winter and a successful first harvest by one of the first groups of English colonists in what became the United States. Those colonists had in effect stolen the land of Native Americans, and their descendants dispossessed Native Americans across the country. However, immigrant families tend to see celebrating Thanksgiving as a way for themselves and their children to connect with or assimilate to the dominant U.S. culture. Because religion is not an obligatory part of the holiday, and because the holiday offers an opportunity to teach history, Thanksgiving gets a lot of attention in the public schools, and immigrant kids, hearing other kids' enthusiasm for turkey and pumpkin pie, no doubt urge their parents to put on a Thanksgiving meal, too. Marco polo (talk) 00:20, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

In the early US, it was regional. New England celebrated Thanksgiving more than Christmas, while other areas celebrated Christmas without much notice of Thanksgiving. Edison (talk) 01:19, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Most Cherokees have celebrated Thanksgiving since 1885. And here is a traditional Cherokee Thanksgiving menu. Baked rabbit and squirrel gravy, yum. Textorus (talk) 06:35, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Members of Jehovah's Witnesses generally eschew all holiday celebrations, including Thanksgiving. Other than that, it is almost universally celebrated in the U.S. — Michael J 10:09, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Worst Candidate Result in the US Electoral College?

Which candidate received the largest percent of the popular vote and the least number of votes in the electoral college in American history? --CGPGrey (talk) 11:41, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

If you mean who required the most popular votes (by %) to win each Electoral College vote, then I wonder if it is Alf Landon, who won 36.5% of the vote but won only 8 of 531 Electoral College votes; or 24.2% of the popular vote for each 1% of the electoral college vote. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 12:04, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

That looks like a good contender. 36.5% of the popular vote with only 1.5% of the electoral vote is a pretty skewed result. Can anyone find worse? --CGPGrey (talk) 12:58, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

The United States presidential election, 1992 resulted in Ross Perot receiving 19% of the popular vote without receiving a single elector. However, since you cannot divide by zero, it is impossible to say how many people voted "per elector" in his case. Gabbe (talk) 13:04, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) x2 Walter Mondale in 1984 would be a close second. He won 40.6% of the electoral vote for a 13/538 electoral votes. That's 16.4% of the popular vote for each 1% of the electoral vote. Mondale took only 2 electoral college contingents: His home state of Minnesota and Washington DC. Landon also only won 2 states, Maine and Vermont. --Jayron32 13:05, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Awesome catch on the division by zero influence of the ranking of answers by correctness. Thank you! Dualus (talk) 18:36, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

In the 19th century, Stephen A. Douglas in the election of 1860... AnonMoos (talk) 13:48, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

What was Douglas's spoil ratio compared to Al Gore's? Dualus (talk) 18:37, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't really know or care, but he came in a strong second in the popular vote total, but a miserable fourth and last in the electoral vote total. as you can see at United States presidential election, 1860. (Of course, as with all pre-1868 elections, the political elites of South Caroline refused to let the unwashed masses have any say in the presidential election, so there was no popular vote total there...) -- AnonMoos (talk) 23:03, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

United States presidential election, 1888 might be worth a look. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:04, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

As should List of United States presidential elections by popular vote margin. Dualus (talk) 02:03, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Where to publish ideas regarding unsolved problems in Humanities and Science?

Imagine that I'm a well-read amateur in a particular topic and, after extensive study, come up with a plausible explanation for an unsolved problem in Humanities or Science —or an alternative, more plausible, explanation for something considered to be solved—. Wikipedia, of course, doesn't allow original research in its articles. Where could I publish such things? --Belchman (talk) 12:56, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Follow these steps:

1. Apply to and get accepted to a graduate program in the area of the topic you wish to publish in.
2. Earn your PhD
3. Get a job as a professor at a university, or a fellow at a well-known "think tank" or other similar body
4. Submit your paper to a well respected peer-reviewed journal.

This is necessary if you want your paper to be taken seriously. The reason for going through all of these steps is that the world is filled with people who have ideas. Lots of ideas, many of them are batshit insane. Which is not to say that yours is. But a gatekeeper which seperates the batshit insane from the reasonably likely not-to-be-batshit-insane is academic qualifications; people who have earned a doctoral degree from a well-respected institution, and have an academic job at a similar institution are generally adjudged to be less likely to be batshit insane (which is not to say that cohort is completely batshit-free... just that it's an indicator there is a better chance you can trust what experts say than amateurs, owing to the value of training and experience). On the other hand, if you don't particularly care if anyone respects what you have to say (or even reads it), you could publish it in a blog. --Jayron32 13:16, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

One option for technical discoveries is to fill for a patent. Another option is arXiv.org: it is still better than a blog, but the chances of being taken seriously are also quite low. On a side note, I have to say that even if you follow Jayron's steps, you probably won't get much attention, specially outside of your field. Quest09 (talk) 13:32, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Jayron's steps are a little extreme, unless Belchman wants to be a lifelong academic. Maybe it depends on the field, but you don't need a PhD to submit a paper to a journal, or to read a paper at a conference (at least, at conferences I have been to, there are always "independent scholars" who may be essentially hobbyists). Your submission should be read blind anyway, so if you know what you're talking about and have actually proven something, it won't matter if you have a PhD or not. But even without knowing your name or your credentials, if you don't know what you're talking about, it will be pretty obvious. So go ahead and submit to a journal, there's no harm in trying, even academics get rejected sometimes. Adam Bishop (talk) 14:00, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

My experience with journals is that in the humanities, anyway, the editor wields so much influence that they would be unlikely to send an article out for peer review if it was from a total outsider. Peer review is ideally (but not always) blind, but the process of deciding who gets peer reviewed is generally not. --Mr.98 (talk) 14:04, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

The way in which outsiders traditionally gain attention from insiders without becoming an insider themselves is to find a sympathetic insider who will vouch for their work as worth paying attention to. The most famous case of this was Einstein (who would have been ignored without Max Planck's interventions), but there are other more mundane cases as well in the history of science (e.g. Nicholas Christofilos). In the humanities the bar is not necessarily so high — there are plenty of untrained (non-Ph.D.) authors who are recognized as competent or outstanding historians (for example, Richard Rhodes or David McCullough). Depending on what field you are talking about, though, you may or may not need to do things in the "science" fashion to be taken seriously. As with all things, the higher the bar of the claim, the more difficult the case is likely to be — if you're trying to prove that, say, Einstein was wrong, or Shakespeare did not exist, or aliens built the pyramids, or some such, you're going to have a real struggle of it. If you're just trying to show that the African warbler has been sighted in Central Park, it's probably not as hard, if you have evidence to back it up. --Mr.98 (talk) 14:03, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

There is no easy answer. It's a bit like saying that you have the ability to coach a professional football team to a championship and asking who will give you a chance to prove it: the answer is, nobody, unless you have some evidence that makes the claim plausible. To get people to pay attention to your ideas, you need some hook that will make them believe your ideas are better than other people's. Usually that means starting small and working upward. Looie496 (talk) 15:18, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

The idea of an "unsolved problem" indicates that the scholarly field actually specifies public and obvious research programmes. If this is the case, then submitting a paper to a conference in that discipline ought to attract attention to your solution. Unless you've read the scholarly literature in your discipline, you may discover that your "problem" was already solved, or that your "solution" has been demonstrated to be a dead end. Fifelfoo (talk) 22:38, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

---

In my broad field, Michael Ventris had a large impact without any academic qualifications -- but on the other hand, the vast majority of proposals for revised etymologies of Biblical Hebrew words and names made by outsiders are merely horrendous blatant and pathetic nonsense, not worthy of the slightest extended consideration (it's surprising how many people think that they're somehow qualified to venture into the realm of advanced and difficult Semitic etymologies without having the slightest knowledge or understanding of the basic principle of Semitic word-structure, the triconsonantal root...). AnonMoos (talk) 00:49, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

The quick and easy route would be to just make a Youtube video explaining your theory, discovery, or insight, perhaps illustrating it with a working model of the device, or a demonstration of the process, or a test of the theory, or a practical illustration of why X happens under circumstances Y. Or you could write a self-published book or Ebook. Getting actually published in a peer-reviewed journal would be harder but would provide more credibility. It should not be that hard to find someone in the world who is an assistant professor at some college in the field in question,. There is your credential. Get a notarized and witnessed copy of your manuscript, so the prof can't just steal your work and claim it is his own. Theft of ideas and other academic piracy are all too common. Now explain to him your great breakthrough theory, and prove it to him to his satisfaction. Then he can help you get it up to a publishable standard, and could use a lab at his school to do some experiment showing its predictive power. Then it can be shipped off to a journal, with the two of you as co-authors, with which ever one contributed the most as first author. Many papers have an undergraduate as second author, so you could also consider registering for "independent study" at the college in an upper level undergrad course related to the subject area. I have been an editorial consultant for a journal, and when a manuscript came in from someone with no advanced degree and no institutional affiliation, it was usually something absurd, besides being poorly written, and lacking a literature review to show familiarity with any related research in the field. Yet some of the outsiders might well come up with an insight, observation or discovery as useful as penicillin was in its day. In the lab I was associated with, if an undergrad came in with a good knowledge of the current theory and research and had an idea for an experiment, he would have been given access to a lab. He might have been tested by being assigned to do an initial experiment as an apprenticeship, which included a replication of some recent unpublished result, to see that he was competent. More than an "idea" is usually needed. If Jane Goodall had just sought to publish a paper claiming that chimps are a lot like people, or whatever, without the years of field work, she would have gotten nowhere. She also got Louis Leakey's mentorship. AEdison (talk) 01:07, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Why would you go for an assistant professor? That strikes me as very wrong. Assistant professors are non-tenured but tenure-track. Their primary motivation is boosting their own fortunes (to make the career jump to associate or full professor), not anyone else's. They're liable to be more conservative with regards to other's ideas as well, in my experience. I would be aiming for someone who is secure, tenured, but not emeritus (emeriti have a reputation for being seduced by bad outsider ideas in their dotage). That's the Max Planck or Louis Leakey sort of person — both of them were quite senior (but not senile) when they started helping ambitious outsiders. --Mr.98 (talk) 18:40, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

See also the cautionary tale of Philo Farnsworth, a brilliant amateur with a fabulous idea - who, sadly, died penniless. Textorus (talk) 10:47, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

But that wasn't because he was an outsider. --Mr.98 (talk) 18:40, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Maybe he wanted to be "thoroughly used up" when he died, a la GBS. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 18:52, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

A nice idealistic quote, but like so many others floating around the 'net, it doesn't quite have the tart freshness of the alleged author's voice, IMO. Textorus (talk) 02:49, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

You dare to deny it? For your sins, you must now go further, and provide the name of the true author. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 09:22, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Um, damn - I can see her face, but I can't call her name right now. Textorus (talk) 11:47, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I have the opposite problem. I run into people I know and I can remember their name but can't quite recall what they look like. It's very embarrassing, but I take the bit manfully between my teeth and come right out with it. "Oh, hello Fred", I'll say. "You know, I can remember your name but I can't quite remember what you look like. Awfully sorry", I go on. They often look very perplexed, not knowing what to say, and walk off mumbling softly to themselves. Funny, but I hardly ever run into the same person twice. I've seen people I know the names but not the faces of cross the street just as they were about to run into me. They must suddenly remember something they had to buy, yes, that must be it .... -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 19:04, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Well now that is very odd, and counter to most people's experience. I reckon it's because you've been living upside-down all your life: the Down (Under) Syndrome. Textorus (talk) 19:24, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Laws of Aikido

What are the laws of Aikido, and how would this martial art possibly be relevant in a dispute on Wikipedia? Someone recently made a statement, "One of your friends, by whom I was attacked User:Nyttend, is engaged in Aikido and he knows all these laws." I'd never even heard of Aikido until I read this comment, and I can't figure out the answer from reading the article. Nyttend (talk) 14:05, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

It probably refers to the philosophy of Morihei Ueshiba? I don't know. I did Aikido for years a long time ago and don't remember any codified laws, just lots of very vague things relating to its general approach to things (e.g. protecting yourself and protecting your attacker simultaneously). In context it looks like a fairly rambling and not very coherent statement, but it doesn't seem negative. --Mr.98 (talk) 15:13, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I'd say that in general Aikido is the most defensive of the traditional martial arts, and in particular the one that most turns the attackers momentum against him or her. In the Wikipedia context, that would suggest one to proceed carefully and with due consideration, so as to not give the opponent the chance to turn your own words and actions against you. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:49, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. Dualus (talk) 21:39, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Northern Irish accent

Is there a typical Northern Irish accent? The guy who sings this song has something that sounds to me like a thick Scottish accent. I've heard other Protestants speak like him, but people like Gerry Adams sound very different to me. --Belchman (talk) 14:18, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I know that there's a bit of variation from place to place to place; when my family were in Dervock for a summer in the 1990s, we were told that the area was well-known for having what outsiders considered an extraordinarily strong and difficult accent. Nyttend (talk) 14:29, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

For people outside of Northern Ireland, there is a general distinctive accent (not quite Irish and not quite Scottish), which I suppose is probably usually the Belfast accent. But certainly people from NI can distinguish many variations, from different cities, different parts of Belfast, different rural accents, and apparently also different Catholic and Protestant accents. Maybe Jeanne Boleyn will be along shortly, I think she lived in Belfast for awhile. Adam Bishop (talk) 16:08, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

As for why the Northern Irish accent may have some commonalities with some Scottish accents, Ulster Scots people may have some answers. As far as examples of famous Northern Irish people for whom to compare, Liam Neeson (the actor), Van Morrison (the singer) and Stiff Little Fingers (the band) are all from Northern Ireland. --Jayron32 17:47, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Not a good comparison as Stiff Little Fingers and Van Morrison both come from Belfast; whereas Neeson is from Ballymena which is close by. OP should go over to YouTube and check out clips on loyalist Billy Wright to hear a strong Portadown accent, Martin McGuinness for a Derry accent, Jackie McDonald for a Belfast accent, and the film Omagh for authentic County Tyrone accents (vastly different from Belfast ones). BTW, the guy singing the song in the clip the OP cited has a very strong Belfast accent. Gerry Adams' Belfast accent (although pronounced) does sound less harsh on the ears.--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 17:54, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Do Catholics and Protestants have different accents in the same city? --Belchman (talk) 18:11, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I could never tell the difference. I linked the YouTube Billy Wright clip above. Have a listen to a typical Portadown accent.--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 18:17, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you! It certainly takes a while to get used to these guys' accents: at first I could barely understand what they were saying :-) --Belchman (talk) 18:48, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

My wife's relatives in Belfast say that Catholics have a different accent. This is apparently because each neighbourhood has a different accent, and the Catholics and Protestants don't really interact with each other. I can't tell the difference, of course. Adam Bishop (talk) 19:14, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

<unindent>If the OP doesn't get a sufficient answer here, I suggest asking again on the Language Refdesk. -- One shibboleth of Northern Irish pronunciation of the letter H, or so I have heard. There's a BBC article on shifting pronunciation in British English over time, and some discussion of that letter, but not its geographic importance: until I got to the comments:

The way you pronounced H was used by kids playing at sectarianism, in 1950s Luton where my Irish Dad spent most of his childhood. Native English speakers would say "aitch" and be assumed to be Protestant, whereas those of Irish decent would say "haitch" and be assumed to be Catholic. This self-consciousness meant my Dad quickly lost his Irish accent and to this day speaks with a broad Bedfordshire lilt.

This may provide some pointers of where else to look. BrainyBabe (talk) 20:48, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Each of the 6 Counties that are in Northern Ireland have a distinct accent the same with Donegal which is the northernmost part of Ireland their accent is very similar to the people of Derry and can be hard to distinguish between the two counties. Mo ainm~Talk 20:53, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

For what it's worth, back in the 1980s I spent a bit of time in Belfast. At one point, while spending the evening at a pub with a group that I think were all or mostly Catholic, I asked if Catholics and Protestants had different accents. (To my American ears the accents around Belfast all sound much the same.) They said that different towns and neighborhoods had different accents but that people of both religions from the same town had the same accent. Marco polo (talk) 00:06, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I've heard the "H" thing. I've also heard that "Catlicks can't pronounce the th sound". I wouldn't give much credence to either. But you know who really can't pronounce the th sound? People from Waterford. Mrs Stoughton (nee O'Brien), is from there - a fisherman's daughter - and she tells how a speech teacher would come into her primary school once a month to drill the kids in pronunciation. "This, that, there, those" the teacher would enunciate, mantra-like, month-in and month-out. And month-in, month-out the response would come from 25 Waterford kids: "Dis, dat, dere, dose". Ivor Stoughton (talk) 03:12, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

It's not just the letter "H" that is pronounced differently in Northern Ireland. Protestants always pronounce the letter "A" as "aye" (as in rain) but Catholics typically pronounce it as "aah" (as in man). This latter derives from the Irish language which many Catholics are taught to speak in school. It's usual for Catholics in Northern Ireland to attend parrochial schools.--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 07:14, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

?? - "Aye" rhymes with "eye" in English on both sides of the Atlantic, doesn't it? Perhaps you mean "ay"? Textorus (talk) 15:41, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Aye, indeed I did mean "ay"! Thanks for pointing out my early-morning, half-asleep, sans expresso, in-a-hurry-need-to-get-dressed error! In fact, "aye" is used much more frequently in the North than "yes". "Ach" or "och" are also used. The adjective "wee" is applied to practically anything or anyone. I was called a "wee girl" and I am 5'8! BTW, that was considered quite tall for a female in the Ireland of the 1980s (north and south of the border).--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 07:31, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

That's very true, so it is. And we reaffirm everything we say with "so", so we do. Like calling everything "wee" ("here's your wee coffee", "here's your wee bill"), it can get quite annoying after a while, so it can. --Nicknack009 (talk) 10:26, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Aye, Nicknack, you're dead on like, so ye are. Here's a wee bit of waffle: my wee boyfriend from Omey Town had the wee habit of calling everybody "mustard". I have yet to discover the origin of this wee word. Another thing before I go till the shops, the word "now" is pronounced as "nie". This is a very noticeable feature of the Norn Iron accent. There ye are nie.--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 10:32, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

So does that last sentence rhyme with blarney or with aren't I? I've never been to the Emerald Isle, so it's not quite clear to me. Textorus (talk) 11:09, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Aren't I would be closer to that "nie" pronounciation of theirs of the word "now", I think. To me, the most noticeable feature of their accent is the way they pronounce the ou cluster in words like "out", "about" and "shout" as /əʉ/. They also say something like "tame" instead of "time". A fun accent indeed. :-) --Belchman (talk) 11:26, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Aye, Norn Iron vauyels are mustard, so they are (I have no explanation of the origin of this use "mustard", I'm afraid). The other odd one is the umlauted "a" dipthong as in "bake" which is pronounced something like ee-ə, like the first syllable of "Ian" or "vehicle". --Nicknack009 (talk) 12:47, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

And one I forgot - in a strong Belfast accent, short 'a' and 'o' switch places. I remember reading a "how til speak Norn Iron" guide that included the following two dictionary entries:

Pat - saucepan

Pot - short for Patrick

and the old joke about two guys walking down the Newtownards Road, and they hear music. "Unforgettable..." One says to the other "That's Nat King Cole", and the other says "Well who is it then?" --Nicknack009 (talk) 12:54, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Don't get me started on Norn Iron jokes. I've a slew of them so I have. I used to find it so amusing when my nickname "Jenny" was rendered "John-neh" by my Norn free-ends. Wait til ye hear this. I was once on a bus to Omagh. A wee Omey girl sittin' behind me was wafflin' on her wee phone like and when she was asked about her estimated time of arrival in Omagh, she replied "Eye don know, arind Twayelve".--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 13:57, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Free White Male Adult Property Owners by State in 1790?

My understanding is that only free white male adult property owners could vote in 1790. How many of them were there in each state? --CGPGrey (talk) 17:16, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Probably not answerable with any exactitude. See the article 1790 United States Census for a breakdown of population by state, or check the original report submitted by Thomas Jefferson. Problem is, it counted all males over 16 as one category (adult = 21+ in those times), and it didn't indicate how many of them were property owners. Textorus (talk) 18:03, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Actually, there were some brief experiments with women voting around 1800. In any case, the necessary voting qualifications were decided locally within each state, so there was no common criterion applied to all states uniformly. AnonMoos (talk) 22:55, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

unicorn

Question: Am I correct in assuming a unicorn may be either male or female?Kukanuk (talk) 17:28, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, unless you are mistaken a mythical creature for a Eunuch :o) The Last Angry Man (talk) 17:35, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

ouch - that was a Corny joke! --Ludwigs2 18:32, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

This is simple to explain. Unlike the Mustang they don’t roam around in herds. Being rather rare, people are so surprised when they see one that they that they don't think to determine its sex. Even Gaff (that little clinkey eyed jobs-worth that keeps dropping origami figures of unicorns in my path) hasn't included the anatomical differences – but I remember seeing them as a child running around on the prairie and they came in both sexes.--Aspro (talk) 19:31, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

My wife Rachael also say's she's not only seen both stallions and mares but a gelding that didn't quite leap high enough, over a barb-wire fence. It always amazes me how we have both seem to have such similar childhood memories. --Aspro (talk) 19:53, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Was the fence enclosing a flock of electric sheep? {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.197.66.253 (talk) 22:00, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

As it happens, I do seem to remember an android shepherd but Rachael thinks he was probable not one of us, since the poor clone obviously had a screw loose due to his constant mutterings of Danger, Will Robinson. What he thought Robinson might do however , we never found out. Not even after the Directors Cut. Maybe we ought to ask about this on Wikipedia Reference Desk.--Aspro (talk) 20:16, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I guess you are asking whether any of the legends about unicorns say anything about their sex. There is no mention of this in our article unicorn. I would agree with you in supposing that the unicorn referred to by ancient writers, supposed to be an exotic but otherwise normal beast, would have had the usual two sexes. I'm not so sure the assumption does apply to the mediaeval legendary unicorn, because of its differential susceptibility to virgin females; but in the absence of any information about their sex perhaps we have no grounds for any other assumption. --ColinFine (talk) 00:46, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Isn't there a mythological connection between unicorns and virgins? If so, you don't need to be Sigmund Freud to see the symbolism... and to guess they'd be male. --Dweller (talk) 14:16, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

In at least one fantasy-themed computer game, they can be male or female. – b_jonas 19:44, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Since it exists entirely in the mind, it can have whatever properties you want to assign it. This includes if you made up several different genders that no one ever heard of. You can even have an invisible pink unicorn. You can make them jump through round squares too.Greg Bard (talk) 19:35, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Why is Human history called History of the world?

And, is this video spectacular? Dualus (talk) 18:54, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't know. But maybe because of anthropocentrism. In Latin mundus meant both the universe and mankind according to this. This usage is more or less still in use in some Romance languages such as French or Spanish, in which "tout le monde"/"todo el mundo" (lit.: "all the world") means "everyone". --Belchman (talk) 19:12, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• Because the world is defined as human civilization and so its just another name for human history] --Thanks, Hadseys 19:18, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I thought the world was just Earth, even back when when humans were just a gleam in some cell's membrane; even back when the metals of the crust were just carbon and oxygen in some dying star; even back when the local spacetime manifold was collapsed inside a pair of colliding black holes. I have no idea what came before that. Dualus (talk) 20:29, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

The planet is Earth. The world is the civilization, usually, though sometimes it is used to only mean the planet. Neither world nor planet refer to the composition of metals that would eventually become the Earth before they did become a planetoid of some sort. Anyway, this is just semantics. You could call it whatever you wanted to; this is what we happen to call it. --Mr.98 (talk) 21:12, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

You can think of in terms of creating fictional works. Worldbuilding refers to creating the setting of the work, and nearly always includes creating not just the physical properties of the land, but the people/creatures/civilizations in it. Otherwise it's just landscaping. Mingmingla (talk) 22:24, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh, and New World vs. Old World. Neither refer to planets. Mingmingla (talk) 22:24, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Neither does the well-known adjective "novomundane". -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 00:48, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I think the video jumps around out of chronological order at the end, should start with the big bang, and does not adequately represent modern life. Dualus (talk) 18:45, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

As Mr.98 said, there are two distinct concepts here: the physical object that we are all riding around the sun on, and the realm of personal experience. 'World' is usually reserved for the largest extension of the realm of human experience (in the sense of 'worldview'). Thus 'history of the world' translates to 'history of worldviews' which translates to 'human history'. 'History of the earth', by contrast, usually starts some 4 billion years ago and charts out the development of physical features of the planet. --Ludwigs2 18:12, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Suppose intelligent extraterrestrials existed and were able to communicate with humans. Would they be part of a shared experience? Dualus (talk) 18:29, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Can we get their primary sources? History is the study of records of human culture through an analysis of content and form—typically it is the study of textual records. If some other culture produces records, historians will historicise it. Fifelfoo (talk) 20:57, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

http://ufohastings.com/ is good, but there are many other corroborating sources. Dualus (talk) 23:33, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Those purport to be primary sources (predominantly third hand oral reports) regarding aliens. They're not primary sources by aliens. Alien historiography will have to wait until someone finds an archival cache. Fifelfoo (talk) 23:57, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Technically, history only begins with a recording either by oral tradition or written tradition. Before that, human existence is described as prehistory. Dinosaurs are prehistoric as well because we have failed to find any of their written texts. Assuming that they have some may make me guilty of dinosaurcentrism. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.38.31.81 (talk) 13:31, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

name of philosophy

Most philosophies and religions assume that humans are the most important thing, or God is. (Please let's not get into a discussion of the existence of the latter.) We even have a way-of-life called humanism. I assume there is a philosophy based on the assumption that humans are nothing special, given the rest of the cosmos, and which leaves God out of the equation. What is it called? BrainyBabe (talk) 20:59, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Nihilism? --Mr.98 (talk) 21:13, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Antihumanism would be a step in that direction. Materialism generally views humans (including consciousness) as simply a part of the rest of the universe. --Daniel 21:15, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement doesn't believe that humans are the most important thing on the planet. Mitch Ames (talk) 22:18, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

evolution?190.56.105.233 (talk) 22:46, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Hedonism?190.56.105.233 (talk) 23:05, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

The idea that humans are the most important thing is anthropocentrism. Our article suggests that its antithesis is "biocentrism", but other web resources suggest "pantheism" or "non-anthropocentrism". None of those seem really adequate. Looie496 (talk) 23:15, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

The opposite of "assuming humans are the most important thing" would be "assuming humans are the least important thing", no? The question isn't asking about the opposite though, rather the idea that "humans are nothing special" (and leaving out God). The first thing I thought of was Zen--although there are many types of Zen and some seem to consider humans as somehow special. At the least, most Zen philosophy I've encountered tends to take the position that you are "nothing special". There's a Joko Beck book with that exact title, Nothing Special. As for "leaving God out", Zen as I know it does that. Whether there is or isn't a God, or gods, and what he/she/they are like is a non-issue ([1]). But that was just my first thought. I imagine there is a better answer. Pfly (talk) 04:02, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

The cosmological principle is what came to my mind, but that isn't really a philosophy - it's more like the mere assertion that "humans are nothing special". 128.232.241.211 (talk) 08:08, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Is humanism really contradictory to your beliefs? According to the article, "Secular Humanism is a secular ideology which espouses reason, ethics, and justice, whilst specifically rejecting supernatural and religious dogma as a basis of morality and decision-making." I don't see where it says humans are the most important thing, or that non-humans (animals, plants?) are unimportant. In fact, I would consider myself a humanist, but by no means do I think humans are the only important beings in the universe (or even on Earth). --140.180.14.123 (talk) 10:47, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

That's right. Humanists in my experience don't think that humans are any better, higher or more important than other lifeforms or objects, just that, as humans, nothing should be more important to us than being good towards other humans. Ghmyrtle (talk) 15:11, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

In my opinion, it still becomes utilitarianism because their actionable beliefs are similar to humanists'. Dualus (talk) 18:18, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Gaia philosophy holds that people are no more important than all the other life forms, and the Earth itself, although they may pose an extreme threat to it. For this reason some think that people must be eliminated, hence the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement listed previously. StuRat (talk) 21:31, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Makeup question for the ladies and or people with SFX makeup knowledge (Halloween related)

I like to paint my face up like a skull when I go begging with my niece and nephew on Halloween. I usually bring the black makeup up to my "waterline." The end result is neat (old pic), but I always have problems getting that black off of my waterline at the end of the night. More precisely, I get the bulk of the makeup off, but it sort of dyes my water line and part of my lashes. I always look like I'm wearing mascara the next day (something I would like to avoid since I have class the following day). What product could I use (before or after) to avoid this? I've heard that putting Vaseline on your face before makeup will make it easier to wash off. Is there some type of makeup remover that ladies use that might help with the waterline thing? --Ghostexorcist (talk) 23:38, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Hope this helps. Remove make up with oil or cold cream before washing off. Cotton swabs with oil are helpful too. Oda Mari (talk) 10:03, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

You can get special eye-makeup remover, including on pre-soaked pads, which aims to remove the makeup without risking injury to your eyes. This means you can clean around the actual eyes much closer to the edge of the lids, although I still don't recommend getting it actually in or on your eyeballs (it stings like anything). Otherwise, have you considered using cheap actual makeup for women in the area closest to your eyeballs, since in my experience that comes off more easily than greasepaint or expensive waterproof makeup? 86.163.1.168 (talk) 16:45, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Cheap eye makeup should never be recommended. The entire eye area is very delicate and cheap makeup can cause a severe infection.--Jeanne Boleyn (talk) 16:35, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't see why. As long as it's hygienically produced, and you use basic hygiene rules, and change it fairly often, I don't see why a teen-targeted brand would be more likely to lead to eye-infection than expensive stuff. It all has to follow the same safety rules. Maybe irritation, but no more than generic greasepaint would. A '17' or similar brand black eyeliner, bought sealed from a reputable shop and replaced next year, isn't going to give him an eye infection. I doubt he's going to use such 'advanced' techniques as drawing inside the lash, which always makes me cringe. And cheap black eyeshadow around the eye has to be better than the greasepaint used on the rest of his face. 86.163.1.168 (talk) 23:10, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Depending on the effect you want to create, perhaps very light sunglasses may remove the need for eye makeup. (I say very light, because you don't want to be blinded when out at night.) StuRat (talk) 21:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)