Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2013 December 29

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December 29

Technical speaking is the African continent or any countries that third world considered to be western countries?

Does the phrase Westernize countries mean countries with new world or modern ideas? Perhaps south American or Africa aren't considered westernize than say Australia or New Zealand" even though the on on the western Hemisphere? Venustar84 (talk) 02:56, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Well, such terms are inherently vague, but many poor nations in the Americas seem to qualify as "Western", in that they are capitalist democracies. Also note that "third world" has somewhat lost it's original meaning of nations not aligned with either communist nations or the western democracies. This is because the Warsaw Pact is gone, and many former communist nations aren't any more (or only pretend to be, as in the case of China). StuRat (talk) 07:40, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

There are no African countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development... -- AnonMoos (talk) 08:20, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Have you read Definitions of the West? It suggests Latin America, Lebanon, Turkey, Israel, and South Africa. It seems to be a combination of economic and cultural criteria. Certainly it is a debatable term. BrainyBabe (talk) 16:57, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Santa Chiara Church

Queen Joanna I of Naples was thrown into a well at Santa Chiara Church upon her death. This book states her tomb is visible at Santa Chiara Church today while this site says she buried in an unmarked ossuary. So did she have a marked tomb or not? Was her remains salvaged from the well at a later point? When was this? Does the well still exist?--The Emperor's New Spy (talk) 03:04, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

You could fact check the tomb/ossuary question, as well as whether the well still exists, by contacting the church directly at [1]. (Their website doesn't mention either Joanna/Giovanna or a well.) 184.147.128.82 (talk) 15:21, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Excommunication

Can an excommunication be lifted after someone's death? If so what was the longest period between an excommunicated person's death and the year his/her excommunication was posthumously lifted.--The Emperor's New Spy (talk) 03:18, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes, but I don't find evidence (on Wikipedia) of such a thing happening for a long long time. The only instance I could find was Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor, whose excommunication was lifted in 1111, five years after his death. Someguy1221 (talk) 03:27, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Where would his soul theoretically have been during those five years? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 11:26, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The excommunication of Michael I Cerularius, patriarch of Constantinople may be what you're looking for. He was excommunicated in 1054, died in 1059 and was rehabilitated by Pope Paul VI in the Second Vatican Council of 1965, i.e. 906 years after his death. - Lindert (talk) 17:24, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

So where was his soul for those 9 centuries, as per Roman Catholic theology? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:20, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The Church's standard is that God decides and that the Church recognizes. A saint is a saint, for example, when he dies and whether it is recognized or not. The Church recognizes sainthood after the fact based on various criteria. People whose excommunications are lifetd haven't been granted pardon by the Church after the fact. The Church has simply realized a mistake was made. μηδείς (talk) 21:41, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Even if it takes them 900 years to get the message. Roger. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:29, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Well... that's the current teaching... Not sure if those answers accurately reflect the teachings of the Church back in Henry's or Michael's day. Back then, if someone was Excommunicated, their souls were thought to be relegated to Hell (or at best, Purgatory)... and you could earn a pardon. Blueboar (talk) 23:06, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

It's just like annulment. You are "married" in the eyes of the Church until the marriage is annulled, due to the discovery of some human error, at which time the Church recognizes you were never, in fact, married. μηδείς (talk) 00:05, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

1872 Round the World Tour

The Thomas Cook & Son article mentions A round-the-world tour started in 1872, which for 200 guineas, included a steamship across the Atlantic, a stage coach across America, a paddle steamer to Japan, and an overland journey across China and India, lasting 222 days. Is there any place I can find an itinerary for this tour? RNealK (talk) 03:42, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Here is most of it: "Route - US (New York - the Statue of Liberty wouldn't be built until 1886, Niagara Falls, Detroit, Chicago, Salt Lake City, Sierra Nevada, San Francisco), Japan (Yokohama, Nagasaki, Osaka, Hiogo/Kobe, Yedo), China (Shanghai, Hong Kong), Malaya (Singapore, Penang), Ceylon (Galle), India (Madras, Calcutta -, Benares, Agra, Kawnpore, Lucknow, Delhi, Jubblepore, Bombay - but before the Victoria Terminus was built in 1887), Egypt/Palestine (Suez, Cairo, Jaffa, Jerusalem, Damascus, Baalbek, Beyrout, Constantinople)".

This site displays a 1972 April Fool's Times article which (apparently) has a map of the complete route. Clarityfiend (talk) 11:10, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

This article gives much more detail (e.g. "Cook’s party of eight set out from Liverpool on 26 September 1872"), but doesn't clear up the exact route back across Europe. Clarityfiend (talk) 11:25, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Why Are European Countries (With the Exception of Russia) Relatively Small?

On this Wikipedia article -- List of countries and dependencies by area -- it appears to show that other than Russia, none of the forty largest countries and dependencies by area are located mostly or completely in Europe (even Turkey, a mostly Asian transcontinental country, is only #37 on this list). What exactly are the reasons for this? I would think that the European balance of power politics which have historically been implemented played at least some role in causing this, since it prevented any one European country (with the exception of Russia) from permanently becoming too large or powerful. Also, I know that Europe is full of ethnic diversity and that its borders (unlike the borders in, say, Africa) are often more-or-less based on the locations of various ethnic groups. Which other reasons exactly am I missing here, though? Futurist110 (talk) 05:40, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

1. They came first?

2. A better question might be "Why Are non-European Countries Relatively Large?" HiLo48 (talk) 06:30, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

1. You mean because they were created first?

2. Perhaps. Futurist110 (talk) 06:47, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The reason is that they have been populated for a long time by approximately the same people, with relatively little mobility until recently. Thus the European nations developed their own distinct languages, culture, etc., and want to keep those features, which generally requires a separate nation. Contrast this with the US or Canada or Australia, where all those distinct cultures (the natives) were supplanted by outsiders, resulting in a more homogeneous culture.

However, note that mobility between European nations has increased quite a bit in recent decades, and I believe this will ultimately lead to more European unity. Despite recent setbacks, the EU seems to be moving in that direction, over the long haul. StuRat (talk) 07:47, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Stu is on the money regards homogeneity. Europe was historically densely populated with many ethnic groups (see Ethnic groups in Europe for a current and historical overview), and this is not the sort of thing that was conducive to multi-ethnic nation-states after the rise of nationalism in Europe (see for example the disintegration of Yugoslavia). So what's the deal with the countries that are huge? Well, Russia is still today mostly uninhabited wilderness, China is amazingly homogeneous for its size (~92% of the country considers itself Han Chinese), and the US and Canada are also quite homogeneous. As Stu said, the local, ethnically diverse populations were supplanted through disease/murder/forced-relocation by a new, relatively homogeneous group. In the early colonial period, white English made up over half of the residents of the colonies that became the United States (two thirds of the unenslaved residents, see Demographic history of the United States). Homogeneous cultures, with shared language and values (and less mutual distrust), make stable democracy much easier. Someguy1221 (talk) 08:13, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

They are small at the present. England, Spain, France and Portugal were able to build empires, as they had the resources for it and there still was a wasteland to be occupied. Given a unpopulated space (like the Asian part of Russia), I suppose every country will expand into it. OsmanRF34 (talk) 13:01, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

What wasteland? CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 16:49, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes, he seems to be using that term in a highly unusual way, as a synonym for a lightly populated region. I'd argue that many highly populated areas are more of a "wasteland". StuRat (talk) 16:55, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Futurist110 -- if you think they're small now, you should look at a map of Europe before the Napoleonic wars. There were then many city-states and mini-states, and no effective centralized government in Italy or Germany. Before the Russians gained the military upper hand over the nomads in the 16th century, even many parts of European Russia were quite sparsely populated... AnonMoos (talk) 13:18, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Just rambling for fun here: Europe could have been engulfed by Rome. Before it did, this happened: Decline_of_the_Roman_Empire. The next close call was Charlemagne, who owned most of continental Europe, but this time it split up by the Treaty_of_Verdun. The_Golden_Horde did conquer a strip of land between the Japanese sea and Cologne in Germany, but after Kublai_Khan, the rich parts were divided up for spoils and the poor part (Europe) was left to rot. After the Investiture_Controversy the catholic church suddenly surged in power and prohibited wars in between christian countries ( Mongols and Muslims were fair game), thereby leaving small nations alive, and stifling attempts at european unification right up until the point when it made Spain and Portugal split up south america between them. By the time Napoleon came to conquer Europe, Nations that were a bit harder to dispose of had been entrenched by the Treaty_of_Versailles. Next attempts were WW1 and WW2 and you know what happened there - I think the US intervened. DanielDemaret (talk) 23:04, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

• Spread zones, characterized by low linguistic diversity, tend to exist in lowlands where mobility is easy, and in areas where there is a quantum leap in cultural level, allowing the swift replacement of smaller, less advanced groups by a single culturally advanced group. Spread zones we know about in Europe include the Italo-Celtic peoples, who first introduced the horse, conquering from Spain and Ireland to Anatolia. The Roman (Romance languages) spread zone followed Roman statecraft and military hegemony. The Slavs occupy a large area because their farming culture largely replaced the Uralic language speaking hunter-gatherers. Since late Roman times the population has been dense enough and the culture homogenous enough in terms of technology that there has been very little linguistic replacement, with Ireland being a prime exception. Europe, with its high land productivity and population density and mountainous landscape has become a residual zone. Unification into nation-states has largely followed linguistic diversity. Had, say, Nazism or communism proven the superior ways of life those ideologies pretended to, Europe might have become largely German or Russian speaking. But they weren't, and it didn't. μηδείς (talk) 02:20, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Might US states extend executive office terms?

State Governments in Germany serve five years and the current four-year-term for the federal government could be changed to five years in some time (at least it's being discussed). All US state goverments (governor, lt. governor, attorney general,...) except two are elected to four years like the president on the federal level. Might a state change it's constitution and extend a gubernatorial term to five years, or would that violate any federal law? (Senate terms would be extended to five years while assembly terms are 2,5 years. Midterm elections would then take place in early May.) --Jerchel (talk) 12:14, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

U.S. states can set the terms of state offices to be whatever they want. In the civil war Confederacy, the term of office for the CSA president was set at six years with no possibility for re-election, but I doubt whether today's state governments will do this. Five years is very pretty much right out, since once-in-five-years elections wouldn't have a constant relationship with the U.S. federal election cycles... AnonMoos (talk) 13:05, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The only part that might be unconstitutional under Federal law is if they extend the terms of those currently in office, without approval from the voters (for example, if the state Senate decides they will stay in office for another year). Of course, each state also has it's own constitution, and changing the length of terms would likely require a change to those, in the case where the length of the terms is defined there. StuRat (talk) 13:09, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

I don't see where there would be any US constitutional issue with changing the length of term of state senators. The US constitution is pretty vague about such issues, except I think it says each state must have a republican form of government (e.g. not a monarchy). If the state legislature approves, then the citizens have implicitly "approved", in the same way that any other law is implicitly "approved" by the citizenry. That doesn't mean they wouldn't pay the conseqences come election time. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:35, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The issue is that once they are allowed to extend their own terms without an election, they could do so again and again, thus squashing democracy. And if there are no elections or recall process, the voters wouldn't have any say in it. This type of thing happens in some other nations fairly often. StuRat (talk) 14:46, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Presumably the state constitution would define the length of terms, and if the legislature tried to change it unilaterally rather than putting it on the ballot as an amendment, then it would violate that state's constitution, and that state's supreme court would eventually nullify that attempt. Where the feds might get involved is if someone tries to establish a dictatorship or an unlimited term of office, which would violate the US constitutional guarantee of a republican form of government. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 15:03, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Historically many offices, especially judicial, had "life tenure." The Constitution of the US does not make any claims about state offices, so any extension would be subject to the rulings of courts in that state. Local offices seem to be an interesting issue -- where local elections were not held, or there were no candidates who got any votes, the usual result has been to retain current officeholders until the next election. Collect (talk) 15:17, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Many states allow for some process to modify their Constitution without a vote from the people. And once you allow a state's government to extend their terms without an election, where do you define a limit ? A 10 year extension ? 20 years ? There's a slippery slope argument that they shouldn't be allowed to start down such a path in the first place.

And the obvious solution to this problem would be for the extended terms to kick in after the next election, so the failure of a state government to do it this way would make it look very much like a power grab. StuRat (talk) 15:10, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Sure. It's just that the feds won't get involved until or if someone asks them to, or Congress decides to take some action, and then a few years later issue will get a court ruling. But if there's already an appeal process going on within the state, that would be kind of brazen thing to do. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 15:20, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

During the WWII, were more decisive battles before 1942 or after?

At what shape was Germany then? OsmanRF34 (talk) 12:26, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

What do you mean by "decisive" ? Battles which made it clear who won the battle, or battles which made it clear who would win the war ? StuRat (talk) 13:16, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The latter, specially battles with huge losses and high symbolic weight. OsmanRF34 (talk) 13:17, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

In that case, decisive battles don't usually happen 4, 5, or 6 years before the end of the war, so yes, I would say that after Stalingrad, most decisive battles happened. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 13:32, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

OK, then what was the most important battle the US took part in Europe? Important in terms of morale, equipment, human losses? OsmanRF34 (talk) 14:44, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

I'd have to say the D-Day invasion. After the allies had a firm foothold in France, it was obvious that Nazi Germany's days were numbered. Of course, that was probably already true after the Battle of Stalingrad, to most military experts, but the common man might not have realized it until D-Day.

Then I suppose the Battle of the Bulge could be seen as Germany's last hope, if not to win, perhaps to get some type of negotiated surrender. After that battle was lost, it was clear there would be no terms. StuRat (talk) 14:49, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The Normandy Landings themselves, although an immense undertaking and a turning point of the war, involved a comparatively small Allied force; two British, one Canadian and three US reinforced infantry divisions plus one British and two US airborne divisions. The Battle of the Bulge included 23 US and 5 British infantry divisions plus 6 US and 2 British armoured divisions. However, as StuRat above says, there's a strong case for saying that the war was won in the east by the Soviets - at the Battle of Kursk in the summer after Stalingrad, 63 German divisions fought 136 Soviet ones and lost. Alansplodge (talk) 15:41, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

I'd also give a shout for the Battle of Stalingrad but the Attack on Pearl Harbor, back in 1941, was the prerequisite for the crucial US involvement on the Western Front. The US ambassador and Churchill "sort of danced around the room together" and later Churchill wrote "Being saturated and satiated with emotion and sensation, I went to bed and slept the sleep of the saved and thankful". See Consequences of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Thincat (talk) 16:04, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The Battle of El-Alamein (which my grandfather was at) helped send the Germans (and Italians) back out of North Africa. The invasion of Sicily, and the subsequent capture of Rome and the hanging of Mussolini also helped to turn the Italians against the Germans. But the real decisive battle was The Battle of Berlin. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 16:18, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes, quoting Churchill again on El Alamein "Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning". Thincat (talk) 16:47, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

• The decisive battles actually happened in 1942. At the beginning of 1942 the Axis had the initiative. At the end of that year the Allies had all the momentum, and it was clear that they were ultimately going to win if they could stick together. The decisive events were the Battle of Stalingrad, the Battle of Midway, and the turning of the tide in North Africa. Looie496 (talk) 17:38, 29 December 2013 (UTC)