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July 25

Are there apps or any software, that can identify one's accent?

E.g, software that can identify a person's native language, when they are currently speaking in a non-native language (e.g. English), rather than in their native language we want to identify.

Yesterday, I presented this question at the language reference desk. However, no one has given me a positive answer yet, except for a possible direction via AI, but without a certain answer. 2A06:C701:7B31:C100:7D63:C50F:C3A5:9744 (talk) 10:18, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

You received a comprehensive answer at the language desk. The answer is no. Shantavira|^{feed me} 11:48, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

AI is used for pattern matching and classification. If there is some pattern that classifies speech as having a specific accent, AI can identify the pattern and classify the accent. AI is not magic. It won't do any more than identify a pattern using one of the many methods of pattern matching and then classify using one of the many ways of clustering and classification. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 12:12, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

A more precise answer is that no respondent here is aware of the existence of such an app. Perhaps the NSA has developed one but is keeping it under wraps. If so, how would we know?  --Lambiam 13:33, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

It is likely that, for the moment, it is far easier and cheaper to employ non-Artificial Intelligences, i.e. people, with linguistic expertise that enables them to make such identifications. This of course would only apply to specific instances – an AI-like application would be needed for automatic surveillance on a mass scale. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 00:18, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

People on Hugging Face have created some accent related models but putting that into some piece of software you can use will be a very much do-it-yourself task. Models found there also have rather variable quality, most of them are research projects not intended for wider consumption. With enough data, classifying existing accents in order to infer other accents should be possible. But, speaking anecdotally as someone who grew up in world cities, the way someone learns a language hugely influences their accent... possibly about equally to the languages they spoke before that, and the possibility for error is huge.

Again speaking anecdotally: You should think of accents as individual but similar to each other - usually a property of how that specific person has used and learned their languages, but sometimes completely learned and how that person wishes to speak. You should approach whatever problem you are trying to solve with this in mind, it is not just a symptom of a person's previous languages. Komonzia (talk) 21:13, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

How to automatically search and replace text in Linux CLUI in a multi-lined way?

We can automatically search and replace single-lined text in Linux CLUI with awk and sed, but I need a way to do it multi-lined.

• File A has several HTML structures.
• File B has this HTML structure:

    <footer class="site-footer">
      <div class="site-footer__inner container">
        {{ page.footer_top }}
        {{ page.footer_bottom }}
      </div>
    </footer>

• File C has this HTML structure:

    <footer class="site-footer">
      <div class="site-footer__inner container">
        {{ page.footer_top }}
        {{ page.footer_bottom }}
      </div>
      <span class="globalrs_dynamic_year">{{ 'now' | date('Y') }}</span>
    </footer>

How to automatically search in file A and if it contains the text of file B then replacing that text with the text of file C?

How would you do this with C/Perl/Python/PHP/Node.js or something else? 103.199.70.159 (talk) 19:06, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

While it would be trivial to do this in Python or any other reasonable programming language, if I wanted to do this with a script, my approach would be:

1. . Convert all three files to a version which eliminates newlines, using sed. For convenience, I would replace the newline character with some character or string which would not occur in the HTML, call it '~' (tilde).
2. . Now add a newline to change the tilde in every occurrence of "</footer>~" to a newline in each of the three converted files. Do the same for "~<footer class="site-footer">". You end up with files where the html of interest is on a single line.
3. . Use sed to do the substitution of the single line file C text to replace the single line file B text in the single line file A text.
4. . Use sed to convert single line file A back to the original formatting by replacing '~' with newline.

This won't work if files B and C are not marked with the exact footer head and tail as you have shown.-Gadfium (talk) 20:46, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

In any programming langauge, A, B, and C are just text. So, you use a string replace function. In C++, it is (from memory) replace(A,B,C);. In Perl (again from memory), it is A=~s/B/C/;. In PHP, it is $A=str_replace($B,$C,$A);. In Python, it is A = A.replace(B,C);. In Node.js it is A = A.replace(B,C) as well. Note that in a programming language, a string is just a string of characters. It doesn't care if there are newline or return characters in it. So, replacing a substring replaces it all, including the return and newline characters. But, the text has to match perfectly. For example, if A is using two spaces for indentation and B is using tab characters, it won't match. Similarly, if one uses all lower case tag names and another uses all upper case tag names, it won't match. In that case, you need to reformat the text so it is all the same or use regular expressions. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 13:31, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

The Unix/Linux utility sed can do this; see sed § Multiline processing example. The search ["sed" multi-line replace] gives some more examples.  --Lambiam 23:01, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Since the OP asked for a Perl solution, here is a simple one.

my $orig = `cat $ARGV[0]`;
my $repl = `cat $ARGV[1]`;
my $text = `cat $ARGV[2]`;
$text =~ s:$orig:$repl:g;
print $text;

CodeTalker (talk) 18:57, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

July 27

Fast Fourier transform

Can a relational database, with its set of rows and columns, support the computerization of the Fast Fourier transform ? Afrazer123 (talk) 04:40, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

No. The FFT algorithms require computations based on the indices. This is not supported by relational databases. The notion of index is in fact alien to the relational model, which is essentially an unordered set of tuples (the rows) of named values (as identified by the row names). One can add the index as a key, basically an extra column, but this does not help. The SQL-type languages that come with such databases also do not support the recursion used by FFT algorithms.  --Lambiam 13:18, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. How pulsating! It seems there's a discharge of some sort which apparently isn't taken into consideration by the RDB while using an extra column (key) only exacerbates things. Also, SQL appears to be to confining, off-limits for the algorithm's recursion. Afrazer123 (talk) 02:09, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

July 28

Turning Off Ad Blocker

If I am using Firefox and Windows 11, and a web site asks me to turn off my ad blocker, and I don't know what ad blocker I am using, how do I determine what ad blocker I am using, so that I can turn it off? This is sort of a strange question, because I don't want to deal with ads, but I would rather just ignore the ads than deal with web sites that aggressively fight ad blocking. I do have Norton Safe Web. I don't know if it tries to block ads. Robert McClenon (talk) 00:23, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Hi, Robert McClenon! In Windows 10 which I'm on, such blockers appear (with other things) in a drop-down list of 'Extensions' found by clicking a jigsaw-puzzle corner piece at the top right corner of the Firefox window. I had a similar problem (with YouTube) until I discovered that Malwarebytes had added ad blocking to its functions. Hope this helps. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 20:54, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

The better way to get around this is to reconfigure your RAM firewall to exclude cloud analytic encryption on your virtual platform. Pretty simple fix, will take about 30 seconds. Jidarave (talk) 21:49, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

The above post is nonsensical. Philvoids (talk) 22:53, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

This is probably the same troll who reappears here periodically to post gibberish like this before getting blocked. CodeTalker (talk) 06:52, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

It looks like perfectly legit response from AI. Maybe someone is training their bot to replace human editors on Wikipedia. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 12:50, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

The responses by LLMs tend to read like something a human could actually have written as a reasonable response, using terms from the question. This response does not. It looks contrived to sound impressive while making no sense whatsoever.  --Lambiam 22:51, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

I'm glad it's confirmed to make no sense, because although I didn't understand it, I feared that to be because of my limited knowledge of IT.

This sidetrack being dealt with, can anybody give a better answer than mine to the OP's query? {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 18:03, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Will I need a turboencabulator for this? -insert valid name here- (talk) 16:36, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

A long shot, but are you using NoScript in Firefox by any chance? It's a kind of an ad-blocker on steroids and because it completely blocks scripts (unless you allow them) it can be difficult to know what's getting blocked. Using the "temporary allow" function usually gets me past things, but sometimes I end up having to switch to incognito mode (which I have setup to run without NoScript). Matt Deres (talk) 16:02, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

In Firefox's Privacy and Security settings, if you have tracking protection set to Strict, try setting it back to Standard. This should help. win8x (talking | spying) 20:19, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

July 29

Can you delete and then undelete your twitter account?

This is about the incident with Pete Souza and an intactly-eared Donald Trump photo.[1] Souza apparently deleted his twitter account after both he and the Trump photographer took heat. Question: can he undelete it later, and get his old tweets back? I mean using normal Twitter features. Presumably someone famous like Souza could get Elon's, um, ear for a special request, but let's not count that. Thanks. 2602:243:2008:8BB0:F494:276C:D59A:C992 (talk) 23:39, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

According to [2] you have 30 days to reactivate your account. After that, it cannot be recovered. RudolfRed (talk) 15:50, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

July 31

Alternating between dark and light mode?

I work on Google Sheets spreadsheets all day and I don't like how bright light mode gets during sunset. I don't like the look of dark mode either, so I'd prefer to only use dark mode during the sunset time or night. Does anyone know if this is a thing that Google has allowed for? Is there an extension that does this? I could try making a Chrome extension but this is not something I have done before. ―Panamitsu (talk) 05:46, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Google Maps does this automatically when in satnav mode, but I don't know if it is extendable to other products. -- Verbarson  ^talk_edits 10:30, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

• Try the Dark Reader extension (also available on Firefox), which modifies a site's colours and has an automation feature. See here for alternatives, though not all of them would have automation: https://alternativeto.net/software/dark-reader/?feature=dark-mode-enforcer
• Outside of your browser you can try an app to change colours of everything. On Linux there are apps like Redshift, that can gradually adjust blue light for all apps at sunset/sunrise or times you specify. See here for alternatives: https://alternativeto.net/category/utilities/color-temperature-adjustment/

Neither of the above are exactly what you want, but it might come close. The "colour temperature adjustment" apps might be closer to what you actually want, since it isn't dark mode. Things get slightly more 'red' when it is active, but your eyes will get used to it - I use it myself. Komonzia (talk) 20:57, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

August 1

Tweaking the "Format Axis" options in Excel

If you have a chart or pivot chart in Excel, you can double click on the X axis to bring up a pane that gives you all kinds of formatting options, including setting minimum and maximum bounds for the graph. So, you can set the maximum value to be $1,000 and any values that go above that either don't display or are cut off (depending on the chart type). My problem is that, I need to set such a maximum, but I want it to truly act like a maximum value instead of a set number. Like, if the user's choice of filters means that the chart never comes near the boundary I set, then the upper and lower limits should behave dynamically. Is there a way to do that?
If that's hard to picture, here's an example: we sell 10-20 apples and 200-300 oranges each month, so the monthly totals are mostly around 250 or so. But one month we had a crazy value: we sold 10,000 oranges. The chart is unreadable if we leave the defaults in, so we set a maximum value of, say, 350. Now we can read it. But if the user selects "apples" from the filter, the graph becomes unreadable the other way around: we've forced the upper bound of the X-axis to be 350 and the apples are now just a ripple across the bottom of the chart. What I want is for Excel to dynamically resize the chart like it normally does, but not go past my maximum. Can it be done? Googling has not been fruitful so far. Matt Deres (talk) 19:11, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

I understand that you do not want to chart dynamically all the monthly apple totals. Instead you may chart dynamically the minimum of two values, viz. each month's apple total and a numerical limit of 350. Use the Excel MIN function. Philvoids (talk) 18:19, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, that is completely unrelated to what I'm talking about. I'm trying to control the way the graphs establish limits to the X-axis. Matt Deres (talk) 01:43, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

August 3

newline

If you use {{subst:Welcome-newuser|heading=no}} it insert an extra newline at the top. Can that be fixed? Thanks, Polygnotus (talk) 02:20, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

This is not a good place to ask; try instead Template talk:Welcome, or, if that yields no response, Wikipedia:Village pump (technical). I can report that the extra newline issue already appears for just {{Welcome|heading=no}}.  --Lambiam 11:47, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, I moved it there. Polygnotus (talk) 15:09, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

August 4

Karnaugh map/gates

As of now, is the 'or' gate better at handling electricity vs the 'and' gate?Afrazer123 (talk) 01:29, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

That will depend on the implementation, and what electrical state represents the 0 or 1. And it also depends on what you mean by "better". (faster, less energy wasted, smaller, least noise, least sensitive to noise, fan out, tolerance of power supply variation, cheaper, higher yield). Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:47, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes. The Karnaugh map is useful for showing logical relations between Boolean data types that take only values "1" (true) or "0" (false). Elementary Logic gate functions such as AND, OR, NAND, NOR, EXOR, etc. can be mapped, also combinations of connected gates if they are not too complicated. However Boolean data is abstract and the "1" and "0" need not always correspond to electric voltages. Karnaugh maps are equally applicable to fluid logic that uses water instead of electricity. For example a fluid OR gate is simply two pipes being merged. Philvoids (talk) 17:15, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

"better": less energy wasted, higher yield. Afrazer123 (talk) 05:52, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

CMOS (Complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor) logic devices have low static power consumption and do not produce as much waste heat as other forms of logic, like NMOS logic or Transistor–transistor logic (TTL), which normally have some standing current even when not changing state. Since one transistor of the MOSFET pair is always off, the series combination draws significant power only momentarily during switching between on and off states. There is no significant difference between power consumptions of the logic functions AND, OR, etc. The current drawn from the supply increases with increasing rate of data changes and is mainly due to charging and discharging the output capacitance. Philvoids (talk) 13:14, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, I read about the clock rate or clock speed. I think it adds to the logic your reply. Afrazer123 (talk) 21:20, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

For actual numbers, old digital circuits that I used back in the 70s implemented both and and or with components. The drop is 0.3v pretty much any way you do it for both an or and an and gate. You are either dropping 0.3v across a diode or 0.3v across a transistor. I doubt any modern circuits have that much drop and I'm certain it is still very similar between diodes and transistors. 12.116.29.106 (talk) 12:20, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Modern CMOS gates don't have diodes, nor do the MOS transistors have saturation voltage drops of the sort you're talking about. Dicklyon (talk) 03:53, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

"As of now" means CMOS, one would presume. The "elementary" gates are inverting: NAND and NOR. One has a marginally better energy per operation than the other, but not so much that you'd worry about it. And it depends on your logic conventions, which you can change in midstream if that helps. Back in the NMOS days, with positive logic (higher voltage representing logic 1), the NOR gate had a signficantly better energy per operation than the NAND gate, due to the use of N-type switches to ground and passive pullups, with switches being in series for NAND and parallel for NOR. And both were better than PMOS gates, due to the higher mobility of electrons compared to holes. But CMOS is more nearly symmetric (at least in the most typical logic gate circuits). I think the one with series N-type and parallel P-type devices is a bit better (that's a NAND for positive logic); but I wouldn't swear to it. Choosing NAND vs NOR is not a big deal compared to using AOI (AND-OR-invert) gates and optimizations at other levels. One such other technique is the use of dynamic logic, which gets more complicated to reason about, but still probably the gates with parallel switches are a bit more energy efficient than the ones with series switches. But other considerations dominate. And I haven't seen anyone use Karnaugh maps in the last 4 decades; are they still teaching those? Dicklyon (talk) 03:53, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

By the way, the Apollo Guidance Computer#Logic hardware used only one type of small-scale chip: a dual 3-input NOR. Dicklyon (talk) 04:03, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

August 5

Downloading MediaWiki for home use

I usually use an LG Gram 1 TB SSD laptop with 32 GB RAM. I've got about 600 MB free. I would like to be able to create articles on my own PC instead of using my personal userspace. I haven't gotten any response at Talk:MediaWiki, so I'm asking here. I have always created my articles in my userspace, but have recently experienced harassment and stalking for doing so, and I'm tired of it.

Can MediaWiki be downloaded for personal use at home, with no one else accessing it? If so, what would be the requirements to get it functioning properly? Would I need to download other software, or have a huge hard drive? I guess I'm hoping for a word processor type program that works like editing here.

If it won't work in that way, is there another software program that uses the same wikimarkup we use here? I'd like to be able to create content on my PC, move it to userspace, maybe then to draftspace, and finally to mainspace. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 02:22, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

You can download MediaWiki software yourself, as per Manual:Installation requirements. You will require both a database and a way to serve the webpages to the user, however, as well as PHP. Doing this yourself would require a separate server or machine, although you can use a webhost and just have them install the required dependencies.

Actual storage and memory requirements are quite low, so storage wouldn't be a terrible issue, but depending on how much you would use it, that can fill up relatively quickly.

Alternatively, there are several wiki softwares that aren't all that great for public use, but are good for what you want to do (personal, internal use). Something like wikijs or dokuwiki would be better suited for this. SmittenGalaxy | talk! 06:41, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

It sounds a bit complicated for this old man. Is there anything simpler and similar to a word processor program like Microsoft Word (and I'm old enough to have used WordPerfect and directly edited its code) that uses our wiki markup? It's okay if there are red links because I wouldn't be hosting all of Wikipedia. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 14:54, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

There is Extension:Word2MedaWiki that can take Microsoft Word and translate it to MediaWiki markup, although it is quite old and unmaintained, and as such I don't believe works on newer 64-bit versions of Word. Microsoft did release this addon for Word 2007 and 2010 (and 2013 with registry editing).

Aside from those, LibreOffice and OpenOffice (stated below as well) are standalone editors that can save directly as MediaWiki. See Help:WordToWiki as well. SmittenGalaxy | talk! 21:51, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

OpenOffice has a wiki extension so you can write articles in a word processor and save them in wiki markup. I personally do not feel that it procudes optimal markup, but it works. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 18:41, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

• Yes, you can do this. I've been doing it for years: on my own servers, on my laptop (often on client sites) and also internet hosted MediaWikis, so that I can access them elsewhere. They're all fairly easy.

One way to do this is with a hosting company (or the free tier on AWS) that offers a 'one click install' of MediaWiki. This is very simple.

However installing complex software on a public-accessible website always needs care and competence. Even if you're just locking it down as an extranet, you still need to lock it carefully. Andy Dingley (talk) 23:18, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Or else you do it the classic and well-documented route of installing a Linux (or Xampp under Windows), then Apache web server, then PHP, then MediaWiki, then some MediaWiki extensions, then the Wikipedia content (mostly some templates) needed to emulate the Wikipedia experience. Because it's not so simply bundled, it's the Wikipedia templates that might take the most time to do. You can also install Lua (not all installs do this as standard) which many Wikipedia templates use instead of MediaWiki template code (which is hateful stuff anyway).

I use this every day. It's my basic desktop organisation tool. I also used to use it for writing articles for here, back when that was still worth doing. Andy Dingley (talk) 22:32, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I think this highlights a key point not really discussed until now. If you're hoping to develop content for en.wikipedia and you want to be able to actually preview locally what you've developed, it's quite likely it's not just a basic wiki install you need but key templates as well. I mean even if you don't care about infoboxes and some stuff so can ignore these, you're probably using templates for referencing and maybe some other formatting things. A quick look at one example of what I guess is a sandbox [3] shows plenty of templates e.g. for referencing, block quotes, and other things. Note also that unless you have a local mirror of all content, or some other more complicated set-up, all interwiki links will generally be red so it might be difficult to notice if you've made a mistake. I'm sure there are ways to set it up to just obtain the templates from en.wikipedia but I suspect this is complicated and you might need some caching setup or API access or risk excessively downloads from the web frontend that server admins aren't happy. Possibly a better option might be to just write and store your content locally, with something capable of highlighting wikisyntax and/or providing shortcuts if that's what you want, and then preview online. This does mean you need an internet connection whenever you preview. (In theory you could make this fairly automated so you have an editing syntax and are able to save locally, except when you preview it uses en.wikipedia, but I'm not sure if there's an easy way to set that up.) Nil Einne (talk) 00:16, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Ideally, volunteer editors (all of us!) should be allowed to use their "personal userspace" for article creation:

"If you would like to draft a new article, Help:Userspace draft provides a standard template and useful guidance to help you create a draft in your userspace, and the Article Wizard can walk you through all stages of creating an article with the option to save as a userspace draft too. You can use the template {{userspace draft}} to tag a userspace draft if it is not automatically done for you."(source)

Does it come with an RfD tag already prepended so nobody else has to slap it on the moment you publish the article? 75.136.148.8 (talk) 11:52, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Those are the rules here, after all, but some don't approve of that practice when it's a topic they don't want to see here, as I have found out. If it's uncontroversial content, then they don't cause problems. Hmmm.... -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:40, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Installing a whole MediaWiki installation may be overkill if the primary use case is working on article drafts. There are a variety of plain text editors with extensions/plugins for highlighting and formatting MediaWiki markup. This also reduces the risk of losing your work if your web browser crashes or drops its cache. ClaudineChionh (she/her · talk · contribs · email) 12:06, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

August 7

Single versus Multiple Exit Points in a Function

When I was in school back in the 90s, we were taught that a function should have only one exit point. Do they still teach this? I'm asking because I'm coming across a lot of code when doing code reviews where the developer has multiple exit points and I'm wondering if I should ask them to change their code to have one exit point or let it slide. For example, I often see code like this:

        private static bool IsBeatle1(string name)
        {
            if (name == "Paul") 
            {
                return true;
            }
            if (name == "John")
            {
                return true;
            }
            if (name == "George")
            {
                return true;
            }
            if (name == "Ringo")
            {
                return true;
            }
            return false;
        }

Personally, this is how I would have written this code:

        static bool IsBeatle2(string name)
        {
            bool isBeatle = false;
            if (name == "Paul")
            {
                isBeatle = true;
            }
            else if (name == "John")
            {
                isBeatle = true;
            }
            else if (name == "George")
            {
                isBeatle = true;
            }
            else if (name == "Ringo")
            {
                isBeatle = true;
            }
            return isBeatle;
        }

So, my question is two fold:

1. Do they still teach in school that a function should have a single exit point?
2. When doing code reviews, should I ask the developer to rewrite their code to have one single exit point? Yes, I realize that this second question is a value judgement but I'm OK with hearing other people's opinions.

Pealarther (talk) 11:21, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

If there was only one school with only one instructor, your answer could be "yes" or "no." However, there are millions of schools with millions of instructors. So, the only correct answer is "both." Yielding functions and scripting languages have changed what is considered optimal when writing functions. So, it comes down to what the function does, what language is being used, and what the instructor feels like teaching. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 11:49, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

• Many things taught in the '90s, and especially the '80s, are now realised to be unrealistic.

There is no reason why functions should only have one exit point. What's important is that some boundary exists somewhere where you can make absolute statements about what happens when crossing that boundary. Such boundaries are commonly functions, but it's broader than that too. In this case, we can define a contract, 'Leaving this function will always return a Boolean, set correctly for isBeatleness.' That's sufficient. To then mash that into this type of simplistic 'Only call return once, even within a trivial function' is pointless and wasteful.

You might also look at 'Pythonic' code, the idiomatic style of coding optimised for use in Python. This raises exceptions quite generously, see Python syntax and semantics#Exceptions. The boundary here is outside the function, but instead the scope of the try...except block. In Pythonic code, the exception handler that catches the exception might be a very long way away. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:58, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, it was accepted wisdom (at least in academic teaching of programming) in the 1980s, and Pascal (the main teaching language in a lot of academic settings) effectively enforced it (at least in the academic versions people taught - I rather think Turbo Pascal, which was always more pragmatic, will not enforce this). But it leads to some horrible patterns:

1. checking inputs and other preconditions are acceptable leads to deep nested ifs, with the "core" of the function many deep.
2. "result" accumulation - especially where "break" is also prohibited (with the same reasoning), where the function has "finished" its calculation, but has to set a result variable, which then trickles down to the eventual real return at the end of the function. This (and the break prohibition) leads to fragile "are we done yet" booleans.

So the restriction was an attempt to avoid bad code, but in doing so produced lots of different kinds of bad, unreadable, fragile code. So it's a daft restriction.

I've no idea what academics teach now, and frankly what universities (often in toy or abstract cases) do is seldom what industry does. So let's look at what industry does:

• Code Complete reads "Minimize the number of returns in each routine. It's harder to understand a routine when, reading it at the bottom, you're unaware of the possibility that it returned some-where above. For that reason, use returns judiciously—only when they improve readability."
• Neither the CoreCPPGuidelines nor Google's C++ styleguide seems to say anything on the topic
• Notable codebases like Chrome, the Linux Kernel, PDF.js, IdTech3, MySQL, LLVM, and gcc all frequently use multiple return paths.

That doesn't mean "just return willy-nilly wherever", as that can be as bad - Code Complete gives smart advice. But it's a bad rule, which won't produce better code in real circumstances, and will frequently produce worse code. "Write good code" can't be boiled down to such simple proscriptions. -- Finlay McWalter··–·Talk 14:13, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

• Although what's Code Complete now? 30 years old? And itself a prime example of fossilised '90s practices. Andy Dingley (talk) 14:29, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

I tend to agree with the OP. However, the example of multiple exits he gives is not that bad because they are all right together. It would be worse practice to have four exits randomly spread out in a routine. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 04:08, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

The underlying rationale for the directive to have a single exit is to make it easier to ascertain that a required relationship between the arguments and the return value holds, as well as (for functions that may have side effects) that a required postcondition holds – possibly involving the return value. If the text of the body of a function fits on a single screen, forcing a single exit will usually make the code less readable. As long as it is easy to find all exits – much easier with on-line editors than with printouts of code on punch cards as was common before the eighties – the directive no longer fulfills a clear purpose.  --Lambiam 08:14, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

How are one-time passwords secure?

To log into my Mailchimp account, I need a password plus a one-time code I either read off the Google Authenticator app on my Samsung tablet, or off the iCloud keychain. The two sources always give the same code, and to set them up, I had to enter a 16-letter code. My question is: how does any of this increase security? To get the one-time code, all a hacker needs is the 16-letter code used, and they're good to go. It just seems like a second password but more complicated. I thought the idea of one-time codes was that it would be something I know (password) and something I have (my tablet). But in fact the something I have is only useful because of the 16-letter code (something else I know). Amisom (talk) 15:48, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

If you know the secret key (the code you started with), the current time, and the algorithm, you can produce the OTP key at any point in time. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 17:21, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Or indeed, as I said, all you need is the secret key and a widely available app like Google Authenticator. So my question is how and why that is more secure than a password alone. Amisom (talk) 17:23, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

The issue is if your communication is being intercepted, someone is looking over your shoulder, or a bug in the browser state means the text you entered (which should be forgotten immediately) is retained in memory, and a wrongdoer can recover it later. If you were sending a shared secret (e.g. a password), now the enemy has your password. If all you enter is the OTP, which expires in a minute or two, the enemy has only seconds to use it. As the OTP is generated from the 80-bit shared secret with a one-way function (in this case, a cryptographic hash function), they can't reverse OTP to recreate the 80-bit secret. The 80-bit shared secret key should not be your regular password, nor derived from it. Typically, when setting up a HOTP entry in Authenticator, the service (e.g. Mailchimp) should generate an 80 bit random key and usually shows this on screen with a QR code (for Google Authenticator to read). After that, the 80-bit shared secret is never passed between the two parties. -- Finlay McWalter··–·Talk 18:02, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Technically, as the concern mentions, if I had thousands of computers all attempting to authenticate at the same time, I could have each one attempt thousands of possible OTP keys based on trying every possible original seed value used to set up the OTP. If one works, I can continue using it without the extra overhead of trying millions of combinations. But, even if only 16 hex values were used in the random initial seed, there would be over 1,000,000,000,000 possible values to try. As mentioned above, you can't intercept this as you can with a password. It is not transmitted anywhere. The user never types it into anything after setting up the OTP. But, the concern is not completely without merit. It is possible that someone could randomly pick out the original value used to set up the whole thing and then have their own copy of it to use. It comes down to the old analogy of you can spend billions to build a system to work out a person's OTP and hack into their bank account or you can spend $5 on a good hammer and force them to give you their phone so you can use it to log in easily. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 19:53, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

There are 16¹⁶ different hexadecimal strings of length 16, which is more than 1.8×10¹⁹. This is a whole lot more than 1,000,000,000,000.  --Lambiam 21:51, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

The comment above that mentions an 80-bit shared secret. Assuming 8 bits per character, that is 10 characters, not 16. Regardless, it is correct to state that it is not likely someone will brute force an OTP secret easily. 12.116.29.106 (talk) 12:40, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

July 25

Vicarization

Greetings! I was reading the http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Fauna_of_Puerto_Rico article and came across the above word, it is blue-linked to "Speciation" but I cannot find that word on the speciation article. I couldn't find a definition in several dictionaries i checked either...Do you know what this word means? could it be made more clear in the article?140.147.160.225 (talk) 18:47, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

The link should be to Allopatric speciation. To my ignorant mind it appears that the correct word is "vicariance", not "vicarization". --Wrongfilter (talk) 19:06, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes. VICARIANCE n. (biology) The separation of a group of organisms by a geographic barrier, resulting in differentiation of the original group into new varieties or species [4] Philvoids (talk) 12:07, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

thanks so much! I've updated the article 140.147.160.225 (talk) 18:42, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Fels-Naptha

At Talk:Fels-Naptha I raised the issue that the article makes that unsourced claim that "Fels-Naptha once contained naphtha, a skin and eye irritant", but I was unable to find any source showing that Fels-Naptha (note the single "h") soap used to have Naphtha (note the two "h"s) in it, when it was removed, or why it was removed. This may be an urban myth. Can anyone find a source for those claims? --Guy Macon Alternate Account (talk) 19:52, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Following up links in the references of that article and of Naphtha leads to several sources that state naphtha was dropped from the ingredients, at least one saying this was due to fears it might be carcinogenic. I don't know if any of those sources count as 'Reliable', and none give their sources. This seems unsurprising given the degree to which naphtha was and is used in many products and processes.

'Naptha' seems merely to be a common variant spelling, particularly in product names, presumably because the string -phth- is uncommon in English and likely to be mispronounced and misread by non-chemists. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 20:49, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

July 26

Absorption of matter, without changing the absorber's restmass. Possible?

When a stationary system absorbs a new stationary body, the system's restmass increases by the new body's restmass.

Something similar happens when an electron absorbs light. See Wikisource: The free electrons absorb some of the ultraviolet energy that initially set them free and form an ionized layer.

However, when a stationary body collides with a moving body, the stationary body gains kinetic energy, without changing this body's restmass.

Can a moving body be absorbed by an absorber (like in the first case), but with the absorber's restmass remaining the same as before (like in the second case)? HOTmag (talk) 12:35, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

A free electron cannot absorb light. Ruslik_Zero 13:24, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Photons caught by a trap increases its mass. As Ruslik_Zero points out, photons interacting with free electrons are not absorbed. Instead they interact elastically, but inelastic collisions are always additive increasing the invariant mass of the absorber. Modocc (talk) 14:26, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Must the answer to the question in the title be negative?

As for free electrons absorbing light, I've struck it out, but is the book "Electronics Technician" wrong? It's quoted in Wikisource: [5]: The free electrons absorb some of the ultraviolet energy that initially set them free and form an ionized layer.

HOTmag (talk) 14:46, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Not wrong. The electrons were bonded so the photons' energies broke them without changing their intrinsic rest masses. Modocc (talk) 15:38, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Ok, so I've just added back the first comment about free electrons absorbing light (I've also added your clarification). Anyway, I'm still curious to know the answer to the question in the title. HOTmag (talk) 16:27, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

In Compton scattering, a free electron gains energy and momentum from a photon, but it does not "absorb" it. --Wrongfilter (talk) 16:52, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Right, matter absorbs radiation per Quantum electrodynamics. Its rest mass increases unless the energy gets scattered elsewhere. Modocc (talk) 18:06, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

The electron's mass does not increase. --Wrongfilter (talk) 18:26, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

With Compton scattering, it cannot absorb the photon. Modocc (talk) 18:29, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Who said it does? I'm out. --Wrongfilter (talk) 18:31, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Sorry. I certainly did not nor did I say the electron's mass increased! And when I realized I simply repeated what you said I was going to fix that. Modocc (talk) 18:35, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Right, the mass of the bound masses increases and with respect to electrons only their energy increases. Modocc (talk) 18:38, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

HOTmag, as I was trying to say, bound matter's rest mass increases unless the energy absorbed by it gets emitted again. Modocc (talk) 18:49, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

In general, the energy of waves are absorbed: See Absorption (acoustics) and Absorption (electromagnetic radiation). Also, all matter is thought to be comprised of matter-waves. Perhaps that helps. Modocc (talk) 19:50, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

To sum up, electrons' masses are intrinsic and elemental, but the bound rest masses of objects are not. Both absorbed light and matter can increase the latter's (bound rest masses) mass as you observed, but neither can increase the former's mass (the electron's). Thus the answer is no, absorbers do not absorb matter without increasing their rest masses unless they release it, like you noted with particle annihilation, if only because their masses are not as elemental as their constituents... Modocc (talk) 00:24, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Let me be more clear, now without mentioning photons:

When a stationary system absorbs a new stationary body, the system's restmass increases by the new body's restmass.

However, when a stationary body collides with a moving body, the stationary body gains kinetic energy, without changing this body's restmass.

Can matter be absorbed by an absorber (like in the first case), but with the absorber's restmass remaining the same as before (like in the second case)? HOTmag (talk) 19:30, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

The first case, absorption, always adds rest mass (the second case changes the object's KE, but not its rest mass like within particle accelerators). Modocc (talk) 20:11, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

I didn't ask about the first case, i.e. about a stationary system absorbing a stationary body so that the whole system's restsmass increases, nor about the second case in which the restmass doesn't change.

I wonder, why there can be no third case, i.e, a case in which a system (whether a stationary one or a moving one) absorbs a moving body, so that the system's kinetic energy increases but the whole system's restsmass doesn't change. Is there any reasoning or explanation behind this fact of absence of such a third case? HOTmag (talk) 21:56, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

When an object is at rest its KE is zero, but conservation of energy requires that every object's total energy to be the sum of its parts. We call it rest mass and absorption(s) increases it. Modocc (talk) 22:36, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

I think the conservation of energy is not sufficient for the full explanation: Without the conservation of momentum, one can still argue, that before the absorptoin, the absorber was at rest - hence carried no kinetic energy, while the other body about to be absorbed carried some kinetic energy. After the absorption, the whole system remained surprisingly with the same mass as before, but gained the absorbed body's kinetic energy. What's wrong with that? The wrong thing is my neglecting the conservation of momentum. HOTmag (talk) 00:58, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

The absorbed body adds, at a minimum, a mass-energy equal to KE/c² to the absorber which gains its KE. In addition, for the n-body system, its rest mass and total energy is conserved and unchanged whether they are far apart or bonded together, or internalized and perhaps superimposed. To calculate their combined rest mass one simply adds up their energies in its center-of-momentum frame. In this reference frame the momentum vanishes and their total energy is therefore its rest mass. Modocc (talk) 03:25, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

As to your first sentence about adding a mass $E_{K}/c^{2}$ to the absorber: Please notice, that without the conservation of momentum, one can still argue that before the absorption, the body about to be absorbed carried a total energy $E$ that included - both an internal energy $E_{0}$ - and a kinetic energy $E_{K}$ equivalent to a mass of the size $E_{K}/c^{2}$ you've mentioned. After the absorption, the whole system remained surprisingly with the same mass as before, whereas the absorbed body's internal energy $E_{0}$ was not added to the absorber's internal energy as an addition of the size $E_{0}$, but rather the absorbed body's total energy $E$ was added to the absorber's kinetic energy as an addition of the size $E$. What's wrong with that, without assuming the consevation of momentum, which may actually be not conserved (as you can see in my following thread)?

As to your last claim that "for the n-body system, its rest mass and total energy is conserved and unchanged whether they are far apart or bonded together": AFAIK, what's conserved is the mass-energy as a whole, but the mass alone doesn't have to be conserved: Check: an electron-positron pair, becoming energy alone, without conserving the mass alone (unless one attributes mass to photons, which is a controversial and debatable possibility). HOTmag (talk) 07:11, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Energy contributes to the rest mass. For example, the gluons' energy within the proton contributes to its overall rest mass. It's a widely accepted concept. Modocc (talk) 12:35, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Not always. Check: an electron-positron pair, becoming energy alone, without contributing any mass to the light emitted (unless one attributes mass to photons, which is a controversial and debatable possibility). HOTmag (talk) 12:38, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

The rest mass of the 2-body system is conserved. Modocc (talk) 12:54, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Before the electron and the positron annihilated each other and became energy, the system's rest mass was positive, but after they annihilated each other, the system became light carrying no restmass. HOTmag (talk) 13:24, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

The light carries only energy and momentum yes, but there is a center-of-momentum reference frame in which the particle-waves' momentum vanishes, but their energy, their 2-body rest mass, does not. Modocc (talk) 13:44, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, their energy does not vanish, but their 2-body restmass does vanish, once they annihilate each other and become light, which actually carries no restmass, so the energy they carried before they annihilated each other does not contribute any mass to the light emitted. HOTmag (talk) 17:19, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Place the event in an opaque container. Both the container's total energy and momentum are unaffected because its rest mass includes the photons. Modocc (talk) 19:55, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, when a photon is absorbed it contributes to the absorber's restmass.

However, when an electron-positron pair becomes light in the free space, the pair's restmass vanishes.

This proves that restmass alone, in the free space (rather than in an opaque container), doesn't have to be conserved.

Indeed, restmass is conserved if one assumes both the conservation of energy and the conservation of momentum, but if one only assumes the conservation of energy without assuming the conservation of momentum, then one can still argue, that although any massive body about to be absorbed carries a total energy $E$ that includes - both a kinetic energy $E_{K}$ - and an internal energy $E_{0}$ equivalent to restmass, still after the absorption, the absorber remains surprisingly with the same restmass as before, whereas the absorbed body's internal energy $E_{0}$ is not added to the absorber's internal energy as an addition of the size $E_{0}$, but rather the absorbed body's total energy $E$ is added to the absorber's kinetic energy as an addition of the size $E$. What's wrong with that, without assuming the consevation of momentum, which may actually be not conserved (as you can see in my following thread)? HOTmag (talk) 22:35, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

The container need not contain free space and even if it does as a system its total energy still does not change. Think also of the atmospheric cloud. It consists of enormous numbers of massive and massless particles moving at various velocities, but it is nearly stationary to you and the clouds' total energy that can be calculated is called rest mass. Modocc (talk) 23:00, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, the container, as well as the atmospheric cloud, are systems each of which conserves the restmass. However, in my previous response I didn't talk about any container, nor about any atmospheric cloud. I only said, that "when an electron-positron pair becomes light, [not in a container nor in an atmospheric cloud, but rather] in the free space, then the pair's restmass vanishes". This proves that restmass alone, in the free space (rather than in a container or in an atmospheric cloud), doesn't have to be conserved. Then I added the crucial last paragraph in my previous response. HOTmag (talk) 06:45, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

We've had the two-photon thing before. --Wrongfilter (talk) 09:32, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I remember, but this time I'm talking with Moddoc about an electron-positron pair, which is another issue. HOTmag (talk) 10:54, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

How many photons do you think come out of an electron-positron annihilation event? --Wrongfilter (talk) 11:13, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

2. HOTmag (talk) 12:54, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

July 27

Grooming behavior

In videos of grooming monkeys put all the trash they clean into own mouth, as if eating it, rather than throwing out (same happens when a pet monkey is grooming a human). Why do they do that and isn't harmful for their health? 212.180.235.46 (talk) 10:00, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

How would they know any different? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 11:41, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

If they find lice, these are delicious and nutritious. Also yummy and more important are flakes of salt (dried-up sweat). Dandruff is harmless. If it was generally harmful to their health, evolution would have weeded out this specific behaviour long time ago.  --Lambiam 12:32, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

I guess when you are a social animal, putting parasites you have found back on the ground probably isn't a good idea. This is, however, what my dog does with ticks. But the ticks are apparently not delicious, even for fire ants. Sean.hoyland (talk) 05:23, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Also, small things sometimes (often?) have some antibacterial and antifungal things in their biological toolkits to help them stay alive. Maybe eating them can be beneficial. Sean.hoyland (talk) 05:36, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

What's the opposite of "sticky"?

When a given object tends to get attached to close objects, it may be called "sticky". What about the opposite phenomenon? i.e. How should a given object be called, when it's "reluctant" to get attached to close objects? Even if all objects are at rest, so the adjective "elastic" is not sufficient for describing the opposite of "sticky". HOTmag (talk) 20:20, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Repulsive, eg. the wall repels objects and the suffix -phobic is used in chemistry, eg. hydrophobic. Modocc (talk) 20:33, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. HOTmag (talk) 22:01, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

There is non-stick, which describes objects made of (or coated with) a material with a very low coefficient of friction. Mikenorton (talk) 20:39, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. HOTmag (talk) 22:02, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Hoban (1975) used the term "anti-sticky". [6]  Card Zero  (talk) 03:42, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

"anti-sticky" is good. I guess you could write "not sticky" as "$\neg$ sticky", a downside being that it looks like a stick being described as stick-like. Sean.hoyland (talk) 07:06, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. HOTmag (talk) 13:11, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Teflon? Teflon-like? Huldra (talk) 21:59, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Also nonadhesive. Modocc (talk) 11:12, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Slippery Doug butler (talk) 11:24, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

July 28

What is the geological composition of Lascaux?

I am an artist currently working on a project themed around prehistory and I'd like to know about the geological composition of Lascaux (as well as other early human settlements and pre-human geography in general), so I can better represent it. Additionally, is there any sort of database I can use for these purposes? Aedenuniverse (talk) 01:20, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

See karst. Not sure that helps much. Sean.hoyland (talk) 06:05, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Specifically, it is reported as being calcarenite from the upper Coniacian. Sean.hoyland (talk) 06:10, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

The function of Lascaux is a topic of academic debate, but it was not a settlement. It, and similar caves, are not suitable for serving as dwellings. Human groups of that time lived in tents or the open air, and may occasionally have found shelter in much shallower caves.  --Lambiam 12:02, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Conserving the kinetic energy, without conserving the momentum. Possible?

There being no external forces, inelastic collisions conserve the whole system's momentum, without conserving the whole system's kinetic energy.

What about the opposite physical process? I.E. is there any physical process, e.g. with external forces, which conserves the whole system's kinetic energy, without conserving the whole system's momentum? HOTmag (talk) 07:27, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Resolved

I've just thought about it:

The whole system is: a single elastic body.

The physical process is as follows: the single elastic body collides with an elastic wall, being the external force.

Result: the single elastic body is pushed back to the oppposite direction, with the same speed as before the elastic collision took place.

Therefore: the elastic body's kinetic energy is conserved, yet the elastic body's momentum is not. QED. HOTmag (talk) 10:05, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Nah, you've ignored newton 3. QED Greglocock (talk) 23:47, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Why do you think I ignored it? I think I didn't. HOTmag (talk) 06:47, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

My second thought is to underline 3 words in my response below. Ignoring what is happening by calling one involved object "the whole system" is disingenuous. Philvoids (talk) 18:21, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

The decision of what the "whole system" is, depends on our choice. Here is a typical example: If two perfectly elastic bodies collide with each other, we can choose, whether to call the two-body system: "the whole system", in which case no external force is involved - hence the momentum is conserved in our "whole system" chosen, or to call one colliding body alone "the whole system", in which case the other body exerts an external force on our "whole system" chosen - hence the momentum is not conserved in our "whole system" chosen. This is how all of physics works, with no exceptions. HOTmag (talk) 20:39, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

The wall will gain some momentum. In a multi body collision the centre of gravity of the system remains at constant velocity (N1) in the absence of external forces. You are 100% wrong, and are just making up random explanations to cover up your lack of understanding. I'll be ignoring you from now on. Greglocock (talk) 23:54, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

I'm referring to a very specific reference frame, which is the wall's reference frame, in which every observer referring to the elastic body as "the whole system" attributes no change to the wall's momentum.

I'm bad at analyzing personal comments, so I'm letting the users decide who is right and who is wrong.

HOTmag (talk) 09:18, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

If you're analysing a collision, you can't just pick one of the things that's colliding and call it the whole system. If it was the whole system, there would be nothing else for it to collide with. "The whole system" is not a reference frame. It's the whole set of objects, by definition; you can't pick and choose which objects it includes. AlmostReadytoFly (talk) 09:57, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

A side note: I've never claimed that "the whole system" is a reference frame.

As to your main response: Can you give any example of a two-body system, for which our referring to one of them as the "whole system" may contradict the laws of physics? AFAIK, there is no example of this kind. Recommendation: before you try to think about such an example, take another look at the example I've already given in my previous-previous response (i.e. the one beginning with "The decision"). HOTmag (talk) 10:35, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

If you have a two-body system, the two bodies are the system. If you say you have a one body system, then say that that body collides with something else (e.g. a wall), you're contradicting yourself. AlmostReadytoFly (talk) 11:30, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Maybe the expression "the whole system" confuses you. I can replace it by the expression "the sub-system chosen", in which case no contradiction follows, even according to your attitude.

One contradicts oneself when one says "x" and then says "not x". My analysis is not the case, even when the expression "whole system" is used, but I'm changing it for you, to avoid confusion. HOTmag (talk) 12:32, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean——neither more nor less."

If you just want a physical process where a body keeps its kinetic energy but not its momentum, consider a body in a circular orbit. AlmostReadytoFly (talk) 13:00, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Humpty Dumpty didn't care if the way he spoke could confuse others, but I do care, and that's why I changed the expression "whole-system" to "sub-system".

Yes, also the body you suggest can be chosen as the sub-system. But also the body I've suggested can. HOTmag (talk) 17:56, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Your Question: is there any physical process, e.g. with external forces, which conserves ... kinetic energy, without conserving ... momentum?

Answer: Yes, a circular orbit. AlmostReadytoFly (talk) 18:24, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

I've already approved your answer, in my previous response, so I wonder why you had to repeat the same answer. I only added that also my answer (that preceded yours) was correct. HOTmag (talk) 18:59, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

(ec)

All types of collision (inelastic or elastic) conserve momentum. Total kinetic energy would be conserved (meaning no release of sound or heat) only in an impractical perfectly elastic collision. To identify a process that conserves a system's kinetic energy but may be affected by external forces, one needs firstly to clarify whether the system shall qualify as an Isolated system where thermodynamic laws apply. The Second law of thermodynamics observes that the entropy of isolated systems left to spontaneous evolution cannot decrease, as they always tend toward a state of thermodynamic equilibrium where the entropy is highest at the given internal energy. Philvoids (talk) 10:10, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

July 29

Access to reference 9 in Petrichor

Garg, Anu (2007). The Dord, the Diglot, and an Avocado Or Two: The Hidden Lives and Strange Origins of Words. Penguin. p. 399. ISBN 9780452288614.

Do you have access to the page 399? I would like to find out what it says about the two researchers, Isabel Bear and Dick Thomas. (In ruwiki the same source is cited and it is written that Thomas was from UK, whereas the enwiki says they are both from Australia).

Thank you in advance for your help. Gryllida (talk, e-mail) 00:41, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

The ref says, "In 1964, two Australian researchers, I.J. Bear and R. G. Thomas..." but does not provide any further biographical informaion about either one. Our article links to enwiki articles about each of them: Isabel Joy Bear and Richard Grenfell Thomas. Bear's article makes a strong claim for her being Australian, even though she did work for a few years in the UK. Thoman's article does not have any hint of any national connection other than Australia. DMacks (talk) 01:02, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, Bear's article says "In the 1950s Bear moved to the United Kingdom, where she worked at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus. She moved to the University of Birmingham, where she worked as a postdoctoral researcher in the department of metallurgy. Whilst working in Birmingham Bear became interested in solid-state chemistry. Bear joined the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIRO) in 1953, [...]" -- does it mean she apparently worked in the UK between 1950 and 1953?

The Nature paper was in 1964. Gryllida (talk, e-mail) 04:05, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, Reference [3] after the first sentence in your quote says explicitly "

In the UK (1950-53)

During three years in the UK she was employed first as an Experimental Scientist in the Metallurgy Division of the Atomic Energy Research Establishment at Harwell, and later as a Research Assistant in the Metallurgy Department of Birmingham University." AlmostReadytoFly (talk) 15:45, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

The fastest Internet speed during rain?

So ChatGPT says the fastest Internet speed during rain is fiber topics, then cabled Internet, then mobile wireless Internet. I just want a 2nd opinion if anyone agrees or disagrees? Specifically, ChatGPT said:

• Most Affected: Mobile wireless internet is the most affected by rainy weather due to signal attenuation.
• Moderately Affected: Cabled internet can be affected if the infrastructure is old or damaged, but it is generally more resilient than mobile wireless internet.
• Least Affected: Fiber optic internet is the least affected by rain due to its well-protected, light-based transmission system.

Thanks. 66.99.15.162 (talk) 19:36, 29 July 2024 (UTC).

Fibre optic cable is always the fastest. The bot is right that wireless technology suffers from rain by signal attenuation, which, provided the protocol is designed to make use of good conditions, can slow down internet speed in rain. Some attenuation isn't too bad, as it reduces interference between nearby cellphone towers, without significantly affecting signal strength on short distances. Once the transmitter reaches maximum power, more rain reduces possible speed.

Wired technology is generally unaffected by rain, unless there's so much rain that it enters the cabinets housing routers etc. or causes landslides, ripping the cables apart. Maybe ChatGPT thinks (to the extend that machines can think) that copper cable networks tend to be older than fibre optic networks and therefore more susceptible to such water intrusion.

Copper networks are typically faster than wireless for the same reason as why speaking tubes are better than providing everybody with a megaphone: the more people shout over the same medium, the more confusion. PiusImpavidus (talk) 09:47, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

The speed of mobile wireless Internet access depends more on the generation of broadband cellular network technology deployed locally (2G, 3G, 4G, 5G) than on the weather conditions. If there is no cellular coverage, the only solution is satellite Internet access, which can stream at a high rate but has a high latency. In all cases (wireless, cable, fiber) the bandwidth may depend on the contract with the provider – often one can opt for a subscription with a higher rate at a higher cost. And in all cases the actual latency and streaming rate may be much lower than the promised one.  --Lambiam 09:57, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Historic (pre-1800s) Wildfires in California

I read that historically, about 2-4 million hectares would burn a year in California, https://www.propublica.org/article/they-know-how-to-prevent-megafires-why-wont-anybody-listen and https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0378112707004379. A claim made in the sources was that smoke was a feature of the landscape, rather than an oddity as it is now. If the "extreme" modern season tends to be around 2 million ha with moderate air quality impact, what would be some rough estimates for the average pm2.5 levels across pre-1800s California in late summertime? Takedalullaby (talk) 21:01, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Sounds like The Burning City by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. They claim that the Los Angeles valley was originally called Iyáangẚ, "the valley of smoke". by the Tongva. Abductive (reasoning) 20:17, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

July 30

Rare quasi-cancer disease in children

Friends recently received a diagnosis for their toddler, and they told me what the doctor had called it, but now I can't remember its name. I know that it has a Wikipedia article, because I read the article when they first told me.

All I remember of the little guy's symptoms is that he frequently has joint pain at unexpected times. The doctor explained to them that the disease causes lesions in random places (including in the bones, if I remember rightly), and because these bulges occur in places where they shouldn't be, some interfere with ordinary movement and cause pain. The disease is treated with chemotherapy, and apparently there's some debate among the experts over whether it should be classified as a kind of cancer. I think the doctor gave a reasonably good prognosis for the disease with treatment and a dreadful prognosis without treatment. I don't remember if the Wikipedia article mentioned if the cause is known, or if it is, what causes it. It's not so rare that the exact number of diagnoses is known, but it's classified as rare (at least here in Australia) because it occurs only once per several thousand individuals. I've looked through Category:Syndromes with musculoskeletal abnormalities without finding it.

While this desk doesn't provide medical advice, remember that I'm not asking for diagnosis: I'm basically starting with a diagnosis and trying to work out the name. This is similar to the strep-infection question from Wikipedia:Kainaw's criterion. Nyttend (talk) 19:27, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Histiocytosis? Ruslik_Zero 20:39, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Ah, it's Langerhans cell histiocytosis. Now I remember my confusion when talking with the friends, since initially I thought they meant it was something pancreatic. Thanks for the pointer! Nyttend (talk) 21:35, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

July 31

Is there any simple necessary sufficient condition that conserves kinetic energy, without mentioning kinetic energy?

Note that the absence of external net force is a simple necessary sufficient condition that conserves momentum, without mentioning momentum (just as the absence of external torque is a simple necessary sufficient condition that conserves angular momentum, without mentioning angular momentum).

However, the absence of external net force is not a necessary condition (that conserves kinetic energy), because a given body's kinetic energy can be conserved even when external net force are exerted on that body, e.g. when it's in a circular orbit (in which case the space must have more than one dimension), or when the body elastically collides with a wall sharing a reference frame with an observer who measures the body's kinetic energy (in which case the space is allowed to have a single dimension).

The absence of external net force is not a sufficient condition (that conserves kinetic energy) either, as can be shown when two bodies inelastically collide with each other: The two body system's kinetic energy is not conserved [when the whole system is not seen at rest], although no external net force is exerted on that two body system.

HOTmag (talk) 07:11, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

In a system of two equal bodies circling each other around a common centre of mass, the net momentum of the system is constant, yet there are forces at play.  --Lambiam 09:18, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

The forces you are talking about, are internal ones, each of which is exerted on only a part of the two body system, on which no external force is exerted. Any way, for the sake of clarity, I've just added the word "external" to my first post. HOTmag (talk) 09:37, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

.

.

Resolved

I've just thought about it, assuming that restmass does not change:

The conservation of velocity is a simple necessary sufficient condition that conserves momentum, without mentioning momentum.

The conservation of speed (i.e. of the absolute value of velocity) is a simple necessary sufficient condition that conserves kinetic energy, without mentioning kinetic energy. HOTmag (talk) 10:49, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

You write ‘The absence of external forces is not a sufficient condition ...’ This is debatable. I say that the kinetic energy of the constituents of the system doesn't necessarily contribute to the kinetic energy of the entire system. The energy associated with the movement of the inelastically colliding bodies relative to their common centre of mass is counted as internal energy of the system, not as kinetic energy. Take for example a bottle of warm gas in a circular orbit around Saturn. After a while, the gas cools down. The kinetic energy of the gas molecules decreases, but the kinetic energy of the bottle of gas remains the same; the thermal energy decreases. PiusImpavidus (talk) 18:08, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Had the absence of external forces been a sufficient condition that conserves kinetic energy, then under that condition - the kinetic energy would've been conserved in all cases - hence in all reference frames and not only when the whole system is seen at rest. Hence, the absence of external forces can't be a sufficient condition that conserves kinetic energy, because when two bodies inelastically collide with each other while the kinetic energy is measured relative to any point that doesn't see the whole system at rest - then the system's kinetic energy does change after the collision - even though no external force is exerted on the system (because the system's momentum does not change). Any way, for the sake of clarity, I've just added this clarification to my paragraph you've quoted. HOTmag (talk) 20:54, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

We have two bodies, inelastically colliding. The kinetic energy of each of the bodies isn't conserved and external forces act on each of them. Namely, the force exerted by the other body. On the other hand, the kinetic energy of the system of two inelastically colliding bodies is conserved, as no external force acts on the system.

Consider the combined kinetic energy of two bodies with masses $m_{1}$ and $m_{2}$ and velocities ${\vec {v}}_{1}$ and ${\vec {v}}_{2}$:

$K={\frac {1}{2}}m_{1}{\vec {v}}_{1}^{2}+{\frac {1}{2}}m_{2}{\vec {v}}_{2}^{2}$

The velocity of the centre of mass is

${\vec {v}}_{cm}={\frac {m_{1}{\vec {v}}_{1}+m_{2}{\vec {v}}_{2}}{m_{1}+m_{2}}}$

Subtracting ${\vec {v}}_{cm}$ from ${\vec {v}}_{1}$ and ${\vec {v}}_{2}$ and rearranging some terms gives the combined kinetic energy of the two bodies in the centre-of-mass frame as

$K_{cm}={\frac {m_{1}m_{2}}{2\left(m_{1}+m_{2}\right)}}\left({\vec {v}}_{1}^{2}+{\vec {v}}_{2}^{2}-2{\vec {v}}_{1}\cdot {\vec {v}}_{2}\right)$

Now suppose we put the two masses into a black box and calculate the kinetic energy of the system in the box:

$K_{s}={\frac {m_{1}+m_{2}}{2}}{\vec {v}}_{cm}^{2}={\frac {1}{2\left(m_{1}+m_{2}\right)}}\left(m_{1}^{2}{\vec {v}}_{1}^{2}+m_{2}^{2}{\vec {v}}_{2}^{2}+2m_{1}m_{2}{\vec {v}}_{1}\cdot {\vec {v}}_{2}\right)$

Now add $K_{s}$ and $K_{cm}$ together and notice how the dot products cancel. Simple calculation shows that

$K=K_{s}+K_{cm}$

That was the maths, now the physics.

The two bodies each have their own kinetic energy. However, when we package the two bodies into a system, the system as a whole has a kinetic energy less than the kinetic energies of the constituent parts. The rest of the kinetic energy of the constituent parts isn't kinetic energy of the system, but internal energy of the system. And this internal energy is equal to the kinetic energy of the constituent parts in the centre-of-mass frame.

So, in your system of two inelastically colliding bodies, the kinetic energy of the bodies is indeed not conserved, but there's an external force acting on each of them. The kinetic energy of the system of two bodies (on which no external force acts) is conserved; it's the internal energy that decreases. PiusImpavidus (talk) 12:14, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

I agree to all of your maths, as well as to all of your claims about physics, except two sentences: "the kinetic energy of the system of two inelastically colliding bodies is conserved, as no external force acts on the system....The kinetic energy of the system of two bodies (on which no external force acts) is conserved".

The correct fact that "no external force acts on the system", is not sufficient for justifying your claim that the system's kinetic energy is conserved. As I've already pointed out in my previous response, the system's kinetic energy is only conserved when the whole system is seen at rest. For more details, see our article inelastic collision: "inelastic collisions do not conserve kinetic energy" [i.e. not in all reference frames].

Btw, for simplicity, let's assume that ${\vec {v}}={\vec {v}}_{1}=-{\vec {v}}_{2}$ and that $m=m_{1}=m_{2}$ (hence $K=K_{cm},$ and $K_{s}=0).$ HOTmag (talk) 14:23, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

The kinetic energy of the system $K_{s}$ only depends on the total mass of the system and $v_{cm}$. In the absence of external forces, neither of those change, so $K_{s}$ is conserved, in every reference frame. What the bodies do to each other is irrelevant. $K_{cm}$ and $K$, the difference between which is constant, are not conserved in an inelastic collision and the loss of energy is the same in every reference frame, including the centre-of-mass frame.

The nice thing I tried to show you is that the sum of the kinetic energies of the bodies can be broken into two parts, being the kinetic energy of the system of two bodies and the internal energy of the system, which can simply be added together. When you calculate the kinetic energy of a rock, you don't include the kinetic energies of all its vibrating atoms, right? Because that's the thermal energy of the rock. It's exactly the same here. PiusImpavidus (talk) 08:07, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you ever so much for your clarifications. So, I'm striking out the wrong thing in my first post (See above). HOTmag (talk) 11:12, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Consider again a system of two equal bodies orbiting around a common centre of mass. Choose the coordinate system such that the common centre of mass of the two-body system is at rest. If one body's momentum equals $\mathbf {p}$ at some instant of time, that of the other at the same instant of time equals $-\mathbf {p} ,$ so the momentum of the system is $\mathbf {0} .$ Now apply external forces rotation-symmetrically to the objects so as to reverse their motion, making them circle again around their common centre of mass – which has not budged – but in the opposite sense. The symmetry guarantees that the momentum of the system remains $\mathbf {0}$ at all times, so the absence of external forces is not a necessary condition for conserving momentum.  --Lambiam 20:06, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Your case does not involve an external force but rather involves an external torque. Any way, for the sake of clarity, I've just added this clarification to the first paragraph of my first post. HOTmag (talk) 20:54, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

...but equal and opposite applied forces like compression conserves momentum too. In other words, absence of external forces is a sufficient condition but it is not necessary. Modocc (talk) 21:35, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

By "equal", I guess you mean "having the same absolute value".

Anyway, when the external forces are equal [in their absolute value] and opposite, then the sum of those external forces is zero. Hence, saying that the external forces are equal [in their absolute value] and opposite, is like saying that there are no external forces. Hence, if you want to prove that the absence of external forces is not a necessary condition that conserves momentum, you will have to give an example in which the sum of the external forces is not zero. HOTmag (talk) 06:47, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

The fact that external forces can sum to zero does not imply they are absent... For example, without material internal resisting forces submarines and neutron stars implode. Modocc (talk) 08:18, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

All depends on what we mean by "absence of external forces". By "absence of external forces" I intend to include also all cases of external forces summing to zero. HOTmag (talk) 08:41, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

If you mean "absence of external net force" then why not write that instead? Also if F=0 then dP/dt=0 per Newton's second law, see Force. Modocc (talk) 12:09, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Re. your first sentence: Ok, I'm adopting your current suggestion (See above in my first post).

Re. your second sentence: Of course, but what was wrong in my saying (ibid.) that "the absence of external [net] force is a simple necessary sufficient condition that conserves momentum, without mentioning momentum"? HOTmag (talk) 14:23, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Nothing wrong, so I deleted the second part. Then in hindsight I deleted the first part because in many contexts it's understood, but not always. Then you restored the entire comment. Sigh. Modocc (talk) 15:02, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Probably I had started responding to your response before you deleted it? Anyway, surprisingly, I didn't get any warning of "edit conflict" when I responded to your deleted response. HOTmag (talk) 15:56, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Also, it is best practice to strike the original phrase(s) when modifying them so Lambiam's and my comments retain context. Modocc (talk) 15:54, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Agree. Next time... HOTmag (talk) 15:57, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

${\vec {F}}\cdot {\vec {v}}=0$ PiusImpavidus (talk) 12:50, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

In my first post I gave two counter-examples:

1. On the one hand, when the body elastically collides with a wall sharing a reference frame with an observer who measures the body's kinetic energy, then the body's kinetic energy is conserved even though this case does not satisfy your condition. Hence it's not a necessary condition.

2. On the other hand, when two bodies inelastically collide with each other, the two body system's kinetic energy is not conserved [when the whole system is not seen at rest], even though this case does satisfy your condition. Hence it's not a sufficient condition. HOTmag (talk) 14:23, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Both counter-examples fail:

1. While bouncing, ${\vec {v}}$ changes such that it is on average either 0 or parallel to the wall, whilst ${\vec {F}}$, the normal force, is perpendicular to the wall. Therefore, their dot product is zero, so the condition is satisfied.
2. I explained that one above. You have to make a distinction between the sum of the kinetic energies of the two bodies and the kinetic energy of the system of the two bodies. The former decreases in every reference frame, but the latter is conserved in every reference frame, so this doesn't prove that the condition is insufficient.

PiusImpavidus (talk) 08:39, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

So by ${\vec {v}}$ you meant the average velocity. I couldn't understand it before you made it clear. Instead of you, I would write: ${\vec {F}}\cdot ({\vec {v}}_{1}+{\vec {v}}_{2})=0.$

Anyways, your necessary sufficient condition could also be expressed verbally: "a zero external net force - or a zero average velocity - in every coordinate", right? HOTmag (talk) 11:12, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

By ${\vec {v}}$ I mean the instantaneous velocy, so the ${\vec {F}}\cdot {\vec {v}}$ is the instantaneous rate of change of the kinetic energy. If that's 0, the kinetic energy is always conserved.

The thing is, an instantaneous elastic collision is a strange thing. The force is infinite and acts during an infinitesimal time interval, the velocity is a step function changing exactly when the force in infinite. If we multiply the two, the result is zero except at the moment of collision, where it's undefined. So the maths don't work. And of course, no real collision is instantaneous. At the midpoint of any real collision, the kinetic energy (except the part associated with the motion parallel to the wall) has been converted to elastic energy, after the collision it has turned back into kinetic energy. So during a non-instantaneous elastic collision (BTW, no real collision can be fully elastic), kinetic energy isn't conserved at all times, but it is restored afterwards.

If you don't want to look into the details of the collision, you can say that it must be symmetrical, so that $\int {\vec {F}}\cdot {\vec {v}}\,dt=0$. If this integral isn't zero, the collision can't have been elastic. PiusImpavidus (talk) 08:15, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

1. Ok, so during the so-called "an elastic collision between a wall and a body", while the wall is exerting a non-zero external force on the body, the body's kinetic energy is not conserved, because it's converted to elastic energy. Agreed. But why does your condition have to mention the value V of the velocity, rather than only saying that "the kinetic energy is conserved if and only if no external force is exerted on the body along the axis of the body's motion", without having to mention the value V of the velocity? I guess that's because you want to include also the cases of so-called "elastic collisions" in which - the average external force is not zero (because the final momentum does not equal the initial momentum) - but the final kinetic energy does equal the initial kinetic energy, so the condition ${\vec {F}}=0$ (where F denotes the average external force exerted on the body along the axis of the body's motion) wouldn't be a sufficient condition, and that's why you had to strengthen it as: ${\vec {F}}\cdot {\vec {v}}=0$ where both F and V are average values, am I right?

2. I asked: "Is there any simple necessary sufficient condition that conserves kinetic energy, without mentioning kinetic energy?"

By asking that, I meant the following:

Is there any simple necessary sufficient condition, satisfying the following:

If a given system, carried (at the beginning of the process) an initial mass $m_{1}$ and an initial velocity ${\vec {v}}_{1}$ and an initial kinetic energy $E_{K1},$ and is carrying (right now) a final mass $m_{2}$ and a final velocity ${\vec {v}}_{2}$ and a final kinetic energy $E_{K2},$ then $E_{K1}=E_{K2}$ if and only if the condition holds.

Then I added, that the condition was not allowed to mention the kinetic energy.

Please note:

a). The kinetic energy can be defined as $\int {\vec {F}}\cdot d{\vec {s}}$ (when it's defined as zero if the momentum is zero), when ${\vec {F}}$ denotes the force and $d{\vec {s}}$ denotes the infinitesimal displacement, so I don't allow the condition to mention (at once) both ${\vec {F}}$ and $d{\vec {s}}$ (sorry for not making it clear before). Nor do I allow the condition to mention any set of properties (e.g. ${\vec {F}},{\vec {v}},dt$) that determines (at once) both ${\vec {F}}$ and $d{\vec {s}}$.

b). The kinetic energy is also determined once we are given any pair of the following three properties: mass-velocity-momentum, so I don't allow the condition to mention any such a pair either (sorry for not making it clear before). Nor do I allow the condition to mention any set of properties that determines any such a pair.

c). Your condition ${\vec {F}}=0$ is not necessary. Check: $m_{1}={\vec {v}}_{1}=m_{2}=1,{\vec {v}}_{2}=-1.$

d). Your condition ${\vec {F}}=0$ is not sufficient. Check: $m_{1}={\vec {v}}_{2}=1,m_{2}={\vec {v}}_{1}=2.$

HOTmag (talk) 19:28, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Is there any simple necessary sufficient condition, that conserves a given system's total energy, without mentioning energy/mass?

Just as absence of external force is a simple necessary sufficient condition that conserves momentum, without mentioning momentum. HOTmag (talk) 10:57, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

The net work done by the system is equal to the net heat received. PiusImpavidus (talk) 17:45, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

It's not a necessary condition: Consider a harmonic oscillator, in which the total energy is conserved, even though the (changing) net work done by the system is not equal to the (zero) net heat received. HOTmag (talk) 21:09, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

What work? An isolated harmonic oscillator does no work on its surroundings. The parts forming the isolated harmonic oscillator do work on each other and their energies oscillate, but the whole system does no work and has constant energy.

Like in the above discussion, you don't keep proper track of what's in your system and what's not. PiusImpavidus (talk) 12:25, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Sorry for not clarifying myself. Anyway, I meant the following:

When a gravity pendulum is influenced by gravitation, the pendulum's total energy is conserved, even though the (changing) net work done by the gravitation on the pendulum is not equal to the (zero) net heat received by the pendulum's movement. HOTmag (talk) 14:23, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

There are two ways to look at this:

1. When the bob of the pendulum climbs, its kinetic energy is converted into potential energy, but still present in the bob. The total energy of the bob doesn't change and no work is done. When the bob descends, the potential energy is converted back into kinetic energy, but again no work is done. This is mathematically the easy way, but not entirely correct.
2. When the bob of the pendulum climbs, it performs work on the gravitational field. The bob loses energy, the field gains energy. When the bob descends, the field performs work on the bob. The field looses energy, the bob gains it. The energy of the bob isn't conserved, but an isolated bob without a gravitational field is no harmonic oscillator. The system of bob+string+gravitational field is a harmonic oscillator and energy in that is conserved. Unfortunately, this approach is mathematically very hard.

In physics, we store energy in fields all the time. PiusImpavidus (talk) 08:22, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

no work is done. What? Don't you agree that the work is equivalent to the change in kinetic energy? HOTmag (talk) 11:18, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

In physics, Work is the product of a force and a lasting, permanent displacement. Philvoids (talk) 18:43, 2 August 2024 (UTC) Underlining added for clarity.

If the force is denoted by ${\vec {F}}$ and the displacement is denoted by ${\vec {s}},$ then the work is defined as $W=\int {\vec {F}}\cdot d{\vec {s}},$ and it's equivalent to the change in the kinetic energy, isn't it? HOTmag (talk) 21:02, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

As I stated, it's not entirely correct, but it's mathematically the easy way. PiusImpavidus (talk) 08:17, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

The more correct alternative is stating that gravity does do work on the bob (approach 2), but then the bob can't have potential energy. PiusImpavidus (talk) 08:24, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

1. I'd asked: "Is there any simple necessary sufficient condition, that conserves a given system's total energy, without mentioning energy/mass?"

2. You'd answered: "The net work done by the system is equal to the net heat received".

I assumed your answer was entirely correct, so I presented a counter example, with a pendulum's bob being the system I'd asked about:

3. When the bob reaches its lowest point, the bob carries a positive kinetic energy. Agree?

4. When the bob reaches its highest point, the bob carries no kinetic energy. Agree?

5. The heat doesn't change. Agree?

6. Hence, the (changing) net work done by the gravitation on the bob is not equal to the (zero) net heat received by the bob's movement. Agree?

7. The bob's total kinetic energy is conserved. Agree?

8. There's a contradiction between: the combination of 1,2, and the combination of 6,7. Agree?

For every statement of the above eight, please indicate if you agree to it. HOTmag (talk) 19:13, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

To be pedantic, I'll assume the point of view where no gravitational potential energy is stored in the bob; it will be stored in the gravitational field instead.

1. Yes, that's what you asked.
2. Yes, that's what I answered.
3. Indeed, at the lowest point the bob has positive kinetic energy.
4. Indeed, at the highest point the bob has no kinetic energy. The energy has been stored in the potential energy of the gravitational field.
5. Heat doesn't change; it flows. But in this case, the heat flow is zero, so I agree.
6. Indeed, during each quarter swing (left–centre–right–centre–left), either positive or negative work is done by the gravitational field on the bob, but no heat ever flows.
7. No, the kinetic energy of the bob isn't conserved. It goes up and down all the time. The total energy of the oscillator (kinetic energy of the bob plus potential energy of the gravitational field) is conserved.
8. No, there's no contradiction. The answer at 2 was about the total energy of the oscillator, the statement at 7 is about the kinetic energy of the bob.

You forgot that the gravitational field is part of the oscillator too. It's as important as the bob. PiusImpavidus (talk) 08:45, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Oh!!! sorry for the big mistake I made in question #7, when I drafted it, adding the redundant word "kinetic". I've just struck it out. Please answer again #7 and #8, and please explain to me what I still didn't understand: when the bob gets to its highest point, doesn't the bob carry a potential energy? If it doesn't, in your opinion, then could you back it with any authoritative source? From Wikipedia if possible. Thank you for your patience! HOTmag (talk) 12:26, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

There are two ways to view this. The lazy way says that the gravitational potential energy is stored in the bob, which is converted to kinetic energy when moving down. Many beginner's books tell this. But if gravity performs work on the bob, this point of view violates conservation of energy. One solution is to ignore work done by gravity, which is easy and what most physicists do most of the time. The other, and proper, way to look at this, explained above under 2, is that the potential energy is stored in the gravitational field, not in any object. Unfortunately, the maths get really hard if you try it that way. As you wondered about the work done by gravity, that's the point of view I'll use here – but I'll skip the maths. So:

7. The bob's energy isn't conserved. The energy moves back and forth between the kinetic energy of the bob and the potential energy of the gravitational field. The total energy of the oscillator, the sum of these, is conserved.

8. No contradiction. Field and bob do work on each other, but are both part of the system. The system performs no work on the outside world. The energy of the system is conserved. The energy of the bob isn't.

It's just a matter of proper accounting. PiusImpavidus (talk) 20:01, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm pretty surprised to read now, that the attitude I've always been taught about, is only what "Many beginner's books tell".

Do you think Wikipedia may add some info about the new description you support?

Additionally and more important: I still don't understand what's wrong in the attitude you describe as the one presented in the beginner's books. You say that "if gravity performs work on the bob, this point of view violates conservation of energy". So first, please notice that also the new description you support violates conservation of energy, because when the bob gets to the highest point the bob has lost the whole kinetic energy the bob carried when it was at the lowest point. Second, according to the attitude you describe as the one presented in the beginner's books, gravity is not committed to the conservation of kinetic energy, but rather is only committed to the sum of the kinetic energy and potential energy, and this sum is always conserved under gravity, even when the potential energy is attributed to the bob rather than to the gravitational field. HOTmag (talk) 07:40, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Many more advanced books don't mention the subject at all.

Suppose an elevated object caries gravitational potential energy. When we let it fall down, it looses this potential energy and gains kinetic energy. So the source of the kinetic energy was already in this object; no energy is transferred to the object when it falls. However, gravity provides a force pulling the object down en provides work to accelerate the object. So the energy is transferred to the object in the form of work by gravity and can't have been in the object beforehand. This is a contradiction. There are just two ways to solve it: either gravity does no work or the potential energy was stored somewhere else than in the object. As you asked about the work done by gravity, I was forced to take the latter approach.

First point: when the bob reaches its highest point, it has lost all its kinetic energy. Gravity has done negative work on the bob and the energy has been stored in the gravitational field. So energy has been conserved.

Second point: The sum of potential energy and kinetic energy is conserved, provided no work is performed on the system. But work is performed on the bob, by gravity. So if our system is just the bob, the potential energy can't be stored in the system, so it's not in the bob.

I never really thought about it for a long time after reading my first books on physics a long time ago, but it's actually pretty obvious. PiusImpavidus (talk) 09:41, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Suppose an elevated object caries gravitational potential energy. When we let it fall down, it looses this potential energy and gains kinetic energy. So the source of the kinetic energy was already in this object.

What? According to the attitude you described as the one presented in the beginner's books, the source of the kinetic energy was not in the object, because every kinetic energy added to any object is given to the object by a force, being the gravity in our case. This is supposed to be obvious in classical mechanics, which really considers gravity to be a "force" .

no energy is transferred to the object when it falls.

I agree, if by "no energy" you mean zero total energy, because in classical mechanics gravity is a conservative force, which actually conserves the sum of potential energy and kinetic energy. However, gravity does not conserve the kinetic energy, and a kinetic energy is transferred to the object when it falls.

First point. When the bob reaches its highest point, it has lost all its kinetic energy. Gravity has done negative work on the bob and the energy has been stored in the gravitational field. So energy has been conserved.

Correct. I apologize for my first point. I confused kinetic energy - which is actually not conserved, with total energy (being the sum of potential energy and kinetic energy in our case) - which is actually conserved.

Second point: The sum of potential energy and kinetic energy is conserved, provided no work is performed on the system.

What? According to the attitude you described as the one presented in the beginner's books, the sum of potential energy and kinetic energy is always conserved under any conservative force, while gravity is really considered to be a conservative force - in classical mechanics, regardless of the work done by that conservative force. According to this attitude, "Work" is equivalent to the change in kinetic energy if there is no change in the potential energy, and is also equivalent to the change in potentia energy if there is no change in the kinetic energy. HOTmag (talk) 11:51, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Physicists carefully define Energy a measurable property that is transferred in interactions and Mass the intrinsic quantity of matter in a body because these are fundamental to both our study and understanding of many Systems i.e. functional groupings of elements that act according to a set of rules. Posing yet another challenge to define a physical system "without mentioning those words" is just inviting responders into a handicapped word play that may provide the engaging debate that the OP is seeking to expose their own ideas but that is a misuse of the reference desk that should not continue. Underlining added for clarity. Philvoids (talk) 10:03, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

I didn't ask about defining something (without using specific words). I only asked about a necessary sufficient condition for the conservation of (total) energy (without mentioning energy/mass), which is a definitely different thing!

Just as the absence of external net force is a necessary sufficient condition for the conservation of momentum, without mentioning momentum. This is a definitely legitimate question. HOTmag (talk) 11:27, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

August 1

Imane Khelif

I'm posting this question in the most neutral and, I hope, respectful way possible. I do not intend to offend anyone or start a fight. What I'd like to know is the actual biological situation of Imane Khelif. Our article is not very clear on the subject. I understand that it is a delicate topic so some of the details may not be public. Does she have X-Y, X-X or some pathological variation of chromosomes? Does she have male or female genitalia? Does she have a specific medical condition (I am aware of the concept of intersex but my understanding is that it could be the outcome of different medical conditions)? Thank you! 79.35.53.87 (talk) 14:30, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

It appears that no details have been shared officially with the public. The IBA has declined to divulge any specifics, but its chairman declared on March 23 to TASS that, based on the results of DNA tests, "it was proved they had XY chromosomes". That is all we know.^[7]  --Lambiam 15:50, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

I believe there are over 50 different 'situations' that fall under the umbrella title of Intersex. We have no access to evidence suggesting which, if any, of these Imane Khelif may fall under, but the OP (and others) might find the article of overall interest.

When categorization for sporting purposes is (some might say as a matter of practicality) binary, but the human species is not, quandries are bound to arise, alas. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.1.169.77 (talk) 01:16, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

One may also consider the gender of Schrödinger´s Cat. --2001:871:6A:1B71:292B:D775:91F7:34E5 (talk) 16:49, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Schrödinger´s Cat's gender is not regarded as an unresolved quantum Wave function so how shall that help? Philvoids (talk) 22:12, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

August 3

Heat capacity, sand battery, check calculation

Could someone please check my work? Sand has a specific heat capacity of around 800 kJ/kg·K. I calculate that if you put 10 000 kWh (10 MWh) into 900 kg (0.6 cubic metres) of it, you raise its temperature by 50 °C. This video is talking about a massive ~40 cubic metre sand battery but it's capacity is only ~10 MWh? Either I'm wrong or the video is wrong, right? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVqHYNE2QwE&t=377s 80.46.251.32 (talk) 01:05, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

According to the article Thermal energy storage, there is a prototype 8 MWh sand battery, built in Finland in 2022. The source given on this system says it is a "steel container, which is 4 m wide and 7 m high, [and it] is filled with 100 tonnes of builder’s sand", and is heated to 500 °C. There is a picture of the silo. So it seems that your calculation must be wrong. Abductive (reasoning) 06:09, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

The specific heat capacity of quartz sand is more like 800 J/kg·K, lower by a factor of 1000. The specific heat capacity is temperature-dependent. At 500 °C it is substantially higher, about 1230 J/kg·K.^[8]  --Lambiam 10:47, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

August 4

density of solid tritium

Has anyone ever actually measured this? I've only seen the density of the liquid discussed in the literature. Double sharp (talk) 07:08, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

see https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4922399/ where they measured the molar volume, effect of pressure and temperature on volume. Also see https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00683620 . Graeme Bartlett (talk) 11:01, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Interferometer116.68.77.174 (talk) 17:48, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

My company got a new project - milk analyzer using FTIR spectroscopy. Now we are conducting a research about interferometer for this milk analyzer and got informations like beamsplitter - [material : KBr or other material that transmit and refract IR beam of 2.5 to 20um wavelength, 50/50 beam splitting coating, anti-reflective coating in mid IR region flatness-1 um for 10um lambda, smoothness-RMS roughness of less than 10nm, thickness- 1 to 5mm]; lens - [plano convex lens that should effectively transmit 2.5 to 20um range wavelength effectively]; Compensating Plate : [Material : Same as beamsplitter, Coating: anti-reflective in the mid-IR range, Anti-reflective coating : Effective in mid IR range, Flatness : 1um for 10um lambda, Smoothness : RMS roughness of less that 10nm, Thickness : match the optical path length difference introduced by your beam splitter]; Mirror: [Reflectance max from 2µm to 20µm, Flatness : 1um for 10um lambda]. Should I proceed with finding optics with these specifications? Do the provided details suffice to initiate the process? And also 2 mirrors are used in this interferometer. One is fixed and other is have a linear motion. When I asked the displacement range of moving mirror in chatgpt 1st time it replied as 0.625mm to 1.25mm. I again asked this question and it replied as 'in a Michelson interferometer, the moving mirror displacement is often around a few millimeters to achieve the desired spectral resolution. Specifically, a displacement range of 1 to 5 millimeters is common, though some high-resolution instruments may require larger displacements.'. I am confused. What is your opinion about this? 116.68.77.174 (talk) 17:48, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

My opinion is that it is unsafe to rely on ChatGPT for any project-critical information. It can however be a useful source of links that you will have to trace and verify. In Wikipedia find Michelson interferometer and FTIR (Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy). External links that I think may help are: Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy as a Tool to Study Milk Composition, Standardization of milk mid-infrared spectra from a European dairy network, Visible and near-infrared spectroscopic analysis of raw milk for cow health monitoring: Reflectance or transmittance? and Human Milk Analysis Using Mid-Infrared Spectroscopy. Philvoids (talk) 23:32, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

IMO one cannot rely on ChatGPT for any factual information, critical or not. It may answer any factual question in an authoritative tone with something that sounds plausible but has no relation to reality.  --Lambiam 23:39, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

It sounds like ChatGPT is ready to run for public office. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:55, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Villar A, Gorritxategi E, Aranzabe E, Fernández S, Otaduy D, Fernández LA (December 2012). "Low-cost visible-near infrared sensor for on-line monitoring of fat and fatty acids content during the manufacturing process of the milk". Food Chemistry. 135 (4): 2756–60. doi:10.1016/j.foodchem.2012.07.074. PMID 22980869. Philvoids (talk) 13:53, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

August 6

Is there any natural process (i.e. without human intervention), conserving the kinetic energy, without conserving the speed (i.e. the absolute value of velocity)?

By conserving the KE without conserving the speed, I mean the following:

Let a system, carry (at the initial moment) an initial mass $m_{1}$ and an initial velocity ${\vec {v}}_{1}$ and an initial kinetic energy $E_{K1},$ and carry (at the final moment) a final mass $m_{2}$ and a final velocity ${\vec {v}}_{2}$ and a final kinetic energy $E_{K2}.$

Is it natural (i.e. without human contact), that $E_{K1}=E_{K2},$ but $|{\vec {v}}_{1}|\neq |{\vec {v}}_{2}|$ [for every reference frame]? while the reference frame remains the same - during the whole process?

Mathematically, it's possible of course, but I wonder if it's also physically possible in any natural process.

Note, that I'm only asking about a change in speed, rather than about a change in velocity, because no question would arise, had I replaced speed by velocity, in which case there would be natural processes conserving the KE without conserving the velocity, e.g. when the system is any given body that elastically collides with a wall sharing a reference frame with an observer who measures the body's kinetic energy. HOTmag (talk) 07:10, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

This can only happen when the mass changes inversely proportional to the square of the speed. It can be done naturally through clever accounting. Suppose a rock changes speed and breaks into four equal parts; a natural process. We can choose to define our system such that three of the parts of the rock leave the system, reducing the mass to one quarter. We can also choose a frame of reference in which the speed of the remaining fragment doubles compared to the speed of the original rock. Then your condition is met. Obviously, this has no physical relevance. PiusImpavidus (talk) 09:04, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Oh, I forgot to add a crucial condition: the reference frame must remain the same, during the whole process. Thanks to your exmaple, I've just added this crucial condition I'd forgotten (See above). Sorry for the confusion. HOTmag (talk) 12:35, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I don't change the reference frame during the process; I just conveniently choose it beforehand. If both speed and mass change, I can always find a reference frame where the kinetic energy is conserved and I can also find one where it isn't. And as the physics cannot depend on the chosen reference frame (principle of relativity), this conservation of kinetic energy can't have physical relevance. PiusImpavidus (talk) 20:24, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Ok, my question wants this process to be independent of the reference frame. I've just added this new condition [in brackets] to my original post. Again, I apologize for the confusion.

Let's put my original question this way: Some natural forces (e.g. the elastic force exerted by a spring), conserve the kinetic energy for the long term (with respect to the "initial moment" defined as such), for every reference frame. Is there any combination of natural forces - that conserves the kinetic energy (in the above sense), but at some moments - at which the kinetic energy turns out to have been conserved (with respect to the "initial moment" defined as such) under that force for every reference frame - the speed (i.e. the absolute value of velocity) does not? HOTmag (talk) 07:43, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

I take the rest frame of the system before the process happens. The speed of the system is 0, and so is the kinetic energy. Now the process happens and the speed changes. My reference frame is no longer the rest frame of the system, so the kinetic energy can no longer be 0. Which proves that I can always find a reference frame in which your condition is violated. This means that there is no process that satisfies your condition in every reference frame. PiusImpavidus (talk) 09:58, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Your consideration can also be used to prove, that if the kinetic energy is conserved for every reference frame, then not only the speed - but also the velocity - is conserved for every reference frame, right? HOTmag (talk) 11:30, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Metastasis of glioblastoma

From Glioblastoma#Surgery:

GBM cells are widely infiltrative through the brain at diagnosis, and despite a "total resection" of all obvious tumor, most people with GBM later develop recurrent tumors either near the original site or at more distant locations within the brain.

Why is this cancer so widely infiltrative? Nyttend (talk) 22:03, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

The glial cells thought to be involved are astrocytes, which are like neurons in many ways except they don't carry electrical signals. They reach out along the same pathways as neurons and if they become cancerous are predisposed to reach into distant areas. Here is a review article. Combine that with the fact that the somatic immune system is barred from the brain, and they cannot be stopped or contained. Abductive (reasoning) 23:02, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Abductive, could you add something to the article explaining this? Proper understanding of the review article demands a higher-than-I-possess understanding of human biology. Even the bits that I can understand are hard to interpret in context, e.g. I understand "Glioblastoma cells generally invade as single cells", but I don't know if it's at all relevant to the "why" question, and I don't want to go dumping content into the article and accidentally cause it to imply something not in the source. Nyttend (talk) 19:45, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

I gave it a shot. Neurobio is the most difficult biology field, along with immunobio. Abductive (reasoning) 20:15, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

It may not be especially infiltrative as compared to other tumors. The problem is that in case of brain the resection of tumors with sufficiently wide margins is impossible for obvious reasons. Ruslik_Zero 19:16, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

You might consider reading the review article I linked above. Abductive (reasoning) 19:47, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Sound effects for Jeopardy dollar amounts heard on 1960s phones

I have this memory of using a telephone in the early 1960s and if I couldn't hear anything else, I could hear a sound (very faint) similar to the old sound effects of dollar amounts appearing on Jeopardy!. a sound effect used in the opening of Jeopardy! Masters. Any idea what I was hearing?— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 22:10, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

• Old relays. Here is a Youtube video with the sound amplified. Abductive (reasoning) 23:08, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

That doesn't seem to be it. It was much more of an electronic or robotic sound. Maybe it was a change in the technology from the old relays to something new.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 15:55, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

August 7

Density of Iridium and Osmium

Note A at Iridium says

"At room temperature and standard atmospheric pressure, iridium has been calculated to have a density of 22.65 g/cm3 (0.818 lb/cu in), 0.04 g/cm3 (0.0014 lb/cu in) higher than osmium measured the same way. Still, the experimental X-ray crystallography value is considered to be the most accurate, and as such iridium is considered to be the second densest element" with a reference to https://technology.matthey.com/content/journals/10.1595/003214089X3311416

I am curious: has anyone ever directly measured the density of a pure crystal of each by immersing them in water and experimentally confirmed these calculations? Or is the difference too small to measure using conventional methods?

Looking at Isotopes of iridium and Isotopes of osmium, would the answer be different if the pure crystals were made from the heaviest stable isotope? Are we even able to seperate the isotopes of iridium and osmium?

Note the "At room temperature and standard atmospheric pressure". See https://technology.matthey.com/content/journals/10.1595/147106714X682337 for some other temperatures and pressures.

Interesting but not reliable: https://www.answers.com/natural-sciences/What_is_densest_material_in_world The bit about plutonium surprised me.

--Guy Macon Alternate Account (talk) 15:07, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

August 8

Butch Wilmore

In the top image on [https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cg4yqepr469o], what's the blurring on Wilmore's chin? Any ideas? --Dweller (talk) Old fashioned is the new thing! 12:25, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Looks like a bandage. It's visible in some Google Images pics. But I can't find an explanation. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:47, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

July 26

I joined the X and Y axes together. What Wikipedia page already mentions the concept?

I had / have this fairly rather long blabbersome brilliant idea. My question is since there is no way that I, with a rather low IQ, could come up with something "new", then my idea certainly must be merely a rehash of some ideas already mentioned on several Wikipedia pages, in fact probably just a sentence on just one page. But which one(s)? Thanks. Jidanni (talk) 04:56, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Your page is cumbersome to follow, but if I'm correct in interpreting it, you are essentially proposing the use of a pairing function or Hilbert curve. It is not possible to continuously reduce dimension in this manner (more precisely, 1D and 2D space are not homeomorphic). It would help if you would more rigorously formulate the function you are proposing rather than merely using examples.--Jasper Deng (talk) 06:22, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia defines "pairing function" only for natural numbers, but below I use the term for (not necessarily unique) functions wrapping up two values (not necessarily integers) into a single one of the same type.

Letting $I$ stand for the unit interval $[0,1],$ the Hilbert curve can be described as a function $h:I\to I\times I.$ Input one number $z,$ output $h(z)=(x,y)\!:$ a pair of numbers. This function is surjective, which implies that there exists an inverse pairing function $h^{{-}1}:I\times I\to I.$ Being an inverse means that when $h(z)=(x,y),$ we have $h^{{-}1}(x,y)=z.$ Function $h$ is also continuous, but it is not injective. Many output pairs are reached several times; for example, $h({\tfrac {1}{6}})=h({\tfrac {1}{2}})=h({\tfrac {5}{6}})=({\tfrac {1}{2}},{\tfrac {1}{2}}).$ So the inverse is not unique.

Numbers in $I$ can be written in base 2; for example, $0=.000000..._{2},$ ${\tfrac {3}{7}}=.011011..._{2},$ and $1=.111111..._{2},$ This expansion is not unique: $.0111111..._{2}=.100000..._{2}={\tfrac {1}{2}}.$ We can view these binary expansions as infinite sequences $a={(a_{n})}_{n=1}^{\infty }\in 2^{\omega }=\mathbb {N} ^{+}{\to }\{0{,}1\},$ The function $r:2^{\omega }\to I$ given by $r(a)=\textstyle {\sum _{n=1}^{\infty }}a_{n}2^{{-}n}$ interprets a binary expansion as a real number. This function $r$ is continuous and surjective, just like function $h$ before, so it has an inverse. But, as before, function $r$ is not injective, so the inverse is not unique. However, by convention, it has a "canonical" inverse: other than $r^{{-}1}(1)=111111...,$ the only possible expansion of $1$ in the domain of $r,$ avoid sequences ending in an infinite stream of $1$s.

Now, using $r,$ we can define a bicontinuous pairing function $\pi :2^{\omega }{\times }2^{\omega }\to 2^{\omega }$ such that

$h(r(\pi (u,v)))=(r(u),r(v)).$

This means that we can give a "canonical" definition for $h^{{-}1}$ by using $r$ and its canonical inverse:

$h^{{-}1}(x,y)=r(\pi (r^{{-}1}(x),r^{{-}1}(y))).$

The function $\pi$ can be described in the form of a 4-state finite-state automaton that gobbles up two streams of bits and produces a single stream of bits. It takes two bits at a time, one from each of the two input streams, and outputs two bits on the output stream.

I suspect that the "brilliant idea" is akin to this way of pairing $x$ and $y.$ I expect the idea is well known, but perhaps only as folklore, and I doubt that it is described or even hinted at in Wikipedia mainspace.  --Lambiam, edited 10:51, 28 July 2024 (UTC) (originall 11:11, 26 July 2024 (UTC))

July 27

Data estimation with excessive log functions

In health care, I noticed that many estimation algorithms make extensive use of log functions. For example, the ASCVD 10-year risk estimation from "2013 ACC/AHA Guideline on the Assessment of Cardiovascular Risk" sums up a coefficient times the log of age, a coefficient times the log of total cholesterol, a coefficient times the log of HDL, etc... It is a set of coefficients, each multiplied by the log of an attribute. Is this type of function or algorithm the result of a specific type of data modeling? It looks to me like they took a sample data set and correlated the log of each attribute, one at a time, to the outcome and produced a coefficient that represents how correlated the log of that attribute is in the sample set. But, I'm just guessing and I'd prefer to know how this type of function is actually produced. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 10:54, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with how this estimator was devised, but model building is an art, especially in cases where the data is noisy and the causal processes are poorly understood. Social scientists routinely use purely linear regression models, because that is what they were taught as students, it is the default model of R, which many use, and everyone else in their field does this. When a variable (independent or dependent) can only assume positive values, it cannot have a normal distribution. This is an indication that pure linear regression may not be the best approach when devising an estimator. So then it is good practice to use a data transformation that makes the observed distribution more normal. I don't know if this is why they did what they did. Another possibility is that they just computed the correlation coefficients and saw they were higher when using a logarithmic scale.  --Lambiam 11:52, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

It is pretty common, and somewhat sensibly motivated, to use the log data transformation when the variables of interest are all strictly positive (e.g. weight, height, waist size). If you do linear regression of the log of the positive result variable in terms of the logs of the input variables, the coefficients are interpretable as the exponents in a multi-variate power law model, which is nice, because then the coefficients are interpretable the same way independent of any of the measurement units. On the other hand, for any specific problem, there are likely better data transformations than the log, and even the most suitable and well-motivated data transformation might be seen as an attempt to "fudge the data" compared to just using linear. Dicklyon (talk) 04:24, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Are there other triangular numbers with all digits 6?

6, 66, 666 are all triangular numbers, are there other triangular numbers with all digits 6? 218.187.67.217 (talk) 16:42, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

These correspond to solutions of the Diophantine equation $10^{p}=12k^{2}\pm 3k+1\!:$

$10^{1}=12\cdot 1^{2}-3\cdot 1+1$

$10^{2}=12\cdot 3^{2}-3\cdot 3+1$

$10^{3}=12\cdot 9^{2}+3\cdot 9+1$

For each solution, the number $8k^{2}\pm 2k$ is an all-6 triangular number.

I don't expect any further solutions, but neither do I see an argument exhibiting that they cannot exist. The weaker requirement $12k^{2}\pm 3k+1\equiv 0~~({\text{mod}}~10^{p})$ has four solutions for $k$ for each given value of $p,$ corresponding to the final digits $1,3,7,9.$ For example, for $p=10$ they are $8811378991,8647117103,1352882897,188621009.$ The polynomials in $k$ in the rhs of the Diophantine equation are irreducible. It seems that considerations based on modular arithmetic are not going to give further help.  --Lambiam 19:59, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

The discriminant of the quadratic is $9-48(1-10^{p})=48\cdot 10^{p}-39=3(16\cdot 10^{p}-13)$. This needs to be a perfect square for there to be a solution, so we need $16\cdot 10^{p}-13=3k^{2}$ for some integer k. Since $16\cdot 10^{p}$ will get "closer" to being an even perfect square as p approaches infinity, I heuristically wouldn't expect more than a finite amount of solutions to exist.--Jasper Deng (talk) 03:34, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

This gives yet another way of phrasing the problem. Define the recurrent sequence $(a_{p})_{p=0}^{\infty }$ by:

$a_{0}=1,~a_{p{+}1}=10a_{p}+39.$

It goes like this:

$1,49,529,5329,53329,533329,5333329,...$

The first four values are squares. Will the sequence ever hit another square?  --Lambiam 10:05, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

It turns out that because the discriminant is added or subtracted to 3 and then divided by 2a=24 in the quadratic formula, there are even more stringent restrictions: the numerator has to be divisible by 24, so we must have $3k\cong \pm 3\mod 24$ and thus $k\cong \pm 1\mod 8$. That restriction alone would seem to greatly reduce the amount of candidates (only every other odd perfect square satisfies that).--Jasper Deng (talk) 04:49, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

If the sequence $(a_{p})_{p=0}^{\infty }$ ever hits another square $k^{2},$ its square root $k$ will satisfy this requirement. This can be seen as follows. For $p\geq 2,a_{p}\equiv 17~~({\text{mod}}~64)$ since $a_{2}=529\equiv 17~~({\text{mod}}~64)$ and $a_{p{+}1}=$ $10a_{p}+39\equiv$ $170+39=$ $209\equiv 17~~({\text{mod}}~64).$ The only residue classes for $k$ modulo $64$ that have $k^{2}\equiv 17~~({\text{mod}}~64)$ are $9,23,41,55;$ in all four cases, $k\equiv \pm 1~~({\text{mod}}~8).$  --Lambiam 10:13, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Right. For any modulus m you can use the recursion to easily compute a_p mod m. It's a bit harder, but still possible to then determine if a_p is a quadratic residue mod m. If it isn't then you can eliminate that a_p as a non-square. Do this for a few thousand prime (or prime power) values of m and you have a sieve which only let's though those a_p's that are square and a vanishingly small number of "false positives". (There are going to be some m where all the values of a_p are quadratic residues, but this won't happen if 10 is a primitive root mod m, and this occurs at a relatively constant rate.) This could be implemented in Python (or whatever) fairly easily to eliminate all the non-square a_p's up to some value, say p≤10000. Keep in mind that a₁₀₀₀₀ would have around 10000 digits, but there's no need for multiprecision arithmetic to carry this out. However, all you would be doing is creating a lower bound on the next highest square a_p, you wouldn't actually be proving there are none. (That's assuming the sieve didn't produce an actual square a_p with p≤10000.) It shouldn't be hard to use a probabilistic argument to show that the "expected" number of squares is finite, but this wouldn't be a proof but rather an indication that it's unlikely that there will be additional squares above a given bound. In any case, I couldn't think of anything that would answer the original question better than a somewhat wishy-washy "probably not". --RDBury (talk) 13:10, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

July 30

Axiom of choice, axiom of countable choice, any others?

We have the Axiom of countable choice, which is weaker than Axiom of choice, so is it possible, meaningful or even already done to have an Axiom of aleph 1 choice or Axiom of cardinality of continuum choice, weaker than the Axiom of choice? Also, could the Axiom of dependent choice actually be such an axiom, corresponding to some particular aleph?Rich (talk) 20:20, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

The notion of cardinality is a fragile one without AC, but you can certainly define the axiom "If $(A_{\alpha })_{\alpha <\omega _{1}}$ is a sequence of nonempty sets, the product is nonempty", and that could be reasonably thought of as $\aleph _{1}$ choice. That's stronger than dependent choice (DC), since it's enough to construct Aronszajn trees, and you can arrange that the Solovay model satisfies DC + no Aronszajn trees. I'm confident it's weaker than full choice, but I don't know enough about symmetric extensions to show it.--Antendren (talk) 06:40, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Interesting. it makes me wonder if a hierarchy of AC axioms as adjuncts to ZF, akin to what i've read about a hierarchy of Large cardinal axioms added to ZFC could be discovered.Rich (talk) 02:29, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Even for finite cardinals this is non-trivial; for example, AC₂ constructively implies AC₄. (Andrzej Mostowski. "Axiom of choice for finite sets". Fundamenta mathematicae, vol. 33 (1945), pp. 137–168.)  --Lambiam 08:29, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Going in the other direction, the Axiom of global choice is stronger than the Axiom of choice. This axiom is used Bourbaki's Theory of Sets. I think these weaker forms of the AoC are efforts to find a "Goldilocks zone" where you can do standard real analysis but don't have to be bothered by pesky apparent paradoxes like non-measurable sets. But I don't know if the resulting plethora of different axioms is more helpful than confusing. --RDBury (talk) 15:46, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

August 2

Conditional probability (please check my math)

As measured by recent Polymarket betting odds, Kamala Harris has 45% chance of winning the POTUS election (electoral vote)[9] and 70% chance of winning the popular vote.[10] Let's ignore edge cases like 3rd party candidates and electoral ties. Also, because of how EV's are distributed between red and blue states, while it's theoretically possible for Trump to win the PV and lose the EV, it's unlikely in practice so let's assign that a probability of 0 (polymarket puts it around 1%). So the event "Harris wins EV" is a subset of "Harris wins PV".

Let HP = the event "Harris wins PV", HE = Harris wins EV, TP=Trump wins PV, TE=Trump wins electoral.

So (abusing notation) HP=70% is split into 45% inside HE and 25% in TE. TE itself is 55%.

Does this mean that Pr[HP|TE], the probability of Harris winning the popular vote conditional on Trump winning the electoral vote, is .25/.55 = about .45? Does that sound realistic in terms of recent US politics? I guess we saw it happen in 2016 and in 2008. Not sure about 2012. Obviously whether this possibility is a good one or bad one is subjective and political and is not being asked here. The .45 probability is higher than I would have guessed.

2602:243:2008:8BB0:F494:276C:D59A:C992 (talk) 03:21, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Your calculation matches mine for the first question in terms of the conditional probability and assuming the assumptions. Whether it's realistic or not is not a math question. Note that Polymarket gives estimated probabilities for all combinations here with P(HP & HE) = .44, P(TP & TE) = .29, P(HP & TE) = .28 and P(TP & HE) = .01, matching your values to within a few percent. I've been following PredictIt myself, which currently gives Harris a 4 point lead over Trump, so there seems to be a fairly large margin of error in these internet odds sites. --RDBury (talk) 04:43, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. Can I ask how it is possible that different betting sites can have different odds for the exact same event? Does that create arbitrage potential that should get used immediately? I noticed yesterday that the Iowa Electronic Markets gave a very high probability (like 70%+) of Harris winning the PV and that surprised me, and I wondered why they made no market (as far as I saw) for the EV. I didn't notice til today that Polymarkets also gave around 70% for Harris wins PV (not sure if it is the exact same conditions as IEM)'s. I'm quite surprised by all of this, especially the PV prediction. For the EV, news outlets have been bipolar for weeks (about Biden and more recently Harris) while the prediction markets stayed fairly serene. Now they're swinging more towards Harris and IDK whether anything has substantively changed. 2602:243:2008:8BB0:F494:276C:D59A:C992 (talk) 04:57, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Suppose two betting markets have substantively different odds for the same event, say $p$ and $q$ expressed as probabilities in the unit interval $[0,1],$ with $p\ll q.$ Given the way bookmakers calculate the pay-off, which guarantees them a margin of profit, betting in one market on the event occurring (at $p$) and at the same time in the other market on it not occurring (at $1{-}q\,$) can only give you a guaranteed net win if $p<{\tfrac {1}{2}}<q.$  --Lambiam 08:22, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

I think you just need p < q (depending on how you distribute the bets) but the difference has to be enough that the profit is more than you'd get just putting your money in the bank and collecting interest. Plus I think that there's a nominal transaction fee with these things. I'm pretty sure it reduces to a minimax problem; find the proportion of bets on E on site a to bets on ~E on site b to maximize the minimum amount you'd win. But I'm also sure plenty of other people have already worked this out and are applying it to equalize the markets. RDBury (talk) 16:46, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

PS. The technical name for this kind of thing is Arbitrage, but it's a bit more complicated than with the usual case with stocks and whatnot. In normal arbitrage you buy X in market A and sell X in market B at a higher amount. In this case we're buying X in market A and not X in market B, then wait until X has been resolved to true or false, which will be months from now. Another factor is that the X in one market may not be exactly the same as the X in the other market, so you have to read the details on each site. For example one site may say "Harris wins" while the other site says "Democrats win". If you don't think it makes a difference then you're not accounting for black swan type events like the presumptive candidate suddenly dropping out of the race. --RDBury (talk) 17:03, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Probability question

Can someone please help me with this probability question? Say I have 10,000 songs on my iPod, 50 of which are by the Beatles. The iPod can play a sequence of songs at random. Assuming no songs are repeated, what is the probability of two Beatles songs being played consecutively? Thanks, --Viennese Waltz 18:03, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Just to clarify, do you mean the probability that, if you choose two songs at random, then both will be Beatles songs, or the probability that, if you play all 10,000 songs at random, there will be two consecutive Beatles songs somewhere in the shuffled list? GalacticShoe (talk) 18:11, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

I thought this was a simple question that would not require further elucidation, but apparently not. I don't understand your request for clarification, I'm afraid. Imagine I turn the iPod on and start playing songs at random. What is the probability that two Beatles songs will appear consecutively? I can't be any more specific than that, I'm afraid. --Viennese Waltz 18:14, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

How many songs are you playing total? Are you playing possibly all 10,000, until you hit two consecutive Beatles songs? GalacticShoe (talk) 18:20, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

I have no idea how many I'm playing total. I don't see it as a finite activity. I just want to know the probability that two will pop up consecutively. If the question is unanswerable in this form, please let me know! --Viennese Waltz 18:22, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Well the problem is that you only have a finite number of songs, so it has to be a finite activity unless you define some behavior for your playlist looping. For example, if the first 10,000 songs are exhausted, then do you reshuffle and play all 10,000 songs again? If that's the case then the probability that you eventually hit two consecutive Beatles songs is essentially 100%. GalacticShoe (talk) 18:25, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Even if you did manage to get a well-posed version of the problem, I doubt there would be a simple formula. In the ball & urn model, you have m balls in an urn, k of which are colored, and you're selecting n balls without replacement, what is the probability that two colored balls in a row will be chosen? There are well-known formulas for the probability that l of the selected balls will be colored, but they don't say anything about the order in which they appear. Part of the problem may be that "no songs are repeated" is vague. Does it mean a no song is repeated twice in a row or that once a song is played it will never be played again. I think most people here would assume the second meaning, which would imply that the sequence would have to end after all the songs have been played. If it's the first meaning then the sequence could continue forever, but in that case the probability of two consecutive Beatles songs is 1. --RDBury (talk) 19:00, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Assuming that these are independent events: the odds of a random Beatles song playing is 50:10,000 or 1:200. The consecutive odds is 1:200x200 or 1:40,000. The next step is to subtract the odds they are the same... Modocc (talk) 19:18, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

The odds the same song plays consecutively is 1:10,000x10,000, which is many orders smaller than any two of them. Modocc (talk) 19:31, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

See Probability#Independent_events. Modocc (talk) 19:57, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

The events aren't independent, because they are drawn without replacement. Tito Omburo (talk) 20:04, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

My take is the apps' songs actually repeat (randomly) and from my experience it seems they do, but the OP simply excluded it (as in that doesn't count). Modocc (talk) 20:13, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Let's assume instead that the app does not repeat any, but plays all of them. The app selects a Beatles song with exactly the same odds initially, and puts every song played into a dustbin. Another similar example should help. Take 10,000 cards with lyrics and randomly assign them to [deal one card to each of the] 10,000 players. With 10,000 non-repetitious events and 50 prized Beatles cards each player has a one in 200 chance of winning a prize card. The chances that any two players (consecutive or not) are assigned these prizes is slightly greater than[differ from] 1:40,000 though because they are no longer independent. Modocc (talk) 22:07, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure how this model relates to the original question. Take the case of an iPod with 3 songs, 2 of which are by the Fab Four. After the first of the 2 Beatle cards has been assigned randomly to one of 3 players, the probability that the player who is randomly selected to receive the second card happens to be the same person is ${\tfrac {1}{3}}.$ Among the possible shuffles of the songs, only those with the non-Beatle song in the middle have no adjacent Beatle songs. The probability of this song randomly being assigned to the middle is ${\tfrac {1}{3}},$ so the likelihood of a random shuffle producing adjacent Beatle songs equals $1-{\tfrac {1}{3}}={\tfrac {2}{3}},$ much higher than the card model suggests.  --Lambiam 14:00, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

I meant one card. It's been 40 years since I aced stats, I'm rusty and I've forgotten some of it. Modocc (talk) 14:46, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

With three independent deals of one card each: 2:3 to win, 2/3x2/3 is 4/9 per pair which is too low. I aced linear algebra too, honors and all that, but I cannot seem to do any of the maths now, but I think the inaccuracy gets smaller with a larger deck because only two consecutive plays are involved.

Modocc (talk) 16:05, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

(ec) One way of interpreting the question is this: given an urn with 10,000 marbles, 9,950 of which are white and 50 of which are black, drawing one marble at a time from the urn, without replacement but putting them neatly in a row in the order in which they were drawn, what is the probability that the final sequence of 10,000 marbles contains somewhere two adjacent marbles that are both black. Generalizing it and taking a combinatorial view, let $P_{n}(m)$ stand for the number of permutations $\sigma (1),\sigma (2),...,\sigma (n)$ of the numbers $\{1,2,...,n\}$ in which no two adjacent elements $\sigma (i)$ and $\sigma (i{+}1)$ are both at most $m,$ where $1\leq m\leq n.$ The answer is then $P_{n}(m)/m!.$ We have $P_{n}(1)=0,P_{n}(2)=2!(n{-}1)!,P_{n}(3)=3!(n{-}2)(n{-}2)!,$ but I don't have a general formula. I suppose, though, that the computation can be made tractable using a (mutual) recurrence relation.  --Lambiam 22:08, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Experimentally, repeating the process 10,000 times, 2130 runs had adjacent black marbles. So $P_{10000}(50)$ should be in the order of $6\times 10^{35658}.$  --Lambiam 22:53, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Let n be the number of songs in the playlist, and k the number of beatles songs. Assuming that every song plays exactly once, we count the number of permutations having the property that two beatles songs are played consecutively. First, note that the number of all such configurations is n!, which we write as $n!={\binom {n}{k}}k!(n-k)!$. This can be interpreted as follows: From n songs of the playlist, we first select k positions in ${\binom {n}{k}}$ ways, into which we insert the k beatles songs in k! ways; then the remaining n-k songs are inserted into the remaining n-k slots in (n-k)! ways. We modify this by replacing the binomial coefficient by the quantity $A_{n,k}$, whose definition is the number of ways of selecting k among n objects, at least two of which are adjacent. Now, we have

$A_{n,k}={\binom {n}{k}}-B_{n,k}$

where $B_{n,k}$ is the number of ways of selecting k from the n objects such that none of the k selected are adjacent. We then have $B_{n,k}={\binom {n-k+1}{k}}$. Now the desired probability is just

${\frac {A_{n,k}}{\binom {n}{k}}}.$

When n=10000 and k=50, we get a probability of about 0.21824. Tito Omburo (talk) 16:40, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

The experimentally observed number of 2130 runs out of 10,000 is within 1.3 sigma of the expected value 2182.4, so this is a good agreement.  --Lambiam 19:38, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Restated as I understand the OP: "what is the probability that two songs played in succession are different Beatles songs?

I assume that two songs is the minimum they listen to in one session and the odds are small and my mouse iis malfuctioninggg too... Modocc (talk) 16:57, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

The probability is 0.21824 when the entire playlist of 10,000 songs is listen to. There are 5000 (even) + 4999 (even shifted one is odd) consecutive pairs. Supposing their expectation values are equal, that is a probability of about 0.21824/9999 or 2.183e-5 or about 1/45,076. The values are converging then as I thought they would. Modocc (talk) 18:30, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

One can add to the model a variable s, which determines the length of a session. Assuming as before that no song is played more than once, we first insert all songs into a playlist in n! ways. Let S_i denote the event that the number of beatles songs in the first s songs is i. Then, for i from 0 to k, these events partition the probability space. We have $p(S_{i})={\binom {n-k}{s-i}}{\binom {k}{i}}/{\binom {n}{s}}.$ Now, the conditional probability of two consecutive beatles songs is $p(X|S_{i})=1-{\binom {s-i+1}{i}}/{\binom {s}{i}}.$ So we get

$p(X)=\sum _{i=0}^{k}p(X|S_{i})p(S_{i})={\binom {n}{s}}^{-1}\sum _{i=0}^{k}\left(1-{\binom {s-i+1}{i}}/{\binom {s}{i}}\right){\binom {n-k}{s-i}}{\binom {k}{i}}.$

For example, when n=10000, k=50, and s=10000, we get 0.21824; whereas if s=100 (we only listen to 100 songs), we have probability of consecutive beatles songs 0.00241166. Tito Omburo (talk) 20:26, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

For clarity's sake, it's worth noting that when s=n, this simplifies to $1-{n-k+1 \choose k}/{n \choose k}$. GalacticShoe (talk) 20:35, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Given 2 finite field elements, is it possible to enlarge or decrease the characteristic at the cost of the dimension ?

Simple question : given 2 finite fields elements, is it possible to compute 2 other equivalent elements having a larger or lower characteristics while keeping the same old discrete logarithm between the 2 new elements (through enlarging or decreasing the dimension and without computing the discrete logarithm) ? 82.66.26.199 (talk) 21:48, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

The algebraic notion of characteristic is usually defined for rings (and therefore also for fields). How do you define it for elements of a field?  --Lambiam 08:45, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Let’s say I have 2 finite fields elements having a discrete logarithm s between them. My aim is to redefine 2 equivalent elements having a larger prime but a lower dimension (with keeping the same discrete logarithm’s) 82.66.26.199 (talk) 10:02, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

If by "prime" you mean the prime number $p$ of the Galois field ${\text{GF}}(p^{k}),$ there is no way to relate its elements algebraically to those of a Galois field with another prime. If you remain in the same field, there is a fair chance that $\log _{(b^{k})}a^{k}=\log _{b}a,$ but the left-hand side may have more solutions in $s$ of the equation ${(b^{k})}^{s}\equiv a^{k}$ than the right-hand side has for the case $k=1.$  --Lambiam 12:58, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Correct, I was talking about ${\text{GF}}$ where $p$ is a 64 bits large prime and $k$ as a power is even larger. Isn’t it possible to decrease k by increasing p while keeping the same previous m between the 2 equivalent finite field elements ? (without knowing what the discrete logarithm $m$) 2A01:E0A:401:A7C0:9CB:33F3:E8EB:8A5D (talk) 13:35, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

I don't think there is any hope. The algebraic structures of the fields are completely different, so there are no homomorphisms between them.  --Lambiam 14:14, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Stupid begginer question. Why is pohlig Hellman varients sometimes applicable to elliptic curves but never on Finite fields having a composite dimension ? 2A01:E0A:401:A7C0:F4D5:FA63:12A5:B6B6 (talk) 16:46, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Pohlig--Hellman is applicable in any finite cyclic group such that the prime factorization of the order is known. It is possible to modify Pohlig--Hellman to any finite abelian group (under the same assumption), but if the rank of the abelian group is greater than one, you need several basis elements rather than just one generator for the discrete log. Notably, the multiplicative group of a finite field is always cyclic, so assuming you know how to factor $p^{n}-1$, you can use regular PH here. For the group of units in a finite ring, you typically need more information. For example, in the units modulo n, where n is composite, you need to be able to compute phi(n) (equivalent to the prime factorization of n), and phi(phi(n)). To answer your original question, if you know that a=b^x (mod p), and have another prime p', just let b' be a primitive root mod p', and define a' as b'^x (mod p'). Tito Omburo (talk) 17:18, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

As I said, I m talking about finite fields of composite dimensions. This excludes $GF(p)$. As far I understand Pohlig Hellman variants don’t apply between elements of ${\text{GF}}(p^{composite\_number})$ unlike ecdlp but why ? 2A01:E0A:401:A7C0:F4D5:FA63:12A5:B6B6 (talk) 19:20, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

It applies if you can determine the prime factorization of p^n-1. The multiplicative group of a finite field is cyclic. Tito Omburo (talk) 20:32, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

It seems to me your are confusing finite fields and finite rings. Finite fields elements of non 1 dimensions are expressed as polynomials like 848848848848487489219*a^4+7378478947844783*a^3+43445998848848898*a^2+87837838383837*a+637837871093836 2A01:E0A:401:A7C0:F4D5:FA63:12A5:B6B6 (talk) 21:46, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

No, I'm not. Any finite (multiplicative) subgroup of *any* field is cyclic. Using PH only requires knowing the prime factorization of the order of the group. In the case of a field with p^n elements, the group of units is cyclic of order is p^n-1. (Of course this may not have many small prime factors, e.g., if n=1 and p is a safe prime). Tito Omburo (talk) 22:37, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Ok but then how to use the resulting factors on a larger polynomial ? 2A01:E0A:401:A7C0:F4D5:FA63:12A5:B6B6 (talk) 00:12, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

The details of how you do multiplication in the field are irrelevant. PH works if the group multiplication is just considered as a black box. Tito Omburo (talk) 12:13, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

No, I’m meaning once I’ve factored the order, how do I shrink the 2 finite field elements to the lower prime factor in order to solve the ꜰꜰᴅʟᴘ in the lower factor ? For example, in the ᴇᴄᴅʟᴘ this is the matter of dividing each point by the prime factor… Especially if the base prime $p$ is lower than the dimension/power $n$.

Though I admit I would like sample code/pseudocode to understand at that point… 82.66.26.199 (talk) 15:58, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Suppose you want to solve $g^{x}=y$ where $g\in GF(p^{n})$ is a generator of the group of units. If you have the unique factorization into prime powers $p^{n}-1=q_{1}q_{2}\cdots q_{r}$, then with $q_{i}'=(p^{n}-1)/q_{i}$, the element $g^{q_{i}'}$ generates the group $U(q_{i})$ of $q_{i}$-th roots of unity in $GF(p^{n})$. Then one uses the prime power case of PH to solve $(g^{q_{i}'})^{x}=y^{q_{i}'}$ in $U(q_{i})$. This can be achieved efficiently (provided $q_{i}=p_{i}^{k_{i}}$ is not a large prime) using the Pohlig–Hellman algorithm#Groups of prime-power order. (Basically, you start with $g^{(p^{n}-1)x}=y^{p^{n}-1}$ and successively remove powers of $p_{i}$ inductively. This is a search over $k_{i}p_{i}$ possibilities, so polynomial time in k_i for fixed p_i.) So, we get a solution exponent $x_{i}$ in each group $U(q_{i})$. Finally, let $1=\sum a_{i}q_{i}'$ be an integral combination, and $x=\sum a_{i}q_{i}'x_{i}$ is the solution. Tito Omburo (talk) 17:25, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

So let’s say I want to solve :

$2*z10^{8}+z10^{7}+6*z10^{6}+4*z10^{5}+4*z10^{4}+3*z10^{3}+z10^{2}+6*z10+1$

$4*z10^{8}+z10^{7}+5*z10^{5}+3*z10^{4}+4*z10^{3}+4*z10^{2}+6*z10+2$

in $GF(7^{10})$

How would those 2 elements be written (what does the polynomials would like) in order to solve the subdiscrete log in 2801 ? 82.66.26.199 (talk) 22:28, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

First raise them both to the power (7^10-1)/2801 in the field. And then check which among 2801 possibilities you have g^x=y. Tito Omburo (talk) 22:37, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

So still 10 polynomials elements per finite fields for just 2801 ? 2A01:E0A:401:A7C0:F4D5:FA63:12A5:B6B6 (talk) 01:02, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

August 4

Even binomial coefficients

Is there an elementary way to show that all the entries except the outer two, on a row of Pascal's triangle corresponding to a power of 2, are even? 2A00:23C6:AA0D:F501:658A:3BC6:7F9D:2A4A (talk) 17:37, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

The entries in Pascal's triangle are the coefficients of aⁿb^n-i in (a+b)ⁿ. It's easy to see that (a+b)²=(a²+b²) mod 2, and consequently (a+b)⁴=(a⁴+b⁴) mod 2, (a+b)⁸=(a⁸+b⁸) mod 2, and in general (a+b)ⁿ=(aⁿ+bⁿ) mod 2 if n is a power of 2. This implies that all the coefficients of aⁿb^n-i are 0 mod 2 except when i=0 or i=n. Note, there are more complex formulas for finding aⁿb^n-i mod 2 or any other prime for any values of n and i. --RDBury (talk) 18:40, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

@RDBury: Did you mean aⁱb^n-i in the first sentence...? --CiaPan (talk) 09:44, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, good catch. RDBury (talk) 13:20, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Another way to see it is, we divide $2^{n}$ into two equal piles of size $2^{n-1}$, so that to select k things from $2^{n}$ is to select i things from one pile and k-i things from the other. That is, we have the following special case of Vandermonde's identity:

${\binom {2^{n}}{k}}=\sum _{i=0}^{k}{\binom {2^{n-1}}{i}}{\binom {2^{n-1}}{k-i}}$

In the right-hand side, every term appears twice, except the middle term (if k is even). We thus have

${\binom {2^{n}}{2k}}\equiv {\binom {2^{n-1}}{k}}{\pmod {2}}.$

We iterate this until k is either odd (and the right hand side is even by induction), or $n=0$ in which case $k=2^{n}$ or $k=0$, which corresponds one of the two outer binomial coefficients. Tito Omburo (talk) 18:51, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

(OP) I think the first approach more my level, but thanks to both for the replies.2A00:23C6:AA0D:F501:6CF2:A683:CAFC:3D8 (talk) 07:10, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

August 6

Bishop and generalised leaper checkmate

We know from the 1983 work of J. Telesin that king, bishop, and knight can force mate against the lone king on any square n×n board in O(n²) moves (a clear presentation), provided that the board has a corner of the colour the bishop travels on.

So, what if we replace the knight with a general (p,q)-leaper with gcd(p,q)=1, so that it can travel to any square on the board? (I guess I'm using the convention gcd(p,0)=|p|.) Is it still the case that mate is forceable in O(n²) moves on an n×n board, for sufficiently large n to stop the leaper from getting stuck by board edges?

(An almost identical question was asked on Kirill Kryukov's forum in 2015 by "byakuugan", but no general answer came.) Double sharp (talk) 11:52, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Note that the king and bishop may be used to pen the black king into a corner, unless the black king "waits" (just moves back and forth without attempting to escape the enclosure). This is the only time the knight (or leaper) needs to take action (and it doesn't matter how many moves it takes to check the king). If you can devise conditions such that half of the board above a main diagonal is connected under knight-moves, I think basically the solution given in that arxiv link works, although I am confused about the second pane of Figure 1 since this does not appear to be a chess position that can be arrived at legally. Presumably checkmate can only happen in the corner? Tito Omburo (talk) 16:08, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Identical partitions of cells of the 24-cell?

I'm wondering whether for each divisor d of 24, whether the cells of a 24-cell can be split into identical pieces (not necessarily connected) with d cells (octahedra). Note since the 24-cells is self dual, an identical partition of d cells is equivalent to a partition of 24/d vertices which can be viewed as the partition of 24/d cells from the vertex in the dual corresponding to each cell. (mostly using the +/- 1,+/- 1,0,0 arrangements here) 1 and 24 area trivial. For 2 cells, pairing a cell with the flip of signs works, For 12 cells, grabbing one of each of the pairs in the 2 cell split will give the partition. this leaves the 3/8 cell pieces in partitions and the 4/6 cell pieces in partitions. For the 4, the vertices can be split based on which two dimensions are zero. so the faces in the dual can be split that way. But I don't think the same flip of 2/12 works. I think for the 8 cell pieces, that a consistent coloring of the octahedra can be done by using three different colors on a single edge, and then continuing the coloring so that each edge had three colors or by pairing 4 cell, but I'm not quite sure how to do 3 or 6.Naraht (talk) 14:44, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Calculate percent below bell curve for a given standard deviation

Assume a normal bell curve. I know that 34.1% of data is 1 standard deviation above mean (and another 34.1% is 1 standard deviation below mean). What is the method for calculating the percent above/below mean for any given standard deviation, such as 0.6 standard deviations above (or below) mean? 12.116.29.106 (talk) 16:43, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

There is an analytical expression that makes use of the error function Erf(x). Specifically, the function $Erf(z/{\sqrt {2}})$ gives the fraction of data within z standard deviations (above+below) of the mean of a normal distribution. Get the amount above (or below) by dividing by two. Tito Omburo (talk) 17:11, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

The "method for calculating" it is not answered there. Of course, the easy way to is to invoke an implementation of the error function that you find in all kinds of standard libraries, spreadsheets, etc. But if you really want to know how to calculate it, then you need to do the integral, numerically, and maybe built a table of polynomial approximants from doing the integral at a bunch of places. Or look it up in a book from a trusted source. Dicklyon (talk) 04:39, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

The section Error function § Numerical approximations gives formulas for calculating approximations with lower and lower maximum errors, down to a maximum relative error less than $2^{-53}.$  --Lambiam 07:12, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Nice! I should have known WP would have the comprehensive answer in the article Omburo linked! Dicklyon (talk) 14:13, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Humanities

"WP:RD/H" redirects here. For the template header used in all areas of the reference desks, see WP:Reference desk/Header.

July 25

Path of would-be Trump assassin Crooks

There is conflicting information when, during the Attempted assassination of Donald Trump, the would-be assassin Thomas Matthew Crooks was first spotted on "the roof" or "a roof". While our article currently follows media who claim that he had been spotted on a/the roof at 5:52 p.m., even directly by the Secret Service, other media report that he was climbing on the roof where he shot from at 6:09 p.m. (which makes a lot more sense). It seems possible that Crooks was on another roof first and then climbed from roof to roof. Either way - has the path he took from the ground to his shooting location been somewhat reconstructed by now? I didn't find anything in the news as available online. --KnightMove (talk) 10:30, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Indeed, ABC News is the main source for this timeline, which is most certainly wrong. But it motivates my question. --KnightMove (talk) 11:54, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Out of curiosity, why do you think the abc timeline is wrong? Blueboar (talk) 12:30, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

It seems entirely plausible that he climbed on to the roof (perhaps unencumbered by his rifle, but with his rangefinder), climbed down again (to retrieve his [hidden?] rifle and set its range), and then up again to carry out the attack. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 12:48, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

1. Crooks actually climbed on the roof ~6:09 p.m., as per many witnesses and reliable sources.
2. Crooks being on the roof since 5:52 in sight of the Secret Service; the Secret Service not doing anything against him, but leading Trump to the podium; AND Crooks then not firing, although he had so much time to prepare and some 7 min opportunity to shoot at Trump unimpaired - that's total nonsense (and fodder for conspiracy theories).
3. There is even evidence to deconstruct how that error happened. This BBC article somewhat supports the error, although their own facts in the article make clear what happened:

"Later, around 17:45 local time, Crooks was spotted again, this time by a counter sniper officer around the Agr International building - the one the gunman later scaled up to aim at Trump."

"By 17:52 - 19 minutes before the shooting - the Secret Service was made aware that Crooks was spotted with a rangefinder, and disseminated that information to other officers on site, CBS reported."

So another (!) counter-sniper - not the Secret Service counter-sniper teams who would later aim at Crooks - spotted Crooks around (!) the roof, and at 17:52 the Secret Service was informed about this.

And some media merge this into the wrong claim "Secret Service snipers spotted Crooks on the roof at 17:52". --KnightMove (talk) 12:49, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

It is my understanding that two different organisations were involved in the maintenance of security, the Secret Service (federal, ie your counter snipers) and a local (?) organisation, be that state or entirely private (the person who initially confronted the assassin, was threatened with the firearm and "dropped" off the roof). It may be possible that the communication between these two entities was grossly deficient. Of course, this is pure speculation in the absence of reliable official information. --2001:871:6A:1B71:B0F9:2533:F61:54B2 (talk) 17:46, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

The FBI and the Pennsylvania State Police each also had a role in implementing the security measures around the rally.^[11][12]  --Lambiam 19:11, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

J B Priestley quotation

In 1970, Isacc Asimov wrote two short stories, "2430 A.D." and "The Greatest Asset", inspired by the following quotation:

Between midnight and dawn, when sleep will not come and all the old wounds begin to ache, I often have a nightmare vision of a future world in which there are billions of people, all numbered and registered, with not a gleam of genius anywhere, not an original mind, a rich personality, on the whole packed globe.

The above Wikipedia articles on the short stories, and many other on-line sources, attribute this to J B Priestley. However, as far as I can tell, it doesn't appear on any standard list of Priestley quotations (including WikiQuote), but only in connection with the Asimov stories. Did Priestley actually write this? If so, where? If not, did someone else write it? It's unlikely that Asimov made it up himself, but not impossible. 194.73.48.66 (talk) 17:42, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

It's from a 1957 book called "Thoughts in the Wilderness", which you can view (with restrictions) on archive.org - the quote is on page 127. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 19:23, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

J. B. Priestley (1957). Thoughts in the Wilderness. London. p. 127.  --Lambiam 19:24, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks! I've added the title of the book to the Asimov articles. 194.73.48.75 (talk) 20:28, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Bohnert's Ethics

One question, does anyone know Bohnert's system of ethics and deontic logic and can explain it or link to an explanatory text? 2A02:8071:60A0:92E0:9B9B:C02B:F5CC:22D1 (talk) 21:54, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Who is Bohnert? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:02, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Herbert G. Bohnert (1918-1984), philosopher, professor at Michigan State University. I cannot help with OP's question. --Wrongfilter (talk) 06:15, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, searching in websites related to logical positivism et al brings no trace of Herbert Bohnert. There is a stack of H. Bohnert´s publications in Google Scholar which may be useful to your research. --2001:871:6A:1B71:C00:3397:39D7:68BE (talk) 17:14, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

It seems that mentions of Bohnert in connection to deontic logic refer to: Herbert Gaylord Bohnert, "The Semiotic Status of Commands". Philosophy of Science 12:4, 1945, pp. 302–315. It is available online (doi:10.1086/286873) but behind a paywall. He appears to attempt to give a translation of commands to propositional logic. Very roughly, let $S$ stand for "Sam eats his veggies" and $P$ for "Sam is punished". Then the command "Sam, eat your veggies!", denoted formally as $!S,$ is given the meaning $S\lor P,$ "[Sam eats his veggies] or [Sam is punished]". Or, as Sam's mother might phrase it, "Sam, eat your veggies, or else!".  --Lambiam 22:14, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

July 26

Allah (peace be upon him)

Would it be considered unusual for someone to say "peace be upon him" after mentioning God himself the same way that Muslims say it after mentioning any Islamic figure? – MrPersonHumanGuy (talk) 19:51, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Based on Peace be upon him (Islam), I would think not. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:08, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes. The term "peace" in this phrase means "the peace of God". It would be just as strange as to say "May God have mercy upon Him", where "Him" refers to God Himself.  --Lambiam 22:20, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Kind of like saying, "God bless God." ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 02:58, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

John 12:28? --Trovatore (talk) 20:28, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Right. He will glorify His name, and He will be a bust (be a bust, be a bust) in the Hall of Fame. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:21, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

@Baseball Bugs: Although I found the Hall of Fame part to be funny, your repetition of "be a bust" in parentheses makes me think you're trying to make a reference to song lyrics. If that's what it's supposed to be, then I'm afraid I don't get what you're trying to reference here. – MrPersonHumanGuy (talk) 22:58, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

This:[13] ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:02, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Well, we (species Homo Sapiens) seem to have created hundreds, or even thousands, of Gods in our image (and to our liking). Blessing your multiple fellow gods may be totally civilised if a random cluster of divinities meet in the supermarket. Quite possible, that they only smite, drown, immolate, holocaust or whatever registered believers of their own party. We seem to have no article to the treaties between Yahveh, Allah or the Flying Spaghetti Monster on negligable genocide. --2001:871:6A:1B71:6D4B:BB6E:1759:BC95 (talk) 14:44, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

But in most (though not all) varieties of Christianity, 'God' is said to comprise a trinity of three persons, including also 'Christ' and 'The Holy Ghost', so persumably Christ could bless The Holy Ghost (etc.). {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 20:26, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

That would still amount to God blessing God. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:53, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, that's the point: the theological contrivance would make that seeming absurdity possible, if it were factual. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 04:09, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

July 27

What is "official Islam"? ~ Encyclopaedia of Islam

Following quote from Encyclopaedia of Islam used by @Louis P. Boog at ongoing Talk:Jinn#RfC: Proposed additions of text 1 talks of wording "official Islam". The source Encyclopaedia of Islam entry by D.B. MacDonald and H. Massé does not seem to include specific definition of wording "official Islam".

• Requesting help in ascertaining, What is "official Islam"? to the authors D.B. MacDonald and H. Massé (based on either their individual academic literature or may be they imported term from Bibliography they used or general academic literature)

This question is formed with 'what' instead of 'which' due to it's academic aspect.

• Quote from Title: Ḏj̲inn, Encyclopaedia of Islam:

"..II. In official Islam the existence of the d̲j̲inn was completely accepted, as it is to This day, and the full consequences implied by their existence were worked out. Their legal status in all respects was discussed and fixed, and the possible relations between them and mankind, especially in questions of marriage and property, were examined. .."

~ D.B. MacDonald, H. Massé. Title: Ḏj̲inn. Encyclopaedia of Islam New Edition Online (EI-2 English) DOI: Source Editors: P.J. Bearman First-online: 24 Apr 2012 ISSN: 1573-3912 Publisher: Brill. Wikipedia Library link provided at WP:REREQ

Bookku (talk) 10:21, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Possibly written Islam as defined by trained and educated Ulama, as opposed to more folklorish or popular concepts? There have been some cases of folk Islam elaborations gaining acceptance among scholars of Islamic law... AnonMoos (talk) 11:44, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

This article:

Németh, Kinga (2024). "The Jinn – The Culprit of the Arabic World". Különleges Bánásmód, 10, Special issue, 107-122. doi:10.18458/KB.2024.SI.107

contrasts "official (Sunni) Islam" with "vernacular Islam", which incorporates beliefs based on vernacular legends. While the term "official Islam" is not explicitly defined in the article, it is connected in the text to the points of view of "Islamic institutions", "scholars of Islam" and "schools of Islam".  --Lambiam 13:03, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

It means "standard/mainstream/mainline" Islam (coming in Shia and Sunni flavours). As supported by Islamic scholarship, or most of it. Arguably not an appropriate term, especially for the Sunni, any more than "official Protestantism". Johnbod (talk) 14:28, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

July 28

National Masturbation Day

In which countries, outside the United States, it is celebrated? CometVolcano (talk) 15:28, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

The clue is in the title. It's national not international. Shantavira|^{feed me} 15:49, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

It is also known as International Masturbation Day. --CometVolcano (talk) 15:50, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

and? Nanonic (talk) 19:53, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

I don't know if you can say this day is "celebrated". Masturbation itself is celebrated every day, year-round, worldwide. Very few people outside the US, and I suspect also in the US, will have heard of a day specifically designated as Masturbation Day.  --Lambiam 12:26, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Source? The folklore is that if you do it you will go blind. 2A02:C7B:107:4100:D868:90B:63A8:DAA6 (talk) 10:28, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

It would only make sense if it happened just one day per year. As with fireworks on July 4th. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 11:45, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

No fireworks on New Year's Eve? 82.13.6.9 (talk) 14:51, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

That's also once a year. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:19, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

July 29

"Great Thoughts" anthology

Does anyone know anything about an anthology of poetry, titled "Great Thoughts", that was published before 1890 and probably after 1840? It's mentioned multiple times in a book I'm working on in Wikisource, with notices like this one that say some of the poems in this collection already appeared in "Great Thoughts". The book these mentions appear in is by a single author, a Alice E. Argent, but I don't know her birth date, so that can't narrow the search. Thanks, — Alien333 (what I did & why I did it wrong) 14:37, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Possibly the series Great Thoughts from Master Minds, published by A. W. Hall, Hutton Street, London. DuncanHill (talk) 15:04, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Got it, that's it, since the first line of that poem is in there. Thanks for the help! — Alien333 (what I did & why I did it wrong) 15:12, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Glad to be of assistance, many mentions of Alice E. Argent in newspapers of the period (1870s - 90s), including in connexion with Great Thoughts. DuncanHill (talk) 15:18, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Indeed, after digging a bit deeper, I was able to find her full name, birth/death dates, etc., and expand the Wikidata item. — Alien333 (what I did & why I did it wrong) 15:25, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Dutch - pl. help confirm

Just I helped a little (probably new) user in their now accepted AFC article about nineteenth century speed skater Anke Beenen.

• Anke Beenen#Popularity says

  On 22 December 1879 her speed skating club "Thialf" paid attention celebrated her silver anniversary by building a large gate in front of the house of mayor Daniël de Blocq of Scheltinga on the Heideburen in Heerenveen.

1) The article's popularity section mentions one 'mayor Daniël de Blocq of Scheltinga'.

WP has an article Daniël de Blocq van Scheltinga of a twentieth century person. Obliviously they are supposed to be different persons being from different centuries but on safer side wish to get that confirmed.

2) I did not get why the club would create 'a large gate in front of the house of mayor'? Since I had already asked good number of questions to the new user I do not make new user that I am going after them.

3) '.. on the Heideburen in Heerenveen.' What is 'Heideburen' being referred to here?

Bookku (talk) 15:07, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

"The Heideburen" is a street. There is a Wikidata item Heideburen

"a large gate" sounds like a triumphal arch of some kind. Temporary ones would be erected to celebrate a victory, visiting royalty, etc. DuncanHill (talk) 15:23, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

the sentence seem referring to 'in front of the house of mayor', does not even say 'in front of the office of mayor' intrigues me; may be I am just over thinking Idk. Bookku (talk) 15:29, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Perhaps a bad translation? DuncanHill (talk) 15:33, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

that can be possibility. Many thanks for inputs Bookku (talk) 15:50, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

(ec)And the Van Scheltinga family seem to have included many Daniël de Blocqs. DuncanHill (talk) 15:33, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

According to the source used in the article (Leeuwarder nieuwsblad, 30 januari 1937), it was indeed a temporary arch, made from blocks of ice, on top of which three figurines were placed, depicting Beenen, her skating partner Jouke Schaap and the 'ice god' Thialf in the middle. The source also clearly says it was in front of the mayor's house. - Lindert (talk) 16:30, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Many thanks for the confirmation Bookku (talk) 16:50, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

The street, Heideburen, was then part of the municipality of Schoterland; you can see the municipal border on this map from 1926 (the black dashed line behind the houses along the canal; Heideburen is the red road along the canal). Dutch Wikipedia has an unsourced article with a list of mayors (w:nl:Lijst van burgemeesters van Schoterland), which gives the name of the mayor as Hans Willem de Blocq van Scheltinga. The newspaper article linked above only gives his name as mayor De Blocq van Scheltinga. Dutch "van" means "of" in English. Translating such prepositions in names of nobility isn't unheard of. The municipal hall or whatever you want to call it was in the next village, Oudeschoot. PiusImpavidus (talk) 18:22, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

A 17th-century Daniël de Blocq of Scheltinga was grietman of Schoterland (w:nl:Lijst van grietmannen van Schoterland). Someone got confused, it seems.  --Lambiam 22:36, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

@DuncanHill mentioned nl:Van Scheltinga family seem to list a 'Mr. Daniël de Blocq van Scheltinga (1835-1878), lid provinciale staten' before Jhr. mr. Hans Willem de Blocq van Scheltinga (1870-1933), gemeenteontvanger en wethouder van Rheden.

But there seem to be some confusion about name and post if we compare all three articles mentioned above. Of course in historical details such discrepancies can be routine too. Bookku (talk) 05:14, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Two sources that confirm that Hans Willem was (at some time) the mayor of Schoterland: [14], [15] The Rheden Hans Willem, born in 1870, was nine years old at the time the ice arch was erected, which was too young to be appointed to a mayorship, so this is a different individual. The Schoterland mayor was Hans Willem jr.; the Rheden wethouder has the right age to have been Hans Willem III. It is a safe assumption that the author who named the mayor "Daniël" did so by mistake. In 1879, the town Heerenveen did not exist as a single municipality but was divided over two municipalities, Aengwirden en Schoterland, so the mayor in front of whose house the arch was erected cannot have been mayor of Heerenveen. I have replaced the last part of the sentence by:

a large gate in front of the house of the mayor of Schoterland, de Blocq van Scheltinga, on the Heideburen street in Heerenveen.

 --Lambiam 11:07, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Many thanks to all of you for all the search and support. Bookku (talk) 12:54, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

USA Banking questions.

So I do know of someone that owed the credit card section of a bank, $27,000, before the bank finally disconnected. Which brings me to several theoretical questions.

1. If someone owes the credit card of Bank A $27,000, do the other banks know about it? I heard that they do not know directly, but they can do through shared databases. But the database doesn't tell the bank an exact amount, just a range amount.

2. What if you owe Bank A $27,000, but you already have over $40,000 in Bank B. What can Bank A do in regards to that?

3. What if you owe the credit-card side of Bank A $27,000, but you do have $27,000 in the commercial-banking side of Bank A. Can Bank A seize that amount? And if so, do they send you a letter notifying you of that, in which you can just withdraw that money out, or can they seize it from you without notifying you, or do they have to take you to court for that, in which you would just withdraw that money out?

4. What if you owe Bank A $27,000, but you have more than that in Bank B. But then, Bank A and Bank B got merged into the same bank? Heh. 66.99.15.162 (talk) 19:41, 29 July 2024 (UTC).

First, credit cards are rarely issued by specific banks… they are issued by specialized companies such as Visa, or Mastercard. You will continue to owe the credit card company for any debt on the card, even if you switch banks.

And yes, if you default on a significantly large debt, the credit card company can take legal action and place a lien on your assets, wherever those assets might be located. Blueboar (talk) 20:10, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

In the US there are several commercial consumer reporting agencies that keep track of people's so-called "credit scores", which are supposed to represents the creditworthiness of individuals; see Credit score § United States. Lenders can access your credit score. The situation under question 2 is, from a legal point of view, not different from the general situation that someone refuses to pay a debt while having valuable assets. What Bank A can do in the situation under question 3 depends on the contract you have with the bank (the rules you agreed to when opening the account), but I cannot imagine it includes transferring money without notification. If you should know, or have reason to expect, that a debtor may take you to court, then, I think, it is a crime to squirrel your assets away in order to avoid the anticipated seizure.  --Lambiam 21:36, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Jurisdiction matters, as does whether the debt is being serviced. 1. is hugely dependent on the jurisdiction. In some places, sharing personal data is a violation of the law; in others, it is just good practice. 2. needs some explanation as to why Bank B needs to know about the debt to Bank A. Imagine the customer is Elon Musk, and ask yourself why Bank B needs to know this information. 3. See 1. Above. In general, the two “sides” of a bank – personal and corporate – are actually two different bank accounts. If the corporate side is not linked to (e.g., collateral for) the corporate side, in many jurisdictions the personal side can only be accessed via a court-ordered bankruptcy proceeding. 4. There is no reason for a bank to merge two bank accounts simply because the corporate entities (bank owners) merged. More, the debt is not said to be in arrears or delinquent, so there would be no reason to notice that it is (or isn’t) related to an unrelated deposit. DOR (ex-HK) (talk) 20:06, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

To Dor (HK). When you say jurisdiction matters, I guess you already stated that this is not a federal court issue and is state. So 1 state will allow Bank A to seize money from Bank B, and another state would not? Wonder if that's correlated with red vs. blue states. Could the same hold true for the credit card and savings coming from the same bank? Also, would the state law be for the state in which you opened the account, or the state the headquarters city is in?

To Blueboar, JP Morgan Chase and Capital 1 both having a commercial banking side, and a credit card side. I would imagine you owing the credit card side of the bank, had less to do with Visa/Mastercard. Visa/Mc makes money from swiping...

And to Lambiam and possibly others. Before my dad divorced his wife #6, she opened up a cc in their name and started using it behind his back, until cc company sent him a bill, hitting $27,000. So he hired a lawyer where the lawyer sent the cc company a picture of his proof of divorce so he's no longer eligible for the bills after their divorce date, which is 99% if not 100%. So now cc company only goes to her for the $27,000. She is Korean but from South America, where she went back to. This was in 2016. Earlier this year, I spoke with the attorney that sent the cc company the divorce, I asked him if the cc company knew she was back in the U.S., could she be arrested? Lawyer said no. Which means this is still a civil issue. So the idea of withdrawing all the money from your bank when the bank notifies you, is probably still not criminal. Also, there is no such thing as civil lawsuits with individuals. Why? Because when the process server rings your doorbell, you say "Sorry you got the wrong address, don't know anyone with that name that lives here." Or better yet you don't answer the doorbell, and certainly never sign anything. So, owing a cc company $27,000 is still not an arrestable offense.

Thanks for your responses guys. 66.99.15.162 (talk) 14:58, 30 July 2024 (UTC).

Now, regarding if you owe Bank A $27,000, does Bank B know about it? I will put this out, because someone will interpret this as asking for legal advice, but the story is over. Before my dad died, the wife #6 transferred $42,000 from his Bank C, to Bank D. So, why do I go to, Bank C or Bank D. Turns out to be a mix of both. And she put my dad's name in her Bank D so both their names are in the account, to make it look like he was transferring his own money, from his own bank to his other bank. So, that became legal. So here I am contacting Bank D about it. I didn't ask for a refund. I asked to mark her as a fraudster person. The bank responded that they sent my story to their fraud-team. Then I told the Bank D, that she owes the credit-card side of Bank B, $27,000 in 2016. You know what Bank D responded? Bank D responded "that has nothing to do with us." But I reiterated that obviously the credit card side of Bank A considers her a fraudster person, to help back up my story that she is a fraudster, and so, Bank D replied we sent this story to the fraud team again... So, Bank A and D are 5/3rd Bank and Byline Bank. If she owes 5/3rd Bank $27,000, do the other banks know about it? Does 5/3rd Bank not try to tell other banks about it? Well, hence comes privacy laws. The fact that she has a Byline Bank in 2024 makes me think the account opened long before 2016... And ChatGPT says Byline Bank will never e-mail or phone call 5/3rd Bank to confirm if she owes $27,000, that that's not how it works, that the only info they can get is through shared databases. 66.99.15.162 (talk) 15:06, 30 July 2024 (UTC).

I'm not looking for advice on how to get back the $42,000, but am looking into how banks can know stories of how other people owe other banks money. I'm also looking for any famous cases where Bank B froze your account because they found out you owe Bank A a lot of money. 66.99.15.162 (talk) 15:39, 30 July 2024 (UTC).

When I said jurisdiction matters, I was thinking of Cuba v. Sudan, or Hong Kong v. Canada; we have very little idea what country you (or your father) live(d) in. DOR (ex-HK) (talk) 19:05, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

July 30

Digestion before the Fall

Ronald Knox's The Creed in Slow Motion, 1949 ed., is a collection of talks given during the Second World War. On page 68, he says in passing:

I even read a book the other day— not by a Catholic, but by a very intelligent man— which suggested that, before the Fall, man’s will directed his digestion. Think how nice it would be if you could digest your meals at will, like brushing your teeth.

He doesn't mention what book it was. Does anyone have any ideas? Marnanel (talk) 12:58, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

I believe it would be difficult to be certain. I have to assume that this was between 1920 and 1930. At the end of the 1800s, Nietzsche was popular, which made way for many very similar philosophical works. Nietzshe had a common complaint throughout his work that mankind previously had control over the body, but over time had devolved into a purely reactionary vessel. He specifically mentions digestion in some of his works. I remember one passage that I studied in college in which he claimed that the flood of information fron a daily newspaper muddies the mind and trains people to quickly react, not think, as the information is digested and the body continues this. It quickly digests whatever is put into the mouth withough considering if it should be digested and what the nutrients might be used for. Because he brought this up in multiple books and the same thoughts were expressed by many others at the time, it would be difficult to identify exactly which book Knox read. You could narrow it down to only non-Catholics, but I doubt many people who published Nietzsche-like books were Catholic. 12.116.29.106 (talk) 14:27, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

July 31

Book publication dates

For a project I'm working on, I need to check the exact publication dates for a bunch of novels etc. Google is my friend, yet often it gives me wildly varying dates for the same book. A case in point: the publication date for Steve Toltz's A Fraction of the Whole is either:

• 12 Feb 2008, 11 Apr 2008, 1 May 2008, before Jun 2008, 23 Sep 2008, 1 Oct 2008, 6 Oct 2008, 14 May 2009, or possibly others, depending on which hit one chooses to believe. [16]

I understand that editions in different languages, and hardbacks vs. paperbacks can come out at different times. Also, books will be released in foreign countries at varying times, because different publishers will be involved. But in general, these do not seem to explain the variations in publication dates that I'm seeing. What would explain them? -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 21:31, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

A Google search for "A Fraction of the Whole" "first published" gives a large number of mentions of specifically February 12, 2008, apparently by Spiegel & Grau. Amazon states explicitly that this is the first edition.  --Lambiam 23:16, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

As a book collector and researcher, I would not place much reliance on dates given on Amazon; they often refer to a 'first edition' in a particular country, and are often entered well before publication, which may then be delayed or advanced.

I note that Spiegel & Grau were/are a New York publisher, whereas the book's article gives its (presumably first edition) publisher as Hamish Hamilton, Australia, as one might expect for an Australian author's first novel. The online Science Fiction Encyclopedia (Toltz's work verges on the fantastic/near future) also gives the Australian edition as the first, though (as always) it records only the year, and by policy favours the author's 'home nation' when editions have appeared simultaneously or nearly so in more than one country. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 01:51, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Hamish Hamilton was a British publisher; the imprint is since 1986 part of Penguin,^[17] now owned by Penguin Random House. Here on AbeBooks a hardcover edition is listed as "Published by Hamish Hamilton, London, 2008".  --Lambiam 09:25, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, all true, but:

(a) Publishing house and imprint ownership often has several tiers, complexly related, but the 'lowest tier' involved (whose name/colophon will definitively be on the Title Page) is conventionally recognised as 'the publisher' of a work, and;

(b) many large London-based publishers have 'local branches' in other Commonwealth countries; these often publish works by that country's authors which the London 'parent' publishes later, or not at all, or for someone with international appeal simultaneously, and they are recognised as 'publishers' in their own right.

As a book collector (and former editor at a London publisher which was then independent but is now a 'mere' imprint) I often wish these matters were more straightforward, but they're not. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.1.169.77 (talk) 01:07, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Enough said. Thank you, all. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 22:56, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Lafcadio Hearn story - One man in a boat

The Algernon Blackwood short story 'The Man who was Milligan' refers to a Lafcadio Hearn story "about a picture of a man in a boat. An observer, watching the picture, had seen the man move. The man actually began to row. Finally, the man rowed right out of the picture and into the place - a temple - where the observer stood." What is the Lafcadio Hearn story? Thank you, DuncanHill (talk) 01:37, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Doesn't match the "temple" part, but maybe "The Story of Kwashin Koji"—see the last paragraph of the story here. Deor (talk) 14:41, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Oh that must be it, especially with the disappearing never to be seen again. Thank you, DuncanHill (talk) 17:25, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Trouble finding reliable sources

I'm trying to add information to Beethoven's legacy section, however I'm having trouble finding reliable sources which give good information. When I use google I run into articles which aren't reliable and when I use google scholar all of the sources are locked behind a paywall. And, yes, I tried looking into the sources section of the wikipedia guides. What can I do? Wikieditor662 (talk) 08:51, 31 July 2024 (UTC)Wikieditor662 (talk) 08:51, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

@Wikieditor662 If you cannot find reliable sources, there is nothing to do, because Wikipedia articles should be solely based on reliable sources. You might have better luck if you mention this issue on the article talk page, which will be watched by editors more familiar with the subject. Shantavira|^{feed me} 09:10, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

I'm sure there are reliable sources on the influence of beethoven, I just don't know how to find them. But, sure, I'll ask on the article page... Wikieditor662 (talk) 09:11, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Sources don't have to be online (links are nice to have, but not essential). A Public Library of any size (if you can get to one) should have (or could obtain for you via Interlibrary loan) biographies of Beethoven which will likely discuss this topic at length. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 12:27, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll see if I can do that. Also, are there any other ways to get online sources, as they're much easier to use? Wikieditor662 (talk) 12:34, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes. Have a look at WP:RX. ColinFine (talk) 18:11, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

A Google Books search often affords no preview or one that is too limited, but you will not run into a paywall. Another searchable repository of books is eBooks and Texts at the Internet Archive. Just searching for Beethoven+legacy turns up possibly useful sources. A source that offers information of interest but is by itself not reliable can serve as a source of inspiration for keywords for a more precisely targeted search. See also Help:Find sources and WP:Advanced source searching.  --Lambiam 21:57, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Wikieditor662, I agree that archive.org (linked above) is an excellent resource and beats even the best reference library hands down. Opening a free account gives you access to copyright works.

Additionally the Wikipedia Library gives you access to a world of academic articles and books such as JSTOR, Oxford, Brill, Taylor & Francis, etc. etc. Alansplodge (talk) 10:40, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

To get you started, I found The Value of Beethoven which you can access through the Wikipedia Library or you can open a free JSTOR account (click on "Alternate access options" on the right of the page). Alansplodge (talk) 10:50, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you guys so much for this. Unfortunately I cannot access the wikipedia as it requires 500+ edits and 6 months+ of editing. I will look into the JSTOR thing, although I haven't found anything useful from "The value of Beethoven" (except for one thing which I already have from somewhere else), and I do find some of the information on there to be questionable, especially when they said that Gluck and Haydn are part of the 6 greatest composers by far (or something like that). Wikieditor662 (talk) 12:09, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

@Wikieditor662: Until you qualify for the Wikipedia Library, and for things it does not cover, you can ask at WP:RX. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 11:05, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, but what I wrote has been rejected so there's no point in me continuing. Wikieditor662 (talk) 14:03, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

August 2

Largest unnamed island?

largest unnamed island not created by river bifurcations 115.188.65.157 (talk) 08:26, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

See No-Name Island. This sounds like an ideal question for a search engine. For example Google tells me that "The largest island in a lake is a nameless, approximately 4.0-hectare (10-acre) island at 66.687°N 70.479°W", and there are a lot more Google answers. Shantavira|^{feed me} 09:22, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

The next question would be whether any of these no-name islands have lakes within them... and whether any such lakes have islands within them. (And so on.) ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 11:47, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia has an article Recursive islands and lakes. Abductive (reasoning) 05:56, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Google AI responded with the largest unnamed island being an island in a large lake on Baffin Island. Looking at sattelite views, it appears that the only reason an island there wouldn't have a name is because nobody is living there to give it a name. In my opinion, if there is an island near people, it will have a name because humans like to call things by a name, even if that name is "No-name island." 75.136.148.8 (talk) 12:05, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Your report reminds of the mountain called K2, which had no local name because no one local knew about it. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:11, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

August 4

Venezuelan parishes map?

Hi hi. Is there anywhere online where it is possible to find a blank locator map for parishes of Venezuela? I tried to google, but I couldn't encounter. I think the data is available in OpenStreetMaps, but I wasn't able to extract one. -- Soman (talk) 13:23, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

The closest I've found is [18]. "Venezuela parishes" is the second map listed. Mapline is a commercial map vendor, but they have a free account option you could try. Some places like that give you some small number of free maps (after which you'd pay), so you might be able to get it for free. As you're likely aware, there are 1,136 parishes. Mapping that would certainly be a chore to do by scratch; you may have to pay for it. Matt Deres (talk) 20:05, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

References to Curran and Farjeon

I'm going through Gershon Legman's joke books. Among the scholarly crimes committed therein is the lack of a bibliography (despite citing works within the body), so that you're kind of left hanging as to which works he was referring to. I'd like to ask about two of them:

1. A number of jokes are cited simply to "Curran, 1938". Was there a folklorist or humorist that would fit that bill? Curran is a very common surname, so I'm hoping someone can shorten the list of possibilities.
2. A humorous poem is appended with "quoting Farjeon's verse, The Sense of Humor". The Farjeon in question is presumably Eleanor Farjeon, whose quaint verses seem ripe for parody, but I don't seem to be able to find a work called The Sense of Humor. The title itself could well be a play on the original title, of course. Does anyone recognize the rhyme/meter here:

The breezes the breezes, they blow through the treeses.
They blow the chemises and through the girls kneeses.
The college boy seeses and does what he pleases.
Which causes diseases, by Jesus, by Jesus.

It certainly seems familiar. Any help for either reference would be appreciated. Matt Deres (talk) 19:56, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I think the Farjeon is Herbert Farjeon, who is quoted in relation to dirty jokes by Stephen Potter in Sense of Humour "To the bees and the breeze and the trees, no doubt, A kitchenmaid heart responds". Potter, Stephen (1954). Sense of Humour. Max Reinhardt. pp. 10–11.

Curran is ""CURRAN, William" [pseud.]. 1938. Clean Dirt. 500 anecdotes, stories, poems, toasts, and wisecracks. Buffalo, N.Y. (At head: "Volume I," but no more published.) 256 pp., 8vo, with supplement of 5 mimeographed leaves of bawdier stories. (Copy: G. Legman.)" from online bibliography "which originally appeared in the October-December 1990 issue of Journal of American Folklore". DuncanHill (talk) 21:41, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Wow! Very well done - thank you very much! Matt Deres (talk) 13:00, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

It appears to be in amphibrachic tetrameter with internal rhymes. Don't know if there's a more specific term. AnonMoos (talk) 01:06, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

August 5

Volkstedt porcelain

Am I right in linking Werkstätten für Porzellankunst (on Arthur Storch (sculptor)) to Volkstedt porcelain? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 11:02, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I think that's wrong. de:Arthur Storch links to de:Unterweißbacher Werkstätten für Porzellankunst, which, although geographically close, was another institution. The article only mentions a brief connection to the Volkstedt manufactory after 1930. --Wrongfilter (talk) 11:49, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. In any case, I now have a more authoritative source which gives his employer at that time as ""Triebner, Ens & Eckert". Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:13, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

British peers killed in action

James IV of Scotland was the last British monarch to be killed in action, dying at the Battle of Flodden in 1513. But who was the last British peer to be killed in action? I ask because I just came across Archibald Wavell, 2nd Earl Wavell, who (as a Major in the Black Watch) was killed during the Mau Mau rebellion in 1953, and wondered if there was anyone after him. If not, we should probably record that in his article - a dark honour but an historically significant one. Proteus (Talk) 14:48, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

You may well be right, but Wikipedia:When to cite suggests that you would need a reliable source that says he was. A brief Google search failed to find anything for me. Alansplodge (talk) 16:42, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Would the death of Lord Mountbatten (27 August 1979) during the Troubles count? -- Verbarson  ^talk_edits 21:29, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

No, because the Troubles were not a war. --Viennese Waltz 13:15, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

The Shasu Yahweh inscriptions

What's the common name of these? The Soleb inscription and the Amarah-West inscription? They're hugely important, but we don't have photos up. We need close up photos and transcriptions to match of the spelling of the name there. We probably need specific pages for them, since the focus on them is specific in our zeitgeist but Wikipedia's articles about the Shasu and the tetragrammaton attestations are scattered. Everybody including laymen refer to them, but we need to make them very easy to look up and see. I don't want to download Fleming's flaccid and drudging 2020 book again to check this again, but I am. Temerarius (talk) 18:51, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

We should also find a way to make the clarifying redundancies in hieroglyphic clear on pages like Shasu. That table, people are going to read it and wonder how 8 or 9 glyphs correspond "very precisely" to the Tetragrammaton.

Temerarius (talk) 18:54, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

There are a number of difficulties and issues and emendations on these things that Fleming 2020 and the others don't bother passing on. I didn't realize the common intpretation had so many dependencies. on pages 97-100 of The Origins of Yahwism.

"See Kitchen, Ramesside Inscriptions II (see n. 37), 217 (10). The assumed change from the sign

wA to the sign actually read as rwD/Ar/Aj can be easily explained as a copy error from a hieratic

template, see Görg, “Jahwe – ein Toponym?” (see n. 7), 185. The Soleb-list shows a quail chick

(read w) at the end of the name instead of a vulture (read A) but an alike emendation seems easi-

ly possible. Görg, “Jahwe – ein Toponym?” (see n. 7), 185, considered this as unlikely since the

scribe of the Amarah-list otherwise displays no difficulties in discriminating between the Aleph-

sign and the w-quail chicken. In Görg, “YHWH – ein Toponym?” (see n. 7 and 16), 11 Görg refers

to an opinion expressed by Elmar Edel: Edel transferred his analysis of the scribal mistakes in

the list of African place names of Thutmosis III. to our list and concluded that “natürliche Le-

sung Y-h-wA-A anzusetzen sei” (the natural reading should be Y-h-wA-A)."

This is note 36 on pg 98.

There's more problems than quoted listed.

Here's my copy of Adrom and Mueller's of the Amara West reference: https://i.postimg.cc/bvkRNPpN/image.png

And Soleb: https://i.postimg.cc/q7bKBGgq/image.png

Both of which they transcribe as tA SAsw y-h-w. (I hope y'all don't mind this easier way of transcribing without special characters, the author uses special characters.)

Temerarius (talk) 01:01, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Now I see how well Daniel Fleming obscures his source material.

"The readings of the Egyptian text here follow the text presented by Adrom and Müller (97), with the vowel marker after the last sign, as wȝ."

Get that? That's not clear? It means Adrom and Mueller gave a trigrammaton, and Fleming added ȝ, making a tetragrammaton. This is one of the most deceptive and most difficult to perceive details in an already harmful-to-scholarship book. I think it's a quite legitimate interpretation, but a wrong one, and presented misleadingly instead of argued for. Sneaky operations like this shouldn't be allowed on topics as consequential and controversial as the tetragram. I hope I'm making some mistake, because this is really poor work on Fleming's part. Temerarius (talk) 01:28, 6 August 2024 (UTC) Temerarius (talk) 01:28, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

References

Blind man playing cards in the 18th century

Did John Metcalf (civil engineer) use a Braille deck of cards? No, he couldn't have, because Braille hadn't been invented yet. But his article says he played cards. Well, how, then? 2601:18A:C500:E830:526A:B17D:E5EF:4ACD (talk) 20:36, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

In his memoir, originally published in 1795, Metcalf writes, using the third person, "Cards, too, began to engage his attention; all of which he could soon distinguish, unassisted;"^[19] without further explanation how this remarkable feat was achieved.  --Lambiam 01:44, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

If the printed ink on the cards was sufficiently thick, he might have been able to tell by feel. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:03, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Seems unlikely - probably, since he lost his sight through a disease at 6, he was partially sighted (like a high proportion of "blind" people), and could see the cards if held close to his face. Johnbod (talk) 04:00, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

However, Metcalf writes, "He was then seized with the small-pox, which rendered him totally blind".^[20]  --Lambiam 12:32, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

August 6

Trustworthy sources for learning about race and ethnicity

I am looking for good up-to-date learning resources on race and ethnicity. I came from an extraordinarily ill-informed household and have subsequently tried shutting out their conversation, undoubtedly I still carry poor views without knowing. I am at the point where I do not know the basics and just need some help getting this sorted out. Just looking for resources, film, sites. They can absolutely be "dumbed down."

I do not think external science is the right direction for this. It becomes off-topic at best and real uncomfortable at worst. I believe this relates more to social constructs, which I would love to have more of an understanding of. I have Darwin's On the Origin of Species on my shelf, having thumbed through that in relation to this topic was shocking. Lurid. It is obviously flawed, 1859 far too distant, and while it is great I know this is wrong, I cannot tell the specifics of the wrong except for gut feelings. I believe it would help to know more of what is right while knowing I can trust that source. Parameci (talk) 17:10, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Does Darwin argue that there is more than one species of humans? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 18:05, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

No, in the 19th century, that was Polygenism, and was embraced by racists who disregarded both traditional religion and emerging evolutionary science, such as Louis Agassiz... AnonMoos (talk) 22:17, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia itself is not a reliable source, but our articles on race (human categorization), ethnicity, as well as human evolution, are pretty good starting points riddled with references to reliable sources. Matt Deres (talk) 18:23, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Darwin says almost nothing about human beings in his "Origin of Species". He reserved that for The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex... 22:14, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I'd like to hear what the OP found "shocking" and "lurid" about Origin of Species. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:17, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Darwin also had no idea about genetics, so he imagined skin color mixing like paint. It would be best for OP not to start with Darwin but with what we presently know, perhaps with something accessible such as the Y-chromosomal Adam and Mitochondrial Eve articles. Abductive (reasoning) 08:59, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

There are people who believe that race is a concept that can be used to classify humans as belonging to specific races. These people also tend to believe that race is heritable. More precisely, they believe that a child inherits the race of its parents (if they belong to the same race). So they believe it is a biological trait. This belief was prevalent in the 19th century, but we know now that there is no scientific basis for splitting humanity into separate races. This pseudoscientific concept of race also underlies racism.

Ethnicity, on the other hand, is generally understood as being a cultural concept, involving language, customs and traditions, belief systems, folklore, and generally all that is culturally transmitted. It is also a fuzzy concept; someone can have multiple ethnicities. For example, someone can be German but at the same time also, more specifically, Swabian. Or someone can have been raised by Japanese parents while growing up in Norway, participating in both cultures and identifying as both Japanese and Norwegian.

Whatever sources you are consulting, it is good to keep in mind that race and ethnicity are very different concepts. Since it is not quite clear what it is you want to know "the basics" of, it is difficult to give a targeted advice on reliable learning resources. Don't hesitate to ask more specific questions here.  --Lambiam 10:54, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Speculation: It seems possible that the OP has been socialised in an authoritarian, racist and creationist family. Finding a way out of the rigid dogma of eternal and absolute truths requires much courage and will trigger some existentialist fear when a person jumps into the cold water of chaotic free thinking.

This may come as a traumatic and frightening culture shock to those whose reality has been filtered by a secure and rigid dogma of divine law and order. Basically, the OP needs to learn how to think and how to decide without the "security net" of dictatorial Gods and authoritarian masters.

The OP should be highly respected for his / her courage. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 16:09, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

The question does have that vibe to it. It would be nice to hear some followup from the OP, but since they only edit once every month or two, I wouldn't count on it. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 18:18, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

On the subject of Darwin, it's worth noting that he's important historically because he we the first person to come up with a generally plausible explanation of evolution and speciation, and laid the groundwork for future research. But science has progressed massively since then - all sorts of things that he was unaware of have since been discovered, all sorts of questions he raised have now been answered, and some of his explanations have been disproved. As such, reading Origin is more something one would do for understanding the history of his ideas, rather than to learn the current understanding of evolution. Iapetus (talk) 11:35, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

August 7

List of the most important 19th c. poems in the Dutch language

Anyone knows where I could find a list of the most important 19th c. poems in the Dutch language? I mean the kind of poems that are in most anthologies and that everyone in Belgium and the Netherlands (at least in principle) have all heard about (if not actually heard or read). I don't need the texts (which I should be able to find online) but only their titles and authors. 178.51.2.117 (talk) 13:22, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Here's a list of the poets featured in Gerrit Komrij's anthology De Nederlandse poëzie van de 19de en 20ste eeuw in 1000 en enige gedichten. It also includes 20th century poets, of course, but if you scroll to the bottom, there's a separate overview of those poets who died before 1900. (I realize you asked for poems, not poets, but maybe this will help you).---Sluzzelin talk 19:44, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

M855A1 and the Hague Conventions of 1899

This document[21] describes how several US rounds, like the M852 and M118LR, are tested and found to the compliant under the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907.

1. Has the new US M855A1 round undergone similar testing?

2. Is there a publicly available source to show #1?

I tried googling "Hague 1899 XXXX" for any other US round and plenty of good primary sources came up (including the source I gave).

But strangely enough, searching for "Hague 1899 M855A1", "Hague JAG M855A1", "Hague JAG corp M855A1", "M855A1 JAG legal review" or other similar queries only turn up news articles or forum posts, none of which link to any useful secondary or primary sources. OptoFidelty (talk) 19:58, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

August 8

Chain of command on a Navy ship

For my purposes this is specifically WWI-era and British Royal Navy, but I imagine it can be applied more universally: if some catastrophe befalls a naval ship and kills the captain and his lieutenants, how does the chain of command progress after that? Is that universal across navies and across the centuries? I feel like I have a good grip on how Army ranks work, and the clear delineation between enlisted man and officer, but not so much with sailor and officer on a Navy vessel, or the way the officer ranks work when in the Navy they often seem to be tied to a specific role. Dr-ziego (talk) 12:02, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

July 29

Tais everywhere!

Looking at the names of four Taiwanese cities, Taipei (臺北), Taichung (臺中), Tainan (臺南) and Taitung (臺東), it can be seen that they share the same first character (臺 Tai, as in 臺灣 Taiwan) while the second one indicates their positions in relation to the island of Taiwan (north, center, south and east respectively). What I'm asking is why the "positional" character is the second one and not the first? I'm not a speaker of Chinese but, from what I know about it, I would be expecting a scheme such as: North-Tai, Center-Tai, South-Tai and East-Tai, not the opposite. Can someone explain this situation to me? Are there other examples like this? (I'm erasing this second question because evidently it may sound like I'm asking about any language while I'm talking specifically about Chinese.) Thank you! 79.35.53.87 (talk) 00:06, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Paris-Nord, Paris-Sud, Paris-Est.  --Lambiam 11:59, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Word order is not the same in all languages.DOR (ex-HK) (talk) 20:09, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Chinese has Beijing and Nanjing, but also Hubei and Hunan. Is there a systematic to these differences or is the order free? The translations suggest that direction in the first position indicates an adjective characterising the second part (northern and southern capital), whereas second position represents a direction with respect to the first part (to the north and south of the lake; in the north/south/centre of Taiwan?). I've forgotten too much Chinese... --Wrongfilter (talk) 20:43, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

There's also Hainan and Nanhai. both made up of Nan/南 and Hai/海。 I think it's just names. I have no experience of Taiwan but in China it's common to form Chinese names of two or three characters with little regard for grammatical meaning/word order. I am thinking of personal names and company names, but it surely applies also to place names which will still be being devised today. And who knows, in a hundred or a thousand years maybe a village being named today will be the capital of a future state.--2A04:4A43:901F:FE56:7C29:7255:3786:BFF3 (talk) 06:46, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

From what I understand direction-second is far more common, with Beijing et al. being the exception. Remsense诉 07:52, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Another thought. Chinese is an odd language. It seems to have a long and stable history, with written characters from thousands of years ago easily understood today. Also for most of its history it was expressed in one way, using Classical Chinese which was the main way of writing Chinese up until a hundred years ago or so.

But Chinese changed dramatically over this time. Classical Chinese is very different from modern vernacular Chinese, really a different language. And the spoken language changed even more, changes that have been disguised by the stability of the written forms.

So it's possible word order was different, or far more flexible, when some of the names here were devised. There are examples at Classical Chinese grammar#Core constituent order of this in particular contexts. It's possible therefore that place names that now seem odd were once correct, according to the grammar of earlier versions of Chinese. Then once written down and widely used the names were fixed, so didn't change as grammar changed.--2A04:4A43:90FF:FB2D:B95F:6B63:16FE:9FE3 (talk) 13:10, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

An Egyptian "god of the extended arm"

On pg 2 of Budge's Book of the Dead lexicon, where is the reference? "Au-a", the "god of the extended arm." I'd like to see that page of papyrus. It sounds like a famous Exodus-related phrase. Deuteronomy 4:34 and 5:15 "with a mighty hand and outstretched arm." Temerarius (talk) 03:01, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

July 30

What is this hieroglyph?

What's the doughy, ugly glyph on the upper right and lower left? https://i.postimg.cc/KzWSv8fr/IMG-3692.jpg Temerarius (talk) 19:51, 30 July 2024 (UTC) Temerarius (talk) 19:51, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

D19, maybe? AnonMoos (talk) 10:56, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

I doubt it; when a symbol is anthropomorphic it's unmistakably so.

Temerarius (talk) 18:03, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

It seems to me to be a reasonably good fit (the only one among the "standard" signs) if only the side of the nose is shown, but I won't insist on it... AnonMoos (talk) 00:21, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

The only one I found was F161. Never seen that weird glyph before.

Temerarius (talk) 18:17, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

In "the essential Gardiner Middle Egyptian sign list", the F series only goes to F52, while in an extended listing that I have ("ISO/IEC JTC1/SC2/WG2 N1944") it only goes to F156, so F161 must be a lesser-used (possibly rather obscure) hieroglyph... AnonMoos (talk) 00:21, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Rather obscure I'm sure; jsesh is where I found it. The inventor of the app claims to be fairly conservative on inclusion but it can't be that exclusive. I wish they'd refer to a relief photo on the rarer ones.

Temerarius (talk) 02:43, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

References

Is there a generic term for "speaker or signer" yet?

It is uncontroversial both that signed language is truly its own modality distinct from speech, and also that much linguistics work limits itself to the latter and will be up-front about that. That's fine in most cases—they are very different modes, so it's hard to write about both!—but it struck me just now that every interdisciplinary work I've read has to go out of its way to repeat "speaker or signer" if desiring to explicitly indicate both spoken and signed language. What would we choose if we had to invent one? Utterer? Seaker? Spigner? Remsense诉 20:00, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

"Communicator"? Maybe still not clear outside of context... 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 22:39, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Another term that does not depend on the modality of the communication channel is sender. Yet another modality-independent term is messager, but sender has the advantage of having a modality-independent term for the counterpart, namely receiver.

 --Lambiam 22:43, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Sender seems particularly suited for general interdisciplinary linguistics discussion, thanks!. Remsense诉 22:46, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Wait! @Lambiam et al., what would senders and receivers together be? I think interlocutor is almost perfect, but it implies a dialogue dimension to written language that doesn't necessary line up. Remsense诉 07:34, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Someone putting up a billboard with a message and people reading this message are generally speaking definitely not interlocutors. (An ancient Roman would have understood the word interlocutor as meaning someone interrupting a speaker, such as a heckler.) The term may be appropriate for the sender and receiver of a personal mail message, in which case the receiver can usually respond when they so choose, but not for one-way communication channels. Since reading a message involves a form of agency, you might write that you'll use the word "agent" in this communication context as a term encompassing both senders and receivers of messages.  --Lambiam 10:47, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I think I've seen "text users" in this context in scholarly works about "text production", but I like the suggestion of "agent" even better. Folly Mox (talk) 11:06, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes! Once again, agent is perfect. Remsense诉 11:09, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

What are these cuneiform signs?

This may be a follow-up on my question of Ishtar spellings. Is dingir "Ur" here, and the glyphs to the side are Istaran? Or is the dingir "ra" in Istaran?

https://i.postimg.cc/9X119kHK/istaran.png

Temerarius (talk) 20:05, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

The eight-pointed asterisk is a version of the "star" or "heaven" sign (see article An (cuneiform)), and likely is a determinative sign indicating that a deity name follows, without itself having any pronunciation in this context (that's what the superscript "d" means). The signs which actually write the name itself seem to be loosely sketched in. This image has a rather low relevant information content for its 1.9 megabyte file size. I'm not sure why you're seeking the Akkadian goddess name "Ishtar" in a Sumerian context. I have a scan of a page from a 19th century book which lists Akkadian deity names in 1st millennium B.C. Assyrian versions of cuneiform signs, and it gives several alternative spellings for Ishtar, none of which look anything like the vague rectangles in the 1.9 megabyte image. I'm not sure of the source or where I downloaded it from (in 2006), so can't upload it here... AnonMoos (talk) 23:31, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Because I want to know every spelling, all attestations of Asherah, Ishtar, Astarte, and anything that can be confused for them. I'd love to see that page of yours if you can think of anywhere to upload it. Temerarius (talk) 01:21, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

I'll do a reverse Google image search later today to see if I can track down its source. I don't know anything about image hosting services (have never used one as uploader). Also, the name Asherah has nothing to do with the others: in Hebrew and similar languages it begins with an Aleph or voiceless glottal stop, while `Ashtaroth (singular `Ashtoreth) begins with an `Ayin or voiced pharyngeal consonant. In the older non-Eastern Semitic languages, these are two completely separate consonants, as distinct as "p" and "k", though this can be obscured by the confusable apostrophes often used in Latin alphabet transcriptions. I doubt that the two goddess names were confused in Hebrew... AnonMoos (talk) 12:03, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Tineye didn't find anything, and Google Images search by image found a lot of "related" stuff not specifically relevant. If you can recommend an image upload site with a minimum fuss, muss, and required personal information, I might upload it there. AnonMoos (talk) 07:05, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

at postimages, the one I used above, you just have to load the page and ctrl-v after copying the image and it'll upload.

Temerarius (talk) 23:18, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

OK, it's apparently at https://postimg.cc/87wk6Ts5 ... -- AnonMoos (talk) 20:51, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

The source is Leonard William King's First Steps in Assyrian (1898). GalacticShoe (talk) 07:36, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Was Asherah an actual name, or a title that could be applied to female consorts of Caananite gods in general? (I'm sure I've seen a passage translated as ("X and his Asherah.")

Either way, did it perhaps derive (in changed form) from an older name of a particular goddess in Mesopotamian (or another) mythology? {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 00:36, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

The word sometimes referred to a goddess (with different characteristics in different cultures), sometimes to a tree or pole, but was still basically a name (proper noun)... AnonMoos (talk) 07:05, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

the logic behind the existence of the "his" and its implication is quite forced and not unanimous.

Temerarius (talk) 23:19, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia article Kuntillet Ajrud inscriptions#Grammar... -- AnonMoos (talk) 00:29, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

What about it? I wrote that section. I wrote all the sections.

Temerarius (talk) 02:40, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

It was more for the benefit of 94.2.67.235 and possibly other curious individuals. AnonMoos (talk) 03:00, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

And I did indeed find it interesting. Thank you. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.1.211.211 (talk) 00:30, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Ishakshar? DuncanHill (talk) 00:42, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

July 31

Argelasse

Provence, it has been said, "smells of argelasse and wild lavender and broom...". Lavender and broom I know, but what is argelasse? Thank you, DuncanHill (talk) 00:18, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Websearching only finds it as an Italian surname, bar the one story on Wikisource you've doubtless seen. I suspect it's a misprint, but I haven't been able to figure out what for: Angelica seems to fit the context, but is too different.

The same spelling appears in the story in the collection on Project Gutenberg, but that is Wikisource's source, so no help. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 01:06, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Possibly Artemisia (plant). 41.23.55.195 (talk) 05:04, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

I'd go for fr:Ulex parviflorus, "known in Languedoc and Provence under the names of argelàs, argelat or argeràs". However, that name is also given to fr:Genêt épineux (the article gives the occitan form arjelàs). --Wrongfilter (talk) 05:49, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

According to French Wiktionary the plural of Occitan argelàs is argelasses. They go with the genêt épineux meaning. --Antiquary (talk) 09:34, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

This seems to be the answer, especially as épineux is described as noted for its scent, whereas the Ulexes are (in my experience) less obviously scented.

Curious that Onions chose to use a name presumably unfamiliar to most English readers, when he could have used broom with reasonable accuracy, though perhaps I underestimate the Victorians' grasp of botany and Provencal. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 12:14, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

"smells of broom, wild lavender and broom" would be rather an odd thing to say. "smells of gorse, wild lavender and broom" seems to me to be far more likely. The use and status of Provencal is alluded to in the story. Gorse blossom smells of coconut. DuncanHill (talk) 17:19, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Yes, my mistake. I meant gorse, but had become confused by all the related plants I was looking up. And I did read the story. (The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 00:29, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Ulex parviflorus created a little while ago. (Curiously, I remember the scent of gorse from Canberra)--Shirt58 (talk) 🦘 02:07, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

If anyone has a source, perhaps the local names could be added to the English language article (which only uses the Latin binomial)? Alansplodge (talk) 11:07, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

IRL

Why do people use "IRL" even when simply "RL" is more grammatically correct? 120.148.140.163 (talk) 09:30, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

"In real life" is grammatically fine. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 10:34, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

IRL is an established acronym, so a phrasing like "IRL Situation" would likely be more understod than "RL Situation". 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 11:42, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

See also RAS syndrome for a related situation. Matt Deres (talk) 16:37, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

It's established, and part of the reason it's established is its phonotactics feel natural when spoken. I think in many possible sentences "RL" is just a hair more awkward for the flow of speech. But maybe that's just because I'm less used to hearing it. Remsense诉 15:06, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Blue Skies

I have just received a couple of emails from a former MP which he signs "yours faithfully and Blue Skies". What does "Blue Skies" mean in this context? Thank you, DuncanHill (talk) 20:14, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

It originated in the world of aviation, and means best wishes, have a great day full of clear weather yada yada.

Be thankful they didn't mention green fields or low-hanging fruit. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 20:56, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

August 1

A riddle that (only?) native speakers can solve.

I'M SOMETHING. I KISS MY MOTHER BEFORE I DIE. WHAT AM I? The answer should be a MATCH STICK, but why? (I'm not a native English speaker). 2A06:C701:7452:1100:C19F:7292:E0F:18EE (talk) 11:28, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

What publication is this in? Does it just give the riddle and the answer with no word of explanation? 91.234.214.10 (talk) 11:52, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

See here, question 11#. 2A06:C701:7452:1100:C19F:7292:E0F:18EE (talk) 14:54, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

I don't think you have to be a native speaker to figure it out, but like many riddles, it's based on pretty strained, figurative reasoning. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 12:10, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

I can't see the mother here. 2A06:C701:7452:1100:C19F:7292:E0F:18EE (talk) 14:55, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Presumably the "mother" here is the matchbox. Shantavira|^{feed me} 12:16, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Got it! 91.234.214.10 (talk) 12:45, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

In what variety, is the matchbox called "mother"? Again, I'm not a native speaker. 2A06:C701:7452:1100:C19F:7292:E0F:18EE (talk) 14:49, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm not aware of any such variety. I think it's just not a very good riddle. --Trovatore (talk) 15:00, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

What surprises me, is that this riddle appears in some websites, as a question that should be answered, and all of the respondents gave the same answer. But you're right, it seems that no variety uses this term, AFAIK. HOTmag (talk) 15:08, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you Trovatore and HOTmag. 2A06:C701:7452:1100:C19F:7292:E0F:18EE (talk) 15:12, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Here's another riddle. How do you know that HOTmag and 2A06:C701 are one and the same? 91.234.214.10 (talk) 15:26, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

I have no idea who the OP is. Maybe what made you think so, is my correction of a grammatical mistake the OP has made? Anyway, if the OP was not satisfied with this correction, they could revert it, but they didn't revert when they thanked me and the other user. HOTmag (talk) 15:40, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Some of the riddles feature nonstandard English:

3. I am something everybody like me but when they see me they ran away. What  am I? And: EXCRETE

The sentence is ungrammatical, "And" is not an abbreviation for "Answer", and excrete is not a noun.  --Lambiam 15:58, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Yep. Btw you can find this riddle in many other websites, written in standard English. Like this one (the fifth riddle). HOTmag (talk) 16:15, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

It seems that "my mother" is equivalent to "the place I came from". HOTmag (talk) 15:46, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

My first question ("Am I right?") was not about "opinion", but rather about whether my calculation was correct, algebraically and arithmetically and logically. As for my last question, it seems you didn't interpret me well. For the correct interpretation, please see the second paragraph - of my previoius response you've just responded to. 2A06:C701:7463:9900:11BA:FAE2:6F7E:5413 (talk) 18:02, 18 November 2023 (UTC)

I've already approved your answer, in my previous response, so I wonder why you had to repeat the same answer. I only added that also my answer (that preceded yours) was correct. HOTmag (talk) 18:59, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Don't tell me that the above two responses are from different people. 91.234.214.10 (talk) 17:35, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, but I don't know what you're talking about. Your second quotation is mine, but I'm not familiar with your first quotation. Anyway, how is all of that related to the topic? If you have any further personal comments, you should only ask me about them on my talk page, not here. HOTmag (talk) 18:15, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

August 4

Could tantrum be related to tantra, or do they only happen to be similar?

Whenever I see the word tantra, it always reminds me of the word tantrum, as in having a temper tantrum. According to Wiktionary, the Sanskrit word is descended from the Proto-Indo-European root *ten-, which means to stretch or extend, while the English word used to be spelt tantrem or tanterum. Latin has a similar word; tantum, which means "so much, to such a degree", "as much of this as that", or "merely".

Fiddling with the search bar also led me to become aware of the word tantara, which is a shortened version of a word that represents the sound of a trumpet or horn. Taking that into consideration, it could be that the act of making a loud, rambunctious display of oneself may have once been referred to as "blowing a tarantara" (sounding a trumpet) and that—down the line—the voiced bilabial plosive (/b/) may have been erroneously picked up as a voiceless dental fricative (/θ/) and tantara may have occasionally been mixed up with trump, which could explain the -um at the end of tant(e)rum. In a nutshell:

• blow a tarantara → blow a tantara → throw a tanterum → throw a tantrum

Alternatively, it also seems possible that tantrem could've been the result of tantara being mixed up with a word like tremble or tremolo, both of which are descended from the Latin word tremulāre, meaning to shake, quiver, or tremble. This would make sense to me, as temper tantrums often involve someone being loud and rambunctious (and making repetitive movements) in a manner that may cause some of the people around them to quiver out of concern for that person's sanity.

trump

tantara

trem

tanterum

tantrem

tantrum

With all of this unsubstantiated personal speculation in mind, I assume that tantrum may not be related to tantra after all, though both words may refer to different types of activities. – MrPersonHumanGuy (talk) 14:12, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

EO says "tantrum" is of unknown origin.[22] ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:32, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

You might wish to read Folk etymology. In short, tracing the true origins of words requires a detailed study of multi-language evolution based on written records and sophisticated philological deductions, rather than superficial similarities. The forms of words are extremely mutable over centuries, as are, independently, the meanings of those words, which can change drastically and even reverse. Your conjectures could be true, but without evidence so could many contradictory others. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.1.211.211 (talk) 21:35, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

And you might wish to read argument from authority. This is cry of someone unfamiliar enough with knowledge methods they think discovery is mountaintop magic, inaccessable to anyone below the peak. Who are these philologists with an understanding that encompasses all languages, putting scholars who claim "multidisciplinary" to shame? Where are the philologists? That's a dusty word. You should read the works of those experts, you'll find them blindered, siloed, overreaching. It's better to lose faith in every thinker, and evaluate each paper and hypothesis as if anonymous. Most papers have two mistakes and an insight. And if there is an insight, you'll be lucky if anyone notices: look at this pdf. http://www.tufs.ac.jp/ts/personal/ratcliffe/comp%20&%20method-Ratcliffe.pdf Ratcliffe uses a messy method and equivocates because he can't tell that other book lacks Chris Ehret's central insights. It's a clear example of a good book and a not good book. And they can't tell.

Temerarius (talk) 17:16, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

"The pluralisations of certain foreign nouns adopted by English have proven to be conundra, and their misuse often drives linguists to tantra." (Jack of Oz, 19 December 2007) -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 23:17, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

These aberrant pluralisations mark their users as ignorami.  --Lambiam 11:42, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Sweet irony. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 11:49, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Early uses appear to be in the plural, as the tantrums or the tanterums.^{[23][24][25][26]} As a state of high agitation, it is an antonym of the doldrums, a state of apathy.  --Lambiam 00:45, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

August 5

Latin inscription

Could I have a translation for this inscription please:

QUISQUIS ADES QUI MORTE CADES, STA, PERLEGE, PLORA. SUM QUOD ERIS, FUERAM QUOD ES. PRO ME PREDOR, ORA.

Machine translations are a bit garbled. It's from a 14th century coffin lid in St Mary's Church, Sturminster Marshall in Dorset. Alansplodge (talk) 13:16, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

The second sentence at least is a rather well known epitaph from some tombs of roman military, followed by a plea to pray for the deceased :"I once was what you are, you will be what I am." As for the first sentence: I don't what know to make of Cades, but the last 3 words would be: pause (here), (and) by law, lament (my passing). But it#s not really easy to translate. Lectonar (talk) 14:22, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Wouldn't "perlege" be "read", and "cades" the future tense of cado 'fall'? I'd go for:

Bystander, whoever you are, who will fall to death: pause, read, and weep. I am what you will be; I used to be what you are now; please pray for me. (I'm assuming that predor is a typo for precor, right?) Fut.Perf. ☼ 14:35, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Literally, "Anyone, you who are present, who will fall to death, stand, read through, weep. I am what you will be, I had been what you are. Pray for me, I pray." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.234.214.10 (talk) 18:06, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

It should indeed be precor; moreover, fueram should be fueramque – "I am what you will be and had been what you are".^[27] The inscription has no phrasal punctuation. If a comma is inserted after the interjection precor, there should also be one before it: Pro me, precor, ora.  --Lambiam 00:11, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you all most kindly. Alansplodge (talk) 08:54, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Resolved

BOTs in singular

Is it correct to say that the Falkland Islands are a "British Overseas Territory", in singular? Or should I always say "British Overseas Territories", in plural? Cambalachero (talk) 19:37, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

They are a British Overseas Territory. DuncanHill (talk) 20:06, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I'd even accept "The Falkland Islands is a British Overseas Territory". -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 21:44, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

So do the Beeb^[28] and His Majesty's Government.^[29]  --Lambiam 23:46, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

August 6

What is a cat??

When we first learn the meaning of the word cat, we learn a small, domestic animal that purrs, drinks milk, and chases mice. But as we get older, we learn that cat means large, wild animal like a lion or tiger. It's a surprise that these 2 definitions of the word co-exist without confusion. Georgia guy (talk) 00:01, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

People who saw a tiger prowling around and warned "there is a cat" failed to alarm others and got eaten by the cat. As the result of an evolutionary process, people now avoid uses that can cause such confusion.  --Lambiam 00:20, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

All languages offer the possibility of ambiguity:

“It's unpleasantly like being drunk."

"What's so unpleasant about being drunk?"

"You ask a glass of water.”

Douglas Adams The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

Successful communication generally involves recognising the potential for misunderstanding, and avoiding it when it matters. If a large and dangerous stripy felid is lurking around, call it a tiger... AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:49, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Anyway, "cat" in its less-specific meaning can refer to any of the Felidae, large or small. It's "big cat" which means "large, wild animal like a lion or tiger". AnonMoos (talk) 02:21, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Our Kitty Fisher and Pussy Simpkins were big cats, from Bristol. They used to beat up the little Cornish cats when we moved there. DuncanHill (talk) 11:11, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I'd say it really only has that meaning in certain specific contexts (e.g. in scientific or ecological discussions). In ordinary conversation, without qualification, it'd invariably be interpreted as referring to the domestic cat. If I told someone "I saw a cat yesterday" and it turned out that I'd seen a tiger in a zoo, they'd think I was being deliberately obtuse. Proteus (Talk) 11:55, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Is this accepted grammar?

I just heard an American on radio tell me that "The first Star Wars films were based off of early science fiction stories". I've heard similar usage from other Americans. I'm Australian. My English teachers would have put big red marks through that, and told me to write "based on". I can accept that language varies around the world, but wondered if this really is standard usage in the US. (And Canada?) HiLo48 (talk) 03:21, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

As a Canadian, I can say it sounds fine to me. Merriam Webster says "since this form is newer, it may seem less formal and less correct to some readers." Clarityfiend (talk) 03:38, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

At one point, somebody did a mass edit changing occurrences of "based off" to "based on" ... but they didn't take into account the idiom "based off of", so following the edit, there were a bunch of occurrences of "based on of". As a North American, I will concur that "based off" and "based off of" both sound quite normal ... but Google Books Ngram Viewer seems to deny the existence of "based off" or "based off of". Other sources, such as "archive.org", "scholar.google.com", and "Chronicling America" admit at most to "based off" (or "based off of") representing a small fraction of the number of occurrences of "based on". Wiktionary admits to this as "U.S." phrasing, but flags it (at least in some cases) as "informal". Fabrickator (talk) 05:08, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

It sounds slangy. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:53, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

It's English as She Is Spoke, eh. Clarityfiend (talk) 07:10, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

A well known British phrase is "That bloke off the telly". Alansplodge (talk) 08:58, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

It's certainly in common usage on this project. I know I've heard this in NA English, but I don't think I've seen it in writing with much frequency. I wouldn't mark it incorrect on a paper I was grading. Folly Mox (talk) 09:21, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I work in an Australian high school. Must ask an English teacher their views. HiLo48 (talk) 10:20, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

This song debuted in 1967. The title was later changed, but the lyrics continued as before. [30] 91.234.214.10 (talk) 10:28, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

It sounds American, and probably informal American, to my British ears. DuncanHill (talk) 11:09, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

It is one thing to use off of and another to use it specifically as the complement of a phrasal verb based on base, which Wiktionary labels as American English. The strange thing is that this ignores the metaphor of using something as a base, a foundation you can build on. At least to me, this is still a live metaphor, and so is something is said to be "based off of" something, its sounds to me as if it is off base. Would you want to live in a house that was built off of its foundation?  --Lambiam 12:15, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, that's part of my concern with the term. It not logical to say based off of. I know we can't demand that language be logical, but based on is more sensible, and more efficient. How did "off of" ever become part of American English anyway? HiLo48 (talk) 23:35, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

That last is a different meaning of based. Clarityfiend (talk) 12:36, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

"To base X on Y" means "to use Y as a base for X". One use of the phrasal verb is literal and the other is metaphorical, so indeed one expects these uses to have different meanings: a literal one and a figurative one.  --Lambiam 22:15, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) In this song (which mentions the Union Jack) once again the title betrays the lyrics [31]. 91.234.214.10 (talk) 12:40, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

"Based off of X" is pretty standard in Canada now. "Based off X" is not common and would sound odd to me. "Based on X" is still common, particularly in commercial use, such as "Based on the book by..." Matt Deres (talk) 18:29, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

What's the point of the "of" in "Based off of X". A bit like "Um"? HiLo48 (talk) 23:37, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Based off of... is a bit redundant, but I wouldn't say grammatically incorrect, just less common than based on. Personally if I ever use it, I just say "based on X", but they appear to be somewhat interchangeable. I've seen some theories that "based on" and "based off [of]" suggest different degrees of rigidity to the source of whatever was used; "based on" is more true to the original, while "based off [of]" implies a story or work was sort of a starting point for further research into a subject, but this is mostly just conjecture. Can't find anything supporting it etymologically. SmittenGalaxy | talk! 02:48, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Yesterday, after having participated in this thread, I heard an NA English speaker on the internet say the phrase "learn off of" in place of the more common "learn from". So it seems the "... off of" construction may have additional flexibility, at least in the Southeastern US topolect the speaker was using. Folly Mox (talk) 08:04, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

August 8

Two forms of Arabic location

As of my current spot in the Duolingo Arabic course, there are two ways of noting that an indefinite object exists at a certain location. The first one I encountered was “hunak [thing] [location]”. For example, “There is a book in the building” would be “hunak kitab fil binayah/هناك كتاب في البنية”. The other, that I encountered more recently, is just “[location] [thing]”, rendering the same phrase as “fil binayah kitab/في البنية كتاب”. Is there any significant semantic difference between these two, or situations that would favor using one over the other? Primal Groudon (talk) 15:38, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

July 25

It Happened Like This

Has the 1962-1963 tv series titled It Happened Like This survived or is it now lost. Matthew John Drummond (talk) 02:59, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

TV Brain indicates it is lost https://www.tvbrain.info/tv-archive?showname=It+happened+like+this&type=lostshow TrogWoolley (talk) 05:09, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

The Renegade

Has the 1961 tv play titled The Renegade survived or is it now lost. Matthew John Drummond (talk) 03:06, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

TV Brain indicates it is lost https://www.tvbrain.info/tv-archive?showname=The+renegade&type=lostshow TrogWoolley (talk) 05:14, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Crying Down the Lane

Has the 1962 tv Mini series titled Crying Down the Lane survived or is it now lost. Matthew John Drummond (talk) 10:19, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Have you checked in that TVBrain website that's been pointed out to you? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:02, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Not everything on there is true because bfi collections have that episodes from some tv shows are available to watch on the bfi collections but on tv brain some episodes of some shows say that there lost when they actually aren’t for example the 1965-1966 tv show titled Blackmail shows the episode titled The Set Up is missing when on bfi it shows that it may exist in the bfi archive there’s also some other episodes from the tv show Blackmail that say there lost on tv brain when there actually available to watch at the bfi archive. Matthew John Drummond (talk) 16:02, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

It sounds like you've got a better handle on this than anyone else here. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:00, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

According to this article, the BBC usually reused video tape as it cost £120 pounds per hour (about £2,750 today). So if it's not showing up on Google searches (I couldn't find anything either), then it's probably lost. Alansplodge (talk) 12:02, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

If you can't find anything about Crying Down the Lane for 1962 can you find out if this also applies to the 1973 tv series For the Sake of Appearance. Matthew John Drummond (talk) 19:12, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

July 26

Honor of Kings copyright issue

Tencent owns 100% of Riot. Even if Honor of Kings is a blatant ripoff of League of Legends, Riot has no right to sue Tencent. I don't understand why Tencent was afraid of Riot? They later changed their game to Arena of Valor to release in the West due to Riot's copyright complaint. 68.187.65.220 (talk) 23:27, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2022 November 20 § Arena of Valor.  --Lambiam 02:42, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

July 27

Victor and Hugo: Bunglers in Crime

Which episodes of the 1991-1992 tv show Victor and Hugo: Bunglers in Crime where released on audio cassettes tapes. Matthew John Drummond (talk) 01:26, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

July 29

Eisenhower's farewell address

Why was Eisenhower's farewell address taken in very low quality black and white video? He was the first U.S. president on color TV on May 22, 1958! -- Toytoy (talk) 06:06, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

You say "very low quality" black and white, but it was probably the standard quality at the time; color (see Professional video camera) was at that date still new, and (I'm fairly sure) significantly poorer in general definition than B&W. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.67.235 (talk) 14:25, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Everyday Readers

Is there anywhere I can watch the 1998 film Everyday Readers starring Peter Sallis. The only website that I've found out about this movie is on the BFI. 2A00:23C8:9DEE:900:FD51:C289:48F0:AA3 (talk) 09:40, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

The Brazilian soccer player Sócrates had a medical degree

The Brazilian soccer player Sócrates had a medical degree. His article mentions that and gives a source. But he's not in the List of athletes with advanced degrees. Just letting you know. I'd add him myself but I'm not sure how to add the source of the first article to the second article. 178.51.2.117 (talk) 18:18, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

The article says he has a bachelor's degree, which is not an advanced degree according to the definition on that list page ("PhDs and other degrees at that academic level"). So maybe that's why. Although saying that, the definition of what level a medical degree is seems complicated according to Doctor of Medicine. --Viennese Waltz 20:05, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Baseball: error in a perfect game

Error (baseball) presents an unusual situation:

If a batted ball were hit on the fly into foul territory, with the batting team having no runners on base, and a fielder misplayed such ball for an error, it is possible for a team on the winning side of a perfect game to commit at least one error, yet still qualify as a perfect game.

Whether at the major league level or elsewhere, is there any record of a perfect game in which the winning team committed such an error? Nyttend (talk) 23:14, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

For MLB, there are not very many perfect games. You can check the box scores yourself if any had an error: List_of_Major_League_Baseball_perfect_games RudolfRed (talk) 05:11, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Not a no-hitter, but in Game 7 of the 1924 World Series, Giants catcher Hank Gowdy dropped a foul pop which extended the at-bat of Senators player Muddy Ruel, who then got on base and eventually scored the winning run.[32] The point being that if a foul-pop error happened in a perfect game, it would probably be noted in the play-by-play. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:22, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

July 30

Kobolds and Copyright Laws

Dear All A friend of mine is working on his own game which features kobolds (small lizard-creatures who worship dragons, like the ones from "Dungeons & Dragons"). I know that kobolds are originally from European folklore. I did some researcha and I've found the story "Der Kobold", from "Die deutschen Volkssagen" by Friedrich Ranke, published in Munich in 1924, which states that small, dragon-like kobolds did exist in early medieval folklore. So my question is this: are the lizard-like kobolds copyright protected or can they be freely used since they are a part of old European folklore? Thank you very much for your replies! 85.4.154.199 (talk) 22:14, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

This depends, at least partially, on the country where your friend is located. Your IP address geolocates to Switzerland; is that where your friend is located? Generally, concepts centuries old are not protected by copyright, but some countries have special legal protection for what they consider cultural heritage. You or your friend should talk with a copyright lawyer. Nyttend (talk) 22:54, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

You are correct, I'm from Switzerland! My friend is also from Switzerland, but he currently lives in the USA (he's a student at a university in Boston, Massachusetts).--85.4.154.199 (talk) 22:59, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

The general idea of small mischievous reptilian creatures cannot be copyrighted, but any specific artistic form in a published work is in principle protected by copyright. Compare talking dogs: you can publish a comic strip about a talking dog just fine, but if your dog looks much like Goofy, you can expect problems.  --Lambiam 23:30, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Friedrich Ranke died in 1950, so copyright on his work has expired. The copyright term in Germany is life of the author plus 70 years. You're free to borrow from him whatever you like. I think copyright on Goofy hasn't expired yet in the US, but is expected to do so at the end of 2027 (publication+95 years). You can begin writing stories featuring him for publication in four years, at the risk of the US increasing copyright term again. PiusImpavidus (talk) 08:37, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Kobolds are a) medieval and b) generic figures of folklore and low mythology. They turn up in multiple guises in contemporary tales (Roald Dahl, Harry Potter, the popular German Pumukl series on TV). It can even be argued that Oskar Mazerath, the ignoble protagonist of Günter Grass´s The Tin Drum, is a kobold of sorts. As such, I see kobolds as literary archetypes in a narration which stand outside any concerns for copyright.

It may as well be argued that Goethe pinched the character of his Faustian protagonist from Marlowe and the historical Germanic sources referring to Georg Faustus (*1480 - †1540). Which, of course, he did without being sued and imprisoned. --2001:871:6A:1B71:18E4:6082:4639:4A95 (talk) 16:27, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Nothing to do with Tolly Cobbold, then: but beware drunken dragons anyway. MinorProphet (talk) 13:18, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Harry Potter? I don't remember them anywhere in the series (I can't remember ever hearing the word before seeing this thread), and https://harrypotter.fandom.com/wiki/Kobold returns their equivalent of MediaWiki:Notitletext. Nyttend (talk) 05:35, 3 August 2024 (UTC)=

Then add this to your mental list of trivia: "The name of the element cobalt comes from the creature's name [kobold], because medieval miners blamed the sprite for the poisonous and troublesome nature of the typical arsenical ores of this metal (cobaltite and smaltite) which polluted other mined elements." You're welcome. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 23:01, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

August 1

Victor and Hugo: Bunglers in Crime audio cassettes

How many audio cassettes where there from the 1991-1992 cartoon show titled Victor and Hugo: Bunglers in Crime and what where the names of each audio cassette. I should also mention that the name of the each audio cassette was included in a book with of the same name as the audio cassette. These cassettes featured Jimmy Hibbert as Victor and Peter Sallis as Hugo. Matthew John Drummond (talk) 09:47, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

August 2

Where's this music from?

This YT-vid at 3:14 uses a sound clip that sounds very familiar to me. I think it's from a famous classic TV series, but I don't get which one. Can someone help me recognizing it? Thank you! --Musicquestion900 (talk) 00:30, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Law & Order (franchise). Modocc (talk) 00:56, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

Definitely. And it looks like a funny video. I'll have to watch it. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:18, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

@Modocc: Yes, thank you! Funny how I never even watched that show, but that sound still got hooked in my brain.

@Baseball bugs: Yeah, he's more than good, he's gooden. --Musicquestion900 (talk) 11:21, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

August 4

A Ghost Story

Does the film center around her husband who, is unexpectedly killed in a car crash and later returns home from the morgue 👻 draped in a white sheet with round eye holes slowly walking around a young, devastated widow at home now embroiled with her leaving a small note inside a small wooden crack and her husband-the-ghost silently talking to another 👻 looking out a window next door, makes way for a reminiscent, ghostly union with the two sheets eventually lying flat on the floor? Afrazer123 (talk) 01:21, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I don't understand what you are asking, but you can read about the movie plot at Ghost_(1990_film) RudolfRed (talk) 02:13, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I think the OP is asking about A Ghost Story, which they could read and see if it answers their question(s). ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:00, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I opine that it's like knowing where's the good vibrations, sweet sensations? Was it before she found him dead in his car? Was it there on the fiery wall at the hospital? Was it the day his ghost opened the front door? Was it the gleaning companionship between two ghosts? In my opinion, these type of questions may stem from a threshold, a train of thought between life and perhaps death as portrayed in Hollywood. Afrazer123 (talk) 04:43, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

You're welcome to your opinions, but this is not a place to discussion opinions. The film is fiction, so if the answer is not in the film there is no answer. Shantavira|^{feed me} 08:37, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

But what is the question? As the plot is described in A Ghost Story § Plot, the deceased husband, C, is the protagonist, and there is no "ghostly union".  --Lambiam 07:50, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Everyday Readers

Where can I watch the 1998 film titled Everyday Readers Starring Peter Sallis. Matthew John Drummond (talk) 16:35, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Is that a documentary? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:11, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Appears to be, though the reference in Sallis's article needs refinement. Currently reference [9] covers about 130(!) separate citations, linked to an overall search for Peter Sallis on the BFI website; the actual film entry requires a further search there, that yields this. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.1.211.211 (talk) 08:19, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

How can we find more further information about the film Matthew John Drummond (talk) 17:48, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

August 5

Victor and Hugo: Bunglers in Crime (2)

How many audio cassette books where there for the 1991-1992 tv series Victor and Hugo: Bunglers in Crime and what are the names for all the audio cassette books. Matthew John Drummond (talk) 21:29, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Matthew John Drummond, if anyone here knew the answer, or knew how to find the answer, they would already have answered your previous near-identical queries on 27 July and 1 August. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.1.211.211 (talk) 08:34, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

August 8

27 Club - identification of a person wanted

This image, taken from this article (and also used in others), shows nine members of the 27 Club. But it is not mentioned and not clear who is the guy on the very right. Anybody know him, please? --KnightMove (talk) 14:02, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

The 27 Club article has quite a few names listed. Have you looked for pictures of each "member"? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:36, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

I quickly skimmed the list and the only one who looks remotely like the guy in the photo is Jonathan Brandis, although I'm not convinced it's him. It's strange, though – the photo doesn't come up in a reverse image search, which I would have expected it to do if the guy was famous. --Viennese Waltz 15:17, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

July 25

Are Personal communications service (NANP) mobile numbers?

Personal communications service mentions that:

A personal communications service (PCS) is set of communications capabilities that provide a combination of terminal mobility, personal mobility, and service profile management.

Does it means that Personal communications service (NANP) are mobile numbers because of providing mobility? I cannot find the mention of ‘mobile numbers’ in NANP or List of North American Numbering Plan area codes. 49.182.135.140 (talk) 01:24, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Most mobile numbers on the NANP, in the sense of telephone numbers assigned to mobile cellular devices, do not have a geography-based area code; although the first three digits of such numbers are commonly referred to as their "area code", this is a bit of a misnomer then. In the USA these mobile numbers have a 5XX "area code". However, according to North American Numbering Plan § Non-geographic services, the converse is not always true: personal communications service 5XX numbers can also be for fixed devices (not using a cellular network).  --Lambiam 11:59, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Punjabi and Bengali instruction language university

Which universities in Punjab, India and Pakistan are known to give instructions or lectures in Punjabi and which universities in West Bengal are known to give instructions in Bengali? I was under the impression that all universities in Punjab, India; Punjab, Pakistan and West Bengal in India give only in Hindi and English. Please do enlighten. Donmust90 Donmust90 (talk) 16:46, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

July 26

Name for type of interchange

At coordinates 34.79749785424678, -82.37485296822788, there is an interchange. On both sides of the highway, there is a short side roadway that has multiple on and offramps. I've been looking at interchange designs, but I can't find an example of this "multi-interchange" with a proper name. I would like a reference that includes this interchange design. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 16:04, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

That looks like a collector-distributor interchange. —C.Fred (talk) 16:06, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. That looks correct. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 16:32, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

July 27

Extraterrestrial orbiters update?

What's the latest data telling us about Jupiter from Juno and about Venus from Akatsuki? Have we learned anything new and interesting lately? Viriditas (talk) 01:05, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

Juno news is still being updated here. Akatsuki news hasn't had updates, but the old articles are still getting minor updates here. 75.136.148.8 (talk) 11:29, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, that is very helpful. I will give both of those a look later tonight. Viriditas (talk) 22:48, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Resolved

Boom box batteries

In Do the Right Thing, one of the characters needs 20 D batteries for his boombox. What sort of boombox would require 20 D batteries, or was that simply a fictional exaggeration? How many and what kind of batteries would one expect to use for a boombox of the size shown in the movie? 2601:18A:C500:E830:526A:B17D:E5EF:4ACD (talk) 04:25, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

[33] Modocc (talk) 05:27, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

So, 10 D batteries then. 2601:18A:C500:E830:526A:B17D:E5EF:4ACD (talk) 05:41, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

My understanding is you would need 20 at a time because the 10 wouldn't last long enough. Viriditas (talk) 08:52, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

You've got to fight the power consumption. Clarityfiend (talk) 11:06, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

July 28

Multiplication memorization

I remember back in elementary school, one of my classmates said he memorized multiplication tables by assigning a gender and color to each equation. For example, he would say eight times nine was male and purple and five times eight was female and brown. Is there a name for this phenomenon, and does this actually work? TWOrantula^TM (enter the web) 02:49, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Grapheme–color synesthesia.-Gadfium (talk) 04:38, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

Synesthesia is likely a natural in-born perception while the OP's classmate voluntarily cultivates an unusual (two-dimensional) form of Mnemonic. These can aid memory because we more easily remember spatial, personal, surprising, physical, sexual, humorous and otherwise "relatable" information than more abstract or impersonal forms of information. Philvoids (talk) 13:46, 28 July 2024 (UTC)

This system is used as a mnemonic in the Byzantine calendar, which is used to calculate the date of Easter, and also the lunar date of each day. The Martyrology and the lunar date of "the morrow" are read out in religious houses at Lauds. In this calendar, odd-numbered months have 29 days and are named after female saints; even-numbered months have 30 days and are named after male saints. Seven times in 19 years the last month is duplicated, to allow for the fact that lunar months are shorter than solar ones. In the last year of the 19-year cycle, the tenth month, Richard, is emasculated (having only 29 days) so that the next cycle will begin on the same civil date as the previous one did. The technical name for this operation is saltus lunae. When the system was first introduced in Alexandria in AD 284 the sixth epagemonal day had the same lunar date as the day before; likewise 28 February 2028 will be 3 Ronan bis, followed by 3 Ronan corresponding to 29 February and 4 Ronan corresponding to 1 March. If the leap day is inserted in its original position between 23 February (a.d. vii kal. mart.) and 24 February (a.d. vi kal. mart.) the sequence is adjusted accordingly. The system is a great improvement on the previous, which involved grappling with epacts. See Special:Permalink/1188536894#The Reichenau Primer (opposite Pangur Bán). Today (Thursday) is the second day of the seventh month. Watch out for the new moon in the west after sunset. 2.102.9.180 (talk) 15:00, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Easter falls in the third month, Miri. Next year, 2025, with golden number 12, Miri begins on 31 March, and with Sunday letter E Easter is on the 21st (20 April). 2.102.9.180 (talk) 15:03, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

July 30

National Identity perceived

Hello. Small curiosity; I don't know if a census was taken at the time or something, but when England won the World Cup in 1966, what was the perceived national identity in the country that year, (England alone); did people describe themselves as more English or more British? Thank you very much. 2.45.43.119 (talk) 12:51, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

Identifying as English or British is not exclusive of one another. A person can authentically identify as both. It is based on need. Your IP looks up to the United States, so in a American sense, a person can identify as Cajun, Louisianian, and American all at the same time, with none of those identities taking away from another identity or being more of an identity than any other identity. It is based on need. If asked for identity while in New Orleans, the person would likely claim to be Cajun. If asked for an identity at the Delta hub in Atlanta, the person might identify as Louisianian. If asked for identity at the Olymics in France, the person might identify as American. Similarly, a person might identify as English while in Britain, but as British while outside Britain, and even go further to identify as a Londoner if in Manchester. 12.116.29.106 (talk) 17:16, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

The English/British nationality issue is complex and evolving, but my impression (I was 8 in 1966) was that English and British were used interchangeably by English people in the 1960s. Note that there was no question about ethnicity in the UK census until the 1991 United Kingdom census and then "White British" was the only option for "indigenous" people (for want of a better term).

For the current situation, see National identity, England and Wales: Census 2021 Alansplodge (talk) 18:16, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

@Alansplodge: I'm only a couple of years older than you, but certainly we were taught the difference between British and English. Possibly a north/south or London/rest of the UK issue? We lived in Yorkshire and I'm of mixed Yorkshire/Scottish parentage.

One can have been taught the distinction and yet use the terms interchangeably in informal speech.  --Lambiam 08:35, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

It is important to note (as no article should ever say) that the modern precise use of these words was elided in the past by metonymy and other close concepts. The precise concept would have been considered clear by context. You will find in some older texts free use of England for Britain (perhaps also the English identity was smudged into British more than others), and Britain (or even England) for the British Empire or Commonwealth.

Nonetheless by the sixties this usage was obsolete as far as I know. I certainly knew growing up in this era that I was English and British (and European), though it was primarily a factual matter. When we visited our Swiss friends to watch Jeux son frontier we cheered the British and Swiss teams equally. In the event that a non-English British team won something we thought this was a good thing.

I'm inclined to believe that most of the English have no trouble identifying as British, even after an English sporting success.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough 13:58, 1 August 2024 (UTC).

Although a Londoner, my parents were Scottish and Cornish, so I was well aware of the difference between English and British, but my impression was/is that not everyone was so particular in the 1960s. Witness the number of Union Jacks at Wembley. By way of a reference, I found:

In the 1970s and 1980s, it became clear that Britain is a multi-national state... England is the dominant region by far; therefore, the English saw little distinction between "English" and "British".

A History of the Peoples of the British Isles: From 1870 to the Present by Thomas Heyck (2019) p. 285

Alansplodge (talk) 19:24, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

August 1

Has time been going faster?

I'm still trying to comprehend how we're almost two-thirds done with the year. It's weird how I can remember my family and I celebrating New Year's back in the beginning of the year. Then I wondered, "Has time sped up since the pandemic?" TWOrantula^TM (enter the web) 20:28, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Once you're over the hill, time speeds up because you're headed downhill. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:42, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

See Time perception. It speeds up with age. Modocc (talk) 21:59, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

While it's considered true that younger people perceive time as running slower and older people as faster, there are other factors that can occur that can make each perceive time differently regardless of age. One of the most common is the perception that time goes faster when you are engaged or busy, and that time slows down when you are unoccupied ("footloose and fancy-free"). All of this dovetails into what is known as the flow state. Recently, neurosurgeon Theodore H. Schwartz had a conversation with Terry Gross about his new book Gray Matters: A Biography of Brain Surgery. During this conversation (and this presumably is also discussed in the book) he talks about how a neurosurgeon conditions themselves to work during long, demanding surgeries that could take anywhere from 3-7 hours, and what a neurosurgeon has to do to maintain that kind of stamina and do their job. One of the things he talks about is getting into the flow state and being able to control their body. I'm bringing up this current example because the connection between flow states and time perception also plays a role that is less discussed. For example, we know that children are able to access flow states easier than adults. This might also go some way towards providing an explanation for age-related time perception. More interestingly, I think there's also sober, altered states of consciousness that lend additional insight, and there's some evidence that people can tap into this kind of state to slow their perception of time down. For example, people in emergency situations, people who meditate, people who play sports, can also see things happen in apparent slower motion. Traffic accident survivors, for example, will often report time slowing down when they experience or recall the accident. As for drugs, there's anecdotal evidence that throughout history, musicians, writers, and artists have used cannabis to slow down their perception of time. All that aside, in terms of objective measures of time, our article on Earth's rotation indicates that indeed, "time" is going faster. In 2022, "Earth's spin was completed in 1.59 milliseconds under 24 hours, setting a new record. Because of that trend, engineers worldwide are discussing a 'negative leap second' and other possible timekeeping measures." Viriditas (talk) 23:12, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

August 2

Weather website

Is there any European weather website similar to AccuWeather, The Weather Channel and Wunderground that eiuld offer forecasts, national and global weather news and other such things? Are there any English-language sites that are such? --40bus (talk) 16:46, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

European countries each have their own weather bureaus, but they generally share their data with the sites you already mentioned and more. If you go to the Nordic Weather Service (Yr.no) for example, you'll see forecasts for the whole world. My favourite on mobile is Yr and the UK Met Office, on desktop the BBC. I am in the UK, and in terms of weather warnings and video forecasts specifically, they (except for Yr) cater specifically for UK audiences. For foreign forecasts, Wunderground on desktop is perfectly fine but their app has a bit of 'nonsense'. Komonzia (talk) 00:02, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

August 3

Simone Biles and marker pen

Biles and marker pen

Why did Simone Biles hold a marker pen with five (or four) fingers rather than two, as did other women in the picture and most other people while writing or drawing? 212.180.235.46 (talk) 19:00, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Some people hold a pen in different ways. --Viennese Waltz 19:01, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Look up "types of pencil grips" on Google Images and you'll see a variety. Also look up videos of her signing autographs. It might be that this is how she's most comfortable signing autographs dozens of times a day. Komonzia (talk) 23:51, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

If you hold a pen with less than four fingers, you get a 0.1 deduction. Them's the rules of gymnastic penmanship! Clarityfiend (talk) 09:47, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Rather reminiscent of the grip used by Japanese calligraphers. In my 1960s childhood in England, we were taught the "correct" way to hold a pen at school; it seems that the education system is less prescriptive in these enlightened times, but the result is that younger folks sometimes hold their writing implements in ways that seem rather awkward to me. Alansplodge (talk) 14:50, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

August 5

Tesla Cybertruck - What conventional English grammar/spelling template should be used?

Should the article be in American English? I feel like that's correct since Tesla's HQ is in California. I would like to add that to the talk page, but I need a consensus vote to apply the change. Article: Tesla Cybertruck. Ṫḧïṡ ṁëṡṡäġë ḧäṡ ḅëëṅ ḅṛöüġḧẗ ẗö ÿöü ḅÿ ᗰOᗪ ᑕᖇEᗩTOᖇ 🏡 🗨 📝 19:32, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

What is it currently? Is it all British, or is it a mix? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:56, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I do not know. I have a feeling it's all AmE (American English), but I could be wrong. Just making sure it's all according to conventions. ѕιη¢єяєℓу ƒяσм, ᗰOᗪ ᑕᖇEᗩTOᖇ 🏡 🗨 📝 23:56, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I may be wrong, but I think the usual practice here is to leave an article alone if its use of either British or American English is consistent within the article. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 02:45, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're concerned about. After reading/skimming the article, I found only one Britishism: "Tesla stated that they use". Everything else would pass US Grammar Police inspection, as far as I can see, and it is available only in North America, so American English seems the logical choice. Clarityfiend (talk) 03:55, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

You can find this use also by (presumably) US speakers, like on Daily Kos, "Tesla put in a 6.5 foot long bed with a lockable and retractable cover which they claim is strong enough to stand on. ... Tesla has said that they'll have a battery-day for investors in the spring, ...".^[34] To become a true Britishism, we'd need to see a plural verb form, as in, "Tesla have stated that ...".  --Lambiam 11:19, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, American usage is a little complex. In more "static" things or when the action is more attributable to the company as a whole, a singular verb form is used. But when the construction is more active or would be more easily understood as the actions of multiple people, a plural verb is used. --User:Khajidha (talk) (contributions) 11:40, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I feel it has more to do with what is meant by a word like "Tesla." Is it "(The people who work at) Tesla say that they..." or is it "(The company that is named) Tesla has shown it will..." 12.116.29.106 (talk) 15:15, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

August 6

Weird social phenomenon

Why does a room full of people suddenly go silent at random points in time? TWOrantula^TM (enter the web) 03:57, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Who says so? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:50, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Check it out.. manya (talk) 06:15, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Statistics? Conversations don't go non-stop, and the pauses may just line up at the same time. Clarityfiend (talk) 07:13, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

An angel has passed. --Error (talk) 16:26, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

River (typography). 91.234.214.10 (talk) 17:51, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

User:TrademarkedTWOrantula, you are mixing up multiple phenomenons and confusing it as a single experience. Please see salience, selective auditory attention, sensory memory, crowd psychology, and collective animal behavior. Like you, I have also witnessed the silence of crowds, but there are many different factors and reasons for this, some of which may be random, some of which may not. I would invite you to study this yourself up close and personal in a busy bar, restaurant, or club where the opportunity will present itself. For the most part, there are good explanations for the silences, which often involve a trigger or stimulus that the rest of the crowd will respond to with silence. There's also elements of spontaneous order and self-organization at work. What I've found is that people will often respond to or mimic what others are doing, probably without even thinking about it. This explains how a loud crowd in a restaurant or bar will suddenly go silent for no apparent reason. Viriditas (talk) 23:26, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I recall that forty years ago, people were commenting on this phenomenon, and claiming that it always occurred at 20 minutes past or to the hour (but not on the hour).^{, but none given.} Personally, I think it's fractal. See also Apophenia. -- Verbarson  ^talk_edits 22:05, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

The link provided by manya points to something called the protection postulate, which I vaguely remember hearing about. It is described as a period of time when "humans lapse into silence so that they can listen for danger in the manner of their prehistoric ancestors". Do we have an article on this or should I create one? Viriditas (talk) 22:08, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

filming location

Here is a screenshot from the movie The Verdict with Paul Newman and I would like to know where this location can be found. https://s20.directupload.net/images/240806/hvvl8par.png Many locations in Boston and New York (Brooklyn Heights) have been identified, this one not. I think there's a church in the background. Thank you! --Chris06 (talk) 10:23, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Compile a list of sources

Moved from Wikipedia talk:AutoEd § Compile a list of sources

 – Aaron Liu (talk) 18:37, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Category of which I have been trying to get your attention or order for me to be able to get a free license

screensaver and competition enforcement services for business owners with a variety range from a broad country's financial environment Bookkeeping@Damiyo 41.121.25.255 (talk) 17:38, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I have read this four times I and have no idea or understanding of what you are asking for. ColinFine (talk) 22:17, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Can I move this thread a second time? I don't think this is the proper venue for unintelligible word salad. Folly Mox (talk) 22:25, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

While we have no clue what the user who posted this is seeking, they will have no clue what happened to their question and won't see a reply posted here anyway.  --Lambiam 09:47, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

A report is being prepared for the coroner

Here's a news report from today's smorgasbord. Dot point 3 says "a report is being prepared for the coroner". I've seen this wording literally thousands of times ("is being prepared" and "will be prepared" are the usual formulations).

I have to wonder why news organisations feel the need to always tell us this. It's obviously a perfectly normal part of the procedure of investigating deaths that occur other than from natural causes. The police who attended the scene may have formed a strong opinion that the cause was suicide, or an accident, or foul play, or whatever. But it's not their call to make any sort of official announcement about the cause. That's the coroner's job. The way these sentences are worded suggests the readers are already aware of coroners and their role in the justice process, so telling us that a report is being prepared seems like one of those cases where "we do it this way because we've always done it this way, and nobody ever questions that, least of all the writers of these news items".

Is there actually any value in these statements? Is this solely an Australian thing? -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 22:31, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I think there's two simple explanations. Firstly, the article you are referring to includes prepared copy that is provided by the authorities, often the investigating agencies, to the media for release. The news agencies then include this copy in their final publications; that's why you see it all the time. In the states, we have similar wording for similar releases. Beyond that, there are other, more significant reasons for the wording. This document from the state government of Indiana indicates how and why law enforcement works with the coroner, and spells out the nature of their relationship and shows how it goes well beyond just the two parties. I think if you look at that document, you'll get the sense that the wording of "a report is being prepared for the coroner" implies this working relationship is occurring and tells the public that due process is being followed. Viriditas (talk) 23:39, 6 August 2024 (UTC)