Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2012 August 9

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August 9

Partition of india- Boundary Comission members

Can I get names of the members of the two boundary commissions for PUNJAB and BENGAL( Four member each beside Cyrill Redcliff ) before partition of British India in 1947?? Thanks AANIRUP' — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aanirup (talk • contribs) 02:28, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

The members of the Punjab Boundary Commission were Din Muhammad, Muhammad Munir, Teja Singh, and Mehr Chand Mahajan. The members of the Bengal Boundary Commission were Abu Saleh Muhammad Akram, S. A. Rahman, Charu Chandra Biswas, and B. K. Mukherjea. (source)--Cam (talk) 06:15, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Burma Reforming

Why exactly did the Burmese junta suddenly decide in 2010-2011 to begin reforms, after essentially running a poverty-stricken police state for several decades? The pace of reforms in Burma so far has been very rapid, so I'm wondering what the causes of it were. Futurist110 (talk) 02:35, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Your incredulity is understandable and the answer to this seemingly unlikely rapid change of affairs comes in two parts. First, pressure for change did not occur starting in 2010 alone; since the middle of the last decade there was considerable mounting popular resistance to the regime which culminated in widespread protests in 2007. This, combined with external pressure (coming mainly in the form of considerable U.N. scrutiny) and the need to court foreign aid to cure the countries economic woes, led to a constitutional referendum in 2008 which ultimately paved the way for the dissolution of the State Peace and Development Council. However, this leads to the second point - many Burmese feel that the military, while diminished somewhat in it's authority, morphed it's approach to controlling the nation more so than it really gave up power; the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (UDSP) won over 80% of open parliament seats in the initial election under questionable circumstances with many of these positions going to former military officers - this is in addition to the 25% of the seats which are held in reserve for standing military officers under the current constitution. Of nearly 60 new cabinet positions, the vast majority are held by individuals who formerly served in high positions in the former regime, including the president. There have also been continuing reports of consistent ongoing suppression and mistreatment of ethnic minorities. However, yes things do seem to be slowly on the upswing for the beleaguered state and to the extent reform is pressing ahead, it can be largely attributed to the decades long work of opposition and humanitarian groups; see, for example, Aung San Suu Kyi who only just two months ago was able to formally accept the Nobel Peace Prize she was awarded more than two decades ago, just three years into her effort to resist the Junta, which, in a broken series of arrests, kept her imprisoned or under house arrest for nearly 16 years. So the answer as to how reform could take place so rapidly is that it really hasn't in reality; it was the result of a long-fought contest and continues to progress in starts and fits. For more information on the matter, the BBC, which has covered these events in detail, has an impressive backlog of articles on their Asian news site. Snow (talk) 06:12, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

There was an article about this in a recent New York Review of Books: [1]. Pfly (talk) 08:01, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

And a well-written and comprehensive article at that - thanks for bringing it to attention. Snow (talk) 09:55, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

In my view, it all depends on how cynical you want to be. If you aren't very cynical, the point of opening up would be to actually change and become more democratic, and 'giving in' to external and internal pressure calling for increased democratisation. If you want to be very cynical, the reason for doing reform isn't to really become more democratic, but to present a veneer of democracy that will make Burma palatable as a business partner for other states, particularly the West. The reason for wanting more business is obvious: From being a pariah state that only has the ability to sell raw materials that are then processed in other countries before reaching the market, by opening up, the Burmese brand can be exported, and processing of natural resources and production of goods can take place in Burma before being exported directly to markets, without having to take a detour to other countries (such as China, India and Thailand), and leaving big chuncks of the profit there. In the latter case, the ruling elite of Burma is no longer the military holding the country in a powerful grip, but rather the military-cum-capitalists holding all the resources and exploiting those resources and the population for its own gain. There are other countries that aren't boycotted due to Human Rights abuses, but that still are less than democratic, and where the elites earn millions on trade with other states through exploitation of their own populations. V85 (talk) 15:49, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

French codes in Oman's History

I have asked this question at the Peninsular War talk page but no editor is replying. So i'll ask it here with any luck. I noticed that this article uses citations from Oman's A history of the Peninsular War. I'm just interested in understanding how the French codes used during the Peninsular War worked. If anyone has a copy of Volume 5 of the histories there is a description of how the French codes worked in Appendix 15 of that book. It would be much appreciated if anyone with a copy could provide me with a brief explaination of those French codes or perhaps list an internet link to a digitalised copy of the book, as I have found neither E-book nor hard copy of Oman's histories. Thanks, Uhlan ^talk 05:08, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Does this link work for you? It's the start of the appendix you want, from Google Books.--Cam (talk) 05:50, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

That won't work from an IP outside the US; but the same scan at Internet Archive should. jnestorius^(talk) 14:54, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

Why did Nixon resign

I heard a theory that the original Watergate breakins were ordered by John Dean to remove evidence of his now wife of her call-girl/high end escort past. The press at the time glossed over this and most assumed that G. Gordon Liddy and others were caught on the 1st attempt but G. Gordon and others have admitted that it was NOT their first break-in to DCC HQ at the Watergate. Nixon being in a bunker mentality and paranoid with the anti-war rallies at the WH gates for years, violent protests and even the '68 MLK and RFK killings instinctively started covering it up and protecting his "plumbers" and friends on staff. The way I heard it John Dean basically orchestrated the whole response. The missing 18 minutes of tape and Ehrlichmans recollection that Nixon was afraid of the "whole Bay of Pigs thing" coming out seems like Nixon the 8 year VP for "beware the military/industrial complex" Eisenhower and architect of the original plot to get Castro in 1960 knew something that was far more destructive and crippling that resignation was the better choice. One WH insider I remember stated "what was Nixon's motive for the break-in? what was his motive to coverup specifically the break-in?", it seems like there was some other big reason that the break-in lead back to prompt him just to have the nation turn the page instead. Thoughts? user:Marketdiamond MarketDiamond 11:23, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

He resigned because his position became untenable. I don't know that the truth of the matter was, but the truth isn't really relevant - if enough people thought he had done something wrong, that's enough to make it politcally impossible for him to continue. He could have tried to prove his innocence in an impeachment trial, but that wouldn't have helped much politically. The old adage "there's no smoke without fire" tends to be relevant in this kind of thing - if enough accusations are made, people will believe there must be some truth to them. --Tango (talk) 12:05, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

He resigned because he had "lost his base of support in Congress". That was his way of saying that his own party was sitting ready to join the Democrats, to impeach him and throw him out of office. So he resigned instead, and almost immediately was pardoned by his successor, and dat was dat. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:48, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

To answer the other question, which is "Why did he have to go", there are a few layers to the answer, which amounts to why he was not going to be President anymore, whether he resigned or was fired. First of all, a chief executive is expected to be directly responsible for the misdeeds of his charges. This is true in many walks of life: American college football coaches get fired when their students are on the take, principals get fired when their teachers cheat on tests, CEOs get fired when companies are mismanaged by their underlings. It is a common thing. The fact that the break-in was tied to people who were underlings of Nixon in various capacities (whether on the White House Staff, he personal staff, or in the Republican Party structure, like the Committee to Re-elect the President (CREEP)), Nixon must bear some culpability for that. Secondly, and perhaps more damning, was that Nixon was directly involved with the cover-up of the break-in. It is possible that the break-in occurred without his prior knowledge, and without his direction. However, the minute he becomes aware that the break-in was managed by his own people, he has an obligation to cut those people loose, turn them over to the authorities, and disavow them entirely. Had he done so, it may have likely saved his job. The fact that he knew about the break in, and all the details, and continued to protect the people involved is why he was forced to resign. As Howard Baker famously quipped, the key piece of information that cost Nixon his job was "What did the President know and when did he know it?" The fact that he knew a lot fairly early, and did nothing about it, was the difference between keeping his job and losing it. --Jayron32 19:46, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

In a recent interview with Woodward and Bernstein, Bob Woodward (himself a Republican) said that Nixon was "operating a criminal enterprise" in the White House. The thought of turning in those "third-rate burglars" likely never crossed his mind. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:57, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

The simple answer to "why did he resign" is that he surely would have been impeached and convicted had he not. I'm not sure if a pardon from Ford was counted on at all. It was an unpopular decision at the time Ford made it too. Shadowjams (talk) 00:46, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Yep. There were claims that a fix was in, but Ford always said that he did it to basically put an end to Watergate and let America move on to other things, which was likely the wise and, frankly, statesmanlike thing to do. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:20, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

As there are lots of opinions above I'll add mine: In my opinion there is NO WAY that the pardon wasn't pre-negotiated. Just because Ford appeared (uncharacteristically ) 'wise and statesmanlike' doesn't mean he was. Tom Haythornthwaite 16:49, 11 August 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hayttom (talk • contribs)

Philosopher studying philosophies of other men

Thread retitled from "Does a philosopher really need to know exactly all the philosophies of all other men before him or during his existence or is it him who would pick those he think is essential for him".

I need to know if these philosophers studies/studied every specific detail in philosophical terminologies or did some of them proceed immediately to the normative area with the aid of philosophical information of some philosophers, and not all. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Smilingswordfish (talk • contribs) 12:33, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

All of the above. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:58, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

1. Does a philosopher really need to know exactly all the philosophies of all other men before him or during his existence No.
2. is it him who would pick those he think is essential for him Yes
3. these philosophers Which philosophers?
4. if these philosophers studies/studied every specific detail in philosophical terminologies The terminology of philosophy is great and I think it's safe to assume that no philosopher studies terminology for areas of philosophy of no concern to him or her.
5. did some of them proceed immediately to the normative area What do you mean by "normative area"?
6. with the aid of philosophical information of some philosophers What do you mean by "philosophical information"?

-- Hoary (talk) 13:05, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

When you talk about what a philosopher needs, what do you mean by "need"? Needs to get a qualification or an academic position? To be published? To perform philosophical analysis? To be a professional applied philosopher such as a medical ethicist? To put "philosopher" under profession on their passport?

No philosopher has studied every past philosopher (although Gilles Deleuze came close), but you have to be aware of the work of previous philosophers in your area, and the normal method of doing philosophy in an academic context is to analyse and critique the work of earlier philosophers. Virtually all philosophy PhDs and published papers will be responses to the work of an earlier philosopher, ancient or modern. If you look at the greatest philosophers, they all started by studying and critiquing the work of earlier philosophers. The influence of even the oldest philosophers is still felt today in the way questions are phrased and analysed and the terminology that is used, so a broad historical overview is very useful.

Having said that, there's a difference between educational procedures that focus on the history of philosophy and those that focus on contemporary philosophical issues - in both cases you'll be studying the work of older philosophers, but if you're studying some philosophical topics then all the important work is from the last 100 years and Plato or Aristotle won't do you much good. --Colapeninsula (talk) 13:48, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

I am revising the heading of this section from Does a philosopher really need to know exactly all the philosophies of all other men before him or during his existence or is it him who would pick those he think is essential for him to Philosopher studying philosophies of other men, in harmony with WP:TPOC, point 13 (Section headings). Please see Microcontent: Headlines and Subject Lines (Alertbox).

—Wavelength (talk) 14:50, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

• Would you please just get yourself an undergraduate philosophy textbook and stop plaguing the Reference desk with these inane questions? Looie496 (talk) 15:41, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

"All philosophies" "every specific detail" implies a lot of stuff. OsmanRF34 (talk) 18:49, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Can i entitle myself as a moral philsopher

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

You have been warned regarding this conduct Smilingswordfish, the reference desk is not your blog Fifelfoo (talk) 22:02, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

---

The above answers were incredibly specific and helpful! So this is my question; I am engaged in moral philosophy and studies it as autodidact and fortunately and successfully I have recently made and submitted a paperwork concerning my own view of meta- ethics, and normative ethics, the problem is how I would represent my self to the society of scholars, can entitle myself, because of the thought I am engage unto, a moral philosopher, in such manner that I belong to such field. I really need answers fast, the conference is nearing! Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Smilingswordfish (talk • contribs) 14:14, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

My personal point of view would be that anyone who philosophises could be a 'philosopher' (moderate it as you see fit). However, I think that scholars tend to look more at what someone has accomplished rather than what they call themselves. I.e. if you haven't produced any notable work, they wouldn't really accept you as anything other than 'some guy'. Of course, if you have published something (like a scholarly article or two, or something similar) - especially recently - I think that you could claim such a title, since it would seem that this is something you plan to pursue. V85 (talk) 15:24, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

I take offense to that. Someguy1221 (talk) 18:26, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Without academic credentials I do not believe anyone within academia will take an autodidact seriously. misspells like 'philsopher' won't also be helpful for your objective. OsmanRF34 (talk) 15:34, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

When presenting yourself to academic and professional scholars (say, when applying for a conference or presenting/submitting a paper), you should title yourself simply an "independent scholar." This is the preferred term for someone who is outside of the academic discipline. To some people it will say, "possibly nutty" (because most academics deeply distrust anyone who is not an academic), but to other, less-insecure folks it will say, "someone who, for whatever reason, has opted out of the traditional system," and with any luck they will give you a fair shake. Titling yourself "moral philosopher" will simply say "definitely nutty" to such people, if you aren't already published and respected. Nobody titles themselves things like that — they say, "professor in moral philosophy at the university of such-and-such" which is a professional title, not one necessarily descriptive of their work or even self-identity. If you want to be accepted into such circles as an equal, start humble, make no disguise of your outsider status, and work to make alliances within the academic circles so that others will take you seriously. --Mr.98 (talk) 16:01, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

There's an article on that: independent scholar.OsmanRF34 (talk) 18:23, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

unidentified symbol

The bottom line of this image of the original proposal for braille consists of an apostrophe, hyphen, and a character I don't rec. I think it might be an end-of-verse symbol. Does anyone recognize it?

Thanks, — kwami (talk) 19:52, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Honestly, it's so obscured I'm having trouble making even a decent guess. Given the symbols it is grouped with, we can probably assume it's a fairly common feature of punctuation in French, but, racking my brain, I can't seem to come up with an even outdated typographical feature that fits. I'm wondering if maybe it's meant to represent an underscore or space? Our French braille article indicates that the braille configuration corresponding to that symbol in the chart in question is currently used to represent the "@" symbol. Snow (talk) 21:44, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Actually, I must be blind. You were correct, that same article indicates the configuration doubles as a notation for an end-of-verse mark. Snow (talk) 21:56, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

And it appears to be a kind of typographic lozenge. <> Fifelfoo (talk) 22:01, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

I suggested the verse mark because most French-braille characters have retained their original values. (The guillemet is also barely legible, but can be ID'd because it still has that value in French.) I just have no idea what an early 19th-century French end-of-verse mark may have looked like. — kwami (talk) 22:40, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

In any event, our article seems to support your assumption, though unfortunately it lacks a citation for this specific meaning, nor a link to a clearer representation of the symbol. Snow (talk) 23:28, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

(Well, I wrote that article; that sense is inherited from WP-fr, as are a couple others. — kwami (talk) 00:35, 10 August 2012 (UTC))

You might wish to ask a librarian at Bibliothèque nationale de France.

• BnF - Poser votre question

—Wavelength (talk) 23:23, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Ah, thanks. Will do. — kwami (talk) 00:42, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

It seems that this is a sign that isn't very frequently used in typography (intended for the non-blind), or at least not in modern typography, as neither French Wikipedia, nor French Wiktionary are capable of giving an actual sign for it (either Unicode or as a picture file), but describe it using words. I guess this could be due to the ability of a seeing person to see the end of the verse (there is no more text on the page, the verse-form is exchanged for conventional prose form, or some other symbol is used, such as a short line across the bottom on the page or a centred asterisk), while a blind person might need some other primer to indicate the end of a verse. Similarly, French Braille includes a sign indicating italics. A seeing person can easily see the difference between normal and italicised text, while a blind person, so long as Braille doesn't include a second set of characters for italics, would need some other primer.

Personally, I would compare it to that little circle or square one sometimes sees at the end of articles in newspapers or magazines, indicating that there is no more text beloning to that article on the following pages. The most commonly used symbols (that I've seen) used to indicate this are □, ■, ○ and ●. Conversely, to indicate that anarticle continues on the following page/s, there might be no mark, or a small arrow that points to the right. V85 (talk) 18:11, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

I didn't get anywhere with detexify but it is often useful for this sort of thing if you are persistent. 67.122.211.84 (talk) 09:43, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Person that signed most bills into law in the U.S.

Hello. This here might be a difficult question: Which officer in the U.S. (president or governors) signed most bills into law during his tenure in office in the histrory of America? And how many? Is this known? Thanks a lot in advance. --78.50.226.128 (talk) 20:18, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

I'm unable to find a source to confirm it, but I would be amazed if it were anybody other than Franklin Roosevelt. Looie496 (talk) 22:09, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

I suspect that Looie is correct. Hard numbers are hard to find, but Roosevelt seems to be the consensus based on a few simple Google searches, along with more dubious claims that the honor goes to Bill Clinton, Barack Obama (I seriously doubt that one), or Lyndon B. Johnson. Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 23:44, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

How could he not beat out the other presidents? He had more terms to do it. He certainly tops the List of United States presidential vetoes. Clarityfiend (talk) 00:58, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

He almost certainly beats all other presidents, but maybe not some governors who aren't always term limited. Bill Clinton had a combined 17 years between Ark. governor and President. NY Gov. George Clinton is the longest serving governor in U.S. history with 21 years in office, but I doubt his 18th/19th century bill signing record rivals FDR. D Monack (talk) 02:04, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

It's definitely not Obama — the Congresses under his term have enacted a historically low number of bills. The number of bills passed by Congress in general has been decreasing since the 1940s. --Mr.98 (talk) 01:29, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

• It's definitely FDR. As Mr. 98 said, the number of bills passed by Congress has been decreasing since the 1940s -- but it's actually even more dramatic than the chart that he cites to suggests. That chart only shows public laws. There used to be an enormous number of private bills, which are laws that only affect one person or a small number of people. The US Constitution bans private bills that punish someone, but not private bills that are helpful or neutral. Back before the rise of federal agencies, Congress spent much of its time dealing with matters that now get handled by Veterans Affairs, Social Security, etc. Part of the reason for the Administrative Procedure Act of 1946 was that it was getting out of control, with congressmen getting more requests than they could possibly even read, let alone vote on. --M@rēino 15:42, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

FDR sounds like a reasonable guess, but without something more empirical I wouldn't say with 100% certainty it's the correct answer. If you're just talking about presidents who signed in the most public bills as president (to narrow down the criteria), you could do an analysis by looking at public laws (the PL or statutes at large) by time-frame. If you removed overturned vetoes (which are rare and you could probably safely exclude) then you could get a count by year and use that to determine who had the highest count.

The question asks about governors too... that makes it trickier because you'd have to do this for all 50 states. Very good question, but hard to answer. I think finding a definitive answer from scratch would be a time consuming process. Shadowjams (talk) 00:43, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

FDR was also governor of New York for a while... AnonMoos (talk) 01:20, 11 August 2012 (UTC)