Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2012 October 29

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October 29

Presidential candidates not elected by their home state

How many times has a presidential candidate not been elected by either their home state or the state they previously ran in as a senator/governor/representative? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.125.190.85 (talk) 02:13, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Here you go:

• In United States presidential election, 1844 James Knox Polk didn't win either his birth state (North Carolina) or his home state (Tennessee).
• In United States presidential election, 1848, Zachary Taylor's official home state was Louisiana, which he won, but he lost his Birth state of Virginia.
• In both United States presidential election, 1860 and United States presidential election, 1864, Abraham Lincoln didn't win his birth state of Kentucky (but he did win his home state of Illinois).
• In United States presidential election, 1916, Woodrow Wilson lost his home state of New Jersey (but he did win his Birth state of Virginia).
• In United States presidential election, 1968, Richard Nixon lost his official state of residence (New York), but he won California, which was the state he was born in and which he had earlier represented as a Senator. In 1972, he had re-established his California residency.
• In United States presidential election, 1988, George H. W. Bush lost his birth state of Massachusetts, but he won Texas, his state of residency, which he had served in the House of Representatives..
• In United States presidential election, 2000 and United States presidential election, 2004, George W. Bush lost his birth state of Connecticut both times, but won Texas, his state of Residency which he had served as governor.

That's the complete list I got by combing the full list of Presidential elections. --Jayron32 03:12, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Al Gore lost his home state in 2000. It's not clear from the question if only eventual winners, or if the user is asking about all the candidates. RudolfRed (talk) 03:32, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

In that case, the list is likely a LOT longer. In several elections, major candidates came from the same state, so only one could win that state. If the OP is interested in expanding the list to include all of the significant candidates, even those that lost, they can do what I did: Start in 1787, check each page in turn, and create their own list. --Jayron32 03:48, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

John Kerry lost the state he was born in too. Hot Stop (Edits) 03:52, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

And, of course, Mitt Romney is likely to lose both his birth state of Michigan, due to his opposition to bailing out the auto companies while supporting Wall Street bailouts, and Massachusetts, due to his move from the center to the right (shown by his rejection of "Obamacare", even though his "Romneycare" was quite similar). See election prediction map here: [1]. StuRat (talk) 04:09, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Of course General Motors was not bailed out, it was seized and its creditors not paid in abrogation of the bankruptcy laws. As for his "supporting" the Wall Street bailout, how did he vote on that in congress? μηδείς (talk) 16:18, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

In 1972 George McGovern lost his home state of South Dakota, winning only Massachusetts and the District of Columbia. Duoduoduo (talk) 15:55, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Every "minor party" candidate for a long time now ... —Tamfang (talk) 00:53, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Mass shootings and suicides

In several mass shootings, at the end, the perpetrators commit suicide (if they aren't killed by the police first). The question is, when planning the shootings, do such perpetrators already plan to make the day of the shooting their last day on Earth, or do they initially not want to kill themselves and only later do so out of remorse or so that they would not be caught? That is, do they plan to commit suicide after the shooting from the start, or do they only decide to do so when they're about to be caught? And in a related question, did the perpetrators of the Columbine High School and Virginia Tech massacres plan to commit suicide from the start or did they do it out of remorse or convenience? Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 03:29, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

I am not sure how many have given interviews, but one could write them and ask.... μηδείς (talk) 03:41, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

They could've kept diaries or documents where they said what they plan to do. --Jethro B 03:46, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Yes, several have left web pages and such, which announced their intention to commit suicide after their killing spree. StuRat (talk) 04:11, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

And were their killing sprees becasue they hated life/depressed & thus the suicide, or was the suicide b/c they had no other option after the killing spree, other than being arrested? --Jethro B 06:21, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

For those who said they planned on committing suicide, I'd say most fall into the first category. After all, if they wanted to live, they would have planned a way to get away, as many murderers do. StuRat (talk) 06:27, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

You've basically got two cohorts, the in-cold-blood alienated children and loners who may have a manifesto, and the crime-of-passion adult who snaps due to a firing or a breakup or the like. I can't think of any instance among the latter group where a plan was found afterwards. μηδείς (talk) 16:14, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Quinzaine Coloniale, 10 novembre, page 667

What source is this book referring to? "Voir la Quinzaine Coloniale, 10 novembre, page 667"--KAVEBEAR (talk) 03:40, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

La Quinzaine Coloniale is a periodical (ISSN: 11491833) published from 1897 to 1923 every two weeks by L'Union Coloniale Française. Some volumes are availables on the site of the BNF (Bibliothèque Nationale de France) here. Are you looking for this page (10 November 1902, page 667)? — AldoSyrt (talk) 12:03, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Thanks.--KAVEBEAR (talk) 06:24, 4 November 2012 (UTC)

Survey revealed men have "a bit too much" sex

I'm looking for a very specific scientific article about this survey where a researcher found out based on his calculations that the men in a (tribe?) village are having proportionally a lot of sex per day. In reality the men of the village didn't know the guy was a researcher and so instead of giving accurate information they exaggerated their sexual activity. I can't remember the country, the name of the researcher or any dates, but I do know it's often cited as an example of a survey gone wrong. Can anyone fill me in with the details? --109.246.247.215 (talk) 08:29, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

While I didn't find details of this particular example, I would note the accuracy of what participants tell reseachers is usually a concern in any research which relies on such things and particularly so in cases involving intimate stuff like sexual activity. See [2] for example. Nil Einne (talk) 13:52, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

This question reminded me of Margaret Mead, who was accused by some of having been duped by some Samoan local's "jokes" into believing something different from the truth. But that wouldn't fit the OP's description of "his calculations". HiLo48 (talk) 16:44, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Margaret Mead focused on the lives of teenage girls in Samoa anyway... AnonMoos (talk) 02:28, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Note also somewhat reenforcing my earlier point, as highlighted in our articles covering the controversy, there's question of who was actually duped. Some suggest it was those who claimed to have found that the people she interviewed lied were in fact generally the ones duped. Nil Einne (talk) 06:03, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

In some past decades I was intermittently keeping track of the Derek Freeman controversy, and it seemed then that Freeman was fairly viciously anti-Mead, but hadn't been able to do much more than establish that by focusing on teenage girls, Mead had a somewhat narrow view of Samoan society as a whole (which is no great surprise -- though on the other hand, in anthropology before the 1970s, anthropologists were rarely considered to have a narrow view of a society when they talked almost exclusively with high-ranking adult males...). To judge from the Derek Freeman article, little has changed since then. AnonMoos (talk) 13:36, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Is there a point in the Ocean which is the most remote place of all Oceans?

Thank you. Iowafromiowa (talk) 11:49, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Yes - Point Nemo, or the oceanic pole of inaccessibility.

I believe it's possible to prove that on a finite globe with bounded coastlines, such a place must exist. AlexTiefling (talk) 11:54, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Theoretically, if there were only two circular land masses on exactly opposite sides of the world, then there would be a ring of inaccessibility, not a point. You can also imagine scenarios with multiple points. StuRat (talk) 16:50, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

As far as human settlement goes, Edinburgh of the Seven Seas is apparently the most remote. 192.51.44.16 (talk) 01:58, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Why do the Brits call soccer football?

Thank you. Iowafromiowa (talk) 11:54, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

A better question would be why American football is called "football" - the name implies a game primarily played with the feet. You'll find more at Names_for_association_football. --Dweller (talk) 12:00, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Here's the short short version:

• At first, there was just football, but there were hundreds of different varieties, whereby every village and town in the UK and US played different sports called football. The only commonality was that there was a ball that had to enter a goal area, and the game was played on foot (this was to distinguish it from games of similar rules played on horseback (c.f Polo). They all had a wide variation in rules. Some only allowed the ball to be kicked. Some allowed the use of hand, some not, some allowed the ball to be caught, some not, some allowed running, some not, some allowed throwing, some not, etc. etc. The first 1869 Princeton-Rutgers game was played under these conditions: the two teams used the set of rules played under Rutgers rules. A later game played at Princeton used their rules. Dartmouth had a game called Old division football. Over time, by the late 1800's, two distinct "codes" of football began to form: Association football, which did not allow the use of hands, and Rugby football, which did. This happened in the U.K. and Canada before it happened in the U.S. During the first few decades of organized football in the U.S. no uniform set of rules developed until the 1874 game between McGill and Harvard. Many of the other Northeastern American schools had settled on a code of football similar to soccer, but Harvard played a local game called the "Boston Game" that allowed players to handle the ball with their hands. Since the other schools didn't, Harvard had a hard time scheduling games against American teams, so they worked out a game against McGill University, a school from Montreal. Being Canadian, they had already adopted Rugby as their uniform code, so they taught the game to Harvard. Harvard fell in love with Rugby, and taught it to Yale. After working out some tweaks to the Rugby game (called the "Concessionary rules") Yale and Harvard would spread the Rugby-style game to other American schools. Over time, an annual rules convention in Springfield, Massachusetts developed to tweak the rules each year. These conventions (which eventually grew into the NCAA) would become dominated by Walter Camp who introduced a series of rules changes which changed the game from essentially Rugby football to a different sport entirely. The last major rule change to create American football was the 1905 change which allowed the forward pass. Canada, independent of the U.S., developed their own form of football which eventually adopted some similar rules.

So, there you go. American football and Canadian football both descend from rugby football, which was one of the two codes of football to become standardized in the nineteenth century. That's why they're all called football. --Jayron32 12:31, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Rugby football has a fair amount of kicking in it, but also a lot of non-forward passing. American football likewise used to have more kicking in it, but the forward pass diminished the need for the kick as a game strategy. You still occasionally see a quick punt on situations other than 4th down, known as a "pooch punt". There's still plenty of kicking in American football, just not as much as there once was. And it's worth pointing out that the all-time scoring leaders in American football tend to be... quess what... kickers. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:37, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, but to be fair, kicking is not considered as vital a part of the game as other parts. Kickers are usually considered fairly interchangeable, and undervalued by those inside of football and those that cover the sport in the media and serious history. The Pro Football Hall of Fame has four players who played kicker for a significant portion of their career, but two played significant time at other positions (QB-K George Blanda and RB-K Paul Hornung) and were not cited specifically as kickers. Of the other two, only Jan Stenerud played kicker exclusively (Lou "the Toe" Groza also played at offensive tackle). There isn't a single punter in the pro football hall of fame, though several lists of "Who's not in the HOF but absolutely should be" have Ray Guy at the top of such a list. Kicking is an important part of American Football, but it isn't clear that kickers are. --Jayron32 01:47, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

"Football" is one of those words, like "corn", which is applied to the most common variety in a particular location. Where wheat is the most common grain, "corn" is wheat. Similarly for barley, oats, maize etc. Where soccer is the most popular game, people call it "football", and call other football games by other names. Similarly for American football, the various versions of rugby, Gaelic football, Australian rules football, and so on. The question realy ought to be, why do so many Americans seem think that what they call "corn" and "football" are the only things those words can mean? --Nicknack009 (talk) 13:15, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Getting off-topic here, but the bit about corn is wrong. Americans don't call corn "corn" because it's the "most common grain". For all I know it may well be the grain that we grow the most of, by total tonnage, but we grow plenty of wheat as well, and if you ask an American to think of a grain, I would expect him to think of wheat, or maybe even rice, before corn. In American English, the word "corn" simply means what you call "maize". (The word "maize" here is usually understood to refer to "Indian corn" — brightly-colored hard-kernel corn used as a decoration around Thanksgiving.) --Trovatore (talk) 01:29, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

What we call "corn" was originally called "Indian corn", to distinguish it from other types of corn (maybe you've heard the term "barleycorn", for example). As "Indian corn" came to be commonly called just "corn" in America, the term "Indian corn" narrowed to the decorative corn you're referring to. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:21, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, that's history worth pointing out. I'm aware that corn in UK usage means, basically, "grain". But I think that's as specific as it gets. What Nicknack009 is missing is that that's not what it means in the States. In the UK, unless I'm mistaken, even if wheat is the most important local grain, corn still means "grain" and not specifically "wheat". (Here's a test: Potato bread, oat bread, then normal bread is ---- bread? I'm pretty sure the answer in the UK is not cornbread.)

In the US, on the other hand, corn means one thing specifically, not grain in general. This is a qualitative difference, and Nicknack009 is mistaken in his claim that the US usage is just an instance of a general pattern. --Trovatore (talk) 09:01, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

The real question is why do so many non-Americans seem to think that Americans don't know that words mean different things in different places. --Jayron32 13:57, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Because of questions like the OP, and a 'World Series' in which a tiny fraction of the world competes? AlexTiefling (talk) 14:02, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

I think the real question is why all these non-Americans seem to think they're right. We invented this language! U-S-A! U-S-A! — Lomn 14:32, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

_{What do you call an elevator with a group of intelligent, softly-spoken people inside? A lift.} Ankh.Morpork 14:45, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

If American English was good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for me! —Tamfang (talk) 18:29, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Since fewer than three in 10 think it important to know the locations of countries in the news and half don't know where India is?[3] Ankh.Morpork 14:38, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Show me the equivalent version of that question for your country of preference. Can we quit all being so brilliantly baited by such obvious troll questions? Shadowjams (talk) 05:38, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

For some REAL football, see the Royal Shrovetide Football which seems to have been played in the town of Ashbourne since 1667. Here's an exciting moment from last year's game. Alansplodge (talk) 15:45, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

It's not just the Brits. It's a lot of Europe and even Asian countries. --Jethro B 16:01, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Not to mention most of the countries on the American continent and Africa, all using their own native equivalent of "football". So it is basically most of the world. --Saddhiyama (talk) 16:17, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

However, the question was about the use of the word "football", hence the Anglo-centric nature of the discussion. Alansplodge (talk) 21:38, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

The article Names for association football highlights the fact that what Americans call soccer has many names around the world. In Australia, there are four different professional games called football by at least some of their fans - Australian Football, Rugby League, Rugby Union and Soccer. (They're in alphabetical order, in case anyone wants to take offence!) American Football and Gaelic Football are played at an amateur level. The fight by some Soccer fans to demand that their game be only called football is a very aggressive one. Those with a lot of time on their hands may be amused by Talk:Soccer in Australia#Requested move. Not one of the nicest nor rational debates ever on Wikipedia. HiLo48 (talk) 16:36, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Why is the national team called "Socceroos" instead of "Footieroos" then? -- AnonMoos (talk) 02:14, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

As our article mentions until 2005 the organisation responsible was known as Soccer Australia or Australian Soccer Association. In 2005 it renamed itself to Football Federation Australia in line with general international usage of the word football. So the nickname arose at the time when the organisation itself used the word soccer, hence isn't particularly surprising. Changing it now is unlikely (plus to be blunt anything you can come up with foot and roo in it is likely to sound dumber then socceroos). Nil Einne (talk) 05:50, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

The name chosen for the national league operated by Football Federation Australia, the A League, avoids the issue of the name of the sport completely. HiLo48 (talk) 01:18, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Presidential children and Proms

Did Susan Ford (who I think had her prom at the White House) or Caroline Kennedy wear dresses or female tuxedeos to their Proms. It was the mid-1970s, the height of Womens Liberation, so I'm just curious. Paul Austin (talk) 14:20, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

A simple search for 'Susan Ford prom' finds [4] which mentions her being in a jersey-gown. A simple image search for the same terms finds plenty of images like [5] showing her in her prom dress. Caroline Kennedy's prom presuming she had and attended one must have been a long time after her father's death given her age so I suspect was a more private affair (and searches aren't helped by various references to other stuff) Nil Einne (talk) 16:16, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

I doubt Caroline Kennedy would have worn a "female tuxedo". For one thing, the "female tuxedo" - known more accurately as Le Smoking - was ten years out of style by that time. For another, Kennedy attended Concord Academy, a very old-fashioned school, and it seems vanishingly unlikely bordering on unimaginable that school authorities would have allowed a girl to wear a suit like that. (Yes, "allowed" - schools had draconian dress codes back then.) Looking at the dates, by the way, it's very possible that she didn't even attend her school prom, as her stepfather died in March of that year. --NellieBly (talk) 05:09, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Accelerated depreciation disincentive

From page 5 of [6] I have questions about this:

"Corporations complain that the corporate income tax discourages investment, but with interest deductible and with accelerated depreciation (relative to what economists call “true economic depreciation”¹¹) it may be that the tax system actually is biased the other way.¹²"

The corresponding footnotes are:

"11. True economic depreciation would allow firms only to deduct the reduced value of the asset that results from usage, obsolescence and aging.

"12. That is, the cost of borrowing is reduced in the same proportion that returns are reduced."

My question is, can someone find a good source (preferably peer reviewed, secondary, or both) which elaborates this point about deductible interest and accelerated deduction? I can find many sources, but they aren't very scholarly. Thanks for any and all help with this. 64.134.60.65 (talk) 15:37, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Biblical Inerrancy

How many people in the world believe that the Bible is inerrant or written without error? 140.254.226.217 (talk) 19:24, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

What type of errors do you mean? Are you referring to grammatical errors/cantillation errors as a result of passing on throughout the years, or errors since the inception? --Jethro B 19:28, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

A huge issue is if you take the Bible literally or figuratively. So, when it says the universe was created pretty much in it's current state in one week, does this literally mean seven 24-hour periods ? If so, this conflicts with just about every branch of science, so not many believe in that. However, if you take it figuratively, where a "day" can be billions of years, far more believe in that. StuRat (talk) 19:32, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

If you want to include fictional characters, we have Ned Flanders: "I literally believe in every bit of the Bible, even the parts that conflict with the other parts." :-) StuRat (talk) 19:34, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

All inconsistencies in holy scripture are only apparent. Explaining them away is intellectual entertainment for reasonably sophisticated believers. Unfortunately, these are increasingly rarer nowadays. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:40, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Well in Judaism, these "inconsistencies" are determined to be consistent as analyzed in the Talmud and lengthy debates, but that's not relevant to Christianity or Islam (which are far more than 1% of the world's population). --Jethro B 20:08, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Expanding on the distinction StuRat lays out, there's also "inerrant theology", which says little about the story aspect of the text. Specifically, in addition to "literal 7 day creation" and "figurative 'days' are 'billions' creation", there's also the "the point is, God saw that people were 'very good' creation". The literal interpretation is probably the easiest to define, but I'd be wary of assuming that arbitrary sources (like the one below) mean 'literal' when they say 'inerrant'. — Lomn 21:06, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

From [7], about 31% of US Americans. Don't know about other countries, but you can leave out the 2/3 of the world that are not Christian, and America is of course quite religious. I got this from googling, btw. IBE (talk) 19:48, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

That's hardly fair to the 1/6 of the world that's Muslim that believes in its literally inerrant scripture--far outnumbering such Christians. μηδείς (talk) 23:22, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Do we know that all nominal Muslims so believe? —Tamfang (talk) 00:48, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

We can't make windows into men's souls, but we do know that the central message of Mohammed was that the prior books had become corrupted, and that he was personally given the literal word of Allah to correct the situation. There is certainly no waffling on that from the major sects like the Sunni and the Shia, and it's the reason for the uproar over The Satanic Verses. Catholicism, on the other hand is far from literalist, and literalism is a minority stance among Protestants, but it's growing. μηδείς (talk) 16:09, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

I don't think one needs to be a literalist to find the idea offensive that your prophet got revelation from the devil and couldn't tell it apart from divine revelation. (though of course you are correct about the mainstream view of scripture in Islam) - Lindert (talk) 19:14, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

(after ec) The original question was about the Bible, though. Mainstream Islamic belief is that the Hebrew scriptures and the New Testament have become corrupted over time, and do not represent the inerrant word of God. As to exactly how literally to take the Qu'ran - well, there's a diversity of opinion about that, too, although I agree that it tends more to the literalist end than the vast majority of Christians' or Jews' views of the Bible. AlexTiefling (talk) 00:53, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

But see Theistic evolution, the reconciling of evolution with Christianity. The leadership of the Roman Catholic Church do not subscribe to creationism. See Catholic Church and evolution. ""In his encyclical Humani Generis (1950), my predecessor Pius XII has already affirmed that there is no conflict between evolution and the doctrine of the faith... Today, more than a half-century after the appearance of that encyclical, some new findings lead us toward the recognition of evolution as more than a hypothesis." John Paul II, 1996. For Anglicans, the Archbishop of Canterbury recently said that ""creationism is, in a sense, a kind of category mistake..." (he likes to talk in riddles, but I think he's against it). In the UK, a recent poll showed that 17% of the population believed in "Young Earth Creationism" which I think is surprisingly high. I've only ever met one adult who believed this - the rest probably keep quiet about it. Alansplodge (talk) 21:31, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

I suspect that the survey results would greatly depend on how you pose the Q: "Do you literally believe everything in the Bible is true ?" ... "Sure !" ... "So, then you believe the universe was literally created in 7 days ?" ... "Heck no !". Thus, for many, their belief in Biblical inerrancy depends on their Biblical illiteracy. StuRat (talk) 21:36, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Six days, heathen! —Tamfang (talk) 00:48, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

StuRat -- the many who have held to the "day-age theory" didn't think they were denying the truth of the Bible at all. AnonMoos (talk) 02:04, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

The key is the word "literal". If you believe a "day" is something other than 24 hours, then you believe in a figurative, not literal, interpretation of the Bible. StuRat (talk) 00:40, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

However, a significant number of day-age theorists did not consider themselves allegorical Euhemerists, but rather restorers of the original meaning of the text, in that they thought that the Hebrew word יום yom could have several meanings. It may seem logical to you that day-age theory is inconsistent with Biblical literalism, but some people have held to both... AnonMoos (talk) 02:12, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

So far this discussion has concentrated on Old Testament stories, but the Jesus bits require a bit of faith too. Apart from the basic stuff of Son of God and the resurrection, there's the loaves and fishes, walking on water, and healing the sick, etc. Mostly impossible from a scientific perspective, so belief in inerrancy would require some faith. HiLo48 (talk) 22:54, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Well, faith is a fundamental requirement of Christianity, or indeed, any faith. That's why they're called "faiths" as well as religions etc. There's no point adhering to a religion if every single thing they teach is scientifically provable; if that were the case, it would just be some branch of history or science or anthropology. The very nature of these organisations puts them outside any of those mainstream disciplines. That in itself is theoretically OK, because people are not technically compelled to believe or follow a single thing they teach. There have been some rather notable exceptions to this theory, which has made for extremely muddy waters. -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 00:43, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Religion would not be religion, if it is scientifically provable. Science is good, but there may be something more out there - something unquantifiable or immeasurable - that belongs in the realm of philosophical discussion or religious inquiry. Since religion caters to subjectivity, emotions, and experience, I am quite sure that they are not provable by science at all. We may study emotion, experience, and subjectivity, but we may also seek to value them as they have their own intrinsic worth. 140.254.226.198 (talk) 15:04, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Within Anglicanism, there is a strand of liberal theology that suggests that literal belief in the all of the New Testament is not a requirement of Christianity. Its most famous proponent. Dr David Jenkins, formally the Bishop of Durham is quoted as saying; "To believe in a Christian way, you don't necessarily have to have a belief that Jesus was born from literally a virgin mother, nor a precise belief that the risen Jesus had a literally physical body,"[8] Of course, to many Christians, even Anglican ones, this is an anathema. Alansplodge (talk) 18:34, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

At the other extreme, there are millions of people who never give the scriptural nuts and bolts of Christianity any thought at all, but still consider themselves to be Christians because, to them, being a Christian means always being kind and courteous and decent and polite and "nice" and never swearing and never speaking out of turn and always paying your bills on time and never speeding. -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 19:48, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

I know someone who routinely speeds, and STILL consider himself a Christian! HiLo48 (talk) 21:42, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

In the letter to the Romans, Paul begins with a discussion of the state of humanity before the possibility of salvation through faith in Jesus. So, I suppose the "salvation by faith alone in Jesus and not by works to achieve salvation" thing is scriptural, and through that faith (which includes repenting old sinful ways) brings good works such as the neat stuff you mention. Sort of. 164.107.182.63 (talk) 21:12, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

North Korean official executed by mortar

Is Kim Il-ch'ŏl the same Kim Chol who was destroyed in spectacular fashion for not properly mourning the late Kim Jong-il? If so, he was pretty old. 205.156.136.229 (talk) 19:50, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

I don't think so. Kim Il-ch'ŏl's article says he was retired from all offices in 2010. On the other hand, he was born in 1928, 1933 and 1941 (until I found a reliable source), so who knows? Black is white, and up is down in that country. Difficult to say. An article says the executed man was a "vice minister of the army", while Kim Il-ch'ŏl, while "first deputy chief of the People’s Armed Forces Ministry", was later made head of the ministry, so you'd think he'd be described differently. However, Kim Il-ch'ŏl had previously displayed a drinking problem in public in 2000.[9] Clarityfiend (talk) 21:34, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

I'm reverting to my previous opinion. According to the Chosun Ilbo, Kim Chol was vice minister at the time of the alleged offense, and Kim Il-ch'ŏl was retired in 2010. Clarityfiend (talk) 04:51, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

There is also Kim Chol-man who's even older but from the sound of it also retired [10] Nil Einne (talk) 05:41, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

You probably know this already, but our Kim (Korean name) article says that 21.6% of Korean people have the surname Kim, Gim or Ghim. Alansplodge (talk) 19:01, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Is Shinto animist or polytheist?

--168.7.230.21 (talk) 21:20, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

An examination of the animism and polytheism articles suggests that can be considered to be both. Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 21:39, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

It's generally considered animist, although there may be people who consider animism to be polytheist. --Jethro B 21:46, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

In essence it`s animist, but there are a couple of more or less well defined deities as well so it has some polytheist tinge to it. 164.71.1.221 (talk) 02:52, 31 October 2012 (UTC)

Voter turnout based on polls

Has there been any research on how polls affect voter turnout? I'd think that if a likely voter hears that his party is way ahead, then it decreases the likelihood that he'll bother to vote. I'm interested in any data that demonstrates this, or refutes it. (I'm aware of the time zone problem the US had in the 1984 election and earlier with regard to exit polling, and I don't care about that for the purposes of this question.) Thank you! Tarcil (talk) 23:34, 29 October 2012 (UTC)

Do you mean polls on the day itself, or just a feeling ahead of time about how comfortable the result is likely to be? If you're excluding 1984, etc, I assume you mean the latter, so let's have a look at the voluminous literature on how perceptions of closeness affect turnout.

In support, Geys (2006) presents some evidence of a link, although it's not clear that he controlled for enough variables in his study. Likewise, one of the big things thought to indicate this effect is that PR systems (which have no "safe seats") seem to have higher turnout than majoritarian systems that do though it is not clear why (Blais 2008; Blais and Dobrynzynska 1998). On the other hand, it turns out to be really hard to pin this down. For example, in the 1997 British Electoral Survey, we see that seats with a 0-10%, 10-20% and 20-30% margin of victory all had similar levels of turnout, mostly because Conservative voters in the UK seem to turn out regardless of how safe a Conservative seat it is they're voting in (there's a better correlation among Labour voters). My lecturer adds that the "relationship between district marginality and turnout is even weaker in the US and Canada" though he doesn't provide a citation for that.

One might ask: if the closeness of the election does not affect turnout, why do we see higher turnout in the elections presumed to be close like the 2010 British General Election? The answer is probably because voters perceive greater difference between the parties in these close-run elections and/or become better informed about those differences, both of which have been statistically linked with higher turnout (see BES 1997 for example). You might argue that the publication of polls showing a close result contributes to those two effects and thereby boosts turnout. Anyway, I hope that gives you some pointers about the variables involved here, if I did indeed interpret your question correctly. - Jarry1250 ^{[Deliberation needed]} 00:27, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Great answer and thank you! Tarcil (talk) 23:21, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

A poll released shortly ahead of the European Parliament election, 2004 (Sweden) gave the June List slightly above four-percent threshold for the first time in a national poll. In the election they won almost 14.5% of the vote. In this case the tripling between the poll and the subsequent election was presumably a consequence of people adjusting their behaviour based on the poll. Gabbe (talk) 07:25, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

Why wouldn't it be just as likely that it's an inaccurate poll? There is a lot of noise in polling. Tarcil (talk) 23:21, 30 October 2012 (UTC)

In electoral systems with an election threshold, you basically throw your vote away if you vote for a party that receives fewer votes than the threshold. The June List had been formed four months ahead of the election, and all polls ahead of the election indicated that they would get fewer votes than the threshold. That is, until a poll released a few days before the election, in which they received more than 5%.[11] According to this report, 69% of the June List's voters made their decision to vote for the party in the final week ahead of the election. Gabbe (talk) 08:07, 1 November 2012 (UTC)