Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2008 December 4

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December 4

Barack Obama Cabinet

I am writing an article for my school newspaper and I need to find a list of Barack Obama's current cabinet. Catch is I can't use Wikipedia because the establishment thinks it is all lies. If anyone can find me a reliable website listing all of his current cabinet it would be greatly appreciated. Strifeblade (talk) 01:03, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

• How about the Associated Press? See [1]. Exxolon (talk) 01:08, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. That is exactly what i was looking for. Strifeblade (talk) 01:24, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Just because you can't quote Wikipedia doesn't mean you can't use Wikipedia. If you go to Barack Obama, his cabinet nominations are listed at the bottom. Then, if you click on Hillary Rodham Clinton, you will see a section titled "United States Secretary of State nomination". Inside that are 5 links to references - any of which you may use since they are not Wikipedia. So, you can see that Wikipedia is a great way to quickly locate a lot of references, even when you can't use Wikipedia as a reference. -- kainaw™ 02:31, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

To counter the obvious falshood in the OP, the establishment doesn't think Wikipedia is all lies; the establishment thinks you are lazy for citing an encyclopedia in a school paper. You should always strive to cite original works where possible. Any encyclopedia, by its nature, is only a collection of paraphrases of other people's work. Use Wikipedia to give you a general overview and for understanding, but for any real writing you intend to do on your own, go find the original sources! --Jayron32.talk.contribs 05:25, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Many people do think Wikipedia is all lies. And they're not all crazy wingnuts either. Intuitively, the idea of a wiki seems like a bad idea, (In the very early days, even Jimbo was unsure of wikis!) throw in a couple of newspaper stories about prominent errors in WP : Bingo, worse fears confirmed. APL (talk) 17:28, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Encyclopedias and dictionaries have never been proper sources for papers. Since Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, it shouldn't be any different than other encyclopedias. -- kainaw™ 19:08, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Source for Quotation from St. Basil of Caesarea

I would be very grateful if someone could identify the exact source for the following prayer from St. Basil the Great:

O God, enlarge within us the sense of fellowship with all living things, our brothers the animals to whom Thou gavest the earth as their home in common with us. May we realize that they live not for us alone, but for themselves and for Thee and that they love the sweetness of life even as we, and serve Thee better in their place than we in ours. For those, O Lord, the humble beasts, that bear with us the burden and heat of the day, and offer their guileless lives for the well-being of mankind; and for the wild creatures, whom Thou hast made wise, strong, and beautiful, we supplicate for them Thy great tenderness of heart, for Thou hast promised to save both man and beast and great is Thy loving kindness, O Master, Savior of the world.

There are many quotations of this prayer on the web, but none seems to give its source. One person ascribed it to the Liturgy of St. Basil, but I could not find it therein. I would like to use the quotation and cite the source, and would ideally therefore very much appreciate a clear identification of the original work, with chapter (and lines, where appropriate), as well as the reference in Migne, if known.

Many thanks for your kindness. Scrutor (talk) 02:16, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Are you sure that's Basil? Sounds more like Francis of Assisi (although his blessing for animals seems to be somewhat different). Adam Bishop (talk) 03:08, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, this webpage has a reference to "Journey to Heaven: Counsels on the Particular Duties of Every Christian, by St. Tikon of Zadonsk, transated by Fr. George D. Lardas, Holy Trinity Monaster, Jordanville, '91". Maybe that will have a reference, if you can find it (there's no preview on Google Books unfortunately). Adam Bishop (talk) 03:52, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Similar to: Rauschenbusch, Walter. (1910) "For this World." Prayers of the Social Awakening. pp. 47-8.—eric 09:20, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Although the prayer does sound "Franciscan," there are MANY references to it on the web as coming from St. Basil. I am hoping that someone familiar with his works will be able to identify its source. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Scrutor (talk • contribs) 21:31, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Some more searching through Google Books leads me to "Nature, Technology and the Sacred" by Bronislaw Szerszynski, who quotes the prayer from "Man's Responsibility for Nature: Ecological Problems and Western Traditions" by John Passmore, which unfortunately only has a snippet view, and not for that particular page. Adam Bishop (talk) 18:30, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

As I keep looking I'm not sure any of these are the kind of books that would cite the PG. But if it helps, you can look through Basil's works in the PG online; it links to PDFs and .doc files, but it should be in there somewhere. From the citations in Google books I think it might be in the Nine Homilies. (Sorry I can't be of much more help than this, I can't read Greek well enough.) Adam Bishop (talk) 01:42, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Huh, that stuff is English, it's not the PG at all. How bizarre. And I didn't see the prayer in the Homilies...maybe it's still somewhere in there though. Adam Bishop (talk) 20:37, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

The CCEL also has some of Basil's works in translation here, but I don't see the prayer in there either. (It also occurs to me that Migne translated the stuff in the PG into Latin, so I could find it if I knew where to look, but I still don't know where to look!) Adam Bishop (talk) 03:26, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

I advise that the prayer did not originate with St. Basil, nor is it found in the Liturgy of St. Basil (Greek, Russian or Coptic versions) - despite the claims made in books, blogs and magazine articles. The actual source was the prayer written by Walter Rauschenbusch "For This World" in his 1910 book Prayers of the Social Awakening (Boston & Chciago: Pilgrim Press, 1910), pp 47-48. This is downloadable from Internet Archive. Rauschenbusch expressly states in the book's preface that he is the author of every prayer in the book. The second paragraph of "For This World" has been uplifted and misattributed to St. Basil ever since the 1960s.

Which U.S. Presidents have been the subject of a major movie/film?

Which U.S. Presidents have been the subject of a major movie/film? And, please list the titles of those movies.

i.e. JFK, Nixon, [recently released]

Dubya George W. Bush You might get a better answer to this on the Entertainment Desk ៛ Bielle (talk) 03:24, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

That's W., at least on this continent. I would add Sunrise at Campobello (Franklin Roosevelt) and Give 'em Hell, Harry! (Truman). --Anonymous, 08:01 UTC, December 4, 2008.

There was a miniseries, "Backstairs at the White House," about the servants at the White House which featured the tenures of many 20th century presidents and portrayed them: Taft, Wilson, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover, Franklin Roosevelt, Truman, and Eisenhower. Another similarly themed movie about a servant at the White House will cover a later 34 year span, 1952 (Eisenhower) through Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, and Reagan. [2] says every U.S. president has been featured in some film, with Fillmore (The Monroe Doctrine (1939)) and Buchanan ("The American President" (2000)) bringing up the rear at one movie each. Lincoln has been the subject of 210 movies or appearances. Nixon ("All the President's Men," (1976), "Nixon" (1995), Washington (119 appearances), Jefferson (81 appearances), Grant (73 appearances), and Franklin Roosevelt (69 appearances), as well as George "W" Bush (67 appearances). Edison (talk) 05:15, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

The question asked about presidents that were the subject of movies, not about presidents that appeared in movies, let alone TV productions. --Anonymous, 08:01 UTC, December 4, 2008.

Wag the Dog and George H.W. Bush, although it was not made explicit. Surely there was a war movie about Eisenhower.--droptone (talk) 12:41, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, of course. Henry Grace played him as General Eisenhower in The Longest Day. That movie still "wounds my heart with a monotonous languor". -- JackofOz (talk) 12:58, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

The Longest Day is probably not the type of film the questioner is asking about, since Ike is not really the subject of the film, and of course he wasn't the president yet. If the question is indeed meant to include films about presidents before they were president, we can add to the list things like Young Mr. Lincoln, and, if TV movies count as "major", movies such as The Crossing and Ike: Countdown to D-Day and Warm Springs. —Kevin Myers 14:06, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

We don't have a list of movies, but we do have a list of actors who played President of the United States. Not all of these are centered on the president in question and many are fictional portrayals, but it a place to start. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 14:33, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

See Truman (film), Wilson (film) and Old Hickory -- Mwalcoff (talk) 00:07, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Existentialism

Can anyone describe the fundamentals of existentialism in under fifty words? The article on it is absolutely confusing. --hello, i'm a member | talk to me! 03:33, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Existentialism is a broad set of philosophical schools which hold that certain basic ideals. Its a really huge part of philosophy, with MANY diverse schools of philosophy being called "existential" but they all share certain basic commonalities.

• While most other schools of thought deal in theoretical constructs used to explain human existance and relationships (think of Hobbes' Leviathan theory or Rousseau's social contracts), existentialism is always firmly grounded in existence, that is it confines itself to actual human interactions and actual human conditions rather than constructed or theoretical ones. This is contained in the idea that "Existence precedes essence", which is sort of the philosophical equivalent of the "nature vs. nurture" debate. This also means that things exist outside of our definitions of them, however nothing has any inherent meaning. A table exists, but it does nothing except exist. It is only a table, rather than a random collection of wood, because in my mind I assign it meaning.
• Most existential philosphies deal with the problems of internal conflict or tension or angst of some sort. The basic problem for existentialism is that free will by its nature creates stress, and how people deal with that stress. There is also the tension between facts of your life you cannot control (called facticity) and your responses to these facts, which of course you are always free to choose. Your conflicting desires to both conform to the facts of your existance, and to break free from them, is a major source of angst. Since nothing in life has any meaning beyond what we assign to it, it is the neverending search to apply meaning to our ultimately meaningless lives which also leads to angst.
• Existentialism is also usually about the search for the authentic life, whatever that may mean. We should live according to our nature, and not according to externally imposed expectations on our behavior.
• Existentialism holds that people make decisions not based on rational thought, but instead all of our decisions are based on attempts to reduce the angst in our lives, as noted above. Whether we choose to succumb to the pre-existing facts of our condition, or whether we choose to break free from them, has little to do with whether our actions will actually make our lives better in a measureable way, but rather we make our choices by taking the course of action that will reduce our internal stress. Thus, people will tend to stay in rediculous situations out of comfort, rather than to leave out of reason. Why would a smart youth in a Western nation with access to quality public education choose to remain in a ghetto and sell drugs, and probably get shot and die, when there are easily availible rational means to get out of that situation? Because leaving the situation would raise his angst level, so he never sees it as a viable option.

That's way more than 50 words, but its a complex series of thoughts, so I tried to hit the highlights.--Jayron32.talk.contribs 05:19, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

• From a "what is your world view" quiz (I was judged to be an existentialist): "Existentialism emphasizes human capability. There is no greater power interfering with life and thus it is up to us to make things happen. Sometimes considered a negative and depressing world view, your optimism towards human accomplishment is immense. Mankind is condemned to be free and must accept the responsibility."Mieciu K (talk) 05:22, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

What makes you so special? It's all a big nothing. You die in your own arms. —Livia Soprano to her grandson, exhibiting the bitter side of existential thinking. Julia Rossi (talk) 08:09, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Sartre claims that the one thing that existentialists all have in common is that subjectivity is the starting point, or that existence precedes essence. Whatever that means. 128.192.81.83 (talk) 18:20, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Sometimes it helps to look at its opposite philosophy to see what it is not, viz essentialism is a belief that things have a set of characteristics that make them what they are, and it's the job of culture to instill "the cultural norm", in other words, essentialism is about essence preceding existence. Both these propositions are a train it's hard to get off in a hurry, Julia Rossi (talk) 09:01, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Short selling and shareholder rights

So when you sell short someone else's stock shares that you borrowed, and if there are shareholder rights that come with the shares in this stock (I dunno, e.g. you can vote on company decisions or something), do you then deprive the original shareholder of these rights? Otherwise, both the person you borrowed shares from and the person you sold it to will expect the rights from those same shares, which can't be possible, right? --128.97.245.18 (talk) 08:39, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

According to Investopedia, the person the short seller sold the shares to becomes the owner of those rights so the original shareholder (i.e. the lender) is deprived of them. See the link for details. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 09:03, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Stock lending agreements usually include provisions to compensate the lender for any benefits that they would otherwise have lost during the period of the loan. For example, the borrower will agree to pay the lender an amount equal to any dividends that the are paid on the stock during the period of the loan - this is called a "manufactured dividend". Voting rights are more difficult to compensate for, as only one party can vote the shares. However, if the lender knows there is an AGM coming up and especially wants to exercise their vote, they will recall the loan before the AGM. If they don't want to exercise their vote, they may be able to negotiate a higher interest rate with the borrower, as the supply of stock available for lending may reduce as the AGM approaches. Gandalf61 (talk) 09:41, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

neil rosenstein doctor surgeon/genealogist of elizabeth new jersey

what is the current up date on this gentleman's status. is he no longer a doctor and if not why? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 196.25.255.194 (talk) 12:31, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Maybe he's too busy researching his family history to do any doctoring.  :) -- JackofOz (talk) 12:59, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

It appears both his New York medical license [3] and his New Jersey medical license were voluntarily surrendered [4] in 2008. The reasons are cited in the linked pages. - Nunh-huh 21:54, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

See the whole world with his naked eye

Who is the first person to see the whole world (planet earth) with his naked eye? 122.107.203.230 (talk) 12:36, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Yuri Gagarin was the first human to reach space and the first human to orbit the Earth, so I would presume he was the first.--droptone (talk) 12:45, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Nobody's seen the whole thing at once; however, the Apollo 8 astronauts were the first to see the maximum possible amount at one go (Gagarin's orbit wasn't high enough to see a full hemisphere). — Lomn 15:48, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Wouldn't you need to be at infinite distance to see a whole hemisphere? The Apollo 8 astronauts presumably saw something very close to the whole hemisphere, but there would have been a ring around the edge they couldn't see. --Tango (talk) 18:53, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, yes. Point is, if "saw as much of the world as possible at a glance" is the criteria, then any of the lunar Apollo missions would have seen substantially more than other astro/cosmonauts. Similarly, if the criteria is "saw the whole world, though over a period of time", Gagarin's orbit might not have been sufficient to see everything. The lunar missions would have stood a significantly better chance. I don't know how to go about verifying that premise, however. — Lomn 19:24, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Throwing together some very back-of-the-envelope calculations, Gagarin might just barely have been able to see the whole surface of Earth, but conditions would have needed to be ideal. At an altitude of 200 miles (Gagarin's apogee), an orbital inclination of about 69° is needed to see the poles. Gagarin's inclination was 65° -- short, but given my rough calculations, that's within the margin of error. However, his orbit was highly elliptical -- perigee was 112 miles. So he'd have had to reach apogee near the extremes of inclination, probably on multiple cycles, to see the full sum of polar regions. It's unlikely.

Apollo lunar astronauts, on the other hand, might have one pole substantially obscured due to the Earth's axial tilt, and I'll get a headache trying to determine the math for that one.

Another major candidate set, that of astronauts on space stations, appears to fail due to insufficient orbital inclination. Skylab, Mir, and the ISS all have ~50° inclinations, far short of what their ~200 mile altitudes would require. — Lomn 19:46, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Let's not forget atmospheric refraction! —Tamfang (talk) 20:27, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Even by the interpretation where you see the entire surface of Earth in sections, Gagarin is definitely wrong. He only flew once (the Soviets didn't want to risk losing their hero in an accident) and only made one orbit. So the parts of the Earth that were not near his orbital plane at that time of day would not have been visible. The first person to fly multiple orbits was Gherman Titov in the following Soviet mission; he stayed in orbit for a full day. But if these missions were only high enough above ground to see one of the poles when at apogee, then other pole would not have been visible.

I think the Apollo 8 astronauts are the best answer in what I think is the spirit of the question, but I have no idea which of the three men was the first to actually look out of the window and see that view. --Anonymous, 05:17 UTC, December 5, 2008.

Richard Nixon

Is this true that when Republican Richard Nixon was the president of U.S., he agreed with Pakistan about not recognizing Bangladesh in the 1970s? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.204.74.211 (talk) 15:37, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that's correct. See Bangladesh_Liberation_War#USA_and_USSR. --Sean 19:31, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

What's wrong with this ballot?

In the recent Minnisotta senate election, this ballot was being disputed by Al Franken. The challenge reason (if I'm reading it correctly) is "Not Coleman, is defaced." Regardless of the validity of the challege, what exactly was Franken claiming is wrong with this ballot? The voter obviously voted for Coleman nor do I see where the ballot was defaced.

http://senaterecount.startribune.com/media/ballotPDFs/yellowmedicine_CanbyW1_challengedballot2.pdf

216.239.234.196 (talk) 18:24, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I guess they mean the way the ovals were scribbled over rather than filled in neatly. I don't know how the US works, but in the UK a vote is valid as long as it is clear what the intention of the voter was, which it clearly is in this case. --Tango (talk) 18:52, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't know Minnesotan electoral law, but the fact that some of the scribble has made its way into the Al Franken oval would invalidate this ballot in some places. Algebraist 19:08, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I wonder if they might be contending that the voter may have started filling in the ovals, then changed their mind and scribbled out their choices? As they haven't marked any other choices and clearly placed the paper in the ballot box, it seems a very weak suggestion, but as I understand it, the general idea is that the candidates challenge any ballot where there could be any possible case to invalidate it. Warofdreams talk 20:37, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Some of the ovals on the back are more properly filled in. So I suppose you could argue that the guy voted for coleman, and then changed his mind and scribbled it out. So it is "not" a vote for "Coleman". Bit of a stretch though. APL (talk) 20:10, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

I agree with the previous responders. It's appears that Franken's team is claiming that the voter scribbled out his choices, which makes the ballot "defaced" and effectively invalid. What is perfectly clear to me is that the person who filled out this ballot is a sloppy idiot who can't follow simple instructions.  :-) --Zerozal (talk) 21:20, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Or just old or disabled or has a tic or whatever. But probably technically invalid, which is as good a reason as any to object to it if you are trying desperately (as both sides are) to invalidate as many ballots for your opponent as possible. No doubt the Coleman camp is doing exactly the same thing, as they are producing even more "contested" ballots than Franken's camp is, at the moment. The margin of votes to determine one or the other is at the moment less than 100 which is close enough to try and pull out all the stops. (Personally I think it's close enough for a re-vote, as it is so close that there is no margin of error for it, but whatever. ) --140.247.11.38 (talk) 23:13, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

The vote for alderman looks weird too. Why vote for "Write-In" and then not write anyone in? APL (talk) 20:06, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Well it does say, 'if any'. If I were voting there and didn't read the instructions, and wasn't otherwise aware of practice, I might presume that if you wanted to not vote you choose write in, if any, but don't write in. What makes it a odd is he/she did not vote at all for others. Perhaps he/she didn't like the candidate but wasn't aware of any other write-in candidates and either wanted to express his/her displeasure or thought it would make a difference Nil Einne (talk) 18:00, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Irish Law

Describe the important events which lead to the adoption of the 1922 Irish Constitution. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.100.234.21 (talk) 18:43, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

We don't answer homework here; check the index of your textbook. Matt Deres (talk) 18:48, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Also check out Constitution of the Irish Free State. Algebraist 19:06, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

We also have an article on the History of the Republic of Ireland, but it should be the best two references for answers to your question are going to be: 1) The textbook your teacher gave you at the start of the class and 2) the class notes you wrote down the day your teacher taught you this. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 19:57, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Make sure you spell the question correctly when you write your answer: "led to the adoption". Itsmejudith (talk) 21:00, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

For a start, the Easter Rising and its aftermath, the Conscription Crisis of 1918, the Irish general election, 1918, the Irish War of Independence, and the Partition of Ireland. But (also for a start) see Norman invasion of Ireland, Tudor reconquest of Ireland, Cromwellian conquest of Ireland, Williamite War in Ireland, Irish Famine (1740–1741), Irish Rebellion of 1798, Great Famine (Ireland), Irish Famine (1879), and Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898. Strawless (talk) 23:11, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Paper on Cotton in the "India Trade"

I am currently gathering Arabic, Jewish, Indian, and Chinese sources for a paper I am writing. It will briefly detail the history of cotton trade in the middle east and Asia and focus on how the lack of large scale cotton production in Song Dynasty China might have led Muslim and Jewish "India Traders" to bring the product to China. My initial research shows cotton was probably grown in China during the ancient dynasties, but remained rare. Foreign cotton was introduced into China during the Tang and was not produced on a large scale until the late Song Dynasty.

I already have a good bit of Jewish sources via books on Cairo Geniza letters by S.D. Goitein, but I am falling short on all of the others. The Cotton article holds little if any material that I can use. Hopefully there are some people here that know of some good sources on the subject. I would also like to give examples of certain foreign merchants that came to China to find their fortune (not necessarily for the pillar of travel like Ibn Battuta). I think several good examples would help support my theory. Thanks in advance for any help provided. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 19:33, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Have you seen Radhanite? Chesdovi (talk) 23:17, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Seek knowledge even as far as China

Muslims have a Hadith that roughly translates to "Seek knowledge even as far as China". Does Judaism have a similar saying? A fellow member of WP:WikiProject Judaism told me the "Book of Proverbs is dedicated almost exclusively to the importance of acquiring knowledge and wisdom. To my knowledge, the Ancient Hebrews probably did not know of China." But according to Donal Leslie's Survival of the Chinese Jews, "A few Greek writers used the term Thinae, as opposed to the more common Seres" to designate China. I imagine the Jews knew of it if the Greeks did. I understand Greek was one of the languages spoken by the ancient Jews. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 20:59, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

I would imagine that most western peoples knew of China. Rome certainly did, the Greeks established nations at China's doorstep (i.e. Bactria). Chinese goods could be found in most parts of the Old World, and western goods found their way to China throughout most of recorded history. The Hebrews in ancient times were not very populous people (despite the millions claimed in the Bible, most historical estimates make the estimate population of the people that would become the Jews MUCH smaller than that). For that reason, I would not be surprised if there is no evidence of direct contact between the ancient Jews and Chinese in the way that Greeks and Chinese or Ethopians and Chinese likely had contact; however contact does not mean knowledge. As Jews had frequent contacts with people who themselves likely had contact with the Chinese, its unlikely that the China as a nation was entirely unknown to the Jews. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 21:20, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Sometimes ancient Greeks and Romans refered to the "Seres" as the source of silk traded through a northern route, and the "Sines" as something approached through a southern sea route beyond India, without being certain whether the two were the same or different. But I'm not sure what this has to do with the possible existence of an analogous Jewish saying, which wouldn't necessarily have to refer to China at all... AnonMoos (talk) 21:45, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Ancient Jews did speak Greek — virtually everyone around the eastern Mediterranean did, to an extent, for several centuries — but this was after Alexander's conquests. What do you mean by "ancient", however? If you mean in the time when Hebrew, rather than Aramaic, was the typical cradlespeech, the period you mean extends (if I remember right) only a little while after the Exile, long before the Greeks conquered the region. An occasional Jew might have travelled far enough to the east to have learned of China, but I seriously doubt that it would have been known by an established Jewish community. If you're meaning the pre-exilic period when most or all of Proverbs was composed (after all, Hezekiah was a century before the Babylonian conquest), I would say it virtually impossible: given that 2 Kings 20.14 speaks of Babylonian envoys to Hezekiah as being "from a far country, from Babylon" (NJPS), I can hardly imagine even well-educated residents of the state of Judah having a chance of knowing about China. Nyttend (talk) 02:27, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, the term "far country" could just mean "not next door". It doesn't mean neccesarily "the farthest place we know about." Even pre-exilic Jews had contact with black Africa, such places as Ethiopia. Its about 2000 miles from Isreal to the horn of Africa, while its about 3000 miles from Isreal to Tibet. I wouldn't put it out of the realm of possibility that the Jews had knowledge of China, even if they didn't have contact with the chinese. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 05:06, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Back to the OP, it should be noted that Islam was founded in the 600's AD; Jews in 600 AD can with certainty be said to have known about china.--Jayron32.talk.contribs 05:06, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

For general western contact with China, we have Sino-Roman relations. Some article also mentions that Buddhists may have been present in ancient Athens, but I can't find it at the moment. Adam Bishop (talk) 15:03, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

I doubt that there were practicing Buddhists in Athens, but there WERE Greeks in Bactria and India who converted to Buddhism. See Greco-Bactrian Kingdom, and Indo-Greek Kingdom and expecially Menander I.

Ok, back to the topic at hand. Does Judaism have a saying similar to the Muslim hadith mentioned above? --Ghostexorcist (talk) 19:50, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't know. Nyttend (talk) 19:26, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Finding a blog post on immigration law

This is a far-out request, but I figure if anyone can help find it, it's Wikipedia. Two years ago, while researching some cases on British law, I stumbled across a blog written by an anonymous lawyer in the US. One of the blog's most visited and well-known posts was the lawyer's story of defending his foreign-born (I believe European) wife from deportation. It dealt with the corruption and opacity of the American naturalization/immigration process, and related how he had to fight tooth and nail, ultimately arguing single-handedly in a federal court against lawyers from I think DHS or INS. The judge ruled in his wife's favor, and forced the government to let her stay. That's the rough outline of the story. I've done my darndest to find the story using Google, but I have come up with nothing so far. Does anyone else remember this story, or have an idea of how I might find it? Johnleemk | Talk 23:11, 4 December 2008 (UTC)