Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2008 October 19

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October 19

Prime Minister of Israel

Israel... why is Ehud Olmert still as Prime Minister in the article?. That corrupt resigned and now is Tzipi Livni. Please, can I modify that?, it's a TOP ARTICLE.--190.49.99.119 (talk) 01:22, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Removed a few ???? from the heading. KnightLago (talk) 01:23, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Made it even more meaningful. This isn't a question about the use of the word "why". -- JackofOz (talk) 01:28, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

From what I gather, Livni isn't the Prime Minister until she organizes a government. Right now she is Acting Prime Minister. Grsz^X 01:27, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Estimated Living AND dead world population as of 2008?

Hi all.

I was reading up on the World population article, and its projections for world population in the future and in the distant past. I was wondering what kind of a number you'd get if you added all those figures together. Granted, a lot of people that were alive in, say, 1750 were also alive in 1800. And some possibly even in 1850.

So I'm curious, how many people would you estimate, are living/have lived as of 2008? And how would you go about calculating that figure?

Much help appreciated ! -=- Xhin -=- (talk) 04:31, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, in the article you linked to, there is a section on precisely this! Look at the number of humans who have ever lived, and you'll notice three things:

1. There's A LOT of dead people
2. It's really hard to estimate exactly how many
3. But the best estimates put the number of humans who have ever lived somewhere between 90-110 billion (meaning that whole "half of everyone who has ever lived is living now"-saying complete nonsense) Belisarius (talk) 04:45, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

I read somewhere (maybe in a novel?) that the number of humans who had ever lived was the sames as "the number of stars in the sky". Certainly poetic, but very likely untrue :-) Astronaut (talk) 07:56, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

It's false. The naked human eye can only see a few thousand stars, even on a clear night. If you count every star in the galaxy, that's more than the number of humans who have ever lived, but on the same scale (about 200-400 billion). Algebraist 09:43, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

It's false as stated, but that's because Astro misremembered it. The passage is from the very beginning of 2001: A Space Odyssey. And what Sir Arthur C. Clarke actually wrote there was:

Behind every man alive stand thirty ghosts, for that is the ratio by which the dead outnumber the living. Since the dawn of time, a hundred billion human beings have walked the planet Earth. Now this is an interesting number, for by a curious coincidence there are approximately a hundred billion stars in our local universe, the Milky Way. So for every man and woman who has ever lived, in this universe there shines a star.

So it's not "in the sky", as Astro said, but it is "in the galaxy", as Algie said. Those words were published in 1968, and the world's population has more or less doubled since then, but the estimate of the number of people who have ever lived is still about right. So for "thirty" in the passage, you can now read "fifteen". As to the number of stars in the galaxy, I can find some pages on the web that agree with the count of 100 billion given by Clarke and others that agree with the higher count given by Algie. I don't know which is the most reliable number today. I wouldn't expect it to be known all that closely anyway. --Anonymous, 22:27 UTC, October 19, 2008.

I've been told that not many people who've gone in for maths or computer science have ever died. Sounds good to me. Dmcq (talk) 13:28, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

The "maths" part is just plain silly -- people have gone in for it since our ancestors began counting on their dirty, stubby fingers. As for computer science, the field is new (relative to math or even aviation) and so hasn't had much time have its adherents shuffle off this mortal coil. Mother COBOL developed the first compiler in the early 1950s, though if she were still alive, she'd be 101. An Wang died in 1990. Once you get away from the early days of mainframes, you're well inside normal life expectancy: Steve Jobs was born in 1955, as was Bill Gates; Dan Bricklin, co-creator of VisiCalc, is 57. While computer science is presently a young field, every person had a telephone in 1890 is dead. --- OtherDave (talk) 03:46, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

This has already been asked.-Ohanian (talk) 08:20, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reference_desk_archive/Humanities/2006_September_4#Number_of_Humans_Since_the_Beginning

hindu religion

Most of bhajans and shlokas in indian languages talk of ekoter kul. What doed this mean , how it is derived and why ekoter? (ekoter kul means seventy one generations) Refer to Gandhiji's favourite bhajan "vaishnav jana to tene re kahiye" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.246.53.226 (talk) 07:00, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

In the Gujarati, kuL ekoter. For a beginning, see Vaishnav jan to. Strawless (talk) 20:09, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Origin of quote

Death Becomes Her is the title of a movie, but I've got a feeling it's quoting from somewhere/one. Does anyone know the origin of this as a quote? Not sure if it should be at the entertainment desk but since is askiing about a quote, it's here. Julia Rossi (talk) 09:31, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I did a search to try to see if it appeared as a quote prior to 1992 using a google book search restricted by date and only found it used as part of a sentence, so if it is from somewhere else, many authors have used it in the past unselfconsciously not flagging it as a quote from anywhere else when they penned it. I know, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, but it can be a good indication when your left trying to prove a negative.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 13:46, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Could it be an allusion to Mourning Becomes Electra? Strawless (talk) 19:58, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Maybe, sounds good. @ Fuhgettaboutit, do you have a link or ref I can chase up, even if an author is freely using it without ref – not having much luck with google books myself. Julia Rossi (talk) 03:26, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

How about Moonlight Becomes You? --LarryMac | Talk 17:52, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Can we find out the origin of the meaning of "to become" in the sense of "to suit or befit", and track down some of the early examples of its use. (Side question) I've heard "<something> becomes you" and "<something> becomes her", but never "<something> becomes him". It's usually said in fashion-related contexts. Does this mean that it's now only ever used in reference to women, and if so, why? -- JackofOz (talk) 22:58, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

And in the same way, I rarely hear 'becoming' in the related sense used with regard to a man. 79.66.33.140 (talk) 21:04, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

women in public life

1.women's participation in U.N.O
2.WOMEN IN PARLIAMENT —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.247.109.216 (talk) 12:11, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

What is your question? Julia Rossi (talk) 13:33, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

For these purposes, I will assume that the asker is querying as to whether there have been any women in [I think] the United Nations Organization or [slightly more obviously] in Parliament. For the first 'question', yes, Carmen María Gallardo Hernández, Claudia Blum , Kirsti Lintonen, María Fernanda Espinosa, María Rubiales de Chamorro (Nicaraguan ambassador since July 13, 2007), Paulette Bethel, Rosemary Banks, Susan Waffa-Ogoo (Gambia since August 25, 2008), Sylvie Lucas (Luxembourg since August 25, 2008), and possibly other (I could not find much more information). As to whether there have been woman in Parliament, yes, woman have been in many parliaments. I'm going to assume that you are referring to the UK Parliament, in that case, see this. I hope I helped. ATKX (talk) 03:57, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Judicial

I'm inclined to think Judicial Investigative Committee, Judicial Misconduct Complaint, and Judicial Misconduct are best redirected somewhere, but I can't figure out where. Grsz^Review! 13:52, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

I think it would be worthwhile to compile a single article on Judicial misconduct, and expand that article, as the other two seem subservient to it. The article could: a) define the nature of misconduct, with examples of different types b) examine how misconduct is invesitgated and c) what remedies are in place to both discourage and remediate if judicial misconduct is shown. These 3 articles deal with that. Lets put them all together into one. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 16:41, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Investment Trader Weekly Report

I am in an Intro to Business class and I have to write a weekly report on my 3 stocks that I chose. I'm wondering how to write this report. Is there anyone who knows what I'm talking about? I'm so confused. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.119.34.68 (talk) 16:18, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

My guess is that you should be looking for more than just the stock value; you should be doing research on the "fundementals" of the company with regard to its stock value. FWIW, insane TV personality Jim Cramer recommends that you do a minimum of 1 hour of reasearch per week for every single stock in your portfolio. Its good practice to learn EVERYTHING about the company you are investing in, such as what business are they in? What is the philosophy of the CEO? What is their business model? How do they do against their prime competitors in their own industry? In their larger sector? How is the industry or sector doing as a whole compared to other industries? How does the company's stock value compare to the real value of the company? How does the price of the stock compare to the earnings of the company? Etc. Etc. Remember, you're not simply buying pieces of paper; you are actually buying a piece of a company. If you own stock, you literally own that company. Its generally, therefore, a good idea if you know everything you can about that business you now own. I would base my report on that sort of information. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 16:37, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Iceland has gone bankrupt -really?

Can any country really go bankrupt? Surely all they need to do is to print more money to pay their debts? (This will result in inflation and a depreciated currency, but that's another story). 78.149.192.49 (talk) 17:33, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually, not at all. There is no requirement that the creditors accept payment of debts in Iceland's currency; if they do, they are likely to demand that the moneys be paid on an open-market value as compared to a more stable currency; like the Euro or Dollar. All that bankruptcy means is that the debtor is unable to pay back the creditors under the terms of the debt. For a government, this can be caused if there is not enough cash on hand to pay back the bonds that are coming due. They could of course issue new bonds, but eventually people will stop buying bonds due to declining credit rating. After all, if the government can't even pay off the debts it has outstanding, who wants to purchase a stake in making that government even MORE indebted? Also, don't confuse specie (that is, hard currency) with money. The amount of printed currency in the world is a miniscule fraction of the "money" in the world; most money exists as bookkeeping entries in computer files. The debtors aren't paying off the creditors in stacks of bills; they are paying them off by transfering funds from one account to another. What is Iceland going to do with their debts, if their accounts don't have enough money in them to pay off the bonds they have outstanding? Printing more money is akin to declaring that there is just more money in the account.

"You only have $1,000,000 in your account"

"No we don't we have $10,000,000"

"How did you get more money?"

"Oh, we just said we could have more, and poof, there it is!"

Does that make any sense? --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:47, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Aren't government bonds usually denominated in local currency? Governments (or rather, central banks, they are often independent these days) can just add an extra nought to an account balance of their choice if they want, but it would cause inflation. Private banks have accounts with the central bank so the government can pay any bonds owned by those banks (or owned by customers of those banks, I guess) by just increasing that bank's account balance. There is no requirement that another balance be decreased by the same amount. Of course, there is nothing a bond owner can do if the government decides not to pay, since the government controls the law and the courts, so it's up to the government whether they default and destroy their credit rating or "print" money and cause hyperinflation. --Tango (talk) 18:19, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, of course a government could do all of those things. The question is whether it is wise to do them. Governments, like any other organization, need credit to operate. Even short-term credit, i.e. commercial paper is needed for doing things like paying government employees. If the government behaves as you describe, then it is likely that no one will grant any credit to said government. Sure, the government could just print more money to pay its employees with, but that money wouldn't be worth more than toilet paper. Per Gresham's law, people would begin to hoard any foreign currecny (which has any real value) and would take that off the market, further devaluing the curency. So you then have a population, with cash that has no value outside of their own borders. You can't even import food, since no one wants your cash, and indeed since the food producers in your own country can get better value by selling the food outside of the country, you can't even hold on to the food your country produces. This is a recipe for popular revolt. "Them belly full, but we hungry, a hungry man is an angry man." The French Revolution was pretty much caused by this exact scenario, and Spain in the course of about 50 years went from world power to backwater nation due to these exact problems. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 18:29, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

If Iceland were "financially embarrassed," and a ship or plane arrived with machine tools, clothes, food, books, fuel oil, electronics, cars, etc., I would expect that the Captain of the ship would be under instructions not to unload the product until funds have been transferred by the Icelandic government to the shipper in acceptable currencies such as dollars or Euros. The Icelandic government still has revenue coming in from income taxes, property taxes, sales taxes, import duties and excise taxes. It is their choice which debts to pay. A shipper has the option not to deliver. A contractor building a road could stop work until paid. A present government employee could refuse to work until paid. Soldiers or teachers could go on strike, at risk of severe punishment. A retiree on a government pension has no options. Edison (talk) 20:38, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Sure, it's extremely undesirable to do either of those things (default on debt or print money) but if the government has run out of cash, it has no choice but to do one or the other (it can raise taxes, but that won't actually increase tax revenue past a certain point and takes some time to kick in so doesn't help with short-term cash flow problems). --Tango (talk) 21:22, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, government bonds are denominated in local currency but Iceland has a considerable amount of external debt including public external debt. According to this recent rating report, its public external debt was 30% of GDP and its total external debt was 7 times GDP (see 2008–2012 Icelandic financial crisis#Sovereign credit ratings for more). So it's quite possible for a country to be unable to pay its debts. A country can also choose to default on its local currency obligations if it feels that the consequences of printing money to repay are worse than defaulting (see this for more). Zain Ebrahim (talk) 20:06, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

The Economy of Iceland article doesn't mention it, but I've heard that a lot of Iceland's GDP was investment income from wealth overseas. When the value of those deployed assets started to waver (And/or were frozen by foreign governments...), it means bad news for the overall tax base, reducing the creditworthiness of the central bank (government bond issues) and reducing demand for krona-denominated assets.

At it's core, the value of a currency is directly related to the value of the assets denominated in that currency. It used to be a lot of claims on overseas wealth. Now it's fish.NByz (talk) 05:13, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Kiwanis Club International constitution and bylaws

I would like to know more about this constitution and bylaws associated with this organization. I've conducted searches and have come up short, I don't seem to be able to find anything on it. I would be much obliged if you could help me track this information down and provide it for me, thanks in advance,

Jay —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.181.86.97 (talk) 18:31, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Click [1] for some stuff on bylaws. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 22:06, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

poverty

i am trying to establish a good definition of poverty. one that is considered to be the globally accepted definition. any help? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.180.106.222 (talk) 19:03, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Poverty is always relative: it's a measure of the local distance between the lifestyles, materials and technology available to the rich and to the poor.--Wetman (talk) 20:38, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

The European Union's standard definition of poverty is "Persons, families and groups of persons whose resources (material, cultural and social) are so limited as to exclude them from the minimum acceptable way of life in the Member State to which they belong". Strawless (talk) 21:01, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

There are lots of different definitions, a common one for "relative poverty" is an income less than a certain percentage (commonly 60%) of the median income for that country. Another common definition is less than $1 or $2 a day. Alternatively, you can choose a basket of goods that can just about sustain a person in that country (working out what are necessities and what are luxuries can be difficult, and will depend on the country) and work out the price of that. Which definition is best depends on what purpose you are putting your statistics to. We have an article, poverty threshold that discusses this. --Tango (talk) 21:12, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Teeth. Julia Rossi (talk) 09:41, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Many development economists define poverty as having access to basic "capabilities" (including being able to eat X number of calories per day, basic education etc.) You can draw that line wherever you want, but my point is just that, by that definition, every time relative prices change, the dollar value of the line in an arbitrary poverty threshold model ought to change.NByz (talk) 05:18, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

You have two forms of poverty, which are economicly acceptable definitions. Relative, and absoloute. absoloute, is $1-2 a day. relative is a certain % of a the average income in a country. 90.242.193.191 (talk) 21:12, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Half-joke: The definition for relative poverty in the "West" is there mainly, to keep people in "poverty" and thus the social workers and esp. the social state bureaucracy in bread and power. There is of course also real poverty here, some people I knew were dead poor. Inflation is a problem for everybody, of course is a nice clean way to rob the population of its money and create the illusion of growth at the same time. Inflation hits the poorer people hard and makes them realy poor, then you have to increase Welfare and bingo! another victory for state power--Radh (talk) 07:55, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Can USA Democratic or Republican Parties expel members?

Can the American Democratic or Republican parties expel members? Do they have any way of responding to entryism from the left or right? Can sections of the party be expelled over differences in ideology? If a party member with significant differences in beliefs from the local, state or national leadership, wins a primary can the party do anything to respond? --Gary123 (talk) 22:47, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

In relation to your last question, if their differences in belief were so great as to warrant taking expulsion action, wouldn't they be hardly likely to have become endorsed as a party candidate in the first place? Unless their beliefs changed radically between endorsement and election, but that also seems unlikely. And if that were the case, why would they want to be associated with that party anyway? -- JackofOz (talk) 22:52, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

As a practical matter, there is far less philosophical difference between the parties than they would have you believe. A Massachusetts Republican, like, for example, Bill Weld is far more "left" of say, a Yellow dog Democrat, such as Robert Byrd. Indeed, until the 1950's or so, the "solid south" was a Democrat stronghold, largely because of the Republican party's former history as the party of abolition, and no one has ever accused the south as being a particularly "liberal" part of America. In general, the concepts of "conservative" vs. "liberal" are more geographical than party-based. This has changed some in the past, but local "party machine" politics had, and in some cases STILL has, a greater effect on what affiliation a candidate has than actual political philosophy. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 23:59, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

There isn't really membership in parties in the US like in other countries. A party can refuse to endorse a candidate, and refuse to provide party funding. See David Duke. Little Red Riding Hoodtalk 04:08, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, this can happen, but appears to be very rare. There was a movement to expel Joe Lieberman when he lost his state's Democratic primary and ran as an independent[2]. "New Haven Democratic Registrar of Voters Sharon Ferrucci plans to research the request, which she said was the first of its kind in her two decades on the job." Edmund V. Bobrowicz was expelled from the dems after being accused of being a communist. A much more important historical example of something similar is the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. According to [3] Henry L. Stimson was expelled from the Republican Party for supporting FDR's aid to Britain, and Edwin F. Ladd was expelled from the Republicans for supporting Robert M. La Follette for president.[4]John Z (talk) 05:57, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

First of all, there is no mass-membership organization called the US Democratic or Republican party. There are only state and county parties that cooperate through national organizations such as the Democratic National Committee. A member of Congress can be expelled from his party's caucus by his peers but cannot be expelled from the national party itself. Whether a member could be expelled from a state party would presumably depend on the state. In Ohio, for instance, one automatically becomes a Republican by voting in a Republican primary, so there's no way the state Republican party could expel someone.

The two major parties generally accept that their candidates will have widely varying viewpoints, so there are few times in which a party would which to reject a candidate nominated in a primary. However, in extreme cases, such as when Lyndon LaRouche supporters won Democratic primaries in Illinois in 1986, the party can take actions such as publicly disassociating itself from the candidate, withholding party campaign funds and endorsing a third-party or independent candidate. However, the party cannot overturn the result of the primary election.

Both major parties are too humungous to be in danger of infiltration. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 22:57, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

If someone said "I am a Republican, but I disagree with every major tenet of the party's elected representatives, and with every part of their platform" the party cannot prevent the person from registering and voting in the Republican primary. If the person were an elected official, the Republican National Committee or other Republican organizations could find someone to run against him in the primary and fund the opponent so well that the dissident would lose the primary and not appear on the ballot as a Republican, or they could support his Democratic opponent in the general election. If he were in congress, they could deny him committee appointments and restrict his opportunities to speak on the floor or to get any of his legislation to a vote. Edison (talk) 00:34, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Joe Lieberman criticized the Democrats so much, that he was challenged in the 2006 Connecticut Democratic Party primary by Ned Lamont. Lamont won the party nomination, but Lieberman ran as an independent against Lamont and the Republican candidate, and won the general election. Since he is not the Democratic Party candidate, he lists himself as "Independent Democrat" and votes in the Democratic Party caucuses in the Senate. This is how the Democrats can claim to have a majority in the Senate, 51 to 49. Most of Lieberman's actual floor votes are Republican-leaning, however. If the Democrats can manage to gain a couple more Senate seats in the November election, they may decide they don't want Lieberman in their caucus any more. Little Red Riding Hoodtalk 20:04, 21 October 2008 (UTC)