Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2009 May 4

= May 4 =

University Suicide
I want to raise awareness about the causes of suicides in university. I don't want to write a letter to an editor to the newspaper (although I would be happy to do so, if someone would help me) (as in if the letter was an open one where the editor publishes it in the newpaper). What can I do?68.148.149.184 (talk) 01:07, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * No disrespect, but if you need help with writing a letter to an editor at a newspaper, perhaps you aren't quite ready to undertake a project like this by yourself. You might want to contact a local organization that works to prevent suicides and see if they need volunteers, or make a donation to them. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 01:31, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I'd be happy to start a blog or something like that.68.148.149.184 (talk) 02:12, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Then start one. Do what you want to do.  Saying that you will be happy to do it is one thing.  Actually performing the action is another. --  k a i n a w &trade; 03:05, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Well, good news: a blog's really easy to set up. Check out Blogspot or WordPress.com, for example. Good luck! -- Captain Disdain (talk) 05:00, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Is a blog the best way to go about spreading awareness and a soapbox for university suffering and suicide and causes of university suicide?68.148.149.184 (talk) 05:26, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * That mostly depends on how good a writer you are, I suppose. Seriously, though: what do you want to say about the topic? Who do you want to say it to? It seems to me that you think it's important, which is fair enough, but you don't really know what to do about it. I again recommend you contact a suicide prevention group in your area and talk to then. Chances are that they can tell you how you can help. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 07:04, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Infinite Perception
Me and my friends were talking the other day and we came to the realization that what we, as human, perceive right now is not truly reality, in the sense that our brains filter out information and that our senses are not capable of perceiving certain sensations. For example, when we walk our dogs outside, they're always sniffing around, smelling things that we cannot sense. We then tried to understand what it would be like if we could obtain infinite perception, what would the universe be like? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.21.109.135 (talk) 03:25, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * See the Omniscience article. Tempshill (talk) 04:14, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * You may be interested in reading the philosphy of various thinkers including the Phenomenalism of David Hume, which holds that reality is ONLY what we perceive, and it makes no sense to think of reality outside of perception. Another important school of thought is that of Phenomenology by Edmund Husserl which is a more pragmatic view of the relationship between perception and reality. Both represnet opposing viewpoints in the school of thought known as Positivism which maintains that all knowledge derives from experience. There are VOLUMES of philosophy texts written on the relationship between senses, perception, and reality.  --Jayron32. talk . contribs  04:19, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * There's also the completely opposite philosophy that reality is one thing, and our perception of reality is another thing. Which is supported by the fact that one person's perception of an event can be very different from another's.  Even if they were identical, that still wouldn't mean that they have truly accessed "reality".  All we know about "reality" is what we can perceive or intuit about it, and that's the best we have to work with.  --  JackofOz (talk) 05:49, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Voltaire wrote a funny little "science fiction" short story Micromegas on this subject... AnonMoos (talk) 14:07, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

On a more practical note, and not entirely related to the OPs question, I would like to point out that it would make you insane. Those with "heightened awareness", shall we call it, can be driven to distraction by the enormity of information that they take in. This is not dissimilar to idiot-savants and some extreme forms of autism. Our filtering of the universe happens for extremely good reason; our brains are simply not capable of processing the information and still retaining much in the way of thought or emotional intelligence. In some science fiction, I think that some extraterrestrial beings are bestowed with greater abilities in this area than humans are, because it's been recognised for years as one of our primary limitations. On another note, and even more removed from the OPs post, you notice a lot more of the physical universe than you think you do. The subconscious is a trap for a lot of perception that our conscious minds filter even further. This is part of the reason why hypnotism is used to try and extract information from people, often information that they are not even aware of knowing. For example, a witness to a crime may not remember what the assailant looked like or what he was wearing, but these details may very well be stored in the unconscious mind. You might not be able to smell the things your dog smells, but if you could, a lot of it would probably be lost somewhere in your unconscious mind as extraneous detail.  Mae din \talk 13:44, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I see what you guys are talking about. But I was going off the base that we COULD perceive everything and it wouldn't be a problem. I think it would go beyond the sense of smell and everything, it would have to do with perceiving all quantum particles and they systems they create. My friends and I thought that it would appear just a point, centered at your position of perception. Your thoughts? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.21.109.135 (talk) 14:28, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * That what would appear just a point? What is the question?  Tempshill (talk) 15:42, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * The point appears to be to continue the chat. // BL \\ (talk) 22:35, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

As Psychology suggests, our perception of the world is unique to each individual, and is the sum of all our past experiences. Some people see better than others, some hear, smell or feel better than others. All of us have past experiences which affect the way we see ourselves and the world in which we live. If we all had the ability to know everything the world would appear as a finite set of challanges, all of which have been met before, just waiting for death. Our unique perspective on life in the world is what generates our drive to succeed, evolve and ultimately to do many of the fantastic things we do. Personally, i don't think my experience could be enhanced by being able to smell piss on a lamp post, but if it troubles you then go for it. russ (talk) 00:44, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

What I'm asking goes beyond human senses. Take a look at the light spectrum, you can see that the human eye can only perceive a very small portion of what it actually out there. My question is what would the world look like to a conscience being that has no limits to his perception. What would the world look like if he could perceive everything that there was to perceive in the universe: atoms, galaxies, radio waves, chemical reactions... and time especially? I'll try to redefine the "point" I was talking about. The only conclusion that we (my friends and I) could come up with, the solution to what the universe would look like if a conscience being had infinite perception, was that everything would be a point, because it would be both infinitely small and infinitely large at the same time. But we are unsure about this theory, so I was wondering what the internet would have to say about it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.21.109.135 (talk) 02:46, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I thought that it would appear just a point. Perhaps missing the point, so to speak, but there is an old Zen koan about the entire universe being One Bright Pearl. Dōgen, a Zen master and philosopher wrote about it as well. The main line is "The entire world of the ten directions is one bright pearl". The "ten directions" bit supposedly indicates that this is the totality of reality being discussed--all that is with nothing outside it. One bright pearl? Pfly (talk) 07:36, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Mainstream bibles around the world
In the English-speaking world, KJV is the most-widely used translation of the Bible. What are the most widely used versions of the Bible of other languages? How old and linguistically-outdated are they? -- Toytoy (talk) 11:41, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Which languages? Does Bible translations by language help?  (Some of the language entries are sub-pages.)  Tempshill (talk) 13:54, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * The KJV is the standard "classical" Bible translation into the English language, but I would question whether it's the most widely-used at this point... AnonMoos (talk) 14:11, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Close, it seems, but not quite. this page lists the New International Version as the most popular, with the New King James Version second and King James Version third. I don't know if KJV and NKJV combined would outsell the NIV. DJ Clayworth (talk) 15:35, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Of course, the word 'used' opens up a whole 'nother barrel of monkeys. I would expect that the KJV would be more commonly given say as a baptism or wedding present than other versions but rarely used while the NIV is more likely to be actually read. Now finding statistics on that would be a real challenge. Rmhermen (talk) 15:41, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * In my experience the NIV is the most used version in Protestant Churches in the U.S. My pastor intentionally will read from a variety of translations, but the pew bibles in the church are NIV.  And, of course, the sales numbers quoted above make it clear that the NIV is the top selling bible.  On a personal note, I find the language in the NIV more accessable than even the New King James version, which may go some to explaining its popularity.  --Jayron32. talk . contribs  20:53, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * I suspect that the KJV is most often quoted, because it is public domain, while NIV and other modern translations are still subject to copyright. Steewi (talk) 03:28, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Luther's Bible had a significant impact on the German language and I think (but am not 100% sure) that many other Germanic early modern bibles were translated into their respective languages from Luther's translation. Greenshed (talk) 18:50, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Greenshed is correct about the Luther Bible being important for German. Other languages have similar versions that are important for their language. Dutch speakers have the Statenvertaling, Chinese speakers have the Chinese Union Version, and Spanish speakers have the Reina-Valera. As for other comments in this thread. I would dispute the NIV is the most used English version in US Protestant churches. In my experience the KJV seems to be the most used (this is based on going to Baptist churches in the South). The NIV seems to be used the most in military chapels. Steewi is incorrect in stating that the KJV is PD. In England, it isn't. I know a guy who wrote Cambridge asking for permission to use the KJV in his Bible program for the iPhone App Store. For more details on how this works, see the KJV article. - Thanks, Hoshie 03:52, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Proto-Helladic period
What is the difference between proto-Helladic and Early Helladic? In the Helladic period article it says Early Helladic II is 2500-2300 BC. However in this article it is indicating the second Proto-Helladic period is 2700-2200 BC. I am trying to get this accurate for the Dokos shipwreck article, which has cargo evidence of about 2200 BC.--Doug Coldwell talk 11:48, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Suggestion: post this query on the discussion page for the Helladic period article, then post a head's up on the two WikiProject pages (WikiProject Greece and WikiProject Archaeology) mentioned there, with a link to your query. This is a great way to alert editors knowledgeable in this field, and also directly documents the query and responses where they'll be most pertinent, i.e. rather than the Ref Desk archives. (I do this often with highly specific queries in geography :-) -- Deborahjay (talk) 16:23, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Thanks, sounds logical. Great idea, did as you suggested. They will have better knowledge on that. We'll see what happens now.--Doug Coldwell talk 16:57, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

world heritage sites
Why no new objects from the US have been inscribed on the world heritage list since 1995? Is it becaause of some beef between the US and the UNESCO? Why do they keep inscribing on the list such sleepy rural places as Sabbioneta? Would they like to attract more tourists to Europe? Your article doesn't offer any clue. --212.73.96.111 (talk) 12:08, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Sabbioneta was founded in the late 16th century, at that time there were just a handful of European settlements in North America. It is natural that there will be more heritage sites in Europe than the US. (Of course, there were Native Americans around long before European colonisation but by my understanding (which, I'll admit, is rather limited in this area) they didn't have many permanent settlements or other things that would still be around today and worth making a world heritage site.) --Tango (talk) 14:24, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * World Heritage Sites can be natural sites, not only cultural ones (like Yellowstone and Yosemite, on the list). The U.S. already has more sites listed than any other country in the Americas, according to List of World Heritage Sites in the Americas. Given a quick scan it looks like Europe has more sites on the list than the rest of the world combined, which may say something about the politics of the listings (or desire to have sites listed). Rmhermen (talk) 15:38, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Projects marred by human rights allegations?
What large projects/events/constructions have been 'marred' (cancelled, even) by allegations of human rights abuses? Beijing 2008, for example, comes to mind. The abuses could be of the workforce or others related to the project. Similar things, like bad health and safety leading to deaths, are also useful to know. Cheers for any help, LHMike (talk) 16:10, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I think you will need to narrow your question, especially the definitions of "marred" and "human rights abuses", because if those two definitions are read broadly, an extremist's answer might be "every construction project in the industrialized world". Does "marred" extend to "a reporter has claimed someone is concerned"?  Does "human rights abuses" extend to "earning five dollars a day"?  These refinements of your question could make the answer meaningful.  Tempshill (talk) 18:15, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Likewise, do you want cases where unfounded accusations caused the damage (i.e. there was no basis for the allegations, but they caused real damage anyways) or where there were real human rights abuses, and where the exposition of those abuses was met with real consequences in the form of sanctions? The tone of the question makes it hard to answer.  --Jayron32. talk . contribs  20:48, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Beijing 2008 was not marred by "human rights" treatment of any workers or anyone involved with the project. You may remember (or not) that the "human rights issues" were all somehow grafted onto the event by some fairly sophisticated PR-manipulation. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 22:38, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Well, surely the event didn't exist in a vacuum, though. China has a pretty bad human rights situation. China hosted the Olympics. The latter is a kind of an obvious tool for protesting the former, and I think it'd be hard to say that there's no connection between the politics of the host country and the event the host country organizes and hosts. I mean, maybe the human rights of the people involved with the project weren't infringed upon, but considering that among other things, China actually banned Tibetans from working in Beijing during the olympics, which led to plenty of people being fired from their jobs, I'd say that it definitely had an impact. (Anyway, personally, I consider that particular issue both more interesting and important than figuring out which dude runs fastest.) -- Captain Disdain (talk) 06:58, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * That's not what the OP asked for, though. He asked for a major project derailed because of its human rights issues. For one, the Olympics was not derailed, and for two, if we are going to talk about Olympic games affected by extraneous political action, then almost every game fits that bill - Moscow, Los Angeles, Berlin ... Even the Sydney Olympics attracted masses of protesters passionate about, if I recall correctly, Aboriginal rights. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 10:12, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, "marred" was the specific word he used, which doesn't mean that the project would have to be derailed or ruined, just made less perfect or attractive. Considering the amount of negatiev press generated by the whole thing, I think it's safe to say that the Beijing Olympics were marred to some degree by it. In any case, China definitely engaged in plenty of activities with a dubious impact on human rights directly because of the Olympics, as the Seattle Times article referenced below demonstrates. (The Human Rights and Censorship section of our article on Concerns and controversies over the 2008 Summer Olympics lists a number of other incidents that aren't exactly the sort that bring to mind liberty and an overall respect for human rights.) I don't think the same could be said of the Sydney Olympics, but I may be wrong -- and if I am, I don't think that would disprove my point. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 23:49, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * And I'd like to see a cite for Tibetans being fired during the Olympics for being Tibetan. It sounds like the kind of news stories that spreads because a foreign government policy is dressed up 100 times and sensationalised into a zippy headline. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 10:12, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Sure -- as this Seattle Times article puts it, "The worst came last week, when police told Horne he had to get rid of two bartenders who are of Tibetan origin. Horne was told no Tibetans could work in Beijing during the Olympics; police apparently fear they might mount disturbances in sympathy with the widespread protests this spring against Chinese repression." Is that true? Well, could be that it isn't. More to the point, though, would that be in any way inconsistent with the Chinese government's treatment of Tibetans and its other actions during the Olympics? I think not. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 23:49, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * If you're looking for examples of projects built with human rights abuses, you could look at the large-scale use of forced labor in and after World War II, e.g. Forced labor of Germans in the Soviet Union, Forced labor in Germany during World War II, Japanese war crimes. Even in the UK POWs were used in building projects such as the harbor of Scapa Flow, in contravention of international law.
 * More recently, many dam projects seem accused of human rights abuses, either forced labor to build them or the removal of people from their homes before they are flooded. E.g. Irrawaddy dam in Burma, Merowe Dam in Sudan, Ilisu Dam in Turkey. --Maltelauridsbrigge (talk) 11:49, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Fact checking, educational system
I took this from the NYT: "students can spend 40k or more per year to be herded into an auditorium for a lecture from some sage only to be actually taught by graduate students is a scandal that no K-12 institution could ever get away with." Is that possible? What institution charges 40k and do that? --80.58.205.37 (talk) 17:54, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I would expect that at most research universities, some portion of the teaching is done by graduate students. I'm note sure if the quote is trying to say anything more than that, or not.  It's definitely phrased in an inflammatory manner&mdash;I don't remember border collies or cattle prods being involved.  -- Coneslayer (talk) 18:00, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Ah, a little fact checking helps so much. Googling a key phrase above took me to this blog. Notice that the sentence quoted above is not said to appear in the NYT article but in the comments to the NYT article. A little more searching took me to the article itself where the phrase doesn't occur.
 * In other words your quote is not from the NYT but from someone commenting on the NYT. So you can treat it with exactly the amount of attention it deserves. DJ Clayworth (talk) 19:31, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Does that really happen in the US? Here in NZ, postgraduate students may teach in labs/tutorials/etc and may mark papers etc but they don't tend to be involved in lectures except as assistants. At least in the sciences. Nil Einne (talk) 20:11, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I only recall a grad student giving 1 lecture when I was in school for engineering (2003-2008), and that was because they were filling in for a sick prof. 65.121.141.34 (talk) 20:14, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * There are two types of grad students: Masters students and PhD students. In many universities, the qualification to teach is a Masters degree.  Therefore, it is not surprising to have a PhD student giving lectures.  The student has met the requirements to teach, but is furthering his or her education.  In my opinion, the complaint is from a student who failed to learn.  Instead of accepting the blame, the student is attempting to blame the teacher.  I get that often.  Just this semester, a student turned in 4 out of 12 assignments and missed four full weeks of class.  He said that it was my fault for not calling him and telling him that he needed to show up to class and do his homework. --  k a i n a w &trade; 20:23, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * In NZ most lecturers have PhDs. This is I believe a requirement to be classified a lecturer in the university pay scale. I think I've heard of a few people without PhDs giving lectures in year 1 courses but they tend to be those who have a fair amount of experience teaching and are usually not postgraduate students and are I think usually primarily used when they couldn't find someone else. On the other hand a 400-600 student lecture is not uncommon in the first year so don't expect it to be very personally (although most lecturers would still be available for questions.) I agree with, it is amazing how many people will pay $40k (or whatever) and then not attend lectures etc, as well as how many students don't attend lectures etc and then are surprised when they fail. Nil Einne (talk) 20:31, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * The lectures in most universities in the U.S. are done by PhD. WHen I was in school, we had one class taught by a non-PhD, and he had two Masters degrees, one of which was in education.  Otherwise, the standard practice is for the PhD professors to give the lectures.  Graduate Students often staff the "Tutoring Center" or hold "Review Sessions" where people can go and ask questions and get help with their homework.  The quote in the OP is probably refering to the fact that the person who stated it learned more from the grad students assisting the professor than from the lecture itself.  That is unsurprising, as the sort of personal contact one gets from a grad student who is working in the Tutoring Center is far more than what one gets sitting in a lecture hall with 200 other students.  Also, that situation usually only exists with entry level classes.  My largest non-100 level class was probably 20 students.  So, in General Psychology you are likely to sit in a lecture hall with 200 other students.  But if you are taking an advanced psychology class, something expected of junior and senior level psychology majors, you are more likely to be in a small class of 20 or so students.  Also unsurprising.  Lets face it, what you are going to learn in Psych-101 or whatever the freshman level class is, you could easily teach yourself from the textbook.  The real learning happens in the advanced classes, where the professor's unique expertise in the subject comes to bear.  The sad fact is, as alluded to above, many people in U.S. colleges never make a serious commitment to their education, and so take "easy" majors without academic rigor, so ALL of their classes are taught in 200 person lectures.  --Jayron32. talk . contribs  20:46, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * In the UK, it depends on the subject - most subjects these days are taught almost exclusively by people with PhDs (barring the occasional lecture where the regular lecturer can't make it due to illness or another engagement, and tutorials/supervisions/labs/etc. that are sometimes taken by postgraduate students). Some subjects do allow people without PhDs to teach, but they would be professional teachers, not students, usually with at least a Masters degree (and probably some kind of teaching qualification) - usually arts subjects more than science subjects, although my Uni's Computer Science dept includes quite a few lecturers without PhDs (it is, however, a rubbish department and will, as of next year, be merged into Engineering because it can't manage itself [they say it is because of low student numbers, but everyone knows the truth]). --Tango (talk) 23:15, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

I once taught a university lecture before I had any formal university degree at all (I hadn't graduated with my BS degree but it was nearly complete and I'd been allowed to start taking MS classes). The year after I again taught a lecture, this time armed with a formal BS degree. In both cases the reason was that the professor was absent. Now, the curious thing is that both those years the lecture was on the same topic - I wonder if it's a coincidence that the professor always happened to have other engagements when the time came to teach floating point arithmetic... Haukur (talk) 15:11, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't blame him... --Tango (talk) 15:46, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

when was oral sex invented?
when was oral sex invented? the article doesn't seem to say... 79.122.30.40 (talk) 20:00, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Because it almost definitely happened multiple times and in multiple places long, long before we had any semblence of written records. Bonobos also practice oral sex as do other animals so it likely predates anything resembling modern humans. Nil Einne (talk) 20:05, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * oh. I thought no animals did, and humans didnt a long time ago. 79.122.30.40 (talk) 20:57, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * As a general rule of thumb, any statement that starts "Humans are the only animal that..." is almost certainly wrong. Numerous such ideas have been assumed to be correct only for someone to find an animal that does it too. People used to think only humans used tools, but that was proved wrong. Then they assumed only humans made tools, but that was proved wrong too. People have assumed various things about humans and language that have been proven wrong. Humans really only differ from the rest of the animal kingdom by degree - we have more complex language skills than any animal (that we know of, at least), but there is no simple cutoff point which humans achieve and other animals don't. Similarly, we make more advanced tools, but there is no simple dividing line between simple tools that animals can make and advanced tools that only humans can make. Sexual activity for pleasure, rather than procreation, has long been assumed to be a purely human thing, but it isn't true. Bonobos, dolphins, etc. all do it. Oral sex is no different from other forms of sexual pleasure, many of which have been observed in the animal world - masturbation, homosexuality, prostitution... --Tango (talk) 21:11, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * OK, I'll bite (possibly an inappropriate choice of words in a thread about oral sex). What animals engage in prostitution? --Richardrj talkemail 11:56, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
 * We know of penguins but there are probably others. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 12:37, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
 * maybe the fact that they're all walking around in tuxedos has something to do with it... 94.27.168.220 (talk) 22:29, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Or maybe not. Tuxedo-clad entities would be more likely to be the clients of prostitutes than the prostitutes themselves.  --  JackofOz (talk) 20:56, 6 May 2009 (UTC)
 * "Only humans sell subprime mortgage-backed securities"? --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 22:33, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, if you go specific enough then obviously you can find things. "Only humans engage in economics" would be false, though (there are plenty of examples of animals trading - penguins even trade sex for stones). --Tango (talk) 23:02, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Do you think all sellers of subprime mortgage-backed securities deserve to be called human? I think the jury is out.
 * But, more seriously, I agree that efforts to find humans unique among species have to go towards the abstruse. - Jmabel | Talk 04:54, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Follow up based on findings from Tango's response above
After reading the above responses I thought i'd have a look around at what the 'key' separators were between Humans and animals. I always thought one of our key separations was that we are able to 'consider' the thoughts of others - I can't think of the appropriate word for it, but essentially that we can put ourselves in someone else's shoes (sort of like empathy). Anyhoo i've no idea if it's true - just something I heard. Anyhoo onto my actual question. According to our article Human we are one of 9 animals that pass the Mirror test. I thought that was quite interesting and I wondered - are there examples of humans that do not pass the test? (i'd rule out blind/physically disabled) - more of question of those that lack the, presumably, mental function that makes us pass the test. ny156uk (talk) 22:26, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * I think empathy is, indeed, the word you are looking for (although empathy is usually used when referring to the emotions of other people rather than more general thoughts, so perhaps there is a better word). That is one of the things people have assumed only we can do and have been proven wrong. Empathy gives a very brief discussion, but I have seen more detailed examples (just can't find them now!). --Tango (talk) 23:05, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Oh, and as for people failing the mirror test, you just have to take a human that is sufficiently young or mentally disabled. You can't rule out the mentally disabled since you are talking about a mental disability - you could ask if it is possible to lack that ability and not any others, but it would be a little difficult to define. --Tango (talk) 23:09, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
 * The initial phenomenon you describe may be theory of mind. --superioridad (discusión) 07:17, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
 * "Sufficiently young," by the way, can be surprisingly old. Many of my (apparently not mentally-challenged) teenage students have a near-total inability to empathize with another's emotional state, although most can fake empathy to a degree. Aylad ['ɑɪlæd] 14:58, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
 * The mirror test isn't about empathy, it's about self awareness. I expect your students are aware of themselves, just not anyone else. --Tango (talk) 15:45, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Only humans argue about whether or not humans are unique. :P —Tamfang (talk) 03:49, 6 May 2009 (UTC)