Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2014 March 8

= March 8 =

How do I file for divorce
I wanna know how to file for divorce in Texas 65.175.250.237 (talk) 13:21, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
 * We cannot offer legal advice, but we can advise you to speak to a lawyer. Google Search gives some information, too. DISCLAIMER: The results of this Google search have nothing to do with Wikipedia, nor with any of Wikipedia's contributors.  KägeTorä - (影虎)  ( TALK )  13:30, 8 March 2014 (UTC)


 * If your spouse is poor, mentally retarded, under 18, doesn't speak English, or is not a US citizen, then the quickest way to get a divorce may well be to accuse them of a capital crime on very little evidence, and wait for them to be quickly convicted and executed. StuRat (talk) 22:28, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Define "quick" execution, in the US. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 22:34, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
 * StuRat, stop giving my spouse ideas!  Market St.⧏  ⧐ Diamond Way  22:45, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, with mine, two out of four ain't bad... :)  KägeTorä - (影虎)  ( TALK )  08:28, 9 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Two out of which four out of the five? --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  21:40, 9 March 2014 (UTC)

Conspiracy theory about Death of Adolf Hitler
How many people said they saw his body? The evidence in the article above seems kinda thin, since all appear to be connected to him somehow. On the top of that, the piece of skull, that was thought to be Hitler's, was not. It is also known that prominent Nazis fled to South America. Why wouldn't a man with all the power in his country board a submarine and disappear? I am not a friend of conspiracy theories, but in this case, how to prove that he died when they say he died? OsmanRF34 (talk) 18:14, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Berlin is a couple of hundred kilometres from the next plausible submarine harbour, all through allied-controlled territory. Hitler was 56, not particularly healthy, and one of the best-known faces on the planet. On another level, how do you prove anything in history? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:25, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Certain things have better evidence backing them than others. This is not about ancient history, but something that happened, in historical terms, recently. The submarine bit is just speculation. But he could have survived and have hidden in the same way that Saddam hid for a long time, or, Radovan Karadžić hid, and even attended conferences giving lectures to hundred of people, in a country where everyone knew him too. OsmanRF34 (talk) 18:46, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
 * As I recall from the early 90s, when a fair number of KGB secrets came out, there was no question they had Hitler's body. It's just that their secretiveness about it (and everything else), opened the door to various speculations. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 22:33, 8 March 2014 (UTC)


 * These ideas have been around a long time, and seem plausible enough to me. Here's a recent version of it  though that article is dismissive of the idea.  When I think of how much art and other treasure wormed its way out of Germany, and how much money Hitler would have had to bargain with, I find it very hard to believe he did not escape.  Especially when, as our article, otherwise sanitized, admits, the skull fragments of "Hitler" turned out to be someone else.  Also see Project Paperclip. Wnt (talk) 00:52, 9 March 2014 (UTC)  N.B. the case may well be settled soon enough.  The Mail article says he had daughters, and with large-scale DNA sequencing becoming easy, and touted for any number of reasons voluntary and involuntary, it should be possible to track back and figure out where each piece of their DNA came from in past generations, to the point where their ancestry is readily discoverable. Wnt (talk) 00:54, 9 March 2014 (UTC)
 * This is of course ignoring all the Germans who also saw him alive in the bunker in the last few days, and his entire character and life history... Adam Bishop (talk) 12:35, 9 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, you can drag any gang member, serial killer, child rapist, or terrorist out of the deepest hole in America and if he says something I might believe it, but I'm not inclined to hold those in Hitler's bunker in such high regard. And we know that a murder or an escape can happen and yet out of an entire prison not one person will speak up and say what happened. Wnt (talk) 16:44, 9 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Sure I guess, but you have to assume that everyone who ever associated with Hitler was a monster and a liar; shockingly some of them were just regular people like us... Adam Bishop (talk) 22:20, 9 March 2014 (UTC)
 * It doesn't seem like much of a stretch to me. Sure, someone like Albert Speer writes a lovely book that almost sounds like he just wanted to build pretty buildings, but if you look closely enough...  the illusion doesn't hold.  And prisons are full of ordinary people - lots of ordinary people are convicted wrongly, though no one will believe them.  But when push comes to shove, when there's something they're not supposed to talk about, they realize it's better to let the authorities keep scratching their heads than to spend the rest of their lives wondering if the last thing they'll see is their wives and kids having their throats cut.  Stop Snitchin' is a real thing even in the nominally "free" neighborhoods to which the poor are consigned.  And with the U.S. government very clearly, almost openly giving out free passes to every Werner von Braun to cross their doorstep, the Nazis would have been very clear on the idea that telling would be something with a huge downside and very little upside.  And that's before we even get to the carrot - that the Nazis were flush with billions in counterfeited money and stolen art, which could be disbursed immediately or on an installment plan.  The amount of Nazi plunder that has circulated, some to this day, also illustrates that Hitler could have passed through a military cordon rendered porous by large amounts of valuable goods. Wnt (talk) 04:41, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Your logic is unintelligible to me. The upside of telling the truth is that you can't be caught out in a lie. If you need to lie, the best approach is to do so with as little deviation from the truth as possible, as you are more likely to get away with it. Speer's books were not a pack of blatant lies. They were self-serving versions of events that obfuscated his own involvement and knowledge as much as he could get way with and be believed. A big fat lie that everyone sticks to about Hitler's death is just not plausible. Anyone who told the "truth" would have huge potential advantages from the allies, if the story was plausible. But it just wasn't. Hitler could easily have escaped if he'd wanted to. All he had to do was leave a few days earlier. But there was always the chance he'd eventually be captured, or handed over. And he'd have to live the rest of his life in obscurity as a fugitive. Nothing we know about his personality suggests that he would have wanted that. I don't even understand what you are saying about "Nazi plunder" helping him to pass through a "military cordon". None did that. It wasn't a case of bribing one guard. There were allied troops everywhere. They'd all have to be corrupt, which is just not plausible. Paul B (talk) 12:12, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Military people are very good at not looking into a crate or not looking into a truck when they're told the contents are secret. Whether it's a truckload of confiscated military prototypes, stolen art, or Fuhrer and friends drinking beer, who can say?  Provided they don't get drunk enough to start singing, anyway.  And we should remember that the U.S. made a lot of "practical" accommodations to get advantage over the Communists - including having virtually no successful war crimes trials of the Japanese who tortured American troops. Wnt (talk) 14:15, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
 * There was no "Practical" accommodation involved in helping Hitler to escape, which would have been to no advantage to anyone, and "military people" would only do as you say if they had clear orders to do so. No other Nazi leader got away in comparable circumstances. None. The essential point is that if Hitler had wanted to get away he could and would have arranged it earlier, rather than leaving it to the last minute when the chances of succeeding were remote. Paul B (talk) 15:29, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Well, it's simple. Yes, he could have run away months earlier (nobody denies that fact), but he was simple too lost. Hitler was known for living in his own world, which doesn't correspond with the reality. Even until the last month before German's surrender, Hitler still thought that Germans would win the war despite the obvious reality that sooner or later Germany will lose. Only until few days before the Soviet approached Berlin that Hitler finally had a wake-up call back to reality. Next thing, he was on his way to escape. And perhaps has a life similar to Josef Mengele. Plus Hitler can have children and train them to wait for the next opportunity to destroy the world (if there is no opportunities then they can keep waiting on until grandchildren and so on). Of course his descendants are pure speculation, but Hitler's escape seem to be more plausible. Last thing, perhaps, the whole thing was a big fat lie from the Germans. You simply just can't trust those who committed unbelievable notorious crimes or worship someone who advocated for those crimes. Perhaps, Hitler has in fact escaped months earlier and the whole thing was a big conspiracy, which is not that hard to do. All they have to do is lie and there is nothing the Allied can do. They know that! It's not like they're being tortured to say the truth. If they were being tortured and said that Hitler in fact was dead then I would believe them with no question. There is no motivation to say the truth. On the other side, there is a big motivation to lie that is to protect their idol or even their god, Hitler! Lastly, I don't get what you mean by huge potential advantages from telling the truth? What exactly do they get for telling the truths? Is the reward really outweighed the cost of betraying their biggest worshiped idol, Hitler?75.168.125.23 (talk) 02:08, 11 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Cash, intelligence reports on the Russians, military research, worldwide contacts... someone might have found an excuse, if already somewhat favorable to Nazi ideology. It is true of course that Nazi hunters went after lower profile targets than Hitler, but Adolf Eichmann wasn't exactly a nobody.  As for your argument that he could have escaped earlier -- he was at that point, frequently encountered in fiction, where the only way to be safe is to be "dead".   (Now to be sure, I'm not saying this is the only way; indeed, there is the somewhat amusing other option, so reminiscent of Osama bin Laden's peculiar burial, that would place Hitler in some nearly forgotten bunker hundreds and hundreds of floors below NKVD headquarters, hooked up to state of the art life support and facing periodic and most intense "interrogation" sessions without much concern for the answers even to this very day).
 * Eichmann was in Austria at the end of the war, which made in vastly easier to escape. Also, his face wasn't well known, and neither was his role in the Holocaust at first. Also he was a careerist, not an ideologue. People like Goering and Goebbels genuinely believed that the German people would be putting up statues to them as heroes in the future, as Goering said. They were proud to be Nazis. I'm pretty sure that Hitler wanted to be seen as a German hero who would die rather than surrender, believing that it would preserve his honour to posterity. Look how appalled he was at General Paulus. The last part of your comments make no sense at all to me. You seem to be entering surreal territory. Paul B (talk) 22:25, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Now, you're simply just speculating what Hitler most likely would have done based on what we know about Hitler. Don't forget that humans are very very complex, and for the most parts unpredictable. I need more concrete evidence or at least a more reliable witness. A bunch of Germans are completely unreliable. The Soviet is only second-hand source, which is likely to be false if the primary source was false. Or even worse, perhaps the Soviet knew Hitler escaped but made this whole thing up to cover the world because they knew if the world knows Hitler was still alive, nobody can rest and everyone would panic. There are many reasons to believe that the Soviet may have something to do with the cover up. They apparently had Hitler's ashes, but for some reasons choose to scatter it to the river. It seems like they wanted to destroy any evidence to prove that Hitler in fact didn't die. Why they didn't keep the evidence for verification in the future? The Soviet wasn't stupid. In the 1970's, there are plenty evidences that we're getting close to DNA testing technology. They could have kept the remain a little longer and then use DNA test to confirm the truth but they didn't. And why they didn't keep both skulls to make sure the Germans didn't lie? Do you really think the Soviet trusted the Germans? If anything, the Germans would be the last one any Soviet would trust. If the Soviet didn't trust the Germans in the first place then the Soviet must have made sure that careful procedure must be carried out to make sure Hitler was dead. Looking at their actions, I don't think they were careful at all. More like recklessly destroyed the evidence to cover up.75.168.125.23 (talk) 02:08, 11 March 2014 (UTC)
 * I am not "simply speculating". I am basing what I say on what we know about Hitler. And it's exactly what Hitler's biographers say. What you say about DNA testing in the 1970s is bizarre. No-one knew any such thing in the 1970s. They destroyed the remains because they had ample evidence of what happened, and did not want them to become relics. "A bunch of Germans are completely unreliable." Charming. Paul B (talk) 12:18, 11 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Yes that's what I wrote. You speculated based on what we know about Hitler. However, it doesn't matter at all, not even in the slightest. Humans, like I said, are very complex and nobody can accurately predict what Hitler would have done. Again, I need stronger evidence. I didn't say anyone knew about DNA testing in the 70's. What I said was our technology was close to able to do that in the 70's. First DNA testing was done in 1986, only 16 years afterward. Almost all technology was foreseen decades or even centuries before we can actually do it. By the 70's, we have done most of the work on understanding DNA since its first discovery in 1869. Most advancements took a long time to make it become reality, they all started first as an idea. Like we didn't just one day get to the Moon. It took decades of efforts. DNA testing is not much difference. The idea is older than 70's, but we have to work for decades until we finally achieved it! And your reason of the Soviet afraiding the remains became relics is absurd. It has to be at least centuries old for it to be classified as relic. And, before any technology became reality, we usually can sense its coming 10 or 20 years or even decades ahead of time. I feel like most genetic experts could reasonable predicted that DNA testing wasn't too far away of a dream in 70's. It's not like people would call you crazy if you talked about possible DNA testing for near the future in 70's. Like I said, Soviet was nowhere to be idiot, they wouldn't destroy the chance to confirm it when the technology available was that close unless there is another reason...75.168.125.23 (talk) 00:06, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

I don't get how we can be so certain that Hitler was dead in 1945. I think he has escaped. Look, my strongest evidence is the skull, we thought all along was his, turned out to be from a woman. I know his body was exhumed and scattered in the river back in the 70's, but apparently, they kept the skull. The skull was from the Hitler's body. If the skull wasn't from Hitler then we can be certain that the dead body wasn't Hitler. Therefore, the fact, whether we like it or not, is Hitler's body was never found. He could have easily escaped, considered that many top Nazi officials have done so. Plus, I don't trust any of the eyewitnesses as they all were Germans and Hitler's supporters at one point. It wouldn't hard to believe that they would do anything to help Hitler successfully escape by spreading the big lie that he was dead. It would be more believable if an American or Soviet actually witness Hitler's death, or any witness beside German. The article should not portray Hitler's death in 1945 as fact because it's not a fact. There is really no concrete evidence to support that fact beside all the German witnesses, who by nature are not reliable by the slightest and should not be taken into account.75.168.125.23 (talk) 05:55, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
 * "If the skull wasn't from Hitler then we can be certain that the dead body wasn't Hitler." This is a complete non sequitur. If the Nazis wanted to fake Hitler's death, why would they put the body of a woman in the supposed grave. Did they think the Russians were dumb? If the Russians wanted to pretend they had found Hitler's body, why use the skull of a woman, when there were many 50-something male corpses to choose from? It makes no sense. The fact is, we have very little evidence that the skull came from the body that was scattered. It's just a bit of skull that some Soviet archivist said came from the body. And we know how reliable history was in the Soviet Union. Since Adolf and Eva were buried together and their bodies burned, it would be easy for a bit of Eva's skull to be mislabeled as Adolf's. There were also many other people who killed themselves in and around the bunker. You are assuming that these body-bits were stored in conditions of great care. That's highly unlikely. Also "many top Nazi officials" did not escape. None of the main leadership did, certainly not those who were in the Berlin bunker at the time. They were completely surrounded. Yes, some simply disappeared, like Bormann and Heinrich Müller, but by the far the most likely explanation is that they were killed or committed suicide and their bodies were not identified. There were thousands of corpses littering the streets. Bormann's skull was later found. Müller's has not been, but that means almost nothing. Paul B (talk) 12:03, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Okay, so both Eva and Hitler were burned before the Soviet even got there. Therefore, there was really no way to identify which skull is from Eva or Hitler. What made the Soviet so certain that the skull they had was Hitler's? I'm sure it was because the German (liers) told them so. How else can the Soviet know the skull was from Hitler? If the only "concrete" evidence (something that can be proven) we ever had turned out to false then it's plausible to think the whole thing was false. As for why they picked the woman's skull instead of the man's skull? It's proven that sometimes humans did things that they didn't know why they did it in the first place. Or perhaps they were frankly stupid? As for the motivation, there are plenty. Remember that they were all Hitler's big supporters at one point or even worshiping Hitler. Plus, at the time, everyone was panicked so they might not think very clearly. They didn't think the Soviet was dumb- but they know with the technology at the time-there is simply no way anyone can possibly identify cremated body from whether it's male or female or whatever. So because they know there is no difference of picking a female body over the male body, why bothers? They could have just randomly picked a dead body and it just happened to be a female by pure chance. Bottom line: there is no concrete evidence to prove that Hitler was in fact dead in 1945 (he probably is long dead by now) except the German witnesses, who are in no way can be trust to say the truth due to their adherence and worship to Nazi and Hitler's ideology. 75.168.125.23 (talk) 02:08, 11 March 2014 (UTC)
 * You have spectacularly failed to get the point. There is no evidence whatever that a skull-fragment in a Soviet archive was ever in a grave in Berlin, or has any actual connection to it. The bodies in the grave were only partially burned. You seem to be ignorant of these basic facts. The Germans didn't give the Russians a fragment of skull and said "this is Hitler". That's absurd. The bodies of Hitler, Eva, the Goebbels' and possibly others were all exhumed, reburied, exhumed again and reburied again several times by the KGB, who then claimed to have completely crushed all the remains and thrown them in a river. Then later, someone said, "oh we've still got this bit of skull" There is no reliable "chain of evidence" connecting this skull fragment to the Berlin bunker. It may have been or it may not have been anywhere near it. The KGB routinely falsified evidence, so the fact that someone sometime found a skull-fragment and said it was Hitler's has next to no value as evidence. The skull fragment is quite separate from the testimony evidence. The idea that being Nazis makes people consummate, unshakable and brilliant liars is a fantasy. Many people who were present in the bunker were not fanatical Nazis at all. They were technical and support staff. Paul B (talk) 12:10, 11 March 2014 (UTC)
 * "The bodies in the grave were only partially burned"? Are you implying that Hitler's body wasn't burned that bad and we still could reasonable identify Hitler by looking at the body's face in 1945? If that was the case then I would believe that Hitler was dead, but you first need to provide me reliable source that confirms what you said.
 * And it clearly says "In 2009, DNA tests were performed on a skull Soviet officials had long believed to be Hitler's". It wasn't just some random dude that came from nowhere and claimed that was from Hitler. The one who claimed it was from Hitler must have "very high" authority and high ranking official. You should read up source m and n in the article death of Hitler above. Clearly, they found it back in 1945. I find it very hard to believe that the Soviet could make a fatal mistake of misidentifying Hitler's body if the Soviet wanted Hitler's death so much. Again, that shows they were either being reckless (which is unlikely) or being fooled by German liers (the Soviet wouldn't believe the Germans in the first place) or something was going on behind the scene. Now that you mention it, why in the world the Soviet kept exhume and rebury the remains many times? Isn't one time enough? There is literally no reason to do all of that if they could just exhume and throw it to the river in 1945. It seems like the Soviet was creating their little nice fake scene to fool most people. This is my speculation: after finding out Hitler wasn't dead and in fact has run away. The Soviet created a massive conspiracy cover-up stories and threatened death to anyone from telling the truth. They burned it many times so no one can recognize the bodies anymore. When DNA testing almost became reality, they hastily threw it in the river for no reason to make sure no one can ever find out their big fat lie. Even though, this is a pure speculation, but that sounds more plausible to believe than Hitler's death based on everything the Soviet did.
 * The Germans didn't have to be any sort of brilliant liar. Anyone can lie, even the stupidest person on earth. It's literally one of the easiest thing to do in life. Most people lie daily from small things to big things for convenience or for profit or whatever reason. Lying is common. Those Germans are even worse kind of people, so I expect lying to them is even easier. They didn't have to be consummate nor unshakable. Nobody was going to torture them so there was no reason for them to shake (I know in this context, unshakable means not going to change their mind). They might not have been fanatics, but no way in the world I can identify them as normal people. Their minds were pretty messed up. They were either honestly believed in the Hitler's regime or completely being brainwashed by Hitler. No one with the right mind would support a regime as ABSOLUTE EVIL as Hitler's regime. It's a myth that most Germans didn't know the mass killing of Jews or other inferior races deemed by the Germans, Responsibility for the Holocaust, YES, they all knew and clearly support Hitler like a hero. No German was innocent by any mean. Their hands were full of blood of killing either it's direct or indirect. It's not an exaggeration when I called them worshipping Hitler! They were all dumb or brainwashed or sick-crazy minded people. The normal, right minded Germans were all killed right away in the world of messed up minds. Everything they did ranging from human experiment to their method of killing proved the Nazi was the worst of the worst, most evil of the evil in the human history (you should read up all of the methods killing of Nazi and let see how long it would haunt you). I wouldn't even classify them as humans, even a wild animal wouldn't kill someone for fun. Any associated with the Nazi simply can't be trusted and should be ashamed of their involvement. DISCLAIMER: I'm not saying the Germans today are bad. They're okay now I guess, but clearly not the Germans in 1945. And I'm not Jewish by any mean. I don't even know that many Jewish in my life. I'm speaking out of justice. Even someone like me who isn't affected by the Holocaust at all can deeply feel the evil of Hitler's regime. (Okay, I just realized I went off topic on this paragraph, but well, my point is it was an easy thing for any German to lie to cover up for Hitler).
 * Lastly, the only evidence backing Hitler's death is witnesses. This is only true when the Soviet trusted the Germans. You're assuming, the Soviet trusted the Germans. Like I said a couple of times, the Germans would be the last thing on Earth any Soviet would trust. The Soviet would maybe rather trust a rock than a German. That being said. Unless you can prove that the Soviet could have trusted the Germans in the 1945, otherwise all the evidences supporting Hitler's death are false. And if they didn't trust the Germans then there is no way the Soviet would announce that Hitler was indeed dead. This ties up to my Soviet's conspiracy again to help everyone free of worry if Hitler escaped.75.168.125.23 (talk) 00:06, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

Does South Africa have some kind of stand-your-ground laws?
Otherwise, I can't see how Pistorius would be completely innocent, whether he shot a burglar through a door, or his girlfriend. But, yes, not every jurisdiction restrict self-defense to the minimum force needed to defend yourself. OsmanRF34 (talk) 18:50, 8 March 2014 (UTC)
 * South Africa is of course somewhat famous for being the home of the Blaster (flamethrower). Anyway there is some discussion of South African self defence laws here . These are general not specific to this case, I found some which are specific to this case from a simple search, but for WP:BLP reasons I will not be providing them here (I could email them to you if you really can't find them). It's worth remembering that Oscar Pistorius says he was on his stumps during the shooting of someone he thought was an intruder in his bathroom (and from what I can tell, the prosecution agrees the stumps bit is likely ). What is resonable in such a situation may be different from someone without such a limitation on their movement. On the other hand, there's no question that the person he killed was not an intruder. Nil Einne (talk) 19:32, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Greek daktylos
Does anyone know of a source for which finger the ancient Greek measurement of "daktylos" refers to? Upon comparison to ancient Hebrew measurements it would seem that it is a thumb (the Herews calculated a handbreadth as 4 thumbs or 5and a third regular fingers or 6 little fingers). 77.127.225.235 (talk) 21:44, 8 March 2014 (UTC)


 * I suspect if anybody will specify that level of detail, it might be Oxford reference . I can't login right now, but I will check later if nobody else can find a good ref. You might be able to get access through your library. SemanticMantis (talk) 22:17, 8 March 2014 (UTC)


 * EO indicates simply "finger". ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 22:29, 8 March 2014 (UTC)


 * I checked the Oxford ref with full access, but it didn't have much additional info. Apparently "monas" is a synonym, so that might help. Oxford lists this book as their source, but it is in Romanian, and probably hard to get. This page  specifies that it is "fingerbreadth", so that makes the ~0.75 inches estimate make more sense. I don't recall if ancient Greek has a separate word for "thumb", but my WP:OR is that fingerbreadth varies more between humans than in does within one humans hand (but perhaps that was less true in a more homogenous population). SemanticMantis (talk) 17:21, 9 March 2014 (UTC)


 * You may be right, however the ancient measurements based on body parts were certainly based on some "standard" person. The ratio of the sizes of different fingers are probably pretty similar in all people. So in whatever hand was used as the standard, 4 thumbs = 5-1/3 fingers = 6 pinkies 77.127.225.235 (talk) 21:39, 10 March 2014 (UTC)