Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2017 March 7

= March 7 =

Racism
Why do most people seem to be racist in their mind? Is it something to do with the fact that people may see others who do do not look like them as a threat?--213.205.192.167 (talk) 00:14, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Who says most people "seem" to be racist "in their mind"? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 00:39, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * They seem to me.--213.205.192.167 (talk) 01:10, 7 March 2017 (UTC)


 * Many have suggested that racism and other prejudices would have been beneficial to our ancestors. See prejudice from an evolutionary perspective for some thoughts. Staecker (talk) 01:20, 7 March 2017 (UTC)


 * Good link. StuRat (talk) 14:41, 7 March 2017 (UTC)


 * The question is unanswerable because the OP has presented the question with a presumption that has not been established as itself true. When did you stop beating your wife?  -- Jayron 32 01:34, 7 March 2017 (UTC)


 * "I stopped beating my wife as soon as she used the safe word, as then it was her turn to use the whip on me." StuRat (talk) 14:39, 7 March 2017 (UTC)


 * O/P: can you tell us how you learned to read people's minds? --Shirt58 (talk) 08:34, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * (Please do not mention the small matter that the Anglo-American legal system purports - see Mens rea and so on - to be able do just that.)


 * It's a natural reaction of most (all?) social animals to be suspicious of others of the same species who look different, behave differently, speak differently, believe differently, even eat differently! That's not racism.  Such natural reactions only turn into prejudice through a refusal to get to know the "different" group.    D b f i r s   10:03, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Either you are supposing that people are naturally racist and are constantly thinking racist thoughts, or you might possibly be extrapolating your own feelings of racism and prejudice and assuming these also apply to other people - see projection. In any case you are asking a question which prompts a need for opinion or debate, which is not the purpose of the ref desk.--WaltCip (talk) 13:14, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Mens rea is assessed objectively based on external evidence, it doesn't involve any mind reading. --165.225.80.99 (talk) 13:24, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * You are still making the flawed assumption that most people who act racially insensitive intend to be racially insensitive, which may not necessarily be the case - see microaggressions.--WaltCip (talk) 13:42, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * WaltCip, I am not the OP. --165.225.80.99 (talk) 15:40, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Why cite mens rea then, as though it explains away the near-impossibility of attempting to determine the intentions behind a person's words?--WaltCip (talk) 15:54, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Someone, presumably User:Dbfirs, said "Please do not mention the small matter that the Anglo-American legal system purports - see Mens rea and so on - to be able do just that", where "that" refers to mind reading. This is plainly wrong. Mens rea is not even purported to be assessed under the common law by mind-reading, it is assessed by objective external evidence. Mind-reading, for a given definition of "mind-reading", may be impossible, but to conflate the assessment of mens rea with "impossible mind reading" is either ignorant or deliberately facetious. I'm not sure which it is, but it was worth pointing out that it was wrong
 * You say mens rea is a bad counter argument to the impossibility of mind-reading. Yes and no. The way mens rea is assessed shows that you can assess someone's state of mind with some degree of certainty by external circumstances - we have a whole science called psychology that is all about this - but it does not show that anyone can mind-read in the sense of literally being able to read someone's thoughts.
 * Your comment further up seems to say that the OP assumes that racist behaviour is due to being racist, rather than due to just being a generally irritating human being. I agree the assumption is not always true, but that has nothing to do with whether it is possible to tell whether someone is a racist. --165.225.80.115 (talk) 19:28, 9 March 2017 (UTC)
 * No, that was Shirt58 who added the comment after his signature. I've now inserted a break just before my comment to make this clearer.    D b f i r s   20:10, 9 March 2017 (UTC)
 * For an example of the process in action see . 5.150.92.20 (talk) 12:01, 10 March 2017 (UTC)
 * There may be information in the BBC archives.  The analysis is at .   Preview at  and .   The programme guide reads

"Michael Mosley asks what drives people to kill in his latest foray into the world of science. Using the Horizon archives, he charts scientists' progress as they have tried to understand murder and whether it can be prevented.   In the 1870s, scientists used outward appearances to determine the mind of a murderer but, as Mosley explains, things have got more sophisticated since then."

Review at. Wiki coverage at. 80.5.88.48 (talk) 10:00, 11 March 2017 (UTC)

Short story collections by Yukio Mishima
What short story collections by Yukio Mishima are available in English? FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 08:19, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * We have a Category:Short story collections by Yukio Mishima which includes Death in Midsummer and other stories and Acts of Worship. And that seems to be all there is. --Antiquary (talk) 09:41, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * The Short Fiction of Yukio Mishima suggests that those two anthologies are all there is. A thorough Google search didn't uncover anything else. Alansplodge (talk) 12:15, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Fully elected House Of Lords
One of today's events says "2007 – The British House of Commons votes to make the upper chamber, the House of Lords, 100% elected." So what happened? We haven't elected any Lords so far. I can't remember the Commons ever voting on it. Thanks! --TrogWoolley (talk) 09:34, 7 March 2017 (UTC)


 * The House of Commons alone does not make UK laws. Proposed laws have to be approved by both Houses.  --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  09:37, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * ... except under the procedure adopted in 1911, which "cured" the problem of the unelected Lords vetoing the elected Commons by giving Commons a trump card in the event of ping pong (to mix metaphors). --165.225.80.115 (talk) 10:36, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * That vote was not on a white paper to actually introduce an elected house. It was part of a series of votes to determine what structure for the upper house would obtain most support. The subsequent white paper, introduced in 2008, was never passed into law. Wymspen (talk) 09:49, 7 March 2017 (UTC)


 * As I recall, the various provisions for Lords reform were included in a Bill and the Commons voted against all of them.  The stumbling block for reform is that if the Lords become wholly or partially elected the Commons consider that they will become more assertive in rejecting legislation . 80.5.88.48 (talk) 09:57, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * LORD MOUNTARARAT: Well, now that the Peers are to be recruited entirely from persons of intelligence, I really don’t see what use we are, down here, do you, Tolloller?
 * LORD TOLLOLLER: None whatever.
 * FAIRY QUEEN: Good! (Wings spring from shoulders of Peers.) Then away we go to Fairyland.
 *  from Iolanthe 1882 by Gilbert & Sullivan. Blooteuth (talk) 23:22, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Research into a company
I have been fixing up the Mappin & Webb article. The article previously noted that starting from the 1890s the British jewellery company opened stores in far flung locations around the world. The official website noted that a store was opened in Japan in 1994. However, the company has no stores outside the UK today. All I have been able to find on this is a newspaper article saying that all of the overseas stores were closed at some point in the past, in the context of the current owners' thoughts of re-expanding overseas. Can anyone with better research skills and/or access to sources shed any light on what happened to the overseas stores? Were they all sold / closed during one of the sales of the company between 1994 and the present? --165.225.80.99 (talk) 10:18, 7 March 2017 (UTC)

Earliest historic quotes expressing depression or despair from life
Hello,

What are some of the earliest historic examples of feelings of depression and deep despair from life? something in the spirit of the book of Ecclesiastes: "Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless. [...] What is crooked cannot be straightened; what is lacking cannot be counted[...]So I hated life, because the work that is done under the sun was grievous to me. All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind."

Thanks, 77.126.90.177 (talk) 17:54, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * I had to google that, it may be more familiar to some readers as "Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity...I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit." DuncanHill (talk) 00:56, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
 * This has an answer to your question, though it isn't the best source. Wikipedia has an article titled History of depression which may lead you places.  This article as well seems a bit better.  -- Jayron 32 18:31, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * And there are more examples in Major_depressive_disorder. 184.147.120.176 (talk) 18:39, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Thank you both, but I am looking for personal accounts of depression, like the quote from Ecclesiastes, rather than clinical descriptions of the condition. I have changed the title accordingly. 77.126.90.177 (talk) 20:11, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
 * This blog post makes two suggestions:
 * (1) "In Orestes, Euripides depicts the tragedy’s protagonist as exhibiting many of the telltale symptoms of depression: loss of appetite, excess sleeping, lack of motivation to even bathe, constant weeping, chronic exhaustion, and a sense of helplessness." Orestes (play) dates to 408 BCE, per our article. Find quotes here
 * (2) "Jason the Argonaut was a great Homeric hero who you’d expect to demonstrate nothing but action and resolve in the face of adversity. Yet when he shipwrecks on the coast of Libya, his mighty mantle falls away and he becomes absolutely helpless and sullen." The Argonautica was written in the third century BCE. Find quotes here
 * A third possibility: "Night was our friend, our leader was despair." The Aeneid (29-19 BC) translated by John Dryden. and "my shattered life crept on in darkness and grief" translated by J. W. Mackail.
 * A fourth: "But Penelope lay in her own room upstairs unable to eat or drink...she lay on her bed bereft of thought and motion." The Odyssey (8th century BC), translated by Samuel Butler
 * And a fifth: "My members fail, my tongue dries in my mouth,  A shudder thrills my body, and my hair Bristles with horror; from my weak hand slips Gandiv, the goodly bow; a fever burns My skin to parching; hardly may I stand; The life within me seems to swim and faint...Arjuna sank upon his chariot-seat, and let fall bow and arrows, sick at heart." The Bhagavad Gita (5th-2nd century BCE) translated by Edwin Arnold.  184.147.120.176 (talk) 00:07, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
 * In the epic of Gilgamesh he suffers from depression and says despair is in his heart after the death of his friend Enkidu saying that he himself would die one day and be like his friend. Dmcq (talk) 00:41, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks! 77.126.90.177 (talk) 06:50, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Just in case you're not familiar with the Epic of Gilgamesh, here is Tablet VIII, and part of the text in question:
 * "I'll cry now, citizens of Uruk, and you
 * will finally hear what no one else
 * has ever had the nerve to say in sorrow.
 * I was family and friend to Enkidu and I shall
 * fill the woodlands where we stalked with loud, sad sobs today.
 * I cry now, Enkidu, like some crazed woman. I howl.
 * I screech for you because you were the axe upon my belt
 * and the bow in my weak hand; the sword within my sheath,
 * the shield that covered me in battle; my happiest robe,
 * the finest clothes I ever wore,
 * the ones that made me look best in the eyes of the world.
 * That is what you were; that is what you'll always be". Alansplodge (talk) 09:13, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
 * that's quite some feelz and self-awareness considering they were all bicameral. could this passage be a later incursion? Asmrulz (talk) 17:02, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
 * I assume you are referring to bicameralism hypothesis? The extract above, according to our article, comes from the standard Akkadian version which "was compiled by Sin-liqe-unninni sometime between 1300 and 1000 BC from earlier texts". The corresponding section is missing from the Old-Babylonian versions (circa 1800 BC) but a subsequent fragment survives and matches the later Akkadian version. It's good stuff though isn't it? Alansplodge (talk) 20:20, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
 * totally Asmrulz (talk) 02:53, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

The first chapter of the Book of Samuel includes the heart-rending and detailed account of Hannah's depression, caused by childlessness and rivalry and, even more poignantly, the understandable but totally useless response of her loving husband: " 6 Because the Lord had closed Hannah’s womb, her rival kept provoking her in order to irritate her. 7 This went on year after year. Whenever Hannah went up to the house of the Lord, her rival provoked her till she wept and would not eat. 8 Her husband Elkanah would say to her, “Hannah, why are you weeping? Why don’t you eat? Why are you downhearted? Don’t I mean more to you than ten sons?”" --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 12:18, 10 March 2017 (UTC)

Scientific study of psychological effects of prostitution on john/punters
Has anyone tackle the issue of how being a john/punter affects the person psychologically? It's not implied by the question, but it would also be interesting to get some links to articles about the psychological motivation of johns/punters. --Hofhof (talk) 19:56, 7 March 2017 (UTC)


 * Research may be more likely which lists going to prostitutes as the result of mental issues rather than the cause. StuRat (talk) 16:18, 8 March 2017 (UTC)


 * On the other hand, it may not be. The OP might find material of interest in the over 8 million hits obtained from the g00gle query "Why do men go to prostitutes?" {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.12.75.147 (talk) 16:38, 8 March 2017 (UTC)


 * I got already some links about what causes men to go to prostitutes. But the consequences part is a little bit tougher. Hofhof (talk) 19:48, 8 March 2017 (UTC)


 * Prostitution is seen remarkably differently by various extant cultures of the world. That being the case, I doubt that there would be much use for a study of the type suggested above being conducted globally. Having said that, I wouldn't mind myself seeing some study regarding the effects in countries which share the same general ethos as the US does today. John Carter (talk) 19:50, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
 * I'd say rather that that would mean a global study would be useful, because it would help distinguish between effects that are inherent and those that are dependent on culture. Iapetus (talk) 09:50, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

If you want to find scientific studies on a subject, Google Scholar (here) is a good place to look. I have not actually searched this question there, though. --76.71.6.254 (talk) 21:21, 8 March 2017 (UTC)