Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2010 October 17

= October 17 =

What is the meaning of gretl's logo?
I'm curious of what the meaning of gretl's logo is. Does anyone know the answer? -- Merry Rabbit 04:18, 17 October 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Πrate (talk • contribs)
 * Is that a picture of Gretel? -- Jayron  32  04:22, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * That would seem the most common association in English to something that sounds like "Gretel" and pictures a young girl. Though there may be some obscure reference to some other Margaret in the illustration that I am unaware of.  Wiki Dao  &#9775;  (talk)  04:32, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I found the larger picture (showing Hansel and more of the forest too), but couldn't identify its creator. Tineye only gave me three results, none of which led me to the illustrator. ---Sluzzelin talk  04:43, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * The story of Hansel and Gretel is particularly significant for economics. Hansel represents the the dedicated but innocent small investor trying to find his way to financial security through the tangled forest of stock market choices, while Gretel is the less sophisticated investor trying to follow his lead intelligently.  The evil witch (of course) represents major wall street firms, offering promises of sweet rewards for investments but delivering investors into dangerous situations.  The whole story is an allegory for libertarian dreams of financial independence from the oppressive interference of government (represented by the father/woodsman who tossed Hansel and Gretel into the forest in the first place) and from the pernicious misrepresentations of large corporate firms.  and that line of bull was a whole lot of fun; can I do it again?    -- Ludwigs 2  05:44, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * lol, cool by me! :D Wiki Dao &#9775;  (talk)  06:03, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Surely the preceding learnèd commentator has missed one of the most striking elements in the Gretel metaphor, briefly epitomized as "the Revolution devours her children" (see Georges Danton, Maximilien Robespierre, Ernst Röhm, Night of the Long Knives, Moscow Trials, Leon Trotsky, etc.) The witch, representing venture capital, predatory lenders or Internet giants, fattens up Hansel and Gretel (archtypes of daring but naïve start-up entrepreneurs exploring new frontiers) not for their own long-term benefit, but to assure herself of fatter proceeds from the dismemberment and assimilation of their expanded remains, otherwise known as "making a killing on the market". As with many such schemes, its success depends upon both a differential schedule of needs (the children need to eat as much as possible as soon as possible to avoid starvation, while the witch can afford to defer her gratification) and an imbalance of knowledge (it is essential that the children's knowledge—like that of a small borrower, a retail consumer or a lottery-ticket buyer—be highly imperfect and selectively incomplete). The recondite econometrics of this process (see South Sea Bubble and Financial crisis of 2007-2010) require the sophisticated tools provided by gretl. ¶ The logo's graphic representation of this dichotomy is, of course, the contrast between Gretel's snow-white apron and the blood-red dress underneath (see, e.g., Snow White and Rose Red); note also her supplicatory posture driven by pressing, immediate hunger (cf. The Taming of the Shrew). —— Shakescene (talk) 07:25, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Antelope powder
Is antelope powder (a baking ingredient, I believe) suitable for vegetarians? Is it actually made from antelopes or parts thereof? Bobby P Chambers (talk) 12:58, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * This refers to it also as 'Mark Cream Powder', while this says "Baking powder component, add 1 part sodium bicarb to 2 parts Antelope." I haven't found any other information. --ColinFine (talk) 13:27, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I suspect this is antelope horn powder, used in Chinese medicine, in which case it is not vegetarian.--Shantavira|feed me 15:00, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I have strong doubts about that. Why would it be used in baking? Particular in the quantities and industrial purposes that it's being sold in the quantities above and in UK and NZ (there's also Davis Trading). That sort of stuff (horn powder) is unlikely to be cheap. Edit: Also this from 1944 mentions antelope powder. In the same vein I doubt it is made from antelopes. This doesn't mean it's not derived from an animal source although I would suspect it's not. I would suggest emailing someone perhaps bakemark Kluman & Balter (who were the only one I could find an email address for) is your best bet to find out what it is. Antelope may just be a brand. (Given the 1944 starting to have my doubts.) Nil Einne (talk) 09:50, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Why would you doubt it was a brand, based on that? Lots of things sold by brandname in 1944, and the list in that advert even includes some. It could even have been some cheap ingredient(s) sold as a miracle product for a high mark-up: we can't tell without more information, but that would hardly be unusual for 1944. 109.155.37.180 (talk) 13:55, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * It seems unlikely to me any brand name which has survived thorough time to refer to something like that is so poorly known. Note that in the 1944 thing most of the brand names are clearly indicated as brand names and I actually recognise the names as well (although acto only barely) although I'm not sure if puffin pastry is a brand name (I suspect it's just a colloquialism for puff pastry). Nil Einne (talk) 16:17, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I was thinking of emailing the UK site but something occurred to me. If you add it to baking soda that must mean it's some sort of acidic component i.e. a substitute for cream of tartar to make Baking powder. Sure enough a search finds . That still doesn't explain precisely what it is although it's possible from that it is a brand name. Interesting enough it seem the Adansonia digitata which is one of the baobab trees is one of the original sources of cream of tartar and antelopes eat fruits and leaves from the tree. However that doesn't seem to help since it's not grown in New Zealand and I don't think imports from those parts of Africa were significant during WW2. There is a related tree in Australia but other then the fact Australia is not New Zealand, it also doesn't produce cream of tartar (the fruit are acidic but so are lemons so I don't know if they produce anything suitable). Baking powder does mention sodium pyrophosphate was used in the US during WW2 and is evidentally still used sometimes nowdays so it's possible antelope powder is that although I can't find any evidence for it and it doesn't explain the name. (Also reading baking powder more carefully as well as Acid salt, it seems Monocalcium phosphate or possibly Calcium dihydrogen phosphate for example is a better substitute for cream of tartar.) Perhaps Roux can shed some light? Nil Einne (talk) 16:58, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Antelope powder is a branded product from Thermphos. It is basically Disodium pyrophosphate (SAPP) and is often listed as E450. See Product sheet for Antelope powder. Thermphos produces a range of baking leaveners with exciting names like Cougar, Springbok, Gazelle, none of which contain any animal products, regards 94.194.98.168 (talk) 11:49, 19 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Interesting. It seems most of those animal name products are for the UK market. I would guess there's a history here where the WW2 (and perhaps before) product in NZ was from the UK originally (I would presume produced in NZ for the NZ market at the time) but has eventually come under the ownership of Thermphos and now only really of interest to the commercial market. Unless that Antelope is unrelated but it seems unlikely given it sounds like it was the same or a very similar product. In any case I was wrong about it not being a brand name. Finding info on this was rather tricky for me, not helped by lack of knowledge of commercial terms (like acidulant) as well as the fact antelope has a lot of irrelevant stuff concerning the animal, although it should have occured to me that Bex and Antelope may be related since most of the earlier links seem to sell both. Nil Einne (talk) 14:08, 19 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I forgot to mention that the UK plant & associated brands were originally owned by Albright and Wilson. It seems that this company still trades in NZ & Oz, so perhaps these products are still being produced/marketed there as well? I'd guess that the history/connection reaches back into the heyday of Empire, regards 94.194.98.168 (talk) 00:40, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

The word BUILDING
Dear All

Why we call " BUILDING " when its already " BUILT " /

Can any one answer this ?

Regards Chinnu

E-mail address removed; please don't post personal information here. Albacore (talk) 15:52, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Lionchinnu (talk • contribs) 15:33, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * This question would be better for the Language Ref Desk, but here is an answer: there are many words in English that have the same structure:  a dwelling, a covering, a coating, a filling.  Formally these are called deverbal gerunds. Looie496 (talk) 18:22, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Dwelling doesn't really fit the same pattern as building since "dwelt" doesn't fit what it currently is doing. Basically, the structure doesn't dwell, the people in it do.  You would say a building is built but you wouldn't say a dwelling is dwelt.  Dismas |(talk) 18:37, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Mainly because 'dwell' is intransitive to begin with; a house could be said to be 'dwelled in'.  --   Jack of Oz    ... speak! ...   19:13, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * You'll notice that (in American usage, anyway) a building is generally a large-scale structure - apartment buildings, corporate office buildings, etc. you'll rarely hear a house (or an outhouse, or a chicken coop) referred to as a 'building'; they are usually referred to as 'structures'.  that leads me to think that building is likely a shortened form of 'building project' - some structure that takes a long time and a lot of effort to build is a 'building project' on a 'building site' for all of the time it's being built, and people get used to calling it a 'building' for short.  -- Ludwigs 2  19:15, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Ingenious, Ludwig, but completely wrong. The OED gives as its second meaning for 'building' "That which is built: a structure, edifice; now, a structure of the nature of a house, built where it is to stand", with examples from 1290. The basic answer to the original question is that '-ing' is more general than just being used to form action nouns. To quote the OED again, (s.v. 'ing'): "forming verbal derivatives, originally abstract nouns of action, but subsequently developed in various directions, ... sometimes they became concrete ... ". Looie is quite right to mentions "covering" ,"coating" and "filling" as parallels, even if "dwelling" isn't.
 * A more general answer is, because languages develop the way they do, and not the way some tidy-minded people think they should. While you can often describe a process that has happened in language change, you usually cannot say why a particular change has happened, or has not happened in some cases. --ColinFine (talk) 20:26, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * The OP asks about building used as a noun meaning "a built structure", but its other use as a gerund is also correct: The building of houses requires craftsmen. While the question implies that there is no word for that which has been built, one hears a jargon use of build in software engineering as a noun meaning a compiled version of a complex software product. I have replaced the question title for easier reference and hope you don't mind. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 08:33, 18 October 2010 (UTC)