Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2015 June 25

= June 25 =

How comprehensive are Wikipedia's lists of aviation accidents?
Hi,

I'm trying to match a vague description of a recent plane crash in which "many [but not all] people were killed" to the ones listed here (Category:Aviation accidents and incidents in 2015, Template:Aviation accidents and incidents in 2015), but there's definitely nothing fitting the given places and times. Are there circumstances under which an event resulting in "many" deaths wouldn't appear in those lists - like, if it was a private or otherwise non-public flight, or if it happened someplace with dubious news coverage, or...? TIA.

176.2.74.134 (talk) 07:16, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
 * The Aviation Safety Network record a lot of aviation incidents. This page contains all incidents that they have recorded for 2015. The articles in the category and template you have mentioned will only reflect articles that have been created here. Hack (talk) 14:20, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
 * We do have a 2015 in aviation which will have some more minor incidents we don't have articles on although also other stuff unrelated to accidents/incidents. Nil Einne (talk) 14:31, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Hm. Still coming up dry, but those two listings certainly do provide far more meticulous coverage. Thanks, both! :) - 176.0.39.211 (talk) 18:51, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
 * (EC) The categories will only have incidents we have articles on. This would require they are WP:notable and someone has written about them (and they will have to have been properly categorised to appear in the category). Nil Einne (talk) 14:31, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Rupert Murdoch political influence
Is there any information on what effect that Rupert Murdoch, and his media empire have had either directly or indirectly in politics / public opinions. Especially in Australia, US and UK. Any studies or scholarly information would be ideal.

I personally hope the earth swallows that POS. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.160.55.86 (talk) 09:05, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
 * There's a fairly recent book on the subject. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 09:09, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Much older and journalistic rather than scholarly, but was well known at the time, is Horrie and Chippendale "Stick it up your punter", the history of Murdoch's Sun newspaper in the UK. (I see there's an updated version on Amazon.) Itsmejudith (talk) 15:31, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * I always liked Mike Royko's quote: "No self-respecting fish would be wrapped in a Murdoch newspaper." ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * There's Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism. InedibleHulk (talk) 22:39, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Jewish prominence
According to Adherents.com Judaism is only the 14th largest religious grouping in the world. Yet the large number of google returns on content related to world religions indicates that journalists and publishers give it the prominence of the world's 3rd or 2nd largest religion. Why do journalists enjoy covering Judaism so unduly and undeservedly? 84.13.31.195 (talk) 16:35, 25 June 2015 (UTC)


 * Have you stopped beating your wife? DuncanHill (talk) 16:40, 25 June 2015 (UTC)


 * "Google result counts are a meaningless metric". AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:43, 25 June 2015 (UTC)


 * Journalism is a complex business. There are two customers: The readers and the advertisers. For the readers, the product is media content. They purchase the media content with actual currency or by submitting themselves to advertising. For the advertisers, the product is consumer attention. They purchase advertising primarily with actual currency based on the number of consumers who will likely be shown the advertisement. In the end, the media content that gets the most viewers is the most profitable. It is further complicated by the advertisers. If the media can be aimed at a specific demographic, then certain advertisers will pay more for the privilege of targeting advertising. The end result, attempting to use an example that is far from your religion example, is that television shows will blatantly target a certain demographic. Home decorating shows represent the world as being nearly 50% gay and lesbian. That isn't a realistic portrayal of the world, but it targets a demographic that the advertisers pay more to target. It is purely about money, not about a stance that the producers have about sexual choice. Relating this to religion, it is obvious that the media you are perusing is targeted at a Jewish population. Why? The advertisers pay more to target that audience. Again, it is all about money. It is not about a stance that the producers have about religious choice. 209.149.113.97 (talk) 16:54, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Unhatted question after a ridiculous accusation of anti-Semitism. The question is phrased awkwardly, but is valid, answer about is informative. Fgf10 (talk) 18:50, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I did Google searches on the names of 5 major religions and the adjective used to refer to that religion or its adherents (Christianity/Christian; Islam/Muslim; Hinduism/Hindu; Buddhism/Buddhist; Judaism/Jewish). In fact, Judaism came in third, just edging out Buddhism.  This is not just about money, but it is about the audience.  Searches on these terms are overwhelmingly going to bring up English-language content.  In the English-speaking world, Christianity is the most widely practiced religion.  No surprise that it gets the most Google hits.  Probably Islam is the second most widely practiced religion, especially if we include a percentage of speakers of English as a second language (since second-language speakers will not use English webpages at the same rate as first-language speakers).  It gets the second greatest number of hits.  In the English-speaking world, Judaism is pretty clearly either the second or third most practiced religion.  So it is not surprising that it gets the third highest number of hits.  Anything else would be surprising.  English-language journalism faces a similar audience and will therefore have a similar distribution of content.  I suspect that if I searched on Baidu in Chinese, Buddhism and Taoism would get more hits than Judaism.  Beyond this, even among speakers of other Western languages, there is a fascination with Judaism because, until the Holocaust, Jews were an important minority in many European countries where English is not the national language.  They remain a large minority in France.  Judaism is part of the cultural heritage of the West.  Marco polo (talk) 19:34, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
 * One way to think of it, without assigning some perjorative word like "undeservedly", is note that Judaism, since the Jewish diaspora, had primarily been concentrated in European countries for thousands of years, and Europeans took their Jewish people with them when they colonized the rest of the world. The hegemony, broadly speaking, of European culture since the 17th century means that all aspects of European culture have been exported worldwide, and that includes its minority religions such as Judaism.  It isn't specifically Judaism which is represented in world culture out of proportion with its historic population.  It's also European languages (Spanish, Portuguese, and English are spoken by many-times-over more people than currently live in Spain, Portugal, and England), European foods, music, language, religion, and other aspects of culture have all been exported worldwide, and all are "overrepresented" relative to the population of Europe.  Judaism is part of that, not distinct from it, and there is nothing particularly insidious about it as the tone of the OP would indicate they believe.  It is just an understandable consequence of history, and easily explainable once one understands the context.  -- Jayron 32 01:49, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Another obvious point is that when discussing the two largest world religions, Christianity and Islam, it is inevitable that Judaism will also be discussed from time to time, given the part it played in their historical origins. AndyTheGrump (talk) 01:55, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * The number of Google search results are an utterly meaningless metric for subjects with more than a few hundred hits. The search engine counts a sweeping work covering the history and culture of the jewish religion equally with a joke about the catholic, the protestant and the jew who...etc.  It counts dictionary entries, crossword puzzle clues, idiot posts from holocaust deniers, spammers...all with equal weight.  The count tells you absolutely nothing about the prominence of the religion.  SteveBaker (talk) 02:36, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * The OP's use of language like "prominence...unduly...undeservedly" and particularly mentioning "journalists and publishers... enjoy..." suggest a biased approach characteristic of adherents to the Zionist Occupation Government conspiracy theory. So as Wikipedia contributors, let's assume good faith and provide content on why "the Jews" are allegedly over-represented in the media. Start by expanding your knowledge about who are the Jewish people, rather than limiting content to Judaism, the Jewish religion, as many Jews historically or presently identify with the former without the latter. See also the Category:Antisemitism and Category:Zionism (the movement supporting a homeland for the Jewish people) . Be sure to read further in the web-accessible sources provided extensively as links in References, Notes, and External links. And do be skeptical about anyone who offers you a definitive reason; the matter's highly complex when viewed objectively. -- Deborahjay (talk) 11:14, 28 June 2015 (UTC)


 * @Deborahjay: I'm sure you could dig out all of that stuff - and maybe prove some kind of exciting conclusion - but it's irrelevant. The OP is using Google search counts to establish this idea that the religion is somehow overrepresented by journalism - and that's simply not a tenable claim.   Google search counts prove NOTHING in that regard.  So the answer here is that the entire premise of the OP's question is unfounded and there is simply no need to go deeper.  SteveBaker (talk) 15:52, 28 June 2015 (UTC)


 * @SteveBaker - Rather than dismiss the issue as based on a specious method of gathering information, I chose to address the OP's query as though it were worded not "why do journalists..." but rather, "why would..." by providing links to WP content touched upon by earlier replies (e.g. of Users Marco polo and Jayron, above). -- Deborahjay (talk) 16:24, 28 June 2015 (UTC)


 * Journalists like sensationalism, and Judaism is often the center of such stories. There's the constant conflict in Israel/Palestine, Holocaust survivors, anti-Semitic hate groups, etc.  Compare that to other small religious groups, like the Amish, who generally avoid doing anything "sensational". StuRat (talk) 12:49, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Eiffel Tower (what design was 2nd to the tower?)
What design finished second to the Eiffel Tower selection? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 104.137.49.146 (talk) 18:19, 25 June 2015 (UTC)


 * I'm having trouble finding any reference except: ".. on 1 May (1886) Lockroy announced an alteration to the terms of the open competition which was being held for a centerpiece for the exposition, which effectively made the choice of Eiffel's design a foregone conclusion: all entries had to include a study for a 300 m (980 ft) four-sided metal tower on the Champ de Mars." So possibly the others were non-starters. Alansplodge (talk) 21:49, 25 June 2015 (UTC)


 * The present structure was chosen from 107 entrants to the design competition, but it's not clear how they were ranked. We do know that the committee that made the decision did so unanimously.  Hence, there may not have been a second place.  Imagine (for example) if each of the members simply voted for their favorite design.  If that was how it was done, Eiffel's design got all of the votes and the other 106 designs tied for second place with zero votes each.  Of course it may have been more nuanced than that - but with such a clear winner, the issue of who came second may have been of so little importance that the placing of the other designs may have been ignored, forgotten, or perhaps never made public.
 * If the link above is correct, none of the other entries might have complied with the amended competition rules. 09:28, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * In the 1975 book The Tallest Tower: Eiffel & The Belle Epoque, Joseph Harriss writes that the design competition was announced on May 2, 1886, and required entries to be submitted by May 18. Architects "were invited to 'study the possibility of erecting on the Champ de Mars an iron tower with a base 125 meters square and 300 meters high.  If they consider it desirable they may present a different design without such a tower.'  Despite the admissibility of designs omitting a tower, it was clear that Lockroy wanted one."  The designs were publicly displayed for 3 days and reviewed by the committee for 5 days more, and then "winners of the twelve prizes, ranging from $800 to $200, were announced."


 * Harriss goes on to describe some of the other designs that were considered, and includes a page with thumbnail drawings of 10 of them. But he doesn't say which if any of them won the other 11 prizes.  So, so far we know that it wasn't a 106-way tie for second, but we don't have an answer to the question.  (The other designs, by the way, included one in the form of a gigantic garden sprinkler, one in the form of an immense guillotine, one that would have straddled the Seine instead of being on the south side, and one with a giant light at the top to illuminate the entire city.) --70.49.171.136 (talk) 13:48, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

The Eiffel Tower vs. the air

 * (My favorite Eiffel tower factoid is that the entire iron structure weighs less than the volume of air it encompasses!)
 * SteveBaker (talk) 02:23, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * for that factoid. Dismas |(talk) 04:32, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * Voilà, from the official Eiffel Tower website. Clarityfiend (talk) 07:14, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * Not what SteveBaker said, but still impressive. I checked the factoid in the PDF and it seems correct if you count only the 7,300 tons of the metallic structure. Based on 0.0807 lbs per ft3 of air. (Actually I computed for a rectangular box instead of a cylinder; I don't know the math for a cylinder; but a cylinder would be more air, making the factoid even more true.) &#8213; Mandruss  &#9742;  07:35, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * ... less air for a cylinder? ... so the tower will weigh something like three times the weight of the air it encompasses.  I'll leave the accurate calculation for someone who knows the exact shape of the tower.    D b f i r s   11:13, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * First, it's easy to see that if a circle is circumscribed around a square, the sides of the square are &#x221A;2 times the radius of the circle and therefore the circle has &pi;/2 times the area of the square. Therefore the cylinder mentioned on site cited by Clarityfiend is larger than the box used by Mandruss, by the same ratio.  Specifically, the volume of a box 300 m high and with ends 125 m square is obviously 300&times;125&sup2; = 4,687,500 m&sup3;, while a cylinder circumscribed around this box is &pi;/2 times that volume, or 7,363,100 m&sup3;.


 * The simplest way to estimate the volume of the convex hull of the tower itself is to ignore the curvature of the verticals and treat it as a series of three truncated square pyramids: one from the ground to the first deck, one from the first deck to the second, and one from the second deck to a height of 300 m, representing the top of the main structure above the third deck. Then we just use the formula V = (1/3)(a&sup2; + ab + b&sup2;)h three times.


 * The relevant dimensions are given on page 1 here. Note that for the three decks they give the area rather than the side length, so that's a&sup2; or b&sup2; in the formula rather than a or b.  So, in metric, the calculation is:


 * 1/3 &times; (125&sup2; + 125 &#x221A;4,415 + 4,415) &times; 57 + 1/3 &times; 4,415 + &#x221A;4,415 &times; &#x221A;1,430 + 1,430) &times; (115 &minus; 57) + 1/3 &times; (1,430 + &#x221A;1,430 &times; &#x221A;276 + 276) &times; (300 &minus; 115) = 538568 + 161581 + 143945 = 844,100 m&sup3;


 * So the rectangular box has about 5.6 times the tower's actual volume, and the cylinder about 8.7 times.


 * Now, Harriss gives the mass of the tower's iron structure as 7,341,214 kg, which, if the "tons" are metric tons, agrees with the figure of "7,300 tons" on both the page cited by Clarityfiend and the one cited by me. For the total weight, those pages give 10,100 tons while Harriss says 8,564,816 kg, but perhaps this difference represents changes made since Harriss wrote the book.  I'll go with 7,341,000 and 10,100,000 kg for the two weights.


 * Then the average density of the tower according to which weight and volume calculation you select, is any of:


 * {| class="wikitable" align="left"

! Based on... ! Structural weight ! Total weight ! Circumscribed cylinder (7,363,100 m&sup3;) ! Circumscribed box (4,687,500 m&sup3;) ! Estimated actual volume (844,100 m&sup3;)
 * + Density of the tower or a circumscribed volume, in kg/m&sup3;
 * 0.997 || 1.372
 * 1.566 || 2.155
 * 8.697 || 11.965
 * }


 * So how does this compare to the density of air? Well, that depends on the weather and also on how high up the tower you measure it.  Here are a few representative values from this air-density calculator:


 * {| class="wikitable"

! Temperature... ! &minus;10&deg;C (14&deg;F) ! 0&deg;C (32&deg;F) ! 10&deg;C (50&deg;F) ! 20&deg;C (68&deg;F) ! 30&deg;C (86&deg;F)
 * + Density of air at 25% relative humidity, in kg/m&sup3;
 * Base of tower || 1.331 || 1.282 || 1.236 || 1.193 || 1.151
 * 300 m above || 1.285 || 1.237 || 1.193 || 1.151 || 1.111
 * }
 * 300 m above || 1.285 || 1.237 || 1.193 || 1.151 || 1.111
 * }


 * Conclusion: the claim based on a circumscribed cylinder is correct in any likely weather if you only consider the structural weight of the tower. If you go by the overall weight, even for the cylinder it would only be true in cold weather so extreme that I suspect it has never been experienced in Paris.  A similar claim based on a circumscribed box fails, and if you use the actual volume of the tower... sorry, Steve, much as I love the tower myself, I have to say that it's nowhere near true.


 * Cheers, --70.49.171.136 (talk) 15:50, 26 June 2015 (UTC)


 * From another angle, consider that the density of steel is more than six thousand times that of air, which implies that for the former to weigh less than the latter, it must occupy less than a six-thousandth, say 0.016%, of their combined volume. That doesn’t seem plausible “by inspection“, even allowing for a bias in favour of the steel (from perceiving the trusses to be more bulky than they are). And I note that the truncated-pyramids model still overestimates the volume, because of the true profile’s concavity, but of course not nearly as grossly as the enclosing-box & -cylinder models.—Odysseus 1 4 7  9  23:17, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
 * List of extreme temperatures in France suggests a record low of - 23.9 °C in Montsouris albeit in 1879 (i.e. before the Eiffel tower was constructed). -24 °C gives 1.406 at 37m-25% and 1.357 at 337m-25% (although if the temperature was - 23.9 °C at close to ground level, I presume it will on average be lower 300 m higher). Nil Einne (talk) 15:49, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

What is a good way to get the smell out of a microwave oven?
What is a good way to get the smell out of a microwave oven? I cleaned the oven, using vinegar. Now, I want to get rid of the vinegar smell. I kept the door open for a while, but that is not the best solution. Any suggestions? Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 21:33, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
 * A "taint free" kitchen cleaner spray should do the trick. Alansplodge (talk) 21:51, 25 June 2015 (UTC)


 * Baking soda should do it but just using the oven will quickly drive the vinegar smell off. Even a crème brûlée won't get tainted. There is not enough acetic acid left as ovens have a ventilation fan.  P.S. Hope you used distilled not fish & chip shop vinegar and not Balsamic.--Aspro (talk) 21:59, 25 June 2015 (UTC)


 * A bowl of hot water with some slices of lemon in it. DuncanHill (talk) 10:57, 27 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Or lemon juice. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:29, 28 June 2015 (UTC)


 * There are any number of "How to..." advice sites on the Web, including one Wikihow. Start by typing your query ("How to remove odor microwave..." in the Search field of Google or a similar search engine, which will yield links to household maintenance tips, some in video tutorial format. -- Deborahjay (talk) 10:27, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

I can vouch for the lemon juice in water approach, with the caveat that it's worth checking awkward spots (eg on roof) for leftover stinky bits first. --Dweller (talk) 12:25, 29 June 2015 (UTC)


 * The stinky bits get in the filter also - but most people don't have the technical ability to get to the fan filter to clean or change it. 209.149.113.185 (talk) 13:05, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, all. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 22:03, 29 June 2015 (UTC)