Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2011 June 13

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June 13

iParty with Victorious Premiere

Hi, last weekend on saturday june 4th was the Prmiere of the crossover iParty with Victorious. Did someone visit it and took some pictures of the Nickelodeon stars? If yes I would be very greatfull if this person upload some photos of the premiere on wikicommons. Thanks for any help. --Simon.hess (talk) 00:24, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Aristotle on proving that which is more certain by that which is less certain

If I remember correctly, at some point Aristotle defines as foolishness the desire to prove the truth of that which is "more certain" (prior?) by that which is "less certain" (consequent?). Can someone provide the quote? I am thinking either Metaphysics or Posterior Analytics, but it might be Sophistical Refutations. μηδείς (talk) 02:57, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Is it this, from Aristotle's Physics Book 2, chapter 1?

What nature is, then, and the meaning of the terms 'by nature' and 'according to nature', has been stated. That nature exists, it would be absurd to try to prove; for it is obvious that there are many things of this kind, and to prove what is obvious by what is not is the mark of a man who is unable to distinguish what is self-evident from what is not. (This state of mind is clearly possible. A man blind from birth might reason about colours.) Presumably therefore such persons must be talking about words without any thought to correspond.

--Antiquary (talk) 17:48, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that is the exact quote, thanks. μηδείς (talk) 16:07, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Utilitarianism

Please provide some online resources which criticize utilitarianism from a strict philosophical (ethical) standpoint. --999Zot (talk) 07:25, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Have you read Utilitarianism#Criticism and defense? Gabbe (talk) 07:43, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Brooke Shields touching the heart of Henry IV of France

In the episode of Who Do You Think You Are? (U.S. TV series) Brooke Shields touched the heart of Henry IV of France at Saint Denis. I have many questions. Did the heart even last this long, over 400 years? Why would she touch it? Wouldn't the French and the people in charge of the museum/church be angry at her for touching it? Wouldn't it cause a great scandal? I mean it was an outrage when Abigail Kawananankoa sat on the royal throne of Hawaii, this instance is a heart not a chair!--KAVEBEAR (talk) 07:28, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

A quasi-religious relic. Itsmejudith (talk) 07:33, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

If we don't have an article on the hearts of the Kings of France, we probably should. In the meantime, you may find this .pdf interesting. It is a general article on the disposition of the hearts of the kings of France, but does specifically mention Henry IV's. As for why touch it - she's a descendant and probably thought it was a cool idea to be able to touch your gggg(etc)grandfather's heart, and the people of France would hardly mind as the nation is no longer a monarchy and monarchical symbols have lost their power. - Nunh-huh 07:49, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

I've seen the episode. I have to say: even though she exclaims "I've just touched Henry IV's heart", it looks as if she's merely rubbing her fingers on the top of the urn containing the heart, rather than touching the actual heart itself. Gabbe (talk) 09:00, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

See reliquary. BrainyBabe (talk) 13:24, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

The heart of Henry IV of France was in the church St Louis located in the Prytanée National Militaire (town of La Flèche): "upon the death of Henry IV, a vast church was built, in which the hearts of Henry IV and his wife queen Marie de Medicis were enshrined." The hearts were burnt in 1793 during the French Revolution, but the ashes were collected by an inhabitant of La Flèche. The (hearted shape) urn is still in the chapel of the Prytanée (in a high place, out of reach of visitors). (Refer to the French Wiki page). One can see the urn in the upper left corner of this picture, and a closer view here. — AldoSyrt (talk) 14:38, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Utilitarian view on torture

What is the utilitarian view on torture? For example, is the torture of the few terror-suspects justified from a utilitarian standpoint? --999Zot (talk) 08:13, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

No. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:04, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Utilitarianism argues for the "greatest good" for the maximum number of people. Torture of a few terror-suspects are usually justified with the argument that it is necessary to save the lives of a lot of people. Is not it a utilitarian argument? --999Zot (talk) 09:13, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

• Peter Singer, a philosopher in the utilitarian tradition, has defended torture under certain circumstances, see [1]. See also the articles "Ethical arguments regarding torture" and "Ticking time bomb scenario" for some more info. Gabbe (talk) 09:23, 13 June 2011 (UTC)
• It's a utilitarian argument, but it's wrong. The "ticking bomb" scenario has been heavily criticised as unrealistic. If I can use arbitrarily contrived situations, I can generate justifications for killing of half the population of the globe (minus one), or even all but the one perfect couple that will repopulate the globe with their perfect children, leading to untold future generations of bliss. In real life, you never know if your suspect really has the information. Moreover, information obtained under torture is inherently unreliable - in the short term, the victim can mislead, and in the long term he or she can be made to say anything, hence you will have a bad case of confirmation bias. In either case, you are likely to waste time following wrong clues, and to seriously alienate the "collateral damage" and its friends and relatives. Further, of course, there is the backlash. Torture some POWs, and 15 years later, John Rambo will take apart your country. More realistically, I'd strongly suspect that e.g. Noam Chomsky, or I, would not help appreciateapprehend terror suspects if we knew they would be mistreated. Thus, you erode support for law enforcement in your country. And lastly, there is the effect on the torturers. You are breeding a crop of psychopaths who think everything is justified to make things go their way. As for the moral dimension, our courts have serious issues with convicting innocent people even after a lengthy legal process. How many of your mere suspects will be innocent? How will your "enhanced interrogation personell" deal with the fact that maybe a third of the victims they pushed cattle prods into scrotums and vaginas of will turn out to be completely harmless people subject to a mixup? How will the responsible politicians? Would you want to vote for someone responsible for not one, but many such cases? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:39, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

What do you mean by "help appreciate terror suspects"? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Quest09 (talk • contribs) 15:47, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Mostly passing on information, e.g. calling the police when I think I've seen a suspect. Or, in my case, help build computer systems for tracking suspects. Voting for parties running on a stricter security policy. Motivating a policeman by telling him that he's doing a good job instead of spitting at him. There are many possibilities, although each in particular is unlikely to come up for any given person. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:30, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

The argument of erosion of legal rights for the individual would, I think, be applicable to utilitarians as well; if the practice of torture is made legal by law under some specified circumstances, then it greatly increases the possibility that it will be made legal under other circumstances as well. --Saddhiyama (talk) 09:53, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, utilitarians will disagree with each other. But it cannot be denied that "utilitarian" arguments in favour of torture and other intuitively repugnant practices can be and have been made, though more often, I suppose, by opponents of utilitarianism. And it is a basic problem in utilitarianism, how to combine some kind of individual dignity with measurements of aggregate "good".

At any rate, one should note that justifying torture with the "ticking bomb" scenario is not necessarily a utilitarian argument, since the bad guy to be tortured is typically assumed to be "guilty", to have forfeited their rights by their own actions. The usual utilitarian or vulgar-utilitarian calculus of one victim versus many victims is unnecessary – Dirty Harry tortured one bad guy to save one victim and the audience cheered him just as loudly as they do Jack Bauer. Which suggests the whole point is justified blood-lust and revenge fantasy, the victims being mainly a prop. (BTW, in Terrence Malick's early version of the Dirty Harry script, the bad guy was himself a Punisher-type vigilante, but that potentially fantasy-spoiling twist didn't make it into the movie.)

As for Singer, if you read that article carefully you will notice he does not directly make an argument for torture there. Singer just says what many others have said: The rules should unequivocally ban torture, but one can imagine circumstances where anybody would decide to torture the prisoner, no matter what the rules say. If it worked, they'd be a hero; if it didn't, they might be punished for trying. There is a tragic dimension there.

À propos authors: Sam Harris is one author who, while not advocating torture, has noted the human tendency to overvalue the needs of a physically present individual ("neighbour", in Christian terms) in comparison to those of more numerous but absent individuals. Harris compares it to an optical illusion and suggests we need to develop objective measuring instruments, as it were.--Rallette (talk) 11:36, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Aside from the moral questions, it is often argued that the tortured will tell their captors what they want to hear, whether it's true or not. The news stories around the taking-down of Osama bin Laden, the biggest post-9/11 target, indicated that the information of his whereabouts was obtained through normal investigation rather than through torture. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:26, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

It should be pointed out that the utilitarian viewpoint is probably more lenient to do with torture than, say, deontological systems. It is possible, in any utilitarian decision that the "price" is reached for a given situation. Some, such as Mr Schulz, above, clearly put such a high value on not torturing people, having a world without torture, etc. that this requirement is never met. But logically, the decision is there. If we believed "torture was objectively wrong" and took it as some sort of universal categorical imperative, we wouldn't need this discussion. Torture is, too, an imperfect knowledge system. One is unlikely to be aware of the consequences of ones actions in doing it. This complicated matters considerably, since one could say that the outcomes one is aware of would be a net positive, whilst accepting that there could be further negative consequences (the information being wrong, as Bugs mentions), and thus not torturing someone. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 14:23, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Utilitarianism doen't specifically permit torture, but nor does it ban it - utilitarianism is about outcomes rather than actions, so an action, such as torture, isn't the focus of the debate. If it can be shown that torturing someone will result in more good than bad (noting that there is a lot of debate about what constitutes good: for example, Peter Singer is a preference utilitarian, so "good" with his approach is the meeting of preferences), then the approach would permit torture. With utilitarianism, you don't necessarily ask "is <this action> wrong?" so much as "how much good will result from <this action>?".

The problem is that working out whether there is more good than bad is tricky. For example, one instance where someone was tortured might bring about more good, but it also might create a devaluing of life, causing issues in society, that would then in the long term bring about more bad than good. Or, as Baseball Bugs pointed out, the effectiveness might actually be low, so while someone might perceive it to be a net benefit in terms of good, the reality might be far from that. And it should be noted that the person being tortured has preferences (such as not being tortured), as do his or her family, and many other people - thus it might be the case that more preferences (if you use that approach) are met by not torturing the person. One of the arguments against utilitarianism is that these sorts of sums are virtually impossible to calculate, and long term effects hard to predict. - Bilby (talk) 14:36, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

The OP's question arose only because someone thinks its answer might be yes, torture is justifiable. Consider the natural consequences of that affirmative answer. It makes torture methods a legitimate subject for training, exercising, examinations, demonstrations and seminars. Sooner or later there will be a "Torture for Dummies" book and torture tutorial clips on YouTube. Torture experts will offer consulting services. We can have torture competitions. A Miss Torture pageant is sure to be popular and a coming TV hit might be "America's Funniest Tortures". The Fisher-Price Little Torturer toy will be on sale in Toys "R" Us in time for next Christmas. Catholicism will enjoy a resurgence with publication of popular editions of Ad extirpanda and Malleus Maleficarum, with broadcasts of Auto-da-fés from the Vatican. The Wikibook on Torture will need attention from an expert. The OP may consider Mathew 7:7 "Ask, and Ye Shall Receive". Cuddlyable3 (talk) 14:48, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Wow, that's quite an overdrawn set of consequences. Many people have argued in favour of torture, and I'm yet to see the videos on YouTube. Since a "war" is the murder of people, except justified, and people don't go around murdering people all the time, I call your bluff on your slippery slope. That's not to say I am in favour of torture, of course. But it's happened, and there have been proponents of it, more American than British. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 20:42, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

"except justified" . --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:08, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

We certainly have videos and "war experts". We have paintball and shooting competitions. The Russian army recently had the Miss Russian Army pageant. We have action figures and other military toys, from a plastic AK-47 to a model M1A1. The analogy is not that far fetched... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 21:15, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

You're merely "cutting" the slippery slope at a different point: we have these things, and yet no explosion in murders (certainly, it mostly correlates with other factors). Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 21:22, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

It's no bluff Grandiose. See U.S. Army and CIA interrogation manuals. Torture was taught by CIA. From the www.infowars.com ^{infowars.com is fringe, does not meet our sourcing guidelines and should not be used}/kubark-the-cias-1963-torture-manual/ CIA 1963 torture manual:] "people who are exposed to coercive procedures will talk and usually reveal some information...The following are the principal coercive techniques of interrogation: arrest, detention, deprivation of sensory stimuli through solitary confinement or similar methods, threats and fear, debility, pain,...most people underestimate their capacity to withstand pain." On YouTube watch Is this torture?, Torture room, Stretch torture and kindly catholics (videos). Cuddlyable3 (talk) 09:52, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

What you should know about utilitarianism. The utilitarianists pretend that they are able to think through the utility of actions - in fact, nobody can. God alone can see the world in which torture is accepted by all society under certain specific conditions, and God alone can see the world in which it is in total disuse. As for utility at points between these extremes: God alone... --188.28.126.160 (talk) 20:46, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

One important part of this question that needs to be addressed is what version of utilitarianism you are talking about. The strictest version of Utilitarianism would say that torture is a moral imperative any time that it makes more people happy than are made unhappy. The trick is measuring, as always. A strict Utilitarian of the most early primitive forms would say that if more people are made happy by publicly torturing certain kinds of criminals than the criminal is made unhappy then it is a moral IMPERATIVE to torture them. Rule utilitarianism might have an issue with that because "torture convicted criminals" is actually a version of the rule/maxim "impose societal norms using brutal force". HominidMachinae (talk) 00:24, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

A question about copyright?

Let's say you want to request permission to copy a book, however all of the authors have died, the publishers closed down and it is not clear as to who currently owns the rights to the book. How do you ask permission in this case? 112.210.183.211 (talk) 11:34, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

See, for a start, Orphan works and Orphan works in the United States.--Rallette (talk) 11:51, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

That's called an orphan work and different countries have different rules regarding them. That article should give you some useful information. --Tango (talk) 11:56, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Is that how Mad secured the rights to Alfred E. Neuman? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:21, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

We can't answer questions about the legality, and in any case the law will vary from one country to another. But in the UK it is quite common for the person copying the material to add a disclaimer along the lines of "Every effort has been made to trace copyright in the following, but if any omission has been made please let us know in order that this may be acknowledged in any future edition."--Shantavira|^{feed me} 12:28, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

I read the article on orphan works and it didn't answer my question, which is how to seek permission to use orphaned works. How do you do so? 112.210.183.211 (talk) 12:45, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Professional publishing companies employ specialists (usually consultancies) who are experts in ferreting out who owns the copyright for a given work. Such people have extensive knowledge of the histories of given publishers (who bought who, who went out of business and sold their IP assets to whom) and lots of contacts in publishing and academia. If these people fail to track down who owns a given work, a professional publisher would most likely not publish at all (they even use these people to track down the ownership of relatively small sections of text, for use in things like anthologies). -- Finlay McWalter ☻ Talk 18:48, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Copyright holders are not required to give their contact information. You copy at your own legal peril. Currently, a work enjoys copyright protection in the US for a period of the life of the author plus 70 years after his or her death. In the case of anonymously published works, copyright is valid for 90 years from publication. Provided a copyright holder did not assign his or her reproduction rights over to a third party, these would pass through the author's estate to his or her heirs. If the rights were assigned to a publishing company and that company became defunct, rights would be held by creditors of that company and possibly sold to another. You could expect damages for illegal copyright at several thousand dollars for each copy. There is no legal status of an "orphaned work." It isn't recognized by the law. If a copyright holder wishes to remain anonymous and only reveal him or herself after a lawsuit is filed, the law permits it. 24.38.31.81 (talk) 14:26, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Courts in most countries will be very reluctant to award "several thousand dollars" if the author can demonstrate a good-faith effort to locate the copyright holders and get their permission. They are much more likely to award reasonable value (cents per copy in the case of, say, a page in a book or so). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:18, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Can anyone point me to any high-profile lawsuits over the use of presumed "orphan" intellectual property which actually did turn out to have owners, who then sued? Has it ever happened? Eliyohub (talk) 13:13, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Legit Libyan rebels?

What makes the Libyan rebels the legitimate interlocutor of the Libyan people? Quest09 (talk) 15:38, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

It is a matter of opinion, of course, but see legitimacy (political). The idea been connected to the idea of consent of the governed since the Enlightenment, but other bases for legitimacy have also historically been held. In Libya, the nations who have granted diplomatic recognition to the National Transitional Council have stated that the Council best represents the Libyan people's goals and democratic aspirations, or something similar. Neutrality^talk 15:50, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

They're not necessarily "legitimate interlocutors", but if they're trying to prevent the dictatorship oppress much of the population, that's fine by me, and Libyans will surely tidy up some constitutional loose ends later. Let's not pretend that the Gaddafi regime is more legitimate. bobrayner (talk) 17:03, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

• At the end of the day, they assert that they are a state and they attempt to enforce their views upon other claimants. Other forms of legitimacy are dependent upon the balance of forces within a hegemonic culture (for example: parliamentary democracy). Fifelfoo (talk) 01:38, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Così fan tutte

Mozart's Così fan tutte contains themes such that, if it were published today, it would be considered sexist. However it is never a good idea to apply modern labels and ideas such as sexist to a time period when the social mores were drastically different, which is why I want to know, how would Mozart's contemporary female spectators/audience members have reacted to this opera? And would his male spectators have seen it as humorously accurate, or humorous but exaggerated? Regards :) 72.128.95.0 (talk) 15:57, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

That is, by the way, not the only such opera of Mozart. You could say the same of Die Zauberflöte. – b_jonas 17:43, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

This is where the librettist comes into his own, because Mozart "only" wrote the music. The people responsible for the stories and the words and whatever sexism was there, were Lorenzo Da Ponte (Così fan tutte) and Emanuel Schikaneder (The Magic Flute). -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 19:32, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your thoughtful comments. However, may I respectfully point out that the question has not yet been answered. 72.128.95.0 (talk) 14:57, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Is there a loophole in Jante Law?

Summarizing Jante Law: We are so equal that you may not do any better than us.

A rather puzzling one. In the Scandinavian culture were the Tall poppy syndrome soars, I have a few counteracting ideas – though not sure if it may work.

For the religious (though Scandinavia isn’t well known for it’s religiousness), one could have argued that the followers of a religion must try to excel in everything they do as a way of thanking God. Which would have been a good counterculture point; alas only before the 1940s.

For atheists, it’s a bit tougher. I have given it some thought – how about patriotism?
“I’m not doing it for myself, I’m doing it for “charity”/“our group”/ “company” / (insert Nordic Country name)”.
In some Nordic countries where everyone gets a piece of the pie (they’re much more group-orientated than the American individualistic approach), the bigger the pie… I mean, it’s for their own benefit! Give the ambitious guy a break, man!

Could it work? Any other ideas?
Like to hear from you.
PS. Oh, regard emigration as not part of the solution.
41.247.34.131 (talk) 16:33, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

I think you hit the nail on the head with the individual versus group mentality. A talented individual may either choose to rise to the top, or help everybody else rise. The same skills can be applied either way. Thus, the Jante Law becomes an indictment of the selfishness of the individual, for not choosing to devote their talents to helping others, but rather engaging in selfish pursuits. StuRat (talk) 17:37, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

In Australia the Tall Poppy is one who serves themselves and does well, instead of serving others and doing well. The Tall Poppy is also one who draws attention to personal success and publicly revels in it. Someone who achieves success working for the group (Bob Hawke, ACTU Leader) is often perceived differently from someone who achieves success where it appears to be for themselves (Bob Hawke, Prime Minister). I'm sure you're aware that Tall Poppy / Jante Law arises in circumstances where the material circumstances of being fairly heavily emphasise collective production; but, where there's a generally shared standard of social living. Living outside the standard becomes a case of beggar my neighbour little tolerated by people who see themselves as peers (and have the social capacity to lop the heads off of Tall Poppies). Fifelfoo (talk) 01:31, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

As You Like It

Here's an extract from Shakespeare's wikisource:As You Like It/Act II.

ROSALIND. Alas, poor shepherd! searching of thy wound, I have by hard adventure found mine own.

TOUCHSTONE. And I mine. I remember, when I was in love, I broke my sword upon a stone, and bid him take that for coming a-night to Jane Smile: and I remember the kissing of her batlet, and the cow's dugs that her pretty chapp'd hands had milk'd: and I remember the wooing of a peascod instead of her; from whom I took two cods, and giving her them again, said with weeping tears, 'Wear these for my sake.' We that are true lovers run into strange capers; but as all is mortal in nature, so is all nature in love mortal in folly.

Various annotated texts are available that explain what Touchstone is talking about: the meaning of "batlet" and his encounter with the pea-plant, the folly of love, and so on. But despite lots of searching I've yet to find an explanation of the part in italics, perhaps because the language used in it is already comprehensible to a modern reader. Yet its meaning is completely unclear to me, perhaps because I'm missing a cultural reference. Why, being in love, would he break his sword upon a stone, and how would that help him see his girl? And who is the "him" in "bid him take that"? [It looks anaphoric but doesn't seem to refer to anybody in the preceding lines that I haven't shown in this extract.] It's Question Time (talk) 17:17, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, breaking a sword is typically symbolic of quitting a fight. Since Touchstone threatened William the shepherd, could that be the fight he was claiming he quit ? StuRat (talk) 17:31, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

But William and Touchstone were vying for the affection of Audrey; this passage seems to be about Touchstone's earlier dalliance with "Jane Smile". (Some sources say that "Jane Smile" is actually a generic name for a woman, should it be read as "Jane Doe" and refers to Audrey?) It's Question Time (talk) 18:37, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I take it to mean a generic woman, or perhaps a generic friendly woman, and, in this case, Audrey. StuRat (talk) 19:25, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

You may well be aware of this, but in the German translation, Touchstone is translated literally as Probstein, wheres Jane Smile is more figuratively "Hannchen Freundlich" - so yes, "generically friendly woman" makes a lot of sense. However, he can't be referring to quitting the fight with William the shepherd over Audrey, because that doesn't happen until Scene I of wikisource:As You Like It/Act V? In fact Audrey doesn't appear in the text at all until Scene III of wikisource:As You Like It/Act III. It's Question Time (talk) 19:42, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, that settles it then. An appeal to the German original :) 188.28.126.160 (talk) 20:43, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

It could be the idea of an offering to the gods so that they will look kindly on him and grant him his wish. --TammyMoet (talk) 17:43, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

There's a fairly direct sexual allegory going on here. Shakespeare was writing for an educated audience of men restricted from marriage and legitimate sexual conduct. Rosalind searches "her wound" which is both the heart and the vulva. Touchstone is obviously describing a jealousy of every day objects: breaking the sword upon the stone is an act of relinquishing combat, but also a phallic image. Jane Smile relates obviously to Jane Doe, and smile has a meaning relating to comeliness and beckoning. It is also a plain reference to the vagina. See also the "dugs" of the cow instead of the breasts of the lover. Peas in the pod are usually a reflection on the clitoris, but "cod" has an archaic meaning of bag or of scrotum. I think the passage is a triple: a discussion on the wounds of love, a discussion of silly relations with material objects for the sake of love (kissing a beating bat, or a piece of clothing), and a discussion of casual sex with "Jane Smile" (think "Jane Easy"). Fifelfoo (talk) 01:26, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Touchstone is describing an imaginary fight, in which he pretended that a stone was his rival for the affection of a milkmaid named Jane Smile. He hit his supposed rival (in reality, the stone) so hard that his sword broke. John M Baker (talk) 12:59, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

This makes sense. By implication, Jane had sat on the stone at night. Marco polo (talk) 13:25, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

This is the first proposed explanation here that seems to explain what the "him" refers to - i.e. he bids the stone "take that". (StuRat proposed "him" to be William, but that does not make sense in the context of the play.) It's Question Time (talk) 15:23, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Anyone familiar with the marines training slogan "this is your weapon, that is your gun?" In this case 'sword' means penis - he thumps himself in the testicles (known both as stones and cods) and bids his willy 'take that!" for "coming a-night" (come on chaps - you were all young once, and your mum must have washed a lot of sheets in her time). Billy Waggledagger was playing to the cheap seats here. Elen of the Roads (talk) 14:35, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

So in this explanation, "him" refers to his "sword"? It's Question Time (talk) 15:23, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

If in doubt, consult [Filthy Shakespeare by Pauline Keirnan, 2006. Check out the table of contents! BrainyBabe (talk) 00:19, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Oldest son of King Abdullah

We currently have at least two people's article both claiming to be the eldest son of Abdullah of Saudi Arabia: Mutaib bin Abdullah and Khaled bin Abdullah. Abdullah's article mentions four wives and seven sons but doesn't name them. Khaled's article incorrectly claimed that he died (from a recent press mistake over his cousin's death) and that he was passed over for next in line for the throne for Mutaib which is a misunderstanding as well. 75.41.110.200 (talk) 17:58, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Since "Saudi state media" reported that Khaled was the eldest son, I'd go with him, even though they also stated he had died (obviously he got better). I see only one rather dubious ghit for Mutaib being the eldest. Clarityfiend (talk) 21:37, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Are you sure Saudi state media was at fault? The source used in our article is the AP [2]. While some of the original sources report his death as coming from state media, it's obviously possible state media correctly reported who died and other news agencies picked up the wrong guy as having died. I haven't yet been able to find a source which says state media made the mistake although I don't speak Arabic. Nil Einne (talk) 01:16, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Some background: The erroneous reports appear to date 11 and 12 June with the correction dating 12 June. Anyway after quite a bit of searching I finally found (most of the English sources from Saudi Arabia don't seem to have bothered with the death) an English language Saudi source [3] which claims to be dated 10 June and updated 10 June (although media organisations are sometimes crap or lie about that sort of thing) and appears to report the correct person. (Some later searching also finds this Arabia MSN site provide by Gulf in the media and which is dated 11 June also says more or less the same thing.) It calls him a prince, I guess this is correct although I don't know for sure.

Interesting enough all sources including those talking about the guy that died as the son say he was 54. After the erroneous death reports, a birth date of 1957 was added to our article. But another source which was added after the death, a book from when Abdullah was still crown prince says he was born in 1950 (and also says he's the eldest son). This strongly suggests the one who died was 54 but the son who didn't die is not (and if the AP had checked their facts like the age they would have realised something was wrong).

P.S. Mildly interesting Princess Munira bint Sultan bin Abdulaziz Al Saud daughter of crown prince Sultan bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud also died recently [4]. Came across this because I found a bunch of condolences [5] [6] although I later found one for Khaled as well [7]

Nil Einne (talk) 02:29, 14 June 2011 (UTC)