Humanities desk
< May 10	<< Apr \| May \| Jun >>	May 12 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Humanities Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

May 11[edit]

Jean-Luc Melenchon Bernie Sanders? and Palestine state recognition[edit]

I thought Benoit Hamon was Bernie Sanders of France or of Socialist Party because he was endorsed by James Galbraith, the economist on Sanders' campaign team and as well as he Benoit Hamon was a supporter of Sanders. How is Melenchon the Bernie Sanders? BTW, what is the stance of Melenchon on Palestinian statehood? Donmust90 (talk) 01:23, 11 May 2017 (UTC)Donmust90Donmust90 (talk) 01:23, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There isn't a "correct answer" here. Drawing one-to-one parallels between American and French politicians is a subjective parlor game. You might as well compare them to sitcom characters or figures from Norse mythology. As for Melenchon's position on Palestine, he is favor of a Palestinian state. LANTZY ^TALK 04:46, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

When did the UK and US start to diverge when it comes to the first-day-of-the-week?[edit]

The question above got me thinking: when did the UK and US start to diverge when it comes to the first-day-of-the-week? Presumably once upon a time the American colonies and the Kingdom of Great Britain were in complete agreement when it comes to first-day-of-the-week.

Same question for Canada and UK as well. ECS LIVA Z (talk) 05:43, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Things are not as clear-cut as the map appears to indicate. My calendar here in the UK has Sunday as the first day of the week, though both styles are available here. The divergence goes back to the early days of Christianity when meetings were held on the first day of the week (our Sunday, the day after the Jewish Sabbath; Acts 20:7), but some Christians in the intervening millennia began to associate Sunday with the "Sabbath", so began to treat it as the seventh day instead of the first. Dbfirs 08:12, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Ya think? I have never heard of the first day of the Christian week as being anything but Sunday. I'm almost sure the Monday-as-first-day convention comes from it being the first day of the work week, not the religious week.

But I would be interested to see a source either way. --Trovatore (talk) 08:27, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, sabbath has nothing to do with "seventh". According to etymonline it is Hebrew for "he rested". So while Sunday may have been adopted as the "Christian sabbath", there is no connection to "seventh", so the purported shift to taking Sunday to be the seventh day for that reason doesn't make a lot of sense (which of course is not to say it can't have happened; a lot of things happen that don't make sense). --Trovatore (talk) 08:36, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

That's correct. Sabbath is the transliteration of Shabbat, which literally means "and he rested". The Hebrew root for things to do with the number seven has two letters in common with Shabbat (shin and bet) but significantly the third letter of the two roots are taf and ayin respectively. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 13:18, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

This site blames Constantine. We have an article Sabbath in Christianity. Dbfirs 08:39, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

You're conflating which day is the sabbath with which day is which ordinal number. Completely separate questions.

The link you give blames Constantine for the Sunday sabbath, not for Sunday being the seventh day, which is unrelated. In fact, that site consistently refers to Sunday as the first day. --Trovatore (talk) 08:42, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'm explaining why Monday came to be regarded as the first day of the working week, rather than Sunday. This is what the question was about. See genesis 2:2 for the connection between seventh and resting. Dbfirs 08:45, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, as a practical matter, yes, the fact that Christians began observing the sabbath on the first day of the week (Sunday) probably was the reason that the work week came to start on Monday, and therefore in popular consciousness many people came to take Monday as the first day. But the first day of the Christian religious week is Sunday. As far as I know this is true without exception the world over and for the whole history of the Christian church.

Note this snippet from sabbath in Christianity:

By the 4th century, Christians were officially observing the first day, Sunday, as their day of rest, not the seventh.

So it looks like the Monday-as-first-day convention is secular, not Christian, albeit it may well have had its practical origin in Christian observance. "On the seventh day he rested" is not a convincing reason to connect the sabbath with the seventh day, when you're explicitly moving it to the first day in memory of the Resurrection. --Trovatore (talk) 08:55, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

A reference for the Christian observance of Sunday as the first day of the week is the hymn On this day, the first of days. Alansplodge (talk) 09:51, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that the day of rest was explicitly moved to the first day, but when the bible came to be available to be read by people who were not historians, confusion arose. I think Trovatore and I are actually in general agreement. It would be interesting to find out when calendars first began to have Monday printed at the start of the week. Dbfirs 09:56, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It perplexes me to no end that people think words have more reality than reality. Read Aristotle, not Plato. The calendar week begins on Sunday in almost all Western nations (I have never seen a calendar that begins on Monday or Saturday) and the work-week begins on Monday. Even when I was a cook at TGIF, their schedule was posted on Saturday for the next Monday thru Sunday. Can we make a template saying that reality takes precedence over terminology? Aaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! μηδείς (talk) 13:05, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. Are the "almost all Western nations" you've visited – or examined calendars in – limited to, say, the United States and Canada? Visit the website for the UK's National Rail and click on the calendar icon to select a date—the first day of the week is Monday. France's SNCF: Lundi (Monday). Germany's Deutsche Bahn: Montag (Monday). Spain's Renfe: Lunes (Monday). Ditto Switzerland's SBB. I got tired of looking at national rail services at that point.

And no, it's not a peculiarity of rail travel. Lufthansa and SAS do it too. (Interestingly, British Airways and Air France start their weeks on the Sunday. Perhaps they have bent under the pressure of easily-confused American travellers.) This sort of mixing of the two formats is always a delight for me when I make travel plans involving bookings on both sides of the Atlantic.

Heck, do a Google image search for British calendar (or German or French) and you'll find a mixed bag, some with a Monday start, and some with a Sunday. If you use Google Calendar, in the Calendar Settings page there's an option for Week starts on: Sunday/Monday/Saturday. If you're going to tell the OP he's making stuff up, at least try doing a trivial Google search to make sure you're not just...less aware than you give yourself credit for. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:59, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

When I was a child in the UK (let's say 50 years ago) it was axiomatic that the first day of the week, on calendars, was Sunday. The first day of the working week was Monday, and the weekend was Saturday and Sunday. (I know that doesn't make sense, but, hey, we're British.) The idea that calendars and timetables start on Monday may perhaps be an indication of growing European influence and harmonisation on such matters as timetable and calendar printing, within the last 40 years or so. Ghmyrtle (talk) 14:57, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Weekend as Saturday and Sunday can be reconciled with Sunday-as-first-day if you think of "weekend" as being like "bookend". Sunday and Saturday stand at opposite ends of the week. I don't know whether that has anything to do with the origin of "weekend" or whether it's just a retrospective rationalization. --Trovatore (talk) 19:59, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

"Weekend" was non-U; the U equivalent was "Saturday-to-Monday" (not "Friday-to-Sunday"). Feel free to infer that the upper-classes shinned "weekend" as illogical. jnestorius^(talk) 21:24, 16 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Instead of that template, can we can one for people who think their country is the only thing that matters? In the very first post on this subject, the maps clearly shows that practices differ. Indeed, that was the whole point of the question. You see calenders starting on a Sunday because you're in the US. I see calendars starting on the Monday (such as my official university work calendar which I was looking at just now, which has options for 'week' and 'work week', both starting Monday) because I'm in the UK. Fgf10 (talk) 14:33, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

And the question is, when did they become different? I was born in the UK and moved to Canada with my parents as an infant, in the 1950s, but I never heard of calendars with Monday as the first day of the week as being a normal thing in any English-speaking country until relatively recently. I'd like to think this proves that UK practice was different in the 1950s compared to today, but it doesn't, because my parents might simply never have mentioned that it was different. --76.71.6.254 (talk) 22:22, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Why is Monday becoming the first day of the western week? Secularization. Djbcjk (talk) 05:08, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Because Monday is the first day of the work week. In the US, you can buy calendars where the week starts on Sunday... and calendars that start on Monday... depending on what you need. I have a Sunday to Sunday calendar on my wall at home, and a Monday to Monday calendar on my desk at work. Blueboar (talk) 10:10, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think Sunday being the first day listed on a calendar is the same as saying it's the first day of the week. It just makes it more symmetrical than having two "S" abbrev days right next to each other. So, it's a stylistic thing. StuRat (talk) 03:37, 13 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Sssomething unsssettling about sssibilance, Ssstu? Even if it has nothing to do with the somewhat symmetrical stylings of ophidiophobia, it seems like this explanation stops working in Québec. There's absolutely nothing pretty about DLMMJVS. Arabic really nails it, once Romanized: AAAAAAA (or AAAAAAA, if Sunday ssstartsss.) InedibleHulk (talk) 04:12, 13 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, repeated S's rattle me. :-) SMTWTFS is almost completely symmetrical, we just need to change Monday to Funday or Friday to Myday. StuRat (talk) 04:36, 13 May 2017 (UTC) [reply]

Another F wouldn't work with the W, so Funday's out of the question. I'd rather wake up in Australia than adopt "Myday". Let's just have two Mondays. We say we hate them now (because deep down inside, we're all cats), but nobody could repeat that without sounding like they mean the good one. If nobody repeats it, nobody has to think about it, offer sympathy or pretend to laugh. When workers aren't thinking, feeling or acting, they're free to work. More work means less time, and less time means (new) Monday comes sooner. After a few wild Monday nights, Monday mornings will seem like the place to be. More piss and vinegar, with less piss and vinegar. Before long, they'll want a Monday to get them through till Monday, and generous overlords can dangle the W in front of them, promisssing to flip it once a month if quotas are exceeded. There's a rat race we can all win! InedibleHulk (talk) 06:00, 13 May 2017 (UTC) [reply]

History of the Israeli Supreme Court[edit]

Our article on this court has no information on its history such as when it was founded and so on. Can anyone help? Eg any journal articles? Thanks Amisom (talk) 07:59, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Localy, the gazette of record for the State of Israel, Reshumot, number 12 of the Israeli Provisional Government <INADEQUATE!!!>has the proclamation, here <INACCURATE!!!>a transcription of the content (from a document sale on eBay)</>. A good read about the period is in this biography of Simon Agranat. Also to consider might be Al-Ittihad (Israeli newspaper) 1948. --Askedonty (talk) 09:01, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know what that English text on ebay is supposed to be, but it's not a transcript of the 1948 document. Transparently so, as it deals with a number of 21st century matters. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 13:35, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Well its called thru "1948 Original OFFICIAL NEWSPAPER Proclaiming IDF SOVEREIGNTY I JERUSALEM Israel", and I'm clearly reading in "ACCORDINGLY WE, MEMBERS OF THE PEOPLE'S COUNCIL, REPRESENTATIVES OF THE JEWISH COMMUNITY OF ERETZ-ISRAEL AND OF THE ZIONIST MOVEMENT, ARE HERE ASSEMBLED ON THE DAY OF THE TERMINATION OF THE BRITISH MANDATE OVER ERETZ-ISRAEL AND, BY VIRTUE OF OUR NATURAL AND HISTORIC RIGHT AND ON THE STRENGTH OF THE RESOLUTION OF THE UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY, HEREBY DECLARE THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A JEWISH STATE IN ERETZ-ISRAEL, TO BE KNOWN AS THE STATE OF ISRAEL. WE DECLARE that, with effect from the moment of the termination of the Mandate being tonight, the eve of Sabbath, the 6th Iyar, 5708 (15th May, 1948), until the establishment of the elected, regular authorities of the State in accordance with the Constitution which shall be adopted by the Elected Constituent Assembly not later than the 1st October 1948, the People's Council shall act as a Provisional Council of State, and its executive organ, the People's Administration, shall be the Provisional Government of the Jewish State, to be called () " --Askedonty (talk) 13:44, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

That text is buried in the middle of an enormous chunk of words that deal, as I say, with 21st century matters, and I can't see that it says anywhere that that excerpt that you quote is a transcript - although it may well be. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 15:48, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Oh my. --Askedonty (talk) 22:42, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Sikh Hierarchy?[edit]

Do Sikhs have a hierarchy, such as a "head Sikh of North America" or the equivalent of eparchs, grand muftis, or archbishoprics? Thanks. μηδείς (talk) 12:59, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Historically, there were the Sikh gurus, which were the people who founded the tenets of the religion. The current leaders of Sikh are the Jathedar, and local teachers are Granthi (similar to Rabbis or Imams in Judaism or Islam). There are no Sikh priests, properly, as Sikh religion requires no intermediaries between the believer and God. Observant Sikhs are classified as Khalsa (the basic term for a believer or soldier of Sikh, meaning "purity"). There is no real hierarchy to speak of in the way one finds in, say, Catholicism. --Jayron 32 13:18, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Flag meeting[edit]

Is the term flag meeting unique to the Indian subcontinent? (in the sense it is used in the article 2017 Afghanistan–Pakistan border skirmish). Are flag meetings always held on the border? What is the exact definition of the term and its origins? SpinningSpark 17:37, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

For the convenience of other readers, I note that the phrase appears in the last paragraph of the article. Loraof (talk) 20:17, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

A quick google search on the term makes me think that it is unique to the sub-continent. Blueboar (talk) 21:19, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I was trying to think of a synonym for "flag meeting" which would be intelligible to other English speakers, but only came up with parley. Alansplodge (talk) 10:43, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Libertarian and anti psychiatry[edit]

I'm looking for sources about the historical relationship between the libertarian and anti psychiatry movements. Benjamin (talk) 19:00, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

You may well already be aware of this, but paragraph 6 of Anti-psychiatry#1960s mentions the libertarian Szasz, with one or two cites. Loraof (talk) 20:32, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There is a huge difference between being "anti psychiatry" and opposing the use of psychiatry to forcibly detain and treat deviance from societal norms, including belonging to certain unpopular religions. --Guy Macon (talk) 21:05, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

From a glance at Thomas Szasz, it looks like "anti-psychiatry" may have been a term applied by the movement's opponents as not infrequently happens — see also Quaker, Lollard, impressionism, lots of others. Szasz himself was a psychiatrist. Nevertheless, he is always going to come up prominently in any discussion of "anti-psychiatry". --Trovatore (talk) 21:19, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Then again, maybe not. Apparently the term was coined by David Cooper, who argued for anti-psychiatry, not against it. I don't follow his reasons exactly; something about wanting a return to a more realized society, whatever that means.

Szasz agreed with many of the criticisms but from radically different (and in my opinion sounder) motivations, and resisted being identified with "anti-psychiatry". --Trovatore (talk) 21:27, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There is, however, zero evidence that Libertarianism is Anti-psychiatry, unless you define "anti-psychiatry" as opposing the use of psychiatry to forcibly detain and treat people with unpopular beliefs or religions. If a belief is held by a billion people, it's a legitimate religion no matter how batshit insane the belief is. If the exact same belief is held by one person, he gets locked up in a rubber room wearing a straitjacket. --Guy Macon (talk) 00:46, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not arguing with you. I agree that there is nothing in libertarianism per se that is opposed to psychiatry per se. Benjamin asked for the historical relationship between the movements, and the answer to that has to go through Thomas Szasz; he rejected the anti-psychiatry label, but was nevertheless associated with the movement by others. --Trovatore (talk) 01:30, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

By others? Who? Benjamin (talk) 04:55, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

But finding a libertarian who is also against psychiatry does not mean that libertarianism is associated with the anti-psychiatry movement. The world is a diverse place, and it is trivial to find any person in the world who believes any arbitrary set of precepts. You might even be able to find two or three or a dozen. It still doesn't mean anything. --Jayron 32 01:34, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If you were reading libertarian publications in the '70s and '80s, you knew who Szasz was. He wasn't just some guy who randomly happened to be associated with both movements; he was worthy of mention relative to both, though he disavowed most of the anti-psychiatry movement.

So anyway, I don't know what we're arguing about. I agree that libertarianism is not anti-psychiatry. But if you ask about a historical connection, there's a pretty obvious answer, and it goes through Szasz. --Trovatore (talk) 04:21, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

And there is a historical connection between serial killer John Wayne Gacy and paintings of clowns. That fact in no way associates the clown painting community with serial killing. There is also a historical connection between Adolf Hitler and vegetarianism. That fact in no way associates vegetarianism with Naziism. --Guy Macon (talk) 06:18, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

This is not useful to the OP--Jayron 32 16:35, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

And the Godwin Award of the Week goes to.... --Jayron 32 10:39, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

And the much-coveted "completely misunderstanding Godwin's law" award goes to... --Guy Macon (talk) 13:09, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Are we having an online discussion? Did Hitler get mentioned? Did time pass? I think we met all requirements for this discussion to confirm Godwin's Law. Let me quote it for you "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Hitler approaches 1" This discussion is a) online b) it grew longer c) a comparison involving Hitler got mentioned. Is there a part of Godwin's law which is not mentioned in the Wikipedia article? If there is, perhaps you can add it to the article, because I'm afraid I can't learn anything unless you make the article better. --Jayron 32 13:36, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I think Guy Macon's point is that when Godwin's law refers to "a comparison involving Hitler", it means a comparison between someone's thoughts/acts/beliefs/whatever and those of Hitler. Guy Macon did not make any such comparison. --Viennese Waltz 14:56, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. Jayron misapplied Godwin's Law, probably intentionally. StuRat (talk) 15:33, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Does it mean that? Because it doesn't say that in the Wikipedia article, it just says a "comparison involving Hitler". You're going to have to find reliable sources to correct the Wikipedia article then, lest it lead others to make the same mistake. --Jayron 32 16:24, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

As our article states, with refs: "Godwin's law itself can be abused as a distraction, diversion or even as censorship, fallaciously miscasting an opponent's argument as hyperbole when the comparisons made by the argument are actually appropriate". This what happened here. Use of Hitler's link to vegetarianism to show that correlation does not imply causation is entirely appropriate, as you well know. StuRat (talk) 16:30, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If it's important to you to be correct, you can be. I don't really need to be. It's not that important. You're correct. I'm wrong. --Jayron 32 16:37, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Another historic reason for libertarians to oppose psychiatry was back when homosexuality was considered a mental disease. StuRat (talk) 15:33, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]