Wikipedia:Main Page history/2021 October 31

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From today's featured article

Earth's air temperatures have increased substantially in recent decades.

Contemporary climate change involves rising global temperatures and significant shifts in Earth's weather patterns. Climate change is driven by emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane. Emissions come mostly from burning fossil fuels (coal, oil and natural gas), and also from agriculture, forest loss, cement production and steel making. Climate change causes sea level rise, glacial retreat and desertification, and intensifies heat waves, wildfires and tropical storms. These effects of climate change endanger food security, freshwater access and global health. Climate change can be limited by using low-carbon energy sources such as wind and solar energy, forestation, and shifts in agriculture. Adaptations such as coastline protection cannot by themselves avert the risk of severe, pervasive and irreversible impacts. Limiting global warming in line with the goals of the Paris Agreement requires reaching net-zero emissions by 2050. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Women Who Fight sculpture

... that a group of feminists placed the Women Who Fight anti-monument (pictured) on a pedestal on which a statue of Christopher Columbus formerly stood?
... that championship belt designer Reggie Parks, whose work was used by WWE, UFC, and Madonna, was the first wrestling opponent of future NWA Worlds Heavyweight Champion Dusty Rhodes?
... that the 2020 documentary film Gather, which explores Native American efforts for food sovereignty and reclamation of ancestral foodways, was named a Critic's Pick by The New York Times?
... that Chen Wenxin discovered that planting legumes and grasses together can increase yield?
... that radio station KWKC dropped its application for a TV station in order to speed the arrival of television to Abilene, Texas, which would otherwise have been 89th in line?
... that Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott, a motet by Telemann, was performed and recorded in 2017 to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the Reformation?
... that the Initial IMO Strategy on the reduction of GHG emissions from ships envisions the elimination of greenhouse gas emissions from maritime transport by the end of the century?
... that Elaine Estes, the first African American director of the Des Moines Public Library, holds a patent on her parents' barbecue sauce?

In the news

Abdel Fattah al-Burhan

A military coup in Sudan, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan (pictured), deposes the government of Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok.
Shavkat Mirziyoyev is re-elected President of Uzbekistan.
Ahead of Barbados becoming a republic, Sandra Mason is elected as the country's first president.
Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny is awarded the Sakharov Prize.

On this day

October 31: Halloween

Indira Gandhi

475 – Romulus Augustulus took the throne as the last effective ruling emperor of the Western Roman Empire.
1517 – According to one account, Martin Luther posted his Ninety-five Theses onto the door of All Saints' Church in Wittenberg, present-day Germany, marking the beginning of the Protestant Reformation.
1941 – Approximately 400 workers completed the 60-foot (18 m) busts of U.S. presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln at Mount Rushmore in South Dakota.
1984 – Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi (pictured) was assassinated by two of her own Sikh bodyguards, sparking riots that resulted in the deaths of thousands of Sikhs.
2015 – Shortly after takeoff, Metrojet Flight 9268 exploded and then crashed into the Sinai Peninsula, killing all 224 people on board.

John Keats (b. 1795)
Juliette Gordon Low (b. 1860)
Larry Mullen Jr. (b. 1961)

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Today's featured picture

The over-the-shoulder shot is a camera angle used in film and television, in which the camera is placed above and behind one of the participants. In this lithographic colour poster, which advertised a show in 1896, it is used to show the scene from the perspective of an audience member watching images projected by a Vitascope, an early type of film projector.

Poster credit: Metropolitan Print Company; restored by Adam Cuerden

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