Humanities desk
< February 10	<< Jan \| February \| Mar >>	February 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.

February 11

Psychological conditions.

Is there a psychological title for when a rescuee falls in love with a rescuer ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.210.15.78 (talk) 03:23, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've heard this referred to as a Reverse Florence Nightingale Effect but haven't seen a more specific term. Dismas|^(talk) 03:49, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Reverse Stockholm Syndrome? NByz (talk) 06:36, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Whatever is the answer should find a mention in the damsel in distress article. Jay (talk) 07:55, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Tricky. Closest perhaps is Cinderella complex when women can't handle the self-sufficiency required by gender equality and desire a man to sweep them off their feet and take care of them[1]; this describes the urge not the actual falling in love. Related is transference in psychoanalysis (over-esteeming or falling in love with psychoanalyst), and the article on it says Florence Nightingale Effect can also refer to the patient falling for the carer as well as carer loving patient (the latter can be countertransference). Also related is Knight in Shining Armor Syndrome or Rescuer Syndrome, the desire in a man to be a rescuer; see Harvey Hornstein's A Knight in Shining Armor. Must go, I can hear a woman screaming! --Maltelauridsbrigge (talk) 15:32, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Patty Hearst married her former bodyguard, Bernard Shaw. --Wetman (talk) 15:57, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Anne Bonny & Mary Read: Bisexual?!

Hey, everyone. A long time ago, I did a report on Anne Bonny and it was rumoured to say that she was bisexual. I know it says nothing on your article about this, but on others it does! Help!!!! THANKS! ~Lynden —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.178.20.243 (talk) 05:14, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

There is a problem with adding things that "are rumored" to an encyclopedia article. Since the person seems to be a historical figures there might be a way to include it. Find a reliable source that reports such rumors and then include a phrase like "Historians have reported evidence of rumors that she might have been bisexual." Just a quote from some blog or "my friends said" is not enough evidence to include such a statement. The next step then would be for you to get an account with a password here and after you've received some welcome info and read a bit on how to edit articles you can include the info. 76.97.245.5 (talk) 06:15, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure that's exactly what the OP's drift was. I think they were just asking if this person was bisexual or not. --Richardrj ^talk ^email 10:27, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

A General History of the Pyrates, our most important source for Bonny and Read, clearly implies that they were both heterosexual. John M Baker (talk) 00:03, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Renovation for Disabled children in Armenia-grant

February 11,2009

Dear Sitr/Madame,

My name is Rebecca Tantama. I am a Peace Corps volunteer working with Disabled children at Bridge of Hope ,Berd Branch, Armenia. We are seeking fund/grant to renovate a room which was given to us by the community. The room has been neglected since Soviet time, It is in extremely poor condition. We would like to use the space for the treatment - Physical therapy, as well as music and art therapy for our children. We are hoping that you may guide me to "Grant assistance project" where I may request for assistance for this project. Thank you very much for your assistance.

Sincerely, Rebecca Tantama <e-mail address removed for security reasons> —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.241.134.230 (talk) 11:08, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Could not find any specific "Grant assistance project", however the Armenian diaspora has been financing public projects, and a list of their non-commercial projects is available here. Jay (talk) 12:37, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Bic's main competitors in the disposable pen market

What are Bic's main competitors (I guess Pilot is one of them) in the market of one-use pens? Thanks. --Taraborn (talk) 11:19, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

google sets has these ones I recognize:

bic
pilot
parker
papermate
avery
sharpie
stabilo

but click the link and maybe you recognize more of them! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.120.236.246 (talk) 12:19, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This link mentions Bic, Pilot, Mitsubishi, Straedtler, Parker in the Australian market, as well as various companies producing promotional items who may be lesser known. You might find more information on environmentalist websites, since they seem quite concerned about disposable pens. --Maltelauridsbrigge (talk) 15:43, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Great! Thanks! --Taraborn (talk) 17:40, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Disposable pen market innovations

Hi again... Now I need to know notable innovations, such as the rollerball pen, erasable pen, etc. Thanks again! --Taraborn (talk) 17:39, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

There is some information at Ballpoint pen if you haven't looked there yet. Interestingly enough, gel pen, erasable pen and rollerball pen may also be useful. ៛ BL ៛ (talk) 17:54, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

How about multi-colored inks, invisible ink (for kids), and ergonomic hand grips ? And, on the marketing end, how about licensing of names and logos like Harley-Davidson ? Pens have always been used to advertise things, too, with the latest trend seeming to be medications. Note that the larger, ergonomic hand grips also provide more room for licensed logos or advertising. Also, I've seen people's own names on (disposable) pencils, but not on disposable pens. I imagine this could be done fairly cheaply, though. StuRat (talk) 00:10, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, really useful! --Taraborn (talk) 13:15, 13 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Naked ladies on pens,that is one's who's clothes disappear as the pen is tipped,86.53.80.11 (talk) 17:43, 14 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I thought of those, but they aren't disposable, since nobody but a disgusted wife would toss out such a pen. :-) StuRat (talk) 15:21, 15 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Needing to read up on finance

Hello. I have undertaken an elementary course in accounting in a semester and know how stocks and bonds work. However I was trying to understand the recent US subprime crisis and the global financial crisis and found that I don't understand several concepts regarding interest rates, money supply etc. Can someone please point me in the right direction so that I know what articles to start off reading and other articles that I should subsequently read? Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks. --ReluctantPhilosopher (talk) 13:33, 11 February 2009 (UTC) EDIT:Kindly note that I am looking for a comprehensive understanding on the subject and I'm willing to spend a few weeks reading, starting from the simplest topics and working towards the difficult ones. Thanks. -- ReluctantPhilosopher (talk) 13:53, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Subprime mortgage, interest rates and supply and demand might be good places to start. Livewireo (talk) 14:29, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You could try Financial crisis of 2007–2010, but I find its treatment of the roots of the crisis superficial. Economists disagree on the causes of the crisis. Many economists see the subprime mortgage boom as but a symptom of the underlying causes, which include excessive deregulation of finance and the suppression of interest rates over more than a decade by the Federal Reserve, which led to the overuse of leverage, a serious underpricing of risk, and long-term imbalances in the current account of the United States and other countries. Our article on financialization summarizes some of this. For one analyst's view of the crisis, written when the subprime trouble was just emerging, you might take a look at this article. Marco polo (talk) 14:40, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

In addition to the articles Livewireo mentions, we have Money supply. Marco polo (talk) 14:42, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This podcast does a surprisingly good job of explaining it for laypersons. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 20:21, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Marco about the multiple causes. Because there is no agreed upon "cause", our articles don't really come together to form a solid single view on the subject of cause. They list contributing factors and give good chronologies of events though.

It looks like Paul Krugman's "The Return of Depression Economics and the Crisis of 2008" is only $14.97 on Amazon. I haven't read it yet, but from reputation alone, I suggest it would be a good overview. In fact... There. I just bought it myself two seconds ago. NByz (talk) 01:14, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Liquidity and the financial crisis

Is the government trying to solve the financial crisis with an injection of liquidity? Wasn't too much liquidity the cause of the bubble in the first place? Couldn't the government just tax 'money that is not moving' so that people move?

Yes, yes, probably not. Just because too much liquidity got us into this mess does not mean than too little liquidity will get us out of it. Taxing anything is unlikely to help, since it will further reduce demand. --Tagishsimon (talk) 18:23, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think the problem is that banks have gone from being nowhere near cautious enough to being overcautious, so availability of credit (not quite the same as liquidity, but closely related) has gone from being far too high to far too low. Governments are lending large amounts of money to try and get back to somewhere near the right amount. There are also massive stimulus plans that are not directly related to the credit crunch, they are intended to deal with the recession (caused by the credit crunch, at least partially) - they aren't about lending, but rather about simply spending (it doesn't really matter what on, from a financial perspective). Forcing people to spend by taxing savings might be possible, but I'm not sure how you would pull it off - people would probably just put all their money in off-shore accounts (you can try and tax money leaving the country, but the diplomatic fallout of such protectionism would be severe). --Tango (talk) 20:28, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Again, experts differ on this, but some have argued that banks are simply insolvent. On this view, government "capital injections" do no more than keep the banks barely solvent and are barely keeping up with banks' accelerating losses. This, rather than overcaution, may explain why banks aren't lending. After all, lending is their main potential source of profit, and if they could do so, they would. Marco polo (talk) 21:41, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Incidentally, if the problem really is insolvency, as I suspect, rather than illiquidity, then taxing away savings or reserves might temporarily increase liquidity at the cost of expanding insolvency. Marco polo (talk) 21:47, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks to all of you for your replies. Actually I'm looking for basic stuff like how interest rates affect inflation, unemployement and money supply - the interest rate article doesn't adequately explain it. Can anyone point me towards a relevant article/online resource / book where I can read up on this stuff. Thanks again. -- ReluctantPhilosopher (talk) 11:17, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well, there are as many theories and explanations of the links between these economic factors as there are economists, but I will attempt a simplified explanation (which will probably be shot down in flames in short order ...):

Most governments of developed countries pursue a monetary policy that is based on inflation targeting i.e. keeping inflation within a target range. The underlying idea here is that too little inflation (lack of growth) is as bad as too much inflation (uncertainty, no incentive to invest); just enough inflation to drive growth and maximise employment without creating uncertainty is just right. How can a government control inflation ? There are direct methods such as price ceilings and price floors, but experience shows that these may cause more problems than they solve - hence the recurring debate over minimum wage legislation. Indirect methods rely on controlling the money supply, which is in turn linked to inflation via the quantity theory of money. So the question then becomes how can a government affect the money supply ? Again, there are various direct methods - increasing or decresing government spending, changing reserve requirements for banks, buying or selling government securities in open market operations. Each of these has some implementation problems - changes in government spending operate over a long time horizon; changing reserve requirements increases uncertainty in the financial sector and can cause liquidity problems; open market operations that are too obviously tied to targets can be exploited by speculators. By contrast, changes to central bank interest rates are easy and cheap to implement and have a rapid effect, so this has become the lever that many governments use to implement their monetary policy. So when inflation is too high the government (or the central bank, if control has been delegated to it) raises interest rates, which contracts the money supply, which should slow inflation; when inflation is too low, they do the opposite - lower interest rates to expand the money supply and so increase inflation. Unfortunately this does not always work as intended - see liquidity trap. Gandalf61 (talk) 14:52, 13 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much, Gandalf61, for taking the time to explain how it all works. It will serve as a good starting point for me to read up more. Hopefully some googling will help. Thanks again :) -- ReluctantPhilosopher (talk) 16:10, 13 February 2009 (UTC) (wiggles head)[reply]

Judith Arpad

I don't think Geza of Hungary and his wife Sarolt ever had a daughter named Judith. I think the stem of this misunderstanding might be that there was another Judith of Hungary (aka. Judith of Swabia) who was the wife of a Polish monarch and whose name in the German Wikipedia is Judith von Ungarn. Also the picture on the Sarolt article, who is that? I am so confused now. Can anybody help set this straight? --Queen Elizabeth II's Little Spy (talk) 22:14, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Géza would have been 102 at the time of Judith of Swabia's birth, surely a remarkable enough thing that we'd notice? ON what grounds do you think they never had such a daughter? (I grant we have no citations in the article.)

btw, the better place to raise this enquiry might have been Talk:Géza of Hungary. But you probably know that. --Tagishsimon (talk) 22:26, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You;d have to talk to User:Mareczko on commons about the image - the source website is kaput. --Tagishsimon (talk) 22:29, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Once again, I'd like to recommend Sarolt von Siebenburgen at Genealogics where you will find that Schwennicke's Europäische Stammtafeln, II 153, indicates that there was indeed such a daughter. - Nunh-huh 22:37, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I was just wondering if that Geza did have a daughter but her name is unknown and that somehow it got mixed up with another Judith who happen to be known as Sophia (sometimes just Judith) of Hungary. Also I have notice that no one seems to answer talk pages. I can wait for weeks without getting a single answer. But the Reference desk seems quiker. --Queen Elizabeth II's Little Spy (talk) 22:51, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It comes down to who's watching the pages: some of the more obscure pages might have few people watching for changes, and thus it may be a while before anyone discovers your questions. The ref desk, on the other hand, has always got people hanging about. You might find Wikiprojects useful (such as WikiProject Poland or WP Middle Ages). You have been involved with some good research. It'd be great if you added the informationa dn discoveries you made to the appropriate pages, so WP is improved and other readers/researchers can benefit. Gwinva (talk) 01:03, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I tried to find an answer to your question about the image at Sarolt and I found this! It's a gallery of "Polish Queens of the House of Piast". It was published in Lemberg (Lviv) in 1851. The portait you were asking about (lower left corner) is captioned "Judith, princess of Hungary, wife of Bolesław I". The other Judith, wife of Władysław Herman, is the second one from the top in the left-hand column, labeled here as "Judith, princess of Bohemia [? – not sure, the print is too small], wife of Władysław I". I'll write more about this lithography on your talk page later. — Kpalion^(talk) 19:48, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Przecława

Was the first wife of Władysław I of Poland consider a Duchess of Poland? That is was she ever alive when he became duke in 1079? --Queen Elizabeth II's Little Spy (talk) 23:24, 11 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The Polish Wikipedia article Władysław I Herman doesn't mention Przecława's name at all. It says that Zbigniew's mother was a Polish woman of unknown name and social origin although there is a hypothesis that she was from the Prawdziwiec clan. There also seems to be no consensus whether she was Władysław's legitimate spouse, a mistress – or if she was only married to him in a pagan ritual. It also says that she either died or was sent away before 1080. Władysław ascended the throne a year earlier. Whether this makes her a duchess of Poland or not – probably nobody knows. — Kpalion^(talk) 18:29, 12 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]