Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2012 May 23

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May 23

SITTING REPUBLICAN US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

WHO AND HOW MANY JEWISH SITTING REPUBLICAN US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ARE THERE..??? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.81.70.93 (talk) 02:48, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Please don't use all capital letters in your posts. It's harder to read, and is considered to be shouting on the Internet. HiLo48 (talk) 02:53, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

A little simple Googling will tell you as much as you're ever likely to want to know. The only Jewish member of the current Republican caucus in either the House or the Senate is Eric Cantor of Virginia, the Majority Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives and thus second within the House Republican Conference after the Speaker of the House, John Boehner of Ohio. The two independent Senators, Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut and Bernie Sanders of Vermont, are also both Jewish (there are currently no independent members of the House of Representatives). For lists of current and recent Jewish members of both chambers, see: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/US-Israel/jewcongtoc.html For a list of every current member by religious affiliation see http://www.pewforum.org/uploadedFiles/Topics/Issues/Government/relig-affil-pdf%20updated%202-24-11.pdf For a statistical overview, see: http://www.pewforum.org/Government/Faith-on-the-Hill--The-Religious-Composition-of-the-112th-Congress.aspx —— Shakescene (talk) 05:12, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Communism on totalitarianism and authoritarianism

Yes I once asked a similar question to this one, but this one is slightly different. Think of it as a follow-up question. The question is basically "is it encouraged?" rather than "why?" Anyway, I've noticed that virtually all "communist" countries (as in socialist one-party countries run by a communist party on a path to communism) eventually become dictatorships with little to no freedom of speech/religion/press etc. and frequently cults of personality. However, I did not notice any part in the articles on Communism, Marxism and Marxism-Leninism which encourage no freedom of speech or press, or cults of personality, although state atheism was encouraged by Marx. But IIRC, Marx wanted some democracy in order to implement certain socialist policies. Does this mean that the road to communism was actually supposed to be a more democratic one instead of totalitarian one? And was there anything in Marx's works that encouraged totalitarianism, authoritarianism or dictatorships? Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 03:16, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, communism basically doesn't work, in that there's no incentive to work. The people soon figure out that this is the cause of their economic problems. So, if people could vote for change, they would. Thus, the only way to maintain communism is to take away people's ability to vote. StuRat (talk) 04:10, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Added a tag to your dubious statement once again. --Broadside Perceptor (talk) 23:43, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

And I removed it again. You are not allowed to edit the talk page contributions of others. That tag is for articles, not here. If you disagree with anything I said, add your own comments, don't edit mine. StuRat (talk) 02:38, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not editing your comment, I'm just adding a warning to anyone who reads your reply that it is highly dubious and unreliable. You also fail to understand that it is not a matter of opinion, because I actually somewhat agree with you. --Broadside Perceptor (talk) 18:03, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

See News from Nowhere on the incentive to work. Itsmejudith (talk) 10:19, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

• "Totalitarian" and "authoritarian" are concepts created by US political scientists in the 1950s and 1960s to justify the US government's support of some anti-democratic societies, while opposing other anti-democratic societies. They are not a useful lens through which to view the actuality of the soviet-style societies.
• Marxism has a democratic heritage. Marx supported the people against existing states in positive politics, and in his theoretical works hypothesised that the labour process would produce a new collective democratic working class identity. This mirrors the condition of a large proportion of the revolutionary socialist movement of Marx's time. Revolutionary socialists viewed democracy as a good thing, and a more ideal way to manage society and the economy. The majority of Marxists maintained this position, though, during the First World War major splits emerged in the Socialist movement, as many socialist parties supported the war whereas many politically active workers did not support the war.
• Marx's political conceptions did include conceptions that were criticised as anti-democratic. The chief critique was that advanced by Bukharin of Marx's attitude towards the state. My lingering suspicious is that Bukharin viewed the state as a bourgeois state apparatus, whereas Marx viewed the state in his writing as the tool of one classes' oppression of other classes.
• Towards the end of the first world war, Russia went through a series of revolutions. The most significant revolutionary moment was the growth of workplace councils during 1917. As Simon Pirani notes, these councils were stifled by the war economy and by the central role played in government by the RSDLP(b). The RSDLP(b) had attacked other socialist parties in the constituent assembly, a bourgeois parliament. They also attacked other revolutionary soviet parties and groups, such as the (pathetically ineffective) Moscow anarchists, the Left SRs, or the Makhnovist movement. With the working class crushed in the factories by starvation and Bolshevik power, in the Red Army by attrition and Bolshevik power, and in the country-side by the destruction of socialist revolutionary movements (by the Bolshevik party), chaos, and kulakisation, working class democracy became ineffective, being replaced by Bolshevik functionaries organised in a hierarchical manner with extremely limited capacity for dissent. Soviet style societies rapidly disconnected from the democratic heritage of Marxism.
• Some other European revolutions in the late 1910s also suffered from anti-democratic tendencies, such as the centralising impulse of the Social Democratic and Syndicalist Hungarian revolution (inspired by Bolshevism). Others, such as the German or Italian revolutions, or the British shop-stewards committees maintained workers' democracy. As can be seen from the "ultra-left" debates (cf: Left wing communism, an infantile disorder), the Bolsheviks had to cement control over the international revolutionary socialist movement by attacking (surprise!) Marxists who favoured workers democracy like the AAUD or KAPD or early British communist party. But as the Hungarian revolution shows, factors other than Leninism lead to anti-democratic practices—isolation from a large working class movement, the substitution of leadership for membership, and centralisation. Strangely, these were factors behind the anti-democratic tendencies in the all-party Soviets of the Soviet Union (and show in the Left SR's anti-democratic politics as well as the Bolsheviks—the Left SRs weren't Marxists by the way).
• By 1930 the 3rd International had become committed to a Bolshevik attitude towards politics, the subordination of the working class, and anti-democratic practices within most Parties. This wasn't helped by the number of revolutions where long term war was a fundamental component (China, Vietnam); or, where Bolshevik politics were forced by occupation, political attacks on socialists and centrists, and coup d'etats (Central Europe). In addition, the attacks on democratising movements in Soviet-style societies by the Soviet Union ensured that any tendency towards democracy by sending tanks over the border.
• By 1930 criticisms of Bolshevism as anti-democratic from within the workers' movement had been developed by Social Democrats, revolutionary Social Democrats varying from ultra-lefts through "right"ists, anarchists, revolutionary labourites, etc. The most commonly known criticisms of the anti-worker attitude of the Soviet Union come from Trotskyists of various varieties. Amusingly, many of the criticisms of the Soviet Union as anti-democratic have come from parties that are themselves anti-democratic!
• "The road to communism" isn't a path established by political parties of bourgeois intellectuals, whether Radical, Anarchist, Social Democratic or Leninist. The road to communism is the path taken by the working class. The natural institutions of the working class, built out of solidarity, are democratic and mass institutions (the union, the cooperative store, the democratic political party branch). This seems to be related to the actual labour process under capitalism as formative of the worker as a collective apparatus, a "social worker." Marx's intentions don't come into whether communism ought to be an extension of existing workers' democracy or not, nor do Lenin's substitutionalism. The structure of the soviet-style societies reflected their inception in bloody brutality, the crushing of revolutionary working class movements, and the maintenance of power by a limited network of Bolshevik functionaries. This is as related to communism as the Absolutist State of Louis XIV is related to capitalism. Fifelfoo (talk) 04:22, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

This topic is highly contentious and has been widely debated since the 19th century. There are many different replies from all sorts of different perspectives, and the answer you'll get will likely depend on whom you're asking. One relatively popular book on the topic is The Road to Serfdom by Friedrich Hayek, in which he argues that state control over the economy (whether "communist" or otherwise) is a slippery slope inevitably leading towards a totalitarian state. Gabbe (talk) 08:40, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

And of course it should be mentioned that Hayek is on the other end of the political spectrum than Marx, and as such is as ideologically loaded as communists and marxists. --Saddhiyama (talk) 11:49, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

StuRats comment is a tired old POV interpretation based on the western media (how can an educated encyclopaedia hold that view?). Also see the governments of West Bengal since the last 40 years. Democratic Comm. govts...and even if the PARTY lost the last election, the new party won on a platform that was more communist (communal ownership vs. privatisation) than the official communists.Lihaas (talk) 23:57, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

You must have noticed the total lack of successful communist nations in the world today (China is now as capitalist as anyone). It's not just bad luck, it just doesn't work. At best it works on a very small scale, where everyone knows everyone else, and they can expel anyone from the commune who doesn't pull their own weight. StuRat (talk) 02:50, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Frank Zappa said it this way: "Communism doesn't work, because people like to own stuff." ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 11:21, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Zappa didn't understand the distinction between private property and personal property. Depending on the form of socialism/communism, you probably can't own a factory, a village, an island, a mountain. You can own clothing, furniture, means of transport, sports equipment, books, paintings etc. And the "no incentive to work" idea is muddled. As the OP understood, the Marxist idea is that societies first make a transition to socialism, where the principle is "from each according to their labour, to each according to their work". The incentive to work is that you have a contract of employment, and if you break your contract you lose pay and may be sacked. Then after a transition to communism, the principle is "from each according to their labour, to each according to their need". The idea there is that people actually want to fill up their days with fulfilling activity. William Morris, in his utopian novel, started with the example of someone who liked to ferry people across the Thames in a rowing boat. In his day there was a craze for rich young men to exert themselves rowing up and down the Thames, carrying no-one who needed to go anywhere. The USSR and China didn't turn to authoritarianism because they had tried the utopian ideal and it failed. They never tried the utopian ideal. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:40, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

The risk of being fired inspires people to do the minimum amount of work they can to get by. Incentives like promotions, raises, etc., are needed to get them to do more than the bare minimum. And I don't think most people enjoy their work to the extent that they would choose to do it for thousands of hours each year, for their whole life, without compensation. StuRat (talk) 17:29, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

You might want to look up Maslow's hierarchy of needs. According to that theory, what drives people isn't money alone. Money is only that useful (unless you have insane quantities of it). For most people, money is spent to get housing (whether you're paying down a mortgage or renting), buying food, clothes and other essentials. If you are lucky, you might be able to afford a holiday to an exotic location every now and then. However, there are other things that trigger people's willingness to work, such as their work being appreciated by others, good work mates and self-realisation. Now, you would argue, self-realisation you've covered in your comment about 'promotions', but that really is a tired cliché. Many jobs are dead end jobs, that don't really lead to anywhere: Office cleaner, burger flipper, receptionist, none of these are likely to get you that fat promotion you want so badly, regardless of how hard you work. V85 (talk) 18:40, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

most forms of socialism have some kind of wage differential, I.e. promotions, raises. The Soviet system certainly did. But the differential factor could be fixed at maximum x5, x10 rather than the present x100 (between the VCR of a university and a cleaner, for example).Itsmejudith (talk) 19:41, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

But even at a 5X differential, you're still going to have a poor "working class" and a relatively rich "ruling class". So, this doesn't qualify as communism, to me. StuRat (talk) 17:44, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

"...was there anything in Marx's works that encouraged totalitarianism, authoritarianism or dictatorships?"

• From the Communist Manifesto (p.26 of the pdf) "The proletariat will use its political supremacy ... to centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the State....Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production...."
• From Critique of the Gotha Program: "Between capitalist and communist society there lies the period of the revolutionary transformation of the one into the other. Corresponding to this is also a political transition period in which the state can be nothing, but the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat."[1]--Wikimedes (talk) 11:47, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

See dictatorship of the proletariat as well for some further clarification of that term. It doesn't necessarily mean a dictatorship, but practical applications have tended to make it, well, a dictatorship. --Mr.98 (talk) 13:16, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

And once you have a dictatorship, you're not likely to find it willing to voluntarily give up power in favor of democracy. StuRat (talk) 17:31, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

No kidding. I always get a laugh when a communism apologist comes along and tries to argue that Americans aren't free either. Well, there's one sure way to tell how free a country is. It's whether you're allowed to leave. I also laugh when I hear that the USA supposedly incarcerates more people than any country. Wrong. If you're living in a country where you're not allowed to leave, then the entire country is incarcerated. That condition describes any communist nation you'd care to name. Because those benevolent governments knew full well that if people were allowed to leave, there would be a ginormous mass exodus. And that would tend to show up the country's leaders. Can't have that! ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:13, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

StuRat, if you can't be bothered reading even the lede of the article you were referred to, don't bother pressing save page. "The use of the term "dictatorship" does not refer to the Classical Roman concept of the dictatura (the governance of a state by a small group with no democratic process), but instead to the Marxist concept of dictatorship (that an entire societal class holds political and economic control, within a democratic system)." Fifelfoo (talk) 23:36, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

It's always useful to issue personal attacks in front of the OP. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:10, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

That may be the theory, but it wasn't the reality. An entire class of people can't rule directly. So you got somebody like Stalin ruling "on their behalf". Of course, once people like him grabbed power, they had no intention of ever giving it up. StuRat (talk) 04:37, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

To the individual, of course, it doesn't really matter whether he is constrained by a single tyrant, a small oligarchy, or an entire class. --Trovatore (talk) 04:42, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Except that it's easier to shoot a single tyrant. StuRat (talk) 04:50, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

There is that. --Trovatore (talk) 05:05, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

All of these critiques are equally applicable to "liberal" democracy. Fifelfoo (talk) 10:46, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Not really. To democracy, yes, but not to liberal democracy, which specifically implies freedom for the individual. Of course a liberal democracy can take away the individual's freedom via the democratic process, but it then ceases to be liberal. --Trovatore (talk) 17:27, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

"Totalitarian" and "authoritarian" are concepts created by US political scientists in the 1950s and 1960s to justify the US government's support of some anti-democratic societies, while opposing other anti-democratic societies." -- That's a really bizarre claim to make --Tyrannus Mundi (talk) 10:01, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

They don't appear previous to this, they don't appear emergent in British scholarship, and they're certainly not categories present in labourist, social democratic, anarchist nor Marxist work. Read more history and philosophy of social science. Fifelfoo (talk) 10:46, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

TM, I think Fifelfoo is talking about the supposed distinction between "totalitarian" and "authoritarian", (the former being taken to be really bad, the latter, bad but not as bad). I think that probably is a justified criticism of US policy in the time frame referenced. That's a different matter from "totalitarian/authoritarian" as a concept including regimes from both the so-called-right and so-called-left, which definitely appears in Hayek (though I don't know what word he used), and he was certainly not American. --Trovatore (talk) 17:48, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

I've just been through the Reader's Digest abridgement of Road to Serfdom that predates the insipid synchronisation of US social science and state aims in the late 1940s and 1950s. Hayek wrote in English, so we can rely on his original choice of words. His use of "authoritarian" is the inversion of "libertarian" in the sense of direct access to negative rights; for example, in the context of Saint Simone's suggestion of state intervention regarding unwilling workers. Hayek's use of "totalitarian" is in the sense of the totalised state, per the 1930s and 1940s fantasy of the actual function of Germany or the Soviet Union (Hayek wasn't a historian of either state, and was working within conventional scholarship—it isn't an error, merely the common place of the scholarship of his time). Hayek doesn't contrast either of these. Hayek's formulation of "authoritarian" is standard and still theoretically useful when discussing the Soviet-style societies. Hayek's formulation of "totalitarianism" as a historical phenomena has been outdated by social histories of Germany and the Soviet Union—"totalisation" did not meaningfully occur in either state. Hayek's formulation of "totalitarianism" as a watch-word against the potential of synchronisation of societies under economic planning is as valid as the rest of his philosophy: ie, a point for people thinking in reason to validly disagree upon. In fact, if we take Hayek's conception of totalitarianism, ie: the totalisation of society, as a spectrum it is meaningfully applicable to the soviet-style societies' actual history. But this is a long way removed from the common fantasies of the vozhd' or the führerprinzip, or the theoretically specious use of these categories in bigoted US sociology. One of the problems in OP's suggestion is that the history of socialism is replete with scholarship engaging the link between theories that imply centralising practices and anti-democratic practices; where as the history of actually existing soviet-style states highlights (like bloody historians always do), the multiplicity of causation and the wide variety of channels through which power and causation flowed. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:09, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

London Partnership Register

Ken Livingstone, then Mayor of London, introduced the London Partnership Register in 2001. it had no legal force, but paved the way for civil partnerships, and was discontinued when the Civil Partnership Act 2004 came into force. It was open to both same-sex and opposite-sex couples. Does anyone know how many partnerships were registered under this scheme (and the breakdown by male, female, and opposite-sex)? --rossb (talk) 09:44, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

998 partnerships were registered: [2]. Warofdreams talk 10:41, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Many thanks for this. But I wonder if anyone knows the gender breakdown?--rossb (talk) 23:22, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

I did a quick search but couldn't find anything except for a mention of the first heterosexual couple in 2001. You could always ask the City of London or whatever authority this was under.

I'm not sure why you want to know, but perhaps examples from elsewhere would also be interesting. For example, Civil union in New Zealand as the article says are available to both same sex and opposite sex couples in NZ (but marriage unfortunately remains unavailable to same sex couples). Using [3] shows from the start (April 2005) until March 2012 there were 1244 female couples, 951 male couples, 543+7 (7 transfers from marriage) opposite-sex couples registering for them for a total of 2745 civil unions. Which works out to be 45.3%, 34.6%, 19.8%+0.3% respectively. The statistics on the female/male split are interesting albeit some would argue not surprising. Despite all the complainers often concentrating on male couples, there were more females.

Note AFAIK, civil unions in NZ provide all legal rights and responsibilities as marriages except when it comes to adoption. (Other countries may not recognise NZ civil unions in the same way, but that isn't really the fault of NZ.) However even many couples without a marriage or civil union are in nearly the same boat, as it's mostly the same for anyone in a de facto relationship (generally most relationships as a couple living together for more then 3 years) [4] [5] [6], the key difference perhaps being without a clear document, someone could challenge the right to make medical decisions or whatever and you would likely have to wait until it's sorted in court. (But still, it's likely some couples don't bother not seeing a reason.)

Nil Einne (talk) 14:18, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

Stage Combat in the 18. Century

Dear Ladies and Gentlemen.

I am looking for a book of the 18. century about stage combat. Thank you for your help.

Kind Regards--188.62.157.252 (talk) 12:45, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Does the Wikipedia article titled Stage combat help any? --Jayron32 19:18, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for your response, Jayron32. I have seen the article, but I need a book from the 17. or 18. century about stage fencing and combat. Kind regards.--188.62.157.252 (talk) 19:24, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

The absolute oldest book on stage combat I could find was Le théâtre héroïque by Letainturier-Fradin, Gabriel, published in the early twentieth century. You can find a copy of that here. Hope that helps. eldamorie (talk) 20:00, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

It would appear that until the late 19th/early 20th century, stage combat was more or less taken directly from fencing manuals, so if you're looking for books on techniques used in stage combat at the time, you might want to check out fencing manuals instead. eldamorie (talk) 14:34, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

I'd also point out that the work I linked to above does include a fairly decent history of stage combat from the time of Cyrus I. eldamorie (talk) 15:00, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Citation needed for it being actual stage combat from the time of Cyrus I, though. That seems highly dubious. --Saddhiyama (talk) 21:22, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

US federal prisoners before federal prisons

According to Federal Bureau of Prisons, the first federal prisons were authorised in 1891. Imagine that I rob a post office or commit some other federal crime, and I'm convicted of the crime in 1890. What happens to me — am I put in the nearest state prison, or is there some other sort of detention facility where I'll be sent, such as a prison ship? Nyttend (talk) 14:38, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

This paper says federal prisoners were kept in state prisons or county jails on a contract basis, due to the low number of federal prisoners. --Colapeninsula (talk) 15:01, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Wasn't Yuma Territorial Prison a federal prison? Or was it run by the territorial government? 69.62.243.48 (talk) 23:06, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Football statistics and copyright

Does anyone know whether NFL stats are considered public domain or if they are copyrighted? 198.185.18.207 (talk) 14:45, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

This kind of question is best asked at WP:MCQ, which deals with copyright issues exclusively. I don't think your question is specific enough — are you asking if you can create a list of each player's statistics, or are you asking if you can copy a page of statistics wholesale? The numbers themselves are not copyrighted (it's not someone's creative work to say that Player A ran for 99 yards and that Player B made five tackles), but the way of listing them potentially is. If this doesn't make sense, read Idea–expression divide. Nyttend (talk) 16:44, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

More specifically, I'm asking if it's fair use and/or public domain to create my own list of NFL stats from scratch (of course, getting the actual data from other sources, but only taking a selection of data and manually typing it into my own database that I constructed entirely on my own) and posting the stats in my own format on a website generating ad revenue. 198.185.18.207 (talk) 18:22, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Before doing anything of this sort, you should definately contact a lawyer who works in this area. They can advise you on the proper way to go about this. Being legal and being unsuable are two different things, and the fact that you could legally do something doesn't prevent the NFL from attempting to shut you down. Having a lawyer ahead of time review what you plan to do and help you set it up could save you trouble down the road. --Jayron32 18:30, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

See Idea–expression divide. A fact is an idea, and cannot be copyrighted. The specific presentation of facts can be. So, for example, the fact that Tim Tebow threw for 100 yards some week, and the same week Tom Brady threw for 350 yards are not copyrightable ideas. However, if another website has a table of the QB statistics for each week, and you copy that entire table, verbatim (or even copy a substantial portion of the table), you are copying an expression. IANAL, but you have to be very specific on what information you wish to use or how you wish to use it, and I agree, you need to ask this question at WP:MCQ with a specific, detailed plan for what you plan to do. --Jayron32 16:59, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Actually I doubt that there is any copyrightable interest in the collection of NFL statistics for a week, at least in the United States. See sweat of the brow, a copyright doctrine rejected in the US in Feist v. Rural. Of course I'm not an expert and no one should rely on this. --Trovatore (talk) 22:37, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

But what about WWE results? They are definitely the result of a creative process, not "just data" ;-). --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:54, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Nope, just like an original description of the plot of a book is not covered by copyright, the results of wrestling matches as reported in truly original language, are not covered by copyright on the original work. I can write a synopsis of the plot of the Hunger Games, and that synopsis does not violate the copyright of the author because the ideas contained within the book are not copyrightable, just the words used to express those ideas. Likewise, I can report the results of a rasslin match without violating the copyright held by the scriptwriters who coreographed that rasslin match. --Jayron32 18:01, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

I believe she was making a joke revolving around the fact that wrestling matches are scripted, like a violent play, rather than simply allowing the competitors to fight it out and let the chips fall as they may. 198.185.18.207 (talk) 18:29, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Yes, and I was making it clear that the idea-expression divide covers the results of scripted rasslin matches as well as unscripted football games. --Jayron32 18:31, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

OP didn't say in what country he or she intended to publish or reproduce the transformed data - in most countries there is no copyright or indeed intellectual property right in the data per se, but there may well be database rights, or copyright protection for effort of gathering or arrnagement. Even though "sweat of the brow" has been rejected in a number of countries, it has also found some degree of acceptance in other countries. If the OP is really concerned about copyright, because as he or she says it is intended to be a commercial publication, then he or she really should consult a lawyer. In many countries, publication of web content is regarded as occurring in the place where it is downloaded and displayed on a screen, not where it was uploaded, so if OP puts an intellectual-property-right-infringing piece of material on the internet, he or she is potentially opening himself or herself up to litigation in many places around the world. If you are worried, find a lawyer. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 08:55, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Does anybody but Americans care about American football statistics? ;-) The OP's IP resolves to the US in any case. --Mr.98 (talk) 13:02, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, it's not altogether impossible. American football has a small but apparently not completely negligible worldwide following. For example the European Football League plays American football (which I might not have guessed, just hearing the name). There seem to be quite a few teams and games; how many fans, I haven't yet managed to find out. --Trovatore (talk) 05:34, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

If the "idea" of a book's plot is not copyrightable — well, some Hollywood lawsuits I've heard of don't make sense. —Tamfang (talk) 18:37, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

"Find a lawyer, nobody knows" warnings aside, Jayron's answers on this are reliable. If you are compiling your own statistics, it is definitely safe. Even if you are taking other statistics, as long as there is no creativity involved (e.g. there isn't some kind of "secret sauce" algorithm involved in generating them, or they aren't entirely subjective) then there should be no copyright issues in the United States. The fact that somebody threw a ball a certain distance or scored a number of points is not copyrightable under the US copyright code. --Mr.98 (talk) 13:02, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Not sure you read all of my post above Mr.98. Just to spell it out - the OP could be sued in Australia, for example, for data he or she uploads in the US, if the data infringes intellectual property rights protected under Australian law and someone in Australia accessed that website in Australia, even if the data does not infringe intellectual property rights under US law. And nobody is saying it can't infringe intellectual property rights under US law (Blueboar's confident statement below notwithstanding). --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 14:20, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

I read it, but I think it's a somewhat silly concern. The OP is talking about data that is explicitly generated in the United States and appears to live well outside of Australian jurisdiction. Show me a single example of something even remotely similar happening with US sports statistics and I'll acknowledge that it's a realistic possibility, but until then, I will conclude that it is not worth worrying about. --Mr.98 (talk) 22:49, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

A word of caution here... I agree that compiling your own statistics is OK from a copyright perspective... but, it can sometimes be a form of Original Research (whether the statistic is OK or not depends on the nature of the statistic, and what conclusions you draw from it). Blueboar (talk) 13:51, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

That only pertains if the OP is trying to post them on Wikipedia, which they have not at all indicated (the goal is to "[post] the stats in my own format on a website generating ad revenue"). --Mr.98 (talk) 22:49, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

In Australian rules football, quite a few statistics (really names for statistics) have been "invented" ("clanger" springs to mind) and copyrighted or trademarked or something, in effect only allowing one specific data-recording company and/or affiliated media sources to use that name for that statistic. Obviously only the name of the statistic is copyrighted, but I seem to remember some sort of court case or controversy involving this. Now if I can only find a link... 203.206.101.76 (talk) 12:58, 27 May 2012 (UTC)

Please help a struggling uncle!

Hi, my nephew asked me yesterday why many fire departments paint their fire engines red. I've looked online and can't find out why! He didn't settle for my answer of "because pink fire engines would look silly". Help! -- role^player 18:45, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

This page says: "Traditionally, red is the emergency service colour, particularly for fire brigades. Often red has been combined with white in a two colour design. The belief was that the superior reflectivity of white would increase vehicle visibility and offset the poor performance of the red colour panels, especially in low light. In fact, the two colours did the opposite... The red is difficult to perceive and the white merges with the surrounding background. This combination distorts perception and slows the sensory process, thus increasing reaction times.". So it seems originally it was meant to be a visible colour, although apparently it is not the most visible, but now the red colour has "strong cultural associations with the fire service" as our article on Emergency vehicle lighting says, and thus it has been kept. --Saddhiyama (talk) 18:52, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

It's notable that airport fire engines are at least as likely to be yellow or greenish-yellow than red (judging from Google image searches for "airport fire engine", "airport fire appliance" and the like). There doesn't seem to be any reason that this is better, just as Saddhiyama notes, that's what people are used to (some of those yellows are fluorescent, but one can make fluorescent red too). Commons has commons:Category:Fire engines by color which gives numbers (obviously a very unscientific sampling) with red the clear leader and yellow a very weak second, but a few odd ones like gray and blue engines. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 19:40, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Greenish-yellow is used because it contrasts with almost everything in an urban environment. --Carnildo (talk) 02:19, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

These colour associations can be traced back to the middle ages... See Barber's pole--Aspro (talk) 19:48, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

There are also, of course, lots of emergency vehicles that have more sophisticated patterns, like this one. These surely do make the vehicle more visible (unlike, it seems, just the colour). But a lot of the appearance of a fire appliance is just to say "this is a fire appliance". At least in the UK most emergency vehicles say "FIRE ENGINE" or whatever (in mirror writing on the front) which is mostly redundant given their character, but which I guess helps clarify matters in a few situations - few other vehicles (like cars, vans, or busses) have "this is a bus" written on them. Given that there are very few pink vehicles on the road, if recognition is the goal, then probably fire engines really should be pink with green spots. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 19:55, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

This forum discusses yellow and pink fire appliances in Coventry in the 1960s and 70s. You can see a YouTube video of a 1965 yellow one here. I dimly recall one experiment with yellow fire engines (maybe in the 1980s?) being abandoned because nobody recognized what they were, they expected fire engines to be red. Also in the UK, we used to have old Civil Defence fire engines that were brought out for the Army to use whenever the Fire Brigade Union went on strike. They were painted in military khaki and were known as Green Goddesses. Youtube video here. I understand they've all been sold off to museums and collectors. Some research here: Why Lime-Yellow Fire Trucks Are Safer Than Red. Alansplodge (talk) 21:00, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Grampian Fire and Rescue Service have white fire engines; they give much better visibility under lighting. I believe they're the only force in the UK not to use red. Grampian were also the first UK force to change their uniform colour from blue to mustard, to make chemical spills on them more visible. Dalliance (talk) 12:39, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

I imagine when you say "under lighting" you mean under low pressure sodium-vapor lamps specifically (as that's the predominant street lighting technology used in the UK). I can certainly see how ordinary red paint would appear nearly black under low-pressure sodium's baleful pall. -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 13:06, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

I went to google images, and when I simply put [fire engines] I got primarily red ones. However, if you google [orange fire engines] or [yellow fire engines] or [green fire engines] or [blue fire engines] or [purple fire engines] or any other basic color you'd care to name, you can see there is a variety. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:01, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Just a guess here... One reason that fire engines might be traditionally painted red is that fire is traditionally thought of as being red - for example, flames in heraldry are often red. Blueboar (talk) 22:01, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

I would think that's a given. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:07, 24 May 2012 (UTC)