The Reading Room

2:19 AM

0

Q: What is the "manhood of a Roman recovery" in John Milton's Areopagitica?

This sentence appears in Milton's "Areopagitica": To which if I now manifest by the very sound of this which I shall utter, that we are already in good part arrived, and yet from such a steep disadvantage of tyranny and superstition grounded into our principles as was beyond the manhood of a Rom...

bobble

3:19 AM

It is again my evening and I am going to double-check all my timeline math. I have the distinct impression some numbers went wrong during the absolute-positioning calculations...

bobble

3:49 AM

Yep, I underestimated. Now to figure out by how much...

I'm re-reading the first parts of the book to see if I missed any references to months.

Oh- oh! I found a reference to "May" on one day and a reference to "June" two days later. This will be very useful

bobble

4:53 AM

Updated guesstimate is 95 days.

I think there's some law where if I mention a guess in chat it has to be proven wrong later

verbose

5:31 AM

@Bookworm nice question

@Tsundoku I haven't read this novel but there is a folk tradition that Draupadi really loved Karna and would have chosen him as her husband given free choice. Would like to read the novel some time. Thanks for mentioning it!

@Randal'Thor well maybe if you're in Venice it's a bit different

@Randal'Thor 💚

@bobble it's too broad

@bobble Since it's specifically about one name, I'd say name-significance. We don't know that the name was inspired by anything else; maybe the author just made it up.

bobble

5:48 AM

I was considering both name-significance and inspiration, for the inspiration and significance of a name

verbose

WHY is it that I think, oh yeah, I know exactly what this means, easy-peasy, it will take me fifteen minutes and then two full m'f'ing hours later I'm done with the answer but behind on life in general?

bobble

I have some time devoted to working on Stack Exchange stuff each night, so I don't feel too guilty about devoting hours to this timeline answer

Some nights that time has been taken up by moderation blowups :/ But most of the time it's enjoyable/productive

I've written up a section discussing how I determined various parts of the timeline. Now I just have to get this complicated beast to play nice with Markdown's list formatting

Tomorrow. I'll do that tomorrow.

For bobble must sleep

verbose

g'nite @bobble 😴

verbose

6:10 AM

@Sciborg where in Michigan? Yooper or troll? I lived eight miles from the Michigan border for several years

Rand al'Thor

8:53 AM

@verbose Because you're verbose? :-P

verbose

9:10 AM

@Randal'Thor ‘tis nominative determinism, that’s what

Tsundoku

9:22 AM

This is ... Dang, I can't find the right term for it.

Rand al'Thor

@Tsundoku Congrats! That's, what, your sixth tag badge?

Tsundoku

Yes, my sixth tag badge.

The next badges suggested by the system are a silver meaning tag badge, then a bronze french-literature tag badge (progress has been slow there lately) and a silver william-shakespeare tag badge, followed by a number of others for which I don't have enough answers yet.

Ha! I've just received a spam mail from an account named "DYSTOPIA AHEAD". Subject line: "Earth's Administrators Are Angry ...". Is this 1984 or what?

Rand al'Thor

9:59 AM

@Tsundoku For me it's silver meaning, bronze inspiration, bronze character-analysis, then some others I'm much further away from.

historical-context will also hit 100 questions soon, and then you and Gareth can compete for another bronze tag badge.

Tsundoku

10:27 AM

Hmm, I don't think I have questions for historical-context.

There are a few inspiration questions that i have on my to-do list (French literature, Nalo Hopkinson).

We could use a george-bernard-shaw expert: 11 out of 18 questions with that tag are still unanswered.

Rand al'Thor

11:21 AM

@Tsundoku Might be worth using the site Twitter account? #GeorgeBernardShaw and see if there's any Shavian society with a Twitter presence that could be pinged.

You never know, maybe someone's interest will be piqued enough to sign up and start answering.

Tsundoku

11:54 AM

@verbose For the restaurant: bagels and John Lockes.

verbose

12:05 PM

@Tsundoku Wow, congratulations!

Tsundoku

I will soon take on a side job as a badger.

verbose

🦡

Tsundoku

Hard to tell whether that's a badger or a skunk ;-)

verbose

@Tsundoku you'll've to take my word for it

Tsundoku

12:21 PM

Haven't figured out yet how to enter emojis on the desktop.

verbose

@Tsundoku Are you a Windows person, a MacPherson, or other?

Tsundoku

Linux. Currently on OpenSUSE Leap 15.2.

verbose

It wouldn't surprise me all that much to know that you fire up a command-line terminal and connect to the interwebs via Lynx

Tsundoku

Lynx isn't all that useful, since websites rely too much on JavaScript nowadays.

Mithical

@verbose Not all of us that use Linux are that computer-adept...

verbose

12:29 PM

@Mithical Yes, but given @Tsundoku's stubborn refusal to subject himself to more intrusive forms of technological surveillance, he might be motivated enough to figure it out.

Tsundoku

I have a colleague who uses Linux (mainly because Windows is spyware) but avoids the command line Corona.

Personally, I like using the command line for many things that are just inefficient in a GUI.

verbose

@Tsundoku yeah I stubbornly use text editors rather than word processors whenever I can get away with it.

That said, I take no stance on the text editor wars. As far as I'm concerned it's vi of one and half a dozen of the other.

Tsundoku

Oh, I have used OpenOffice/LibreOffice since 2003 or 2004 (LibreOffice since 2010). I'm no vi/vim expert, or at least not yet.

For editing code, I use jEdit, which is Java-based and therefore works across operating systems.

verbose

@Tsundoku I use BBEdit, typically, but honestly, I use Xcode quite a lot too

Tsundoku

Those tools have been around for ages. (Purists will obviously object that they aren't open source.)

verbose

12:39 PM

I keep going back and forth between wanting to edit this answer to make an explicit connection between manhood/virility and Milton's gendered view of Protestant vs Catholic theology, and then deciding against it. Sigh.

Tsundoku

That answer reminded me that I still have a copy of Milton and the English Revolution somewhere. Possibly in a box that I haven't unpacked since moving to Germany nine years ago ...

verbose

@Tsundoku It's the kind of answer that I'm simultaneously proud of, and wonder why I bother with.

Tsundoku

@verbose Perhaps something for a self-answered question?

b_jonas

@Tsundoku There are so many different mustelids and they look so similar that I've given up trying to distinguish them.

verbose

@Tsundoku Oh gawd no, it would take too much time and research to come up with a good Q and and good A on that. Maybe I'll add a couple of sentences to the existing answer.

b_jonas

12:47 PM

commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Wolverine_fed_jarvzoo.JPG is a wolverine, which I can tell because it's in a zoo and there's a plaque telling that it's a wolverine; and commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/… are marmots which I know because I called them beavers and then someone told me they aren't.

Tsundoku

@b_jonas Well, they are related. There is even a stink badger. But my favourite mustelid is Privacy Badger.

b_jonas

There are mustelids with smaller and larger tails, ones that look more like a longcat than usual, so there's probably some degree of identification possible, but I've given up trying to understand it.

Mithical

@Tsundoku I used to use those, but on the whole I found that I prefer Gedit

b_jonas

And they all have weird traditional names instead of some kind of descriptive names like, you know, "brown bear", "black bear", "polar bear".

And their names aren't even consistent among languages.

Tsundoku

I used Gedit for a while but I found Gnome really messed it up by removing the menu bar.

b_jonas

12:50 PM

They're worse than birds.

Tsundoku

If I fire up a GUI-based editor on the desktop, it's either jEdit or Geany.

verbose

@Tsundoku okay I edited it. So there.

b_jonas

Birds at least usually look different, even if they have random names.

verbose

@b_jonas I'm not sure I understand. Could you elaborate?

Tsundoku

@verbose The Areopagitica question went NHQ two hours ago.

verbose

12:58 PM

@Tsundoku yeah I figured with "manhood" in the title it probably would

b_jonas

@verbose The common names of mustelids I mean. They have random common names that are totally unrelated in Hungarian versus English.

verbose

Is the posting of HNQ in this chat room broken again? It seems to work for a bit and then just ... felo-de-se

@b_jonas Ah. I wish I spoke Hungarian. I know zero non-Indo-European languages. It would be such fun to speak something Finno-Ugric.

b_jonas

@verbose I think mustelid names still differ randomly among Indo-European languages.

Tsundoku

@verbose As far as I know, it has worked only once in recent years. I have tried to make it work many times. After my last attempt, it worked just once.

verbose

@b_jonas Ah. Good to know.

@Tsundoku You and @Randal'Thor often mention when a question has gone HNQ. Do you guys just monitor the list, then?

Tsundoku

1:05 PM

I don't monitor it systematically; I just sometimes check a question's activity history.

verbose

@Tsundoku oh. Is that a mod-level thing, or can us plebes do that too?

Tsundoku

Dec 21 '20 at 15:47, by Rand al'Thor

^ nice, the HNQ feed is working

@verbose If you click the clock pictogram below the bookmark pictogram next to the Areopagitica question, can you see whether the question went HNQ?

I can see that information on sites that I don't moderate, e.g. Spanish SE, so it doesn't look like a moderator privilege.

verbose

@Tsundoku No, it doesn't show its having gone HNQ for me. It shows when I answered, and when I edited, but that's it. There's an option to see vote summaries.

@Tsundoku of course I could just be doing something wrong like not clicking on the right menu item or something, who knows.

Tsundoku

I have just opened that question in a different browser and I can see "became hot network question".

Screenshot from Opera:

verbose

@Tsundoku Oh! I see it now. How odd.

Feeds

1:18 PM

Tsundoku has made a change to the feeds posted into this room

verbose

Oh I know what I was doing wrong. I was clicking on the clock next to the answer, not the question

Tsundoku

1:31 PM

@verbose If you're in for a challenge, you might consider Veps, which has twenty-three grammatical cases.

Rand al'Thor

1:59 PM

@verbose No, but I can often tell even ahead of time when a question is destined for HNQ - a quick good answer, or more than one answer, often means it'll go HNQ as soon as it's 8 hours old.

Many Lit questions don't stay there for long though - just occasionally someone hits the jackpot with a long-lasting HNQ.

Tsundoku

2:13 PM

@verbose Also for drinks at the Topless Restaurant: Eau de Hurlevent.

Rand al'Thor

1

Q: Can anyone explain what I did wrong scanning this line of Argonautica?

I was looking over some practice tests and came across this question: What is the scansion of the first four feet of "Atque haec impressō gemuit miseranda cubīlī" Based on my knowledge, I got At / qu(e) haec / imp / res / ... "At", "imp", and "res" each should be long by position and "qu(e) haec"...

scansion

Tsundoku

Wines: Vins Temps-Après

Rand al'Thor

^^ apparently scansion of poetry is on-topic at Latin.SE too

Tsundoku

2:51 PM

The G B Shaw tweet.

Sciborg

3:01 PM

@verbose I live in West Michigan/Grand Rapids area at the moment :)

Sciborg

3:12 PM

but my dad is a Yooper, so I guess I'm a half-blood Yooper

bobble

Where it has blizzarded a lot recently, if their chat messages are to be believed

Sciborg

Yeah, my WiFi got completely knocked out last night while I was chatting with you in the Grove. Didn't come back on for like two hours :(

and my poor car is now a small mountain

bobble

of kitties?

Sciborg

If only ;-;

verbose

@Sciborg ah. I lived in South Bend, IN, for several years. Never made it to Grand Rapids, nor to the UP. Did go to Big Rapids for a few days, though

Rand al'Thor

3:20 PM

I hope this question will be a success. Not sure how answerable it'll be even now, but hopefully I've defined my criteria clearly enough ...

bobble

confused westerner looks

Sciborg

Big Rapids is a nice area :)

bobble

My foot is currently covered up by a pile of white floof-dog

there, that's like snow, right?

Sciborg

I will accept it

verbose

@Sciborg yep. I had some work to do at a university there: Ferris Wheel 🎡 or some such name.

bobble

3:25 PM

verbose: how many emojis is too many emojis?

verbose

Of course I’d go to SW Michigan all the time, since it’s part of what they locally call Michiana. Like, you can’t buy booze on Sundays in IN, so just head up the road to Niles, MI

@bobble No such thing. I wanna take us back to Ancient Egypt so that our written communication is entirely hieroglyphs

Sciborg

A friend of mine went to Ferris State for game design, excellent university.

Rand al'Thor

Isn't it somewhat oxymoronic that someone called verbose likes to discourse in emojis instead of words? :-P

2

verbose

@Randal'Thor Do I contradict myself? Very well, I contradict myself. I am large; I contain multitudes

besides, it’s part of my futile attempt to break out of this trap of nominative determinism 🪤

Sciborg

quietly isn't sure what nominative determinism means

Rand al'Thor

3:31 PM

> Consistency is the defense of a small mind.

-- Beldin, The Malloreon

verbose

Nominative determinism

Nominative determinism is the hypothesis that people tend to gravitate towards areas of work that fit their names. The term was first used in the magazine New Scientist in 1994, after the magazine's humorous "Feedback" column noted several studies carried out by researchers with remarkably fitting surnames. These included a book on polar explorations by Daniel Snowman and an article on urology by researchers named Splatt and Weedon. These and other examples led to light-hearted speculation that some sort of psychological effect was at work. Since the term appeared, nominative determinism has been...

Rand al'Thor

@Sciborg It's like if you became a cyborg after choosing that username.

Sciborg

Ah, I gotcha. The "Dennis Dentist" phenomenon :P

verbose

@Randal'Thor that’s stolen from Dr Johnson: consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds

bobble

Have we determined whether I am a bobblecrown or simply control them?

Sciborg

3:33 PM

Both?

My vote is both

Rand al'Thor

I guess it's not nominative determinism if people gravitate towards areas that fit their internet forum avatars.

Pictorial determinism?

I'm now imagining bobble becoming the queen of Britain.

You never know, it can happen even if you're only 139th in line to the throne, Daphne.

bobble

Small problem that I'm American. And none of my ancestors have ever lived in the UK

Sciborg

Bobble, Monarch of Bobblies and Bobblecrowns, Ruler of the Bobble Nation.

Rand al'Thor

@bobble You just need enough people to die first :-P

Sciborg

That would honestly make a hilarious villain motivation. "Oh, I'm only 25th in line for the crown? Sounds like a lot of people are about to have horrible accidents"

verbose

3:38 PM

@Sciborg Tom Stoppard’s The Real Inspector Hound is on point

bobble

Or just seem to have horrible accidents - don't have to kill them, just have to make it seem like they died. Alternatively, force them to convert to Catholicism.

Sciborg

Oooh, true

@verbose Drat, someone had this idea first :p

verbose

alas

bobble

Oh no, it prevents you from adding to your list of unfinished projects!

Sciborg

The bane of every author: "oh hey that sounds like [book]"

@bobble how dare you be absolutely correct

Rand al'Thor

3:40 PM

Surely that must have been the plot of several stories over the years.

It's quite a natural idea given that people do put stock in being n th in line to the throne even for quite large values of n.

Sciborg

I definitely had it first dangit, if you ignore the thousands of similar books

bobble

For that sentence to make logical sense as intended I think "given that" should be "if"

Bookworm

2

Q: What was the first published book set during a Covid-19 lockdown?

The onset of the Covid-19 pandemic changed the world and many people's lives in countries all over the world in 2020. Much has been written about how writers of fiction have needed to change or shelve their manuscripts to reflect the new state of the world, or to avoid the temporal setting of the...

history-of-literature

verbose

The Stoppard play isn’t about the royal family. It just humorously uses a similar setup

Sciborg

@bobble you caught me early in the morning with a pre-caffeinated brain, sorry :p

bobble

3:43 PM

Your brain is always pre-caffeinated, admit it

Sciborg

My brain has that problem where it sees the caffeine molecules coming in and just chooses to ignore them until there are a sufficient amount of them (re: about three cups)

Mithical

That sounds like I'd be stuck in the bathroom all day.

Sciborg

3:55 PM

To be fair, I drink very weak coffee :p

b_jonas

4:23 PM

@Randal'Thor What about people who keep changing their avatars?

Sciborg

@b_jonas they're occupationally fluid, of course

bobble

Timeline answer finally has the formatting I want, tonight will be final grammar check and posting. Also it got really big somewhere along the line...

Sciborg

The Watership Down timeline?

bobble

yep

Sciborg

Dang. I'm impressed

bobble

4:30 PM

30k is the max answer length, so I'm good on that front

On the other front, of my sanity, we're not so sure

Also, that count is after removing a bunch of smaller, less-important events

Sciborg

"It is not yet certain why the bobblecrown went off the deep end, but scientists theorize it was due to a 2,000-word Literature answer they posted shortly beforehand"

Mithical

@bobble you had that to begin with?

bobble

According to the doctor-person who checked me out in middle school, yes

Tsundoku

@verbose Have you reckon'd a thousand emojis much?

French publishers are flooded with manuscripts by would-be authors: Confinement : les éditeurs croulent sous les manuscrits d'écrivains en herbe.

Rand al'Thor

5:50 PM

@bobble Looking forward to this! :-D

Tsundoku

I have edited this deleted question about background reading for Camus's The Rebel and undeleted it.

Since we want to attract more experts and scholars ...

Rand al'Thor

Now let's see if some non-mods will vote to reopen.

Bookworm

7:04 PM

0

Q: Was it normal in the late 19th century to have an indoor tree in a room of farmhouse?

In "In the Midst of Alarms" (1894) by Robert Barr, a girl was seeking to get a doctor for her wounded brother without disturbing anyone, and was convincing another man with that: The professor said: “I will go for the doctor.” “You do not know the way. It is five or six miles. I will ride Gypsy,...

in-the-midst-of-alarms robert-barr

bobble

7:34 PM

@Randal'Thor I just added historical-context to a question that got bumped by other reasons

Which brings it up to 100!

bobble

7:56 PM

the excerpt for ayn-rand has a stray space in the parentheses, but it feels a bit too small for me to get rep on an edit

Sciborg

and yet, you can hear what your inner grammar nerd is telling you

bobble

shush, nerd-sensor

i am a perfectly normal human being who is not blaming Tsundoku for his edit adding the parentheses with an extra space

Sciborg

you would never call someone out like that

bobble

never

Tsundoku

9:07 PM

@bobble You know, those years of birth and death should have an en-dash (–) between them instead of a hyphen (-) or an em-dash (—).

Don't tell North ;-)

@b_jonas Do you find it easy to distinguish between a common raven, a crow and a jackdaw from a distance of more than 15 meters?

Tsundoku

9:26 PM

Update on unanswered questions: "1,102 questions with no upvoted or accepted answers"

bobble

Have you kept the answer-forges hot?

Tsundoku

Mine has cooled down a bit, but answer counts are again increasing faster than question counts.

bobble

10:00 PM

I'm considering posting an answer to verbose's meta Q, where I would detail why I became an active participant and what kinds of questions attracted me to the site. Now I'm dithering over whether this is useful or not

Tsundoku

10:14 PM

Rand al'thor, verbose and I don't represent the entire community. I think it would be useful to hear the perspective of someone who didn't join the site in the first two years of the beta.

Rand al'Thor

11:07 PM

@bobble It's only a single data-point, but yes, I think it'd be great to hear from a newer user as well as veteran users doing their best to represent the viewpoint of new users.

@b_jonas Nice, a new answer to a 4-year-old unanswered question.

b4rtr has done a few nice answers to Russian-related questions. Might be time to reheat my bounty-forge.

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