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Python Programming/Sets

Starting with version 2.3, Python comes with an implementation of the mathematical set. Initially this implementation had to be imported from the standard module set, but with Python 2.6 the types set and frozenset became built-in types. A set is an unordered collection of objects, unlike sequence objects such as lists and tuples, in which each element is indexed. Sets cannot have duplicate members - a given object appears in a set 0 or 1 times. All members of a set have to be hashable, just like dictionary keys. Integers, floating point numbers, tuples, and strings are hashable; dictionaries, lists, and other sets (except frozensets) are not.

Overview
Sets in Python at a glance:

Constructing Sets
One way to construct sets is by passing any sequential object to the "set" constructor.

We can also add elements to sets one by one, using the "add" function.

Note that since a set does not contain duplicate elements, if we add one of the members of s to s again, the add function will have no effect. This same behavior occurs in the "update" function, which adds a group of elements to a set.

Note that you can give any type of sequential structure, or even another set, to the update function, regardless of what structure was used to initialize the set.

The set function also provides a copy constructor. However, remember that the copy constructor will copy the set, but not the individual elements.

Membership Testing
We can check if an object is in the set using the same "in" operator as with sequential data types.

We can also test the membership of entire sets. Given two sets $$S_1$$ and $$S_2$$, we check if $$S_1$$ is a subset or a superset of $$S_2$$.

Note that "issubset" and "issuperset" can also accept sequential data types as arguments

Note that the <= and >= operators also express the issubset and issuperset functions respectively.

Like lists, tuples, and string, we can use the "len" function to find the number of items in a set.

Removing Items
There are three functions which remove individual items from a set, called pop, remove, and discard. The first, pop, simply removes an item from the set. Note that there is no defined behavior as to which element it chooses to remove.

We also have the "remove" function to remove a specified element.

However, removing a item which isn't in the set causes an error.

If you wish to avoid this error, use "discard." It has the same functionality as remove, but will simply do nothing if the element isn't in the set

We also have another operation for removing elements from a set, clear, which simply removes all elements from the set.

Iteration Over Sets
We can also have a loop move over each of the items in a set. However, since sets are unordered, it is undefined which order the iteration will follow.

Set Operations
Python allows us to perform all the standard mathematical set operations, using members of set. Note that each of these set operations has several forms. One of these forms, s1.function(s2) will return another set which is created by "function" applied to $$S_1$$ and $$S_2$$. The other form, s1.function_update(s2), will change $$S_1$$ to be the set created by "function" of $$S_1$$ and $$S_2$$. Finally, some functions have equivalent special operators. For example, s1 & s2 is equivalent to s1.intersection(s2)

Intersection
Any element which is in both $$S_1$$ and $$S_2$$ will appear in their intersection.

Union
The union is the merger of two sets. Any element in $$S_1$$ or $$S_2$$ will appear in their union.

Note that union's update function is simply "update" above.

Symmetric Difference
The symmetric difference of two sets is the set of elements which are in one of either set, but not in both (also called exclusive-or in logic).

Set Difference
Python can also find the set difference of $$S_1$$ and $$S_2$$, which is the elements that are in $$S_1$$ but not in $$S_2$$.

Multiple sets
Starting with Python 2.6, "union", "intersection", and "difference" can work with multiple input. For example, using "set.intersection":

frozenset
A frozenset is basically the same as a set, except that it is immutable - once it is created, its members cannot be changed. Since they are immutable, they are also hashable, which means that frozensets can be used as members in other sets and as dictionary keys. frozensets have the same functions as normal sets, except none of the functions that change the contents (update, remove, pop, etc.) are available.

Exercises

 * 1) Create the set {'cat', 1, 2, 3}, call it s.
 * 2) Create the set {'c', 'a', 't', '1', '2', '3'}.
 * 3) Create the frozen set {'cat', 1, 2, 3}, call it fs.
 * 4) Create a set containing the frozenset fs, it should look like {frozenset({'cat', 2, 3, 1})}.

Reference

 * Python Tutorial, section "Data Structures", subsection "Sets" -- python.org
 * Python Library Reference on Set Types -- python.org
 * PEP 218 -- Adding a Built-In Set Object Type, python.org, a nice concise overview of the set type

title: Python Programming/Sets


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Communication Theory/The Frankfurt School

The Frankfurt School and Communication Theory
The Frankfurt School was a group of critical theorists associated with the Institut für Sozialforschung (Institute of Social Research) which was located first at the University of Frankfurt (1923–1933), then in Geneva, Switzerland (1933–35), Columbia University in New York (1935–1949), and finally back at the University of Frankfurt, from 1949 to present. Some of the theorists associated with what became known as the Frankfurt School included Max Horkheimer, Theodor Adorno (née Wiesengrund), Herbert Marcuse, Walter Benjamin, Erich Fromm, Leo Lowenthal, and Friedrich Pollock.

Felix Weil began the Institute of Social Research in 1923. The theoretical basis of the Institute was Marxist, to no small degree because of Carl Grünberg, who served as director from 1923-1930. Max Horkheimer succeeded Grünberg as director and served in that capacity until 1960, when Theodor Adorno became director, until his death in 1969. These theorists were all associated with the Institute in the 1920s, except for Marcuse, who began working with the Institute in 1932. From the late 1950s Jürgen Habermas would be involved with the Institute, but for a number of reasons his work is often considered separate from that of the Frankfurt School. The Institute for Social Research continues to operate at the University of Frankfurt, but what is known as the Frankfurt School did not extend beyond the theorists associated with it.

The interests of the Frankfurt School theorists in the 1920s and 1930s lay predominantly in a Marxist analysis of social and economic processes, and the role of the individual and the group in relation to these processes. Their particular relevance to communication theory lies primarily in Adorno's idea of the culture industry, and Marcuse's concept of the "one dimensional" man.

The Culture Industry
In 1947 Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno published Dialektik der Aufklärung: Philosophische Fragmente, whose title was translated into English (in 1972) as Dialectic of Enlightenment: Philosophical Fragments. One of the sections of this book was concerned with what Horkheimer and Adorno called the culture industry. It was their contention that the culture industry was the result of an historical process that with an increase in technology (including mass communication technology) there was an increase in the ability to produce commodities, which enabled increased consumption of goods. The consumption of mechanically reproduced cultural products—predominantly radio and film—led to formulas of producing them for entertainment purposes, and it did not occur to consumers to question the idea that the entertainment presented to them had an ideological purpose or purposes. Consumers adapted their needs around these cultural products, and in doing so no longer knew of anything else that they might desire, or that there might be anything else they could desire. The entertainment that they enjoyed did not reflect their real social, political, or economic interests, but instead blinded them from questioning the prevailing system. Entertainment also had the function of allowing the dominant system to replicate itself, which allowed for further expansion in production and consumption. Thus, for Adorno and Horkheimer the culture industry worked in such a way that those who were under its influence would not even notice that they were being manipulated.

Subsequent to the book’s publication in 1947, theorists of the Frankfurt School knew of Adorno's concept of the culture industry, but the impact of his analysis of the culture industry was limited well into the sixties. Dialectic of Enlightenment did not receive a wider distribution until 1969, and although Herbert Marcuse continued the general idea of the culture industry in his One-Dimensional Man of 1964, he did not refer to it as such. In spite of Marcuse’s incisive criticism of dominant ideological structures, there is not a cultural component in his thought that can be separated out from ideology as a whole, as appears in the work of Adorno and Horkheimer. Thus, as a concept relating to communication theory in the United States, the culture industry can more properly be said to have come to existence due to the English translation of Adorno and Horkheimer’s book in 1972.

Genesis of “The Culture Industry”
In order to understand the creation of the idea of the culture industry as well as its reception the concept can be examined chronologically, from its pre-conditions, through its generation, to its subsequent impact. The idea of the culture industry grows out of a concern with culture, is developed through insights into the mechanical reproduction of culture, and is ultimately generated in opposition not only to popular music, but also to Hollywood movies. That this is so grows out of a number of historical contingencies.

Theordor Wiesengrund enrolled at the University of Frankfurt in 1921 not only to study philosophy, but music. Wiesengrund published in the 1920s and early 1930s under the name Theodor Wiesengrund-Adorno, and later took the name Adorno, which had been his mother’s maiden name. According to Thomas Mann, Adorno refused to choose between music and philosophy throughout his entire life, believing that he was pursuing the same objective in two disparate fields (Jäger, 2004, p. 31). Although he wrote his doctoral thesis on Husserl, and a postdoctoral thesis on Kierkegaard, Adorno moved to Vienna to study music composition with Alban Berg. Adorno wrote most of his music between 1925 and 1930, though he continued to compose music for the rest of his life. In addition to composing, Adorno was a music critic and editor of Musikblatter des Anbruch from 1928 to 1932. As a composer and music critic Adorno was aware of conditions relating to the production and dissemination of music in the 1920s and 1930s. This aspect of Adorno’s career is important in understanding his subsequent approach to culture. Because he had a profound knowledge of art, which is a great part of culture, his belief of what real art should be like influenced his criticism of the culture industry. To Adorno, the gist of real art is autonomy. Both the production and the consumption of a cultural product should originate through autonomy which provides uniqueness to real art. According to Adorno, the culture industry produces a mass cultural product not based on autonomy, but rather on passivity, so that it never seeks to create real art or culture.

Adorno was introduced to Walter Benjamin in 1923, and the two theorists became friends. Since Benjamin never received a degree that would allow him to teach at a university, according to Hannah Arendt, Adorno became in effect Benjamin's only pupil. After Benjamin’s death “it was Adorno who then introduced a rationalized version of his ideas into academic philosophy.” (Jäger, 2004, p. 65-6). The relationship with Benjamin had an impact on the development of Adorno's thought during this period.

Returning to Frankfurt, Adorno began teaching at the Institute, and published articles in the Zeitschrift fur Socialforschung (Journal for Social Research) that had been set up by the Institute in 1932. Adorno lost his right to teach in September 1933 due to the rise to power of the Nazi party. Horkheimer had already set up a branch of the Institute in Geneva, Switzerland, and the Institute began operating there. The Nazis' rise to power not only meant that Adorno lost his job and would eventually force his departure from Germany, but also affected his philosophical thought. As Jürgen Habermas would later note, the fact that labor movements were co-opted in the development of fascist regimes was one of the historical experiences influencing the development of critical theory, the others being Stalinist repression and the production of mass culture in the United States (Morris, 2001, p. 48).

Adorno was at Oxford from 1934 to 1938, where he worked on a manuscript on Husserl. He was considered an outsider, never integrating into the British academic mainstream, and he looked forward to joining his Frankfurt School colleagues, many of whom had in the meantime moved to the United States.

Already in the late 1930s Adorno evidenced little hope for mass culture. As propaganda and entertainment increased during the 1930s, Benjamin and Adorno debated mass culture, since film and radio became the two most popular means to disseminate propaganda under the fascist and Stalinist dictatorships. The essay translated as “On the Fetish Character in Music and the Regression in Listening” is in effect a pessimistic reply to Walter Benjamin’s more optimistic essay, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (Brunkhorst, 1999, p. 62). A primary problem for Adorno lay in the fact that instead of being enjoyed in a concert hall, symphonic works could now be heard over the radio, and could be reproduced on phonograph records. The result was inferior to the original, and Adorno was emphatic in his condemnation of the mechanical reproduction of music: “Together with sport and film, mass music and the new listening help to make escape from the whole infantile milieu impossible” (Adorno, 2001b, p. 47). While Benjamin regarded the destruction of aura by photograph or film as the emancipation from hierarchical tastes tied to class, to Adorno, the aura of the original artwork was the essential of the artistic authenticity. To Benjamin, the mechanical reproduction was the challenge against the authority of Platonic order from the top-the original or Idea- to down of layers of imitations; to Adorno, mass production was nothing but the destruction of the authenticity. The general attitude of the Frankfurt school was that of Adorno.

In 1938 Max Horkheimer, who had succeeding in establishing a relationship for the Institute of Social Research with Columbia University that enabled the Institute to continue working in New York, obtained a position for Adorno at the Princeton Radio Research Project, run by Paul Lazarsfeld. Adorno, anxious to leave Britain in the hopes of being with other members of the Institute, accepted the position, although he later claimed that he did not know what a “radio project” was. For his part, Lazarsfeld looked forward to working with Adorno, whom he knew to be an expert on music. Adorno wrote for the Project’s journal Radio Research in 1941, reiterating his position that radio was only an image of a live performance. In addition, he questioned the claim by the radio industry that the medium was bringing serious music to the masses (Wiggershaus, 1994, p. 243). While working at the Princeton Radio Research Project Adorno became shocked at the degree to which culture had become commercialized in the United States. Commercialization of culture in the United States had gone far beyond anything he had seen in Europe. Further, the prevalence of advertising in the United States was something with no correlative in Europe. The closest thing in Adorno’s experience to the advertising industry in the United States was fascist propaganda (Jäger, 2004, p. 122).

Adorno was later to allude to his experience with the Princeton Radio Research Project in the essay on the culture industry by noting the statistical division of consumers, and stating that he saw this research as being “indistinguishable from political propaganda” (Horkheimer and Adorno, 2002, p. 97). It became obvious that Lazarsfeld and Adorno did not agree on the value of empirical studies, and Adorno left the project. Adorno’s dissatisfaction with the work of the Princeton Radio Research Project would eventually motivate him to further develop the idea of the culture industry.

Because of the relationship between the Institute for Social Research and Columbia University, Horkheimer, who had already moved to California, could not bring Adorno to the West Coast until November 1941. When Adorno was finally able to relocate, he joined an expatriate community that included Fritz Lang, Arnold Schoenberg, Hans Eisler, Thomas and Heinrich Mann, Alfred Döblin, and Bertolt Brecht, several of which found work in the Hollywood movie industry. The fact that Adorno was part of this intellectual community whose members were involved in the production of Hollywood movies must have had some influence in developing his thoughts on culture, since the Hollywood system inhibited the creative freedom that many of the expatriates had enjoyed in Weimar Germany. According to Douglas Kellner, Max Horkheimer wanted to write a “great book on dialectics,” and Herbert Marcuse, who had been admitted to the Institute in 1932, was eager to work on the project. While Horkheimer (and later Adorno) moved to California, Marcuse went to work for the Office of Strategic Services (the precursor to the Central Intelligence Agency), and later the State Department. Thus it was Adorno and not Marcuse who became Horkheimer’s co-author on the project on dialectics (Kellner, 1991, p. xviii). The work that resulted was The Dialectic of Enlightenment, with its section titled “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception” drafted by Adorno.

These preconditions—Adorno’s interest in music, his friendship with Benjamin, and his work on the Princeton Radio Project, as well as involvement with the expatriate community in California and the relationship of several of these to the Hollywood film industry—are all important to an understanding of his concern for the idea of the culture industry.

“The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception”
For Adorno, popular culture on film and radio did not bother to present itself as art. They were instead a business, and this in turn became an ideology “to legitimize the trash they intentionally produce” (Horkheimer and Adorno, 2002, p. 95). This business was based on what Adorno referred to as “Fordist capitalism,” in which mass production based on the techniques used by Henry Ford were implemented in the cultural sphere, insofar as these tendencies were based on centralization and hierarchy (Hohendahl, 1995, p. 142). Examples of this—not specified by Adorno—were the Hollywood production system, or the CBS radio network that had been associated with the Princeton Radio Research Project. Movies and hit songs were based on formulas, and “the formula supplants the work” (Horkheimer and Adorno, 2002, p. 99). Mechanical reproduction ensured that there would not be any real change to the system, and that nothing truly adversarial to the system would emerge (Horkheimer and Adorno, 2002, p. 106-7). Paradoxically, any innovation would only reaffirm the system, and Adorno cited Orson Welles as an example of someone who was allowed to break the rules. The elasticity in the system would allow it to assume the stance of any opposition and make it its own, ultimately rendering it ineffectual (Friedman, 1981, p. 165). Like religion and other institutions, the culture industry was an instrument of social control (Horkheimer and Adorno, 2002, p. 120), but freedom to choose in a system of economic coercion ultimately meant the “freedom to be the same” (Horkheimer and Adorno, 2002, p. 136).

Since Adorno had been, in his essays on music and radio, an apparent defender of high art, “The Culture Industry” has been criticized as being a defense of high art, as opposed to popular culture. Adorno specifically defines avant-garde art as the adversary of the culture industry (Horkheimer and Adorno, 2002, p. 101). It was not high art that Adorno was presenting as an alternative to the culture industry, but modernism. Although he provides the idea of an opposing force to the culture industry, Adorno provides no overt Marxist analysis. Instead, he notes in passing that the dominant system utilized capacities for mass consumption for entertainment or amusement, but refused to do so when it was a question of abolishing hunger (Horkheimer and Adorno, 2002, p. 111).

Dialectic of Enlightenment was issued in mimeograph form in 1944, in German, and thus would have limited impact outside of the expatriate community. In the meantime Adorno began working, along with Else Frenkel-Brunswik, Daniel Levinson, and R. Nevitt Sanford, on an empirical investigation into prejudice titled The Authoritarian Personality. He wrote Minima Moralia: Reflections on Damaged Life in 1945, and this work, upon its publication in Germany in 1951, would mark the beginning of his impact in Germany (Jäger, 2004, p. 167). Adorno would also co-author Composing for the Films with Hans Eisler, and in this text Adorno made it clear that the culture industry is not identical with high or low art (Hohendahl, 1995, p. 134). This is perhaps the first of several of Adorno’s attempts at redefining the culture industry to an audience that in all probability had no exposure to the concept as it was detailed in the original essay.

Return to Germany
Dialectic of Enlightenment was published in Amsterdam in German in 1947 with a number of variants, excluding words and phrases in the published edition that could be construed as being Marxist (Morris, 2001, p. 48). Their apparent intent was to not attract the attention of the American occupation authorities in Germany. One of the main reasons for this is that Horkheimer wanted to return the Institute for Social Research to Germany, not only because of the desire to return to Frankfurt but also because a committee at Columbia University had evaluated the work of the Institute and recommended that the Institute become a department of Paul Lazarsfeld’s Bureau of Applied Social Research at Columbia (Jäger, 2004, p. 149). Marcuse, who had been producing propaganda for the OSS during the war based on his expert knowledge of Germany, published revolutionary theses in a journal in 1947, and these theses could not be reconciled with the direction of the Institute due to an apparent change in Horkheimer’s attitude towards Marxism. Thus, when excerpts from Dialectic of Enlightenment were published without their permission in 1949, Horkheimer and Adorno protested, distancing themselves from their own work, in order not to jeopardize their return to Germany. In the late 1940s the Institute relocated to Frankfurt, and opened in its new premises in 1951. Horkheimer became the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Frankfurt.

In 1954 Adorno published an essay entitled “How to Look at Television” that was the result of a study that had been done for the Hacker Foundation, with the involvement of George Gerbner and others. In this essay Adorno warned, “rigid institutionalization transforms modern mass culture into a medium of undreamed of psychological control” (Adorno, 2001a, p. 160). It was one of the few occasions in the 1950s that Adorno would discuss the implications of mass culture. At least one observer found it strange that “the leading cultural theorist of his day” did not take part in cultural developments of the fifties (Jäger, 2004, p. 191). Adorno would nonetheless on occasion attempt to reshape his thought on the culture industry. For example, in 1959 he wrote of a “universal pseudo-culture” in the United States (Adorno, 1993, p. 21), and gave a radio talk in Germany in 1963 on “The Culture Industry Reconsidered.” In 1966, when writing the essay “Transparencies on Film,” Adorno conceded that film-making might be an acceptable cultural practice in opposition to the culture industry, within the context of modernism (Hohendahl, 1995, p. 131).

One-Dimensional Man, and Suppression of “The Culture Industry”
Adorno took over running the Institute in 1960, and his primary philosophical concern in the 1960s was his critical engagement with Martin Heidegger, especially Heidegger’s language, as detailed in the book The Jargon of Authenticity. In the meantime, Marcuse had developed a critique of Stalinism, and was developing a critique of social conditions in Western democracies, in part based on his familiarity with Adorno's work. He was, for example, connecting “the analysis and critique of false needs to a critical theory of mass media and popular culture” (Agger, 1995, p. 34). Marcuse did not oppose popular culture as completely as Adorno, however, recognizing “fissures in the edifice of mainstream mass culture which could be pried open still further” (Agger, 1995, p. 34). In One-Dimensional Man Marcuse put an analysis “of late capitalist society into a systematic context,” as opposed to other writers in the Frankfurt School (Wiggershaus, 1994, p. 609). Instead of culture serving ideological ends, for Marcuse “social control mechanisms in advanced industrial society ensure the wholesale integration of the individual into mass society” (Reitz, 2000, p. 144). Capitalist production and the tremendous wealth that resulted from it formed a “system of repressive affluence” that kept elements of society satisfied and quiescent (Alway, 1995, p. 83). The entirety of society had become organized around an ideology whose main objectives were to maintain social control and continue to perpetuate the ideology that maintained that control.

Echoing Adorno, Marcuse wondered whether the information and entertainment aspects of mass media could be differentiated from their manipulation and indoctrination functions (Marcuse, 1991, p. 8). However, it is difficult in Marcuse's argument to separate culture or mass media from society as a whole because Marcuse did not distinguish culture or mass media as entities separate from the totality of dominant ideology in the same way that Adorno had done. In the end Marcuse’s analysis of society allowed for no opposition to the dominant ideology. Marcuse wrote, "how can the administered individuals—who have made their mutilation into their own liberties and satisfactions, and thus reproduce it on an enlarged scale—liberate themselves from themselves as well as from their masters? How is it even thinkable that the vicious circle be broken?” (Marcuse, 1991, p. 251). Given the pessimistic tone of the book, it is somewhat ironic that largely because of it he would be perceived as an icon for leftist movements of the 1960s in the U.S. and Germany that developed an oppositional stance.  In spite of this, Marcuse maintained that he was a philosopher, and not an activist.  Like others associated with the Frankfurt School, he was wary of the idea that theory could be translated into practice (Chambers, 2004, p. 226).

While Marcuse was writing a work that would become essential to student movements in the 1960s, in 1961 Adorno and Horkheimer resisted the reissue of Dialectic of Enlightenment that had been proposed to them by the publishing house of Fischer. The publisher felt that the book could be read as a description of prevailing conditions in Germany. Marcuse enthusiastically supported the reissue of the book in 1962, but Adorno and Horkheimer withheld their consent (Jäger, 2004, p. 194). The reasons that Horkheimer and Adorno tried to keep Dialectic of Enlightenment from reaching a wider audience are not entirely clear. In reviewing the text in 1961, Friedrich Pollack reported to Adorno and Horkheimer that the work required too much revision to receive mass dissemination. The two authors continued to negotiate with the Fischer publishing house until 1969, and may have only agreed to republish the work since pirate copies had already been disseminated by individuals in the German student movement. Students also began posting snippets of the text as handbills.

While student movements in the United States and Germany looked to Herbert Marcuse as their idol, the situation in Frankfurt degenerated to the point at which Adorno could no longer effectively conduct classes. He complained to the dean about the radical students in his classes who were making teaching impossible. In the winter term of 1968-69 students occupied a number of buildings at the University at Frankfurt, including the Institute for Social Research. After the strike ended, Adorno returned to teaching, but his lectures continued to be disrupted, including one “tasteless demonstration” in which three females bared their breasts. Adorno died a few months later (Jäger, 2004, p. 201-08).

Critical Response to “The Culture Industry”
The 1972 English-language translation marked the first real appearance of the idea of the culture industry outside of a German context. In the years since there have been numerous criticisms of the text, not least since Adorno made sweeping generalizations about “the commodified and fetishized character of all cultural goods” (Cook, 1996, p. 113). For the generally sympathetic Deborah Cook, Adorno erred in not discussing the processes of cultural production, and failed to examine the culture industry’s economic dependence on other business sectors, including marketing and advertising (Cook, 1996, p. 48).

For Terry Eagleton, both Adorno and Marcuse overestimated the dominant ideology, believing that “capitalist society languishes in the grip of an all-pervasive reification” (Eagleton, 1991, p. 46). Still, Eagleton conceded that “the diffusion of dominant values and beliefs among oppressed peoples in society has some part to play in the reproduction of the system as a whole” (Eagleton, 1991, p. 36). Fredric Jameson pointed out that Adorno’s idea of a culture industry was historically limited, since the society that developed in the 1960s and 1970s with new media went beyond the cultural possibilities available during the 1940s. While the idea of the culture industry can be defended as a useful theory for industrial societies between 1920 and 1970, trying to use it today weakens its effectiveness (Hohendahl, 1995, p. 146-48). Thus, for a some critics, the value of the idea of the culture industry would appear to be merely historical, if they in fact conceded that it had any value at all.

According to Hohendahl, for many postmodern critics the essay on the culture industry is problematic because they confuse the defense of modernist art with a defense of high culture, against popular culture. In the context of Dialectic of Enlightenment it is the destruction of traditional culture that is in question, along with its replacement with new forms depending on commodity exchange (Hohendahl, 1995, p. 137). In relation to this Deborah Cook cites such artists as Schoenberg, Beckett, and Kafka as cultural producers who are not entirely subject to commodification, and notes that Jameson is in agreement that modernism is the “dialectical opposite of mass culture” (Cook, 1996, p. 107). Thus for some critics modernist works would be counteracting forces against the dominant ideology. As noted in the example of Orson Welles, however, it may be the case that the dominant ideology can co-opt modernist works for its own ends.

The idea of the culture industry has had an importance in critical theory since its appearance in the 1940s, in that it has led to thought about the role of mass communications in relation to ideology, and hence, society. Since Adorno made sweeping generalizations about the impact of the culture industry, and since he did not systematically explore how the culture industry operated, it has been generally easy for some to dismiss the idea of a culture industry. It is nonetheless the case that motion pictures are still made by large companies and that their movies largely rely on formulaic plots. It is also the case that radio is increasingly controlled by a small number of companies, which tend to impose restrictions on how stations operate. As a broadcast medium, television is very much related to both radio and film, and shares with them qualities that situation it in the culture industry. While there is a democratizing aspect to the Internet (in that anyone can create a web site), it happens that the commercial companies operating on the Internet continue to maintain an ideological function. For example, one seldom sees new stories on MSNBC or Yahoo that would question the prerogatives of corporate America. A reexamination of the idea of the culture industry may be necessary in order to theorize on how mass communication media propagate dominant ideologies.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
Communication Theory/Social Systems

Communication Theory has one universal law, written by S. F. Scudder in the early 1900s, and later published in 1980. The Universal Communication Law states that, "All living entities, beings and creatures communicate." In a an unpublished interview, Scudder clarified the concept - "All of "The Living" communicate through movements, sounds, reactions, physical changes, gestures, languages, breath, color transformations, etc. Communication is a means of survival, existence and being and does not need another to acknowledge its presence. Examples - the cry of a child (communication that it is hungry, hurt, cold, etc.); the browning of a leaf (communication that it is dehydrated, thirsty per se, dying); the cry of an animal (communicating that it is injured, hungry, angry, etc.). Henceforth, Everything living communicates."

Social Systems
When the second World War ended in Europe, seventeen-year-old Niklas Luhmann had been serving as an anti-aircraft auxiliary in the German army. He was briefly detained by the Americans. When asked in 1987 to describe this experience, he replied:

Before 1945, the hope was that after the defeat of the compulsory apparatus everything would be right by itself. Yet the first thing I experienced in American captivity was that my watch was taken off my arm and that I was beaten up. So it was not at all as I had thought it would be. Soon you could see that one could not compare political regimes according to a scheme of `good' versus `bad', but that you had to judge the figures according to a bounded reality. Of course I don't want to say that the time of the Nazi-regime and the time after 1945 are to be judged on equal terms. Yet I was simply disappointed in 1945. Yet is that really important? In any case the experience of the Nazi-regime for me has not been a moral one, but an experience of the arbitrary, of power, of the tactics to avoid the regime used by the man of the people. (Luhmann qtd. in Baecker, 2005)

The realization that human realities were subjective appears to have influenced the famous sociologist throughout the rest of his life. This chapter will introduce Luhmann and a few remarkable aspects of his theory.

Introduction
The type of communication theory I am trying to advise therefore starts from the premise that communication is improbable, despite the fact that we experience and practice it every day of our lives and would not exist without it. This improbability of which we have become unaware must first be understood, and to do so requires what might be described as a contra-phenomenological effort, viewing communication not as a phenomenon but as a problem; thus, instead of looking for the most appropriate concept to cover the facts, we must first ask how communication is possible at all. (Luhmann 1990, p. 87)

The body of work produced by German sociologist Niklas Luhmann probably represents history’s most comprehensive attempt by one man to explain the whole of social existence. The above quotation hints at the essential nature of Luhmann’s thought – no “accepted wisdom” of the social science tradition could be left unexamined. Through more than 50 books and 400 articles, Luhmann applied his sociological systems theory to areas including law, science, religion, economics, politics, love, and art. Sociological systems have become one of the most popular theoretical models in contemporary German sociology, and are also widely applied in fields such as psychology, management science, and literary studies. A primary distinction of Luhmann’s social systems theory is that its focus of analysis is not individuals, groups, behaviors, or institutions, but the communication that occurs within systems. Dirk Baecker, a student of Luhmann’s explains that the systems theory “does away with the notion of system in all its traditional wording” and can carefully examine “every possible assumption of organism, mechanism, and information” – even, recursively, its own structure (Baecker 2001, p. 72). This realignment towards communication represents a significant break with social science tradition. Although Luhmann’s theory (or for that matter, most systems theories) do not lend themselves well to reduction, this chapter will attempt to present an overview of the subject.

Life in Brief
Niklas Luhmann was born in 1927. Following his teenage stint in the army, he went on to study law at the Universität Freiburg from 1946-1949 (Müller 2005). He trained as a lawyer, but found the intellectual constraints of practicing law not to his liking. He decided to go into public administration, as it promised him more freedom to pursue his own ideas (Hornung 1998). Luhmann became a civil servant for the town of Lüneburg in 1954. Although he enjoyed his work, he accepted the opportunity to take a sabbatical leave to study administrative science at Harvard University in 1960. Here Luhmann became a student of systems theorist Talcott Parsons, a thinker who would have a great impact on the development of Luhmann’s theories. After returning to Germany in 1961, Luhmann transferred to a research institute at the Hochschule für Verwaltungswissenschaften (School of Public Administration) in Speyer. Here he was afforded the freedom to pursue his scientific interests, and began his research of social structure.

In 1965, Luhmann studied Sociology for a single semester at the Universität Münster. He was awarded a PhD and Habilitation (a postdoctoral qualification enabling one to teach at the university level) for two books previously published. After briefly occupying Theodor Adorno’s former chair at the Universität Frankfurt, (where he taught a poorly-attended seminar on the sociology of love), he accepted a position at the newly-founded Reformuniversität Bielefeld (Baecker, 2005).

In 1973 he engaged in a debate with theorist Jürgen Habermas about the role of social theory. This debate was later published as a series of essays in Theorie der Gesellschaft oder Sozialtechnologie: Was leistet die Systemforschung? (Theory of Society or Social Technology: What can Systems Research Accomplish?) (1973). The debate with Habermas (whose theory receives a much wider acceptance outside of Germany) served as the Anglophonic world’s major introduction to Luhmann’s thought.

Luhmann published profusely throughout his career, with each book and essay building a foundation for his final theory of society. He retired from this position in 1993, but continued to publish. His magnum opus, Die Gesellschaft der Gesellschaft (The Society of the Society) was published a year before his death in 1997.

Early Influences
By the end of the 19th century, industrialization had profoundly changed the Western world. Sociology had come into its own as a science: Karl Marx published profusely throughout the mid-1800s. Ferdinand Tönnies (1887) described social flows from Gemeinschaft (community, relationship oriented association) toward Gesellschaft (self interest oriented society) in 1887. Emile Durkheim (1893) explored the division of labor a few years later, and opened the first European sociology department in 1896. Max Weber developed new methodological approaches and also founded a sociology department by 1920. While these fathers of the discipline differed greatly in their research and philosophy of society, they all recognized that the function and dysfunction of society is linked to the function and dysfunction of different social components such as classes, institutions, technologies, or individuals.

Durkheim’s Functionalism
Durkheim’s theory of functionalism, in particular, had a lasting impact upon the social sciences. Durkheim argued that “social facts” existed independent of individuals and institutions, and that these facts were the most productive subject for empirical sociological research. Social facts (such as suicide rates (Durkheim 1951), policies, or church attendance) can be measured, interpreted, and tested. Social theories derived from these analyses can then be used to explain social functioning.

The determination of function is. . . necessary for the complete explanation of the phenomena. . . .To explain a social fact it is not enough to show the cause on which it depends; we must also, at least in most cases, show its function in the establishment of social order. (1950, p. 97) Durkheim’s functionalism measured social effects within the context of a larger social environment. Durkheim’s 1893 book The Division of Labor in Society focused on labor division in an attempt to describe and explain social order. He elaborated on the manner in which increasing labor division affects the evolution of societies.

Parsonian Social Systems
Talcott Parsons, who would become America’s preeminent social theorist throughout the mid-20th century, drew on Durkheim’s functionalism in the development of his theory of social action. He was also able to integrate concepts from the burgeoning fields of general systems theory (von Bertalanffy, 1950; 1976), information theory (Shannon & Weaver, 1949), and social cybernetics (Wiener, 1948; 1950). Whereas Durkheim was content to develop sociology as a discipline alongside the other social sciences, Parsons became the advocate of a “grand theory” that could subsume the other social sciences. Drawing heavily from Weber’s writings on action (which Parsons translated himself), Parsons’ functionalism was developed as a theory of action. Individuals were understood as acting of their own volition, influenced in their behavior by external forces. As a component of this larger theory, Parsons developed the theory of the social system. His “social system” is generally synonymous with the term “society” and emerges from the interaction of individuals (Parsons, 1951). For the purposes of this chapter only a few features of Parson’s theory can be discussed. These will include his conceptions of the functional imperatives of action and the notion of equilibrium.

Equilibrium
Parsons’ social equilibrium is the orderly, smoothly functioning society. It is the result of individuals' acting according to the norms and values that have been provided in their social environment (Parsons, 1951). Parsonian social systems tended towards equilibrium, because “the actions of the members of a society are to a significant degree oriented to a single integrated system of ultimate ends common to these members” (Parsons qtd. in Heyl, 1968). The understanding of equilibrium within different societies was the primary goal of social systems theory, and (as Parsons would have it) sociology as a whole.

Functional imperatives of action
Parsons’ functional imperatives of action were developed as a way to classify the goals that “action systems” (be it individuals, institutions, or groups) would pursue to reach equilibrium. His AGIL model (adaptation, goal-attainment, integration, latent pattern maintenance) remains one of his most famous formulations.

 * A - The function of adaptation addresses the fact that resources in the environment are scarce, and the system must secure and distribute these resources. For social systems, social institutions are employed to meet these needs. The economy is generally identified as the primary institution that meets this need.
 * G - The function of goal-attainment deals with the system’s desire to use resources to achieve specific situational ends. Political institutions generally fulfill this role for social systems.
 * I – Integration is the most complex and problematic of the functional imperatives. It addresses the need for a system to coordinate and regulate the various subunits within a system. Integration of social systems is often associated with laws and norms, and judicial institutions.
 * L – Finally, the function of pattern maintenance refers to a system’s ability to maintain its own stability, and consists of two distinct components. For social systems, the first component deals with the ability of the system to motivate normative behavior of actors. The second component is involved with the transmission of social values. This imperative might be institutionally satisfied by education and religion (Wallace & Wolf, 1991).

The actions of an individual, for example, could then be compared to the actions of an institution within this framework. The social system, also subject to these imperatives, is in equilibrium because all of its constituent actors are morally impelled to perform socially-expected functions. As might be expected, Parsons’ early work was frequently criticized for failing to account for social change, the opposite of social equilibrium. Parsons eventually developed an evolutionary model of social change that described incremental adjustments occurring through slight disruptions of the social system’s equilibrium.

Luhmann and Social Systems
Sociology is stuck in a theory crisis. (Luhmann, 1995, p. xlv)

Luhmann criticized the sociology of his time as being irredeemably subjective and unable to usefully describe reality. “Action theory is reconstructed as structural theory, structural theory as linguistic theory, linguistic theory as textual theory, and textual theory as action theory” (Luhmann, 1995, p. xlvi). The acquisition of new knowledge, Luhmann argued, was derived from some recombination of the work of classical theorists. Social theory spiraled into higher and higher levels of complexity, each refocusing and realignment of classical theory laying the foundation for ever more complex theoretical iterations. Luhmann set his personal task as no less than the complete theoretical reconceptualization of the discipline within a wholly consistent framework.

Luhmann’s sociological systems theory makes only two fundamental assumptions: that reality exists, and that systems exist (Luhmann, 1995, p. 12). The theory contains a constructivist epistemology, as it claims that knowledge can only exist as a construction of human consciousness. Luhmann does not claim that there is no external reality, but that our knowledge of it will always be subject to the symbolic system we use to represent it.

From these simple assumptions, Luhmann attempts to build a universal social theory:

Theory… claims neither to reflect the complete reality of its object, nor to exhaust all the possibilities of knowing its object. Therefore it does not demand exclusivity for its truth claims in relation to other, competing endeavors. But it does claim universality for its grasp of its object in the sense that it deals with everything social and not just sections. (Luhmann, 1995, p. xlv)

The theory is universal because it seeks to describe and explain itself, along with all other social phenomena. The theory is self-referential.

Luhmann proceeds to clarify three fundamental differences between his theory and previous social theories. First, his theory is universal and can be applied to all social phenomena. Second, his theory is self-referential, and capable of examining itself in its own terms. Third, his theory is both complex and abstract enough to accomplish the previous two goals (Luhmann, 1995, xlviii).

There is no default entry point to Luhmann’s sociological systems theory. The structure of the theory is systemic. This means that the integration of its components is not linear and additive, but circular. The components of the theory do not build upon each other but produce each other. This introduction will attempt to show some of Luhmann’s most innovative developments, including his break from previous social systems theory.

A theory of communication
Luhmann found Parsons’ systems approach inspiring, but noticed several inconsistencies and problems. Stichweh (2000), a student of Luhmann’s, explains that there are two major strands of reasoning that led Luhmann to base his theory on communication rather than action. The first issue was that the actions of psychic systems (minds) and of social systems is difficult to distinguish using action theory. The interaction of the actor and his environment can only be described when the actor and environment are placed on the same analytic level. In Luhmann’s theory, the social system emerges from the communication between psychic systems (minds), and cannot be understood as a separate system “acting” on the individual. The second issue is that action theory cannot differentiate between action and experience. Selection (one of the components of Luhmann’s definition of communication, to be outlined below) can be viewed as either an action on the part of the selecting system, or as information about the state of the selecting system’s environment. The classification of information, Luhmann reasons, is not causally related to actors, and should be classified as experience, not action.

Individuals and the social system
One aspect of Luhmann’s theory that is significantly different from most social theories is that the human individual is not seen as focal to understanding society. In fact, Luhmann’s theory states unequivocally that the individual is not a constituent part of society. This counterintuitive claim begins to make sense if one recalls that Luhmann’s basic social element is communication. An individual is only relevant to society to the extent that they communicate. Whatever does not communicate within the society – such as biological and psychic systems – is not a part of the society. Psychic systems, or individual minds, can think but cannot communicate. In the social systems view, individuals are only loci for social communication.

Autopoietic systems
We will return to the issue of the individual within the social system after further discussion of Luhmann’s notion of “system”. A system is emergent, in that it comes into existence as soon as a border can be drawn between a set of communications and the context of the communication, or the systems environment. A system is always less complex than its environment – if a system does not reduce the complexity in its environment, then it cannot perform any function. A system effectively defines itself by creating and maintaining a border between itself and the environment. In the case of biological systems, this concept of systemic self-generation was first identified and examined by Maturana and Varela (1980). They termed the self-generation of biological systems “autopoietic”. Luhmann believed that autopoiesis could be usefully applied to social systems as well. Luhmann’s autopoietic systems do more than just define their own borders. They also produce their own components and organizational structures. The major benefit of the autopoietic perspective on social systems is that it presents them without ambiguity, and not as something that can be reduced to anything other than itself, such as “consciousness” or a sum of actions (Anderson, 2003). Returning to the issue of the individual, it is again possible to see why individuals cannot be components of social systems – social systems are comprised of communications and therefore produce communications, not people (“Niklas Luhmann,” 2005).

Communication as selection
Another Luhmannian conception that might seem counterintuitive is his subjectless, actionless definition of communication. “Communication is coordinated selectivity. It comes about only if ego fixes his own state on the basis of uttered information” (Luhmann, 1995, p. 154). Luhmann criticizes the “transmission” metaphor of communication because “it implies too much ontology” and that “the entire metaphor of possessing, having, giving, and receiving” is unsuitable (1995, p. 139). For Luhmann, communication is not an “action” performed by an “actor” but a selection performed by a system. This "selection" that results in communication is more similar to Darwin’s “natural selection” than to the everyday usage of the term. A social system generates communication much as a natural environment generates biological traits.

The selection process that Luhmann terms communication is actually a synthesis of three separate selections: the selection of information, the selection of a form, and the selection of an understanding (Anderson, 2003). Following Shannon and Weaver’s (1949) theory of information, Luhmann identifies information as a selection from a “repertoire of possibilities” (1995, p. 140). The form of a communication is how the message is communicated. The selection of understanding refers to what should be understood about the message. A critical note here is that understanding does not refer to the message’s reception by a psychic system, but rather the linkage of the message to subsequent communications (Anderson, 2003). The result of this selection process is the creation of meaning, which is the medium of communication in social systems (Luhmann, 1995, p. 140).

Social (and psychic) systems construct and sustain themselves in this way through communication. Communications can only exist as a product of social (and psychic) systems. Society is then a self-descriptive system that contains its own description. Luhmann recognizes that this definition is recursive and antithetical to classical scientific theory (“Soziologische Systemtheorie”, 2005).

Contemporary research
A variety of scholars today employ sociological systems analysis in fields ranging from law to literary theory. The theory is one of the most popular in German sociology, and has a significant following in continental Europe, Japan, and elsewhere (“Soziologische Systemtheorie,” 2005). Many of Luhmann’s former students and colleagues, such as Dirk Baecker, Peter Fuchs, Armin Nassehi, and Rudolf Stichweh, continue to develop the theory.

Conclusion
The preceding can only serve as the briefest of introductions to an enormous body of original thought. A lifetime’s work of thousands of pages of published text cannot be condensed into a few thousand words. This chapter has attempted to trace some of the major theoretical threads which led to the development of Luhmann’s universal theory of sociological systems. It presents some of Luhmann’s most engaging and innovative conceptual formulations. Because Luhmann’s theory represents a major break from the classical social sciences in structure and content, its comprehension requires a significant investment of intellectual effort. This effort is worthwhile, as Luhmann’s meticulous theoretical paradigm provides a useful alternative to other social science traditions.

More Information

 * Radio Bremen:Radio programs related to Luhmann, including an interview (in German).

title: Communication Theory/Social Systems


text:
User talk:Zephram Stark

What can I do for you today? --Zephram Stark 18:51, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

Futurology
I'm wondering if you know about the Futurology book here? It went up for VfD because it was basically abandoned, but we saved it because we figured that somebody would eventually come around and expand it. If you know much about singularities (or Kurzweil's writings in general), you might have a bit of fun working on that project. --Whiteknight T C E 19:34, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

 * Thank you; I'll read it and see what I can add. --Zephram Stark 19:37, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

Re: Image:globe.png
"I love the picture you created. May I use it as part of a logo for Wikiversity? I consider your rendering to be the best choice, but if you don't feel comfortable having it used in a Wikimedia copyrighted logo, I will trade it for a different globe. If you are willing to give this work to Wikimedia, do you have a bigger bitmap or a vector version? --Zephram Stark 17:40, 26 March 2006 (UTC)"

Yes you may! That is an awesome logo you made! You can use that image for any thing you want. I don't have a bigger bit map or vector anymore, sorry :-(

Noldoaran 22:11, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

title: User talk:Zephram Stark


text:
Rebol Programming/Language Features/Rebcode

Rebcode is a dialect for creating very high performance code which can be useful for heavy computations and for creating algorithms.

In essence, Rebcode is an assembly language within Rebol. Rebcode should only be used when it's necessary, since it's based on performance, not ease of use, and is tedious to work with for longer scripts.

Also since Rebcode is designed for performance, it does not check for mistakes, and mistakes in Rebcode can crash Rebol, just like any other assembly language.

Rebcode is currently pre-alpha and is not finished. This section of the book will not be completed until we have a stable version of Rebcode which won't change too much or the release of a public release or late beta.


text:
Talk:Python Programming/Metaclasses

This empty page is currently the fourth result on a google search for "python metaclasses", perhaps putting something here should be a high priority. --Artevelde 09:22, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

move page
"MetaClasses" is nonstandard capitalization. It's one word and should have no special caps; just "metaclasses" (but "Metaclasses" since it's part of a title). I'd do it myself but can't seem to find the 'move' option. --Cybercobra (talk) 05:47, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * ✅ --Dan Polansky (discuss • contribs) 11:14, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

title: Talk:Python Programming/Metaclasses


text: Template:User windows

title: Template:User windows


text: User:Artevelde

title: User:Artevelde


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Calculus/Acknowledgements

Acknowledgements
Portions of this book have been copied from relevant Wikipedia articles.

Contributors
In alphabetical order (by surname or display name):
 * Aaron Paul (AKA Grimm)
 * "Professor M." (no user page available)
 * Chaotic llama
 * User:Cronholm144
 * User:Fephisto
 * User:Juliusross
 * User:Rgdboer (Hyperbolic angle)
 * User:Stranger104
 * User:Whiteknight

Other Calculus Textbooks
Other calculus textbooks available online:
 * Calculus Refresher by Paul Garrett, notes on first-year calculus (PDF/TeX).
 * Difference Equations to Differential Equations: An Introduction to Calculus by Dan Sloughter, available under a Creative Commons license (PDF).
 * The Calculus of Functions of Several Variables by Dan Sloughter, available under a Creative Commons license (PDF).
 * Lecture Notes for Applied Calculus (PDF) by Karl Heinz Dovermann, first-semester calculus without using limits.
 * Elements of the Differential and Integral Calculus by William Granville (1911), a classic calculus textbook now available online in various forms. (It is also partially available at Wikisource.)
 * Calculus (3rd Ed., 1994) by Michael Spivak, is a more rigorous introductory calculus textbook.
 * Top-down Calculus by S. Gill Williamson, available under a Creative Commons license (PDF).

Other printed calculus textbooks:
 * This two-volume set provides a rigorous introduction to calculus.

Using infinitesimals

 * Elementary Calculus: An Approach Using Infinitesimals (2nd Ed., 1986) by H. Jerome Keisler, an out-of-print nonstandard calculus textbook now available online under a Creative Commons license (PDF).
 * Yet Another Calculus Text by Dan Sloughter, an introduction to calculus using infinitesimals available under a Creative Commons license (PDF).
 * Calculus by Benjamin Crowell, an introduction to calculus available under a Creative Commons license (PDF). Also see Crowell's "Five Free Calculus Textbooks" (2004) review on Slashdot.

Interactive Websites

 * Online interactive exercises on derivatives
 * Visual Calculus - Interactive Tutorial on Derivatives, Differentiation, and Integration
 * Planet Math: A wiki-style math reference.

Other Resources

 * Notes on Integration Techniques: Structured, comprehensive lecture notes scanned and uploaded to Wikimedia Commons.

title: Calculus/Acknowledgements


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Persian/Introduction

Welcome to the English Wikibook for learning the Persian Language.

This course requires no prior knowledge of Persian. It aims to teach grammar, vocabulary, common phrases, conversational language, and formal/literary Persian. By the end, you should be able to read and write Persian but will probably need a human teacher to help with listening and speaking. The book is meant to be read starting with lesson 1 and moving forward. It will move slowly.

The Persian Language
Persian (local names: Parsi, Farsi or Dari) is an Indo-European language, the dominant language of the Indo-Iranian language family and is a major language of antiquity. After the 7th century Persian absorbed a great deal of Arabic vocabulary. Persian is the official language of Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan. Persian is also a popular language in academia and business. Related languages include Pashto, Kurdish, Ossetian, and Balochi. Urdu and Turkish also have a sizable vocabulary from Persian.

Persian or Farsi?
Farsi is an Arabized form of the word Parsi, one of the original names in Persian for the Persian language. Since there is no [p] sound in Arabic, Parsi became Farsi after the Arab conquest of Persia. Farsi then became the local name of Persian, but English speakers still call the language “Persian”, just as they say “German”, “Spanish”, and “Chinese” for languages locally called Deutsch, español, and Hanyu. There is considerable opposition to calling Persian Farsi in English and other languages, as is summarized by the following pronouncement on the English name of Persian language by the Academy of Persian language and literature:
 * 1) “Persian” has been used in a variety of publications including cultural, scientific and diplomatic documents for centuries and, therefore, it carries a very significant historical and cultural meaning. Hence, changing “Persian” to “Farsi” would negate this established important precedent.
 * 2) Changing the usage from “Persian” to “Farsi” may give the impression that “Farsi” is a new language, although this may well be the intention of some users of “Farsi”.
 * 3) Changing the usage may also give the impression that “Farsi” is a dialect used in some parts of Iran rather than the predominant (and official) language of the country.
 * 4) The word “Farsi” has never been used in any research paper or university document in any Western language, and the proposal to begin using it would create doubt and ambiguity about the name of the official language of Iran.

Persian and English
Since Persian and English are both Indo-European languages, many basic Persian words are familiar to English speakers. For example, , and.

Difficulty of Persian Alphabet
Persian Alphabet is easy. Some people have learnt it in less than one hour. Persian alphabet is far easier than Korean, Chinese, Hindi, Hebrew, etc. There is no need to learn it through alternative alphabets like Pinyin for Chinese. Apart from the 32-letter alphabet you need to learn some diacritical marks which are used for representing vowels. For learning the alphabet, study Alphabet page in this book.

Pronunciation
Although Persian was influenced by Arabic, English speakers should not find it too difficult to pronounce Persian letters fairly well. Fortunately for English speakers, the glottal stop ء [ʔ] from Arabic is barely pronounced in Persian, and the “emphatic” consonants in Arabic ( ط ض ص ظ ح ع ) are pronounced without the pharyngealization, making them much easier for most native English speakers.

It is important to listen to Persian often and to try to use the language. Pronunciation guides can only closely convey the sounds of Persian but are never totally exact, so pronunciation benefits greatly from listening to native speakers.

Transcription
There are several systems of transcription to represent the sounds of Persian in the Latin alphabet. This book uses the UniPers (also called Pârsiye Jahâni, "Universal Persian") transcription system, which uses the basic Latin alphabet plus a few modified letters (‹â›, ‹š›, ‹ž›, and an apostrophe ‹’›) as a standard phonemic script that is clear, simple, and consistent. Each transcription is enclosed in angle brackets, e.g., ‹fârsi›:

Vocabulary and grammar
In learning to read or speak any language, the two aspects to be mastered are vocabulary and grammar. Acquiring vocabulary is a matter of memorization. Children learn thousands of words of their native language by the time they are conscious of the learning process, so it is easy to underestimate importance of having a large vocabulary. This process can be reactivated by immersion: moving to where the language is spoken and one’s native tongue cannot be used for daily communication.

Without the opportunity to move to a Persian-speaking area, a student must make a substantial effort to learn the meaning, pronunciation, and proper use of words. Be sure to learn all of the vocabulary words in each lesson. Early lessons have simple sentences because the student’s vocabulary is presumably limited, but more complex sentences in later lessons demonstrate more typical Persian. It may be helpful to translate these using a Persian-English dictionary. Access to a print dictionary is very helpful. Other sources of Persian, such as newspapers, magazines, and web sites can help to build vocabulary and to develop a sense of how Persian sentences are put together.

Resources
The Internet has a wide variety of study resources. You can refer to the appendix of this book for a selection of some of the best sources:

 * Websites
 * Persian - English Wiktionary

Also, each new vocabulary term introduced in this course can be looked up easily in the English Wiktionary wherever the dictionary image appears. Click on the image to look up a Persian word wherever you see a link like the following:

title: Persian/Introduction


text:
Talk:Blender 3D: Noob to Pro/Putting Hat on Person

In my opinion most of this chapter could be deleted because the basic rotation/location/scaling operations have been explained before already. What new in this chapter is the Putting it on (i.e. making parent) and the adding color (which doesn't belong in this chapter though)

Why doesn't my text show up on the discussion page? :-?

"Putting it on" section no longer accurate?
Under version 2.37a (still a problem with 2.42a too), the model is already created as one object; it appears to be impossible to select just one group, such as the hat or the head, in object mode.

Solution: i) While in EDIT MODE select all the vertices for the Hat then press the PKEY. In Seperate menu simply select "selected". The Hat and the Man will now be seperate objects. ii) With the hat still selected press f9 and in the mesh pannel click on center new, this will give the hat its own center point.

Alternative solution: Before creating the hat, deselect the man by pressing AKEY. Then create the hat as normal.

Pictures?
It could be useful getting some pictures in this area. It gives a good guide for what to work towards. Without images some of the things don't quite workas explained and arn't as easy to correct without it.

Confusing
The tutorial up until now was really clear and easy to follow. This chapter sort of hit me like a brick wall. I have the man's body, his head, and his hat. How do I attach his head to his body first? I don't want his head to act like his hat (able to move separately from his body).
 * Is it possible that you added the head while you were in object mode rather than edit mode? If this is the case I don't know how you would 'combine' the objects (head and body) but if I find a way I will come back and post here. Aineolach (talk) 17:15, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Color the hat?
Tried to follow the same steps to color the hat but couldnt get the same material options to come up...is coloring the hat beyond the scope of the tutorial at this point?
 * For anybody that's confused after reading this the coloring section was removed on 22 February 2007.Aineolach (talk) 17:18, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Selection -> Center as way to move object center (pink dot)
This method doesn't seem to work for me the way it is implied. "Or you could hit SHIFT+SKEY, select Selection → Center. " From the text I got the understanding that this would move the dot to the cursor, but this function doesn't seem to do that. Maybe it's just me but if this is supposed to facilitate moving the object's center I think it needs to be reworded.

Merge with previous page
Hi guys, I think the content required for this page is just too little to merit it's existence. I propose we merge it with Creating A Simple Hat, the previous module. What do you think? --JamesNZ (discuss • contribs) 02:39, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

 * Sure! - 2600:1700:DAC0:9840:EC35:A1D3:F895:95A0 (discuss) 20:23, 3 February 2019 (UTC)


text:
Wikijunior talk:Solar System/Introduction

Hi, this is Basejumper123. I have put an introduction on the intro page that is meant to help reader's understand about the project, and who and what it took to finish just take a look if you're curious

renaming page
Maybe there should be a notes to parents and educators or introduction for parents and educators If I move the page will that screw up references in the book.--Gbleem 17:27, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

Notes and questions
Wikijunior books would like to introduce a free children's book from all the writers at Wikibooks. "The Solar System" is a fabulous place for children to learn about - and why buy a book about it in a store, when you can get all the facts and pictures from the experts and writers at wiki?

Let's not bash the comercial distributer who might copy this text. The discount versions provided directly to children might says something like: This printing of the wikibook has been provided at a reduced cost by the Beck Foundation. or This printing of the wikibook has been provided at a reduced cost by a group of really bad people to draw children into a life of crime. It should be something the printer puts in.

Wikibooks is a project of the Wikimedia Foundation, aimed at providing quality reading for adults and children minus the cost or trouble of going and getting books from a library or store.

Getting it at a store or library may be the easiest way to get the book.

The people here at all the wiki projects are here because they want to advance the cause of learning, and increase the global spread of knowledge. Nobody was paid to write this book's manuscript, and no single person tries to lay claim to its pages or what they contain. When the first launched into cyberspace as a full, finished version it will be independent of a publishing corporation, independent of a printer, and free from all that is part of normal book making.

There are many discussions about the use of free vs. open source. Free might imply you don't have to pay for the printed copy. --Gbleem 17:41, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

provider introduction
There should probably be a separate printer/distributer introduction. I'm sure any printer or distributer will add their own. They would probably leave in the wikibook introduction if it limits it's scope.

Questions, comments about the text
Capitalisation of the Sun. The Sun should be capitalised. A sun should not. "Sun" is a proper noun when used as the name of this solar system's star. Same goes for the Moon vs a moon. 203.22.236.14 14:07, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

 * I would have to concurr on this point. I've tried to use the capitalized version throughout this whole Wikibook as it is a proper noun, and one solution to this by Science Fiction writers is to use the Latinized version of these celestial bodies like Sol and Luna instead.  I am not advocating this approach, as I consider "The Sun" and "The Moon" to be proper names for these object, and ones that kids should be familar with if they speak English.  However, if you are refering to "the moons of Mars", moon is in lowercase.  This makes a spellchecker something that causes heartburn on projects like this, but it is something that perhaps we need to deal with and check.  --Rob Horning 17:09, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Pluto and Dwarf Planets?
Pluto. I removed references to pluto as a planet in the introduction. Should this be done throughout the text? Should there be a separate category for dwarf planets? Should I have discussed it before making such a change? I'm new to this.--Mcgill 04 September 2006

Pluto and Dwarf Planets are something that should be mentioned, in my opinion. In the line about planets, it says there are many types, including rocky and gas. What about dwarf? MiltonT 05:33, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Edit of Introduction Page
I rewrote the measurement section to be as clear and as brief as possible, ensuring that this section is accessible and not off-putting to young readers who need the information. I also took out the section "What is in the night sky?" as I felt it was repeating much of what is said in the Solar System module. I replaced it with some discussion on how scientists study the solar system, which covers how we know what we know. I don't think this is covered in the rest of the book and it is appropriately introductory.

-- Teshi


text:
CAT-Tools/DéjàVu X/XLS format

If you need to translate text in one column and enter it into a second column, you can use the "ignore red text" feature on importing an Excel file into DV.

Prepare the Excel file as follows:
 * 1) Copy the text to be translated to the target column or cells.
 * 2) Mark the source text "red".
 * 3) Save the Excel sheet.
 * 4) In the DVX project explorer, select the excel file to be imported.
 * 5) In the properties window which appears once you have highlighted a file to import, tick the "ignore red text" box.

When you have translated and exported the file as usual, don't forget to change the text you set to red back to normal.

title: CAT-Tools/DéjàVu X/XLS format


text:
International Relations/Regionalisation

Regionalisation
In International Relations regionalisation (or regionalism) is actually the set of processes that lead states to work together in an international system on a regional scale. From the realist perspective of International Relations it is actually an outward expansion from the nation state.

Behind the process of regionalisation lies the concept of regionalism. This can be seen as the normative aspects, or values, that underly regionalisation e.g. the (contested) European identity. However, it is also a theoretical tool for analysis of international relations. For example the concept of security regime in regional security would not be possible without the analytic tool of 'regionalism'.

The E.U. Model C.S.N. (Comunidad de Sudamericana Naciones) The African Union A.S.E.A.N. A.P.E.C. N.A.F.T.A.

title: International Relations/Regionalisation


text:
International Relations/Approaches to International Relations/Theories of I.R.

< International Relations = Theories of International Relations =

Introduction
In actual fact, the commonly used term/title "Theories of International Relations" is somewhat of a misnomer because in practice, most books or articles on this topic do not present theories OF international relations, but theories IN/WITHIN international relations (insofar as international relations is an identifiable field of inquiry). The heading theories OF international relations might be more appropriate in epistemological discussions where the object of inquiry would be theories about the field of international relations, rather than disparate theories that are within the field and focus on different aspects of the international relations world.

Realism
Realism is the traditional school of international relations theory. It developed as a method of analysis of international relations when political actors consisted almost exclusively of states. Thus, it is a state-centred view of international relations and discounts the importance of other actors such as international organisations, Non-Government Organisations (NGOs), terrorist organisations, etc. It is assumed that all states act for their own interest, and that all states, in a given situation, will act the same way.

Survival, Territorial Integrity, Population
It has been posited that a state requires three main elements to survive. The top three priorities for a state (the "national self-interest") have been posited to be survival, territorial integrity, and population, in that order:
 * Survival its existence as a state, with sovereign boundaries, administration, and control within its boundaries (threat of force).
 * Territorial Integrity considered breached if another state launches an invasion; a breach of territorial integrity does not necessarily mean that a state is defeated (for example, the invaded state may choose to launch a counter-attack), but rather, may sometimes be compromised to ensure a state's survival
 * Population can sometimes be compromised (e.g. conscription in the army)

Green Theory
Green Theory in International Relations: Sustainable Environment

Dramaturgical Theory
Dramaturgical theory is based heavily on Erving Goffman's sociological work, especially his description of impression management. Nations and other international actors are treated as trying not only to advance their own interests in the short-term, but create long-lasting impressions of their cultures, habits, etc. that foreigners (and possibly their own citizens) will take as true. Gregory Adams did the most work in developing it.

Feminist Theory
Feminist theory in international relations considers the effects of male domination in international relations and its related fields.

The Clash of Civilisations Thesis
The Clash of Civilizations thesis is a theory developed by Samuel P. Huntington to explain conflict in the post-cold war world. Huntington predicted that post cold war conflict would take place between civilizations defined along broad ethnic and religious lines. The civilizations he predicted were the Western, orthodox, Islamic, African, Latin American, Sinic, Buddhist, Hindu and Japanese.

=References=

This page also draws heavily upon the following Wikipedia resources:
 * international relations theory

=External links=
 * The Globalist


text:
Guide to X11

Wikibooks Guide to X11 /Authors/ · /History/ · /Print/

This book is about the X Window System, the environment popular with Unix systems.

Contents

 * 1)  /Introduction/ what is X11?
 * 2)  /Configuring/ making XF86Config or xorg.conf
 * 3)  /Building/ building X11 from its source tree
 * 4)  /Starting Sessions/ starting sessions and window managers
 * 5)  /Starting Programs/ opening clients
 * 6)  /Fonts/ core and Xft fonts
 * 7)  /Window Managers/ a long list
 * 8)  /Xt Clients/ about X resources and xterm
 * 9)  /Political History/ the rise of many X11 factions
 * 10)  /References and Links/ other Wikibooks

Supplements

 * Guide to Unix/Commands/X11 Unix commands for X11

title: Guide to X11


text:
Talk:Calculus/Integration/Archive 1

Are you sure it's a good idea to write this chapter before the previous ones? As it is, we will have to (and already are) making assumptions about what will be taught in them. IMO we should write the chapters in order. Anybody have comments? Eric119 17:24 26 Jul 2003 (UTC)

 * Well, when I have time, I'll go fill in the others. The stuff on differentiation requires nice pictures and demonstrative examples, which will take a lot of time to fix and prepare, whilst integration is more a symbolic thing and most of it can be written without having diagrams and such (but they will be needed later)
 * Hope this clarifies things... Dysprosia 00:37 2 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Is it just me or are some of the  $$...$$  tags producing text instead of images? --Matt 03:55, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)
 * Nevermind my question... --Matt 07:40, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Fundamental Theorem of Calculus
Perhaps I missed it (completely possible as I'm a bit of a Wiki newbie) but I didn't see mention of the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus (FTC). IMHO, the FTC is one of the most "surprising results" in mathematics. First, I think that integration is not really about finding anti-derivatives, though certainly it involves using them. Integration is about infinite sums (of areas). Second, the surprising thing is that if we look at a function (f) between A and B, find the anti-derivitive of f (F), then take Fs value at B and subtract Fs value at A then that gives us (drum roll please) the exact area under the curve (f) between A and B! How??? Of course, there is a good reason but the FTC was, and I think still is, a rather surprising thing to discover.

Okay, this is starting to look like a rant... sorry. Wistful recolleciton of my days teaching college Calculus, I suppose. Anyway, please let me know if I simply missed it somewhere -- maybe it's planned but not written or something like that. Thanks.

Exception
It should be explicitly noted, although it is implied by the (alpha + 1) factor in the denominator, that the power rule for integration does not hold for alpha = -1.

 * Of course. Dysprosia 04:56, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)

title: Talk:Calculus/Integration/Archive 1


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The Written Word/Introduction

Reader's Intro
Welcome to another Wikibook. As you most likely know, Wikibooks are a division of the Wikimedia foundation (a free open-source media project), and they are generated, edited, proofed, and read by online contributors, fans, and scholars. Each book is a labor of love on the part of its many creators because no contributor is paid for their works and no person is held in higher regard than his peers. All wiki products are made for the advancement of knowledge and the spread of intellect. They are free to every person who can access them. Every book is edited to perfection by all the thousands of volunteers who process the ideas contained within them. Now we, the creators, wish to invite you inside this wikibook and to learn about the written word.

Where would we be without the classical science that has evolved to be language and writing? Would we be bone-toting barbarians living in caves and wearing furs? Would we be using sign language? What would we do without the words that are written within this book? The written word has created and destroyed life, instigated wars and the sought peace after, the word has been the epoch of love and the credulity of hate, and the written word has shaped the age we now live in. What happened to create the alphabets of today, and what place will our words take us tomorrow? If you wish to read more, just "open" this wikibook.

Writer's Manual
Thanks for your interest in contributing to this wikibook, this manuscript is in desperate need of additional content. Please add all content and pictures you can. Thank you.

title: The Written Word/Introduction


text:
The Written Word/What Is A Word?

What Is A Word
The Written Word is the basic building block of knowledge. It allows a way to leave information behind, to be read years or decades later. The way you use them, and how effectively, determines how the information is received. Consider this: when we have a math teacher who stands at the front of a classroom and talks in a monotone voice, with absolutely no expression, boredom will ensue, no matter how interested a student is. Compare this to a teacher who is enthusiastic, who explains things in an uptone style, and students will have a difficult time not becoming interested. This is commonly the difference between good and bad writing. This isn't just limited to novels, but to every kind of text. While novels are the ones who most commonly use vivid descriptions and nuances in the writing, it should be noted that the same techniques can be used elsewhere.

Word Theory
According to Wiktionary, a word is a distinct unit of language with a particular meaning

In the classical Roman form of writing, each word is formed by a series of characters. The Roman classical alphabet is as follows:

Each character is designed to make a specific sound when pronounced. And when the sounds are placed together they make the noises that the human brain translates as "words". Specific groupings of characters can be placed together to form sounds, that without the grouping, would take too many characters and would be tedious to write. Letters make sounds according to the others that surround them in words. For example, the letters "c" and "h" when placed together make the sound "cha" but spelling is still just "ch".

Writing and Speaking are opposites, but they are opposites that attract. Most people that write also know how to speak and vice versa, but take one skill away and the other will quickly deteriorate. People who cannot write rarely speak well, and people who cannot speak (not counting a prohibitive disease) are rarely good writers.

title: The Written Word/What Is A Word?


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The Written Word/Historical Background

The First Word
The first organized alphabet of characters is believed to be mesopotamian Cuneiform. *Still working*

It is also to be considered that in the region of the Shinnar plain about three thousand BC and maybe even earlier, that beer drinkers were partly to blame for the formation of the first notation on clay tablets. Labouring in the fields growing corn and barley along with hops they were given a daily beer allowance by the landowners. Usually among drinkers of alcoholic beverages their ability to count becomes somewhat blurred so they would place several marks on these tablets according to the amount to which each was entitled. These markings lead directly to the aforementioned cunieform.

title: The Written Word/Historical Background


text:
Cookbook:Raw Sugar

Raw sugar is the sugar which results from removing molasses from sugar cane, before further refinement.

title: Cookbook:Raw Sugar


text:
Talk:General Chemistry/Periodic Table

Why Wikibooks and not Wikipedia
This is a quick note as to why I'm keeping this page even though all of the links go to Wikipedia.

Earlier I deleted all of the "sub pages" to this Wikibook module because it was largely duplication of previous work on Wikipedia and mainly encyclopedic articles that were poorly named as well. I'm keeping this particular module (renamed, however) because I feel that this table is indeed something that can be kept in a simple form and not subject to the whims of Wikipedia editors unrelated to the General Chemistry Wikibook. This also give more freedom for the authors of that Wikibook a chance to incorporate this Wikibook module more closely into the contents of that book, and even do modifications that make sense only within that book.

A "generic Peroidic Table" within Wikibooks is inappropriate as Wikipedia already does a pretty good job as it is. This is a book-specific table and should be treated as such. --Rob Horning 18:01, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

Name Change
You are absolutely right, this should be a simple Periodic table for the general chemistry book. I changed the name to reflect that this is part of the General Chemistry book. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Julians (talk • contribs).

Removal of "History" section
While I'm not against adding a history section here, what was added is in clear violation of copyright and can be found here instead:

http://www.wou.edu/las/physci/ch412/perhist.htm

That is clearly copyrighted material and needs to be removed completely from this article. Any attempt to add it back will be deleted immediately because we simply can't have that on Wikibooks. If you want to paraphrase it and do some scholarly research to elaborate on those ideas, but make it something original, you are welcome to do so. --Rob Horning 23:27, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Nonmetals
Although I like your coloring scheme, I believe it misleads students into thinking that the halogens are not nonmetals. Is there another way of assigning all the nonmetals the same color while still defining which are halogens and noble gases?

We don't need to do that.

We can just change "Nonmetals" to "Other Nonmetals," and also put something saying that the nonmetals not colored in the color are "Halogens," and "Noble gases".

Germanium
Germanium is always considered as a metalloid. Here I put it as a metal.

Can someone change it to a metalloid.

And then I will put a citation saying why I put polonium as a metal.

Please also do that for the General Chemistry/Periodic Table/Print article.

Lawrencium atomic weight change from [263] to [262], [262] is the most commonly stated atomic weight for Lr
As with No on the /Print version, on this and that I want Lr to be changed from [263] to [262], to not confuse most people.

title: Talk:General Chemistry/Periodic Table


text:
First Aid/CPR summary

Area - check the area
Look for hazards. Hazards include split electrical wires, fire, unstable building structure or anything else that could present a risk to the responder. If there are hazards, remove them, or remove the victim from them if possible. If not, then retreat to a safe distance, call EMS and wait for their arrival. Make sure that you do not put yourself in danger. If you are near a road, ensure that you are clearly visible to traffic.

Put on gloves if you have them and use a Pocket Mask or Face Shield if you have access to them and need to give rescue breaths.

Awake - check level of consciousness
Does the victim respond to voice?

If YES, check the victim for other conditions and call for help if necessary.

If NO, call for help, check for breathing and if victim is not breathing start doing CPR until help arrives

Ambulance - call EMS
Call EMS using a bystander if possible. If you're alone, and the victim is an adult (>8 years old), then leave the victim to call EMS yourself. If you're alone but the victim is a child (1–8 years old) or an infant (<1 year old), then continue; you'll call EMS later.

Obtain an AED and AED-trained responder if possible. If no AED-trained responder is available and an AED is available, obtain it and follow the voice prompts given by the AED and instructional pictures.

Breathing - check for breathing
Quickly remove any loose and obvious obstructions from the mouth. Check the victim for signs of obvious breathing, such as clear signs of chest rise and fall. Breathing must be regular, consistent and obvious.

Gasping, irregular, infrequent or extremely shallow breathing should not be considered normal breathing. The victim's brain may attempt to cause breaths when the heart has stopped. If the breathing is not adequate, or you are unsure, continue CPR with compressions.

Is the victim breathing?

If YES, place the victim in the Recovery position and call for help unless a spinal injury is suspected in which it is crucial to not move the patient. If the patient vomits, however, it is more important to roll them over to their side while holding the back, neck, and head stable.

If NO, give 30 chest compressions, then 2 rescue breaths.

Compressions - begin compressions

 * Hand/finger placement on the center of the chest, on the lower half of the breastbone. Be sure to not compress the soft area of the abdomen before the breastbone.
 * After 5 cycles (approx. 2 minutes) call EMS if you haven't done so already (in the case of children or infants). If a bystander is available, get them to call immediately upon arrival. If they have to leave the area to contact EMS, tell the bystander to return to you and inform you of the ETA of the EMS.
 * Compress at the rate of at least 100 per minute.
 * Push at least 2" (5 cm) on adults; at least 1/3rd of the chest depth for pediatric victims.
 * Use two hands for adult compressions, one or two hands for children, and two fingers for infant compressions.

Airway - open the airway
Place one hand on the forehead and two fingers on the chin. Tilt the head back and lift the chin so the victim's jawline is perpendicular to the ground

Breathing - give breaths
Place a CPR shield over the victim's mouth, if available. With the head tilted back as described in "Airway", pinch the victim's nose shut with the hand that in on their forehead. Place your mouth over their mouth, making a complete seal. Give a normal breath until you see chest rise. Give a second breath, then immediately go back to compressions.

Do not stop CPR to recheck for signs of life. Signs of life tend to be very dramatic and movement will be observed if the victim no longer requires CPR. Continue CPR until emergency help takes over, the victim moves, you are too exhausted to continue or the area becomes unsafe. If an AED and AED-trained responder arrives on the scene, it will have priority on the over CPR. Continue CPR until the AED operator asks you to stop.

title: First Aid/CPR summary


text:
Talk:First Aid/CPR summary

This summary is terrible
I just updated the full CPR section to reflect reality and sanity. Please change this summary so it corresponds to CPR and not someone's invention. All in all its not as bad as the full article, but its seriously out of date ie there is no circulation check, and there hasn't been for several years! Mike.lifeguard 14:27, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Done! Mike.lifeguard 19:27, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Circulation assessments are going by the way side now. It has been realised that most lay people can't accurately detect a pulse under pressure. So now the recommendation is - No Breathing do CPR.

Thanks Chris Hodson
 * Yes, that was updated some time ago. — Mike.lifeguard | talk 20:17, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

What does "30-2" indicate in the CPR chart? Thirty compressions to every two breaths? This can't seem right if there's 100 compressions per minute but twenty to thirty breaths in the same time (going off the "breath every 2-3 seconds" note). Can someone make it a little clearer? - 124.168.114.17 (talk) 15:05, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

title: Talk:First Aid/CPR summary


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Talk:Python Programming/Control Flow

Trailing Newlines
There should be some consistency in whether we add trailing newlines in the "print" statements in the for and while loops. I vote we don't add them. --Artevelde 22:28, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

Control flow
This page should be called "control flow". See control flow. Kenyon (talk) 06:13, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Moved from "Flow control" to "Control flow". --Dan Polansky (discuss • contribs) 22:29, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

title: Talk:Python Programming/Control Flow


text:
Visual Basic .NET/Getting Started

To begin programming in Visual Basic .NET, you can either compile directly from the command line with the .NET SDK, use Microsoft's Visual Studio IDE, or the open-source SharpDevelop IDE.

In this manual, however, we will only be covering Microsoft's official IDE. Programming a form (window) by hand can be challenging if you are not familiar with the language, so starting with a good form designer will help a lot.

Okay, it's now time for your first program!

Application Windows Forms
Start up a Visual Basic .NET IDE and create a windows application.

Double click on the form to open up the code view. You should see something similar to:

Enter in the following code in the Form_Load Sub (between the "Private Sub" line and the "End Sub" line):

This creates your classic "Hello World!" program.

Press F5 or go to the Debug menu and select Start to start the program. You should see an alert box that says "Hello World!" and then the main window (with nothing on it) should open. Click the "X" in the title bar like you would to quit any program!

Application console
Add a new project via the menu File, then New, Project... and select Application console.

Paste in the Main function:

Now to avoid the program to automatically launch the previous paragraph form instead of the console, right click on the new ConsoleApplication1 from the Solutions explorer, and Set as starting project.

Then the console appears when pressing F5.

Basic symbols
As Visual Basic, VB.net uses:
 * 1) ' before comments
 * 2) _ to split a command on the next line
 * : to start a new command on the same line

Visual Basic .NET/Premier script

title: Visual Basic .NET/Getting Started


text:
Visual Basic .NET/Style Guide

This is the style guide for the Visual Basic .NET wikibook. Please try to follow it when making changes or additions to this book. If you find a page that does not follow this guide please change it.

Code
When adding code examples, please color it as it would appear in VB .NET. Use the span HTML Tags to do this. Example:

' This is a comment Dim x As Integer = 5 Dim s As String = "Hello World!"

produces: ' This is a comment Dim x As Integer = 5 Dim s As String = "Hello World!"

 * Apologies I just stumbled across this and have been updating some of the pages using the tag . Please feel free to revert Pluke (discuss • contribs) 15:15, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

title: Visual Basic .NET/Style Guide