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Mount Vesuvius

Mount Vesuvius is a somma-stratovolcano located on the Gulf of Naples in Campania, Italy, about 9 km east of Naples and a short distance from the shore. It is one of several volcanoes forming the Campanian volcanic arc. Vesuvius consists of a large cone partially encircled by the steep rim of a summit caldera, resulting from the collapse of an earlier, much higher structure.

The eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD destroyed the Roman cities of Pompeii, Herculaneum, Oplontis, Stabiae, and several other settlements. The eruption ejected a cloud of stones, ash and volcanic gases to a height of 33 km, erupting molten rock and pulverized pumice at the rate of 6e5 m3 per second. More than 1,000 people are thought to have died in the eruption, though the exact toll is unknown. The only surviving eyewitness account of the event consists of two letters by Pliny the Younger to the historian Tacitus.

Vesuvius has erupted many times since. It is the only volcano on Europe's mainland to have erupted in the last hundred years. It is regarded as one of the most dangerous volcanoes in the world because 3,000,000 people live near enough to be affected by an eruption, with at least 600,000 in the danger zone. This is the most densely populated volcanic region in the world. Eruptions tend to be violent and explosive; these are known as Plinian eruptions.

Mythology
Vesuvius has a long historic and literary tradition. It was considered a divinity of the Genius type at the time of the eruption of AD 79: it appears under the inscribed name Vesuvius as a serpent in the decorative frescos of many lararia, or household shrines, surviving from Pompeii. An inscription from Capua to IOVI VESVVIO indicates that he was worshipped as a power of Jupiter; that is, Jupiter Vesuvius.

The Romans regarded Mount Vesuvius as being devoted to Hercules. The historian Diodorus Siculus relates a tradition that Hercules, in the performance of his labors, passed through the country of nearby Cumae on his way to Sicily and found there a place called "the Phlegraean Plain" (Φλεγραῖον πεδίον, "fiery"), "from the mountain which of old spouted forth a huge fire [...] the mountain is called Vesuvius." It was inhabited by giant bandits, "the sons of the Earth. With the gods' assistance, he pacified the region and continued. The facts behind the tradition, if any, remain unknown, as does whether Herculaneum was named after it. An epigram by the poet Martial in 88 AD suggests that both Venus, patroness of Pompeii, and Hercules were worshipped in the region devastated by the eruption of 79.

Etymology
Vesuvius was a name of the volcano in frequent use by the authors of the late Roman Republic and the early Roman Empire. Its collateral forms were Vesaevus, Vesevus, Vesbius and Vesvius. Writers in ancient Greek used Οὐεσούιον or Οὐεσούιος. Many scholars since then have offered an etymology. Given that peoples of varying ethnicity and language occupied Campania during the Roman Iron Age, the etymology depends to a large degree on the presumption of what language was spoken there at the time. Naples was settled by Greeks, as the name Nea-polis, "New City", testifies. The Oscans, an Italic people, lived in the countryside. The Latins also competed for the occupation of Campania. Etruscan settlements were in the vicinity. Other peoples of unknown provenance are said to have been there at some time by various ancient authors.

Some theories about its origin are:
 * From Greek οὔ = "not" prefixed to a root from or related to the Greek word σβέννυμι = "I quench", in the sense of "unquenchable".
 * From Greek ἕω = "I hurl" and βίη "violence", "hurling violence", *vesbia, taking advantage of the collateral form.
 * From an Indo-European root, *eus- < *ewes- < *h₁ews-, "shine", "burn", sense "the one who lightens", through Latin or Oscan.
 * From an Indo-European root *wes = "hearth" (compare e.g. Vesta)

Topography
Vesuvius is a "humpbacked" peak, consisting of a large cone (Gran Cono) partially encircled by the steep rim of a summit caldera caused by the collapse of an earlier (and originally much higher) structure called Mount Somma. The Gran Cono was produced during the A.D. 79 eruption. For this reason, the volcano is also called Somma-Vesuvius or Somma-Vesuvio.

The caldera started forming during an eruption around 17,000–18,000 years ago and was enlarged by later paroxysmal eruptions, ending in the one of AD 79. This structure has given its name to the term "somma volcano", which describes any volcano with a summit caldera surrounding a newer cone.

The cliffs forming the northern ridge of Monte Somma's caldera rim reach a maximum height of 1132 m at Punta Nasone. The summit of the main cone of Vesuvius is 1281 m above sea level and more than 400 m above the 5 km long valley of Atrio di Cavallo (the northern floor of Monte Somma's caldera).

The volcano's slopes are scarred by lava flows, while the rest are heavily vegetated, with scrub and forests at higher altitudes and vineyards lower down.

Formation
Vesuvius is a stratovolcano and was formed as a result of the collision of two tectonic plates, the African and the Eurasian. The former was subducted at a convergent boundary beneath the latter, deeper into the earth. As the water-saturated sediments of the African oceanic plate were pushed to hotter depths inside the planet, the water boiled off and lowered the melting point of the upper mantle enough to partially melt the rocks. Because magma is less dense than the solid rock around it, it was pushed upward. Finding a weak spot at the Earth's surface, it broke through, thus forming the volcano.

The volcano is one of several forming the Campanian volcanic arc. Others include Campi Flegrei, a large caldera a few kilometers to the north-west, Ischia, a volcanic island 20 km to the west, and several undersea volcanoes to the south. The arc forms the southern end of a larger chain of volcanoes produced by the subduction process described above, which extends northwest along the length of Italy as far as Monte Amiata in Southern Tuscany. Vesuvius is the only one to have erupted in recent history, although some of the others have erupted within the last few hundred years. Many are either extinct or have not erupted for tens of thousands of years.

Eruptions
Mount Vesuvius has erupted many times. Numerous others preceded the eruption in AD 79 in prehistory, including at least three significantly larger; an example is the Avellino eruption around 1800 BC, which engulfed several Bronze Age settlements. Since AD 79, the volcano has also erupted repeatedly, in 172, 203, 222, possibly in 303, 379, 472, 512, 536, 685, 787, around 860, around 900, 968, 991, 999, 1006, 1037, 1049, around 1073, 1139, 1150, and there may have been eruptions in 1270, 1347, and 1500. The volcano erupted again in 1631, six times in the 18th century (including 1779 and 1794), eight times in the 19th century (notably in 1872), and in 1906, 1929 and 1944. There have been no eruptions since 1944, and none of the eruptions after AD 79 were as large or destructive as the Pompeian one.

The eruptions vary greatly in severity but are characterized by explosive outbursts of the kind dubbed Plinian after Pliny the Younger, a Roman writer who published a detailed description of the AD 79 eruption, including his uncle's death. On occasion, eruptions from Vesuvius have been so large that the whole of southern Europe has been blanketed by ash; in 472 and 1631, Vesuvian ash fell on Constantinople (Istanbul), over 1200 km away. A few times since 1944, landslides in the crater have raised clouds of ash dust, raising false alarms of an eruption. Since 1750, seven of the eruptions of Vesuvius have had durations of more than five years; only Mount Etna has had as many long-duration eruptions in the last 270 years. The two most recent eruptions of Vesuvius (1875–1906 and 1913–1944) each lasted more than 30 years.

Vesuvius is still regarded as an active volcano, although its current activity produces little more than sulfur-rich steam from vents at the bottom and walls of the crater.

Layers of lava, ash, scoria and pumice make up the volcanic peak. Their mineralogy is variable, but generally silica-undersaturated and rich in potassium, with phonolite produced in the more explosive eruptions (e.g. the eruption in 1631 displaying a complete stratigraphic and petrographic description: phonolite was firstly erupted, followed by a tephritic phonolite and finally a phonolitic tephrite).

Volcanic explosivity index
According to the Smithsonian Institution's Global Volcanism Program, Vesuvius has had 54 confirmed eruptions during the Holocene Epoch (the last 11,700 years). A volcanic explosivity index (VEI) has been assigned to all but one of these eruptions.

Before AD 79

Scientific knowledge of the geologic history of Vesuvius comes from core samples taken from a 2000 m plus borehole on the flanks of the volcano, extending into Mesozoic rock. Cores were dated by potassium–argon and argon–argon dating. The area has been subject to volcanic activity for at least 400,000 years; the lowest layer of eruption material from the Somma caldera lies on top of the 40,000-year‑old Campanian ignimbrite produced by the Campi Flegrei complex. The volcanic complex stands on a large, sedimentary plain. Several surviving works written over the 200 years preceding the AD 79 eruption describe the mountain as having had a volcanic nature, although Pliny the Elder did not depict the mountain in this way in his Natural History:
 * 25,000 years ago: Vesuvius started forming in the Codola Plinian eruption.
 * Vesuvius was then built up by a series of lava flows, with some smaller explosive eruptions interspersed between them. By this time, the volcano was 2,000 meters (6,560 feet) tall, with the summit being 500 meters (1,640 feet) east of the current summit.
 * About 19,000 years ago: the style of eruption changed to a sequence of large explosive and caldera-forming Plinian eruptions, of which the AD 79 one was the most recent. The calderas are aligned in a roughly east–west direction, and all contributed to forming present-day's Somma caldera. The eruptions are named after the tephra deposits produced by them, which in turn are named after the place where the deposits were first identified:
 * 18,300 years ago: the Basal Pumice (Pomici di Base) eruption, VEI 6, the original formation of the Somma caldera. The caldera's formation was asymmetric towards the west. The eruption was followed by a period of much less violent, lava-producing eruptions.
 * 16,000 years ago: the Green Pumice (Pomici Verdoline) eruption, VEI 5.
 * Around 11,000 years ago: the Lagno Amendolare eruption, smaller than the Mercato eruption.
 * 8,000 years ago: the Mercato eruption (Pomici di Mercato) – also known as Pomici Gemelle or Pomici Ottaviano, VEI 6.
 * Around 5,000 years ago: two explosive eruptions smaller than the Avellino eruption.
 * 3,800 years ago (19th century BC): the Avellino eruption (Pomici di Avellino), VEI 6; its vent was apparently 2 km west of the current crater and the eruption destroyed several Bronze Age settlements of the Apennine culture, including ancient Afragola. Several carbon dates on wood and bones offer a range of possible dates of about 500 years in the mid-2nd millennium BC. In May 2001, near Nola, Italian archaeologists using the technique of filling every cavity with plaster or substitute compound, recovered some remarkably well-preserved forms of perishable objects, such as fence rails, a bucket and especially in the vicinity, thousands of human footprints pointing into the Apennines to the north. The settlement had huts, pots and goats. The residents had hastily abandoned the village, leaving it to be buried under pumice and ash in much the same way that Pompeii and Herculaneum were later preserved. Pyroclastic surge deposits were distributed to the northwest of the vent, travelling as far as 15 km from it, and lie up to 3 m deep in the area now occupied by Naples.
 * The volcano then entered a stage of more frequent, but less violent eruptions, until the most recent Plinian eruption, which destroyed Pompeii and Herculaneum. Evidence of these eruptions comes from badly preserved ashfall deposits that have been dubitatively assigned to either the Somma-Vesuvius complex, or the Phlegrean fields.
 * The last of these may have been in 217 BC. There were earthquakes in Italy during that year and the sun was reported as being dimmed by gray haze or dry fog. Plutarch wrote of the sky being on fire near Naples, and Silius Italicus mentioned in his epic poem Punica that Vesuvius had thundered and produced flames worthy of Mount Etna in that year. However, both authors were writing around 250 years later. Greenland ice core samples of around that period show relatively high acidity, which is assumed to have been caused by atmospheric hydrogen sulfide.
 * The volcano was then quiet (for 295 years, if the 217 BC date for the last previous eruption is true) and was described by Roman writers as having been covered with gardens and vineyards, except at the top, which was craggy. The volcano may have had only one summit at that time, judging by a wall painting, "Bacchus and Vesuvius", found in a Pompeian house, the House of the Centenary (Casa del Centenario).
 * The Greek historian Strabo (c. 63 BC) described the mountain in Book V, Chapter 4 of his Geographica as having a predominantly flat, barren summit covered with sooty, ash-coloured rocks, and suggested that it might once have had "craters of fire". He also perceptively suggested that the fertility of the surrounding slopes may be due to volcanic activity, as at Mount Etna.
 * In Book II of De architectura, the architect Vitruvius (c. 80–70 BC –?) reported that fires had once existed abundantly below the peak and that it had spouted fire onto the surrounding fields. He described Pompeiian pumice as having been burnt from another species of stone.
 * Diodorus Siculus (c. 90 BC), another Greek writer, wrote in Book IV of his Bibliotheca Historica that the Campanian plain was called fiery (Phlegrean) because of the peak, Vesuvius, which had spouted flames like Etna and showed signs of the fire that had burnt in ancient history.

Eruption of AD 79
In AD 79, Vesuvius erupted in one of the most catastrophic eruptions of all time. Historians have learned about the eruption from the eyewitness account of Pliny the Younger, a Roman administrator and poet. Several dates are given in the surviving copies of the letters. The latest evidence supports earlier findings and indicates that the eruption occurred after 17 October.

The volcano ejected a cloud of stones, ashes and volcanic gases to a height of 33 km, spewing molten rock and pulverized pumice at the rate of 6e5 m3 per second, ultimately releasing 100,000 times the thermal energy released by the Hiroshima-Nagasaki bombings. The cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum were destroyed by pyroclastic surges and the ruins buried under tens of metres of tephra.

Precursors and foreshocks
The AD 79 eruption was preceded by a powerful earthquake in 62, which caused widespread destruction around the Bay of Naples, and particularly to Pompeii. Some of the damage had still not been repaired when the volcano erupted. The deaths of 600 sheep from "tainted air" in the vicinity of Pompeii indicates that the earthquake of AD 62 may have been related to new activity by Vesuvius.

The Romans grew accustomed to minor earth tremors in the region; the writer Pliny the Younger even wrote that they "were not particularly alarming because they are frequent in Campania". Small earthquakes started taking place four days before the eruption becoming more frequent over the next four days, but the warnings were not recognized.

Scientific analysis
Reconstructions of the eruption and its effects vary considerably in the details but have the same overall features. The eruption lasted two days. The morning of the first day was perceived as normal by the only eyewitness to leave a surviving document, Pliny the Younger. In the middle of the day, an explosion threw up a high-altitude column from which ash and pumice began to fall, blanketing the area. Rescues and escapes occurred during this time. At some time in the night or early the next day, pyroclastic surges in the close vicinity of the volcano began. Lights were seen on the peak, interpreted as fires. People as far away as Misenum fled for their lives. The flows were rapid-moving, dense and very hot, knocking down, wholly or partly, all structures in their path, incinerating or suffocating all population remaining there and altering the landscape, including the coastline. Additional light tremors accompanied these and a mild tsunami in the Bay of Naples. By late afternoon of the second day, the eruption was over, leaving only haze in the atmosphere through which the sun shone weakly.

The latest scientific studies of the ash produced by Vesuvius reveal a multi-phase eruption. The initial major explosion produced a column of ash and pumice ranging between 15 and 30 km high, which rained on Pompeii to the southeast but not on Herculaneum upwind. The chief energy supporting the column came from the escape of steam superheated by the magma, created from seawater seeping over time into the deep faults of the region, which interacted with magma.

Subsequently, the cloud collapsed as the gases expanded and lost their capability to support their solid contents, releasing it as a pyroclastic surge, which first reached Herculaneum but not Pompeii. Additional blasts reinstituted the column. The eruption alternated between Plinian and Peléan six times. Surges 3 and 4 are believed by the authors to have buried Pompeii. Surges are identified in the deposits by dune and cross-bedding formations, which are not produced by fallout.

Another study used the magnetic characteristics of over 200 samples of roof-tile and plaster fragments collected around Pompeii to estimate the equilibrium temperature of the pyroclastic flow. The magnetic study revealed that on the first day of the eruption a fall of white pumice containing clastic fragments of up to 3 cm fell for several hours. It heated the roof tiles up to 140 C. This period would have been the last opportunity to escape.

The collapse of the Plinian columns on the second day caused pyroclastic density currents (PDCs) that devastated Herculaneum and Pompeii. The depositional temperature of these pyroclastic surges reached up to 300 C. Any population remaining in structural refuges could not have escaped, as gases of incinerating temperatures surrounded the city. The lowest temperatures were in rooms under collapsed roofs, at approximately 100 C.

The two Plinys
The only surviving eyewitness account of the event consists of two letters by Pliny the Younger to the historian Tacitus. Pliny the Younger describes, amongst other things, the last days in the life of his uncle, Pliny the Elder. Observing the first volcanic activity from Misenum across the Bay of Naples from the volcano, approximately 35 km, the elder Pliny launched a rescue fleet and went himself to the rescue of a personal friend. His nephew declined to join the party. One of the nephew's letters relates what he could discover from witnesses of his uncle's experiences. In a second letter, the younger Pliny details his own observations after the departure of his uncle.

The two men saw an extraordinarily dense cloud rising rapidly above the peak. This cloud and a request by a messenger for an evacuation by sea prompted the elder Pliny to order rescue operations in which he sailed away to participate. His nephew attempted to resume a normal life, but that night a tremor awoke him and his mother, prompting them to abandon the house for the courtyard. Further tremors near dawn caused the population to abandon the village and caused disastrous wave action in the Bay of Naples.

A massive black cloud glistering with lighting obscured the early-morning light, a scene Pliny describes as sheet lightning. The cloud obscured Point Misenum near at hand and the island of Capraia (Capri) across the bay. Fearing for their lives, the population began to flee the shore along the road. An ash rain fell, causing Pliny to shake it off periodically to avoid being buried. Later that same day, the pumice and ash stopped falling, and the sun shone weakly through the cloud, encouraging Pliny and his mother to return to their home and wait for news of Pliny the Elder.

Pliny's uncle, Pliny the Elder, was in command of the Roman fleet at Misenum and had meanwhile decided to investigate the phenomenon at close hand in a light vessel. As the ship was preparing to leave the area, a messenger came from his friend Rectina (wife of Tascius ) living on the coast near the foot of the volcano, explaining that her party could only get away by sea and asking for rescue. Pliny ordered the immediate launching of the fleet galleys to the evacuation of the coast. He continued in his light ship to the rescue of Rectina's party.

He set off across the bay but, in the shallows on the other side, encountered thick showers of hot cinders, lumps of pumice and pieces of rock. Advised by the helmsman to turn back, he stated, "Fortune favors the brave" and ordered him to continue to Stabiae (about 4.5 km from Pompeii).

Pliny the Elder and his party saw what they believed to be flames coming from several parts of the crater. After staying overnight, the party was driven from the building by an accumulation of material, presumably tephra, which threatened to block all egress. They woke Pliny, who had been napping and emitting loud snoring. They elected to take to the fields with pillows tied to their heads to protect them from the raining debris. They approached the beach again, but the wind prevented the ships from leaving. Pliny sat down on a sail that had been spread for him and could not rise even with assistance when his friends departed. Though Pliny the Elder died, his friends ultimately escaped by land.

In the first letter to Tacitus, Pliny the Younger suggested that his uncle's death was due to the reaction of his weak lungs to a cloud of poisonous, sulphurous gas that wafted over the group. However, Stabiae was 16 km from the vent (roughly where the modern town of Castellammare di Stabia is situated), and his companions were unaffected by the volcanic gases. It is more likely that the corpulent Pliny died from another cause, such as a stroke or heart attack. His body was found with no apparent injuries the next day, after dispersal of the plume.

Casualties

Along with Pliny the Elder, the only other noble casualties of the eruption to be known by name were Agrippa (a son of the Herodian Jewish princess Drusilla and the procurator Antonius Felix) and his wife.

By 2003, around 1,044 casts made from impressions of bodies in the ash deposits had been recovered in and around Pompeii, with the scattered bones of another 100. The remains of about 332 bodies have been found at Herculaneum (300 in arched vaults discovered in 1980). What percentage these numbers are of the total dead or the percentage of the dead to the total number at risk remain unknown.

Thirty-eight percent of the 1,044 were found in the ash fall deposits, the majority inside buildings. These are thought to have been killed mainly by roof collapses, with the smaller number of victims found outside of buildings probably being killed by falling roof slates or by larger rocks thrown out by the volcano. The remaining 62% of remains found at Pompeii were in the pyroclastic surge deposits, and thus were probably killed by them – probably from a combination of suffocation from inhaling ashes and blast and debris thrown around. Examination of cloth, frescoes and skeletons shows that, in contrast to the victims found at Herculaneum, it is unlikely that high temperatures were a significant cause of the destruction at Pompeii. Herculaneum, much closer to the crater, was saved from tephra falls by the wind direction but was buried under 23 m of material deposited by pyroclastic surges. Likely, most of the known victims in this town were killed by the surges.

People caught on the former seashore by the first surge died of thermal shock. The rest were concentrated in arched chambers at a density of as high as three persons per square metre. As only 85 m of the coast have been excavated, further casualties may be discovered.

Later eruptions from the 3rd to the 19th centuries
Since the eruption of AD 79, Vesuvius has erupted around three dozen times.
 * It erupted again in 203, during the lifetime of the historian Cassius Dio.
 * In 472, it ejected such a volume of ash that ashfalls were reported as far away as Constantinople (760 mi.; 1,220 km).
 * The eruptions of 512 were so severe that those inhabiting the slopes of Vesuvius were granted exemption from taxes by Theodoric the Great, the Gothic king of Italy.
 * Further eruptions were recorded in 787, 968, 991, 999, 1007 and 1036 with the first recorded lava flows.

The volcano became quiescent at the end of the 13th century, and in the following years, it again became covered with gardens and vineyards as old. Even the inside of the crater was moderately filled with shrubbery.

 * Vesuvius entered a new phase in December 1631, when a major eruption buried many villages under lava flows, killing around 3,000 people. Torrents of lahar were also created, adding to the devastation. Activity thereafter became almost continuous, with relatively severe eruptions occurring in 1660, 1682, 1694, 1698, 1707, 1737, 1760, 1767, 1779, 1794, 1822, 1834, 1839, 1850, 1855, 1861, 1868, 1872, 1906, 1926, 1929, and 1944.

Eruptions in the 20th century

 * The eruption of 5 April 1906 killed more than 100 people and ejected the most lava ever recorded from a Vesuvian eruption. Italian authorities were preparing to hold the 1908 Summer Olympics when Mount Vesuvius violently erupted, devastating the city of Naples and surrounding comunes. Funds were diverted to reconstructing Naples, and the Games were transferred to London.
 * Vesuvius was active from 1913 through 1944, with lava filling the crater and occasional outflows of small amounts of lava.
 * That eruptive period ended in the major eruption of March 1944, which destroyed the villages of San Sebastiano al Vesuvio, Massa di Somma, and Ottaviano, and part of San Giorgio a Cremano. From 13 to 18 March 1944, activity was confined within the rim. Finally, on 18 March 1944, lava overflowed the rim. Lava flows destroyed nearby villages from 19 March through 22 March. On 24 March, an explosive eruption created an ash plume and a small pyroclastic flow.

In March 1944, the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) 340th Bombardment Group was based at Pompeii Airfield near Terzigno, Italy, just a few kilometres from the eastern base of the volcano. The tephra and hot ash from multiple days of the eruption damaged the fabric control surfaces, the engines, the Plexiglas windscreens and the gun turrets of the 340th's B-25 Mitchell medium bombers. Estimates ranged from 78 to 88 aircraft destroyed.

The eruption could be seen from Naples. Different perspectives and the damage caused to the local villages were recorded by USAAF photographers and other personnel based nearer to the volcano.

Future
Large Vesuvian eruptions which emit volcanic material in quantities of about 1 km3, the most recent of which overwhelmed Pompeii and Herculaneum, have happened after periods of inactivity of a few thousand years. Sub-Plinian eruptions producing about 0.1 km3, such as those of 472 and 1631, have been more frequent with a few hundred years between them. From the 1631 eruption until 1944, there was a comparatively small eruption every few years, emitting 0.001–0.01 km3 of magma. For Vesuvius, the amount of magma expelled in an eruption increases roughly linearly with the interval since the previous one, and at a rate of around 0.001 km3 for each year. This gives an approximate figure of 0.08 km3 for an eruption after 80 years of inactivity.

Magma sitting in an underground chamber for many years will start to see higher melting point constituents such as olivine crystallizing out. The effect is to increase the concentration of dissolved gases (mostly sulfur dioxide and carbon dioxide) in the remaining liquid magma, making the subsequent eruption more violent. As gas-rich magma approaches the surface during an eruption, the huge drop in internal pressure caused by the reduction in weight of the overlying rock (which drops to zero at the surface) causes the gases to come out of solution, the volume of gas increasing explosively from nothing to perhaps many times that of the accompanying magma. Additionally, the removal of the higher melting point material will raise the concentration of felsic components such as silicates, potentially making the magma more viscous, adding to the explosive nature of the eruption.

The government emergency plan for an eruption therefore assumes that the worst case will be an eruption of similar size and type to the 1631 VEI 4 eruption. In this scenario, the volcano's slopes, extending out to about 7 km from the vent, may be exposed to pyroclastic surges sweeping down them, whilst much of the surrounding area could suffer from tephra falls. Because of prevailing winds, towns and cities south and east of the volcano are most at risk from this. It is assumed that tephra accumulation exceeding 100 kg/m²—at which point people are at risk from collapsing roofs—may extend out as far as Avellino to the east or Salerno to the south-east. Near Naples, this tephra fall hazard is assumed to extend barely past the volcano's slopes to the northwest. The specific areas affected by the ash cloud depend upon the circumstances surrounding the eruption.

The plan assumes between two weeks and 20 days notice of an eruption and foresees the emergency evacuation of 600,000 people, almost entirely comprising all those living in the zona rossa ("red zone"), i.e. at greatest risk from pyroclastic flows. The evacuation, by train, ferry, car, and bus, is planned to take about seven days, and the evacuees would mostly be sent to other parts of the country, rather than to safe areas in the local Campania region, and may have to stay away for several months. However, the dilemma that would face those implementing the plan is when to start this massive evacuation: If it starts too late, thousands could be killed, whereas if it is started too early, the indicators of an eruption may turn out to be a false alarm. In 1984, 40,000 people were evacuated from the Campi Flegrei area, another volcanic complex near Naples, but no eruption occurred.

Ongoing efforts are being made by the government at various levels (especially of Campania) to reduce the population living in the red zone, by demolishing illegally constructed buildings, establishing a national park around the whole volcano to prevent the future construction of buildings and by offering sufficient financial incentives to people for moving away. One of the underlying goals is to reduce the time needed to evacuate the area, over the next twenty to thirty years, to two or three days.

The volcano is closely monitored by the Osservatorio Vesuvio in Naples with extensive networks of seismic and gravimetric stations, a combination of a GPS-based geodetic array and satellite-based synthetic aperture radar to measure ground movement and by local surveys and chemical analyses of gases emitted from fumaroles. All of this is intended to track magma rising underneath the volcano. , no magma has been detected within 10 km of the surface, so the volcano is classified by the Observatory as at a Basic or Green Level of hazard.

National park

The area around Vesuvius was officially declared a national park on 5 June 1995. The summit of Vesuvius is open to visitors, and there is a small network of paths around the volcano that are maintained by the park authorities on weekends. There is access by road to within 200 m of the summit (measured vertically), but after that, access is on foot only. There is a spiral walkway around the volcano from the road to the crater.

Funicular
Mount Vesuvius' first funicular — a type of vertical transport that uses two opposing, interconnected, rail-guided passenger cars always moving in concert — opened in 1880, subsequently destroyed by the March 1944 eruption.

"Funiculì, Funiculà", a Neapolitan language song, was written to commemorate the opening of the first funicular on Mount Vesuvius.

title: Mount Vesuvius


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Surveillance aircraft

Surveillance aircraft are aircraft used for surveillance. They are primarily operated by military forces and government agencies in roles including intelligence gathering, maritime patrol, battlefield and airspace surveillance, observation (e.g. artillery spotting), and law enforcement.

Surveillance aircraft usually carry limited defensive armament, if any. They do not require high-performance capability or stealth characteristics and may be modified civilian aircraft. Surveillance aircraft have also included moored balloons (e.g. TARS) and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).

Definitions
The terms "surveillance" and "reconnaissance" have sometimes been used interchangeably. In the military context, a distinction can be drawn between surveillance, which monitors a changing situation in real time, and reconnaissance, which captures a static picture for analysis. Surveillance is sometimes grouped with intelligence, target acquisition, and reconnaissance to form ISTAR.

The term observation was used when the main sensor was the human eye.

Pre World War I
The French were the first to adopt hydrogen-filled balloons on the battlefield for reconnaissance. In the early 1790s, the French would deploy a hydrogen-filled balloon that held two soldiers: one who possessed a telescope, and the other would relay information to troops on the ground. These balloons did not cross into enemy lines; they were deployed on friendly lines for the purpose of surveillance from a higher point of view. These balloons formed the first air force in 1794, which was referred to as the Compagnie d'Aéronautiers. Also in 1794, during the Battle of Fleurus, the French Aerostatic Corps balloon L'Entreprenant remained afloat for nine hours. French officers used the balloon to observe the movements of the Austrian Army, dropping notes to the ground for collection by the French Army [2] and also signaled messages using semaphores.

This method of surveillance would eventually be adopted by the Union Army in the Civil War. American inventor Thadeus Low proposed this invention to President Abraham Lincoln, to which a similar idea would be adopted. The Union Army would use balloons that could hold as many as five soldiers, and they would use telegraphs to relay information.

In the 1880s, a British meteorologist named Douglas Archibald experimented with unmanned surveillance vehicles. Douglas rigged cameras to a kite and used a long cable attached to the kite's string to activate the shutter. This invention would eventually catch the eyes of American Army Corporal William Eddy.

During the Spanish-American War of 1898, Eddy adopted his own version of Archibald’s kite-mounted camera. Eddy’s kite was responsible for creating the first-ever military aerial surveillance photos.

World War I
One of the first aircraft used for surveillance was the Rumpler Taube during World War I, when aviators like Fred Zinn evolved entirely new methods of reconnaissance and photography. The translucent wings of the plane made it very difficult for ground-based observers to detect a Taube at an altitude above 400 m. The French also called this plane "the Invisible Aircraft", and it is sometimes also referred to as the "world's very first stealth plane". German Taube aircraft were able to detect the advancing Russian army during the Battle of Tannenberg (1914).

Aircraft were initially used for reconnaissance missions. The pilots of these initial aircraft would track the movement of enemy troops using photographs. These photos would be used to understand enemy formations and create maps that would eventually be used by infantry. By 1916, these aircraft would assist in the spotting of artillery, and the guidance and coordination of infantry. These aircraft forced enemy troops to camouflage their position to hide from aerial observation.

Eventually, surveillance aircraft would be highly valued due to commander’s reliance on their information. However, surveillance aircraft would fly a low, slow, and predictable flight path, and with the introduction of aerial combat, surveillance aircraft were an easy target.

World War II
Pre-war, the British built and flew two Fleet Shadower aircraft, including the General Aircraft Fleet Shadower, that could follow and observe the enemy fleet at a distance. However, they were made obsolete by the 1940s with the introduction of airborne radar.

Air observation posts were developed during World War II. Light aircraft such as the Auster were used by the British Royal Artillery for artillery spotting. By the mid-1960s, air observation was generally taken over by light observation helicopters.

Cold War
Spy flights were a source of major contention between the United States and the Soviet Union during most of the 1960s. Due to the difficulty of surveillance in the USSR, US policymakers established the National Reconnaissance Office. To combat this difficulty of surveillance, the US military developed the U2. This aircraft could fly at altitudes of 70,000 feet to avoid detection from KGB surveillance. The U2 was also equipped with a Hycon 73B camera. This camera was capable of capturing details as small as 2.5 feet wide. In 1962, a U2 captured images that discovered nuclear missiles in Cuba. These photos would initiate what we know as the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Aerial Reconnaissance was dangerous: Out of 152 cryptologists who died in the Cold War, 64 of them were participating in aerial reconnaissance missions. During the time period of 1945-1977, more than forty reconnaissance aircraft were shot down in the European and Pacific areas.

The US Military originally used standard aircraft like B-29s for reconnaissance missions. Eventually, variants of the aircraft were designed for reconnaissance, e.g. the C-130 and RC-130. These repurposed aircraft were sometimes referred to as “ferret” aircraft, and intelligence personnel commanding these aircraft were nicknamed “backenders”.

The United States also performed surveillance using repurposed Ryan Firebee unmanned target drones. Variants of these vehicles, designated the Model 147, could fly for 2500 miles.

In May 1991, the Department of the Navy reported that at least one UAV was airborne at all times during Operation Desert Storm.

War on terror
During the global war on terror, the US military developed defenses to surveillance aircraft to combat surveillance use. The United States military used precision cameras, drones that detect drones, and direct-energy weapons that disrupt control links and GPS navigation.

Maritime patrol
The main components of maritime surveillance consist of sightings from ship captains and aircraft pilots. However, due to the radar horizon, surveillance aircraft are preferred as they can identify targets hundreds of miles further than vessels. An example of this today is the Coast Guard’s use of unmanned aerial systems (UASs) to improve their capabilities while reducing the risk for service members. Currently, the Coast Guard has roughly 250 drone certified officers across the US. The main uses of UASs within maritime activities are search and rescue operations and responding to different environmental disasters. The Coast Guard’s use of unmanned drones specifically led them to creating an “Unmanned Systems Strategic Plan.” This plan would expand the use of current aerial surveillance systems to new challenges such as drug trafficking surveillance, migrant interdiction, and ice operations. With regards to environmental tasks, UASs will be expanded to address marine safety, fishing activity, and navigational uses. The Coast Guard outlines the future of aerial surveillance in maritime patrol as improving current UAS systems, integrating improved sensors and AI/ML, and creating more organized command and control plans/operations.

Maritime patrol aircraft are typically large, slow machines capable of flying continuously for many hours, with a wide range of sensors. Such aircraft include the Hawker-Siddeley Nimrod, the Breguet Atlantique, the Tupolev Tu-95, the Lockheed P-2 Neptune and the Lockheed P-3 Orion/CP-140 Aurora. Smaller ship-launched observation seaplanes were used from World War I through World War II.

Law enforcement
Unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) are being increasingly deployed by U.S. law enforcement agencies. In August 2023, a Congressional Research Service to members of Congress described the multiple uses of these aircraft, including general surveillance and intelligence or evidence gathering. Unmanned surveillance drones can also be used to identify the locations of suspects who may be hiding or analyze the physical layout of a room before officers enter. Furthermore, unmanned surveillance drones can be used by law enforcement to light up large areas where it may be dark and difficult for officers to use traditional means of illumination. There are a few federal laws that apple to the use of unmanned surveillance systems, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) currently only has 2 options for the use of this technology by law enforcement. The first is that they can only operate them under 400 feet and need to maintain visual of the aircraft. Second, operators of the aircraft need to receive specific license and certifications to operate them. In response to the few and vague laws, the Department of Justice (DOJ) and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has created policies to regulate the use and deployment of these drones domestically.

Predator UAVs have been used by the US for border patrol.

Current military applications

Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) surveillance aircraft have been "deployed or are under development in many countries, including Israel, Iran, the UK, the United States, Canada, China, India, South Africa and Pakistan." Most air forces around the world lack dedicated surveillance planes.

Several countries adapt aircraft for electronic intelligence (ELINT) gathering. The Beech RC-12 Super King Air and Boeing RC-135 Rivet Joint are examples of this activity.

Unmanned surveillance UAVs include both airships—such as Sky Sentinel and HiSentinel 80 —and airplanes.

South China Sea
The United States military has flown reconnaissance flights, called sensitive reconnaissance operations (SRO) by the U.S. Air Force, to monitor expansionist developments by the People’s Republic of China, North Korea, and Russia in the Indo-Pacific region for decades; however, recent operations in the region have focused on monitoring movements by the People’s Republic of China. More than ten different aircraft are used for SRO missions in the theater, including manned aircraft USAF RC-135 Rivet Joint and U-2 Dragon Lady, and the unmanned aircraft RQ-4 Global Hawk. Reconnaissance missions are capable of changing course within minutes to monitor activity and therefore used for reconnaissance missions more often than satellites, which can take hours or days to change position and are vulnerable to anti-satellite weapons.

Ukraine War
Small unmanned drones have been used by the Ukrainian military to identify enemy units and navigate artillery fire for safer and more efficient attacks on Russian targets, record propaganda videos of ambushes for posting on social media, and document alleged Russian war crimes and damages. Class I and III drone systems, classified by NATO as those of less than 150 kilograms and more than 600 kilograms, respectively, have been the most frequently used in the region. Turkish Bayraktar TB2 military drones have often been utilized by Ukraine in both reconnaissance and strike missions, and both Ukrainian and Russian militaries have used hobby drones donated to them by civilians, such as DJI Mavic mini drones, to conduct surveillance and strikes on enemy troops.

Israel-Hamas War
The United States military had flown MQ-9 Reapers, unmanned aerial vehicles capable of more than 20 consecutive hours of flight, over the Gaza Strip for at least a month after the surprise attack on Israel by Hamas on October 7, 2023. According to the U.S. Defense Department, flights collected surveillance with the purpose of locating hostages taken by Hamas during the surprise attack on Israel and finding signs of life, but did not aid Israeli military ground operations. The British military also carried out flights over Gaza to locate hostages initially using unarmed Shadow R1 aircraft. As of March 2024, the Israeli military conducted hundreds of flight hours and almost 100 sorties in Gaza using the Oron reconnaissance aircraft, previously used as a business jet and upgraded to include advanced sensors and defense systems.

Israel-Hezbollah Conflict
On June 18, 2024, Hezbollah released provocative drone footage capturing sensitive sites in northern Israel, including military complexes and naval bases around Haifa. This aggressive action showcased areas such as the Rafael Military Industries Complex and various naval facilities. Hezbollah's campaign aims to intimidate and threaten Israel by displaying its surveillance capabilities and asserting its ability to penetrate Israeli defenses. This act highlights Hezbollah's growing technological and operational threats against Israel's security.

Business aircraft
With smaller equipment, long-range business aircraft can be modified in surveillance aircraft to perform specialized missions cost-effectively, from ground surveillance to maritime patrol:
 * the 99,500 lb, 6,000 nmi Bombardier Global 6000 is the platform for the USAF Northrop Grumman E-11A Battlefield Airborne Communications Node, the radar-carrying ground-surveillance Raytheon Sentinel for the UK Royal Air Force, and Saab's GlobalEye AEW&C carrying its Erieye AESA radar as UK's Marshall ADG basis for Elint/Sigint for the United Arab Emirates; it is also the base for the proposed Saab AB Swordfish MPA and the USAF Lockheed Martin J-Stars Recap battlefield-surveillance program, while IAI's ELI-3360 MPA is based on the Global 5000;
 * The 91,000 lb, 6,750 nmi Gulfstream G550 was selected for the IAI EL/W-2085 Conformal Airborne Early Warning AESA radar for Italy, Singapore and Israel (which also has IAI Sigint G550s) while L3 Technologies transfers the U.S. Compass Call electronic-attack system to the G550 CAEW-based EC-37B, like the NC-37B range-support aircraft, and will modify others for Australia's AISREW program, Northrop Grumman proposes the G550 for the J-Stars Recap;
 * Dassault Aviation developed the Falcon 900 MPA and Falcon 2000 Maritime Multirole Aircraft for France (which delayed its Avsimar requirement), South Korea and the Japan Coast Guard with a mission system developed with L3 and Thales Group;
 * Embraer delivered several EMB-145s as a platform for AEW&C, MPA and multi-intelligence;
 * the Beechcraft King Air 350ER is a platform for ISR versions, including L3's Spyder II and Sierra Nevada Corp.'s Scorpion and as the MC-12W for the U.S. Army.

Current civilian applications
Drones are increasingly used in conservation work to complete tasks such as mapping forest cover, tracking wildlife, and enforcing environmental laws by catching illegal loggers or poachers.

Monitoring protests
Surveillance drones, helicopters, and airplanes were deployed over 15 cities during the 2020 George Floyd protests. Unmanned aircraft were used to track the movements of protestors and to provide aerial views of violent acts and arson. The recorded video was sent to a digital network that could be accessed by various federal agencies and local law enforcement for use in criminal investigations. However, the National Air Security Operations Center stated the drones flew at a height that made it impossible to identify individuals or license plates.

Border patrol
Surveillance aircraft have recently been used to patrol maritime borders that are much longer than land borders and typically have less personnel. The Schengen Area in the European Union has recently used it to monitor their southern border in the Mediterranean. They gather intelligence including illegal crossings, search and rescue operations, smuggling, and fishing. Belgium has also deployed drones to monitor irregular maritime activity and to find children lost on the beach.

Public opinion
A 2014 survey from the Pew Center showed that pluralities or majorities of people in 39 of 44 countries oppose American drone strikes in the Middle East. Only in Israel, Kenya, and the USA do at least half of the public support American drone strikes. Additionally, following the Edward Snowden incident, concern within the US is only increasing regarding the government respecting people’s privacy and civil liberties. Regarding the use of surveillance drones domestically in the US, the public tends to consider the benefits of this kind of surveillance versus the risks to individual privacy. Findings from an ethical analysis suggest people understand the benefits UAVs contribute to protecting the public while at the same time poses a risk to individual safety. A report from 2014 found 70%-73% of U.S. adults believed government use of surveillance drones was “excessive” and “violates personal privacy.” Subsequently, only 39% believed it “increased public safety” and only 10% believed it was “necessary” for surveillance. Furthermore, the public is more opposed to surveillance drones being in the hands of private individuals and businesses, rather than the government.

Applicable law
In the U.S., case law holds that airborne surveillance does not violate privacy rights protected under the 14th Amendment of the Constitution, so long as unmanned aircraft systems are not in "general public use". The lack of widespread use of such systems justifies individuals' reasonable expectations of privacy again this type of surveillance.

In the European Union, Article 7 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union 2000 provides that people have a right of privacy and Article 8 protects the right to one's individual personal data. Under these provisions, aerial surveillance of public spaces would be lawful but surveillance of one's private home be subject to administrative oversight.

The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) of 2000 applies to air surveillance in the United Kingdom. RIPA prohibits large-scale and generalized surveillance, and RIPA authorization is required for individualized surveillance of private residences.

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

title: Surveillance aircraft


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Barry Took

Barry Took (19 June 1928 – 31 March 2002) was an English writer, television presenter and comedian. His decade-and-a-half writing partnership with Marty Feldman led to the television series Bootsie and Snudge, the radio comedy Round the Horne and other projects.

He is also remembered in the UK for presenting Points of View, a BBC Television programme featuring viewers' letters on the BBC's output, and the BBC Radio 4 programme The News Quiz.

Took was known as the "Father of Monty Python", for bringing together the comedy performers who would establish Monty Python's Flying Circus.

Early life and education
The son of a manager at the Danish Bacon Company, Took was born in Victoria Road, Muswell Hill, north London, and lived in Winton Avenue, Bounds Green. When evacuated to Wisbech in Cambridgeshire during the Second World War, he ran away from his assigned home there, cycling 20 miles to Peterborough in order to get a train back to London. He attended Stationers School but left at the age of 15. His elder brother Philip would eventually work for the US Space Program before dying as a young man.

Career
With his limited education, Took found work as an office boy for a publisher and a cinema projectionist. During his period of National Service in the Royal Air Force, in which he played the trumpet, he began performing and later worked as a stand-up comedian, eventually becoming a West End revue performer, working on For Amusement Only and For Adults Only.

Took's best comedy writing was done in collaboration with Marty Feldman, whom he first met in 1954. The two men wrote for several television shows in the 1950s and 1960s, including The Army Game and its spin-off Bootsie and Snudge. He co-wrote Beyond Our Ken for two series (1958–59) with Eric Merriman for BBC Radio before leaving after a disagreement with his fellow writer. With Marty Feldman he wrote most episodes of Round the Horne; the intermittent partnership between them continued until 1974.

In the late 1960s, Took became comedy advisor to the BBC, and was responsible for bringing together the performers who formed Monty Python's Flying Circus before he moved to the US to work briefly on Rowan and Martin's Laugh In. He returned to the UK in early 1970 and was involved in setting up the BBC series The Goodies, although he had returned to take up the position of Head of Light Entertainment at London Weekend Television. He resigned from this position when Stella Richman, his superior and the Director of Programming, was dismissed. On the Move (1975–76), a programme linked to a national campaign to promote adult literacy, was written by Took and featured Bob Hoskins and Donald Gee. He was involved in two further television series in support of this initiative, Your Move and Write Away.

In 1977, Took hosted his own comedy sketch show, Took and Co. Also featuring Robin Bailey, Chris Emmett, Andrew Sachs and Gwen Taylor. The series ran for seven episodes late at night on ITV.

In 1979, he became chairman of The News Quiz on BBC Radio 4, a role he filled until 1981 and again from 1986 to 1995. In the same year he became a presenter of Points of View, staying with the programme for over seven years.

Took also hosted the BBC Radio 2 comedy panel game The Impressionists, which included Peter Goodwright, Roger Kitter, David Jason and Dave Evans and, in 1998, the single-series revival of Twenty Questions titled Guess What?.

He had seven books published, including his autobiography and several histories of comedy. He also wrote Kenneth Williams's life story for the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography in 1996.

Personal life and final years
During his time with the Royal Air Force Took met his first wife, Dorothy "Dot" Bird, who was serving in the Women's Royal Air Force. They married in 1950 and had three children (Barry, Susan and David), but were later divorced. In 1964, he married Lynden "Lyn" Leonard, this second marriage resulting in a daughter named Elinor. The couple separated in 1999, and eventually divorced. He also spoke publicly about his experiences with depression and of undergoing extensive psychotherapy for several years.

After suffering from bladder cancer during the 1970s, in 1999 he was diagnosed with cancer of the oesophagus, and suffered a stroke four weeks after undergoing major surgery. He died on Easter Sunday 2002, aged 73, in a nursing home in Enfield.

Autobiography

 * A Point of View (1990)

title: Barry Took


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Talk:Consciousness

Untitled
Because of their length, the previous discussions on this page have been archived. If further archiving is needed, see How to archive a talk page.

 * Archive 1 ( //  to 21/10/05)
 * Archive 2 (21/10/05 to 13/04/07)
 * Archive 3 (13/04/07 to 29/11/09)

Any objections to re-structuring this page?
I think this page needs to be significantly re-organized. There are a lot of high quality sources and I think in general the page does a good job of covering lots of perspectives that researchers have put forward, but often not in a very systematic way. I'm planning to re-organize the page in a sandbox (without making any changes to the content) and then copy in my revised version here, but first I wanted to check if anyone objects to my overall plan. Here are the main problems I see and how I'm planning to fix them:

 * The lead currently only addresses how to define consciousness rather than summarizing the whole article. The material in the lead belongs in the "Problem of definition" section with just a shorter summary in the lead along with summaries of other sections.
 * The "Interdisciplinary perspectives" section is actually closer to a lead since it actually summarizes the sections for philosophy, science, and medicine below. A trimmed down version of that material and summaries of other sections can together form a new lead. The "Interdisciplinary perspectives" material doesn't need a section in the body, since it just covers what is said in later sections more briefly.
 * Three of the sub-sections in the "Philosophy of mind" section should be moved out: "Consciousness in children", "Animal consciousness", and "Artifact consciousness". As the material in these sub-sections demonstrates, these topics are not necessarily only philosophical ones but rather span various disciplines. These three could be the sub-sections of a new section further down. Maybe it could be called "Consciousness outside human adults", though hopefully I can think of a better section title.
 * Within the "Scientific study" section, there should be a sub-section for "Models of consciousness". Currently, there's already quite a bit about this crammed into the "Neural correlates" sub-section and for some reason "Entropic brain" has its own sub-section while no other model does.
 * The "Stream of consciousness" section should be broken up. The part from William James can be worked into the "Scientific study" section, while the part about Buddhist psychology can be added to the "Spiritual approaches" section. The "Narrative form" sub-section is off-topic and I think the material should be moved to a more appropriate article, but for now I would just leave it as a separate section to avoid combining content changes with my organizational changes.
 * The "Anasognosia" sub-section belongs within the "Disorders of consciousness" sub-section.

There may be a few other things to move around but that's basically my plan. Again, I won't bundle content changes together with my re-organization (though in the future a lot of these sources probably need updating). If anyone has objections/suggestions for this let me know. Otherwise I'll go ahead soon. Gazelle55 (talk) 19:59, 11 May 2022 (UTC)

 * I've been a bit slow to get to this and I think it's better I implement the above piece by piece rather than all at once. Just fixed the organization regarding anosognosia. Let me know if any objections as I re-organize.  Gazelle55  Let's talk!  21:08, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

Theories of consciousness
According to Roger Penrose in a recent interview with New Scientist, there are four theories of consciousness current in scientific circles. One is obviously his Orch OR, another is Integrated Information theory (IIT). What are the other two? And should this article include a brief summary of them? — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 09:25, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

 * Hi, I'm glad you posted about this – the article definitely needs to give a better overview of current theories/models of consciousness. I consolidated all the ones that are covered into one section called "Models", but it doesn't do justice to the research that's been done on the topic. I don't know exactly which four Penrose was referring to, but I just added references that compare across theories, showing there are at least 22. From my reading, though, Orch-OR is largely not considered tenable except by its core proponents (Penrose & Hameroff).  Gazelle55  Let's talk!  22:47, 11 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I much appreciate your efforts here. Personally I suspect that Orch OR is better described as a postulate or proposal rather than a theory. It proposes extensions to quantum theory which Penrose says do not at present exit. Does physics acknowledge "theories" with no mathematical foundation? I suppose the question for us here is, do its opponents describe it as a theory in reliable sources? — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 10:10, 12 January 2023 (UTC)
 * , that makes sense, we should follow reliable sources when choosing a term. This 2009 paper uses the terms "model" and "proposal" to describe Orch OR. This 2006 paper and this 2012 paper use "hypothesis". This 2006 paper uses both "model" and "theory". So it looks like various terms could apply whether Orch OR is correct or not - all four of those papers are critical of Orch OR.  Gazelle55  Let's talk!  21:44, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

Second paragraph of section 4.3
The phrasing from the second sentence onwards sounds unnatural. I find it difficult to understand. What do you guys think? Indochina2 (talk) 16:21, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:Consciousness


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George V

George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until his death in 1936.

George was born during the reign of his paternal grandmother, Queen Victoria, as the second son of the Prince and Princess of Wales (later King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra). He was third in the line of succession to the British throne behind his father and his elder brother, Prince Albert Victor. From 1877 to 1892, George served in the Royal Navy, until his elder brother's unexpected death in January 1892 put him directly in line for the throne. The next year, George married his brother's fiancée, Princess Victoria Mary of Teck, and they had six children. When Queen Victoria died in 1901, George's father ascended the throne as Edward VII, and George was created Prince of Wales. He became king-emperor on his father's death in 1910.

George's reign saw the rise of socialism, communism, fascism, Irish republicanism, and the Indian independence movement, all of which radically changed the political landscape of the British Empire, which itself reached its territorial peak by the beginning of the 1920s. The Parliament Act 1911 established the supremacy of the elected British House of Commons over the unelected House of Lords. As a result of the First World War (1914–1918), the empires of his first cousins Nicholas II of Russia and Wilhelm II of Germany fell, while the British Empire expanded to its greatest effective extent. In 1917, George became the first monarch of the House of Windsor, which he renamed from the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha as a result of anti-German public sentiment. He appointed the first Labour ministry in 1924, and the 1931 Statute of Westminster recognised the Empire's Dominions as separate, independent states within the British Commonwealth of Nations.

George suffered from smoking-related health problems during his later reign. On his death in January 1936, he was succeeded by his eldest son, Edward VIII. Edward abdicated in December of that year and was succeeded by his younger brother Albert, who took the regnal name George VI.

Early life and education
George was born on 3 June 1865, in Marlborough House, London. He was the second son of Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, and Alexandra, Princess of Wales. His father was the eldest son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and his mother was the eldest daughter of King Christian IX and Queen Louise of Denmark. He was baptised at Windsor Castle on 7 July 1865 by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Charles Longley.

As a younger son of the Prince of Wales, there was little expectation that George would become king. He was third in line to the throne, after his father and elder brother, Prince Albert Victor. George was only 17 months younger than Albert Victor, and the two princes were educated together. John Neale Dalton was appointed as their tutor in 1871. Neither Albert Victor nor George excelled intellectually. As their father thought that the navy was "the very best possible training for any boy", in September 1877, when George was 12 years old, both brothers joined the cadet training ship HMS Britannia at Dartmouth, Devon.

For three years from 1879, the princes served on HMS Bacchante (1876), accompanied by Dalton. They toured the colonies of the British Empire in the Caribbean, South Africa and Australia, and visited Norfolk, Virginia, as well as South America, the Mediterranean, Egypt, and East Asia. In 1881 on a visit to Japan, George had a local artist tattoo a blue and red dragon on his arm, and was received in an audience by the Emperor Meiji; George and his brother presented Empress Haruko with two wallabies from Australia. Dalton wrote an account of their journey entitled The Cruise of HMS Bacchante. Between Melbourne and Sydney, Dalton recorded a sighting of the Flying Dutchman, a mythical ghost ship. When they returned to Britain, the Queen complained that her grandsons could not speak French or German, and so they spent six months in Lausanne in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to learn another language. After Lausanne, the brothers were separated; Albert Victor attended Trinity College, Cambridge, while George continued in the Royal Navy. He travelled the world, visiting many areas of the British Empire. During his naval career he commanded Torpedo Boat 79 in home waters, then HMS Thrush (1889) on the North America and West Indies Station. His last active service was in command of HMS Melampus in 1891–1892. From then on, his naval rank was largely honorary.

Marriage

As a young man destined to serve in the navy, Prince George served for many years under the command of his uncle Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, who was stationed in Malta. There, he grew close to and fell in love with his cousin Princess Marie of Edinburgh. His grandmother, father and uncle all approved the match, but his own mother and Marie's mother opposed it. The Princess of Wales thought the family was too pro-German, and the Duchess of Edinburgh disliked England. The Duchess, the only daughter of Alexander II of Russia, resented the fact that, as the wife of a younger son of the British sovereign, she had to yield precedence to George's mother, whose father had been a minor German prince before being called unexpectedly to the throne of Denmark. Guided by her mother, Marie refused George when he proposed to her. She married Ferdinand, Crown Prince of Romania, in 1893.

In November 1891, George's brother, Albert Victor, became engaged to his second cousin once removed Princess Victoria Mary of Teck, known as "May" within the family. Her parents were Francis, Duke of Teck (a member of a morganatic, cadet branch of the House of Württemberg), and Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge, a male-line granddaughter of George III and a first cousin of Queen Victoria.

On 14 January 1892, six weeks after the formal engagement, Albert Victor died of pneumonia during an influenza pandemic, leaving George second in line to the throne and likely to succeed after his father. George had only just recovered from a serious illness himself, having been confined to bed for six weeks with typhoid fever, the disease that was thought to have killed his grandfather Prince Albert. Queen Victoria still regarded Princess May as a suitable match for her grandson, and George and May grew close during their shared period of mourning.

A year after Albert Victor's death, George proposed to May and was accepted. They married on 6 July 1893 at the Chapel Royal in St James's Palace, London. Throughout their lives, they remained devoted to each other. George was, on his own admission, unable to express his feelings easily in speech, but they often exchanged loving letters and notes of endearment.

Duke of York

The death of his elder brother effectively ended George's naval career, as he was now second in line to the throne, after his father. George was created Duke of York, Earl of Inverness, and Baron Killarney by Queen Victoria on 24 May 1892, and received lessons in constitutional history from J. R. Tanner.

The Duke and Duchess of York had five sons and a daughter. Randolph Churchill claimed that George was a strict father, to the extent that his children were terrified of him, and that George had remarked to the Earl of Derby: "My father was frightened of his mother, I was frightened of my father, and I am damned well going to see to it that my children are frightened of me." In reality, there is no direct source for the quotation and it is likely that George's parenting style was little different from that adopted by most people at the time. Whether this was the case or not, his children did seem to resent his strict nature, his son Prince Henry going as far as to describe him as a "terrible father" in later years.

They lived mainly at York Cottage, a relatively small house in Sandringham, Norfolk, where their way of life mirrored that of a comfortable middle-class family rather than royalty. George preferred a simple, almost quiet, life, in marked contrast to the lively social life pursued by his father. His official biographer, Harold Nicolson, later despaired of George's time as Duke of York, writing: "He may be all right as a young midshipman and a wise old king, but when he was Duke of York ... he did nothing at all but kill [i.e. shoot] animals and stick in stamps." George was an avid stamp collector, which Nicolson disparaged, but George played a large role in building the Royal Philatelic Collection into the most comprehensive collection of United Kingdom and Commonwealth stamps in the world, in some cases setting record purchase prices for items.

In October 1894, George's maternal uncle-by-marriage, Alexander III of Russia, died. At the request of his father, "out of respect for poor dear Uncle Sasha's memory", George joined his parents in Saint Petersburg for the funeral. He and his parents remained in Russia for the wedding a week later of the new Russian emperor, his maternal first cousin Nicholas II, to one of George's paternal first cousins, Princess Alix of Hesse and by Rhine, who had once been considered as a potential bride for George's elder brother.

Prince of Wales

As Duke of York, George carried out a wide variety of public duties. On the death of Queen Victoria on 22 January 1901, George's father ascended the throne as King Edward VII. George inherited the title of Duke of Cornwall, and for much of the rest of that year, he was known as the Duke of Cornwall and York.

In 1901, the Duke and Duchess toured the British Empire. Their tour included Gibraltar, Malta, Port Said, Aden, Ceylon, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Mauritius, South Africa, Canada, and the Colony of Newfoundland. The tour was designed by Colonial Secretary Joseph Chamberlain with the support of Prime Minister Lord Salisbury to reward the Dominions for their participation in the South African War of 1899–1902. George presented thousands of specially designed South African War medals to colonial troops. In South Africa, the royal party met civic leaders, African leaders, and Boer prisoners, and was greeted by elaborate decorations, expensive gifts, and fireworks displays. Despite this, not all residents responded favourably to the tour. Many white Cape Afrikaners resented the display and expense, the war having weakened their capacity to reconcile their Afrikaner-Dutch culture with their status as British subjects. Critics in the English-language press decried the enormous cost at a time when families faced severe hardship.

In Australia, George opened the first session of the Australian Parliament on the creation of the Commonwealth of Australia. In New Zealand, he praised the military values, bravery, loyalty, and obedience to duty of New Zealanders, and the tour gave New Zealand a chance to show off its progress, especially in its adoption of up-to-date British standards in communications and the processing industries. The implicit goal was to advertise New Zealand's attractiveness to tourists and potential immigrants, while avoiding news of growing social tensions, by focusing the attention of the British press on a land few knew about. On his return to Britain, in a speech at Guildhall, London, George warned of "the impression which seemed to prevail among [our] brethren across the seas, that the Old Country must wake up if she intends to maintain her old position of pre-eminence in her colonial trade against foreign competitors."

On 9 November 1901, George was created Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester. George's father wished to prepare him for his future role as king. In contrast to Edward himself, whom Queen Victoria had deliberately excluded from state affairs, George was given wide access to state documents by his father. George in turn allowed his wife access to his papers, as he valued her counsel and she often helped write his speeches. As Prince of Wales, he supported reforms in naval training, including cadets being enrolled at the ages of twelve and thirteen, and receiving the same education, whatever their class and eventual assignments. The reforms were implemented by the then Second (later First) Sea Lord, Sir John Fisher.

From November 1905 to March 1906, George and May toured British India, where he was disgusted by racial discrimination and campaigned for greater involvement of Indians in the government of the country. The tour was almost immediately followed by a trip to Spain for the wedding of King Alfonso XIII to George's cousin Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg, at which the bride and groom narrowly avoided assassination when the driver of their coach and more than a dozen spectators were killed by a bomb thrown by an anarchist, Mateu Morral. A week after returning to Britain, George and May travelled to Norway for the coronation of King Haakon VII, George's cousin and brother-in-law, and Queen Maud, George's sister.

Reign
On 6 May 1910, Edward VII died, and George became king. He wrote in his diary: "I have lost my best friend and the best of fathers ... I never had a [cross] word with him in my life. I am heart-broken and overwhelmed with grief but God will help me in my responsibilities and darling May will be my comfort as she has always been. May God give me strength and guidance in the heavy task which has fallen on me."

George had never liked his wife's habit of signing official documents and letters as "Victoria Mary" and insisted she drop one of those names. They both thought she should not be called Queen Victoria, and so she became Queen Mary. Later that year, a radical propagandist, Edward Mylius, published a lie that George had secretly married in Malta as a young man, and that consequently his marriage to Queen Mary was bigamous. The lie had first surfaced in print in 1893, but George had shrugged it off as a joke. In an effort to kill off rumours, Mylius was arrested, tried and found guilty of criminal libel, and was sentenced to a year in prison.

George objected to the anti-Catholic wording of the Accession Declaration that he would be required to make at the opening of his first parliament. He made it known that he would refuse to open parliament unless it was changed. As a result, the Accession Declaration Act 1910 shortened the declaration and removed the most offensive phrases.

George and Mary's coronation took place at Westminster Abbey on 22 June 1911, and was celebrated by the Festival of Empire in London. In July, the King and Queen visited Ireland for five days; they received a warm welcome, with thousands of people lining the route of their procession to cheer. Later in 1911, the King and Queen travelled to India for the Delhi Durbar, where they were presented to an assembled audience of Indian dignitaries and princes as the Emperor and Empress of India on 12 December 1911. George wore the newly created Imperial Crown of India at the ceremony and declared the shifting of the Indian capital from Calcutta to Delhi. He was the only Emperor of India to be present at his own Delhi Durbar.

As he and Mary travelled throughout the subcontinent, George took the opportunity to indulge in big game hunting in Nepal, shooting 21 tigers, 8 rhinoceroses and a bear over 10 days. He was a keen and expert marksman. On a later occasion, on 18 December 1913, he shot over a thousand pheasants in six hours (about one bird every 20 seconds) while visiting the home of Lord Burnham. Even George had to acknowledge that "we went a little too far" that day.

National politics
George inherited the throne at a politically turbulent time. Lloyd George's People's Budget had been rejected the previous year by the Conservative and Unionist-dominated House of Lords, contrary to the normal convention that the Lords did not veto money bills. Liberal Prime Minister H. H. Asquith had asked the previous king to give an undertaking that he would create sufficient Liberal peers to allow the passage of Liberal legislation. Edward had reluctantly agreed, provided the Lords rejected the budget after two successive general elections. After the January 1910 general election, the Conservative peers allowed the budget, for which the government now had an electoral mandate, to pass without a vote.

Asquith attempted to curtail the power of the Lords through constitutional reforms, which were again blocked by the Upper House. A constitutional conference on the reforms broke down in November 1910 after 21 meetings. Asquith and Lord Crewe, Liberal leader in the Lords, asked George to grant a dissolution, leading to a second general election, and to promise to create sufficient Liberal peers if the Lords blocked the legislation again. If George refused, the Liberal government would otherwise resign, which would have given the appearance that the monarch was taking sides – with "the peers against the people" – in party politics. The King's two private secretaries, the Liberal Lord Knollys and the Unionist Lord Stamfordham, gave George conflicting advice. Knollys advised George to accept the Cabinet's demands, while Stamfordham advised George to accept the resignation. Like his father, George reluctantly agreed to the dissolution and creation of peers, although he felt his ministers had taken advantage of his inexperience to browbeat him. After the December 1910 general election, the Lords let the bill pass on hearing of the threat to swamp the house with new peers. The subsequent Parliament Act 1911 permanently removed – with a few exceptions – the power of the Lords to veto bills. George later came to feel that Knollys had withheld information from him about the willingness of the opposition to form a government if the Liberals had resigned.

The 1910 general elections had left the Liberals as a minority government dependent upon the support of the Irish Nationalist Party. As desired by the Nationalists, Asquith introduced legislation that would give Ireland Home Rule, but the Conservatives and Unionists opposed it. As tempers rose over the Home Rule Bill, which would never have been possible without the Parliament Act, relations between the elderly Knollys and the Conservatives became poor, and he was pushed into retirement. Desperate to avoid the prospect of civil war in Ireland between Unionists and Nationalists, George called a meeting of all parties at Buckingham Palace in July 1914 in an attempt to negotiate a settlement. After four days the conference ended without an agreement. Political developments in Britain and Ireland were overtaken by events in Europe, and the issue of Irish Home Rule was suspended for the duration of the war.

First World War

On 4 August 1914, George wrote in his diary, "I held a council at 10:45 to declare war with Germany. It is a terrible catastrophe but it is not our fault. ... Please to God it may soon be over." From 1914 to 1918, Britain and its allies were at war with the Central Powers, led by the German Empire. German Kaiser Wilhelm II, who for the British public came to symbolise all the horrors of the war, was the King's first cousin. George's paternal grandfather was Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha; consequently, the King and his children bore the German titles Prince and Princess of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and Duke and Duchess of Saxony. Queen Mary, although born in England like her mother, was the daughter of the Duke of Teck, a descendant of the German Dukes of Württemberg. George had brothers-in-law and cousins who were British subjects but who bore German titles such as Duke and Duchess of Teck, Prince and Princess of Battenberg, and Prince and Princess of Schleswig-Holstein. When H. G. Wells wrote about Britain's "alien and uninspiring court", George replied: "I may be uninspiring, but I'll be damned if I'm alien."

On 17 July 1917, George appeased British nationalist feelings by issuing a royal proclamation that changed the name of the British royal house from the German-sounding House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to the House of Windsor. He and all his British relatives relinquished their German titles and styles and adopted British-sounding surnames. George compensated his male relatives by giving them British peerages. His cousin Prince Louis of Battenberg, who earlier in the war had been forced to resign as First Sea Lord through anti-German feeling, became Louis Mountbatten, 1st Marquess of Milford Haven, while Queen Mary's brothers became Adolphus Cambridge, 1st Marquess of Cambridge, and Alexander Cambridge, 1st Earl of Athlone.

In letters patent gazetted on 11 December 1917, the King restricted the style of "Royal Highness" and the titular dignity of "Prince (or Princess) of Great Britain and Ireland" to the children of the Sovereign, the children of the sons of the Sovereign and the eldest living son of the eldest son of a Prince of Wales. The letters patent also stated that "the titles of Royal Highness, Highness or Serene Highness, and the titular dignity of Prince and Princess shall cease except those titles already granted and remaining unrevoked". George's relatives who fought on the German side, such as Ernest Augustus, Crown Prince of Hanover, and Charles Edward, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, had their British peerages suspended by a 1919 Order in Council under the provisions of the Titles Deprivation Act 1917. Under pressure from his mother, George also removed the Garter flags of his German relations from St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle.

When Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, George's first cousin, was overthrown in the Russian Revolution of 1917, the British government offered political asylum to the Tsar and his family, but worsening conditions for the British people, and fears that revolution might come to the British Isles, led George to think that the presence of the Romanovs would be seen as inappropriate. Despite the later claims of Lord Mountbatten of Burma that Prime Minister David Lloyd George was opposed to the rescue of the Russian imperial family, the letters of Lord Stamfordham suggest that it was George V who opposed the idea against the advice of the government. Advance planning for a rescue was undertaken by MI1, a branch of the British secret service, but because of the strengthening position of the Bolshevik revolutionaries and wider difficulties with the conduct of the war, the plan was never put into operation. Nicholas and his immediate family remained in Russia, where they were killed by the Bolsheviks in 1918. George wrote in his diary: "It was a foul murder. I was devoted to Nicky, who was the kindest of men and thorough gentleman: loved his country and people." The following year, Nicholas's mother, Marie Feodorovna, and other members of the extended Russian imperial family were rescued from Crimea by a British warship.

Two months after the end of the war, the King's youngest son, John, died aged 13 after a lifetime of ill health. George was informed of his death by Queen Mary, who wrote, "[John] had been a great anxiety to us for many years ... The first break in the family circle is hard to bear but people have been so kind & sympathetic & this has helped us much."

In May 1922, George toured Belgium and northern France, visiting the First World War cemeteries and memorials being constructed by the Imperial War Graves Commission. The event was described in a poem, "The King's Pilgrimage" by Rudyard Kipling. The tour, and one short visit to Italy in 1923, were the only times George agreed to leave the United Kingdom on official business after the end of the war.

Post-war reign
Before the First World War, most of Europe was ruled by monarchs related to George, but during and after the war, the monarchies of Austria, Germany, Greece, and Spain, like Russia, fell to revolution and war. In March 1919, Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Lisle Strutt was dispatched on the personal authority of the King to escort the former Emperor Charles I of Austria and his family to safety in Switzerland. In 1922, a Royal Navy ship was sent to Greece to rescue his cousins Prince and Princess Andrew.

Political turmoil in Ireland continued as the Nationalists fought for independence; George expressed his horror at government-sanctioned killings and reprisals to Prime Minister Lloyd George. At the opening session of the Parliament of Northern Ireland on 22 June 1921, the King appealed for conciliation in a speech part drafted by General Jan Smuts and approved by Lloyd George. A few weeks later, a truce was agreed. Negotiations between Britain and the Irish secessionists led to the signing of the Anglo-Irish Treaty. By the end of 1922, Ireland was partitioned, the Irish Free State was established, and Lloyd George was out of office.

George and his advisers were concerned about the rise of socialism and the growing labour movement, which they mistakenly associated with republicanism. The socialists no longer believed in their anti-monarchical slogans and were ready to come to terms with the monarchy if it took the first step. George adopted a more democratic, inclusive stance that crossed class lines and brought the monarchy closer to the public and the working class—a dramatic change for the King, who was most comfortable with naval officers and landed gentry. He cultivated friendly relations with moderate Labour Party politicians and trade union officials. His abandonment of social aloofness conditioned the royal family's behaviour and enhanced its popularity during the economic crises of the 1920s and for over two generations thereafter.

The years between 1922 and 1929 saw frequent changes in government. In 1924, George appointed the first Labour Prime Minister, Ramsay MacDonald, in the absence of a clear majority for any one of the three major parties. George's tact in appointing the first Labour government (which lasted less than a year) allayed the suspicions of the party's sympathisers that he would work against their interests. During the General Strike of 1926, George advised the government of Conservative Stanley Baldwin against taking inflammatory action, and took exception to suggestions that the strikers were "revolutionaries" saying, "Try living on their wages before you judge them."

In 1926, George hosted an Imperial Conference in London at which the Balfour Declaration accepted the growth of the British Dominions into self-governing "autonomous Communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate one to another". The Statute of Westminster 1931 formalised the Dominions' legislative independence and established that the succession to the throne could not be changed unless all the Parliaments of the Dominions as well as the Parliament at Westminster agreed. The Statute's preamble described the monarch as "the symbol of the free association of the members of the British Commonwealth of Nations", who were "united by a common allegiance".

In the wake of a world financial crisis, George encouraged the formation of a National Government in 1931 led by MacDonald and Baldwin, and volunteered to reduce the civil list to help balance the budget. He was concerned by the rise to power in Germany of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. In 1934, George bluntly told the German ambassador Leopold von Hoesch that Germany was now the peril of the world, and that there was bound to be a war within ten years if Germany went on at the present rate; he warned the British ambassador in Berlin, Eric Phipps, to be suspicious of the Nazis.

In 1932, George agreed to deliver a Royal Christmas speech on the radio, an event that became annual thereafter. He was not in favour of the innovation originally but was persuaded by the argument that it was what his people wanted. By the Silver Jubilee of his reign in 1935, he had become a well-loved king, saying in response to the crowd's adulation, "I cannot understand it, after all I am only a very ordinary sort of fellow."

George's relationship with his eldest son and heir, Edward, deteriorated in these later years. George was disappointed in Edward's failure to settle down in life and appalled by his many affairs with married women. In contrast, he was fond of his second son, Prince Albert (later George VI), and doted on his eldest granddaughter, Princess Elizabeth; he nicknamed her "Lilibet", and she affectionately called him "Grandpa England". In 1935, George said of his son Edward: "After I am dead, the boy will ruin himself within 12 months", and of Albert and Elizabeth: "I pray to God my eldest son will never marry and have children, and that nothing will come between Bertie and Lilibet and the throne".

Declining health and death
The First World War took a toll on George's health: he was seriously injured on 28 October 1915 when thrown by his horse at a troop review in France, and his heavy smoking exacerbated recurring breathing problems. He suffered from chronic bronchitis. In 1925, on the instruction of his doctors, he was reluctantly sent on a recuperative private cruise in the Mediterranean; it was his third trip abroad since the war, and his last. In November 1928, he fell seriously ill with septicaemia, which localised between the base of his right lung and diaphragm in the form of an empyema that required drainage. For the next two years his son Edward took over many of his duties. In 1929, the suggestion of a further rest abroad was rejected by the King "in rather strong language". Instead, he retired for three months to Craigweil House, Aldwick, in the seaside resort of Bognor, Sussex. As a result of his stay, the town acquired the suffix Regis – Latin for "of the King". A myth later grew that his last words, on being told that he would soon be well enough to revisit the town, were "Bugger Bognor!"

George never fully recovered. In his final year, he was occasionally administered oxygen. The death of his favourite sister, Victoria, in December 1935 depressed him deeply. On the evening of 15 January 1936, George took to his bedroom at Sandringham House complaining of a cold; he remained in the room until his death. He became gradually weaker, drifting in and out of consciousness. Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin later said:

"... each time he became conscious it was some kind inquiry or kind observation of someone, some words of gratitude for kindness shown. But he did say to his secretary when he sent for him: 'How is the Empire?' An unusual phrase in that form, and the secretary said: 'All is well, sir, with the Empire', and the King gave him a smile and relapsed once more into unconsciousness."

By 20 January, George was close to death. His physicians, led by Lord Dawson of Penn, issued a bulletin with the words "The King's life is moving peacefully towards its close." Dawson's private diary, unearthed after his death and made public in 1986, reveals that George's last words, a mumbled "God damn you!", were addressed to his nurse, Catherine Black, when she gave him a sedative that night. Dawson, who supported the "gentle growth of euthanasia", admitted in the diary that he ended the King's life:

"At about 11 o'clock it was evident that the last stage might endure for many hours, unknown to the Patient but little comporting with that dignity and serenity which he so richly merited and which demanded a brief final scene. Hours of waiting just for the mechanical end when all that is really life has departed only exhausts the onlookers & keeps them so strained that they cannot avail themselves of the solace of thought, communion or prayer. I therefore decided to determine the end and injected (myself) morphia gr.3/4 [grains] and shortly afterwards cocaine gr.1 [grains] into the distended jugular vein ... In about 1/4 an hour – breathing quieter – appearance more placid – physical struggle gone."

Dawson wrote that he acted to preserve the King's dignity, to prevent further strain on the family, and so that George's death at 11:55 pm could be announced in the morning edition of The Times newspaper rather than "less appropriate ... evening journals". Neither Queen Mary, who was intensely religious and might not have sanctioned euthanasia, nor the Prince of Wales was consulted. The royal family did not want the King to endure pain and suffering and did not want his life prolonged artificially but neither did they approve Dawson's actions. British Pathé announced the King's death the following day, in which he was described as "for each one of us, more than a King, a father of a great family".

The German composer Paul Hindemith went to a BBC studio on the morning after the King's death and in six hours wrote Trauermusik ("Mourning Music"), for viola and orchestra. It was performed that same evening in a live broadcast by the BBC, with Adrian Boult conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the composer as soloist. At the procession to George's lying in state in Westminster Hall, the cross surmounting the Imperial State Crown atop George's coffin fell off and landed in the gutter as the cortège turned into New Palace Yard. George's eldest son and successor, Edward VIII, saw it fall and wondered whether it was a bad omen for his new reign. As a mark of respect to their father, George's four surviving sons – Edward, Albert, Henry, and George – mounted the guard, known as the Vigil of the Princes, at the catafalque on the night before the funeral. The vigil was not repeated until the death of George's daughter-in-law, Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, in 2002. George V was interred at St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, on 28 January 1936. Edward abdicated before the year was out, leaving Albert to ascend the throne as George VI.

Legacy
George V disliked sitting for portraits and despised modern art; he was so displeased by one portrait by Charles Sims that he ordered it to be burned. He did admire sculptor Bertram Mackennal, who created statues of George for display in Madras and Delhi, and William Reid Dick, whose statue of George V stands outside Westminster Abbey, London.

Although he and his wife occasionally toured the British Empire, George preferred to stay at home pursuing his hobbies of stamp collecting and game shooting and lived a life that later biographers would consider dull because of its conventionality. He was not an intellectual: on returning from one evening at the opera he wrote, "Went to Covent Garden and saw Fidelio and damned dull it was." He was earnestly devoted to Britain and its Empire. He explained, "it has always been my dream to identify myself with the great idea of Empire." He appeared hard-working and became widely admired by the people of Britain and the Empire, as well as "the Establishment". In the words of historian David Cannadine, King George V and Queen Mary were an "inseparably devoted couple" who upheld "character" and "family values".

George established a standard of conduct for British royalty that reflected the values and virtues of the upper middle-class rather than upper-class lifestyles or vices. Acting within his constitutional bounds, he dealt skilfully with a succession of crises: Ireland, the First World War, and the first socialist minority government in Britain. He was by temperament a traditionalist who never fully appreciated or approved the revolutionary changes under way in British society. Nevertheless, he invariably wielded his influence as a force of neutrality and moderation, seeing his role as mediator rather than final decision maker.

Titles, honours and arms
As Duke of York, George's arms were the royal arms, with an inescutcheon of the arms of Saxony, all differenced with a label of three points argent, the centre point bearing an anchor azure. The anchor was removed from his coat of arms as the Prince of Wales. As King, he bore the royal arms. In 1917, he removed, by warrant, the Saxony inescutcheon from the arms of all male-line descendants of the Prince Consort domiciled in the United Kingdom (although the royal arms themselves had never borne the shield).

title: George V