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Automatic writing

Automatic writing, also called psychography, is a claimed psychic ability allowing a person to produce written words without consciously writing. Practitioners engage in automatic writing by holding a writing instrument and allowing alleged spirits to manipulate the practitioner's hand. The instrument may be a standard writing instrument, or it may be one specially designed for automatic writing, such as a planchette or a ouija board.

Religious and spiritual traditions have incorporated automatic writing, including Fuji in Chinese folk religion and the Enochian language associated with Enochian magic. In the modern era, it is associated with Spiritualism and the occult, with notable practitioners including W. B. Yeats and Arthur Conan Doyle. There is no evidence supporting the existence of automatic writing, and claims associated with it are unfalsifiable. Documented examples are considered to be the result of the ideomotor phenomenon.

Early history
Spirit writing, later called Fuji (扶乩/扶箕), has a long tradition in China, where messages from various deities and spirits were received by mediums since the Song dynasty. In the 19th century, messages received through spirit writing led to the foundation of several Chinese salvationist religions. The spread of Chinese cultural techniques, such as printing and painting, introduced the influence of "spirit writing", practised by Japanese Zen Ōbaku monks, who were said to communicate with an ancient Taoist sage credited with creating the kung fu system.

In the West, an early example of the practice is the 16th-century Enochian language, allegedly dictated to John Dee and Edward Kelley by Enochian angels and integral to the practice of Enochian magic. The language is said to be extremely detailed and complex in its grammar and rules. Dee also claimed that the Enochian instruction included information regarding the elixir of life in the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey.

Approach
Parapsychologist William Fletcher Barrett wrote that "automatic messages may take place either by the writer passively holding a pencil on a sheet of paper, or by the planchette, or by an 'ouija board'." In Spiritualism, spirits are claimed to take control of the hand of a medium to write messages, letters, and even entire books. Automatic writing can happen in a trance or waking state. Some psychical researchers such as Thomson Jay Hudson have claimed no spirits are involved in automatic writing and the subconscious mind is the explanation.

Hoaxes
Paranormal investigator Harry Price exposed the supposed automatic writing in the Borley Rectory as the wall-scrawling of a housewife attempting to hide an extramarital affair.

A prominent alleged example of automatic writing is the Brattleboro hoax. When Charles Dickens died in 1870, he left The Mystery of Edwin Drood unfinished. According to the itinerant printer T. P. James, this angered Dickens' spirit so much that he channelled the rest of the novel through James's hand. This is supposed to have begun on Christmas Eve 1872 and continued in tri-weekly sessions until completion.

Practitioners
Automatic writing as a spiritual practice was reported by Hyppolyte Taine in the preface to the third edition of his De l'intelligence, published in 1878. Besides "ethereal visions" or "magnetic auras", Fernando Pessoa claimed to have experienced automatic writing. He said he felt "owned by something else", sometimes feeling a sensation in the right arm he claimed was lifted into the air without his will. Georgie Hyde-Lees, the wife of William Butler Yeats, also claimed she could write automatically. Sri Aurobindo and his follower, The Mother (Mirra Alfassa), regularly practiced Automatic writing.

Shortly after his 1917 marriage to Georgie Hyde-Lees, the poet W. B. Yeats came to be heavily influenced by her delving into what they referred to as "the automatic script".

In his 1918 book The New Revelation, Arthur Conan Doyle wrote that automatic writing occurs either by the writer's subconscious or by external spirits operating through the writer. Doyle and his wife led an automatic writing séance with Harry Houdini wherein Lady Doyle wrote 15 pages of purported messages from Houdini's mother, although this information was immediately discounted as fraudulent by Houdini.

The essay The Automatic Message (1933), first published in the magazine Minotaure, No. 3-4, (Paris), was one of André Breton's significant theoretical works about automatism. In 1919, Breton and Philippe Soupault had used what later became the Surrealist automatism method to compose Les Champs Magnétiques (The Magnetic Fields). In 1997, "The Magnetic Fields" was also the title of a compilation of surrealist writing of André Breton, Paul Éluard, Philippe Soupault, and others. It included the authorized translation of Breton's The Automatic Message in English by the poet David Gascoyne, whose Man's Life is This Meat (1936) (a collection of his own surrealist writings and translations of the French surrealists) and Hölderlin's Madness (1938) established Gascoyne's reputation as one of a small group of English surrealists. Gascoyne's 1935 A Short Survey of Surrealism for the 1936 London International Surrealist Exhibition also expanded the movement to the English-speaking world. The Surrealist poet Robert Desnos claimed he was among the most gifted in automatic writing. Surrealist automatists, most notably André Masson, adapted these methods to art-making in which the artist suppresses conscious control over the making process, allowing the unconscious mind to have great sway. Prior to the Surrealists, Dadaists, such as Hans Arp, made some use of this method through chance operations.

The medium Pierre L. O. A. Keeler had an alleged spirit writing communication from Abraham Lincoln currently exhibited at the Lily Dale Museum. Despite Lincoln being well-known for his skepticism and Keeler having been known to employ magician's tricks, this is used as one of the many examples of skeptics purportedly endorsing Spiritualism posthumously. Skeptical investigator Joe Nickell who conducted a detailed examination of the "spirit" writing, concluded it had no resemblance to Lincoln's handwriting and described the message as "bogus".

There was an apocalyptic cult led by a lapsed Scientologist named Dorothy Martin. She and her followers were waiting for an alien ship to take them to the nonexistent planet Clarion and save them from a worldwide flood that was to commence at midnight on December 20, 1954. When that did not occur, Martin allegedly got an automatic writing message from God calling the whole thing off.

Since 1975
In 1975, Wendy Hart of Maidenhead claimed she wrote automatically about Nicholas Moore, a sea captain who died in 1642. Also in 1975 the CIA attempted to employ remote viewing through the Stargate Project. In the spring of 1989, Angela Dellafiora, a member of Stargate Project's remote viewing unit, claimed to be guided by spirits moving her hand in writing responses about the location of a fugitive DEA agent named Charlie Jordan. In reviewing the matter, Joe Nickell states, "[T]he Charlie Jordan case, touted as one of the most successful examples... in the U.S. government's psychic-spying project is not convincing evidence of anything — save perhaps folly. ...[I]t also illustrates the limitations of anecdotal evidence: conflicting versions, selective reporting, and lack of documentation, together with additional manifestations of faulty memory, bias, and other human foibles."

Conspiracy theorist David Icke said he first became aware of being "Son of the Godhead" via automatic writing. Vassula Ryden claims to receive and transcribe messages from her guardian angel Daniel, Jesus, Yahweh. She has provoked both skepticism and credulity from Catholic laity and clergy, as well as the skeptical community at large. Alleged cases of automatic writing have included Joseph Smith, Patience Worth, Aleister Crowley, Jane Roberts, Helen Schucman and author Neale Donald Walsch. Crowley, for instance, compiled the Collected Works over time, which included The Book of the Law as well as transcripts of his visions of the first two Enochian Aethyrs (planes).

Scientific analysis and skepticism
Scientists and skeptics consider automatic writing to be the result of the ideomotor effect.

According to skeptical investigator Joe Nickell, "automatic writing is produced while one is in a dissociated state. It is a form of motor automatism, or unconscious muscular activity." Neurologist Terence Hines has written "automatic writing is an example of a milder form of dissociative state". In 1900, Swiss psychologist Theodore Flournoy studied the case of the French medium Helene Smith, particularly her handwriting during seances. He concluded that the automatic writing phenomenon was an effect of autosuggestion produced by autohypnotization, leading to the emergence of a secondary self.

Paranormal researcher Ben Radford writes in his 2017 book Investigating Ghosts that there is no real way to know if the writing is coming from "outside their bodies," you "must take their word for it. Because the source of the information is at issue and the medium cannot be validated, we must turn to the content of the material." Various psychic mediums have claimed to channel famous dead people, such as Susan Lander, who claimed that Betsy Ross contacted her to say, "I am gay and I fly the flag of pride and liberty for all of us." According to Radford, historians say that there is "no credible historical evidence that Ross ... either made or had a hand in designing the American flag." Without some kind of validation, "anyone can claim to communicate with the spirit of anyone." Radford argues that "Automatic writing should logically hinder, not help spirit communication," given spelling and grammar are more difficult than direct speech.

Scientific studies
In an 1890 paper on hypnotism Morton Prince claims, "automatic writing is not a purely unconscious reflex act, but, the product of conscious individuality," and further claims that the hand that is writing is under the control of a separate hypnotic personality during trances. Physician Charles Arthur Mercier in the British Medical Journal (1894) criticized the spiritualist interpretation of automatic writing, concluding, "there is no need nor room for the agency of spirits, and the invocation of such agency is the sign of a mind not merely unscientific, but uninformed."

Psychology professor Théodore Flournoy investigated the claim by nineteenth-century medium Hélène Smith (Catherine Müller) she did automatic writing to convey messages from Mars in Martian language. Flournoy concluded her "Martian" language had a strong resemblance to Ms. Smith's native language of French and her automatic writing was "romances of the subliminal imagination, derived largely from forgotten sources (for example, books read as a child)." He invented the term cryptomnesia to describe this phenomenon.

In 1927, psychiatrist Harold Dearden wrote that automatic writing is a psychological method of "tapping" the unconscious mind and there is nothing mysterious about it.

In 1986, A. B. Joseph investigated two female patients who were found to exhibit ictal hypergraphia.

Automatic writing behavior was discovered by Dilek Evyapan and Emre Kumral in three patients with right hemispheric damage.

A 2012 study of ten psychographers using single photon emission computed tomography showed differences in brain activity and writing complexity during alleged trance states vs. normal state writing.

Pop culture and media
Automatic writing is touted by medium Bonnie Page in a Sentinel and Enterprise article as a method of accessing claircognizance abilities.

Automatic writing is featured prominently in a 1961 episode of Perry Mason, The Case of the Meddling Medium, and is also depicted in the 1980 film The Changeling and the 1999 film The Sixth Sense.

Portions of Van Morrison's album Astral Weeks supposedly are inspired by dreams, reveries, and automatic writing.

Czech director Jan Svankmajer claims he concocted the screenplay for his hybrid film Insect (Hmyz) in a fit of automatic writing.

William S. Burroughs has described his book Naked Lunch as "automatic writing gone horribly wrong" and believed he found his subconscious taken over by a hostile entity.

In an interview in GQ, David Byrne indicated an interest in automatic writing due to the influence of Brian Eno.

title: Automatic writing


text:
Matti Vanhanen

Matti Taneli Vanhanen (born 4 November 1955) is a Finnish politician who served as Prime Minister of Finland from 2003 to 2010. He was also Chairman of the Centre Party in 2006. In his earlier career, he was a journalist. Vanhanen is the son of professor Tatu Vanhanen and Anni Tiihonen.

Career
Vanhanen studied political science at the University of Helsinki, graduating as a Master of Social Sciences in 1989. He was chairman of the Centre Party Youth League from 1980 to 1983. He also served as a member of the Espoo City Council from 1981 to 1984. Vanhanen used to work as a journalist. He was an editor (1985–1988) and editor-in-chief (1988–1991) at the local newspaper Kehäsanomat. In a column in Suomenmaa (the Centre Party's organ), he strongly condemned the Baltic Star pro-Estonian independence demonstration held in Helsinki in July 1985, calling the demonstration "provocative".

Vanhanen was elected to the Finnish Parliament (Eduskunta) in 1991. As a member of Parliament he was interested in ecological issues. For instance, Vanhanen spoke against the building of a fifth nuclear power plant in 1992, at the same time as serving on the board of electricity corporation Fortum. He served on the Parliamentary Environment Committee 1991–1995, and was chair of the Parliamentary Grand Committee 2000–2001. He was vice-chair of the Centre Party Parliamentary group 1994–2001, and Deputy Chairman of the Centre Party 2000–2003.

Another important topic for Vanhanen was Finland's foreign and security policy. As a specialist on the European Union he was a member of the European Union Constitutional Convention. There he criticised the president of the convention, former French president Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, as authoritarian. Vanhanen has said that he is unenthusiastic about European co-operation, and that he is an "EU pragmatist", so he may be considered a eurosceptic, especially when compared to his EU-enthusiast predecessor Paavo Lipponen.

Vanhanen served as Chairman of the Youth Foundation from 1998 to 2003 and deputy chairman from 1981 to 1997. The prosecution claims the Youth Foundation donated under the direction of Centre Party MP Antti Kaikkonen funding of over 90,000 euros for his own campaign and that of other Centre Party MPs including Matti Vanhanen. Prosecutors say this contravened the Foundation's own rules and laws governing such institutions.

Vanhanen's first cabinet
Vanhanen resigned from the Constitutional Convention in 2003 when he became Minister of Defense in the cabinet of Prime Minister Anneli Jäätteenmäki. After Jäätteenmäki's resignation, Vanhanen was elected Prime Minister and his first cabinet was formed.

As a politician, Vanhanen is considered to be part of the liberal wing of the old agrarian Central Party, along with the two other Party ministers from Uusimaa region. His government cut the top state income tax rate from 35.5% to 33.5% in 2005 and 32.5% in 2006 (resulting in approximately 55% total tax rate after local government and social security taxes). The corporate tax rate was also lowered to 26% and capital gains to 28% (both formerly 29%), though at the same time dividends were partially made taxable.

Presidential candidate
As the Centre Party candidate, Vanhanen challenged President Tarja Halonen in the 2006 Finnish presidential election. He received 18.6% of the vote, coming third to the National Coalition Party's Sauli Niinistö (24.1%) and Social Democrat and incumbent Tarja Halonen (46.3%), and thus did not qualify for the runoff. Vanhanen expressed his support for Niinistö in the runoff election against his coalition partner's candidate Halonen.

The presidential election, and co-operation between Centre Party and National Coalition Party, proved to be a major strain on the government coalition between the Centre Party and Social Democrats. The flashpoint came in March, when the Centre Party demanded national agricultural subsidies to cover farmers' losses when the Finnish exception in the European Union's Common Agricultural Policy was about to expire. At the end of the crisis Vanhanen told his parliamentary group that taxpayers would cover ninety percent or about 100 million euros in losses.

Matti Vanhanen received 25,000 euros for his presidential election campaign in 2006 from Ahti Vilppula via his company Helsingin Mekaanikkotalo. Mekaanikkotalo is owned by Procomex in Luxembourg and further by Kilbrin Investments Limited in the Virgin Islands. In 2009 it was found out that this finance was not included in the finance announcement.

Vanhanen's second cabinet
After the March 2007 election the Centre Party narrowly remained the largest party after losing four seats. However, their coalition partner, the SDP, lost eight seats and the centre-right National Coalition Party gained ten. Vanhanen's second cabinet was formed on a centre-right basis, with minor partners the Green League and the Swedish People's Party.

A scandal involving Vanhanen's second cabinet began rolling in May 2008, after the leader of the Centre Party's parliamentary group Timo Kalli said publicly that he would not reveal information about his campaign finances, because such disclosure was not required. After a media backlash, Kalli gave up his secrecy and listed a group of businessmen known as "Kehittyvien maakuntien Suomi" (KMS; in English, "The Finland of Developing Regions"), who had financed the Centre Party. Centre Party links with KMS were suspected, as one address of the organisation belonged to a party official. It was later revealed that the organisation had been formed in the Centre Party's general secretary's office.

After the Russian response to the Georgian invasion of South Ossetia, Vanhanen said that Finland would rethink its security.

Vanhanen's cabinet proposed raising the retirement age from 63 to 65 years. His proposal was fiercely opposed by the Central Organisation of Finnish Trade Unions (Finnish acronym SAK), which is affiliated with the SDP.

In December 2009, Vanhanen announced that he would step down as chair of the Centre Party at its June 2010 convention. Mari Kiviniemi was chosen to the position and she also inherited the position as Prime Minister. In September 2010 Vanhanen started as the head of the Family Business Network Finland and left the parliament.

In 2010, the Finnish police investigated whether Vanhanen had been wrong not to disqualify himself in certain cabinet decisions on financial contributions to an organisation affiliated with the Centre Party, which had previously financed Vanhanen's presidential campaign. Because the charges concerned Vanhanen's actions while in office, the decision whether he should be prosecuted fell to the Constitutional Law Committee of the Finnish Parliament. The Committee decided not to prosecute Vanhanen.

Return to politics
In November 2014, Vanhanen announced that he would leave the Family Business Network. He was elected to the parliament in the 2015 elections with 11,304 personal votes. In June 2015, Vanhanen was chosen as the chairman of the Centre Party parliamentary group.

In March 2016, Vanhanen announced that he is seeking Centre Party's candidacy in 2018 presidential election. As no challengers appeared within the party, Vanhanen was the sole candidate in June's party conference and was confirmed as the Centre Party's candidate in the presidential election. Vanhanen said that his candidacy is motivated by the support he felt he had around the country during his last campaign and the will to improve the security situation in the areas surrounding Finland. Following the nomination, Vanhanen left his duties as the chairman of the parliamentary group in order to focus on global affairs. On 23 June 2016, Vanhanen was chosen as the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the Parliament. In the first round of the presidential election, Vanhanen placed fifth with 4.1 percent of the votes, while the incumbent president Sauli Niinistö went on to secure his second term with a majority of votes.

After getting re-elected in 2019 parliamentary election, Vanhanen was elected as the Speaker of the Parliament.

In June 2020, after Katri Kulmuni's resignation, Vanhanen was appointed Minister of Finance. Though he initially didn't want to accept the offer, he changed his mind and accepted out of a sense of duty. In May 2021 Vanhanen announced his resignation from the post to hand it over to party chair Annika Saarikko.

In 2016, Vanhanen said that Finland's membership in NATO was a true option. In 2022, Vanhanen supported Finland's membership in NATO. In 2023, as the Speaker of the Parliament of Finland he signed the parliament's approval to join the military alliance.

Personality
Vanhanen has been characterised as uncharismatic and even boring, which he has attempted to turn to his advantage in tense political situations. Vanhanen is known for being a teetotaler, saying that he does not like the taste of alcohol.

Matti Vanhanen was against the independence movement in the Baltic States during the 1980s. In his column in Suomenmaa in 1985, Vanhanen condemned the Baltic independence movement both for "wishing to change the Soviet system" and for "indifference towards the post Second World War reality." Vanhanen claimed that the difference between capitalism and socialism was not significant; and that instead of being concerned about the Soviet system, it would be better to concentrate, for example, on the research of Finno-Ugric languages.

In 2009, he visited China and credited the government for being systematic, as well as being able to place clear priorities and to mobilise the required resources to accomplish them. In his opinion, the Western world ought to note the example of China, where policies are implemented rapidly and effectively. He said he was impressed of the progress the country has made in dealing with difficult issues.

Vanhanen married Merja Vanhanen in 1985. They have two children: Annastiina (born 1991) and Juhana (born 1994). Matti Vanhanen and Merja Vanhanen unexpectedly announced their divorce on 6 April 2005.

After his divorce, he dated Susan Kuronen (she later changed her last name to Ruusunen). In February 2007, Kuronen released a tell-all book The Prime Minister's Bride, which actually boosted the prime minister's popularity with the public. Tens of thousands of Finns signed an online petition against the book and some bookstores refused to put it on the shelf. Vanhanen sued the book's publisher (but not Kuronen) for invasion of privacy in March 2007, following the March elections. In 2010 the Supreme Court of Finland upheld the privacy violation conviction against Susan Ruusunen and her publisher.

After ending his dating relationship with Kuronen (Ruusunen), Vanhanen got engaged to Sirkka Mertala in 2009. This relationship ended in 2010.

In a 2006 book commissioned for the presidential elections, Se on ihan Matti, Vanhanen compared the Finnish tabloid press to the KGB and Stasi, former Soviet Union and East German secret police agencies.

Vanhanen has two homes; he lives permanently in Lepsämä, a rural village in the Nurmijärvi municipality, but on weekends in the town of Rauma.

Vanhanen is about 198 cm. He is left-handed.

Cabinets

 * Vanhanen I Cabinet
 * Vanhanen II Cabinet

Honours

 * FIN Order of the Lion of Finland 5Class BAR.svg 🇫🇮 Finland Order of the Lion of Finland (1999)
 * FIN Order of the White Rose Grand Cross BAR.svg 🇫🇮 Finland, Grand Cross, Order of the White Rose of Finland (2004)
 * EST Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana - 1st Class BAR.svg 🇪🇪 Estonia, 1st Class, Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana (2007)
 * ITA OMRI 2001 GC-GCord BAR.svg 🇮🇹 Italy, Knight Grand Cross with Collar, Order of Merit of the Italian Republic (2008)
 * Royal Order of the Polar Star (1748-1975) - Commander Grand Cross.svg 🇸🇪 Sweden, Commander Grand Cross, Order of the Polar Star
 * GRE Order of the Phoenix - Grand Cross BAR.png 🇬🇷 Greece, Grand Cross, Order of the Phoenix (Greece)

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

title: Matti Vanhanen


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Talk:Orbit (dynamics)

Explain
Can we explain this better in English? -- The Anome

 * I think so - let me have a stab at it hawthorn

I'm not sure I understand how the given definition of closed orbits applies to continuous dynamical systems (ie, ODEs) ... the only orbits in such systems that contain finitely many points are stationary points ... right? It seems like closed orbits should be defined differently in the context of ODEs. Or am I missing something here? Maybe I'm not understanding the sense in which "infinite" is being used...? --Buggi22 05:47, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * The article could easilly be wrong at some level. I wrote it, and I'm not a mathematician, just a (now former) math student who took some dynamics.  We have plenty of real mathematicians on Wikipedia, but none of them seem to have a strong interest in dynamics, so I tried to fill in gaps. Isomorphic 06:35, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

Comments on the rewrite
What is "discrete time"? The article probably had a slant toward discrete dynamics before, but now it sounds bizare. When you're iterating a map, there's no inherent assumption that your iterations have anything to do with time at all. That's just something that comes in when you're doing applications of dynamics. We need a more general definition. Isomorphic 19:30, 29 May 2005 (UTC)

 * Some authors tend to use orbit for maps and trajectories for flows, but it is common to speak of periodic orbits for flows. My intent was to include the continuous time definition of orbit in the article.  The formal definition of an orbit uses the notion of a dynamical system, which is a manifold M together with a function ft(x) that describes how the points move around.  The time parameter t ∈ T, which is one of four sets: the integers, the non-negative integers, the reals, or the non-negative reals.   Sets with different additive structure have not as yet yielded any significant theory.   I agree that the expression discrete time is a little strange, but it is also common usage in the dynamical systems literature.    An orbit is a set parameterized by the t variable, time.  An orbit or trajectory with initial condition u is the set
 * $$ \{ x \in M | x = f^s(u) \,, s \in T \} $$
 * Our challenge is to convert this mathematical definition into prose.  XaosBits 13:43, 30 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Apologies. Now that I've gone back and reread bits of my old dynamics textbook, it's clear that your edits were fine and that I don't know what I'm talking about.  No matter how much "discrete time" sounds to me like something from quantum mechanics, it is indeed the correct terminology.  It's nice to finally have someone around Wikipedia who knows dynamics.  Proceed, sir!  I can worry about readability, if you worry about accuracy. I'm pretty good at explaining things in English once I understand them correctly myself. Isomorphic 04:05, 31 May 2005 (UTC)

 * I think your rewrite reads much better. XaosBits 01:14, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Geometry
The new paragraph on geometry (or is it topology?) needs context. I understand the fact presented, but not why it's interesting or useful. Could you provide context or a better explanation? In the mean time I moved it to the bottom so as not to break the flow of the rest of the article. Isomorphic 05:26, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

 * It is a generalization of what is discussed in Polygon. I and others may think of expansions and more connections to other articles later.--Patrick 20:35, 15 September 2005 (UTC)
 * What I'm trying to say is, angles don't come to mind in the context of mathematical orbits. The concept of an orbit doesn't even require that you're in a metric space.  It certainly doesn't guarantee Euclidean geometry.  So talking about angles, and a property of those angles that doesn't even hold for most cases, seems beside the point.  Isomorphic 01:52, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
 * I removed the paragraph on the turning angle. The turning angle (the winding number of the tangent vector) and other types of winding numbers seem appropriate topics in differential geometry, but are not directly applicable to trajectories of dynamical systems.  (The article on winding numbers could use some work; it only takes the complex variables perspective.)   There have been some attempts in the literature to use geometrical characterizations of the orbits of dynamical systems, but the results, while elegant, are specific to low-dimensional systems and do not generalize.  The exception is the Maslov index of a closed curve.   XaosBits 02:52, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
 * Ok, I moved it to rigid body.--Patrick 14:47, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

period
I can't find the explicit definition of period here. --Adam majewski (talk) 19:14, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Orbit cannot converge
Ii is written
 * ''It could be an asymptotically periodic orbit if it converges to a periodic orbit. ...

However, the orbit is defined to be the set (not sequence) of points of the trajectory; so it cannot converge (in the sense of limit, as linked) to anything. — MFH:Talk 00:51, 27 March 2022 (UTC)

Backward orbit typo (?)
When defining the orbit for a discrete time dynamical system, the backward subset is shown as follows: $$\gamma_{x}^{-} \ \overset{\underset{\mathrm{def}}{}}{=}  \     \{f^{t}(x)  : t \ge 0 \}$$. Shouldn't it be $$\gamma_{x}^{-} \ \overset{\underset{\mathrm{def}}{}}{=}  \     \{f^{t}(x)  : t \le 0 \}$$? 2804:14C:BF27:4B2C:9A68:7D7A:F7F0:5521 (talk) 03:57, 11 February 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:Orbit (dynamics)


text:
Talk:Vowel

Prosody and intonation
I think this section fits badly into the article. There are good articles already in WP about prosody and intonation. The most relevant bits of this section are about vowel length, and these would be worth keeping but under a heading "Vowel length" or "Vowel quantity". Most of the rest is (as the article points out) about syllables, not specifically vowels, and I think it should be removed. RoachPeter (talk) 08:47, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090403083403/http://www.ling.hf.ntnu.no/ipa/full/ipachart_vowels_fbmp3.html to http://www.ling.hf.ntnu.no/ipa/full/ipachart_vowels_fbmp3.html

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 * https://web.archive.org/web/20120412023624/http://www.abdn.ac.uk/langling/resources/Watt-Tillotson2001.pdf

— Bobagem (talk) 21:17, 21 October 2021 (UTC)

EXAMPLES
It would be so great to include a vowel chart with example words that had the vowel sounds, in addition to the chart that is there now. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 73.220.247.81 (talk) 21:49, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

title: Talk:Vowel


text:
Talk:Ginkgo biloba

Thought to be extinct by Europeans?
"For centuries, it was thought to be extinct in the wild, but is now a common tree cultivated throughout eastern China, Korean, and Japan. [...] Despite their widespread habitat, high genetic uniformity exists among ginkgo trees, with some Chinese scholars suggesting that ginkgo trees in these areas may have been planted and preserved by Chinese monks over a period of about 1,000 years."

Much of the article suggests that Asia has had the ginkgo trees for much of history, while ginkgo declined elsewhere. However, the first sentence of that paragraph doesn't specify who thought the ginkgo tree was extinct. Was this assumption just a European phenomenon?

SheepTester (talk) 05:10, 16 October 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:Ginkgo biloba


text:
Talk:Once More, with Feeling (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)

Horrible Page
This is just a very poor page. The entire theme of it sounds like it's written by a fan. It doesn't sound remotely encyclopedic.68.154.185.125 01:07, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * -Yeah 68.154.185.125, but that's kind of the point of Wiki. If it's really bugging you, fix it : ) Eventually between all of us we'll have put up a decent, and hopefully verisimilar page. I dissagree by the way, even though this page is a work in progress... but I am a huge Buffy fan, and therefore not impartial; which is why I've been reticent to contribute myself. Manuelcuribe (talk) February 2008

68.154.185.125 I can't believe you would say that. I agree with Manuelcuribe. And btw who else coined have written it?? If you weren't a fan you wouldn't watch till season 6!! Don't be a hater. October 2016

I have the dvds as asked for above.. it is SMG singing, she isnt off key (i know shocking really sounds like she is) its just the key Joss Whedon wrote the song in, she wasnt going to sing originally but seen where the storline was going and stepped up to do it herself. Going by the extras on the dvds they all loved doing it and had a great time, Joss Whedon respected the actors who didnt really want to sing and gave them small singing parts (Alyson Hannigan and Michelle Trachtenberg, the latter loving dance and hence the dance number she performed). James Marsters loves guitar/ rock music so he incorported that as well, from the dvd commentary Whedon tried to include which talent/skills each performer had or loved. The commentary also tells of how the musical came together, in that the actors who are musically inclined went regularly to Whedons house to sing/play music and him realising how many of his actors where gifted musicians and that he could use that for an episode. He talked about doing the musical long before he actually put the episode together, in the dvds his producers even state that they thought he was joking until he turned up with a fully written script for episode 7 of season 6. Also hinton battle's dance as sweet had to be cut as he was so good and kepted adding more dance moves. The vampires and demon from the start, the street sweepers and sweets henchmen are the same dancers — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.115.204.102 (talk) 07:13, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

The Music Section
The section 'Music' is all weird. The 'current' Willow seriously does not have stage fright, earlier in this very episode she dances in front of multiple strangers with no reluctance. Granted, the dancing was magically induced, but the argument against the lack of magically induced singing on her part is tied in to her character by the author. In short, it doesn't make sense.

And The opening sequence is completely changed from its usual form, featuring a 26-second main theme whose rock and dark atmosphere was eliminated through its use of percussion in the background and a stereotypical light drum sequence at the end of the theme, similar to the conclusion of heroic classical films. just seems to be complete original research. And I'm not even sure what it means. Lots42 (talk) 05:01, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

 * The normal Rock buffy intro theme is replaced with a kinda sweeping instrumental version. Surely you've watched the episode? That is what it refers to. It's as original research as saying Giles sounds british.

As for the Willow stage-fright thing. She admitted in earlier episodes she suffers from it, and has some instances of being afraid in-front of a crowd on a stage. Magically induced singing and dancing aside she has one audience member she cares about during that scene and isn't on a stage.--96.29.242.188 (talk) 07:14, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Monkey Trouble
I took out an erroneous sentence that said that Xander and Anya sing about Monkey Trouble, and Tara and Willow sing about dinner. Xander and Anya sing about problems in their relationship that they aren't telling each other about, whereas Tara sings about the effect Willow has had on her whilst also alluding to the fact that Willow has been casting spells on her.--86.150.11.34 (talk) 06:01, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Title

 * The title of the episode comes from a line sung by Sweet;

While there is a line which includes the title, is it really right to say that this is where the title "comes from"? It's a phrase that predates Buffy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Davidhorman (talk • contribs) 16:29, 23 December 2015 (UTC)


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Liverpool, New South Wales

Liverpool is a suburb of South Western Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is located approximately 31 km south-west of the Sydney CBD. Liverpool is the administrative seat of the local government area of the City of Liverpool and is situated in the Cumberland Plain.

History
Liverpool is one of the oldest urban settlements in Australia, founded on 7 November 1810 as an agricultural centre by Governor Lachlan Macquarie. He named it after Robert Banks Jenkinson, Earl of Liverpool, who was then the Secretary of State for the Colonies and the English city of Liverpool, upon which some of the area's architecture is based.

The Post Office opened at Liverpool on 1 March 1825 - one of the first Post Offices to be opened in New South Wales. Liverpool was one of the six stations on the first line of Telegraphs to be constructed in this Colony. On 26 January 1858, a Telegraph Office was opened at the Railway Station. Later, on 12 July 1878, these two offices were amalgamated and plans proposed to construct a joint office. Finally a Foundation Stone was laid prior to construction starting. Mrs. N. G. Bull of Cabramatta had the honour of laying the Stone - such a responsibility given to a woman bringing great indignation by the Mayor and several of the leading men. An Indignation Meeting held soon after confirmed unanimously that Mrs Bull was "a fit and proper person" to have laid the stone.

Urban sprawl of Sydney across the Cumberland Plain soon reached Liverpool, and it became an outer suburb of metropolitan Sydney with a strong working-class presence and manufacturing facilities. The Liverpool area also became renowned for its vast Housing Commission estates housing thousands of low-income families after the slum clearance and urban renewal programs in inner-city Sydney in the 1960s.

Heritage listings
Liverpool has a number of heritage-listed sites, including:
 * 251 Bigge Street: Liverpool Courthouse
 * Birkdale Crescent: Collingwood
 * College Street: Old Liverpool Hospital
 * Elizabeth Drive: St Luke's Anglican Church
 * Georges River, Heathcote Road near Newbridge Road: Liverpool Weir
 * Great Southern railway: Liverpool railway station
 * 17 Speed Street: Rosebank

Commercial area
Liverpool is currently the major city centre in South Western Sydney. The city centre has a Hoddle Grid layout with many little laneways and arcades, similar to that of Melbourne. The central retail strip is Macquarie Street which contains numerous small cafes. In recent times the extension of the Westfield shopping centre has seen many new fashion stores come in. The Central Business District is being touted as Sydney's Third CBD centred around the Western Sydney Airport and aerotropolis. The CBD was rezoned for mixed use in 2018 to allow for more homes, offices and shops.

The main shopping area is centred on Macquarie Street, with Westfield Liverpool, a major shopping centre at the northern end. Liverpool Plaza is a shopping mall located between Macquarie Mall & Northumberland Street. The northern end of the city has been zoned for high density residential apartments. The southern end of the city is zoned for high density commercial developments. Liverpool has a large teaching hospital, two technical colleges and many shopping centres and office buildings. The private hospital operator Healthscope owns the Sydney Southwest Private Hospital in Liverpool.

Transport
Liverpool is well served by roads such as the Hume Highway (also known as Liverpool Road), the M5 Motorway, and the Westlink M7 Motorway.

Liverpool railway station is on the Main Southern railway line. Liverpool has services to the Sydney CBD, Leppington, Parramatta and Schofields. The Liverpool to Parramatta transitway provides a bus-only route for buses.

For details of long distance and local bus services see Liverpool station.

Schools
There are three public primary schools within the suburb of Liverpool: Liverpool Public School, Liverpool West and Marsden Road. Liverpool Boys and Liverpool Girls are the two public secondary schools. The Mainsbridge School caters to children with intellectual disabilities and Liverpool Hospital School for children hospitalized for lengthy periods.

Private schools include All Saints Primary School, All Saints Catholic College and Al Amanah College.

Post secondary education is catered to with the South Western College of TAFE, Macarthur Community College, Liverpool U3A: School for Seniors, University of Western Sydney English Language Centre, School of Arts in Macquarie Street, and the University Of Wollongong.

Places of worship
St Luke's Anglican Church, located in the city centre across the road from Westfield Liverpool, is the oldest existing Anglican church in Australia. All Saints Catholic Church in George St is located with the All Saints schools. St Raphael, Nickolas and Irene Greek Orthodox Church is in Forbes Street and the Serbian Orthodox Church of the Apostle Luke is on Flowerdale Rd.

Ganzibra Dakhil Mandi is a Mandaean temple located in the city centre of Liverpool, and is the largest of its kind in Australia. It is led by Rishama (head priest) Salah Choheili.

Parks
There are many open spaces within the city centre, including botanical parks and sporting facilities. Bigge Park on the east side of the city features a War Memorial while Pioneer Memorial Park to the north has a historical cemetery. Woodward Park to the west is the main sporting precinct containing a number of outdoor playing fields and the Whitlam Leisure Centre, hosting a swimming pool and a 3000-seat indoor sports stadium. Other notable sports facilities within the suburb of Liverpool include Collimore Park (netball) and Paciullo Park (soccer and touch football).

Sporting teams
Prominent local teams include Fairfield-Liverpool Cricket Club which plays in the Sydney Grade Cricket competition, Liverpool City Netball, which has participated successfully in many State and representative competitions, Hinchinbrook Hornets Junior Rugby League and FC Bossy Liverpool which plays in the New South Wales Super League and Liverpool Rangers FC which is located at Ireland Park, Memorial Avenue. The West Sydney Razorbacks basketball team used to play out of the Gough Whitlam Centre while they were in the NBL. Liverpool is also home to Australian Ice Hockey League team the Sydney Ice Dogs who play out of the Liverpool Catholic Club Ice Rink and Liverpool little athletics.

Media
Liverpool has an arts and creation centre which provides music lessons with instruments such as:guitar, drums and banjo etc.

Liverpool is currently served by a full-time radio station 89.3FM 2GLF which broadcasts local information, music and ethnic programming. It is one of the first FM radio stations setup in the early '80s.

Liverpool has had several newspapers since the late 1800s. The first newspaper appeared in Liverpool in 1886 was The Liverpool Times which was soon superseded by The Liverpool Mercury. Both of these newspapers were then incorporated with The Liverpool Herald. There was also the free newspaper The Liverpool News that ran from 1904 to about 1973. Liverpool now has two newspapers, The Liverpool Leader and The Liverpool Champion published every Wednesday.

Demographics

According to the 2021 census conducted by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, Liverpool had a population of 31,078. These came from a wide variety of ethnic backgrounds; less than one-third (33.9%) of residents were born in Australia. The next most common countries of birth were Iraq (11.3%), India (4.9%), Vietnam (3.1%), Fiji (2.7%), and Philippines (2.2%). The most popular ethnic responses were Australian (9.4%), Iraqi (8.3%), English (8.3%), Serbian (6.9%), and Indian (6.8%).

24.6% of people only spoke English at home. Other languages spoken at home included Arabic 19.2%, Serbian 6.5%, Vietnamese 4.4%, Hindi 3.2%, and Urdu 2.4%.

Liverpool is remarkable for the high proportion of people who reported following some religion in the Census; only 12.1% stated that they had no religion, much lower than the national average of 38.4%. This Census question is optional and 10.9% of residents did not respond to it, which introduces some uncertainty into all the religious figures. The most common responses for religion were Islam 16.4%, Catholic 16.2%, and "Miscellaneous Religions" 9.2%.

Notable people

 * Mark Bosnich, former footballer
 * Leslie Camilleri, convicted criminal with 3x life imprisonment charges
 * Michael Clarke, cricketer
 * Sir Jenkin Coles, auctioneer and politician
 * Walter Hampson Cooper, journalist, playwright, politician and barrister
 * Isaac De Gois, rugby league player
 * Mitchell Duke, soccer player
 * Michael Dwyer, Irish Rebellion Leader (1798–1803) and Chief of Police Liverpool (1813–1820)
 * Nathan Foley, former member of Hi-5, entertainer
 * Frederick Augustus Forbes, store-keeper, grazier and politician
 * Scott Gardiner, first golfer of Aboriginal descent to play on the PGA Tour
 * Liam Hatcher, cricketer
 * Vic Hey, rugby league player
 * Brett Hodgson, rugby league player
 * Harry Kewell, soccer player
 * Craig Knowles, politician
 * Terry Lamb, rugby league player
 * Anthony Minichiello, rugby league player
 * Mark Minichiello, rugby league player
 * Brad Morrin, rugby league player
 * Pat Richards, rugby league player
 * Richard Sadleir (1794–1889), first mayor of Liverpool (in 1872)
 * Lenny Zappavigna, boxer

Politics
The suburb of Liverpool is split in its representation at all three levels of government with Hoxton Park Road the divider in each case. At the local level, Liverpool is part of the City of Liverpool, which is divided into two wards, the North Ward on the north side of Hoxton Park Road and the South Ward on the other side. Each ward elects five councillors and the council currently consists of four Labor councillors, four Liberals, two members of the Liverpool Community Independents Team (LCIT). There is also a directly elected mayor, Ned Mannoun.

For New South Wales state elections, the north side of Liverpool is located in the Electoral district of Liverpool, held by Charishma Kaliyanda, while the south side is in the electoral district of Holsworthy, held by Tina Ayyad. Charishmas Kaliyanda is a member of the Labor Party while Tina Ahmad is a member of the Liberal Party. Federally, the north side of Liverpool is located in the Division of Hughes held by Jenny Ware of the Liberal Party. The south side is part of the Division of Werriwa, held by Labor's Anne Stanley.

The table above illustrates recent election results in the Liverpool area by combining results from each of the booths located in the suburb of Liverpool. The table regards only the first-preference votes. The winner(s) of each election is highlighted in yellow.

Geography
The Cooks River/Castlereagh Ironbark ecological community and Cumberland Plain Woodland are the indigenous flora community of the area, which are found in remnants within the suburb.

Climate
Liverpool has a humid subtropical climate (Köppen climate classification: Cfa) and is a few degrees warmer than the Sydney CBD at daytime, although nights are slightly cooler than Sydney's. If the maximum temperature is 27 °C in the city, in Liverpool it could typically reach as high as 33 °C, while in winter the temperature can be close to 0 °C while it is above 7 °C in central Sydney.

Rainfall is somewhat spread throughout the months, although the first half tends to be wetter. July to September tend to be drier, namely due to foehn winds originating from the Great Dividing Range. Frost can occur in the winter; The lowest recorded temperature was -5 °C, which was registered on 25 July 1994.

title: Liverpool, New South Wales


text:
Bendis

Bendis (Βένδις) was a Thracian goddess associated with hunting and the moon. Worship of the goddess seems to have been introduced into Attica around 430 BC. In Athens, Bendis was identified with the goddess Artemis, but she had a separate temple at Piraeus, near the temple of Artemis, and was a distinct goddess. She was a huntress, like Artemis, but was often accompanied by dancing satyrs and maenads, as represented on a fifth-century red-figure stemless cup at Verona.

The Greeks wrote of Bendis as one of the seven daughters of Zeus who were turned into swans who would later reappear in human forms driving a golden carriage and teaching crowds.

Etymology
The deity's name, Bendis, is thought to derive from a Proto-Indo-European stem *bʰendʰ-, meaning 'to bind, unite, combine'.

Worship
By a decree of the Oracle of Dodona, which required the Athenians to grant land for a shrine or temple, her cult was introduced into Attica by immigrant Thracian residents, and, though Thracian and Athenian processions remained separate, both cult and festival became so popular that in Plato's time (c. 429–413 BC) its festivities were naturalized as an official ceremonial of the city-state, called the Bendideia (Βενδίδεια). Among the events were night-time torch-races on horseback, mentioned in Plato's Republic, 328: "You haven't heard that there is to be a torchlight race this evening on horseback in honour of the Goddess?" "On horseback?" said I. "That is a new idea. Will they carry torches and pass them along to one another as they race with the horses, or how do you mean?" "That's the way of it," said Polemarchus, "and, besides, there is to be a night festival which will be worth seeing." In Piraeus there was a temple of the goddess which was called the Bendidia / Bendideion (Βενδίδειον).

A red-figure skyphos, now at Tübingen University, of c. 440–430, seems to commemorate the arrival of the newly authorized cult: it shows Themis (representing traditional Athenian customs) and a booted and cloaked Bendis, who wears a Thracian fox-skin cap.

A small marble votive stele of Bendis, c. 400–375 BC, found at Piraeus, (pictured left) shows the goddess and her worshippers in bas-relief. The image shows that the Thracian goddess has been strongly influenced by Athenian conceptions of Artemis: Bendis wears a short chiton like Artemis, but with an Asiatic snug-sleeved undergarment. She is wrapped in an animal skin like Artemis and has a spear, but has a hooded Thracian mantle, fastened with a brooch. She wears high boots. In the fourth century BC terracotta figurine (pictured right) she is similarly attired and once carried a (wooden?) spear. Elsewhere in Greece, the cult of Bendis did not catch on. Just as in all other respects the Athenians continue to be hospitable to things foreign, so also in their worship of the gods; for they welcomed so many of the foreign rites that they were ridiculed for it by comic writers; and among these were the Thracian and Phrygian rites. (Strabo, Geography (1st century AD), 10.3.18) The "Phrygian rites" Strabo mentioned referred to the cult of Cybele that was also welcomed to Athens in the 5th century.

Related deities
The Athenians may have blended the cult of Bendis with the equally Dionysiac Thracian revels of Kotys, mentioned by Aeschylus and other ancient writers. Archaic female cult figures unearthed in Thrace (modern-day Bulgaria) have also been identified with Bendis.

Bendida Peak on Trinity Peninsula in Antarctica is named after the goddess.

title: Bendis


text:
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title: User:Wapcaplet/T-Shirts