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Kahan summation algorithm

In numerical analysis, the Kahan summation algorithm, also known as compensated summation, significantly reduces the numerical error in the total obtained by adding a sequence of finite-precision floating-point numbers, compared to the obvious approach. This is done by keeping a separate running compensation (a variable to accumulate small errors), in effect extending the precision of the sum by the precision of the compensation variable.

In particular, simply summing $$n$$ numbers in sequence has a worst-case error that grows proportional to $$n$$, and a root mean square error that grows as $$\sqrt{n}$$ for random inputs (the roundoff errors form a random walk). With compensated summation, using a compensation variable with sufficiently high precision the worst-case error bound is effectively independent of $$n$$, so a large number of values can be summed with an error that only depends on the floating-point precision of the result.

The algorithm is attributed to William Kahan; Ivo Babuška seems to have come up with a similar algorithm independently (hence Kahan–Babuška summation). Similar, earlier techniques are, for example, Bresenham's line algorithm, keeping track of the accumulated error in integer operations (although first documented around the same time ) and the delta-sigma modulation.

The algorithm
In pseudocode, the algorithm will be:

function KahanSum(input) // Prepare the accumulator. var sum = 0.0 // A running compensation for lost low-order bits. var c = 0.0 // The array input has elements indexed input[1] to input[input.length]. for i = 1 to input.length do // c is zero the first time around. var y = input[i] - c        // Alas, sum is big, y small, so low-order digits of y are lost. var t = sum + y        // (t - sum) cancels the high-order part of y; // subtracting y recovers negative (low part of y) c = (t - sum) - y        // Algebraically, c should always be zero. Beware // overly-aggressive optimizing compilers! sum = t    // Next time around, the lost low part will be added to y in a fresh attempt. next i    return sum

This algorithm can also be rewritten to use the Fast2Sum algorithm:

function KahanSum2(input) // Prepare the accumulator. var sum = 0.0 // A running compensation for lost low-order bits. var c = 0.0 // The array input has elements indexed for i = 1 to input.length do // c is zero the first time around. var y = input[i] + c        // sum + c is an approximation to the exact sum. (sum,c) = Fast2Sum(sum,y) // Next time around, the lost low part will be added to y in a fresh attempt. next i    return sum

Worked example
The algorithm does not mandate any specific choice of radix, only for the arithmetic to "normalize floating-point sums before rounding or truncating". Computers typically use binary arithmetic, but to make the example easier to read, it will be given in decimal. Suppose we are using six-digit decimal floating-point arithmetic,  has attained the value 10000.0, and the next two values of   are 3.14159 and 2.71828. The exact result is 10005.85987, which rounds to 10005.9. With a plain summation, each incoming value would be aligned with, and many low-order digits would be lost (by truncation or rounding). The first result, after rounding, would be 10003.1. The second result would be 10005.81828 before rounding and 10005.8 after rounding. This is not correct.

However, with compensated summation, we get the correctly rounded result of 10005.9.

Assume that  has the initial value zero. Trailing zeros shown where they are significant for the six-digit floating-point number. y = 3.14159 - 0.00000            y = input[i] - c t = 10000.0 + 3.14159            t = sum + y = 10003.14159                  Normalization done, next round off to six digits. = 10003.1                      Few digits from input[i] met those of sum. Many digits have been lost! c = (10003.1 - 10000.0) - 3.14159 c = (t - sum) - y (Note: Parenthesis must be evaluated first!) = 3.10000 - 3.14159            The assimilated part of y minus the original full y. = -0.0415900                   Because c is close to zero, normalization retains many digits after the floating point. sum = 10003.1                      sum = t

The sum is so large that only the high-order digits of the input numbers are being accumulated. But on the next step,, an approximation of the running error, counteracts the problem. y = 2.71828 - (-0.0415900)       Most digits meet, since c is of a size similar to y. = 2.75987                      The shortfall (low-order digits lost) of previous iteration successfully reinstated. t = 10003.1 + 2.75987            But still only few meet the digits of sum. = 10005.85987                  Normalization done, next round to six digits. = 10005.9                      Again, many digits have been lost, but c helped nudge the round-off. c = (10005.9 - 10003.1) - 2.75987 Estimate the accumulated error, based on the adjusted y. = 2.80000 - 2.75987            As expected, the low-order parts can be retained in c with no or minor round-off effects. = 0.0401300                    In this iteration, t was a bit too high, the excess will be subtracted off in next iteration. sum = 10005.9                      Exact result is 10005.85987, sum is correct, rounded to 6 digits.

The algorithm performs summation with two accumulators:  holds the sum, and   accumulates the parts not assimilated into , to nudge the low-order part of   the next time around. Thus the summation proceeds with "guard digits" in, which is better than not having any, but is not as good as performing the calculations with double the precision of the input. However, simply increasing the precision of the calculations is not practical in general; if  is already in double precision, few systems supply quadruple precision, and if they did,   could then be in quadruple precision.

Accuracy
A careful analysis of the errors in compensated summation is needed to appreciate its accuracy characteristics. While it is more accurate than naive summation, it can still give large relative errors for ill-conditioned sums.

Suppose that one is summing $$n$$ values $$x_i$$, for $$i = 1, \, \ldots, \, n$$. The exact sum is
 * $$S_n = \sum_{i=1}^n x_i$$ (computed with infinite precision).

With compensated summation, one instead obtains $$S_n + E_n$$, where the error $$E_n$$ is bounded by
 * $$|E_n| \le \big[2\varepsilon + O(n\varepsilon^2)\big] \sum_{i=1}^n |x_i|,$$

where $$\varepsilon$$ is the machine precision of the arithmetic being employed (e.g. $$\varepsilon \approx 10^{-16}$$ for IEEE standard double-precision floating point). Usually, the quantity of interest is the relative error $$|E_n|/|S_n|$$, which is therefore bounded above by
 * $$\frac{|E_n|}{|S_n|} \le \big[2\varepsilon + O(n\varepsilon^2)\big] \frac{\sum\limits_{i=1}^n |x_i|}{\left|\sum\limits_{i=1}^n x_i\right|}.$$

In the expression for the relative error bound, the fraction $$\Sigma |x_i| / |\Sigma x_i|$$ is the condition number of the summation problem. Essentially, the condition number represents the intrinsic sensitivity of the summation problem to errors, regardless of how it is computed. The relative error bound of every (backwards stable) summation method by a fixed algorithm in fixed precision (i.e. not those that use arbitrary-precision arithmetic, nor algorithms whose memory and time requirements change based on the data), is proportional to this condition number. An ill-conditioned summation problem is one in which this ratio is large, and in this case even compensated summation can have a large relative error. For example, if the summands $$x_i$$ are uncorrelated random numbers with zero mean, the sum is a random walk, and the condition number will grow proportional to $$\sqrt{n}$$. On the other hand, for random inputs with nonzero mean the condition number asymptotes to a finite constant as $$n \to \infty$$. If the inputs are all non-negative, then the condition number is 1.

Given a condition number, the relative error of compensated summation is effectively independent of $$n$$. In principle, there is the $$O (n \varepsilon^2)$$ that grows linearly with $$n$$, but in practice this term is effectively zero: since the final result is rounded to a precision $$\varepsilon$$, the $$n \varepsilon^2$$ term rounds to zero, unless $$n$$ is roughly $$1 / \varepsilon$$ or larger. In double precision, this corresponds to an $$n$$ of roughly $$10^{16}$$, much larger than most sums. So, for a fixed condition number, the errors of compensated summation are effectively $$O (\varepsilon)$$, independent of $$n$$.

In comparison, the relative error bound for naive summation (simply adding the numbers in sequence, rounding at each step) grows as $$O(\varepsilon n)$$ multiplied by the condition number. This worst-case error is rarely observed in practice, however, because it only occurs if the rounding errors are all in the same direction. In practice, it is much more likely that the rounding errors have a random sign, with zero mean, so that they form a random walk; in this case, naive summation has a root mean square relative error that grows as $$O\left(\varepsilon \sqrt{n}\right)$$ multiplied by the condition number. This is still much worse than compensated summation, however. However, if the sum can be performed in twice the precision, then $$\varepsilon$$ is replaced by $$\varepsilon^2$$, and naive summation has a worst-case error comparable to the $$O(n \varepsilon^2)$$ term in compensated summation at the original precision.

By the same token, the $$\Sigma |x_i|$$ that appears in $$E_n$$ above is a worst-case bound that occurs only if all the rounding errors have the same sign (and are of maximal possible magnitude). In practice, it is more likely that the errors have random sign, in which case terms in $$\Sigma |x_i|$$ are replaced by a random walk, in which case, even for random inputs with zero mean, the error $$E_n$$ grows only as $$O\left(\varepsilon \sqrt{n}\right)$$ (ignoring the $$n \varepsilon^2$$ term), the same rate the sum $$S_n$$ grows, canceling the $$\sqrt{n}$$ factors when the relative error is computed. So, even for asymptotically ill-conditioned sums, the relative error for compensated summation can often be much smaller than a worst-case analysis might suggest.

Further enhancements
Neumaier introduced an improved version of Kahan algorithm, which he calls an "improved Kahan–Babuška algorithm", which also covers the case when the next term to be added is larger in absolute value than the running sum, effectively swapping the role of what is large and what is small. In pseudocode, the algorithm is: function KahanBabushkaNeumaierSum(input) var sum = 0.0 var c = 0.0                      // A running compensation for lost low-order bits. for i = 1 to input.length do var t = sum + input[i] if |sum| >= |input[i]| then c += (sum - t) + input[i] // If sum is bigger, low-order digits of input[i] are lost. else c += (input[i] - t) + sum // Else low-order digits of sum are lost. endif sum = t    next i     return sum + c                    // Correction only applied once in the very end.

This enhancement is similar to the replacement of Fast2Sum by 2Sum in Kahan's algorithm rewritten with Fast2Sum.

For many sequences of numbers, both algorithms agree, but a simple example due to Peters shows how they can differ. For summing $$[1.0, +10^{100}, 1.0, -10^{100}]$$ in double precision, Kahan's algorithm yields 0.0, whereas Neumaier's algorithm yields the correct value 2.0.

Higher-order modifications of better accuracy are also possible. For example, a variant suggested by Klein, which he called a second-order "iterative Kahan–Babuška algorithm". In pseudocode, the algorithm is:

function KahanBabushkaKleinSum(input) var sum = 0.0 var cs = 0.0 var ccs = 0.0 var c  = 0.0 var cc = 0.0 for i = 1 to input.length do var t = sum + input[i] if |sum| >= |input[i]| then c = (sum - t) + input[i] else c = (input[i] - t) + sum endif sum = t        t = cs + c         if |cs| >= |c| then cc = (cs - t) + c        else cc = (c - t) + cs        endif cs = t        ccs = ccs + cc     end loop return sum + cs + ccs

Alternatives
Although Kahan's algorithm achieves $$O(1)$$ error growth for summing n numbers, only slightly worse $$O(\log n)$$ growth can be achieved by pairwise summation: one recursively divides the set of numbers into two halves, sums each half, and then adds the two sums. This has the advantage of requiring the same number of arithmetic operations as the naive summation (unlike Kahan's algorithm, which requires four times the arithmetic and has a latency of four times a simple summation) and can be calculated in parallel. The base case of the recursion could in principle be the sum of only one (or zero) numbers, but to amortize the overhead of recursion, one would normally use a larger base case. The equivalent of pairwise summation is used in many fast Fourier transform (FFT) algorithms and is responsible for the logarithmic growth of roundoff errors in those FFTs. In practice, with roundoff errors of random signs, the root mean square errors of pairwise summation actually grow as $$O\left(\sqrt{\log n}\right)$$.

Another alternative is to use arbitrary-precision arithmetic, which in principle need no rounding at all with a cost of much greater computational effort. A way of performing correctly rounded sums using arbitrary precision is to extend adaptively using multiple floating-point components. This will minimize computational cost in common cases where high precision is not needed. Another method that uses only integer arithmetic, but a large accumulator, was described by Kirchner and Kulisch; a hardware implementation was described by Müller, Rüb and Rülling.

Possible invalidation by compiler optimization
In principle, a sufficiently aggressive optimizing compiler could destroy the effectiveness of Kahan summation: for example, if the compiler simplified expressions according to the associativity rules of real arithmetic, it might "simplify" the second step in the sequence

to

and then to

thus eliminating the error compensation. In practice, many compilers do not use associativity rules (which are only approximate in floating-point arithmetic) in simplifications, unless explicitly directed to do so by compiler options enabling "unsafe" optimizations,   although the Intel C++ Compiler is one example that allows associativity-based transformations by default. The original K&R C version of the C programming language allowed the compiler to re-order floating-point expressions according to real-arithmetic associativity rules, but the subsequent ANSI C standard prohibited re-ordering in order to make C better suited for numerical applications (and more similar to Fortran, which also prohibits re-ordering), although in practice compiler options can re-enable re-ordering, as mentioned above.

A portable way to inhibit such optimizations locally is to break one of the lines in the original formulation into two statements, and make two of the intermediate products volatile: function KahanSum(input) var sum = 0.0 var c = 0.0 for i = 1 to input.length do var y = input[i] - c        volatile var t = sum + y         volatile var z = t - sum c = z - y        sum = t     next i     return sum

Support by libraries
In general, built-in "sum" functions in computer languages typically provide no guarantees that a particular summation algorithm will be employed, much less Kahan summation. The BLAS standard for linear algebra subroutines explicitly avoids mandating any particular computational order of operations for performance reasons, and BLAS implementations typically do not use Kahan summation. The standard library of the Python computer language specifies an fsum function for accurate summation. Starting with Python 3.12, the built-in "sum" function uses the Neumaier summation.

In the Julia language, the default implementation of the  function does pairwise summation for high accuracy with good performance, but an external library provides an implementation of Neumaier's variant named   for the cases when higher accuracy is needed.

In the C# language, HPCsharp nuget package implements the Neumaier variant and pairwise summation: both as scalar, data-parallel using SIMD processor instructions, and parallel multi-core.

title: Kahan summation algorithm


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Björneborg

Björneborg may refer to:

 * Björneborg, Sweden
 * the Swedish name of Pori, city of Finland

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

title: Björneborg


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Brändö

Brändö is an island municipality of Åland, Finland. Characteristics of Brändö are the numerous assembly of islands and islets, most important of which are linked by bridges and causeways. The municipality has a population of 0 and covers an area of undefined km2 of which undefined km2 is water. The population density is undefined PD/km2. The municipality is unilingually Swedish and NaN of the population are Swedish speakers.

Villages
In 1967, Brändö had 12 legally recognized villages (henkikirjakylät):

 * Asterholma
 * Baggholma
 * Björnholma
 * Brändö
 * Fiskö
 * Hullberga
 * Jurmo
 * Korsö
 * Lappo
 * Porsskär
 * Torsholma
 * Åva

Demographics
In 2020, 8.9% of the population of Brändö was under the age of 15, 58.1% were aged 15 to 64, and 33.0% were over the age of 65. The average age was 52.2, over the national average of 43.4 and regional average of 43.8. Speakers of Swedish made up 71.7% of the population and speakers of Finnish made up 18.9%, while the share of speakers of foreign languages was 9.4%. Foreign nationals made up 9.8% of the total population. Brändö has no urban areas.

The chart below, describing the development of the total population of Brändö from 1975 to 2020, encompasses the municipality's area as of 2021.

Economy
In 2018, 20.9% of the workforce of Brändö worked in primary production (agriculture, forestry and fishing), 11.5% in secondary production (e.g. manufacturing, construction and infrastructure), and 58.8% in services. In 2019, the unemployment rate was 1.0%, and the share of pensioners in the population was 36.2%.

The five largest employers in Brändö in 2019 were as follows:

 * 1) Brändö Lax Ab, 35 employees
 * 2) Municipality of Brändö, 32 employees
 * 3) Brändö Bygg Ab, 8 employees
 * 4) Brändö Andelshandel, 5 employees
 * 5) Brändö Fritidsservice Ab, 5 employees

Interesting facts
The Brändö municipality was sponsor of the Ukraine men's national bandy team at the 2017 Bandy World Championship.

title: Brändö


text:
Anthony Lake

William Anthony Kirsopp Lake (born April 2, 1939) is an American diplomat and political advisor who served as the 17th United States National Security Advisor from 1993 to 1997 and as the sixth Executive Director of UNICEF from 2010 to 2017.

He has been a foreign policy advisor to many Democratic U.S. presidents and presidential candidates, and served as National Security Advisor under U.S. President Bill Clinton from 1993 to 1997. Lake is credited as being one of the individuals who developed the policy that led to the resolution of the Bosnian War. He also held the chair of Distinguished Professor in the Practice of Diplomacy at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, in Washington, D.C.

Early life
Lake is the grandson of Kirsopp Lake, a member of the Church of England clergy who moved to the United States from Oxford, England, in 1914, to teach New Testament studies at Harvard. Lake's father, Gerard Kirsopp Lake, was a New Deal Democrat, and his mother, Eleanor (née van Someren Hard), a Republican.

Lake himself was born in New York City. He attended Middlesex School and Harvard College, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1961. Lake studied international economics at Trinity College, Cambridge for two years and later received a PhD from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University in 1974 after completing a doctoral dissertation titled "Caution and concern: the making of American policy toward South Africa, 1946-1971." He later (in 2001) co-edited a festschrift for his Princeton mentor, Richard H. Ullman.

Lake was good friends with Richard Holbrooke whom he met in Vietnam while both of them were in the foreign service. They frequently visited each other and Lake aided Holbrooke throughout the early years of his career. They grew apart when Holbrooke had an affair with Lake's wife. Although this did not initially end their companionship, they rarely spoke, and by the time Lake became National Security Advisor, their friendship was over.

Career
Lake joined the State Department in 1962, serving until 1970 as a Foreign Service Officer. Lake was an assistant to Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. during the Vietnam War. His State Department career included assignments as consul at the U.S. Embassy in Saigon, South Vietnam (1963), vice consul in Huế (1964–1965) and special assistant to the assistant to the president for national security affairs (1969–1970) in the Nixon administration. In 1969, he accompanied National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger on his first secret meeting with North Vietnamese negotiators in Paris. In 1970, he had a falling-out with Kissinger over the Nixon administration's Cambodian Campaign and left the State Department as a result. He later wrote a book critical of Kissinger's approach to Africa.

Lake worked for Democratic U.S. Senator Edmund Muskie of Maine in his 1972 presidential campaign. After Muskie lost the nomination to George McGovern, Lake served briefly at the Carnegie Endowment and International Voluntary Services before returning to serve as Director of Policy Planning under Jimmy Carter (1977–1981).

After Carter lost the 1980 election to Ronald Reagan, Lake became the Five College Professor of International Relations chair in Massachusetts (1981–1992), teaching first at Amherst College. In 1984, he moved to Mount Holyoke College, where he taught courses on the Vietnam War, Third World revolutions, and American foreign policy. (He left Mount Holyoke College in 1993 to become National Security Advisor from 1993 to 1997.) Among his protegees at Mount Holyoke was his student research assistant Mona Sutphen who would later serve in the Barack Obama White House as Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy. In 1997, he became Distinguished Professor in the Practice of Diplomacy at Georgetown University, until accepting his position with UNICEF.

During the 1992 presidential campaign, he was one of Clinton's chief foreign policy advisers. Lake later served as National Security Advisor (1993–1997). In the aftermath of the Cold War, Lake advocated a policy of "enlargement" of the number free market democracies. Told by the White House to sell his stocks in energy companies when he took the office in 1993, Lake did not do so. When Clinton decided in 1994 to allow Iran to arm the Bosnian army, Lake admitted he made a mistake when he didn't push to inform Congress of the decision.

Director of Central Intelligence nomination
Following Clinton's 1996 re-election, he nominated Lake to become the Director of Central Intelligence, but his nomination was withdrawn due to Republican opposition. It has also been reported that the failure of his nomination was related to his decision to withdraw support at the last minute for an Iraqi coup that might have removed Saddam Hussein without U.S. intervention. However, others have speculated that Lake's nomination "failed, in part, because Lake stated in a television interview that he was not sure if Alger Hiss was guilty."

After the withdrawal of his CIA nomination, Lake became White House Special Envoy (1998–2000). As special envoy Lake mediated the drafting of the Algiers Agreement, ending the Eritrean-Ethiopian War.

Lake co-founded Intellibridge Corporation in 2000 with David Rothkopf. In 2005 the assets of Intellibridge were acquired by the Eurasia Group.

Lake was a foreign policy adviser for Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign, having endorsed him over Senator Hillary Clinton, whom he had worked alongside during the Clinton administration. Lake was considered a potential Secretary of State until Senator Clinton was named to the position.

UNICEF
On March 16, 2010, Lake was named by United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon as the next Executive Director of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), following his nomination by U.S. President Barack Obama.

On April 30, 2010, he officially entered the post, succeeding Ann Veneman, a former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture. On May 2, 2014, he was reappointed Executive Director of UNICEF by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and served through the end of 2017.

At UNICEF, he was active at effort to refocus investment towards the most disadvantaged children, and reducing child mortality.

Other activities
Lake was an advisory board member for the Partnership for a Secure America, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to recreating the bipartisan center in American national security and foreign policy. He has also served as chair on the boards of the United States Fund for UNICEF and the Marshall Legacy Institute. He also is serving a term from 2005-2010 on the Mount Holyoke College Board of Trustees.

For many years Lake served on the Board of Trustees for St. Mary's College of Maryland. He played key roles in the establishment of the Center for the Study of Democracy at the college, where he also served on the advisory board.

Religion
Lake was raised in the Congregational Church, but recounts that he "embarked on his spiritual journey as a young man," first converting to the Episcopal Church. However, since then he had "long been drawn to Judaism," and "began to feel strongly that I wanted to be part of that community." He ultimately converted to Judaism in 2005, before marrying Julie T. Katzman, currently the Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of the Inter-American Development Bank. He credits Katzman's religious faith as the impetus responsible for his decision to investigate his attraction to Judaism more fully, and began studying with former Navy Chaplain Rabbi Arnold Resnicoff (who was serving with him on the Board of Trustees of the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs) for a full year before his conversion. Later, Resnicoff officiated at his marriage to Katzman.

However, Lake jokes that he was Jewish in the eyes of others well before his formal conversion. First, in 1997, when news broke that Secretary of State Madeleine Albright had discovered that she had Jewish ancestors, and a story about other Jews in the Administration mistakenly reported that Clinton's "entire national security team was Jewish." Based on that news story, Lake recounts, his name was added to the list used by the White House Liaison to the Jewish community, and Lake began to receive invitations to special events, such as the White House Hanukkah Party—and he says he was delighted to accept those invitations. The second time was two years later, when a 1999 Washington Post story described a new release of Watergate tapes of conversations between President Richard Nixon and H.R. Haldeman, his Chief of Staff. Those tapes included a conversation where Nixon asks if Lake is Jewish, and Haldeman responds, "Well, I'm not so sure, but he looks Jewish." Based on these tapes, Lake has said that, "Now I can trace my [Jewish] heritage all the way back to Nixon!"

Personal life
Lake was married to Antonia Plehn from 1962 to 1995; they had three children.

In 2000, Lake began a relationship with investment banker Julie Katzman. They married in 2005, and Lake converted to Judaism the same year.

Books authored

 * More Than Humanitarianism : A Strategic U.S. Approach Toward Africa (2006, co-author with Christine Todd Whitman)
 * 6 Nightmares: The Real Threats to American Security (2001)
 * The Real and the Ideal: Essays on International Relations in Honor of Richard Ullman (2001, co-edited)
 * After the Wars: Reconstruction in Afghanistan, Central America, Indochina, the Horn of Africa, and Southern Africa (1990, editor)
 * Somoza Falling: A Case Study of Washington at Work (1989)
 * Third World Radical Regimes: U.S. Policy Under Carter and Reagan (1985)
 * Our Own Worst Enemy: The Unmaking of American Foreign Policy (1984, co-author)
 * The "Tar Baby" Option: American Policy Toward Southern Rhodesia (1976).
 * Legacy of Vietnam: The War, American Society, and the Future of U.S. Foreign Policy (1976, contributing editor)

Honours

 * JPN Kyokujitsu-sho 1Class BAR.svg Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun (2018)

title: Anthony Lake


text:
Ninian Stephen

Sir Ninian Martin Stephen, (15 June 1923 – 29 October 2017) was an English-born Australian judge who served as the 20th governor-general of Australia, in office from 1982 to 1989. He was previously a justice of the High Court of Australia from 1972 to 1982.

Stephen was born in England to Scottish parents. As a child he lived for periods in France, Germany, Scotland, and Switzerland, eventually arriving in Australia at the age of 16. Stephen served with the Australian Army during World War II, and after the war entered the legal profession. He became one of Australia's leading constitutional lawyers. Stephen was appointed to the Supreme Court of Victoria in 1970, and then to the High Court in 1972, aged 48. He was considered a member of the court's "moderate centre". In 1982, Stephen was appointed governor-general on the recommendation of Malcolm Fraser. He approved two double dissolutions during his time in office, the only governor-general to do so. After his term expired, Stephen remained active in public life as a conservationist and member of various international tribunals. He died at the age of 94, making him Australia's longest-lived governor-general.

Early life
Stephen was born in Nettlebed, Oxfordshire, England, to Scottish parents, Barbara (née Cruickshank) and Frederick Brown Stephen. His father, a chauffeur, poultry farmer and motorcycle courier in World War I, left the family shortly after his birth, emigrating to Canada and starting a new family; his son was told that he had died, and did not learn the truth until 2003. Stephen's mother, formerly a lady's maid was a paid companion for Nina Mylne, the wealthy heiress of the Queensland pastoralist Graham Mylne; his given name was in her honour. During his early childhood, the three of them lived for periods in Switzerland (Geneva where he was christened and Montreaux), France (Paris, Cannes, and Saint-Cast-le-Guildo) and Germany (Wiesbaden), where Mylne took him to Nuremberg for the 1938 Reichsparteitag Grossdeutschland (5-12 September) which he photographed. They eventually moved to Edinburgh in 1929 so Stephen could begin his formal schooling.

Mylne paid for Stephen's education, which took place in Scotland (George Watson's College and Edinburgh Academy), London (St Paul's School), and Switzerland (Chillon College, Montreux). He and Mylne generally traveled together, while his mother remained in Scotland and ran a boardinghouse. In 1940, the three of them moved to Melbourne to avoid the war, booking first into the Oriental Hotel then taking a flat in Linden Hall opposite Scotch College which Stephen attended for two terms, and was then accepted into the University of Melbourne to study law.

Second World War
In December 1941, following the end of his first year at university, Stephen enlisted in the Citizens Military Force to serve part-time in the Melbourne University Regiment. Following Japan's entry into World War II, Stephen completed full-time military training from 8 December 1941 to 15 February 1942 and was then posted to the 10th Field Regiment, Royal Australian Artillery, serving in Western Australia. He subsequently transferred to the Second Australian Imperial Force. In late 1943, Stephen transferred to the Royal Australian Engineers, serving in New Guinea from April to August 1944 with the 43rd Australian Water Transport Company. He then attended courses, culminating in a commissioning course in April 1945. As a lieutenant, he served in the 41st Australian Landing Craft Company in New Guinea and New Britain. In August 1945, he was posted to Labuan, Borneo, arriving after the war's end and serving there until January 1946. After returning to Australia, he was discharged on 5 February 1946.

Legal career
Stephen completed his studies after the war's end, and was admitted to the Victorian Bar in 1949. By the 1960s, he had become one of Australia's leading constitutional and commercial lawyers. He was made a Queen's Counsel in 1966.

Judicial career
On 30 June 1970, Stephen was appointed as a judge of the Supreme Court of Victoria. He held this position until 29 February 1972, relinquishing it to take up his appointment as a justice of the High Court of Australia. Sworn of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom in 1979 and sat as a member of its Judicial Committee.

Although Stephen was appointed to the High Court by a Liberal government, he proved not to be a traditional conservative upholder of states' rights. He joined the "moderate centre" of the court, between the arch-conservatism of Sir Garfield Barwick and the radicalism of Lionel Murphy. In 1982 he was part of the majority that decided on a broad interpretation of the "external affairs power" of the Australian constitution in the Koowarta v Bjelke-Petersen case.

Governor-general
In March 1982, Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser announced that Queen Elizabeth II had approved his recommendation of Sir Ninian Stephen to succeed Sir Zelman Cowen as Governor-General of Australia. His appointment was praised by both sides of politics. He was sworn in on 29 July 1982, the first former High Court justice to become governor-general since Sir Isaac Isaacs in 1931. When Fraser was defeated by the Labor Party under Bob Hawke in 1983, Stephen had no difficulty working with a Labor government. In 1987, his term was extended by 18 months as a mark of personal respect and also to allow Bill Hayden (to whom Hawke had promised the position) to leave politics at a time of his choosing. Stephen is the only governor-general to have approved two double dissolutions – in 1983 (for Fraser) and 1987 (for Hawke).

Later work
In 1989, Stephen became Australia's first Ambassador for the Environment and, in his three-year term, was particularly energetic in working for a ban of mining in Antarctica. In 1990 he became the chair of the Australian Antarctic Foundation, based in Hobart, and subsequently also became the chair of the Constitutional Centenary Foundation, based in Melbourne, which was established following the 1991 Constitutional Centenary Conference. In 1991, he undertook a  difficult task when he was appointed chairman of the second strand of the Northern Ireland peace talks. From 1991 to 1995, he was a judge ad hoc of the International Court of Justice in the case East Timor (Portugal v. Australia) 1991–1995. From 1993 to 1997, he was a judge on the international tribunals investigating war crimes in Yugoslavia and Rwanda. He also served as chairman of the Australian Citizenship Council from 1998. In 1994, he acted as a special envoy of the UN Secretary General to resolve political conflicts in Bangladesh.

Stephen later moved back into the legal field, becoming president of an arbitral tribunal constituted under Chapter 11 of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), charged with the adjudication of an investment dispute between Mondev, a Canadian investor, and the United States.

A detailed scholarly biography of Stephen, Fortunate Voyager by Philip Ayres, was released in September 2013. Drawing upon it, Ayres also summarised Stephen's career for the Victorian Bar News.

Honours
Stephen was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE) on 20 April 1972 "for distinguished services to the Law", and sworn of the Privy Council in 1979. As governor-general he was made a Knight of the Order of Australia (AK), Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George (GCMG) and Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order (GCVO). In 1994 Queen Elizabeth II appointed him a Knight Companion of the Order of the Garter (KG), being the most recent Australian to be granted a knighthood in the personal gift of the monarch of Australia. He therefore had the unusual distinction of holding six separate knighthoods and joined Lord Casey and Sir Paul Hasluck as one of the few Australian Knights Companion of the Order of the Garter. In 1983 he was named a Commandeur of the French Légion d'honneur.

Stephen delivered the first Sir Ninian Stephen Lecture at the University of Newcastle's law school in 1993, giving his name to this lecture series.

Personal life and death
In June 1949, Stephen married Valery Mary Sinclair (4 July 1925 – 3 November 2019) and they had five daughters. Stephen and his wife were patrons of the Australian Inland Botanic Gardens. He died in Melbourne on 29 October 2017, aged 94. A state funeral for Stephen was held on 8 November at St Paul's Cathedral, Melbourne.

title: Ninian Stephen


text:
Český Těšín

Český Těšín (Czeski Cieszyn; Tschechisch-Teschen) is a town in Karviná District in the Moravian-Silesian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 23,000 inhabitants.

Český Těšín lies on the west bank of the Olza river, in the heart of the historical region of Cieszyn Silesia. Until the 1920 division of the region between Poland and Czechoslovakia it was just a western suburb of the town of Teschen, which after the division fell to Poland as Cieszyn. The combined population of the Czech and Polish parts of the town is around 57,000 (23,500 in Český Těšín, 33,500 in Cieszyn).

The historic centre in Český Těšín is well preserved and is protected by law as an urban monument zone.

Administrative parts
The town parts and villages of Dolní Žukov, Horní Žukov, Koňákov, Mistřovice, Mosty and Stanislavice are administrative parts of Český Těšín.

Geography
Český Těšín is located about 12 km south of Karviná and 23 km east of Ostrava. It lies on the border with Poland in the historical region of Cieszyn Silesia and is a twin city with the Polish city of Cieszyn. The town is situated in the Moravian-Silesian Foothills, on the left bank of the Olza River. The highest point is the hill Šachta at 427 m above sea level.

History
The first written mention of Těšín is from 1155, when a castle called Tescin was mentioned in a deed of Pope Adrian IV. In 1290, the settlement was first referred to as a town.

The area was originally a small western suburb of the town of Cieszyn, the capital of the Duchy of Cieszyn, which was established in 1290, during the fragmentation of Poland into smaller duchies. It was ruled by the Piast dynasty until 1653, and by the Habsburg dynasty afterwards. Under Austrian rule, it was known under its Germanized name Teschen. It was known for its national and cultural diversity, consisting mostly of German, Polish, Jewish and Czech communities. In 1849, the western part of Teschen was home to only 14.9% of the town's total population: in 1880 24% and in 1910 33.4%. There was also a small but lively Hungarian community in the town, mostly officers and administrative workers.

From 1870 (when the Košice–Bohumín Railway was put into operation) until 1914, there was a construction boom and the districts that forms the today's Český Těšín were built.

According to the Austrian census of 1910, Teschen had 22,489 inhabitants, 13,254 (61.5%) of them were German-speaking, 6,832 (31.7%) were Polish-speaking and 1,437 (6.6%) were Czech-speaking. The most populous religious groups were Roman Catholics with 15,138 (67.3%) followed by Protestants with 5,174 (23%) and the Jews with 2,112 (9.4%).

Following the fall of Austria-Hungary, Czech and Polish local governments were established. Both of them claimed that the whole of Cieszyn Silesia belonged to Czechoslovakia or Poland respectively. To calm down the friction which developed, the local governments concluded an interim agreement on division of the area running along ethnic lines. The division line imposed by the interim agreement was seen as unacceptable by the central Czechoslovak government, mainly because the crucial railway connecting the Czech lands with eastern Slovakia was controlled by Poland, and access to that railway was vital for Czechoslovakia at that time.

Despite the division being only interim, Poland decided to organize elections to the Sejm (Polish parliament) in the area. To prevent this, Czechoslovakia decided to attack the Polish part of the region on 23 January 1919. After the Polish–Czechoslovak War, Czechoslovakia forced Poland, which was at that time at war also with the West Ukrainian National Republic, to withdraw from the larger part of the area. After a ceasefire, the entire area was divided by the decision of the Spa Conference from July 1920, thus in practice creating the Trans-Olza area, leaving a sizable Polish minority on the Czech side and dividing the town of Cieszyn between the two states.

Český Těšín was then the centre of Český Těšín District, existing in the years 1920–1938 and 1945–1960.

In 1938, following the Munich Agreement allowing the German annexation of the Sudetenland, Poland coerced Czechoslovakia to surrender the region of Trans-Olza (including Český Těšín). Following negotiations with Czech authorities, Polish troops and authorities entered it on 2 October 1938, and the territory was annexed by Poland and again joined to Cieszyn. After the German invasion of Poland in 1939, the entire territory was annexed by Nazi Germany. In 1941, Nazi Germany established the Stalag VIII-D prisoner-of-war camp for Polish, French, Belgian, British and Serbian POWs, which in September 1942 was converted into a subcamp of the Stalag VIII-B camp. After the war, the sizeable German-speaking community was expelled in accordance with the Potsdam Agreement, and the 1920 borders were restored.

Jewish community
The first Jews in the area of Český Těšín were first documented in the early 18th century. The oldest Jewish prayer houses had existed in Český Těšín since the early 20th century. It was run by the Schomre Schabos (Guardians of Shabbat) society. After 1869 the Jewish minority increased rapidly and in 1914 they made up 40% of the Těšín population. They significantly contributed to the establishment, development and maintenance of trade contacts with neighbouring countries.

After the division of Teschen in 1920, there were no synagogues and cemetery in the Czech part of the town, and new ones had to be established. The Jewish Community of Český Těšín was established in 1923.

In 1938, there was a sizeable Jewish minority in the town, about 1,500 in Cieszyn and 1,300 in Český Těšín. Nearly all of them were killed by Nazi Germany in concentration camps. Most of the synagogues were destroyed. Today, only one synagogue still stands in the town, used as a Polish cultural centre.

Demographics
As of 2021, the Poles make up 14.3% of the town's population,. The town is an important cultural and educational centre of the Polish minority in the Czech Republic. The number of Poles is however decreasing as a result of continuing assimilation. Although a border town, there is no longer any real ethnic tension between Czechs and Poles.

Religion
The diversity of the town is not only ethnic, but also religious. Many Christian denominations are present in the town. In the past a large Jewish community lived there. According to the 2021 census, 31.6% of the population is religious, out of whom 34.4% are Roman Catholics, and 3.7% are Czech Brethren.

Economy
The largest industrial employer based in the town is Kovona System, which is engaged in production of metal products. It employs about 800 people. The second notable industrial company is Finidr, one of the biggest producers of hardback and paperback books in Central Europe with about 600 employers.

Culture
Těšín Theatre has Czech and Polish ensembles, where plays are presented in both the Czech and Polish languages. It is one of the few theatres outside Poland which has a professional Polish ensemble.

Education
Alongside several Czech primary schools and one gymnasium, the town has both a Polish primary school and a gymnasium. The Pedagogical Centre for Polish National Education in Český Těšín takes care of the needs of schools with the Polish teaching language in the Czech Republic.

Sights
There is six church buildings in the town. The oldest is the Neo-Gothic Catholic Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, built by architect Ludwig Satzky in 1893–1894.

After the division of Teschen in 1920, there were no Lutheran churches in Český Těšín. In 1927 the local German population built a Lutheran church in the town, and in 1932 the second Lutheran church was built. The church of the Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren was constructed in 1929.

In 1928–1929 the Jewish community built a new synagogue on Breitegasse Street, which is to date the only synagogue in the town which still stands. It was the only synagogue not destroyed by Nazis due to its proximity to other residential buildings. In 1967 the building was bought by the Polish Cultural and Educational Union. It is not protected as a cultural monument. Together with fragment of the Jewish cemetery, which was established in 1926, it is the only Jewish monument in the town.

The railway station was built in the Neo-Renaissance style in 1889 and belongs to the most valuable railway station buildings in the country.

The town hall is the landmark of the town square. The 54 m-long building was built in 1928.

Český Těšín is home to the Museum of Cieszyn Silesia, founded in 1948.

Notable people

 * Jiří Třanovský (1592–1637), Protestant scholar and poet
 * Simon R. Blatteis (1876–1968), New York pathologist
 * Viktor Ullmann (1898–1944), Jewish composer and musician
 * Ludvík Aškenazy (1921–1986), Jewish writer
 * Terry Haass (1923–2016), French painter
 * František Vláčil (1924–1999), film director
 * Jaromír Hanzlík (born 1948), actor
 * Jiří Drahoš (born 1949), chemist and politician
 * Jaromír Nohavica (born 1953), musician; lived here
 * Luděk Čajka (1963–1990), ice hockey player

Twin towns – sister cities
Český Těšín is twinned with:
 * 🇵🇱 Cieszyn, Poland
 * 🇸🇰 Rožňava, Slovakia

title: Český Těšín


text:
Blanaid Salkeld

Blánaid Salkeld (born Florence Ffrench Mullen; 1880 – 1959) was an Irish poet, dramatist, actor, and publisher, whose well-known literary salon was attended by, among others, Patrick Kavanagh and Flann O'Brien.

Early life and family
Salkeld was born Florence Ffrench Mullen in Chittagong on 10 August 1880, and grew up in Dublin on Fitzwilliam Street. Her father, Lt Colonel Jarlath ffrench-Mullen, a doctor in the Indian Medical Service, was a friend of Rabindranath Tagore and also introduced her to the poetry of Keats. She had at least one brother, Padraic. She married Henry Salkeld in 1902 and spent the next six years in India with her husband, who worked in the Indian Civil Service, living in Dacca and Bombay. She returned to Dublin with her son Cecil, in 1910 following the death of her husband in 1909. Though some accounts have Salkeld back in Dublin as early as 1906.

Career
In Dublin, she joined the Abbey Players as an actor, using the Irish form of her name, Blánaid (then spelled Blathnaid) and the stage name Nell Byrne. She played the lead role in George Fitzmaurice's three-act play The Country Dressmaker. She started writing verse plays in the 1930s, and one of these, Scarecrow Over the Corn, was staged in 1941 at the Gate Theatre with stage sets designed by Louis le Brocquy. Salkeld contributed numerous book reviews to The Dublin Magazine, Irish Writing, and The Bell. She translated Akhmatova, Bruisov, Blok, and Pushkin from the Russian into English. The salons she hosted in her home were frequented by Kate O'Brien, Arland Ussher, Patrick Kavanagh, Flann O'Brien, and Micheál Mac Liammóir. Her first volume of poetry, Hello Eternity, was praised by Samuel Beckett. She founded the Irish Women's Writers' Club with Dorothy Macardle in 1933.

She co-founded the Gayfield Press with her son, Cecil, in 1937. It operated from the garden shed at their home at 43 Morehampton Road until 1946. The press was a small Adana wooden hand press. The Salkelds later loaned the press to Liam and Josephine Miller in 1951, with which they founded the Dolmen Press.

During the preparations for the Easter Rising, a room on the first floor of 130 St Stephen's Green which she had lent to Thomas MacDonagh was his headquarters.

Salkeld died in Dublin in 1959. Her granddaughter Beatrice married Brendan Behan. Her work is considered overlooked within the canon of early 20th century Irish poetry, as it was neither of the Celtic revival or modernist.

Poetry
Salkeld published five books of poetry:

 * Hello, Eternity (Elkin Mathews 1933)
 * A Dubliner (Dublin: Gayfield 1942)
 * The Fox’s Covert (JM Dent 1935)
 * The engine is left running (Gayfield 1937)
 * Experiment In Error (Aldington, Kent: Hand & Flower Press 1955)

title: Blanaid Salkeld


text:
AutoREALM

AutoREALM is an open source program designed to draw maps for role-playing games, mainly in fantasy settings. The program is similar to the commercial Campaign Cartographer.

AutoREALM, in its 2.x series, is primarily written in Delphi and only works in Windows and Wine. Work is underway to recode the GUI to use wxWidgets and extending the support to Linux, FreeBSD and Mac OS X.

The program is a vector art program that supports various graphics layers. The program supports various kinds of grids and measurement methods. It supports drawing vector objects with both straight and fractal lines, and has various line styles. It also supports grouping of objects into map symbols that are arranged in a symbol library. The library shipping with the program includes various symbols from contributors.

The program also has some other modules, such as AutoNAME, a name generator based on context-free grammars.

title: AutoREALM


text:
Great Eastern Islamic Raiders' Front

The Great Eastern Islamic Raiders' Front (İslami Büyükdoğu Akıncılar Cephesi in Turkish, abbreviated İBDA-C) is an Islamist militant organization. The group's self-proclaimed goal is to dismantle Turkey and form the State of Grandsublime (Başyücelik Devleti), a Sunni Islamic federate state in the Middle East. They are notably hostile to Shia, Alevi, Christian and Jewish interests. IBDA-C carries on its pro-Islamic legacy with a newly born radicalism that wishes to restore religious rule to Turkey of whose government it finds illegal with an added willingness to commit acts of terrorism.

IBDA-C has a history of claiming credit for attacks most experts believe are beyond its capabilities, such as the November 2003 and July 2008 attacks on diplomatic, business, and religious interests in Istanbul. As such, its designation with the United States government continues to be as an "Other Terrorist Group", as opposed to the better-organized and -financed groups designated as official "Designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations".

History
IBDA-C was founded in 1970 by Salih İzzet Erdiş, better known as Salih Mirzabeyoğlu. The group moved from rhetoric to violence in the 1990s, culminating in a series of 90 bombings and attacks in 1994.

Salih İzzet Erdiş, a spiritual follower of Kısakürek, was captured on Dec. 31, 1998, and sentenced to death in April 2001 for "attempting to overthrow Turkey's secular state by force". His lawyer, Ahmet Arslan, maintained that his client was no more than "a man of thought", arguing that there was a lack of concrete evidence supporting the charges. Erdiş's death sentence was later commuted when Ankara abolished the death penalty in August 2002.

In August 2003, Erdiş claimed responsibility for his crimes and attributed his actions to "mind control", seeking help from the Forensic Medicine Institute in Turkey. In March 2004, a Turkish court sentenced Erdiş to 20-years in prison for using handmade explosives and weapons in a riot against authorities at Metris Prison.

Following the imprisonment of Erdiş, IBDA-C continued its activities, being most heavily active in the Istanbul region, attacking bars, discothèques, and churches. Members of IBDA-C don't operate under any defined hierarchical structure, and carry out actions in small independent groups that are united behind their common goals and ideologies.

Doctrine

The Great East Islamic Raiders Front comprises Turkish Sunni Jihadis, a contingent roughly defined as those who are willing to take up arms for the faith of Islam. Viewing Turkey's secular governmental system as "illegal," IBDA-C wishes to destroy the secular state and constitutional system and replace it with religious rule and law, first in Turkey, and then throughout the world. The group has gone about asserting these goals by inflicting armed terror primarily on civilian targets. IBDA-C shares ideological ties with Al-Qaeda.

Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, whom IBDA-C borrows its core ideology from, advocated a return to "pure Islamic values" and the restoration of a universal Islamic caliphate in the Muslim world. His system of thought, Büyük Doğu, was an absolutist ideology promising to bring Muslims closer to success and salvation, with the central idea that truth is only accessible through the practice of Islam. He also argued that the secular nature of Turkey was responsible for the state's inability to ward off what he saw as Western imperialism. Kısakürek was seen as the pioneer of "ideal Islamic society" by the founders of IBDA-C.

The 2003 Istanbul bombings provide the strongest implication of ties between IBDA-C and Al-Qaeda, although the exact nature of their cooperation remains unclear. Al-Qaeda may have acted merely as an outside support base, or possibly in tandem with IBDA-C in terms of planning and execution. Some, on the other hand, assert that IBDA-C had no involvement at all; contradicting reports from the Turkish media solely credit al-Qaeda with the attacks, implying that IBDA-C did not have the means to carry out such a sophisticated act of terrorism. Indeed, IBDA-C showed no willingness to exercise suicide terrorism prior to November 2003. Regardless of whether or not IBDA-C actively participated in these particular attacks, the attention received provided the group with a heightened level of international infamy, as they were previously not well known at the global level.

Despite Al-Qaeda's similar aims and superior stature as an international terrorist organization, IBDA-C views itself as the quintessential Islamic revivalist movement toward which all others should dedicate their resources. In addition to committing terrorist attacks, the organization also produces propagandist literature put out in bookstores and on the Internet, which has the potential to attract new members, including those from other countries.

In December 2003, the German newspaper Der Spiegel reported that the group could count on as many as 600 supporters in Germany. In another report regarding the possible German contingent, a Turkish rail worker claimed, "Istanbul was nothing. The major butchery is yet to come." Although IBDA-C is thought to have supporters throughout Western Europe, the group has not performed any significant terrorist attacks there since their alleged actions in Istanbul. The number of extremist supporters actively participating in IBDA-C's terrorist plots is not known, but thought to be small.

IBDA-C has kept relatively quiet in 2004, although seven members of the group were indicted in June for the murder of a Turkish cult leader, Col. tr:İhsan Güven and his wife. Burak Çileli, one of the defendants, is said to have described Güven contemptuously in IBDA-C literature, calling him a "pervert," a "Jewish sympathizer," and "pro-American." The accused were apparently angered that the murders were not immediately reported by the press, claiming that they also had plans to attack a TV talk show host and columnist named Savas Ay in order to heighten publicity for their organization.

IBDA-C is not an organization to be taken lightly, but it can perhaps be said to have a dubious future as its leader, Erdiş, sits in prison, and the group has no clearly defined hierarchical structure. By the same token, the lack of organized centrality makes the group more elusive and difficult to eliminate, much like al-Qaeda. IBDA-C will continue to be a threat if it is able to sustain external spheres of support, especially from other terrorist organizations such as al-Qaeda.

After Erdiş's arrest and subsequent conviction on December 29, 1998, followed by the detention of many lower-ranking figures in the group, IBDA-C's activity seemed to quiet down. However, IBDA-C burst back into the headlines when it claimed responsibility for the dual synagogue bombing in Istanbul on November 15, 2003, which killed 24 and injured 255, as well as a subsequent attack on the HSBC Bank and British consulate on November 20, 2003 (see 2003 Istanbul bombings). The second claim called the bombings a joint attack with Al Qaeda; the authenticity of the claim is disputed.

On November 29, police in Istanbul announced the arrest of a yet-unnamed man they stated had admitted to giving the order to suicide bombers to attack Beth Israel synagogue on November 15.

Designation as a terrorist organisation
The organisation is listed among the 12 active terrorist organisations in Turkey as of 2007 according to Counter-Terrorism and Operations Department of Directorate General for Security (Turkish police). In December 2001, IBDA-C was labeled an "illegal organization" by the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.

It is also one of the 48 groups and entities to which European Union's Common Position 2001/931/CFSP on the application of specific measures to combat terrorism has applied. In April 2003, the U.S. Department of State (DoS) designated the group as a "terrorist group" in their annual Patterns of Global Terrorism report.

Human Resources
According to information provided by the Intelligence Resource Program of the Federation of American Scientists based on the 2003 Patterns of Global Terrorism report the strength of the organisation in terms of human resources remains unknown.

A study carried out by the Counter-Terrorism and Operations Department of Directorate General for Security over a sample of files about people convicted of being a terrorist under Turkish laws including 200 militants from the organisation and the four other currently active Islamic organisations (see reference 1) 2.5% of the members are aged 10 to 14, 72.5% 15 to 24, 17% 25 to 29, 6% 30 to 34, and 2% 35 to 64. University graduates make up 22.5% of the members, high-school graduates 40%, secondary-school graduates 14%, primary-school graduates 19%, literate non-graduates 2.5% and illiterates 1.5%.

title: Great Eastern Islamic Raiders' Front


text:
Mass-Observation

Mass-Observation is a United Kingdom social research project; originally the name of an organisation which ran from 1937 to the mid-1960s, and was revived in 1981 at the University of Sussex.

Mass-Observation originally aimed to record everyday life in Britain through a panel of around 500 untrained volunteer observers who either maintained diaries or replied to open-ended questionnaires (known as directives). The organisation also paid investigators to anonymously record people's conversation and behaviour at work, on the street and at various public occasions, including public meetings and sporting and religious events.

Origins
The creators of the Mass-Observation project were three former students from Cambridge: anthropologist Tom Harrisson (who left Cambridge before graduating), poet Charles Madge and filmmaker Humphrey Jennings. Collaborators included literary critic William Empson, photographers Humphrey Spender and Michael Wickham, collagist Julian Trevelyan, novelists Inez Pearn and G.B. Edwards, spiritualist medium Rosemary Brown, journalist Anne Symonds, and painters William Coldstream and Graham Bell. Run on a shoestring budget with money from their own pockets and the occasional philanthropic contribution or book advance, the project relied primarily on its network of volunteer correspondents.

Harrisson had set up his base in a working-class street in the northern English industrial town of Bolton (known in Mass-Observation publications as "Worktown"), in order to "systematically... record human activity in this industrial town" (Madge & Harrisson, 1938:7) using a variety of observational methods. Meanwhile, Madge, from his London home, had started to form a group of fellow-poets, artists and film-makers under the name "Mass-Observation". The two teams began their collaboration in early 1937.

An important early focus was King Edward VIII's abdication in 1936 to marry divorcée Wallis Simpson, and the succession of George VI. Dissatisfied with the pronouncements of the newspapers as to the public mood, the project's founders initiated a nationwide effort to document the feelings of the populace about important current events by collecting anecdotes, overheard comments, and "man-in-the-street" interviews on and around the coronation of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth on 12 May 1937.

Their first published report, May the Twelfth: Mass-Observation Day-Surveys 1937 by over two hundred observers was published in book form. The result tended to subvert the Government's efforts at image-making. The principal editors were Humphrey Jennings and Charles Madge, with the help of T. O. Beachcroft, Julian Blackburn, William Empson, Stuart Legg and Kathleen Raine. The 1987 reprint contains an afterword by David Pocock, director of the Tom Harrisson Mass-Observation archive.

In August 1939, Mass-Observation invited members of the public to record and send them a day-to-day account of their lives in the form of a diary. No special instructions were given to these diarists so they vary greatly in their style, content and length. 480 people responded to this invitation and their diaries are now held in the organisation's archive.

Impact
During the Second World War, Mass-Observation research was occasionally influential in shaping British public policy. In 1939 Mass-Observation publicly criticised the Ministry of Information's posters, which led to their being replaced with more appropriate ones. In addition, their study of saving habits was successfully used by John Maynard Keynes to argue for tax policy changes. During the war, there were also a few cases of Mass-Observation (MO) doing research on commission for government authorities trying to shape recruiting and war propaganda: Mary Adams, for example, employed Mass-Observation on commission for the Ministry of Information.

Decline and end
Following the war, and the departure of project founders Harrisson, Madge, and Jennings, research began to focus on the commercial habits of the country rather than the broader cultural research that characterised its first decade. This turn towards market research was formalised in 1949 when the project was incorporated as a private firm and, under new management, became registered as a market research limited company, Mass Observation (UK) Limited. Eventually the firm was merged with the advertising agency J. Walter Thompson's UK research agency BMRB, to form MRB International, followed by a full merger in the early 1990s.

Relaunch: The Mass Observation Project (1981–present)
A re-evaluation of the Mass-Observation archives led to a relaunch of the project in 1981. Today, housed at the University of Sussex, Mass-Observation continues to collect the thoughts of its panel of writers through regular questionnaires (known as directives) and is used by students, academics, media researchers and the public for its unique collection of material on everyday life in Britain. The project issues annual call-outs for day diaries on the 12th of May each year, echoing the initial call on 12th May 1937; anyone is welcome to submit a diary of their activity on this day either digitally or physically.

The Mass-Observation archive of materials is currently housed in The Keep, an archive housing East Sussex and Brighton and Hove councils' historical record.

Publications

 * Mass-Observation (Charles Madge & Tom Harrisson), Mass-Observation (pamphlet), London, Frederick Muller, 1937.
 * Charles Madge & Humphrey Jennings, eds. May the Twelfth, Mass-Observation Day-Surveys 1937, by over two hundred observers, London, Faber and Faber, 1937. ISBN 0-571-14872-7
 * Charles Madge & Tom Harrisson, First Year's Work, London, Lindsay Drummond, 1938.
 * Charles Madge & Tom Harrisson, Britain, Harmondsworth, Penguin Books, 1939.
 * Mass-Observation, War Begins at Home, London, Chatto & Windus, 1940.
 * Mass-Observation, Clothes Rationing, Advertising Service Guild, 1941
 * Mass-Observation, Home Propaganda, Advertising Service Guild, 1941
 * Mass-Observation, The Pub and the People, London, Gollancz, 1943; reprinted Seven Dials Press, 1971.
 * Mass-Observation, War Factory, London, Gollancz, 1943.
 * Mass-Observation, People's Homes, London, John Murray/Advertising Service Guild, 1943
 * Mass-Observation, The Journey Home, London, John Murray/Advertising Service Guild, 1944
 * Mass-Observation, Britain and her Birth Rate, London, John Murray/Advertising Service Guild, 1945
 * Mass-Observation, Peace and the Public - A Study, London, Longmans, Green, 1947
 * Mass-Observation (Herbert Wilcox), Juvenile Delinquency, London, Falcon press, 1949.
 * Mass-Observation (with illustrations by Ronald Searle), Meet Yourself at the Doctors, London, Naldrett Press, 1949
 * Mass-Observation (with illustrations by Ronald Searle), Meet Yourself on Sunday, London, Naldrett Press, 1949
 * Tom Harrisson, Britain Revisited, London, Gollancz, 1961.
 * Tom Harrisson, Living through the Blitz, London, Collins, 1976.

A number of publications are also available from the University of Sussex. The following selection of titles also gives some idea of the scope of Mass Observation's work:

 * Attitudes to AIDS
 * Bolton Working Class Life
 * Children's Millennium Diaries
 * Everyday use of social relaxants and stimulants
 * Gender and Nationhood
 * Britain in the Falklands War
 * Health, sickness and the work ethic, Helen Busby (2000)
 * Looking at Europe: pointers to some British attitudes
 * Researching women's lives: notes from visits to East Central Europe
 * Mass-Observation: des 'capsules' de vie quotidienne
 * One Day in the Life of Television, ed. Sean Day-Lewis (1989)
 * Sex surveyed, 1949–1994 – The actual Mass-Observation survey was called Little Kinsey; the results were published in a book by Liz Stanley under the above title.
 * Pub and the People: A Worktown study ed. Tom Harrisson (1943)
 * Weeping in the Cinema in 1950, Sue Harper and Vincent Porter (1995)

Since the archive was moved and re-established at Sussex University, a number of books based on the diaries commissioned by Mass-Observation in 1939 have been published. These include:

 * Among You Taking Notes. The Wartime Diary of Naomi Mitchison ed. Dorothy Sheridan. 1985 (Victor Gollancz). 2000 (Phoenix)
 * Our Hidden Lives, The Everyday Diaries of Forgotten Britain between 1945–48 ed. Simon Garfield 2005 (Ebury Press)
 * Love and War in London. A Woman's Diary 1939–42 by Olivia Cockett, ed. Robert Malcolmson. 2005 (Wilfrid Laurier University Press).  2008 (The History Press)
 * We Are At War. The Diaries of Five Ordinary People in Extraordinary Times ed. Simon Garfield 2006 (Ebury press)
 * Nella Last's War ed. Richard Broad and Suzie Fleming, 1981 (Falling Wall Press). 2006 (Profile Books)
 * Private Battles: How the War Almost Defeated Us ed. Simon Garfield 2007 (Ebury press)
 * Nella Last’s Peace, covering the years 1945–8. ed. Patricia and Robert Malcolmson,  2008 (Profile Books)
 * Our Longest Days - a People's History of the Second World War, an anthology ed. Sandra Koa Wing 2008 (Profile Books)
 * Wartime Women. A Mass Observation Anthology ed. Dorothy Sheridan 1990 (Heinemann). 2009 (Phoenix Press)
 * Dorset in Wartime: The Diary of Phyllis Walther 1941-1942 ed. Patricia Malcolmson and Robert Malcolmson 2009 (Dorset Record Society)

See also:

 * Hubble, Nick. Mass-Observation and Everyday Life. Houndmills-Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. 2006. ISBN 1-4039-3555-6. A history of the Mass-Observation movement from a former Research Fellow at the Mass-Observation Archive, University of Sussex, UK (from back cover).

Findings of Mass-Observation have also played a large part in such works of social history as Joe Moran's Queuing for Beginners.

title: Mass-Observation


text:
Askola

Askola is a municipality of Finland. It is located in the Uusimaa region. The municipality has a population of 0 and covers an area of undefined km2 of which undefined km2 is water. The population density is undefined PD/km2. Monninkylä is the largest village of the municipality in terms of population (1,326 inhabitants). Neighbouring municipalities are Myrskylä, Mäntsälä, Pornainen, Porvoo and Pukkila.

The municipality is unilingually Finnish. Askola is one of three municipalities in the Uusimaa region that do not have a Swedish name; the others are Nurmijärvi and Mäntsälä.

History
The Askola parish was part of Porvoo until 1639, when it became a chapel parish, and finally became independent in 1896. The Askola church was completed in 1799.

The coat of arms of the municipality seeks influence from the history of the parish; the millstone is reminiscent of the Askolas's many mills and famous breads, while the roses of the coat of arms refer to Finnish author Johannes Linnankoski, who was born and influenced in Askola, whose most famous work was The Song of the Blood-Red Flower.

Geography
The most significant waters in Askola includes the River Porvoo flowing from the center of Askola between Orimattila and Porvoo, and eleven lakes in the eastern part of the municipality.

There are no Natura 2000 sites in Askola, but instead five rock areas have been classified as nationally valuable. In one of them, Kirnukallio, are the well-known Askola's glacial potholes. The nationally valuable landscape area of the River Porvoo Valley also extends to the Askola side. Prestbacka Manor and Pappilanharju's natural reserve are also protected as cultural landscapes.

Villages
In 1967, Askola had 12 legally recognized villages (henkikirjakylät):

 * Askola
 * Huuvari
 * Juornaankylä
 * Korttia
 * Monninkylä
 * Nalkkila
 * Nieto
 * Puharonkimaa
 * Särkijärvi
 * Tiilää
 * Vahijärvi
 * Vakkola

Demographics
In 2020, 18.7% of the population of Askola was under the age of 15, 61.0% were aged 15 to 64, and 20.2% were over the age of 65. The average age was 42.3, under the national average of 43.4 but above the regional average of 41.0. Speakers of Finnish made up 93.7% of the population and speakers of Swedish made up 3.4%, while the share of speakers of foreign languages was 2.9%. Foreign nationals made up 1.8% of the total population.

The chart below, describing the development of the total population of Askola from 1975-2020, encompasses the municipality's area as of 2021.

Urban areas
In 2019, out of the total population of 4,943, 2,636 people lived in urban areas and 2,251 in sparsely populated areas, while the coordinates of 56 people were unknown. This made Askola's degree of urbanization 53.9%. The urban population in the municipality was divided between two urban areas as follows:

Services
Askola has four primary schools, and two secondary schools, as well as one vocational school. Both secondary schools also receive students from the neighboring municipality of Pukkila, which does not have its own post-primary school education.

The Askola's library operates in six locations: the church village, Monninkylä and four schools of the municipality.

Public health care is provided at the Askola Health Center.

There are only two Sale grocery stores in the municipality: one in the church village and the other in Monninkylä. Locals have also wished the municipality a third grocery store from a competing chain, such as Kesko or Lidl.

Politics
Results of the 2011 Finnish parliamentary election in Askola:

 * True Finns  32.1%
 * Centre Party  21.9%
 * National Coalition Party  16.1%
 * Social Democratic Party  14.8%
 * Green League  5.4%
 * Left Alliance  5.0%
 * Christian Democrats  1.8%
 * Swedish People's Party  1,6%

Economy
In 2018, 8.1% of the workforce of Askola worked in primary production (agriculture, forestry and fishing), 36.2% in secondary production (e.g. manufacturing, construction and infrastructure), and 53.1% in services. In 2019, the unemployment rate was 6.7%, and the share of pensioners in the population was 23.0%.

The ten largest employers in Askola in 2019 were as follows: • # TerraWise Oy, 323 employees

• # Municipality of Askola, 293 employees

• # Hakevuori Oy, 37 employees

• # Fimet Oy, 35 employees

• # Eteva kuntayhtymä, 31 employees

• # Kuljetusliike M. Lindberg Oy, 30 employees

• # SimFors Oy, 28 employees

• # Kymppirakenne Oy, 27 employees

• # Oy Meyer vastus Ab, 25 employees

• # Ginola Oy, 25 employees

People born in Askola

 * Juho Laakso (1854–1915)
 * Erkki Peltonen (1861–1942)
 * Johannes Linnankoski (1869–1913)
 * Oskar Kumpu (1889–1935)

title: Askola


text:
Bhrikuti

Bhrikuti Devi (भृकुटी, known to Tibetans as ', Bhelsa Tritsun ("Besa" Nepal lit. 'Nepali consort'), or simply, ' (lit. 'royal lady') was a princess of the Licchavi kingdom in Nepal. In c.622 Bhrikuti became the first wife and queen of the king of Tibet, Songtsen Gampo (c.605–650 CE). Bhrikuti was seen as an incarnation of Green Tara, and is credited for bringing Buddhism to Tibet, together with  the Jowo Mikyo Dorje statue for which the Jokhang Temple in Lhasa was built.

Life
Even though the historicity of Bhrikuti Devi is not certain, and no reference to her has been found among the documents discovered at Dunhuang, "there are increasing indications supporting this hypothesis." There were certainly very close relationships between Tibet and Nepal at this period and, "Such a mythological interpretation discredits in no way the historical likelihood of such a marriage...."

Many Tibetan accounts make Bhrikuti the daughter of Amshuvarma (605–621 CE), co-ruler and successor of Śivadeva I. If this is correct, the marriage to Songtsen Gampo must have taken place sometime before 624 CE. Acharya Kirti Tulku Lobsang Tenzin, however, states that Songstän Gampo married Bhrkuti Devi, the daughter of king "Angsu Varma" or Amshuvarma (Tib: Waser Gocha) of Nepal in 632.

According to some Tibetan legends, however, a Nepali king named Go Cha (identified by Sylvain Lévi as "Udayavarman", from the literal meaning of the Tibetan name) was said to have a daughter called Bri-btumn or Bhṛkuti.

"Udayavarman" was most likely the same king we know as Udayadeva, the son of Śivadeva I and later, the adopted son and heir to Aṃshuvarmā. He was also thought to be the father of Narendradeva (Tib: Miwang-Lha). If this is accepted, it means that Narendradeva and Bhrikuti Devi were brother and sister.

We do have some fairly detailed historical accounts of Narendradeva. The (Jiu) Tangshu, or Old Book of Tang, records that when the king of Nepal, the father of Licchavi king Naling Deva (or Narendradeva), died, an uncle (Yu.sna kug.ti = Vishnagupta) usurped the throne. "The Tibetans gave him [Narendradeva] refuge and reestablished him on his throne [in 641]; that is how he became subject to Tibet."

It is not known exactly when Bhrikuti married Songtsen Gampo, but it was presumably about the time that Narendradeva fled to Tibet (c. 621 CE), following Dhruvadeva's take-over of the throne (who, according to an inscription dated in 623, was ruling jointly with Jiṣṇugupta.)

Bhrikuti in Tibet
This is considered to be the oldest copy of the famous traditional history, the dBa' bzhed, states:

 * "Then during the reign of bTsan po Khri Srong btsan, after his marriage with, the daughter of the king of Nepal, the temple (gtsug lag khang) of Ra sa [Lhasa] Pe har gling was built. Furthermore, the construction of the forty-two temples of the Ru bzhi was requested and the Brag lha [temple] was built. 'Thon mi gSam po ra was sent by royal order [to India] in order to get the Indian doctrine and the model of the alphabet (yi ge'i dpe). . . ."

Bhrikuti was a devout Buddhist as was her father, and she brought many sacred buddhist images along with expert Newari craftsmen to Tibet as part of her dowry. Songtsen Gampo and Bhrikuti built the great temple, the Tsulag Khang (or 'House of Wisdom') to house the images, which is now known as the Jokhang Temple ('House of the Lord') in the heart of Lhasa, and is considered to be the most sacred temple in Tibet. Her statue of Jowo Mikyo Dorje was then housed in the Jokhang. They also built the red palace of dMar-po-ri which shifted the ancient seat of government in the Yarlung Valley at Yumbulakhang to the site of modern Lhasa. The Red Palace, or Red Fort (Mar-po-ri Pho-drang) on Marpo Ri (Red Mountain) in Lhasa that was later rebuilt into the thirteen storey Potala by the Fifth Dalai Lama, was originally constructed by Nepali craftsmen. She also had constructed the Tub-wang and other statues in Samye and the famous Nepali artist Thro-wo carved the revered statue of Chenresig, Thungji Chen-po rang-jung nga-ldan.

The famous statue Bhrikuti brought is called the Jowo Mikyo Dorje, which came originally from Bodhgaya and, according to the 8th Dalai Lama, the statue rested in Swayambhunath for seven months before being brought into Tibet. This statue is also called the Manuvajra, the Ramoche Jowo, or Jowo Chungpa. It is currently housed in the Ramoche Temple in Lhasa.

Through history, the Jokhang temple had been sacked at least two times – first during the Mongol invasions and later it was gutted in the 1960s during the Chinese invasion and Cultural Revolution. It is said that the lower half of the statue was found in a Lhasa rubbish dump and the upper part found in Beijing. The parts have since been joined and the statue is surrounded by the Eight Bodhisattvas and located at Ramoche.

Bhrikuti is usually represented as Green Tara in Tibetan iconography. Songtsen Gampo also married the Chinese Princess Wencheng in 641, who is considered to be another incarnation of Tara, of White Tara. As queens, Bhrikuti and Wencheng are said to have worked together to establish temples and Buddhism in Tibet.

title: Bhrikuti


text:
Talk:Brigham Young

NPOV discussion
I agree - the POV violations are consistent in judging the man by modern standards instead of historical standards (by which Abraham Lincoln could be condemned as racist). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.72.16.25 (talk) 04:12, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

The article almost exclusively includes controversial aspects of Brigham Young's life, only very briefly brushing over his positive contributions. This needs to be rectified. It's pretty clear that the authors have mainly looked for scandalous content to include. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 103.217.167.110 (talk) 04:13, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

The entire introduction save the last sentence is exalting. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Historybuff18 (talk • contribs) 04:40, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

 * If anything, the Legacy section completely white-washes this racist, genocidal figure's failings.50.111.22.143 (talk) 08:02, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Haha no joke, this article reads like a Mormon recruitment brochure. The guy was a violent opportunist and hypocrite. Also, the whole church is based on the ridiculous lies of a grave robber.73.211.15.138 (talk) 03:51, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

You are entitled to your own personal opinion. But Wikipedia is not based on the opinions, biases, or preferences of any individual contributor. A variety of people with a variety of perspecitves, viewpoints, and opinions work together here on each article to ensure the tone of each page meets the requirements of maintaining a neutral point of view, including information supported by reliable sources, and in altering content based on a majority opinion on all major issues found with each article. I have my own perspective of Brigham Young, but if I were to assert that my own personal opinion should be the most meritorious and sole measure of how to craft the sum and total content in this article, I'm sure I would come off sounding like a crazy person. For that reason, my suggestion to every editor who has a problem with any of the content in any article here would be to ensure they check their motivations, biases, prejudices, and pre-conceived notions at the door before weighing in on how any topic should be covered here. Failure to do so makes it clear that one's own motivations may not be in the best interest of the reader, who deserves to have a well-crafted, impartially composed article with relevant references that allow the reader to craft his or her own opinion of the article subject. Thanks. --Jgstokes (talk) 04:58, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

If neutrality is the aim then critiwue of Young should be included, it's not.

There should probably be a list of all the things he introduced, not just the good stuff.

Even a section about his polygamy uses the word "only" in reference to his having had children by 26 wives.

It's probably unintentional bias, but it is bias nonetheless. CuriousStapler (talk) 23:11, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

Unintentional or otherwise, it's clear that this page has been primarily edited by LDS members. The legacy section in particular is a whitewash: it primarily consists of a list of memorials and hagiographies from the early/mid 20th century. The section on race and slavery begins claiming he had a "somewhat mixed view of slavery" while going on to essentially only provide evidence of virulent racism and support for slavery without any real counterpoints. Any other article about a figure like this would make a note of their controversial legacy and modern criticism. The section on the Mountain Meadows Massacre also relies heavily on one source from an official LDS historian when other historians have argued for a greater degree of personal involvement. I am far from an expert on any of this, but this page clearly stands out as only having a pretence of NPOV. 157.211.126.195 (talk) 05:36, 4 May 2024 (UTC)

Young's Nicknames
Are Young's nicknames in the introduction paragraph necessary? They're not really an overview of him, and it's really an obscure fact that goes down below, I'd think. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheTeaDrinker (talk • contribs) 20:01, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I went ahead and moved the nickname stuff down to the Legacy section. I kept some of the relevant information up in the lead, like the fact that he travelled with the pioneers.Cjstirlbyu (talk) 18:29, 7 January 2022 (UTC)

More details and sourcing
I have begun to add more details from Thomas G. Alexander's biography of Brigham Young. The problem is my electonic copy does not include page numbers. I am not sure how to specifcy where I am finding details.John Pack Lambert (talk) 13:27, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

BY javelin quote
I have concerns about the addition of the "javelin" quote added here. The quote was initially included in an edit by a different editor about a month ago. I trimmed that substantial edit to keep this a summary article, cribbing wording from the actual blood atonement article and avoiding details like unnecessary exact quotes. I believe that this should still be a summary paragraph of BY's teachings on blood atonement. I still don't think that this quote adds anything to the summary. Additionally it is quoting a primary source - it would be better if this were to secondary source so that the claim that this is an example of a blood atonement. Overall, I find the quote too sensationalistic and undue weight, and I will again remove it and invite discussion on the talk page. --FyzixFighter (talk) 23:14, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

 * I would add that the Journal of Discourses, the primary source document referenced for the javelin quote, has issues as a source. Historians have discovered that George D. Watts, the transcriber, would for reasons frankly quite unknown change the text between his shorthand transcription of a talk and the published version in the Journal. (Gerrit Dirkmaat and LaJean Purcell Carruth [2016] "The Prophets Have Spoken, but What Did They Say?" ; LaJean Purcell Carrth [August 4, 2020] "Preached vs. Published: Shorthand Record Discrepancies") As such, quotations from the Journal of Discourses, while most likely broadly reflective of the speaker's meaning, nearly always vary from the actual words used, sometimes by quite a lot (for an example, see page 25–26 from "The Prophets Have Spoken"). Weighing the evidence and parsing through what excerpts from the Journal of Discourses legitimately reflect what was said and which are more Watts than the speaker seems to me more a task for secondary sources than for us at Wikipedia. As such, I would encourage refraining from quoting directly from the Journal of Discourses. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 00:20, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, the quote is just some extra fluff. Sorry for all of the trouble. Qinggong482 (talk) 17:28, 16 September 2021 (UTC)

Biography source evaluation for Brigham Young
Hello my fellow Wikipedia editors, you may have noticed that my student has been editing parts of this page. I'm hoping that we can give it a complete overhaul. I felt a bit overwhelmed by the sheer number of biographies and did a bit of a literature review on the biographies I've found so far. I found book reviews of the biographies and based my opinion of the books on those. My conclusion is that I believe the Turner, Arrington, and Alexander biographies to be the best sources for this page. I couldn't find reviews for the McCloud biography, but reading through it, I don't believe that it is a suitable source for this page. I will be replacing the McCloud sources with citations to one of the other biographies. Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 16:48, 24 March 2022 (UTC)

 * I'm happy to second Turner's Pioneer Prophet, Arrington's American Moses, and Alexander's Expansion of the Mormon Faith as the best and most reliable biographies of Brigham Young.
 * In case it comes up, there's one other biography of Young, not on Rachel Helps's list: David Vaughn Mason's Brigham Young: Sovereign in America (Routledge, 2014), originally written for a series aimed at students. Reviews I've seen are somewhat mixed, trending positive while suggesting that Sovereign in America over-focuses on a somewhat narrow idea of who Young was, and a review in the Journal of Mormon History points out an assortment of discrepancies of fact that should be born in mind if an editor consults Sovereign in America. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 19:44, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

 * [ Hydrangeans ] Thank you for the info on Brigham Young: Sovereign in America! I added it to my list. Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 16:14, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Best way to organize information about Brigham Young's polygamy
hi again, I'm thinking about how to organize the information on this page. Specifically, I am wondering where would be a good place to put information about Young's proposal to Martha Brotherton and maybe some other information about his participation in polygamy. I think I will put it in the paragraph about Brigham Young's time in Nauvoo for now. But I feel like a section on Young's polygamy and proposals might be appropriate because there could be a lot of information on it (and maybe that section would also include his theological support of the practice as later church president/prophet). Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 19:25, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

Number of children
Did Young have 56 or 57 children? It says that he had 56 wives and 57 children in the intro, but in the info box he's only listed as having 56 children. WikidKev (talk) 22:23, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:Brigham Young


text:
Talk:Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

Theme
The infobox lists homosexuality and alcoholism among the "subjects", but the Theme section fails to mention either. These are clearly major focuses of the story and merit inclusion.Artaxerxes (talk) 15:42, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Premise
Cat on a hot Tin Roof is a play by Tennessee Williams. It tells the story of a Southern woman who suffers in her husband's oppressive home and from her unfullfilling marriage.

do you really think that's the content of the play?

 * "Content?" I'm not sure what you mean by that, but I think that summary you have given describes just the play from Maggie's viewpoint. I wonder if it should be changed... -  THE GREAT GAVINI  {T-C} 20:27, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Brick's sexuality

 * My English teacher told me that Williams said Brick was not gay. Cls14 22:12, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

I think your English teacher must be crazy. Read the play. There's an extended dialogue between Brick and Big Daddy in which Brick makes it crystal clear that his relationship with his dead best friend was sexual. Further, one of the main themes of the entire work is Maggie's sexual frustration with Brick. She knows she'll never have him the way she wants him and she dreads ever facing the reason why.

Perhaps your teacher puts too much stock in the incidental facts that Brick was married to a woman and that there is at least some sexual component to that marriage; the play makes this much clear. But this is the fact of life for many gays, particularly in the South. They marry women and have sex and children with them. Often, they take the wife and kids to church every week. That way, no one knows they're gay. Unless and until they get caught in a public restroom somewhere, anyway.

Brick is such a man, coming to terms with the life of duplicity he's chosen for himself.

 * Williams does not make it clear, nor would the character Brick make it clear. Big Daddy was more accepting than Brick (Big Daddy had positive dealing with a man named Ochello, and with maturity comes the ability to see beyond the pat and facile, even in his own son).  Brick felt because he wasn't a "fairy" he wasn't gay, that homosexuality was dirty and disgusting, and what he and Skipper had was deeper and more profound so he could not possibly be gay.  Of course audiences, then as now, see through this, and so does Big Daddy.  The main theme is mendacity, the lies we tell others, and the lies we tell ourselves. When Skipper reached out to Brick, Skipper was met with hostility and rejection.  This rejection leads to his suicide, and Brick's downward spiral (of course Brick loved Skipper in that way but to the very end he could not admit it). Williams himself wrote that he intentionally left the question unanswered, that Brick's sexuality was to be forever ambiguous (both on the stage, and in Brick's mind).  The teacher probably did not  say Brick was not gay, but more likely to have said Brick could not see himself as gay. Jacksinterweb (talk) 15:10, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Well, if that's what the teacher said then I have no argument. It seems pretty clear to me that Brick is gay, but I admit that the play leaves just enough doubt that it's possible to interpret his emotional problems as related only to the guilt he feels. At the time the play was composed, I should think such an interpretation would have been much more likely, but today, after all the scandals involving religious conservative leaders and lawmakers, it's hard to miss all the signs of a classic closet case.

 * Brick "not [being able to] see himself as gay" is really due to the fact he is living in Cold War-era America. Compulsory heterosexuality was a part of belonging to the American nuclear family, and anything other than heterosexuality was a sign of deviancy, which lead to loose morals, then being susceptible to influence of the much-feared COMMUNISM. So, to perceive yourself as a homosexual was to perceive yourself as a traitor due to this Cold War ideology (I am heavily referencing lecture notes from my Modern Theatre and Society course at York University). Like the above commentator, it is quite clear to me that Brick is struggling with some level of homosexuality. Williams' plays are largely autobiographical, and as a homosexual himself, he seems to write his voice into Brick, and the play as a whole is autobiographical of his life in the American South. That being said, evidence that Brick had a sexual relationship with Skipper is downplayed to the point of nonexistence in the 1958 film version (Cold War ideology strikes again), hence, many people seem to glance over the true nature of the Brick-Skipper relationship when reading the play. Mattpmarshall 12:45, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree with your points, Matt, but disagree with your Cold War connections. The "much feared communism" has merely been replaced with much-feared terrorism; the circumstances surrounding that fear are still with us, including the negative attitudes toward gays.

(I see that I haven't been using the code to add my username; I'll start doing that now.) Berberry 20:11, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Though I appreciate your comments, I think it's better to leave the issue at Brick's sexuality is ambiguous, and this is what our mysterious English teacher was trying to say. In the edition of Cat I'm presently reading, the postscript (by Brian Parker, a UT professor) says "[Some of Williams' later revisions] supported Williams' assertion that Brick was heterosexual, not a closeted gay man."(page 180, A New Directions Publishing Co., 2004.)

I have not seen any direct statement on this by Williams. However, the stage directions provide a pretty insightful look at his agenda, in the key moment when Big Daddy confronts Brick in act two (page 116 of my edition.) Extended quote: "The thing they're discussing... is the inadmissible thing Skipper died to disavow between them. The fact that if it existed had to be disavowed... may be at the heart of the 'mendacity' Brick drinks to kill his disgust with. Or maybe it is only a single manifestation of it, not even the most important."

He continues, "the bird that i hope to catch in the net of this play is not the solution of one man's psychological problem. I'm trying to catch the true quality of experience in a group of people, that cloudy, flickering, evanescent--fiercely charged!--interplay of live human beings in the thundercloud of common crisis."

And then he states his angle quite clearly: "Some mystery should be left in the revelation of character in a play, just as a great deal of mystery is always left in the revelation of character in life, even in one's own character to himself. This does not absolve the playwright of his duty to observe and probe clearly and deeply... but it should steer him away from "pat" conclusions, facile definitions, which make a play just a play, and not a snare for the truth of human experience." Brick is gay! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.169.132.237 (talk) 12:01, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

So, I don't think we can say Brick is gay (or not.) Maybe we can say Skipper was. It's not important to what the play is about. This is the joy of liberal arts: ambiguity. Take that, math majors! 71.232.158.54 (talk) 08:36, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

 * There must be other forums online for discussing the meaning of the play. This page is supposed to be for discussing improvements to the article, which is marred by apparent OR - Original Research and the lack of citations to reliable sources to support assertions about Themes, and other material, such as judgments about which productions or performances were finest.Parkwells (talk) 13:26, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Different versions
The article alludes briefly to the fact that Williams prepared different versions of the play (I believe this is particularly true of the third act). The article should describe the differences and explain why the revisions were made. 74.96.11.178 (talk) 01:33, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

 * It should do this based on valid sources, not some editor's ideas about it.Parkwells (talk) 13:27, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Meaning of the title?
The title seems obscure -  unless it is meant to be rhyming slang for the well-known 4-letter word for a homosexual. Is that meant to be it? 86.148.131.107 (talk) 15:13, 13 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Have you seen the play? The title comes from the phrase that Maggie uses to describe her situation.  It would be interesting to know whether TW just made the image up, or did it already exist?  Poof does rhyme with roof, but so does horse's hoof - none of this is relevant to the play's title (at least not in the universe that I inhabit!) 82.32.112.174 (talk) 01:10, 26 February 2018 (UTC)

Move proposal
I propose moving the page to Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (play) and then make "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" a disambiguation page. There are at least three notable film adaptations with the same title. Any objections? --Bensin (talk) 21:44, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

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Disambiguation is not always needed!
Based on Tenessee Williams' views on the key theme of this play, it seems as if the question of whether brick 'is' gay (or 'isn't' gay) is not particularly important. In the opinion of the play's writer, anyhow. If we can grant that TW is allowed to ask questions of his audience, without being responsible for providing answers, I wonder how the community expects to decide what sort of information an article like this OUGHT to contain? The most interesting info in this article (I reckon) is the statement that the original text that TW wrote was not the text that was originally performed. Regarding these two versions, I wonder if it possible to find out whether the text used by UK National Theatre in 2017 is close to the version as originally written by TW? 82.32.112.174 (talk) 01:05, 26 February 2018 (UTC)

title: Talk:Cat on a Hot Tin Roof


text:
Talk:Christian anarchism

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title: Talk:Christian anarchism