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Atomicity (database systems)

In database systems, atomicity (from ἄτομος) is one of the ACID (Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation, Durability) transaction properties. An atomic transaction is an indivisible and irreducible series of database operations such that either all occur, or none occur. A guarantee of atomicity prevents partial database updates from occurring, because they can cause greater problems than rejecting the whole series outright. As a consequence, the transaction cannot be observed to be in progress by another database client. At one moment in time, it has not yet happened, and at the next it has already occurred in whole (or nothing happened if the transaction was cancelled in progress).

An example of an atomic transaction is a monetary transfer from bank account A to account B. It consists of two operations, withdrawing the money from account A and saving it to account B. Performing these operations in an atomic transaction ensures that the database remains in a consistent state, that is, money is neither lost nor created if either of those two operations fails.

The same term is also used in the definition of First normal form in database systems, where it instead refers to the concept that the values for fields may not consist of multiple smaller values to be decomposed, such as a string into which multiple names, numbers, dates, or other types may be packed.

Orthogonality
Atomicity does not behave completely orthogonally with regard to the other ACID properties of transactions. For example, isolation relies on atomicity to roll back the enclosing transaction in the event of an isolation violation such as a deadlock; consistency also relies on atomicity to roll back the enclosing transaction in the event of a consistency violation by an illegal transaction.

As a result of this, a failure to detect a violation and roll back the enclosing transaction may cause an isolation or consistency failure.

Implementation
Typically, systems implement Atomicity by providing some mechanism to indicate which transactions have started and which finished; or by keeping a copy of the data before any changes occurred (read-copy-update). Several filesystems have developed methods for avoiding the need to keep multiple copies of data, using journaling (see journaling file system). Databases usually implement this using some form of logging/journaling to track changes. The system synchronizes the logs (often the metadata) as necessary after changes have successfully taken place. Afterwards, crash recovery ignores incomplete entries. Although implementations vary depending on factors such as concurrency issues, the principle of atomicity – i.e. complete success or complete failure – remain.

Ultimately, any application-level implementation relies on operating-system functionality. At the file-system level, POSIX-compliant systems provide system calls such as  and   that allow applications to atomically open or lock a file. At the process level, POSIX Threads provide adequate synchronization primitives.

The hardware level requires atomic operations such as Test-and-set, Fetch-and-add, Compare-and-swap, or Load-Link/Store-Conditional, together with memory barriers. Portable operating systems cannot simply block interrupts to implement synchronization, since hardware that lacks concurrent execution such as hyper-threading or multi-processing is now extremely rare.

title: Atomicity (database systems)


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Kyle Gass

Kyle Richard Gass (born July 14, 1960) is an American musician, singer and actor, best known for having been a founding member of Tenacious D, a Grammy-winning comedy band. He is also a member of Trainwreck and the Kyle Gass Band.

Early life
Kyle Richard Gass was born in Walnut Creek, California on July 14, 1960, and he has two brothers. At 8 years old, he learned to play guitar and flute. Then at 28, he was working on his first television appearance with 7up. He attended Las Lomas High School alongside notable alumnus Greg Williams, where he played flute in the marching band, graduating in 1978. He studied acting at UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television, where he met Tim Robbins. In 1982, he joined Robbins' The Actors' Gang and in the early 1990s met and befriended Jack Black in the group.

Acting
Gass first appeared on-screen in a 1988 7up Gold commercial, and made his film debut two years later in Brain Dead.

He made a cameo appearance in the Seinfeld episode "The Abstinence" in 1996, in a 1999 episode of the television show Fear of a Punk Planet, and in a 2003 episode of Friends, "The One With The Mugging" (S9 E15), as Phoebe's street friend Lowell. He appeared in music videos for Good Charlotte's 2002 song "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous", the Foo Fighters' 1999 song "Learn to Fly", and I Prevail's 2017 song "Already Dead".

Gass has played small roles in many of Jack Black's films (Year One, Kung Fu Panda, Shallow Hal, Saving Silverman, The Cable Guy, etc.). He starred with Jack Black in the movie Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny.

Gass appeared in Jacob's Ladder (1990), appeared as the "couch potato" in The Cable Guy (1996), and as an inept author of children's books in the comedy Elf (2003). He had a cameo role as a singing karaoke cowboy in Wild Hogs (2007). In 2008 he played the porn director in Extreme Movie, Walrus Boy in Wieners, the dirty trucker in the men's room in Sex Drive, and Decatur Doublewide in Lower Learning.

Music
In Tenacious D, Gass plays lead guitar and sings backing vocals, and also plays the role of Black's comic foil in most of their comedy routines.

While appearing on Late Night with Conan O'Brien on November 15, 2006, Gass claimed to have been the youngest graduate of the Juilliard School of Music with a degree in classical guitar studies at the age of 13. Juilliard did not have a guitar program in 1973, but began its graduate level guitar program in 1989 under Sharon Isbin, and its undergraduate program in 2007. Earlier, in an article in the Sunday Times on October 29, 2006, Black stated that Gass was the youngest graduate of Juilliard. On May 13, 2008, Gass was a phone-in guest on the Adam Carolla Show. When Adam Carolla asked him "... And did you go to Juilliard?" Kyle replied "I didn't. I—you know, I made that up as a joke," he continued, "and I thought it would be hilarious, and then I've been hearing about it ever since. Apologies to Juilliard."

In 2017, Gass performed the song "Penelope" for Amazon Music's "Love Me Not" compilation album.

In 2021, Gass announced his first solo tour "Kyle Gass Must Save the World", however it was later cancelled.

Other media
Gass starred in a web show, Guitarings, with John Konesky and currently hosts the Did We Do It podcast with Kevin Weisman. He has appeared as a contestant on the TV game show Sale of the Century.

Comment on Donald Trump's attempted assassination
On July 16, 2024, Jack Black announced the cancellation of the ongoing Tenacious D Australian tour after Gass said "Don't miss Trump next time" on stage two days earlier, referencing the attempted assassination of Donald Trump. Gass made the comment after being presented with a birthday cake and asked to "make a wish". This also put all future creative plans for the band on hold. Gass apologized on social media, calling his comment "highly inappropriate, dangerous and a terrible mistake". He was subsequently dropped by his longtime talent agent, Michael Greene. Gass deleted the apology two days later.

Discography
with Tenacious D
 * Tenacious D (2001)
 * The Pick of Destiny (2006)
 * Rize of the Fenix (2012)
 * Post-Apocalypto (2018)

with Trainwreck
 * The Wreckoning (2009)

with Kyle Gass Band
 * Kyle Gass Band (2013)
 * Thundering Herd (2016)

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

title: Kyle Gass


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Talk:Documentary hypothesis/Archive 1

I have added a brief paragraph outlining the views of some of the Christian literalists. Please feel free to edit as appropriate. In an article of this length and nature their views should be at least noted. Chris H

I have made this page more neutral. Some changes that I would make, I didn't make because I couldn't figure out how to do them. Ezra Wax

This is getting particular offensive to me. I can understand and appreciate how people do not accept documentary hypothesis. Nevertheless, I would expect that people writing a critique of it actually know something about the subject, know the sources, know how to read a primary text and interpretative materials on it (both emedieval and contemporary). I would expect them to have a good working knowledge of the history of the books and the period they describe, comparative literature and religion, language, and everything else that goes into biblical scholarship. Simply countering something because it makes someone feel uncomfortable is not intellectually sound--I woudl go so far as to say that it is intellectually dishonest. Arguing that "other rabbis disagree" does not add to the discourse; it simply intensifies the discomfort that is felt. Arguing from internal sources (religious texts and religious commentaries on those texts) while ignoring all of the serious multidisciplinary scholarship in the field does not help anyone gain a better understanding of the subject. It simply promotes ideologies. Danny

Nor do I like the fact that this article has become entirely Judeo-centric and that it ignores textual and content-based discrepancies between various editions of the Bible (Hebrew, Samaritan, Septuagint, etc.). Jews do not have a monopoly on the Bible (and I say that as a Jew). Danny

 * Perhaps Ezra Wax's energies could for the moment be directed more constructively to articles on Pilpul and PaRDeS? Slrubenstein

- One comment about this article. It really isn't about the "Documentary Hypothesis" per se, but rather on the more general subject of the authorship question (which the Documentary Hypothesis offers an answer to). In fact, there is a whole section with just the title "Documentary Hypothesis"--in other words, we have a subsection with the same name as the article title!. The article clearly covers more than what the title suggests. I haven't been following the history of how this got put together, but I presume it was somehow patched together at some point so that it covers more than its original intention. soulpatch

 * I was hoping that the article would cover the history of the documentary hypothesis, as well as its findings, which it currently does. However we don't have enough on its findings, enough on modern day scholarship, nor do we have enough information on the various Christian perspectives. These are the areas I believe that the article currently needs the most contributions on. RK

Can someone tell me who the original author of the article is? I need it for a reference on a bibliography page. dixievargo@msn.com

 * Wikipedia does not have a notion of "author", so you should cite it as any other anonymous encyclopedia article (but with an on-line address). Stephen C. Carlson 00:53 Jan 8, 2003 (UTC)

If the user Corey doesn't stop raping the Documentary Hypothesis page, it will be useless but to a Christian zealot Dwmyers 19:35, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

There is no "raping" going on where there is an addition of facts. I filled out the evolution of the theory and added the other side of the issue. If you call knowledge "raping", then you have to call Wikipedia, and any encyclopedia for that matter, an orgy of rapists. -- Corey 19:39, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

 * If the material you were adding were accurate or scholarly, I wouldn't care. Some of what you're adding is just sheer trash. The whole part about the hypothesis and whether the bible is inspired has to have been written by a half wit. Item 1 in the list can be summarized as "anything can happen." and is the exact opposite of Occam's razor. Hardly logical. Item 3 is just silly, because if Moses wrote the Pentateuch, then the Documentary hypothesis is false, and can't be used to prove anything. It's *this* kind of pseudo-logic you're shoving down people's throats that I object to. Why don't you think for once about the crap you write and then see if it makes sense to add it. Dwmyers 20:04, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

First of all, before I noted your reply here, I was going to say, and still make the promise, that I have been doing a lot of editing on this page, contrary to the direction of the wikipedia page. So I will refrain from doing so much editing and start doing all of my editing in NotePad.

Secondly, to reply to Dwmyers, I will demonstrate the logic of my defense.

Before I begin, let me say that the defense I gave in the article was against saying that JEPD "proves" that the Bible is uninspired, not against JEPD per se.

 * The abundance of possibilities is not admissable as proof against one possibility.

Regarding this statement, it is most certainly true that one cannot disprove a possibility with a possibility. They can only disprove a possibility with facts.

 * Moses may have, and most likely, compiled his writing from other sources, not making it any less inspired.

I think where you have the problem with this is in how positive the statement is in asserting Moses' authorship. I will consede to this. Instead, it should state: "The posibility of Moses being the redactor and editing author is still acceptable without the assertion that Ezra was the sole redactor. It is just as possible that later redactors re-edited the material. Because there is no exacting proof to either conclusion, as no one today was alive back then, and all suppositions are conjectural, the JEPD Theory cannot be taken as fact, and therefore cannot be used as proof for anything but that other possibilities exist."

If you still disagree with this, then please state your objection more logically without attacking my argument or my person with hypebole. This hardly makes you look any less the half wit. I suggest, too, that you add your own research. -- Corey 20:20, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)
 * Corey, let me get more to the point. The Documentary hypothesis is a hypothesis about authorship, and is totally neutral on the question of inspiration. Therefore, the whole insert serves no purpose in the main text other than as a kind of bizarre interpolation, because the documentary hypothesis is not about the divinity of the text. I think that section of text should be removed from the main body and placed in the Talk: section. I'll say as well that a list of references that only include people who despise and dislike the documentary hypothesis is a total disservice to this article as a source of knowledge about the hypothesis. Is it asking too much of you to read (or at least reference) perhaps, Richard Friedman's Who Wrote the Bible? (A man who studied with Professor Cross of Harvard and is therefore an authority on the subject) as opposed to Joshua McDowell, who isn't a documentary hypothesis scholar but rather an evangelist who targets college freshmen, and has a less than stellar critical reputation? Further, and this also has to be said, why are you so worried about the documentary hypothesis and inspiration, when a battery of Christian denominations accept it as compatible with the Bible in the first place? For one, I bought my copy of Friedman's book at an Episcopal book store. Dwmyers 20:55, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

This is the section of text I removed, for reasons I have given above: Dwmyers 21:53, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

''Some use the Documentary Hypothesis as reason for claiming that the Bible is uninspired. However, this arguments fails on these points:
 * 1) The abundance of possibilities is not admissable as proof against one possibility.
 * 2) Additions and edits by later authors does not disprove authenticity of the Bible as the inspired word of God, as they could have been equally inspired.
 * 3) Moses may have, and most likely, compiled his writing from other sources, not making it any less inspired.''

I just want to voice my support for Dwmeyers' edits and discussion. RK 22:05, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I do not wholely disagree with it's removal, seeing as it's removal has support. However, once again I point out that some have attempted to use it as proof against inspiration. And once again I state that I was not using this as proof against the theory. Additionally, I was not aware of McDowell's reputation as such. However, McDowell is not where I got this defense. Actually, those first three references I actually used to fill out the history of those who contributed to the JEDP Theory. Since none of their works are in print today, it is only by the word of other scholars (excepting their repution be reputable for doctering such facts) that such information may be compiled. If, however, you object to anything Mr. McDowell has ever written on the grounds that he doctors all facts or even just the types of facts concerning historical persons and their contributions to particular subjects, then I would most gladly remove the information and get it from a more reputable source. Is Mr. McDowell of that sort that you know of? Or is it just the fact that he tries to manipulate? If it is simply manipulation that is his crime, then I can hardly say that's enough to say that he invents facts about historical personages. -- Corey 22:48, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

P.S. I put the first three references in the article because I did get good information that helped to flesh out the article a little more. I think I can say that a substantial bite of this article as it appears now, came from my research. If you can provide information contrary to anything in the article, I would be glad to remove those portions.

Also, I wish to point out that I am really undecided on the subject of JEDP Theory, myself. I came across this subject in doing research for another page on this site. I put those points in there because I felt it important to help the reader understand the issues involed in JEDP Theory. It was not my intention to weigh it in one direction or the other, except that I wanted to balance the weight away from JEDP blind acceptance, as the article was originally slanted. Now it contains multiple views and points to other issues involved. For me, it doesn't matter one way or the other.

In addition, the statement made in the article that "Wellhausen argued that the Bible is an important source for historians, but cannot be taken literally," shows that the idea of this theory disproving the Bible's inspiration is indeed introduced, and therefore needs address. Conversely, to accept the JEDP theory as proposed by Wellhausen, one would have to reject the Bible as truthful, as it claims that the "institutionalized religion" of the Jews had developed over time, and by suggesting that some of the law was not introduced until the post-exilic period, thus claiming that it is a lie for that portion to have been injected there if it was never stated in the original law. I'd say the issue is important. -- Corey 23:11, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

By the way, as far as the accusation left in my e-mail box about deleting information that should probably stay, what information are you talking about? The only thing I did was reword the opening paragraph to free it up from two restrictive interpretation as having been originally postulated by Wellhausen, when in fact all Wellhausen did was narrow the field, restate other's theories, inject some unsupported claims of his own, and give it all a name. Outside of this, there were a couple of statements that I moved, not deleted, in order to properly attribute them. -- Corey 23:40, 11 Sep 2003 (UTC)

In terms of deletion, you did delete a sentence or two to the effect that most Talmudic scholars no longer believed that Moses was the sole author of the Torah. Now, I have no great knowledge of Talmudic scholars, but I rather doubt that you do either. In which case I have to ask, did you delete it because you found the statement to be untrue and had proof it was wrong, or did you delete it because it offended some sensibility you had about the Bible and regarded it as wrong, proof or no?

Continuing: calling the documentary hypothesis JEDP theory seems odd to me, as most proponents of this kind of rationale don't use those terms. Maybe it's popular in Joe's Bible College, I don't know. But it seems insulting, or at least narrowing.

Third: I don't consider Wellhausen the be-all and end-all of this kind of research, which is ongoing (there are statements in the article now that suggest any research in this area ended with Wellhausen, which seem to be to be plain wrong). Wellhausen was a late 19th century German, with all the academic conceits of his era. To the extent you want to attack his extra-literary speculations about the nature of literacy and sophistication of the society of Biblical Palestine, be my guest. But to the extent this article is an anti-Wellhausen polemic, I do think that this article is being narrowed and is becoming unsuitable to the disinterested reader.

Fourth: outside of Richard Friedman's Who Wrote the Bible?, the most common text the lay reader is going to encounter the Documentary Hypothesis in any form is through Joseph Campbell's book Occidental Mythology in which a whole chapter, the Gods of the Levant, is devoted to his explanation of W. M. L. de Wette's version of the Biblical texts. Why aren't either of these mentioned? I'd much prefer texts that devote many pages to these ideas than a few one page references from Christian apologists who are opposed to the theory in general.

Fifth: my understanding is that this whole area is a part of a broader area of criticism called historical-literary criticism. There is no article in the wikipedia that talks of this, perhaps because as a literary theory, it's passe in the days of queer theory and deconstructionism. Maybe that ought to be alleviated, so that specific elements of Biblical historical-literary criticism, such as Wellhausen's views, can be separated from the others and those Christians who want to take swings at his 120 year old views of the world of Palestine can do so. Dwmyers 14:19, 12 Sep 2003 (UTC)

 * I want to register my agreement with all of Dwmeyers' points. I think such an article would be very worthwhile. RK 15:39, 12 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Minor point, but is Baruch Spinoza a "Classical Christian"? Obviously a man excommunicated from the Jewish community is not a "good" Jew, but his religious treatise was banned by the Catholics as well. What to do with him? Dwmyers 14:06, 13 Sep 2003 (UTC)

All of these things are great! Include them if you like. As to the assumption that I had anything to do with "narrowing" the article, is rediculous. The article seemed to be plenty narrow in the first place, and from all the literature I've read, it seems to end with Wellhausen's "JEDP Theory." If you have this much to add, then feel free to add it. We would love to have your input and research. I'm certainly not stopping you.

In regard to the part you claim that I deleted, I don't recall. If I did delete it, it likely had to do with some other reason, not having to do with my own sensabilities. Perhaps I meant to edit it into a more sensable and historical statement, and simply forgot. You will have to refresh my memory with the exact statement.

I changed the statement just now about "Orthodox Judaism and Christianity in general", because, while "the majority" rejects the JEDP Theory, which is apparently in much dispute among historians, but generally accepted among higher critics (which seems to be the source of much of its support), I felt that statement to be inaccurate, and disputes for accepting JEDP and documentary hypothesis as one and the same, when JEDP is simply a version of the other. It is JEDP that is disputed, not documentary hypothesis.

P.S. Whoever did the additions to the references, thank you, it looks great. Also, the points that I made above, for including the other side of the issue, appears to still be unaddressed. -- Corey 14:24, 13 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Also: The documentary hypothesis is NOT disputed by most orthodox Jews and Christians. It is actually widely accepted. Only JEDP Theory is widely rejected by Jews and Christians. And I assume that by your admission, you too agree that even historians reject JEDP Theory. Judging by your own statements in the article, and by all the information I've come accross, it would appear that only higher critics have supported the view. Higher critics, since the 19th century, have been more concerned with trying to disprove the Bible than find facts. Their mistakes have become so common place and so well known that they are no longer being taken seriously by little more than hard-core atheists (some of them coming from the Jewish and Christian community itself!).

By the way, the reason my argument at the end of the article looked nonsensable was because someone bulleted and reworded the part that was supposed to lead into the other points. I have corrected this. Also, one of the points is missing. -- Corey 14:48, 13 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Ok, a couple points. I've removed the parts I found objectionable, the rest of your additions are an attack against versions of analysis that postulate illiteracy in the times of Moses. These are the (among others) views of one Hermann Gunkel, who proposed in 1901 that Genesis was a product of an oral tradition, that originally it was a kind of epic saga, much like the Iliad or the Odyssey. Since some of what you're objecting to may not originate with Wellhausen, lumping all of your criticism of Mosaic illiteracy under the umbrella of "JEDP Theory" just seems sloppy. Lets see if we can't put names and faces to specific scholars and specific ideas and then deal with each in turn.

I'm in the process of rereading Blenkinsopp's book "The Pentateuch", the first chapter of which is titled "Two Centuries of Pentateuchal Scholarship". My brain is hurting as a consequence (The book is part of the Anchor Bible series, with all that implies in terms of densely written careful scholarship). If the stuff I'm reading is correct, we'll have to rewrite much of this. By about the 1970s, we start getting other scholars with divergent points of view, the documentary hypothesis (as stated by Wellhausen) as an intellectual hegemony breaks around then. The section marked "rejection" needs to be rewritten so that scholars who have markedly different readings of the Hebrew Bible can get some space. For example, there is one modern scholar, for example, who thinks "it's all D and nothing else".

Finally, as other modes of criticism are used to analyze the Pentateuch and Hexateuch and have become important in terms of all this (the Finklestein reference isn't a literary criticism per se, it's archeology applied to these issues), when I get time, I'm probably going to create an entry called "Biblical criticism" or the like, so that we can deal with literary criticism and archeological evidence, and other modes of literary analysis, such as form criticism. Perhaps RK can find a term for the criticism of the "Hebrew Bible" that wouldn't imply anything special in terms of a Christian or Jewish bias. Understand, that in the first half of the 20th century, there was considerable skepticism in Jewish circles of Wellhausen's synthesis. In that time, one Solomon Schlecter characterized "the higher criticism" as "the higher antisemitism" and we really need to avoid that. Dwmyers 16:10, 13 Sep 2003 (UTC)

-- I removed the following sections from the text, for now, and would like to explain why: RK 21:18, 13 Sep 2003 (UTC)

 * Many Christians object to the JEDP theory's a priori rejection of such internal evidence as stated authorship and purpose of the Torah. They object further to the extirpation of the Creation and Flood accounts, et al., as authoritative Scripture. They have a more literal interpretation based on P. J. Wisemans work that the book of Genesis consists of sections, each of which was written by a separate historical author. Genesis was merely compiled by Moses. This is also called the Tablet theory.—"Ancient Records and the Structure of Genesis" P.J. Wiseman. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, Inc., 1985

 * I doubt that most fundamentalist Christians know of the work of Wisemans; could you clarify who holds this view? The way it was written it was presented as a mainstream view in the Christian world, but that is not accurate. RK 21:18, 13 Sep 2003 (UTC)

 * They claim that the JEDP Theory presupposes that religion in Israel went through a continual evolutionary process, as mentioned above. It is assumed that such complex religious ideas could not have been developed by Moses in 1400 B.C.E. or earlier. Attempting to further such an idea, archeologists, sociologists, and some liberal theologians also thought that writing could not have been an established practice in 2000 B.C.  Instead, they viewed writing as having developed late in human history. However, archaeology has shown otherwise

 * This is confused. The paragraph starts off by arguing one point (sophisticated theological and religious ideas) but ends up only talking about writing letters. This makes no sense. Is this an accurate rendering of the actual arguments made by fundamentalists? RK 21:18, 13 Sep 2003 (UTC)

 * It is agreed upon by most scholarship that Egyptian history is at least dated to 3000 B.C.E. and the earliest Egyptian writings are dated to 2800-2700 B.C.E. Ancient Egypt hieroglyphics contained 24 consonants, and it was simplified to the hieratic form by 1300 B.C.E. The demotic form became highly popular by 400-100 B.C.E. Akkadians (c.2000 B.C.E.) used nearly 300 characters to form the syllabic characters of their language.

 * Again, I don't follow this. Some people learned how to write letters many thousands of years ago. How does this prove that Moses wrote the entire Torah (or nearly all of it), and how does this disprove the vast amount of evidence for the documentary hypothesis? This "argument" is making the fundamentalists look incoherent. RK 21:18, 13 Sep 2003 (UTC)
 * My interpretation: The sources Corey was using probably objected to the "oral heritage" strain of Pentateuchal scholarship, which postulates that J and E (perhaps the others as well) are oral narratives, and that a redactor later wove these oral traditions together. These scholars have tended to postulate that the Israelis were largely illiterate people. This can be countered a number of ways, not the least of which, if Moses was historical and raised in Egypt around 1300-1400 BCE, then if he knew nothing else, he easily could have learned the Egyptian form of writing, which was well developed at the time. Also, the article in the Wikipedia on Hebrew notes that archeology has dated the earliest known examples of Hebrew to the 10th century, contemporary with David and Solomon, and within the periods most conservative scholars date the J document. However, those arguments probably either belong in The Bible and history, or they belong in articles linked to that topic. One of the issues we will encounter as we work on this article is that a myriad of people from different disciplines and degrees of faith have used the literary-critical method to analyze the Torah. It's hard to satisfy everyone when people from faithful scholars to lay believers to lay skeptics to historians to anthropologists to folklorists to mythologists have looked at the Torah to pursue an extra-literary agenda unattached to the narrative at hand. Dwmyers 00:17, 14 Sep 2003 (UTC)

On that last comment, it only proves that it was possible, not that he actually did. It was meant to rebut the argument that Moses didn't write the pentateuch because, as is claimed by the earlier proponant, that I believe Dwmyers mentioned in the article. I think you should reread the article with that comment back it belongs so that you can understand it better. But you are right, I think, those other two paragraphs should be rewritten to clarify them; but I think wholesale removal of them is unwarrented, because, though confused, they are not entirely confusing. I think most people have the brains to untangle the mess. Since those two paragraphs belong to DW, I beleive, then I'll leave it to him to rewrite.

By the way, DW, you're doing a commendable job. It was never my intention to stir things up, and especially not to make things appear biased. I wanted only to fill in the gaps that the article was clearly missing. As I said earlier, I'm new to this subject, so I believe it better left to you, as you have more materials on the subject at your disposal. When you are done sprucing up the article I'll be glad to read it in the confidence that a competent researcher has contributed to its construction.

P.S. Just a friendly reply to a past comment: I am a Christian, but as far as calling me a zealot, that is a matter of viewpoint. I am very interested in allowing all voices to be heard, no matter what one's belief system, even atheist. But when I know someone is being unduely authoritarian or absolutist (regarding the article, not you) I have to put the brakes on and step in to provide the other side. I belong to a religion that strongly believes in allowing others to have their say, and encourages facts, not conjecture. Also, if there appeared to be any bias in the things I contributed, it was just because I was going in order of the things I found in a Google search. I'm sure I would have soon come across the higher critic stuff, and somewhere I would have found the more unbiased information on some site and been privileged to use it. But now I hand it to you. I rest knowing that this page is in capable hands. -- Corey 21:49, 13 Sep 2003 (UTC)
 * A large part of my reaction to your work, Corey, was a kind of panic, because as quickly as you were writing and changing things, I feared a total meltdown of the article. The majority of the product you created seems pretty innocuous after the fact. I'll state as well that I'm not a researcher in this field, just a lay person with an interest. I never did "get" the Bible anyway in its unanalyzed form. But viewed through the lens of critical analysis, I don't think it loses anything and gains a lot, in terms of consistency and depth, to a skeptical guy like me. Dwmyers 00:17, 14 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Thanks for your candidness. Though, before, this article did put a lot of undue credit to Wellhausen for the documentary hypothesis, which he had no responsibility for in the first place, while completely ignoring the history from Astruc on, which I had filled in (noting, not bragging).

Even if you don't have special knowledge on this subject, you do certainly seem to have the right tools at your disposal, which I do not. This in itself makes you more qualified to make the corrections.

As regards the Bible, if you'd like, I can tell you (by e-mail or other such forum of discussion, as this isn't the place) why I found the Bible to be of interest for more than just on the grounds of faith, but on reason (I study logic regularly as a result of Romans 12:1 (don't associate the quote with the link in the article; I'm not associated with them) which says to "Render sacred service with...your power of reason", and also because of my Bible teacher), and even to atheists and agnostics, as I and others I know have met a few who read it for interest in historical details as well as the abundance of good advice and examples found therein. A person doesn't have to believe in God to get a good benefit out of it. I can also show you how the Bible isn't all about war, hellfire and strange concepts of God as have been painted by some of Christendom's denominations. Actually, my Bible teacher had told me to reason on everything in the Bible, and never rationalize (that is, not to force preconceived ideas into the reading, but to get out of the reading what is actually there, using its context and the context of the Bible as a whole). -- Corey 01:55, 14 Sep 2003 (UTC)

 * Ok, without taking anything away from other original thinkers, Wellhausen was the guy who broke up the text into J,E,D,P and the redactor, and he did it with such a degree of academic brilliance that his interpretation was accepted rapidly and it *still* remains the dominant framework that people work with (or contend with). In other words, he did such a bang-up job of synthesis that other scholars simply say, "There hasn't been a Wellhausen in the 20th century". The problem for the conservative believer is that Wellhausen interpreted it as a historian, as opposed to a theologan (so much so that Wellhausen gave up a chair as a professor of Theology because he no longer felt suited to teach the religious). Most issues, imo, with conservative Jewish or Christian belief and any particular breakdown of the Hebrew Bible is that if scholars start making interpretations about the historical nature of different people or events, they get into trouble. It's not the breakdown that might be contentious, it's the post-narrative interpretation. I think a lot of that however is inevitable, especially wrt comparative folklorists. Dwmyers 03:27, 14 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I see where you're coming from, and I agree to a large extent. The problem is in the post-narrative interpretation. Interpretation is always speculative, and it is that speculation that should be neutrally handled, instead of insisted upon. If one can achieve that, then one makes one's self a valuable encyclopedic contributor. — Corey

Issues regarding this page: Baruch Spinoza problem is not resolved (i.e. calling him a Christian is a bit of a stretch). Would the fix to change the title of that section and the previous section to ones based on date? All of the rabbinical quotes prior to the "Christian" section are 15th century or earlier and all in the "Christian" section date to the 16th century or later.

 * Egads. That needs to be changed. Spinoza is not a hellbound Christian heretic. He is a hellbound Jewish heretic. ;-)  RK

Next issue I have is that Josh McDowell's publisher, I don't have a publisher location. Where is "Here's Life Publishers" located anyway? I'm trying to be anal about the bibliography here in case people outside the United States would be interested in these books. Third, there is a scholar named R. N. Whybray who considers the Pentateuch a historiographical book in the same mold as Herodotus's History. It's not a widely held viewpoint but as he's taken to be a serious scholar by Blenkinsopp and his views discused in depth, I'd be appreciative if anyone else has any information on him. How to explain his views still confuses me at present. Dwmyers 19:19, 15 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Due to a specific request, I will be considering continuation on this site. However, my participation on this page is done. I have removed my comments about scientists, etc., and all replies to it, to stop any further comments.

P.S. Please desist on the Christian fanatic talk. I'm neither a fanatic, neither did I add half the stuff that seems to be alludingly attributed to me. If participants wish to be taken seriously they should desist from arguments against the man and actually start some real intellectual discussion. Attacking individuals ideologies is neither scientific nor intellectually stimulating. — Corey 23:02, 15 Sep 2003 (UTC)

 * Corey, I'd rather you stick around (even if you don't write, comment on the article). We've all had our share of oops moments here where we misunderstood the other guy and the article has seemed to survive okay. This article, like all good articles, is a work in progress and I'd be happier if it served everyone from liberal to traditional. Besides, maybe you know what happened to "Here's Life Publishers" :> Dwmyers 00:24, 16 Sep 2003 (UTC)

 * I think that you are looking for one of the publishing ministries of Campus Crusade for Christ International. Many of the older titles have been taken up by Nelson Publishers.  I hope that's a clue.  Mkmcconn 00:54, 16 Sep 2003 (UTC)

 * Cool. I notice Mr McDowell has a new edition of his book, the reference being McDowell, Josh The New Evidence That Demands A Verdict Fully Updated To Answer The Questions Challenging Christians Today, dated 1999 and it is indeed Nelson Reference. Now we (well, I'd like to know) need to know if we can move the McDowell reference from the old book to the new one. I probably will not read this book myself. Dwmyers 17:25, 16 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Ty, Dw. Sounds like Mk has the low down. See you in another forum. By the way, the article looks great.— Corey

I've added a link to a book and have otherwise made a relatively minor addition
I am new to Wikipedia, and I'm therefore fairly unfamiliar with Wikipedia procedures, so feel free to advise me if I should be posting this comment differently.

I added a link to this article, to add the later book by Richard Elliott Friedman, which I think is a significant book for this topic.

I have also added several sentences to the section of the article talking about modern attributions to the 4 authors, summarizing Friedman's theories regarding same, as stated in both books now included among the links.

I was careful not to state Friedman's opinions as facts, and I also corrected the stated chronology of what he wrote and what Bloom wrote.

I heartily commend Friedman's books to those of you who haven't read them. Even if you disagree with his conclusions, he seems to be a very careful scholar, who cites all his evidence with great specificity.

Friedman and Baruch Halpern are among the most accessible of Frank Cross's Harvard students. I certainly recommend Friedman myself. I've added a bit of Blenkinsopp's speculation about the reason for the redaction in this article. It has to be regarded as speculation, but it's very tempting stuff, and so much so I think it adds value to the article.

When I first touched on this article, there was a tendency to see the documentary hypothesis as sterile and barren intellectual ground from Wellhausen on. That, I knew from my reading, is the opposite of the actual situation. It will be hard to suggest the ongoing intellectual fertility without discussing some of the spectrum of ideas that surround this topic. Hopefully the new Blenkinsopp material can help accomplish that. Dwmyers 14:52, 17 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Would You be so kind as to write kind of a profile of each author (J, E, P), identifing the specific concerns and points of view of each?

The four sources
J - Jahweh, Jehovah'

One of the two epic sources, the name is taken from the name of God, YHVH, used exclusively by this source. The letter 'J' comes from the erroneous German Christian rendering of Yod-He-Vav-He, the name of God, as Jehovah. This source emerged from Judah, the southern Kingdom. It emerged after the civil war in which Israel split into two kingdoms; Israel in the north, and Judea in the south.

E - Elohim, Elohist'

The second epic source, its stories always refer to God by the name 'Elohim'. This collection emerged from the northern kingdom of Israel, and is generally more concerned with general stories than individuals. At some time in pre-exilic history around 650 B.C.E., J and E were combined by a Judean editors. This combined version is known as "JE".

P - Priestly writings, Priesterschrift

Warning! Thiis section is excerpted from, with minor adaptations, from Professor Baruch Levine's Jewish Publication Torah commentary on Leviticus. It is, as such not public domain. It does represent a mainstream current view of Biblical scholars on the subject (including research by Christians, Jews, and others), although it is by no means the last word.

The P source focuses on the formal relations between God and society, including the genealogies which document the chain of transmission of God's message and authority from Creation to Moses. "P" uses both Elohim and El Shaddai as names of God. The book of Leviticus is solely composed of P. Leviticus emerged from centers of priestly administration in biblical Israel such as Jerusalem. It is linked by language and subject matter to other priestly materials preserved in other books of the Torah. As such, it would be profitable to discuss in some depth the history and development of P.

Deuteronomy ordains that all sacrificial worship and cultic activity be conducted at the one central Temple in Jerusalem. Such activities would be illegitimate if carried out at any other site. Deuteronomy, therefore, announces a new pattern of worship. In some way this doctrine is historically related to the edict of Josiah, King of Judah, issued in 622 B.C.E., and reported in 2 Kings 22-23. And so the question arises: Is the cultic legislation of Leviticus based on this Deuteronomic doctrine of centralized worship?

Some scholars, including Julius Wellhausen in the 19th century, interpreted Lev. 17 as indirectly endorsing the doctrine of cult centralization. More recently, H. L. Ginsberg has argued that the festival legislation of Lev.23 represents a response to the same Deuteronomic doctrine of centralized worship. Ginsberg, noting similarities of diction and doctrine between Hosea and Deuteronomy, traces the origin of the law of cult centralization (in Deut.) to the northern kingdom of Israel, in the period before the fall of Israel to the Assyrians in 721 B.C.E. He proposes that Deuteronomic writings (though not the entire book of Deuteronomy) were then transmitted to Judah [the southern kingdom] and its capitol, Jerusalem. These ideas then influenced Judea's King Hezekiah, who endeavored to do away with the high places (2 Kings 18:4). This effort apparently failed. He was followed by King Manasseh. In the late 7th century B.C.E., King Josiah destroyed the major cult sites in use at the time and altered the role of the priesthood. In this view, P developed shortly thereafter in the early 6th century B.C.E.

Thus if Leviticus mirrors the doctrine of Deuteronomy, then it is most likely a product of the age of Josiah at the earliest, at least in its broad outline. However, other scholars dispute this historical reconstruction. They regard the priestly legislation of Leviticus as coming from an earlier time, before Josiah and before the Deuteronomic writings. Foremost among these scholars is Yehezkel Kaufmann. He argues that the priestly literature of the Torah emerged at an earlier period; more recent scholars who follow this chronology, date P to the early 7th century B.C.E.

Scholars also note many similarities in content and style between P and Ezekiel. Ezekiel, the priest-prophet, was a major spokesman of the priestly school of Jerusalem. He lived in the time of the destruction of the First Temple and went into exile to Babylonia. Some scholars, following Kaufmann and others, maintain that P served as a source for Ezekiel. However, others suspect the reverse - that Ezekiel introduced those themes that found their way into P. Prof. Ginsberg proposes that themes prominent in the Epilogue to Lev. 26 were drawn from Ezekiel. Historically this would mean that, at the very least, parts of this were written well into the Babylonian exile, 6th century B.C.E.

So when was the P literature developed ? The most prudent view would approximate that of the late E. A. Speiser: that priestly law  and literature took form over a protracted period of time and that it would be inaccurate to assign all of their contents to a single period of ancient history. This approach helps to explain the presence of some relatively early material in Leviticus, while at the same time allowing for the inclusion of exilic and post-exilic creativity.

D - Dtr, Deuteronomist

Warning: This section is excerpted from, with minor adaptations, from Rabbi Prof. Jeffrey Tigay's JPS commentary on Deuteronomy. As such, it is not in the public domain. It does represent a mainstream current view of Biblical scholars on the subject (including research by Christians, Jews, and others), although it is by no means the last word.

The D source is the source of the book of Deuteronomy, and likely in addition, the books of Joshua, Judges, I and II Samuel and I and II Kings. Generally speaking, the Deuteronomist emphasizes centralization of worship and governance in Jerusalem. Consider the book of the teaching - this was the book that was found in the Temple in 622 B.C.E. by the High Priest Hilkiah while the Temple was undergoing a renovation....Modern scholarship has argued convincingly that this book of the teaching was in fact Deuteronomy....Several of the Deuteronomic prescriptions that Josiah carried out were actually created for the first time shortly before he did so, in the late 8th and 7th centuries B.C.E....

The first attempt to centralize sacrifice was made about a century before Josiah by King Hezekiah (late 8th-early 7th centuries B.C.E.). Hosea (early-mid 8th century B.C.E.) was the first prophet who criticized the proliferation of altars. Earlier, no prophets or pious kings attacked or suppressed the practice, and no less a prophet than Elijah (9th century B.C.E.) built an altar and offered sacrifices on Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18). As for the united national Pesach sacrifice, Kings itself says that nothing of the sort had even been done since the days of the Chieftains. If these Deuteronomic prescriptions did not exist prior to the 8th-7th centuries [B.C.E.], than Deuteronomy itself could not have existed earlier." [p.xx]

....key aspects of Josiah's reform and of Deuteronomy - centralization of sacrifice, destruction of shrines other than the Temple, and destruction of cultic pillars and sacred posts - had already been undertaken a century earlier by Hezekiah. Since Hezekiah's short-lived reformation is not said to have been based on a book, we cannot be certain than Deuteronomy existed then, but the ideas that produced the book were clearly developing. It seems likely, then, that Deuteronomy was composed in the 8th-7th centuries B.C.E." [p.xxi]

...Many features of Deuteronomy, particularly its vigorous monotheism and fervent opposition to pagan practices in Israel, are very understandable as a reaction to conditions in the 8th-7th centuries....[many examples discussed] ....However there is much in the book that seems considerable older than this. The society reflected in Deuteronomy's laws is a good deal less advanced than that of 7th century Judah. It consists primarily of farmers and herders. There are no laws about merchants, artisans, professional soldiers or other processionals. There are none dealing with commerce, real estate, or written contracts, and none dealing with commercial loans...There is no mention of royal officials or the royal power to tax and confiscate property and draft citizens....But [it does] contain some later elements. Deuteronomy in particular reflects some conditions that developed in monarchic times.

....Combining all of these chronological clues, it appears that the civil laws of Deut. go back to a time in the United Monarchy or the early divided monarchy - the tenth and nine centuries B.C.E. - during the transition from the old tribal-agrarian society to a more urbanized, monarchic one. It is difficult to tell whether Deut, selected these laws individually or in groups, or whether they were already a collection... In any case, these laws were supplemented and partly revised during the Assyrian age, primarily for the purpose of centralizing sacrificial worship and countering the threat of pagan religious belief and practice to which Israel was exposed during that time period....These connections with the northern kingdom make it seem likely that the Deuteronomic ideology crystallized there as a reform program, partly inspired by Hosea, during the final years of the kingdom as a response to the assimilatory pressures of the Assyrian age and to the excesses of the northern monarchy.....

 * Warning: The above quotes are excerpted from, with minor adaptations, from the Jewish Publication Society commentary on the Torah. As such, this text is not in the public domain. It does represent a mainstream current view of Biblical scholars on the subject (including research by Christians, Jews, and others), although it is by no means the last word.

 * Thank You! I really appreciate Your help.

title: Talk:Documentary hypothesis/Archive 1


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Stuffing

Stuffing, filling, or dressing is an edible mixture, often composed of herbs and a starch such as bread, used to fill a cavity in the preparation of another food item. Many foods may be stuffed, including poultry, seafood, and vegetables. As a cooking technique stuffing helps retain moisture, while the mixture itself serves to augment and absorb flavors during its preparation.

Poultry stuffing often consists of breadcrumbs, onion, celery, spices, and herbs such as sage, combined with the giblets. Additions in the United Kingdom include dried fruits and nuts (such as apricots and flaked almonds),  and chestnuts.

History
It is not known when stuffings were first used. The earliest documentary evidence is the Roman cookbook, Apicius De Re Coquinaria, which contains recipes for stuffed chicken, dormouse, hare, and pig. Most of the stuffings described consist of vegetables, herbs and spices, nuts, and spelt (a cereal), and frequently contain chopped liver, brains, and other organ meat.

Names for stuffing include "farce" (~1390), "stuffing" (1538), "forcemeat" (1688), and relatively more recently in the United States; "dressing" (1850).

Cavities

In addition to stuffing the body cavities of animals, including birds, fish, and mammals, various cuts of meat may be stuffed after they have been deboned or a pouch has been cut into them. Recipes include stuffed chicken legs, stuffed pork chops, stuffed breast of veal, as well as the traditional holiday stuffed turkey or goose.

Many types of vegetables are also suitable for stuffing, after their seeds or flesh has been removed. Tomatoes, capsicums (sweet or hot peppers), and vegetable marrows such as zucchini may be prepared in this way. Cabbages and similar vegetables can also be stuffed or wrapped around a filling. They are usually blanched first, in order to make their leaves more pliable. Then the interior may be replaced by stuffing, or small amounts of stuffing may be inserted between the individual leaves.

Purportedly ancient Roman, or else Medieval, cooks developed engastration recipes, stuffing animals with other animals. An anonymous Andalusian cookbook from the 13th century includes a recipe for a ram stuffed with small birds. A similar recipe for a camel stuffed with sheep stuffed with bustards stuffed with carp stuffed with eggs is mentioned in T.C. Boyle's book Water Music. Multi-bird-stuffed dishes such as the turducken or gooducken are contemporary variations.

Fillers
Almost anything can serve as a stuffing. Many American stuffings contain a starchy ingredient like bread or cereals, usually together with vegetables, ground meats, herbs and spices, and eggs. Middle Eastern vegetable stuffings may be based on seasoned rice, on minced meat, or a combination thereof. Other stuffings may contain only vegetables and herbs. Some types of stuffing contain sausage meat, or forcemeat, while vegetarian stuffings sometimes contain tofu. Roast pork is often accompanied by sage and onion stuffing in England; roast poultry in a Christmas dinner may be stuffed with sweet chestnuts. Oysters are used in one traditional stuffing for Thanksgiving. These may also be combined with mashed potatoes, for a heavy stuffing. Fruits and dried fruits can be added to stuffing including apples, apricots, dried prunes, and raisins. In England, a stuffing is sometimes made of minced pork shoulder seasoned with various ingredients, such as sage, onion, bread, chestnuts, dried apricots, and dried cranberries. The stuffing mixture may be cooked separately and served as a side dish. This may still be called stuffing or it may be called dressing.

Food safety
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) states that cooking animals with a body cavity filled with stuffing can present potential food safety hazards. Even when the meat reaches a safe temperature, the stuffing can still harbor bacteria, and if the meat is cooked until the stuffing reaches a safe temperature, the meat may be overcooked. For turkeys, for instance, the USDA recommends cooking stuffing separately from the bird and not buying pre-stuffed birds.

title: Stuffing


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Talk:Energies of God

What is the connection to an encyclopedia here? Which god is this, for a start? Where do these ideas come from? Any connection with Christianity, for instance? Wetman 02:55, 21 Nov 2003 (UTC)

---

Here's the scoop. From the quote of St. Basil, it's obvious that the reference is to a doctrine of Eastern Orthodoxy. However, the original version seems to only consult a somewhat "fuzzy-wuzzy" book (A History of God), that is not a work of Orthodox theology but is a very modern "cook's tour" theological work, that jumbles together a big mash of stuff. I hope I've cleaned up the article sufficiently, although it's still a somewhat specialized topic. Dogface

___

I think that the article (Energies of God) needs to be discarded. The correct terminology for this Eastern Orthodox precept is the Essence Energies Distinction. Its fundamental principal, one that is ignored in this article, is that there is no real distinction in God but rather, for the sake of theological argument an artificial line is drawn between God's Essence and his Energies. The other article does an adequate job of correctly presenting the concept while this one definitely leaves something to be desired. Delete this article in favor of the other.Phiddipus 22:30, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

title: Talk:Energies of God


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Limit cardinal

In mathematics, limit cardinals are certain cardinal numbers. A cardinal number λ is a weak limit cardinal if λ is neither a successor cardinal nor zero. This means that one cannot "reach" λ from another cardinal by repeated successor operations. These cardinals are sometimes called simply "limit cardinals" when the context is clear.

A cardinal λ is a strong limit cardinal if λ cannot be reached by repeated powerset operations. This means that λ is nonzero and, for all κ < λ, 2κ < λ. Every strong limit cardinal is also a weak limit cardinal, because κ+ ≤ 2κ for every cardinal κ, where κ+ denotes the successor cardinal of κ.

The first infinite cardinal, $$\aleph_0$$ (aleph-naught), is a strong limit cardinal, and hence also a weak limit cardinal.

Constructions
One way to construct limit cardinals is via the union operation: $$\aleph_{\omega}$$ is a weak limit cardinal, defined as the union of all the alephs before it; and in general $$\aleph_{\lambda}$$ for any limit ordinal λ is a weak limit cardinal.

The ב operation can be used to obtain strong limit cardinals. This operation is a map from ordinals to cardinals defined as
 * $$\beth_{0} = \aleph_0,$$
 * $$\beth_{\alpha+1} = 2^{\beth_{\alpha}},$$ (the smallest ordinal equinumerous with the powerset)
 * If λ is a limit ordinal, $$\beth_{\lambda} = \bigcup \{ \beth_{\alpha} : \alpha < \lambda\}.$$

The cardinal
 * $$\beth_{\omega} = \bigcup \{ \beth_{0}, \beth_{1}, \beth_{2}, \ldots \} = \bigcup_{n < \omega} \beth_{n} $$

is a strong limit cardinal of cofinality ω. More generally, given any ordinal α, the cardinal
 * $$\beth_{\alpha+\omega} = \bigcup_{n < \omega} \beth_{\alpha+n} $$

is a strong limit cardinal. Thus there are arbitrarily large strong limit cardinals.

Relationship with ordinal subscripts
If the axiom of choice holds, every cardinal number has an initial ordinal. If that initial ordinal is $$\omega_{\lambda} \,,$$ then the cardinal number is of the form $$\aleph_\lambda$$ for the same ordinal subscript λ. The ordinal λ determines whether $$\aleph_\lambda$$ is a weak limit cardinal. Because $$\aleph_{\alpha^+} = (\aleph_\alpha)^+ \,,$$ if λ is a successor ordinal then $$\aleph_\lambda$$ is not a weak limit. Conversely, if a cardinal κ is a successor cardinal, say $$\kappa = (\aleph_{\alpha})^+ \,,$$ then $$\kappa = \aleph_{\alpha^+} \,.$$ Thus, in general, $$\aleph_\lambda$$ is a weak limit cardinal if and only if λ is zero or a limit ordinal.

Although the ordinal subscript tells us whether a cardinal is a weak limit, it does not tell us whether a cardinal is a strong limit. For example, ZFC proves that $$\aleph_\omega$$ is a weak limit cardinal, but neither proves nor disproves that $$\aleph_\omega$$ is a strong limit cardinal (Hrbacek and Jech 1999:168). The generalized continuum hypothesis states that $$\kappa^+ = 2^{\kappa} \,$$ for every infinite cardinal κ. Under this hypothesis, the notions of weak and strong limit cardinals coincide.

The notion of inaccessibility and large cardinals
The preceding defines a notion of "inaccessibility": we are dealing with cases where it is no longer enough to do finitely many iterations of the successor and powerset operations; hence the phrase "cannot be reached" in both of the intuitive definitions above. But the "union operation" always provides another way of "accessing" these cardinals (and indeed, such is the case of limit ordinals as well). Stronger notions of inaccessibility can be defined using cofinality. For a weak (respectively strong) limit cardinal κ the requirement is that cf(κ) = κ (i.e. κ be regular) so that κ cannot be expressed as a sum (union) of fewer than κ smaller cardinals. Such a cardinal is called a weakly (respectively strongly) inaccessible cardinal. The preceding examples both are singular cardinals of cofinality ω and hence they are not inaccessible.

$$\aleph_0$$ would be an inaccessible cardinal of both "strengths" except that the definition of inaccessible requires that they be uncountable. Standard Zermelo–Fraenkel set theory with the axiom of choice (ZFC) cannot even prove the consistency of the existence of an inaccessible cardinal of either kind above $$\aleph_0$$, due to Gödel's incompleteness theorem. More specifically, if $$\kappa$$ is weakly inaccessible then $$L_{\kappa} \models ZFC$$. These form the first in a hierarchy of large cardinals.

title: Limit cardinal


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Diversity training

Diversity training is any program designed to facilitate positive intergroup interaction, reduce prejudice and discrimination, and generally teach individuals who are different from others how to work together effectively.

Diversity training is often aimed to meet objectives such as attracting and retaining customers and productive workers; maintaining high employee morale; and/or fostering understanding and harmony between workers.

Despite purported and intended benefits, systematic studies have not shown benefits to forced diversity training and instead show that they can backfire and lead to reductions in diversity and to discrimination complaints being taken less seriously. As of 2019, more than $8 billion a year is spent on diversity training in the United States.

1960s
In the 1960s, the concept of promoting diversity in the workplace was prompted as a result of the societal and legal reforms that followed the civil rights movement. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, enacted by the 88th US Congress, made it illegal for employers with more than 15 workers to discriminate in termination, hiring, promotion, compensation, training, or any other term, condition, or privilege of employment based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. Since its enactment, Title VII has been supplemented with legislation that prohibits discrimination on the basis of pregnancy, age, and disability. After the Civil Rights Act came to be, activists protested organizations who refused to hire blacks, planned jobs banks, and filed charges against employers that discriminated against their employees.

1970s
D.C. reinforced civil rights policies in the early 1970s with the Supreme Court extending the definition of discrimination in 1971, in Griggs v. Duke Power Company; the Court overruled employment practices that ostracized black employees without evidence of intent to discriminate. The civil rights movement helped to recreate its momentum for a new round of movements in the 1970s for the rights of women, the disabled, Latinos, and others. With shifts in societal and legal reforms, Federal agencies took the first step towards modern day diversity training, and by the end of 1971, the Social Security Administration had enrolled over 50,000 employees through racial bias training. Corporations followed suit and, over the next five years, began offering anti-bias training to their employees. By 1976, 60 percent of large companies offered equal-opportunity training.

1980s to Present
In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan tried to reverse affirmative action regulations put forward by JFK and appointed Clarence Thomas to run the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. As a result, diversity trainers in the U.S. began calling for diversity training arguing that women and minorities would soon be the backbone of the workforce and that companies needed to determine how to include them amongst their ranks. By 2005, 65 percent of large corporations offered their employees some form of diversity training.

Impact
Findings on diversity trainings are mixed. According to Harvard University sociologist Frank Dobbin, there is no evidence to indicate that anti-bias training leads to increases in the number of women or people of color in management positions. A 2009 Annual Review of Psychology study concluded, "We currently do not know whether a wide range of programs and policies tend to work on average," with the authors of the study stating in 2020 that as the quality of studies increases, the effect size of anti-bias training dwindles.

According to a 2006 study in the American Sociological Review, "diversity training and diversity evaluations are least effective at increasing the share of white women, black women, and black men in management." A meta-analysis suggests that diversity training could have a relatively large effect on cognitive-based and skill-based training outcomes. An analysis of data from over 800 firms over 30 years shows that diversity training and grievance procedures backfire and lead to reductions in the diversity of the firms' workforce. A 2013 study found that the presence of a diversity program in a workplace made high-status subjects less likely to take discrimination complaints seriously.

Alexandra Kalev and Frank Dobbin conducted a comprehensive review of cultural diversity training conducted in 830 midsize to large U.S. workplaces over a thirty one-year period. The results showed that diversity training was followed by a decrease of anywhere from 7.5–10% in the number of women in management. The percentage of black men in top positions fell by 12 percent. Similar effects were shown for Latinos and Asians. The study did not find that all diversity training is ineffective. Mandatory training programs offered to protect against discrimination lawsuits were called into question. Voluntary diversity training participation to advance organization's business goals was associated with increased diversity at the management level; voluntary services resulted in near triple digit increases for black, Hispanic, and Asian men.

A 2021 meta-analysis found a lack of high quality studies on the efficacy of diversity training. The researchers concluded that "while the small number of experimental studies provide encouraging average effects... the effects shrink when the trainings are conducted in real-world workplace settings, when the outcomes are measured at a greater time distance than immediately following the intervention, and, most importantly, when the sample size is large enough to produce reliable results."

In addition to increasing workforce diversity and reducing discrimination, diversity training is often intended to prevent successful discrimination lawsuits: corporate diversity training first became common in the United States after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 as a way to protect corporations from lawsuits, and although promoting respect and appealing to minority employees and customers became significant goals of diversity training starting in the late 1980s, an expansion of diversity training in the early 2000s was prompted by a series of high-profile discrimination lawsuits in the financial industry. A 2013 study found that white men were less likely to think a complaint of discrimination by an employee was accurate when they were told that the employer used diversity training, even when they were presented with evidence of discrimination, and several studies of the results of discrimination lawsuits in the United States have found that official diversity structures, including diversity training, have increasingly been accepted by judges as evidence of a lack of discrimination regardless of their effectiveness. Indeed, according to Nakamura & Edelman's (2019) summary of corporate diversity policies, "[i]n the twenty-first century, diversity commitments and policies are standard and firms that lack such structures look suspect."

title: Diversity training


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User:Raakesh

Welcome to My Page i m Rakesh frm Bangalore, india well more info to be added soon

I was Born on 14th January, 1981.

title: User:Raakesh


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Wikipedia:Recovering from Wikipediholism

Wikipediholism is a tongue-in-cheek term used to describe excessive time spent reading or editing on Wikipedia. The term may be humorous, but the problem can be grave. Like any behavioral addiction, Wikipedia overuse may lead to job loss, divorce, bankruptcy, or worse. Fortunately, a variety of corrective strategies exist.

Recovering from Wikipediholism
Read this once every hour you spend on Wikipedia:

Wikipedia is a great project. It's good to help Wikipedia. It's a good pastime and it's very educational.

However:
 * 1) Every hour you spend at Wikipedia is an hour from your life. Do you have something more important to do? Consider doing it first.
 * 2) Wikipedia may not help you reach your life goals.
 * 3) Even though Wikipedia is educational, there may be better ways of educating yourself. Wikipedia is not necessarily a substitute for them.
 * 4) Time is money. Are you sure you can afford the time to serve Wikipedia? If you can, that's well and good, but do so one hour at a time only.
 * 5) Sometimes it is necessary that you take a WikiBreak when you have something much more important to do. Moreover, this will help you to rejuvenate yourself.
 * 6) If you are using a mobile device, consider using its settings to limit the amount of time you can spend on Wikipedia. If you are using a computer, you can take a forced Wikibreak.

All the best. Remember, Wikipedia wants you to be the best person you can. It is not the goal of the project to steal the time you can use to improve your career prospects, learn new skills, spend time with family or friends, rejuvenate yourself, or use any way you wish. Remember, it's your time and you are donating it to Wikipedia. It is healthy to donate what you can afford to donate, but no more.

Corrective strategies
Wikipediholism can be a manifestation of problematic Internet use (PIU) and/or a variety of co-occurring psychiatric disorders such as attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or clinical depression. Corrective strategies include self-control software, content-control software, various other addiction treatments (such as motivational interviewing), and treating any co-occurring disorders.

If self-control software is insufficient, you may want to try one or more of the following ideas:

 * 1) You could contact a professional.
 * 2) * If you live in Canada or the US, you can check the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry list or with a doctor. If neither of those two resources were able to help you, then you can check the American Society of Addiction Medicine directory.
 * 3) * If you live elsewhere, you can contact your local psychiatric society, or you can ask a doctor. If neither of those two resources were able to help you, then you can contact your local addiction medicine society or the International Society of Addiction Medicine.
 * 4) * If you still haven't found a professional who you can afford to see, you can ask a local doctor, or Narcotics Anonymous or Alcoholics Anonymous in your area, to point you to a mental-health professional you can afford to visit. There are charities in many places that offer free or low-cost mental health counselling.
 * 5) Meanwhile, you could visit a twelve-step meeting. Narcotics Anonymous is very accepting of problematic Internet users, and it may be helpful for you.  If you feel that it might indeed help you, keep going back. There are no dues, fees, or waiting lists. Narcotics Anonymous operates in about 130 countries.
 * 6) You could see a doctor and get screened to see if you have any co-occurring psychological disorders. Such disorders are very common, and it may be impossible to recover from problematic Internet use if you do not treat them.

Or, you may write to us on the talk page and ask us for more help.

Software that may help

 * Self-control software is one possible solution.
 * Or you can use break reminder software. Some, like Workrave, can lock you out of your computer after a daily time limit has passed.
 * Or you can use content-control software. Mobicip, Qustodio, Limit Launcher or K9 Web Protection can stop you from using the Internet late at night altogether. Use a random password generator to choose a password for your content-control software. Write it down on an index card. Lock the index card in a box. Lock the box in a remote location (such as a car trunk). Put the key to the box in a labeled envelope, and store it in a different remote location (perhaps underneath some heavy furniture such as a dresser, or underneath one or more mattresses, or in an attic or crawlspace, or in a basement underneath a pile of heavy items). Or tell a friend to use some remote control software to set a password which only they will know. The friend should email the password to themselves so as not to forget it.
 * If you only procrastinate on Wikipedia, then you can instead get an anti-Wikipediholism reminder once an hour or can use the WikiBreak Enforcer. Alternatively, you can request that an administrator block you from editing.


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Flag of Pakistan

The national flag of Pakistan, also known as the Flag of the Star and Crescent, is made up of a green field with a stylized tilted white crescent moon and five-pointed star at its centre, and a vertical white stripe at its hoist-end. Though the specific shade of green on the flag is mandated only as 'dark green', its official and most consistent representation is in Pakistan green, which is shaded distinctively darker. It was adopted by the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan on 11 August 1947, and it became the official flag of the Dominion of Pakistan on 14 August 1947, following independence from the British Empire. The flag was subsequently retained as that of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan in 1956 and remains in use as the national flag to this day.

Most notably, the flag is referred to in the third verse of Pakistan's national anthem, and is widely flown on several important days of the year, including Republic Day, Independence Day and Defence Day. It is also hoisted every morning at schools, offices and government buildings to the playing of the national anthem and lowered again before sunset. A very elaborate flag-raising and lowering ceremony is carried out every evening by the Pakistan Rangers and their Indian Border Security Force counterparts at the Wagah–Attari border crossing between India and Pakistan, which is regularly attended by hundreds of spectators. The Government of Pakistan has formalized rules and regulations related to the flying of the national flag; it is to be displayed all day at full-mast on 23 March annually to commemorate the adoption of the Lahore Resolution in 1940 and the declaration of Pakistan as an independent Islamic republic with a constitution in 1956, both of which occurred on the same day. The same regulations also apply on 14 August annually, in celebration of Pakistan's day of independence; when the country was carved out from erstwhile British India as the homeland and nation-state for the Muslims of the Indian subcontinent.

History
In 1942, the Pakistan National Movement published a pamphlet, "The Millat of Islam and the menace of 'Indianism'", by the founder of the Pakistan Movement, Choudhry Rahmat Ali, depicting on its cover a flag of a proposed Pakistan with a thin white crescent and five white stars on a green field. A graphic illustration of Ali's flag in a critical work from 1946 more clearly portrays the stars in a pentagonal arrangement. Each star apparently represented a constituent nation of the proposed state: Punjab, Afghania (NWF), Kashmir, Sindh, and Balochistan. Ali also apparently designed a flag for an envisioned association of independent Muslim states distributed across South Asia, a 'Pak Commonwealth of Nations'. This flag featured a smaller crescent and ten stars.

The design eventually adopted as the Flag of Pakistan was based on the flag of the Muslim League. In 1937, the Muslim League began using a solid green banner charged with white crescent and star. In the early 1920s, during the era of the Khilafat Movement, Muslims had begun using a green banner with crescent and star, but as a religious rather than national symbol. By the 1930s, Muslims in India had become leery of the acceptance of the tricolor flag of the Congress Party as the national flag of India, in significant part because the discourses and rituals of hoisting the flag invoked explicitly Hindu religious themes. In 1940, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, leader of the Muslim League and future founder of the state of Pakistan, declared the League's flag the 'national flag of Muslim India'. By 1944, Muhammad Ali Jinnah was publicly declaring that they intended it to be the flag of Pakistan. This would become the flag of Pakistan, albeit charged with a white heraldic side or flank at the hoist. The resulting flag bears a striking resemblance to the various iterations of the Saudi flag from 1744-1937 which featured a white heraldic side or flank at the hoist and a green field charged with white calligraphic text (the Shahada).

In 1947, the Viceroy of India, Louis Mountbatten, proposed a national flag for the state of Pakistan which comprised the flag of the All-India Muslim League albeit with a Union Jack in the canton. This proposal was rejected by Muhammad Ali Jinnah on the grounds that a flag featuring both Saint George's Christian Cross alongside an Islamic star and crescent would not be accepted by the Pakistani people.

A team led by Syed Amir-uddin Kedwaii created the design that would ultimately be approved as the national flag. It was officially adopted by the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan on August 11, 1947, a few days before Pakistan gained its independence from British rule. Upon independence it became the flag of, first, the Dominion of Pakistan and then from 23 March 1956 that of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. The design remains unchanged since its initial adoption.

Symbolism
The Islamic green of the flag represents the Muslim-majority populace of Pakistan while the white stripe on the hoist-end represents its various religious minorities i.e. Non-Muslims, such as Hindus, Christians, Sikhs, Zoroastrians and others. The combined star and crescent serve as a symbol of Islam, with the crescent representing progress and the five-pointed star representing light and knowledge. The flag symbolizes Pakistan's commitment to both Islam as well as the rights of religious minorities.

The Pakistan Flag is based on the original flag of the Muslim League, which itself drew inspiration from the flag of the Ottoman Empire.

Design
The official design of the national flag was adopted by the Constituent Assembly together with a definition of the features and proportions.

According to the specifications, it is a dark green rectangular flag in the proportion of length [A] and width [B] as 3:2 with a white vertical bar at the mast, the green portion bearing a white crescent in the centre and a five-pointed white heraldic star. The width of the white portion [C] is one quarter the length of the flag [A], nearest the mast, so the green portion occupies the remaining three quarters [D]. Draw a diagonal L3 from the top right-hand corner to the bottom left corner of the green portion. On this diagonal establish two points P1 and P2. P1 is positioned at the centre of the green portion and P2 at the intersection of the diagonal L3 and an arc C4 created from the top right-hand corner equal to 13/20 the height of the flag [E]. With the centre at point P1 and a radius 3/10 the height of the flag describe the first circle C1 and with the centre at point P2 and a radius 11/40 the height of the flag describe a second circle C2. The enclosures made by these two circles form the crescent. The dimensions of the five-pointed white heraldic star are determined by drawing a circle C3 with a radius 1/10 the height of the flag positioned between P2 and P3 on the diagonal L3. The circle surrounds the five points of the heraldic star and the star lies with one point on the diagonal L3 at point P3 where circle C1 intersects the diagonal L3. The flag is coloured in Pakistan green having standard RGB values (red = 0, green = 64, blue = 26) or with hex triplet #00401A or the HSV value = (h = 144, s = 100, v = 25). The left strip, the star and the crescent are painted in white. The flag is supported from left white side.

Dimensions
The Interior Ministry of Pakistan provides dimensions for flags in different circumstances:
 * For ceremonial occasions: 24′ × 16′, 21′ × 14′, 18′ × 12′, 11′ × $6 2/3$′ or 9′ × $6 1/4$′.
 * For use over buildings: 6′ × 4′ or 3′ × 2′.
 * For cars: 24″ × 16″.
 * For tables: $10 1/4$″ × $8 1/4$″.

National flag protocols

 * No other flag must fly higher (except the United Nations flag at United Nations buildings).
 * When displayed or flown alongside other national flags, the National Flag must be displayed or flown at the same height as the other national flags, never lower.
 * When displayed alongside provincial, military or corporate flags, the National Flag must be higher.
 * When tied to a mast, it must be tied only at the left (at the beginning of the white bar) and left to fly freely without any obstruction.
 * Must not touch the ground, shoes or feet or anything unclean.
 * Must never be flown in darkness.
 * Must be raised at dawn and lowered at dusk (except on the Parliament of Pakistan, which is the only official building on which the flag is never lowered). When flown over the Parliament of Pakistan at night, it must always remain alit with artificial light
 * Must not be marked with anything (including words or pictures).
 * When raising: (i) must be saluted to by all uniformed personnel, (ii) others must stand in attention.
 * Must be raised or lowered ceremoniously.
 * Must never be displayed vertically.
 * When displayed horizontally, the white strip must always be at the left, with green field on the right.
 * Must not fly or be displayed upside down or with the crescent and star facing left.
 * Must not be displayed anywhere where it is likely to get dirty.
 * Must not be set on fire or trampled upon.
 * Must not be buried or lowered into a grave (when burying a flag-bearing casket, the National Flag must be detached from the casket and held above the grave as the casket is lowered or removed from the casket before burial).

Use by public officials
The use of the national flag is regulated by the Pakistan Flag Rules, which were introduced in 2002 by Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali. The rules are not available online but there have been instances of misuse such as officials using flags on their vehicles when they are not entitled to do so. The national flag is flown on the official residences and vehicles (cars, boats, planes) of the following public officials:

Milestones

 * 2019 – The largest balloon mosaic (flag) is 180.172 m2 (1939 ft² 37 in²) achieved by Pakistan Hindu Council (Pakistan) in Islamabad, Pakistan, on 5 August 2019. It is a Guinness World Record.
 * 2017 – On 14 August, People of Balochistan hoisted a 2-mile-long flag of Pakistan in Quetta.
 * 2014 – On 15 February, 29,040 people gathered in a stadium in Lahore to form the flag of Pakistan and set a new world record for forming the world's largest national flag comprising humans, which was certified by Guinness World Records.
 * 2012 – On 22 October, 24,200 people gathered in a stadium in Lahore to form the flag of Pakistan and set a new world record for forming the world's largest national flag comprising humans, which was certified by Guinness World Records.
 * 2004 – In August, a 340 × 510 ft (173,400 square foot) flag of Pakistan was unfurled at the National Stadium Karachi, setting the world record for the largest flag.
 * 1947 – On the night of 14 August 1947, a group of Indian Boy Scouts were in France when the news reached them that their country had become independent. Mohammad Iqbal Qureshi was one of the Muslim boy scouts who with the help of his friends turned a green turban into a Pakistani flag and unfurled it. 15 August 1947 was the first time when the Pakistani flag flew on foreign soil.

title: Flag of Pakistan