Wikipedia:Today's featured article/November 2004

Today's featured article archive

November 1

Graphic representation of the world wide web around Wikipedia

The World Wide Web is a distributed hypertext system that operates over the Internet. Hypertext is browsed using a program called a web browser which retrieves pieces of information (called "documents" or "web pages") from web servers (or "web sites") and displays them on one's screen. One can then follow hyperlinks on each page to other documents or even send information back to the server to interact with it. The act of following hyperlinks is often called "surfing" the web. The Web can be traced back to a project at CERN in 1989 when Tim Berners-Lee and Robert Cailliau built ENQUIRE. (more...)

Recently featured: Infinite monkey theorem – Louis XIV – Speed of light

November 2

Air Force One is the airline call sign of any U.S. Air Force aircraft carrying the President of the United States. Since 1990, the presidential fleet has consisted of two specifically-configured, highly customized Boeing 747-200B series aircraft—tail numbers 28000 and 29000—with Air Force designation VC-25A. These planes are maintained by the U.S. Air Force solely for presidential air transport. From its inception, Air Force One has become a symbol of Presidential power and prestige, carrying the president on several diplomatic missions. Before these planes entered service, two Boeing 707-320B-type aircraft—tail numbers 26000 and 27000—had operated as Air Force One, starting in 1962. The Secret Service refers to Air Force One by the codename "Angel." (more...)

Recently featured: World Wide Web – Infinite monkey theorem – Louis XIV

November 3

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet, dramatist, mystic and public figure. Yeats was one of the driving forces behind the Irish Literary Revival and was co-founder of the Abbey Theatre. His early work tended towards a romantic lushness and dreamlike quality best described by the title of his 1893 collection The Celtic Twilight, but in his forties, inspired by his relationships with modernist poets such as Ezra Pound and his active involvement in Irish nationalism, he moved towards a harder, more modern style. As well as his role as member of the board of the Abbey, Yeats served as an Irish Senator. He took his role as a public figure seriously and was a reasonably hard-working member of the Seanad. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923 for what the Nobel Committee described as "his always inspired poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation". (more...)

Recently featured: Air Force One – World Wide Web – Infinite monkey theorem

November 4

Baroque was a cultural movement and style in European art, originating around 1600 in Rome. The Council of Trent (1545–63), in which the Roman Catholic Church answered many questions of internal reform, addressed the representational arts by demanding that paintings and sculptures in church contexts should speak to the illiterate rather than to the well-informed. This turn toward a populist conception of the function of ecclesiastical art is seen by many art historians as driving the innovations of Caravaggio and the Carracci brothers, all of whom were working (and competing for commissions) in Rome around 1600. The appeal of Baroque style turned consciously from the witty, intellectual qualities of 16th century Mannerist art to a visceral appeal aimed at the senses. It employed an iconography that was direct, simple, obvious, and theatrical. Baroque art drew on certain broad and heroic tendencies in Annibale Caracci and his circle, and found inspiration in other artists like Correggio and Caravaggio and Federico Barocci, nowadays sometimes termed "proto-Baroque". Germinal ideas of the Baroque can also be found in the work of Michelangelo. (more...)

Recently featured: William Butler Yeats – Air Force One – World Wide Web

November 5

The Lord Chancellor is one of the most senior and important functionaries in the government of the United Kingdom. He is a Great Officer of State, and is appointed by the Sovereign on the advice of the Prime Minister and is, by convention, always a peer, although there is no legal impediment to the appointment of a commoner. The Lord Chancellor's responsibilities are wide-ranging; they include presiding over the House of Lords, participating in the Cabinet, acting as the custodian of the Great Seal and heading the judiciary. Concerns over these wide-ranging powers have led to a proposal to abolish the office from Tony Blair's ministry. A Bill to achieve the desired effect has been proposed, but has not been passed into law. Lord Falconer of Thoroton is the current Lord Chancellor. (more...)

Recently featured: Baroque – William Butler Yeats – Air Force One

November 6

Dred Scott v. Sandford was a lawsuit decided by the Supreme Court of the United States in 1857. It is considered by many to have been a key cause of the American Civil War, and of the later ratification of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, leading to the abolition of slavery and establishment of civil rights for freed slaves. While the name of the case is "Scott v. Sandford", the respondent's surname was actually "Sanford". A clerk had misspelled the name, and the court never corrected the error. The decision for the court was written by Chief Justice Roger Taney. Dred Scott was a slave who was taken first to Illinois, a free state, and then to Minnesota, a free territory, for an extended period of time and then back to the slave state of Missouri. After his original master died, he sued for his freedom. After the Missouri Supreme Court ruled against him, he appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which upheld the decision of the Missouri court, but also used the case to fundamentally change the legal balance of power in favor of slaveholders. (more...)

Recently featured: Lord Chancellor – Baroque – William Butler Yeats

November 7

There have been two real-life documented incidents of exploding whales. The better known explosion occurred in Florence, Oregon in 1970 when a dead Gray Whale was blown up by the Oregon Highway Division in an attempt to dispose of its rotting carcass and became famous when American humorist Dave Barry wrote about it in his newspaper column. Footage of the incident later appeared on the Internet and it became an instant hit due to the improbability and absurdity of the event. The other reported case of an exploding whale was in Taiwan in 2004 when a build up of gas inside a decomposing Sperm Whale caused it to explode while it was being transported to have a post-mortem performed. The explosion was reported to have splattered whale entrails over surrounding shop-fronts, bystanders and cars. In popular culture, exploding whales are a theme written about by several authors, mainly because their unusual, absurd and highly improbable nature makes them an interesting topic. (more...)

Recently featured: Dred Scott v. Sandford – Lord Chancellor – Baroque

November 8

The House of Commons is the lower, directly elected house of the Canadian Parliament

The Parliament of Canada is Canada's legislative branch, seated at Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario. According to section 17 of the Constitution Act, 1867, Parliament consists of three components: the Sovereign, the Senate, and the House of Commons. The Sovereign is normally represented by the Governor General, who appoints the 105 members of the Senate on the advice of the Prime Minister. The 308 members of the House of Commons are directly elected by the people, with each member representing a single electoral district (or riding). The democratically elected "Lower House", the House of Commons, is the dominant branch of the Canadian Parliament. The "Upper House", the Senate, rarely opposes the will of the other Chamber, and the duties of the Sovereign and Governor General are purely ceremonial. The Prime Minister and Cabinet must retain the support of a majority of Members of the Lower House in order to remain in office; they need not have the confidence of the Upper House. (more...)

Recently featured: Exploding whale – Dred Scott v. Sandford – Lord Chancellor

November 9

The Shrine of Remembrance, located in St Kilda Road, Melbourne, is one of the largest war memorials in Australia. It was built as a memorial to the 114,000 men and women of Victoria who served in World War I, but soon came to be seen as Australia's major memorial to all the 60,000 Australians who died in that war. It now serves as a memorial for all Australians who served in war, and is the site of annual observances of ANZAC Day (25 April) and Remembrance Day (11 November). Around the Sanctuary walls is a frieze of 12 carved panels depicting the armed services at work and in action during World War I. The Sanctuary is surrounded by a narrow walkway called the Ambulatory. Along the Ambulatory are 42 bronze caskets containing hand-written, illuminated Books of Remembrance with the names of every Victorian who enlisted for active service with the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) or Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force in World War I or died in camp prior to embarkation. (more...)

Recently featured: Parliament of Canada – Exploding whale – Dred Scott v. Sandford

November 10

There are three types of Japanese toilets. The oldest type is a simple Asian squat toilet, which is still common in public restrooms. After World War II, modern Western-type flush toilets and urinals became common. Current state of the art is a high-tech bidet toilet, are known as Washlet, which as of 2004 is installed in over half of all Japanese households. These high-tech toilets include a built-in bidet for both the anus and vulva, where a water jet cleans the private regions of the user. Many additional features are also often included, such as a blow dryer, seat heating, massage options and other adjustments for the water jet of the bidet, automatic opening of the lid and flushing after use, a wireless toilet control panel, heating and air conditioning for the toilet room, etc. (more...)

Recently featured: Shrine of Remembrance – Parliament of Canada – Exploding whale

November 11

Sarajevo is the capital and largest city of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is considered one of the most important cities in the Balkans and has had a long and rich history ever since it was founded by the Ottomans in 1461. It was the site of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand which sparked World War I; more recently Sarajevo has hosted the 1984 Winter Olympics and experienced the longest siege in the history of modern warfare. Sarajevo is part of Canton Sarajevo, one of the ten Cantons of Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is located close to the geometric center of the triangularly-shaped Bosnia and Herzegovina, and covers some 142 km² (88.2 square miles) of land. Sarajevo has a continental climate, lying between the climate zones of central Europe to the north and the Mediterranean to the south. The city has warm summers, with temperatures of 35°C (95°F) not being uncommon; Sarajevo also has cold winters with much snow due to the city's high altitude. (more...)

Recently featured: Japanese toilet – Shrine of Remembrance – Parliament of Canada

November 12

Baseball is a team sport that is popular in the Americas and East Asia. In the United States, baseball has often been called the national pastime, and the total attendance for Major League games is more than that of all other American professional sports combined. In Japan, the Dominican Republic, Cuba, South Korea, and several other countries, baseball is the most popular sport by any measurement. Among American television viewers, however, it has been surpassed in popularity by American football and, in the South, car racing. Although the three most popular team sports in North America are ball games (baseball, basketball and American football), baseball's popularity was once so great that the word "ballgame" in the United States specifically refers to a game of baseball, and "ballfield" or "ballpark" to a baseball diamond. Baseball is played between two teams of nine players each on a baseball field, usually under the authority of one or more officials, called umpires. The game is played in nine innings in which each team gets one turn to and try to score runs while the other pitches and defends in the field, attempting to get three players of the batting team out. (more...)

Recently featured: Sarajevo – Japanese toilet – Shrine of Remembrance

November 13

The economy of Africa comprises more than 800 million people in fifty-four different nations. Africa's economy is emerging from the after-effects of colonialism and it struggles with difficult democratic, welfare and quality of life issues. Africa is by far the world's poorest continent, and more saliently it is on average poorer than it was twenty-five years ago. While rapid growth in China and now India, and moderate growth in South America, has lifted millions beyond subsistence living, Africa has stagnated, even going backwards in terms of foreign trade, investment, and per capita income. This poverty has widespread effects, including low life expectancy, violence, and instability—factors that further increase the continent's poverty. Over the decades a number of solutions have been proposed and many attempted, but no improvement scheme has shown much success. (more...)

Recently featured: Baseball – Sarajevo – Japanese toilet

November 14

Jonathan Swift's first major work, A Tale of a Tub, was composed between 1694 and 1697 and published in 1704. It is probably his most difficult satire, and possibly his most masterful. The Tale is a prose parody which is divided up into sections of "digression" and "tale". The "tale" presents a consistent satire of religious excess, while the digressions are a series of parodies of contemporary writing in literature, politics, theology, Biblical exegesis, and medicine. The overarching parody is of enthusiasm, pride, and credulity. From its opening (once past the prolegomena, which comprises the first three sections), the book is constructed like a layer cake, with Digression and Tale alternating. (more...)

Recently featured: Economy of Africa – Baseball – Sarajevo

November 15

Linus Pauling was an American physical chemist. Widely considered as the most influential chemist of the 20th century and one of the most important scientists of all time, Pauling was one of the first quantum chemists, and in 1954 was awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry for his work describing the nature of chemical bonds. Pauling received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1962 for his campaign against above-ground nuclear testing, becoming one of only two people to receive the Nobel Prize in more than one field, the other being Marie Curie. (more...)

Recently featured: A Tale of a Tub – Economy of Africa – Baseball

November 16

A scene of Felix "laffing" from "Felix in Hollywood" (1923).

Felix the Cat is a cartoon character. Created in 1922, his black body, white eyes and giant grin, coupled with the surrealism of the situations his cartoons placed him in, combined to make him one of the most recognizable cartoon characters in the world. Felix was the first cartoon character to attain a level of popularity sufficient to draw movie audiences based solely on his star power. His origins were in cartoons starring an animated Charlie Chaplin that Messmer created while working at the animation studio of Australian émigré Pat Sullivan. Felix reached the height of his worldwide fame in 1925. Felix's career plummeted in 1930, when a desperate attempt to add sound to the shorts failed. However, the advent of television would prove the cat's savior. (more...)

Recently featured: Linus Pauling – A Tale of a Tub – Economy of Africa

November 17

The Battle of Leyte Gulf was a naval battle of the Pacific campaign of World War II, fought in the seas around the island of Leyte in the Philippines from October 23 to October 26, 1944. The Japanese intended to repel or destroy the Allied invasion of Leyte. Instead, the Allied navies inflicted a major defeat on the outnumbered Imperial Japanese Navy which finished it as a strategic force in the Pacific War. The battle is often considered to be the largest naval battle in history. Leyte Gulf was also the scene of the first use of kamikaze aircraft by the Japanese. The Australian heavy cruiser HMAS Australia was hit on 21 October, and organized suicide attacks by the "Special Attack Force" began on 25 October. (more...)

Recently featured: Felix the Cat – Linus Pauling – A Tale of a Tub

November 18

In mathematics, a regular polytope is a geometric figure with a high degree of symmetry. Examples in two dimensions include the square, the regular pentagon and hexagon, and so on. In three dimensions the regular polytopes include the cube, the dodecahedron, and all Platonic solids. There exist examples in higher dimensions also. Circles and spheres, although highly symmetric, are not considered regular polytopes because they do not have flat faces. The strong symmetry of the regular polytopes gives them an aesthetic quality that interests of non-mathematicians and mathematicians alike. (more...)

Recently featured: Battle of Leyte Gulf – Felix the Cat – Linus Pauling

November 19

Sir Alfred Hitchcock was a British film director whose films are closely associated with the suspense thriller genre. Hitchcock is one of the most well-known and popular directors of all time, known as the "Master of Suspense" due to the many successful motion pictures he directed involving murderers and the innocent people caught in their paths. He directed over fifty films over the course of his career, with several of them becoming well-known box office hits that have influenced a great number of filmmakers, producers, and actors. From 1955 to 1965, Hitchcock was the host and producer of a long-running television series entitled Alfred Hitchcock Presents. While his films had made Hitchcock's name synonymous with "suspense," the series made Hitchcock a celebrity himself. His voice, image, and mannerisms became instantly recognizable, and were often the subject of parody. He directed a few episodes of the series himself, and he upset a number of movie production companies when he insisted on using his television crew to produce his motion picture Psycho. (more...)

Recently featured: Regular polytope – Battle of Leyte Gulf – Felix the Cat

November 20

Afsluitdijk seperates the IJsselmeer from the North Sea

The Zuiderzee Works were a massive hydraulic engineering project undertaken by the Netherlands during the 20th century. They were built to protect land from flooding and to reclaim land in extensive polders, for farming and housing. Original plans for the works date back to the 17th century, but it was not until 1913, when Cornelis Lely became minister of transport, that official planning started. The single biggest structure in the project was a 32 km long dam, the Afsluitdijk, protecting the Dutch from the North Sea. But to test the waters the small Amsteldiepdijk was built first, construction of which lasted four years and proved to be a valuable learning experience for the much larger Afsluitdijk. When the Afsluitdijk was finished in 1932, the Zuiderzee was completely dammed off and from then on would be called lake IJsselmeer. The inflation-adjusted cost of the dam would be the current equivalent of $710 million. (more...)

Recently featured: Alfred Hitchcock – Regular polytope – Battle of Leyte Gulf

November 21

ROT13 replaces each letter by its partner 13 characters further along the alphabet

ROT13 is a simple Caesar cipher for obscuring text by replacing each letter with the letter thirteen places down the alphabet. A becomes N, B becomes O and so on. The algorithm is used in online forums as a means of hiding joke punchlines, puzzle solutions, movie and story spoilers and offensive materials from the casual glance. ROT13 has been described as the "Usenet equivalent of a magazine printing the answer to a quiz upside down." ROT13 originated in Usenet Internet discussions in the early 1980s, and has become a de facto standard. As a Caesar cipher, ROT13 provides no real cryptographic security and is not used for such; in fact it is often used as the canonical example of weak encryption. Because ROT13 scrambles only letters, more complex schemes have been proposed to handle numbers and punctuation, or arbitrary binary data. (more...)

Recently featured: Zuiderzee Works – Alfred Hitchcock – Regular polytope

November 22

The Indus Valley Civilization (fl. 2800 BCE–1800 BCE) was an ancient civilization that is so named because its first excavated sites, Harappa and Mohenjo-daro, were on the Indus River in the northwest of the Indian sub-continent in present day Pakistan. At its height around 2200 BCE, the Indus Civilization covered an area larger than Europe, centered on Mohenjo Daro on the Indus River. The nomenclature Sindhu-Sarasvati Civilization was introduced into Indian textbooks in 2002, as a new designation for the well-known Indus Valley civilization. The addition of "Saraswati," an ancient river central to Hindu myth, is meant to show (or make believe) that Indus Valley civilization was actually part of Vedic civilization. Research which identifies the civilization's location with the Vedic Sarasvati river system mentioned in ancient literature is speculative. (more...)

Recently featured: ROT13 – Zuiderzee Works – Alfred Hitchcock

November 23

William I of Orange was the main leader of the Dutch revolt against the Spanish that set off the Eighty Years' War and resulted in the formal independence of the Netherlands in 1648. A wealthy nobleman, William originally served at the court of the Spanish regent. Unhappy with the lack of political power for the local nobility and the Spanish persecution of Dutch Protestants, William joined the Dutch uprising and turned against his former masters. The most influential and politically capable of the rebels, William led the Dutch to several military successes in the fight against the Spanish. Declared an outlaw by the Spanish king in 1580, he was assassinated by Balthasar Gérard in Delft at a time when his popularity was waning. In the Netherlands, he is also known as the Vader des vaderlands ("Father of the Fatherland") and the Dutch national anthem, the Wilhelmus, is named for him and commemorates his life. (more...)

Recently featured: Indus Valley Civilization – ROT13 – Zuiderzee Works

November 24

Buddha and Bodhisattvas, 11th century, Pala Empire.

The history of Buddhism spans from the 6th century BCE to the present, starting with the birth of the Buddha Siddharta Gautama. This makes it one of the oldest religions practiced today. Throughout this period, the religion evolved as it encountered various countries and cultures, adding to its original Indian foundation Hellenistic as well as Central Asian, East Asian and Southeast Asian cultural elements. In the process, its geographical extent became considerable so as to affect at one time or another most of the Asian continent. The history of Buddhism is also characterized by the development of numerous movements and schisms, foremost among them the Theravada, Mahayana and Vajrayana traditions, punctuated by contrasting periods of expansion and retreat. (more...)

Recently featured: William I of Orange – Indus Valley Civilization – ROT13

November 25

William Shakespeare is regarded as one of the greatest English poets ever

The history of English poetry stretches from the middle of the 7th century to the present day. Over this period, English poets have written some of the most enduring poems in European culture, and the language and its poetry have spread around the globe. Consequently, the term English poetry is unavoidably ambiguous. It can mean poetry written in England (and, by extension, the United Kingdom), or poetry written in English. With the growth of British trade and the British Empire, the English language has been widely used outside England. In the twenty-first century, only a small percentage of the world's native English speakers live in England, and there is also a vast population of non-native speakers of English who are capable of writing poetry in the language. A number of major national poetries, including the American, Australian, New Zealand and Canadian poetry have emerged and developed. Since 1922, Irish poetry has also been increasingly viewed as a separate area of study. (more...)

Recently featured: History of Buddhism – William I of Orange – Indus Valley Civilization

November 26

Athanasius Kircher was a German Jesuit scholar who published around 40 works in the 17th century, most in the fields of oriental studies, geology and medicine. He made an early study of Egyptian hieroglyphs. He was ahead of his time in proposing that the plague was caused by an infectious microorganism and in suggesting effective measures to prevent the spread of the disease. A scientific star in his day, towards the end of his life he was eclipsed by the rationalism of René Descartes and others. In the late 20th century, however, the aesthetic qualities of his work have again begun to be appreciated. He has been described by one scholar, Edward Schmidt, as "the last Renaissance man." (more...)

Recently featured: English poetry – History of Buddhism – William I of Orange

November 27

The Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution amended the provisions of Article II relating to presidential elections. Originally, the Electoral College would elect both the President and the Vice President in a single election; the person with a majority would become President and the runner-up would become Vice President. The election of 1800, however, demonstrated some problems with the system. The Twelfth Amendment, proposed by Congress on December 9, 1803 and ratified by the requisite number of state legislatures on June 15, 1804, required electors to cast two distinct votes: one for President and another for Vice President. (more...)

Recently featured: Athanasius Kircher – English poetry – History of Buddhism

November 28

Mozilla Firefox is a free web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and hundreds of volunteers. Before its 1.0 release on November 9, 2004, Firefox had already garnered a great deal of acclaim from the media, ranging from Forbes to the Wall Street Journal. With over 5 million downloads in the first 12 days of its release, Firefox 1.0 is one of the most-used free software applications among home users. With Firefox, the Mozilla Foundation aims to develop a small, fast, simple, and highly extensible web browser (separate from the larger Mozilla Suite). Firefox has become the main focus of Mozilla development along with the Mozilla Thunderbird email client and has replaced the Mozilla Suite as the official browser release of the Mozilla Foundation. Firefox has attracted attention as an alternative to Microsoft Internet Explorer, since Internet Explorer has come under fire by the media for insecurity, lack of features, disregard for Web standards, and vulnerability to spyware and malware installation. (more...)

Recently featured: Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution – Athanasius Kircher – English poetry

November 29

The Celtic Tiger is a nickname for the Republic of Ireland during its period of rapid economic growth between the 1990s and 2001 or 2002. Many economists credit Ireland's low taxation rate (10 to 12.5 percent throughout the late 1990s) and business-friendly regulation policies as responsible for much of the growth. A more sceptical interpretation is that much of the growth was due to the fact that the economy of Ireland had lagged the rest of northwestern Europe for so long that it had become the one of few remaining sources of a relatively large, low-wage labour pool left in Western Europe. (more...)

Recently featured: Mozilla Firefox – Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution – Athanasius Kircher

November 30

The Mercedes-Benz 450SEL 6.9 was a high-performance version of the S-Class luxury sedan. Built on its own assembly line by Daimler-Benz AG (now DaimlerChrysler) in Stuttgart and based on the long-wheelbase version of the "W116" chassis introduced in 1973, the 6.9, as it was generally referred to in the company's own literature to separate it from the regular 450SEL, was first shown to the motoring press at the Geneva Auto Show in 1974 and produced between 1975 and 1981 in extremely limited numbers. It was billed as the flagship of the Mercedes-Benz car line and the successor to Mercedes-Benz's original high-performance sedan, the 300SEL 6.3. The 6.9 also has the distinction of being among the first vehicles ever with optional anti-lock brakes, first introduced by Mercedes-Benz and Bosch in 1978. (more...)

Recently featured: Celtic Tiger – Mozilla Firefox – Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution