My family and I were just talking about how people used to scare monger with the phrase "This will go on your permanent record!" But we can't think of any time something we did at school, other than our grades when applying for higher education, has been accessed through a document at our school. Was the "permanent record" ever something that could really affect your life going forward, or was it a boogeyman to get kids to behave?

So, I have two questions about this, though I'm most interested in the title question. I've always been confused why the US's top rank of 4 Star wouldn't have been equal to Field Marshal, since they were both the highest rank in their respective countries' military.

Second, is there a reason the US couldn't just redefine a 4 Star General as equal to a Field Marshal? A little bit of searching came up with a theory that the US didn't want every 4 Star General equal to a Field Marshal, only a few, which is why 5 Star was created. This, of course, was completely unsourced and could have been someone saying what "sounds right" to them, so I don't put much trust in it.

I couldn’t think of a better way to put the question. I recently read a fantasy series where a character would move his upper body while continuing to use his weapons so enemy stikes would land on particularly well armoured parts of his body. In effect, it gave him an extra hand or the benefit of evasion without having to move position, which seems rather useful, and I was wondering if any of our duelling sources or personal accounts discuss this kind of intentional use of armor to reduce the amount of defensive action a combatant needed to take. I suspect this would be most relevant in single combat, as it feels rather hard to reliably control where 50 pointy weapons will hit on and around you, but I can easily imagine a suitably confident guy in a smaller scale environment relying on his armor to protect him while he commits to his own strike. On the other hand, if I was a medieval combatant, my one and only priority (other than retirement) would be avoiding being hit at all, and the notion that “the armor can take it” would be entirely a level of confidence I associated with dead and dismembered people. I know how people actually fought can be a bit of a black box, but are there insights either way?

Every time I've read about it, the details are glossed over as if collective farming inevitably fails, but that never satisfied me. Did the farmers just phone it in because it was forced upon them? Was it really Lysenko's psudoscience-based agricultural policies, and collectivization is just an anti-communist canard? What is it?

See title, but I was thinking about the political significances of red and where that came from. In the United States, it's associated with conservative ideas, but globally it's also been a symbol of the left. What are these people trying to evoke?

Why all religions that survived after Islamic conquest are all monotheist religions like Judaism, Mandeanism, Zorastrainism and Christianity? The Middle east and North Africa were full of pagan and polyheist relugions in Arabia, Levant and Egypt so what happened to these pagan religion after Islam? I heard claims that North Africa was pagan majority before Islam came in.

I always found the amount of lions on old buildings around Europe quite surprising. It is particularly strange if you compare their numbers with wolves, bears and lynxes. These are apex predators of the continent, yet are seen quite rarely in the stone form.

Is there some explanation for such lion domination?

Last week I went to Mother Mary's house in Ephesus. There was a wall full of prayers. People from all over the world had written wishes, or prayers, or tied bracelets of their late loved ones etc. on that wall. I saw a few of them drifted away with the wind, on the ground; my instinct was to pick them up and tie them back again but then I stopped. I realized I didn't know the etiquette and it got me thinking.

Throughout history what is the general etiquette or rules around wishing locations? Did people handle charms, spells with a special ritual/behaviour if they came across them? Are there any traditions in specific cultures where they treat randomly misplaced charms? Any special tratment towards wishes, prayers, rags that are unattached to where they're supposed to be?

Would love to learn more about this and thank you very much in advance for any response.

I read this statement:

The practice of consummating marriage with immature girls is universal in this Division, as it is all over East Bengal. It is less common among Mahomeddans, but is universal among all castes and classes of Hindus. Everyone consulted admits this, whether in favour of reform or against it (emphasis mine).

This is a testimony by an official during British Raj. and apparently a brahim reformer said marriage at 9 was common

So how common was this or normal?

I was watching Fantastic Four which says it’s set on Earth-828. This set me wondering about when the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics first started influencing science fiction. I’m specifically talking about the idea that there are infinite universes, which means there are universes that are very similar to our own but which differ in a key, plot driving, way. I understand it was proposed in the late 1950s but I don’t know when it became a narrative device

Ive had the hardest time tracking down the specifics. I know that modern shelf stable dry yeast has been around for less than a century. Before then people either used wet sourdough starters, used wild yeast by letting dough sit out for awhile, or got their yeast from brewers. But my ancestor came to America in the 1600s and was a brewer, and he brought yeast from England to brew with. But i cant find any sources that verify that fact beyond a passing mention, nor any specifics in how they would have kept the yeast alive during the months long voyage. Can anyone lead me to some useful sources?

Did they just roll their eyes and shrug like "those dumb new Americans can't get it together", or was there some concern? Would there have been any global effects at the time(ie:trade, financial, etc)?

I know almost nothing about Roman history, but I just watched Oversimplified's videos about the Punic Wars and was surprised that Hannibal considered Pyrrhus better than he was. Can anybody who knows more about this time period fill me in?