Significant Number Factoid Friday – Today Number Six 6

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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By special request, today’s significant number is the number six. My thanks to John in Australia for the suggestion, turns out it was a very interesting choice. So let’s get started. Enjoy.

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The Number Six  6

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6

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In religion

  • Chapter One of Genesis, the first book in the Old Testament, tells us that the Creation was done over a six day period, and that man was created on day number 6. Moreover, six days were appointed to man for his labor, while one day is associated in sovereignty with the Lord God, as His rest.
  • The serpent also was created on the sixth day.
  • The Sixth Commandment relates to the worst sin – murder.
  • The sixth clause of the Lord’s prayer treats of sin.
  • There are six points on a Star of David.
Star of David
Star of David
  • There are six Orders of the Mishnah.
  • Six symbolic foods are placed on the Passover Seder Plate.
  • The Jewish holiday of Shavuot starts on the sixth day of the Hebrew month of Sivan.

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  • In Islam there are Six articles of belief
  • Fasting six days of Shawwal, together with the month of Ramadan, is equivalent to fasting the whole year

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  • In Hindu theology, a trasarenu is the combination of 6 celestial paramanus (atoms)

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In mathematics

  • Six is the first number which is neither a square number nor a prime number.
  • Six is the largest of the four all-Harshad numbers.
  • There are six basic trigonometric functions.
  • A cube has six faces.

cube

  • A hexagon is a regular polygon with six sides.
  • A hexahedron is a polyhedron with six faces, with a cube being a special case.
  • S6, with 720 elements, is the only finite symmetric group which has an outer automorphism. This automorphism allows us to construct a number of exceptional mathematical objects such as the S(5,6,12) Steiner system, the projective plane of order 4 and the Hoffman-Singleton graph.
  • Six similar coins can be arranged around a central coin of the same radius so that each coin makes contact with the central one (and touches both its neighbors without a gap), but seven cannot be so arranged. This makes 6 the answer to the two-dimensional kissing number problem. The densest sphere packing of the plane is obtained by extending this pattern to the hexagonal lattice in which each circle touches just six others.

Kissing Coins .

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In science

  • Six is the atomic number of carbon.
  • A benzene molecule has a ring of six carbon atoms.
  • The prefix “hexa-“ (Greek word for ‘six’) also occurs in the systematic name of many chemical compounds, such as “hexamethyl”.
  • A hexamer is an oligomer made of six sub-units.
  • Adenine is one of four bases that code for all life in deoxyribonucleic acid. Adenine’s molecular structure is based on a hexagonal ring bonded to a pentagonal ring.

Adenine

  • In the Standard Model of particle physics, there are six types of quark and six types of lepton.
  • In statistical mechanics, the six-vertex model has six possible configurations of arrows at each vertex.
  • The six-fold symmetry of snowflakes arises from the hexagonal crystal structure of ordinary ice.
  • People with sexdactyly have six fingers on each hand.

sexdactyly

  • Six babies delivered in one birth are sextuplets.
  • There are six tastes in traditional Indian Medicine called Ayurveda: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, pungent, and astringent. These tastes are used to suggest a diet based on the symptoms of the body.
  • Phase 6 is one of six pandemic influenza phases.
  • The cells of a beehive honeycomb are 6-sided.

beehive honeycomb

  • Insects have 6 legs.
  • The measuring instrument called a sextant got its name because its shape forms one-sixth of a whole circle.

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In space

  • The New General Catalogue object NGC 6 is a spiral galaxy in the constellation Andromeda.
  • Messier object M6, a magnitude 4.5 open cluster in the constellation Scorpius, also known as the Butterfly Cluster.
Messier object M6
Messier object M6
  • The gaseous planet Saturn has hexagonal clouds on its north pole discovered by Voyager 1 in 1977 and verified again in 2006 by the Cassini spacecraft, meaning this hexagon is a persistent structure on the scale of a planet.
Saturn's hexagonal north pole clouds
Saturn’s hexagonal north pole clouds

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  • Apollo 6
  • Apollo 6, the final unmanned mission of the United States Apollo Program, was launched on April 4, 1968. It was an A type mission and the second test flight for the Saturn V launch vehicle, intended to demonstrate full lunar injection capability of the Saturn V with a nearly full simulated payload, and also the capability of the Command Module’s heat shield to withstand a lunar-speed re-entry.
Apollo program insignia
Apollo program insignia
  • The mission was not designed to go to the moon, but merely to achieve a trans-lunar speed toward an imaginary point in space nowhere near the moon, then turn around and return in about 10 hours.
  • However, fuel line failures in several Saturn V second and third stage engines prevented it from achieving lunar injection, but it was able to get close to lunar return velocity by using the Apollo spacecraft’s engine, as was done on Apollo 4, the first Saturn V test. Despite the engine failures, the flight nonetheless provided NASA with enough confidence in the Saturn V to use it for manned launches.
  • Launch video

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In politics

  • Massachusetts was sixth to receive statehood on, Wednesday, February 6, 1788.
  • The Sixth Amendment (Amendment VI) to the United States Constitution is the part of the United States Bill of Rights that sets forth rights related to criminal prosecutions. The Supreme Court has applied the protections of this amendment to the states through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
  • The sixth President of the United States of America was John Quincy Adams (1767–1848) who served from March 4, 1825 to March 4, 1829. His V.P. Was John C. Calhoun.
John Quincy Adams Sixth President of the United States of America
John Quincy Adams Sixth President of the United States of America

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  • The sixth Prime Minister of Australia was Sir Joseph Cook, (7 December 1860 – 30 July 1947). A coal miner from Silverdale, Staffordshire, Cook emigrated to Lithgow, New South Wales during the late 1880s, and became General-Secretary of the Western Miners Association in 1887.
  • He was a founding member of the Australian Labor Party, and was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Assembly as Member for Hartley in 1891.
  • Later Cook switched to the Free Trade Party, and was a minister in the cabinet of Premier George Reid from 1894 to 1899. During Australia’s first federal election in 1901, Cook was elected unopposed to the federal seat of Parramatta, and served as the deputy to Reid, then Alfred Deakin, following the creation of the Commonwealth Liberal Party from Cook’s and Deakin’s parties.
  • As leader of the Liberal Party, Cook became Prime Minister following the 1913 elections; but he only had a one-seat majority in the lower house and no majority at all in the upper house, so he repeatedly sought to obtain a double dissolution. The outbreak of World War I just before the September 1914 election led to a Labor victory. Following a split in the Labor party in 1916, Cook joined William Morris Hughes’ Nationalist Party of Australia, and following the Nationalist victory in the 1917 election, served as Minister for the Navy, then Treasurer under Hughes.
  • In 1921 Cook resigned from the federal parliament, and was appointed Australian High Commissioner in London. During 1928 and 1929, he headed the Royal Commission into South Australia as affected by Federation. He died in Sydney in 1947.
Joseph Cook sixth Prime Minister of Australia
Joseph Cook sixth Prime Minister of Australia

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  • Australia has six states, Queensland (capital, Brisbane); New South Wales (capital, Sydney); Victoria (capital, Melbourne); Tasmania (capital, Hobart);        South Australia (capital, Adelaide); and Western Australia (capital, Perth). The Northern Territory (capital, Darwin), as the name implies, is classed as a ‘territory’, not a ‘state’.
Australia political map
Australia political map

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  • The ‘Six Counties’ is a term used to describe Northern Ireland which consists of the six north-eastern counties of the island of Ireland. It was created when Ireland was partitioned in 1921.  After a campaign of terrorism, murder and bombing lasting almost thirty years the London government (of first Conservative John Major and later Labour Tony Blair) along with the Clinton administration brought about a ‘peace’ agreement that saw terrorists installed as part of the Northern Ireland government in Belfast. This was done during the 1990s and pre the 9/11 terrorists attacks on New York when Americans got first hand experience of what terrorism was all about. It is questionable if a post 9/11 American administration would have been so keen to participate in appeasing terrorism.

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In sport

  • The National Basketball Association and National Hockey League have six divisions.
  • The Original Six teams in the National Hockey League are Toronto, Chicago, Montreal, New York, Boston, and Detroit. They are the oldest remaining teams in the league, though not necessarily the first six; they comprised the entire league from 1942 to 1967.
  • In American college football, there are six conferences that automatically qualify for Bowl Championship Series games.
  • Six-man football is a variant of American or Canadian football, played by smaller schools with insufficient enrollment to field the traditional 11-man (American) or 12-man (Canadian) squad.
  • In a football (soccer) game each side is allowed a maximum of three substitutes, making six in all.
  • In ice hockey, six is the number of players per team, including the goaltender, that are on the ice at any one time, excluding penalty situations.
  • In volleyball, six players from each team on each side play against each other.
  • In some sports, six goals is known as a double-hat-trick, but is very hard to accomplish. A hat-trick in sport is the achievement of a positive feat three times or more during a game, or other achievements based on threes. The term was first used in 1858 in cricket to describe H H Stephenson’s feat of taking three wickets in three balls. A collection was held for Stephenson, and he was presented with a hat bought with the proceeds. The term was used in print for the first time in 1878 and was eventually adopted by many other sports including association football, water polo, and team handball, but did not become popular in North America until the mid-1940s in the National Hockey League.
  • In American and Canadian football, a touchdown earns 6 points.
  • In Australian Rules football, six points are received for a goal.
  • In cricket there are six balls to an over, and a “six” or “sixer” is a shot in which the ball clears the boundary without bouncing, scoring six runs.
  • In rugby union, the starting blindside flanker wears jersey number 6. (Some teams use “left” and “right” flankers instead of “openside” and “blindside”, with 6 being worn by the starting left flanker.)
  • In most rugby league competitions (but not the European Super League, which uses static squad numbering), the jersey number 6 is worn by the starting stand-off half (Southern Hemisphere term) or five-eighth (Northern Hemisphere term).
  • In football (soccer) AC Milan retired shirt number 6 belonging to their legendary center back and captain Franco Baresi in 1997.

Franco Baresi holding his #6 shirt

  • In Britain, Arsenal retired the number 6 shirt after their long serving center back and captain Tony Adams retired in 2002.

Tony Adams

  • In Major League Baseball: the Atlanta Braves, for manager Bobby Cox; the Boston Red Sox, for Johnny Pesky; the Detroit Tigers, for Hall of Famer Al Kaline; the Minnesota Twins, for Tony Oliva; the St. Louis Cardinals, for Hall of Famer Stan Musial; the San Diego Padres, for Steve Garvey.
#6 Stan Musial
#6 Stan Musial
  • In the NBA: the Boston Celtics, for Hall of Famer Bill Russell; the Orlando Magic, for their fans (the “sixth man”); the Philadelphia 76ers, for Hall of Famer Julius Erving; the Phoenix Suns, for Walter Davis; the Sacramento Kings, also for their fans.
Hall of Famer Julius Erving
Hall of Famer Julius Erving
  • In the NFL: the Kansas City Chiefs, for Warren McVea.
Warren McVea
Warren McVea
  • In the NHL: the Detroit Red Wings, for Larry Aurie; the Pittsburgh Penguins, for Ian Ackerman; the Toronto Maple Leafs, for Hall of Famer Ace Bailey (the Leafs have a unique policy of not retiring numbers unless the player honored either died or suffered a career-ending incident while a member of the team. Bailey suffered a fractured skull during a game in 1933; while he recovered and lived for nearly 60 years after the incident, he never played again. The Leafs would issue the number to Ron Ellis in 1968 at Bailey’s personal request, and Ellis wore it until his own retirement in 1981.)
Hall Of Famer Ace Bailey
Hall Of Famer Ace Bailey
  • In NASCAR, the number 6 is currently owned by Roush Fenway Racing. Since the 2007 season, the first year in which Roush Racing was merged with the Fenway Sports Group that owns the Boston Red Sox, the Cup Series version of the car has been driven by David Ragan. From 1988 to 2006, Mark Martin drove the #6 in the Cup Series for what was then Roush Racing.
Roush Fenway Racing #6 car
Roush Fenway Racing #6 car

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Cars and Bikes

  • Yamaha YZF R6
  • The Yamaha YZF R6 is a super sports bike, motorcycle manufactured by Yamaha Motor Company. The Yamaha comes with many sports bikes that are Yamaha R1, Yamaha FZ8, Yamaha R15 and Yamaha Vmax, Yamaha MT01 and more. The Yamaha YZF R6 is the one of the most advanced production in the 600cc segment from Yamaha. The Yamaha, bike manufacturer is flourishing in the Indian Market with the most stylish and delivers the best and advanced technology in India.
Yamaha YZF R6 Motorcycle
Yamaha YZF R6 Motorcycle

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  • Audi S6
  • Easily distinguishable by the row of LED running lights that graces both sides of its front bumper, Audi’s sport-inspired version of its A6 executive saloon, the S6, has much more than visual cues to separate it from its little brothers. This four-door, five-passenger luxury sport sedan comes standard with the six-speed Tiptronic automatic transmission with steering-wheel-mounted paddle shifters, Audi’s quattro AWD and a 435-hp, 5.2-liter V10 designed by Lamborghini.
Audi S6
Audi S6

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  • Mercedes 600
  • During the resurgence of Germany from the rubble of WWII, after a tough post-war German automotive industry was recovering, and it was there that Mercedes Benz proposed making the car better representation of the world, whatever the cost. Work began in 1955 and after eight years of development the result was the Mercedes 600, also known as der Großer Mercedes, a car totally superlative in all respects. This was the car of choice of Presidents, Popes, dictators and billionaires.
Mercedes Benz 600 Pullman x3
Mercedes Benz 600 Pullman

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In books, music, television & movies

  • Six Graves to Munich by Mario Gianluigi Puzo, perhaps better known for his novels about the Mafia, including The Godfather (1969), which he later co-adapted into a film by Francis Ford Coppola.
  •  Six Days Of The Condor, a thriller novel by James Grady first published in 1974 by W.W. Norton, is a suspense drama set in contemporary Washington, D.C., and is considerably different from the 1975 film version, Three Days of the Condor starring Robert Redford and Faye Dunaway. It was followed by a second novel by Grady titled Shadow of the Condor, released in 1978.

Six Days Of The Condor by James Grady

  • Hexameter is a poetic form consisting of six metrical feet per line.
  • Six Degrees of Separation is a movie about an affluent New York couple find their lives touched, intruded upon, and compelled by a mysterious young black man who is never quite who he says he is.
  • Six Days Seven Nights is a movie starring Harrison Ford and Anne Heche.  Robin Monroe, a New York magazine editor, and the gruff pilot Quinn Harris must put aside their mutual dislike if they are to survive after crash landing on a deserted South Seas island.
  • Six Days in June is a documentary about the Six Day War.
  • Sixth Sense starring Bruce Willis is a movie about a boy who communicates with spirits that don’t know they’re dead seeks the help of a disheartened child psychologist.

The Sixth Sense

  • Number 6 (Teresa Palmer) is a character in the movie I Am Number Four (2011).
  • The Six Million Dollar Man, was an extremely popular sci-fi television series from the 1970s about former astronaut Steve Austin  crippled in an airplane crash but rebuilt using bionic components that gave him super-human strength and speed.

Six Million Dollar Man

  • The Bionic Six are the heroes of the eponymous animated series.
  • A group of six musicians is called a sextet.
  • There are 6 semitones in a tritone.
  • A standard guitar has 6 strings.
  • Most woodwind instruments have 6 basic holes or keys (e.g., bassoon, clarinet, pennywhistle, saxophone); these holes or keys are usually not given numbers or letters in the fingering charts.
  • Les Six (“The Six” in English) was a group consisting of the French composers Georges Auric, Louis Durey, Arthur Honegger, Darius Milhaud, Francis Poulenc and Germaine Tailleferre in the 1920s.
  • Bands with the number six in their name include Six Organs of Admittance, 6 O’clock Saints, Electric Six, Eve 6, Los Xey (sei is Basque for “six”), Out On Blue Six, Six In Six, Sixpence None the Richer, Slant 6, Vanity 6, and You Me At Six.
  • #6 is the pseudonym of American musician Shawn Crahan, when performing with the band Slipknot.
  • “Six geese a-laying” were given as a present on the sixth day in the popular Christmas carol, “The Twelve Days of Christmas”.
  • The concerti grossi Opus 3, organ concertos Opus 4 and Opus 7 (each) by Georg Frideric Handel.
  • The sixth album by Dream Theater, Six Degrees Of Inner Turbulence, was based around the number six: the album has six songs, and the sixth song — that is, the complete second disc — explores the stories of six individuals suffering from various mental illnesses.
  • Six is the second album by Mansun released in 1998. It takes its name in part from the main character in the television series The Prisoner, and from A. A. Milne’s poetry book, Now We Are Six.
  • Patrick McGoohan played prisoner number 6 in the mysterious British television series called The Prisoner, catchphrase “I am a man, I am not a number”.

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In militaria

  • Carrier Air Wing Six
  • Carrier Air Wing Six (CVW-6) was a United States Navy aircraft carrier air wing whose operational history spans from the years prior to World War II to the end of the Cold War, including participating in the Battle of Midway, the Battle of the Eastern Solomons, and the Vietnam War.
  • When the unit was named “Air Group Six” during its time on the Enterprise, it was the Navy’s only carrier-based air group to carry out three complete tours of duty during World War II.
  • It was based on 15 different carriers during its operational lifetime. The lineage of Carrier Air Wing Six can be traced to the Enterprise Air Group, created on 1 July 1938, which included the following squadrons and aircraft:
  • Bombing Six (VB-6) — 18 Douglas SBD-2 Dauntless dive bombers
  • Fighting Six (VF-6) — 18 Grumman F4F-3 Wildcat fighter
  • Scouting Six (VS-6) — 18 Douglas SBD-2 Dauntless dive bomber
  • Torpedo Six (VT-6) — 18 Douglas TBD Devastator torpedo bomber
Enterprise Air Group
Enterprise Air Group

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  • Douglas DC-6
  • The Douglas DC-6 is a piston-powered airliner and transport aircraft built by the Douglas Aircraft Company from 1946 to 1958. Originally intended as a military transport near the end of World War II, it was reworked after the war to compete with the Lockheed Constellation in the long-range commercial transport market.
  • More than 700 were built and many still fly today in cargo, military and wildfire control roles.
  • The DC-6 was known as the C-118 Liftmaster in United States Air Force service and as the R6D in United States Navy service prior to 1962, after which all U.S. Navy variants were also designated as the C-118.

DC-6 .

  • Shenyang F-6
  • The F-6 was a Chinese copy of the MiG-19S Farmer-C cannon-armed day fighter. From the late 1960s to the final batch in 1971, a total of more than 70 F-6s were reported delivered, equipping six squadrons at 3 bases, for both interceptor and attack duties. Some of the 1971 batch were late production F-6C version, featuring a prominent braking parachute housing at the base of the rudder.
  • A few FT-6 two-seat trainers also appear to have been supplied. The FT-6 wasn’t certified for production until December 1973, so these examples must have been delivered after this date. It is also reported that 4 F-6 aircraft are fitted with ventral cameras for the reconnaissance role – whether these are export versions of the JZ-6 or local conversions is not known.

Shenyang F-6 serial 3-83 .

  • Beechcraft T-6 Texan II
  • Developed from the Pilatus PC-9, the Beechcraft T-6 Texan II is a single-engined turboprop aircraft built by the Raytheon Aircraft Company (now Hawker Beechcraft). The T-6 is used by the United States Air Force for basic pilot training and by the United States Navy for Primary and Intermediate Joint Naval Flight Officer (NFO) and Air Force Combat Systems Officer (CSO) training. It has replaced the Air Force’s T-37B Tweet and is replacing the Navy’s T-34C Turbo Mentor.
  • The T-6A is also used as a basic trainer by the Royal Canadian Air Force (CT-156 Harvard II), the German Air Force, the Greek Air Force, the Israeli Air Force (Efroni), and the Iraqi Air Force.

T-6A Texan II .

  • AT-6
  • As well as being an initial trainer, the multirole Hawker Beechcraft AT-6 is capable of performing missions including: net-centric ISR with the ability for precise geo-registration, streaming video and datalinks, light attack including combat search and rescue (CSAR), close air support, forward air control and convoy escort, homeland defense (border security), port security, counter-narcotics operations and civil missions such as disaster area reconnaissance, search and rescue and firefighting. There are tandem HOTAS (hands on throttle and stick) controls fore and aft for pilot and instructor.
  • Hawker Beechcraft showcased the AT-6 at the Royal International Air Tattoo and Farnborough International Airshow in the UK in 2010.

Hawker Beechcraft AT-6 .

  • Fiat L6/40
  • The Fiat L6/40 was a light tank used by the Italian army from 1940 and on through World War II. It was designed by Fiat-Ansaldo as an export product, and was adopted by the Italian Army when officials learned of the design and expressed interest. It was the main tank employed by the Italian forces fighting on the Eastern Front alongside the L6/40-based Semovente 47/32 self-propelled gun. L6/40s were also used in the North African campaign.
  • The official Italian designation was Carro Armato (“armored tank”) L 6/40. This designation is understood as follows: “L” for Leggero (Italian: “light”), followed by the weight in tons (6) and the year of adoption (1940).

Carro Armato L6 40 tank .

  • Ordnance QF 6 pounder
  • The Ordnance Quick-Firing 6-pounder 7 cwt, or just 6 pounder, was a British 57 mm gun, their primary anti-tank gun during the middle of World War II, as well as the main armament for a number of armoured fighting vehicles.
  • It was first used in North Africa in April 1942, and quickly replaced the 2 pounder in the anti-tank role, allowing the 25 pounder to revert to its intended artillery role.
  • The United States Army also adopted the 6 pounder as their primary anti-tank gun under the designation 57 mm Gun M1.

QF 6 pounder batey haosef .

  • The Six Gun
  • Whilst not actually a firearm as such, the term ‘six gun’ or ‘six shooter’ is a general, if inaccurate, description of a revolver. The original name came from the fact that the majority of the early revolvers had a cylindrical bullet magazine that held six rounds of ammunition.

frontier scout and 6 shot cylinder

  • However, modern revolvers come in a variety of capacities including 5 round, 6 round, 8 round and 10 round. An example being the Smith & Wesson Model 617 is a 10 round capacity .22LR revolver shown below.

10 shot revolver .

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Six Million

  • The Holocaust, also known by the Biblical word Shoah (which means calamity), was the mass murder or genocide of approximately six million Jews during World War II. Led by Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party, it was part of a program of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi Germany throughout German-occupied territory.
  • Of the nine million Jews who had resided in Europe before the Holocaust, approximately two-thirds were killed. Over one million Jewish children were killed in the Holocaust, as were approximately two million Jewish women and three million Jewish men.
  • Some scholars argue that the mass murder of the Romani and people with disabilities should be included in the definition, and some use the term “holocaust” to describe other mass murders, including those of Soviet prisoners of war, Polish and Soviet civilians, and homosexuals. Recent estimates based on figures obtained since the fall of the Soviet Union indicates some ten to eleven million civilians and prisoners of war were intentionally murdered by the Nazi regime.
  • The persecution and genocide were carried out in stages. Various laws to remove the Jews from civil society, most prominently the Nuremberg Laws, were enacted in Germany years before the outbreak of World War II. Concentration camps were established in which inmates were subjected to slave labor until they died of exhaustion or disease. Where Germany conquered new territory in eastern Europe, specialized units called Einsatzgruppen murdered Jews and political opponents in mass shootings. The occupiers required Jews and Romani to be confined in overcrowded ghettos before being transported by freight train to extermination camps where, if they survived the journey, most were systematically killed in gas chambers. Every arm of Germany’s bureaucracy was involved in the logistics that led to the genocides, turning the Third Reich into what one Holocaust scholar has called “a genocidal state”.
  • There are numerous Holocaust Memorials throughout the world, including in Jerusalem, Washington, and Berlin, Germany.

holocaust_memorial_day .

  • However, it was not the German Nazis, but the Croatian Ustase who were responsible for some of the most bloody and sadistic crimes carried out against the Orthodox population in Croatia. Some of their crimes so heinous that they even appalled the Nazis.
  • The Ustaše committed their deeds in a bestial manner not only against males of conscript age, but especially against helpless old people, women and children. The number of the Orthodox that the Croats massacred and sadistically tortured to death has been estimated at approximately three hundred thousand.
  • The legacy of the brutality of this genocidal campaign still affects the political situation in that part of Europe.

Ustasha .

  • Think it could never happen again? Don’t be too sure. In 1994 in Rwanda, Africa somewhere in the region of one million people were murdered by the Interahamwe death squads in a genocidal campaign. Local officials assisted in rounding up victims and making suitable places available for their slaughter. Tutsi men, women, children and babies were killed in thousands in schools. They were also killed in churches with the collusion of some clergy. The victims, in their last moments alive, were also faced by another appalling fact, namely that their cold-blooded killers were people they knew – neighbors, work-mates, former friends, sometimes even relatives through marriage.

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Finally, other stuff

  • There are said to be no more than ‘six degrees of separation’ between any two people on Earth.
  • Extra-sensory perception is sometimes called the ‘sixth sense’.
  • Six Cardinal Directions: north, south, east, west, up, and down.
  • The number of sides on a cube, hence the highest number on a standard die.
  • The highest number on one end of a standard domino.
  • ‘Six’ is used as an informal slang term for the British Secret Intelligence Service, MI6, the one Ian Fleming’s fictious character James Bond works for.
  • Six is the number of cans of soda or beer in a ‘six-pack’.
  • A ‘six pack’ refers to the appearance of well developed stomach muscles.
  • The term ‘six pack’ also refers to the number of fundamental flight instruments lumped together on a cockpit display.
  • ‘Six Flags’ is the name of a series of amusement parks and theme parks.

Six Flags Resorts and Theme Parks

  • ‘Six of the best’ is a slang term for corporal punishment particularly in schools where the offending pupil was given six slaps with a cane.
  • A ‘sixer’ is the name of the leader of the smallest group of Cub Scouts, traditionally consisting of six people.
  • Six is the number of feet below ground level where a coffin is traditionally buried, thus also leading to the phrase ‘six feet under’ meaning that a person, or thing, or concept is dead.
  • In the ancient Roman calendar, Sextilis was the sixth month. After the Julian reform, June became the sixth month and Sextilis was renamed August.
  • Sextidi was the sixth day of the decade in the French Revolutionary calendar.
  • ‘L’Hexagone’ is a French nickname for the continental part of Metropolitan France.
  • A ‘hex nut’ is a nut with six sides, and a hex bolt has a six-sided head.
  • On most phones, the 6 key is associated with the letters M, N, and O, but on the BlackBerry it is the key for J and K, and on the BlackBerry 8700 series and Curve 8900 with full keyboard, it is the key for F.
  • The ‘6 meter band’ in amateur radio includes the frequencies from 50 to 54 MHz.
  • 6 is the resin identification code used in recycling to identify polystyrene.
  • In Astrology, Virgo is the 6th astrological sign of the Zodiac.
  • There are six dots in a Braille cell.

braille cell

  • The Six Dynasties form part of Chinese history.
  • 6 is a lucky number in Chinese culture.
  • The unit of measurement used for the Great Pyramid was the inch and its sexagesimal multiples. The first multiple is the foot, 12 inches (2×6); and after this the rises are 18 (3 x 6), 24 (4×6), 30 (5 x 6), and 36 (6×6 or one yard).
  • Natural time-spaces are also based on multiples of six, there are 12 months in a year, a day consists of 24 hours (4 x 6),  hours are 60 minutes (6×10), and minutes made up of 60 seconds (6×10).

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Significant Number Factoid Friday – Today Number Forty-Four 44

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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Okay, this week’s significant number was either going to be 44 or 45, but, rightly or wrongly, the American people voted for Barack Obama and so the number is 44  –  hard luck Mitt.

So here we go, and just like President Obama we’re not sure exactly where.

Enjoy.

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44 Forty-four

 44

 

 

In politics

  • In the U.S. presidential election of 1944, Franklin D. Roosevelt won reelection over Republican challenger Thomas E. Dewey, becoming the only U.S. president elected to a fourth term.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt

 

  • A few days ago Barack Obama was elected to his second term as the 44th US President.
Barack Obama 44th President of the United States of America
Barack Obama 44th President of the United States of America

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In mathematics

  • 44 is a tribonacci number, a happy number, an octahedral number and a palindromic number.

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In science

  • 44 is the atomic number of ruthenium

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In space

  • STS-44 was the 44th Shuttle mission. It was cut short after one of its three navigational units failed.

 sts-44-patch

 

  • Messier object M44, also known as the Beehive Cluster, is a magnitude 4.0 open cluster in the constellation Cancer,
Messier object M44
Messier object M44

  

  • 44 is the Saros number of the solar eclipse series which began on April 30, 1448 BC and ended on June 7, 168 BC . The duration of Saros series 44 was 1280.1 years, and it contained 72 solar eclipses.
  • The Saros number of the lunar eclipse series which began on October 1, 1363 BC and ended on March 27, 153 . The duration of Saros series 44 was 1514.5 years, and it contained 85 lunar eclipses.

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In sport

  • 44 is the retired number for former baseball players Hank Aaron, Willie McCovey and Reggie Jackson; the number is sometimes considered to be a “hitter’s number”.

Hank Aaron

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  • In the NFL 44 was the number of Floyd Little (Denver Broncos) and Pete Retzlaff (Philadelphia Eagles)
Floyd Little
Floyd Little

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  • In the NBA 44 was the number of Dan Issel, (Denver Nuggets); Jerry West (L.A. Lakers); Paul Westphal (Phoenix Suns); Sam Lacey (Sacramento Kings); and George Gervin (San Antonio Spurs).
Dan Issel
Dan Issel

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  • A number of football legends at Syracuse University also wore 44, most notably by Jim Brown, Ernie Davis, Floyd Little, and Rob Konrad. Although the number was officially retired in 2005, the legend of 44 remains an important part of the identity of Syracuse University.

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In WWII

1944 was arguably the most interesting year of World War II. Incidents of note included:

 

  • The Fosse Ardeatine massacre in Rome when 335 Italians are killed, including 75 Jews and over 200 members of the Italian Resistance from various groups.

 

  • The real “Great Escape” (as opposed to the famous movie version) when 76 Royal Air Force prisoners escape by tunnel “Harry” from Stalag Luft III. Only three made it back to the UK, and of those recaptured, fifty were executed.

 

  • Exercise Tiger, or Operation Tiger, was the code name for one in a series of large-scale rehearsals for the D-Day invasion of Normandy, which took place on Slapton Sands or Slapton Beach in Devon.
  • The first practice assault took place on the morning of 27 April. H-hour was set for 7:30 am, and was to be preceded by a live firing exercise to acclimatize the troops to the sights, sounds and even smells of a naval bombardment. During the landing itself, live rounds were to be fired over the heads of the incoming troops by forces on land, for the same reason. This followed an order made by General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Supreme Allied Commander, who felt that the men must be hardened by exposure to real battle conditions.
  • The British heavy cruiser HMS Hawkins was to shell the beach with live ammunition, from 6:30 to 7:00 am, giving the beachmasters half an hour to inspect the beach and declare it safe.
  • However, several of the landing ships for that morning were delayed, and the officer in charge decided to delay the bombardment until 8:30am. This message was received by HMS Hawkins, but not by a number of the landing craft, with the result that troops were landing on the beach at the same time as the bombardment was taking place. This unfortunate mix-up resulted in a “friendly fire” incident with 946 American servicemen losing their lives.
  • The incident was under the strictest secrecy at the time due to the impending invasion, and was only nominally reported afterward. As a result it has been a largely “forgotten” disaster of WWII.

Plaque commemorating those killed in Operation Tiger

 

  • On June 6 Operation Overlord, or the D-Day landings, took place, when 155,000 Allied troops shipped from England land on the beaches of Normandy in northern France.
  • It was the largest amphibious military operation in history and was the beginning of the liberation of France and the other countries in Europe invaded by Nazi Germany.
D-Day Landings
D-Day Landings

 

  • Also in 1944, on July 20 there was an unsuccessful assassination attempt on the life of Adolf Hitler led by Claus von Stauffenberg.
Führerhauptquartier, Stauffenberg, Hitler
Führerhauptquartier, Stauffenberg, Hitler

 

  • At the beginning of August 1944 the Warsaw Uprising began and lasted until October 2, when it was finally ended by Nazi troops.
Warsaw Uprising Symbol
Warsaw Uprising Symbol

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  • Also in August of that year, the Gestapo, acting on a tip off from a Dutch informer, sealed-off an area in an Amsterdam warehouse and captured Jewish diarist Anne Frank and her family.
  • They were placed on the last transport train from Westerbork to Auschwitz, and on October 30, Anne Frank and sister Margot Frank are deported from Auschwitz to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.
Anne Frank diary
Anne Frank diary

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In militaria

  • The .44 Remington Magnum or .44 Special are popular large-bore cartridge calibres. Originally designed for revolvers, a their introduction, they were quickly adopted for carbines and rifles as well.
44 calibre ammo
44 calibre ammo

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  • However many people mistakenly believe that the Smith & Wesson (S&W) .44 calibre revolver heavily featured in numerous Hollywood movies, particularly Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry is called the .44 Magnum (the most powerful handgun in the world), neither of which are true. The revolver used in those movies is actually the Smith & Wesson Model 29, a six-shot, double-action revolver chambered for the .44 Magnum cartridge. It comes in a variety of models with 3″, 4″, 5″, 6″, 6½”, 8″ and, later, 10″ barrel lengths.

Smith & Wesson Model 29

 

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  • StG 44
  • The StG 44 (Sturmgewehr 44) is an assault rifle developed in Nazi Germany during World War II that was the first of its kind to see major deployment and is considered by many historians to be the first modern assault rifle.
  • It is also known under the designations MP 43 and MP 44 (Maschinenpistole 43, Maschinenpistole 44 respectively).
Sturmgewehr StG44
Sturmgewehr StG44

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  • Pzf 44 
  • Panzerfaust 44 “Lanze” (or Pzf 44 in short) is an antitank weapon. Development of this weapon commenced circa 1960, with grenade and launcher developed by German company Dynamit-Nobel AG.
  • The Pzf 44 entered German service during mid-sixties and in several modifications served until mid-eighties, when it was replaced by moremodern Panzerfaust 3 (Pzf 3) weapon.
  • It is a .44 Magnum carbine with a synthetic stock and stainless steel fittings. In common with many Ruger carbines it uses a rotary magazine which holds 4 rounds and fits inside the stock under the breech.

 

Panzerfaust 44 "Lanze" Pzf 44
Panzerfaust 44 “Lanze” Pzf 44

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  • DL-44 
  • The BlasTech Industries DL-44 heavy blaster pistol was a powerful sidearm from the time of the Galactic Civil War (yes, a little bit of sci-fi talk here). The DL-44 is described as a powerful, highly modifiable and accurate blaster pistol.
BlasTech Industries DL-44 heavy blaster pistol - tech drawing
BlasTech Industries DL-44 heavy blaster pistol – tech drawing
  • However, in outward design it is uncannily like the (real) German “Broomhandle” Mauser C96 pistol, used by both its German creators and the Ottoman Empire during World War I, and wound up in the hands of such notable figures as T. E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) and Winston Churchill, and also saw service among various revolutionary movements throughout the world following the First World War.

 

"Broomhandle" Mauser C96
“Broomhandle” Mauser C96

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  • T-44
  • The T-44 was a medium tank first produced towards the end of the Second World War by the Soviet Union. It was the successor to the famous T-34. Fewer than two thousand T-44s were built, but the design became the basis for the T-54/55 series of main battle tanks, the most-produced tank of all time.
Soviet T44 tank
Soviet T44 tank

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  • TKX
  • The TKX is a relatively new Japanese tank with a 120mm gun, costing approximately $7 million and weighing in at 44 tons weight.

 

Japanese Army TKX 44 ton tank
Japanese Army TKX 44 ton tank

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  • A-44
  • Sometimes known as the ‘mystery tank’, the A-44 was developed as T-34 modernization program in 1941. 29-30 tonns, Hull front armour – up to 75 at 60 degrees, sides – 60mm, 76.2mm and 57mm cannons, 600hp enqine. Only paper project.
A-44 'mystery' tank
A-44 ‘mystery’ tank

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  • XB-44
  • One B-29A was handed over to Pratt & Whitney to be used as a testbed for the installation of the new Wasp Major 28-cylinder engines in the B-29. They came up with the XB-44 variant.

 

XB-44-1 variant of the B-29A
XB-44-1 variant of the B-29A

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  • X-44 MANTA
  • The Lockheed Martin X-44 MANTA (Multi-Axis No-Tail Aircraft) was a conceptual aircraft design that has been studied by NASA and the U.S. Air Force. It was intended to test the feasibility of full yaw, pitch and roll control without tailplanes (horizontal or vertical), attitude manipulation relying purely on 3D thrust vectoring. The aircraft design was derived from the F-22 Raptor and featured a stretched delta wing and no tail surfaces.
The Lockheed Martin X-44 MANTA (Multi-Axis No-Tail Aircraft)
The Lockheed Martin X-44 MANTA    (Multi-Axis No-Tail Aircraft)

 

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  • T-44A
  • The T-44A “Pegasus” aircraft is a twin-engine, pressurized, fixed-wing monoplane, manufactured by Beech Aircraft Corporation, Wichita, Kansas, whose mission is to train Navy and Marine Corps pilots.

 

The T-44A "Pegasus"
The T-44A “Pegasus”

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Other stuff

  • Cities on the 44th parallel include, Minneapolis,  Simferopol (Ukraine), Bordeaux  (France),  Belgrade and Šabac (Serbia), Halifax (Nova Scotia, Canada), Bucharest (Romania), Pierre (South Dakota), Augusta (Maine), and Montpelier (Vermont).
  • Cities on the 44th line of longitude include, São Luís (Brazil), Sana’a (Yemen), Baghdad (Iraq), Nizhny Novgorod (Russia), Hargeisa (Somalia), Arbil (Iraqi Kurdistan), Yerevan (Armenia), and Tbilisi (Georgia).
  • 44 is the international direct dial code for phone calls to the United Kingdom;
  • Interstate 44 is the freeway that runs from Texas to Missouri;
  • U.S. Route 44, is the highway that runs from New York to Massachusetts;
  • In Pennsylvania Route 44(PA 44), is the long state highway in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania
  • The name of a mysterious savior of Poland was prophesied by the Polish national poet Adam Mickiewicz in his masterpiece dramatic poem Dziady (Forefathers). In scene 5 of act 3, the priest Piotr announces a “reviver of the nation” who is to bring back the lost freedom of Poland, and describes him as: “Born from a foreign mother, his blood of ancient heroes, And his name will be forty and four.”
  • 44 is the name of a variant of the card game poker.
  • +44 is the name of a band that includes Blink-182 vocalist/bassist Mark Hoppus and Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker.
  • A blues song, Forty-Four, also known as “44 Blues”
  • Vicks Formula 44 is a cough suppressant
  • The 44 Cent Cure is the cost of treatment of intestinal worms that affect 400 million children in various arts of the world and leads to stunted physical and mental development in both boys and girls. They also cause nausea and diarrhea and in severe cases, they kill.
  • 44 is the largest number for which Wolfram Alpha offers a visual representation.
  • Wyoming was the 44th state to join The United States of America.
  • There are 44 candles in a box of Hanukkah candles.
  • An agent in the American Television series Get Smart goes under the title of 44, usually assigned to small, enclosed, unexpected spots, to meet Maxwell Smart, agent 86.
  • On January 15 1944 An earthquake hits San Juan, Argentina, killing an estimated 10,000 people in the worst natural disaster in Argentina’s history.
  • In 1944 meat rationing ends in Australia.
  • On March 4, 1944 in Ossining, New York, Louis Buchalter, the leader of 1930s crime syndicate Murder, Inc., was executed at Sing Sing, along with Emanuel Weiss, and Louis Capone.
  • In 1944 IBM dedicates the first program-controlled calculator, the Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator (known best as the Harvard Mark I).
  • On September 14, 1944 the ‘Great Atlantic Hurricane’ makes landfall in the New York City area.
  • And on October 20 an LNG explosion destroyed a square mile of Cleveland, Ohio.

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