title: Ping pong show

text: The Laotian capital Vientiane was once famous for its brothels and "ping-pong-show" bars during the 1960s and 1970s as a result of the country's involvement in the Vietnam War. Travel writer Paul Theroux described a bar in 1973 Vientiane thus: “Your eyes get accustomed to the dark and you see the waitress is naked. Without warning she jumps on the chair, pokes a cigarette into her vagina and lights it, puffing it by contracting her uterine lungs." British journalist Christopher Robbins wrote that "The White Rose", a famous Vientiane bar during the war, featured floor shows in which women used their vaginas to smoke cigarettes and fling ping pong balls. Such shows have since disappeared and brothels are now prohibited by Laotian law.


title: Ping pong show

text: In the red light district of De Wallen in Amsterdam the "Moulin Rouge" and "Casa Rosso" theatres feature on-stage sex shows including variations on the ping pong show.


title: Ping pong show

text: The ping pong show is designed to get people talking about it so that people will come to the bar to see it. Often customers come only to see the show and leave when it is over. This is good business for the bar, which makes much of its profits from drinks. However, the majority of the bar workers do not participate in the show. Research published in 2002 indicated that most bar workers regard the show as bad for business and do not like it. Many bar workers consider the show to be low-class and in bad taste, boring as it is the same every night, and liable to take attention away from the bar workers by focussing on the acts.


title: Ping pong show

text: An article in 2009 described an example of the working conditions of women at ping pong shows. The employees arrived at 18:00 and left at daybreak. They stamped a time card and were penalized 5 baht (US$0.14) for every minute they were late. Each month, they received two nights of leave and, if they did not miss any additional nights, they earned a salary of 6,000 baht (US$181), supplemented by tips. In 2015 the average monthly income in Thailand was $489, according to the International Labour Organization.


title: Ping pong show

text: Some human rights organizations (such as Not For Sale) have denounced ping pong shows as inherently misogynistic. Taina Bien-Aimé of Equality Now commented that: "The attitude that [sex work in places like ping pong shows] is empowering gives a green light to traffickers. We're trying to fight the commercial sex trade, not empower the sex trade." Some of the performers in ping pong shows in Thailand come from poorer neighbouring countries such as Myanmar, Cambodia, or Laos. The closure of factories in Thailand during the Great Recession in the late 2000s led to an increase in unemployment in the country. Some women formerly engaged in factory work moved to Thailand's red-light districts and ended up working in ping pong shows. Bien-Aime commented: "Working 14 hours [a day] in a factory or blowing ping pong balls out of your vagina should not be a person's only choices in life." Although no pain or suffering is generally experienced by female performers during the show, there have been rare accidents in which performers have been seriously and irreparably injured. The inclusion of a ping pong show scene in the film "The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert" led to the film being criticised on the grounds of sexism and racism.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The Ant and the Grasshopper, alternatively titled The Grasshopper and the Ant (or Ants), is one of Aesop's Fables, numbered 373 in the Perry Index. The fable describes how a hungry grasshopper begs for food from an ant when winter comes and is refused. The situation sums up moral lessons about the virtues of hard work and planning for the future.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: Even in Classical times, however, the advice was mistrusted by some and an alternative story represented the ant's industry as mean and self-serving. Jean de la Fontaine's delicately ironic retelling in French later widened the debate to cover the themes of compassion and charity. Since the 18th century the grasshopper has been seen as the type of the artist and the question of the place of culture in society has also been included. Argument over the fable's ambivalent meaning has generally been conducted through adaptation or reinterpretation of the fable in literature, arts, and music.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The fable concerns a grasshopper (in the original, a cicada) that has spent the summer singing and dancing while the ant (or ants in some versions) worked to store up food for winter. When winter arrives, the grasshopper finds itself dying of hunger and begs the ant for food. However, the ant rebukes its idleness and tells it to dance the winter away now. Versions of the fable are found in the verse collections of Babrius (140) and Avianus (34), and in several prose collections including those attributed to Syntipas and Aphthonius of Antioch. The fable's Greek original cicada is kept in the Latin and Romance translations. A variant fable, separately numbered 112 in the Perry Index, features a dung beetle as the improvident insect which finds that the winter rains wash away the dung on which it feeds.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The fable is found in a large number of mediaeval Latin sources and also figures as a moral ballade among the poems of Eustache Deschamps under the title of "La fourmi et le céraseron". From the start it assumes prior knowledge of the fable and presents human examples of provident and improvident behaviour as typified by the insects. As well as appearing in vernacular collections of Aesop's fables in Renaissance times, a number of Neo-Latin poets used it as a subject, including Gabriele Faerno (1563), Hieronymus Osius (1564) and (1604).


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The story has been used to teach the virtues of hard work and the perils of improvidence. Some versions state a moral at the end along the lines of "An idle soul shall suffer hunger", "Work today to eat tomorrow", and "July is follow’d by December". In La Fontaine's Fables no final judgment is made, although it has been argued that the author is there making sly fun of his own notoriously improvident ways. But the point of view in most retellings of the fable is supportive of the ant. It is also influenced by the commendation in the biblical Book of Proverbs, which mentions the ant twice. The first proverb admonishes, "Go to the ant, you sluggard! Consider her ways and be wise, which having no captain, overseer or ruler, provides her supplies in the summer, and gathers her food in the harvest" (6.6-8). Later, in a parallel saying of Agur, the insects figure among the 'four things that are little upon the earth but they are exceeding wise. The ants are a people not strong, yet they provide their food in the summer.' (30.24-5)


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: There was, nevertheless, an alternative tradition also ascribed to Aesop in which the ant was seen as a bad example. This appears as a counter-fable and is numbered 166 in the Perry Index. It relates that the ant was once a man who was always busy farming. Not satisfied with the results of his own labour, he plundered his neighbours' crops at night. This angered the king of the gods, who turned him into what is now an ant. Yet even though the man had changed his shape, he did not change his habits and to this day goes around the fields gathering the fruits of other people's labour, storing them up for himself. The moral given the fable in old Greek sources was that it is easier to change in appearance than to change one's moral nature. It has rarely been noticed since Classical times. Among the few prominent collectors of fables who recorded it later were Gabriele Faerno (1564), and Roger L'Estrange (1692). The latter's comment is that the ant's "Vertue and Vice, in many Cases, are hardly Distinguishable but by the Name".


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: Because of the influence of La Fontaine's Fables, in which "La cigale et la fourmi" stands at the beginning, the grasshopper then became the proverbial example of improvidence in France: so much so that Jules-Joseph Lefebvre (1836–1911) could paint a picture of a female nude biting one of her nails among the falling leaves and be sure viewers would understand the point by giving it the title "La Cigale". The painting was exhibited at the 1872 Salon with a quotation from La Fontaine, "Quand la bise fut venue" (When the north wind blew), and was seen as a critique of the lately deposed Napoleon III, who had led the nation into a disastrous war with Prussia. Another with the same title, alternatively known as "Girl with a Mandolin" (1890), was painted by Edouard Bisson (1856–1939) and depicts a gypsy musician in a sleeveless dress shivering in the falling snow. Also so-named is the painting by Henrietta Rae (a student of Lefebvre's) of a naked girl with a mandolin slung over her back who is cowering among the falling leaves at the root of a tree.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The grasshopper and the ant are generally depicted as women because both words for the insects are of the feminine gender in most Romance languages. Picturing the grasshopper as a musician, generally carrying a mandolin or guitar, was a convention that grew up when the insect was portrayed as a human being, since singers accompanied themselves on those instruments. The sculptor and painter Ignaz Stern (1679–1748) also has the grasshopper thinly clad and shivering in the paired statues he produced under the title of the fable, while the jovial ant is more warmly dressed. But the anticlerical painter Jehan Georges Vibert has male characters in his picture of ""La cigale et la fourmi"" from 1875. It is painted as a mediaeval scene in which a minstrel with a tall lute on his back encounters a monk on a snow-covered upland. The warmly shrouded monk has been out gathering alms and may be supposed to be giving the musician a lecture on his improvidence. By contrast, the Naturalist Victor-Gabriel Gilbert (1847–1933) pictures the fable as being enacted in the marketplace of a small town in Northern France. An elderly stall-keeper is frowning at a decrepit woman who has paused nearby, while her younger companion looks on in distress. In his lithograph from the Volpini Suite, “Les cigales et les fourmis” (1889), Paul Gauguin avoids making a judgment. Subtitled ‘a souvenir of Martinique', it pictures a group of women sitting or lying on the ground while in the background other women walk past with baskets on their heads. He is content that they exemplify the behaviour proverbially assigned to the insects without moral comment.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: For a long time, the illustrators of fable books had tended to concentrate on picturing winter landscapes, with the encounter between the insects occupying only the lower foreground. In the 19th century the insects grew in size and began to take on human dress. It was this tendency that was reproduced in that curiosity of publishing, the 1894 "Choix de Fables de La Fontaine, Illustrée par un Groupe des Meilleurs Artistes de Tokio", which was printed in Japan and illustrated by some of the foremost woodblock artists of the day. Kajita Hanko's treatment of the story takes place in a typical snowy landscape with the cricket approaching a thatched cottage, watched through a window by the robed ant. An earlier Chinese treatment, commissioned mid-century by Baron through his diplomatic contacts, uses human figures to depict the situation. An old woman in a ragged dress approaches the lady of the house, who is working at her spinning wheel on an open verandah.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: Use of the insects to point a moral lesson extends into the 20th century. In Jean Vernon's bronze medal from the 1930s, the supplicant cicada is depicted as crouching on a branch while the ant rears up below with its legs about a beechnut. Engraved to one side is its sharp reply, "Vous chantiez, j’en suis fort aise./ Eh bien, dansez maintenant." (You sang? I'm glad; now you can dance.) Jacob Lawrence depicts much the same scene in his 1969 ink drawing of the fable, but with a different moral intent. There a weeping grasshopper stands before a seated ant who reaches back to lock his storeroom door. It is notable that artistic sentiment has by now moved against the ant with the recognition that improvidence is not always the only cause of poverty. Nevertheless, Hungary used the fable to promote a savings campaign on a 60 forint stamp in 1958. The following year it appeared again in a series depicting fairy tales, as it did as one of many pendents on a 1.50 tögrög stamp from Mongolia. In this case the main stamp was commemorating the 1970 World's Fair in Japan with a picture of the Sumitomo fairy tale pavilion.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: La Fontaine's portrayal of the Ant as a flawed character, reinforced by the ambivalence of the alternative fable, led to that insect too being viewed as anything but an example of virtue. Jules Massenet's two-act ballet "Cigale", first performed at the Opéra-Comique in Paris in 1904, portrays the cicada as a charitable woman who takes pity on "La Pauvrette" (the poor little one). But La Pauvrette, after being taken in and fed, is rude and heartless when the situation is reversed. Cigale is left to die in the snow at the close of the ballet.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: La Fontaine's poem has also been subverted by several French parodies. In Joseph Autran's "Réhabilitation de la fourmi", the ant, while only having straw to eat himself, agrees to share his stocks with the cicada, so long as she sings him a song that would remind them of the summer, which, to him, will be more than worth the price. Tristan Corbière's "A Marcelle - le poete et la cigale" is a light-hearted literary criticism of a bad poet. In the 20th century, Jean Anouilh uses it as the basis for two almost independent fables. In "La fourmi et la cigale" the ant becomes an overworked housewife whom the dust follows into the grave. The cicada's comment is that she prefers to employ a maid. In "La Cigale", Anouilh engages with the reality of the artistic life, reviewing the cicada as the type of the female musician. In this fable she figures as a night-club singer who asks a fox to act as her agent. He believes that she will be an easy victim for his manipulations but she handles him with such frosty finesse that he takes up singing himself. Pierre Perret's 1990 version in urban slang satirises the cicada's more traditional role as a thoughtless ‘queen of the hit parade’. The subversion lies in the four-line moral at the end, in which he advises that it is better to be an impresario than a performer.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The English writer W. Somerset Maugham reverses the moral order in a different way in his short story, "The Ant and The Grasshopper" (1924). It concerns two brothers, one of whom is a dissolute waster whose hard-working brother has constantly to bail out of difficulties. At the end the latter is enraged to discover that his 'grasshopper' brother has married a rich widow, who then dies and leaves him a fortune. The story was later adapted in the film "Encore" (1951) and the English television series "Somerset Maugham Hour" (1960). James Joyce also adapts the fable into a tale of brotherly conflict in "The Ondt and the Gracehoper" episode in "Finnegans Wake" (1939) and makes of the twin brothers Shem and Shaun opposing tendencies within the human personality:


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: In America, John Ciardi's poetical fable for children, "John J. Plenty and Fiddler Dan" (1963), makes an argument for poetry over fanatical hard work. Ciardi's ant, John J. Plenty, is so bent upon saving that he eats very little of what he has saved. Meanwhile, Fiddler Dan the grasshopper and his non-conforming ant wife survive the winter without help and resume playing music with the return of spring.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: Ambrose Bierce has two variant of the tale in his "Fantastic Fable". In the first, "The Grasshopper and the Ant", after the ant asks the grasshopper why it didn't make any stocks, it replies that it actually did, but the ants broke in and took them all away. In another, "The Ants and the Grasshopper", the grasshopper is a miner who was too busy digging to prepare, while the ants are replaced by politicians, for whom it is his work which is "profitless amusement".


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: John Updike's 1987 short story "Brother Grasshopper" deals with a pair of brothers-in-law whose lives parallel the fable of the ant and the grasshopper. One, Fred Barrow, lives a conservative, restrained existence; the other, Carlyle Lothrop, spends his money profligately, especially on joint vacations for the two men's families, even as he becomes financially insolvent. However, at the end comes an unexpected inversion of the characters' archetypal roles. When Carlyle dies, Fred, now divorced and lonely, realizes that he has been left with a rich store of memories which would not have existed without his friend's largesse.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: "Revolution" ("La Rivoluzione"), a poem by the Italian Communist writer Gianni Rodari, offers an alternative political moral by cutting through the debate over duty, compassion, and utilitarianism that has been the legacy of La Fontaine's fable. He describes simply seeing an ant give half of his provisions to a cicada. Such generosity is the true revolution! In Dmitry Bykov's poem "Fable" ("Басня") the grasshopper is perishing from cold and dreams that in Heaven the ant will someday ask her to let him share in her dance, to which she'll answer "Go and work!"


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: There were two comic operas that went under the title "La cigale et la fourmi" in the 19th century. The one by Ferdinand Poise was in one act and dated 1870. The one by Edmond Audran was in three acts and performed in Paris in 1886, in London in 1890 and in New York in 1891. This was shortly followed by the darker mood of Jules Massenet's ballet "Cigale", mentioned above. Later adaptations of the fable to ballet include Henri Sauguet's "La cigale at la fourmi" (1941) and the third episode in Francis Poulenc's "Les Animaux modèles" (Model Animals, 1941). In the 21st century there has been "La C et la F de la F", in which the dancers interact with the text, choreographed by Herman Diephuis for Annie Sellem's composite presentation of the fables in 2004. It also figures among the four in the film "Les Fables à la Fontaine" directed by Marie-Hélène Rebois in 2004.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The Belgian composer Joseph Jongen set La Fontaine's fable for children's chorus and piano (op. 118, 1941) and the Dutch composer set the French text in "Vijf fabels van La Fontaine" (op. 25, 1964) for school chorus and orchestra. There is a happier ending in the American composer Shawn Allen's children's opera, "The Ant and the Grasshopper" (1999). At the end of this thirty-minute work, the two insects become musical partners during the winter after the ant revives the dying grasshopper.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: Ivan Krylov's variant of the fable was set for voice and piano by Anton Rubinstein in 1851; a German version ("Der Ameise und die Libelle") was later published in Leipzig in 1864 as part of his "Fünf Fabeln" (Op.64). In the following century the Russian text was again set by Dmitri Shostakovich in "Two Fables of Krylov" for mezzo-soprano, female chorus and chamber orchestra (op.4, 1922). A Hungarian translation of the fable by Dezső Kosztolányi was also set for mezzo-soprano, four-part mixed chorus and 4 guitars or piano by Ferenc Farkas in 1977. The Catalan composer set the fable in his "7 Fábulas de la Fontaine" for recitation with orchestra in 1995. These used a Catalan translation by his father, the writer .


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: There have also been purely instrumental pieces; these include the first of Antal Dorati's "5 Pieces for Oboe" (1980) and the first of Karim Al-Zand's "Four Fables for flute, clarinet and piano" (2003).


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: Settings of the Aesop version have been much rarer. It was among Mabel Wood Hill's "Aesop's Fables Interpreted Through Music" (New York, 1920). It was also included among David Edgar Walther's ‘short operatic dramas’ in 2009. In 2010 Lefteris Kordis set the Greek text as the second fable in his "Aesop Project" for octet and voice.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: La Fontaine follows ancient sources in his 17th century retelling of the fable, where the ant suggests at the end that since the grasshopper has sung all summer she should now dance for its entertainment. However, his only direct criticism of the ant is that it lacked generosity. The Grasshopper had asked for a loan which it promised to pay back with interest, but "The Ant had a failing,/She wasn't a lender".


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The readers of his time were aware of the Christian duty of charity and therefore sensed the moral ambiguity of the fable. This is further brought out by Gustave Doré's 1880s print which pictures the story as a human situation. A female musician stands at a door in the snow with the children of the house looking up at her with sympathy. Their mother looks down from the top of the steps. Her tireless industry is indicated by the fact that she continues knitting but, in a country where the knitting-women ("les tricoteuses") had jeered at the victims of the guillotine during the French Revolution, this activity would also have been associated with lack of pity.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: Other French fabulists since La Fontaine had already started the counter-attack on the self-righteous ant. In around 1800 Jean-Jacques Boisard has the cricket answering the ant's criticism of his enjoyment of life with the philosophical proposition that since we must all die in the end, "Hoarding is folly, enjoyment is wise". In a Catholic educational work ("Fables", 1851) Jacques-Melchior Villefranche offers a sequel in which the ant loses its stores and asks the bee for help. The ant's former taunt to the grasshopper is now turned on himself:


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: But then the bee reveals that it has already given the grasshopper shelter and invites the ant to join him since 'All who are suffering/Deserve help equally.'


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: La Fontaine's fable also had a number of translations into Russian, in most of which the word used for the grasshopper is "strekoza". Though that word means a dragonfly today, at the time it could be used for a grasshopper as well. Ivan Krylov's best known "The Grasshopper and the Ant" ("Strekoza i muravej", 1808) follows the French original closely, but in the 1782 variant by Ivan Chemnitzer, simply titled "The Grasshopper", there is . This comments on the ant's final words that they were only spoken for the sake of teaching the grasshopper a lesson, after which the ant really did feed the grasshopper out of pity.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: In the 20th century the fable entered the political arena. Walt Disney's cartoon version, "The Grasshopper and the Ants" (1934) confronts the dilemma of how to deal with improvidence from the point of view of Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal. The Grasshopper's irresponsibility is underlined by his song "The World Owes us a Living", which later that year became a Shirley Temple hit, rewritten to encase the story of the earlier cartoon. In the end the ants take pity on the grasshopper on certain conditions. The Queen of the Ants decrees that the grasshopper may stay, but he must play his fiddle in return for his room and board. He agrees to this arrangement, finally learning that he needs to make himself useful, and 'changes his tune' to


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: In recent times, the fable has again been put to political use by both sides in the social debate between the enterprise culture and those who consider the advantaged have a responsibility towards the disadvantaged. A modern satirical version of the story, originally written in 1994, has the grasshopper calling a press conference at the beginning of the winter to complain about socio-economic inequity, and being given the ant's house. This version was written by Pittsburgh talk show guru Jim Quinn as an attack on the Clinton administration's social programme in the USA. In 2008 Conservative columnist Michelle Malkin also updated the story to satirize the policies of 'Barack Cicada'. There have been adaptations into other languages as well. But the commentary at the end of an Indian reworking explains such social conflict as the result of selective media presentation that exploits envy and fear.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The fable has equally been pressed into service in the debate over the artist's place within the work ethic. In Marie de France's mediaeval version the grasshopper had pleaded that its work was 'to sing and bring pleasure to all creatures, but I find none who will now return the same to me.' The ant's reply is thoroughly materialistic, however: 'Why should I give food to thee/When you cannot give aid to me?' At the end of the 15th century, Laurentius Abstemius makes a utilitarian point using different insects in his similar fable of the gnat and the bee. The gnat applies to the bee for food and shelter in winter and offers to teach her children music in return. The bee's reply is that she prefers to teach the children a useful trade that will preserve them from hunger and cold.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The fable of "A Gnat and a Bee" was later to be included by Thomas Bewick in his 1818 edition of Aesop's Fables. The conclusion he draws there is that 'The many unhappy people whom we see daily singing up and down in order to divert other people, though with very heavy hearts of their own, should warn all those who have the education of children how necessary it is to bring them up to industry and business, be their present prospects ever so hopeful.' The arts are no more highly regarded by the French revolutionary Pierre-Louis Ginguené whose "New Fables" (1810) include "The Grasshopper and the Other Insects". There the Grasshopper exhorts the others to follow his example of tireless artistic activity and is answered that the only justification for poetry can be if it is socially useful.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: Such utilitarianism was soon to be challenged by Romanticism and its championship of the artist has coloured later attitudes. In the early decades of the 20th century, the Romanian poet George Topîrceanu was to make the case for pure artistic creation in "The ballad of a small grasshopper" ("Balada unui greier mic"), although more in the telling than by outright moralising. A cricket passes the summer in singing; autumn arrives, but he continues. It is only in icy winter that the cricket realizes that he hasn't provided for himself. He goes to his neighbour, the ant, to ask for something to eat, but the ant refuses saying, “You wasted your time all summer long.” The English folk-singer and children's writer Leon Rosselson subtly turns the tables in much the same way in his 1970s song "The Ant and the Grasshopper", using the story to rebuke the self-righteous ant (and those humans with his mindset) for letting his fellow creatures die of want and for his blindness to the joy of life.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: In the field of children's literature, Slade and Toni Morrison's rap retelling of the fable, "Who's Got Game?: The Ant or the Grasshopper?" (2003), where the grasshopper represents the artisan, provokes a discussion about the importance of art. An earlier improvisation on the story that involves art and its value was written by the Silesian artist Janosch under the title "Die Fiedelgrille und der Maulwurf" (The fiddling cricket and the mole), originally published in 1982 and in English translation in 1983. There the cricket fiddles for the entertainment of the animals all summer but is rejected by the stag beetle and the mouse when winter comes. She eventually encounters the mole who loves her music, especially because he is blind. and invites her to stay with him.


title: The Ant and the Grasshopper

text: The theme had been treated at an even further distance in Leo Lionni's "Frederick" (1967). Here a fieldmouse, in a community narrowly focused on efficiently gathering for the winter, concentrates instead on gathering impressions. When the other mice question the usefulness of this, Frederick insists that 'gathering sun rays for the cold dark winter days' is also work. Indeed, the community comes to recognise this after the food has run out and morale is low, when it is Frederick's poetry that raises their spirits.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: in English to differentiate it from an earlier Jìn dynasty whose name is rendered identically in Hanyu Pinyin without the tone marking.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: It is also sometimes called the "Jurchen dynasty" or the "Jurchen Jin", because members of the ruling Wanyan clan were of Jurchen descent.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The Jin emerged from Wanyan Aguda's rebellion against the Liao dynasty (916–1125), which held sway over northern China until the nascent Jin drove the Liao to the Western Regions, where they became known in historiography as the Western Liao. After vanquishing the Liao, the Jin launched a century-long campaign against the Han-led Song dynasty (960–1279), which was based in southern China. Over the course of their rule, the ethnic Jurchen emperors of the Jin dynasty adapted to Han customs, and even fortified the Great Wall against the rising Mongols. Domestically, the Jin oversaw a number of cultural advancements, such as the revival of Confucianism.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: After spending centuries as vassals of the Jin, the Mongols invaded under Genghis Khan in 1211 and inflicted catastrophic defeats on the Jin armies. After numerous defeats, revolts, defections, and coups, they succumbed to Mongol conquest 23 years later in 1234.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The Jin dynasty was officially known as the "Great Jin" at that time. Furthermore, the Jin emperors referred to their state as China, "Zhongguo" (), just as some other non-Han dynasties. Non-Han rulers expanded the definition of "China" to include non-Han peoples in addition to Han people whenever they ruled China. Jin documents indicate that the usage of "China" by dynasties to refer to themselves began earlier than previously thought.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The original homeland of the Jurchens was the forested mountain areas of what is now eastern Manchuria and Russia's Primorsky Krai, but they had spread to the Songhua River basin by the tenth century. Unlike the nomadic Khitans and Mongols, the Jurchens were hunters and fishers, while those who moved to the plains practiced agriculture. During Tang times, the Jurchens formed part of the Mohe people and were subjects of the Bohai kingdom until its conquest by the Liao dynasty in 926. Two groups were considered ancestors of the Jurchen people: the Heishui Mohe ("Black River Mohe"), named after the Amur River, and the Wuguo ("Five Nations") federation, which lived to the northeast of nodern Jilin.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: By the 10th century, the Jurchens had become vassals of the Khitan rulers of the Liao dynasty. While most Jurchen groups in the Northeast China Plain became Liao subjects, some sought to establish direct relations with other countries such as the Song dynasty and Goryeo. The Jurchens sent a number of tributary and trade missions to the Song capital Kaifeng, which the Liao tried unsuccessfully to prevent. Some Jurchens paid tribute to Goryeo and the Jurchens sided with the latter during the Khitan–Goryeo War. They offered tribute to both courts out of political necessity and the attraction of material benefits.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: In the 11th century, there was widespread discontent against Khitan rule among the Jurchens, as the Liao violently extorted annual tribute from the Jurchen tribes. Leveraging the Jurchens' desire of independence from the Khitans, chief Wugunai of the Wanyan clan rose to prominence, dominating all of eastern Manchuria from Mount Changbai to the Wuguo tribes. His grandson Aguda eventually founded the Jin dynasty.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The Jin dynasty was created in modern Jilin and Heilongjiang by the Jurchen tribal chieftain Aguda in 1115. According to tradition, Aguda was a descendant of Hanpu. Aguda adopted the term for "gold" as the name of his state, itself a translation of "Anchuhu" River, which meant "golden" in Jurchen. This river, known as Alechuka in modern Chinese, is a tributary of the Songhua River east of Harbin. The Jurchens' early rulers were the Khitan-led Liao dynasty, which had held sway over modern north and northeast China and the Mongolian Plateau, for several centuries. In 1121, the Jurchens entered into the Alliance Conducted at Sea with the Han-led Northern Song dynasty and agreed to jointly invade the Liao dynasty. While the Song armies faltered, the Jurchens succeeded in driving the Liao to Central Asia. In 1125, after the death of Aguda, the Jin dynasty broke its alliance with the Song dynasty and invaded north China. When the Song dynasty reclaimed the Han-populated Sixteen Prefectures, they were "fiercely resisted" by the Han Chinese population there who had previously been under Liao rule, while when the Jurchens invaded that area, the Han Chinese did not oppose them at all and handed over the Southern Capital (present-day Beijing, then known as Yanjing) to them. The Jurchens were supported by the anti-Song, Beijing-based noble Han clans. The Han Chinese who worked for the Liao were viewed as hostile enemies by the Song dynasty. Song Han Chinese also defected to the Jin. One crucial mistake that the Song made during this joint attack was the removal of the defensive forest it originally built along the Song-Liao border. Because of the removal of this landscape barrier, in 1126/27, the Jin army marched quickly across the North China Plain to Bianjing (present-day Kaifeng). On 9 January 1127, the Jurchens ransacked the Imperial palaces in Kaifeng, the capital of the Northern Song dynasty, capturing both Emperor Qinzong and his father, Emperor Huizong, who had abdicated in panic in the face of the Jin invasion. Following the fall of Bianjing, the succeeding Southern Song dynasty continued to fight the Jin dynasty for over a decade, eventually signing the Treaty of Shaoxing in 1141, which called for the cession of all Song territories north of the Huai River to the Jin dynasty and the execution of Song general Yue Fei in return for peace. The peace treaty was formally ratified on 11 October 1142 when a Jin envoy visited the Song court.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Having conquered Kaifeng and occupied North China, the Jin later deliberately chose earth as its dynastic element and yellow as its royal color. According to the theory of the Five Elements (wuxing), the earth element follows the fire, the dynastic element of the Song, in the sequence of elemental creation. Therefore, this ideological move shows that the Jin regarded the Song reign of China was officially over and themselves as the rightful ruler of China Proper.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: After taking over Northern China, the Jin dynasty became increasingly sinicised. About three million people, half of them Jurchens, migrated south into northern China over two decades, and this minority governed about 30 million people. The Jurchens were given land grants and organised into hereditary military units: 300 households formed a (company) and 7–10 formed a (battalion). Many married Han Chinese, although the ban on Jurchen nobles marrying Han Chinese was not lifted until 1191. After Emperor Taizong died in 1135, the next three Jin emperors were grandsons of Aguda by three different princes. Emperor Xizong (r. 1135–1149) studied the classics and wrote Chinese poetry. He adopted Han Chinese cultural traditions, but the Jurchen nobles had the top positions.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Later in life, Emperor Xizong became an alcoholic and executed many officials for criticising him. He also had Jurchen leaders who opposed him murdered, even those in the Wanyan clan. In 1149 he was murdered by a cabal of relatives and nobles, who made his cousin Wanyan Liang the next Jin emperor. Because of the brutality of both his domestic and foreign policy, Wanyan Liang was posthumously demoted from the position of emperor. Consequently, historians have commonly referred to him by the posthumous name "Prince of Hailing".


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Having usurped the throne, Wanyan Liang embarked on the program of legitimising his rule as an emperor of China. In 1153, he moved the empire's main capital from Huining Prefecture (south of present-day Harbin) to the former Liao capital, Yanjing (present-day Beijing). Four years later, in 1157, to emphasise the permanence of the move, he razed the nobles' residences in Huining Prefecture. Wanyan Liang also reconstructed the former Song capital, Bianjing (present-day Kaifeng), which had been sacked in 1127, making it the Jin's southern capital.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Wanyan Liang also tried to suppress dissent by killing Jurchen nobles, executing 155 princes. To fulfil his dream of becoming the ruler of all China, Wanyan Liang attacked the Southern Song dynasty in 1161. Meanwhile, two simultaneous rebellions erupted in Shangjing, at the Jurchens' former power base: led by Wanyan Liang's cousin, soon-to-be crowned Wanyan Yong, and the other of Khitan tribesmen. Wanyan Liang had to withdraw Jin troops from southern China to quell the uprisings. The Jin forces were defeated by Song forces in the Battle of Caishi and Battle of Tangdao. With a depleted military force, Wanyan Liang failed to make headway in his attempted invasion of the Southern Song dynasty. Finally he was assassinated by his own generals in December 1161, due to his defeats. His son and heir was also assassinated in the capital.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Although crowned in October, Wanyan Yong (Emperor Shizong) was not officially recognised as emperor until the murder of Wanyan Liang's heir. The Khitan uprising was not suppressed until 1164; their horses were confiscated so that the rebels had to take up farming. Other Khitan and Xi cavalry units had been incorporated into the Jin army. Because these internal uprisings had severely weakened the Jin's capacity to confront the Southern Song militarily, the Jin court under Emperor Shizong began negotiating for peace. The Treaty of Longxing (隆興和議) was signed in 1164 and ushered in more than 40 years of peace between the two empires.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: In the early 1180s, Emperor Shizong instituted a restructuring of 200 "meng'an" units to remove tax abuses and help Jurchens. Communal farming was encouraged. The Jin Empire prospered and had a large surplus of grain in reserve. Although learned in Chinese classics, Emperor Shizong was also known as a promoter of Jurchen language and culture; during his reign, a number of Chinese classics were translated into Jurchen, the Imperial Jurchen Academy was founded, and the imperial examinations started to be offered in the Jurchen language. Emperor Shizong's reign (1161–1189) was remembered by the posterity as the time of comparative peace and prosperity, and the emperor himself was compared to the mythological rulers Yao and Shun. Poor Jurchen families in the southern Routes (Daming and Shandong) Battalion and Company households tried to live the lifestyle of wealthy Jurchen families and avoid doing farming work by selling their own Jurchen daughters into slavery and renting their land to Han tenants. The Wealthy Jurchens feasted and drank and wore damask and silk. The History of Jin (Jinshi) says that Emperor Shizong of Jin took note and attempted to halt these things in 1181.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Emperor Shizong's grandson, Emperor Zhangzong (r. 1189–1208), venerated Jurchen values, but he also immersed himself in Han Chinese culture and married an ethnic Han Chinese woman. The "Taihe Code of law" was promulgated in 1201 and was based mostly on the Tang Code. In 1207, the Southern Song dynasty attempted an invasion, but the Jin forces effectively repulsed them. In the peace agreement, the Song dynasty had to pay higher annual indemnities and behead Han Tuozhou, the leader of the hawkish faction in the Song imperial court.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Starting from the early 13th century, the Jin dynasty began to feel the pressure of Mongols from the north. Genghis Khan first led the Mongols into Western Xia territory in 1205 and ravaged it four years later. In 1211 about 50,000 Mongol horsemen invaded the Jin Empire and began absorbing Khitan and Jurchen rebels. The Jin had a large army with 150,000 cavalry but abandoned the "western capital" Datong (see also the Battle of Yehuling). The next year the Mongols went north and looted the Jin "eastern capital", and in 1213 they besieged the "central capital", Zhongdu (present-day Beijing). In 1214 the Jin made a humiliating treaty but retained the capital. That summer, Emperor Xuanzong abandoned the central capital and moved the government to the "southern capital" Kaifeng, making it the official seat of the Jin dynasty's power.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: In 1216, a hawkish faction in the Jin imperial court persuaded Emperor Xuanzong to attack the Song dynasty, but in 1219 they were defeated at the same place by the Yangtze River where Wanyan Liang had been defeated in 1161. The Jin dynasty now faced a two front war that they could not afford. Furthermore, Emperor Aizong won a succession struggle against his brother and then quickly ended the war and went back to the capital. He made peace with the Tanguts of Western Xia, who had been allied with the Mongols.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The Jurchen Jin emperor Wanyan Yongji's daughter, Jurchen Princess Qiguo was married to Mongol leader Genghis Khan in exchange for relieving the Mongol siege upon Zhongdu (Beijing) in the Mongol conquest of the Jin dynasty.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Many Han Chinese and Khitans defected to the Mongols to fight against the Jin dynasty. Two Han Chinese leaders, Shi Tianze and Liu Heima (), and the Khitan Xiao Zhala (蕭札剌) defected and commanded the three tumens in the Mongol army. Liu Heima and Shi Tianze served Genghis Khan's successor, Ögedei Khan. Liu Heima and Shi Tianxiang led armies against Western Xia for the Mongols. There were four Han tumens and three Khitan tumens, with each tumen consisting of 10,000 troops. The three Khitan generals Shimo Beidi'er (石抹孛迭兒), Tabuyir (塔不已兒), and Xiao Zhongxi (; Xiao Zhala's son) commanded the three Khitan tumens and the four Han generals Zhang Rou (), Yan Shi (), Shi Tianze and Liu Heima commanded the four Han tumens under Ögedei Khan.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Shi Tianze was a Han Chinese who lived under Jin rule. Inter-ethnic marriage between Han Chinese and Jurchens became common at this time. His father was Shi Bingzhi (史秉直). Shi Bingzhi married a Jurchen woman (surname Nahe) and a Han Chinese woman (surname Zhang); it is unknown which of them was Shi Tianze's mother. Shi Tianze was married to two Jurchen women, a Han Chinese woman, and a Korean woman, and his son Shi Gang was born to one of his Jurchen wives. His Jurchen wives' surnames were Monian and Nahe, his Korean wife's surname was Li, and his Han Chinese wife's surname was Shi. Shi Tianze defected to the Mongol forces upon their invasion of the Jin dynasty. His son, Shi Gang, married a Keraite woman; the Keraites were Mongolified Turkic people and considered as part of the "Mongol nation". Shi Tianze, Zhang Rou, Yan Shi and other Han Chinese who served in the Jin dynasty and defected to the Mongols helped build the structure for the administration of the new Mongol state.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The Mongols created a "Han Army" () out of defected Jin troops, and another army out of defected Song troops called the "Newly Submitted Army" ().


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Genghis Khan died in 1227 while his armies were attacking Western Xia. His successor, Ögedei Khan, invaded the Jin dynasty again in 1232 with assistance from the Southern Song dynasty. The Jurchens tried to resist; but when the Mongols besieged Kaifeng in 1233, Emperor Aizong fled south to the city of Caizhou. A Song–Mongol allied army surrounded the capital, and the next year Emperor Aizong committed suicide by hanging himself to avoid being captured in the Mongols besieged Caizhou, ending the Jin dynasty in 1234. The territory of the Jin dynasty was to be divided between the Mongols and the Song dynasty. However, due to lingering territorial disputes, the Song dynasty and the Mongols eventually went to war with one another over these territories.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: In "Empire of The Steppes", René Grousset reports that the Mongols were always amazed at the valour of the Jurchen warriors, who held out until seven years after the death of Genghis Khan.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Contemporary Chinese writers ascribed Jurchen success in overwhelming the Liao and Northern Song dynasties mainly to their cavalry. Already during Aguda's rebellion against the Liao dynasty, all Jurchen fighters were mounted. It was said that the Jurchen cavalry tactics were a carryover from their hunting skills. Jurchen horsemen were provided with heavy armor; on occasions, they would use a team of horses attached to each other with chains ("Guaizi Ma").


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Ethnic Bohai were an important element of not only civil but military administration in the Jin dynasty from its earliest stages. After annexing the Bohai rebel regime of Gao Yongchang, the Jin moved to attract Bohai recruits by sending out two Bohai, Liang Fu (梁福) and Wodala (斡荅剌) to encourage their compatriots to join the Jin, using the slogan "Jurchen and Bohai are originally of the same family" (女真渤海本同一家). Da Gao (大㚖), a descendant of Bohai royalty, was a major military commander in the Jin, commanding 8 meng-an of Bohai troops, and excelled in battle against the Song army. The Bohai were admired for their martial skills: "full of cunning, surpassing other nations in courage."


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: As the Liao dynasty fell apart and the Song dynasty retreated beyond the Yangtze, the army of the new Jin dynasty absorbed many soldiers who formerly fought for the Liao or Song dynasties. The new Jin empire adopted many of the Song military's weapons, including various machines for siege warfare and artillery. In fact, the Jin military's use of cannons, grenades, and even rockets to defend besieged Kaifeng against the Mongols in 1233 is considered the first ever battle in human history in which gunpowder was used effectively, even though it failed to prevent the eventual Jin defeat.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: On the other hand, the Jin military was not particularly good at naval warfare. Both in 1129–30 and in 1161 Jin forces were defeated by the Southern Song navies when trying to cross the Yangtze River into the core Southern Song territory (see Battle of Tangdao and Battle of Caishi), even though for the latter campaign the Jin had equipped a large navy of their own, using Han Chinese shipbuilders and even Han Chinese captains who had defected from the Southern Song. Prince Hailing was the first northern conquest dynasty leader to attempt to expand into naval technology, to attack the waterways leading to southern China.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: In 1130, the Jin army reached Hangzhou and Ningbo in southern China. But heavy Chinese resistance and the geography of the area halted the Jin advance, and they were forced to retreat and withdraw, and they had not been able to escape the Song navy when trying to return until they were directed by a Han Chinese defector who helped them escape in Zhenjiang. Southern China was then cleared of the Jurchen forces.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The Jin military was organised through the "meng-an mou-k'o" ("meng'an mouke") system, seemingly similar to the later Eight Banners of the Qing dynasty. "Meng-an" is from the Mongol word for thousand, "mingghan" (see Military of the Yuan dynasty) while "mou-k'o" means clan or tribe. Groups of fifty households known as "p'u-li-yen" were grouped together as a "mou-k'o", while seven to ten "mou-k'o" formed a "meng-an", and several "meng-an" were grouped into a "wanhu", Chinese for Ten Thousand Households. This was not only a military structure but also grouped all Jurchen households for economic and administrative functions. Khitans and Han Chinese soldiers who had defected to the Jin dynasty were also assigned into their own "meng-an". All male members of the households were required to serve in the military; the servants of the household would serve as auxiliaries to escort their masters in battle. The numbers of Han Chinese soldiers in the Jin's armies seemed to be very significant. The headships of the meng-an were initially the economic basis of the Jurchen aristocracy; some of the meng-an became private armies of hereditary imperial princes, seizing properties and challenging the throne. Jurchen military commanders were largely hereditary Jurchen nobles, and were given power over the local civilian governors where they were garrisoned. Prince Hailing abolished these autonomous positions, brutally suppressing potential threats, and thus established a more centralized Chinese-style model. In 1140 sedentary populations such as the Han and Bohai were discharged from the meng-an system, and in 1163 the Khitans were discharged due to rebellion, although the Khitans who remained loyal were declared exempted from removal a few months later. After the meng-an forces declined in effectiveness, ad hoc Chinese irregulars called "Zhongxiao Jun" (filial and loyal troops) were raised to fight the Mongols. They were known for their courage but also ill-discipline.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The "Hulubojilie" (忽魯勃極列, from Jurchen "gurun begile") was the army commander's title. "Bojilie" was the title of tribal chiefs. When the population was mobilized for war, the Bojilie took on military command of the meng-an, which was the name of both the military unit and the title of its commander. The leadership of the dynasty was directed by the Council of Great Chieftains (Bojilie) until 1134 when Wuqimai dismantled it.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: In order to prevent incursion from the Mongols, a large construction program was launched. The records show that two important sections of the Great Wall were completed by the Jurchens.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The Great Wall as constructed by the Jurchens differed from the previous dynasties. Known as the Border Fortress or the Boundary Ditch of the Jin, it was formed by digging ditches within which lengths of wall were built. In some places subsidiary walls and ditches were added for extra strength. The construction was started in about 1123 and completed by about 1198. The two sections attributable to the Jin dynasty are known as the Old Mingchang Walls and New Great Walls, together stretching more than 2,000 kilometres in length.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The government of the Jin dynasty merged Jurchen customs with institutions adopted from the Liao and Song dynasties. The pre-dynastic Jurchen government was based on the quasi-egalitarian tribal council. Jurchen society at the time did not have a strong political hierarchy. The "Shuo Fu" (說郛) records that the Jurchen tribes were not ruled by central authority and locally elected their chieftains. Tribal customs were retained after Aguda united the Jurchen tribes and formed the Jin dynasty, coexisting alongside more centralised institutions. The Jin dynasty had five capitals, a practice they adopted from the Balhae and the Liao. The Jin had to overcome the difficulties of controlling a multicultural empire composed of territories once ruled by the Liao and Northern Song. The solution of the early Jin government was to establish separate government structures for different ethnic groups.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Because the Jin had few contacts with its southern neighbour, the Song dynasty, different cultural developments took place in both states. Within Confucianism, the "Learning of the Way" that developed and became orthodox in Song did not take root in Jin. Jin scholars put more emphasis on the work of northern Song scholar and poet Su Shi (1037–1101) than on Zhu Xi's (1130–1200) scholarship, which constituted the foundation of the Learning of the Way.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The Jin pursued a revival of Tang dynasty urban design with architectural projects in Kaifeng and Zhongdu (modern Beijing), building for instance a bell tower and drum tower to announce the night curfew (which was revived after being abolished under the Song). The Jurchens followed Khitan precedent of living in tents amidst the Chinese-style architecture, which were in turn based on the Song dynasty Kaifeng model.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: A significant branch of Taoism called the Quanzhen School was founded under the Jin by Wang Zhe (1113–1170), a Han Chinese man who founded formal congregations in 1167 and 1168. Wang took the nickname of Wang Chongyang (Wang "Double Yang") and the disciples he took were retrospectively known as the "seven patriarchs of Quanzhen". The flourishing of "ci" poetry that characterized Jin literature was tightly linked to Quanzhen, as two-thirds of the "ci" poetry written in Jin times was composed by Quanzhen Taoists.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: The Jin state sponsored an edition of the Taoist Canon that is known as the "Precious Canon of the Mysterious Metropolis of the Great Jin" ("Da Jin Xuandu baozang" 大金玄都寶藏). Based on a smaller version of the Canon printed by Emperor Huizong (r. 1100–1125) of the Song dynasty, it was completed in 1192 under the direction and support of Emperor Zhangzong (r. 1190–1208). In 1188, Zhangzong's grandfather and predecessor Shizong (r. 1161–1189) had ordered the woodblocks for the Song Canon transferred from Kaifeng (the former Northern Song capital that had now become the Jin "Southern Capital") to the Central Capital's "Abbey of Celestial Perpetuity" or Tianchang guan 天長觀, on the site of what is now the White Cloud Temple in Beijing. Other Daoist writings were also moved there from another abbey in the Central Capital. Zhangzong instructed the abbey's superintendent Sun Mingdao 孫明道 and two civil officials to prepare a complete Canon for printing. After sending people on a "nationwide search for scriptures" (which yielded 1,074 fascicles of text that was not included in the Huizong edition of the Canon) and securing donations for printing, in 1192 Sun Mingdao proceeded to cut the new woodblocks. The final print consisted of 6,455 fascicles. Though the Jin emperors occasionally offered copies of the "Canon" as gifts, not a single fragment of it has survived.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: A Buddhist Canon or "Tripitaka" was also produced in Shanxi, the same place where an enhanced version of the Jin-sponsored Taoist Canon would be reprinted in 1244. The project was initiated in 1139 by a Buddhist nun named Cui Fazhen, who swore (and allegedly "broke her arm to seal the oath") that she would raise the necessary funds to make a new official edition of the Canon printed by the Northern Song. Completed in 1173, the Jin Tripitaka counted about 7,000 fascicles, "a major achievement in the history of Buddhist private printing." It was further expanded during the Yuan.


title: Jin dynasty (1115–1234)

text: Buddhism thrived during the Jin, both in its relation with the imperial court and in society in general. Many sutras were also carved on stone tablets. The donors who funded such inscriptions included members of the Jin imperial family, high officials, common people, and Buddhist priests. Some sutras have only survived from these carvings, which are thus highly valuable to the study of Chinese Buddhism. At the same time, the Jin court sold monk certificates for revenue. This practice was initiated in 1162 by Shizong to fund his wars, and stopped three years later when war was over. His successor Zhanzong used the same method to raise military funds in 1197 and one year later to raise money to fight famine in the Western Capital. The same practice was used again in 1207 (to fight the Song and more famine) as well as under the reigns of emperors Weishao (r. 1209–1213) and Xuanzong (r. 1213–1224) to fight the Mongols.


title: David Fincher filmography

text: David Fincher is an American film director who has worked on feature films, television series, and music videos. His works have been nominated for Academy Awards, Golden Globes, BAFTAs, Grammys and Emmy Awards, among other accolades. He received Academy Award for Best Director nominations for "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" (2008), "The Social Network" (2010), and "Mank" (2020).


title: David Fincher filmography

text: He made his directorial debut in 1992 with the science-fiction horror film "Alien 3". Since then, he has gone on to direct several films in the thriller genre, including "Seven" (1995), "The Game" (1997), "Fight Club" (1999), "Panic Room" (2002), "Zodiac" (2007), "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" (2011), and "Gone Girl" (2014). He has also produced three television series for Netflix: "House of Cards" (2013–2018), "Mindhunter" (2017–present), and "Love, Death and Robots" (2019).


title: David Fincher filmography

text: Outside of feature films, Fincher has directed music videos for artists including The Rolling Stones, Justin Timberlake and Jay-Z—for which he won two Grammy Awards for Best Music Video—Nine Inch Nails, Michael Jackson, Madonna, and Rick Springfield, among others.


title: Duncan James

text: Duncan James (born Duncan Inglis, 7 April 1978) is an English singer and actor. He became widely known in 2001 as a member of the boy band Blue and later for playing Ryan Knight in the British soap opera "Hollyoaks".


title: Duncan James

text: James grew up an only child in Dorset and was raised primarily by his mother Fiona Inglis and grandparents after his father abandoned his mother before he was born. He was raised a "strict Catholic" and educated at Dumpton School (where his grandfather worked as a music teacher), Milldown School (Blandford Forum), Corfe Hills School (Broadstone), and Sidmouth College (East Devon). At the age of 15 he played Puck in "A Midsummer Night's Dream". He played Dr Watson in "Sherlock Holmes" for Sidmouth Youth Theatre.


title: Duncan James

text: James, along with Antony Costa, convinced Lee Ryan and Simon Webbe in early 2000 to form the group Blue. Blue's R&B-influenced pop allowed the group to achieve commercial success in the United Kingdom and many other countries, including Ireland, Portugal, Belgium, Italy, France, Australia and New Zealand. The band released their debut single "All Rise" in May 2001 and it reached No. 4 on the UK Singles Chart. Their follow up single, "Too Close", was released in August 2001 peaking at No. 1 on the UK Singles Chart. They went on to achieve a second number one in November with the ballad "If You Come Back". The album "All Rise" was released in time for Christmas and reached number one on the UK Albums Chart, eventually selling in excess of 1.8 million albums in the UK. The final single from the album, "Fly By II", reached No. 6 in March 2002.


title: Duncan James

text: Their second studio album, "One Love", was released in October 2002; it entered the UK Albums Chart at No. 1 and sold more than 150,000 copies. Three singles were released from the album: "One Love", which peaked at No. 3, "Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word", featuring vocals from Elton John, which peaked at No. 1, and "U Make Me Wanna", which peaked at No. 4. Their third studio album, "Guilty", was released in autumn 2003; it too entered the UK Albums Chart at No. 1, and sold 100,000 copies in the week of release. The album spawned four singles, including "Guilty", which peaked at No. 2, "Signed, Sealed, Delivered I'm Yours", featuring vocals from Stevie Wonder and Angie Stone, which peaked at No. 11, "Breathe Easy", which peaked at No. 4, and "Bubblin'", which peaked at No. 9.


title: Duncan James

text: Two compilation albums, Best of Blue and "4ever Blue," were released in 2004 and 2005 respectively. "4ever Blue" included three tracks only previously performed in Japan: "The Gift", "It's Alright" and "Elements". By the indication of the album booklet, a live version of "Lonely This Christmas" from CD:UK was intended to be track seven on the album; however, this was removed from the track listing for unknown reasons. The album was available in several European countries, as well as Japan, Thailand and China; however, it was a commercial failure, and failed to chart anywhere. The album was not released in the UK, despite copies being widely available.


title: Duncan James

text: James returned to the music scene in May 2006 with his solo single "Sooner or Later", releasing the video in early May and planning to release the single commercially on 5 June 2006. The video reached No. 2 on The Box and No. 5 on The Hits. However, the single was no commercial success and entered the British charts at No. 35, before slipping down to No. 72 in its second week. "Can't Stop a River" was James's next single. Released on 21 August 2006, the track only reached No. 59 in the UK and No. 97 in Ireland. In continental Europe, where "Can't Stop a River" was released a day earlier than in the UK, it similarly proved unpopular, dropping out of the singles charts in many countries such as France, Turkey, Germany, and Belgium. James' album also fell short, selling less than 1,000 copies in the UK in its first week (and failing to reach the Top 50). The album sold a total of 412,350 copies around the world.


title: Duncan James

text: Although his debut album "Future Past" did not do as well as hoped (except in Italy, where it reached No. 2 on the chart and was certified platinum for shipments of 80,000 copies), on 2 February 2007, music channel B4 premièred the video for "Amazed", his new single which was scheduled to be released 12 March 2007. However, there was once again a lack of interest. The release was cancelled and James was dropped from his recording contract. He has since announced he has quit his solo career. In 2007 he appeared in the West End production of "Chicago". He completed ten more weeks in "Chicago" from 10 December 2007 until 9 February 2008. He appeared in an episode of "The Bill" entitled "The Morning After", which aired on 1 January 2009. It was confirmed in February 2009 that James had been selected to replace Denise Van Outen as presenter of "", the sequel to "". Filming commenced in early 2009.


title: Duncan James

text: In May 2009, James announced the UK's voting in the Eurovision Song Contest. He presented "Hannah-Oke" on Disney Channel UK, a singing and dancing contest based on the popular Disney TV series "Hannah Montana". He also appeared on "Celebrity Are You Smarter Than A 10 Year Old?" and raised £10,000 for his charities. In 2006, James appeared with the other members of the boyband Blue on 26 June episode of "Ministry of Mayhem", where James and the other band members were all hypnotised by UK stage hypnotist David Days.


title: Duncan James

text: James has worked occasionally as a television presenter, having presented the 95.8 Capital FM's "Party in the Park" for the Prince's Trust (2003 and 2004), and ITV2's coverage of the TV series "Soapstar Superstar", along with Jayne Middlemiss. His other presenting work includes "Pop City Live", "Variety Club Showbusiness Awards 2004", "T4 Movie Special: Spider-Man 2", "Record of the Year: Downloaded" and GMTV's "Entertainment Today".


title: Duncan James

text: He took part on ITV1's "Dancing on Ice" in 2007, when he made it to the grand final alongside rugby player Kyran Bracken and actress Clare Buckfield. He came third in the contest, although was unable to perform his Bolero performance. In 2007, James played himself in the pilot episode of "Plus One", which was part of Channel 4's "Comedy Showcase". A full series was broadcast in 2009, in which he played a broad caricature of himself called "Duncan From Blue". He made an appearance on a new show for Sky One, "Guinness World Records Smashed", performing with Festival4Stars contestants. It aired in November 2008. In 2008 he became an Ambassador of Festival4Stars talent competition after he judged a national final. James was cast as one of the leads in the musical "Legally Blonde" (adapted from the film "Legally Blonde") as it transferred from Broadway to London's West End in December 2009. He played opposite Sheridan Smith as Elle, and Aoife Mulholland as Brooke. In December 2009, James appeared as Warner Huntington III in the West End production of "Legally Blonde". He appeared as a celebrity guest on 14 August 2009 on "Daily Cooks Challenge".


title: Duncan James

text: In 2010, James presented the quiz show "Scream if You Know the Answer!" where the contestants have to answer questions whilst on rollercoasters. In July 2010 he was a judge on "Don't Stop Believing", a talent show for choirs. He has his own radio show on 95.8 Capital FM, every Sunday from 7–10 pm.


title: Duncan James

text: The band represented the UK at the 2011 Eurovision Song Contest in Düsseldorf with the song "I Can" coming in 11th place with 100 points. Blue released their fourth studio album, "Roulette" on 25 January 2013 with "Hurt Lovers" as the lead single. On 21 February 2013, it was confirmed that the group would be joining "The Big Reunion", a TV series in which six groups from the past, including Liberty X, Atomic Kitten and 5ive, reform for a one-off gig. Beginning in May 2013, the group were to tour Great Britain and Ireland with the other groups in The Big Reunion concert series. On 27 March 2013 the group announced they would embark on their first headlining tour later on in the year, their first tour in nearly ten years. On Sunday 29 May 2022 James performed at Durham Pride 2022 as the headline act.


title: Duncan James

text: According to an interview he gave to Gabby Logan on BBC Radio 5 Live on 28 July 2007, he is a great-grandson of Herbert Chapman, who managed the Arsenal football team during the inter-war years.


title: Duncan James

text: He defined himself as bisexual in an interview with the "News of the World" on 12 July 2009. James came out privately as gay to fellow band member Simon Webbe in 2012. In an interview in 2014, James specified that he still has sex with women but identifies as a gay man, clarifying: "Regardless of whether I sleep with women or not, I'm still sleeping with men so I'm gay. So I'm still attracted to women, I could still easily sleep with a woman". In July 2017, as he appeared in public for the first time with his new boyfriend at that time, James said that coming out was the "best thing he ever did" after years of "living a lie". In May 2019, in response to a question about what being gay meant to him now, James stated, "It shouldn't really mean anything to people these days. You are who you are. We should lose the labelling, really. Being who you are is good enough, and whatever you are, people should be fine with that. Let's just all get along and let's all be happy." In July 2019, James publicly released pictures of him with his current boyfriend, Rodrigo Reis, adding that he is "proud to be gay". In October 2019, James featured in two episodes of "First Dates Hotel" in which he had his first public date while openly gay, with 38-year-old Portuguese native, Joao.


title: Duncan James

text: James has a daughter, Tianie Finn, who was born in February 2005, with former girlfriend Claire Grainger whom he dated from 2002 to 2005. From 2008 to 2009, James dated Tara Palmer-Tomkinson. In 2013, James stated that he would like to have another child with Grainger.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: The Cougar is a mine-resistant ambush-protected (MRAP) and infantry mobility vehicle structured to be resistant to landmines and improvised munitions.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: It is a family of armored vehicles produced by Force Protection Inc, which manufactures ballistic and mine-protected vehicles. The vehicles are integrated by Spartan Motors. These vehicles are protected against small arms, land mines and improvised explosive devices (IEDs) using a combination of design features and materials to protect both the crew and engine compartment against a wide range of attacks. A Monocoque type, V-shaped hull extends to the engine bay and serves to direct the blast away from under the vehicle. The dual air-conditioners help keep heavily dressed troops from overheating in temperatures over in Iraq.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: Force Protection, Inc. was formed in 2002 when Sonic Jet purchased Technical Solutions Group, using the name Sonic Jet until 2004. Technical Solutions Group had been a defense company in the US that was involved in a range of products, including mine-resistant vehicles based on South African designs. A few vehicles were sold to the US Army for evaluation, and a small fleet of heavily protected vehicles was sold to the British Army in 2001.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: Some 4,000 of these vehicles were fielded under the US military's MRAP and other vehicle programs. US Defense Secretary Robert Gates demanded that the vehicles be ordered in larger numbers after the Marines reported in 2004 that no troops had died in more than 300 IED attacks on Cougars. Since then, Cougar vehicles have been hit by IEDs many times in Iraq with few fatalities. Britain chose the Cougar over the RG-31 Nyala for their "Mastiff" APV.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: Official data states that the Cougar is able to withstand a blast of at least 14 kg (30.86 lb) TNT under a wheel and 7 kg (15.43 lb) TNT under a belly.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: The Cougar comes in two main configurations, a 4×4, and 6×6. It is designed for the transport and protection of troops and equipment, especially against mines or IEDs. The two main configurations come in specific variants.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: The Cougar is used primarily by the United States Armed Forces and the British Army, as well as law enforcement agencies in the United States. In service with those countries, the Cougar is used in a variety of roles, including the HEV (Hardened Engineer Vehicle) and the Joint Explosive Ordnance Disposal Rapid Response Vehicles (JERRV) while in service with the US Marine Corps, US Navy Seabees, and US Air Force Rapid Engineer Deployable Heavy Operational Repair Squadron Engineers.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: Compared to the original Cougar vehicle, the British variant is fitted with large, vertical armor plates that cover the large vision blocks and weapon firing ports. This is in line with British Army doctrine concerning the role of the APC/MICV, specifically that it is to carry troops under protection to the objective and give firepower support when they have disembarked. The Mastiff is fitted with a turret sporting either a L7A2 General Purpose Machine Gun, L110A1 Light Machine Gun, L11A1 Heavy Machine Gun or L134A1 40 mm Grenade Machine Gun. One aspect of the British Army's approach to APC/MICV units (which differs to that of the United States) is that the ability of the average soldier to fire accurately out the ports of a moving IFV has been questioned. The large armor plates add side protection from RPGs or IED explosions.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: The British Army has operated an earlier MPV named "Tempest MPV". As of November 2008, the British Army has ordered over 400 Cougar vehicles for deployment in Iraq and Afghanistan following a series of Urgent Operational Requirements (UORs). Deliveries of the first 86 Mastiffs began in February 2007, and an order for 22 further vehicles was placed in March, bringing the total to 108. In October 2007, Gordon Brown announced a further 140 Mastiffs and 157 new Cougar 4x4 variants, named Ridgeback were being ordered to protect troops from mines and roadside bombs.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: From November 2008, forty Cougar H were lent by the United States for the Polish contingent in Afghanistan. In Polish service they carried 7.62mm PK machine guns.


title: Cougar (MRAP)

text: On Jan 5, 2012 an Air Force EOD Team, Team Tripwire, 3 Airman, were killed by a remote detonated IED attack.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: The Ramstein air show disaster occurred on Sunday, 28 August 1988 during the "Flugtag '88" airshow at USAF Ramstein Air Base near Kaiserslautern, West Germany. Three aircraft of the Italian Air Force display team collided during their display, crashing to the ground in front of a crowd of about 300,000 people. There were 70 fatalities (67 spectators and three pilots) and 346 spectators sustained serious injuries in the resulting explosion and fire, and hundreds more had minor injuries. At the time it was the deadliest air show accident in history until a 2002 crash at the Sknyliv air show that killed 77.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: Ten Aermacchi MB-339 PAN jets from the Italian Air Force display team, Frecce Tricolori, were performing their "pierced heart" (Italian: "Cardioide", German: "Durchstoßenes Herz") formation. In this formation, two groups of aircraft create a heart shape in front of the audience along the runway. In the completion of the lower tip of the heart, the two groups pass each other parallel to the runway. The heart is then pierced by a lone aircraft, flying in the direction of spectators.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: The mid-air collision took place as the two heart-forming groups passed each other and the heart-piercing aircraft hit them. The piercing aircraft crashed onto the runway and consequently both the fuselage and resulting fireball of aviation fuel tumbled into the spectator area, hitting the crowd and coming to rest against a refrigerated trailer being used to dispense ice cream to the various vendor booths in the area.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: At the same time, one of the damaged aircraft from the heart-forming group crashed into the emergency medical evacuation UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter, injuring the helicopter's pilot, Captain Kim Strader. He died 20 days later, on Saturday, 17 September 1988, at Brooke Army Medical Center in Texas from burns he suffered in the accident.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: The pilot of the aircraft that hit the helicopter ejected, but was killed as he hit the runway before his parachute opened. The third aircraft disintegrated in the collision and parts of it were strewn along the runway.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: Of the 31 people who died on impact, 28 had been hit by debris in the form of airplane parts, concertina wire, and items on the ground. Sixteen of the fatalities occurred in the days and weeks after the disaster due to severe burns; the last was the burned and injured helicopter pilot. About 500 people had to seek hospital treatment following the event, and over 600 people reported to the clinic that afternoon to donate blood.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: The disaster revealed serious shortcomings in the handling of large-scale medical emergencies by German civil and American military authorities. US military personnel did not immediately allow German ambulances onto the base, and the rescue work was generally hampered by a lack of efficiency and coordination. The rescue coordination center in Kaiserslautern was unaware of the disaster's scale as much as an hour after it occurred, even though several German medevac helicopters and ambulances had already arrived on site and left with patients. American helicopters and ambulances provided the quickest and largest means of evacuating burn victims, but lacked sufficient capacities for treating them, or had difficulty finding them. Further confusion was added by the American military's usage of different standards for intravenous catheters from German paramedics. A single standard was codified in 1995 and updated with a newer version in 2013.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: A crisis counseling center was immediately established at the nearby Southside Base Chapel and remained open throughout the week. Base mental health professionals provided group and individual counseling in the following weeks, and they surveyed the response workers two months following the tragedy and again six months after the disaster to gauge recovery.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: Several different video recordings of the accident were made. They show that the "piercing" aircraft (Pony 10) came in too low and too fast at the crossing point with the other two groups (five aircraft on the left and four on the right) as they completed the heart-shaped figure. Lead pilot Lieutenant Colonel Ivo Nutarelli, flying Pony 10, was unable to correct his altitude or lower his speed, and collided with the leading airplane (Pony 1, piloted by Lt. Col. Mario Naldini) of the left formation "inside" the figure, destroying the plane's tail section with the front of his aircraft. Pony 1 then spiralled out of control, hitting the plane on its lower left (Pony 2, piloted by Captain Giorgio Alessio). Lt. Col. Naldini ejected but was killed as he hit the runway before his parachute opened. His plane crashed onto a taxiway near the runway, destroying a medevac helicopter and fatally injuring its pilot, Captain Kim Strader. Pony 2, the third plane involved in the disaster, was severely damaged from the impact with Pony 1, and crashed beside the runway, exploding in a fireball. Its pilot, Captain Alessio, died on impact.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: Pony 10, the aircraft that started the crash, continued on a ballistic trajectory across the runway, completely out of control and in flames, its forward section destroyed by the impact with Pony 1. The plane hit the ground ahead of the spectator stands, exploding in a fireball and destroying a police vehicle parked inside the concertina-wire fence that defined the active runway area. The plane continued, cartwheeling for a distance before picking up the three-strand concertina-wire fence, crossing an emergency access road, slamming into the crowd, and hitting a parked ice cream van. The area of the crash, being centered on the flightline and as close to the airshow as civilian spectators could get, had been considered the "best seats in the house", and was densely packed. The entire incident, from the collision of the first two planes to the crash into the crowd, took less than seven seconds, leaving almost no time for spectators to escape. The low altitude of the maneuver (45 meters above the crowd) also contributed to the short time frame.


title: Ramstein air show disaster

text: An examination of photos and footage from the disaster showed that Pony 10's landing gear came down at some point; it has been suggested that this could have been lowered intentionally as a last second effort by Lt. Col. Nutarelli to slow his plane down and avoid the impact, but there is no substantial evidence pointing to this; the undercarriage could have been lowered by a number of factors. In April 1991, Werner Reith, a German journalist from the newspaper "Die Tageszeitung", suggested in an article that the Ramstein disaster could have been caused by some sudden technical problem—or even sabotage—in Nutarelli's plane. No supporting evidence could be collected. Reith pointed out that Lt. Col. Nutarelli and Lt. Col. Naldini were supposed to know details about another air disaster, the 1980 Ustica massacre, citing Italian press sources. Judge Rosario Priore, who was investigating the case at the time, found that they were performing training flights nearby minutes before the Ustica incident, but he definitely rejected their deaths as sabotage.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: In statistics and machine learning, lasso (least absolute shrinkage and selection operator; also Lasso or LASSO) is a regression analysis method that performs both variable selection and regularization in order to enhance the prediction accuracy and interpretability of the resulting statistical model. It was originally introduced in geophysics, and later by Robert Tibshirani, who coined the term.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Lasso was originally formulated for linear regression models. This simple case reveals a substantial amount about the estimator. These include its relationship to ridge regression and best subset selection and the connections between lasso coefficient estimates and so-called soft thresholding. It also reveals that (like standard linear regression) the coefficient estimates do not need to be unique if covariates are collinear.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Though originally defined for linear regression, lasso regularization is easily extended to other statistical models including generalized linear models, generalized estimating equations, proportional hazards models, and M-estimators. Lasso's ability to perform subset selection relies on the form of the constraint and has a variety of interpretations including in terms of geometry, Bayesian statistics and convex analysis.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Lasso was introduced in order to improve the prediction accuracy and interpretability of regression models. It selects a reduced set of the known covariates for use in a model.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Lasso was developed independently in geophysics literature in 1986, based on prior work that used the formula_1 penalty for both fitting and penalization of the coefficients. Statistician Robert Tibshirani independently rediscovered and popularized it in 1996, based on Breiman's nonnegative garrote.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Prior to lasso, the most widely used method for choosing covariates was stepwise selection. That approach only improves prediction accuracy in certain cases, such as when only a few covariates have a strong relationship with the outcome. However, in other cases, it can increase prediction error.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: At the time, ridge regression was the most popular technique for improving prediction accuracy. Ridge regression improves prediction error by shrinking the sum of the squares of the regression coefficients to be less than a fixed value in order to reduce overfitting, but it does not perform covariate selection and therefore does not help to make the model more interpretable.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Lasso achieves both of these goals by forcing the sum of the absolute value of the regression coefficients to be less than a fixed value, which forces certain coefficients to zero, excluding them from impacting prediction. This idea is similar to ridge regression, which also shrinks the size of the coefficients; however, ridge regression does not set coefficients to zero (and, thus, does not perform variable selection).


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Consider a sample consisting of "N" cases, each of which consists of "p" covariates and a single outcome. Let formula_2 be the outcome and formula_3 be the covariate vector for the "i" case. Then the objective of lasso is to solve


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Here formula_5 is the constant coefficient, formula_6 is the coefficient vector, and formula_7 is a prespecified free parameter that determines the degree of regularization.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Letting formula_8 be the covariate matrix, so that formula_9 and formula_10 is the "i" row of formula_11, the expression can be written more compactly as


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Denoting the scalar mean of the data points formula_15 by formula_16 and the mean of the response variables formula_17 by formula_18, the resulting estimate for formula_19 is formula_20, so that


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: and therefore it is standard to work with variables that have been made zero-mean. Additionally, the covariates are typically standardized formula_22 so that the solution does not depend on the measurement scale.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Assuming first that the covariates are orthonormal so that formula_27, where formula_28 is the Kronecker delta, or, equivalently, formula_29, then using subgradient methods it can be shown that


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: formula_31 is referred to as the "soft thresholding operator", since it translates values towards zero (making them exactly zero if they are small enough) instead of setting smaller values to zero and leaving larger ones untouched as the "hard thresholding operator", often denoted formula_32, would.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Ridge regression shrinks all coefficients by a uniform factor of formula_37 and does not set any coefficients to zero. .


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: where formula_39 is the "formula_40 norm", which is defined as formula_41 if exactly m components of z are nonzero. In this case, it can be shown that


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: where formula_32 is the so-called hard thresholding function and formula_44 is an indicator function (it is 1 if its argument is true and 0 otherwise).


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Therefore, the lasso estimates share features of both ridge and best subset selection regression since they both shrink the magnitude of all the coefficients, like ridge regression and set some of them to zero, as in the best subset selection case. Additionally, while ridge regression scales all of the coefficients by a constant factor, lasso instead translates the coefficients towards zero by a constant value and sets them to zero if they reach it.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: In one special case two covariates, say "j" and "k", are identical for each observation, so that formula_45, where formula_46. Then the values of formula_47 and formula_48 that minimize the lasso objective function are not uniquely determined. In fact, if some formula_49 in which formula_50, then if formula_51 replacing formula_52 by formula_53 and formula_54 by formula_55, while keeping all the other formula_56 fixed, gives a new solution, so the lasso objective function then has a continuum of valid minimizers. Several variants of the lasso, including the Elastic net regularization, have been designed to address this shortcoming.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Lasso regularization can be extended to other objective functions such as those for generalized linear models, generalized estimating equations, proportional hazards models, and M-estimators. Given the objective function


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: where only formula_59 is penalized while formula_60 is free to take any allowed value, just as formula_5 was not penalized in the basic case.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Lasso can set coefficients to zero, while the superficially similar ridge regression cannot. This is due to the difference in the shape of their constraint boundaries. Both lasso and ridge regression can be interpreted as minimizing the same objective function


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: but with respect to different constraints: formula_63 for lasso and formula_64 for ridge. The figure shows that the constraint region defined by the formula_65 norm is a square rotated so that its corners lie on the axes (in general a cross-polytope), while the region defined by the formula_66 norm is a circle (in general an "n"-sphere), which is rotationally invariant and, therefore, has no corners. As seen in the figure, a convex object that lies tangent to the boundary, such as the line shown, is likely to encounter a corner (or a higher-dimensional equivalent) of a hypercube, for which some components of formula_59 are identically zero, while in the case of an "n"-sphere, the points on the boundary for which some of the components of formula_59 are zero are not distinguished from the others and the convex object is no more likely to contact a point at which some components of formula_59 are zero than one for which none of them are.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: The lasso can be rescaled so that it becomes easy to anticipate and influence the degree of shrinkage associated with a given value of formula_26. It is assumed that formula_11 is standardized with z-scores and that formula_72 is centered (zero mean). Let formula_19 represent the hypothesized regression coefficients and let formula_74 refer to the data-optimized ordinary least squares solutions. We can then define the Lagrangian as a tradeoff between the in-sample accuracy of the data-optimized solutions and the simplicity of sticking to the hypothesized values. This results in


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: where formula_76 is specified below. The first fraction represents relative accuracy, the second fraction relative simplicity, and formula_77 balances between the two.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Given a single regressor, relative simplicity can be defined by specifying formula_78 as formula_79, which is the maximum amount of deviation from formula_19 when formula_81. Assuming that formula_82, the solution path can be defined in terms of formula_83:


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: If formula_85, the ordinary least squares solution (OLS) is used. The hypothesized value of formula_86 is selected if formula_77 is bigger than formula_83. Furthermore, if formula_89, then formula_77 represents the proportional influence of formula_86. In other words, formula_92 measures in percentage terms the minimal amount of influence of the hypothesized value relative to the data-optimized OLS solution.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: If an formula_93-norm is used to penalize deviations from zero given a single regressor, the solution path is given by


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: formula_94. Like formula_95, formula_96 moves in the direction of the point formula_97 when formula_77 is close to zero; but unlike formula_95, the influence of formula_83 diminishes in formula_96 if formula_77 increases (see figure). <br>Given multiple regressors, the moment that a parameter is activated (i.e. allowed to deviate from formula_19) is also determined by a regressor's contribution to formula_83 accuracy. First,


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: An formula_83 of 75% means that in-sample accuracy improves by 75% if the unrestricted OLS solutions are used instead of the hypothesized formula_19 values. The individual contribution of deviating from each hypothesis can be computed with the formula_108 x formula_108 matrix


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: where formula_111. If formula_112 when formula_83 is computed, then the diagonal elements of formula_114 sum to formula_83. The diagonal formula_114 values may be smaller than 0 or, less often, larger than 1. If regressors are uncorrelated, then the formula_117 diagonal element of formula_114 simply corresponds to the formula_119 value between formula_15 and formula_72.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: A rescaled version of the adaptive lasso of can be obtained by setting formula_122. If regressors are uncorrelated, the moment that the formula_117 parameter is activated is given by the formula_117 diagonal element of formula_114. Assuming for convenience that formula_19 is a vector of zeros,


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: That is, if regressors are uncorrelated, formula_77 again specifies the minimal influence of formula_19. Even when regressors are correlated, the first time that a regression parameter is activated occurs when formula_77 is equal to the highest diagonal element of formula_114.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: These results can be compared to a rescaled version of the lasso by defining formula_132, which is the average absolute deviation of formula_74 from formula_19. Assuming that regressors are uncorrelated, then the moment of activation of the formula_117 regressor is given by


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: For formula_137, the moment of activation is again given by formula_138. If formula_19 is a vector of zeros and a subset of formula_140 relevant parameters are equally responsible for a perfect fit of formula_89, then this subset is activated at a formula_77 value of formula_143. The moment of activation of a relevant regressor then equals formula_144. In other words, the inclusion of irrelevant regressors delays the moment that relevant regressors are activated by this rescaled lasso. The adaptive lasso and the lasso are special cases of a '1ASTc' estimator. The latter only groups parameters together if the absolute correlation among regressors is larger than a user-specified value.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Just as ridge regression can be interpreted as linear regression for which the coefficients have been assigned normal prior distributions, lasso can be interpreted as linear regression for which the coefficients have Laplace prior distributions. The Laplace distribution is sharply peaked at zero (its first derivative is discontinuous at zero) and it concentrates its probability mass closer to zero than does the normal distribution. This provides an alternative explanation of why lasso tends to set some coefficients to zero, while ridge regression does not.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Lasso can also be viewed as a convex relaxation of the best subset selection regression problem, which is to find the subset of formula_145 covariates that results in the smallest value of the objective function for some fixed formula_146, where n is the total number of covariates. The "formula_40 norm", formula_148, (the number of nonzero entries of a vector), is the limiting case of "formula_149 norms", of the form formula_150 (where the quotation marks signify that these are not really norms for formula_151 since formula_152 is not convex for formula_151, so the triangle inequality does not hold). Therefore, since p = 1 is the smallest value for which the "formula_14 norm" is convex (and therefore actually a norm), lasso is, in some sense, the best convex approximation to the best subset selection problem, since the region defined by formula_155 is the convex hull of the region defined by formula_156 for formula_151.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Lasso variants have been created in order to remedy limitations of the original technique and to make the method more useful for particular problems. Almost all of these focus on respecting or exploiting dependencies among the covariates.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Elastic net regularization adds an additional ridge regression-like penalty that improves performance when the number of predictors is larger than the sample size, allows the method to select strongly correlated variables together, and improves overall prediction accuracy.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Group lasso allows groups of related covariates to be selected as a single unit, which can be useful in settings where it does not make sense to include some covariates without others. Further extensions of group lasso perform variable selection within individual groups (sparse group lasso) and allow overlap between groups (overlap group lasso).


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Fused lasso can account for the spatial or temporal characteristics of a problem, resulting in estimates that better match system structure. Lasso-regularized models can be fit using techniques including subgradient methods, least-angle regression (LARS), and proximal gradient methods. Determining the optimal value for the regularization parameter is an important part of ensuring that the model performs well; it is typically chosen using cross-validation.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: In 2005, Zou and Hastie introduced the elastic net. When "p" > "n" (the number of covariates is greater than the sample size) lasso can select only "n" covariates (even when more are associated with the outcome) and it tends to select one covariate from any set of highly correlated covariates. Additionally, even when "n" > "p", ridge regression tends to perform better given strongly correlated covariates.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: So the result of the elastic net penalty is a combination of the effects of the lasso and ridge penalties.


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Returning to the general case, the fact that the penalty function is now strictly convex means that if formula_45, formula_168, which is a change from lasso. In general, if formula_169


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: Therefore, highly correlated covariates tend to have similar regression coefficients, with the degree of similarity depending on both formula_172 and formula_173, which is different from lasso. This phenomenon, in which strongly correlated covariates have similar regression coefficients, is referred to as the grouping effect. Grouping is desirable since, in applications such as tying genes to a disease, finding all the associated covariates is preferable, rather than selecting one from each set of correlated covariates, as lasso often does. In addition, selecting only one from each group typically results in increased prediction error, since the model is less robust (which is why ridge regression often outperforms lasso).


title: Lasso (statistics)

text: In 2006, Yuan and Lin introduced the group lasso to allow predefined groups of covariates to jointly be selected into or out of a model. This is useful in many settings, perhaps most obviously when a categorical variable is coded as a collection of binary covariates. In this case, group lasso can ensure that all the variables encoding the categorical covariate are included or excluded together. Another setting in which grouping is natural is in biological studies. Since genes and proteins often lie in known pathways, which pathways are related to an outcome may be more significant than whether individual genes are. The objective function for the group lasso is a natural generalization of the standard lasso objective