SV: Re: Names and statistics

[Olaf Solstrand]

A little something Sigvald:
> > One can be Swedish and still have a German
> > name.
> 
> Maybe so, but this time my suspicion was proven true.

"Proven true"...

First: The original statement, that Scroeder is Swedish, still stands. Nobody 
has been able to tell yet whether he's a Swedish citizen or not, but as we know 
he has lived in Sweden as long as he has, it frankly would surprise me if he 
didn't.

Second: Why on EARTH are we discussing that? Sigvald, I must confess: When 
someone in the middle of a discussion mentions "Swedish (something)", I find it 
a little STRANGE to suddenly burst out saying "he's most likely not Swedish" 
unless you KNOW that. Drawing that conclusion based on his name only, and 
saying it out loud, seems to me a little bizarre. And that's regardless of 
whether it's true or not that he was born and raised in Germany, as you had no 
way of knowing that. It's irrelevant for the discussion anyway.

If you KNEW something, it would be a whole different discussion. If someone 
wrote "Don Rosa has been my favorite artist since he started making Mickey 
Mouse comics in 1974", and you responded "Don Rosa didn't start making Disney 
comics before 1986/87, and he has never made a Mickey Mouse comic" - THAT would 
be a whole different case. In that case you would be correcting a wrong fact 
for something you KNEW were correct. But in this case... am I wrong if I guess 
that you, Sigvald, never has heard of Horst Scroeder before this discussion 
started? TRUE, Horst is a German name, but there's still a chance the man 
himself is Swedish, plus that is a tiny detail with no relevance for what 
people are talking about... so why argue on it? Why fix it if it's not broken?



> > Oh no... That can only mean... Horst Schroeder > is really Hitler? :-)
> 
> No, no, no you are taking my statement way to far!

I did that on purpose... trying to follow the great thread among others Daniël 
and Cord (may he go into the history books as a pioneer of time travelling!) 
has started lately. Obviously, I'm not very good at it.



> Yes, but with kings it doesn't work just like that. Our next king can
> freely choose if he will be called "Haakon VIII" or "Haakon VIII Magnus",
> so that Swedish king could in 1950 freely have chosen to be called Gusav 6
> without using the Adolf name. He chose to use it - well OK a name is just
> a name I guess, but I doubt that could have happened in Norway or in
> Denmark.

A name is just a name, true. As Shakespeare said it: "Deny thy father and 
refuse thy name, or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love and I'll no longer 
be a Capulet!" And we all stand free to change our names - but personally I 
think a name is something you have such strong feelings for that it takes 
something extraordinary to change it.

(I'll change my surname when I marry, though, but that's extraordinary, isn't 
it?)



Best,
Olaf the Grey
(just felt for a name change tonight)