Response (pronounced ri-spons (U) or
ree-spons (non-U))
(1) The act of responding; a reply or reaction; a
reaction to a stimulus or provocation.
(2) In the card game bridge, a bid
based on an evaluation of one's hand relative to the previous bid of one's
partner.
(3) In liturgical use in Christianity, a word, phrase or short sentence recited or
sung by the choir or congregation in reply to the priest or
officiant at a church service (usually in the plural
and used (loosely) also of any versicle or anthem said or sung during or after a
lection).
(4) In electronics the ratio of the output to the input
level, at a particular frequency, of a transmission line or electrical device.
(5) In pathology, any pattern of glandular, muscular, or
electrical reactions induced by stimulation of the nervous system.
(6) In biology, any behavior of a living organism that results
from an external or internal stimulus.
(7) In engineering, the reaction of a mechanical device
to changes in energy input.
(8) In legal proceedings (and other forms), reply
to an objection.
(9) In
the calculation of online advertising performance metrics, a measure
representing one click-through from an online ad to its destination URL.
1250–1300:
From the Latin respōnsum (answer),
noun use of the neuter past participle of respondēre
(to reply, respond, answer, the construct being re- (in the sense of “again”) + spondere
(to pledge), nominal use of the neuter form of respōnsus, the perfect passive participle of respondeō, the construct being from re- + spondeō (promise). It replaced the Middle English respounse & respons, from the Middle French respons,
from the Old French respons, respuns
& response (which endures in Modern
French as réponse), from the same Latin
source. Response, responsion, responsure
& responsiveness are nouns, responsal, responsory & responsorial are
nouns & adjectives, responsive is an adjective and responsively is an
adverb; the noun plural is resposes.
Depending
on context, a response might also be called a feedback, reply or return and in
science, medicine and engineering, derived forms such as responseless, counter-response, allergic
response, autonomous response, host response etc are coined as required. In law enforcement and military use, the
coinings include armed response, artillery response, naval
response etc. The adjective responsive was
an early fifteenth century form meaning “making answer, responding” and was
from the Old French responsif and
directly from Late Latin responsivus (answering),
from the Classical Latin respons-,
past-participle stem of respondere. The use in the sense of “responding readily
to influence or action, able or inclined to respond” was documented first in 1762,
the adverb responsively & noun responsiveness both appearing within a
decade. In Christianity, the use to mean
“a part of the liturgy said or sung by the congregation in reply to the priest”
dates from the 1650s. The transferred
sense (adopted in literature, poetry and psychology) of feelings or actions was
part of the Romantic movement early in the nineteenth century. One of the best known “responses” was the
adjectival “Pavlovian Response” which dates from 1911 and came from the experimental
work of Russian physiologist Ivan Petrovich Pavlov (1849-1936), the best known
example of which was the conditioned salivary reflexes of dogs in response to
the mental stimulus of the sound of a bell being associated with food. The term “response time” seems first to have
been used in the US in 1958 and was associated with the increasingly precise
measurements needed as transistors replaced vacuum tubes in electronics.
Boris Yeltsin, who got a bit of fun out of life.
The phrase
“diplomatic response” isn’t really part of the study of international
relations. It’s used in general
discourse to describe ways of communicating that are polite, tactful and intended
to ensure reasonable relationships are maintained and the self-help sections in
bookshops often contain titles which include guides on the topic, their advice
on the matter probably usually suggesting the salient points are (1) Politeness
(using courteous language to show respect), (2) Neutrality (avoiding taking
sides or making definitive statements that might be thought controversial), (3)
Constructiveness (focusing on solutions and positive outcomes), (4), Empathy (acknowledging
the other person's feelings or perspectives) and (5) Caution (being careful
with word choice to avoid misunderstandings or offense). In diplomacy proper, there are examples such
as when Boris Yeltsin (1931–2007; President of Russia 1991-1999) announced he
would decline a Japanese offer of help in dealing with a natural disaster
because they might use it as leverage in territorial disputes, the Japanese
Foreign Ministry responded by saying: “He must have been misquoted”. Lindsay Lohan in 2017 followed the example
when asked about comments made by Donald Trump in 2004 when he said she was: “probably deeply
troubled and therefore great in bed. How come the deeply troubled women, you
know, deeply, deeply troubled, they're always the best in bed?” Her response was to say: “I wish him the best. We live in a world of
societies that consistently find fault in people. I think it’s a really scary
factor. Taking someone else down is never the answer, and I think we all know
that.” It’s not believed Mr
Trump responded.
Responses
of some who survived political assassination attempts
That photograph.
The
compositional elements of the photograph destined to become one of the classics
of US political history are so perfect it would have been assumed to be an AI
(artificial intelligence) meme had the moment it captured not been witnessed by
so many: Donald Trump (b 1946; US
president 2017-2021, fist raised in defiance, his blood staining his face, being
hustled to safety by his Secret Service detail after an assassin’s bullet was a
fraction of an inch to the left; one zephyr during its 125 metre (410 feet)
travel and Trump would likely be dead. The
image, taken by AP (Associated Press) photographer Evan Vucci (b 1977) was a an
extraordinary piece of serendipity for the Trump campaign, being almost entirely
of red, white & blue with the Stars & Stripes flying as a backdrop, the
whole thing recalling the famous photograph by AP’s Joe Rosenthal (1911–2006)
which captured US Marines planting the flag atop Mount Suribachi during the Battle
of Iwo Jima. Quite how the incident will
affect the election campaign can’t be assumed but it’s unlikely to be detrimental
to the Trump cause and the photograph will help, the strident defiance of the
stance exactly what appeals to the base and probably attractive to not a few of
the undecided, the contrast with the less dynamic Biden obviously striking. As a response from
someone who has just cheated death, his presence of mind in having the Secret
Service delay his evacuation from the stage by a few seconds so he could
provide AP their photo-opportunity will guarantee publicity the
Republican Party couldn’t buy no matter how many millions they spent.
Senator Marco Rubio (b 1971; senator (Republican) for Florida since 2011 and the "little Marco" of Mr Trump's 2016 nomination campaign) was quick to tweet "God protected" Mr Trump which was noted by those running the betting markets for the 2024 running mate on the Republican ticket. On his own Truth social platform, Mr Trump said much the same thing and previously, there have been those who made much of being saved from assassination by "providence" and it's not impossible Mr Trump is now persuaded it was indeed "divine intervention". In the last decade, Mr Trump has done well by pretending to be religious to court the Christian vote: they knew he was lying and he knew that they knew he knew but such was the political symbiosis that all involved ignored the facts and focused on outcomes. Now, he may start believing his own publicity.
The footage was viewed world-wide within minutes and almost immdeiately questions were asked including (1) why was a line-of-shot available within 150 m (500 feet) of the target and (2) why were Secret Service agents allocated who were not even tall enough to reach his shoulder (they are as a last resort, human body armor). The photograph was political gold for the campaign but it should never have been allowed to happen; Mr Trump should have been smothered with Secret Service bodies and immediately taken from the stage. Some agreed the presence of the shooter was an obvious lapse but that what happened on stage followed protocol and there's never been any policy (or practice) of allocating agents on the basis of their height matching that of the protectee.
Portrait of Theodore Roosevelt (1903) by John Singer Sargent.
In
October 1912, a man shot Theodore Roosevelt (TR, 1858–1919; US president
1901-1909) while he was on the campaign trail for that year’s presidential election. What saved Roosevelt was the bullet having to
pass through a metal spectacles case and, tellingly, a folded, 50 page copy of the speech he was about to deliver on behalf of his Progressive
Party. The enraged crowd were holding
and threatening to lynch the shooter but Roosevelt intervened, ensuring he was
handed to the safe custody of the Wisconsin police. Roosevelt had spent much of his life hunting
big game and, on the basis he was not coughing up blood, correctly concluded
that bullet was lodged in his muscle and had not punctured the lung, the
relative lack of external bleeding suggesting no vital artery or vein had been
severed. His response to what would have
put most men into a state of shock was to proceed to the hall and deliver his
speech as planned. Lodged too
precariously to extract, the bullet remained with him until, peacefully, he died
in his sleep at Oyster Bay, New York.
Men in frock coats: The “Big Four” at the Paris Peace Conference (1919-1920), outside the Foreign Ministry headquarters, Quai d'Orsay, Paris. Left to right: David Lloyd George (1863–1945; UK prime-minister 1916-1922), Vittorio Orlando (1860–1952; Italian prime minister 1917-1919), Georges Clemenceau (1841–1929; French prime minister 1906-1909 & 1917-1920) and Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924; US president 1913-1921).
Georges
Clemenceau (1841–1929; Prime Minister of France 1906-1909 & 1917-1920) was
a physician who turned to politics via journalism, a not unfamiliar trajectory
for many; at a time of national crisis, he undertook his second term as
premier, providing the country’s politics with the stiffness needed to endure what
was by then World War I (1914-1918); he was nick-named le tigre (the tiger) in honor of his ferociously
combative political demeanour. In
February 1919, while travelling from his apartment a meeting associated with the Paris Peace Conference (1919-1920), he was shot several times, his assailant an anarchist carpenter
& joiner, Émile Cottin (1896-1937) and two decades on, another leader would
learn carpenters can be assassins. Le tigre was lucky, the bullets missing his vital organs although one which
passed through the ribcage ending up lodged close to his heart; too close to
that vital organ to risk surgery, like Roosevelt, there it remained until his
death (from unrelated causes) ten years later.
Cottin’s death sentence was later commuted to a ten year sentence and he
would die in battle, serving with the anarchist Durruti Column during the early
days of the Spanish Civil War. The Tiger’s
response to his survival was to observe: “We have just won the most terrible war in history, yet
here is a Frenchman who misses his target six out of seven times at point-blank
range. Of course this fellow must be
punished for the careless use of a dangerous weapon and for poor marksmanship.
I suggest that he be locked up for eight years, with intensive training in a
shooting gallery.” In the
circumstances, deploring the state of French marksmanship displayed a certain
French sang froid.
Although
the details of most at the time weren’t known, there were so many plots to kill
Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government
1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) that books were written exploring the
topic, the most comprehensive of which was Killing
Hitler (b 2006) by British historian Roger Moorhouse (b 1968). For a variety of reasons, none succeeded but
the first to come close was in Munich in 1939 when a bomb (it would now be called an IED (improvised explosive device) was fabricated by German carpenter
and joiner, Georg Elser (1903–1945) and secreted in a pillar directly
behind where Hitler was scheduled to be standing while delivering to his old comrades one of his
annual set-piece addresses. However, on the night, because he wanted to return
early to Berlin to resume planning his latest foreign policy adventure, he cut
short his speech and the bomb detonated a quarter hour after he and his entourage
had left; it killed eight and injured dozens.
Hitler’s response was to say his survival was “…proof to me that
Providence wants me to reach my goal.”
Surprisingly, Herr Elser, apprehended almost by chance, wasn’t executed,
the fate of many who had done much less, but until 1945 was a “privileged prisoner”
in relatively pleasant conditions; Hitler, who for years clung to the idea the man must have had some connection with the British secret service, ordered him hanged only when it was
obvious he’d be of no use as a hostage.
Hitler
again thanked providence when he survived the most celebrated of the attempts,
the bomb in July 1944 planted by an army colonel and timed to explode during a military
conference. Hitler on that occasion
avoided death because (1) a table’s heavy socle deflected much of the blast,
(2) only one of the planned two charged was primed and (3) the conference was
moved from an enclosed underground bunker to a building on the surface with
walls and windows which were “blown-out” in the explosion, dissipating much
energy. Those details were lost on the Führer
who chose again to attribute this life being spared to “providence”. One of those convince was the visiting Benito
Mussolini (1883-1945; Duce (leader) & prime-minister of Italy 1922-1943),
by then a much diminished puppet dictator of a puppet statelet sustained by the
German military. Dutifully the vassal
Duce responded to Hitler: “Absolutely I agree with you, it’s a sign from
providence”. That decided, Hitler’s response
to this “stab in the back” from his own army was savage, some 7000 rounded up,
5000-odd of which would be executed, the leading figures in the conspiracy
dying in an especially gruesome manner, a event filmed although there are
contradictory reports about whether it was something Hitler ever chose to view. In the way of Nazi crack-downs, not all those
executed were actually connected with this or any other plot, the security
services using the operation as a pretext to dispose of those of one of their
many lists of “undesirables”.
A prototype Humber Imperial fitted with a 273 cubic inch (4.5 litre) Chrysler LA V8. By the mid 1960s the Humber Super Snipe (1964-1967) was essentially a mid-1950s US sedan being produced in England, a phenomenon which was emblematic of a malaise afflicting much of the UK's motor industry. The Imperial was an up-market, better-appointed Super-Snipe and after Chrysler took a stake in the company, perhaps as many as six V8 prototypes were built but the advantages gained were few and the project never proceeded to general production. When Chrysler in 1967 took over Rootes Group (the corporation of which Humber was a part) the Super Snipe range was discontinued, replaced in the UK market by Australian-produced Chrysler Valiants, chosen in preference to the US-built versions because they were available in right-hand drive configuration and the Commonwealth Preference scheme meant they attracted lower import tariffs. Although only ever a niche product in the UK market and never approaching the sales volumes achieved by the big Humbers, the Valiants remained available until 1976.
Arthur
Augustus Calwell (1896-1973; Australian Labor Party (ALP) leader of the
opposition 1960-1967) was a rare Australian target of an attempted political
assassination. Two years after being
knighted by Paul VI (1897-1978; pope 1963-1978) (his Pontifical Equestrian
Order of St. Gregory the Great (KCSG) apparent unrelated to the attempt on his
life), Calwell was sitting in the front passenger seat (it’s an Australian tradition)
of his official car when 19 year-old student Peter Kocan (b 1947), at
point blank range, fired a shell from a sawn-off rifle, aimed directly at his
target. In 1966, the Commonwealth’s car
fleet still included their last intake of British-built cars and Calwell was
sitting in a Series V Humber Super Snipe (1964-1967), an outdated machine but one which was stately
& roomy and thus enjoyed by politicians who found their replacement, the lower Ford
Galaxie, less comfortable, especially the ingress and egress. Fortunately for Calwell, the side glass in
the old-fashioned Humber was thick and instead of penetrating the pane, it shattered, absorbing most of the bullet’s energy; it was spent by the
time it had travelled those few feet, lodging harmlessly in the lapel of the target’s
jacket, Mr Calwell's injuries limited to some minor cuts from the broken glass. Kocan was found guilty of
attempted murder and sentenced to life imprisonment, sent initially to Sydney's
Long Bay Gaol before being transferred to Morriset Psychiatric Hospital for the
criminally insane. There he studied
literature and after his release became a prize winning poet and novelist,
eventually graduating from the University of Newcastle with a BA (Hons) & MA. Calwell’s response to the man who tried to
kill him was to pay a visit to the hospital and, although a great hater in the ALP tradition,
he was also a good Catholic, sending a letter of forgiveness.
Arthur Calwell leaving hospital in his Humber Super Snipe, the presence in numbers of the New South Wales (NSW) Police suggesting they were going to make sure nothing more happened to him before he returned to Victoria. The police cars are locally assembled Rambler Classics and in Australia, various AMCs were in small volumes assembled and sold under the Rambler name until 1977.
In an
example of how difficult it can be for security services to monitor and
intercept those who plan to kill political figures, the motive of the man who
in March 1981 shot Ronald Reagan (1911-2004; US president 1981-1989) was to
impress an actress with whom he’d become obsessed. That was something even less likely to attract the
attention of the authorities than the earlier case when a botched attempt had been
made by a member of Charles Manson’s (1934-2017) “Family” cult to assassinate
Gerald Ford (1913–2006; US president 1974-1977). Mr Reagan’s injury was life-threatening and was saved only by surgical intervention.
When greeted by the surgeons who were to perform the operation, his response
was to tell them he hoped they “…were all Republicans”. In an example of good bedside
manner they assured him he was in safe political hands although one later confessed to being a lifelong Democrat. When his wife arrived at the hospital, he delivered the line “Honey, I forgot to duck”, borrowed from boxer Jack Dempsey (1895–1983) who said it to Mrs Dempsey on the night he'd lost a bout to Gene Tunney (1897–1978).
