What important event that occurred today was announced with the message:
"The Italian navigator has landed in the new world"?
Friday, December 02, 2005
Just popping in
So Epsilon, is a hurricane. Yes we got a hurricane after Thanksgiving ain’t El Nino grand? You notice all the talk about global warming never mentions this is an El Nino year. Why? Because they can blame all the weird weather and unusually warm temps on global warming, one by one instead of having to lump it all as an El Nino effect. The media knows that people are tired of hearing about El Nino, so they have to spin the weather news differently so people will pay attention.
Now then here is my point:
If reincarnation is real would you have to be reincarnated after you died? It would seem that there are no temporal limits, especially for a supreme being. So, I could die in 2088, and be reincarnated in 1622, that way I could be burned as a warlock for my heresy in this life.
This also brings up the question of a soul. It seems that for the soul to have any value as an eternal being, it would have to contain your personality and memories. (Without those things you aren’t you.) Conveniently those are the only things about a person that isn’t inherent or tangible. I have never seen a good definition of what comprises a soul? Does it have mass or is it more like a shadow? If I had to guess I would say the soul is what endows humans with consciousness, and is therefore indistinguishable from the person. That would make the soul much more that electrochemical reactions, but would make the soul the nearly quantum level of complexity that make the brain more than the sum of its parts. My philosophy I don’t think conflicts with any tenants of any major religion that I am aware of.
Now then here is my point:
If reincarnation is real would you have to be reincarnated after you died? It would seem that there are no temporal limits, especially for a supreme being. So, I could die in 2088, and be reincarnated in 1622, that way I could be burned as a warlock for my heresy in this life.
This also brings up the question of a soul. It seems that for the soul to have any value as an eternal being, it would have to contain your personality and memories. (Without those things you aren’t you.) Conveniently those are the only things about a person that isn’t inherent or tangible. I have never seen a good definition of what comprises a soul? Does it have mass or is it more like a shadow? If I had to guess I would say the soul is what endows humans with consciousness, and is therefore indistinguishable from the person. That would make the soul much more that electrochemical reactions, but would make the soul the nearly quantum level of complexity that make the brain more than the sum of its parts. My philosophy I don’t think conflicts with any tenants of any major religion that I am aware of.
Thursday, November 17, 2005
GMO and the coming apocalypse! Not
Many people scream and whine about genetically modified organisms, however I think that is silly. For fairness I have worked in field.
They put one gene in cotton to get it to produce an organic pesticide (replacing millions of tons of dangerous chemicals), or a gene into corn that keeps it from being harmed by a common herbicide. Then weave it into cloth (after a bleaching process that ensures no protein is retained) or feed it to animals, and people have a cow. However, when you go to the store and buy a hybrid of cauliflower and broccoli, fruit hybrid like a plumot or tangelo and no one says a thing, cause it is "natural". These are double standards that make little sense. Who cares if the cow you are eating is cloned, once it’s cooked medium well, its parentage is of little concern. Some of the biggest transgenics experiments are going on in your large intestine right now. The bacteria that live there pick up bits and pieces of DNA from their surroundings and incorporate that into their genome, just to see if it might be useful. So if the bacteria in your gut are performing illegal research in cross species transgenics, why haven’t we been wiped out? Because most of it is harmless, the bacteria die for their mistake, and life goes on since there was 500 billion bacteria just like them living in you. As for the possibility that these transgenic genes will cause mass allergic reactions which will kill people like nerve gas, um well then it should have already happened. Bt is sprayed on organic fruits and vegetables, and the Roundup ready gene is an amplification of one of the plant’s natural genes. It is just better press to scream the sky is falling, than talk about the 2 billion people will have food and clothes, instead of starving like they would if we grew all crops organically.
They put one gene in cotton to get it to produce an organic pesticide (replacing millions of tons of dangerous chemicals), or a gene into corn that keeps it from being harmed by a common herbicide. Then weave it into cloth (after a bleaching process that ensures no protein is retained) or feed it to animals, and people have a cow. However, when you go to the store and buy a hybrid of cauliflower and broccoli, fruit hybrid like a plumot or tangelo and no one says a thing, cause it is "natural". These are double standards that make little sense. Who cares if the cow you are eating is cloned, once it’s cooked medium well, its parentage is of little concern. Some of the biggest transgenics experiments are going on in your large intestine right now. The bacteria that live there pick up bits and pieces of DNA from their surroundings and incorporate that into their genome, just to see if it might be useful. So if the bacteria in your gut are performing illegal research in cross species transgenics, why haven’t we been wiped out? Because most of it is harmless, the bacteria die for their mistake, and life goes on since there was 500 billion bacteria just like them living in you. As for the possibility that these transgenic genes will cause mass allergic reactions which will kill people like nerve gas, um well then it should have already happened. Bt is sprayed on organic fruits and vegetables, and the Roundup ready gene is an amplification of one of the plant’s natural genes. It is just better press to scream the sky is falling, than talk about the 2 billion people will have food and clothes, instead of starving like they would if we grew all crops organically.
How to bargin
Most people think that bargaining is dead in our price tagged society and that is totally wrong. Yes, I wouldn’t try and bargain at the grocery store since saying “Yes I know this can of peas is 75 cents, but would you take 50 cents?” makes you sound crazy or cheap. However telling the guy at the electronics store “This TV is $750 but I can only really afford $600…?”, is different. If I sound crazy or cheap that is fine, he might say yes and the worst he can do is say no.
Now there are rules at least in my mind, if it is a big chain store and the people aren’t on commission go for blood. If it is a little mom and pop store then let them make some money that is just neighborly. You must be nice, and it will take a bit of time to get them to like you enough, so if you think you can be in and out in 20 minutes plan on an hour. However, unless you make $200+ an hour, spending a little extra time to save that much money is well worth it. What do I mean by be nice? Talk to them; make them feel important, it is hard to explain but you will know it when you see it. Offer them a deal, if they give you the discount, you will spend part of the money you saved on accessories. Yes, it eats up your savings but if it is stuff you needed anyways…? Last is it somewhat risky to come out and ask for a deal, word the request such that is their idea. Such as “I want this TV (the $750 price is understood) and these accessories (the $250 price is understood), but I only have $750, well I guess I can wait or maybe I can find the accessories online or something, hmmm.” Salesman thinks (“Well the markup is 75% and I would hate to lose the business…”) so the salesman says “Well if I give you a 25% discount on everything then you can buy it all now…” This way everyone wins(ish).
Now there are rules at least in my mind, if it is a big chain store and the people aren’t on commission go for blood. If it is a little mom and pop store then let them make some money that is just neighborly. You must be nice, and it will take a bit of time to get them to like you enough, so if you think you can be in and out in 20 minutes plan on an hour. However, unless you make $200+ an hour, spending a little extra time to save that much money is well worth it. What do I mean by be nice? Talk to them; make them feel important, it is hard to explain but you will know it when you see it. Offer them a deal, if they give you the discount, you will spend part of the money you saved on accessories. Yes, it eats up your savings but if it is stuff you needed anyways…? Last is it somewhat risky to come out and ask for a deal, word the request such that is their idea. Such as “I want this TV (the $750 price is understood) and these accessories (the $250 price is understood), but I only have $750, well I guess I can wait or maybe I can find the accessories online or something, hmmm.” Salesman thinks (“Well the markup is 75% and I would hate to lose the business…”) so the salesman says “Well if I give you a 25% discount on everything then you can buy it all now…” This way everyone wins(ish).
Saturday, November 12, 2005
Random facts about risk
About 14 people a year are killed world wide by sharks
About 150 people a year are killed world wide by falling coconuts
By that metric being in the water is safer that being on the beach!
About 100 people are killed every year in the USA by lightening strikes.
(However, more than a 1,000 are struck and survive, which is amazing because the average lightening bolt delivers more energy than a large nuclear power plant over the same time interval.)
About 291 people are killed in the USA by prion diseases (like CJD) every year.
(The cause of most prion disease is a natural mutation in a brain protein. To date no one on record in the USA has contracted and died of a prion disease they got from eating American beef; however several people a year die of prion disease contracted by eating squirrel brains.)
A few more sobering statistics
About 14,000 people a year are killed in the USA by HIV/AIDS
About 36,000 people a year are killed in the USA by Influenza
About 40,000 people a year are killed in the USA by car accidents
(Compare this to less than ~300 people killed per year in the USA by commercial plane crashes.)
About 54,000 people a year are killed in the USA by Alzheimer’s
About 553,000 people a year are killed in the USA by cancer
About 931,000 people a year are killed in the USA by Cardiovascular Disease
About 2,500,000 people a year die in the USA alone
Lest that make you sad, 4,300,000 people a year a born in the USA alone!
About 150 people a year are killed world wide by falling coconuts
By that metric being in the water is safer that being on the beach!
About 100 people are killed every year in the USA by lightening strikes.
(However, more than a 1,000 are struck and survive, which is amazing because the average lightening bolt delivers more energy than a large nuclear power plant over the same time interval.)
About 291 people are killed in the USA by prion diseases (like CJD) every year.
(The cause of most prion disease is a natural mutation in a brain protein. To date no one on record in the USA has contracted and died of a prion disease they got from eating American beef; however several people a year die of prion disease contracted by eating squirrel brains.)
A few more sobering statistics
About 14,000 people a year are killed in the USA by HIV/AIDS
About 36,000 people a year are killed in the USA by Influenza
About 40,000 people a year are killed in the USA by car accidents
(Compare this to less than ~300 people killed per year in the USA by commercial plane crashes.)
About 54,000 people a year are killed in the USA by Alzheimer’s
About 553,000 people a year are killed in the USA by cancer
About 931,000 people a year are killed in the USA by Cardiovascular Disease
About 2,500,000 people a year die in the USA alone
Lest that make you sad, 4,300,000 people a year a born in the USA alone!
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
Riots in France and torture in America
So the riots in France have continued night after night for almost 2 weeks now. My question is what do the rioters do during the day? I mean do they spend the day "preparing" for the next nights rioting, and if so how? It seems like if the riots aren’t day and night then they are rioting because they know they can’t be stopped. I am sure that is not news, but it puts America’s problems in perspective. Doesn’t it?
Now then the president (after the CIA got caught running secret prisons) says that America doesn’t torture. That is a lie, of course we torture, every country tortures. A successful interrogation requires torture (why else would the person talk, the interrogators charming personality?) but before you freak lets consider what constitutes torture.
The definition of torture is the infliction of severe physical or psychological pain or grief as an expression of cruelty, a means of intimidation, deterrent, revenge or punishment, or as a tool for the extraction of information or confessions.
So now that you are aware of the meaning of torture, you see that not all torture involves bamboo and thumbscrews. The police torture suspects all the time that is not a secret, they just don't beat them to a pulp, they don't need too. Torture abounds in society, our civilized society just has gotten better at it, there is no need to roast people alive any more. Pain is something the mind and the body can be taught to endure psychological torture on the other hand is much less noticeable and much harder to endure, so it works much better.
Banning torture is a useless gesture, it is already illegal. I am not saying torture is right, I am saying that it is part of human nature, and as long as there are people who don't just offer up information when requested, torture isn’t going to go away.
Believe me America is taking the high road here, the prisoners at camp X-ray are calling the Red Cross to complaint about the food, or that the prayer rugs are too small. If we weren’t they wouldn’t be getting food, or sleep or medical treatment, they would be locked in a cage that’s too small to stand or lie down, in total darkness, except when they were being beaten like a piñata, and everyday they would be told was their last on this earth. See the difference? That isn’t even bad torture that is relatively benign as that sort of thing goes. (I didn’t make that example up, that is a heavily edited for graphic content version of a story told to me by a former Vietnam POW.)
Now then the president (after the CIA got caught running secret prisons) says that America doesn’t torture. That is a lie, of course we torture, every country tortures. A successful interrogation requires torture (why else would the person talk, the interrogators charming personality?) but before you freak lets consider what constitutes torture.
The definition of torture is the infliction of severe physical or psychological pain or grief as an expression of cruelty, a means of intimidation, deterrent, revenge or punishment, or as a tool for the extraction of information or confessions.
So now that you are aware of the meaning of torture, you see that not all torture involves bamboo and thumbscrews. The police torture suspects all the time that is not a secret, they just don't beat them to a pulp, they don't need too. Torture abounds in society, our civilized society just has gotten better at it, there is no need to roast people alive any more. Pain is something the mind and the body can be taught to endure psychological torture on the other hand is much less noticeable and much harder to endure, so it works much better.
Banning torture is a useless gesture, it is already illegal. I am not saying torture is right, I am saying that it is part of human nature, and as long as there are people who don't just offer up information when requested, torture isn’t going to go away.
Believe me America is taking the high road here, the prisoners at camp X-ray are calling the Red Cross to complaint about the food, or that the prayer rugs are too small. If we weren’t they wouldn’t be getting food, or sleep or medical treatment, they would be locked in a cage that’s too small to stand or lie down, in total darkness, except when they were being beaten like a piñata, and everyday they would be told was their last on this earth. See the difference? That isn’t even bad torture that is relatively benign as that sort of thing goes. (I didn’t make that example up, that is a heavily edited for graphic content version of a story told to me by a former Vietnam POW.)
Monday, November 07, 2005
Category 7
I am not sure when it is on but they’ve been advertising a show called Category 7: The end of the world. They show a clip of Paris being destroyed and everything. Ok here is the deal it is physically impossible to get a hurricane above Cat 5. Why? Because reach Cat 5 just to reach Cat 5 requires near prefect conditions, then once they do they can’t keep up with their own energy needs so they weaken and go back to a Cat 4 or 3. Now if it was possible for a storm to keep growing once it reached Cat 5 it would be so large that it would pull its self apart because to keep the core spinning would mean the outside spiral arms would have to move so fast they would shear off.
If we pretend that a hurricane could reach Cat 7 once it touches land it starts to lose energy since the energy is taken from the ocean and to get Paris would require a big piece to be over land (Portugal, Spain, the rest of France, North Africa, little things.) If we keep pretending that could happen then the storm would have to get unhindered above the 48th parallel which on the other side of the Atlantic is Newfoundland, yes like Vikings and reindeer. But past about Virginia there isn’t enough energy in the ocean to keep the storm going. Now if we keepppp pretending that a Cat 7 hurricane could do all of these things, to reach Paris would require the storm to go against the earth rotation and that my friends in impossible, and if it were possible we would have bigger problems cause one of the few things that could actually destroy the earth much like it destroys car transmissions is shifting into reverse going full speed. The sudden reversal of the earth’s rotation would shatter the crust and cause massive deformation of the semi-liquid mantle which would spurt out and maybe calve us a new moon. Unfortunately no one would survive to see the double moon rise, so the view would be largely wasted. You need not worry; to reverse the earth’s rotation would take an unimaginable amount of energy. You also need not worry about a Category 7 hurricane either.
But if you need to worry about something there is a caldera volcano (a so called supervolcano) under Yellowstone Park, that when it erupts will blanket most the Midwest in several meters of ash, trigger a short lived nuclear winter, cause a sever drop in global temperature that could last a decade and the eruption is several thousand years overdue. I wouldn’t panic yet since in geological time even a couple thousand years is a blink of an eye, so the average human’s life time isn’t even worth measuring.
If we pretend that a hurricane could reach Cat 7 once it touches land it starts to lose energy since the energy is taken from the ocean and to get Paris would require a big piece to be over land (Portugal, Spain, the rest of France, North Africa, little things.) If we keep pretending that could happen then the storm would have to get unhindered above the 48th parallel which on the other side of the Atlantic is Newfoundland, yes like Vikings and reindeer. But past about Virginia there isn’t enough energy in the ocean to keep the storm going. Now if we keepppp pretending that a Cat 7 hurricane could do all of these things, to reach Paris would require the storm to go against the earth rotation and that my friends in impossible, and if it were possible we would have bigger problems cause one of the few things that could actually destroy the earth much like it destroys car transmissions is shifting into reverse going full speed. The sudden reversal of the earth’s rotation would shatter the crust and cause massive deformation of the semi-liquid mantle which would spurt out and maybe calve us a new moon. Unfortunately no one would survive to see the double moon rise, so the view would be largely wasted. You need not worry; to reverse the earth’s rotation would take an unimaginable amount of energy. You also need not worry about a Category 7 hurricane either.
But if you need to worry about something there is a caldera volcano (a so called supervolcano) under Yellowstone Park, that when it erupts will blanket most the Midwest in several meters of ash, trigger a short lived nuclear winter, cause a sever drop in global temperature that could last a decade and the eruption is several thousand years overdue. I wouldn’t panic yet since in geological time even a couple thousand years is a blink of an eye, so the average human’s life time isn’t even worth measuring.
High tech toys shouldn't buy this holiday season and why
An HDTV
The whole HDTV is a disaster, the 1080p (which is the top of the top) are just now starting to come out on the mass market, this means that the 720p and 1080i are on their way out since they were only stepping stones to getting to full HDTV resolution. Plus most HDTVs are 16X9 but most content is still the standard 4X3 so you end up with less TV for your money. Then there is the debate about how HDTV signal is sent, is it Component 3 channel, Component 5 channel, DVI or HDMI? Till they decide on a standard if you pick wrong then you get to buy a new TV in a few years anyways. Wait till at least the end of 2006 and you will be much happier.
WiFi equipment that uses pre 802.11N
Again this is a standard thing. Each company is making equipment with the standard they hope will get adopted. Now this means that your equipment might not work on your buddy's pre-N network. Plus if life has taught us anything it is best that no one wins, so the N standard will be a compromise. If this happens and your equipment isn't upgradeable your shiny new pre-N router and cards are junk! I suggest getting a 802.11g router with MIMO. You won't have the best but you will be pretty damn close, and you card will connect you to most WiFi networks for many years to come!
An Ipod Nano
Never buy the 1st generation of a new product that works with new technology. You will pay too much and the chances it will get recalled are much better. If you want proof, the Nano 4 gig costs as much as the regular 20/30 gig and has a less battery life! I am not saying you shouldn't buy an IPod, I am saying let some else's $200 to $300 work out the bugs and drive the price of memory down. As a side note Samsung one of the top memory chip makers announced this week they have a memory chip that can hold 32 GigaBytes! So 4 GigaBytes will be old hat soon.
The whole HDTV is a disaster, the 1080p (which is the top of the top) are just now starting to come out on the mass market, this means that the 720p and 1080i are on their way out since they were only stepping stones to getting to full HDTV resolution. Plus most HDTVs are 16X9 but most content is still the standard 4X3 so you end up with less TV for your money. Then there is the debate about how HDTV signal is sent, is it Component 3 channel, Component 5 channel, DVI or HDMI? Till they decide on a standard if you pick wrong then you get to buy a new TV in a few years anyways. Wait till at least the end of 2006 and you will be much happier.
WiFi equipment that uses pre 802.11N
Again this is a standard thing. Each company is making equipment with the standard they hope will get adopted. Now this means that your equipment might not work on your buddy's pre-N network. Plus if life has taught us anything it is best that no one wins, so the N standard will be a compromise. If this happens and your equipment isn't upgradeable your shiny new pre-N router and cards are junk! I suggest getting a 802.11g router with MIMO. You won't have the best but you will be pretty damn close, and you card will connect you to most WiFi networks for many years to come!
An Ipod Nano
Never buy the 1st generation of a new product that works with new technology. You will pay too much and the chances it will get recalled are much better. If you want proof, the Nano 4 gig costs as much as the regular 20/30 gig and has a less battery life! I am not saying you shouldn't buy an IPod, I am saying let some else's $200 to $300 work out the bugs and drive the price of memory down. As a side note Samsung one of the top memory chip makers announced this week they have a memory chip that can hold 32 GigaBytes! So 4 GigaBytes will be old hat soon.
Sunday, November 06, 2005
America the chunky: Fat kids and portion sizes
Ok I will be honest my nickname as kid was not "beanpole", and if it was it would have been for the same reason biker gangs have so many guys named "Tiny". With that disclaimer out of the way I figured out why kids today are so fat and while it has a lot to do with them sitting on their butts in front of the TV all day but there is something else that isn’t their fault. I saw an ad for Healthy Choice TV Dinners, where the idiot father was forced to take care of the kids for the day, and the only thing he did right was feed them a Health Choice meal for dinner. Let’s analyze the commercial the dad was probably 190 lbs and his daughter was say 45 lbs and son 35lbs, but they all go the same size portion. Ok that would be fine, since the kids would eat till they are and then the Dad would finish their meals, but what is the mantra of so many parents? It involves kids in other countries not getting food so you better eat all yours. The USDA is partly at fault for fat kids, but I doubt they will admit it, but it evidence is irrefutable. 2000 calories a day is a guideline, not what every one needs! We have become a nation of one size fits all. In fact the average woman needs ~2000 calories, the average man needs ~2,800 and kids it varies too much to put a number to it. However feeding your 6 year old kid 2,000 calories a day is like you eating ~4,500 or more and you bet your stretchy pants you’ll gain weight. Let your kids eat till they are full but no more, then if they are hungry between meals don’t starve them offer them carrots or grapes, soon their metabolism will adjust and they will eat the calories they need to make their metabolic goals.
Now before I signoff this is a message to all the women from all the men. Men require more calories on average, if you glance above you will notice it men require 1.4 times the calories of women and the bigger or more muscular your guy the more he needs up to 20,000 for the super duper fit weight lifter. I eat lunch with women a lot and I always feel bad or get dirty looks from them for eating sooooo much and I assume this happens to a lot of men. I have to eat more it is not optional, so get use to it. If a man and a woman go on the same diet and get the same amount of exercise it likely the man will lose twice the weight, since the caloric reduction is much larger for the guy and the higher muscle mass of the guy will make the exercise consume more calories. It is physiology, and therefore ladies not debatable.
I will close with a thought for women, while you seek equality in all things, the dinner table is not a place for this philosophy, since equality there, will mean you and he will wear the same size pants too. Like Chris Rock says (and look how thin he is) give the man the big piece of chicken. Here is an idea, if you want to lose weight as a couple, the man should eat the woman’s size portion and the woman should eat 3/4 of that, (portion size in America is 25% to 50% too large anyways). The pounds will melt away.
Now before I signoff this is a message to all the women from all the men. Men require more calories on average, if you glance above you will notice it men require 1.4 times the calories of women and the bigger or more muscular your guy the more he needs up to 20,000 for the super duper fit weight lifter. I eat lunch with women a lot and I always feel bad or get dirty looks from them for eating sooooo much and I assume this happens to a lot of men. I have to eat more it is not optional, so get use to it. If a man and a woman go on the same diet and get the same amount of exercise it likely the man will lose twice the weight, since the caloric reduction is much larger for the guy and the higher muscle mass of the guy will make the exercise consume more calories. It is physiology, and therefore ladies not debatable.
I will close with a thought for women, while you seek equality in all things, the dinner table is not a place for this philosophy, since equality there, will mean you and he will wear the same size pants too. Like Chris Rock says (and look how thin he is) give the man the big piece of chicken. Here is an idea, if you want to lose weight as a couple, the man should eat the woman’s size portion and the woman should eat 3/4 of that, (portion size in America is 25% to 50% too large anyways). The pounds will melt away.
Saturday, November 05, 2005
Alanis Morissette on Global Warming
I saw ad last night for a show called "Alanis Morissette explores the science behind Global Warming" on PBS. I will not dispute that it is not a good idea to burn fossil fuels at the rate we currently do, and that trees are good. However, the evidence for global warming is not all that sound since we have less than 100 years of temperature measurements, and about 30 years of high resolution weather data. (All those ice cores are kind of crappy science too, why? CO2 is soluble in water and the colder the water the more soluble it is. That “air that hasn’t seen the light of day 100,000 years” so is a prefect record of the ancient atmosphere, has been washed clean during all that time. If you squeeze ice hard enough it melts even if the temperature remains below the freezing point, (this is why you can skate on ice), so most of the CO2 can be removed by the water while rest of the gas remains largely unaltered.)
Determining long term weather trends with 30 years of data is just poor science (but makes great "news"), remember that between 1150 and 1460 there was a mini-ice age. This all happened before the Industrial Revolution, so we can’t really pin that on man’s interference, it just happened then, it went away. Weather is chaos at its finest, it is unpredictable more than a few days in advance, I cite hurricane landfall prediction as proof of this. The thing as the size of a Midwestern state but they can’t tell more than a few hours in advance what it will do. Sure NOAA thinks it will be a warm winter and they will probably be right because of El Nino, but if there wasn’t an obvious signal, they really would only be guessing.
Now whether or not you believe in global warming is immaterial, the question is should Alanis Morissette, be the person who interprets and reports on the evidence behind global warming? She clearly has an agenda, since on the commercial she said global warming is a fact. Now I did enjoy her album, Jagged Little Pill, it was wrought with emotion, and conveyed a rawness that spoke to her inner torment so it will surely to become a classic. However, it is equally clear that this woman doesn’t know what irony is, since everything she said was ironic wasn’t, it was tragic perhaps, but definitely not ironic. So I ask you this, is a woman who doesn’t know what irony is, qualified to interpret climatological data and draw conclusions? I think not, but I find it ironic that she (and the fine folks at PBS) thinks so, and by the way, that is a real example of irony.
Determining long term weather trends with 30 years of data is just poor science (but makes great "news"), remember that between 1150 and 1460 there was a mini-ice age. This all happened before the Industrial Revolution, so we can’t really pin that on man’s interference, it just happened then, it went away. Weather is chaos at its finest, it is unpredictable more than a few days in advance, I cite hurricane landfall prediction as proof of this. The thing as the size of a Midwestern state but they can’t tell more than a few hours in advance what it will do. Sure NOAA thinks it will be a warm winter and they will probably be right because of El Nino, but if there wasn’t an obvious signal, they really would only be guessing.
Now whether or not you believe in global warming is immaterial, the question is should Alanis Morissette, be the person who interprets and reports on the evidence behind global warming? She clearly has an agenda, since on the commercial she said global warming is a fact. Now I did enjoy her album, Jagged Little Pill, it was wrought with emotion, and conveyed a rawness that spoke to her inner torment so it will surely to become a classic. However, it is equally clear that this woman doesn’t know what irony is, since everything she said was ironic wasn’t, it was tragic perhaps, but definitely not ironic. So I ask you this, is a woman who doesn’t know what irony is, qualified to interpret climatological data and draw conclusions? I think not, but I find it ironic that she (and the fine folks at PBS) thinks so, and by the way, that is a real example of irony.
Thursday, November 03, 2005
Denver and pot
Well here is a conundrum, Denver just legalized marijuana with 54% in favor. The problem is that Colorado still says pot is illegal and in the “legal hierarchy” city law can’t permit something the state or Federal government is illegal. (Someone should tell Nevada this.) So, what is Denver to do? Well I have a feeling they are already doing it, since penalty for having pot in Colorado is $100 fine and no jail time.
However, the city government and conservative groups are livid that pot was legalized. They are screaming that the police will ignore the law and crack down on pot smoking. I would bet the ACLU people are beginning to prepare the defense for the first person how is arrested for doing something that is legal. (Remember getting a date with the Supreme Court takes time so it would be wise for them to plan ahead, do you think they talk call ahead seating like OutBack?)
You know the "people" in Las Vegas are pissed, they wanted to be the first to legalize pot since it would be a serious tourist draw. But they shouldn’t be, if you think about it though skiing and pot are good together, some of those people could stand to be mellowed out (You know the ones, the guys who learn to ski, have a few beers and go straight to the double black diamond with a blood red skull and crossbones slope called “Splat!”.) Plus skiing burns calories so the munchies won’t make you gain weight. Gambling and drinking (from the casinos’ point of view) are a good combo since booze makes people brave and stupid (this encourages people to do things like hitting on 20 in Blackjack cause "they felt lucky" or putting an “escort” on your business credit card when there spouse is the company accountant.) Drunks can be separated from their money very efficiently and that is goal of Vegas. (Why do you think the drinks are free if your playing?). Pot would hurt their business, since people wouldn’t gamble or shop, they would just sit in their rooms eating Cheetos and watching cartoons.
However, the city government and conservative groups are livid that pot was legalized. They are screaming that the police will ignore the law and crack down on pot smoking. I would bet the ACLU people are beginning to prepare the defense for the first person how is arrested for doing something that is legal. (Remember getting a date with the Supreme Court takes time so it would be wise for them to plan ahead, do you think they talk call ahead seating like OutBack?)
You know the "people" in Las Vegas are pissed, they wanted to be the first to legalize pot since it would be a serious tourist draw. But they shouldn’t be, if you think about it though skiing and pot are good together, some of those people could stand to be mellowed out (You know the ones, the guys who learn to ski, have a few beers and go straight to the double black diamond with a blood red skull and crossbones slope called “Splat!”.) Plus skiing burns calories so the munchies won’t make you gain weight. Gambling and drinking (from the casinos’ point of view) are a good combo since booze makes people brave and stupid (this encourages people to do things like hitting on 20 in Blackjack cause "they felt lucky" or putting an “escort” on your business credit card when there spouse is the company accountant.) Drunks can be separated from their money very efficiently and that is goal of Vegas. (Why do you think the drinks are free if your playing?). Pot would hurt their business, since people wouldn’t gamble or shop, they would just sit in their rooms eating Cheetos and watching cartoons.
The difference between scientists and engineers
I am in a branch of science that is very applied, so like engineers, we are “doers”. (Pure science is for the “thinkers”, but pure scientists are so rare these days that the EPA might soon classify them as endangered (Won’t that be funny, they would all had to wear GPS ear tags, but at least the government would fund projects to encourage their reproduction, (interpret that last crack however you want.)))
Back to the point, I have always considered myself a fairly engineery scientist since it used to be scientists “thought”, and engineers “did”, but I do both. However, yesterday I found a new definition that I think is more accurate given the death of pure science. I was talking to an engineer I work with and I asked him what he was doing. When he told me, and I ask why he was doing that he had already done it once. He replied “last time I had to do it fast, this time I am doing it cheap”. I was baffled, why would he think that spending weeks of work was good idea just to save $216 on an instrument that will cost more than $50,000 to build, when there was no difference in performance? (To his credit fast was a damn good design, that cheap couldn’t possibly beat.) However, there was no doubt in his mind that this was the right thing to do, and I was told that his design was still so expensive that in industry he would be laughed at (mind you removing this control system all together would only save $76 from the “cheap” cost). I would have been happy with adding 0.4% to the cost and spent my time working on getting the next part to work. I don’t wish to cheapen the engineering process since many engineers are scientists too, but the mindset and goals are just different.
So my definition is that “scientists just “do” without regard to how it is done, and engineers “do” it cheaper and faster.” If that was unclear, when a scientist gets something to work it is generally the first time that has been done, so they are just glad it works they don’t care about “how”. Engineers already know “it” works they need to make it last longer, and build it cheaper.
Back to the point, I have always considered myself a fairly engineery scientist since it used to be scientists “thought”, and engineers “did”, but I do both. However, yesterday I found a new definition that I think is more accurate given the death of pure science. I was talking to an engineer I work with and I asked him what he was doing. When he told me, and I ask why he was doing that he had already done it once. He replied “last time I had to do it fast, this time I am doing it cheap”. I was baffled, why would he think that spending weeks of work was good idea just to save $216 on an instrument that will cost more than $50,000 to build, when there was no difference in performance? (To his credit fast was a damn good design, that cheap couldn’t possibly beat.) However, there was no doubt in his mind that this was the right thing to do, and I was told that his design was still so expensive that in industry he would be laughed at (mind you removing this control system all together would only save $76 from the “cheap” cost). I would have been happy with adding 0.4% to the cost and spent my time working on getting the next part to work. I don’t wish to cheapen the engineering process since many engineers are scientists too, but the mindset and goals are just different.
So my definition is that “scientists just “do” without regard to how it is done, and engineers “do” it cheaper and faster.” If that was unclear, when a scientist gets something to work it is generally the first time that has been done, so they are just glad it works they don’t care about “how”. Engineers already know “it” works they need to make it last longer, and build it cheaper.
Tuesday, November 01, 2005
A man’s advice on how to separate good men from bad.
or “Are men squirrels?”
I friend of mine who is a girl told me that she thinks of men as squirrels, since if you want to keep them around you have to be very careful since they scare easily. At first I took offence to that comment, but then the more I thought about it, it started to make sense. Some guys are like squirrels, but these guys are losers and not worth the girls attention. The mistake is a lot of women run after the squirrels. This is absolute wrong response, you shouldn’t chase a squirrel, you should be sad it ran off, and move on. You ever try to catch a squirrel? If you can catch them is worth the effort? NO!
To continue the metaphor good men are like library pigeons. It takes real effort to scare them off, and all they do is move to a safe place and watch for it to be ok to come back down. Sometimes women do stuff to scare men off, it is a fact. No seriously y’all do some stuff that absolutely baffles us. However, a good man will take a lot before he “leaves”, and then he only slips into the shadows to watch for when it is safe to return. Sometimes women (well everyone) just need to work stuff out on their own, and it is unsafe for another person to interfere with this process. Then once she is through the worst part then he can return and be supportive.
There is no metaphor for a great man, since a great man is there for you. Sure you still have to work “it” out on your own but he will be there for you. A great man will hold in his arms while your tears make you quake. (Perhaps this acts as a “getting through it” catalyst, since the sadness seems to pass in hours not days or weeks this way.) A great man looks you in the eyes when you say something “scary” and says something that makes it alright. A great man doesn’t always know what to say or do, but works through it with you. A great man helps you not take yourself or life so seriously, humor and concern really can take the edge off of life. Yes, great men are out there, but most great men start out as good men, and grow with you.
I friend of mine who is a girl told me that she thinks of men as squirrels, since if you want to keep them around you have to be very careful since they scare easily. At first I took offence to that comment, but then the more I thought about it, it started to make sense. Some guys are like squirrels, but these guys are losers and not worth the girls attention. The mistake is a lot of women run after the squirrels. This is absolute wrong response, you shouldn’t chase a squirrel, you should be sad it ran off, and move on. You ever try to catch a squirrel? If you can catch them is worth the effort? NO!
To continue the metaphor good men are like library pigeons. It takes real effort to scare them off, and all they do is move to a safe place and watch for it to be ok to come back down. Sometimes women do stuff to scare men off, it is a fact. No seriously y’all do some stuff that absolutely baffles us. However, a good man will take a lot before he “leaves”, and then he only slips into the shadows to watch for when it is safe to return. Sometimes women (well everyone) just need to work stuff out on their own, and it is unsafe for another person to interfere with this process. Then once she is through the worst part then he can return and be supportive.
There is no metaphor for a great man, since a great man is there for you. Sure you still have to work “it” out on your own but he will be there for you. A great man will hold in his arms while your tears make you quake. (Perhaps this acts as a “getting through it” catalyst, since the sadness seems to pass in hours not days or weeks this way.) A great man looks you in the eyes when you say something “scary” and says something that makes it alright. A great man doesn’t always know what to say or do, but works through it with you. A great man helps you not take yourself or life so seriously, humor and concern really can take the edge off of life. Yes, great men are out there, but most great men start out as good men, and grow with you.
Monday, October 31, 2005
Horoscopes and astrology
I occasionally read my horoscope in the paper and sometime even I believe. Last week was suppose to be a crap week, (I have never seen numbers soooo low) and it was. Even more promising is that once I stopped reading it things got better, and today when I was considering reading it my paper was stolen. That is fate
Astrology is a game of numbers I am Aquarius along with ~500,000,000 other people (if you like the Chinese version over the Greeks I am a Dragon), so by chance alone some of those people are bound to have enough vaguely worded things happen to them that they see it as prophecy. Also, like the psychic guy who talks to the dead John N something, most people over look the mistakes and only see the accuracies, they fool themselves. Now before I dismiss Astrology out of hand the signs are a very nice way to classify people. However, if you read the characteristics assigned to your sign you would have to work to not match them, plus they can be modified to “fit” better since I am Aquarius Pieces rising, plus I have a weird moon effect, and Jupiter had taken the day off so Venus and Saturn snuck out… So I fit my profile perfectly! Ok seriously, there is a chance that planets and stars conspire with chaos theory to alter the day to day lives of people, (especially if you believe they do), but it is unlikely to alter your fortune
Astrology was once a science, that is why it ends in -logy which roughly means the study of. However, the problem is the Greeks and the Romans did all the calculations between 2 and 3 thousand years ago, and since orbital theory is still fairly new today. So what they did was very inaccurate long term, so a couple of thousand years of orbital drift hasn’t been accounted for at least in the books I have seen. This means that when Mars is supposed to be doing something he might not be, since he isn’t at “home”. The Astrology people really need to start hanging out with the Astronomy and math people, since if they want to achieve the level of a science they need to put some science back in. (Unless you consider psychology as defined by P.T. Barnum a science, in which case Astrology is still very much a science.)
Why then do I read my horoscope? Because you just never know, it is a faith based system, so it can never be disproven. (Like the Kansas School Board, does it really exist? I can’t prove it does, so I have to accept them.) (Ok, a pseudo-pun on quantum mechanics is a bit much but since they won’t get it I am leaving it in!) My theory is that it doesn’t hurt to believe in things that can’t be proven, especially since not believing and being wrong has serious consequences.
Astrology is a game of numbers I am Aquarius along with ~500,000,000 other people (if you like the Chinese version over the Greeks I am a Dragon), so by chance alone some of those people are bound to have enough vaguely worded things happen to them that they see it as prophecy. Also, like the psychic guy who talks to the dead John N something, most people over look the mistakes and only see the accuracies, they fool themselves. Now before I dismiss Astrology out of hand the signs are a very nice way to classify people. However, if you read the characteristics assigned to your sign you would have to work to not match them, plus they can be modified to “fit” better since I am Aquarius Pieces rising, plus I have a weird moon effect, and Jupiter had taken the day off so Venus and Saturn snuck out… So I fit my profile perfectly! Ok seriously, there is a chance that planets and stars conspire with chaos theory to alter the day to day lives of people, (especially if you believe they do), but it is unlikely to alter your fortune
Astrology was once a science, that is why it ends in -logy which roughly means the study of. However, the problem is the Greeks and the Romans did all the calculations between 2 and 3 thousand years ago, and since orbital theory is still fairly new today. So what they did was very inaccurate long term, so a couple of thousand years of orbital drift hasn’t been accounted for at least in the books I have seen. This means that when Mars is supposed to be doing something he might not be, since he isn’t at “home”. The Astrology people really need to start hanging out with the Astronomy and math people, since if they want to achieve the level of a science they need to put some science back in. (Unless you consider psychology as defined by P.T. Barnum a science, in which case Astrology is still very much a science.)
Why then do I read my horoscope? Because you just never know, it is a faith based system, so it can never be disproven. (Like the Kansas School Board, does it really exist? I can’t prove it does, so I have to accept them.) (Ok, a pseudo-pun on quantum mechanics is a bit much but since they won’t get it I am leaving it in!) My theory is that it doesn’t hurt to believe in things that can’t be proven, especially since not believing and being wrong has serious consequences.
I’m back, and a fashion show review
I finally have reliable high speed internet back!
I celebrated by looking at a bunch of Yahoo! Most viewed photos’, which were a fashion show and some picks of the White Sox victory. Ok, seriously as for the fashion show picks, perhaps I am old fashion but I like women to look like women. Those women looked well, dead.... Actually they looked like tall prepubescent boys who died in an eye makeup explosion and then were put into clothes they say they would wear only over their dead bodies. Of course they would have to be zombies since normal dead people can’t walk a run way.
Perhaps I could become a fashion designer, since I think I have a leg up I know that real women aren’t 6’1” but only weight 100 lbs. Plus the clothes those women have on most people won’t be caught dead in. I know none of this is earth shattering revelations, models haven’t represented real women (or at least been a good try) since Marilyn Monroe.
Here is the novel part, since the voice of women hasn’t been heard, since the models just get thinner (soon stick figures will quite the vogue thing), it is time the people whose opinion count on the topic of women’s fashion spoke up. Yes that’s right, men! If men demanded that the models have hips and breasts, guess what they would, and real quick too! Like I said I am old fashion, but if we can’t get some meat on the models bones could we at least make them look more alive?
I celebrated by looking at a bunch of Yahoo! Most viewed photos’, which were a fashion show and some picks of the White Sox victory. Ok, seriously as for the fashion show picks, perhaps I am old fashion but I like women to look like women. Those women looked well, dead.... Actually they looked like tall prepubescent boys who died in an eye makeup explosion and then were put into clothes they say they would wear only over their dead bodies. Of course they would have to be zombies since normal dead people can’t walk a run way.
Perhaps I could become a fashion designer, since I think I have a leg up I know that real women aren’t 6’1” but only weight 100 lbs. Plus the clothes those women have on most people won’t be caught dead in. I know none of this is earth shattering revelations, models haven’t represented real women (or at least been a good try) since Marilyn Monroe.
Here is the novel part, since the voice of women hasn’t been heard, since the models just get thinner (soon stick figures will quite the vogue thing), it is time the people whose opinion count on the topic of women’s fashion spoke up. Yes that’s right, men! If men demanded that the models have hips and breasts, guess what they would, and real quick too! Like I said I am old fashion, but if we can’t get some meat on the models bones could we at least make them look more alive?
Saturday, October 29, 2005
DSL trouble and dialup internet access
For the past several days my very smooth 1.5 Mbs internet connection has been 6Kbs, which is slower than most fax machines, when it worked at all. Needless to say I have been abit put off. At first I thought it was my fault, that I was transferring too much data and that was slowing me down. So, I stopped all network traffic except http and pop3 no luck, then I tried every cleaver trick I could think of to fiddle with my network and DSL modem, with intermittent success. Finally I broke down and called tech support, the women who was clearly in India (I love hearing Indian’s speak, since they speak excellent English (if slightly accented) but the English they speak is learned from a book, since they use words that are technically correct, but just not quite right because of how formal they are, and no I can’t think of an example right now, but let’s just say some one with that strong of a vocabulary should be able to understand idiomatic English too.) She was no help but since by the time I got to talk to her the connection was fine. I swear it is a conspiracy something can be broken beyond repair but as soon as the repair person touches it, it works totally fine and you look like a moron.
By this morning the connection was totally shot, 10 minutes to open Yahoo.com. To cut an already long story short they blamed my computer as being broken, I explained the innumerable reasons that was not the most likely scenario and was forwarded along to an other level of tech support who again blamed me until she read the note that it was a area wide problem, and quickly changed tacks. Do I feel better yes and no. Yes because will get fixed no because it might take days, and so until then I come to you live at 26.4K dial up. I don’t understand how anyone can live with a connection that crawls like this. So, if you only have dial up you have my sympathy.
By this morning the connection was totally shot, 10 minutes to open Yahoo.com. To cut an already long story short they blamed my computer as being broken, I explained the innumerable reasons that was not the most likely scenario and was forwarded along to an other level of tech support who again blamed me until she read the note that it was a area wide problem, and quickly changed tacks. Do I feel better yes and no. Yes because will get fixed no because it might take days, and so until then I come to you live at 26.4K dial up. I don’t understand how anyone can live with a connection that crawls like this. So, if you only have dial up you have my sympathy.
Friday, October 28, 2005
The myth of 98.6
98.6 is not normal body temperature! I don’t care if your mom and your school nurse told you it was. 98.6 is the average body temperature measured with a mercury armpit thermometer in the later 1800’s, and it is just that an average! (Plus when was the last time someone measured your armpit temperature?) The normal range for people is from 96 to 99 and varies from person to person and cycles during the day. My normal body temp is 97.1 but since my school nurse thought you had to at least hit 99 to be sick, and most of the time I couldn’t even hit 98.6 I had a hard time convincing her I was sick. By her standards the barely perceptible change of 0.4 degrees was worse than the 1.5 degree change I had. That is why I don’t take my temperature when I am sick cause I rarely have a “fever”.
Also the only accurate way to measure temperature is with a rectal thermometer since that is as close to the core temp as you can get without things turning seriously unpleasant. All the other thermometers are inaccurate because the surface they measure is air or liquid cooled, and being sick so you are mouth breathing compounds the problem since your mouth is strongly cooled. That inner ear temp gauge is a crock; one of the functions of the ear is as a radiator for the brain, so its blood supply is controlled by the core temp, so if you are cold you ear temp drops as blood is cut off and the ear drum isn’t that deep in you skull that it is insulated from the external temp. Forehead and temple are external and radiant surfaces as well, so their temp is not well correlated with core temp. Actually measuring the temp in the armpit if it was allowed to stabilize isn’t that bad of an idea, since a closed armpit would quickly reach core temp given the large amounts of blood passing by and the large muscle groups.
Oh well my 98.7 degree self must get back to my fake hot and cold spells since I clearly don’t have a fever.
Also the only accurate way to measure temperature is with a rectal thermometer since that is as close to the core temp as you can get without things turning seriously unpleasant. All the other thermometers are inaccurate because the surface they measure is air or liquid cooled, and being sick so you are mouth breathing compounds the problem since your mouth is strongly cooled. That inner ear temp gauge is a crock; one of the functions of the ear is as a radiator for the brain, so its blood supply is controlled by the core temp, so if you are cold you ear temp drops as blood is cut off and the ear drum isn’t that deep in you skull that it is insulated from the external temp. Forehead and temple are external and radiant surfaces as well, so their temp is not well correlated with core temp. Actually measuring the temp in the armpit if it was allowed to stabilize isn’t that bad of an idea, since a closed armpit would quickly reach core temp given the large amounts of blood passing by and the large muscle groups.
Oh well my 98.7 degree self must get back to my fake hot and cold spells since I clearly don’t have a fever.
Star Trek Revelations
Sure Iran is threatening Israel, one of the top aides to the VP has been indicted, and a Supreme Court appointment has stepped down, but the big news is that George Takei the Original Star Trek’s Sulu, is gay.
Who cares?!
All that means is that Star Fleet had a gay captain in one of the movies (I am not enough of a Trek fan to remember which one.) That changes nothing, if anyone embarrasses the show it is William Shatner. Have you heard that man sing?
Who cares?!
All that means is that Star Fleet had a gay captain in one of the movies (I am not enough of a Trek fan to remember which one.) That changes nothing, if anyone embarrasses the show it is William Shatner. Have you heard that man sing?
Thursday, October 27, 2005
How to get a Republican president in ‘08
As it stands right now the chances of getting another Republican in the Oval Office in ’08 are slim to none if the Democrat’s nominate even a half-assed candidate. So here is my plan to get another GOP president. The key assumption is that Cheney will not run. I doubt it but if he does then all this is moot. Here is the key no one in the GOP who is the obvious choice can win! The whole party is tainted with war, debt, scandal and oil woes. (My brother thinks Rice will run against Clinton, but I doubt it.)
So, the GOP needs to start now. They need to pick a youngish unknown perhaps a junior congressman or senator, someone who is fully of piss and vinegar and wants change things. They need to start grooming him now, he needs to distance himself from the current administration. He needs to start getting exposure, putting out some new ideas, he must become a vehicle of change. He must represent a new order, he must be a Kennedy or it pains me to say a Clinton. That is the only way the American people would elect another Republican, is it he was a new Republican that was going to create a new party. He should be middle of the road, since too far to the right will only alienate the people, a little hawkish but with a plan to get us out of Iraq, and stabilize the Middle East. He should have a plan to save Social Security, and reform FEMA, etc.
I can hear the speech now “Ladies and gentleman, I am not a Washington insider so I really don’t understand how it works in this city, but I do understand how it works in real life. I believe the American people want what I wanted when I came to Washington, a government they could believe in and trust to act in the people’s best interest.
Tell me are you more secure or prosperous now than you were 4 or 8 or 10 years ago? I have seen the numbers and the answer is no, more over I have talked to the people and seen that the answer is a resounding No! I believe every American wants and deserves prosperity and security, and ladies and gentleman your current government has let you down. I am not here to lay blame since blame cannot be placed on anyone person, or even a group, both parties and all branches of government share the blame equally. Even I share in the blame, I have voted with my party when I should have voted with my conscious! Why would a politician admit that? Because it is a matter of public record, and that changes today! I encourage all American’s to look at the voting record of their elected officials, and hold them accountable. Today I challenge all every member of legislator, to follow my lead and vote their conscious. The government must reform itself or the American voters will reform it for us in the coming years.
Do I have all the answers? Can I fix all the problems? Sadly, I cannot, one man cannot cure what ails America. However, I have plans, and I am working to build a partnership that spans party lines, and I want to reach out to the American people. As I said one man cannot cure what ails this nation, but all of us working together we can return this nation to prosperity and return a sense of security!…”
By election time ’06 he and a select group senators and congressman whose seat can be saved should form a “reform council”. They must call for change, and in what would be one of the great Washington moments denounce the president, but still receive his full support. The current administration must realize it is tainted, but still has a great deal of power, and that with distance it can support this new regime. By ’07 he and those who ride his coat tails (and those who act in the shadows) should have him well positioned to run, and well (very well) funded. The American people must see him as a leader, and a force for change. You can bet the Democrats will be doing this, so we must do it better. By ’08 and the Conventions he must be the obvious choice, in his speech he will take credit for anything good that happened and blame the Dem’s and current administration for anything that has gone wrong. The rest is obvious, he claims to run a clean and open campaign, and has his dirty work and muck raking done by those in shadows. If all this works, we should have a new Republican order and 4 to 8 more years of GOP rule.
I will temper my statement by saying that perhaps we should have some checks and balances the Branches of government should be divided. Perhaps being forced to consider the opinion of others wouldn’t hurt us abit, the minority is a minority but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have a voice. I do look forward to ’06 when the mood of the nation can truly be gauged. By ’08 if things are not way better no one short of the person I spoke of can get elected, heck if things are bad enough a third party might have a real shot, especially if they employ a strategy similar to the one I have just laid out.
Before anyone thinks it I am not old enough to run for President, or even Congress! Plus no one it their right mind would elect me to run anything much less the free world.
So, the GOP needs to start now. They need to pick a youngish unknown perhaps a junior congressman or senator, someone who is fully of piss and vinegar and wants change things. They need to start grooming him now, he needs to distance himself from the current administration. He needs to start getting exposure, putting out some new ideas, he must become a vehicle of change. He must represent a new order, he must be a Kennedy or it pains me to say a Clinton. That is the only way the American people would elect another Republican, is it he was a new Republican that was going to create a new party. He should be middle of the road, since too far to the right will only alienate the people, a little hawkish but with a plan to get us out of Iraq, and stabilize the Middle East. He should have a plan to save Social Security, and reform FEMA, etc.
I can hear the speech now “Ladies and gentleman, I am not a Washington insider so I really don’t understand how it works in this city, but I do understand how it works in real life. I believe the American people want what I wanted when I came to Washington, a government they could believe in and trust to act in the people’s best interest.
Tell me are you more secure or prosperous now than you were 4 or 8 or 10 years ago? I have seen the numbers and the answer is no, more over I have talked to the people and seen that the answer is a resounding No! I believe every American wants and deserves prosperity and security, and ladies and gentleman your current government has let you down. I am not here to lay blame since blame cannot be placed on anyone person, or even a group, both parties and all branches of government share the blame equally. Even I share in the blame, I have voted with my party when I should have voted with my conscious! Why would a politician admit that? Because it is a matter of public record, and that changes today! I encourage all American’s to look at the voting record of their elected officials, and hold them accountable. Today I challenge all every member of legislator, to follow my lead and vote their conscious. The government must reform itself or the American voters will reform it for us in the coming years.
Do I have all the answers? Can I fix all the problems? Sadly, I cannot, one man cannot cure what ails America. However, I have plans, and I am working to build a partnership that spans party lines, and I want to reach out to the American people. As I said one man cannot cure what ails this nation, but all of us working together we can return this nation to prosperity and return a sense of security!…”
By election time ’06 he and a select group senators and congressman whose seat can be saved should form a “reform council”. They must call for change, and in what would be one of the great Washington moments denounce the president, but still receive his full support. The current administration must realize it is tainted, but still has a great deal of power, and that with distance it can support this new regime. By ’07 he and those who ride his coat tails (and those who act in the shadows) should have him well positioned to run, and well (very well) funded. The American people must see him as a leader, and a force for change. You can bet the Democrats will be doing this, so we must do it better. By ’08 and the Conventions he must be the obvious choice, in his speech he will take credit for anything good that happened and blame the Dem’s and current administration for anything that has gone wrong. The rest is obvious, he claims to run a clean and open campaign, and has his dirty work and muck raking done by those in shadows. If all this works, we should have a new Republican order and 4 to 8 more years of GOP rule.
I will temper my statement by saying that perhaps we should have some checks and balances the Branches of government should be divided. Perhaps being forced to consider the opinion of others wouldn’t hurt us abit, the minority is a minority but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have a voice. I do look forward to ’06 when the mood of the nation can truly be gauged. By ’08 if things are not way better no one short of the person I spoke of can get elected, heck if things are bad enough a third party might have a real shot, especially if they employ a strategy similar to the one I have just laid out.
Before anyone thinks it I am not old enough to run for President, or even Congress! Plus no one it their right mind would elect me to run anything much less the free world.
An idea whose time has come, private libraries.
Ok I live in a fairly wealthy suburb of Dallas, so the library I have access to is very nice. However, it is nothing compared to my local Barnes and Nobles, but B&N frowns on me “borrowing books”, and multimedia content. Never the less people buy books, especially computer books, read them and return them. So, my idea is a private library or a library club. I am sure something like this already exists, since BooksFree.com has a similar model, but not the selection or the physical location. Imagine if B&N had a plan that for $20 a month, plus $1 (or a bit more) per item per week, you could borrow a book. Then you could either buy it and credited for the “rental”, or return it. However, if when you returned the item it was not in a sellable condition, or you lost it, then you buy it.
Now then it doesn’t depend on B&N or Borders, to do it. A similar thing could be done by a club or even a group of individuals, since if they donated use of their private books plus money for new acquisitions, they could quickly acquire a good selection. If the members were diverse enough the waits wouldn’t be too long for any particular selection, and most wouldn’t notice especially if the depth of selection was good enough since there would be plenty of books people had never thought to read.
Now then it doesn’t depend on B&N or Borders, to do it. A similar thing could be done by a club or even a group of individuals, since if they donated use of their private books plus money for new acquisitions, they could quickly acquire a good selection. If the members were diverse enough the waits wouldn’t be too long for any particular selection, and most wouldn’t notice especially if the depth of selection was good enough since there would be plenty of books people had never thought to read.
Connections
One of my favorite shows is back on the air, James Burke’s Connections. For those unfamiliar with the show it is about a dry humored British man who talks about how two things like the Internet and Cornflakes are connected via weird twists in history. As the British say it’s brilliant, since the connections can be through diesel engines and humane societies and health clubs, and Sam Morse. For anyone who is interested it is on the Science Channel, I highly recommend seeing it at least once.
Monday, October 24, 2005
A return to randomness
While I am expected to regain feeling in my finger and make a full recovery, I also have strep throat. So, this has not been my week and it’s only Monday.
I see that we have a new Fed chairman, assuming Ben Bernanke is confirmed. Dr. Bernanke should be an interesting change, since while he is qualified for the job (and I was really hoping to get the call, oh well perhaps I can have Karl Rove’s job, when it opens up in the New Year), he will have a more proactive monetary policy. Our new chairman will set targets for inflation and alter monetary policy to mean his goals. If he is soft on inflation and we have stagflation we are in trouble. Also, his character is in question, he is from and economic standpoint the 2nd most powerful man in the world, his every move can alter the world’s financial markets? Does he have what it takes to wield this power and shape America’s economic policy? I don’t know.
The one thing I can never predict is gas prices, and I figured out why. Most of the big oil companies both produce crude oil and refine it into fuel. So if they were prfiteering they would make money on both transactions, which is what I always assumed. That is why I could never predict price changes, since the price of oil is more inversely related to the price of gasoline. Here is how it works, Exxon (or other large oil company) drills for oil and sells it at a huge profit, well they mostly sell it to themselves. They take the oil and refine it and sell the fuel at less than it “cost to make”, however since the oil they sell themselves doesn’t actually cost what it costs on the open market, the selling at a lose is only on paper, and so they still make good money. Now the problem is small oil, since it is paying open market prices so it has to sell at market prices too, so big oil fixes its prices based on small oil being nearly profitable. Yes, oil is a false commodity much the same way it was when Standard Oil controlled the market.
I see that we have a new Fed chairman, assuming Ben Bernanke is confirmed. Dr. Bernanke should be an interesting change, since while he is qualified for the job (and I was really hoping to get the call, oh well perhaps I can have Karl Rove’s job, when it opens up in the New Year), he will have a more proactive monetary policy. Our new chairman will set targets for inflation and alter monetary policy to mean his goals. If he is soft on inflation and we have stagflation we are in trouble. Also, his character is in question, he is from and economic standpoint the 2nd most powerful man in the world, his every move can alter the world’s financial markets? Does he have what it takes to wield this power and shape America’s economic policy? I don’t know.
The one thing I can never predict is gas prices, and I figured out why. Most of the big oil companies both produce crude oil and refine it into fuel. So if they were prfiteering they would make money on both transactions, which is what I always assumed. That is why I could never predict price changes, since the price of oil is more inversely related to the price of gasoline. Here is how it works, Exxon (or other large oil company) drills for oil and sells it at a huge profit, well they mostly sell it to themselves. They take the oil and refine it and sell the fuel at less than it “cost to make”, however since the oil they sell themselves doesn’t actually cost what it costs on the open market, the selling at a lose is only on paper, and so they still make good money. Now the problem is small oil, since it is paying open market prices so it has to sell at market prices too, so big oil fixes its prices based on small oil being nearly profitable. Yes, oil is a false commodity much the same way it was when Standard Oil controlled the market.
Sunday, October 23, 2005
I will return
Friday night I had a little accident. After a trip to the ER, where I got stitches and lots of shots, I will be fine. However, for next 10-14 days I am left handed. Since typing is now painful I not be posting very regularly for a while. Hope everyone understands.
However, when the woman made me sign all the financial papers before I was treated, I bled all over her pen cause it reopened my cut to sign the papers.
However, when the woman made me sign all the financial papers before I was treated, I bled all over her pen cause it reopened my cut to sign the papers.
Hurricanes and Avian Flu
Well by now Wilma is done flatting Mexico and is on her way to Florida. I just looked at the satellite photos for the equatorial Atlantic off the West Coast of Africa and guess what I saw! Two more storms that are starting to rotate. Only time will tell if they are Alpha and Beta.
In the mean time most people are worrying about an Avian Influenza pandemic. The Avian flu (mostly the H5N1 flu strain) is deadly to birds and has been found in Turkey and East Asia. While only 50 people have died from the avian flus (there are many types) and it is not spread from person to person, it is a major concern. So major in fact that birds are being killed en masse to ensure that it doesn’t spread, and Bush has asked the vaccine companies to produce a vaccine. Here is the flaw in that little plan; the real threat of avian flu is that it will infect a host that is already infected with a human strain of influenza and recombine. This new type of flu might and I stress, might combine the ability to easily infect humans and be, at least from an immunological perspective be completely new, leaving us defenseless, and the vaccine useless. This is how we got the Swine flu.
It is not an accident that East Asia is where most new flu strains get their start. The three major types of flu hosts ducks, pigs and people live in close contact and share their viruses. Some pig in Shanghai, China might at this very moment be allowing the exchange of genetic information between strains of influenza that will be the next super virus.
Should we panic and close the airports? No! Should we be vigilant and if we get sick stay home? Yes! Influenza is one on of the best novice bioweapons, because people want to spread it. People go to work thinking I’ll be ok and start infecting people, or if they are ordered into work when they feel bad they think “Wait till they feel like this, that’ll teach them” and start intentionally infecting people. Parents send sick kids to school just so it will be someone else’s problem, and by lunch time when the disease has had a chance to reach full power dozens of people are infected and the kids are sent home.
There is good money in a saliva test for flu. If it cost like a buck a pop and people just held the stick in their mouth for a minute it would sell like bottled water and plywood before a hurricane.
In the mean time most people are worrying about an Avian Influenza pandemic. The Avian flu (mostly the H5N1 flu strain) is deadly to birds and has been found in Turkey and East Asia. While only 50 people have died from the avian flus (there are many types) and it is not spread from person to person, it is a major concern. So major in fact that birds are being killed en masse to ensure that it doesn’t spread, and Bush has asked the vaccine companies to produce a vaccine. Here is the flaw in that little plan; the real threat of avian flu is that it will infect a host that is already infected with a human strain of influenza and recombine. This new type of flu might and I stress, might combine the ability to easily infect humans and be, at least from an immunological perspective be completely new, leaving us defenseless, and the vaccine useless. This is how we got the Swine flu.
It is not an accident that East Asia is where most new flu strains get their start. The three major types of flu hosts ducks, pigs and people live in close contact and share their viruses. Some pig in Shanghai, China might at this very moment be allowing the exchange of genetic information between strains of influenza that will be the next super virus.
Should we panic and close the airports? No! Should we be vigilant and if we get sick stay home? Yes! Influenza is one on of the best novice bioweapons, because people want to spread it. People go to work thinking I’ll be ok and start infecting people, or if they are ordered into work when they feel bad they think “Wait till they feel like this, that’ll teach them” and start intentionally infecting people. Parents send sick kids to school just so it will be someone else’s problem, and by lunch time when the disease has had a chance to reach full power dozens of people are infected and the kids are sent home.
There is good money in a saliva test for flu. If it cost like a buck a pop and people just held the stick in their mouth for a minute it would sell like bottled water and plywood before a hurricane.
Friday, October 21, 2005
Shower Soothers
While I am not big into product reviews, this stuff is worth it! The new SudaCare Shower Soothers, work as promised. Man you throw one of those bad boys on the floor of your shower, and in about a minute you head will be cleared right out. Then after about 3 minutes (if you weren’t completely stopped up) you will be able to feel how far back into your head your sinus go cause every breath will be like ice, (not in a bad way, it’s just different.) Some advice when they say the disk gets hot they are serious, (yes I should believe them but that is something you have to figure out for yourself.) Also, there will be a stream of colored water coming off the disk, DO NOT step in it, I learned this the hard way. They are about a buck a piece, but since they are like a thousand times strong than Vick’s Vapor Rub I think they are worth it!
Thursday, October 20, 2005
Random thoughts on relationships
Despite what men think women pick men, not the other way around. Think about it, if you are not dating women who are so far below what you could get that they are just so happy to have your attention, they pick you! Asking a girl out is not a misnomer, the key word is asking, since you have a chance of hearing the word No. I am glad it is this way, choice is a terrible thing. How many women have said yes to one guy only to find out shortly after that a better guy was planning to ask? This is a terrible thing but the situation is very similar the philosophical math problem the prisoner’s dilemma. Since if the goal is be with someone is it better to turn down a man now in hopes of better one in the future, or should she take the current guy assuming the better guy in the future isn’t likely? Quite the quandary, since how you answer that question will determine a good part of your life and choosing wrong can get you a bum or a house full of cats. ;)
Men’s actually play the same game, only we don’t have it as bad since picking which women to pursue isn’t near as hard, but deciding how hard you will try to turn the mandatory “no” on the first request into a “yes”, can be difficult. Now since women have the same problem of finding ways to get asked, I guess men just have it easier.
There are few things more awkward (or amusing in a very evil way) than hanging out with a girl who is just “a friend” but would like a chance to be more. Actually it is only awkward if the guy knows the girl's feelings, if he hasn’t noticed then he can have a great time, while the girl digs her finger nails into her palm every time he says something to get her hopes up only to dash them in the next breath. However if the guy does know then it can be overly awkward, since he will try to avoid any conversion topics that raise or dash hopes. (It is wickedly amusing since this often impossible, and even more so if the girl doesn’t think he knows, he can watch her keep smiling even though it is clear she is biting her lip.) Yes, this is evil, but girls there is good news, unless you have slipped into a class were he thinks of you as a sister/mom figure, if he is there and being awkward with you, then you have a shot! Advice for men in this situation: Don’t touch them! While it seems like an innocent thing or even a good idea, don’t do it! I have no proof, but I am fairly sure that women can value a touch very highly, so touching them is just cruel. If she would smash her coffee cup over the head of the guy at the next table if you told her you would kiss her if she did, you taking her hand or brushing her leg under the table is like tormenting her. I could go on and use a Thesaurus of synonyms for cruel, but I would since “just don’t do it should suffice!”
A couple more things
Yes, men can be fairly clueless, and women can manipulate us, don’t get too full of yourself just cause it works. A lot of the time men know they are being manipulated, and do it what we are asked cause we choose too. We simply ignore the manipulation part, as irrelevant. Or we know that after request by manipulation comes the less pleasant ways women ask for things (nagging and yelling.) So, if it is something we would do anyways, she can feel good cause she got her way by being sly and we avoid her having a grunge can she had to ask the hard way, it is best to give in at the manipulation stage.
Also, when a man asks you what you want (like Where do you want to go to dinner?), just answer! Few things are more annoying than asking and being told “I don’t care, what do you want?”. Then having 99 things you suggest turned down, as not what she wants. It should be a law that if you reject a suggestion that you must give a new one!
Men’s actually play the same game, only we don’t have it as bad since picking which women to pursue isn’t near as hard, but deciding how hard you will try to turn the mandatory “no” on the first request into a “yes”, can be difficult. Now since women have the same problem of finding ways to get asked, I guess men just have it easier.
There are few things more awkward (or amusing in a very evil way) than hanging out with a girl who is just “a friend” but would like a chance to be more. Actually it is only awkward if the guy knows the girl's feelings, if he hasn’t noticed then he can have a great time, while the girl digs her finger nails into her palm every time he says something to get her hopes up only to dash them in the next breath. However if the guy does know then it can be overly awkward, since he will try to avoid any conversion topics that raise or dash hopes. (It is wickedly amusing since this often impossible, and even more so if the girl doesn’t think he knows, he can watch her keep smiling even though it is clear she is biting her lip.) Yes, this is evil, but girls there is good news, unless you have slipped into a class were he thinks of you as a sister/mom figure, if he is there and being awkward with you, then you have a shot! Advice for men in this situation: Don’t touch them! While it seems like an innocent thing or even a good idea, don’t do it! I have no proof, but I am fairly sure that women can value a touch very highly, so touching them is just cruel. If she would smash her coffee cup over the head of the guy at the next table if you told her you would kiss her if she did, you taking her hand or brushing her leg under the table is like tormenting her. I could go on and use a Thesaurus of synonyms for cruel, but I would since “just don’t do it should suffice!”
A couple more things
Yes, men can be fairly clueless, and women can manipulate us, don’t get too full of yourself just cause it works. A lot of the time men know they are being manipulated, and do it what we are asked cause we choose too. We simply ignore the manipulation part, as irrelevant. Or we know that after request by manipulation comes the less pleasant ways women ask for things (nagging and yelling.) So, if it is something we would do anyways, she can feel good cause she got her way by being sly and we avoid her having a grunge can she had to ask the hard way, it is best to give in at the manipulation stage.
Also, when a man asks you what you want (like Where do you want to go to dinner?), just answer! Few things are more annoying than asking and being told “I don’t care, what do you want?”. Then having 99 things you suggest turned down, as not what she wants. It should be a law that if you reject a suggestion that you must give a new one!
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
The new hurricanes and a warm winter
Well hurricane Wilma is forming in the Gulf of Mexico, and since hurricane season has another month we will soon see the Greek Alphabet letter storms for the first time ever. Hopefully, Wilma, Alpha, Beta, Gamma and any other storms that follow will spare the Gulf Coast, but since tropical storms almost always hit land someone will have to suffer. Right now Wilma is expected to hit Mexico in the next few days, but we will have to wait and see.
Why do I think we will see Letter storms?
Well here in Dallas it is still in the 90’s and it is mid-October. These high temps are hurricane fuel, and with the temps expected to continue for the foreseeable future there will be lots of fuel!
The only good news from all this is that we are expecting a warm winter across much of the country. Since natural gas and fuel oil prices are expected to be at record prices, 90% higher than last years already high prices, a warm winter would be welcome. While the NOAA says the warmer area will be mostly in the central US and the North West, even if the Northeast has its usual brutal winter, as long as the whole country doesn’t have high fuel use, fuel prices will stay down.
Caveat:
Remember fuel stocks are being built up right now and the people who decide the stocking levels are using the same NOAA map I am using, and while the overall winter maybe warmer it says nothing of winter storms. So they have decisions to make about how much to stock, and if they decide to stock for a 60% warmer winter than normal we could have problems. One large storm sweeping across the central US, could cause a surge in demand which will deplete supplies and will raise prices significantly. Since the storms move from the NW to SE, the opposite direct that fuel comes up from the Gulf Coast, it will take longer to replenish stocks in the North as fuel is withdrawn to meet increased demand in the South, so if a series of storms come through it might be a bad winter for the Central US.
With El Nino you have to take that good with the bad.
Why do I think we will see Letter storms?
Well here in Dallas it is still in the 90’s and it is mid-October. These high temps are hurricane fuel, and with the temps expected to continue for the foreseeable future there will be lots of fuel!
The only good news from all this is that we are expecting a warm winter across much of the country. Since natural gas and fuel oil prices are expected to be at record prices, 90% higher than last years already high prices, a warm winter would be welcome. While the NOAA says the warmer area will be mostly in the central US and the North West, even if the Northeast has its usual brutal winter, as long as the whole country doesn’t have high fuel use, fuel prices will stay down.
Caveat:
Remember fuel stocks are being built up right now and the people who decide the stocking levels are using the same NOAA map I am using, and while the overall winter maybe warmer it says nothing of winter storms. So they have decisions to make about how much to stock, and if they decide to stock for a 60% warmer winter than normal we could have problems. One large storm sweeping across the central US, could cause a surge in demand which will deplete supplies and will raise prices significantly. Since the storms move from the NW to SE, the opposite direct that fuel comes up from the Gulf Coast, it will take longer to replenish stocks in the North as fuel is withdrawn to meet increased demand in the South, so if a series of storms come through it might be a bad winter for the Central US.
With El Nino you have to take that good with the bad.
Barbie Clothes
For many years "those look like Barbie clothes" was something of an insult, or a statement that the clothes were really tiny. That all changed today when Mattel makers of Barbie announced that they are going to make Barbie clothes but for real women. Yes, you too can now wear doll clothes, and not cheap doll clothes either. A pair of Barbie jeans will cost you $180 and a Barbie sweat shirt $150 (but it has a hood, so you must be getting your money’s worth.) Now if they could just make women 5’9”, 36-18-33 to fit them. ;)
The Netherlands
Since I mentioned the Netherlands in the last post and how they treat marijuana cultivation the same as we treat cotton and corn I thought I would throw in a few more interesting facts about the Dutch.
But first a couple tangentially related facts about the US. First the Pennsylvania Dutch, creators of some of the most of the distinctly American foods like apple pie are actually German, or Deutsche not Dutch. Second despite the government’s insistence that marijuana has no medical purpose, they maintain a research facility in rural Mississippi to study hemp and marijuana cultivation, and the properties of the plant.
Ok back to the Dutch.
Most of the Netherlands is below sea level, all those pastoral windmills you see in the pictures are not windmills they actually wind powered pumps to stop the country from flooding.
What I find most interesting about the Netherlands is almost nothing is illegal but guns and hard drugs. Squatting is legal so if you build a home someone else can move in and you can’t evict them. Pot is legal, but I already covered that. Prostitution is legal and there is a brothel in the Amsterdam airport. (This is cheap but I can’t resist, that gives a new meaning to the term layover.) The Netherlands was the first European country to legalize same sex marriage, which I have no problem with. However they legalized polygamy last year, which besides being a bad idea is a touch creepy. Among the flat wrong things you can do in the Netherlands is they permit bestiality, and some what look the other way at child pornography.
They have also fully decriminalized doctor assisted suicide, and dealt with a host of other social issues that divide America.
Now you would think that a country that values personal liberty to the point where it borders on anarchy (in my opinion), and hosts the World Court would be peace loving. Alas that is wrong, in the spirit that made the Dutch a world trading power and brought it wealth and power through a level of colonial oppression that England and Japan point to and say see how nice we were compared to them, the Dutch aren’t peaceful people. The Dutch supplied Saddam Hussein with much of the materials he used to make the chemical weapons he used on the Kurds and the Iranians during the 80’s. The Dutch are also among the world’s biggest arms dealers, technically they only resell, but the result is the same. They are truly an interesting people the Dutch, trying to atone for a brutal past by going way far to left. Meanwhile, immigrants from Turkey and Morocco have begun to stretch the very open society and renewing interests in neo-Fascism. Just a subtle reminder that every society has its problems and that even in a Utopia someone will be unhappy because they aren’t are happy as their neighbor.
Now I will leave you with a thought the full name of the Shell Oil is Royal Dutch Shell.
But first a couple tangentially related facts about the US. First the Pennsylvania Dutch, creators of some of the most of the distinctly American foods like apple pie are actually German, or Deutsche not Dutch. Second despite the government’s insistence that marijuana has no medical purpose, they maintain a research facility in rural Mississippi to study hemp and marijuana cultivation, and the properties of the plant.
Ok back to the Dutch.
Most of the Netherlands is below sea level, all those pastoral windmills you see in the pictures are not windmills they actually wind powered pumps to stop the country from flooding.
What I find most interesting about the Netherlands is almost nothing is illegal but guns and hard drugs. Squatting is legal so if you build a home someone else can move in and you can’t evict them. Pot is legal, but I already covered that. Prostitution is legal and there is a brothel in the Amsterdam airport. (This is cheap but I can’t resist, that gives a new meaning to the term layover.) The Netherlands was the first European country to legalize same sex marriage, which I have no problem with. However they legalized polygamy last year, which besides being a bad idea is a touch creepy. Among the flat wrong things you can do in the Netherlands is they permit bestiality, and some what look the other way at child pornography.
They have also fully decriminalized doctor assisted suicide, and dealt with a host of other social issues that divide America.
Now you would think that a country that values personal liberty to the point where it borders on anarchy (in my opinion), and hosts the World Court would be peace loving. Alas that is wrong, in the spirit that made the Dutch a world trading power and brought it wealth and power through a level of colonial oppression that England and Japan point to and say see how nice we were compared to them, the Dutch aren’t peaceful people. The Dutch supplied Saddam Hussein with much of the materials he used to make the chemical weapons he used on the Kurds and the Iranians during the 80’s. The Dutch are also among the world’s biggest arms dealers, technically they only resell, but the result is the same. They are truly an interesting people the Dutch, trying to atone for a brutal past by going way far to left. Meanwhile, immigrants from Turkey and Morocco have begun to stretch the very open society and renewing interests in neo-Fascism. Just a subtle reminder that every society has its problems and that even in a Utopia someone will be unhappy because they aren’t are happy as their neighbor.
Now I will leave you with a thought the full name of the Shell Oil is Royal Dutch Shell.
Monday, October 17, 2005
Pot in the media
I am not sure if this is nationwide media push but here in Dallas there has been a sudden surge in media reporting about how we are losing the war against marijuana, and a lot of it seems to be almost slightly pro-legalization in that they say there are better ways to spend money. To me this seems like a test of the political winds, and I can’t wait to see which way they blow. If the government starts talking about the evils of Mary Jane and announces a major new offensive in the War on Drugs, well the message is obvious. However, if they let it slip, or the response is tempered, that might signal a weakening in the government’s resolve to enforce the prohibition on soft drugs. Now this is a long way away from legalizing but if pot was illegal, like speeding is illegal we could spend a lot of money we currently spend on enforcing the laws against pot to enforce the laws against hard drugs and real crimes.
In addition if pot was don’t ask don’t tell legal, it drive down the prices. While most pot growers are also pot users and therefore the only violence they are prone to is severely beating a hackeysack with a bunch of other stoners, there is a group of growers that are violent. Because pot is not a compact drug like Coke or Heroin, it is hard to smuggle, so Mexican Drug Cartels have taken to growing the pot here on clandestine farms hidden on public lands. These people are the violent gun toting psychopaths who kill fishermen and hikers, as well as Federal Agents, which hardens the resolve of the government to stomp out pot. However, if the price fell because more people grew their own, the Cartels which only care about the profit would begin to move to more profitable substances.
Now if pot was made legal and hit with 10% tax assuming the usage didn’t increase at all, and the price for pot was cut in half, and the government saw no savings from reduced enforcement or incarceration the government could add $2.3 billion a year to it’s coffers, plus the states split another ~$2 billion in sales tax. Now if we consider that in many areas the tax on tobacco is >100% (in some places 200%), plus taxes on manufactures, wholesalers and retails, means that cigarettes are taxed upwards of 500%. So, the government could tax the prices of pot back up to current prices and no one would blink. The newspapers say that pot sells for $160 an ounce, so the government could pull in $100 an ounce in taxes easy by the time it reached consumers, (which would more than pay for the cost of enforcing the tax laws). Even with taxes like that, the profit is still $50 an ounce versus 6 cents an ounce for tobacco, if you don’t think Philip Morse or RJR won’t jump at the chance to make that money, or that the tobacco farmers wouldn’t till under their crops and plant pot you are wrong (tobacco is $428 in profit per acre, pot could make them $2,000 easy.) Even if pot prices collapsed falling 500%, the profit is still dollars per oz, instead of cents per pound with tobacco. (In researching this article I found fake pot selling for hundreds of dollars a pound, even completely legal stuff sells for a premium.)
With pot legalized in the UK and Canada, and several states trying to legalize, how much longer can we keep it up? One of the reasons pot is on an upswing is that now you can buy it in Canada, and the US/Canadian border is like a sieve at the tightest locations and completely open in others. If Nevada or Oregon legalizes, keeping it illegal in the rest of the country would be a futile gesture.
I am not saying legalization is the right thing, I just think that marijuana isn’t a class 1 drug like Meth or Coke. If tobacco, alcohol, and milk are regulated substances but legal perhaps the same model might work for pot too. (Yes, milk is a regulated substance, but not for the same reasons the other two are.) Hell after seeing the effects of Meth (and cheap Whiskey) on rural communities, I think pot is an outstanding substitute for those who find it necessary to live life in an altered state and will find something to achieve this task. If pot helps the Meth problem in rural America, we should consider it. Yes potheads might not make great people, but when was the last time pot made someone torture their kid to death for ruining their stash, or beat an old woman to death so they could take her social security check? Meth is so popular in small towns because it is produced locally and is therefore cheap and readily available. If these people could buy pot at the same store they bought their Copenhagen and Natural Light, then go home and “forget”, how much call for Meth would their be?
However, if pot is to remain illegal, I have a few suggestions for helping to hurt the production of marijuana. In the 70’s and 80’s the government got rid of all the wild hemp. Since pot like any other plant only puts energy into flowers, until seeds are made, and the flowers are the drug, the growers get rid of the male plants, to keep seeds from forming. The seedless drug is both higher quality and harder to track to its source. Now if wild hemp which produced no THC (the compound that makes pot a drug) was planted and the male plants left to the pollen would spread far and wide causing seed formation in all the female plants for several miles. Seeds reduce the quality and efficacy of the drug, so it could no longer command a premium. Also, since the wild hemp produced no THC the seeds from the F1 hybrid would be useless for planting a new crop, so the farmer’s seed costs would increase. Last if multiple types of wild or industrial hemp were used the seeds produced would have different fathers. So, the types and amounts of each father type found in the seeds of confiscated pot could be used to track the drug to location it was grown. Yes, they are using DNA testing to track pot now, but if all the seeds are from the Netherlands or Canada how does that help?
Speaking of DNA and pot the Dutch Universities have massive breeding and molecular genetics programs to improve marijuana. It is a science to them, like corn and cotton are to us.
In addition if pot was don’t ask don’t tell legal, it drive down the prices. While most pot growers are also pot users and therefore the only violence they are prone to is severely beating a hackeysack with a bunch of other stoners, there is a group of growers that are violent. Because pot is not a compact drug like Coke or Heroin, it is hard to smuggle, so Mexican Drug Cartels have taken to growing the pot here on clandestine farms hidden on public lands. These people are the violent gun toting psychopaths who kill fishermen and hikers, as well as Federal Agents, which hardens the resolve of the government to stomp out pot. However, if the price fell because more people grew their own, the Cartels which only care about the profit would begin to move to more profitable substances.
Now if pot was made legal and hit with 10% tax assuming the usage didn’t increase at all, and the price for pot was cut in half, and the government saw no savings from reduced enforcement or incarceration the government could add $2.3 billion a year to it’s coffers, plus the states split another ~$2 billion in sales tax. Now if we consider that in many areas the tax on tobacco is >100% (in some places 200%), plus taxes on manufactures, wholesalers and retails, means that cigarettes are taxed upwards of 500%. So, the government could tax the prices of pot back up to current prices and no one would blink. The newspapers say that pot sells for $160 an ounce, so the government could pull in $100 an ounce in taxes easy by the time it reached consumers, (which would more than pay for the cost of enforcing the tax laws). Even with taxes like that, the profit is still $50 an ounce versus 6 cents an ounce for tobacco, if you don’t think Philip Morse or RJR won’t jump at the chance to make that money, or that the tobacco farmers wouldn’t till under their crops and plant pot you are wrong (tobacco is $428 in profit per acre, pot could make them $2,000 easy.) Even if pot prices collapsed falling 500%, the profit is still dollars per oz, instead of cents per pound with tobacco. (In researching this article I found fake pot selling for hundreds of dollars a pound, even completely legal stuff sells for a premium.)
With pot legalized in the UK and Canada, and several states trying to legalize, how much longer can we keep it up? One of the reasons pot is on an upswing is that now you can buy it in Canada, and the US/Canadian border is like a sieve at the tightest locations and completely open in others. If Nevada or Oregon legalizes, keeping it illegal in the rest of the country would be a futile gesture.
I am not saying legalization is the right thing, I just think that marijuana isn’t a class 1 drug like Meth or Coke. If tobacco, alcohol, and milk are regulated substances but legal perhaps the same model might work for pot too. (Yes, milk is a regulated substance, but not for the same reasons the other two are.) Hell after seeing the effects of Meth (and cheap Whiskey) on rural communities, I think pot is an outstanding substitute for those who find it necessary to live life in an altered state and will find something to achieve this task. If pot helps the Meth problem in rural America, we should consider it. Yes potheads might not make great people, but when was the last time pot made someone torture their kid to death for ruining their stash, or beat an old woman to death so they could take her social security check? Meth is so popular in small towns because it is produced locally and is therefore cheap and readily available. If these people could buy pot at the same store they bought their Copenhagen and Natural Light, then go home and “forget”, how much call for Meth would their be?
However, if pot is to remain illegal, I have a few suggestions for helping to hurt the production of marijuana. In the 70’s and 80’s the government got rid of all the wild hemp. Since pot like any other plant only puts energy into flowers, until seeds are made, and the flowers are the drug, the growers get rid of the male plants, to keep seeds from forming. The seedless drug is both higher quality and harder to track to its source. Now if wild hemp which produced no THC (the compound that makes pot a drug) was planted and the male plants left to the pollen would spread far and wide causing seed formation in all the female plants for several miles. Seeds reduce the quality and efficacy of the drug, so it could no longer command a premium. Also, since the wild hemp produced no THC the seeds from the F1 hybrid would be useless for planting a new crop, so the farmer’s seed costs would increase. Last if multiple types of wild or industrial hemp were used the seeds produced would have different fathers. So, the types and amounts of each father type found in the seeds of confiscated pot could be used to track the drug to location it was grown. Yes, they are using DNA testing to track pot now, but if all the seeds are from the Netherlands or Canada how does that help?
Speaking of DNA and pot the Dutch Universities have massive breeding and molecular genetics programs to improve marijuana. It is a science to them, like corn and cotton are to us.
Saturday, October 15, 2005
Things I learned from TV
I have learned several life lessons from my years of watching TV that I want to share with you. I am not talking about the obvious stuff like if you have your mortal enemy in your grasp, shot them, don’t talk them to death! If you feel the need for them to hear your brilliant plan in the last moments of their life then shot them in the liver or knee caps first, that way they’re still alive but not going anywhere. (How many perfectly good plans for world domination have been ruined by a long winded discussion before the coup de grace?) Or if you life feels like a soap opera then always get their full life history before you marry someone. How awkward would it be to marry your long lost sibling, the child of your parents arch-enemy, or an assassin sent to kill you?
I am talking about less obvious stuff, like if you fly over any ocean other than the North Atlantic (too cold and few islands), your carryon bag should always contain a batteryless LED flashlight, fishing line (and hooks if you can), protein bars, water purifying tablets, vitamins, Gatorade powder, a box of heavy gauge trashbags, a roll of aluminum foil, condoms (not for what you think), a survival manual which you have read, broad spectrum antibiotics, 50 SPF sunscreen, OFF, pain killers, a first aid kit, soap, several sweaters, a pair of goggles, and books you wouldn’t read unless you had all the time in the world. Oh sure the security people will look at you funny, but you will thank me when your plane crashes and you end up on a deserted island. (Yes, there is other stuff you would need, but it is one thing for the security people to look at you fun, it is another for them to take you into the little room for interrogation.)
For the truly paranoid use luggage that floats and bring more food bars, water purifying tablets, medical supplies and antibiotics, tarps, rope and heavy string, magnesium matches, several knives, a Leatherman, a heavy machete, a wire saw, wire animal traps, wet stones and spice blends that are very strong with lots of salt and pepper/chili. For the long term seeds for heirloom corn, squash, spinach, lentils/peas/beans/soy, chili peppers, tomatoes, herbs, alliums, and cabbage (if it is cool enough) (bring several varieties of each since some might not adapt, and heirloom is important since you will be saving seeds and hybrids don’t breed true, rice, and other cereal grains are impractical since they require lots of land and labor. Keep the seeds in an airtight container, since they shouldn’t get wet if you go down, and if you don’t so the USDAs dogs can’t smell them when your bags are checked.) Remember this is survival not civilization so you will be gill netting, trapping, and practicing slash and burn agricultural all of which are illegal, but they will have to rescue you before they arrest you. Also, consider your footwear, sensible shoes that tie are you best bet, leather soles or heels are not shoes you wish to live in for a long time. (This is also that same stuff you should have along if you expect an accident or dragons destroy civilization.) While this is not a complete list of survival stuff, the rule of thumb is you want stuff that can break like a radio or requires something like bullets to function.
The other thing I have learned is that in future when humans are getting mechanical parts I don’t want anything that would let my mind to be directly connected to the net or core or whatever they will call it in the future. Sure it would be cool to have all the parts that break (organs, bones, etc) replaced with mechanical super parts or to have eagle vision across the entire electromagnetic spectrum. I might even go so far as to get external memory installed so I could keep information that was likely to be forgotten in it (such as directions, people’s names, or calculus, yes it would be cybernetic palmpilot.) But no direct connections to the outside and certainly nothing that was wireless. Yes telepathy would be cool but the risk of problems wouldn’t be worth it. While I am sure that anyone who entered my mind would be unable to make any sense out of the huge amounts of jumbled information to do anything (if they weren’t killed instantly by the connection) how can you have secrets if your storage facility isn’t secure? Now days you have to bribe or torture to get information from people, if your mind is connected to shared network all someone would have to do is record your dreams, or in cyber lingo you’re your mind.
Remember “Just say No to cybernetics!”
I am talking about less obvious stuff, like if you fly over any ocean other than the North Atlantic (too cold and few islands), your carryon bag should always contain a batteryless LED flashlight, fishing line (and hooks if you can), protein bars, water purifying tablets, vitamins, Gatorade powder, a box of heavy gauge trashbags, a roll of aluminum foil, condoms (not for what you think), a survival manual which you have read, broad spectrum antibiotics, 50 SPF sunscreen, OFF, pain killers, a first aid kit, soap, several sweaters, a pair of goggles, and books you wouldn’t read unless you had all the time in the world. Oh sure the security people will look at you funny, but you will thank me when your plane crashes and you end up on a deserted island. (Yes, there is other stuff you would need, but it is one thing for the security people to look at you fun, it is another for them to take you into the little room for interrogation.)
For the truly paranoid use luggage that floats and bring more food bars, water purifying tablets, medical supplies and antibiotics, tarps, rope and heavy string, magnesium matches, several knives, a Leatherman, a heavy machete, a wire saw, wire animal traps, wet stones and spice blends that are very strong with lots of salt and pepper/chili. For the long term seeds for heirloom corn, squash, spinach, lentils/peas/beans/soy, chili peppers, tomatoes, herbs, alliums, and cabbage (if it is cool enough) (bring several varieties of each since some might not adapt, and heirloom is important since you will be saving seeds and hybrids don’t breed true, rice, and other cereal grains are impractical since they require lots of land and labor. Keep the seeds in an airtight container, since they shouldn’t get wet if you go down, and if you don’t so the USDAs dogs can’t smell them when your bags are checked.) Remember this is survival not civilization so you will be gill netting, trapping, and practicing slash and burn agricultural all of which are illegal, but they will have to rescue you before they arrest you. Also, consider your footwear, sensible shoes that tie are you best bet, leather soles or heels are not shoes you wish to live in for a long time. (This is also that same stuff you should have along if you expect an accident or dragons destroy civilization.) While this is not a complete list of survival stuff, the rule of thumb is you want stuff that can break like a radio or requires something like bullets to function.
The other thing I have learned is that in future when humans are getting mechanical parts I don’t want anything that would let my mind to be directly connected to the net or core or whatever they will call it in the future. Sure it would be cool to have all the parts that break (organs, bones, etc) replaced with mechanical super parts or to have eagle vision across the entire electromagnetic spectrum. I might even go so far as to get external memory installed so I could keep information that was likely to be forgotten in it (such as directions, people’s names, or calculus, yes it would be cybernetic palmpilot.) But no direct connections to the outside and certainly nothing that was wireless. Yes telepathy would be cool but the risk of problems wouldn’t be worth it. While I am sure that anyone who entered my mind would be unable to make any sense out of the huge amounts of jumbled information to do anything (if they weren’t killed instantly by the connection) how can you have secrets if your storage facility isn’t secure? Now days you have to bribe or torture to get information from people, if your mind is connected to shared network all someone would have to do is record your dreams, or in cyber lingo you’re your mind.
Remember “Just say No to cybernetics!”
Friday, October 14, 2005
The grocery store as a meatmarket
If a woman wants to be treated like meat all she need do is leave the house, and at some point during the day she will be inspected more closely than she would if she was cow at auction. However, it is much less common for a man to receive similar treatment. But there is one place a man can go to be treated similarly: nice grocery store. I live and work near nice areas so while I do my primary shopping at low end stores I can shop at Central Market or Wholefoods. (While I think much of the organic/whole food crazy is silly, those stores have way nicer stuff than Safeway. No sprouted onions or wrinkled peppers, and you can barely go a few steps without being offered help.)
The best time for a guy to go if he wants to be treated like meat is from 2:30 to 6 on a weekday, when most people are working or just getting off. During those hours I have noticed that almost everyone in the store is female. (I figure that the women from 2:30 to about 4 are housewives, and since men don’t usually shop for dinner everyday since single men shop late or on the weekend, the women from 4-6 are single professional women just picking up a couple things for their dinner.) Either way every time I shop during those hours the number of women who are super nice, or seem to “need” the same things I do “repeatedly” goes way up. Even more amusing is that some will “need” things off high shelves or after I walk down an aisle right as I turn and I can see them for a split second, and they are staring at me, with that “predator” look. Now I am not Brad Pitt or Orlando Bloom or whoever the hot guy all the women want, but they are just regular women too. While many of the women are quite open about their “interest”, I have tested the assumption to ensure I am not misreading the signals. By shopping at these same stores outside, the stated time interval, the same type of women who are now accompanied by their mates or kids, are far less interested, and just want to shop and go home. Now this same thing happens at Walmart and Safeway during the same hours, but if I am going to get chatted up by total stranger at a store I am going with the woman at Wholefoods who is wearing clothes from Neiman’s and carrying a Coach purse and works out everyday, rather than the Walmart woman in an old T-shirt and sweat pants, buying 12 pounds of snack cakes. Call me shallow but if someone is going to stare at my ass or try and touch me, I want quality! ;)
What is more useful is that these same stores are in a gay part of town, so most of the employees and male shoppers are shall we say coveting the women’s Prada’s. (I have no idea if any of the women are wearing Prada’s but given the area it is likely.) The reason it is useful is that a lot of gay men like manly men. So the “associates” as they are called will walk right past an attractive woman and help me, when at my normal store I couldn’t get them away from her with a net and tranquilizer gun. Most men are nervous around gays because they are insecure, and being hit on by a man causes to question their sexuality and like Yoda said fear leads to anger... I am straight and I have no reason to question that, so when another man makes eyes at me or stares at my crotch, I feel fuzzy inside since it is just a complement. However, the best part is getting special treatment, since pretty women get special treatment all the time, but I get it rarely. When the guy behind the counter is making eyes at you, you generally get free stuff. (Yes, a man can be excited by a getting a free nutmeg or cheese risotto cake, and still be straight.)
I am not trying to demean the plight of women who spend their lives being hooted at by morbidly obese construction workers, but if you consider the alternative, which would you rather have? Also, I just find it amusing and ironic that in that place at that time, I can see how the other half lives, as 30 and 40 something women think lurid thoughts me and men make eyes and treat me nice.
The best time for a guy to go if he wants to be treated like meat is from 2:30 to 6 on a weekday, when most people are working or just getting off. During those hours I have noticed that almost everyone in the store is female. (I figure that the women from 2:30 to about 4 are housewives, and since men don’t usually shop for dinner everyday since single men shop late or on the weekend, the women from 4-6 are single professional women just picking up a couple things for their dinner.) Either way every time I shop during those hours the number of women who are super nice, or seem to “need” the same things I do “repeatedly” goes way up. Even more amusing is that some will “need” things off high shelves or after I walk down an aisle right as I turn and I can see them for a split second, and they are staring at me, with that “predator” look. Now I am not Brad Pitt or Orlando Bloom or whoever the hot guy all the women want, but they are just regular women too. While many of the women are quite open about their “interest”, I have tested the assumption to ensure I am not misreading the signals. By shopping at these same stores outside, the stated time interval, the same type of women who are now accompanied by their mates or kids, are far less interested, and just want to shop and go home. Now this same thing happens at Walmart and Safeway during the same hours, but if I am going to get chatted up by total stranger at a store I am going with the woman at Wholefoods who is wearing clothes from Neiman’s and carrying a Coach purse and works out everyday, rather than the Walmart woman in an old T-shirt and sweat pants, buying 12 pounds of snack cakes. Call me shallow but if someone is going to stare at my ass or try and touch me, I want quality! ;)
What is more useful is that these same stores are in a gay part of town, so most of the employees and male shoppers are shall we say coveting the women’s Prada’s. (I have no idea if any of the women are wearing Prada’s but given the area it is likely.) The reason it is useful is that a lot of gay men like manly men. So the “associates” as they are called will walk right past an attractive woman and help me, when at my normal store I couldn’t get them away from her with a net and tranquilizer gun. Most men are nervous around gays because they are insecure, and being hit on by a man causes to question their sexuality and like Yoda said fear leads to anger... I am straight and I have no reason to question that, so when another man makes eyes at me or stares at my crotch, I feel fuzzy inside since it is just a complement. However, the best part is getting special treatment, since pretty women get special treatment all the time, but I get it rarely. When the guy behind the counter is making eyes at you, you generally get free stuff. (Yes, a man can be excited by a getting a free nutmeg or cheese risotto cake, and still be straight.)
I am not trying to demean the plight of women who spend their lives being hooted at by morbidly obese construction workers, but if you consider the alternative, which would you rather have? Also, I just find it amusing and ironic that in that place at that time, I can see how the other half lives, as 30 and 40 something women think lurid thoughts me and men make eyes and treat me nice.
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
The economy: on the brink of stagflation. Part 2: Your choices
(Economics it like biology far too complex to understand as a whole, but like biology patterns emerge and pathways can be isolated. That is why I love economics; it is so easy for the biologist to understand. Now before you alter your investment portfolio, I have had precious few economics classes and never worked for the Federal Reserve.)
Unless government spending goes up and fuel prices go down, very soon we are headed to hard times. I figure if you can see something is a "bubble" there is enough doubt to pop it. So, suggest you don’t buy a house for awhile, unless you are sure you will be in it long term and get a fixed rate mortgage that you can pay. Otherwise I advise saving and waiting especially if you are in a bubble area. If you are in an apartment that is cheap you can save up until it is a buyer’s market and get a better house and make a bigger down payment, then buying a house now that you can't afford and possible seeing it not appreciate in value fast enough to beat interest rates.(A bigger down payment is money in the bank, if you borrow $100K at 5.75% for 30 years you pay $583.57 a month for a total of $210,085, but if you borrow $80K at 5.75% for 30 years you pay $466.86 a month for a total of $186,069 which when you consider the $20K down saves you $22,000 dollars over the life of the loan. This is money in your pocket every month for 30 years and big money when you sell.)
However, if you are in an apartment now and don’t plan to get a house that is good too since it is harder to raise the rent on you if lots of people suddenly find themselves in need of housing. Yes, you have no equity, but you also have less risk since you aren’t responsible for maintenance, so if you are living check to check in an apartment a broken appliance isn’t your concern and so won’t be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. If you can rent a house do it, that way if you decide to buy you might be able to weasel some of you rent money as equity in the house (but don’t count on it) or if the owners do bankrupt you can make an offer to the bank to pay off the loan and get the equity back that way. (The karma implications of doing this are substantial, so consider that you are doing something hoping that someone else suffers.) Home equity loans are like financial suicide, of you sell your equity to pay high interest debt and you default (or the bubble bursts and value of your house falls) you lose your house, your equity, and still owe money! Yes, if you have debt and must refinance don’t get adjustable rate loans, interest rates almost certainly go up in the next few years, so you might go from 4.5% to 7% or more. The last time we stagflated interest rates were in the teens.
This piece of advice you should take with a huge grain of salt, if you have extra money that you can either save or pay credit card debit, I say pay the debt. Why? The bank gives you 3% interest but the credit card company charges between 9-20%, so while it is riskier than money in the bank, you save money on interest and restore your emergency borrowing power. Why is this riskier? Because it requires huge amounts of discipline and chances are you built up high credit card debit because you lacked discipline. To do this you must have enough savings to at least make the minimum payment every month no matter what happens because defaulting screws you more than you can imagine. So, I will waffle here a say you should balance savings with paying high interest debt.
Start cutting expenses now, if you spent $8 on coffee a day, stop now before you have to stop. With less than a month of savings you can buy an espresso machine and make better coffee for less money. Eat in more, even if you buy high priced groceries, it is still cheaper than eating out and probably healther too. Invest in "money saving" things, like the espresso machine costs $200 but with coffee costs and drinking 2 cups a day you save $1,500 a year vs Starblanks. Or if you don’t have one, buy a washer and drier. Say it costs $1 for wash and dry a load of laundry at a wash place, well your $500 Sear’s washer and drier only cost you 25 cents each cycle, plus no getting to and from the place so more savings. Even so it only takes 650 loads of wash to pay it back which at 4 loads a week is less than 3 years considering only a 75 cents savings per load. Remember the savings are money in your pocket and you have “something” which is like equity. (Which if inflation becomes high owning things is the only stable form of savings, since your $500 washer/drier was still $500 dollars, when they go up to $750 your used machine increases in value too and if the wash place raises it’s prices to $2 a load, even if your costs double too, you just save money faster with a payback period of 1.5 years.)
However, I don’t suggest you get rid of cable, Netflix or broadband internet since those provide fixed price entertainment. Seeing 5 movies (with someone else) a month costs me the same but only entertains me for 10 hours (and I have to spend $5 in gas to get to the theater), but since the average person has >200 free hours a month, what do you do the rest of the time? Yes, you will get chunky but if all your exercise was coming from walking to and from the car at the mall or theater, you were going to get chunky anyways. I want to give responsible advice, so take the saving and buy something that makes you forget you are exercising, like a soccer ball or a lawn games. While you might play a Navy Seal in a videogame and make him run 25 kilometers flat out, you are still sitting on you ass. Plus while real games never get old, video games do, so you have to buy new games and new systems to keep up. When was the last time you have to upgrade a ball because the field used Grass version 2.1 and your ball was only compatible with versions 1.9 or lower? America had a high tech Depression in the 1930’s with cars and radios, so I am proposing the future of high tech economic downturns. I don’t think it would be such a bad thing for people to realize that a sand box and a creative mind are excellent toys for children, but lets face it in the 1930’s the radio and the car were cheap entertainment for hard times and now it is DVDs and MP3s.
Unless government spending goes up and fuel prices go down, very soon we are headed to hard times. I figure if you can see something is a "bubble" there is enough doubt to pop it. So, suggest you don’t buy a house for awhile, unless you are sure you will be in it long term and get a fixed rate mortgage that you can pay. Otherwise I advise saving and waiting especially if you are in a bubble area. If you are in an apartment that is cheap you can save up until it is a buyer’s market and get a better house and make a bigger down payment, then buying a house now that you can't afford and possible seeing it not appreciate in value fast enough to beat interest rates.(A bigger down payment is money in the bank, if you borrow $100K at 5.75% for 30 years you pay $583.57 a month for a total of $210,085, but if you borrow $80K at 5.75% for 30 years you pay $466.86 a month for a total of $186,069 which when you consider the $20K down saves you $22,000 dollars over the life of the loan. This is money in your pocket every month for 30 years and big money when you sell.)
However, if you are in an apartment now and don’t plan to get a house that is good too since it is harder to raise the rent on you if lots of people suddenly find themselves in need of housing. Yes, you have no equity, but you also have less risk since you aren’t responsible for maintenance, so if you are living check to check in an apartment a broken appliance isn’t your concern and so won’t be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. If you can rent a house do it, that way if you decide to buy you might be able to weasel some of you rent money as equity in the house (but don’t count on it) or if the owners do bankrupt you can make an offer to the bank to pay off the loan and get the equity back that way. (The karma implications of doing this are substantial, so consider that you are doing something hoping that someone else suffers.) Home equity loans are like financial suicide, of you sell your equity to pay high interest debt and you default (or the bubble bursts and value of your house falls) you lose your house, your equity, and still owe money! Yes, if you have debt and must refinance don’t get adjustable rate loans, interest rates almost certainly go up in the next few years, so you might go from 4.5% to 7% or more. The last time we stagflated interest rates were in the teens.
This piece of advice you should take with a huge grain of salt, if you have extra money that you can either save or pay credit card debit, I say pay the debt. Why? The bank gives you 3% interest but the credit card company charges between 9-20%, so while it is riskier than money in the bank, you save money on interest and restore your emergency borrowing power. Why is this riskier? Because it requires huge amounts of discipline and chances are you built up high credit card debit because you lacked discipline. To do this you must have enough savings to at least make the minimum payment every month no matter what happens because defaulting screws you more than you can imagine. So, I will waffle here a say you should balance savings with paying high interest debt.
Start cutting expenses now, if you spent $8 on coffee a day, stop now before you have to stop. With less than a month of savings you can buy an espresso machine and make better coffee for less money. Eat in more, even if you buy high priced groceries, it is still cheaper than eating out and probably healther too. Invest in "money saving" things, like the espresso machine costs $200 but with coffee costs and drinking 2 cups a day you save $1,500 a year vs Starblanks. Or if you don’t have one, buy a washer and drier. Say it costs $1 for wash and dry a load of laundry at a wash place, well your $500 Sear’s washer and drier only cost you 25 cents each cycle, plus no getting to and from the place so more savings. Even so it only takes 650 loads of wash to pay it back which at 4 loads a week is less than 3 years considering only a 75 cents savings per load. Remember the savings are money in your pocket and you have “something” which is like equity. (Which if inflation becomes high owning things is the only stable form of savings, since your $500 washer/drier was still $500 dollars, when they go up to $750 your used machine increases in value too and if the wash place raises it’s prices to $2 a load, even if your costs double too, you just save money faster with a payback period of 1.5 years.)
However, I don’t suggest you get rid of cable, Netflix or broadband internet since those provide fixed price entertainment. Seeing 5 movies (with someone else) a month costs me the same but only entertains me for 10 hours (and I have to spend $5 in gas to get to the theater), but since the average person has >200 free hours a month, what do you do the rest of the time? Yes, you will get chunky but if all your exercise was coming from walking to and from the car at the mall or theater, you were going to get chunky anyways. I want to give responsible advice, so take the saving and buy something that makes you forget you are exercising, like a soccer ball or a lawn games. While you might play a Navy Seal in a videogame and make him run 25 kilometers flat out, you are still sitting on you ass. Plus while real games never get old, video games do, so you have to buy new games and new systems to keep up. When was the last time you have to upgrade a ball because the field used Grass version 2.1 and your ball was only compatible with versions 1.9 or lower? America had a high tech Depression in the 1930’s with cars and radios, so I am proposing the future of high tech economic downturns. I don’t think it would be such a bad thing for people to realize that a sand box and a creative mind are excellent toys for children, but lets face it in the 1930’s the radio and the car were cheap entertainment for hard times and now it is DVDs and MP3s.
The economy: on the brink of stagflation. Part 1: Greenspan’s choice
So here is the deal. Right now high energy costs are hurting everyone’s pocket book. Fuel costs for winter heating has doubled since last year, and with gas prices expected to stay around $3 for awhile it’s starting to really hurt. However, most consumer goods have not yet gone up in price to reflect the increased costs, or at least not enough to return the margins to the former levels. Now the problem is that as people’s wages rise to help cover the increased cost of living, then the cost of consumer goods will have to rise too since the increased labor costs can’t be absorbed by the already reduced margins. (I agree that a minimum wage of $5.15 which has been $5.15 for a very long time isn’t enough, but that is not relevant to the discussion.) This problem is called inflation, since people’s purchasing power is reduced however inflation normally occurs when the economy is growing since more money is put into the economy which drives up prices. We’ve got what was called stagflation, since high fuel costs alone are driving the increases in cost of living, so without economic growth we stagnant. The last time we had stagflation was the Carter years, and (I don’t care what you think of him) it took Reagan’s aggressive military spending (sort of like an evil New Deal) to get us out.
This time I think it will be a special stagflation. For many people the wage adjustment will not actually be enough, since it will not keep pace with the rising cost of living, so it will only slow the bleeding. For years people were living on stretched budgets with high housing costs, and credit debit. This means the average American’s savings isn’t enough to cushion increases in expenses. Now is the bad part the Federal Reserve can either go after the inflation by rating interest rates or the stagnation by lowering interest rates. Now increased interest rates are the worse choice in the short term since many people and business currently depend on low debt costs to get by, so increased interest rates will drive a lot of bankruptcies and foreclosures, resulting a collapse of housing prices and increased unemployment. But the root problems are dealt with in the long term. The other way is less painful but might only delay the problem. If interest rates go down, borrowing money is cheaper and so hopefully more people and businesses can continue to make the payments and operate or even grow. Now this makes the inflation worse, but stimulates the economy. However, if the economy doesn’t grow and simply sinks deeper into debit, (like it has for the last 4.5 years), then when they eventually raise the interest rates the ensuing collapse is that much worse.
I don’t envy the choices made by those who set our monetary policy, since they are damned either way and so are we. There are two ways out first get fuel prices down to ~2002 levels, very very soon. This might restore the margins for the companies so they can increase wages, without substantial increases in prices. (The killer in stagflation is the people have less money and things cost more.) Or the government needs to spent big, like FDR or Reagan big. It is possible that all the rebuilding in New Orleans will help some, but the money isn’t spread out enough to really boost the economy. We need roads, and dams, and bombers, things people build but don’t buy. (The government is going to have to buy people’s debts from them to stabilize the economy this way.)
Now you might be thinking why not just raise wages? Well that starts a vicious cycle of price increases that quickly exceed the wage increases, and go around and around until equilibrium is reached, but the cost of living will be higher than wages for quite awhile. (I worked it out for the average Californian cost of living is such they need to make $19 an hour, which is outrageous, and I did the model on cheap energy costs.) Also, the rest of the worlds economy is tied to our economy, oil is sold worldwide on the dollar, and a lot of countries back their currency not on gold but on the dollar. So, our inflation in magnified in the rest of the world and hurts them far more. Besides China most of the world’s largest economies (and therefore more self sufficient economies) have high energy prices already and minimum wages around $10 an hour. Now then that serves as an excellent model for us since we can see how $4 gas in the UK translated into a $7 minimum wage, but that means the rest of the world has to move to compensate. The shockwaves will be terrible, since savings will be cut by a forth, and prices will rise quickly to meet the new price points. Most world economies depend on a stable high value dollar and a strong American desire to buy. If this stops, (sure we are not enjoying ourselves) they suffer far more, especially the poorer economies that depend on exports for most of the income. Now it is possible that the combined economic strength of the EU and euro can serve as a second economic super power and buffer the effects, but since they are stagflating too, I doubt it (gas is 11 pounds a gallon in the UK that is $19.27!!!, so quit whining about $3 a gallon gas.)
Stay tuned for part 2 what to do!
This time I think it will be a special stagflation. For many people the wage adjustment will not actually be enough, since it will not keep pace with the rising cost of living, so it will only slow the bleeding. For years people were living on stretched budgets with high housing costs, and credit debit. This means the average American’s savings isn’t enough to cushion increases in expenses. Now is the bad part the Federal Reserve can either go after the inflation by rating interest rates or the stagnation by lowering interest rates. Now increased interest rates are the worse choice in the short term since many people and business currently depend on low debt costs to get by, so increased interest rates will drive a lot of bankruptcies and foreclosures, resulting a collapse of housing prices and increased unemployment. But the root problems are dealt with in the long term. The other way is less painful but might only delay the problem. If interest rates go down, borrowing money is cheaper and so hopefully more people and businesses can continue to make the payments and operate or even grow. Now this makes the inflation worse, but stimulates the economy. However, if the economy doesn’t grow and simply sinks deeper into debit, (like it has for the last 4.5 years), then when they eventually raise the interest rates the ensuing collapse is that much worse.
I don’t envy the choices made by those who set our monetary policy, since they are damned either way and so are we. There are two ways out first get fuel prices down to ~2002 levels, very very soon. This might restore the margins for the companies so they can increase wages, without substantial increases in prices. (The killer in stagflation is the people have less money and things cost more.) Or the government needs to spent big, like FDR or Reagan big. It is possible that all the rebuilding in New Orleans will help some, but the money isn’t spread out enough to really boost the economy. We need roads, and dams, and bombers, things people build but don’t buy. (The government is going to have to buy people’s debts from them to stabilize the economy this way.)
Now you might be thinking why not just raise wages? Well that starts a vicious cycle of price increases that quickly exceed the wage increases, and go around and around until equilibrium is reached, but the cost of living will be higher than wages for quite awhile. (I worked it out for the average Californian cost of living is such they need to make $19 an hour, which is outrageous, and I did the model on cheap energy costs.) Also, the rest of the worlds economy is tied to our economy, oil is sold worldwide on the dollar, and a lot of countries back their currency not on gold but on the dollar. So, our inflation in magnified in the rest of the world and hurts them far more. Besides China most of the world’s largest economies (and therefore more self sufficient economies) have high energy prices already and minimum wages around $10 an hour. Now then that serves as an excellent model for us since we can see how $4 gas in the UK translated into a $7 minimum wage, but that means the rest of the world has to move to compensate. The shockwaves will be terrible, since savings will be cut by a forth, and prices will rise quickly to meet the new price points. Most world economies depend on a stable high value dollar and a strong American desire to buy. If this stops, (sure we are not enjoying ourselves) they suffer far more, especially the poorer economies that depend on exports for most of the income. Now it is possible that the combined economic strength of the EU and euro can serve as a second economic super power and buffer the effects, but since they are stagflating too, I doubt it (gas is 11 pounds a gallon in the UK that is $19.27!!!, so quit whining about $3 a gallon gas.)
Stay tuned for part 2 what to do!
Greek tragedy and my life
I haven’t been prefect as a person but I am sure I have done nothing so bad as to warrant a punishment fit for Sisyphus. It is not with in the scope of this site narrative for me to whine about my life but I thought the story of Sisyphus, might serve as a nice metaphor. While Sisyphus’ story is long and colorful he met his end when he betrayed Zeus, and was personally taken to the underworld by Hades (an honor, but not a good honor.) While he did manage to break out for a time, he was soon dragged back. For his crimes he was set a simple task, all he has to do is roll a stone over a hill. However, since the ancient had a serious cruel streak with the greatest effort he is able to roll the to the very top then right before it rolls down the other side freeing him, it rolls back to the hill forcing him to start all over. So, his sentence is of the cruelest type an eternity of toil and failure but since the stone waivers each time he is tormented by hope of obtaining his freedom, and seeing that hope crushed. Tantalus and Prometheus with enjoy similarly unpleasant eternities, for their crimes. You have to admire the Greek mythology since Muslim’s Jew’s and Christian’s may have unpleasant visions of a negative afterlife, but they lack the creative flare of the Greek’s to really make you suffer. However today I added a new twist to Sisyphus’, since when my stone rolled down the hill it flattened me in a fashion that would make Wile E. Coyote cringe.
End of whine
End of whine
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
RSS feeds, get rich quick scams (and the new CNN)
As the few of you who read my site frequently might have noticed I am trying to make it easier for people to get their “fix” by making it easier to subscribe to my feed. However, I must be getting old because I can’t tell if I am doing it right. I read all these sites on how to do it and they all says “it’s so easy”, so I do what it says to and hope for the best. Does it work? It seems too, but since I am the admin on the aggregator sites I have privileges that others don’t, so can’t really tell if any one else can get the feed.
So I am asking for your help, if you read the site through an RSS/Atom feed, plus let me know with an email or comment (since that means it works). If no one is using a feed, (which seems to be the case) will you try, and let me know? (I am not sure how I can thank you, but I will write nice things about you or make you a key figure in my new religion ;)
As for everyone else if it isn’t asking too much, can you at least tell me how you found the site, and what you think of it? I enjoy the feedback, it shows me you care. :)
Now you might wonder why I don’t just learn CSS, so I can make my own template and then control all the feeds and pinging? Well I am trying, but with all the sources of information it’s hard to get a clear picture, and you have to learn the quirks of each aggregator and the two feed services. Yes, that is a weak excuse, but it’s the only one I’ve got.
However, I in my quest for knowledge I did fine numerous blog scams. (Ads like “You can make $50K a month just by blogging, we can teach you how! The first lesson is free and the other 60 are only $24.99 each, so sign up now.”) Ok that didn’t actually surprise me, since get rich quick schemes are the most legitimate way to separate people from their money, but still to see it so well “organized” was impressive. There were whole communities of people trying to get rich from blogging, all paying for lessons and server space. Seriously, unless you have content that people want to buy (books, porn, goofy cartoon movies, a kidney, etc), you will have to work or pay for every set of eyeballs that sees your site. I am no CNN (hell CNN is no CNN anymore, that Nancy Grace lady and the entertainment news people need to sit down and shut up, so the news people talk. If CNN wants to have shows then they need to sell content to the local stations, I watch CNN for news, which I want on 24/7, not just when it is convenient for them.) But I digress, as I was saying I am no CNN, but in my opinion I have an ok record of putting up interesting content, and news that will be news on TV in a few days. However, if I get 4 or 5 new hits a day, I consider that a big day. Now if I had ad and I get 1/10 of a cent for each visitor that links out to one of my sponsor’s sites, then I make should nearly 15 cents a month. To make $50K a month I would have to have 50 million hits a month, and that level the traffic load would make Blogspot very mad at me. Yes, you can make money blogging but even full time writers for Weblogs.com are only pulling in $500 to $600 a month (and I can’t live on that. Could you?)
Perhaps I can just put a PayPal link on my site and if people like what they read they could just give me money. I could be a digital bum on the street corner holding a sign saying “Will be witty for food. Please help…” or I could go for the honest approach “Why lie? I need broadband”.
I have talked with several “Will work for food” bums they “make” >$75 a day and double that around the holidays so there is money in it. (Yes, I will talk to anyone.) As business plans go the digital bum is way better than the professional blogger with ads, since if one in 100 visitors gives me a dollar I make more than 10 times as much as a digital bum than whoring for clicks….
So I am asking for your help, if you read the site through an RSS/Atom feed, plus let me know with an email or comment (since that means it works). If no one is using a feed, (which seems to be the case) will you try, and let me know? (I am not sure how I can thank you, but I will write nice things about you or make you a key figure in my new religion ;)
As for everyone else if it isn’t asking too much, can you at least tell me how you found the site, and what you think of it? I enjoy the feedback, it shows me you care. :)
Now you might wonder why I don’t just learn CSS, so I can make my own template and then control all the feeds and pinging? Well I am trying, but with all the sources of information it’s hard to get a clear picture, and you have to learn the quirks of each aggregator and the two feed services. Yes, that is a weak excuse, but it’s the only one I’ve got.
However, I in my quest for knowledge I did fine numerous blog scams. (Ads like “You can make $50K a month just by blogging, we can teach you how! The first lesson is free and the other 60 are only $24.99 each, so sign up now.”) Ok that didn’t actually surprise me, since get rich quick schemes are the most legitimate way to separate people from their money, but still to see it so well “organized” was impressive. There were whole communities of people trying to get rich from blogging, all paying for lessons and server space. Seriously, unless you have content that people want to buy (books, porn, goofy cartoon movies, a kidney, etc), you will have to work or pay for every set of eyeballs that sees your site. I am no CNN (hell CNN is no CNN anymore, that Nancy Grace lady and the entertainment news people need to sit down and shut up, so the news people talk. If CNN wants to have shows then they need to sell content to the local stations, I watch CNN for news, which I want on 24/7, not just when it is convenient for them.) But I digress, as I was saying I am no CNN, but in my opinion I have an ok record of putting up interesting content, and news that will be news on TV in a few days. However, if I get 4 or 5 new hits a day, I consider that a big day. Now if I had ad and I get 1/10 of a cent for each visitor that links out to one of my sponsor’s sites, then I make should nearly 15 cents a month. To make $50K a month I would have to have 50 million hits a month, and that level the traffic load would make Blogspot very mad at me. Yes, you can make money blogging but even full time writers for Weblogs.com are only pulling in $500 to $600 a month (and I can’t live on that. Could you?)
Perhaps I can just put a PayPal link on my site and if people like what they read they could just give me money. I could be a digital bum on the street corner holding a sign saying “Will be witty for food. Please help…” or I could go for the honest approach “Why lie? I need broadband”.
I have talked with several “Will work for food” bums they “make” >$75 a day and double that around the holidays so there is money in it. (Yes, I will talk to anyone.) As business plans go the digital bum is way better than the professional blogger with ads, since if one in 100 visitors gives me a dollar I make more than 10 times as much as a digital bum than whoring for clicks….
Earthquakes, death tolls and what can be done
With the death toll following the earthquake in Pakistan expected to be between 35-40 thousand and with 2.5 million left homeless something must be done to prevent such tragedy in the future. The best way to prevent earthquake deaths and damage is properly engineered buildings, and high quality materials. Now the $64,000 question is how do we do this worldwide, even in some of the poorest parts of the world? The only way I can think of engineered lumber.
What is engineered lumber? Engineered lumber is like a wooden I-beam, so you get the strength of a large high quality board, but it is made of waste wood and it is light for it’s load capacity. Why engineered lumber? Because engineered lumber can be made anywhere in the world from some of the lowest quality wood imaginable, but every piece is the same. Because the materials are so reproducible, buildings can be pre-engineered and cheaply prefabed on a house sized assembly line, or if that isn’t possible designed from simple load and stress table, and cut on site and nailed together. You can’t do that with brick or stone (both of with have a tendency to turn to rubble in an earthquake.) Real wood is often unavailable and if it is the quality is unknown. Reinforced concrete is nice but is expensive and can’t be made to with stand earthquake loads without some pretty serious engineering. Iron or steel are nice but are too expensive and require skilled labor. For single or multi-family homes the best choice for earthquake hardened buildings is engineered lumber. It isn’t as cheap as real wood in some places but its design, transportation, and labor cost is much lower. (I figure now that most of New Orleans is going to get condemned, since once a building floods it is cheaper to rebuild than repair, engineered lumber and a host of other high tech building materials will get their chance to shine. However, the price of construction materials especially sheet rock is going to go way up. So if you are planning to build a house or remodel I would wait, or at least factor it into your budget. End of tangent.)
While engineered lumber may be the way of things in cities where materials are available and building can be inspected, in rural areas this will be more of a problem. To this end I suggest engineers without borders, (it’s like doctors without borders, but different.) This group would travel to high risk areas, and find ways to use local materials to build houses that can withstand Mother Nature’s wrath. In areas that have had a disaster, the EWB can come in and figure out how the make the remaining structures safe, and how to best rebuild. Earthquakes are a fact of life but with proper foundation and framing design deaths and property damage can be prevented. In the mean time hope for no aftershocks and a lot of miracles.
What is engineered lumber? Engineered lumber is like a wooden I-beam, so you get the strength of a large high quality board, but it is made of waste wood and it is light for it’s load capacity. Why engineered lumber? Because engineered lumber can be made anywhere in the world from some of the lowest quality wood imaginable, but every piece is the same. Because the materials are so reproducible, buildings can be pre-engineered and cheaply prefabed on a house sized assembly line, or if that isn’t possible designed from simple load and stress table, and cut on site and nailed together. You can’t do that with brick or stone (both of with have a tendency to turn to rubble in an earthquake.) Real wood is often unavailable and if it is the quality is unknown. Reinforced concrete is nice but is expensive and can’t be made to with stand earthquake loads without some pretty serious engineering. Iron or steel are nice but are too expensive and require skilled labor. For single or multi-family homes the best choice for earthquake hardened buildings is engineered lumber. It isn’t as cheap as real wood in some places but its design, transportation, and labor cost is much lower. (I figure now that most of New Orleans is going to get condemned, since once a building floods it is cheaper to rebuild than repair, engineered lumber and a host of other high tech building materials will get their chance to shine. However, the price of construction materials especially sheet rock is going to go way up. So if you are planning to build a house or remodel I would wait, or at least factor it into your budget. End of tangent.)
While engineered lumber may be the way of things in cities where materials are available and building can be inspected, in rural areas this will be more of a problem. To this end I suggest engineers without borders, (it’s like doctors without borders, but different.) This group would travel to high risk areas, and find ways to use local materials to build houses that can withstand Mother Nature’s wrath. In areas that have had a disaster, the EWB can come in and figure out how the make the remaining structures safe, and how to best rebuild. Earthquakes are a fact of life but with proper foundation and framing design deaths and property damage can be prevented. In the mean time hope for no aftershocks and a lot of miracles.
Monday, October 10, 2005
Genetics research for the home inventor. Version 2
A generation ago people learned wood or metal working in high school. Then as they grew up they tinkered in their garages building row boats or chairs with plans they got out of the back of Popular Mechanics. Now students are routinely taught genetic engineering. So plasmid preps and restriction enzyme digestions are familiar terms to most people who were at least college track in high school.
What will be in the back of Popular Mechanics in a few years?
In any city with a major university you can get everything you need to setup a genetics lab in you basement for a couple hundred dollars. If you think well regulated genetic experimentation that undergoes years of testing before it is reject by the USDA for release, is bad wait till some guy builds a new bacteria that eats PVC and then lets it go cause his neighbor’s lawn sprinkler got his hover car wet.
(Before anyone has a fit, it would be very very hard to actually make a PVC eating bacteria. It would be very hard to make an engineered bacterium that could live in the wild at all, since most lab adapted strains are “weak and soft” and would be killed and eaten very quickly once they were on their own.)
Seriously, here is the thing, since most of the early genetic research was done in the late 70’s and early 80’s using simple home build equipment the early technology can be combined with ’05 genetic knowledge to allow nearly anyone with the time and a little money to build their own genetics lab.
Now I am not here to provide a guide to DIY genetic experimentation, since you can get a Promega catalog and learn lots, so I don’t need too. While I do have concerns about the common man engaging in unregulated genetic experimentation, I don’t think it should be banned either. It is the only area where the “common” man can invent. Sure he can’t compete with a modern lab facility but rudimentary experimentation is very possible. I know for a fact the genetic puzzle has lots of missing pieces, so a cleaver experimenter can get on Pubmed and read papers to find areas where there are gaps in the scientific narrative, and seek to close them. Heck there are lots of cool things RNA and DNA can do alone. With a genome that is more junk than genes the human genome is a largely unexplored jungle with new species of DNA and RNA enzymes or other wonder waiting to be discovered. Oh sure computers are the way of the future, but computer programming is just learning a language and speaking it, so it is not really experimenting. To experiment with computers requires a fab and a foundry and you can’t get those things used at a university auction, since even in the 60’s and 70’s companies not individuals pioneered the early technology. With a few thousand dollars and a lot of time and luck, the garage molecular genetics researcher can contribute substantially to his field.
Look we can’t stop amateur genetic research, unless we make salt water and jello controlled substances. In fact there have been genetic engineers for hundreds of years Mendel and his peas. Heck I did my first genetic engineering experiment at 10, I got a bunch of snails put them in a bag and ran them through the X-ray machine at the airport about 20 times. Then I let them go in a controlled part of the yard and waited. If you are interested nothing happened (no evil mutant super-snail arose to conquer the lands) and since I got the snails in a wet climate and took them to a dry climate, after a few years the native snails out competed them and they died out.
What is the point? I think if we are going to teacher people genetic engineering when they are 17 we need to teach it better. They need to know the laws, and the risks, perhaps even a licensing process like amateur radio. There should be clubs, magazines (I like Popular Genetics) and a cable TV channel (GenTV, with shows like Dr. Debby Does DNA) we should not wait till there is a problem to get involved. Like any hobby that has potential misuses, policy and self regulation will be the most effective means of control. I can’t walk in the Radio Shack and buy a 10 Watt transceiver without a license, and I don’t think private citizens should be allowed to purchase certain enzymes or equipment without a license either. Clubs could split the cost of expensive equipment, provide waste pickup, and serve to educate the members and the community about the hobby. Companies could sequence DNA and make synthetic oligos and use the information to be sure the work was legal, or restrict the sale of items based on the licensee’s classification.
While the anti-genetic engineering people scream about apocalyptic danger from any attempts to fiddle with life. The day to day risks of even amateur genetic research are minimal, no one is going to turn themselves into a zebra or clone Hitler or whatever you see on TV. There is the possibility for problems to develop, so we must be proactive in attempting to minimize the risk and be ready to act if something does go wrong. As for people who might use the technology for evil, well those people are already out there, and if their research is improving Anthrax virulence factors, do you think they care if amateur genetic research as a whole is illegal? (If you are doing bioweapons development at your house, please pick up the phone, dial 911, and say “Anthrax” to whomever answers, and then wait right where you are, someone will be along shortly.) Of course some people start of ok then will be lured to do dangerous and illegal genetic research simply because it is taboo. While this might present a problem, without proper safety equipment these people are not long for this earth, so it will largely take care of itself. (Chances are these people would have found ways to kill themselves in other fields too, so is it really genetics fault they were nuts? Good double meaning huh?)
There are of course exceptions. Amateur virus research presents a potential problem but since with few exceptions human viruses are very difficult to work with, so no one is going to cross HIV with the common cold, or Ebola and West Nile in their home lab. (I don’t care what the video game people or the TV people say there is no Zombie virus and a retrovirus can’t make you turn into a chimera right before your eyes.) However, I am still strongly against home virus research and here’s why. A mutant virus can’t give you super powers anymore than a radioactive spider bite can, but it can kill you or give you cancer in a heart beat. Look putting a novel gene in bacteria more often than not results only in a dead bacteria, putting a novel gene in virus results in cancer and death (Look at the poor success rate of the John Hopkins genetic therapies, 9 in 10 died, and this was really well planned experiments.) Again you will not create a virus that makes you live longer, or a super-plague to zombify all humanity (if that seems like a good idea in your sick little mind), you will end up in box, deep underground or burned to a cinder when they napalm your lab with you in it, to prevent spreading of your cancer virus, and you will be remembered only for your Darwin Award! (If you are twisted you might think even cancer virus could be cool and novel, well it isn’t, there are lots of cancer viruses already, and bioweapons people have lousy retirement plans, either the burned to a cinder thing or a single shot to the back of the head when they become a liability, and if you did manage to live long enough to do to prison and aren’t killed by the inmates, you would just be waiting for your appeal before that one last meal and a short walk. Please take note that all roads lead to the same place.) In plain and simple English “Don’t mess with viruses, you might not live long enough to sorry.
To temper the previous rant I will close with this. Yes, teenagers represent most of the computer virus writers and general internet miscreants but just like kids with chemistry sets don’t automatically become Meth cooks, if they learn in a controlled environment they are more like to respect the technology and put it to good use. Given the number of people to at least take a passing interest amateur genetics research, we really can’t stop people from doing it any more than we can stop them from growing pot in a closet (based on the large number of pot magazines at my local bookstore that little prohibition isn’t going so well.) If we are to remain the intellectual juggernaut that we currently are, this country needs more scientists than wannabe pro basketball players. Since science has taken the place of wood shop, well still have a shot.
What will be in the back of Popular Mechanics in a few years?
In any city with a major university you can get everything you need to setup a genetics lab in you basement for a couple hundred dollars. If you think well regulated genetic experimentation that undergoes years of testing before it is reject by the USDA for release, is bad wait till some guy builds a new bacteria that eats PVC and then lets it go cause his neighbor’s lawn sprinkler got his hover car wet.
(Before anyone has a fit, it would be very very hard to actually make a PVC eating bacteria. It would be very hard to make an engineered bacterium that could live in the wild at all, since most lab adapted strains are “weak and soft” and would be killed and eaten very quickly once they were on their own.)
Seriously, here is the thing, since most of the early genetic research was done in the late 70’s and early 80’s using simple home build equipment the early technology can be combined with ’05 genetic knowledge to allow nearly anyone with the time and a little money to build their own genetics lab.
Now I am not here to provide a guide to DIY genetic experimentation, since you can get a Promega catalog and learn lots, so I don’t need too. While I do have concerns about the common man engaging in unregulated genetic experimentation, I don’t think it should be banned either. It is the only area where the “common” man can invent. Sure he can’t compete with a modern lab facility but rudimentary experimentation is very possible. I know for a fact the genetic puzzle has lots of missing pieces, so a cleaver experimenter can get on Pubmed and read papers to find areas where there are gaps in the scientific narrative, and seek to close them. Heck there are lots of cool things RNA and DNA can do alone. With a genome that is more junk than genes the human genome is a largely unexplored jungle with new species of DNA and RNA enzymes or other wonder waiting to be discovered. Oh sure computers are the way of the future, but computer programming is just learning a language and speaking it, so it is not really experimenting. To experiment with computers requires a fab and a foundry and you can’t get those things used at a university auction, since even in the 60’s and 70’s companies not individuals pioneered the early technology. With a few thousand dollars and a lot of time and luck, the garage molecular genetics researcher can contribute substantially to his field.
Look we can’t stop amateur genetic research, unless we make salt water and jello controlled substances. In fact there have been genetic engineers for hundreds of years Mendel and his peas. Heck I did my first genetic engineering experiment at 10, I got a bunch of snails put them in a bag and ran them through the X-ray machine at the airport about 20 times. Then I let them go in a controlled part of the yard and waited. If you are interested nothing happened (no evil mutant super-snail arose to conquer the lands) and since I got the snails in a wet climate and took them to a dry climate, after a few years the native snails out competed them and they died out.
What is the point? I think if we are going to teacher people genetic engineering when they are 17 we need to teach it better. They need to know the laws, and the risks, perhaps even a licensing process like amateur radio. There should be clubs, magazines (I like Popular Genetics) and a cable TV channel (GenTV, with shows like Dr. Debby Does DNA) we should not wait till there is a problem to get involved. Like any hobby that has potential misuses, policy and self regulation will be the most effective means of control. I can’t walk in the Radio Shack and buy a 10 Watt transceiver without a license, and I don’t think private citizens should be allowed to purchase certain enzymes or equipment without a license either. Clubs could split the cost of expensive equipment, provide waste pickup, and serve to educate the members and the community about the hobby. Companies could sequence DNA and make synthetic oligos and use the information to be sure the work was legal, or restrict the sale of items based on the licensee’s classification.
While the anti-genetic engineering people scream about apocalyptic danger from any attempts to fiddle with life. The day to day risks of even amateur genetic research are minimal, no one is going to turn themselves into a zebra or clone Hitler or whatever you see on TV. There is the possibility for problems to develop, so we must be proactive in attempting to minimize the risk and be ready to act if something does go wrong. As for people who might use the technology for evil, well those people are already out there, and if their research is improving Anthrax virulence factors, do you think they care if amateur genetic research as a whole is illegal? (If you are doing bioweapons development at your house, please pick up the phone, dial 911, and say “Anthrax” to whomever answers, and then wait right where you are, someone will be along shortly.) Of course some people start of ok then will be lured to do dangerous and illegal genetic research simply because it is taboo. While this might present a problem, without proper safety equipment these people are not long for this earth, so it will largely take care of itself. (Chances are these people would have found ways to kill themselves in other fields too, so is it really genetics fault they were nuts? Good double meaning huh?)
There are of course exceptions. Amateur virus research presents a potential problem but since with few exceptions human viruses are very difficult to work with, so no one is going to cross HIV with the common cold, or Ebola and West Nile in their home lab. (I don’t care what the video game people or the TV people say there is no Zombie virus and a retrovirus can’t make you turn into a chimera right before your eyes.) However, I am still strongly against home virus research and here’s why. A mutant virus can’t give you super powers anymore than a radioactive spider bite can, but it can kill you or give you cancer in a heart beat. Look putting a novel gene in bacteria more often than not results only in a dead bacteria, putting a novel gene in virus results in cancer and death (Look at the poor success rate of the John Hopkins genetic therapies, 9 in 10 died, and this was really well planned experiments.) Again you will not create a virus that makes you live longer, or a super-plague to zombify all humanity (if that seems like a good idea in your sick little mind), you will end up in box, deep underground or burned to a cinder when they napalm your lab with you in it, to prevent spreading of your cancer virus, and you will be remembered only for your Darwin Award! (If you are twisted you might think even cancer virus could be cool and novel, well it isn’t, there are lots of cancer viruses already, and bioweapons people have lousy retirement plans, either the burned to a cinder thing or a single shot to the back of the head when they become a liability, and if you did manage to live long enough to do to prison and aren’t killed by the inmates, you would just be waiting for your appeal before that one last meal and a short walk. Please take note that all roads lead to the same place.) In plain and simple English “Don’t mess with viruses, you might not live long enough to sorry.
To temper the previous rant I will close with this. Yes, teenagers represent most of the computer virus writers and general internet miscreants but just like kids with chemistry sets don’t automatically become Meth cooks, if they learn in a controlled environment they are more like to respect the technology and put it to good use. Given the number of people to at least take a passing interest amateur genetics research, we really can’t stop people from doing it any more than we can stop them from growing pot in a closet (based on the large number of pot magazines at my local bookstore that little prohibition isn’t going so well.) If we are to remain the intellectual juggernaut that we currently are, this country needs more scientists than wannabe pro basketball players. Since science has taken the place of wood shop, well still have a shot.
Sunday, October 09, 2005
How the tax system and taxes breaks really work, or “A Dummies Guide to Voodoo Economics”
This started out as a story my dad email me, and since I thought it was so amusing I wanted to put it up. So while I didn’t write it, (and I have no idea who did) I did edit it to correct a logic flaw.
"Let's put tax cuts in terms everyone can understand. Suppose that every day, ten men go out for dinner, to this restaurant that’s charges by the table, and not by the person. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:
The first four men -- the poorest -- would pay nothing; the fifth would pay $1, the sixth would pay $3, the seventh $7, the eighth $12, the ninth $18, and the tenth man -- the richest -- would pay $59.
That's what they decided to do. The ten men ate dinner in the restaurant every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement -- until one day, the owner decided to give them a break.
"Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to reduce the cost of the table by $20."
The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes. So the first four men were unaffected. They would still eat for free. But what about the other six -- the paying customers? How could they divvy up the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his "fair share?"
The six men realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, Then the fifth man and the sixth man would end up being PAID to eat their meal. So the restaurant owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.
And so the fifth man paid nothing, the sixth pitched in $2, the seventh paid $5, the eighth paid $9, the ninth paid $12, leaving the tenth man with a bill of $52 instead of his earlier $59. Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to eat for free.
But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. "I only got a dollar out of the $20," declared the sixth man who pointed to the tenth. "But he got $7!"
"Yeah, that's right," exclaimed the fifth man, "I only saved a dollar, too . . . It's unfair that he got seven times more than me!".
"That's true!" shouted the seventh man, "why should he get $7 back when I got only $2? The wealthy get all the breaks!"
"Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison, "We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!"
The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up. The next night he didn't show up for dinner, so the nine ate without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered, a little late the flaw in their logic. They were FIFTY-TWO DOLLARS short of paying the bill!"
Look the rich do get the biggest tax break but they pay more to begin. So a 10% tax break for someone paid $100K in taxes is $10K, but the same break for someone paying $10K is a $1,000. Ok it isn’t “fair” that the rich have more money, but that is how life works. While people whine about the rich get tax breaks that are bigger than their tax burden, they forget the $90K tax burden the rich still pay. To make the it’s budget the government needs $20K from each taxpayer, but only gets ~$11K, so the average taxpayer only pays 55% of necessary amount. Where do you think that extra $9K comes? In 2000 the top 5% of taxpayers (those making more than $130K a year) paid more 56.7% of the taxes.
I know a lot of families where the one of the people work, just to pay the taxes of the other. How depressing would that be? Sure you have money as a couple, but your entire salary goes straight to the IRS.
Voodoo economics works on the theory that when a rich person gets a big tax break that money is reinvested into the economy. Yes, poorer people can use the money more to buy clothes or medical care, but that money expands the economy minimally by increasing demand. However, a rich person gets more money back, and since they don’t need the money to live they will invest it in making more money. Which means they make jobs and help every one else indirectly, but since there is a time lag people don’t ever think it is working. But Voodoo and economic theory are the subject for another day!
"Let's put tax cuts in terms everyone can understand. Suppose that every day, ten men go out for dinner, to this restaurant that’s charges by the table, and not by the person. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:
The first four men -- the poorest -- would pay nothing; the fifth would pay $1, the sixth would pay $3, the seventh $7, the eighth $12, the ninth $18, and the tenth man -- the richest -- would pay $59.
That's what they decided to do. The ten men ate dinner in the restaurant every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement -- until one day, the owner decided to give them a break.
"Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to reduce the cost of the table by $20."
The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes. So the first four men were unaffected. They would still eat for free. But what about the other six -- the paying customers? How could they divvy up the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his "fair share?"
The six men realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, Then the fifth man and the sixth man would end up being PAID to eat their meal. So the restaurant owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.
And so the fifth man paid nothing, the sixth pitched in $2, the seventh paid $5, the eighth paid $9, the ninth paid $12, leaving the tenth man with a bill of $52 instead of his earlier $59. Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to eat for free.
But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. "I only got a dollar out of the $20," declared the sixth man who pointed to the tenth. "But he got $7!"
"Yeah, that's right," exclaimed the fifth man, "I only saved a dollar, too . . . It's unfair that he got seven times more than me!".
"That's true!" shouted the seventh man, "why should he get $7 back when I got only $2? The wealthy get all the breaks!"
"Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison, "We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!"
The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up. The next night he didn't show up for dinner, so the nine ate without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered, a little late the flaw in their logic. They were FIFTY-TWO DOLLARS short of paying the bill!"
Look the rich do get the biggest tax break but they pay more to begin. So a 10% tax break for someone paid $100K in taxes is $10K, but the same break for someone paying $10K is a $1,000. Ok it isn’t “fair” that the rich have more money, but that is how life works. While people whine about the rich get tax breaks that are bigger than their tax burden, they forget the $90K tax burden the rich still pay. To make the it’s budget the government needs $20K from each taxpayer, but only gets ~$11K, so the average taxpayer only pays 55% of necessary amount. Where do you think that extra $9K comes? In 2000 the top 5% of taxpayers (those making more than $130K a year) paid more 56.7% of the taxes.
I know a lot of families where the one of the people work, just to pay the taxes of the other. How depressing would that be? Sure you have money as a couple, but your entire salary goes straight to the IRS.
Voodoo economics works on the theory that when a rich person gets a big tax break that money is reinvested into the economy. Yes, poorer people can use the money more to buy clothes or medical care, but that money expands the economy minimally by increasing demand. However, a rich person gets more money back, and since they don’t need the money to live they will invest it in making more money. Which means they make jobs and help every one else indirectly, but since there is a time lag people don’t ever think it is working. But Voodoo and economic theory are the subject for another day!
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