Cosmologic roundup: meaning and nothingness

Jim Holt, one of my favorite science writers, has written a pretty introduction to modern cosmology. He makes the rounds of the famous, and even introduces a bit of Bayesian cosmology via the Copernican principle.

He has a light touch with the biggest possible topics. It's a fun read, don't resist.

The BBC's new blog: something different?

The BBC is launching a new blog -- of course I'll subscribe. They've have an amusing and intriguing story about about how they're approaching this:

BBC NEWS | UK | Magazine | Down with blogs... so here's another

...the editors across BBC News have got together to start their own blog. Called 'The Editors', it launches on Monday. The hope is that it will become a discussion forum for all sorts of issues and dilemmas surrounding our news programmes.

The BBC is becoming a major force in new media -- rather under the radar of much of the US. They're quiet little (big) radicals over therer ...

The Bush timetable for leaving Iraq

The good news is that the Bush plan is rather similar to what I and a zillion others write -- it's time to leave Iraq.

U.S. General in Iraq Outlines Troop Cuts - New York Times

... after criticizing Democratic lawmakers for trying to legislate a timeline for withdrawing troops, skeptics say, the Bush administration seems to have its own private schedule, albeit one that can be adjusted as events unfold.

If executed, the plan could have considerable political significance. The first reductions would take place before this falls Congressional elections, while even bigger cuts might come before the 2008 presidential election.

Of course Bush says something different ("stay the course" blah, blah), but if Bush says it's sunny an umbrella is obligatory. Follow the body, not the puck.

The cynical electoral timing is a nice touch, also predictable. On balance the plan is a good thing.

Greenland's day after tomorrow

If Greenland's galciers melted all at once, sea level would rise 21 feet. That won't happen, but the glaciers are melting faster than climate models predicted.

Computer simulations always start out with large assumptions -- like treating a glacier as a homogeneous block of ice. If the data doesn't fit the model's predictions, scientists study what's really happening and refine the models. It sounds like glaciers have complex internal structures that can cause non-linear responses to external warming.

It will be interesting to see what the next generation of models look like. We cannot assume they will show things getting warmer everywhere. Even if all of Greenland's glaciers don't melt, a large melt will introduce a new and large chaotic element to global climate change. Currents shift, precipitation varies, contintents rise ...

We'll have to wait for the simulations. Ohh, and a carbon tax might be a good idea too ....

Bank record spying: why I didn't read about it.

Another story about domestic spying. Another Cheney attack on the media.

Cheney Assails Press on Report on Bank Data - New York Times

Vice President Dick Cheney on Friday vigorously defended a secret program that examines banking records of Americans and others in a vast international database, and harshly criticized the news media for disclosing an operation he said was legal and "absolutely essential" to fighting terrorism.

I can't force myself to read about this.

I assume that any and all laws, regulations and practices that "protect" our privacy have been swept aside. I assume that the data will be used for other purposes than fighting terrorism. I assume there are no effective protections or regulations. I assume the people doing this don't understand sensitivity, specificity, response curves or positive predictive value. I assume their laptops will be stolen. I assume their data mining is no better than Google's -- and Google's spam and splog detection is very bad. I assume that Americans don't understand any of this and don't care. I've read that it's extremely unlikely that either house of Congress will switch hands this November.

Things will have to get much worse before they get better. So there's not much point in reading this ...

DeLong does cosmology: The anthropic principle

DeLong has a readable and amusing defense of the Anthropic Cosmological Principle. Now if he'd only bring in Bayes' theory.

Doing evil with Google stuff

I can't improve on the original posting or the title. Educational, amusing and inevitably prophetic:

The Devil's Guide to Google

Here’s how to become a totally evil, worm-like creature with Google’s array of services in under a month ...

I know a smart young developer who's traveled this dark road. It's hard for some to resist the combination of the technical challenge and the money.

On a different note, I've posted elsewhere about the 21st century employment opportunities for the outsiders and for the "weak", I couldn't help but notice that 'click jockey' is a position that could be filled by someoneone with fairly severe cognitive and physical disabilities. An oddly positive feature of an otherwise dark world.

bin Laden's ratings collapse

Pascal Riche has pulled together five bits of encouraging news from a recent poll:

Finally Some Good News | TPMCafe

... 1) Support for Osama bin Laden is declining around the Muslim world. This is especially the case in Jordan, where just 24% express at least some confidence in bin Laden now, compared with 60% a year ago.

... 3) By lopsided margins (91% among Muslims in France; 82% in Spain; 71% in Great Britain; and 69% in Germany) Muslims in Western Europe express favorable opinions of Christians.

5) ... 86% of the French have a “favorable opinion” of Jews (77% among Americans, 45% in Spain, 1% in Jordan). And 71% of the french Muslims have a favorable opinion of Jews as well.

It would be good to know why bin Laden's support has plummeted in Jordan, but I'm guessing it was bin Laden's support for Zarqawi that did him in (rather than, for example, his lack of operational effectiveness). Zarqawi's insane hatred of the Shia, and his bombing of a Jordanian wedding party, did bin Laden no favors.

Of course it's not clear how serious or long-lived bin Laden's support for Zarqawi really was. My guess is that bin Laden did make a mistake, and the US amplified the connection. Not all propaganda is a bad thing, even if it may have been as much "emergent" as planned.

This poll is very encouraging. I was particularly struck by the universal anti-semitism among Jordanians vs. the far lower prevalence among french Muslims.

The aesthetics of execution

This is stone simple. Why did the this NYT journalist have such trouble getting to the point?

Doctors See Way to Cut Suffering in Executions - New York Times:

... because drugs like Pavulon can mask suffering, many states outlaw them for animal euthanasia.

Execution by barbiturate alone would take longer than the current method, Dr. Dershwitz said. Although prisoners would quickly lose consciousness and stop breathing, they could not be pronounced dead until electrical activity in the heart had stopped. That could take as long as 45 minutes.

Pavulon is a famously effective paralytic agent. It doesn't reduce pain or diminish consciousness, it simply makes movement impossible. It's used in executions to make the experience less unpleasant for witnesses.

Depending on who the witnesses are, the victim may care more or less about their discomfort. One approach would be to give the condemned a menu of options, from explosive attached to the skull to pure barbiturate to a mix of drugs. With informed consent, of course.

Or we could decide that this is really a very stupid business. As I've noted before, if we're going to execute people we need, at an absolute minimum, to assign lawyers randomly to rich and poor alike.

Gender gap in academic performance and the age of menarche

We know the age of menarche has decreased in Korea from age 17 to age 12.7 between 1920 and 1986. I think 12.7 is the average age in wealthy nations.

Between 1982 and 2000 Canadian medical school admissions, which are largely grade based, shifted from 50% female to 75% female. The gap in academic performance among median high school students may be even greater. At age 19 boys are far behind girls.

I wonder if the two trends are related.

Homeland security and the Great LA Quake of 2008

If LA had Magnitude 8 quake next month, would we be ready?

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Quake fears for south California

...If all the strain was released at once, it would have enough energy to unleash a magnitude-8 earthquake - roughly the size of the devastating 1906 quake in San Francisco.

...Quakes are predicted to occur on the southern part of the fault every 200-300 years. And according to Professor Fialko, the observed movement on the fault is on a par with the maximum amount of shift the fault has ever experienced between quakes.

I put the "IF" in bold because it sounds like a Magnitude 8 quake is a worse case scenario. It might be more likely that only a part of the slippage would occur. All the same, it would be good to know if LA is ready. It could be tomorrow, it could be 2008, but it sounds like sooner than 2016. I wonder if they've published a probability curve ...

The road to hell: General Formica's version

We all know that the road to hell is gradual. A little bit here, a little bit there. In time the unthinkable becomes commonplace, even acceptable. When that happens, you have arrived. General Formica has arrived.

Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal: Impeach George W. Bush. Impeach Him Now

[The New York Times wrote ...]

.... General Formica found that in the third case at a Special Operations outpost, near Tikrit, in April and May 2004, three detainees were held in cells 4 feet high, 4 feet long and 20 inches wide, except to use the bathroom, to be washed or to be interrogated. He concluded that two days in such confinement "would be reasonable; five to seven days would not." Two of the detainees were held for seven days; one for two days, General Formica concluded.

[Spencer Ackerman responds:]

... Here are two such questions you can puzzle over from your home or office. Take all the shelving out of a typical filing cabinet. (My own office cabinet happens to be slightly smaller than the cell described here.) Now lock yourself in it for two days. You may notice you can neither stand up straight nor lie down, and crouching gets really uncomfortable extremely fast. Remember that as an Iraqi detainee, the Geneva Conventions apply to you. Now ask yourself: Why would Formica consider such treatment "reasonable" for two days? And if someone put an American soldier in such conditions for two days--or authorized doing so--what should happen to that person?

This is what's known as torture. If anyone doubts that, I urge them to try the filing cabinet experiment. I particularly urge Ann Coulter to try the filing cabinet.

General Formica feels that two days of this would be quite reasonable. General Formica has finished his journey. America is well down the same road.

The Ecoomist saves the whales

The Economist, a journal that’s been on death’s door these past few years, shows signs of life in the June 17th issue. There's a semi-sentient review of the ailing American middle class [1], an obituary of one of the 3 men who recently committed suicide in our Cuban concentration camp, and the best suggestion I’ve read on how to regulate the hunting of cetaceans (ie. whaling).

They suggest that when the international whaling commission eventually permits hunting, that kill rights not be allocated by quota. Instead they should be allocated by bid. They predict that whaling opponents will buy up all the hunting rights, shutting down the industry forever. After all, the hunters can only bid a fraction of the tiny market for whale meat, opponents would raise hundreds of millions from Americans alone.

Brilliant. This is the sort of thing they used to be able to do regularly.

[1] Paul Krugman, btw today makes a good case today that the end of the American middle class caused the end of bipartisanship in American politics.

Cringely's cruel verdict on Gates

Cringely is well known as one of the most interesting and well connected tech pundits. That's not to say he's always right, in this league batting 300 is respectable.

Here he empties both barrels into Microsoft and Gates.

PBS | I, Cringely . June 15, 2006 - Taking One for the Team

... Microsoft has spent five years and $5 billion NOT shipping Windows Vista. This reflects a company deliberately built in the image of its founder, Bill Gates -- a single-tasking, technically obsolete executive with no checks or balances whatsoever who fills the back seat of his car with fast food wrappers. So Bill has to go, because as an icon, he's great, but as a manager, he sucks.

Part of this is Gates, personally, and part of it is his entourage -- a meritocracy based as much on historical proximity to Bill as anything else. That inner circle has to go, too, and if it doesn't go -- and go immediately -- the required change won't really happen because the one true Bill will just be replaced by a dozen or more Bill clones.

... while Ozzie and Mundie are each capable of failure, it is important to remember that GATES HAS ALREADY FAILED, so coming back isn't really an option, though he may not yet get that.

... The other attribute that Microsoft has historically lacked is ethics, which also comes directly from the cult of Bill, with its infinite shades of gray. Microsoft has to this point generally thrived by stealing technology from other companies. But now it is at the point where there isn't that much left to steal, so Microsoft is faced with operating in a whole new manner -- actually inventing stuff. This requires discipline -- not just discipline to do the work, but discipline not to backslide and steal a little of this and that when the going gets rough.

... So IF THEY DO IT THE RIGHT WAY, look for Gates to move his office to the Foundation immediately, look for several dozen of his closest and oldest associates to leave the company in the next four to six weeks, and look for Steve Ballmer to leave, too, within a year....

I think he underestimates Gates' unique talent for shooting his own horse, but I also think that Microsoft's last real technical achievement was Windows 2000. Microsoft is cursed by its monopoly -- without real competition there's no way for the company to direct itself, and it's demoralizing to get paid well for crummy work. Gates would be a happy man today if the Clinton admistration had succeeded in dividing up the company; his support for Bush blocked that option. That was a Faustean bargain with classically satanic consequences.

I bolded the comment about the challenge of invention. From 1990 to 2005 the best corporate strategy was to be quick to copy. I think it still works in many industries, but it's been tapped ou t in the Wintel world. Apple's too alien to steal from effectively and Dell, HP and Microsoft have crushed all the innovators. Both Dell and Microsoft are now staggering because they've effectively crushed internal innovation ...

The SonicCare Elite, revenge, and the price of consumption

This morning I was reading Sandra Tsing Loh's Atlantic essay on women, money and class. It's mostly entertaining, though I think she lost her way at the end. The bit that caught me eye was brief:

... there’s a new mistress of the shabby pavilions, a new Queen of Cheap! She is New York writer Judith Levine, and I so enjoyed her new book, Not Buying It, that I’ll be “gifting” my copy on this Christmas, in turn, to each member of my penurious family.

Nauseated not just by her own maxed credit cards but by her weakness in a hyperconsumerized world, Levine decided to try to survive, for one year, on just “essentials”—a strategy that saved her $8,000 (out of a gross income of $45,000). Yes, there was a diabetic cat requiring expensive veterinary care, and no, Levine’s vanity (which I respected her for fessing up to) would not allow her to give up her $55 haircuts. But beyond that, the strictures were urban-spartan. She and her partner, Paul, were to buy no clothes or shoes. There would be no restaurants, movies, gifts. They could buy groceries, but not fancy ones. Toilet paper, yes; Q-tips, no (this impressed me—I consider Q-tips essential).

Levine’s yearlong Visa-free journey reveals a hitherto-invisible realm. Without the whirl of buying, vast quantities of time open up—and not just from a lack of purchased entertainment; consuming itself takes time. (In The Paradox of Choice, Barry Schwartz illustrates how we can fritter our days away even on trying to choose the best price for something on the Internet).

Yeah, the price of ownership is high these days. What really irks me is the hidden inflation of Things that Break. (The way we measure inflation ignores the reality that our new stuff doesn't last -- so even it it's cheap to buy once we need to buy it two or three times. Ask me about the $25 back yard sprinker ...). Even when one might arguably come out ahead (AMEX buyers assurance), the time hit is awesome.

So I put down the magazine and picked up my $150 super-duper gum-protecting Sonicare Elite 7500 Power Toothbrush -- and the switch didn't work. It's been flaky for a week or so. The camel's back snapped and the damn thing hit the garbage. Of course, in the digital age, some revenge is a negative Amazon review:

... I bought this for more than $150 at my dentist. It worked well for about a year, though it does get pretty disgusting beneath the top half without fairly intensive cleaning.

After about a year of use, however, the switch broke. It wouldn't turn off or on reliably. Now I'm SURE Philips would have happily replaced it under warranty. The problem is, I can't be bothered with a toothbrush that adds that much complexity to my life. An iPod breaking is bad enough, a $100 plus toootbrush breaking is the proverbial straw.

It also didn't magically prevent the age and gene related recession of my gums -- if it had I'd suffer the time drain. As it is, it's back to the old toothbrush. I'll spend the time I save on better gum care.

I can't afford to buy sh*t. Since there's often nothing else for sale, I just say "no" more and more.