Gambling on Climate Change - The Chronicle Review - The Chronicle of Higher Education
I have one quibble - I can't see on-line shopping meaning the complete death of shopping malls. It's a bit like the predictions that TV, or cable TV, would spell the end of cinema. They are different experiences.
Friday, April 17, 2015
The three reasons the new Star Wars trailer is creating buzz (to put it mildly)
1. the music
2. the fact that when on the ground, it doesn't look like one or two real people acting in front of a gigantic green screen (which is what made the prequels and the LOTR movies uninvolving - that and the fact George Lucas can't write a good screenplay to save himself and I am completely uninterested in Tolkien-lore)
3. Harrison Ford looks better than expected as a aged Han Solo
2. the fact that when on the ground, it doesn't look like one or two real people acting in front of a gigantic green screen (which is what made the prequels and the LOTR movies uninvolving - that and the fact George Lucas can't write a good screenplay to save himself and I am completely uninterested in Tolkien-lore)
3. Harrison Ford looks better than expected as a aged Han Solo
A scandalous use of Commonwealth money
Abbott government gives $4m to help climate contrarian set up Australian centre | Environment | The Guardian
Lomborg has next to no credibility amongst climate change scientists and policy analysts who take climate change seriously.
And all you really need to know is this:
Lomborg has next to no credibility amongst climate change scientists and policy analysts who take climate change seriously.
And all you really need to know is this:
The Institute of Public Affairs responded to Lomborg’s new Australian operation by saying, “Bjørn, it’s great to have you!”
Quite an omission
It's rather surprising to find the academic author of a an article about how fatal shootings are reducing in several different Western countries says this in response to a comment about whether improved medical treatment is behind the dropping numbers:
And I just noticed, further down in the comments thread Simon Chapman turns up with a pointed question to the author as follows:
Good question about medical treatment. That could certainly be one of the contributors to falling death rates. I’ve also seen a suggestion that mobile phones have made a difference, because they mean medical help can be called out more quickly. It would be interesting to look more closely at these possibilities.If she had read this article before, I would have thought she would have answered more along the lines of "yes, there are certainly some experts in America who believe that is the case."
And I just noticed, further down in the comments thread Simon Chapman turns up with a pointed question to the author as follows:
Samara, in your declaration you say you "hold memberships with, and volunteer for, a range of not-for-profit firearm-related organisations." Could you please list these for the sake of transparency, and tell us whether any of these organisations or you personally are an advocate for watering down Australia's firearms laws in areas like ending gun registration, opposing restrictions on semi-automatic hand guns, allowing self defense as a reason to own a firearm, and introducing "right to carry" legislation in Australia of the sort supported by the US NRA and law in many US states. Do any of the organisations you are affiliated with have mutually supportive relationships with the NRA.She hasn't answered yet....
Thursday, April 16, 2015
Cheese hackers
Interesting to read that some DIY work is being done by science/computer nerds on fiddling with DNA in yeast to get it to make milk, and thereafter Real Vegan Cheese.
Seems much more plausible to me than lab grown meat ever being particularly tasty, or texturally as good as, or economically viable compared to, the real thing from a cow.
The only environmental concern, I suppose, would be if there was ever a chance that escaped milk producing yeast could interfere with the alcohol producing "natural" variety used in wine and beer making. A great scientific dystopia it would be if in a 1,000 years beer brewing had to be abandoned because it kept going half milky!
Seems much more plausible to me than lab grown meat ever being particularly tasty, or texturally as good as, or economically viable compared to, the real thing from a cow.
The only environmental concern, I suppose, would be if there was ever a chance that escaped milk producing yeast could interfere with the alcohol producing "natural" variety used in wine and beer making. A great scientific dystopia it would be if in a 1,000 years beer brewing had to be abandoned because it kept going half milky!
From Slate today
Still, the evidence suggests that America’s wealthiest faced a significantly higher tax burden during the country’s years of midcentury prosperity. Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez, for instance, find that, once corporate and estate taxes are added into the mix, the top 0.1 percent of earners paid 71.4 percent of their income to the IRS in 1960, compared to 34.7 percent in 2004. Reaching further back and using slightly different methodology, the Congressional Research Service finds that 0.1 percenters paid an average effective personal income tax rate of 55 percent in 1945, compared to around 25 percent during the late 2000s. The tax code really was more progressive back in the day—and more aggressive.Here's the link.
Not sure about this...
Why a 'Google tax' is not the answer to corporate tax avoidance
It's from the Lowy Institute blog, but it covers the issue pretty well.
It's from the Lowy Institute blog, but it covers the issue pretty well.
Worrying about glaciers
A short video here showing why experts in the field of Antarctic glaciers think the situation is likely worse than thought only a decade or so ago:
Wednesday, April 15, 2015
Boys and Girls! You too can make something travel faster than light!
Can't say I had realised this before, but physicist Bee has a fascinating post that starts:
But, it's still fascinating.
(And it's posts like this that I sometimes re-read years later and think "Geez, I do run a great blog!")
If you sweep a laser pointer across the moon, will the spot move faster than the speed of light? Every physics major encounters this question at some point, and the answer is yes, it will. If you sweep the laser pointer it in an arc, the velocity of the spot increases with the distance to the surface you point at. On Earth, you only have to rotate the laser in a full arc within a few seconds, then it will move faster than the speed of light on the moon!Now a bit more explanation:
This faster-than-light motion is not in conflict with special relativity because the continuous movement of the spot is an illusion. What actually moves are the photons in the laser beam, and they move at the always same speed of light. But different photons illuminate different parts of the surface in a pattern synchronized by the photon’s collective origin, which appears like a continuous movement that can happen at arbitrary speed. It isn’t possible in this way to exchange information faster than the speed of light because information can only be sent from the source to the surface, not between the illuminated parts on the surface.Oh, and your average laser pointer won't still be visible on the moon, and I have my doubts a laser strong enough to be visible is available from scientific supplies shops.
But, it's still fascinating.
(And it's posts like this that I sometimes re-read years later and think "Geez, I do run a great blog!")
Sort of disappointing
Search for advanced civilizations beyond Earth finds nothing obvious in 100,000 galaxies
From the link:
From the link:
"Whether an advanced spacefaring civilization uses the large amounts of energy from its
galaxy's stars to power computers, space flight, communication, or something we can't yet imagine, fundamental thermodynamics tells us that this energy must be radiated away as heat in the mid-infrared wavelengths," Wright said. "This same basic physics causes your computer to radiate heat while it is turned on."
Theoretical physicist Freeman Dyson proposed in the 1960s that advanced alien civilizations
beyond Earth could be detected by the telltale evidence of their mid-infrared emissions. It was not until space-based telescopes like the WISE satellite that it became possible to make sensitive measurements of this radiation emitted by objects in space.
Roger Griffith, a postbaccalaureate researcher at Penn State and the lead author of the paper, scoured almost the entire catalog of the WISE satellite's detections—nearly 100 million entries—for objects consistent with galaxies emitting too much mid-infrared radiation. He then individually examined and categorized around 100,000 of the most promising galaxy images.
Wright reports, "We found about 50 galaxies that have unusually high levels of mid-infrared radiation. Our follow-up studies of those galaxies may reveal if the origin of their radiation results from natural astronomical processes, or if it could indicate the presence of a highly advanced civilization."
In any case, Wright said, the team's non-detection of any obvious alien-filled galaxies is an interesting and new scientific result. "Our results mean that, out of the 100,000 galaxies that WISE could see in sufficient detail, none of them is widely populated by an alien civilization using most of the starlight in its galaxy for its own purposes. That's interesting because these galaxies are billions of years old, which should have been plenty of time for them to have beenlled with alien civilizations, if they exist. Either they don't exist, or they don't yet use enough energy for us to recognize them," Wright said.
Irvine on company tax (and the problem with economics)
Why Joe Hockey's tax review should focus on lowering company tax
Since returning to Fairfax, Jessica has been doing a pretty good job with explaining some economic issues.
The problem with economics (and I'd be sure this is not an original thought) is that there is "always something else going on" which makes pinning down cause and effect of particular policy settings very hard to work out. And it enables economists from opposite and set ideological positions to look at the same set of global evidence and both claim they are vindicated.
Hence, with company tax, you can complain that the Australia rate is now uncompetitive, yet the American rate is even worse (and there appears little prospect of it dropping soon), but America is still achieving an economic recovery. "Sure" the anti tax, small government economists will say "but if you look at countries X, Y and Z and their growth, consider how much faster the American recovery could have been!" (And, of course, you can often look at some aspect of how country X, Y and Z operates which the ideologically committed would disagree with, so it's virtually impossible to find a country that you could say is a perfect example of following one consistent economic ideological line.)
I'm not saying that is impossible to ever get to a "truth" in economics; just that the very nature of it means that there are always going to ways for dubious economists to convince politicians that they are the ones who are right.
As with the world of moral philosophy, it pays to not tie oneself to any one analyst, and let intelligent common sense from outside the field guide your actions.
Since returning to Fairfax, Jessica has been doing a pretty good job with explaining some economic issues.
The problem with economics (and I'd be sure this is not an original thought) is that there is "always something else going on" which makes pinning down cause and effect of particular policy settings very hard to work out. And it enables economists from opposite and set ideological positions to look at the same set of global evidence and both claim they are vindicated.
Hence, with company tax, you can complain that the Australia rate is now uncompetitive, yet the American rate is even worse (and there appears little prospect of it dropping soon), but America is still achieving an economic recovery. "Sure" the anti tax, small government economists will say "but if you look at countries X, Y and Z and their growth, consider how much faster the American recovery could have been!" (And, of course, you can often look at some aspect of how country X, Y and Z operates which the ideologically committed would disagree with, so it's virtually impossible to find a country that you could say is a perfect example of following one consistent economic ideological line.)
I'm not saying that is impossible to ever get to a "truth" in economics; just that the very nature of it means that there are always going to ways for dubious economists to convince politicians that they are the ones who are right.
As with the world of moral philosophy, it pays to not tie oneself to any one analyst, and let intelligent common sense from outside the field guide your actions.
Tuesday, April 14, 2015
UFOs and Poltergeists
J. Allen Hynek Writes Letter About Infamous Ghost Experiment - The Black Vault Case Files
Ooh.
J. Allen Hynek wrote very sensible books in a measured tone about UFOs at the peak of public interest in them, and ended up being a consultant to Spielberg for Close Encounters (as well as making a cameo appearance.)
Interestingly, the letter at his link shows that, despite his reputation for leaning towards the "alien spaceship" side of likely explanations for UFOs, he did have an interest in the possible interconnection between psychic phenomena, including ghosts and poltergeists, and UFO sightings.
I wonder whether it was conversations with him that got Spielberg interested in writing the story for Poltergeist. I guess the answer to this might be in a biography of Spielberg on my shelf that I've never got around to reading.
Speaking of the very enjoyable Poltergeist, the remake is due out soon. The first trailer left me a bit underwhelmed, but the second one that came out recently is making me much more inclined to see it. It is, I think, a great example of a scary movie trailer, particularly when you consider most viewers probably know the story.
Watch it in a dark room with headphones on, and see if doesn't cause a jump or two:
Ooh.
J. Allen Hynek wrote very sensible books in a measured tone about UFOs at the peak of public interest in them, and ended up being a consultant to Spielberg for Close Encounters (as well as making a cameo appearance.)
Interestingly, the letter at his link shows that, despite his reputation for leaning towards the "alien spaceship" side of likely explanations for UFOs, he did have an interest in the possible interconnection between psychic phenomena, including ghosts and poltergeists, and UFO sightings.
I wonder whether it was conversations with him that got Spielberg interested in writing the story for Poltergeist. I guess the answer to this might be in a biography of Spielberg on my shelf that I've never got around to reading.
Speaking of the very enjoyable Poltergeist, the remake is due out soon. The first trailer left me a bit underwhelmed, but the second one that came out recently is making me much more inclined to see it. It is, I think, a great example of a scary movie trailer, particularly when you consider most viewers probably know the story.
Watch it in a dark room with headphones on, and see if doesn't cause a jump or two:
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