The Big Picture

World Clock

Sunday, March 09, 2008 | 06:00 AM

I love that all of these are now totally embeddable . . .

Active Denial System: non-lethal, directed-energy weapon

Monday, March 03, 2008 | 05:00 AM

in Science | War/Defense | Web/Tech

Fascinating report on the Pentagon's Active Denial System, a/k/a the Pentagon Ray-gun:

Quick excerpt:

What if we told you the Pentagon has a ray gun? And what if we told you it can stop a person in his tracks without killing or even injuring him? Well, it’s true. You can’t see it, you can't hear it, but as CBS News correspondent David Martin experienced first hand, you can feel it.

Pentagon officials call it a major breakthrough which could change the rules of war and save huge numbers of lives in Iraq. But it's still not there. That because in the middle of a war, the military just can't bring itself to trust a weapon that doesn't kill.

Sources:
The Pentagon's Ray Gun
David Martin
CBS 60 Minutes, March 2, 2008
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/02/29/60minutes/main3891865.shtml

Active Denial System
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_Denial_System

Reconciling Cold Weather and a Warming Climate

Sunday, March 02, 2008 | 01:00 PM

in Psychology/Sentiment | Science | Technical Analysis

Yesterday, I criticized those who made the claim that ""Twelve-month long drop in world temperatures wipes out a century of warming" in my usual understated and charming way.

I have to admit that the responses surprised me. First, I had no idea so many people rabidly disbelieve that 1) climate change is occurring and 2) we Humans are responsible for some of that. Truly eye opening to me.

There was a pretty amazing discussion in comments, ranging from brilliant to scientifically insightful to rhetoric of all manners, including some that had not yet achieved total enlightenment (so they got that going for them). I found the entire debate fascinating.

Sometime in the future, I will put the lawyer hat on to discuss evaluating witnesses. You will find that helpful when evaluating any speaker on any subject regardless of what media, politics, etc.

For now, some more weather change chart porn:

click for ginormo -- and familiar looking -- chart:

Courtesy of NYT

Here's the ubiq-cerpt:™

"According to a host of climate experts, including some who question the extent and risks of global warming, it is mostly good old-fashioned weather, along with a cold kick from the tropical Pacific Ocean, which is in its La Niña phase for a few more months, a year after it was in the opposite warm El Niño pattern.

If anything else is afoot — like some cooling related to sunspot cycles or slow shifts in ocean and atmospheric patterns that can influence temperatures — an array of scientists who have staked out differing positions on the overall threat from global warming agree that there is no way to pinpoint whether such a new force is at work.

Many scientists also say that the cool spell in no way undermines the enormous body of evidence pointing to a warming world with disrupted weather patterns, less ice and rising seas should heat-trapping greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels and forests continue to accumulate in the air.

“The current downturn is not very unusual,” said Carl Mears, a scientist at Remote Sensing Systems, a private research group in Santa Rosa, Calif., that has been using satellite data to track global temperature and whose findings have been held out as reliable by a variety of climate experts. He pointed to similar drops in 1988, 1991-92, and 1998, but with a long-term warming trend clear nonetheless.

“Temperatures are very likely to recover after the La Niña event is over,” he said.

My point yesterday -- which several commentors elected to ignore -- was that confusing the short term trend with the longer term trend was simply wrong.

Using recent weather fluctuations to disprove climate change was like looking at the minute by minute S&P500 chart to determine long term markets trends . . .

Source:
Skeptics on Human Climate Impact Seize on Cold Spell
ANDREW C. REVKIN
NYT, March 2, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/02/science/02cold.html

Global Warming Denialists: We Suck at Math Also!

Saturday, March 01, 2008 | 08:26 AM

in Politics | Quantitative | Science | Technical Analysis

"Not only do we misunderstand Science, we're bad at math, too!"

So say the innumerates.

Every now and then, I venture over to other fields to see what the debates look like. The most recent laugher was amongst the global warming denialist crowd.

Why? In 2007, the average global temperatures dropped by 0.595 degrees centigrade. This is a fact. The response from this group was to say (verbatim) "Twelve-month long drop in world temperatures wipes out a century of warming."

Um, no. As the charts below reveal, it does nothing of the sort.

As we say all the time with the Non-Farm Payroll (NFP), you look at the overall trend, not any single data point. A monthly NFP of 10,000 does not guarantee a recession, nor does a single month of 200k job gains guarantee an expansion. And neither monthly release eliminates the trend of the prior 100 data points.

All data series have anomalies -- large magnitude points that may be curious, or unusual. To claim that a "Twelve-month long drop in world temperatures wipes out a century of warming" simply reveals a disturbing statistical/mathematical incompetency that is rather embarrassing.

The 20 year and 130 year charts clearly explain what this quite clearly.

The shorter term chart shows a volatile series, with high magnitude aberrations to the upside (1998) as well as the downside (2008):

>>
Yeah! Global warming has been defeated! (1987-2008)

The longer term chart unequivocally reveal a long term trend, as the data points move from the lower left to the upper right

Boo! Global Warming Remains an Ongoing Trend (1880-2010)

Sources: Watts Up With That?

If the above long term chart was a stock, would you short it?

Now, my own views on Global Warming are spectacularly conventional: Take 6 billion people, give them an industrial revolution; then for the next 2 centuries, have them burn all manner of carbon products. Its not too hard to imagine this activity might impact the system in which it takes place.

These aren't the ravings of an enviro-nut. I am a big time energy consumer. I don't lecture anyone about their energy consumption. Anytime someone offers me a ride on a private jet, I jump at it. Yes, I dislike SUVs -- but that's because they are ungainly, unsafe, handle poorly, and go-too-slow. I personally have way too many motorized vehicles, all but one of which skew towards high-horsepower, go-fast, poor-fuel economy end of the scale. Trust me when I tell you a 6 speed manual transmissions in a V12 is not about saving gasoline.

Another disclosure: I have been long oil for 5 years, and quite a few oil companies for much longer. I am not a shrinking violet when it comes to recognizing the ongoing demand for energy, and the role that carbon based products are likely to play over the next decade or longer. I have personally profited hugely from these oil positions.

But I am at heart someone who loves math and statistics, and who finds the abuse of the truth to be offensive. Anyone who claims that a high magnitude outlier within a volatile data series conclusively proves this or that -- someone who chooses to ignore the broader data trend -- is simply putting their own mathematical ignorance and innumeracy on display.

Your mileage may vary . . .

UPDATE: March 1, 2008: 1:45PM

Do not misunderstand my position: I am not advocating pro or con for any specific policy, nor am I arguing against nuclear power.

What I said above is the person who made the statement that the past 12 months average temperature decline has wiped out a century of global warming is a clueless innumerate.

I appreciate the many intelligent statements in comments. My beef is with the chart and the math, not the policy discussion.

Source:

4 sources say “globally cooler” in the past 12 months
Anthony Watts
Watts Up With That? 19 February 2008
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/02/19/january-2008-4-sources-say-globally-cooler-in-the-past-12-months/

The Innumerate (mathematically illiterate):

Temperature Monitors Report Widescale Global Cooling
Michael Asher
Daily Tech February 26, 2008 12:55 PM
http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monitors+Report+Widescale+Global+Cooling/article10866.htm

Evidence of Global Cooling
Brit Hume
Fox News, Thursday, February 28, 2008
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,333328,00.html

Drudge

Strange December

Saturday, December 01, 2007 | 08:30 AM

in Science

Is it me, or is this an odd, eerie time?

I take the pooch out for an early morning walk -- its a crisp clear cold December 1. Why do half the trees still have their leaves on? The Oak trees have turned yellow brown, but the foliage is on the trees, instead of in bags on the ground where they belonged a month ago.

We live a block from the harbor -- walk the dog over, where the stiff breeze makes white caps. Its 33 degrees, but last week it was 60. Hmmm, there are still a few sailboats in the water -- on December 1 ?! Weird.

The various neighborhood Japanese Dwarf trees are still 90% leaved -- turning a lovely golden yellow -- but its December, and they should be bare naked. Our Dwarf Maple has -- finally! -- dropped 80% of its red leaves this week.

I have no idea what any of this means. Its just very odd . . .

Happy Turkey Day!

Thursday, November 22, 2007 | 04:00 PM

in Science

Think you know what a typical Turkey Day meal looks like? Well, look closer. No — much closer. Wired asked Mike Davidson, a biologist and expert photomicrographer at Florida State University's National High Magnetic Field Lab, to turn his lenses on the all-American meal. The images aren't particularly appetizing, and they probably won't help you keep your gobbler moist this year (try brining), but at least you'll be more intimate with the stuff that's making you loosen your belt as you collapse on the couch:

Source:
Wired Puts Your Thanksgiving Feast Under a Microscope
Tom Conlon
10.23.07 | 12:00 AM
http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/15-11/st_thanksgiving

MicroIslet Board of Directors

Sunday, September 30, 2007 | 03:00 PM

in Corporate Management | R&D | Science

Since this was announced this week, and so many of you emailed me, I might as well make it official: this week, I joined the Board of Directors of MicroIslet (MIIS).

I have for quite some time liked their bio-technology -- an area that is far, far afield from whatever expertise I have. My own lack of medical expertise notwithstanding, their approach to managing diabetes seems to me to have lots of potential promise to resolve some of the problems that Diabetics encounter.

Diabetes has run in my family (skipping a generation), has a genetic component, and hence, my interest in this space.

My prior issue with the company was never their technology -- it was the lack of communication by management. When the stock ran into trouble in late 2006, there was almost no public response from the company about it. The shares slid from $2.15 to pennies with not much said. I had previously recommended the stock, with a $1 stop loss (Its now 61 cents).

Over time, I had been in contact with some of the larger shareholders, many of whom also "noticed" the lack of communication from (the former) management. I made a few suggestions as to what they should have done, what they should do in the future, in terms of investor relations, etc.

When the new regime came in, we spoke, discussed the firm's needs, I made some suggestions as to what should be dine differently. Long story short, I an now on the Board.

~~~

NOTE: For obvious reasons, I will not be discussing any of the particulars of the company going forward. I am writing this now because I do not yet have any non public material inside information. This will very likely be my one and only post on MicroIslet.

Suffice it to say that this space is quite dynamic: Thanks to our increasingly fat planet, Diabetes has become epidemic world-wide, and whatever company develops a treatment and/or cure stands to make its investors a lot of money . . .

Those of you who are interested should do your homework into the various competitive Diabetes treatment companies, including this one.

The Stuff of Thought

Tuesday, September 25, 2007 | 07:30 PM

in Books | Psychology/Sentiment | Science

I'm always attracted to books that give insight into the minds of investors.

The newest outing from Harvard prof Steven Pinker looks to be just that sort of book: “The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature” explores language and human cognition:

“The Stuff of Thought” explores the duality of human cognition: the modesty of its construction and the majesty of its constructive power. Pinker weaves this paradox from a series of opposing theories. Philosophical realists, for instance, think perception comes from reality. Idealists think it’s all in our heads. Pinker says it comes from reality but is organized and reorganized by the mind. That’s why you can look at the same thing in different ways.

Then there’s the clash between ancient and modern science. Aristotle thought projectiles continued through space because a force propelled them. He thought they eventually fell because Earth was their natural home. Modern science rejects both ideas. Pinker says Aristotle was right, not about projectiles but about how we understand them. We think in terms of force and purpose because our minds evolved in a biological world of force and purpose, not in an abstract world of vacuums and multiple gravities. Aristotle’s bad physics was actually good psychology.

How can we be sure the mind works this way? By studying its chief manifestation: language. Variations among verbs reflect our distinctions among physical processes. Nuances among nouns illustrate the alternate interpretations built into our most basic perceptions."

-from the NYTimes review

Fascinating concept, completely applicable to the Bull/Bear debate.

A great video of Steven Pinker at TED is below:

“The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature”

Quote of the Day: Logic

Monday, September 24, 2007 | 03:30 PM

in Psychology/Sentiment | Science

"The real trouble with this world of ours is not that it is an unreasonable world, nor even that it is a reasonable one. The commonest kind of trouble is that it is nearly reasonable, but not quite. Life is not an illogicality; yet it is a trap for logicians.

"It looks just a little more mathematical and regular than it is; its exactitude is obvious, but its inexactitude is hidden; its wildness lies in wait."

- G. K. Chesterton

Very astute observation, and completely applicable to the stock market . . .

Why Are Poor Countries Poor?

Wednesday, September 05, 2007 | 02:30 PM

in Commodities | Economy | Politics | Science

Over at Slate, Tim Harford has an interesting discussion on a rather intriguing economic question: Why Are Poor Countries Poor?

The answer is less obvious than you might imagine. The usual explanation goes something like this:

"One very plausible account of why at least some poor countries are poor is that there is no smooth progression from where they are to where they would be when rich. For instance, to move from drilling oil to making silicon chips might require simultaneous investments in education, transport infrastructure, electricity, and many other things. The gap may be too far for private enterprise to bridge without some sort of coordinating effort from government—a "big push."

However, a new line of thinking has bled over into Economics from Physics. It turns out that:

"Rich countries have larger, more diversified economies, and so produce lots of products—especially products close to the densely connected heart of the network. East Asian economies look very different, with a big cluster around textiles and another around electronics manufacturing, and—contrary to the hype—not much activity in the products produced by rich countries. African countries tend to produce a few products with no great similarity to any others."

Anyway, by thinking about this in network terms, the physicists have created a map (infoporn!) of the relationships between different products in an abstract economic space:

Pretty fascinating thinking that has ramifications for what sort of might want to emphasize to poorer countries . . .

Sources:
The Product Space and the Wealth of Nations
http://www.nd.edu/~networks/productspace/index.htm

Milton Friedman, Meet Richard Feynman
How physics can explain why some countries are rich and others are poor
Tim Harford
Slate, Saturday, Aug. 18, 2007, at 7:07 AM
http://www.slate.com/id/2171898

Battle at Kruger: Lions, Buffalo, Crocodile

Tuesday, May 29, 2007 | 05:30 PM

in Digital Media | Science | Television

One of the fascinating things about YouTube is that it grants you access to video you would never have come across on your own. There simply never was a mechanism for finding and viewing clips of this sort before.

"Media," tracing its way back to the Gutenberg Printing Press, started out broadcasting as a priviledged few-to-few. The rise of the Mass Media in the 19th (Print) and 20th (Electronic) centuries turned media into a few-to-many communication form.

Today, media is many-to-many.

Which leads me to this video clip from the South African jungle. It is utterly fascinating -- I can guarantee you've never seen anything like this before. Perhaps there are some lessons in it for life.

Via Investment Post Cards

When Corporate Interests Conflict on Global Warming

Monday, March 12, 2007 | 07:12 AM

in Commodities | Corporate Management | Energy | Markets | Science

One of the first things attorneys learn about cross-examination is to look for the witness's motives. Its not that most people are outright liars -- though too many are -- its that people are often unaware how much their own biases and self interest color their views. In the marketplace of ideas (including litigation), the goal is for the best, most logical ideas to win out.

That's why its so interesting when in the corporate world, a debate breaks out over a scientific concept. The motivations of all parties are to preserve their business model, income stream and profitibility. However, out of this debate, we may potentially develop resolution on a disputed theory or notion.

For quite some time now, the debate over Global Warming has primarily been asymmetrical: The bulk of scientists on one side, versus Carbon producers (Oil companies, Auto manufacturers, Energy producers) on the other.

Which leads us to today's issue: Which corporate interest might be on the other side of the debate from the Global Warming deniers ? That question is indirectly explored in the Sunday Times: The Real Riddle of Changing Weather: How Safe Is My Home?

Here's an excerpt:

"The bigger threat to property is the possibility of more frequent and increasingly vicious storms that could propel already encroaching waters onto the shore, could dump larger amounts of precipitation, and could lash glassy skyscrapers and crumbling tenements.

And even before that happens, real estate values in low-lying areas could erode as heightened awareness of global warming draws attention not only to long-term exposure to storms but also to near-term damage from severe storms that could happen regardless of any long-term warming trend — like the major hurricane that experts say is overdue in New York City.

One Manhattan real estate agent said the fear was already weighing on some clients’ minds. “After Katrina, they saw how ineffective the U.S. is at holding back water compared to some other places, and it has made some people concerned,” said the agent, Tom Hemann of Brown Harris Stevens, who sells downtown. He said last month’s gloomy report on global warming prompted four former clients who had bought downtown to voice concern about living in low-lying neighborhoods.

Several interest come to mind right away: Properrty owners such as REITs are one; Home builders with substantial land holdings are another. Architects and city planners are also weighing in; Real Estate agencies, too. As previously noted, however, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) has been too busy spinning the housing market. They have yet to look into how this issue might impact its membership.

But the biggest potential corporate interest is without a doubt, the Insurance companies:

"Among insurers, all of whom factor climate change into their risk assessments, some like Allstate are already refusing to renew homeowners’ policies in the eight downstate counties (including metropolitan New York) most vulnerable to hurricanes and other major storms that could proliferate in a warming climate. (Allstate continues to insure individual co-op and condo units.)

“When you have trillion-dollar exposure, it doesn’t take much bad weather to cause extensive damage,” said L. James Valverde Jr., the vice president for economics and risk management at the Insurance Information Institute, a trade group based in Manhattan. “That’s really on the mind of the industry. When you’ve got this kind of concentration of people and property in a very important sector of the country, the potential for economic and insured loss really is great.”

So far, the debate on Climate Change has been between two very different sets of participants. However, the debate on Global Warming is now entering a new phase: Corporate versus Coprorate. Should get interesting, to say the least.

Map courtesy of NYTimes

Source:
The Real Riddle of Changing Weather: How Safe Is My Home?
TERI KARUSH ROGERS
NYT, March 11, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/11/realestate/11cov.html

New Yorker Global Warming

Saturday, February 10, 2007 | 04:15 PM

in Economy | Financial Press | Science

Amusing:

The more observant of you will note that there is no California on this map . . .

This is a parody of the famous Saul Steinberg 1976 New Yorker cartoon called "A View of the World from 9th Avenue, 1976"

9.1 Degrees

Monday, February 05, 2007 | 05:52 AM

in Commodities | Energy | Science

The trustee Oregon Scientific is reading a frigid 9.1 degrees this morning here on Long Island! Man, that's cold!

Watch energy consumption and prices this week . . .

Prices on these have come down dramatically

UPDATE February 5, 2007 6:56am

Barron's Technical columnist, Michael Kahn warns about rising cold -- and energy prices -- at Marketwatch

Watch out if crude moves through $60

Marketwatch February Trading Strategies: Cold Snap

Variant Perception in Science

Tuesday, August 15, 2006 | 05:55 PM

in Politics | Psychology/Sentiment | Science | UnScience

I love finding disconnects in the market (i.e.,the PPI data today);

Unfortunately, the people who fail to understand what the scientific methodology entails are pressing in the political realm -- rather than in the market place. We have seen they dare not try their silly little stunts in the peer reviewed scientific sphere.

If only these people were investors -- we would be emptying their bank accounts!

In politics, perception is reality, and so, for the most part, the penalty for deviating from reality is de minimus.

In the stock market, you cannot create your own reality -- at least not for long. Eventually, the market place comes around to the numerical facts -- i.e economics, revenues, and earnings.

For example: In surveys conducted in 2005, people in the United States and 32 European countries (The same question was posed to Japanese adults in 2001).

Respondants were asked whether to respond “true,” “false” or “not sure” to this statement:

“Human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animals.”

It turns out that the United States had the second-highest percentage of adults who said the statement was false -- and the second-lowest percentage who said the statement was true, researchers reported in the current issue of Science. (Only adults in Turkey expressed more doubts on evolution).

What is the penalty for this belief system? Well, you probably won't get a Science-based job -- but that's about it.

The acceptance of evolution is lower in the United States than in Japan or Europe, largely because of widespread fundamentalism and the politicization of science in the United States.

That -- and the lack of any sort of financial or societal disincentive for the belief system. At least so far . . .

UPDATE August 16, 2006 6:26am

Some questions in the comments require a bit of schooling:

Understand what the Scientific Method is: It is a body of techniques for investigating natural phenomena and acquiring new knowledge, as well as for correcting and integrating previous knowledge.

It posits theories which are used until better theories come along. Example: Gravity is a theory that works so well we assume it to be a fact. And if one day a better theory of gravitation comes along that predicts the motion of bodies and interaction of masses better than the present one, well then we will throw out the old theory and replace it with the better one.

Scientific Method assumes that its theories are subject to revision as additional evidence is acquired. No axioms are invioable, every thesis is subject to rigorous testing and peer review; Every theory is based on observable, empirical, measurable evidence, and subject to laws of reasoning.

All the acquired data are collectively called scientific evidence.

Source:
Did Humans Evolve? Not Us, Say Americans
NYT, August 15, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/15/science/sciencespecial2/15evo.html

The Evolution Debate: Complete Coverage
http://www.nytimes.com/pages/science/sciencespecial2/index.html

Public Acceptance of Evolution
Science, 11 August 2006:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/313/5788/765

Human to Human Bird Flu transmission?

Tuesday, May 23, 2006 | 04:15 PM

in Markets | Science

Birinyi Associates points to a Bloomberg story at 1:43pm implying Human to Human Bird Flu transmission in indonesia as the source of the selloff.

The chart looks like that's where the softness began; Kudos to Cumberland Advisor's David Kotok for flailing this issue recently when everyone had already moved passed it . . .

UPDATE March 24, 2006 9:14am

David Kotok of Cumberland Advisors goes into more details: How Bird Flu May Have Contributed to the Stock Market Sell Off

Source:
Seven Indonesian Bird Flu Cases Linked to Patients
John Lauerman
May 23 (Bloomberg)
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000080&sid=
aWESsJvt6CFE&refer=asia

Avian influenza – situation in Indonesia – update 14
WHO, 23 May 2006
http://www.who.int/csr/don/2006_05_23/en/index.html

How Bird Flu May Have Contributed to the Stock Market Sell Off
David Kotok
MARKET COMMENTARY, May 21, 2006
http://www.cumber.com/commentary.aspx?file=052106.asp&n=l_mc

Google Maps/Weather.gov mashup: Weathermole

Wednesday, May 17, 2006 | 08:51 AM

in Science | Technology | Web/Tech | Weblogs

Weathermole is a very excellent combination of two web apps: Google maps, and the National Weather Service 7 day forecasts.

Click anywhere on the map, and the seven day forecast for that city appears at the bottom of the page. Terrific for you business travellers who fly around the U.S. alot. As someone who did an abusrd amount of travel in 2005, this would have been exrtremely useful to have.
>

click for larger map

Weathermole via Rocketboom

http://weathermole.com/WeatherMole/index.html

George Gilder: So THAT explains it

Tuesday, May 09, 2006 | 07:15 AM

The Gilder effect, as it was known in the late 1990s, was what would happen when George Gilder's newsletter would recommend a stock, sending its share price surging to absurd levels. By absurd, I mean even relative to those heady dot com, bull market days.

By the late 1999/early 2000, we used to reliably fade (Short) Gilder picks after the first or second wave. It had to be done by scaling, cause you never knew how high these absurdities would run. But they eventually came crashing back down to earth. Many of them subsequently went bankrupt.

The key tell that his newsletter was a house of cards was that even Gilder himself would note that "He doesn't do price." When you consider how utterly absurd that is for an investment newsletter, you can understand how totally out of hand things can get.

Gilder's subscribers got utterly devastated in the crash: At one time, over 75,000 subscribers paid him good money for his picks; Today, fewer than 5,000 people subscribe (still a respectable number). Quote GG: "The trouble with my business is that everyone came in at the peak. The typical Gilder subscriber lost all his money and that made it very hard for me to market the newsletter." Gilder's saving grace was he ate his own cooking, investing right along side his readers. The WSJ reports he "was as close to bankruptcy as you can get without filing."

I never liked Gilder's approach or his "priceless picks," and I just found out why: He is a rigid idealogue. That's a guaranteed recipe for stock market disaster.

How idealogically rigid is GIlder? Consider:

-He is a zealous advocate of "intelligent design;"
-He believes evolution is a myth;
-He helped found the Discovery Institute;
-He was an early proponent of supply-side economics;
-He was outspoken critic of women's rights in the 1970s;
-He was a former Nixon speechwriter.

Even Gilder himself admitted "I did not put the companies through a rigorous financial test or filter. It was a real disaster. I was a naïve guy doing this. It almost didn't matter what the hell I did when all the companies went bankrupt, there is no way to look good."

No shit. That's got to be the understatement of the year. Additionally, it is horrifically irresponsible.

But understand my takeaway from all this; It isn't about politics -- its about being intellectually flexible and being able to adjust your thinking on the fly. Gilder is the poster boy for the opposite of that. Is it any surprise his readers and investors got demolished? They got suckered in at the top by someone who was unqualified to give financial advice.

What's even more astounding is that there are still 5,000 people who continue to pay him for his "insights."

Source:
Where Are They Now: George Gilder
MARCELO PRINCE
WSJ, May 8, 2006
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB114433479738318882.html

Dark Matter Revisited

Friday, February 10, 2006 | 06:55 AM

in Data Analysis | Economy | Science | UnScience

Monday's discussion of the BusinessWeek cover story on "Economic Dark Matter and Why the Economy is Stronger than You Think" generated some buzz -- at least going by all the comments.

Funny thing is, that post hardly discussed the specific problem with dark matter, and instead criticized the misleading way BusinessWeek characterized the issue via its headlines.

Today's online WSJ takes a deeper look at the core issue, in "Is 'Dark Matter' in the Deficit?" Its a great debate about the intellectually intiguing question of why, despite all of the structural imbalances, the US economy hasn't fallen apart. (I manage to get in a few amusing quotes).

Of course, economies don't behave like stocks -- miss a quarterly number, and get cut in half. Macro-Economic issues are, well, macro -- they are bigger, more complex, and take much longer for their full cycles to play out

But the concept of Dark Matter makes for a brilliant and handy excuse for all manner of bad government policies -- Federal deficits, negative account balances, excessive spending, vanishing savings rates, etc. Not to worry, Dark Matter will make up the gap.

Here's the Ubiq-cerpt:™

"Physicists for decades have used "dark matter" as Spackle to fill pesky anomalies that seem to defy theories about gravity, the Big Bang and more. Recently, economists have proposed a similar fix for apparent anomalies in U.S. economic data. Unlike dark matter in space, dark matter in economics is a concept that has been mostly derided by other economists. If it's real, though, it might be no joke for investors.

If you want to immerse yourself in the wonk-fest that is dark matter, feel free to read the recent paper, by Harvard economists Ricardo Hausmann and Frederico Sturzenegger, identifying the stuff. In a quantum nutshell, their theory is meant to explain something that has bugged economists and investors for years: A persistent trade deficit has built up a mountain of U.S. debt, taking America's balance sheet from about $400 billion in the black in 1980 to about $2.5 trillion in the red in 2004. When Average Joe is up to his eyeballs in debt, he sacrifices his income to whittle away debt. Uncle Sam, on the other hand, still nets about $30 billion more a year on his foreign investments than he shells out to foreigners in debt service and other payments.

Dismal scientists have long warned that this affront to the natural order can't be sustained, that the U.S. must pay off its debts, suffering all manner of horrors, including a hobbled economy and weaker U.S. stocks, bonds and dollars. But that day of reckoning hasn't come, and Messrs. Hausmann and Sturzenegger think they know why: The U.S. has a vast, imaginary asset -- dark matter -- that not only wipes out its debt but provides a surplus that generates that $30 billion a year in investment income.

Working backward from the $30 billion, Messrs. Hausmann and Sturzenegger tried to put a value on that dark-matter generated surplus. By using what they thought was a reasonable rate of return on an investment -- 5% a year -- they decided that surplus must then be $600 billion. Thus the U.S. since 1980 has accumulated $3.1 trillion that, if accounted for, erases that $2.5 trillion in debt and then some.

And, what is this dark matter? Mostly, the Harvard researchers say, it is simply a deep well of good old American know-how -- the consistent ability to export, say, Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurants to Moscow that are more appealing and profitable than Rasputin's House of Chicken and Waffles. According to this theory, foreigners have been pouring money into the U.S. in hopes of tapping that well again and again."

Its a great discussion; I'll ask Mark if they can move the entire piece to the public site.

UPDATE: February 10, 2006 11:38am

This is now on the free WSJ site.

Source:
Is 'Dark Matter' in the Deficit?
Spackle for Economic Anomalies Looks to Explain How U.S. Operates With Massive Debt
MARK GONGLOFF
WSJ, February 10, 2006
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB113952992119570152.html

Top US Patent Recipients for 2005

Monday, January 16, 2006 | 07:57 AM

in Data Analysis | Science | Web/Tech

Each year, the US Patent office releases its annual list of top 10 global private sector patent recipients. Listed below are the 10 corporations receiving the most U.S. patents for inventions in 2005, along with their 2004 ranking.

Top 10 Private Sector Patent Recipients for the 2005 Calendar Year.


Preliminary Rank in 2005	Preliminary # Patents in 2005	Organization	(Final Rank in 2004)	(Final Number of Patents in 2004)
1	2,941	International Business Machines Corporation	(1)	(3,248)
2	1,828	Canon Kabushiki Kaisha	(3)	(1,805)
3	1,797 *	Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. *	(4)	(1,775)
4	1,688	Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.	(2)	(1,934)
5	1,641	Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.	(6)	(1,604)
6	1,561	Micron Technology, Inc	(5)	(1,601)
7	1,549	Intel Corporation	(7)	(1,513)
8	1,271	Hitachi, Ltd	(8)	(1,893)
9	1,258	Toshiba Corporation	(9)	(1,311)
10	1,154	Fujitsu Limited	(11)	(1,296)

* Calendar year counts for 2005 for Hewlett-Packard Development Company, include seven patents issued to Hewlett-Packard Company.

By country, the list contains 5 Japanese firms (Canon, Matsushita, Hitachi, Toshiba, and Fujitsu) 4 US firms (IBM, HP, Micron, and Intel), and 1 Korean firm (Samsung).

By patent total, the 4 US firms garned 649 more patents than the 5 Japanese companies: 7,848 to 7,199, or about a 9% difference

Source:
USPTO Annual List of Top 10 Organizations Receiving Most U.S. Patents
January 10, 2006
http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/com/speeches/06-03.htm

Alaska is Melting . . .

Wednesday, December 28, 2005 | 03:30 PM

in Science | Technical Analysis | UnScience

It seems that the melting polar ice is becoming more of a concern to Alaskans than those of us in the lower 48.

click for larger graphic

courtesy of Anchorage Daily News

Thank goodness there's no Global Warming -- imagine how much more of Alaska would be melting if there was!

See also:

The truth about global warming > http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002549346_globewarm11.html

A world of evidence says global warming is real > http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/news/nation-world/globalwarming/1.html

Source:
Permafrost-thawing concern deepens
PERMAFROST: Computer scenario shows rising temperatures could melt top 11 feet in Alaska by 2100.
DOUG O'HARRA
Anchorage Daily News, December 25, 2005
http://www.adn.com/front/story/7312139p-7223885c.html

The "breathtaking inanity" of Intelligent Design

Saturday, December 24, 2005 | 06:40 AM

in Science

Dig this:

"A federal judge barred a Pennsylvania school district yesterday from mentioning "intelligent design" as an alternative to evolutionary theory in a scathing opinion that criticized local school board members for lying under oath and for their "breathtaking inanity" in trying to inject religion into science classes.

U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III, a Republican appointed by President Bush, did not confine his opinion to the missteps of a local school board. Instead he explicitly sought to vanquish intelligent design, the argument that aspects of life are so complex as to require the hand, subtle