GWT

As announced in November, I have spent significant time this year programming fairly advanced webpages using the Google Web Toolkit. The toolkit was released spring of 2006. It features not a Java wrapper for Javascript as previously stated, but rather a full compiler which translates Java code resembling the Swing graphical interface package to pure Javascript. Google currently uses the toolkit to make services such as Google Groups and Picasa Web Albums although some of their most sophisticated services such as Gmail, iGoogle, and Docs and Spreadsheets still relies on low level Javascript.

I Cringely recently predicted that Javascript toolkits, especially GWT, would become the standard not just for web development, but especially and more immediately for applications designed to run securely on mobile devices such as the iPhone. Apple's recent move to open Safari to Windows (especially in a very broken condition) was a well thought out strategic move to encourage Javascript programmers to begin supporting Apple's proprietary web browser. The GWT connection comes from the fact that Google has put significant effort in ensuring that GWT compiled JS functions on all major browsers since most browsers process JS differently and often fail as a result. At the same time, Google is making concessions to Apple in making YouTube videos available in Apple format.

Let me pause and say that for all of its impressive strengths, Apple's critical weakness comes from its obsession with its own closed platforms and formats.

Back to GWT. I am honoured that the GWT news site, onGWT has on my recommendation posted the link to the Cringely article. onGWT is the best site available for the latest news and resources for GWT.

Blog Recommendation: Future Pundit

Future Pundit (RSS) is in many regards what I wish my blog were. He has an informed perspective on current world developments and understands their implications for the future of technology. Previous generations did not have the luxury of understanding the laws of physics and knowing what technologies would be possible in the future. Today, the physical laws are understood well enough to predict the general range of human technology for several millenia. In my opinion, a great deal more human discussion must focus on the future. Unfortunately, with a world all too focused on petty squables over land, primitive energy resources, and backwards religious belief, we loose sight of the larger picture to the detriment of the emerging future world.

More on Pigovian Taxes

Steven Levitt of Freakonomics has a great post in favour of further petroleum taxes. Interestingly, he argues that carbon taxation to prevent global warming is less important than reducing congestion and traffic accidents for social welfare. I suspect that he is not properly factoring in the globally felt negative externalities of global warming, but his conclusion is nonetheless correct that at least a tax of USD 1.00 on petroleum is dearly needed.

The most economically efficient solution to the issue of congestion, ie a proper Pigovian tax, would be a system like London's centre where only those vehicles which have paid a daily fee may enter. Their system relies on sophisticated network of cameras and plate recognition software to automatically bill and fine drivers.

Traffic accidents are doubtless a problem which should be seriously considered. I would expect that insurance and lawsuits already captures those externalities, but I do think a tax on vehicle size and weight per mile driven would help to counter the runaway arms race of personal safety that exists in vehicle addicted nations. I am mostly referring to the exorbitant demand for SUVs particularly for women. The individual driver, surrounded by an armada of SUVs piloted by cellphone distracted drivers, is not inclined to purchase a Volkswagon Golf. Thus the rational individual, in the interests of self preservation, chooses to join the backwards collective. This lesson I learned quite vividly on my first visit to Texas.

Nonetheless, a gasoline tax would as Levitt suggests have a beneficial effect on many things including congestion, traffic accidents, climate change and obeisity.

Petroleum and Obeisity

In the United States, a morbidly obese country, rising fuel prices will have a very positive effect on public health. Sustained high energy prices should accelerate the effect owing to increased investment in public transit and more rationally designed cities.

Film Review: Sicko

The propagandist Michael Moore, perhaps partly responsible for the Bush reelection, has produced a new film. Google's ratings suggest it is being received extremely well. Like all of his work, Sicko appeals much more to emotion than to reason. In seducing the American populace with the conveniences of socialism, he completely whitewashes the costs paid in high taxation, lower economic growth, high unemployment, and reduced technological advancement. Perhaps this is why country after country in Europe has been electing conservative governments; they have learnt the lessons of socialism the hard way. I agree that for poor, unproductive, and unambitious people such as those featured in Sicko, socialism is an absolutely fantastic deal. Goods and services are provided at someone else's expense. Michael Moore would lead one to believe that it is the greed of megacorporations who are responsible for all human suffering in the United States. The problem of unaffordable health care in the United States does not come from competing insurance companies. It is a problem of monopoly.

The American Medical Association, the State union of doctors, maintains medical school quotas and strictly suppresses the licencing of foreign trained doctors. This medical monopoly also maintains the sole ability to prescribe medication. Prescription fraud such as trying to fill a prescription in a higher amount than ordered by a doctor, is a felony punishable by prison sentencing. Doctors tend to prescribe medicines in artificially low quantity so as to encourage more overpriced visits for a refill. On top of this the medicine which is prescribed is sold at a large premium because of the lack of regulation in drug pricing as well as the overprotective intellectual property inherent in the American patent system.

Medical expenses are further inflated by the inordinate costs of doing business. Malpractice insurance is extremely expensive. There is no upper limit to the damages in a medical malpractice suit. Merck was famously ordered to pay USD 253 million for the death of one marathon runner. With 33% cuts, over-educated and overpaid lawyers are all too happy to help recover alleged damages. Lawyers such as John Edwards make fortunes preying upon the misfortunes of others.

There are of course some delightfully positive aspects of the US system. With the supply of doctors kept artificially small, the competition to be one of those doctors is increased so that American doctors, after they have been paid, are some of the best in the world. Maltreated patients do have the recourse to sue. Overprotected intellectual property drives innovation in medicine saving countless lives and improving quality of life in the long term. With drug price regulation in most other countries, America effectively subsidises medicine for the rest of the World.

Unfortunately, Michael Moore does not address any of these real issues. He is long on sob stories and short on understanding. American medicine is no doubt expensive and long overdue for anti-trust and tort reform, but calls for a medical socialist revolution are entirely inappropriate.

Weather

It took me a while to find a decent website for weather. Weather.com is owned by the weather channel and is mostly spam from what I can see. Sadly, this is where I would often go when I needed some weather information. Intellicast.com on the other hand is a great site. No advertising, global content, and readily-accessible multifactor weather forecasts. If you know of some other good weather sites, by all means share with the group.

Another Successful SCRAM Jet Test

SCRAM Jet engines offer the potential for up to Mach 15 atmospheric flight. At these speeds, one could fly from Ney York to Syndey in under 2 hours. Satellites could also be launched into orbit much more cheaply with a SCRAM jet than with rockets alone since rockets must carry their oxidiser. Unlike traditional jet engines, SCRAM jets have no moving parts and rely on air compression alone to ignite fuel at very high speeds.

While wind tunnel experiments have shown the potential of SCRAM jets for many years, expensive field tests have been rare but promising. Reuters reports that another successful field test has been carried out over the Australian outback. The experiment results from the collaboration of the Austrialian Defence Science and Technology Organisation and the American Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). DARPA, the original creator of the Internet, is one of the few truly profitable and effective components of the United States military.

*Update* I have been informed by an esteemed SCRAM Jet research engineer at Cal Tech that depending on fuel, the theoretical maximum speed could be as high as M 25.

N-tuplets

Humanity has long been plagued with the very difficult task of bearing and birthing children. It is one of the most dangerous periods of life for both mother and child. Complications from this ordeal more often than not resulted in mortality. Today, modern medical science has drastically reduced the probability of death from such complications and has even given fertility hope to many couples who would have been doomed by their own biology never to produce viable offspring. Unfortunately, the innate drive to reproduce has caused many couples to push their own biology to the limit of medical science in trying to produce offspring. Once impregnated through a cocktail of drugs, hormones and possibly invasive procedures sometimes involving third parties as donors or hosts, couples will then decide to try to simultaneously bring multiple babies to term even as many as 7 at a time. If this is not a crime against those children and a crime against nature then I do not know what is. The children tend to be born prematurely and are at extreme risk through their entire development process. The most bizarre part is that these couples will not terminate some of the pregnancies for the good of the rest because of their religious hang-ups. I can appreciate an anti-abortionist position, but for a woman to undergo such unnatural and dangerous procedures and then claim a profound respect for the dignity of human life is well beyond my comprehension.

When technology is sufficiently advanced, one can more seriously consider a Brave New World in which children are grown by the hundreds in artificial wombs. In such a scenario, there would presumably be little danger to the child's safety or development. A person could then spawn as many genetically similar children as they had desire and means to support.

Here on early 21st Century Earth, upright, large brained humans cannot reproduce in litters. Reproductive technologies are very fresh and need not be used lightly to satisfy some perverted fantasy or primitive impulse. There are literally millions of unwanted or orphaned children around the world. Infertile parents should consider adoption. I propose that carrying greater than 3 unnaturally conceived children simultaneously to term should be criminally prosecuted or prohibitively taxed. Society might also consider removing the children from those households since clearly such parents are unfit.

Google Maps

I am frequently puzzled when I hear of people who still use MapQuest. MapQuest was indeed useful in the late '90s during the Dot Com era. Today Google Maps is the way to go. They recently rolled out a new feature, Street View.

Surface Computing

Popular Mechanics has an impressive demonstration of new human-computer interaction technology being developed with Microsoft.

Green Energy Technology

Last Friday, on NPR Science Friday, two developers of clean energy technology were interviewed.

Klaus Lackner, director of the Lenfest Center for Sustainable Energy at Columbia University, presented technology which could relatively cheaply sequester carbon directly from the atmosphere. His breakthrough was not so much in the basic principle, but in significantly reducing the cost. He believes that very soon the CO2 from a litre of petroleum could be sequestered for merely an additional USD 0.07 per litre. Emissions could be sequestered into sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) or calcium carbonate (chalk, antacid).

Meanwhile, Jerry Woodall a very accomplished inventor at Perdue University has developed a simple means of using aluminum, gallium, and water to generate hydrogen. His proposed aluminum cycle could be a very useful way to allow hydrogen fuel portability at about 40% energy efficiency. The hydrogen could then be used in fuel cells or if necessary, combusted.

Today from New Scientist: University of Utah scientists have developed a means of recovering waste heat energy through an acoustic heat engine which converts heat to sound to electricity also at about 40% efficiency. One cubic centimetre of these small devices could recover about 1 W of power.

Andrew Sullivan

Notes from the Underground is back with an excellent review of Andrew Sullivan's new book. While I have always admired Sullivan's intellect, eloquence and 'eclectic' background, I lost most respect for him when I saw him transition from classical conservative thinker to Neoconservative attack dog. He became in my mind one of the most pernicious types of people alive today akin to wartime National Socialist supporters, and his reverence for the (divine) Lincoln makes him even more suspect. Nonetheless, he is yet worthy of some attention. His blog is the Daily Dish.

Another Reason Not to Smoke

If you are still a tobacco smoker, you may wish to take note of a new study out of Hellas, the country where tobacco consumption AVERAGES one pack per day per person making it the highest per capita. Tobacco absorbs large quantities of radionuclides making the deadly smoke not just chemically harmful, but also radioactive.

Google Compound Gadget

My readers will know how useful I find the Google Personalised Page which has been poorly renamed iGoogle. A Compound Gadget has been released which is very useful for decluttering the personalised page into tabbed gadgets. I will soon be reposting all the RSS and XML feeds to which I link on my own personalised page.

The Mandelbrot Set

Fractals - The Colours of Infinity is an excellent documentary on fractal geometry with particular regard to the Mandelbrot Set which is generated by iterating: fc(z) <-> z^2 + c. More can be learned from Wikipedia. The afore linked documentary is narrated by science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke. It features colour cycling of the Mandelbrot Set which result in stunningly beautiful visualisations of the infinite complexity and repetitive order inherent to this particular fractal at any magnification. Indeed, one begins to appreciate that the geometry of the natural world is seemingly a special case of fractal geometry.

Politics and US Healthcare

As I have mentioned before, the biggest flaw I see in the current US system is the problem of the limited supply from the American Medical Association doctor's labour union. This aside, I would like to draw attention to Brad DeLong's FT opinion article endorsing Barak Obama's proposed healthcare "solution." Obama should be applauded for having the courage to announce such a detailed proposal which exposes him to political attacks.

DNA Discoverer has Personal Genome Sequenced

Nobel laureate James Waston, together with Francis Crick, discovered the double helix structure of DNA along with the mechanism by which it is the medium for Genetic information. The entire human genome was sequenced only 4 years ago as a large collaborative effort costing USD 3 billion over 13 years. Gene sequencing technology, like computing is advancing exponentially such that in 60 days Watson's genome was sequenced for under USD 1 million. A genome's information will fit on a single DVD.

Watson is an active proponent of human genetic engineering, what could be termed "eugenics." While many support the idea of genetic therapy to cure or prevent disease, Watson goes farther, supporting genetic engineering even for cosmetic purposes. This issue will more and more come to the forefront of public policy and debate, hopefully even overshadowing the Anna Nicole Smith's baby daddy controversy or Paris Hilton's jail sentencing. I fully support reproductive freedom with the limits that parents are taxed for bringing new people into the world (perhaps progressively) and parents and doctors punished if their genetic or fertility experiments result in undue or unnatural human suffering. The unfortunate result of this may be that the human genome experiences fads where some celebrity's genes become very quickly overrepresented in the population, but overall I expect people will wish to preserve large sections of their own genome in the next generation while tweaking out negative carcinogenic genes and aiming for healthy life extension in the next generation. Meanwhile the cult of the "organic" will come to encompass the human population where a natural and more diseased segment of the population will remain reproductively exclusive. If I had the choice and the technology were sufficiently developed so as to be well understood and extremely reliable, my offspring would probably not be organic. To quote Watson, "If every girl were beautiful, I think it would be great!"

Personal genome sequencing has more immediate implications for health care, preventative medicine, insurance, and medical economics, but that is a topic for another time.

Global Peace Index

The Economist Intelligence Unit together with several other think tanks has compiled a Global Peace Index by country. Norway ranks first, while the United States ranks 96th and its protectorates Israel and Iraq rank 119 and 121 respectively filling the bottom tier. BBC article.

Mathematica 6.0

Mathematica, the child of Stephen Wolfram, is a Kernel and a Development package and a symbolic language for mathematical evaluation and manipulation. Beyond its core functionality, Mathematica has a vast function library which allows it to be tied in or to glue together many other platforms and languages including Matlab, C++, Python, Java and .Net. A skilled Mathematica programmer can develop extremely complex and sophisticated programmes with ease. Unfortunately, being a closed source platform which retails for around 2000 USD per copy, it remains a niche product for academics and some quantitative professionals. Mathematica 6.0 was recently released as announced by /. I have had the pleasure to use Mma 6.0 and I have been extremely impressed with the the upgrade. Improvements include text coloration for different language types which makes reading the code far easier as well as the new Dynamic evaluation function which allows for greater flexibility in realtime evaluation and animation. Since Mma relies only on a serial number for activation and every previous version of Mathematica was easily cracked, I assume Mathematica 6.0 will soon become common in underground circles.

Economic Thinking vs. Evolutionary Thinking

Economics is the study of the allocation of scarce resources in the production and consumption of goods and services. Mankind has finally entered a stage where the economy tends to increase at a positive rate owing to scientific understanding and the mastery of the physical world through technology. If humanity survives past its current critical phase (Type 0), the economic expansion will likely continue until the energy of the nearby galaxies has been exhausted and the Universe gradually begins to die a particle death.

During large periods of human evolution such was not the case. Resources and technology were stagnant. One person's average gain was another's average loss. Accepting immigrants into the community or yielding resources to a nearby tribe could have been an existential threat to a population's genetic prevalence. Thus humans have evolved with an inherent suspicion of outsiders and reluctance to trade with them. It works well as an evolutionary survival strategy on the African forest or Savannah, but is a very poor strategy for expanding wealth and resources in a positive-sum, technologically advancing civilisation. Without education to overcome the protectionist genetic instincts of primitive man or similar memetic cultural exclusivity, politics and laws end up restricting trade and immigration in very unproductive and uncooperative ways to the detriment of everyone.

Paul Rubin has written a very interesting piece about this. Via Mankiw.

Euro Monetary Policy

Quite unlike the possibilities for future private currencies, I find traditional governmental monetary policy generally uninteresting. The 20th Century taught us that the most economically and politically stable monetary policy is one in which money supply and interest rates are gently tweaked only to maintain price stability. The US Federal Reserve and the now the ECB have held to this fairly well thus making them the World's reserve currency. A stable money supply also promotes economic activity with participants confident in the future value of their long term contracts.

Price stability really is a one-size fits all solution. Countless models have been able to show circumstances where deviation from this policy could be beneficial. Despite the painful inflationary lessons many countries learned in the last century, there are always some who wish to manipulate the money supply to take advantage of the short term benefits of the Phillips Curve in lowering the rate of unemployment. Sarkozy has been among those calling for monetary policy to target job creation rather than price stability. For the specific case of France, Sarkozy's suggestion likely would be a net benefit since their labour market is so completely bureaucratic, over-regulated and backwards. Some inflation would act like a lubricant on rusted metal. Tyler Cowen explains it a bit better. However, France's focus really should be on firing its State employees, eliminating labour market regulations, and cutting back on welfare benefits. Just because inflationary monetary policy would be politically acceptable amelioration in France does not mean the rest of Europa should have to suffer.

Happy Planet Index

Human Development and quality of life most often comes at the price of environmental destruction. The New Economics Foundation's HPI makes a fair attempt to rank different countries on the basis of human quality of life or happy human years per environmental footprint. Vanuatu has the highest HPI. Maximising measures such as these rather than artificial production or velocity measures such as GDP should be the aim of economists and policymakers.

09*F9*11*02*9D*74*E3*5B*D8*41*56*C5*63*56*88*C0

The title to this blog is allegedly a key to the new HD DVD encryption. Previous Post. Since its publication has caused great controversy, I thought I would help raise awareness on the issue. I am curious to see if the title of this post elicits a "Cease and Desist" response from AACS or a forced takedown from Google.

Incidentally, I believe I previously posted about the cracking of the Blue Ray format, but now that post seems to be missing. I believe that it was removed by Google without my consent or notification. I cannot blame them for avoiding any potential legal exposure, but notification at least would be appreciated.

Limiting users access to media content is at best difficult. Anything which must ultimately be decoded into a form suitable for human comprehension is extremely easy to crack, replicate, or circumvent. Intellectual Property is in general overprotected by International law (and especially US law) beyond a socially beneficial level. In light of tecnological advances, a newer subscription/taxation/library model for content remuneration bolstered by demand measurement mechanisms would be far fairer and more effective than the current model of imposed artificial monopolies over otherwise free, infinitely reproducable media.

Simon Schama

Simon Schama, one of the great public intellectuals of our time, masterfully delivers his erudite historical and artistic knowledge and appreciation through his books and documentaries. His latest documentary, 'The Power of Art,' is now available on MVGroup. One of these episodes focuses on Mark Rothko's Seagram Murals which I was pleasantly surprised to encounter recently at the National Gallery of Art in Washington.

'Rough Crossings,' Schama's historical book and documentary relates the story of the establishment of Freetown in modern Sierra Leone. For me, currently mired in a United States of "support our troops" and "spread freedom and democracy" it was particularly poignant to remember that the success of the American Revolution meant more slavery. The founders of Freetown had to struggle immensely and flee from the States to Canada and finally to the jungles of Sierra Leone just to have a remote chance at a "free" and democratic existence. Refugees from American slavery, these slaves in fact experienced the brief 18th century experiment in 'British Freedom.' While there is a valuable mythology of the Founding Fathers and the story of 'American Freedom,' the story of the settlers of Freetown greatly enriches the understanding of 'American Freedom,' particularly in the context of African-American History.

Finally, Schama's 15 part 'History of Britain' stands as his best work to date.

*Update: Regarding Schama's book, 'Rough Crossings,' on his book tour, Schama gives two superb lectures at the Google Mountain View Campus. Lecture 1, YouTube as part of the Authors@Google programme. Lecture 2, Google Video. Both Highly Recommended!

Fascism

Laws and Principles are meaningless when blatantly violated by those responsible for upholding them. Granting a general amnesty to those who were complicit in violating those laws and principles should be considered with the greatest sobriety. Such actions should not be permitted to reinforce a corrupt regime or to whitewash their misdeeds and those of their traitorous collaborators. More often than not, the proper response is to overthrow the corrupt authority and hold their allies to account. Too many people have sacrificed too much in support of those principles to casually permit their debasement.

Allowing the Extinction of Species

Under the Bush Administration's "interpretation" of the 1973 Endangered Species Act, species need only be listed as endangered whose existence is threatened in its current viable range, not its traditional range. So far 38 prominent scientists have signed a letter of protest.

Larry Summers on Climate Change

Finally, the Global Warming debate is hotting up. Larry Summers begins to call for practical solutions to the crisis in his FT column. The first in a series I presume.

Via DeLong.

Dell and Linux Take a Step Forward

Dell will begin shipping their computers with Ubuntu Linux installed. This is a great step forward for the OS since it will be well supported now by a major hardware vendor. I recently tried to convert my system to Linux, but I ran into some problems because I could not get my video card to function properly. Meanwhile, M$'s lasts advantage is as a former monopolist, they support almost all hardware, or to put another way, almost all hardware supports M$.

Dell is in a unique position to reassert its dominance in the hardware arena while at the same time lowering its variable costs by supporting free software. Dell should be aiming to better assert themselves into peripheral devices such as TVs and DVRs which also could be manufactured cheaply and run Linux (ie MythTV). They ought to be positioning themselves to partner with an Apple or a Google to produce high quality affordable computers with top notch user friendly software and once and for all crush the M$ abomination.

Unfortunately, the executives at Dell seem to be too ensconced in their traditional way of doing business and loathe to adopt or experiment with new ideas. They certainly cannot risk alienating M$ too much and loosing their lucrative OEM status but they should at the same time recognise that M$ is the Titanic and they had better have a lifeboat secured.

WTF CNN?

Following up my rant about television news, I find CNN a worthless platform for infotainment. With so much trouble in the World they will not report, I find their assertion of being a news organisation offensive. It is not even funny, typically relying upon shock, fear, and anger as its hook to sell adverts. I question Google's default link to CNN on their personalised page. If infotainment is what you seek, at least watch Colbert or read the Onion before you turn on CNN. WTF CNN seems like a great blog elucidating the absurdity of CNN and is at least distilled comedic infotainment. Video of Jon Stewart's legendary appearance on CNN's Crossfire.

Thanks to Meredith for the link.

Wealth and Efficiency at the Cost of Privacy

The Economist has an article about the coming wireless revolution. Gradually, wireless-enabled microchips will be embedded in almost everything that is manufactured turning our cities into giant sensor nets. The benefits of this will be unprecedented, but so will the ability for even the average person to spy on almost anything. It is Little Brother rather than Big Brother who will be the menace of the 21st Century. I believe that no matter what the laws are, in future privacy will be all but eliminated. People will do well to live their lives with this in mind.

Debating the Future

This BBC article concerns a debate being held by London's Science Museum regarding the future impact robotics will play in our lives and how liability for robot behaviour and mistakes will be determined. Addressing future technological impact in a mature way is healthy for our society. It allows us to look forward, to consider and shape the world and society in which we actually want to live. Rather than Anna Nicole's baby daddy, at such a critical point in human evolution, society should be considering privacy rights, reproductive regulation, genetic engineering, and particularly environmental protection. Simply put: long term welfare.

Theoretical Physicist, Michio Kaku, concluding 'Parallel Worlds':

The generation now alive is perhaps the most important generation of humans ever to walk the Earth. Unlike previous generations, we hold in our hands the future destiny of our species, whether we soar into fulfilling our promise as a type I civilization or fall into the abyss of chaos, pollution, and war. Decisions made by us will reverberate throughout this century. How we resolve global wars, proliferating nuclear weapons, and sectarian and ethnic strife will either lay or destroy the foundations of a type I civilization. Perhaps the purpose and meaning of the current generation are to make sure that the transition to a type I civilization is a smooth one. The choice is ours. This is the legacy of the generation now alive. This is our destiny.

Personally, I have no fear of robotics, though I expect to be held completely liable for any damages my machines may one day cause. I welcome the day that machines exceed my own intelligence and the day that people merge themselves with intelligent or even spiritual machines.

Social Choice and Voting Systems

The Economist's blog, Free Exchange, has a post relating the characteristics of the French election to Arrow's Impossibility Theorem, (pdf proof) from Kenneth Arrow's 'A Difficulty in the Concept of Social Welfare,' The Journal of Political Economy, Volume 58, Issue 4 (August, 1950), pp. 328–346. This and his more comprehensive book 'Social Choice and Individual Values' won him the Nobel Prize in 1972. The theorem explains the inefficiency of voting systems with more than two candidates and more than one voter in determining the one candidate who is the social optimum. It can be shown that in some voting scenarios, the aggregate outcome can produce a result which is below the social optimum. In the case of France, François Bayrou was the clear social optimum, but in only a two round election system, the results were polarised in the first round between Ségozy and Sarkolène as Jean-Marie Le Pen called them. The United States also has a particularly inefficient selection system where geographic area and party affiliation vote on a candidate in the primaries, then geographic areas vote again for a president who is elected then by several hundred members of the Electoral College. For example, Albert Gore won the popular election but ultimately lost the election in the Electoral College. The inefficiency of voting systems can also be exacerbated or exploited as in Tom Delay's infamous Tejas redistricting of 2003.

It should be stated that a voting system based on modern information technology could easily be far superior to all of the 18th Century systems currently in use.

The Economics of Climate Change

In fall 2006, the Stern Review of the Economics of Climate Change,a British government commissioned study, was released. Most scientific or economic criticisms have said that the review did not go far enough in assessing the effect of climate change, although it did present extremely stark warnings for the future. Martin Weitzman has a upcoming book review of the Stern Review in the upcoming Journal of Economic Literature. Brad DeLong also has a great post on this topic. Combined with UN reports on climate change, the evidence for highly destructive global climate change is conclusive and undeniable. The solutions to this crisis are clear, and yet the corruption and inefficiency of the geopolitical system allows the perpetuation of such egregious harm to life on Earth and human well being. How and when will it end?

Quantifiable Advantages of a Large City

An article in Scientific American pointed me to an interesting article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. From SciAm:

"This is a fascinating paper that quantitatively explores the complex interactions between urbanization, sustainability and social innovation...Insights, such as those presented in this paper, will help guide our collective choices as the pace of socioecological change accelerates."

-Thomas Parris

And Now for Something Completely Different

Monty Python lost German episodes.

Thanks to Tyler Cowen

Privatised Currency

Introductory Economics teaches that there are 3 fundamental properties of money: divisibility, transferability, and storing of value. Traditionally, various commodities which were rare, small, and relatively indestructible such as precious metals were the dominant currency or at least backed the value of dominant currencies. As governments became more stable and dominant in people's lives in the last two centuries, they were able to abandon all commodity backing of their treasury notes whilst letting currencies stand on their own merit as stores of value. This served to further governments grip over its populace by permitting enormous macroscopic control over wealth, interest rates, and inflation in the economy for good or ill.

We are now entering the information age where anyone may be able to create their own effective "virtual" currencies through modern technology. This soon will allow encrypted and anonymous transactions which will effectively transfer value beneath the radar of government. Governments will try to suppress this activity, but ultimately currency simply represents information and the preservation of information is a law of physics. With satellite internet available in a wristwatch, who will possibly be able to destroy the flow of information? Currency is an important example of the gradual inevitable decline in power and authority of governments and the rise of the multinational corporations as the dominant world powers of the future. After all, the modern system of Nation-States is an idea less than 200 years old, having been created at the Congress of Vienna. It will pass, like all previous forms of rule and diplomacy, into mere history texts.

The currencies of the near future will be varied, exchangeable, customised to individual financial needs and desires, and backed by a tradable basket of securities. To buy a haircut, you could be paying with shares of IBM and GOOG whilst the barber is receiving credit towards his new telescreen and futures contracts on organic wheat. I must thank David Friedman for first sharing this revelation with me in his book 'The Machinery of Freedom.'

This post was prompted by this WSJ article describing the current "virtual" currency, QQ, now being suppressed in Zhong Guo for doing just what I have described, undermining the legitimacy of the Yuan. As with other forms of information oppression, Zhong Guo is doomed to fail.

Never Slap the Gift Donkey

A good friend of mine has a new blog, 'Never Slap the Gift Donkey.' (feed) It promises to be completely random, and always entertaining.

Architectural Blog

Following up on de Botton, since architecture is one of my passive interests, I have begun following '[The] Daily Dose of Architecture' blog. Architecture and more generally urban planning are often ignored but extremely important subjects. Like the natural world, changes in our artificially constructed world tends to change gradually, making it easy to ignore the big picture. Meanwhile their real impact on our lives, though difficult to quantify, is at least equivalent to most other factors. Living in the United States, I am daily confronted by congestion, sprawl, cheap construction, and shameful architectural design and urban planning. Bob Marley (discography) rightly referred to the modern cities of Babylon as "Concrete Jungles." Americans especially have allowed their lives to become dominated by the illusory convenience, comfort, and sexiness of their automobiles. In so doing, they have sacrificed their society, economy, environment, and quality of life. Now many emerging economies are in danger of making the same mistakes. Just as travel enriches us by exposing us to new and varied cultures, attitudes, and lifestyles, constant exposure and reminders of new architectural ideas can similarly enrich our lives, foster creativity, and help redirect our long term thinking to a forward, positive direction.

Please feel free to recommend other quality sites.

Alain de Botton

Son of a wealthy Swiss banker and a Cambridge scholar of philosophy, literature, and architecture, Alain de Botton has produced several documentary series focusing on how an understanding of philosophy, conscious architectural design, or approach to travel can significantly improve one's life. Breaking down trends in our modern Western lives to their simplest terms, de Botton skillfully calls our ambitions, attitudes, and decisions into question by merely stating the obvious while doing homage to great thinkers of the past.

Perfect Home
Philosophy: A Guide to Happiness
Art of Travel
Status Anxiety
How Proust Can Change Your Life

LEDs

A FT article about the development of the Blue LED, which makes possible white LEDs. This technology is set to vastly reduce world energy consumption and improve quality of life. Note the willingness of some corporations to completely screw employees that have made them billions of dollars for extremely little pay. Yet another reason to have a significant ownership or partnership interest in your company.

Progress in Environmental Protection

No thanks to Republican appointed Supreme Court justices, the Supreme Court ruled April 2 that the Environmental Protection Agency must regulate the emissions of greenhouse gasses. Enforcement of this obligation will still be an uphill battle with Republicans controlling the Presidency, but the precedent of this decision could have positive lasting consequences. The dissenting viewpoint of the Republican judges that this type of ruling exceeds the limited authority of the courts in a democratic society if anything undermines the legal authority of the Constitution of the United States itself. How can the Supreme Court have no authority to rule on the necessity to regulate a pollutant which exacerbates a mass extinction event? NY Times opinion.

Starting Your Own Business

For anyone who has ever thought about starting their own business, this essay by Paul Graham may be encouraging. I am among many people I know who have started a business. Most of them have not yet acheived great success and even if it has to be a part time gig at first, it is all still worth it for the experience alone. If you can do it full time and make good money, tant mieux. Working at a start-up is also much better in terms of setting your own schedule. As such, the BBC found that flexible hours were the most valuable job benefit.

Tax Reform in Sverige

In both a symbolic and truly effective move, the Swedish government plans to eliminate the wealth tax which encourages successful Swedes to shelter their money in other countries, or move entirely as in the case of Johnny Hallyday from France. In a world of capital mobility, this can only be a positive move for the Swedish economy.

Quote of the Day: 2007-03-29

"Patriotism is often an arbitrary veneration of real estate above principles."

- George Jean Nathan

Adam Curtis Documentaries

Adam Curtis, creator of 'The Power of Nightmares' has produced several documentary series about the political, economic, and psychological forces driving Western society. UKNova has a torrent for a collection of his series. His new series, 'The Trap: What Happened to our Dreams of Freedom' is currently airing in the UK. It can be accessed on MVGroup.

School Vouchers

School vouchers is an idea which I first heard proposed by Milton Friedman in 1962 in 'Capitalism and Freedom.' The idea is a public good with positive externalities and therefore needs subsidy. However, rather than a limited and uncompetitive system of public schooling, education should be subsidised as vouchers which can be applied to private or public education. Especially in the United States, the educational system is completely broken. Public schools are funded by neighbourhoods, which result in well funded and decent public school in rich school districts, and absolutely abysmal prison-like schools in poorer areas. The problems are compounded by teachers unions which block the firing of incompetent teachers and support the interests of established teachers instead of students' education. Even George Bush campaigned for president by supporting school vouchers, but as with most of his campaign promises, they had very little to do with his actual policies. Having attended private school and realising their enormous superiority over their public counterparts, I have always supported the idea of school vouchers. If education should be subsidised at all, then private schooling should be accessible by anyone who is accepted, not just the wealthy. Financial limitations on access to education serve only to reinforce class differences, reduce competitiveness of the public schools, distort real estate markets, and dampen long run productivity of the economy.

Tyler Cowen on vouchers.

US Department of Transportation: Not Completely Worthless

The Department of Transportation has tentatively approved Virgin America as a new domestic United States carrier allowing renewed life and competition into this overprotected and stagnant industry.

I have posted before on this story. Thank you to everyone who petitioned the DoT to achieve this result.

Home Ownership and Unemployment

Via Mankiw again, I have learned something I never before considered. Home ownership, by reducing geographic mobility, greatly increases unemployment. Of course! On the other hand, it is important to remember that owning a home gives strong incentive to improving it, while renting has almost no such incentives. Given the overwhelming amount of wealth tied up in real estate and the externalities of neighbourhood effects, the unemployment factor cannot be taken at face value to completely demonise home ownership subsidies.

Freedom of the Press

I had a discussion recently with a friend regarding sensationalistic television news stories in the United States and what it says about our society in general. The discussion was provoked by a local Bay Area television news story which targeted the fears and frustrations of drivers concerning high gasoline prices in California. Rather than addressing the root causes of rising petroleum price or the strong economic arguments behind high consumption taxes on fossil fuels, the story instead targeted the anger and frustration of lower-income, uninformed drivers.

I have almost completely given up consuming television news media, but these stories get to the heart of the failure of modern American "democracy". The founders of the United States realised that freedom of the press and more abstractly, freedom of information, was fundamental to the proper functioning of a representative republic where the will of the masses translates ultimately into political policy and law. Unfortunately, the capitalist environment in which this "free press" operates, has transformed mass media into either infotainment, sensationalism, or fear-mongering. The purpose is simply to sell advertising by any psychological technique necessary to attract viewership and boost ratings. A society whose press is controlled by commercial interests is arguably as bad as or worse than one with governmental controls over the dissemination of information. The same distortions and manipulations are possible: media-driven public support for the invasion and occupation of Iraq proves the point.

The makers of the gasoline price stories are probably reasonably intelligent people of above average education. They likely understand that raising gasoline prices and especially raising prices through taxation are extremely beneficial overall to the global economy and environment. However, the stories lament high gasoline taxes, claiming they are an injustice. Ignoring economists or sensible policy makers who might actually enlighten the public, they focus on the petty frustrations of gasoline consumers of low education and attempt to elicit similar anxieties in the viewer and thereby making the viewer more likely to sit through the commercial. The wider repercussions of misinforming the public are of no concern to the television producers. En masse, people are controlled by fear, not responsibility. Their consumption of information and their political reactions will follow the same overall trend.

As a college student exploring the ideas of libertarianism, one of the strongest arguments I found for maintaining a government paternalistic presence in the media was the manifestly brilliant quality of BBC, PBS, NPR and other publicly sponsored media in stark contrast to the base intellectual standards and low overall quality of commercially driven and advertisement interrupted media. While a high value should be placed on freedom and choice, it should not completely supersede pragmatism, efficiency, and social progress.

Mankiw on Friedman on Global Warming

David Friedman, wary of ever expanding government, expresses caution for the seemingly obvious imposition of a Pigovian carbon tax. Greg Mankiw gives an excellent response to Friedman's slippery slope argument, citing his father, the legendary Milton, as a supporting argument.

More on Virtual Machines

The new version of Parallels for Mac has a great new view called 'Coherence.' Windows and the Mac OS can be used as a single integrated environment with both the Windows taskbar and Apple Dock and Menubar accessible simultaneously. Additionally, the Apple Doc now contains all the programmes running within Windows as well as OSX. With a click of the mouse, the Windows or OSX desktops are brought to the front and accessible. One may easily drag and drop files between the Mac and Windows file systems as well. This software greatly increases the value, accessibility, and productivity of both the Mac OSX and M$ Windows desktops.

Another virtualisation software, VMWare, can run a virtual OS from a separate bootable partition.

The End of Stargate

Stargate SG-1 was one of the funniest and consistently well made science fiction shows ever made. Indeed, 10 years also makes it one of the longest running. It started to decline in the 8th season with the gradual exit of Richard Dean Anderson (aka MacGuyver) from the show yet still held up reasonably well with the other core characters and the absorption of the actors from the failed Farscape series. I recently finished watching the final episode of this enjoyable show. A collection of all the episodes is available here in high quality formats.

Google Talk Gadget

While as I have stated before, Google should provide secure encryption for their Instant Messaging and voice link communications, they have taken a giant step forward with the new Google Talk Gadget for the Google personalised page or other Google Gadget capable sites.

Caloric Restriction versus Obesity

This is my response to David Friedman's thought that a parent who does not enforce a Calorie Restricting diet (ie provides a standard diet) on their children is nearly as unfit a parent as one who overfeeds their children because in both cases lifespan is being shortened.

Immigration Policy

Legendary businessman and philanthropist, Bill Gates criticises immigration policy in the United States before a Senate committee. WSJ article. FT article. Many foreign students lucky enough to be given subsidised graduate-level education in the United States are then forced to return home right at their economic prime. An economy only benefits from the import of high skilled, high income labour. Conversely, brain drain in undeveloped countries tends to maintain a vicious cycle of poverty. Much fuss has been made recently in the US calling for anti-immigration policies. Maintaining tight limits on the numbers of H1-B visas owing to a large influx of low skilled illegal Mexican immigrants is a travesty of economic policy.

Bookmarks

You can learn a lot about a person from their web History or Bookmarks - perhaps too much. I have taken the bold move of publishing mine on the web via the Companion Page.

I did this by exporting my Google Bookmarks with the Google Toolbar and the Firefox Gmarks plugin as suggested by this post. This was still a relatively involved process and as I have said before, Google needs better Bookmarking features with better sharing and exporting capacities. In the meantime though, I refuse to use del.icio.us because it is just too dirty, and as Matt Panaro stated "you share with that many people, you tend to get diseases." As anonymity is important to me, kindly inform me if I did not properly filter out any identifying or otherwise inappropriate links. Now enjoy browsing years of bookmarks and I encourage everyone to publish their own.

New Companion Page

In the Recommended Panel on the right, a Companion Webpage has been added. This page will be gradually expanded with useful links primarily to media. I have begun with convenient links to Annenberg CPB content otherwise found at learner.org in an obtuse format. The 'Art of the Western World' series hosted by Michael Wood and the 'Western Tradition' series by UCLA professor Eugen Weber are the first series I have posted. More and varied content will follow. Eventually, I hope that this page will have an RSS feed of its own.

Designer Babies

Assuming humanity is not destroyed by its own poor decisions nor by a cosmic event, the human species will flourish, become far more varied, and eventually speciate into unrecognisable multifarious forms most beautiful and wonderful, to borrow from Darwin. This process would occur naturally, but humanity's knowledge about its own genetic makeup will greatly accelerate the process. What starts with "Designer Babies" now to eliminate disease from the population, will certainly expand into mere cosmetic engineering, life extension, and superhuman abilities. When in vitro fertilisation was developed, many ignorant reactionaries even questioned if the children born of this would have a soul (while of course assuming that the rest of us do). Now that your best friend could be a test tube baby, the mob has for the most part come to terms with in vitro fertilisation and often see it as a necessity and a right for couples with fertility difficulties. Being a proponent of adoption, I discourage test tube babies for environmental and social reasons. Nonetheless, I do not have an inherent problem with the technology. Similarly, genetically engineered people are as inevitable as genetically engineered crops. You may wish to stay organic, but that will not stop anyone else from moving forward towards greater health, prosperity, and complexity. I instead would call for further research and development and government sponsorship of this technology and its implementation. After all, it is in society's best interests.

The position of the Roman Catholic Church in this matter prompted these thoughts.

California: Abysmal, but the Best the USA Has to Offer

Excerpts from a recent Paul Krugman column in the NY Times concerning California's energy conservation policies.

Regulatory Bodies and Societal Detriment

I have made several statements regarding the absurdity of the FDA's announced position that cannabis has no proven medical benefit. It undermines the legitimacy of this administrative authority. Politically motivated lies and interdiction on medicine, the most sacred of human institutions, originating from the medical regulatory body itself cannot be tolerated. A caveat emptor, free market for medicine would be preferable to draconian restrictions by religiously driven inquisitions.

Now there is some hope. Americans for Safe Access has sued the FDA for violating the Data Quality Act. This comes via the Drug Law Blog (RSS), a very informative source for legal developments in the execrable "War on Drugs," a war against human dignity itself.

Air Traffic

Last weekend I was one of the unhappy passengers to be screwed by the JetBlue fiasco. Hopefully I will be compensated and the company will improve.

On another note, FlightAware is a useful website which tracks and displays US air traffic information. Maps are available showing all airborne planes and flight paths for public airlines.

Ascent of Man

Dr Jacob Bronowski's magnificent 1973 thirteen part BBC television series 'The Ascent of Man' traced our rise both as a species and as moulders of our own environment and future. It covers the history of science, but of science in the broadest terms. Invention from the flint tool to geometry, from the arch to the theory of relativity, are shown to be expressions of man's specific ability to understand nature, to control it, not to be controlled by it. Dr Bronowski's rare grasp not only of science, but also of its historical and social context, gave him great advantages as an historian of ideas. It is a series which gives us a new perspective not just on science, but on civilisation.

Available here on MVGroup or here on BitMeTV.

Gapminder and Worldmapper

I came across this post from Reason magazine pointing out the Gapminder tool for viewing world development statistics. I cannot wait to have proper access to the tools for creating my own statistical displays with this tool.

*Update* Timothy points us to the related site Worldmapper with density equalising maps for World statistics.

The Pigou Club Manifesto

Most readers of this blog will probably already realise that the best way to eliminate carbon emissions is a direct consumption tax on fossil fuels. In the Pigou Club Manifesto Greg Mankiw outlines the seven most important benefits of such a tax.

Parfait

This TechCrunch article is correct in declaring Gmail a perfect email programme with the addition of the new Mail Fetcher feature. The feature has not yet been made available in all accounts, but it will be soon. It allows users of any POP3 enabled accounts to download their mail to gmail in addition to sending. This will make Gmail far and away superior to any other email product currently available at no cost but for minimal noninvasive advertisements.

*Update* The Mail Fetcher feature is now functional for all gmail accounts. It works very well. If you set up gmail forwarding, it will even forward the POP mail as well.

Doomed to Fail

The Chinese policy of Internet censorship is understandable in the context of recent history. Since the Maoist revolution, Zhong Guo has striven to progress with one mind. The nail that sticks up gets hammered down. Limited freedom of speech proved very destabilising for the entire country in the Tienanmen manifestation. Since then, the authoritarian government has maintained its mandate under heaven by providing blistering economic growth and prosperity to the cities. Internet access there has grown very quickly also as an essential component of communication and economic development. Of course the potentially disruptive force of freedom of expression that the Internet inherently allows has proven frustrating and worthy in the eyes of the party of systematic suppression. For determined and intelligent internauts, expression is always possible through encryption and proxying, but is certainly more difficult with the incredible resources of the Chinese security authorities and the audience is significantly smaller. What Zhong Guo will ultimately have to prepare for is a completely free and open Internet made possible through coming technologies. By 2020, we should expect to receive satellite Internet in a simple wristwatch and I seriously doubt the Chinese military will start using their new anti-satellite system to shoot down every internet satellite out of the sky. The democratising effect of the Internet is inevitable. China's policymakers who overall have done very well in the past two decades must prepare for this inevitability and focus on the future rather than holding on too tightly to the oppressive past.

*Update* I somehow missed this Economist article on censorship and circumvention.

Google News and Utilities

Three weeks ago, columnist Robert X. Cringely predicted Google would effectively become the Internet thanks to high demand for Internet video. He managed to crystallise in my mind that Google will be the singular dominant information entity of the future and that at $500, its stock is a good buy. After all, it is extremely profitable, rates as the best company to work for, attracts the best talent, and people genuinely like its product and philosophy.

One technology in which they lack accessibility and functionality is their Bookmarks. In December, they took a small step in correcting this by releasing a new Bookmarks gadget. It has some bugs, but is a significant improvement over the first iteration. It is a perfect addition to the homepage. The newly released Google Toolbar 3.0 also has a quality Bookmarks feature built in.

I was surprised to learn that Google Video can be downloaded as an .avi file.

Lastly, the unofficial Google Operating System blog is an excellent source of useful tools and information as is the Official Blog.

Apple Plays a Different iTune

Given the recent drama in Norige, Steve Jobs has started playing a different tune on DRM. Now he has joined me in calling for open standards for iTMS, but is blaming record labels for Apple's inability to do so. Whether or not this is just a well calculated move to ingratiate himself with disgusted customers while seeking greater control for Apple in the music sales business, it is nonetheless a positive development and hopefully will gain momentum. After all, whatever system allows for the continued creation of high quality media at the lowest cost to the consumer is the socially optimal one. Apple's motives are irrelevant. And what of the incentives for artists to create media in a DRM free, copy friendly world? As the boys of South Park conclude in the episode 7 x 9, 'Christian Rock Hard:'

Kyle: ...[A]ll this time we've been so caught up with how to protect our music that we forgot to just play.

Lars: But why play if we're not gonna make millions of dollars?

Kyle: Because that's what real artists do. People are always gonna find a way to copy our music and swap it for free. If we're real musicians, then we should just play and be stoked that so many people are listening.

Stan: Besides, maybe our songs would have gotten downloaded for free, but if they were good songs then people still would have bought tickets to see our band in concert.

It is that simple.

Human Papillomavirus

Human Papillomavirus or HPV comes in over 100 strains which infect skin and mucous membranes of humans and many animals. Some of these strains are fairly benign and unnoticeable, some cause common warts or plantar warts (warts on the bottom of the foot). Other strains are more malignant causing genital or anal warts or cervical cancer. Cervical cancer is responsible for the death of over 280,000 people per year and is almost always caused by sexually transmitted HPV infection. Unfortunately the use of safe sex practices such as condoms to prevent HPV has been clearly shown to be only partially effective since transmission is skin to skin. Conservatives are correct in suggesting that abstinence is the only way to be truly safe.

I had the good fortune lately to dine with a friend who is working at Merck pharmaceuticals company promoting the use of their new HPV vaccine, Guardasil. Guardasil defends against four common cancer causing HPV types responsible for 70% of cancers and 90% of genital warts. The European Union has already approved the use of guardasil in both men and women while the more backwards and highly politicised US Food and Drug Administration, who deny any medical benefit of cannabis, have so far only approved Guardasil for young women and girls. My friend did inform me that some enlightened US doctors will nonetheless prescribe Guardasil to men even though it is not "indicated."

The State of Tejas recently decided to implement mandatory HPV vaccination for middle school girls with exceptions made for allergic or religious conflict. This is an extremely wise decision by the State legislature and much to the benefit of the people of Texas and those who might have sexual contact with a Texan woman. The move is much to the credit of Texas which is often stereotyped as a bastion of ignorant fundamentalist Christian extremism.

Hopefully new vaccines will emerge combating other strains of the virus and others which plague the human species.

Regarding the ethics of infectious disease transmission and sensible public health policies, I will have much more to say. In the meantime, my readers may ponder this post from Volokh Conspiracy. Most importantly I wish my readers to recognise the tremendous prevalence of HPV in our society, and to take a much more sober view of sexual contact than pop culture and health classes would have you believe. 27 million Americans have genital HPV infection. Many people with HPV, HSV-2 or even HIV, even those who know they have it, will lie about their status and knowingly infect their partners out of shame or selfishness.

Be safe and Ja Bless.

Virgin America

Last month the US Department of Trade denied Virgin America, the new US airline hopeful, the permission to fly domestically within the United States on the ground that it is too much controlled by foreigners. Anyone who has ever flown a US carrier knows how disgustingly poor the overall experience is, with the possible exception of JetBlue. Virgin America promises to change that. This is the sister company of Virgin Galactic, the company aiming to send passengers into space affordability. Who would you rather fly, Delta? I encourage all US citizens who read this blog to enlist their support of Virgin America in their next attempt to secure the needed go-ahead from the US government. I further encourage readers to boycott Continental for lobbying heavily to keep VA grounded. I cannot imagine who would choose to fly Continental in the first place.

Knowing an employee at Virgin America, I can attest to the quality this airline will bring to the industry.

*Update* Freakonomics commented on this as well.

*Update 2* via Digg, yet another great reason to campaign for Virgin to fly.

M$ Vista

I have recently downgraded my PC from Windows XP Professional to Windows Vista. I say downgrade because not only do several hardware components like dual video cards no longer function properly, but even the basic selling point of Vista, its flashy graphics and new look, in fact just look completely silly and ugly. Whatever "artist" they chose to design their GUI should be taken out and shot. When switching I was almost tempted to think that Vista might be good enough to maintain my continued use of the Windows platform, but my short experience has disabused me of such a misguided notion. Any future PCs I use will run Linux with VMware or Parallels allowing a virtual Windows Enterprise session.

Proper Drugs Policy

The Confoederatio Helvetica, or Switzerland as it is commonly known, in my opinion the best designed and run State on Earth, has perhaps the most sensible drugs policy in the world. Cannabis is legal for personal use, and each person is permitted to grow three personal plants at a time. Meanwhile diamorphine (heroin), a far more dangerous and addictive drug is treated as a medical condition for which the state provides treatment which often includes supplying the diamorphine itself to addicts unable to overcome their addiction so that they might still function as normal, productive and law abiding citizens. This liberal policy has led to heroin addiction being viewed as a dead end ignoble drug among the youth, and its use has dramatically fallen largely owing to its legal toleration and availability.

Virgin Stem Cell

I have previously posted on another of Sir Richard Branson's brands Virgin America. Since airlines, music, space travel, and cola clearly are not sufficient, Virgin is moving into Stem Cell storage for parents hopeful for the potential future benefits for their newborn children.

Standards and Openness

Norway's consumer ombudsman has declared the Apple iTMS (iTunes Music Store) illegal for selling music which may only be played on the Apple iPod or through the iTunes software. I agree with this action by the Norwegian government and I strongly encourage other enlightened governments to join Norway to hopefully force an opening of iTunes standards setting a good precedent.

Openness and standardisation within the media as with electrical outlets and computer parts are only to the advantage of consumers and society as a whole. It is true that hundreds of millions of people have purchased iPods or have used iTMS despite the unfair limitations. This speaks very highly of Apple's technology and design. However, Apple will continue to have overwhelming success with this product even in a more competitive environment for music distribution.

I mentioned electrical outlets because while travelling last week, I forgot to bring my cellphone charger. Since virtually every cellphone provider and every manufacturer has their own recharger standards, the markets on rechargers are virtually cornered with artificially created demand. I could not just borrow a friends charger because likely they use a different provider, so in a bind one must buy an entirely new charger for somewhere around $25 USD. Luckily in my case, my hotel had a whole collection of chargers that unlucky guests had left in the room so I was able to find a compatible charger for my phone.

Incidentally, Norwegian legend Jon Lech Johansen may have already solved the iTunes DRM difficulties in practice.

The Neurology of Addiction

An interesting article from the NY Times concerning the insula of the brain.

Gay Adoption

I came across this article this morning. The article arises from the current row in the UK concerning whether Catholic adoption agencies may exclude potential adoptive parents on the basis of sexual orientation. Most gays I know disagree with me in recognising pædophilia as a sexual orientation. Nevertheless I do and to the extent possible sympathise with those of such unfortunate predilections. Unlike normal homosexuality though, pædophiles require particular scrutiny and caution when it comes to interaction with children. The problem of adoption comes when normal homosexuals are conflated with pædophiles. If there were a high correlation between the two phenomenon, there may be a case to be made, but I have not seen any such evidence to that effect.

Homosexuals are just as capable as heterosexuals of providing prosperous homes and loving parenting. Indeed, given the population pressures our world is suffering combined with high levels of inequality, affluent homosexual adoptive couples are something of a godsend. Any people innocently, selflessly, and lovingly willing to give their time, energy, and soul to raising another's child should be revered in our society.

Regarding the legality of a religious organisation in discriminating adoptive couples, I must side with the religious organisations. Catholic organisations pushing for the right of discrimination against homosexuals are confused about child welfare and confused about the doctrines of their own faith. However, the right of conscientious action or objection for a religious organisation should be respected. Moreover, biological parents should have at least the control over their child's rearing in selecting adoption agencies holding similar values to their own. Therefore, the marginal decision for potentially gay versus straight adoption should rest with the biological parent. In this case, according special rights to gays in the guise of anti-discrimination actually amounts to pernicious undue privilege.

On the other side of the coin, the most harmful laws in this category are those which ban gay adoption.

A Warning

Recently, Winnipeg scientists have resurrected the H1N1 influenza virus of 1918 which killed 50 million people with a death rate of 2%. The procedure by which the virus was resurrected was impressive and hopefully will lead to a defence against H5N1 or other future influenzas. Nothing against the Winnipeg scientists nor their research, but it is reminiscent of a very dangerous scenario which must be addressed:

In the brilliant Terry Gilliam film '12 Monkeys' (torrent), a lab scientist working silently develops a virus to wipe out 95% of mankind while making the surface of the Earth uninhabitable. There is a sizable population of humanity who in light of the continued and seemingly inevitable destruction of Earth's biodiversity caused by one single species, would support a mechanism to eliminate that species and the threat by whatever means necessary. The only practical means of carrying this out would be the development of an airborne, highly infectious and deadly virus with a long incubation period. While your average misanthrope is not determined enough to wipe out mankind, a motivated biologist who not so abnormally values non-human life on the same scale as human life could very easily rationalise and carry out the decision to develop the ultimate weapon of mass destruction. I have met several people who in principle are not opposed to such an idea leading me to completely reconsider the likelihood of this event.

Biological science should not be stopped for fear of this scenario. While oversight should be strengthened especially where virus work is concerned, security and oversight in the field should not interfere with scientific progress.

Life on this planet will go on with or without humanity. Humanity surely has many thousands more species to eliminate forever, but the real question is whether humanity itself will survive. Ultimately, humanity's probability of survival is directly proportional to its degree of conservation and stewardship of other life on the planet. Given our current direction, I am betting on 12 Monkeys, this time without the time travel.

Science Further Undercut

Economically and scientifically relevant data on the Earth are no longer important priorities for NASA as shown by budgetary cuts in satellite based Earth observation. Robotic space exploration is the only scientifically or economically effective sort, yet funds are being diverted instead on a fool's errand to send men to the Moon and Mars. Observation of the Earth is important especially to measure climate change. Hopefully the ESA will pick up the pieces on this.

Infectious Disease in Prison

Yet again, civilised society owes safety, decent treatment, and proper medical care to all its prisoners. In this case, Susan Oakie writes in the NEJM about public health in US prisons. Clearly, much more needs to be done to prevent the spread of deadly infectious diseases among inmates. Russian prisons have managed to breed extremely deadly multi-drug resistant tuberculosis which kills 40-60% of those infected. In addition to the measures recommended in Oakie's article, I suggest that all prisoners placed in general population should have compulsory testing for transmissible diseases and those who are infected should be publicly labeled as such if not quarantined while regularly educating prisoners on modes of transmission. Moreover, prison managers - in many cases private corporations in the United States - should be held to pay damages to families of prisoners who die as a result of infections they received in prison. Clearly making sex, drugs and tattooing in prisons 'illegal' is not getting the job done; they are prisoners after all. The human rights situations in prisons are tenuous enough without the possibility for prisoners to be infected with pathogens.

The Continued Inefficacy of Copy Protection

Copy protection on media is a losing proposition. The new HD DVD DRM has now been cracked. It is time that both the large media corporations and governments acknowledge the fecklessness of trying to control the sharing of information, and focus instead on developing reasonable economic mechanisms for the creation and free distribution of high quality content. Film, audio, and print media are public goods and should be treated accordingly.

Carl Sagan

Carl Sagan was one of the most articulate and rational thinkers of the past 50 years. A visionary, humanist, planetary scientist and professor at Cornell University, he put considerable effort into communicating the knowledge and implications of scientific revelation to the general public. On issues from science, public and foreign policy, and informed religious belief, he was an important voice for mankind. Indeed, when in my previous post I declared that technocrats should be the ones setting policy, I was referring to men such as him. His public television series 'Cosmos' should be required viewing.

He died 10 years ago.

Incidentally, most of his public writing was shaped by his regular use of cannabis. While he remained private about this issue during his life so as not to detract from his important public message, he anonymously advocated very strongly for its legalisation and responsible use.

Recently, his wife was interviewed recently by Ira Flatow on NPR Science Friday. This is an archived interview of Carl Sagan himself with Flatow from 1994 which I highly recommend.

My good friend Timothy recently posted about Sagan as well.

Domestication

This article about genetically engineering complacent zombie animals indifferent to their treatment or conditions reminds me of the Ameglian Major Cow from the 'Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' (part 5) by Douglas Adams. The cow politely offers parts of his body for fine dining.

..."May I urge you to try my liver, it must be very rich and tender by now, I have been force feeding it for months?"

Arthur, disgusted asks, "Is there any reason why I shouldn’t have a green salad?"

The cow replies, "I know many vegetables who are very clear o­n that point sir, which was why it was decided to cut through that whole problem by breeding an animal that actually wanted to be eaten."

While the satire of Adams is proving remarkably prescient, targeted OGM domestication of plants and animals is no different from the millenia of breeding or 'artificial selection' which has produced such agriculturally useful organisms as we have now. Comparing a chihuahua with a wild wolf, one has a sense of revulsion in realising that the chihuahua was the product of human will upon the wolf for in some sense a crime has been committed against nature. However, this act is ultimately no different from the domestication of any other organism. GM is nothing more than the targeted acceleration of the inevitable process of artificial selection and should be embraced despite the 'yuck' factor.

In many ways, humans with less 'yuck' sensibility have a significant survival advantage over those with it in a biotechnology driven world making it somewhat inevitable. I encourage the rest of my species to get over their fears now. Realise the benefits of OGM, and focus on reaping the multifarious benefits it has to offer.

In Defence of the Chimera

This Economist opinion article provides a defence for the creation of chimeras and encourages the expansion of this line of research.

*Update* A classic amusing post from DeLong from a while ago.

Buying a Micronation

PirateBay hopes to purchase Sealand to shield itself from copyright law enforcement. I predict that even if they raised sufficient capital to purchase this currently independent nation, political forces in militarily aggressive empires such as the US and UK would eventually shut them down if only by cutting their Internet connexion. While international copyright laws are severely flawed, these nations would nonetheless have some justification for their action against a cyber-criminal rogue nation of Sealand.

This is reminiscent of Earthstation 5's fraudulent claim to operate out of Palestine to avoid copyright law.

I suggest that in the near future world when high-speed satellite Internet will be available in one's wristwatch everywhere, there is no stopping the flow of information between interested parties. Even absent the wristwatches, the technology for encrypted distributed proxied networks already sufficiently exists for data exchange without Sealand.

Lastly, the idea of purchasing a nation or even creating wealthy bustling nations out of nothing but large fortunes and dirt a la mode de Dubai will become more and more common, especially for special interest groups seeking independence and freedom from persecution just as originally occurred with the colonisation of the New World. The power of Internet communication makes citizenship, political participation, and "nation building" much more accessible to everyone especially the geographically dispersed.

Apple Does it Again

The newly announced iPhone looks absolutely incredible. Too bad we will have to wait until June. Also, too bad we will be limited to Cingulair in the United States. The phone most likely will start at $500 USD plus a minimum $50/month for 2 years commitment, but I dare say it would be worth it for such an amazing device. For a premier device from a company 5 years ahead of its time, who can argue?

Crooked Timber's profound reaction.

Children of Men

I recommend watching the skillfully made, high budget film, 'Children of Men.' (torrent) A science fiction story, it takes place in near-future Great Britain with important parallels to our own time.