Lomborg on Zakaria GPS: Painfully Correct Thinking

Posted on June 15, 2008 by JoeDuck

More kudos to Zakaria’s GPS on CNN for bringing key global thinkers to the news table.

Today GPS featured Bjorn Lomborg, a figure who is controversial for the very simple reason that he has challenged sacred cows with common sense. When the sacred cow includes global warming alarmism even many otherwise clear thinking scientists have attacked Lomborg, generally on personal grounds rather than on the statistical high ground squarely occupied by Lomborg and the Copenhagen Consensus.

Bjorn Lomborg’s economically optimal approaches to finding solutions for global development, poverty reduction, global health, and more are thoughtful and rational. So rational and thoughtful that it’s always painful to hear his critics disparage him as a “global warming denier” (he is NOT even a GW skeptic as Zakaria very unfairly branded him during the introduction).

Lomborg’s main point is simple: We should seek the most effective solutions to global problems, which means seeking the most effective spending approaches given our current understanding of the problems.

I am very confident that history will show that the approaches taken by the Copenhagen Consensus were a sort of early “best practices” for Global problem solving, one of the first efforts to powerfully integrate science and economics in a rational rather than political or emotional way towards the vision of a better world.

Corporation as psychopathic? Nonsense!

Posted on June 6, 2008 by JoeDuck

RealClimate offers some great science and discussion but also reveals a lot of the unvarnished bias you get when true believers discard reason for hyperbole and nonsense. (thx to JCH for this caveat about caution when confusing a blog with the comments).

This little nugget emerged from a regular commenter:

I called the corporations psychopaths, not those running them, and for a very good reason: they are legally bound to consider only maximising shareholder value. Damage to the environment? No. Deaths among employees, customers or third parties? No. So long as such deaths or damage do not break the criminal law, and will increase profit, that’s what they are legally bound to do. That’s why I said capitalism created these psychopaths…

I’m seeing this bizarre view appear more and more and I’m not sure where it comes from, but probably the film I have yet to see about corporations and how evil they are. I think it’s called “The Corporation”.

One can easily make the case that corporations *emphasize* profit. They should do that within legal means – that is the *whole point*. American style socialist (ie heavily taxed) capitalism is the reason we live large while those in less corporate driven societies struggle just to keep fed and keep healthy, often failing in both measures.

Almost *every single corporation* will typically factor in a variety of environmental and social factors in the interest of the greater good, the good of employees, and the prevailing cultural and ethical standards. This is in part due to the laws and prevailing cultural standards as is almost every type of collective behavior, but it is also because contrary to the assertion above, corporations that act psychopathically

In the USA these factors generally make big businesses a great place to work. Yahoo, for example, has extensive ‘green’ initiatives. Google not only pays a small fortune in stock and salaries but pays for all the meals and does the laundry…free. You’ll say these are the exceptions but good stewardship is the corporate rule which is why the west enjoys such high living standards. That prosperity sure didn’t come from the bureacracy – it came in spite of it. This is why your rules are better applied to enterprises run by those who generally despise US style multinational corporations.

My challenge to corporate critics is to randomly pick 10 companies from S&P 500. Assign either “mostly psychopathic activity” or “mostly morally acceptable activity” to each and also do that on the “mostly exploits those in developing world” or “mostly helps those in developing world”. In most cases 9 of those 10 will pass both tests if you answer these rationally and reasonably without cherry picking from the companies or company histories as CL has done above.

Here’s a list of the S&P 500 – clearly a good list of companies that powerfully represent a globalized capitalist vision and experience: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_S%26P_500_companies

Now let’s grab ten of these. Presumably the first letter should not bias the sample so I’ll grab the first and last five on the Wikipedia S&P 500 list:

3M
Abbott Labs
Abercrombie & Fitch Co.
ACE Limited
Adobe Systems

XTO	XTO Energy Inc.	reports	Energy
YHOO	Yahoo Inc.	reports	Information Technology
YUM	Yum! Brands Inc	reports	Consumer Discretionary
ZMH	Zimmer Holdings	reports	Health Care
ZION	Zions Bancorp	reports	Financials

OK so now the questions to apply to each are whether they are “psychopathic” or not, and whether they are “exploiting more than helping”. My test allows only ONE to fail either test.

—– to be continued after I get some real work done ——–

—– Ouch, Karma injection alert? Just after posting I was trying to get Bank of America to credit my card for the Beijing Scam I was conned with in China. After charge dispute sent me away claiming that becaue I signed the paper it was out of their hands, fraud said (incredibly) that even if they had changed the number it would not be a fraud case – fraud is basically only reserved for stolen numbers. I’m not sure this makes Bank of America a psychopathic corporation but it’s also true that they are helping perpetrate scams all around the globe by failing in follow up. Given that I *cancelled my card number* after this they should assume I’m not just ranting without cause. But backwards Karma injection: Super low interest for one year will save far more than my $85 ripoff from the Tea House.

——– back to work! ————

Hey, double karma reinjection – B of A eventually refunded my Tea Scam payment. Would a psychopath have done that?

Freeman Dyson on Climate Change Hysteria

Posted on May 27, 2008 by JoeDuck

Visonary physicist Freeman Dyson most certainly cannot be labelled a “global warming denialist” yet in this review of two new books he is expressing the growing reservation of clear thinkers that for some environmentalists, the gospel of catastrophic climate change is leading them to dismiss intelligent debate and allocate resources in very ineffective ways:

Unfortunately, some members of the environmental movement have also adopted as an article of faith the belief that global warming is the greatest threat to the ecology of our planet. That is one reason why the arguments about global warming have become bitter and passionate. Much of the public has come to believe that anyone who is skeptical about the dangers of global warming is an enemy of the environment. The skeptics now have the difficult task of convincing the public that the opposite is true. Many of the skeptics are passionate environmentalists. They are horrified to see the obsession with global warming distracting public attention from what they see as more serious and more immediate dangers to the planet, including problems of nuclear weaponry, environmental degradation, and social injustice. Whether they turn out to be right or wrong, their arguments on these issues deserve to be heard.

The lack of insight that Dyson notes in the article is expressed well by the sloppy response to Dyson over at RealClimate.org, which betrays the naivete many physical scientists bring to the table in terms of a quality grasp of economics and social policy. The key issue with Climate Change is not that it’s happening or that humans play a significant role – the key issue is what we should do about this and how we should carry on the debate.

I wrote over at RealClimate.org:

The comments here about discounting strike me as very naive and begging the key question of what we should do. DICE models aside, the basic issues are how much do we spend (or how much wealth do we forego) on mitigation, when do we spend it, and on what? We will address these questions whether we do it haphazardly as suggested here, or more analytically as suggested by Dyson and others. Dyson and most mainstream economists reasonably suggest that we should spend modestly on mitigating CO2 in favor of using those resources to mitigate current catastrophic conditions and saving them to use on more effective mitigation measures of the future.

<i>So, we are a lot richer now than when the last Moa was eaten. Can we use that wealth to bring back the Moa?</i>

No, we cannot, but what if we use those *extra* riches we would not have today to keep 10 species from extinction? Without looking at both sides of these equations we lose our ability for reasoned analyses.

I’d be interested in hearing where people here would draw the line in spending to mitigate warming? The number *must* be between 0% and 100% of global GDP.

Guardian UK Climate Changers

Posted on May 17, 2008 by JoeDuck

In January the Guardian UK listed fifty people who can help save the planet. I was very encouraged to see Bjorn Lomborg on this list as he’s one of the few well informed and rational voices in the global warming debate. Lomborg simple, obvious, and common sense argument is that we are failing to prioritize our time and treasure as we deal with global challenges like Global Warming, health, and poverty. He’d like to see us devote more resources to the most pressing problems and fewer to the least pressing, suggesting that although Global Warming will cause problems it is very unlikely that catastrophe is looming.

Perhaps ironically the next person on the list is Climatologist Gavin Schmidt from the RealClimate.org blog -my favorite source for spirited debate about Climate Change. Gavin is one of several well connected scientists who participate regularly at that blog along with a group of moderately informed yet rabid commenters who are very quick to attack as “denialists” blog participants who suggest any deparature from the prevailing partly line on climate change. A friend noted to me recently that climate change has become the new religion of the inquisition, where heretics are verbally burned at the stake – usually by those who are not particularly well informed – for suggesting even obvious problems such as the many defects in current global climate computer models.

As somebody trained in science, my biggest concern remains the reluctance (refusal?) of climate scientists to define their work in ways that allow much if any falsifiability – they key mainstay of all modern science. You’ll be very hard pressed to find many climate modellers say “if we find [insert any measurable phenomenon here], then our assumptions about warming are misguided”. Unlike most conventional science where falsifiabilty is king and politics is left at the door, the climate community has a political component that is coloring the perception of the scientists. I rarely hear scientists challenge the hysterical assertions that climate change will lead to catastrophic conditions soon. Since the science does not suggest we have catastrophe looming, why this failure to comment more thoroughly and responsibly on the issue? I think most of this is the assumption that reducing pollution is so important it’s OK to mislead the public into thinking warming catastrophes are looming when in fact they are not. Watch “An Inconvenient Truth”, a movie largely supported as factual by the climate community and then read the critiques of the film’s examples.

Although many in the climate field bristle at the notion that they have a vested interest in “hype” thanks to over $5,000,000,000 in annual grants for climate reasearch, but clearly feeding your kids plays a role in most human opinions and scientific opinion is no exception to this.

The list *should* include Steve McIntyre, creator of the blog www.ClimateAudit.org, created in some ways to foil the dramatic level of omission of relevant information and participation that characterizes RealClimate.org. MyIntyre is a mathematician and amateur scientist who is making quite a name for himself by replicating tree ring studies and challenging some questionable practices in the climate change community.

From the Guardian:
Bjørn Lomborg
Statistician

Bjørn Lomborg, 42, has become an essential check and balance to runaway environmental excitement. In 2004, the Dane made his name as a green contrarian with his bestselling book The Skeptical Environmentalist, and outraged scientists and green groups around the world by arguing that many claims about global warming, overpopulation, energy resources, deforestation, species loss and water shortages are not supported by analysis. He was accused of scientific dishonesty, but cleared his name. He doesn’t dispute the science of climate change, but questions the priority it is given. He may look increasingly out of step, but Lomborg is one of the few academics prepared to challenge the consensus with credible data.

Gavin Schmidt
Climatologist

Gavin Schmidt, 38 and British, is a climate modeller at the Nasa Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York. He founded RealClimate.org with colleagues in 2004. Offering “climate science from climate scientists”, the site has quickly become a must-read for interested amateurs, and a perfect foil to both the climate sceptic misinformation that saturates sections of the web and the overexcitement of the claims of some environmentalists. Unapologetically combative, technical and high-brow, the site and its contributors – essentially blogging in their spare time – nail the myth that scientists struggle to communicate their work. Whenever a major flaw is pointed out in the global consensus on climate change, or new evidence is discovered to blame it on the sun, it is always worth checking RealClimate. The site has a policy of not getting dragged into the political or economic aspects of science, but it’s fairly easy to guess which side it’s on.

Update to make my case: Realclimate’s response to the new Hurricane study that suggests that the link between Hurricanes and Global Warming has been exaggerated shows how – to my way of thinking – they have little if any interest in falsifiability. RC seems to frequently highlight even anecdotal evidence supporting their view but critically rejects even well researched, peer reviewed studies that suggest things they don’t want to hear. This rejecting the alternative hypothesis because it does not suit your beliefs science … or is it religion?

Organic Frustrations?

Posted on April 27, 2008 by JoeDuck

CNN is reporting today on a new study that shows Americans are getting increasingly reluctant about Organic products: http://money.cnn.com/2008/04/23/news/companies/organics_backlash/index.htm?postversion=2008042314

Folks, that is a good thing because for the most part the whole concept of organic food superiority is at best wrong and at worst…fraudulent and marketing hype driven.

In terms of pesticides and other chemical concerns, few regular vegetables have more measurable problems than organic vegetables. However for other concerns, such as insect contamination – you can make the case that organics are riskier since those production methods have eliminated from the production chain chemicals and treatments that prevent bugs, rot, or other forms of biological contaminations. But I’m not trying to make a case here that organics are “more dangerous” than non-organics. Rather they are indistinguishable in terms of the health impact on a human, and therefore generally a waste of time, money, and resources. We surround ourselves with huge risk every day in the form of traffic, smoking (for those who do), and a plethora of contaminants we largely ignore despite the fact they represent measureably far more risk than vegetable items which are far overregulated at almost every part of the production cycle.

It might make your mind *feel* better about your health to eat organic, but unlike hundreds of other behaviors you don’t worry about (bikes in traffic, no seatbelts, smoking, etc, etc, etc) eating organic is not having any measureable impact on your health.

I’m very open to criticism on this and trying to keep an open mind, so if anybody knows of any research on health and organic stuff I’d be very interested in reading it.

Of Rats and Men: Rat brains, Blue Brains, and the coming AI age.

Posted on March 7, 2008 by JoeDuck

SEED magazine reports on the Blue Brain, which IMHO is the most likely project to attain machine-based self consciousness. This in turn will change everything completely and usher in a new era that will bring more change to humanity than any previous event in history.

“The column has been built and it runs,” Markram says. “Now we just have to scale it up.” Blue Brain scientists are confident that, at some point in the next few years, they will be able to start simulating an entire brain. “If we build this brain right, it will do everything,” Markram says. I ask him if that includes selfconsciousness: Is it really possible to put a ghost into a machine? “When I say everything, I mean everything,” he says, and a mischievous smile spreads across his face.

As I’ve noted many times before I believe that machine consciousness will bring profound changes to humanity which will be hugely positive. Now, we allocate resources very ineffectively. Conscious computers will be able to do vastly superior resource allocations and staggering design improvements. These alone will likely resolve all global resource issues such as energy, food, and water. It’s not as clear if the AI age will bring a resolution to problems that have as a a core cause our human defects. Health, Education should benefit enormously but some of the human thinking that creates war, intolerance, crime and suicide will persist and it will resist the improvements.

However the abundance that the AI age will bring to the world should allow us to manage many of these human problems much more effectively.

Markram: “What is holding us back now are the computers.”
Markram estimates that in order to accurately simulate the trillion synapses in the human brain, you’d need to be able to process about 500 petabytes of data – about 200 times more information than is stored on all of Google’s servers.
Energy consumption is another huge problem …. Markram estimates that simulating the brain on a supercomputer with existing microchips would generate an annual electrical bill of about $3 billion …. But if computing speeds continue to develop at their current exponential pace, and energy efficiency improves, Markram believes that he’ll be able to model a complete human brain on a single machine in ten years or less.

This 10 year estimate is even more optimistic than Ray Kurzweil’s but in the same league. Although most of the computer programmers I know strongly reject this view, I think it’s also possible that AI could emerge with very limited human intervention from the massive parallel processing environments such as Google’s search server farm of hundreds of thousands of connected machines. Consciousness and human intelligence, if it is as overrated as I believe, is best seen as something of a byproduct of simpler, evolutionarily derived mental processes and other mental activities. As the number of interconnections in machines approaches the number we have in our brains (again we bump into a 10-20 year time frame), and machines are programmed with current routines to do the same mental tasks we do, I’ll be very surprised if machine consciousness will require more than a modest level of additional tweaking of the type they have already started at Blue Brain.

So, I’m not buying my laptop a birthday cake quite yet, but remain cautiously optimistic about the end of the world as we know it.

Gutenberg + 550 years = Our ADDd Internet

Posted on January 27, 2008 by JoeDuck

John Naughton, writing in the Guardian, has a nice piece about the reading revolution inspired by Gutenberg and the uncertain future of our online equivalents to the books we have held dear for several centuries.

Studies are noting how fleeting our attention has become, especially in our young folks. In terms of “total enlightenment” I actually favor the quick skim to the in-depth read because I believe retention is better for the short bits of information as well as better for the “key concepts” that you get quickly from surfing on a topic.

Thus if I read a carefully crafted work I’ll be moderately informed but then lose most of the information over the years, where if I jump around to 20 sources I’ll be similarly well-informed but will retain it better.

All that said, I’d agree with internet critics who suggest we may be losing our ability – to the extent it was ever there – to quietly and deeply reflect on topics. Also I’d agree we don’t know the consequences of this shift, though from the national dialog about politics, religion, and other things I’d say we aren’t really falling back or making much progress. We are a modestly contemplative primate, and we can’t escape that fate regardless of how we input the information.

Bluetooth prosthetics for US soldier

Posted on January 25, 2008 by JoeDuck

A Double amputee will walk again thanks to bluetooth enabled prosthetic legs which can walk naturally in part thanks to using the wireless signals. News report.

I find it frustrating that people are on the one hand very comfortable supporting great technologies like this for those with disabilities, but as soon as somebody suggests we should also use technology to enhance our own “normal” and feeble abilities people seem to get worried and object. There will be an inevitable trend to enhancing out lives using technologies we place in our bodies, and this is nothing to fear. We’ve used *external* technologies for many years (e.g. specatacles) and many people already use many internal high tech devices (heart stints).

So, bring on the brain chips!

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Joe Duck

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