On Wilt Chamberlain

De "Robert Nozick (1938-2002)" (the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy):

Standard theories of distributive justice, Nozick says, are either ahistorical "end-state" or "end-result" theories, requiring that the distribution of wealth in a society have a certain structure, e.g. an egalitarian structure (regardless of how the distribution came about or how people got what they have); or they are historical theories requiring that the distribution fit a certain pattern reflecting such historical circumstances as who worked the hardest or who deserves the most.

Nozick illustrates and defends the .... theory in a famous thought-experiment involving the basketball player Wilt Chamberlain. Imagine a society in which the distribution of wealth fits a particular structure or pattern .... Now suppose that among the members of this society is Wilt Chamberlain .... over the course of the season, one million fans decide to pay the twenty-five cents to watch him play. The result will be a new distribution, .... in which Chamberlain now has .... much more than anyone else .... no one has any grounds for a complaint of injustice; and thus there is no injustice.

.... the example shows that "liberty upsets patterns," that allowing individuals freely to use their holdings as they choose will inevitably destroy any distribution advocated by .... theories, whether they be socialist, egalitarian liberal, or some other theory of distribution. And the corollary of this is that patterns destroy liberty .... As Nozick puts it, "the socialist society would have to forbid capitalist acts between consenting adults." ....

Para uma análise mais completa: Nozick.

A verdade ensinada às criancinhas

John Stossel - The Global Warming Debate 10-20-07

Socionomics

A imagem abaixo já é sugestiva por mérito próprio. Contudo foi ali parar porque para além de receber a mailing list da Astronomy Picture of the Day, há poucos dias enviaram-me uns links de Economia que faziam referência àquelas espirais. E, como se não bastasse, os links falavam de forecasting, o tema de uma apresentação de Scott Armstrong a que vou assistir hoje.

Os ditos links diziam respeito à doutrina Socionomics, que diz que quase toda a experiência social humana pode eser explicada por fractais (ver, por exemplo, "The Human Social Experience Forms a Fractal" ou "The Fractal Design of Social Progress".

Este campo de pesquisa (ver arquivos) alega que consegue explicar e até prever processos complexos como os mercados de capitais - desafiando algumas das conclusões da Teoria dos Mercados Eficientes.

Colocando de parte a numerologia (ou numero-magia), são interessantes algumas observações quanto à "natureza" auto-replicável da acção humana, uma vez que há padrões que se devem repetir, a diversas escalas, em qualquer ordem espontânea. Mas também há ali muita minhoquice. Deixo um vídeo para que os leitores formem a sua opinião.


Fibonacci, Fractals and Financial Markets - Socionomics.net

well-educated people who imagine that the way to end the world’s woes is through socialism

"Everything You Love You Owe to Capitalism" de Lew Rockwell:

I'm sure that you have had this experience before, or something similar to it. You are sitting at lunch in a nice restaurant or perhaps a hotel. Waiters are coming and going. The food is fantastic. The conversation about all things is going well. You talk about the weather, music, movies, health, trivialities in the news, kids, and so on. But then the topic turns to economics, and things change.

You are not the aggressive type so you don't proclaim the merits of the free market immediately. You wait and let the others talk. Their biases against business appear right away in the repetition of the media's latest calumny against the market ....

You begin to offer a corrective, pointing out the other side. Then the truth emerges in the form of a naïve if definitive announcement from one person: "Well, I suppose I'm really a socialist at heart." ....

Espirais logarítimicas

APOD

Explanation: Uncomfortably close Typhoon Rammasun (right) and 25 million light-year distant galaxy M101 don't seem to have much in common. For starters, Rammasun was only a thousand kilometers or so across while M101 (aka the Pinwheel Galaxy) spans about 170,000 light-years, making them vastly dissimilar in scale, not to mention the different physical environments that control their formation and development.

But they do look amazingly alike: each with arms exhibiting the shape of a simple and beautiful mathematical curve known as a logarithmic spiral, a spiral whose separation grows in a geometric way with increasing distance from the center. Also known as the equiangular spiral, growth spiral, and Bernoulli's spiral or spira mirabilis, this curve's rich properties have fascinated mathematicians since its discovery by 17th century philosopher Descartes.

Intriguingly, this abstract shape is much more abundant in nature than suggested by the striking visual comparison above. For example, logarithmic spirals can also describe the tracks of subatomic particles in a bubble chamber, the arrangement of sunflower seeds and, of course, cauliflower.

Leadership

Conservatives Deserting the GOP (News AOL):

.... conservatives cannot surrender their agenda to McCain. Leadership for conservatives should form from and within the conservative GOP delegation, and they need to do an end run around the GOP leadership.

What they need to do, and do without delay is to form an opposition party to John McCain and declare that they will oppose John McCain where he differs from them on spending, on global warming, on amnesty, on drilling in ANWR, etc. They should also, of course, say that they will work with McCain on judges, on fighting terrorists, etc. But the primary need is to serve as a rallying point to roust and energize the dormant and fleeing conservative base.

A ler: "Ron Paul Revolt at the Republican Convention?" n'O Insurgente.

Concorrência na regulaçao

Uma interessante "guerra" entre entidades reguladoras da "propriedade" intelectual, em que obviamente ganha o consumidor: "La SGAE tiene rival: EXGAE" (El País):

Hasta 1449 los libros sólo tenían un camino para ser difundidos. Los monjes y frailes copistas eran los encargados de realizar las copias de los ejemplares señalados como actos, la revolución de Gutemberg fue la expansión y difusión de los libros provocada por la imprenta. A partir de ese momento, cualquiera podía acceder a la lectura porque los costes eran cada vez menores. A su vez, la interpretación de la Biblia ya no estaba reservada a los sacerdotes. Al igual que entonces, Internet ha causado un efecto similar: la difusión de música, libros, fotografías... se escapan a las entidades de gestión. ¿Cuál es la copia y cuál es el original? ¿Cómo se agrava con un impuesto algo que físicamente no existe?

Imigração e colectivismo

Recentemente, entrei em discussão com uns apoiantes de Ron Paul que se entretinham a vilipendiar a Imigração, deturpando a posição do bom doutor. Oportunamente, saiu este artigo de Butler Shaffer: "The Immigration Question":

As with government control generally, the power of the state to prevent or regulate immigration is grounded in the doctrine of collectivism. When governments build walls or fences around politically-defined boundaries, they are doing what all other property owners do: staking out their claims to everything contained within. .... The state, through no other principle than the coercive force that defines it, is able to transform itself from an agency of protection into a principal interest to be protected!

It is within my authority, as a property owner, to prevent another from moving onto my land without my consent. If, however, I try to extend such authority to prevent others from moving into territory that is not mine, I overstep my boundaries and no longer behave as an owner. I then become a trespasser of the self-ownership claims of others. So, too, with the state, when it acts to prevent others from entering the country. Or does the state have an ownership interest in the entire country? If so, how was this interest acquired, and how far do the state’s boundary claims extend?

.... So, too, is the campaign against immigrants grounded in a presumed state-ownership that defines all collectivist systems.

(post vagamente inspirado neste outro)

Resources, Population, Environment (4)

À semelhança da Simon-Ehrlich wager, The Challenge:

Scott Armstrong of the Wharton School challenges Al Gore $20,000 that he will be able to make more accurate forecasts of annual mean temperatures than those that can be produced by climate models. Scott Armstrong’s forecasts will be based on the naive (no-change) model; that is, the forecasts would be the same as the most recent year prior to the forecasts. The money will be placed in a Charitable Trust to be established at a brokerage house. The charity designated by the winner will receive the total value in the fund when the official award is made at the annual International Symposium on Forecasting in 2018.

###
De Global Warming: Forecasts by Scientists versus Scientific Forecasts (PDF) por Scott Armstrong:

In 2007, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Working Group One, a panel of experts established by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Programme, issued its Fourth Assessment Report.

The Report included predictions of dramatic increases in average world temperatures over the next 92 years and serious harm resulting from the predicted temperature increases. Using forecasting principles as our guide we asked: Are these forecasts a good basis for developing public policy? Our answer is “no”.

The forecasts in the Report were not the outcome of scientific procedures. In effect, they were the opinions of scientists transformed by mathematics and obscured by complex writing. Research on forecasting has shown that experts’ predictions are not useful in situations involving uncertainly and complexity. We have been unable to identify any scientific forecasts of global warming. Claims that the Earth will get warmer have no more credence than saying that it will get colder.

Mais material:

- Dr. Scott Armstrong on Climate Forecasting - Part I
- Dr. Scott Armstrong on Climate Forecasting - Part II
- Dr. Scott Armstrong on Climate Forecasting - Part III
- apresentação (PDF)

O pecado da impressão

"O pecado da impressão" (Lóbi):

- Gostavas que uma árvore recebesse um e-mail como este e o mandasse imprimir no teu corpo?

Waribashi - Aprender a Jogar Go

número 1 da revista Waribashi
(já vai no número 8 e é fantástica)
A não perder, a partir da página 46 do número 8, "Aprender a Jogar Go"

Resources, Population, Environment (3)

"False prophets of doom" por Walter Williams:

In 1968, Paul Ehrlich, Vice President Gore's hero and mentor, predicted there would be a major food shortage in the U.S. and "in the 1970s ... hundreds of millions of people are going to starve to death." Ehrlich said 65 million Americans would die of starvation between 1980 and 1989, and by 1999 the U.S. population would have declined to 22.6 million. Ehrlich's predictions about England were gloomier: "If I were a gambler, I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000."

It's not just latter-day doomsayers who have been wrong; doomsayers have always been wrong. In 1885, the U.S. Geological Survey announced there was "little or no chance" of oil being discovered in California, and a few years later they said the same about Kansas and Texas .... Having learned nothing from its earlier erroneous claims, in 1974 the U.S. Geological Survey advised us that the U.S. had only a 10-year supply of natural gas. According to the American Gas Association, there's a 1,000 to 2,500 year supply.

.... In 1970, when environmentalists were making predictions of manmade global cooling and the threat of an ice age and millions of Americans starving to death, what kind of government policy should we have undertaken to prevent such a calamity?

.... what makes us think that environmental alarmism is any more correct now that they have switched their tune to manmade global warming?

Venezuela se respeta!

"Hugo Chávez usa imagem de Sócrates em campanha" (DN Online)
"Sócrates recebe a chave de Caracas" (Portugal Diário)

To shrug (2)

"Chavez nationalizes biggest steelmaker (AFP):

"Here, beside these furnaces in the middle of Siderurgica del Orinoco (Sidor steel company), I have enacted the law by which we reclaim steel making," he told hundreds of company employees.

Waribashi - entrevistas

Nas entrevistas de trabalho deste universo do business administration, é costume que façam algumas perguntas quebra-cabeça. A ideia é testar a rapidez e estrutura de pensamento do candidato. Há perguntas que são muito razoáveis - por exemplo, estimar o lucro de um determinado negócio. Outras são quase anedóticas - por exemplo, estimar o número de traças no território russo. Ora, estava a ler um artigo e o primeiro pensamento que me veio à cabeça, acto contínuo - deve ser condicionamento - foi calcular um desses números. O artigo era sobre os waribashi, os pauzinhos descartáveis que os japoneses usam como talheres.

Quantos pares de waribashi são usados anualmente no Japão?

Ainda estava a matutar quando a resposta apareceu logo de seguida no texto.

Resources, Population, Environment (2)

"The Doomslayer de Ed Regis na WIRED, sobre a famosa aposta Simon-Ehrlich wager:

He always found it somewhat peculiar that neither the Science piece nor his public wager with Ehrlich nor anything else that he did, said, or wrote seemed to make much of a dent on the world at large. For some reason he could never comprehend, people were inclined to believe the very worst about anything and everything; they were immune to contrary evidence just as if they'd been medically vaccinated against the force of fact. Furthermore, there seemed to be a bizarre reverse-Cassandra effect operating in the universe: whereas the mythical Cassandra spoke the awful truth and was not believed, these days "experts" spoke awful falsehoods, and they were believed. Repeatedly being wrong actually seemed to be an advantage, conferring some sort of puzzling magic glow upon the speaker.

Em baixo, uma descrição da aposta:
###

Ehrlich .... wrote the runaway best-seller The Population Bomb. Published in 1968, the book was solidly Malthusian.

"The battle to feed all of humanity is over," it began. "In the 1970s and 1980s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. ....

Julian Simon read this stuff, which he viewed as unalloyed and total nonsense .... he sprang forth .... in the pages of Science, in an article titled "Resources, Population, Environment: An Oversupply of False Bad News." It led with a summary that became a manifesto: False bad news about population growth, natural resources, and the environment is published widely in the face of contrary evidence ...

The battle lines now drawn, it was not long before Ehrlich and Simon met for a duel in the sun. The face-off occurred in the pages of Social Science Quarterly, where Simon challenged Ehrlich to put his money where his mouth was .... with "a public offer to stake US$10,000 ... on my belief that the cost of non-government-controlled raw materials (including grain and oil) will not rise in the long run."

You could name your own terms: select any raw material you wanted - copper, tin, whatever - and select any date in the future, "any date more than a year away," and Simon would bet that the commodity's price on that date would be lower than what it was at the time of the wager.

Ehrlich and his colleagues picked five metals that they thought would undergo big price rises: chromium, copper, nickel, tin, and tungsten ....

Between 1980 and 1990, the world's population grew by more than 800 million, the largest increase in one decade in all of history. But by September 1990, without a single exception, the price of each of Ehrlich's selected metals had fallen, and in some cases had dropped through the floor. Chrome, which had sold for $3.90 a pound in 1980, was down to $3.70 in 1990. Tin, which was $8.72 a pound in 1980, was down to $3.88 a decade later.

Which is how it came to pass that in October 1990, Paul Ehrlich mailed Julian Simon a check for $576.07.

To shrug

If you saw Atlas, the giant who holds the world on his shoulders, if you saw that he stood, blood running down his chest, his knees buckling, his arms trembling but still trying to hold the world aloft with the last of his strength, and the greater the effort the heavier the world bore down upon his shoulders -- what would you tell him to do? I don't know. What could he do? What would you tell him? To shrug.

Francisco D'Anconia, personagem de Atlas Shrugged

Resources, Population, Environment

"Resources, Population, Environment: An Oversupply of False Bad News" de Julian L. Simon — o artigo publicado em 1980 na Science que veio estilhaçar o "consenso" sobre os efeitos "catastróficos" do aumento da população no ambiente e na disponibilidade de recursos naturais:

Summary. False bad news about population growth, natural resources, and the environment is published widely in the face of contradictory evidence. For example, the world supply of arable land has actually been increasing, the scarcity of natural resources including food and energy has been decreasing, and basic measures of U.S. environmental quality show positive trends. The aggregate data show no longrun negative effect of population growth upon the standard of living. Models that embody forces omitted in the past, especially the influence of population size upon productivity increase, suggest a long-run positive effect of additional people.

###

Why Do We Hear Phony Bad News?

Why do false statements of bad news dominate public discussion of these topics'? Here are some speculations.

1) There is a funding incentive for scholars and institutions to produce bad news about population, resources, and the environment. The AID and the U.N.'s Fund for Population Activities disburse more than a hundred million dollars each year to bring about fertility decline. Much of this money goes to studies and publications that show why fertility decline is a good thing. There are no organizations that fund studies having the opposite aim.

2) Bad news sells books, newspapers, and magazines; good news is not half so interesting. Is it a wonder that there are lots of bad-news best-sellers warning about pollution, population growth, and natural-resource depletion but none telling us the facts about improvement?

3) There are a host of possible psychological explanations for this phenomenon about which I am reluctant to speculate. But these two seem reasonably sure: (i) Many people have a propensity to compare the present and the future with an ideal state of affairs rather than with the past or with some other feasible state; the present and future inevitably look bad in such a comparison. (ii) The cumulative nature of exponential growth models has the power to seduce and bewitch.

4) Some publicize dire predictions in the idealistic belief that such warnings can mobilize institutions and individuals to make things even better; they think that nothing bad can come of such prophecies. But we should not shrug off false bad news as harmless exaggeration. There will be a loss of credibility for real threats as they arise, and loss of public trust in public communication. As Philip Handler, president of the National Academy of Sciences, testified to congressmen. in the midst of the environmental panic of 1970: "The nations of the world may yet pay a dreadful price for the public behavior of scientists who depart from .... fact to indulge .... in hyperbole"

The question, then, is: Who will tell us the good-and-true news? How will it be published for people to learn?

Todas as semelhanças com fenómenos actuais são puras coincidências.