Category Archives: Economics

Business, Economics, Education, Mathematics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Bernie’s Proposals

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They would add $18T to the national debt. That’s essentially doubling it (again, after Obama already did it once), not even counting the unfunded liabilities of social security et al.

Related: BS from Bernie:

Bernie Sanders, the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, spoke at Liberty University today. You can read his speech here. It is useful, in that it exposes the extent of Sanders’s ignorance and radicalism. Any deconstruction of a speech this bad must be selective.

Read the whole fisking. It’s also worth noting, in contrast to when a conservative speaker comes to a leftist college, how politely he was treated.

Economics, Mathematics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Social Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

Why We Can’t Go To Mars

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Yet…

Stephen Fleming gave a talk on that subject at Dragoncon this weekend (I should go some time). I haven’t looked at them yet, but his slides are on line, and I suspect there’s some good input to the Kickstarter there.

[Update a few minutes later]

Still haven’t been through slides, but I’m amused to see that he stole my graphical book-cover them in the very first one.

[Reading through]

I’d note that in his slides on the “Martian Defense Grid,” someone on the Mars panel at the AIAA meeting last week called Mars our “Jamestown.” High casualties to initial pioneers.

[Update a few more minutes later]

I wish we could show those charts of the unknown shape of the health/gravity curves to Congress. It makes a powerful case for a gravity lab, but only to people who actually give a damn about Mars. Actually, someone should show them to Elon.

Business, Economics, Health, Media Criticism, Science And Society, Technology and Society

A New Class Of Cholesterol Drugs

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I wish I had more confidence that they’re not just treating a symptom:

As for the efficacy of the drugs, it is not yet proved that very low LDL levels produced by drugs lead to sharp reductions in heart attacks, strokes and deaths from cardiovascular disease, as researchers have seen in people with the naturally inactive PCSK9 gene.

Many cardiologists, though, are persuaded by a large body of evidence supporting the idea that the lower the LDL, the lower the risk.

“I believe lower is better and do not believe that a very low LDL is harmful,” said Dr. Daniel Rader, a cardiologist at the University of Pennsylvania.

Others, like Dr. Harlan Krumholz, a cardiologist at Yale, urge caution. “We are in a period of exuberant enthusiasm about these drugs,” he said. “We could just be performing cosmetic surgery on a lab value.”

If it were certain that the PCSK9 inhibitors were safe and effective in preventing heart attacks and deaths there would be no need for clinical trials, he noted.

$14,000/year is a lot of money for a treatment for which we have no idea whether or not it’s effective. I think improving diets would be much more cost effective.

[Update Tuesday morning]

Here’s a longer piece about the new drugs and the issues. Note: 1) It is assumed that the goal is to lower cholesterol, and that this will in turn result in lower mortality and 2) No mention of diet as a potential solution. Of course, it’s hard to get people to change their diets. But I suspect that to the degree that doctors are telling people to do so, they’re still telling them to cut out sat fat and cholesterol, despite all the actual science, and probably still telling them to follow FDA food-pyramic advice, which is junk science.

[Bumped]

Business, Economics, Space, Technology and Society

Growing Metal Structure

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…like a tree:

Modumetal uses nanotechnology — manipulation of matter at the molecular level — to micromanage at a very small scale to better control the conditions and substances through which electroplating occurs. Basically, the company grows metal on a surface in a way that makes it easier to shape and tinker with the material’s characteristics. Lomasney says it’s similar to how nature controls the environment related to a tree’s growth— sunlight, soil, location, temperature—and then creates a tree that is a product those conditions.

This is the sort of thing that Eric talked about in Engines of Creation almost thirty years ago. It’s one of the reasons that any plans NASA has for Mars missions decades from now are already obsolete.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Social Commentary

Income Inequality And Poverty

No, they’re not the same thing. And Glenn makes a good point: “Notice how little we hear about ‘wealth inequality.’ There’s a lot of untaxed wealth in foundations, university endowments, family trusts, etc. A populist who wanted to put Democrats on the spot might propose taxing that. You know, for the common good. Only working stiffs have more income than wealth.”

[Update a few minutes later]

The plan to further enrich the wealthy left at the expense of the middle class.

And yes, there probably is nothing more corrupt, both in the US and internationally, than the environmental movement.

Business, Economics, Political Commentary, Popular Culture, Social Commentary, Technology and Society

Silicon Valley

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…is headed for disaster:

America will always plant crops and need chemicals to service those crops. And it will always need payment, delivery and data services. But will it always need Facebook and Twitter? Cisco runs a large proportion of the Internet; Facebook hosts your grandma’s pictures. You do the math.

There won’t be any suicides in Silicon Valley – the most dangerous thing to happen in northern California occurred last month when an angel investor’s Birkenstocks got caught in the BART elevator – but the whole edifice on which the delicate San Francisco ecosystem is based is about to come crashing down all over again.

If so, I won’t shed a tear, after all the damage those people have done to the state of California and the country.