MyATMPinIs1234

I'm Just Sayin

What happens when you put an exposed 190MW nuclear reactor core near a whole lot of ice? My computer model predicts that the ice will melt.

What if I told you there was such a reactor close to the arctic circle? It is inside what used to be the Soviet Mike Class K-278 Komsomolets submarine.

Does Al Gore ever mention this fact when he preaches about the melting ice caps? Of course not, because it doesn't fit with his thesis, the verity of which he has some credibility riding on.

He also probably doesn't mention it, because I just made this whole thing up right now, and it's a ridiculous association.

But I can't wait to launch this into the discussion next time someone starts talking about the arctic ice melting.

I would like to congratulate my colleagues on reaching a new milestone in their attempt to justify our headcount by making each team member less productive.

Since last Wednesday afternoon, I have received 1200 emails, 11 of which contained information relevant to me. Most were automated alerts for things I don't deal with, improperly broad carbon copies and distribution lists for things I don't deal with, and compliance emails for things I don't deal with.

In case you were wondering, this translates to a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of -41.5 decibels. To put that in perspective, if my Outlook inbox were a radio station, it would be blasting almost pure static.

If left unfiltered, email would no longer be a viable information channel with a SNR that low. And by the way, this doesn't even count any externally generated spam.

Why does Windows even care if I have unused items on my desktop?

Look around your house. Is there too much stuff lying around? Do you have to go to the Container Store this weekend?

Then why are you working so hard to get even more stuff?

Lately I've read a couple articles about the need to have a disaster supply kit on hand in case something really bad happens. You know, critical stuff like a whistle, aluminum foil, pencils, and a map of the area and compass.

The problem is, 99% of the time the "disaster" amounts to a bit of inconvenience until the Walmart reopens the next day, or FEMA relief supplies show up a few days after that. And in the other 1% of the time, a building has fallen on your head, or you live in Bhopal, in which case your disaster supplies are conveniently within reach of your corpse.

Not to mention the fact that the vast majority of people will never be in a disaster in the first place. So a widespread policy of stockpiling useless items seems to me to be a waste of resources.

But for the sake of argument, I would like to present my disaster supply kit, designed for the intermediate scenario where some catastrophic event causes the temporary or permanent breakdown of law and order and societal functioning, but does not actually kill you.

An example of this would be some kind of super virus that infects and brings down the google and wikipedia data centers, removing humanity's ability to access all knowledge, aside from the no longer vital and rapidly outdated content of the US Weekly on your coffee table.

During the widespread panic, looting, starvation, and death that would ensue, I believe the following items would be useful:

• A rifle and ammunition, for self-protection and eventually hunting for food.
  
• A NIOSH N95-N100 rated particulate respirator, for protection against infectious diseases that either caused, or resulted from the given calamity.
• An ample supply of offline, paper-based pornography. Remember, in a disaster, the internet and even your electricity may fail.
  
• Several months supply of canned food. If you don't have this or run out, you can alternatively use the first item in the list to obtain it.
  
• A water filtration unit with spare filters.
  
• A fire starting kit.
  
• Optional: According to most social networking profiles' "about me" section, very few can live without their iPod. These people will want to include an iPod hand-crank charger in the kit.
  

Today's Global Warming Post

If you look at it the right way, this global warming thing could end up being a heads-i-win-tails-you-lose situation.

On one hand, if global warming ends up happening, those pricks in Saudi Arabia have to live in a country that's 140 degrees instead of 120.

Alternatively, we could invent some incredible alternate energy production and distribution system, and then we would be able to tell the Kremlin, Hugo Chavez, and the Middle East where to shove their fucking oil.

I, for one, would be willing to pay a princely sum for option 2. I guess it's all in the way you sell it.

It's amazing how often major economic decision making, when discussed by politicians and the media, ignores or downplays the most crucial dimension in financial analysis -- timing.

"Should we open ANWR and the US coastline for more oil exploration?"

You see this headline all the time. I guess the implication is that the decision is whether to do so right now. But without actively bringing time into the equation, it's difficult to see that the real question is:

"When should we open ANWR and the US coastline for exploration (including never)?"

People are constantly whining about how we are unnecessarily shipping billions of dollars into the coffers of middle eastern tyrannies to pay for all the oil.

Which is true. Except if you believe in the Peak Oil Theory, under which these stupid dictators have been busy for 50 years shipping us dirt cheap oil, and now that they are running out, we can tap (the rest) of our own sources at sky high prices. In this admittedly oversimplified (and probably incorrect) analysis, the perverse incentive is to leave it in the ground, even if your goal is economic maximization.

Especially since it's not like any country (including USA) invests the proceeds of the oil in something to benefit the future like infrastructure or education. Most countries would blow it on palaces for the rulers, or in our case, pork and entitlements.

My point is not to answer the question of when to drill for oil, because I frankly have no idea. I just don't understand why people can have 19 spreadsheets to figure out when and what Plasma TV to buy, but on important things like what to do with our country's natural resources or when, if ever, to address climate change, all rigor goes completely out the window.

And by the way, fuck it, lets pump it all out now.

First, they came to take away our guns. But I said nothing, because I hate freedom, don't want to protect my family, and prefer to rely on others to provide food.

Related to the Dunning-Kruger effect discussed in a previous post is the fallacious appeal to authority. Specifically, I'm talking about an improper appeal to one's own authority. This is when a very smart person with a high level of achievement in a given field thinks they can intelligently discuss another, unrelated field. A classic (and especially dangerous) example of this is when a famous actor feels qualified to publicly weigh-in on macroeconomics, climatology, or veterinary science.

Most people, as the D-K effect would suggest, believe they have expert knowledge and correct opinions on a wide variety of topics, which makes the problem especially pernicious. You might have even noticed on this very blog, how most of the posts unrelated to my area of expertise -- self-gratification -- are complete rubbish.

The above was brought to mind when I recently stumbled upon a post entitled, "An Engineer's Guide to Weight Loss." It amazed me that this person, who appears to be a high achiever otherwise, could write the single worst post on diet and nutrition available anywhere on the entire internet.

The quick summary of his prescription for weight loss is to eat less (but more coffee and low-fat ice cream), and use the elliptical machine for an hour a day. You might recognize this as the technique millions of fat people fruitlessly use to lose weight or keep it off.

Ted says, "the science of weight loss is simple: eat fewer calories than your burn." This is wrong. It is not simple. And this sentence bakes in multiple unsubstantiated assumptions, including unlikely ones such as that energy intake and expenditure are independent and unrelated variables, and that the type of food does not effect other bodily systems, such as hormonal.

The first assumption is wrong, and dieters even know it's wrong, because they talk about how lowering calories reduces your metabolism, which requires a further reduction in calories. It seems possible that the equation could be rewritten as [Energy_In - Energy_Stored = Energy_Burned], which would make the "Simple I/O operation" fruitless in the long term. As a counterexample, if it were a simple I/O equation, I would've weighed 600 lbs by the end of college solely from my liquid caloric ingestion (here for further info).

The second assumption is wrong as well. Take a person eating 2000 calories of cane sugar a day versus a person eating 2000 calories of lean protein and vegetables. Do you think they will have the same outcome?

Moving on to the exercise suggestion: one hour on the elliptical. One thing he's right about is that this will really suck. And it's a great way to ensure you will not be following this plan for long. I heard once that someone wrote a whole book on exercise, but for the sake of brevity I will just say -- don't do the exercises people tell you to do. Do what you enjoy. That is the only way you will be able to keep it up long term.

Hopefully it will include a healthy dose of weight training, since additional lean body mass has a host of positive effects on the body, including higher metabolism. And if you really want to do elliptical, don't do it for an hour. If you can maintain your pace for an hour you are doing very low intensity, no matter what you might think. Do some intervals, or tabata. And when your vagina stops hurting start doing some real workouts.

[Author's Note: I have no particular expertise in diet, nutrition, physiology, exercise science, grammar, or personal hygiene. The information in this post is probably wrong, and I am unaware of this.]

Good news folks! Apparently civil rights issues have all been solved. The bad news is that there is one thorny issue remaining requiring civil rights leaders' attention. Watching television.

"Some civil-rights leaders are calling on Congress to put more money toward helping people cope with next year's transition from analog to digital television.

The Leadership Conference on Civil Rights said the government needs to help communities that may be unequally affected by the slated Feb. 17, 2009, change (WSJ, July 9, 2008; Page B6)."

Really? This is what civil rights leaders are worried about now?

The changeover isn't even an issue if you have cable or satellite. And if you don't, you need to buy a converter box, which is basically FREE with the $40 government coupon every American household gets two of.

What about the people who don't know about the changeover? They will turn on their TV on Feb 18th, it won't work, and then they will know. And if people who are too stupid to know about this, and too poor to afford cable go without TV for a few days, it's probably a good thing.

Holy crap, CNN! Is there anything bad that isn't caused by climate change?

I assume the accompanying article will explain the science and the causation link between [presumably human caused] climate change and stunted children, right? Or perhaps quote some weather experts or climatologists? What is that? It doesn't have any scientific evidence? And only quotes the baby's mother and someone from the "Church World Service?"

This article is pure eco-propaganda. There have been natural disasters forever. There's really no way to attribute a particular drought, flood, or hurricane to climate change. I guess that's why the author of this article didn't even try to offer substantiation.

But I also love how only really terrible things are caused by climate change. Wouldn't, presumably, climate change be the cause of all weather events? You always see headlines like "global warming causes terrible heat wave on the east coast," but never "climate change causes the perfect weather we are having on the west coast." Was climate change the cause of the really light 2006 and 2007 hurricane seasons? Because I didn't see any articles about that. I guess climate change took two years off after destroying New Orleans in 2005.

Yes, Joanna Slater, people do read page C7. You can't slip a sentence like this in without provoking an amused blog post.

"The most extreme example is the Vietnamese dong (WSJ 7/1, pg C7)."

And no, I will not grow up.