Origin XT Blog

I dedicate this page to the issue of global warming, specifically the two articles about global warming wherein the second completely owns the first.

This first article relies completely on irrelevant “evidence” to contradict global warming, making a fool out of the author:

Scientific `consensus’ on global warming doesn’t exist By Robert Cohen

The recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change summary, released Feb. 2, states that it is “very likely” that changes in climate are due to human influence. More recent comments in various media outlets have focused on a scientific consensus which supports the panel’s conclusions. Those who question this consensus have been compared to Holocaust deniers, and some have been threatened with job dismissal. This is no longer science, but scientific socialism. I do not agree with all of the IPCC conclusions and know through peer discussions that the idea of a consensus in the meteorological community is false.

The IPCC was formed under U.N. auspices, and while each expert contributed a few pages of the report, the final publication was vetted through governmental committees before release, where significant changes could be made. The documents signed by the contributing experts note that they agree with the pages they contributed, but not necessarily the complete report nor its conclusions.

There are a number of inconsistencies in the report. The most glaring is that the models on which the conclusions depend do not agree with various sets of observations. Following are a few specific examples: The summary notes an increase in mean sea level of 7 inches during the 20th century, with a forecast rise of an additional 7 to 23 inches by 2100. Observations, however, do not agree with these predictions. Stockholm, which has the world’s longest sea level measurement record of about 1,200 years, has shown increases in sea level of only plus-or-minus 0.06 inches per year, with an average very close to zero; these observations are well below the model predictions.

The Pacific Island nation of Tuvalu , barely above sea level, has requested permission to move its people to Australia or New Zealand, based on the predicted sea level rise. However, satellite data and sea level measurements indicate falling sea level at the island. The models predict that temperature increases will appear first at the poles. However, data published after the release of the IPCC Summary indicate that temperatures in the Antarctic have not increased during the previous 50 years. Those data frequently quoted in the media of increasing temperatures are only from a small region occupied by scientists; the Antarctic region as a whole does not show rising temperatures.

Away from the earth’s surface, models predict that temperature trends should show a strong increase with height, particularly in the tropics. However, observations indicate upper atmosphere temperatures showing flat or decreasing temperature trends.

Research has also shown that slight changes in energy from the sun can significantly affect the earth, particularly in terms of clouds, which are a weak link in the global warming models. The level and amount of cloud can determine whether temperatures will warm as the cloud layer limits heat dissipation to space or whether temperatures will cool as the sun’s incoming energy is reflected back to space before reaching the Earth’s surface.

Temperature has fluctuated significantly in the past, with shorter-term cooling and warming trends of about 1,500 years superimposed on long-term cycles of ice ages and glacial melting. The 1,500-year cycle includes the Medieval Warming Period and the Little Ice Age, which together extended from about 900 to 1850 A.D. During the former, literature and archaeology provide evidence that the Vikings found grapes in Newfoundland, naming their new settlement Vinland. The Little Ice Age was associated with major diseases which were rampant, due at least partially to the cold weather. As the Arctic ice edge advanced, Inuit hunters in kayaks were observed as far south as Scotland around 1700.

Clearly, these changes were not due to human influence. It has yet to be determined whether we are in a warming period which is part of the normal climate cycle.

Is it worth destroying our economy and lifestyle based on an unproven theory which does not correlate with historical observations?

The article above gets absolutely dismantled a week later by an article written by Rafael Reyes and Stephen H. Schneider:

The debate is over; we must address climate change now

In his March 5 opinion article, “certified consulting meteorologist” Robert Cohen seeks to cast doubt on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the climate-change science consensus. His is a campaign of misinformation that relies on common misconceptions.

First, regarding sea level, a common denier tactic is to say that observations in one location invalidate the global measurements of rising seas. This is like saying the stock market can’t be up if one stock is down. Globally distributed tide-gauge data from 1870 to 2004 shows the sea level is increasing over half a foot per century, and is accelerating.

Second, regarding upper-atmosphere temperatures and the effect of the sun, if the warming we are observing were primarily due to changes in energy output from the sun, the whole atmosphere would warm. This is not happening. The observed pattern - warming below, cooling higher up - is a “fingerprint” that emissions are trapping heat at lower levels, and is one of a half dozen such fingerprints that support human emissions as a main factor in recent climate trends.

Third, regarding past climate changes, current carbon-dioxide concentrations are higher than any seen in almost a million years! What’s more, the rate of global climate change that we are currently experiencing is greater than that during any time since the end of the last ice age. It is the rapid rate of change of temperature relative to previous eras that defines the unique and serious problem of global warming that we are facing.

The IPCC report is produced by teams of scientists under exhaustive review, and while government representatives may comment, the scientists are under no obligation to incorporate their suggestions. All responses by authors to comments are screened by editors to minimize any hint of bias. With nearly 4,000 participating experts in 130 countries, the IPCC’s report is probably the most scrutinized document in the world. There is virtual unanimity among climate scientists that carbon dioxide from human sources is a major factor in global warming. As noted by Donald Kennedy, editor in chief of Science magazine, a “consensus as strong as the one that has developed around this topic is rare in science.”

By pouring new carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, we are fundamentally changing the delicate balance that regulates the temperature of the planet. And the risks are severe. As one example close to home, the Sierra snowcap is showing signs of decrease and projections for resulting water loss in the state run from 30 percent to 80 percent in the coming decades depending on the extent to which we act.

There is no longer serious debate about whether we should take action to deal with the risks. Chief executives of major companies including BP America, Lehman Brothers, General Electric, Wal-Mart Stores, Alcoa, DuPont, Caterpillar and numerous others have called for urgent action. Even former skeptics such as Pat Robertson and Bill O’Reilly have acknowledged the reality of serious human-caused warming and the need to address it.

But this call to action is simply more incentive to do what we should do anyway. Burning fossil fuels is a major factor in the country’s asthma epidemic, with 50,000 deaths from outdoor air pollution annually in the United States. And too many of our dollars spent buying petroleum support dictatorships around the world, weakening our national security.

Further, there are huge financial benefits to realize from investment in alternatives. The opportunities are so great that Jeffrey Immelt, GE’s CEO, recently stated, “We think green means green. This is a time period where environmental improvement is going to lead toward profitability. This is not a hobby to make people feel good.” Our region will greatly benefit from the technologies and jobs that will come from addressing climate change head on. Already, many businesses are growing from the “clean energy” boom.

The science is strong; the debate over fundamentals of human-induced warming is over. We need action at every level and the time is NOW.

The failed attempts to contradict the scientifically based theory of global warming is clearly reminiscient of the days when nay-sayers of evolution reigned. Oh wait, that’s STILL the case in places like Oklahoma, whose Senator, who adamantly refuses to believe global warming, called Gore “Full of shit.” Good world!

MIT waitlisted me. Apparently notification of whether I’d be accepted or denied admission will come AFTER I notify my other college(s) whether I want in or not. MIT, if you really don’t want me, I don’t want you either. You won’t even give me stats for the waiting list and for admissions. I had to Google them up.

For the 2005-6 year, 7600 men and 2800 women applied to MIT, of whom 750 and 740 (respectively) were admitted. Those numbers are pretty demoralizing. I highly doubt that ALL of those 740 women were more qualified than ALL of the other 6850 unadmitted men (basically, I doubt the LEAST QUALIFIED of the 740 exceeds the qualifications of the MOST QUALIFIED of the 6850–something I believe is very unlikely). This is just a clear example of politically- and institutionally-endorsed discrimination (The P.C. variant of the terminology is the familiar “affirmative action”) gone completely wrong; instead of admitting students solely based on their ability, their past contributions, and their other records, MIT gives a 200% (3x) lead for women simply because they are women.

Let’s see how many men would have been admitted if the total numer of admission were the same, but men were admitted at the same ratio: total = 750+740=1490 ~ 1500. At this rate, 400 women and 1100 men would have been admitted. This means, IF ALL of the women in the waiting list were more qualified than I am, I still would have had 90.2% chance of being admitted.

Also from the same page, I see that of the 470 put on the waiting list last year, 0 were offered admission. Isn’t that just wonderful? Because of this, and the second period of uncertainty (third time for early applicants who got waitlisted), the experience is like being temporarily stored in purgatory while god determines whether there is space in hell (or heaven) for you.

I did not expect admission into MIT anyway, but the admissions office should have been frank with the waitlisted applicants by offering them detailed statistics of their chances of admission, how many applied, how many were admitted (both with men/women breakdowns), etc.

MIT is not the place for me anyway. I bid the rest of you guys good luck in finding suitable colleges that appreciate your admission.

I’ve come up with one solution to poverty in Africa, US budget deficits, and global warming. It’s a very simple yet elegant solution, involving the exploitation of the process of photosynthesis. I will break this post into two parts: what will be done, and how that will benefit the world.

What will be done: Move ALL of the world’s polluting factories into Africa–oil refineries, shit processing plants, nuclear waste storage facilities (etc). Relocate ALL tropical timber companies into Africa. Eliminate American farming subsidies, and foreign aid to Africa. Replace coal-fired power plants with gasified-coal plants or nuclear (which can be purchased from Africa). Demand as tribute “peacekeeping troops” from the African beneficiaries who will be taught English, be trained in American combat techniques, and be loaned American assault weapons.

How this will benefit everyone: The efficiency of photosynthesis is severely limited by the scarce abundance of carbon dioxide (thanks to photorespiration). This fact is especially evident in tropical areas where plants receive significantly more sunlight (in the light reaction) than they can store (in the light-independent reaction). Therefore, the amount of CO2 those plants can remove from the atmosphere and thus the amount of O2 they can release are limited ONLY by the limited supply of CO2, meaning that introducing additional sources of CO2 into that environment will not increase overall CO2 concentration in that region, but instead it will significantly speed up plant growth.

The capital investors can help keep the plant material level by planting trees for timber, then chopping them down (to act as constant atmospheric carbon absorbers). In doing so, they are not only helping to keep the natural equilibrium and balance but also profiting from this (in addition to getting cheap wood for the industrial nations). What will the additional CO2 source be, though, you ask? What else can they be? Industrial factories.

Moving those factories to Africa will dramatically decrease the demand of energy in industrial nations, and thus the greenhouse gas emissions. And the land originally used by those factories and power plants (whatever was moved away) can be now filled with tons of trees, which would offset (if not even undo) the waste produced by cars and other miscellaneous polluters that were not moved to Africa.

It will also create jobs (some of which may be somewhat high-tech) in Africa, which will contribute to its human capital (in addition to the physical capital), reduce (or virtually eliminate) its poverty, and ultimately make Africa self-sufficient (so the US does not have to send them money). Just in return, every eligible male African citizen is expected to devote one year of his life (6 months to adequate training, 6 months in duty) to serve as US (screw UN) peacekeeping officers for international tasks. They can handle all of Iraq; they can power humanitarian missions around the world; etc.

The US will have to spend significantly less on its military and foreign aid, and even less on volatile OPEC energy. It will also be self-sufficient in terms of wood, and it will have a happy trading partner. Therefore this would eliminate US budget deficits (by cutting unnecessary costs) and markedly improve (if not eliminate) trade deficits.

The environmental benefits are obvious, so I won’t cover that much. Basically moving factories to Africa won’t mean Africa will spew out more greenhouse gases, but it will eliminate (considering the neutralization factor with more trees) emission in industrial nations. (Sorry, I’m using the US and “industrial nations” interchangeably, but I mean the latter)

Some potential problems: Textile workers in Atlanta will lose their jobs to a much cheaper labor force in Africa. But, so what? New sectors always emerge in the economy, creating new jobs. An economic shift from labor-intensive work to automated-production is an emperical evidence for a successful economy. The whole industrialized world is quickly shifting to a services-oriented economy, meaning the moving of factories will have increasingly decreasing (lol) effect on the economy.

Another problem is more evident: Africa probably will not be content with the industrial world controlling and building crap on their land. To avoid this problem, they would need to be convinced that this plan will be mutually beneficial (I see it as a good deal on their part too), and if they have any rationality, this should not be too hard.

This is an incomplete idea, but the basic skeleton is there. Comment and critique, please.

I was unfortunately caught in the market downtime because I was at first skeptical that the market can so suddenly drop, so I left my stocks alone at first. Unfortunately, by the time I checked later at school, my stocks have already dropped a good deal. My only big loser was the stock of a mining company (let’s say M), whereas the rest of them had a forgivable loss totaling less than 1000.

Mr. Woo told me about the successes he has had with M, and he said it’s a growth stock. He said he’s keeping his, so on the first sign of a dip yesterday, I bought it. Unfortunately, for that day, it didn’t move up very much after I had bought it. And this morning, when I saw it was DOWN 3%, I dismissed it as a temporary fluctuation, and left for school. By the time lunch had arrived, I had already lost almost 3000 off this stock, and I decided to cut my losses for everything by selling them all.

20 minutes later, Dell came in for some odd reason. The log out function in Investopedia must not always work, apparently. I got rid of Dell too when I saw it.

I guess the 420ish drop in the DOW is not as bad as the 24.39% drop on Saturday, December 12, 1914. That would’ve been bad.

Not because its chips are the best mass-produced consumer computer processors, not because it is the biggest manufacturing company in the Silicon Valley, not because it is one of my most favorite companies, but because its stock results don’t reflect reality.

I bought Intel when it dropped below 21 (I got it at 20.91, I think) on Friday, after the huge tumble down thanks to unfavorable oil price fluctuations. I was pretty confident 21 is pretty much as low as it can go, with such a bright future ahead of it: AMD’s losing market-share, nVidia’s inevitable obsoleteness (as Intel rolls out chips that eliminate the need for an independent graphics core), and its new Metal-K technology combined with 45nm wafer-etching abilities. It probably can go higher in the next few days, but the immediate result is abysmal.

In the morning today, Intel announced a teraflop capable processor that runs at 62 Watts! That basically allows any willing consumer to purchase a supercomputer that uses half the power normal desktop chips use (If you were to get a supercomputer network this fast, you would need a huge room full of processors). This could replace whole datacenters with a pair of servers running these chips, and reduce power usage by data networks by 98%. Intel stocks inched up a bit from the opening price, and strangely, tanked after that.

This is what doesn’t make sense to me–here, the company unveiled the most powerful chip and the most ambitious invasion tactic to date, but the stocks tumble on the positive news. What’s going on? If stocks were more predictable than typical brownian motion maybe I wouldn’t be jumping all over the place. Do you have any major experiences with inexplicably illogical stock movements?

In response to a letter a TIME reader sent to TIME in response to the “Dawn of a New Dynasty” edition (which I never got):

“The Chinese Century” convinced me that by buying products made in China I am supporting that country’s political nonintervention policies in areas like Darfur and helping perpetuate a disgusting lack of regard for the value of human life. From now on, I am going to focus on buying American-made products.”

Janet Thurston
Brighton, Michigan

Your response convinced me that by buying products made in America I am supporting this country’s political and military intervention policies in areas like Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, and Kosovo and helping perpetuate a disgusting lack of regard for the value of human life (think Iraq war and the tens of thousands killed). From now on, I am going to focus on buying whatever products satisfy me best.

With what hypocrisy and audacity you mutter! Go take a deeper look at all which the US has involved itself with, and the hypocritical and judgmental attitudes with which it views China and the rest of the world. Iraq? That’s a total mess. If you think China’s “human rights abuses” (apparently they think massacring dogs with rabies is a human rights violation. What the hell?) were bad, look at the devastation in Vietnam, Iraq. After submitting a 600-billion-dollar plus military budget for 2007, the US has the nerve to criticize China’s 40 billion dollar budget, which is spread over a population five times larger than that of the US. Hey, China brought 500 million people out of poverty in the past 30 years; what did the US do? Pop out more babies into poverty? That’s right: poverty rate increased, with vital funds being drained by an unnecessary international intervention effort.

Regardless, I don’t think commercial interests should be tied to politics. As the consumer, I just want the best items from the cheapest places; and as a prospective employer, I just want the best and least expensive labor I can get.

So far, I have made $500+ off Intel, $600+ off nVidia, $400+ off TiVo, $250 off IBM, $300 off Xilinx (my mom’s company), $50 off China Life Insurance (I sold it because it was too risky), $950 combined off China Mobile and VFC, and $50 off Marvell. Those stocks consist of 9/10th of my stock history, and all nine of them have returned a decent profit–pretty good for an extremely cautious and conservative investor such as myself. They total to around $3100 bucks, or 3.1% above the starting cash of 100k. That’s pretty good; momentarily, those profits put me in 1st place in my class (period five).

I suppose you’ve noticed I’ve listed 9 stocks of my 10 that have profited me in an acceptable manner, but have left out the last one. That is the one I want to discuss mainly here: EVCC. Before you accuse me of simply and blindly jumping onto the EVCC bandwagon that propelled many to the top 5, I will tell you that this purchase (4000 EVCC stocks at the onset) was part of a calculated profit plan that should have reaped $950-$1000 a day or so, but instead, because of a malfunctioning limit-sell function of Investopedia, I am down $5000 (down $6000 if you include the potential profit) because of it.

What was the plan, you ask? Well, I noticed that EVCC was highly fluctuating, changing as much as 20% a day, and then back, so I realized I could profit immensely from the limit buy and limit sell functions, setting Investopedia to purchase at price x, then sell at price x+y immediately when that happens. The plan would have worked perfectly if Investopedia had worked.

How did I execute the plan? I set up a limit-buy on Monday for 4000 EVCC shares at $4.5 per share, which Investopedia purchased yesterday morning at $4.45. I also had a limit-sell at $4.64 per share, so that I can reap an immense amount of profits from the hourly fluctuations. When I checked back half an hour later, I saw that the EVCC stocks were at $4.69 per share, and I was quite elated, too, because that meant I would have gotten more than I had expected. I would have gained $960 ($920 after minusing 20 dollar commission each way) from the transaction, from that single fluctuation alone.

But when I checked the stocks at lunch, instead of seeing them sold by Investopedia (the limit sell requirements have been met! I even saw the data loaded onto Investopedia!), their values plummeted 13% or so. Although this had dropped me from the momentary high to 31st rank, I decided to keep them, not knowing what to do. Unfortunately, they plummeted again today–this time by $3000 in total value–dropping me to rank 159.

Oh yes, someone logged in as me and made market transactions at 12:49 PM Pacific time (3:49PM Eastern)–when I am in class–and screwed around with my EVCC stocks, causing me an additional 500 dollar loss, but that is insignificant amid this insane $6000 loss from one stock. I’ve changed my password, by the way, although I was sure that I had pressed the log-out button every time I checked my stocks at school.

So instead of being at 103850, I am at 973xx. This sucks. Damn you Investopedia! Good thing this is “fake” money, though, and I did pretty well on the test. Still, this 6000 dollar loss is undeserved; I cannot blame myself for Investopedia not following through with the limit-sell.

I’ve fluctuated between 99800 and 100950 or so in the past two days in the simulated stock game. I bought Intel when it was supposedly down, but because I bought after the market closed–which I must, because school ends after the market closes–I was subjected to the mercy of the market. And I lost. The next day, the price began at a pretty insane high and dropped back to the same place, but because I placed my order the night before, Investopedia made the purchase the second the market opened.

But off that note, the recent financial announcements from Google, Nintendo, IBM, AMD, Intel etc and the resulting stock-price changes in some of the world’s most-known companies did not make sense.

Google, which announced that its quarterly profit tripled to 1.03 billion or so dollars, saw its shares drop 20 points, or 4%.

Nintendo, whose Wii propelled its profits to a record 1.1 billion dollars for the nine-months ending Dec 2006, saw its shares decline 2%

AMD, devastated by a miserable 500+ million dollar quarterly loss and a losing market-share (to Intel), saw its shares climb 2%.

IBM, which earned 3.54 billion dollars last quarter after a staggering 25% growth, saw its shares tank 5% (4.51 dollars)

Intel, whose new announcements of the 45 nm chip and Metal-K technology combined with its regaining market share and marketing momentum led Wall Street to declare it the winner in microchip corporations, saw its shares decline 3% before rebounding slightly.

I wish stocks were more logical.

Click on the images to see everything.

A month is a long enough wait.

Yes. Reacting violently and irrationally when caught in one’s acts is inexplicably more perverse.

Several times in the past I have blogged about cheating and what I have observed regarding it, accusing it of being the worst case of perversion. But those I’ve discussed before have been largely unprosecuted, and even if they were, their responses would have been disappointment at themselves and perhaps even remorse–nothing too radical.

But I have been wrong; there are things worse–much worse–than simply cheating. Cheating really is just compromising the cheater himself (unless grades were curved, of course), but acting on impulse to react to an unjustified sense of indignation causes harm to innocent victims, sometimes even unintended.

While cutting metal in H5A (the robotics mini-room) today, I learned that Mr Nguyen’s car was trashed today, and seemingly as a second-thought, so was Mr Bowen’s van. After a bit of questioning around regarding the cause of this mishap, I found out that earlier, one (or more?) of Mr N’s sophomores was (or were?) punished for cheating. And Bowen gave Hal (per 2) a zero for “cheating” on his unit test–I’m guessing to set an example because Bowen told us (per 4) exactly that. Yet I don’t think there was any connection. As Mr N surmised, the damage on Bowen’s van was probably an afterthought to perhaps direct attention away from his original intent.

This form of retaliation is just low–very low. His punishments were probably not unfounded, considering this act perfectly shows his unstable character. But if he really were just misjudged, he should have written a formal letter of complaint, explaining the situation and arguing his defense. I would have if I were in his position and misjudged.

I have nothing more to say about this. Your comments are greatly appreciated.

P.S. Yes. I realize I say “He” when I don’t know the sex of the offender, but that’s because the noticeable cheaters I’ve known have been mostly guys. Statistically this is more accurate.