It is good to hear when a crazy idea I believed wasn't entirely crazy. A nature article is about the highest standard in science. If there are articles in nature that say something, they are not always correct(my time at Cornell was almost entirely wasted following some paper from nature that didn't seem to have much basis in reality) but you should pay very close attention to them. They represent the thoughts of the best scientists in the world on the topic.
So I was excited to see that they published some barefoot running articles showing that shoes really do cause problems running.
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Writing on different gadgets
I don't currently have internet at home. I have it at work, and I have my iphone. One of the more odd things this has taught me is that my writing is significantly worse on an iphone. I don't really understand this, if anything having to slow down while I write seems like it should improve my writing. But whenever I am on a computer and edit anything I wrote on an iphone I am really shocked by the silly errors I make.
Queue the marijuana propaganda
Because of the ballot measure legalizing marijuana being voted on this November there will be a quite a few propaganda pieces, like this LA times article, written about marijuana legalization. They will all spout out the same lies and half truths while typically trying to make one of the following cases:
1. Marijuana should stay illegal because it is so much more dangerous than alcohol or cigarettes.
2. Making Marijuana legal will increase crime rates.
3. The money we would gain by making it legal would be insignificant.
The first argument is the most absurd. Hundreds of people a year die from alcohol overdose. None from marijuana. Withdrawal from alcohol has been known to kill, from marijuana it is unpleasant but not deadly. Both lead to similar risks from driving under the influence, but this isn't as important since the ballot measure doesn't change any of those laws.
The cancer risks are the most uncertain. Some people, like the LA times article I previously linked, claim that marijuana smoke has more carcinogens than tobacco implying it is more likely to cause cancer. This is quite a controversial claim. Many researchers have come to the conclusion cigarette smoke is more dangerous. Unlike with cigarettes there is no consensus that marijuana causes cancer at all. If it was as bad as cigarettes it would be relatively easy to show how bad the cancer risk is. As opposed to nicotine, THC is at worst a very mild carcinogen and probably not even one at all. So it is only the smoke that is dangerous. Even if marijuana smoke was worse than cigarette smoke though it probably doesn't matter. The total exposure is less leading to the total risk being much less; since a typical cigarette smoker might smoke a pack a day, while few pot-heads ever smoke nearly as much. At worse the risk is similar to cigarettes, and at best the risk is far less. This is clearly no excuse for prohibition.
Another of the more aggravating arguments I hear is that marijuana is stronger now than it was in the past. First of all, it is probably not true; but even if it is, so what? If anything that makes it safer since it is the smoke that is dangerous and less smoke is required for the same high. That should lower the cancer risk. Since overdose is not an issue there really isn't the sort of danger that say taking shots of everclear represents. And even if it was an issue, just legalize the lower THC strains. After all we first ended prohibition for low alcohol beer, than for most alcohol a bit later.
The crime rate argument one is the favorite argument of many people. It just sounds plausible. However there are a lot of good reasons to why this isn't the scary proposition people make it out to be.
Marijuana has been pseudo-legal in California for many years now. The medical marijuana bill passed in 1996. Since then, anyone with a doctor's permission can legally buy marijuana. Getting a doctor to approve you does not appear to be very difficult either. I know many perfectly healthy people with medical marijuana, so clearly there is a great deal of legal recreational use out there. So we have first hand experience with liberalization of drug laws. If making it a lot easier to smoke was going to increase crime rates, than we have over a decade of data to look at to find out how bad it has been. Guess what? Crime rates have been consistently dropping since the bill was passed(although they started to fall before the bill, so I am not saying that the liberalization caused the decline, although a good case for that could be made). If there is an increase in the crime rate we therefore know that it is a tiny one incapable of stopping a long-term decrease in the crime rate.
There are many reasons that crime rates have not increased, one of the biggest is that making something illegal gives people reason to fight over it. Drug dealers compete with guns. Liquor stores compete with price cuts, wide selection, and advertising. Therefore turning drug dealers into legitimate businessmen is one of the best things we can do to reduce crime rates. They will no longer be shooting up our neighborhoods.
Also thousands of police officers are wasting their lives arresting these drug users and dealers. If this proposition passes they will be free to spend their time chasing after violent criminals. This will almost certainly bring down crime rates.
As for the money the state will save if this bill passes, it comes from many sources:
1. Taxes on marijuana.
2. Reduced criminal justice system costs because we are arresting less people.
3. Taxes payed by citizens who would be in jail, but are now free to work.
When arguing the income is too small to matter, people typically focus only on the first source of income. But the net swing will be far more than just that. It is safe to say that the state will make billions off of the ballot measure. That won't single-handedly save the state budget, but the 1.34 billion dollars in tax money the bill is expected to make is enough money to entirely fund six Fresno State sized colleges. That would do a lot more good for our economy than locking up nonviolent criminals ever could.
1. Marijuana should stay illegal because it is so much more dangerous than alcohol or cigarettes.
2. Making Marijuana legal will increase crime rates.
3. The money we would gain by making it legal would be insignificant.
The first argument is the most absurd. Hundreds of people a year die from alcohol overdose. None from marijuana. Withdrawal from alcohol has been known to kill, from marijuana it is unpleasant but not deadly. Both lead to similar risks from driving under the influence, but this isn't as important since the ballot measure doesn't change any of those laws.
The cancer risks are the most uncertain. Some people, like the LA times article I previously linked, claim that marijuana smoke has more carcinogens than tobacco implying it is more likely to cause cancer. This is quite a controversial claim. Many researchers have come to the conclusion cigarette smoke is more dangerous. Unlike with cigarettes there is no consensus that marijuana causes cancer at all. If it was as bad as cigarettes it would be relatively easy to show how bad the cancer risk is. As opposed to nicotine, THC is at worst a very mild carcinogen and probably not even one at all. So it is only the smoke that is dangerous. Even if marijuana smoke was worse than cigarette smoke though it probably doesn't matter. The total exposure is less leading to the total risk being much less; since a typical cigarette smoker might smoke a pack a day, while few pot-heads ever smoke nearly as much. At worse the risk is similar to cigarettes, and at best the risk is far less. This is clearly no excuse for prohibition.
Another of the more aggravating arguments I hear is that marijuana is stronger now than it was in the past. First of all, it is probably not true; but even if it is, so what? If anything that makes it safer since it is the smoke that is dangerous and less smoke is required for the same high. That should lower the cancer risk. Since overdose is not an issue there really isn't the sort of danger that say taking shots of everclear represents. And even if it was an issue, just legalize the lower THC strains. After all we first ended prohibition for low alcohol beer, than for most alcohol a bit later.
The crime rate argument one is the favorite argument of many people. It just sounds plausible. However there are a lot of good reasons to why this isn't the scary proposition people make it out to be.
Marijuana has been pseudo-legal in California for many years now. The medical marijuana bill passed in 1996. Since then, anyone with a doctor's permission can legally buy marijuana. Getting a doctor to approve you does not appear to be very difficult either. I know many perfectly healthy people with medical marijuana, so clearly there is a great deal of legal recreational use out there. So we have first hand experience with liberalization of drug laws. If making it a lot easier to smoke was going to increase crime rates, than we have over a decade of data to look at to find out how bad it has been. Guess what? Crime rates have been consistently dropping since the bill was passed(although they started to fall before the bill, so I am not saying that the liberalization caused the decline, although a good case for that could be made). If there is an increase in the crime rate we therefore know that it is a tiny one incapable of stopping a long-term decrease in the crime rate.
There are many reasons that crime rates have not increased, one of the biggest is that making something illegal gives people reason to fight over it. Drug dealers compete with guns. Liquor stores compete with price cuts, wide selection, and advertising. Therefore turning drug dealers into legitimate businessmen is one of the best things we can do to reduce crime rates. They will no longer be shooting up our neighborhoods.
Also thousands of police officers are wasting their lives arresting these drug users and dealers. If this proposition passes they will be free to spend their time chasing after violent criminals. This will almost certainly bring down crime rates.
As for the money the state will save if this bill passes, it comes from many sources:
1. Taxes on marijuana.
2. Reduced criminal justice system costs because we are arresting less people.
3. Taxes payed by citizens who would be in jail, but are now free to work.
When arguing the income is too small to matter, people typically focus only on the first source of income. But the net swing will be far more than just that. It is safe to say that the state will make billions off of the ballot measure. That won't single-handedly save the state budget, but the 1.34 billion dollars in tax money the bill is expected to make is enough money to entirely fund six Fresno State sized colleges. That would do a lot more good for our economy than locking up nonviolent criminals ever could.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Ultra-Simple Generator
My newest creation is an ultra-simple generator. It is just about the simplest generator possible. 400 feet of really thin wire, four magnets, a nail, a really low voltage light bulb, and a cardboard box.
On the one hand it kind of sucks. It can barely make a flash of light. It can at least be seen in a lit room, but it is a whole lot of work for that little bit of light.
On the other hand, it is just about the only way to get electricity without plugging something into a wall, a commercial generator which is difficult to understand, or using a battery. This generator also happens to use the same physics as real power plants but in a way that is easily seen, if still difficult to understand.
What I really want is a generator and motor that are easy to see working and connected together. If I was to make improvements I think I could spin one magnet, and have it turn another one across the room. I would just be a transformer away from have a mini version of a utility.
Next though is a Leyden Jar and Electrophorus to charge it with. Big sparks sound more fun than little flashes of light.
On the one hand it kind of sucks. It can barely make a flash of light. It can at least be seen in a lit room, but it is a whole lot of work for that little bit of light.
On the other hand, it is just about the only way to get electricity without plugging something into a wall, a commercial generator which is difficult to understand, or using a battery. This generator also happens to use the same physics as real power plants but in a way that is easily seen, if still difficult to understand.
What I really want is a generator and motor that are easy to see working and connected together. If I was to make improvements I think I could spin one magnet, and have it turn another one across the room. I would just be a transformer away from have a mini version of a utility.
Next though is a Leyden Jar and Electrophorus to charge it with. Big sparks sound more fun than little flashes of light.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Now it is only twice as expensive to buy!
Fairly often articles enter newspapers that are blatent propaganda for the real estate industry. I have been seeing this for years, as the real estate industry has never predicted prices would drop, even during the worst of the crash. Their predictions of growth always recieve media attention from someone who uncritically passes it along as fact. This SF gate article, citing a forbes article, strikes me as one such piece. Its logic is so twisted I can't begin to comprehend it.
Right now in San Francisco it costs a little more than twice as much to buy as to rent. This is down from about three times as much at the peak of the bubble. So obviously it makes sense to rent. It is cheaper, you don't have to maintain it, and the money you can save is a far better investment than real estate is. No real estate bubbles will be occuring in CA for at least a decade. Bubbles almost never repeat themselves, too many people lose too much money to fall for the same story a second time. However somehow that article takes that same statistic, assumes home prices will rise a lot, than uses that as evidence it is time to buy. That logic hurts my head. It is time to buy when it is cheaper to buy than rent. Only then is the hastle worth it.
Edit: OK, so the paragraph admitting buying was a poor option makes it a bit better than I made it out to be. Still, the assumption that home prices will be increasing rapidly when it is cheaper to rent, foreclosure rates are rising, and unemployment is the highest it has been in my lifetime, is just silly.
Right now in San Francisco it costs a little more than twice as much to buy as to rent. This is down from about three times as much at the peak of the bubble. So obviously it makes sense to rent. It is cheaper, you don't have to maintain it, and the money you can save is a far better investment than real estate is. No real estate bubbles will be occuring in CA for at least a decade. Bubbles almost never repeat themselves, too many people lose too much money to fall for the same story a second time. However somehow that article takes that same statistic, assumes home prices will rise a lot, than uses that as evidence it is time to buy. That logic hurts my head. It is time to buy when it is cheaper to buy than rent. Only then is the hastle worth it.
Edit: OK, so the paragraph admitting buying was a poor option makes it a bit better than I made it out to be. Still, the assumption that home prices will be increasing rapidly when it is cheaper to rent, foreclosure rates are rising, and unemployment is the highest it has been in my lifetime, is just silly.
I ran into the following quote today in a power textbook from 1948:
It is remarkable how slow the utility industry changes. We have nuclear, and oil is too expensive to burn for electricity anymore but other than that we are doing things pretty much like we were in World War Two
The sources of energy for large-scale generation of electricity are:
1. Steam, from (a) coal, (b) oil, or (c) natural gas
2. Water (hydro-electric)
3. Diesel power from oil
Other possible sources of energy are direct solar heat, windpower, tidal power, shale oil, and atomic energy, but none of these as yet has gone beyond the pilot-plant stage, for the reason that coal and petroleum are still abundantly available. But as fossil fuels become scarcer and more expensive, there is every reason to believe that. all of these, as well as petroleum manufactured from vegetable matter,
may become useful and economical supplementary sources of energy.
--C.A. Powell
It is remarkable how slow the utility industry changes. We have nuclear, and oil is too expensive to burn for electricity anymore but other than that we are doing things pretty much like we were in World War Two
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Manufacturing
I periodically go visit factories. The last one I went to really reminded me that as an Engineer one of my main functions is putting people out of work. We were getting the sales pitch from a whole bunch of people about a new product, and most of it was based around how much quicker it was to install. We wouldn't install more if it was easier to install, we would simply hire less construction workers and do the same job as always.
This is the second most impressive accomplishment of Scientists and Engineers of the past century. The most
impressive is of course that we invented an absurd amount of new stuff that would previously be unimaginable. But besides that we also produce the same stuff with far less work. The following graph demonstrates this quite well:
Engineers keep tweaking manufacturing processes. This slow process has caused the often talked about decline in American manufacturing. It is not that we produce less. It is that we produce the same amount without needing nearly as many workers. So if you are a low skill factory worker, it feels like manufacturing is in decline; while an executive would get the opposite idea. We are making the same money without needing to pay so many people, that means more profit!
The next few years will see the economy finally facing this problem head on. Do we have enough work for all these low skill workers that used to go to manufacturing or construction but now can't? Do we have the ability to train them in professions that are in demand? I suspect we will figure out how to put these people to work, but it won't be easy.
This is the second most impressive accomplishment of Scientists and Engineers of the past century. The most
impressive is of course that we invented an absurd amount of new stuff that would previously be unimaginable. But besides that we also produce the same stuff with far less work. The following graph demonstrates this quite well:
Engineers keep tweaking manufacturing processes. This slow process has caused the often talked about decline in American manufacturing. It is not that we produce less. It is that we produce the same amount without needing nearly as many workers. So if you are a low skill factory worker, it feels like manufacturing is in decline; while an executive would get the opposite idea. We are making the same money without needing to pay so many people, that means more profit!
The next few years will see the economy finally facing this problem head on. Do we have enough work for all these low skill workers that used to go to manufacturing or construction but now can't? Do we have the ability to train them in professions that are in demand? I suspect we will figure out how to put these people to work, but it won't be easy.
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