Alexis Tsipras, head of the Greek hard left coalition Syriza, and who may well become prime minister if his coalition does well in the next Greek election, said he sees little chance that Europe will cut off giving money to Greece, but if they do, Athens will stop making payments on its loans. And a financial collapse in Greece will drag down the rest of the Euro zone.
Is Alexis that stupid 'cause he's Greek, or 'cause he's a lefty?
The Europeans can stop giving free money to Greece anytime. When the Greeks stop making payments to European lenders, the Europeans can just give the money they were gonna give the Greeks direct to the lenders. If the lenders, European investors and banks, cry hard enough, the Germans will bail them out, just this once. The Greeks already gave the lenders a 75% haircut last month, what's a second pass with the clippers mean after that?
As soon as the Europeans stop paying, the Greeks are in real trouble. They don't have enough tax revenue to pay all the pensioners and government workers and suppliers. They will have to print IOU's, or drachma's to keep things going. Any Greek with two braincells firing, ought to be dropping by his bank and drawing all his money out, in Euro's, while he still can. Because pretty soon the government will tell the banks, you are going to drachmas. Don't pay out any more Euros to anyone, give 'em these nice fresh crisp hot-off-the-press drachma's instead. That's what we call a run on the banks, and the Greeks are only two inches away from having one.
Greece is a narrow gauge side show. The rest of Europe can manage just fine without them. A Greek default on their debts would be an annoyance but not a body blow. The Greeks would do well to understand that. There is no provision in the Euro constitution, or common Christian charity that compels giving money to deadbeats.
Friday, May 18, 2012
Who's afraid of the big bad algorithm?
Not me. But some newsie on NPR is afraid one is gonna conquer the world. She was talking about Netflix and their movie recommendations, all made by computer. Not that I think Netflix's recommendations are extra ordinary, but occasionally they do steer me onto a good flick. The newsie feared that improvements in the the "algorithm" would yield a killer app that could read minds, violate civil liberties, and put Skynet in charge of the world.
Not to worry. First of all, the algorithm Netflix uses is trivial. Algorithm means procedure. As an example, consider a popular algorithm to find square roots. It goes like this, guess what the root might be. Square your guess and compare it with the original number. If the squared guess is too big, try a smaller guess, conversely if the squared guess is too small, try a bigger guess. Repeat until the squared guess is close enough to the original number. Code this algorithm in your favorite computer language, and you have a program to find square roots.
What Netflix does is ask us viewers which movies we like. Then it looks to find other movies that are like the ones we like. To do this you need a list of all the movies in Netflix, and to go with each movie , we need some properties. Such as type (western, war movie, musical, costume drama, animated, etc) cast (actor and actress who play in the movie), director, rating (G, PG, R ...), year released, color or black & white, and so on. All the computer does is look for movies that match the properties of the movies the customer likes. This is a database of movies. The Netflix "algorithm" is merely find movies with properties as close as possible to the properties of the customer's liked movies. For a computer guy, that's a straightforward bit of coding.
What makes it work well is the database. Especially if we can define some more properties. Amount of violence, and sexiness come immediately to mind, but there must be more. The more well chosen and well defined properties in the data base, the better the match.
But it's the database that makes Netflix work, the algorithm is trivial.
Not to worry. First of all, the algorithm Netflix uses is trivial. Algorithm means procedure. As an example, consider a popular algorithm to find square roots. It goes like this, guess what the root might be. Square your guess and compare it with the original number. If the squared guess is too big, try a smaller guess, conversely if the squared guess is too small, try a bigger guess. Repeat until the squared guess is close enough to the original number. Code this algorithm in your favorite computer language, and you have a program to find square roots.
What Netflix does is ask us viewers which movies we like. Then it looks to find other movies that are like the ones we like. To do this you need a list of all the movies in Netflix, and to go with each movie , we need some properties. Such as type (western, war movie, musical, costume drama, animated, etc) cast (actor and actress who play in the movie), director, rating (G, PG, R ...), year released, color or black & white, and so on. All the computer does is look for movies that match the properties of the movies the customer likes. This is a database of movies. The Netflix "algorithm" is merely find movies with properties as close as possible to the properties of the customer's liked movies. For a computer guy, that's a straightforward bit of coding.
What makes it work well is the database. Especially if we can define some more properties. Amount of violence, and sexiness come immediately to mind, but there must be more. The more well chosen and well defined properties in the data base, the better the match.
But it's the database that makes Netflix work, the algorithm is trivial.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Crossfire Trail with Tom Selleck
If you liked Quigley Down Under, this is more of the same. It's a western with all the trimmings. A ranch, a man from out of town with a gun, a nasty well dressed villain, some cattle driving, a pretty widow, a tiny frontier town way out in the middle of nowhere, a bad guy with a black hat, sixguns, and a fancy rifle in a big leather case, some romance, and of course a big showdown with lots of shooting. Good fun to watch, few socially redeeming features. Tom Selleck wears the same big black 'stache and white floppy hat he wore in Quigley Down Under. He also uses the same understated dialog that is always good for a few chuckles. Wilford Brimley puts on a great old codger role. The movie is based upon a book by Louis Lamour.
The movie opens with Tom Selleck promising to look after a dying buddy's ranch and widow. When he finally gets out to the ranch he finds it deserted and overgrown in weeds, and the widow is living in town. Everybody in town thinks the buddy died at a different time and place than Selleck knows is the truth. Things develop from there in directions that any fan of westerns can probably guess. It's all well done, well filmed (no shake the camera shots) , good sound (all the dialog is understandable), and fun to watch. Brought to me by Netflix and USPS.
About the only quibble I have, is the nasty well dressed villain has a bit too much hand rubbed walnut paneling in his office and too much fine furniture including a grand piano in his house for the fresh built in the wilderness kind of town he is doing bad in. This tiny burg doesn't even have a railroad yet and the thought of lugging all that stuff that far into the boondocks on horse back kinda breaks into my "willing suspension of disbelief".
All in all a worthy western.
The movie opens with Tom Selleck promising to look after a dying buddy's ranch and widow. When he finally gets out to the ranch he finds it deserted and overgrown in weeds, and the widow is living in town. Everybody in town thinks the buddy died at a different time and place than Selleck knows is the truth. Things develop from there in directions that any fan of westerns can probably guess. It's all well done, well filmed (no shake the camera shots) , good sound (all the dialog is understandable), and fun to watch. Brought to me by Netflix and USPS.
About the only quibble I have, is the nasty well dressed villain has a bit too much hand rubbed walnut paneling in his office and too much fine furniture including a grand piano in his house for the fresh built in the wilderness kind of town he is doing bad in. This tiny burg doesn't even have a railroad yet and the thought of lugging all that stuff that far into the boondocks on horse back kinda breaks into my "willing suspension of disbelief".
All in all a worthy western.
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
Solar Power
Sunstorms, sudden solar flares, jets of ions swirling past the earth at relativistic speeds. They pile into the earth's geomagnetic field and make it move. The resulting moving magnetic fields induce humungous currents into the the electric power grid, transformers melt, circuit breakers pop, and the lights go out and stay out. This horror story made today's Wall St Journal. Page three, not the front page.
Oh really? The power grid is harder and tougher than it used to be. Back when I was a child, lightning from ordinary summer thunder storms put the lights out on a regular basis. That doesn't happen anymore. Only thing that puts the lights out now-a-days is a tree falling on the wires and breaking them. The grid is hardened against lightning bolts (no mean feat). And, it is hardened against over-current, otherwise known as short circuits. It has to be. Plenty of ordinary accidents will short hot circuits to ground. The resulting currents can melt expensive and hard to replace equipment in milliseconds. To preserve such equipment, overcurrent protection devices sense excessive current and can switch expensive alternators and transformers off line faster than short circuit currents can melt them. This sort of equipment is composed of tons of solid iron and copper and it takes time to heat that much metal hot enough to endanger the electrical insulation, let alone melt metal.
Granted, there have been scary solar events in the past. The 1859 Carrington event caused the new fangled electric telegraph wires to shower sparks into telegraph offices across the world. Impressed the bejesus out of the operators. We have never seen a solar storm that strong since. In 1989 the province of Quebec suffered a blackout that was blamed upon a solar storm. However no important equipment was damaged and the lights came back on within 9 hours.
Oh really? The power grid is harder and tougher than it used to be. Back when I was a child, lightning from ordinary summer thunder storms put the lights out on a regular basis. That doesn't happen anymore. Only thing that puts the lights out now-a-days is a tree falling on the wires and breaking them. The grid is hardened against lightning bolts (no mean feat). And, it is hardened against over-current, otherwise known as short circuits. It has to be. Plenty of ordinary accidents will short hot circuits to ground. The resulting currents can melt expensive and hard to replace equipment in milliseconds. To preserve such equipment, overcurrent protection devices sense excessive current and can switch expensive alternators and transformers off line faster than short circuit currents can melt them. This sort of equipment is composed of tons of solid iron and copper and it takes time to heat that much metal hot enough to endanger the electrical insulation, let alone melt metal.
Granted, there have been scary solar events in the past. The 1859 Carrington event caused the new fangled electric telegraph wires to shower sparks into telegraph offices across the world. Impressed the bejesus out of the operators. We have never seen a solar storm that strong since. In 1989 the province of Quebec suffered a blackout that was blamed upon a solar storm. However no important equipment was damaged and the lights came back on within 9 hours.
Trip to Harvard Square
Favorite Daughter and her boyfriend came up to Boston to attend her high school reunion. I drove down to spend a day in Harvard Square with them. Going south thru Franconia Notch we have a repaving project in full swing, spending money. That road was in fine condition, no potholes, before they started repaving it. It's nice to have spare money to give to road contractors. Then drove thru the road widening project on I93 south of Manchester. That bit of four lane highway has been a pain-in-the-tail bottleneck for at least 25 years. About a third of it is "widened" . Except that the "widened" portions are still only four lanes wide. Granted the lanes and shoulders are wider and the curves are gentler, but we really needed to get six lanes in return for spending all that money.
Picked up Daughter and boyfriend and did both the Museum of Science and Harvard Square, both old sentimental favorite places for Father and Daughter. Virginia bred boy friend was OK with them. Wound up drinking Ballentine Ale at Charlie's Kitchen (about the oldest joint left in Harvard Square) and telling stories. Good time was had by all.
Picked up Daughter and boyfriend and did both the Museum of Science and Harvard Square, both old sentimental favorite places for Father and Daughter. Virginia bred boy friend was OK with them. Wound up drinking Ballentine Ale at Charlie's Kitchen (about the oldest joint left in Harvard Square) and telling stories. Good time was had by all.
Sunday, May 13, 2012
Congressmen need to "get things done"
This from John Hoeven (R-NorthDakota) on C-span. We have to get things done. The two things he wants to get done are the transportation bill and the farm bill. Both of these are pure pork. We could dump them both and save $30-50 billion, just this year. None of this ten year savings baloney, we could save $40-50 billion THIS YEAR.
The transportation bill sends maybe $15 billion a year of federal gasoline tax money to the 50 states for road building and commuter rail projects. Better to let the states fund just the projects they need. Let the federal gas tax expire. If the states need more money, let them raise the state gas tax. We would be better off with out a federal transportation bill.
And we would be better off without a farm bill. Maybe family farmers needed federal price supports back during the Great Depression, but not anymore. Farms are mostly run by corporations like Archer Daniel Midlands, and corporations don't need subsidies. Plus, why should farmers get federal payouts? Why not retailers and manufacturers and loggers and miners and telephone companies and airlines and truckers and everyone else in the country? Why should farmers get something that nobody else gets.
With luck, a bunch of new Congressmen will turn up in Washington and refuse to "get things done".
The transportation bill sends maybe $15 billion a year of federal gasoline tax money to the 50 states for road building and commuter rail projects. Better to let the states fund just the projects they need. Let the federal gas tax expire. If the states need more money, let them raise the state gas tax. We would be better off with out a federal transportation bill.
And we would be better off without a farm bill. Maybe family farmers needed federal price supports back during the Great Depression, but not anymore. Farms are mostly run by corporations like Archer Daniel Midlands, and corporations don't need subsidies. Plus, why should farmers get federal payouts? Why not retailers and manufacturers and loggers and miners and telephone companies and airlines and truckers and everyone else in the country? Why should farmers get something that nobody else gets.
With luck, a bunch of new Congressmen will turn up in Washington and refuse to "get things done".
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