Quotulatiousness

September 30, 2009

Artificial skin

Filed under: Science — Tags: — Nicholas @ 12:53

Victor is doing some research on artificial skin for a school project, and he found this link, which he sent along to me, writing “Ghost in the Shell: Closer than we think?”.

What we’re trying to do is to interface electronic components with the human body. One of the challenges is that conventional electronics is typically made on very hard and flat surfaces. If you look at our own body we are a 3D object that is moving all around. The challenge is not only electrical but also mechanical because we need to find ways to make electronic things that can conform the body and therefore use materials that are no longer hard and brittle but materials that can be elastic, similar to our own skin, for example.

[. . .]

This is the second aspect of the project. In my group we’re looking at ways to make these prosthetic skins but there’s also this application where we’re looking at a way to use these very soft electronic devices to interface everything with the nervous system. Because the human body and particularly the nervous system is made of extremely compliant material we cannot use a silicon chip to interface directly with your nerve for a long time. What we’re doing is to use this polymer and elastomer substrate with embedded electrodes in it to connect directly with a peripheral nerve — so a nerve which is in the limb, not in the spinal cord or the brain — really in the limb, from the electrical signal from the neurons. Once we can do that then the idea would be to connect these peripheral implant directly to the prosthetic skin so that we could take the signals that are coming out of the prosthetic skin and convert them into a neuron format and feed that directly into the implant which would then communicate to the nerve and back to the brain.

Testing whether incentive pay for teachers improves student outcomes

Filed under: Economics, Education, India — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 12:13

A post up at Marginal Revolution summarizes a new paper by Karthik Muralidharan and Venkatesh Sundararaman, examining whether incentive pay for teachers (PDF) improves student performance:

1) Evidence comes from a very large sample, 500 schools covering approximately 55,000 students, and treatment regimes and controls are randomly assigned to schools in a careful, stratified design.

2) An individual-incentive plan and a group-incentive plan are compared to a control group and to two types of unconditional extra-spending treatments (a block grant and hiring an extra teacher). Thus the authors can test not only whether an incentive plan works relative to no plan but also whether an incentive plan works relative to spending a similar amount of money on “improving schools.”

3) The authors understand incentive design and they test for whether their incentive plan reduces learning on non-performance pay margins.

In the west, with most students being taught in publicly funded schools with strong teaching unions, these results will not be welcomed by the majority of school systems or unions. From the abstract:

Performance pay for teachers is frequently suggested as a way of improving education outcomes in schools, but the theoretical predictions regarding its effectiveness are ambiguous and the empirical evidence to date is limited and mixed. We present results from a randomized evaluation of a teacher incentive program implemented across a large representative sample of government-run rural primary schools in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. The program provided bonus payments to teachers based on the average improvement of their students’ test scores in independently administered learning assessments (with a mean bonus of 3% of annual pay). At the end of two years of the program, students in incentive schools performed significantly better than those in control schools by 0.28 and 0.16 standard deviations in math and language tests respectively. They scored significantly higher on “conceptual” as well as “mechanical” components of the tests, suggesting that the gains in test scores represented an actual increase in learning outcomes. Incentive schools also performed better on subjects for which there were no incentives, suggesting positive spillovers. Group and individual incentive schools performed equally well in the first year of the program, but the individual incentive schools outperformed in the second year. Incentive schools performed significantly better than other randomly chosen schools that received additional schooling inputs of a similar value.

I’m surprised that the results were so positive for relatively minor incentive bonus amounts.

More background on that broken hockey stick

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Environment, Media, Politics — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 09:53

I don’t want to sound like a climate crank — there are more than enough of them out there, on both sides of the issue — and I’m still very much of the opinion that the question of anthropogenic global warming/climate change still needs a lot of work to answer. If human activities are causing the planet’s atmosphere to warm up in excess of what the natural feedback systems of the planet can handle, then we do need to look at ways to reduce our contribution to that warming.

Politicians and power-seeking bureaucrats jumping up and down in front of the cameras, insisting that the crisis is upon us and we need to do something now are in no way to be trusted with additional powers: without sufficient scientific evidence, we’d just be installing petty dictators over all sorts of different areas of our lives.

The specific piece of “evidence” most useful to the “do something now” faction has been the famous Hockey Stick Graph, which has been debunked. The data was carefully selected to support pre-decided conclusions. Everyone who took high school science knows the temptation . . . you know how the experiment is supposed to turn out, and who’ll know if you just write it up as if you got textbook results? The answer is . . . that’s why you do the experiment: to determine if the result matches the expectation. Skipping the whole “do the experiment” step saves time, but it’s not science.

Bishop Hill explains how the hockey stick became the best-known case of junk science in decades:

The story of Michael Mann’s Hockey Stick reconstruction, its statistical bias and the influence of the bristlecone pines is well known. McIntyre’s research into the other reconstructions has received less publicity, however. The story of the Yamal chronology may change that.

The bristlecone pines that created the shape of the Hockey Stick graph are used in nearly every millennial temperature reconstruction around today, but there are also a handful of other tree ring series that are nearly as common and just as influential on the results. Back at the start of McIntyre’s research into the area of paleoclimate, one of the most significant of these was called Polar Urals, a chronology first published by Keith Briffa of the Climate Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia. At the time, it was used in pretty much every temperature reconstruction around. In his paper, Briffa made the startling claim that the coldest year of the millennium was AD 1032, a statement that, if true, would have completely overturned the idea of the Medieval Warm Period. It is not hard to see why paleoclimatologists found the series so alluring.

Some of McIntyre’s research into Polar Urals deserves a story in its own right, but it is one that will have to wait for another day. We can pick up the narrative again in 2005, when McIntyre discovered that an update to the Polar Urals series had been collected in 1999. Through a contact he was able to obtain a copy of the revised series. Remarkably, in the update the eleventh century appeared to be much warmer than in the original – in fact it was higher even than the twentieth century. This must have been a severe blow to paleoclimatologists, a supposition that is borne out by what happened next, or rather what didn’t: the update to the Polar Urals was not published, it was not archived and it was almost never seen again.

With Polar Urals now unusable, paleclimatologists had a pressing need for a hockey stick shaped replacement and a solution appeared in the nick of time in the shape of a series from the nearby location of Yamal.

Yes, it’s long, and somewhat convoluted . . . but that is the point. Researchers were being deliberately obstructive to other researchers, concealing data necessary to reproduce the experimental results, yet publishing in numerous journals (who all should have enforced their own standards, but failed to do so) as if the data was impossible to refute.

And it was . . . because the raw data was kept out of the hands of other scientists. This is not science. It’s a deliberate fraud.

Update: JoNova adds to the story, including an image showing the relative locations of the sampled sites:

Busted_Hockey_Stick_locations

Update, the second: Tom Kelley corrects my use of the word “anthropogenic”, which I had idiotically written as “anthropomorphic”. Thanks, Tom.

Felicia Day interview in Wired

Filed under: Gaming, Media — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 09:21

Felicia Day, creator of The Guild, interviewed by Gus Mastrapa:

Felicia Day’s stardom wasn’t handed down to her from on high by Hollywood. She’s guest-starred on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and House, but most of her legions of fans still know her because of a show she wrote and produced herself that doesn’t air on any network.

Now in its third season, The Guild — Day’s microbudget comedic web series about a group of online gamers — enjoys financing from Microsoft as well as cushy placement on the Xbox 360 dashboard. But fans are still discovering Day and her nerdy ways online.

After landing a plum role in Joss Whedon’s Emmy-winning web series Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog last year, Day’s got a bona fide viral hit on her hands this year, thanks to a funny promo video for Season 3 of The Guild.

If you’ve ever done online gaming, especially MMORPG gaming, you’ll probably enjoy watching The Guild. If you haven’t done any online gaming, you may not find the humour to be to your taste.

Or you have no taste.

Your call.

A different approach to healthcare reform

Filed under: Government, Health, Politics — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 09:03

“John Galt” has a different suggestion for fixing what ails the American healthcare field:

We have some real problems: Bizarre incentives that have led to runaway costs. Rescission. An employer stranglehold over workers’ healthcare. Overuse in the form of care prescribed to protect doctors from lawyers, rather than protecting patients from illness. Arbitrary requirements to carry coverage for other people’s expensive risks.

The truth is that every one of those issues could be addressed — right now, and in a bipartisan fashion — without a single-payer system, a mandate, or any other form of “universal healthcare.” It wouldn’t even take a single massive “reform” bill — just a few simple bills, mostly repealing existing regulation.

But the left has settled on universal healthcare. The “public option.” No other reform is acceptable. No other reform will be permitted. Nothing can actually be fixed if it will lower the number of people who might benefit from a universal system, or if it will reduce national dissatisfaction with market-based care.

It’s quite true that there’s already massive government involvement in the health market, and that a lot of that consists of regulations that have dubious health benefits, but measurable detriments to patients, doctors, and hospitals.

The intersection of the War on Drugs with the government’s role in healthcare, for example, has led to a number of doctors being imprisoned for “inappropriate” prescriptions of painkillers to patients with chronic pain issues. It has also led to a huge number of doctors being afraid to prescribe what their patients actually need, for fear of being charged and convicted of “drug trafficking”. Many patients now suffer prolonged pain because they can’t get an adequate dose of painkillers and can’t find doctors to prescribe them.

All this, in pursuit of getting tough on illicit use of prescription medicine. Government at its finest.

September 29, 2009

If you like bad drivers, you’ll enjoy this collection

Filed under: Randomness — Tags: — Nicholas @ 13:07

Twelve stupid car crashes, including this one, which illustrates that you don’t need to be travelling fast to flip your vehicle:

H/T to Lois McMaster Bujold, “Whom the Internet has lately taught the definition of the word ‘schadenfreude‘. Plus how to spell it.”

Calling it “bubbly” is highly appropriate

Filed under: Science, Wine — Tags: — Nicholas @ 12:48

According to a recent study, the bubbles in Champagne do more than just tickle your nose:

Research shows there are up to 30 times more flavour-enhancing chemicals in the bubbles than in the rest of the drink.

Wine experts say the finding changes completely our understanding of the role of bubbles in sparkling drinks.

The study is reported in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

Commenting on the research, Dr Jamie Goode, founder of wineanorak.com, said: “In the past, we thought that the carbon dioxide in the bubbles just gave the wine an acidic bite and a little tingle on the tongue, but this study shows that it is much more than this.”

A broken hockey stick graph

Filed under: Environment — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 12:12

The red line in the following graph should be familiar to you, if you’ve been following the Global Warming/Climate Change debate:

Busted_Hockey_Stick

The trick here is the black line:

A comparison of Yamal RCS chronologies. red — as archived with 12 picked cores; black — including Schweingruber’s Khadyta River, Yamal (russ035w) archive and excluding 12 picked cores. Both smoothed with 21-year gaussian smooth. y-axis is in dimensionless chronology units centered on 1 (as are subsequent graphs (but represent age-adjusted ring width).

The “blade” of the hockey stick was a data artifact of the careful selection of only twelve samples. Including a wider sample produces a very different picture, as you can see above.

The Guild, Season 3 Episode 5

Filed under: Gaming, Humour — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 12:07

<br /><a href="http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=en-US&#038;vid=d492d422-9f08-481f-a6c7-e0f096cf614e" target="_new" title="Season 3 - Episode 5: Application&#39;d">Video: Season 3 &#8211; Episode 5: Application&#39;d</a>

QotD: Confessions

Filed under: Quotations, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 09:01

Whew, I’m pooped. Jimmy Carter has got me run ragged with all the hating I’m supposed to do. Jimmy says I’m a racist because I oppose President Obama’s health care reform program. Even Jimmy Carter can’t be wrong all the time. And since Jimmy Carter has been wrong about every single thing for the past 44 years, maybe — just as a matter of statistical probability — he’s right this time.

I hadn’t noticed I was a racist, but that was no doubt because I was too busy being a homophobe. Nancy Pelosi says the angry opposition to health care reform is like the angry opposition to gay rights that led to Harvey Milk being shot. Since I do not want America to suffer another Sean Penn movie, I will accept that I’m a homophobe, too. And I’m a male chauvinist due to the fact that I think Nancy Pelosi is blowing smoke — excuse me, carbon neutral, biodegradable airborne particulate matter — out her pantsuit.

Also, I’m pretty sure Rahm Emanuel is Jewish, and you can’t be against (or even for) President Obama without the involvement of Rahm Emanuel, so I’m an anti-Semite. Furthermore, although I personally happen to be a libertarian on immigration issues, I do agree with Joe Wilson that you can’t say you’re expanding health care to the poor and then pretend you’re going to turn those poor away if their driver’s licenses look a little Xeroxy and what’s on their Social Security cards turns out to be a toll-free number for a La Raza hotline. Thus I’m prejudiced against Hispanics as well.

P.J. O’Rourke, “Outsourcing Hate: The burdens of conservatism in the Obama age”, The Weekly Standard, 2009-10-05

September 28, 2009

QotD: Gambling on CO2 reduction

Filed under: Economics, Environment, Politics, Quotations — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 12:45

There is a real and growing prospect of an all-out trade war being waged in the name of climate change.

The struggle to generate international agreement on a carbon deal has created a desire to punish “free riders” who do not sign on to stringent carbon emission reduction targets. But the greater goals seem to be to barricade imports from China and India, to tax companies that outsource, and to go for short-term political benefits, destroying free trade.

This is a massive mistake. Economic models show that the global benefits of even slightly freer trade are in the order of $50 trillion — 50 times more than we could achieve, in the best of circumstances, with carbon cuts. If trade becomes less free, we could easily lose $50 trillion — or much more if we really bungle things. Poor nations — the very countries that will experience the worst of climate damage — would suffer most.

In other words: In our eagerness to avoid about $1 trillion worth of climate damage, we are being asked to spend at least 50 times as much — and, if we hinder free trade, we are likely to heap at least an additional $50 trillion loss on the global economy.

Bjorn Lomborg, “Costly Carbon Cuts: Proposed Strategies Would Hurt the Most Vulnerable”, The Washington Post, 2009-09-28

Vikings get last-second TD to beat 49ers, 27-24

Filed under: Football — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 07:54

The Minnesota Vikings moved to a 3-0 record on the season with a squeaked-out victory against the San Francisco 49ers yesterday. I got to watch most of the game, until the two-minute warning, when Fox — or the CTV sports programmer carrying the Fox feed — switched over to the already-decided Patriots-Falcons game.

Minnesota appeared to have the game well in hand until the final play of the first half, when Nate Clemons scooped up a blocked Ryan Longwell field goal attempt and ran for the go-ahead TD. A huge momentum-changer, as the Vikings went from a potential 2-score lead to one point down. The stats were all in Minnesota’s favour, except for the only one that matters, the one on the scoreboard.

In his first regular-season home game with the Vikings, Brett Favre managed yet another fourth-quarter game-winning drive, this time connecting with recently signed wide receiver Greg Ellis.

The first five series of the second half: Three punts, Favre’s first interception, and a turnover on downs. The Vikings (3-0), who gained only 85 yards on Adrian Peterson’s 19 carries, still had three timeouts left and were able to force a punt. They got the ball back at their 20 with 89 seconds remaining.

“I didn’t say a whole lot,” Favre said. “I knew what I was thinking: We blew our chances.”

Well, not quite all of them.

The last play began with 12 seconds left, and Favre stepped forward in the pocket and slid to the right by design to buy time for his receivers to move in position. Instead of throwing a ball up for grabs, he figured he could get close enough to the line of scrimmage to fire a line drive that would be tougher to defend.

Lewis watched the quarterback’s eyes, and broke the other way — Favre said he didn’t even know who was running across the end zone — to find room near the right corner.

He caught his first pass from Favre, who completed six throws on that drive, and looked forward to the next one.

Random links of possible interest

Filed under: Health, Law, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 07:38
  • More on the ongoing ammunition shortage in the US, as manufacturers are still unable to produce enough to satisfy demand.
  • Police at G20 take trophy photo including arrested protester handcuffed and kneeling in front of the group. H/T to Radley Balko.
  • Voyeurs rejoice! What sounds like a report from the Journal of Spike TV reveals that a mere 10 minutes of ogling well-endowed women provides as much benefit to men as 30 minutes in the gym, as far as heart disease, high blood pressure and stress are concerned. H/T to Ghost of a Flea.
  • New Zealand bans in-vehicle GPS navigation systems . . . but only if they’re running on a mobile phone. Non-phone based systems apparently don’t distract you with directions the way phone-based ones do. Or something.
  • Detroit Lions fans love the Washington Redskins.

You know the stories about “they built ’em better in the old days”?

Filed under: Technology — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 00:13

Here’s an interesting video from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), pitting a 2009 sedan against a 1959 model at a combined speed of 80 mph:

In the 50 years since US insurers organized the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, car crashworthiness has improved. Demonstrating this was a crash test conducted on Sept. 9 between a 1959 Chevrolet Bel Air and a 2009 Chevrolet Malibu. In a real-world collision similar to this test, occupants of the new model would fare much better than in the vintage Chevy.

“It was night and day, the difference in occupant protection,” says Institute president Adrian Lund. “What this test shows is that automakers don’t build cars like they used to. They build them better.”

Even with the video evidence, not everyone will be convinced. This is my favourite quote from the Slashdot thread on the topic (I think the comment is offered in an ironic tone):

But then again, back in the 50’s we didn’t need all these fancy crumple zones, seat belts and air bags. Men were real men. Hell, I’ll bet you dollars to donuts any man from the 50’s driving that Bel-Air would have jumped right out of that wreck to help the crying sissy-boy with a cut lip driving that Malibu.

September 26, 2009

British libraries now afraid to lend scissors to patrons

Filed under: Britain, Bureaucracy — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 16:13

The staff at the Holborn Library in London are apparently very worried about the risk of being attacked by library patrons, so they won’t even lend scissors:

Lorna Watts, 26, a self-employed dressmaker, was turned down at Holborn Library in central London.

She said: “It’s ridiculous — public libraries are supposed to be supportive of small businesses.”

A spokeswoman for Camden Council, which runs the library, has apologised and said it would investigate the incident.

Ms Watts, from Islington, north London, said: “I asked why I couldn’t borrow a pair of scissors and she said, ‘they are sharp, you might stab me’.

“I then asked to borrow a guillotine to cut up my leaflets but she refused again — because she said I could hit her over the head with it!”

The way Britain has been going, I’m surprised they didn’t hit Ms. Watts with an ASBO for the implied threat here: “It’s absurd — there are plenty of heavy books I could have hit her with if I wanted to.”

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