Quotulatiousness

May 7, 2014

“I’ve been an oncologist for 20 years, and I have never, ever seen anything like this.”

Filed under: Business, Health, Science — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 15:30

In Forbes, Matthew Herper looks at how Novartis is transforming itself in an attempt to conquer cancer:

“I’ve been an oncologist for 20 years,” says Grupp, “and I have never, ever seen anything like this.” Emily has become the poster child for a radical new treatment that Novartis, the third-biggest drug company on the Forbes Global 2000, is making one of the top priorities in its $9.9 billion research and development budget.

“I’ve told the team that resources are not an issue. Speed is the issue,” says Novartis Chief Executive Joseph Jimenez, 54. “I want to hear what it takes to run this phase III trial and to get this to market. You’re talking about patients who are about to die. The pain of having to turn patients away is such that we are going as fast as we can and not letting resources get in the way.”

A successful trial would prove a milestone in the fight against the demon that has plagued living things since dinosaurs roamed the Earth. Coupled with the exploding capabilities of DNA-sequencing machines that can unlock the genetic code, recent drugs have delivered stunning results in lung cancer, melanoma and other deadly tumors, sometimes making them disappear entirely – albeit temporarily. Just last year the Food & Drug Administration approved nine targeted cancer drugs. It’s big business, too. According to data provider IMS Health, spending on oncology drugs was $91 billion last year, triple what it was in 2003.

But the developments at Penn point, tantalizingly, to something more, something that would rank among the great milestones in the history of mankind: a true cure. Of 25 children and 5 adults with Emily’s disease, ALL, 27 had a complete remission, in which cancer becomes undetectable. “It’s a stunning breakthrough,” says Sally Church, of drug development advisor Icarus Consultants. Says Crystal Mackall, who is developing similar treatments at the National Cancer Institute: “It really is a revolution. This is going to open the door for all sorts of cell-based and gene therapy for all kinds of disease because it’s going to demonstrate that it’s economically viable.”

H/T to Megan McArdle for the link.

Peak inequality in England – about 200 years ago

Filed under: Books, Britain, Economics, History — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 10:18

An interesting article that starts and ends talking about Thomas Piketty’s new book, but in the middle goes a long way to explain what happened to English aristocracy over the last few hundred years:

Extravagances like the stately homes of England made economic sense before the 19th century because the relative wages of servants and construction workers mostly fell from 1500 to 1800 as the supply of English workers slowly recovered in size from the Black Death of the 1340s.

But, outside of economic theory, the rich have often tended to get poorer, especially when they spend more than they make. It’s a common theme in English literature (Evelyn Waugh’s A Handful of Dust) and television (Downton Abbey). For instance, by the time of Winston Churchill’s birth in 1874, the English ultra-rich weren’t getting richer.

[…]

The long agricultural depression of 1873-1896 meant the great houses of England began falling apart. Wings had to be shut as servants found higher paying jobs in factories. Repairs could not be paid for.

The usual solutions were to first auction off the art collection, then marry American heiresses, as in Downton Abbey, where Countess Cora, played by Elizabeth McGovern, is from the Chicago Levinsons. Winston’s mother Jenny was from the Jeromes of Wall Street.

[…]

Servants had steadily become more expensive in England. One reason was the increase in jobs elsewhere in a modernizing economy. On Downton Abbey, to illustrate, a maid applies for a job in town as a secretary, which is a much better post.

A forgotten reason, though, was that the massive emigration from the British Isles reduced the supply of workers and thus raised their wages. While Tony Blair’s Labor Government liked to claim that Britain had always been a nation of immigrants, it was in truth a nation of emigrants. Today, there are perhaps two or even three times as many people descended from the British Isles living in the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and Argentina as there are in Britain and Ireland. Without all that outflow, wages in Britain would be lower and land prices astronomical.

H/T to Kathy Shaidle for the link.

David Harsanyi – The climate change debate is over

Filed under: Environment, Media, Politics — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 09:45

At The Federalist, David Harsanyi says the debate is over and the environmentalists have lost:

The truth is that even if Americans believed that scientists had seer-like abilities and the models were accurate, they would still be hesitant to embrace 19th century technology because they simply can’t afford it. Though I suspect most people instinctively understand that the environment has gotten better by almost every measure over the past 40 years, climate change activists ignore the massive benefits of carbon emitting fuels and technology that helps us become more productive and increasingly efficient.

Now, you can try and guilt trip everyone into compliance. You can batter them with distressing hypothetical scenarios. You can “educate” them on the issue from kindergarten onward, you can mainstream an array of Luddite ideas, you can browbeat society so they never utter a word of skepticism, but we still want to drive our cars everywhere. This is probably why over-the-top warnings and preposterous analogies have hit peak levels of absurdity.

And that’s saying something. Dr. John Holdren, Obama’s Science Czar, who was on media call for the National Climate Assessment release, once predicted global warming could cause the deaths of 1 billion people by 2020 and that sea levels would rise by 13 feet by the end of the century (not to mention, he co-authored a book with Paul Ehrlich in which he explained that “population-control laws, even including laws requiring compulsory abortion, could be sustained under the existing Constitution…”). Malthusians never admit they’re wrong, they simply push the apocalypse out a couple of decades. I just don’t think people believe them anymore.

Yes, when asked, Americans perfunctorily tell pollsters that climate change matters to them. A recent Pew Research Center poll found that 40 percent of Americans believe that climate change is a major threat. A Gallup poll survey found that around third of Americans personally worry about climate change. But when they’re not asked specifically about global warming, voters never bring the topic up. They’re most important concerns are the economy, jobs and debt. Though there is always strong support for the abstract idea of environmental regulation and “clean energy,” but when it comes some concrete policy it is nearly always unpopular. Few people want to stop the Keystone XL Pipeline. Few people support new emissions regulations. And I doubt another scaremongery study will change that reality.

“[T]he embarrassingly dumb pseudo-issue of ‘thick’ versus ‘thin’ libertarianism”

Filed under: Liberty — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 07:03

L. Neil Smith has been off working on a pair of novels, so he only recently heard about “thick” and “thin” libertarianism. He’s underwhelmed:

One item that has broken through my self-imposed “cone of silence” is the embarrassingly dumb pseudo-issue of “thick” versus “thin” libertarianism. It’s an idea almost as stupid as “right” versus “left” libertarianism.

Read and understand this: a libertarian is a person who believes that no one has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human being for any reason whatever; nor will a proper libertarian advocate the initiation of force, or delegate it to anyone else.

Individuals who act consistently with this principle are genuine libertarians, whether they realize it or not. Those who fail to act consistently with it are not libertarians, regardless of what they may claim.

I call it the “Zero Aggression Principle”. Tell me: where’s the “right” and “left” to that? You’re either libertarian or you’re not. Period.

If I understand the pushers of this new conceptoid, they believe — and insist — there must be more to libertarianism than the Zero Aggression Principle, that we must incorporate into the movement and its underlying philosophy concerns that properly belong to creatures who have dirtied the word “liberal” so badly they now call themselves “progressives”.

Since I first became a conscious libertarian, 52 years ago (when you get to be my age, time flies whether you’re having fun or not), and certainly since the founding of the Libertarian Party, a decade later, there have always been individuals attempting to redefine libertarianism — usually downward—to suit their own prejudices and purposes.

[…]

I have always thought, and I believe that history backs me up in this, that it was a serious mistake to try to establish an Objectivist aesthetic. Aesthetics are purely arbitrary, a matter of whatever we’ve become accustomed to. Look at the way the idealized feminine form has changed (driven, some say, by the economics of feast and famine) from the paintings of Peter Paul Rubens to the images of Lesley “Twiggy” Lawson. Or, over a much shorter span, from Jayne Mansfield to Mia Farrow.

The purveyors of “thick” libertarianism are making a mistake as obvious and pathetically foolish as Rand’s. They want to take a 987 Porsche Boxter — the sleek, slim Zero Aggression Principle — glue cardboard shoeboxes, empty coffee cans, and dead cats on it at random, and herald it as something new and wonderful. But new and wonderful it ain’t.

It’s the same old crap.

A short term for “thick” libertarians is “liberals”.

QotD: Firefly‘s Kaylee

Filed under: Humour, Media — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 00:01

When I first auditioned for Firefly, I read the breakdown of the characters and the one that caught my eye was River. I read it and I thought, “Oh that sounds meaty, I like that.” There was a lot of crying and hysteria and every actor wants to do that. But then I read Kaylee, and they said, “Well actually Joss wants to see you for Kaylee,” and I thought “Oh,” because it said “chubby” on the breakdown, and I’m not chubby, and I didn’t know if they meant ‘Hollywood chubby’ or what. So I put myself on tape and kind of forgot about it, and then a few weeks later I got the call and I flew down to meet Joss, and he told me flat out. He said, “You know I need this character to be full of life, and by full of life I mean she has to look like she enjoys life. She has to look like she eats a burger now and then, and drinks a few beers once in a while.” He didn’t want her to be a typical size zero actress, which I understand. I’m naturally this way. I was a little taken aback because I’m really into yoga, and I like to stay healthy. But I loved the role so much it wasn’t like I was going to say no. So I just stuffed my face for about three weeks, and got to eat lots of mayonnaise. I got to eat doughnuts every morning and I felt so sick because I was so full all the time, but I had to keep eating like that to keep the weight on. It was interesting. My husband loved it — guys apparently like a little weight on women! It was awesome.

Jewel Staite, speaking onstage at the “Fusion” convention, 2004.

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