Category Archives: Uncategorized
A Smarter N. Korea Response: Free Internet
Even the smallest possible military strike against North Korea – one that would disable enough artillery to prevent a catastrophic retaliation against South Korea – will cost well into the tens of millions of dollars. What else might we do … Continue reading
Is Your Reality Just a Simulation? Calculate the System’s Capacity.
Consider the idea that, unless intelligent civilizations tend to self-destruct, or they tend to lack the introspection to simulate their own origins, it is (apparently) statistically more likely that we (including you, dear reader) are a simulation – not the … Continue reading
Libertarian Nirvana, or how I realized Objectivism is a slippery slope to pointlessness
Many of my posts exists within a dialogue-debate between my siblings. Lately, I realized I’ve been posting few thoughts on this blog because they were all going into reply-comments on Facebook… So I’m going to try to post more of … Continue reading
Fed Up: The real GMO
I’m really happy to see a documentary like Fed Up be released. I didn’t hear of Robert Lustig’s viral lecture (or his other one) until just 9 months ago, but it crystallized everything I’d been reading up to that time. … Continue reading
Fiscal Stimulus: Target The Oversupplies
Adding a bit to Krugman’s latest. Think about it: what would the true costs be of repairing our roads? It wouldn’t divert capital from other investments — capital has no place to go, and markets are practically begging the federal … Continue reading
Misunderstanding the Mistake in Black-Scholes and Fama’s Rational Markets
Abstract: Probability has been getting a bad rap in finance and economics due to modeling mistakes that have led to many of the biggest financial catastrophes of the past 50 years. This has bled over into popular misconceptions that the … Continue reading
Sovaldi: Risk vs Uncertainty, Innovation vs Facilitation, and How Patents and Ownership Don’t Differentiate Them
(This is an extension of my previous two posts on Sovaldi, particularly the second one.) Piracy is simply the free market saying, “Your markup is ridiculous.” As Nassim Nicholas Taleb mentions in his books The Black Swan and Fooled By … Continue reading
Sovaldi: What Price Innovation?
Just a brief addendum to my post on the $84,000 apparent hepatitis C-cure, Sovaldi. (See also addendum #2) Gilead’s vice president Gregg Alton said, “Those who are bold and go out and innovate like this and take the risk — … Continue reading
The Price of Sovaldi: A Pound of Flesh
A new hepatitis C treatment was approved in December 2013 via an expedited FDA program because the new drug, used in combination with one or two existing (relatively inexpensive) drugs has a virtually 100% cure rate. The drug, Sovaldi, marketed by … Continue reading
Ezra Klein’s Asymmetric Stupidity on the Futility of More Information
I’m borrowing Paul Krugman’s blog post title on this item by Ezra Klein. Krugman focused on the asymmetry of stupidity (actually, stubbornness) in liberals and conservatives, which results in the conservative party just being “stupid” all too often, lately. However, … Continue reading
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