Category: linked down

Just interesting stuff around the web that I want to clip and save for future reference (and possibly comment on).

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A Comeback for Lamarckian Evolution?

http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/22061/

Some studies indicate that there are traits that can get passed on from mother to offspring that are extra-genetic — meaning they aren’t in the DNA. These are called epigenetic changes.

Fascinating.

In Feig’s study, mice genetically engineered to have memory problems were raised in an enriched environment–given toys, exercise, and social interaction–for two weeks during adolescence. The animals’ memory improved–an unsurprising finding, given that enrichment has been previously shown to boost brain function. The mice were then returned to normal conditions, where they grew up and had offspring. This next generation of mice also had better memory, despite having the genetic defect and never having been exposed to the enriched environment.

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Nassim Taleb and Nouriel Roubini on CNBC

http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1027496846

Video from CNBC. Hard to glean anything particularly new from this. It is maddening to watch the CNBC pundits try and talk over Roubini and Taleb and then demand investment advice from them. What a bunch of whiny, idiotic children.

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Government Intervention, Not the Lehman Collapse, Caused the Financial Crisis

http://online.wsj.com/art…MDExNDAzWj.html

Ignoring Taylor’s own suggestions as to solutions, it’s refreshing to see his piece published in the WSJ — an article that rightly points the finger at the root cause of our current debacle, most notably, loose monetary policy.

Monetary excesses were the main cause of the boom. The Fed held its target interest rate, especially in 2003-2005, well below known monetary guidelines that say what good policy should be based on historical experience. Keeping interest rates on the track that worked well in the past two decades, rather than keeping rates so low, would have prevented the boom and the bust. Researchers at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development have provided corroborating evidence from other countries: The greater the degree of monetary excess in a country, the larger was the housing boom.

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Study: Do Women Like Men With A Stubble?

http://wiseperception.com/node/148

Makes sense to me — if not for the pronounced lower jaw, for the manly (read: non-juvenile) look a bit of stubble provides. Oddly enough, this thought had crossed my mind in a comment on Patri’s LJ almost right before I found this article. And of course, I’ve blogged on shaving before.

Women participating in the research rated men with stubble as tough, mature, aggressive, dominant and masculine – and as the best romantic partners, either for a fling or a long-term relationships. The findings of the experiment, carried out on British women aged 18 to 44, could explain the appeal of actors such as George Clooney and Brad Pitt who cultivate their unshaven look. The explanation for the preference is not clear, but experts in human evolution say that that facial hair may be a signal of aggression because it boosts the apparent size of the lower jaw, emphasising the teeth as weapons. Psychologists at Northumbria University who carried out the new study believe that stubbly men may offer women the best worlds – not too strongly masculine, but mature and with the potential to grow a full beard.

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Interview with Leonard Mlodinow (part 3)

http://www.blog.sethrober…lodinow-part-3/

There are 15 parts and counting to this interview with writer, scientist Leonard Mlodinow (they are all about a page long). He’s wrote The Drunkard’s Walk, which I’ve ordered from Amazon — it sounds similar to Taleb’s The Black Swan, which was fantastic and crystallized some thoughts that had been racing around in the ether of my brain. Saving this one down as I particularly liked Mlodinow’s commentary on writing here.

For the rest, here’s the current directory:

  1. part 1
  2. part 2
  3. part 3
  4. part 4
  5. part 5
  6. part 6
  7. part 7
  8. part 8
  9. part 9
  10. part 10
  11. part 11
  12. part 12
  13. part 13
  14. part 14
  15. part 15

Also mentioned in part 15 is a documentary about Cal-Tech basketball that sounds intriguing — it is called “Quantum Hoops.” Might be worth renting.

MLODINOW I think that in a way . . . I guess there’s two components to being able to write. One is your natural proclivity, I try not to say talent, but it’s your voice or the way you express yourself. And the other is the craft part of it that you learn by doing. I think I always had a good sense of humor and maybe a way to say things colorfully or think in terms of dramatic or powerful situations and I guess that’s the first part and served well. The other part is the things you learn as you go, such as what puts people to sleep or how to abandon what you think are good ideas but really aren’t. That’s a hard lesson to learn because it’s difficult to let go of things you might like and to realize that it just doesn’t belong or goes on too far or the idea that sometimes it’s hard to recognize things that may be good but just don’t belong there–that are tangents and they take away the dramatic thrust of where you’re going and they really have to be cut even though they’re good and you like them. You know, lessons like that, lessons about pacing–you learn by doing, by failing. You learn more about pacing, all sorts of technical aspects of writing, whether its fiction or nonfiction or TV or books; there are certain principles that you just learn by repeatedly doing and doing wrong and realizing, absorbing what went wrong and fixing it and you grow that way. In book writing you’re able to do that a lot with rough drafts so a lot of your mistakes don’t end up getting published–you know? TV writing can be so fast that often you don’t see the problems with the script until you actually watch it on the air and then you go, ‘Next time I think I won’t have that guy climbing the stairs for four minutes in the middle of the scene; I think five seconds is enough to get the idea across.’

…

ROBERTS Yes, that kind of brings us back to the very beginning. I feel like somehow the times have changed and people are smarter. Now you can make a living from what you’re doing. You’re writing this very entertaining intellectual history; finally there’s a market for it. Finally people are smart enough to be at your level so that you can write a book that you respect but you can get a wide enough audience.

MLODINOW Are you saying that in the 50s that couldn’t have been done? I don’t know.

ROBERTS Well, nobody did it; let’s put it that way.

MLODINOW No, nobody did it. I don’t know why.

ROBERTS As I said before we started recording, you’re the first person to ever do this. Will you be the last? I don’t know but you’re the first. You’re the first person to write intellectual histories that actually are popular and that people want to read, that they’re not forced to read by their teachers. It’s not just a tiny group of people reading them. Professors of course write them but they’re not well written and it’s just their job to write them; they get a salary from the government to write those books. You’re not getting any salary. You’re an entrepreneur and it’s just so different. Your books have to be popular or your job goes away. It’s just a different level of competence; your books are just infinitely more accessible, infinitely better than a professor would normally write. A professor is subsidized and that’s what is basically comes down to. Practically everybody who writes about science is subsidized but you’re not.

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There’s No Biz Like No Biz at Twitter! (And Will Google Swoop In Before It All Comes Crashing Down?)

http://kara.allthingsd.co…-crashing-down/

Another dotcom valuation – is Twitter worth $250mm? More?

Since BoomTown constantly called the $15 billion valuation of Facebook “insane” when Microsoft forked over $240 million in 2007 and gave Slide’s Max Levchin a very hard time when his widget company got a $550 million valuation a year ago, it’s only fair that I say something equally appropriate about Twitter. The hot microblogging service just got its very own $250 million valuation, all without a dime of revenue in sight. (I know, Bijan, it’s coming, it’s coming!)

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The No-Stats All-Star

http://www.nytimes.com/20…&pagewanted=all

Interesting article on Shane Battier, Houston Rockets b-ball player whose conventional stats are totally unimpressive but unconventionally, he makes all his teams much better. Interesting read from many angles.

The 3-point shot from the corner is the single most efficient shot in the N.B.A. One way the Rockets can tell if their opponents have taken to analyzing basketball in similar ways as they do is their attitude to the corner 3: the smart teams take a lot of them and seek to prevent their opponents from taking them. In basketball there is only so much you can plan, however, especially at a street-ball moment like this. As it happened, Houston’s Rafer Alston was among the most legendary street-ball players of all time — known as Skip 2 My Lou, a nickname he received after a single spectacular move at Rucker Park, in Harlem. “Shane wouldn’t last in street ball because in street ball no one wants to see” his game, Alston told me earlier. “You better give us something to ooh and ahh about. No one cares about someone who took a charge.” The Rockets’ offense had broken down, and there was no usual place for Alston, still back near the half-court line, to go with the ball. The Lakers’ defense had also broken down; no player was where he was meant to be. The only person exactly where he should have been — wide open, standing at the most efficient spot on the floor from which to shoot — was Shane Battier. When Daryl Morey spoke of basketball intelligence, a phrase slipped out: “the I.Q. of where to be.” Fitting in on a basketball court, in the way Battier fits in, requires the I.Q. of where to be. Bang: Alston hit Battier with a long pass. Bang: Battier shot the 3, guiltlessly. Nothing but net.

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China Feasts on Miners as “Bank of Last Resort”

http://www.bloomberg.com/…VMA&refer=home#

What’s China to do with their $2 trillion in reserves (world’s largest)? Spend it, of course. And what better place to spend that money than on real assets?

An interesting, if not predictable (to some), development.

Wuhan Iron & Steel Group and Jiangsu Shagang Group Co., China’s third- and fifth-largest steelmakers, are shopping for iron ore mining stakes in Australia and Brazil, executives said in interviews.

“We are evaluating and selecting” candidates in Australia and Brazil, said Shen Wenrong, Jiangsu-based Shagang’s chairman. “Going overseas is the government policy, so I believe we will get financing from Chinese banks.” Wuhan spokesman Bai Fang said his company is “looking for opportunities” amid lower acquisition costs for iron ore assets in Australia and “won’t rule out other countries.”

The world’s top metal user, China has agreed to acquire $22 billion worth of commodity assets this year after a 70 percent drop in metals and oil since July ended a six-year boom in raw materials. With U.S. and Australian banks still hesitant to lend, Rio Tinto Group and OZ Minerals Ltd., laboring under combined debt of $40 billion, agreed this month to sell stakes to Aluminum Corp. of China and China Minmetals Corp., respectively.

“China has turned out to be the bank of last resort,” said Glyn Lawcock, head of resources research at UBS AG in Sydney. “China is a net importer of copper, bauxite, alumina, nickel, zircon, uranium. China is looking for ways to secure supply of these raw materials.”