Tag Archives: revolution

No, University Students Should Not Be Forced to Have Facebook Accounts

by Chana6228ztgwm Posted on March 10, 2014

Mother Jones

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Thoreau attended a teaching conference this weekend. The keynote speaker had some things to say about communicating with the kids these days:

One small observation: The guy was insisting that we need to move all of our digital communication with students away from email and course management systems (Blackboard, Moodle, etc.) and instead communicate with students entirely via Facebook, posting assignment links there. I shall refrain from speculating on what sorts of stocks are in his retirement portfolio. Instead, I will note that while he was standing up there saying “Look, I’m old, you’re old, we’re all old, so we need to get with the times or become obsolete, now move your class to Facebook already!”, the Kids These Days are actually becoming less interested in Facebook. You could say that he proved his own point about faculty being old and out of touch, except he’s an administrator in his day job. So he actually proved that administrators are out of touch.

I am completely out of touch with both kids and universities, plus I’m an old fogey. And if you really want to know the truth, I’m not sure why university professors need to communicate with their students digitally at all. Don’t they still meet a couple of times a week in meatspace, like we used to when I was a lad? Can’t assignments and office hours and so forth be sufficiently communicated during class time?

But fine. I get it. We all communicate digitally these days, so university professors need to do it too. But you know what? University students actually do know how to use email. Sure, they might consider it something that’s mainly used for sending messages to grandma and grandpa, but they all know how to use it. And it has the virtue of being universal, extremely flexible, and supporting embedded links to any old thing you want. Students who plan to find jobs after graduation should probably know how to use it.

But my real point is this: If I were a student, I’d be pissed if I were actually forced to get a Facebook account in order to communicate with a professor. Maybe I don’t like or trust Facebook. And what if my other professors all have different favored ways of communicating? Am I forced to get a Tumblr account and a Pinterest account and a Google+ account and a Twitter account? That would be annoying as hell. Why should any of those things be required merely to be a student? Email is free, easy to use, and isn’t a vehicle for creating more Silicon Valley zillionaires. Any student who can’t be bothered to use it has way bigger problems than having to endure a slightly fogeyish professor.

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No, University Students Should Not Be Forced to Have Facebook Accounts

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Friday Cat Blogging – 7 March 2014

by Kyle3094ioyoxj Posted on March 7, 2014

Mother Jones

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Last weekend’s rain has obviously traumatized Domino. Sunny skies may have returned to Southern California since then, but Domino has spent all week hiding in a blanket cave anyway, just in case the rain clouds return. Her humans failed her once, after all. There’s no telling when we’ll fail her again.

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Friday Cat Blogging – 7 March 2014

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Divided Government Isn’t Going Away Anytime Soon

by LeslieHides Posted on March 7, 2014

Mother Jones

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Ronald Brownstein pithily sums up our current electoral dilemma:

Republicans can’t attract enough minorities to consistently capture the White House. Democrats can’t win enough whites to consistently control Congress.

Neither party has a lock on any branch of government. But Republicans are getting weaker and weaker nationally, which makes it very difficult for them to capture the White House. Midterm elections, however, which feature lower turnouts and depend on state and district voting, pose a problem for Democrats.

Obviously details still count. Republicans have a good chance of taking the Senate this year because Democrats are defending a lot of weak seats. Conversely, Democrats have a good chance of taking the Senate in 2016 because Republicans will be defending a lot of weak seats. Nonetheless, we do seem to be entering an era in which Democrats have an ever stronger edge in presidential elections and Republicans have an ever stronger edge in congressional elections, especially midterms. Unless something changes, we can probably look forward to divided government for a long time.

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Divided Government Isn’t Going Away Anytime Soon

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CIA Lashes Out at Senate Staffers it Says Mishandled Classified Info

by HollieHazon Posted on March 6, 2014

Mother Jones

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McClatchy has an update to yesterday’s story about the CIA monitoring Senate staffers who were investigating the CIA’s detention and torture practices. Apparently, long after their report was complete and the CIA had already responded, the Senate staffers were trawling through a CIA database and ran across an internal review ordered by former CIA Director Leon Panetta of previously released materials. The staffers concluded that the Panetta review confirmed their findings, even though the official CIA response had strongly disputed them:

The aides printed the material, walked out of CIA headquarters with it and took it to Capitol Hill, said the knowledgeable person.

….The CIA discovered the security breach and brought it to the committee’s attention in January, leading to a determination that the agency recorded the staffers’ use of the computers in the high-security research room, and then confirmed the breach by reviewing the usage data, said the knowledgeable person.

Sen. Mark Udall, D-Colo., a member of the Intelligence Committee who has led calls for the release of the report, disclosed at a hearing in December the existence of the Panetta review without saying how the committee had learned of it. He contended that the review broadly corroborated the committee’s findings and questioned why it was dramatically different from the CIA’s official response.

Roughly speaking, Senate staffers say their actions were justified because they had evidence the CIA was lying to them. The CIA says its actions were justified because Senate staffers were removing top secret materials that weren’t supposed to leave the secure room they were working in.

In the meantime, the 6,300-page report itself is still in limbo, with the CIA fighting tooth and nail to prevent it from being released. But maybe it’s time for the report and the internal review and the CIA response and everything else to be published so the American public can decide for itself what it thinks of all this? We’re the ones paying the bills, after all.

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CIA Lashes Out at Senate Staffers it Says Mishandled Classified Info

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The Tech Revolution Might Kill Economic Growth But Make Us All Happier Anyway

by d3gz0t Posted on February 19, 2014

Mother Jones

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Matt Yglesias makes a point worth sharing about technology and economic growth:

It seems entirely conceivable to me that future technological progress simply won’t lead to that much economic growth. If we become much more efficient at building houses, that will increase GDP, because the output of the housing sector is selling housing. But the output of the health care sector is selling health care services, not curing illnesses, and sick people already buy a lot of health care services. People with cancer tend to buy cancer treatments. If those treatments become more effective at curing cancer, that’d be great for patients and their families but it’s not obvious that it would raise “productivity” in the economic sense.

Yglesias provides a couple of example of this ambiguity. The printing press didn’t do much for GDP growth, because books just aren’t a big segment of the economy and never have been. But that doesn’t mean the printing press wasn’t a revolutionary invention. Likewise, if someone invented a pill that cured cancer, that might actually reduce GDP by eliminating all the money we spend on cancer care. But it would still be a huge contribution to human welfare.

This is a point that plenty of economists have made, but it’s worth repeating. Facebook is a big deal, but it hasn’t added an awful lot to measured GDP. In terms of the market economy, it employs a few thousand people, owns some buildings, and operates some large server farms. That’s not a huge contribution. On the flip side, if 100 million people spend more time on Facebook and less time going to the movies or reading books, it could actually be a net GDP loser. Ditto for video games, which might reduce economic output if the time and energy spent buying games and game consoles is less than what people used to spend all those hours on.

This isn’t a bulletproof case. It’s just meant to illustrate a point. If, in the future, we spend a lot more time on activities that are relatively cheap to produce—social networking, video games, virtual reality, etc.—we could end up in a world where people are as happy as they are now (or happier) with far less in the way of the traditional production of market goods. I doubt that this dynamic has had much effect on growth yet, but it’s quite possible it will in the future. Living in the Matrix is pretty cheap, after all.

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The Tech Revolution Might Kill Economic Growth But Make Us All Happier Anyway

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Is Our Robot Future Really All That Speculative Anymore?

by NanceeDundalli Posted on January 23, 2014

Mother Jones

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James Pethokoukis points us to a new working paper about economic growth released by the San Francisco Fed this month. Here’s a piece:

Even more speculatively, artificial intelligence and machine learning could allow computers and robots to increasingly replace labor in the production function for goods….In standard growth models, it is quite easy to show that this can lead to a rising capital share — which we intriguingly already see in many countries since around 1980 (Karabarbounis and Neiman, 2013) — and to rising growth rates. In the limit, if capital can replace labor entirely, growth rates could explode, with incomes becoming inï¬&#129;nite in ï¬&#129;nite time.

Pethokoukis comments:

The Fed paper is particularly amazing when you consider that when outgoing Fed chairman Ben Bernanke mentioned “robotics” in a commencement address last spring, he was the first US central-bank boss to use the word in a speech since Alan Greenspan in 2000. Expect more mentions from Janet Yellen.

Technological progress in AI and robotics — even short of the singularity — raises huge questions about the future of work, mobility, and inequality….What do we make of all those long-range economic and fiscal forecasts from folks at the Fed, Congressional Budget Office, and other expert groups? How do we plan for a future that may be just as revolutionary, if not more so, as the Industrial Revolution?

My long-form take on this is here. The thing that gets me is that so many people continue to think of this as wild speculation. I don’t mean the infinite incomes stuff, which is obviously hyperbole since we’ll always need more than just capital to make the economy run. I just mean the general idea that robots and AI are pretty obviously going to have a huge economic impact in the medium term future. This is something that seems so obvious to me that I’m a little puzzled that there’s anyone left who still doesn’t see it. Nonetheless, an awful lot of people still think of this as science fiction. I put the doubters into four rough buckets:

  1. Moore’s Law is going to to break down sometime very soon, and we’ll never get the raw computing power we need for true AI.
  2. There is something mysterious about the human brain that we will never be able to emulate with silicon and software. Maybe something, um, quantum.
  3. Meh. We’ve been hearing about AI forever. It’s never happened before, it’s not going to happen this time either.
  4. La la la la la.

#1 is at least plausible. I think we’re too far along for it to be taken very seriously anymore, but you never know. #2 is basically New Age nonsense dressed up as physics. #3 is understandable, but lazy. We heard about going to the moon for a long time too, but it didn’t happen until the technology curve caught up. We’re at the same point with AI. #4 is the group of people who kinda sorta accept that AI is coming, but for various reasons simply don’t want to grapple with what this means. Conservatives don’t like the idea that it almost inevitably will require a much more redistributive society. Liberals don’t like the idea that it might make a lot of standard lefty social programs obsolete.

As a liberal believer, I’ll put myself in the latter camp. I’m not willing to give up on the standard liberal social program because (a) I might be wrong about AI, (b) if I’m not, we’re still going to need variations on these programs, and (c) we still have to deal with the transition period anyway. I assume conservative believers might feel roughly the same way.

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Is Our Robot Future Really All That Speculative Anymore?

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Marcel Dzama’s Artwork Is Totally Twisted (and I Totally Dig It)

by Joe Mosh Posted on November 23, 2013

Mother Jones

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The prolific Canadian artist Marcel Dzama is not yet 30, but he’s accumulated a body of paintings, collages, sculpture, dioramas, costumes, and film-design work that would be impressive from someone decades his senior. You can experience the breadth of his talent in a great new collection, Marcel Dzama: Sower of Discord, out recently from Abrams Books.

The coffee-table book, which showcases hundreds of Dzama’s works in various media, also includes a poster, writings from the artist Raymond Pettibon and the art historian Bradley Bailey, and three collaborative short stories by Dave Eggers—which I’ll admit I haven’t quite gotten to yet, even though I loved this and this.

Ah, but the artwork! Great artists are evocative, and Dzama’s work evokes all sorts of emotions: wistfulness, joy, fear, revulsion, wonder, arousal. Drawing inspiration from current events, revolutionary images, his esteemed predecessors (notably Marcel Duchamp, Francis Picabia, Oskar Schlemmer, and William Blake), and his own childhood fears and encounters, Dzama has developed a distinctive-yet-familiar style that’s at once playfully subversive, twisted, childlike, and disturbing.

Recurring themes and characters include anthropomorphic trees, real and fictional animals, flag-bearers, distinctively yonic octopi, hooded men and women with guns (Subcomandante Marcos meets Guantanamo Bay), and sensual dancers in two-tone, polka-dot catsuits. We see superheroes, bats and owls, hanging men, dismembered cowboys, snowmen, rabbits and bears, Pinocchios, surreal multi-species crime scenes, bestiality of a sort, children curled in grave-like underground dens, disembodied heads, and plenty of sex—some of it alluringly primal. The book explores Dzama’s intent with some of these elements, but you may want to simply experience them first, and discover what meanings they bring to the uninitiated.

Bold the beauty of New York City, 2009. Ink and watercolor on paper. Marcel Dzama

The great sacrifice was our only dog, such a tragic gesture, 2011.

Ink and gouache on paper. Marcel Dzama

Circle of Infidels (The 6th revolution), 2008. Ink and watercolor on paper. Marcel Dzama

Dzama grew up in Winnipeg, where he struggled somewhat in school, partly because he’s dyslexic. He was constantly drawing, though, and settled on art school not from any high aspirations, but because “art was the only thing I was good at,” he tells filmmaker Spike Jonze in an included Q&A that, while fun and informative, needed some trimming.

Untitled, 2000. Ink and gouache on paper. Marcel Dzama

In any case, Dzama was discovered by the New York City art aficionado and gallery owner David Zwirner, and he’s been on a tear ever since. His art has traversed the globe, appearing in esteemed spaces such as Manhattan’s Museum of Modern Art and Metropolitan Museum of Art, Le Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, DC, and Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal. Sought after by celebs and collectors who can afford him, his work has graced album covers by the likes of Beck and They Might Be Giants. (I first encountered it in Bed Bed Bed, a charming TMBG side project consisting of a CD and accompanying lyrics book—which I highly recommend for anyone with kids under seven.)

Welcome to the land of the drone, 2011. Ink and gouache on paper. Marcel Dzama

I’ll leave you with a few more examples from the book, which is worth owning. You might, however, want to keep it where your kids can’t reach until they’re of age. For instance, I wouldn’t want my nine-year-old stumbling across Dzama’s My Weekend in Berlin, which looks like a pretty exciting weekend. I’ve not included it here. Guess you’ll just have to buy the book.

If you can’t bring good news, then don’t bring me any, 2012.

Ink, gouache, graphite, and collage on paper. Marcel Dzama

Turning into puppets (Volviendose marionetas), 2011 (details).

Steel, wood, aluminum, and motor. Marcel Dzama, photos by Sammlung Ottmann

My Ladies Revolution, 2008. Wood, sliding glass, acrylic, collage, and plaster.
Marcel Dzama, courtesy Sies + Höke, Düsseldorf

Goodbye.

Untitled, 2000. Ink and gouache on paper. Marcel Dzama

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Marcel Dzama’s Artwork Is Totally Twisted (and I Totally Dig It)

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Fracking won’t fix the climate

by AshleaMelina844 Posted on October 22, 2013

Fracking won’t fix the climate

By

WCN 24/7

The claim that natural gas is saving the climate is revealed as hot air.

Perhaps you’ve heard the claim that the natural-gas boom made possible by fracking is reducing America’s greenhouse gas emissions.

The logic underpinning this claim is that natural gas is a cleaner-burning fuel than coal, and hydraulic fracturing has produced a surfeit of cheap natural gas. Ergo, fracking is helping power plants switch from coal to natural gas, helping the climate along the way.

But that’s only half the story.

A Stanford-led study, which was produced with input from 50 academic, government, and private-sector experts, concludes that natural gas is having only “modest impacts” on carbon dioxide emissions.

Yes, natural gas is helping to dig a grave for coal. It’s the lesser of two fossil-fuel evils. But natural gas’s low price is also slowing down the country’s shift toward climate-friendly solar and wind power. From the Stanford report [PDF]:

Shale development has relatively modest impacts on carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide emissions, particularly after 2020. Since 2006, electricity generation has become less carbon intensive as its natural gas share increased from 16 to 24 percent and its coal share decreased from 52 to 41 percent. Over future years, this trend towards reducing emissions becomes less pronounced as natural gas begins to displace nuclear and renewable energy that would have been used otherwise in new powerplants under reference case conditions.

Meanwhile, the study concludes that fracking is helping to slightly expand America’s economy — but not nearly to the extent that the industry would like us to think:

Shale development also boosts the economy by $70 billion annually over the next several decades. Although this amount appears large, it represents a relatively modest 0.46 percent of the US economy. Today total natural gas expenditures represent about one percent of GDP within this country.

Joe Romm of ClimateProgress points out that the International Energy Agency recently warned that the low price of natural gas is also hampering efforts to improve energy efficiency, which is bad news for greenhouse gas emissions.

“From a climate perspective, then, the shale gas revolution is essentially irrelevant,” argues Romm, “and arguably a massive diversion of resources and money that could have gone into deploying carbon-free sources.”


Source
Changing the game?: Emissions and market implications of new natural gas supplies, Energy Modeling Forum, Stanford University
Major Study Projects No Long-Term Climate Benefit From Shale Gas Revolution, ClimateProgress

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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We can’t blame everything on climate change: Soot melts glaciers too

by w0ujpysd Posted on September 3, 2013

We can’t blame everything on climate change: Soot melts glaciers too

By

Frank Paul, University of Zurich

The Aletsch Glacier in Switzerland.

The world’s glaciers are wasting away at a cracking pace — but it’s not just because the climate is warming.

Soot and other black carbon is settling on ice and snow, absorbing the sun’s rays and causing frozen water molecules to melt. It can be hard to tell how much of the melt to attribute to warming and how much to soot.

But researchers have pinpointed a period shortly after the Industrial Revolution when black carbon alone appears to have caused glaciers to melt in the European Alps.

During the middle of the 19th century, the filth from fossil-fuel burning was starting to blanket parts of Europe. “Housewives in Innsbruck refrained from drying laundry outdoors,” said Georg Kaser, a glaciologist at the University of Innsbruck in Austria and coauthor of a paper published Tuesday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. But temperatures weren’t yet rising; if anything, it was still getting colder.

Yet in 1865, more than 40 years before temperature records started showing warming in the Alps, the region’s glaciers began a retreat that has continued until this day, marking the end of a 500-year ice age.

PNASA chart from the PNAS paper tracking the expansion and decline of five glaciers in the Alps since the first measurements. (Click to embiggen.)

Scientists used ice cores and computer simulations to calculate that heat absorbed by polluted snow would have been enough during the second half of the 19th century to melt the snow and expose glaciers to sunlight, kicking off their decline.

“The end of the Little Ice Age in the European Alps has long been a paradox to glaciology and climatology,” wrote Kaser and his coauthors. “Radiative forcing by increasing deposition of industrial black carbon to snow may represent the driver of the abrupt glacier retreats.”

Andreas Vieli, a glaciologist who was not involved with the research, told Nature that the study offers “a very elegant and plausible explanation” for the glacial melt. “It appears that in central Europe soot prematurely stopped the Little Ice Age.”

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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We can’t blame everything on climate change: Soot melts glaciers too

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The Third Industrial Revolution: How Lateral Power Is Transforming Energy, the Economy, and the World

by Myrna Posted on May 16, 2013

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