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Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Terraforming the Earth


As space agencies around the world race to the red planet and beyond in an attempt to satisfy ego and ignorance, they may want to focus their limited resources on real tactical problems facing the planet. As those, who had a tough time with science at school, rise to make polices that affect humanity, the danger of human extinction is now more real than ever. To top it off, those who were good at science appear to get real excitement by looking at pictures of the dwarf planet and designing ways to punch a one-way ticket for humans to a planet close-by. Admirable, of course, but completely irrelevant.

It is time NASA had a real resource and portfolio management process. Engineers, albeit being good at what they do, often fail to see the big picture. The risk of an asteroid impact or run-away greenhouse effect are so high in close quarters - it does not make any sense to allocate resources to finding green men in the solar system or among the thousands of exo-planets, that were found recently.  Terraforming the Earth, although not as exciting as the projects undertaken by the space agency, has real utility for humanity. Humans, designed to burn anything they get their hands to, have cooked up a real mess, that would require rectifying. It is a solvable problem if the best technologists in the world put their minds to it and perhaps forget the exploration of the universe for a little bit. Sure, this may not propel careers or pave the way to easy Nobel prizes, but limited resources have to be optimally deployed for the sake of humanity. Additionally, although not as exciting as science fiction including a black hole from the LHC devouring us all, an asteroid impact that could substantially extinguish humans is real. Having “plans on paper” to “bomb the rock” may not be realistic. It may require real technology to nudge the Earth bound catastrophe to safety.  

Those who are responsible and accountable for deploying the limited resources to practical uses may need to refocus their priorities. Ego cannot be part of the objective function, rationality has to be.

Monday, December 28, 2015

Barren universe

Not withstanding the efforts of space agencies and academic institutions around the world to find extra-terrestrial life, it appears that disappointment could be in store for humans. Recent excitement about an exoplanet just 14 light years away is symptomatic of scientific quest that is chasing pre-determined answers. Before turning all listening devices to the “target,” one may want to ask a few questions. If we are seeking human like life there, one has to assume that they are enjoying “Friends” and “Seinfeld” now. And, it is difficult to find fault with them not attempting to make contact. If we are seeking something less or more, then it is unlikely they will be spewing garbage into the airways. In other words, the attempts of humans to make contact are unlikely to be rewarded unless an extra-terrestrial civilization of similar incompetence is close at hand.

Humans, locked into a tiny window of space-time, have been chasing an unattainable dream – intelligent life that could teach them better tricks. As they peak through that microscopic window, they are most likely to see a barren universe, devoid of life and intelligence. Expanding the window, either by new Physics or by constructs deemed feasible with the status-quo, such as worm holes, information travelling at speeds many magnitudes higher than light and quantum entanglement, could provide a way out of these hard constraints.

Finding life in the searchable space-time in close proximity is as unlikely as spotting a needle in a haystack as big as the solar system. Good luck getting there by 2020.

Tuesday, December 1, 2015

The death of logic

 
In a country of blue, red and grey
In a land of every possible hue
Where policies are made on the back of a napkin
To satisfy donors and those who may become donors
 
In a country of red, white and blue
In a land of every possible opinion
Where judgments are made by pictures on TV
To satisfy friends and those who may become friends
 
In a country of East, West and Midwest
In a land of every possible culture
Where biases are made by location and accents
To satisfy those nearby and those who may move close
 
In a country of wealthy, poor and the middle-class
In a land of disappearing dreams for most
Where classes segregate by every possible means
To satisfy those who hold similar views
 
In a country of knowledge, ignorance and mediocrity
In a land of expensive and unattainable education
Where students march in the streets to be heard
To satisfy their own cults and egos
 
In a country of fake hair, fake stories and fake passion
In a land of politicians and incompetent policy-makers
Where debates are designed to expose the hatred
To satisfy the millions glued to the idiot box
 
In a country of science, religion and agnosticism
In a land of pretense and wisdom
Where they battle each other for superiority
To win prizes, acceptance and money
 
In a country of coasts, mountains and plains
In a land of inexplicable space and beauty
Where they battle for the last acre of land
To nourish their own false sense of wealth
 
In a country of finance, technology and movies
In a land of fraud, fallacy and fiction
Where the suits battle the turtle-necks
To stuff their own pockets and wallets
 
In a country of such complexity
Where logic is dead and buried
But, somehow, one can’t lose hope
For without it, the world will be in despair

Sunday, November 29, 2015

Proof of simulation

The idea that the universe is a simulation has been in the periphery of cosmology. This is not surprising – every established scientific arena, astrophysics, medicine and economics included, has not been kind to pursuits that questioned the status-quo. This abundant bias, nourished by the ability to publish and win Nobel prices in short horizons, has perpetuated established theories even in the absence of any evidence. Even “theories” that could never be tested has been gaining popularity, within the closed doors of academia, with even less interest to look outside than country club dwellers.

The thought experiment that the universe could be a simulation, however, has been around for over a decade. Some have even suggested ways to test it experimentally. Given that the established theories require 96% fantasy for them to work, it is not too big a leap to go a bit further. After all, thought experiments typically do not require 6 trillion experiments to ferret out an elusive particle and such statistical fantasies have been held as one of the greatest achievements of contemporary humans.

If the universe were a simulation, what would be the properties of such a system? In a sufficiently complex simulation:

1. The participants of the simulation, albeit capable of describing the processes that make the simulation work, will never be able to explain the origin of it.

2. The participants, who could measure the constants that drive the rules of the simulation, will find them finely tuned and held constant.

3. The simulation will exhibit recurring patterns.

4. The participants will find constraints within the system that limit them to certain parts of the simulation.

5. The participants will face an overall hard constraint that does not allow them to get outside the simulated system.

6. The participants of the system will remain unaware of anything outside the boundaries of the simulation for the duration of the simulation.

7. The participants will likely reject the hypothesis that they are part of the simulation.

8. The participants may find anomalies to the rules they have discovered because of the possible flaws in the simulation itself. Such flaws may be patched up over time and the anomalies may disappear.

9.  The system will exhibit no learning.

10. Any excursion – random, planned or induced by the participants, away from the rules, will revert back to the rules.

Within the context of the tiny part of the universe – humans - all these properties appear to be true. Moreover, no current observation negates the hypothesis. Hence, it is likely that the universe is a simulation.

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

Chicago’s moment to leap to the future

With nearly 75% of the US population expressing the idea that racism is a problem for the country, it is clear that the country is in deep thoughts as to how to get rid of the cancer affecting its soul. A modern society, afflicted by the disease of racism, could have a rather pessimistic prognosis. On the other hand, if most of the country sees the problem, then, we can certainly solve it. As they say in medicine, early diagnosis almost always leads to better outcomes. And, in the pain and despair of a horrible incident, Chicago has a unique opportunity to lead the country and perhaps the world out of ignorance and a curable disease through education and the advancement of culture.

Chicago has been at the forefront of advancing emerging ideas in economics, science, arts and journalism. Its educational institutions opened the eyes of those seeking knowledge but the city itself, could not get out of its artificially imposed boundaries, allowing irrational thoughts and actions to percolate through. In the process, they suffered from violence and segmented islands of wealth, information and ignorance. A city, that led in thought and culture advancement has been trailing in practical actions, however. Steeped in political corruption for decades, the city has been losing its just position in history. It will be a shame if one of the greatest cities in the world, sub optimizes itself, not because of lack of knowledge but of the constraints self imposed on itself.

This is Chicago’s moment to leap to the future. It has leaped many times before to open the eyes of the world. Now, it is time for introspection and out of that will come strength to leap again. 

A small leap for Man and a big jump for Math

Recent news that a University of Chicago mathematician may have reduced a NP complexity problem of network comparisons to that akin to P level complexity, signals a jump in knowledge in otherwise stagnant field. Consumed by big data and bigger noise, mathematicians and data scientists have been burning the midnight oil, solving everything under the Sun, using century old techniques and faster computers. In the process, most forget to think and step aside to see the challenge in front of them could be simplified before diving deep.

In the age of cheap hardware and companies plush with cash, innovation appears stagnant. Making a neural net with thousands of computers in a network is not innovation, it is just a show of brawn over brains. Pumping large number of rules through a supercomputer in an attempt to beat a human recollecting random facts is not innovation, it is scaling ignorance. Collecting, storing and analyzing large amounts of noise in an attempt to discover complex heuristics is not innovation, it is just sticking one’s head in the cloud.

Innovation happens but only rarely. Reducing the complexity of a problem class, fits the bill perfectly.

Saturday, November 14, 2015

The economics of violence

Organizations – religions, countries and country clubs, operate on a simple idea. Individuals in a system have a put option with a limited exercise horizon and if the system can coax an individual to exercise it prematurely for the presumed benefit of the system, then the managers of the system could effectively do anything they want. Since the objective function of the system itself is fuzzy and ill defined, managers do not need to show optimality and they can use anecdotes and unproven hypotheses, to elicit premature and suboptimal exercise from a small number of individuals. The act of violence, perpetuated by closed systems, autocratic and strategic, with benefits accruing to a small percentage of the members, require the ones on top convincing a few to engage in irrational acts by demonstrating the asset they hold is wasting and a premature extinguishing of their own lives is optimal, if not for themselves but the system itself.

For hundred thousand years, humans killed and mutilated their way to glory, aided and abetted by clan leaders, fully aware of what they were doing. If the value of an individual demonstrably improves, then it will diminish the ability of clan leaders to force premature exercise of put options held by the individual. Education, the only tool, that could improve asset values in closed systems, may be the last hope for humans, slipping away to oblivion at the height of their ascendancy. Education and knowledge have been stagnating, however, with a few drinking from fire hydrants and others infinitely seeking the illusive mirage. While some in the valley sleep dreaming about the singularity and the cure for death, there are seven billion elsewhere, without a clue what tomorrow is going to bring.

The foundations, sitting on billions still debating whether to provide white or pink nets to cure malaria, may have to rethink their strategy. If they really want to cure the ills of the world, they have to improve the knowledge content of humans.

Thursday, November 5, 2015

Puppet show

The Unified Microbiome Initiative (UMI), as described in a recent article in Science, albeit belated, is a step in the right direction. As indicated by one of the founding members from the department of Ecology and Evolution at the University of Chicago, it has been abundantly clear that microorganisms play a critical role in the welfare of humans. Perhaps, UMI should go a bit further – it is not just that microorganisms have a critical role in health and disease of humans in a tactical sense, they may be controlling how humans evolve, a true strategic imperative.

Intelligence has been ill defined. Ability to maximize utility for the system seems to move inversely to the complexity of the individual. Thus, humans, on top of the food chain, appear least competent to maximize societal utility. An alternative definition of intelligence is the ability of the individual to contribute to system welfare. Here, microorganisms are dominant. They have been here for 4 billion years and they will likely be here for another 4 billion before the Sun throws a temper tantrum and balloon to a red giant. Meanwhile, the “intelligent,” will likely perish in an asteroid impact within perhaps a few 100s of thousands of years.

More importantly, humans appear almost ignorant of the systemic effect imparted on them by microorganisms. The DNA provided by the parasites far surpasses any bits and pieces of the human DNA admitted to the ecosystem, some affectionately call, the human body. In this vast universe of organs and food digesting machinery, humans have been dancing to every whim of their visitors in the stomach and elsewhere. Diseases can be forecasted, health can be measured and even death can be predicted by a simple conversation with the Microbiome.

It is ironic that humans are simple puppets to those who have been dominating the Earth for so long.

Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Language optimization

Language, a distinct advantage that separated humans from chimps, may become a liability for them in a regime of accelerating information and forced specialization. Early on, language provided efficient communication among clan members with relatively simple objective functions to optimize. Later, as they branched into art, philosophy and literature, language became a construct that may have touched the souls of some, but it also meant that it began to lose the communication efficiency, it was originally designed to do. Presently, conventional languages, with complex semantics and grammar, appear unable to distill and communicate critical technical information.

Computer languages, that stay at a lower level without flowery grammar, are certainly more efficient to program machines. In the human sphere, millennials have been experimenting with a variety of constructs that remove the complexity of grammar and schema, but it is unclear if any of the current methods are efficient in communicating content. In an environment of deep but not broad knowledge per individual, science and engineering may need to invent a modern language that does not constrain them to formats that are designed for different purposes. For example, the abstract of a scientific article, that often limits the format to certain number of words but force the author to utilize inefficient grammar, lose in multiple ways.

It is time to rethink scientific language. Nobody has the time to read through the entire paper and content is not complete in allowed abstract format that conforms to artificial and old constraints.

Thursday, October 29, 2015

Gravitational annoyance

A recent paper in the Journal of Science that describes the failure to detect gravitational waves from any source including the merging of two galaxies with possible combination of two black holes, perpetuates the gravitational holdout to otherwise beautiful theories woven up by physicists. Gravitation has spoiled every attempt at Grand Unification of the hypothesized fundamental fields of nature. It is ironic that a field that is obvious at human scale has been the one most difficult to understand and explain with status-quo theories. Ever since an apple fell on Newton’s head, gravity has vexed humankind and it seems like the current situation will continue for a while.

Failure of Grand Unification Theories is a subtle sign that we do not yet have theories that can be unified. Early in the 20th century, a few brilliant minds made inexplicable leaps into emerging knowledge. It is scary to even think of a world in which they did not exist. Newtonian mechanics could have ruled the mediocrity for a few more centuries. However, there were visible cracks in both the theory of relativity and quantum mechanics, and the ones who followed are simply unable to mend them. More importantly, they have taken the hammers given to them and they have been looking for nails all around the universe to put the hammers to good use. None is able to spend a career or even risk a tenured position to ask if the hammers need modifications.

The jumps in the stochastic evolution of knowledge are rare and they are driven by an amazingly few members of billions of humans around the world. The next jump appears too far in a regime mediated by paid research and manufactured education.

Monday, October 26, 2015

Machines do not learn!

Artificial Intelligence is fashionable again, aided by cheap computing and cheaper memory, computer behemoths have been diving head first into the abyss. It has happened before, albeit, with much limited computing power. Just as in the previous iteration in the 80s, the current excitement may die down in a few years. Simulated machine voice and jeopardy are easier problems to solve but finding a cure for cancer is a lot harder. Similarly, churning through limitless text - “search”, is a mechanistic process but “curing death” is not. Soon, hopefully, the “leaders” will realize the naked truth – machines do not learn and that the “singularity” they envision is many centuries away.

Machines have captured the human imagination from the start. When they trained animals to drive farm equipment many thousands of years ago, they understood how machines could be built and powered to enhance productivity. More recently, the silicon chip, a conventional and mechanistic processor, has raised their ambitions to a level that may not be realistic. In the initial going, it was focused on productivity, very similar to farm equipment but now some believe their machines can learn. If so, this is a departure for humans from sustenance to imagination, from mediocrity to advancement, from tactics to strategy. But alas, machines do not learn!

“Machine learning,” a term used too liberally by information technology and consulting firms, may need further definition. One can clearly demonstrate machines do not learn by themselves and if so, we are back to using machines to enhance productivity – a posture humans have been in for ten thousand years.

Saturday, October 24, 2015

Real finance

Recent observations by a previous Fed chairman that it is puzzling why one would advocate a reinstatement of Glass-Steagall act because he could not see how the crisis in 2008 would have been avoided had it been in effect, is symptomatic of regulators who are good tacticians but not strategists. From Princeton to Wall street, financial institutions and their regulators still believe intermediation is “God’s work.” Academics, slaves to economics text books from last century, still believe financial intermediation is integral to markets and the economy. If the former chairman is intellectually honest, he may want to revisit the transcripts from Jackson Hole in 2005, before spewing wisdom. The one who came before him, who spewed infinite wisdom for many decades seem to have finally realized, “something was wrong.” He is still selling wisdom at $75K per pop. Meanwhile financial malls, that do everything but intermediation, with a skewed incentive to take risks for their bonuses that depend on the upside potential emanating from their actions and they are generally not accountable for the downside risk, invest into fooling both the academics and the regulators.

Although the chairman may be an expert of the depression era, what he may be missing is that the modern economy needs very little finance as we know it. Any financial activity, that does not have a direct connection to real assets and real investments, adds no value to the economy. Real assets today comprise of only two things – real estate and intellectual property. Financial intermediation in the former can now be done by the internet and it does not require “God’s men,” behind oak desks in the penthouses. And financing needed to develop and nourish IP is not something the mega banks have any clue about. They are dinosaurs with a ridiculous combination of disparate businesses with conflicting incentives that still pose a systemic risk to the entire population.

Glass-Steagall is a necessary condition to eliminate the greed of the ignorant and I am sure “God” will approve.

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

Hilbert hotel

Recent news that scientists have realized a quantum Hilbert hotel using a beam of light is indicative of the power of thought experiments, validated by simple experiments. Both interesting thought experiments as well as simple validation techniques are on the decline not only in Physics but also in other fields. In the Hilbert thought experiment, a hotel with infinite rooms, fully occupied, could make an additional room by shifting occupants one room up. More generally, the same hotel could make infinite empty rooms by shifting people to even number rooms leaving an infinite number of odd number rooms. The human brain that evolved through practical needs of Sapiens, has been lured into thoughts it was never designed to have.

Thought experiments on Infinity and zero (absolute nothing), such abstract concepts, are in a favorable direction to nourish the brain and perhaps move it into the next quantum state of knowledge. It takes no investment, no heavy machinery and not even high mathematics. It, however, takes imagination, something that has been draining out of humanity. Humans have been unable to internalize infinity and zero, perhaps because of the limitation of the brain but it is more likely because the brain gets inundated with the finite continuously. The thoughts that envelope the finite are mediocre at best and they are not extensible to the abstract nature of infinity or zero.

Thought experiments are possibly the best path to fundamental shifts in human knowledge.

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

ET’s very large SUV

Recent discovery of an object by NASA’s Kepler telescope around a star, some 1500 light years away that cannot be explained by typical exoplanet properties, has raised speculation that it may be an artificial structure, created by advanced intelligence to garner energy from the star. A simpler explanation, such as a fragmented comet could be more valid, but certainly less interesting. Astrophysics, quickly degrading into bedtime stories of fancy, may yet have a long way to sink in conventionalism, before it could make a contribution.

Humans, seeking intelligence elsewhere, with attributes similar to theirs, seem to forget that their own experiences clearly show that intelligence is a network process. The mighty bacterium, able to dance with billions in unison, appears much more intelligent as a system than humans could ever be. By substantially increasing the diversity and the probability of favorable mutations at the micro-level, the system is able to evolve and adapt faster in a universe that appears hostile in every direction. Harnessing energy in such systems will be an internal process and may not require structure-building or star-domination, only phenomena humans are able to understand fully. Granted, finding such intelligence will remain outside human capabilities for the foreseeable future, if not for ever.

The recent fervor in seeking extra-terrestrials, is symptomatic of the limited understanding of humans of the formation, development and propagation of intelligence.

Tuesday, October 6, 2015

Training Schrödinger’s Cat

A recent article in Nature describes a possible break-through in quantum computing. Engineers at the University of New South Wales seem to have built a quantum logic gate in Silicon, possibly opening up a pathway toward practical quantum computing in Silicon based processors. In theory, the technology could turn conventional bits into quantum bits, allowing traditional chip architectures to morph into those supporting quantum computing.

This is good news. As many philosophers worry about singularity, for no apparent reason, creative engineers have been moving the goal posts closer to practical quantum computing. It is a technology discontinuity, something if shown to be practical, could substantially change the economic prospects of a whole generation, currently stuck in a plateau of no innovation. They are beginning to realize that calling a phone 6, 7, 18 or 6S is not really innovation – it is packaging. They are realizing that creating fake computer generated voices in marketing announcing Sherlock Holmes and Watson, is not really innovation, it is bad sales technique. They are realizing that skipping version 9 and going straight to 10 is not innovation, it is a cheap gimmick. They are realizing that names that are difficult to pronounce are not really technologies but ways to siphon money out of companies who want to jump on the latest band wagons.

The next discontinuity is not in software – it is in hardware. Unfortunately, world's largest hardware companies do not seem to understand it and the world is now replete with incompetent software companies – creating operating systems, applications, "artificial intelligence" and databases – with no innovation content.

Saturday, October 3, 2015

Mirror, mirror…

There is an audible buzz in the air ever since NASA finally announced the “well kept secret” - there could be water – the flowing variety – on Mars. This is exciting news, and it brings back visions of Green men (I wonder if they were women) walking out of shiny space crafts – the “contact,” humanity has been waiting for a long time now. There have been more good news – subtle but nonetheless important – related to the same. A recent article in “Astrobiology,” shows “Earth like planets,” orbiting close to stars likely have magnetic fields – making them even more “Earth like,” allowing life to flourish like bacteria on a dirty towel.

It seems like we are nearing the historic occasion – predicted by NASA to be 2020, when life would absolutely be discovered outside Earth. All efforts are focused on finding the “twin Earth,” with Oxygen, flowing water, a magnetic field and a hard surface to stand on – where humanity will ultimately shake hands with an organism – 6 ft tall with two hands and legs, cone shaped head and (hopefully) with a sense of humor. Some of the greatest living physicists don’t think ET will be in a playful mood at all, for they argue ET will make contact only to extinguish humanity. Not sure who is right, but how could one blame ET to take such an extreme stance.

Mirror, mirror…. who is the best organism in the universe? Don’t tell me there is nothing else – the right answer is – humans who are superior to a vast array of sub intelligent creatures across the universe.

Sunday, September 27, 2015

The multiplicative effect

With world population at 7.5 Billion with only 40% having an internet connection, the information multiplicative effect on global economies is significant if complete saturation can be achieved. At the current rate, saturation is unlikely to arrive for another two decades. Accelerating this has beneficial effects on all economies and the UN could possibly lead an effort in this direction with investments from all participants. Countries such as the US that will benefit disproportionately, with a dominant presence in search and social media, may be willing to invest their fair share in this direction.

Information has become a basic necessity for humans – an indication that they are slowly maturing into a level 1 society. For 100 thousand years they struggled with food and sex, attributes of a primitive society and although half the world population is still locked into the same objective function for survival, there are reasons for optimism. In a fully connected world, there will be billions of brains – quantum computers in their own right – analyzing and interacting with newly emerging information at any point in time. With that, humanity could possibly escape from the trivialities of politics, clan conflicts and ego – and look outward in concert for the first time. It is a powerful notion – a brain storm with a billion brains is possible now and one can escape dreary conference rooms, conventions and the status-quo. We could reach a slope where only innovation matters and not tenure, color, elitism and even skills and know-how. Those who make new and valuable things will be the leaders and the next generation will look back in astonishment how a society with similar intelligence content as they could behave so inexplicably in the past.

The information multiplicative effect, so powerful that anybody ignorant of it should not be leading anything – countries, companies, localities and even households.

Friday, September 18, 2015

Elite efficiency

A recent paper (1) studies the “distributional preferences of the elite” and makes a somewhat obvious (startling to them) conclusion - “the elite” prefers not to distribute compared to the general population. There are many problems with the study including the premise and the definition of the “elite,”  comprising of the graduates of the Yale Law School (YLS). The assertion is that these graduates are destined to power and influence (and presumably wealth) and hence the “branding” of “elite.” Institutions and researchers looking backwards and frozen in time, may be in for a shock when they look outside their theoretical and historically adorned windows and see the future.

How do we test a hypothesis that YLS students prefer not to redistribute compared to a random graduate? Could we use the same study and data? Suppose we prove that YLS students are not “elite” at all because the probability of a YLS graduate to have any influence on society is roughly equal to a random graduate, what would it imply for the study? Economists tend to use fancy words and create complexity so that they can live within their secluded ivory towers, contributing nothing to society. In this context, what exactly does equality-efficiency trade-offs mean? Does it mean that the “elite” like to keep the money for themselves and phenomena that cannot be understood in this framework is assumed to maximize efficiency?

Practical educators and researchers should stop wasting time assigning labels and useless observations in a label prone, segregated and tiring society.

(1) The distributional preferences of an elite
Raymond Fisman1,*, Pamela Jakiela2, Shachar Kariv3, Daniel Markovits4
1Department of Economics, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA.
2Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA.
3Department of Economics, University of California, Berkeley, Berkely, CA, USA.
4Yale Law School, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA.

Saturday, September 12, 2015

The human syndrome

The human syndrome, a disease that has been with humans ever since they arrived, has been declining for several centuries. A complex phenomenon, that has many symptoms including empathy, compassion, anonymous charitable giving and effective altruism, has been tackled well by modern humans. Eradication efforts around the world that include institutionalized religion, racism and a variety of modern segmentation schemes, have been exceptionally effective in reducing the prevalence and spread of this horrible disease. Systematized education at all levels seem to have also aided the efforts to eradicate the disease.

It has been a triumph for humans. They have been able to nearly get rid of irrationality and imagination, characteristics of environments that aid the spread of the disease. More recently, large swaths of humans immersing in prescriptive sciences, engineering and technology, has acted as an inoculation against it. Although complete eradication could be a few decades away, the reliable negative slope in prevalence is encouraging. The biggest danger appears to be the tendency of humans to be emotional and their occasional excursions into thinking about the world as a system. Such CNS deficits, could be treated effectively with available medicines. Perhaps a cocktail of such medications coupled with the policies pursued by the ignorant, could do the trick.

The human syndrome, that has held humans back for over 100 thousand years, is nearly history. This is apt as the “singularity,” dreamt by the technologists would require humans and mechanical robots to be indistinguishable from each other. We appear to be very close to it.

Sunday, September 6, 2015

Fusion, it is here (almost)

Ever since a brilliant member of the Homo Erectus produced fire for the first time nearly 2 Million years ago, their descendents have been trying to tame and use energy optimally. More recently, humans have been getting smarter with alternatives to wood burning, including fossil fuels, biofuels, nuclear energy, hydro, solar, wind and tidal. For many decades now, it has been obvious to many that most of these are inelegant solutions to the energy problem.

Burning hydrocarbons, albeit easy to do, has possible long term negative effects on the environment and biofuels take more energy than they produce. Nuclear fission, often fails to account for the costs associated with the storage of waste materials, with half lives exceeding 50,000 years. Solar, the darling of environmentalists, is not economical – in all varieties, photoelectric and concentrating-solar and it is an industry propped-up by subsidies, devised by politicians looking for brownie points. Hydro power has displaced massive populations across the world, with long term deleterious effects on the ecosystem. Finally, tidal and wind, better understood by public, show low efficiency and they are pushed by “green companies,” who make turbines for profits.

The energy problem is far from being solved. Lately, however, there are glimpses of hope – Lockheed, Alpha Energy and National Ignition Facility – to mention a few, seem to be making great strides to taming fusion. Ever since humans understood how stars worked, it should have been obvious that there is only one avenue to pursue to solve energy. Better late than never.

Fusion could lead to zero cost energy and that will make most tactical problems that consume humanity currently, utterly irrelevant.

Wednesday, September 2, 2015

Accreditation revoked?

The famous school in Philadelphia, that has produced many capable people in politics and business, appears to be running out of steam. Its recent entries into politics appear less convincing – some paranoid and others ignorant, that the professors of the illustrious school may be holding their head in eternal shame. Even its business school, famous for finance and business, seems to have produced somebody who does not understand that the asset side of the balance sheet is not equivalent to net worth. Did the business school allow skipping Accounting 101 in its business program? How else would one explain it?

In a world crowded by educational institutions, accreditation should be at risk if graduates of a school, that it has awarded degrees to, do not understand basic stuff. Even if that person got a D in Accounting, the fact that the school was willing to hand out a degree, should be sufficient to put its accreditation at risk. It does not matter if it has Nobel Laureates in its faculty, if the school graduates a person of complete ignorance, one has to question the system. It has been tried before, another famous son of a school, up north, argued, he did not know accounting to avoid going to jail.

It is time for the famous school in Philadelphia to give up its accreditation, for its graduates seem to lack basic intelligence and knowledge.

Friday, August 28, 2015

Advanced society

As the astrophysicists look for advanced intelligence across the universe, it may be worthwhile to reflect what an advanced society may look like, conceptually. As asserted by the knowing, it appears that an “Earth-Like” planet – similar size, rocky and in the “habitable zone” from its star, harboring water and possibly Oxygen, are all that is needed for ET with big brains to emerge. A more subtle question is if ET is actually advanced, what characteristics are more likely in such a society. Perhaps, this is less interesting for the scientists, but it could be almost as important as water.

The going in hypothesis appears to be that an advanced society will unambiguously try to dominate its neighborhood. Metrics such as the quantity of radiation at certain wavelengths were suggested as possible proxies a few decades ago and accepted without question, even now. The desire and ability to dominate their planet and galaxy, appear to be necessary conditions for “advanced intelligence.” As the presidential race heats up in the US, we do see some “highly advanced intelligent beings” in the race, according to this metric, used by NASA and other ET seeking organizations. One of them, so dominant, he is scaling his domination of real estate to this universe and the next – a sure sign of ET like intelligence.

An advanced society, one could argue, is one that has solved space-time to its advantage. Such a society is unlikely to be restricted by such trivial things as water and Oxygen and they will have no interest to come eye-to-eye with ET seeking sub-intelligence. They are unlikely to be wrapped in radiation, emitted by systems of incompetence and ignorance. They are unlikely to be interested in the tactics of “domination” for there are so much more interesting thoughts that can span the multi-verse. 

More practically, one has to wonder if humans are equipped to seek intelligence elsewhere, as they appear to be lacking it.

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Superior Agnosticism

A recent study that uses conventional metrics to show a positive correlation between atheism and intelligence, may be erring in the scientific principles it purports to use. Religion and atheism, both irrational based on observable data, have divided whole populations into polar opposites. In a world, where strife is derived from these two fundamental concepts, one has to argue that society is stuck on irrational thoughts – led by scientists and religious leaders. Scientific dogmatism, as damaging as religion, has been leading an entire generation down rabbit holes. The scientist who shouted, “Nobel prizes all around” after finding the “Higgs Boson” by using inescapable noise from trillions of experiments is no better than those who lead populations down blind alleys based on religious hypotheses, that remain un-provable.

The only rational thought is agnosticism, wrapped in humility – a complete acceptance that known information remain insufficient to prove anything. The value that can be imputed to remaining flexible and agnostic is significant for the individual and the society. Creating noise by large volume of data cannot prove anything – scientific or not. Similarly, asserting religious beliefs, by definition, cannot be accepted at any level. The parallels between these two streams of thoughts are surprisingly high – one using old scriptures and the other, newer ones.

Agnosticism, the only rational dimension of humanity, could be fast losing ground – struck from the left and the right.

Sunday, August 16, 2015

Selective Bayesian Updating

Confirmation and conformation biases, symptoms of a disease that is eating into science and technology, have wrecked havoc in many areas including pharmaceutical research, astrophysics, finance, healthcare and policy, just to name a few. It appears that participants in these areas, utilize a novel mathematical technique – Selective Bayesian Updating (SBU). It is not just that data are fine tuned to prove the hypothesis but even in cases where it could not be proved, the posteriors remain the same for subsequent experiments.

Take Search for Extra-terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) as an example. It has been speculated that oceans that could support life exist in many icy and rocky remnants within the solar system – Titan, Europa and even the outcast, Pluto. Suppose the missions to these objects reveal no signs of life, will NASA and SETI use Selective Bayesian Updating for the probability of ET? Recent excitement around Kepler 452B, the most “Earth-like” planet ever found in the Milky Way, has led SETI to focus their instruments in that region. Suppose we find no signals of value, will the posterior probability of the existence of ET, remain the same? This is very convenient for those involved in the research. It is the ultimate free lunch in science – a negative result has no change in the posterior probability of the hypothesis being correct.

In pharmaceutical research, it has been shown that the efficacy of marketed drugs decline over time. This is a curious phenomenon as cutting edge research coupled with a vigilant regulator, the FDA, are unlikely to let marginal drugs into market. Was Selective Bayesian Updating deployed in the many experiments that led to the approval of the drug? Patients and providers, perhaps, are less susceptible to this problem and normal updating over a period of time, may be revealing the truth.

Selective Bayesian Updating, a disease that is substantially slowing the innovation slope in science and technology, could be treatable.

Thursday, August 13, 2015

Perfect simulation

It has long been speculated that the universe is a simulation and it is not real. The observed heavy fine tuning of its hypothesized ingredients – dark matter, dark energy, matter and anti-matter – supports this view. It is believed that an addition of even a gram of ordinary matter into the system could substantially alter its expected end state and its progression toward that. Both the initial conditions as well as the fundamental parameters of the laws of Physics, appear to have been so carefully selected for this simulation to work. Whatever be the case, these cannot be proved or disproved by the participants in the simulation as it will require an outside the system view and/or experiments that span multiple such simulations.

Perfection can come in only two ways – either there are infinite trials that produced a perfect outcome randomly or the experiment is designed carefully. Granted, in this context, the definition of perfection is somewhat arbitrary without data on alternative simulations that may lead to systems that are equally perfect. However, the possibility that we could be living in a simulation has many implications, the least of which is the approach we could take to search for life outside our corner in the universe.

If it is indeed a simulation, it is possible that it is focused on biological systems in a singular space-time that evolves over time. However, if our current understanding is correct (which is unlikely), the space-time window afforded to these very special biological entities is so narrow that the scope of the simulation (the universe itself) does not make sense. This leads to either rejecting the existence of the hard space-time constraint or not accepting that the only currently observed biological systems are special. An alternative is that the observed single occurrence of biology is an error and that such errors are unlikely in a system that is so well tuned. If it is an error, it would not make sense to seek such systems elsewhere as the objective function of the game does not include biology. Another possibility is that biology is a central theme of the simulation and the game evolves from an infinite separate occurrences of such features, across the universe. However, given that the participants of the simulation will have no control over the outcomes of such a pursuit, it seems less interesting.

In general, if the universe is a simulation, it does not make sense to seek intelligence elsewhere.

Friday, August 7, 2015

Quantum business

Businesses, for many centuries, have been dealing with constructs analogous to Newtonian Physics. For example, traditional finance and accounting, based on agriculture and more recently manufacturing, have devised cash flows and Net Present Value (NPV), constructs most conventional businesses apparently still run on. They stipulate precise measurement of the stock and flow of cash and decisions based on those ideas. They also introduced risk, something that became more precise over time, an unavoidable bad to adjust the cash flows, considered to be unambiguously good. All of these are precisely measurable – just as the gravitational constant and terminal velocity on Earth.

Business schools, world over, are still enamored by these archaic notions and they continue to graduate students, adept at counting and dividing, skills that have no value in the modern context. Businesses have been forced to migrate into a different regime, in which counting is delegated to computers and the velocity of Intellectual Property (IP) creation, reign supreme. Accounting metrics, profits and tangible assets, and even more sophisticated ones, free cash flow from operations, have all become utterly irrelevant. IP does not often equate to cash flows nor does it allow representation in a balance sheet, a remnant of manufacturing. The regime of quantum business has arrived and it is likely going to divide those engaged in it, into parallel worlds, some chasing the past of cash flows and the other redefining the uncertain future.

Financial statements, the least representative of the value of a firm in the modern world, still waste a sizable portion of the GDP in their creation, interpretation and consumption.

Wednesday, July 29, 2015

The human algorithm

Biological evolution, speculated to be a mechanism to improve the operating system of Earth based life, by massive parallel experiments, may be running out of steam. Lack of future slope in incremental benefits may lead to a stalemate or more likely a retreat to previous and more stable states. The human algorithm shows significant instability, having specialized more in the individual and less in systems. Individual’s objective functions tend to be simplistic and tactical, primarily bound by hard constraints, such as expected and predictable life span. Meanwhile, society, with inexplicable false expectations, languishes.

The human algorithm, imperfect at best, shows no signs of improvement over time. Individual's objective function has largely remained the same for over hundred thousand years, with a few clear goals. Occasional excursions into irrational arts and science have been quenched quickly, with bone numbing efficiency. They extricated the few individuals who asked questions and then innovated ways to cleanse entire swaths of gene pools, who disagreed. Improvements in the operating system itself were delegated to fancy apps with attrition rates that rival fruit flies. Optimism was replaced by fear, appropriately so, with octogenarians making policies and taking courses in gerrymandering.

The human algorithm, inefficient and stagnant, requires motivation to move to the next quantum state.

Saturday, July 25, 2015

Singularity, suspended?

There appears to be less noise in the airways about the impending singularity, recently. Perhaps, reality is sinking in, yet again. Many times in the past, humans have been lured by the exponential curve – some looking forward, ready to shake hands with ET and watch robot football. Others, looking backward, have been lamenting about the world running out of gas (fossil fuels, that is) and all associated problems. The exponential curve has led many astray.

The human brain, albeit a quantum computer, still remains limited in its ability to take advantage of exponential trends. For over 100 thousand years, they have been living in a linear progression, devoid of any major discontinuities. Apparent modern discontinuities – airplanes, computers and the internet – may have changed the slope incrementally, but the baggage carried by the human brain and psyche, will all but assure that there is no exponential ride for the race. They are prone to mean revert in any stochastic regime and the volatility afforded by the increasing stock – now approaching 8 billion – could all but assure they remain grounded.

As a minority in an ego bubble, worry about the singularity - for most, it is still, simply suspended animation.

Wednesday, July 8, 2015

Same beat, different drums

A recent article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows that dozens of statistical universals are present in music from all around the world. The authors argue that all music are constructed from the same building blocks. They also hypothesize that music brings people together and it has been acting as a social glue. Regardless, the statistical observations are interesting.

It has been intuitively obvious that humans have an affinity to rhythmic beat but the observation that statistical universals exist across all genre of music is intriguing. Music, perhaps, a precursor to the more structured and rigid language, has spanned evolution, as many animals show an equal or higher level of skill. Human societies, fragmented by language and culture, could find common ground in music – a more foundational protocol of communication. The fact that the shape, type and color of the drums carried by different cultures do not matter as they produce the same beat, may come as a surprise to those trying to cling to meaningless differences.

Music, foundational to human culture, could be a powerful mechanism to bring people together. It could be more effective than older concepts such as religion and emerging tools such as science.