Getting the numbers wrong and cherry-picking — typical for a denialist

by ♥ellie♥

Wegman scandal: where was the due diligence?
[Via Deltoid]

Deep Climate continues his examination of the Wegman report. It would seem that Wegman’s “reproduction” of McIntyre’s results amounted to nothing more than running McIntyre’s code without understanding what it did. And while Mann’s “short centring” method does tend to produce a hockey-stick McIntyre greatly exaggerated the extent that it does so.

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Lots of background and investigation but one essential part – the denialists ran a simulation generating 10,000 graphs but then only used the top 1% that looked the way they wanted them to.

Makes me wonder what the other 99% actually looked like.

Would you wear Hitler’s Sweater?

by Chas Redmond

A Real-Life Version of the Hitler’s Sweater Experiment
[Via Big Think]

Colonel Russell Williams is one of those double-life people—an able military commander who was also a rapist and murderer. The crimes for which he was sentenced last month were shockingly evil, and that led the Canadian military last week to enact a real-life version of a well-known psychology …

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While I think the article was a little simplistic with regard to how the military makes decisions and maintains morale – it is not a rationalistic machine and uses symbols all the time – it does have an interesting point. Objects become imbued with the ‘spirit’ of their owners.

And the ending, where we find out how Canada dealt with Williams’ stuff is just great. And it prevents anyone from benefiting personally from them. I wish we had ceremonies like that for all sorts of people.

Insights into why iOS apps are so dominant

Scoble on iOS’s Domination in Mobile Apps
[Via Daring Fireball]

Terrific companion piece to my piece on the profound difference between today’s Android and iOS app markets. These “datapoints” from Scoble are exactly the sort of things that I’m talking about.

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The question is whether app developers even need the tech press and reviews anymore. But not for the reasons one might expect.

The biggest hits for the apps is to be featured that the iTunes store. And how do they get featured by Apple? Iy may be because Apple looks at the tech press to get ideas. The media is not acting as a filter to the consumer but as a filter for the distributor.

Apple wants to be the best broker of games – it wants the apps with the best potential to be popular to be seen. If they get popular, Apple makes money. So it wants to make it easier for people to discover new games/apps. That is where the tech press comes in, helping identify new apps.

When SNL actually successfully makes fun of you, you should quit

by Wonderlane

SNL is not always the top of satire as it used to be but sometimes it hits the mark pretty well.

The only thing better would have been having a male ‘guest’ wearing a kilt choosing which agent he wanted to perform a search.

Jeez, I wonder what the procedure is for the TSA when a gut going commando wears a kilt?

Remember how mortgages worked in It’s a Wonderful Life?

Who owns your mortgage, the mind-croggling flowchart edition
[Via Boing Boing]

This insanely complex chart represents securitization auditor Dan Edstrom’s best attempt to figure out who actually owns his mortgage: “The following flow chart reverse engineers the mortgage on the Ekstrom family residence. It took Dan over one year to take it this far and it clearly demonstrates what happens when there are too many lawyers being manufactured.”

Just When You Thought You Knew Something About Mortgage Securitizations(Thanks, Mr. Tough!)

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We are in this mess because a lot of ‘smart’ guys figured out how to make a mortgage into a three card monty scheme. No more having the bank hold the mortgage and title while they provide money.

Now everyone has a hand in the pile and after taking their cut and moving it around,it looks like there may have been a lot of fraud involved also.

But, they hold the economy hostage with their fraud so they take us al down also if we go after their crimes.

They will not stop until brought to heel. Put them in jail.

‘Dirty” courts dealing with fraud

Florida’s dirty “rocket docket” courts are a gift to fraudulent lenders
[Via Boing Boing]

Writing in next week’s Rolling Stone, Matt Taibbi is incandescent on the fraud-riddled, corrupt, closed-door “Rocket Docket” courts set up in Florida to expedite the process of dirtbag lenders kicking people out of their homes without having to provide any real evidence that the banks own the note or that the homeowners are delinquent. Taibbi smuggles himself into the court and documents in ghastly, clinical detail the dirty process by which banks use (badly) forged documents and judges who don’t give a damn about justice to steal peoples’ houses, all the while making indignant noises about “people who don’t pay their mortgages shouldn’t be in those houses.”

Now, months after its first pass at foreclosure was dismissed, the bank has refiled the case — and what do you know, it suddenly found the note. And this time, somehow, the note has the proper stamps. “There’s a stamp that did not appear on the note that was originally filed,” Kowalski tells the judge. (This business about the stamps is hilarious. “You can get them very cheap online,” says Chip Parker, an attorney who defends homeowners in Jacksonville.)

The bank’s new set of papers also traces ownership of the loan from the original lender, Novastar, to JP Morgan and then to Bank of New York. The bank, in other words, is trying to push through a completely new set of documents in its attempts to foreclose on Kowalski’s clients.

There’s only one problem: The dates of the transfers are completely fucked. According to the documents, JP Morgan transferred the mortgage to Bank of New York on December 9th, 2008. But according to the same documents, JP Morgan didn’t even receive the mortgage from Novastar until February 2nd, 2009 — two months after it had supposedly passed the note along to Bank of New York. Such rank incompetence at doctoring legal paperwork is typical of foreclosure actions, where the fraud is laid out in ink in ways that make it impossible for anyone but an overburdened, half-asleep judge to miss. “That’s my point about all of this,” Kowalski tells me later. “If you’re going to lie to me, at least lie well.”

The dates aren’t the only thing screwy about the new documents submitted by Bank of New York. Having failed in its earlier attempt to claim that it actually had the mortgage note, the bank now tries an all-of-the-above tactic. “Plaintiff owns and holds the note,” it claims, “or is a person entitled to enforce the note.”

Soud sighs. For Kessler, the plaintiff’s lawyer, to come before him with such sloppy documents and make this preposterous argument — that his client either is or is not the note-holder — well, that puts His Honor in a tough spot. The entire concept is a legal absurdity, and he can’t sign off on it. With an expression of something very like regret, the judge tells Kessler, “I’m going to have to go ahead and accept [Kowalski's] argument.”

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These financial guys aren’t even trying to lie in a believable way. The only reason to do this is because they do not think they will have any consequences for fraud.

And so far that seems to be the case. MAybe if a few CEOs ended up behind bars these lies would stop.

I wonder how accurate it is?

Heart Rate Free app uses iPhone 4 camera to measure pulse rate
Via MacDailyNews]

CMG Research Ltd today announced the release of Heart Rate Free 1.0…

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It is not for real medical use but I expect that we will see real medical apps that can get data on health and send it on to our doctors. That will be really neat.

Why I hate wireless carriers – their fees nickel and time you to death

Verizon’s Service Charges for the Galaxy Tab
[Via Daring Fireball]

An activation fee here, an overage charge there, and all of a sudden your first monthly bill for your “$20 plan” is $89.

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I’ll pay all that crap because I need a cell phone but I’ll be damned if I will put up with it for a tablet. That is why my iPad is a Wi-Fi only. If I have to access something via 3G, I’ll use my iPhone. Otherwise, I use my iPad.

Why have to deal with the eternal hassles of the wireless carriers TWICE? (Although the data plan Jobs worked out with ATT appears to have none of these picayune fees.)

And that is why the iPad will always be a big seller. I can get the exact same experience whether I have a WiFi only model or one with 3G. Same apps,. Everything.

Not so in the Android world where I have yet to see a WiFi only model that has anywhere close the same experience as the 3G forms. So, if you want to go Android and have a tablet, you HAVE to deal with the cell phone companies.

And all their assorted fees.

How a slaveholder felt 150 years ago

by Rennett Stowe

Disunion: A Slaveholder’s Diary
[Via NYT > Opinion]

In 1860, a widowed plantation mistress records her reaction to Lincoln’s election in her diary.

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This is a fascinating look into the schizophrenic and paranoid worldview of someone who was anticipating the glorious struggle about to occur so that she could keep her slaves.

And an interesting view of Lincoln, who she wishes had died because his election forced South Carolina to secede. The fact that Lincoln worked at least until at least 1863 to accomplish exactly what she wanted from her diary – free the slaves but send them overseas – does not seem to have entered her consciousness.

And, of course, all her slaves were very happy with their master, even though she knew they hated her. She knew everyone of them would try for freedom if given the opportunity. She wrote that down in her diary also. A nice person, who knew that her slaves were not animals and who would seek freedom if they could. Simply hard for us today to understand that sort of mindset.

I’d guess she would say that was due to the abolitionists from the North who were really the cause for all the problems.

In actuality, it appears most of it had to do with her economic situation – owning slaves was for the wealthy.

Most Southern whites did not own slaves. Perhaps 25-35% did, depending on the Southern state.

And of those, like today, the capital wealth of the slaves was concentrated in the hands of a few. In some states, there were more slaves than non-slaves. But over half owned less than 5. Brevard, the diarist, was one of the larger slave holders, with more than 200. Less than 1% of the slaveholders held 20-30% of the slaves. Sixteen slaveholders total held 1 in 346 of the slaves. One man, Joshua Ward, had over 1000 slaves.

Owning slaves was very lucrative. On a plantation with more than 20 slaves, the slaves were worth more than the land. The per capita income in the South was about $4,000 a year. Brevard owned slaves with a value of $150,000. Almost 40 times the annual income of others in the South. Ward owned slaves worth over $750,000 – almost 200 times the average income. The wealthiest people in America were found in the South. In fact, the cost of Southern slaves was so great that the idea of the Federal government ‘buying out’ all the Southern owners was ludicrous – the cost was too high. It was greater than the GDF of the North. It may have seemed cheaper to fight the most terrible war we have had than to find a peaceful, economic solution. Of course, in hindsight it would have been much, much more fiscally responsible for the North to have bought out the South, as the capital costs were almost 3 times higher for fighting the war.

But hard numbers have a difficult time with many worldviews, particularly the one espoused by Keziah Goodwyn Hopkins Brevard. The slaves made her wealthy. Secession would maintain that wealth. How wrong she was.

The coming war was to be fought over an economic lifestyle that only a minority of those in the South actually lived. And, while complete records are not available, it looks like close to 25% of those fighting for the South died during the conflict.

Get cancer or get blown up. The odds are the same.

Chance of Dying From Airport Backscatter Radiation About the Same as Chance of Getting Killed by Terrorists
[Via Daring Fireball]

MSNBC:

Peter Rez, a physics professor at Arizona State University in Tempe, did his own calculations and found the exposure to be about one-fiftieth to one-hundredth the amount of a standard chest X-ray. He calculated the risk of getting cancer from a single scan at about 1 in 30 million, “which puts it somewhat less than being killed by being struck by lightning in any one year,” he told me.

While the risk of getting a fatal cancer from the screening is minuscule, it’s about equal to the probability that an airplane will get blown up by a terrorist, he added. “So my view is there is not a case to be made for deploying them to prevent such a low probability event.”

(Via Randal Schwartz.)

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There is no benefit to the individual in this case. In fact, they are probably orders of magnitude more likely to die driving to the airport.

But these numbers are really interesting. About 2 million people fly a day in the US. So, by a rough rule of thumb from my statistic days, this would mean that there would be a greater than 95% chance that at least once malignancy would be caused by these machines every 45 days or about 8 a year.

But we don’t see 8 people a year die from terrorist attacks on planes in the US, do we? seems like the current efforts have been quite successful.

We have had zero people killed in the US on planes in the last year due to terrorists.Thus if the machines had been around a year ago, they would have caused 8 cancers but would really not have done any good at all.

So I would say these numbers indicate that not only is there no benefit to the individual but there is also no benefit to society. These machines could cause 8 cancers a year but have not demonstrated any ability to stop terrorist bombings.

I don’t think I will fly for a while.

I was full of Rage for John Carmack last night

from id Software.

Mike Schramm Interviews John Carmack
[Via Daring Fireball]

Nice interview at TUAW regarding Id’s amazing new Rage game and iOS gaming in general.

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It seemed to take forever to download the game. But while playing, it became obvious why: it is gorgeous. The scary thing from the interview is that they have enough content to fill out three Rage games for iOS. Good bye free time.

I spent several hours last night playing Rage on my iPad. I was very sore and facing an existential dilemma : continue to play or uncramp my body. Being an adult, I chose the latter but very unwillingly.

I can control the action either by a tilt interface to aim or by a touch one. I liked the touch one because I could at least finish the levels. But the tilt is really cool so I’m going to practice getting better.

And that is what is magic about this game. Replay value is tremendous. In a game on rails, you actually can not really control the character’s movement between set pieces – thus the rails. So many of these games quickly become somewhat boring.

Not Rage. There are so many details in every spot that I can only appreciate them all while playing the game again and again. Not just for the high resolution and realistic imagery but just for normal gameplay.

For example, ammo, health and cash are available but only if you grab them during the split second they are available. No going back to recharge. If you miss them, you have to quickly change a strategy because ammo loading and health are at a premium.

But there are also added reasons to try again. There are 50 bullseye targets in each level to try and shoot out. There is cash to pick up. There are head shots to accomplish.

And the action is so fast. But it is one where you have to really learn the entire level to accomplish it well. It will not be something that you can accomplish the first time. But each time you play the level, it comes easier. So the frustration level is really low and the advantage gained by learning is obvious.

It is the best game for replay action I have even had. I just want to beat my previous score, get more money and shoot more targets all while grabbing that ammo that seems to always be just out of my reach. It” get worse when they integrate it with Game Central.

I’ve been playing computer games since Adventure and Star Trek. I am just in shock to look at where gaming has gotten. From printing out text on teletypes to twisting a handheld mobile device around, from cryptic representations of spaceships to beautiful renderings, from game action that took minutes to complete to realistic twitch play.

Incredible. And I will get to have a really big edition for my desktop. But without the tilt or touch interface, it will not be quite as immersive, I thin.

I’d be asking TSA screeners these questions

Are TSA Airport Screeners Allowed to Wear Radiation Badges?
[Via Daring Fireball]

Ira Flatow, a month ago:

This weekend, when traveling through the airport at Buffalo, NY I happened upon one of those new whole body x-ray scanners. Refusing to be screened that way, I chose for a full body pat-down. Upon gathering up my stuff, I asked one of the screeners if she knew how much radiation she was exposed to each day. She said she did not know and wanted to wear one of the badges that her friend wears at a local hospital, but was told “no,” that would not be permitted. She was upset with that decision.

Why do dentists, doctors, med techs, etc. who work in other x-ray environments gladly wear these exposure detectors on their clothing but TSA employees do not or cannot?

This is just hearsay, of course, but it’s a good question for TSA. Maybe someone should ask Blogger Bob: Are TSA screeners permitted to wear radiation exposure badges?

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The levels of exposure to the X-rays are very small, so getting a couple is no problem. And the machines are supposed to be properly controlled so that spurious radiation does not leak out.

But, as I mentioned the other day, improperly calibrated machines can spew out radiation all over the place.

Are there monitors around to make sure that the TSA screeners are not being exposed to radiation? Sure, the machines may be great in a lab setting but what about real world? Are there measures in place to make sure that nothing odd happens and the TSA screeners get exposed?

And, what happens if they decide to wear a radiation badge on their own volition? Will they be fired or what? Turns out that in the comments at ScienceFirday, a screener says they can not wear ones on the outside because it is not part of their uniform but they could pay for one on their own and wear it under the uniform.

I think someone could make a killing right now selling radiation badges to passengers for plane flights. Frequent fliers could use them, send them in once a month for analysis, etc. A quick check reveals that you can get dosimeter badges or rings for about $70 for a years subscription, although it drops to about $50 in bulk. They can measure the exposure at deep, shallow and lens of the eye levels. The latter is the one best done for the backscatter.

The scariest thing about the TSA body scanners

by Wildernice

They apparently run off of an embedded version of Microsoft Windows XP! Prone to security vulnerabilities is right.

Every scanner is required to posses Ethernet connection, USB connections and able to have TCP/IP networking. They have everything they need to be networked. If they are, how hard would it be for internal pervs to send out pictures or external hackers to break in and control the data?

I mean could hackers send in any one of the known openings in XP to reboot the system and take it over? I’d sure like to put my security in the hands of XP.

Followup to climate change communication effort

More Thoughts on Why Climate Change Communication Often Backfires
[Via Age of Engagement | Big Think]

Over at the NY Times’ Dot Earth, Andrew Revkin has a post titled “An Inconvenient Mind” gathering thoughts from social scientists Dan Kahan and Robert Bruille on the UC Berkeley study that I discussed earlier this week. Here’s what Kahan and Bruille had to say, quoted from an email discussion …

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Study Finds That Fear Won’t Don’t Do It: Why Most Efforts at Climate Change Communication Might Actually Backfire
[Via Age of Engagement | Big Think]

Over the past few years, a growing body of research from the social sciences has pointed to one of the major challenges in communicating about climate change. This research suggests that many political leaders, environmentalists, and scientists–by focusing narrowly on the risks of climate change …

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I guess sometimes I should just read all of a site’s posts before commenting. But then that would take all the fun out of blogging.

The Age of Engagement has several earlier posts – see above – dealing with communication problems and some of the studies discussing the difficulties, particularly some of the social and psychological ones.

Fear does not work for most people because for one, people do not generally think rationally when afraid. In addition, fear of something they feel they have little control over often results in their inability to examine the problem at all. AFter a while they get desensitized to the fear and then it no longer gas any ability to change their behavior. Quite the opposite.

As I mentioned in my earlier post, the heuristics people use to deal with a complex world can often get in the way of facts and learning. As the research shows, belief in a just world can hamper understanding of Climate Change. These people believe in an ordered world where hard work pays off, laziness is punished and there is a certain order to things. “Future rewards await those who strive for them, and punishment awaits those who don’t work hard or break rules.”

When worldly events that are essentially random, that can fall on the just and unjust alike – such as climate change – are presented to those who score high on the just world heuristic, they become skeptical. If doomsday scenarios are shown, they simply ignore them.

Only when positive methods are shown, do they become connected to the message.

This makes sense. Their heuristic is that they have some control in the world. As long as they work hard, they will be successful. Showing them something that indicates they can not do anything will not resonate. Show them what can be done to be successful and they will be more accepting.

So, a firm understanding of the underlying rules of thumb people use to live their lives will be required. Not every message will resonate with everyone, but specific messages can be targeted to resonate with specific world views.

The problem is not strictly an incomplete presentation of the facts. It comes down to the manner those facts are presented to them.

[Updated] Confronting a communication problem head on

[See my followup post for an updated discussion]

by cdsessums

Letter at Science: Time to Take Action on Climate Change Communication
[Via Age of Engagement | Big Think]

In a letter at the journal Science this week, my colleagues Ed Maibach and Tony Leiserowitz join with Tom Bowman, climate scientists, and other social scientists to issue a call-to-action among expert organizations to systematically invest in new approaches to climate change communication. I …

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I applaud the effort even as I expect it to have a tough time. In some cases, the problem can be overcome by education of important facts. But in many cases, there are strong psychological pressures that prevent people from changing their views.

There are a number of studies which demonstrate that when people are given facts that resonate with their preconceived view of the world, that is what they remember, even when those facts are wrong. Even when they are told those facts are wrong.

The internal heuristics we all develop to deal with a complex world are very potent and it requires a tremendous amount of work to alter those rules of thumb. Simply presenting facts will not accomplish that. People rationalize what things to remember and believe, finding ways to ignore or deprecate data that contradicts what they ‘know’, what their gut tells them.

Pulling people out of these Cargo Cult Worlds they have gotten themselves into will not be an easy task.