Game theory shows that Chinese generals were right

To bluff, or not to bluff? That is the question
[Via Science Blog -]

Economist Christopher Cotton from the University of Miami (UM), uses game theory to explore two of the most famous military bluffs in history. The findings are published in the current issue of the Journal of Peace Research.

The study is one of the first to use game theory to assess the Chinese military legends of Li Guang and his 100 horsemen (144 BC), and Zhuge Liang and the Empty City (228 AD). The stories appear in modern day translations of Sun Tzu’s fundamental book on military strategy “The Art of War” to explain what is meant by deception.

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The key they found was not to pretend to be strong when you are not but to make the opponent worry about the army’s strength. Making the strength ambiguous – could be large or could be smal – makes it more likely that the opposing army will retreat.

Uncertainty increases the chances of the bluff working. So presenting contradictory information will make people more likely to wait and see instead of confronting.

This seems to be applicable to other areas, such as climate change. The strongest group – the thousands of climate scientists and their supporters – is up against a much smaller group that works simply to confuse the issue, making it hard to create a sure victory for the stronger group.

Pretending to be large and strong while also sending signals of weakness is the best strategy when you have nothing. Strong armies do not need to do that.

Another ‘failed hypothesis’ is apparently due to the Jews

Evolution: Jewish Conspiracy to Rule the World!
[Via Dispatches from the Culture Wars]

PZ already spotted this one but it’s worth another look. These are the wingnut’s wingnuts, arguing that evolution is a Jewish conspiracy to destroy Christianity and take over the world. It includes gems like this:

Why doesn’t the scientific community abandon Darwin’s failed hypotheses? Simple: The Jewish-dominated media and educational establishment are determined that, like unconditional support of Israel, Holocaust mythology, hate laws, and “civil rights” favoritism, there will be no end to the relentless force-feeding of evolution. Belief in evolution is a prerequisite for Jewish supremacism’s new-world order.

The whole thing is hilarious and worth reading just for amusement.

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Failed hypothesis seems to be one of the latest talking points for denialists. Here, though, the model they wish to substitute for evolution seems to reveal more about their bigotry than their science.

A name to watch out for – Ted Pike and the National Prayer Network. The Anti-Defamation League certainly is.

The climate confusers continue their ‘conversation’

by Ivan Walsh

The Heartland Institute: Undermining Science in the Name of the “Scientific Method”
[Via DeSmogBlog - Clearing the PR Pollution that Clouds Climate Science]

365px-Francis_Bacon_2.jpg

I must confess, I’m less and less motivated these days to write posts debunking climate change skeptics and deniers. Their minds don’t change, and fighting over climate science may just make us polarized—especially since mounting evidence suggests the climate divide is really more about values than science to begin with, and science is simply the preferred weapon in a clash over different views of how society (and especially the relationship between the government and the market) should be structured.

Sometimes, though, you just can’t resist blasting away. This is one of those times.

The Heartland Institute is having yet another conference to undermine climate science, and this time, they are flying it under this banner: “Restoring the Scientific Method.” It’s like they think they are now Francis Bacon (at left) or something.

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Anyone who calls anthropogenic climate change a ‘failed hypothesis’ ,as the Heartland Institute does, has an incomplete view of how science and the scientific method works.

But then their purpose is not to further our understanding of the world around us but to create political cover for policy makers. They used the same sorts of tactics against cigarettes. In fact, some of the same groups involved in confusing us about lung cancer are involved in confusing us about climate change.

Science works best by creating models to describe Nature. We use data to understand how good a fit the model is to reality. The better the model, the better it fits – not only to data that have already been generated but also in a predicative sense, explaining data that will be generated.

There is a huge amount of data, much of it generated after the idea of AGW was promulgated, that supports this model. Other models that have been proposed – its the sun, it due to incorrect data readings, etc. – has simply fallen away because they do not explain the data we have generated.

The best explanation is a model that includes human generated carbon dioxide. This comes closest to fitting ALL the data.  That is why this model is so strong.

There is no other model which does as good a job. Until there is, AGW will remain. If they want to overturn AGW by science, then do it by science – come up with a better model.

It has not happened so far, although many have tried. There might be something better than AGW – after all, it is a model of reality – but it is the very best we have at the moment and there is no indication of any better one coming along soon.

Climate denialists, just as we see with denialists of every stripe, really have no model to fit the void that would be left if the scientific model was removed. They have no explanation that is both explanatory or predictive.

If they did, there would be some real understanding of the Scientific Method. All they really have is obfuscation and confusion.

I guess lying and fibbing is a living. At least for lawyers. Not for scientists.

An interesting view on the Arab Spring

What Caused the Arab Spring?
[Via Big Think]

What’s the Latest Development? French social scientist Emmanuel Todd calls himself a “cosine academic”. In favoring statistical models over political or ideological explanations, it is not surprising that he links the uprisings across the Middle East and North Africa to very measurable metrics: literacy, birth and marriage rates. In each case he sees a process of modernization that augments individuals’ liberties. “When more than 90 percent of young people can read and write and have a modicum of education, no traditional authoritarian regime will last for long.”

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He says it is not strictly due to a policy of regression and that the rise of fundamentalists is due to the rapidly changing milieu people find themselves in. Some react by embracing the new; others by becoming more repressive.

A modicum of literacy, particularly amongst women, seems to be a major spur for the toppling of authoritative regimes. As well as young who no longer want to be as restricted in their thinking. There may be some intermittent rulers who abrogate these ideals, just as the French Revolution led to Napoleon.

In the end, Enlightenment always seems to win.

How 3D movies screw things up for the rest of us

by Jesse Varner

Cinema chains dimming movies “up to 85%” on digital projectors
[Via Boing Boing]

The Boston Globe reports that AMC, National Amusements, and Regal cinema chains are leaving 3D projector lenses on for 2D movies. This means that the projected image is polarized and far dimmer than it should be. The chains won’t acknowledge that they’re doing it, but one quoted insider says its an “unspoken” corporate policy.

Given that your HD TV set shows it just fine, and your living room doesn’t smell of weaponized butter, aren’t they driving customers to piracy? Try this for irony: one reason operators hate changing lenses is reportedly because of crippling DRM on Sony’s digital projectors, which “will shut down on you” if a mistake is made when resetting the system. So, they just don’t change them, because serving a ruined product is better than serving no product at all.

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In order to change the lenses, they need passwords and security clearance. If they do it wrong – which is likely – the projector shuts down.

So, they leave on the 3D lenses and make the overall picture much darker.  Take your monitor and turn the brightness down to the 15% level. Is that a great ‘picture’? Now watch a video fullscreen. DO things seem a little muddy?

Thus even with 2D movies, 3D ruins the experience.

Psychology Today’s own blogs dismantle the ‘black women are not attractive’ pseudoscience

by tibchris

Not everyone at Psychology Today is incompetent
[Via Pharyngula]

That study claiming that black women are “objectively” unattractive seems to be finally getting its author, Satoshi Kanazawa, in big trouble. That would be entirely wrong if it were based on disliking his conclusions, but if it were based on a demonstration of Kanazawa’s incompetence, then it would be earned. And that seems to be what is happening. Interestingly, many really good criticisms of Kanazawa are coming from Psychology Today’s blogs.

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I had read some initial critiques of this ‘work’ but these are pretty devastating. In particular, this one where the author went back and looked at the data itself:

Kanazawa mentions several times that his data on attractiveness are scored “objectively”. The ratings of attractiveness made by the interviewers show extremely large differences in terms of how attractive they found the interviewee. For instance the ratings collected from Waves 1 and 2 are correlated at only r = .300 (a correlation ranges from -1.0 to +1.00), suggesting that a meager 9% of the differences in second wave ratings of the same individual can be predicted on the basis of ratings made a year before. The ratings taken at Waves 3 and 4 correlated between raters even lower, at only .136– even though the interviewees had reached adulthood by then and so are not expected to change in physical development as strongly as the teenagers. Although these ratings were not taken at the same time, if ratings of attractiveness have less than 2% common variance, one is hard pressed to side with Kanazawa’s assertion that attractiveness can be rated objectively.

This means that the data do not really support Kanazawa’ conclusion as well as simple chance does. In fact the data support the conclusion that there is no difference between ethnicities regarding physical beauty.

It is pretty interesting how crappy pop psychology from a non-peeer review magazine can get spread all over the world. People’s biases to believe certain things are on sharp display then.