Monday, April 9, 2018

Apr 9 Links

  • THE Sons of Mary seldom bother, for they have inherited that good part; But the Sons of Martha favour their Mother of the careful soul and the troubled heart. And because she lost her temper once, and because she was rude to the Lord her Guest, Her Sons must wait upon Mary's Sons, world without end, reprieve, or rest. [Kipling]
  • It's a mild, early March Saturday in Nashville: the first real weekend of bachelorette season. By 10 a.m., they've already descended on the Gulch, a neighborhood that looks like it was constructed in The Sims: everything built at the same time, in the same slick, clean-lined style. Fifteen years ago, it was a rail yard — an actual gulch. Today, it's a collection of brunch spots (the most popular is Biscuit Love, included in every respectable bachelorette blog post), a Frye Boots store, an Urban Outfitters, a Google office, a place called "Two Old Hippies" selling $200 dresses and tea towels printed with spunky messages, a blowout bar, a juice bar, and an actual bar. [Buzzfeed]
  • In 1910, just 5% of American babies named "Charlie" were girls. Over 100 years later, girl Charlies took over their male counterparts for the first time in 2016—making up 51% of the share. With little fuss or fanfare, Charlie has gone gender-neutral. [link]
  • It is well known that non-classical anti-cancer drugs, such as metformin, aspirin and resveratrol, demonstrate promising and synergistic efficacy when combined with other chemotherapeutic drugs. Most importantly, nearly all these drugs can activate the AMPK signaling pathway to inhibit cancer cell proliferation. As the critical energy sensor, AMPK monitors intracellular energy alterations and is conserved across all eukaryotes. AMPK is activated by a decrease in intracellular ATP concentration and a concomitant increase in the amount of AMP. Upon ATP depletion or various other stress conditions, AMPK is phosphorylated at 172 Thr by LKB1 and other upstream kinases. Then, AMPK inhibits mTOR signaling and protein synthesis, which has been reported to be critical for tumor growth in experimental animal models as well as in cultured cells. Therefore, AMPK activation is a feasible therapeutic strategy for cancer treatment. Interestingly, as we mentioned in this review, metformin, aspirin, resveratrol, berberine, lovastatin, epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG) and capsaicin activated AMPK and demonstrated anti-cancer effects, regardless of whether they were used alone or in combination with other chemotherapeutic drugs. Noticeably, metformin, aspirin and berberine could also resensitize cancer cells, even those that were resistant to doxorubicin or radiotherapy. [link]
  • In our view, much of the difference between the artificial values of the dot-com era and the genuine value created by the Internet can be explained by the difference between the Metcalfe-fueled optimism of n2 and the more sober reality of n log(n). [IEEE]
  • Several animal phyla lack bilateral symmetry. Among these, the sponges (Porifera) probably diverged first, representing the oldest animal phylum. [Wiki]
  • What everyone except the MAGA-sphere has figured out is they can push Trump around without consequence. He's just a gutless windbag. This migrant horde will cross the border and be turned lose in your neighborhood, while Trump is on twitter demanding the Democrats support his DACA plan to legalize a million new Democrat voters. Trump is turning out to be a crude, blustering version of Jeb Bush. [Z Man]
  • From the perspective of the ruling class, a Democrat House is the ideal solution to their Trump problem. For the remaining two years of his tenure, nothing will make it out of the House that can pass the Senate, and nothing the President wants will pass either house of Congress. Trump will go into his primary against someone like Ben Sasse, financed by globalist money, having nothing to show for his first term in office. The ads showing a wide open border with the sound of Trump promising a wall will cripple his campaign. [A]t some point, one has to assume the public will notice that voting makes no difference. Right now, voting seems to make things worse. If a populist candidate or party does well, the political class punishes the voters with even more globalism. The results thus far suggest staying home is the best way to promote your interests. Eventually, even Trump voters will figure this out and disengage. [Z Man]
  • Why do individuals become entrepreneurs? We develop a model in which individuals signal their unobservable ability to employers (e.g., via educational qualifications). However, signals are imperfect and individuals whose ability is greater than their signals convey to employers choose entrepreneurship. [SSRN]
  • Before these theories of light were unified in stack of abstractions, each theory had to start with a fundamental concept of light from the ground up. This involves making up a fresh set of unrealistic assumptions. Newton's ray optics modeled light as a spray of particles that could be attracted to, or repelled from, solid matter. Huygens modeled light as a longitudinal pressure wave through a mystical medium called "ether". He modeled light like sound. [link]
  • This morning every stock in my portfolio is down — excepting United Health (UNH), which reported stronger than expected higher profits. As I complete this post, my portfolio is down 3%, which is huge. As I eye the red ink, I am beginning to believe that Trump's anger (and ignorance) will seriously hurt the stockmarket's prospects for the rest of this year. [Technology Investor]
  • "It turns out my maternal ancestry is from Yerevan," a user wrote on the website Eksi Sozluk, where thousands of comments have appeared on the issue. "My paternal ancestry meanwhile is Georgian. I am in shock." [NY Times]
  • John William Friso and his wife are the most recent common ancestors to all currently reigning European monarchs. This is a distinction he has held since 1938, when Franz Joseph II -a descendant of John William Friso, succeeded Franz I - who was not a descendant, as Prince of Liechtenstein. [Wiki]
  • When Trump indeed did win, he started to look like he might have some superhuman grasp of the dynamics of power and influence. But that looks absurd today. Trump's rebellion is minor, and the Republican Party is in charge, shouting about wonderful tax cuts as voters prepare to give them the boot. [VF]
  • "Right-wing Asian" often refers to someone who hates the Constitution, views free speech as a confused historical aberration, and pledges to ban guns on every survey. [Sailer]
  • We generally obtain licenses for two types of rights with respect to musical compositions: mechanical rights and public performance rights. With respect to mechanical rights, for example, in the United States, the rates we pay are, to a significant degree, a function of a ratemaking proceeding conducted by an administrative agency called the Copyright Royalty Board. The rates that the Copyright Royalty Board set apply both to compositions that we license under the compulsory license in Section 115 of the Copyright Act of 1976, and to a number of direct licenses that we have with music publishers for U.S. rights, in which the applicable rate is generally pegged to the statutory rate set by the Copyright Royalty Board. The most recent proceeding before the Copyright Royalty Board set the rates for the Section 115 compulsory license for calendar years 2018 to 2022. The Copyright Royalty Board issued its initial written determination on January 26, 2018. [EDGAR]
  • They got 200 miles of range (against a spec of 310 for the $56,000 car) in weather just below freezing. Will Tesla 3 passengers who aren't starstruck by Elon Musk say "I feel like I'm riding in a tin can mounted on top of a marine battery"? [Phil G]
  • This aggressively minimalistic approach results in some strange and unsuccessful attempts to reinvent the automotive interior. The process required to move the mirrors and to manipulate the power-adjustable tilting and telescoping steering wheel incorporates both a menu within the touchscreen and the finicky steering-wheel scroll buttons. Changing the direction of airflow from the HVAC vent that stretches across the full width of the dash is, similarly, a multistep affair in which you must pinch and swipe a display within the climate-control menu that resembles a not very addictive smartphone game. [Car and Driver]
  • Netanyahu figured that unloading 16,000 of Israel's 35,000 African immigrants onto to goyishe kopf white gentile countries would be a masterstroke. But Bibi's rightwing frenemies objected that it would be a concession that Israel couldn't unload the other 19000 back to their native continent on the grounds that it would be inhuman to return Africans to Africa, a precedent that could well destroy the Jewish State over the rest of this century. [Sailer]
  • Much of the class hatred in America stems from the suspicions of the intelligentsia that plumbers and mechanics are using their voodoo cognitive ability of staring at 3-D physical objects and somehow understanding why they are broken to overcharge them for repairs. Thus it's only fair, America's white-collar managers assume, that they export factory jobs to lower-paid China so that they can afford to throw manufactured junk away when it breaks and buy new junk rather than have to subject themselves to the humiliation of admitting to educationally inferior American repairmen that they don’t understand what is wrong with their own gizmos. [Sailer]
  • Parents in Japan regularly send their kids out into the world at a very young age. A popular television show called Hajimete no Otsukai, or My First Errand, features children as young as two or three being sent out to do a task for their family. As they tentatively make their way to the greengrocer or bakery, their progress is secretly filmed by a camera crew. [link]
  • Don't watch TV, don't read magazines, don't even listen to NPR. Create your own roadshow. The nexus of space and time where you are now is the most immediate sector of your universe, and if you're worrying about Michael Jackson or Bill Clinton or somebody else, then you are disempowered, you're giving it all away to icons. This is shit-brained, this kind of thinking. That is all cultural diversion, and what is real is you and your friends and your associations, your highs, your orgasms, your hopes, your plans, your fears. [link]
  • It is said among merchant mariners that, yes, a captain has the authority to refuse orders he deems to be unsafe—but probably only once. [Vanity Fair]
  • Spencer Fullerton Baird (February 3, 1823 – August 19, 1887) was an American naturalist, ornithologist, ichthyologist, herpetologist, and museum curator. Baird was the first curator to be named at the Smithsonian Institution. He would eventually serve as assistant Secretary of the Smithsonian from 1850 to 1878, and as Secretary from 1878 until 1887. He was dedicated to expanding the natural history collections of the Smithsonian which he increased from 6,000 specimens in 1850 to over 2 million by the time of his death. He published over 1,000 works during his lifetime. [Wiki]
  • The water imposes strict constraints. To thrive in it, mammals must be just the right size—big, yes, but not too big and not too small. And Gearty could calculate the boundaries of this Golidlocks zone with a set of equations that connect a mammal's size with the heat it loses to the water and the rate at which it can find food. These equations predicted both the optimum 1,100-pound average that seagoing mammals have evolved toward, and the narrow range of sizes around that ideal. [Atlantic]
  • After more than a week of deliberations, the North Carolina Business Court has ruled in favor of Raleigh-based First Citizens BancShares' efforts to suspend Smithfield-based KS Bancorp's "poison pill" provision – at least while the litigation between the two banks continues. [link]
  • Among US adults aged 51 years and older, loss of wealth over 2 years was associated with an increased risk of all-cause mortality. [JAMA]
  • For instance, in a conversation with one of Mr. Pruitt's closest aides, Mr. Chmielewski sharply objected to a proposal to buy a $100,000-a-month charter aircraft membership that would have allowed Mr. Pruitt to take unlimited private jet trips for official business. [NYT]
  • Magazines, in Langewiesche's opinion, are great beasts that have to be fed, constantly. If they're not fed they die, and so they're desperate for material. But they're usually fed poorly. [link]
  • In mathematics it's been a tradition for hundreds of years to make papers as formal and austere as possible, often suppressing the very visual aids that mathematicians use to make their discoveries. [Atlantic]

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Not sure how you find links, but thought this was interesting, albeit a bit long...

"Inflation good, deflation bad"

https://medium.com/@jjncapital/yea-capitalism-fools-gold-7ad5fb86598c

Midwest Pete said...

Apropos of a Links post, based upon your occasional Bach posts, Credit Bubble, you might like this discussion on the Dynamic Compression/Loudness Wars in music. Admittedly Dynamic Compression almost a 20 year old phenomenon at this point and if, as some say, the war is over, well, it seems the good guys lost.

Good comment thread too.

http://archimago.blogspot.ca/2018/04/musings-on-dysphonic-sounds-and-mobys.html

OTOH, Classical music and Jazz have been largely spared, so depending on your musical preferences, it might be a moot issue for you.

League of Women Voters said...

Midwest Pete can you explain that for those who aren't recorded music aficionados?