CNN.com - Beijing closes public places over SARS - Apr. 27, 2003 As of Saturday, there were 4,836 cases of SARS worldwide, with 293 deaths, according to WHO figures.


Am I the only one (besides Fumento) that thinks SARS is a ploy of the UN to regain some of the esteem they have lost due to rational people taking action 12 years after it should have happened?

Watching FOX news right now, I almost got the impression that SARS was epidemic. Quickly I ran to CNN.com.

Top Story "Beijing closes public places over SARS".

Fearful that 100's of thousands of people had been struck down, I scanned the article. Buried down at the bottom were the number.

Total cases world wide: 4893
Total Deaths: 296

I couldn't find the duration of the "epidemic," but I understand it is more than a couple of months.

This doesn't mean I am going to go and breathe the same air as a SARS victim on purpose, but I am not going to stop a planned trip anywhere based on 5000 cases of anything after several months.

I understand that up to 40,000 Americans die every year from influenza. Using my advanced calculus techniques, this is about 100 people per day.

Fortunately, most people seem capable of handling the above numbers rationally. Just ask them them to put it in perspective and they visibly relax.

Controlling Medical Costs

I screwed up yesterday. My son went in for his one year physical. As the doctor was examining him, he noticed that my son's spleen was larger than he thought it should be. The doctor considered having a CAT scan done, but settled on an ultrasound. We consented to the test, along with a blood work up.

I admire the doctors throroughness in his job, but I am now questioning my attentiveness in controlling medical expenses. Hey... it was covered by insurance, why should I worry? This is the exact problem with the medical system at this time. Since the money isn't coming out of my pocket, I don't check it before deciding what tests I am willing to pay hard earned cash. The Ultrasound will cost approximately $400 (at least that was what it was last time). I don't know what the blood work will cost. The end result of the test was negative, but we will also be visiting the doctor again in 6 weeks so he can feel the spleen again.

If I had been more attentive, I should have discussed the options with the doctor a little more thoroughly. Just waiting 6 weeks and letting the doctor see him again may have been a more cost effective and reasoned approach. My son had no other indications. Happy, lively, active, rambunctious, eating, drinking, pooping and peeing. A couple of mild sicknesses so far, but nothing out of the ordinary. Apparently, spleens have been known to change sizes in babies as they are growing. Maybe 6 weeks would be too much, but 3 weeks probably wouldn't have been. If the enlarged spleen was still a concern at the slightly later date, we could start to be a little more concerned and take more significant steps at clearing the spleen.

Another options might be to reduce the cost and increase the availability of testing techniques. If techniques like digital ultrasound, CAT, XRay, and MRI are adopted, then significant cost savings can be achieved (just through the loss of the media maintenance). Other means can also be used (smaller, cheaper, machines available on demand).

The only problem with cheaper tests is that they can lead to even worse abuse.

Healthcare must be the responsibility of the patient not the doctor. We must be the ones determining what drugs we take, what therapies to undergo, and how we live our lives. When a doctor wants to give you a test, ask him how much it is going to cost and what the alternatives are. I got tested for strep several months ago. The doctor gave me two swabs. A 15 minute test and a 24 hour test. Each cost $80. If I had known this ahead of time, I probably would have just had him do the 24 hour test (since it is apparently more accurate). I can suffer the night for $80.

I will strive to minimize the cost of my healthcare to my employer. I hope that all who read this will do their best also.

Brad

Bizarre Science DEPLETED URANIUM

A good discussion of why DU is not likely to have caused cancer in the balkans.

AlterNet: A Hydrogen Economy Is a Bad Idea Currently, a Toyota Prius may get 5 percent of its overall energy from its batteries and could only go a mile or so as a zero emission vehicle. A second generation Prius might get 10 percent of its energy from batteries and might have a range of 2-3 miles. Why not encourage Toyota and Honda and others to increase the proportion of the energy they use from the batteries?


Amazing ! Somehow a vehicle that doesn't get a charge from the grid gets 5% of its power from the battery. One of the unique skills they taught us in engineering school is how to draw a box. Such a simple tool a box, but incredibly useful. In this case, we draw a box around the car. We then evaluate how energy enters and leaves the boundary created by the box. From what I have read about the Toyota Prius, the only way that energy crosses the boundary is in the form of Unleaded Gasoline. Hence, not one joule of energy comes from the battery. All of the energy comes from the fuel which is converted into mechanical energy by the Internal Combustion Engine.

No matter what Honda and Toyota do with their battery in this car, they will never, ever make the battery provide any net energy into the system. The whole reason for the batteries existence is to provide acceleration when an extra punch is needed to get the car moving or to get it to pass another vehicle. By using a battery, they were able to use a smaller engine. Smaller engine equates to greater efficiency.

Although the author of this article is generally correct about the probable usefulness of a hydrogen economy, he doesn't quite understand the problems with "renewables" like wind and solar.

The master of numbers has this (bottom of page POWER MAD) about creating energy policy.

Time to throw out 'myth' of recycling -- The Washington Times Time to throw out 'myth' of recycling

Hey look at this, a group of Environmentalists are finally starting to make sense. They are starting realize a simple rule of resource management:

If it costs more to recycle something than it does to make it from raw resources, don't bother recycling.

When I lived in Idaho Falls, the recyclers didn't collect glass. There was a very simple reason. It cost them $30/ton to ship to the nearest glass consumer and they could only get $20/ton from that consumer. Here in Hull, WI they don't collect white or colored paper for same reason.

Times Online has a nice little piece about the silliness associated with "green" power. A little black duck living in Carmarthen Bay will be quackers with fear over the Government?s energy White Paper. Although, the Cabinet wisely refused to commit itself yesterday to the much-hyped target of generating a fifth of our energy by 2020 from so-called ?renewables?, like waves and wind, it still presented a vision of our little island covered by giant wind-farms. But, the unpalatable truth about most ?renewables? is that they are no more ?green? than coal, oil, gas, or nuclear, which at least have the merit of working.

The Weekly James Because the question is not whether there will be more attacks. There will be. The question is whether we can survive them and still maintain an open society. What good is it to have Osama trapped in a basement somewhere if, by just whispering a few threats on Al Jazeera TV, he can trap us in self-sealed rooms?

No good at all, which is why the only survival purchase I've made since Code Orange is a new set of Ben Hogan Apex irons, and why my all-American survival kit would include: a movie guide, a concert schedule, Rollerblades, a bicycle ? plus a reminder to attend your local PTA meetings, Little League games, neighborhood block parties and your book club and to get plenty of tickets for your favorite sports team.


I am not going to buy a new set of clubs, but I will be hitting a bunch of golf balls as soon as the snow clears and i can find the ones I already hit.

Exxon VS Ed Begely Jr.

Here’s a question for the environmentally aware. Who is environmentally more friendly Exxon or Ed Begely Jr. Exxon drills, drums, and delivers Millions of Barrels of oil every year. That oil is then refined into Gasoline and other products, which drive our industrial society. Cars use the fuel and spit out nasty CO2 and other noxious chemicals. Most devastating of all, Exxon was in charge of the vessel Valdez, which dumped over 250,000 barrels of oil into the pristine Prince William Sound, devastating over a thousand miles of Alaskan coastline.

Mr. Begely, on the other hand, drives an electric vehicle charged by the solar panels on the roof of his house. He recycles just about everything. He probably doesn’t need to take trash to the curb more than once a year. He has a solar barbecue/oven in his back yard. He powers his television with a bicycle generator. At least part of his garden is watered by ‘grey’ water from his home (dishwater, shower water, etc). This man is the epitome of the environmental movement. Hard to imagine that anyone could compare this iconoclastic idol of greenpeace could be put anywhere near Exxon, the great menace to the earth.

I contend that Mr. Bagley is the greater evil of the two. Although he entertains a few people from time to time (I enjoyed him in Seventh Heaven, but wasn’t a target audience for St Elsewhere), I can’t say that he employs a lot of people with his skills. Exxon on the other hand employs hundreds of thousands. They employed over 10,000 people for the Valdez spill alone spending over $2 Billion trying to clean up their mess. If it weren’t for the steady stream of oil into this country, trucks wouldn’t be delivering goods to our supermarkets, department stores, and health food centers. Because of that oil, manufacturers are able to target larger markets and make products in greater quantity allowing economies of scale to take hold. Food can get from parts of the country that grow it well to where it is needed. People’s time is freed up so they can come up with new ways to view the world.

Exxon is guilty of polluting, but they are also guilty of creating the assets that funded the television shows in which Mr. Begley acted. These are the same funds that then bought him Solar Cells (which have yet to produce a net watt of electricity), an Electric car, and the spare time to sort all of his recyclables so that his taxes can pay for their disposal.

If I am pressed to choose between big business and some pansy ass fanatics, I am going to choose big business.

Create, Consume, Channel

This is my answer the dogma put forth by the anti-capitalists: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle . While I agree with the sentiment of the motto (I hate having to deal with excess waste), I realize that it misses a fundamental aspect of why our system of commerce works. It ignores the fact that the way to building wealth (and the free time to consider the implications of ones actions) is through the creation of goods and services that make others lives easier (giving them time to ponder). Those goods and services must be consumed. They must be allowed to be consumed with vigor (although not with abandon). If people like the product they will buy it. If they don't they won't.

Reduce, reuse, recycle is really talking about maximizing the efficiency of the whole process. In our system, the optimum way to track efficiency is to track profitability. The more efficient the entire process is, the more profitable it will be.

Traitors?

I have seen headlines in newspapers, on Fox News, and many other locations that had the gall to label the people who marched in protest of the possibility of war as TRAITORS. While I completely disagree with their position, I support their right to rally and march in opposition of whatever cause they wish.

The traitors of the day are the people like me who didn't march with signs saying:


"To Elbe with Saddam"
"Saddam! Get out now!"
"Free Iraq! Let's go in!"
"It is about the Oil! Don't let Saddam use it to kill Kurds!"
"Let individuals speak!"
"We get to march in opposition, why don't the Iraqis?"

I hope that I can mitigate my traitorous act, by speaking here, though few will actually hear it.....

Intemperate thoughts on War

I support the right of people to assemble and voice their concerns over the affairs of government. Without such expression, we might not question the actions that out leaders orchestrate. We must constantly question. Without questions, leaders will have no feedback.

That said: I disagree with just about everything the marchers espouse. Peace is not obtained by drawing lines in the sand and backing up and drawing a new line. Some argue that we shouldn't draw any lines, but they are wrong. If you don't define the boundaries of acceptable behaviour then all behaviour becomes acceptable. We (the silly united nations) decided that Iraq crossed the line. We (the UN) decided that Iraq should be disarmed of Weapons of Mass Destruction. Iraq refused to comply. The UN has made itself irrelevant to the esablishment of peace on this planet when it refused to back up its resolutions (I believe there have been 14) with something more harsh than a "Saddam, we mean it this time".

The war in Iraq IS about oil. It is; however, not about cheap gas for americans. It is about the power the Oil represents to the regime that controls it. Saddam has shown repeatedly that he is desperate to join the Nuclear Brotherhood by any means possible. I do not completely trust those that lead this country (this has to do with the fact that you have to be liar in order to get elected in this country in any election that is greater in scope than local), but I do trust that they will do everything within their power to keep from being exposed as a complete liar. The easiest way to do this on a subject of the magnitude of a War with Iraq is to obfuscate as little as possible. Bluffing at this point in the game would hurt the esteem of any politician involved more than backing down from the war.

War can be avoided. Saddam just needs to start coughing up the materials we no he has or he needs to abdicate and get the hell out of Baghdad. If he starts toeing the line, we will happily allow him to continue breathing.

The people of Iraq DO NOT have the ability to speak freely. All interviews with journalists are monitored to ensure that people do not speak anything that will offend his exalted excellency. 100% votes of confidence are sure signs that something stinks.

I look forward to a world filled with peaceful commerce. Peace of this scale will not be achieved until the leaders of all the world recognize the importance of the individual. The power the United States enjoys is the summation of individuals striving to find solutions to make their lives a little easier. They worked hard and in the process created unforseen wealth. We unleashed to power of the individual and won. It is disquieting to tyrants, socialists, and communists to have it demonstrated to them that allowing individuals free reign results in the greatest good.

President Bush, Secretary Powell, Tony Blair all want peace. Putting your soldiers in harms way is the last thing they want to do. But they have to be ready to do it to defend those individual rights. Depicting these gentlemen as blood thirsty politicians set on furthering their power base by indulging in war is nothing more than a win win ploy by there adversaries. Bush will be lambasted if he heads to war, but he would be equally criticized if he were to not go. Ridding the world of Saddam will make him more popular. That doesn't mean that is why he is intent on doing it.

If the Iraqis want to be free of Saddam, the war will be easy. If they want Saddam, then we shouldn't go, and we should probably turn the area into glass.

Will Nuclear Get the same exemption? Concerned about the potential impacts of the proposed fees on renewable and clean generation equipment, at least one commissioner is preparing an alternative to offer an exemption to "ultra clean resources."

Wanna bet "Ultra clean" means Photovoltaic (wait a minute, silicon is needed to make PV) and Wind generation and excludes Nuclear?

Nuclear is excluded from the renewable game, despite the fact that we have plenty nuclear fuel to last us till the end of times. Sadly determining the end of times is a little difficult. Some people were saying it would occur three years ago. Chances are it will occur sometime between now and several millions years from now. How's that for a prediction. We have adequate nuclear fuels to get us to the millions number. Hopefully in that time we can come up with a substitute.

Can't beat Junkscience for leads "The field of toxicology has made a terrible blunder," says Calabrese. "A lot of high-powered people need to take the time to explore this." (Nature Science Update)

Haven't doctors been using poisons for years to treat ailments? Of course the homeopaths would argue that the toxicologists were correct, but then they would like to dose you with vacuum disguised as a pill.

Any votes on the chance that such rational conclusions will continue?

Beer Drinkers Guide to Green House Gasses

Gather ye together:

4 Bottles Bud Light (5 Proof)
1 Bottle Samuel Adams (12 Proof)
3 tablespoons white Grape Juice (No Proof)
1 Tablespoon Fortified Whine (40 proof)
1 drop Monopoly (200 Proof)

Additionally you might like to get the following tools.

1 Pitcher
1 Tablespoon (a teaspoon will work)
1 Straw (gotta measure that drop accurately)

The whole discussion of carbon dioxide causes me no end of bemuzement. The global swarming masses keep harping that carbon dioxide is going to bring down the world. OH MY GOD! (oops atheists aren't supposed to say that ;-) ). The world is going to end because of CO2. What are we going to do?

Wait a minute. My sixth grade text book (or was it 9th) said that the composition of the atmosphere was something resembling the following.

79% Nitrogen: mildly reactive, but basically boring, can you say Bud Light.
18% Oxygen: A little more reactive, much needed by us carbon life forms... (wait a minute can there be a connection carbon and oxygen....) Sam Adams, my friends.
1% Argon: Huh?
1% Water Vapor: OOPS what's this a Green House Gas. Fortified Wine.
1% other: This with the argon makes great grape juice.

Hey wait a minute. They didn't even list Carbon dioxide. I must have missed something.

Nope. Here it is. 370 ppmv. That's 0.04%. Since the powers that be tell us that it is a devestating chemical (which just happens to be vital to the life cycle of most plants), we will use Monopoly (nasty stuff that will cause your throat to vapor lock) to represent it.

Open the bottles of beer and poor them into the pitcher.
Measure out the grape juice and fortified wine.

We can't just use a tablespoon to measure the monopoly though...

Take the cap from one of the beer bottles. Place it on a coaster. Pour a little monopoly in the cap. Take the straw and put it in the cap. Cover the end with your finger and transfer the drop that is held in the straw to the pitcher.

Did the Monopoly affect the potency (alcohol content) of the brew?

Some will tell me that nitrogen and oxygen don't absorb infrared radiation. While this is mostly true, they do absorb some radiation and they act as a container for the rest of the greenhouse gasses. Trying to have a green house without nitrogen and oxygen would be like trying to boil water without a container.

Since 95% of all green house gasses are produced naturally (Volcanoes, forest fires, cows belching, crops decomposing, and oh wait a minute humans respirating) it seems pretty ridiculous to think that cutting back 10, 20, or 30% on our industrial (including automobiles) CO2 production will do anything. If the evil United States, just up and quit producing CO2, the entire population effectively disappearing without a trace, total green house gas production will decrease to 99% of current levels. Yes, that's right just barely a percent decreasesin output.

This doesn't even take into account the fact that water vapor is more prevelant than Carbon dioxide and actually a more effective green house gas.

Of course, my Environmental Education friends will tell me I am a stooge for Bush...

Neal discusses (try here after 2/12) Bush's proposal to overhaul the tax system.

See details at Fair tax .

Congress made a decision supporting your privacy! Did they do it to because they were worried about votes or their own sordid web abuse?

Guillame le Goat

I had the displeasure of observing the great astrologer Guillame le Goat in action a couple of weeks ago. He was seated in a little vestibule where he was dispensing nostrums to a gullible public. For the exceedingly small fee of $2/minute, he helped people over the hurdles in their lives. I, having created horoscopes in my youth, knew something of the mechanics involved and figured that this master of astrological meanderings would have all the tools at his side to perform the calculations involved. The software involved to calculate a natal chart and overlay a current state is not that complicated and can be found on the web with a quick google search. I figured he would have a laptop or PDA sitting on the table into which he would enter the birthdate, birthtime, and birthplace of his intended mark. I was wrong. Who needs such complicated and expensive gadgets when a big book will do the same thing.

Somehow, this goat manages to open a book to a page, glance at it overlay the current position of planets, calculate oppositions, conjunctions, quartiles, and sextiles and then provide the interpretation necessary to enlighten his victim. Or should I say lighten. No reading was longer than 10 minutes, and he managed to start the interpretation within 5 seconds of turning to a page (which I assume were precalculated natal charts). I am probably wrong. But then I believe in strange things like gravitation, electricity, and nuclear power.

Go Figure.

If you can't figure out who le goat is .... email me and I will send you a link to his website.

A Useful Job For Epidemiologists

Since the number of useful applications of epidemiology are growing smaller, we need to find useful employment for them before they milk our governments dry with possible claims of potential health problems. As readers of Junkscience and Numberwatch well know, the number of health concerns that we should actually be concerned about is tiny. Each day another data dredge is published by publicity impoverished pseudo scientists picked up by gullible media managers and fed to an equally pliable public.

Let's find them real jobs. Instead of allowing them to suck up public funds creating scare after scare, let hand them over to the advertising industry. The desire to purchase goods can easily be seen as a disease. The factors that define the group that will buy a particular item can be seen as causes. They can do all the data dredging they want and present it to their new masters for testing. They will face a little problem though. The advertising industry will test their hypotheses almost immediately. "More study needed" won't work for very long, because if their infinitesimal relative risk factors (identifying good advertising risks) don't pan out properly, they will be told to hit the road.

Chances are that some aspiring Epidemiologist did try this and may have realized the spurious nature of small relative risk factors and run quickly back to the warm embrace of of public scare compaigns.

Silly me.

*** It should be noted that epidemiology is a tool that is quite useful in the proper circumstance. An epidemic is something larger than 5 cases of any disease. It is another example of sorites paradox as so aptly explained by John. This is good for epidemiologists, because they can define an epidemic as 1 or even 0. ***

Homeopathic Dilutions:

A simple calculation to find out how much of a 30c solution I must ingest in order to get 1 molecule of the substance into my system.
30c means that a solution has been diluted 1 part per hundred 30 times.
This can be represented by (1/100)^30 or (1/10)^60.
If I assume that the 1 molecule is elemental Hydrogen which has a molecular mass of 1 grams/mole.
Avagadros number (the number of atoms/molecules in a mole of a substance) is 6.022 X 10^23, we will make it 10^24.
To get 1 Kg of Hydrogen I need 1000 moles -> 10^3.
The mass of the earth is 6 X 10^24 kg -> 10^25 kg
So 10^24 molecules/mole *1 mole/1 g H * 10^3 g/kg * 10 ^25 kg/earth =10^52 molecules/earth.
I need 10^60 molecules to reach the point that I can start to think that I might actually ingest a little hydrogen.
This means that we need 10^8 earths (100,000,000) in order to ingest 1 molecule of hydrogen. Keep in mind that I was extra generous to the homeopaths. The molecules they use don't weigh 1 g/mole.

Considering that 30c is not as efficacious (according to the fanciful practictioners of Homeopathy) as a 200c dilution (10^400 and a good bit more than the mass of the universe), one wonders why any one of us is every sick. We must be ingesting all the antidotes to all the maladies all the time just by breathing.
Of course I don't have faith (being an atheist), which may explain my lack of belief in nonsensical concepts.