npts2020

For those short on time the following will be pretty long-winded. I have seen many ideas about what is happening to the economy (particularly the American) and only a few have made any real sense to my non-economist mind. Even fewer of the proposed "solutions" have made any sense to me. The following is a description of how I see the economic problem and view the the solution. I don't expect anyone to agree with the analysis or conclusions but any respectful feedback will be greatly appreciated. Premises of discussion 1)We are on the brink of the greatest economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930's and maybe ever. 2)Random spending of vast quantities of money will not solve the problems. 3)The problems are mostly structural (or lack of) related to an unsustainable economy. 4)There are solutions for avoiding the worst effects of our situation. 1) To say the economy is in a funk is not a statement any sane person would disagree with, but to say that it may become the worst ever is something that requires further explanation. The signs of slower economic activity are fairly indisputable; higher unemployment, lower stock market, fewer imports and exports, slowed or negative GNP growth, etc. These are just the some of the ones that are frequently on the front page. In addition, there are some markets that are almost completely unregulated (I have ranted elsewhere about derivatives---supposedly $500 trillion worth of investment) that have exceeded their natural limit. What happens if a significant number of those entities (corporate or individuals) are not able to meet their financial obligations? IMO if this does happen things willbe worse than ever, hence the frantic shovelling of money from Washington, D.C. into the black hole of wishful thinking..... 2)Already a boatload of money (we can quibble about the amount) has passed from the U.S. Treasury to corporate America in the past year with little visible effect. IMO it is simply because it was given no direction. This is so profound that even Congress is beginning to wonder why. They need to look in the mirror to find the cause. What do you think happens when you hand out money with so few strings, that a plan for being able to pay it back is not even needed (isn't that kinda what happened with the sub-prime mortgages:doh:)? Very little, if any, of the money the government has handed out has had any specifications for its use, and therefore gets used to keep doing what is already being done. If what is being done is the reason you are in trouble to begin with, how is it logical to expect continuing to do it will reverse your fortune? The answer, of course is..... 3)What has gotten us here has worked in the past. The problem is that there are a few things happening now that have not happened in the past. In my mind the most prominent is the sheer size of the human population, not necessarily in America or even in the world as a whole but in the numbers that aspire to use resources at the rate of Americans. Even though there would be someone glad to sell the means for everyone to do this, it is highly unlikely our biosphere would not suffer major changes doing this for everyone in the world, the way we go about things at present. The major obstacle at present is energy, not in lack of it but rather how it is produced. This affects every user from automobiles, to chemical manufacturing plants, to street lights. If energy prices vary widely, economic planning becomes more difficult because of a less certain future. Once there are sufficient wind, solar, geothermal, tidal, or other relatively carbon-free sources in place this problem should be largely solved. Some other unsustainable aspects of the economy; the national debt, chronic trade deficit, negative savings rate, unrestricted corporate bailouts, rate of increase of health care cost, no-interest Fed loans. In order to keep this post at a readable length I will not expound on any of these further now except to say they are a bad combination to have at any time but even more so under the current economic stress. 4)From what I can gather, economists almost universally say that it will take some kind of massive government expenditure to avoid the worst effects of this recession. This is all well and good, but if you are going to drive the national debt up to the point where it could take more than a generation to pay it back, shouldn't we get something that lasts for a generation or more for it? IMO the best place government can spend money is on infrastructure used by all. My personal preference is for automating our highway system but also includes electric grids, communication grids, schools (buildings and equipment), sewage and waste disposal, clean water and others I can't think of off the top of my head. The point being that, so far the government has been giving out money to be "invested" instead of just doing the investment itself. Why are the billions of dollars better invested by going through a "middleman" rather than spending it on things you know need to be invested in? The only solution I can see is government spending, but that has to be carefully directed with enough strings attached to figure out where it went, especially when handed over to a third party. Even if all of that happens, there is no guarantee it will work but at least we will have some first rate schools, more reliable grids, and/or an automated transit system.

Isn't that what Mahatma Ghandi did?

I wonder how the citizens of Tuvalu or many other Micronesian countries feel about melting enough ice to put their entire country below sea level?

Few people I know who are serious students of cosmology would much disagree with this other than perhaps contesting the notion of Big Bang vs. Big Bounce or quibbling about the exact age. Nobody (that I am aware of) has ever shown conclusively that either idea is correct or not.

The cosmological constant only changes relative to our present time. Relative to the cosmos it is constant, it is the cosmos that changes.

Trouble is, I seriously doubt more than a few members of Congress ever read the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (as with most legislation) and would bet even fewer had/have any clue of its implications. The fact that it even passed is as strong proof as I have ever seen that America is run by a single "Business Party" with any differences about being Democrat or Republican being mostly cosmetic. Why would any "traditional" Democrat be in favor of giving money to the richest corporations in the world? Yet the Congressional puppet jumped when the executive from the "other" party pulled the strings.

Unfortunately The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 Places almost no conditions on the recipients of the money or the Treasury Secretary, who hands the money out. The only "concessions" made between the bill that was turned down and the one that passed, was more spending not more regulation or oversight. Currently the only oversight is we can complain, if we can figure out exactly where all of the money went. I don't think anyone can be prosecuted for this seemingly legal looting of the U.S. Traesury, our elected representitives have gone for it hook, line, and sinker.

Is that how long it's going to take to get the LHC fired up to do the job? And here I was being told next year.

IMHO The only way humans will ever fly with their own wings is if somebody figures out a way of grafting a nerve and muscle system onto a carbon fiber infratructure, this *might* make you light enough to fly. It would still require a tremendous amount of energy for even a short flight (how many of us can run as far as 100 meters without pretty severe shortness of breath by the end?). Of course this is after figuring out how to graft your vitals into the infrastructure. I think I will be not attempting any of this ever.

I have nothing to back this up but I would think the strongest field would either be at the edge of where the core becomes molten or halfway from there to the center, not in the exact center. Where is the strongest field in a bar magnet? If the core is what causes our magnetosphere could it not be modelled like a spherical bar magnet?

snp; You should definitely put forward any ideas you have. There are people here who can either show you where your ideas are in error or help refine them into coherence. I have found the review process to be typically fair, if sometimes harsh. Be prepared for a lively discussion if you are proposing anything novel to current understanding. Good luck to you, sir. IMO advancement of knowledge is a worthwhile pursuit for anyone not struggling with basic survival.

I don't see why anyone would be surprised by this, after all it was the same profligate greed and disregard for consequences that got us here to begin with. IMO most of the current consternation is a result of the derivative market more than just real estate troubles, although the two are very interrelated, especially since credit default options (CDO's) make up a significant part of the derivative market. Essentially, a derivative allows you (usually a large corporation) to borrow money against assets, frequently being leveraged to 90% or more. Now you have asset values, especially real estate, being depressed, making the degree of leveraging even greater. Everything is still ok as long as the vast majority of derivatives are not being cashed in. The kicker comes when the companies backing the derivatives go into default themselves. A typical derivative is backed by anywhere from about 30 to 100 companies but if a certain number of those companies (as few as 12 on many) go into default the derivative is considered to be in default. Only a little over 100 companies underwrite virtually all of the derivatives worldwide. Some of the ones already in default, WaMu, Lehman Bros., Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae. Additionally, there are up to 35 more of those companies in financial trouble enough to be considering bankruptcy, mergers, downsizing or other drastic restructuring. A few of these companies are GMAC, Ford Credit, AIG, Citicorp, Goldman Sachs. If as few as about 20 of these companies end up defaulting for any reason, as much as $500 trillion in wealth could be basically flushed down the drain. One could say that that wealth never really existed to begin with but the fact of the matter is that it will have to be accounted for in some manner IMO deflation and devaluing of the dollar being the ultimate accountant. Now, if you want a concrete definition or "too big to fail", check out what companies are underwriting this market and are in trouble, those are the ones too much in debt to be able to afford to let fail. BTW the derivative market is one of the least regulated financial markets in the world......hmmm.

I would take issue with the notion that the atmosphere or ocean are the *primary* cause of the lag. In order to have net warming you have to recieve a certain amount of sunlight each day. That means that after the winter solstice (I will use Canada as my reference for seasons) the Earth is still cooling, until it reaches a point where there is net warming each day. Read carefully iNow's second reference.

What? Open a bottle of wine and not drink it all! Why that's sacrilege.

Just curious. Why would one want to freeze wine when it keeps so well in the bottle?

Feet first with arms and legs crossed and toes pointed downward. I have done this from at least 25 meters (once). Finishing the plunge was rather exhilirating but I wouldn't recommend doing it for entertainment.

I think he (GWB) was only referring to profligate consumption. That way of life requires no other freedom or ethics than to be able to consume.

The auto manufacturers would be ok if the economy made a u-turn fairly soon and oil stayed cheap. What are the chances of both those things happening? IMO about the same as the flying spaghetti monster showing up and taking over the world. Firstly, I see no reason why an economy, leveraged to the point ours is, will suddenly turn around when the underlying reasons for the problem have not been addressed. Secondly, if it does turn around, the price of energy (especially oil) will go right back up to where it was a couple of months ago and beyond.

Carbon sequestration is barely out of the "proof of concept" phase and has never been used on any scale for a long period of time to actually see if it works the way we think it should. If coal is going to be used over the long term it may be necessary to use it. I just think there are far better options insofar as they are cleaner, more sustainable, and close to the same price (maybe even cheaper if you don't count carbon emissions as zero cost).

Does anyone know for sure how or why the ballots get "challenged" to begin with?

Carbon sequestration is the best hope for the coal industry but it is similar to radioactive waste disposal for nuclear plants in that the harmful product will be around for many years and require constant monitoring. If there were no other options, this might be an acceptable situation but there are literally dozens of less environmentally destructive options: wind, solar, geothermal, tidal, piezoelectric to name just a few. This is the direction we need to be looking, IMO.

So failed we are only going to give them $17.4 billion. I hope if my company ever fails I can get a few billion $$$$ from Uncle Sam too.

Changing to wind power can happen much faster than most people think, especially if you can put a soon to be unemployed auto sector to work on it. I have recently read (I will try to find the source) that grids the size of Australia, U.S., or E.U. may not even require storage for backup. The same authors say that a grid the size of the British Isles is approaching minimum area required for no backup but probably would not be 100% dependable. I wonder where tidal generation rates on their scale, I didn't see it mentioned?

Or you could take the parents' line......'cause I said so.

So consciousness=existance? If I am sedated for an operation, does that mean I cease to exist for a period of time?