This time Russ Roberts really nails it, in my personal books, by managing to find an economist who holds a degree in electrical engineering. I hold electrical engineering, or at least an electrical engineer, close to my heart and always appreciate their ability to find error wherever it lurks, even if it lurks in the apple of their eye. But here these two economists find error in their own ways and in so doing return to good old Adam Smith, to his much neglected Moral Sentiments. The error lies in expecting two person interactions to be the same as larger group interactions, and not being able to measure trust and goodwill which mess up the maximum utility equations. Well, they explain it much better than I could, and really I was mostly excited because they mentioned Jeremy Bentham, a figure who figured quite prominently in my childhood but then appeared not to have taken the world by storm, despite having been stuffed upon death so he could continue to attend meetings of the Royal Society. They had to give him a wax head after his own head decayed in a macabre fashion due to poor mummying techniques:
Be that as it may, here is the inimitable Russ Roberts helping to explain why economists are getting it wrong:
Vernon Smith on Adam Smith and the Human Enterprise
Nobel Laureate Vernon L. Smith of Chapman University talks to EconTalk host Russ Roberts about how Adam Smith’s book, The Theory of Moral Sentiments has enriched his understanding of human behavior. He contrasts Adam Smith’s vision in Sentiments with the traditional neoclassical models of choice and applies Smith’s insights to explain unexpected experimental results from the laboratory.
Good Morning, again.
Infectious laugher
Transitions into and out of daylight saving time compromise sleep and the rest-activity cycles
Background
The aim of this study was to analyze the effects of transition out of and into daylight saving time on the rest-activity cycles and sleep. Rest-activity cycles of nine healthy participants aged 20 to 40 years were measured around transitions out of and into daylight saving time on fall 2005 and spring 2006 respectively. Rest-activity cycles were measured using wrist-worn accelerometers. The participants filled in the Morningness-Eveningness and Seasonal Pattern Assessment Questionnaires before starting the study and kept a sleep diary during the study.
Results
Fall transition was more disturbing for the more morning type and spring transition for the more evening type of persons. Individuals having a higher global seasonality score suffered more from the transitions.
Conclusion
Transitions out of and into daylight saving time enhanced night-time restlessness and thereby compromised the quality of sleep.
I’ll say. And I totally suffer from seasonal affective disorder and am filling the house with full spectrum light bulbs, that I just happen to have. So I guess if you are seasonally affected, daylight saving is even more disruptive. It used to make sense but trying to figure out when the global peak energy use is, and coordinate time zones, is insanely difficult. Best to just settle for getting the clocks synced. Once governments accept that they cannot be the sole providers of electrical energy, we will all be better off.
These bulbs, and this is a sweet deal:
http://www.verilux.com/full-spectrum-lightbulbs/whole-house-conversion-pack/
Yes to light bulbs like that. Also to big doses of Vit. D this time of year.
Vitamin D vs broad spectrum phototherapy in the treatment of seasonal affective disorder.
Yes to Vitamin D although they sure were harsh on the lights! Maybe a drug company vs an electric company thing. Both hubby and eldest daughter tested significantly low on vitamin D and I try to stuff it into the family. And B12 which I forget to take, but seems to really help me when I remember. There is so much conflicting advice and different studies that only common sense can rule the day. I know the bulbs make my plants grow fabulously throughout the winter and flower, etc., so I find it hard to believe it doesn’t work on me. And the vitamins are clearly helpful in this crappola northern climate.
2050 on the S&P. And the Doomsday Crowd continues to miss every.single.tick. Way to “prep”, dudes.
All the reasons why people didn’t buy stocks for the past 5 years, with a nice chart.
THE WALL OF WORRY, ILLUSTRATED
They talk just briefly in the podcast above about how people get caught up in a false hope of continuing rising prices, and I couldn’t help but remembering realizing I was hoping the price of gold would go up – not thinking it would. They are talking in context of the housing bubble – and I suppose this sounds like I am saying the S & P is doomed, but I meant the exact opposite. Gold has stagnated, indeed lost about 50 bucks or so, since I started this happy unicorn and puppy filled blog. With great effort we learned and restructured and are back to working it like that guy who proved one man could have built Stonehenge, levering logs slowly higher like a climbing teetertotter:
Every little dip on that stock chart I’ve been thinking, “Ok, that’s the end”, and been emotionally prepared for it, and ready to reposition. But it keeps bouncing back. I look at every new high as a total gift. Stocks could tank tomorrow, or go higher for another decade. I have no idea. I know both arguments. I’m just going with the flow.
Buy strength, sell weakness, ignore the chatter, don’t get too clever, don’t fight the tape.
Just got an update on my brother. He has the gout in the one ankle, but the bigger concern is an infected toe on the other foot. For a diabetic, this is a major danger. Without proper treatment, amputation is likely. He’ll be coming home in a day or two, but he has to go in EVERY DAY for intravenous antibiotics, for six weeks. And he can’t drive with the IV line in his arm all the time, so his wife will take him in. At first, they were going to put him in a nursing home, but his doctor said no, he can go home, and just go in every day for the IV. He’ll be off work for six weeks, but is covered by some sort of disability plan. He is far from out of the woods yet.
many good times and some beautiful people at the Speak. I’m not surprised by the move. A full on rotting corpse. . Some vintage Jackson.
just an old fave,
w/John Prine sittin in.
more Prine….this song seems to have a different meaning every time I listen. gonna be up too late and dragging in the am (once again) thanks for the link on the link on the lamps Xty, winter is not my best suit.
I know curare and Yanamamo- anthro minor- but where the heck were you to stumble across woorali?
Unlike the Yanomami, who stayed in my mind forever because of their counting system, one, two and more than two, which satisfied my brain in many numerical situations – like counting stars – I am trying to keep the old grey matter chugging, and as I mentioned in passing I recently noticed my stinking Scrabble app was set to “advanced” when there was an “expert” setting, and lurched at the challenge. Basically it now plays astonishing nonsense, but that one did seem to exist. I am keeping a list, mostly so I don’t smash the phone when it plays “iwis”:
i·wis also y·wis
adv. Archaic
[Middle English, from Old English gewis.]
Late start here too – messed up sleep patterns.
Or, on a lighter note (I think I am a little scattered – need to collect myself, so to speak)
I’ll stick with the “o” ending, as that seems to still predominate after a quick check that turned this up as well.
I thought o as well and am glad to revert.
The video “wasn’t available” btw. Maybe just in Canada? This however was strongly recommended, and I am only a minute in:
Glad we’re both on the same page. Yes, I was an iconoclast (read: anal) about the”o”, but that’s just a minor exhibition. My new Kindle Fire HD7 will be here tomorrow, and I can’t wait. It was just a few months ago that I said Never! to that, but after checking into it, I found a lot of advantages. I can always go heft and smell a random tome if I get the urge.
Exactly what iBooks got me with – no matter where I am I cannot escape the 40 odd classic novels I haven’t read. And then the bank we switched to had an incentive which I leapt through hoops to achieve and they just sent me a “free” mini iPad, which is a good bookish-sized platform. Dragged either wittingly or unwittingly into the future …
Xty, that vid is priceless! Had I a mouthful it would have spewed onto the screen at Hannah Montana. And yes, I did know the definition of “that word”. I am sending this to a friend who has trouble sleeping- this is the remedy I had suggested for her. Now I really have to get busy. ttyl.
The office building where I work (when I DO work) has a doorbell system. When clients stop by after hours they are supposed to ring the doorbell, and if it is your client you go down and let them in. Anyhoo, the bell itself has a tune, not exactly like , but close enough, to the intro to “Mr. Sandman”, and every time it rings I can’t help myself but to start singing along out loud to it. Oh Mr. Sandman, bring me a dream….
My mates in the adjoining cubicles are pretty much used to it by now…I hope.
Oh, been meaning to say – I don’t know what to say about your brother. Amputation was my first thought when you mentioned gout. And every day for six weeks – his wife is either a saint or an enabler. What work does your brother do if I may be so bold as to ask?
And a better Andrews Sisters song, that is equally hard to remove from your brain once fixed:
It’s official: The Nutbag Brigade is in the tank for Rand Paul 2016. By “Nutbag Brigade” I mean ZH and all it’s fellow travelers. There’s an article on ZH now, but I’d rather die than link it.
Battle lines are drawn, let’s bring it on!
All I have to say about Rand Paul is that in 2010 his senate race in deep-red Kentucky was far too close for comfort, and he suffered from such incredible foot-in-mouth disease that his handlers had to keep him quarantined away from the media for the last month of the campaign (not unlike Iowa’s Joni Ernst this time around) so that he wouldn’t fuck it up.
You read it here first: Rand (Empty Suit) Paul will never survive presidential scrutiny.
Bro is a computer programmer for the formerly great state of Wisconsin.
I read somewhere that for a diabetic simply having an open sore on a foot puts the odds of amputation at 14-24%, and that’s even before it gets any worse. I don’t see a 550 pound guy coping with a prosthetic foot. This current IV antibiotic program is a life or death situation, as far as I’m concerned. I did check, and got confirmed, that they are using a different antibiotic this time than last. Last time he got super antibiotics for a skin infection his kidneys shut down and he got dialysis for a week before pulling through.
Latest word is only 5 more weeks, the past week counts as the first.
I’m on call if his wife gets a conflict. Likely, as her Mum is 95 and there’s always something going on with her as well.
Supposed to go down to 3 degrees F tonight. This winter already sucks. Could be worse though. Just ask our friend out in Buffalo.
Buffalo snow, but from 1977, Dec 1st:
We were in England that winter and I remember sheep getting lost in the snow.
LOL
For any intelligent person, this should close the book on Benghazi, but of course for republicans, it won’t, because, duh, they’re not particularly intelligent. (Or is it because they just never let the facts get in their way?)
WASHINGTON (AP) — A two-year investigation by the Republican-controlled House Intelligence Committee has found that the CIA and the military acted properly in responding to the 2012 attack on a U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, and asserted no wrongdoing by Obama administration appointees.
Debunking a series of persistent allegations hinting at dark conspiracies, the investigation determined that there was no intelligence failure, no delay in sending a CIA rescue team, no missed opportunity for a military rescue, and no evidence the CIA was covertly shipping arms from Libya to Syria.
GOP Intel Report Debunks Its Own Party’s Nutty Benghazi Theories
And let’s be honest, watching the haters foam at the mouth over O’s immigration thing is more fun than Christmas morning.
‘Cause the players gonna play, play, play, play, play
And the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate
Baby, I’m just gonna shake, shake, shake, shake, shake
I shake it off, I shake it off
Heart-breakers gonna break, break, break, break, break
And the fakers gonna fake, fake, fake, fake, fake
Baby, I’m just gonna shake, shake, shake, shake, shake
I shake it off, I shake it off