[Vo]:OT:Pre-positioning for troubled financial times
Some minor corrections and clarifications follow. Within the context of the mortgage industry debacle precipitated financial crisis it appears there is something even more sinister making for the crazy markets: http://tinyurl.com/3czmpr Actual URL for above: http://www.forbes.com/home/opinions/2008/02/06/croesus-chronicles- darkpools-oped-cz_rl_0207croesus.html The quants and their systems may be unintentionally setting up the world markets and financial systems for a crash. Automated arbitrage systems appear work fine until an underlying market fundamental changes, like sudden changes in the the value of real estate or some set of commodities. The problem with modern portfolio theory is its fundamental assumption, that the market activity is actually based on stochastic processes. It is assumed that all fundamentals are known by all the participants and very quickly priced into the market. All that is left is due to random fluctuations. I think a large part of the variance in the random distributions is not random at all, but rather merely due to variables and functions not understood, but which test well for being random distributions. An example of this might be the effects of a feedback loop between publications (reporters) and politicians, and further, the changes in cycle time, amount, quality, distribution, and uncontrolled distribution of information brought about by the internet. Of greater concern is the fact market transactions are increasingly instant computer trades rather than trades by open and manual bidding systems. This vastly increases the velocity of money within the market place in times of a crises, and the velocity is further increased when the buyers and sellers are mostly computers too. We are moving toward the point where the ultimate crash could take place in seconds. The velocity of money V is the average frequency with which a unit of money is spent, the dollar turnover rate, the frequency of dollar spending per unit of time. For a discussion of the velocity of money see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantity_theory_of_money and also see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Velocity_of_money There you'll see Milton Friedman's famous equation: M*V = P*Q V = P*Q/M where M is the money in circulation, and P*Q is the gross domestic product, the sum of the values of all transactions in a given period of time. The value of a transaction is the unit price time quantity for the transaction. This is expressed in the equation of exchange: M*V = Sum[i=1,n] p_i*q_i In a computer generated crash, a huge amount of the world's capital can cycle around between multiple investors instantly, i.e the velocity V - inf. Let F represent the values of all non stock market transactions: F = Sum[i=1,x] p_i*q_i and G represent the sum of the values of all stock market transactions: G = Sum[i=x+1,n] p_i*q_i This means V = (F+G)/M and if F remains fixed, yet the market transaction values for some period go toward infinity, then we have as: as G - inf, V - (F+G)/M = (F+inf)/M = inf/M = inf This means V = P*Q/M - inf if G - inf i.e. the velocity of money goes to infinity if the velocity of money in any subset of the economy goes to infinity. Since the quantity of goods Q would remain fixed in the final seconds of collapse, it rigorously must be that, since P*Q/M - inf, either (or both): P - inf, or M - 0 and neither case is good. Such a collapse can, however, be triggered by a sudden reduction in Q, through the collapse of derivatives, e.g. futures contracts, which are in effect commodities manufactured from nothing, yet which require real money to buy. If I have this right (and I am definitely not an economist!) in the end either price goes toward infinity, or money supply goes toward zero, or both. Since we are in a global economy, this appears to apply to the global money supply. It is now of concern that, unlike the way things unfolded in 1929-1932, a total market collapse, as well as the bankruptcy of many brokerages, arbitrage houses, and banks, could be almost completely over before even a hint of it ever hits anyone's screens. The only effective means of insurance is to be pre-positioned at all times. The standard means of providing pre-positioned insurance is to keep a percentage of assets in personally held gold or other commodities not held as securities for debt. However, as economic crisis looms as an obvious possibility, gold, silver, mining stocks, etc, and their downside risks, become unaffordable. I think I have found a reasonable method of achieving some degree of pre-positioning at this late date, at least for US citizens. That is to buy I-bonds and/or TIPS. The US treasury has recently limited the purchase of I-bonds to $5,000 per person per year for actual bonds (down from $30,000) and
[Vo]:Ocean glider uses ocean heat differentials
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7234544.stm The heat differentials expand or constrict wax, which provides energy for propulsion. Battery power needed to sensors and communications. Lawrence
Re: [Vo]:volvo hybrid concept
(Re: As a followup to the single point of using a small Wankel as the lighter weight back-up engine (ICE) for what is basically a plug-in hybrid, with intermediate range (50-60 miles)... --- Standing Bear wrote: Mazda sold this for years in the RX-7 to mixed success. Problem was always excessive oil consumption. True, back then, but perhaps not as relevant to this envisioned implementation. This particular point (of using a light-weight backup ICE instead of more batteries) is worth addressing in detail for a number of reasons. Mainly cost and availability. Look at the alternatives: - especially when first introduced, any advanced battery (bettery) especially if it uses expensive raw materials like lithium, will be sold at a premium, and the range will always be considered by some to be too low. Even the shortest charging-times are far in excess of filling up at a station, and unacceptable for long trips. The infrastructure for the ICE is already in place, which is very important for marketing. Now - why rotary instead of reciprocating ICE? 1) The rotary engine is ~half or less the weight of the 4-cycle ICE for the same power. This would be most important for a back-up gen-set in a very lightweight plug-in, using a carbon fiber body. 2) The rotary design can be highly efficient, BUT only in a narrow (high speed) RPM range. When out of range, it is not efficient. Fortunately, usage as a gen-set allows the engine to be used ONLY within that narrow RPM range of high efficiency. This is also true of oil consumption. 3) All, or most of NSU's former Intellectual Property on the basic design has expired (but not Mazda's). 4) Most of the oil consumption problem has been solved in the latest Mazda version, but anyway, this is not a big issue with an engine which would only be used infrequently in a plug-in hybrid. Hopefully the average driver could go for weeks of normal commuting or shopping, without the need for the ICE to kick-in at all; but at the same time, with the assurance that if she needs to go see Mom over in the next county, she will not end-up stranded out in the boondocks on the way back. No way to keep it sealed given the odd shaped combustion chamber Mazda's new RX-8 (Renesis engine) brings fuel and oil consumption within a better than normal range for US 4-cycle engines, and even passes California's very strict Low Emissions Vehicle or LEV standards. This is stricter than the normal standard. Actually, this is quite a remarkable transformation from the old oil-burner status. Looking ahead, one wonders if an advance ceramic version of this design could not be made oil free? Plus of all engines, Mazda has shown that the rotary is BY FAR the best design to use with hydrogen, due to the higher flame speed of the fuel combined with the inherent high RPM efficiency of the Wankel. The Renesis using hydrogen is an amazing 45% Carnot efficiency, which is better than any auto-diesel and almost as good as the grid plant. Yes, hydrogen is way, way off into the future - if at all- except for this: the in situ hydro-booster (electrolysis) add-on. That may be looking too far ahead, for these purposes, so let's stick to what is available now. Anyway, this solution is all available now, and I see the Wankel in a backup role to an intermediate battery array, as a near perfect solution to the high cost and high weight of a full plug-in capable of 200 mile range ... not to mention ... that full plug-in technology may never happen, given how slow it has been (historically) to develop the proper 'bettery' Jones
Re: [Vo]:OT:Pre-positioning for troubled financial times
Howdy Horace, Why not the topic of economics ? Every other OT subject is on the table. You do present an interested set of cause and effect. Having a personal game plan to counter what we call the market is a step. The problem is where to step. Back in a certain book I study, I read the following .. they threw their gold in the streets. I take that to mean that gold may not be an answer.. For sure we have a situation arisen in economics that defy any apparent solution. WE have the example represented by insurance. In effect, we dun ben tol .. ain't no insurance money left to pay da claim.. sue us ! This , of course was told after AIG sorta moved all the cash thay had in US banks over to Bermuda so they could protect us. Only problem was Buffett had to loan them the money to transfer... go figure. People get plum bent outa shape when you start messin' wid dare moneys. I sur wish da peoples in charge understan if things get outa hand.. it gets noisy.. I don't like noise. Richard Horace wrote.. At least hopefully economics, though known as the dismal science, is at least closer to on topic here than religion.
Re: [Vo]:Costaka Inc.: Making ethonol for a dollar a gallon, possibly by 2011.
Steven Vincent Johnson wrote on 2-4-08: ``Additional material some Vorts may enjoy reading regarding our country's frantic catch-up attempts in the plug-in market, and alternative fuels. See: http://www.kiplinger.com/businessresource/forecast/archive/Park_It_and_Plug_It_080201.html GM is betting on a breakthrough that will make ethanol as plentiful as gasoline by investing in Costaka Inc., a company that says it has perfected technologies that will enable it to make large quantities of cellulosic ethanol -- fuel produced from grasses and other plants as well as agricultural waste -- starting in 2011 for around $1 per gallon. Making ethanol for $1 per gallon isn't just a game changer. It's a whole new ballgame, says David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research, an auto industry consultancy. E85 fuel that retails for even $2 per gallon will steeply undercut gasoline's price and significantly reduce U.S. oil consumption.'' Hi All, The thought of $1/gallon ethanol adds urgency to the Oil Gang's imperative to protect its markets. The imminent precipitous decline in oil price because of the world oil glut raises the probabilty that Bush will attack the Iranian oil fields to reduce supply. It is absolutely essential that we get off oil now, no matter where it comes from, because sooner or later the Oil Gang is going to realize that there is no peak oil; and they will stop at nothing to maintain price and eliminate competition. Jack Smith http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20080202/fob1.asp NEWS ARTICLE from Science News, 2-2-08, by Sid Perkins Vol. 173, No. 5, p. 67, [Inorganic Oil] ``The Lost City hydrothermal field, which sits on the side of an undersea mountain about 2,500 kilometers east of Bermuda, was discovered in December 2000 (SN: 7/14/01, p. 21). Unlike most hydrothermal vents, which crop up along midocean ridges where tectonic plates spread to form new seafloor, those of the Lost City lie about 15 km west of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge on ocean crust that's about 1.5 million years old. Accordingly, the chemistry of the fluids surging from the Lost City vents differs radically from that found at other hydrothermal sites, says Giora Proskurowski, a geochemist at Woods Hole (Mass.) Oceanographic Institution ... Lost City fluids ... contain small quantities of hydrocarbons such as methane, ethane, and butane. A number of clues suggests that those substances, whose natural production usually results from the long-term heating of sediment rich in organic matter, were actually produced by inorganic chemical reactions, Proskurowski says. First, the rocks beneath the Lost City don't contain large amounts of organic matter. Second, the hydrothermal fluids are rich in dissolved hydrogen but contain a much lower than normal concentration of dissolved carbon dioxide. This suggests that what are called Fischer-Tropsch inorganic chemical reactions, which convert carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and hydrogen into hydrocarbons, generated the substances. Finally, the proportion of the carbon-13 isotope in the hydrocarbons found in the Lost City fluids drops as the size of the hydrocarbon molecule grows, a trend opposite that found in sediment-derived hydrocarbons but characteristic of those generated by inorganic reactions, Proskurowski and his colleagues report in the Feb. 1 Science. Although some types of microorganisms that inhabit the mineral chimneys in the Lost City may have generated a portion of the fluids' dissolved methane, none found there could have produced the ethane, butane, or other organic compounds in the vents' brew. Finding butane in the fluids is particularly important, because that hydrocarbon is a building block for some of the organic substances found in cell membranes, Proskurowski notes ... Robert M. Hazen, a geophysicist at the Carnegie Institution of Washington (D.C.), agrees: This is an exciting finding ... that demonstrates there are so many ways to make hydrocarbons in an abiogenic setting. ...'' -- href=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_biogenic_petroleum_theory From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ``Deep biogenic petroleum theory The deep biotic petroleum theory, similar to the abiogenic petroleum origin hypothesis, holds that not all petroleum deposits within the Earth's rocks can be explained purely according to the orthodox view of petroleum geology . This theory is strictly different from abiogenic oil in that the role of deep-dwelling microbes is a biological source for oil which is not of a sedimentary origin and is not sourced from surface carbon ... Deep microbes Microbial life has been discovered 4.2 kilometers deep in Alaska and 5.2 kilometers deep in Sweden.[citation needed] Methanophile organisms have been known for some time, and recently it was found that microbial life in Yellowstone National Park is based on hydrogen metabolism. Other deep and hot extremophile organisms continue
[Vo]:WAY OFF TOPIC Scissors, paper, rock politics
Polls show that Clinton beats Obama, Obama beats McCain, and McCain beats Clinton. It is an election race around a mobius strip, and I bet the candidates are beginning to feel that way. - Jed
RE: [Vo]:WAY OFF TOPIC Scissors, paper, rock politics
grin The Mobius strip is broken when we remember that the Clinton-Obama competition is within the Democratic Party, while the other two are national elections. Lawrence -Original Message- From: Jed Rothwell [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, February 09, 2008 12:44 PM To: Vortex Subject: [Vo]:WAY OFF TOPIC Scissors, paper, rock politics Polls show that Clinton beats Obama, Obama beats McCain, and McCain beats Clinton. It is an election race around a mobius strip, and I bet the candidates are beginning to feel that way. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:OT:Pre-positioning for troubled financial times
On Feb 9, 2008, at 12:02 AM, Standing Bear wrote: Seems a large part of this problem is lack of controls at the exchange market level. [snip] Solution: 1. Go back to commodity based currencies..hard money 2. Make all stock exchange transactions legal only with actual paper instruments, no computer trading allowed 3. Re-enact the Glass-Steagal Act and take banks out of the market 4. Re-enact the old Jacksonian National Bankruptcy Act of 1936 5. Re-enact the old laws forbidding banks to cross state lines 6. Absolutely forbid the participation of foreign banks in the United States except in certain set 'financial port districts' 7. Allow no corporation to own another corporation. This includes corporations owning stock. Only individuals own stock 8. Make illegal all electronic funds transfers 9. Re-enact the usury laws and make violations serious felonies 10. Repeal all so called 'free trade' laws and go back to tariffs 11 Discourage importation of consumer goods 12 Slam the borders tight 13 Make illegal the taking of money out of the country The above would seriousely slow down not only the velocity of money, but would also keep the country from being literally looted in seconds by a hostile power. [snip] While much of what you say appears true to me, it is also true that most economists agree that the standard of living is increased through free trade. Implementation of the all above remedies, especially 10 through 13, would cause a severe and immediate reduction in quality of life, so would be highly unpopular. Also, little remedial action can happen until election financing is taken out of the hands of big business and lobbyists, who instigated the mess in the first place. More difficult is the fact some of these things now need to happen on an international basis. Just making all market transactions visible and requiring built in time delays would take international cooperation on an unprecedented degree, though implementing 3-6 above would probably reduce the need for international cooperation to achieve some level of protection for the US, but likely not without first triggering an international financial crises of the most severe kind. What is needed for the US is more yankee innovation plus government action to increase our competitiveness. Our education system is in shambles with regard to our competitiveness, in large part because maintaining discipline is impossible and many high schools turn out cookie cutter lowest common denominator students without useful job skills or adequate preparation for college. There is a need to provide low cost or free web based post secondary school education to US citizens. Horace Heffner http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/
RE: [Vo]:WAY OFF TOPIC Scissors, paper, rock politics
Let's say it gets down to Obama/Clinton on the same ticket. Some say Hill wouldn't settle for Veep, but cynics think she would, realizing that even before the election, some harm may come to her running mate. Not 'Vinced,' exactly ... but the fear is that there are a few extreme conservatives, of the Cheney persuation (IOW: the cabal who took care of JFK)... who might be that desperate. IOW that there are a few well-placed bigots in the Pentagon, CIA etc, who think that they could not ever, never-ever, tolerate a black liberal President who would cut the Military budget in half as the first order of business. of course, for some liberals, Obama is not black enough being half-and-half. For me, I look at the situation metaphorically: kinda like O'Bama, of the silver-tongued black-Irish tradition... Anyway, there is no doubt that McCain is very shrewd old-time Politico, dirty-trick genius etc, and knows that he has got the conservative and religious right vote *no matter what*... (a huge luxury) ... so that the best way that he can manipulate the situation, and nullify the huge turnout for Obama (assuming he survives) AND Hill !! and using the analogy of this subject line - is to trump both the scissors and the paper by bringing out the red-hot rock that burns paper and to: Ta-da ... recruit a black woman as running mate. So happens there is the perfect candidate for that job waiting in the wings Signed, Harry TuttleSpin-Doctor-Deluxe
Re: [Vo]:WAY OFF TOPIC Scissors, paper, rock politics
On Feb 9, 2008 2:47 PM, Jones Beene [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: So happens there is the perfect candidate for that job waiting in the wings Barack Condoleezza?? :-) Surely you don't mean Rice, Beene? Terry
Re: [Vo]:WAY OFF TOPIC Scissors, paper, rock politics
Howdy Jones, One can view the candidates as people.. or as.. actors on a stage.. what happens when a stand-in is needed ? No problemo.. bingo! another face ! It is fascinating how true the adage.. The king is dead !!, all stand for a hail to the new king! Why is it so easy to switch loyalty from the old to the new? Because nobody grieves a dead lion. There are only differences in the way the lion passes. We read in history the brave or cowardly deeds of lions. We abhor the one that died in disgrace, yet sing for valor, those that die as heroes.. Viva Zapata!. Those that lurk behind the stage curtain directing the course of the pre-written script control the perceptive illusion of the drama and thus write history to suit their ego's. They are most powerful of all where no value can be held so sacred, that it cannot be sacrificed for gain. Richard Jones wrote, Anyway, there is no doubt that McCain is very shrewd old-time Politico, dirty-trick genius etc, and knows that he has got the conservative and religious right vote *no matter what*... (a huge luxury)
Re: [Vo]:Ocean glider uses ocean heat differentials
In reply to Lawrence de Bivort's message of Sat, 9 Feb 2008 11:08:28 -0500: Hi, [snip] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7234544.stm The heat differentials expand or constrict wax, which provides energy for propulsion. Battery power needed to sensors and communications. It would seem trivial to include a small hydraulic motor driven by the expanding oil, which drives a generator to top up the batteries. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[Vo]:re:Ocean glider uses ocean heat differentials
Vorts, A disadvantage to Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion has been the thick long pipes needed in the ocean. It may be more practical to have a machine go to the water of a different temperature that it needs. A more compact OTEC machine could deployed quickly and defouled more easily too. Aloha, Charlie
Re: [Vo]:Creationism (was Re:OT: periodic table)
OrionWorks wrote: Thomas sez: The discussion in question was on the Wall Builders, all one I suspect many progressives have difficulty following the logic attributed to comments such as ...a biblically based legal system is superior to all others. from the very next comment where Supremacy, based on religion is associated with the reign of the Taliban. Well, when you find another nation, where you are freer and richer than we are, let me know. --- http://USFamily.Net/dialup.html - $8.25/mo! -- http://www.usfamily.net/dsl.html - $19.99/mo! ---
