L33t Links: Late Night Caffeine Edition
Back from Cleveland and, since I was at work late and unable to resist the sweet allure of late-night iced coffee, up late. As usual, there are lots of things I want to blog about, but so little time, so mini-stories with links, GO!
Here's a video about expected value, why people are bad at estimating it and therefore bad at making rational economic decisions. But the guy misses something big when discussing the lottery, namely the Kelly Criterion, highlighted in the article Do Not Play the Lottery Unless You Are a Millionaire. Basically, if you're gambling with a good expected value (say a coin flip where you win twice your bet when you win and lose your bet when you lose), you shouldn't invest too much of your money. Obviously, if you bet 100% of your bankroll, you're flat out of luck the first time you lose. When applied to the lottery, it means that the answer to "when you should play the lottery" is not when prize times odds is more than the cost of a ticket, it really is never unless you're already exceptionally rich.
Two very different musical YouTube links: One on a young piano virtuoso (next Mozart is probably overblown, but it is awesome) and one... well, just watch it.
About GM, now a subsidiary of USCo, evidently (which is giving the Republicans a stroke): It seems that this crazy variant of Chapter 11 bankruptcy is going to be heinously expensive and probably just a stalling measure... but possibly a more effective stalling measure than Chapter 11, which could be good, a rapid collapse of GM would really ripple through the economy in a bad way. More interesting is the question of what the reorg means for (more) fuel-efficient cars (summary: it's decidedly mixed). But that may be missing the point a bit, are Americans going to be really gung-ho about buying new cars en masse anytime soon, Congress's proposal to throw more massive amounts of money at the problem aside? (I'm not sure whether to be horrified at that one or hopeful because at least some dramatic options are being considered, although there's no chance in hell the government will use it's influence to convert that spare industrial capacity to making windmills or trains or something crazy like that.)
Magic: The Gathering is doing a major rules rewrite for Magic 2010 (their major core set change, core sets now get new cards, are treated as full sets, and are numbered by year). It's actually a pretty great example of game design. "In play" is now "the battlefield", "removed from game" is now "exiled" (so there's no silly stuff about the "removed from game" zone being "not in the game" when, in fact, it is part of the game). (Digression: Now that "hand" is the only non-flavorful zone name, is that due for a change?) Mana burn is gone, "damage on the stack" is gone, combat with multiple blockers substantially reworked to still be interesting given the previous change. Deathtouch and Lifelink are now static abilities, Deathtouch doesn't stack with destruction from normal damage (requiring two regenerations), you don't get multiple effects from multiple copies of the abilities, you don't die in combat before getting life gain from Lifelink.
Slacktivist has a long-running series deconstructing the Left Behind books, and this post is particularly good, because it gets at the curious subtype of the belief in "salvation by faith alone" (a sort of "salvation by faith in salvation by faith alone") that some American evangelicals seem to hold. Be very suspicious of anyone who quotes Ephesians 2:8-9 but not 10.
If you have more time to burn after reading the above, I suggest this game, it's good.
Here's a video about expected value, why people are bad at estimating it and therefore bad at making rational economic decisions. But the guy misses something big when discussing the lottery, namely the Kelly Criterion, highlighted in the article Do Not Play the Lottery Unless You Are a Millionaire. Basically, if you're gambling with a good expected value (say a coin flip where you win twice your bet when you win and lose your bet when you lose), you shouldn't invest too much of your money. Obviously, if you bet 100% of your bankroll, you're flat out of luck the first time you lose. When applied to the lottery, it means that the answer to "when you should play the lottery" is not when prize times odds is more than the cost of a ticket, it really is never unless you're already exceptionally rich.
Two very different musical YouTube links: One on a young piano virtuoso (next Mozart is probably overblown, but it is awesome) and one... well, just watch it.
About GM, now a subsidiary of USCo, evidently (which is giving the Republicans a stroke): It seems that this crazy variant of Chapter 11 bankruptcy is going to be heinously expensive and probably just a stalling measure... but possibly a more effective stalling measure than Chapter 11, which could be good, a rapid collapse of GM would really ripple through the economy in a bad way. More interesting is the question of what the reorg means for (more) fuel-efficient cars (summary: it's decidedly mixed). But that may be missing the point a bit, are Americans going to be really gung-ho about buying new cars en masse anytime soon, Congress's proposal to throw more massive amounts of money at the problem aside? (I'm not sure whether to be horrified at that one or hopeful because at least some dramatic options are being considered, although there's no chance in hell the government will use it's influence to convert that spare industrial capacity to making windmills or trains or something crazy like that.)
Magic: The Gathering is doing a major rules rewrite for Magic 2010 (their major core set change, core sets now get new cards, are treated as full sets, and are numbered by year). It's actually a pretty great example of game design. "In play" is now "the battlefield", "removed from game" is now "exiled" (so there's no silly stuff about the "removed from game" zone being "not in the game" when, in fact, it is part of the game). (Digression: Now that "hand" is the only non-flavorful zone name, is that due for a change?) Mana burn is gone, "damage on the stack" is gone, combat with multiple blockers substantially reworked to still be interesting given the previous change. Deathtouch and Lifelink are now static abilities, Deathtouch doesn't stack with destruction from normal damage (requiring two regenerations), you don't get multiple effects from multiple copies of the abilities, you don't die in combat before getting life gain from Lifelink.
Slacktivist has a long-running series deconstructing the Left Behind books, and this post is particularly good, because it gets at the curious subtype of the belief in "salvation by faith alone" (a sort of "salvation by faith in salvation by faith alone") that some American evangelicals seem to hold. Be very suspicious of anyone who quotes Ephesians 2:8-9 but not 10.
If you have more time to burn after reading the above, I suggest this game, it's good.