Newsworthy events 2009

From InterSciWiki

• Comes now, finally and belatedly, one Bruce Scott, a somewhat dissenting economist at Harvard B-school where, apparently, there has been NO class or coverage of the issue of integrating "capitalism" AKA corporatism, with the rules and priorities of democracy. See: Bruce R. Scott The Concept of Capitalism.
• The Economist: Fertility rates fall; still, it's a tiny planet Mpls Trib on The Economist lead article Oct 31, 2009.
• Hate crime laws to include sexual orientation, gender, gender identity and disability NYTimes October 28, 2009
• Rethinking What Leads the Way: Science, or New Technology? Review of W. Brian Artur's The Nature of Technology, Oct 20, 2009.
• "The commons" Elinor Ostrom and Oliver Williamson win Nobel Prize in Economics First woman to win the prize. October 12, 2009
• Athlete of the year? Reported by The Common Scold blog "from Jack Rains who was chair of the Houston-Harris County Sports Authority when the (now) Minute Maid Stadium was built." (courtesy Chris)
• Rock and Roll Shames America Our Healthcare Illiteracy (courtesy Chris)
• Save College as We Know It Sept 11 09 Courtesy Algaze

Social networks provide new lessons in learning Sept 10 09

• Google Algorithm Predicts When Species Will Go (Network analysis) Hadley Leggett, Sept 4 09 Wired Magazine.
• On the Origin of Cooperation - Elizabeth Pennisi (Origins:) Science 4 September 2009: Vol. 325(5945): 1196 - 1199.
• How Economists Got It So Wrong: Paul Krugman takes on "the economists" in Sunday's Magazine. August 29, 2009.

"Few economists saw our current crisis coming, but this predictive failure was the least of the field’s problems. More important was the profession’s blindness to the very possibility of catastrophic failures in a market economy."

A complexity view: Economic Networks: The New Challenges. 2009 Frank Schweitzer, Didier Sornette, A. Vespignani, G. Fagiolo, F. Vega-Redondo, and Doug White in Science 24 July: 422-425.

• Using satellite data, UCI and NASA hydrologists have found that groundwater beneath northern India has been receding by as much as 1 foot per year over the past decade -- and they believe human consumption is almost entirely to blame. More than 109 cubic kilometers (26 cubic miles) of groundwater disappeared from the region's aquifers between 2002 and 2008 -- double the capacity of India's largest surface-water reservoir, the Upper Wainganga, and triple that of Lake Mead, the largest manmade reservoir in the U.S. UCi brief -- Sept. 2, 2009.
• Four experts discuss the balance between pristine land and renewable energy, the pros and cons of photovoltaics versus solar thermal, and how much rooftop solar can help. Seed Magazine Aug 28, 2009
• For the Irish in you Aug 27, 2009, courtesy Bill Fitzgerald
• Zakaria interview with Chinese Premier Wen Jaibao nominated for the "best interview" Emmy Award. Aug 23, 2009. Wen Jaibao's reading list: Adam Smith, Morality and Ethics - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
• 5 Myths About Health Care Around the World By T.R. Reid, Washington Post July 23 2009
• Maryland Governor describes a new way of running government ESRI plenary talk July 2009
• temperature and income per capita- July 2009 - part of the debate
• PNAS 106:5025-5028 "The medial prefrontal cortex exhibits money illusion"
• Washington Post sells access to lobbyists renewal of Bush-era journalism out of Washington
• Twitter in the classroom Jun 26 2009 Washington Post
• The Wikipedia Revolution, 2009, by Andrew Lih David Runciman Review in LRB 28 May 2009
• Memorial day news May 24th: U.S. and Afghan Forces Seize Biggest Drug Cache to Date
• Cheney faces-off against the nation's quest for legal accountability May 10 09
• GPS with Fareed Zacaria, Richard Holbrooke and Karzai on Pakistan May 3 09
• Obama's Secret Of Success Apr 25, 2009 Fareed Zacaria
• Stefan Thurner 24 April 2009 in Science 324(5926): 452 - 453 Leverage: The Root of All Financial Turmoil reported by Garry Peterson, Resilience Science weblog
• Malcolm Gladwell on Outliners: Talent = The desire to practice = Hard work April 27, 2009
• 2008 MIT press book on coffee as a tangible medium to approach larger questions about how "sustainable" markets and international agreements affect agriculture, ecology and rural development.
• International Council for Science (ICSU) implementation steps for a holistic strategy on the Earth system research (27-04-09)
• Sweeping land reform in Bolivia and Venezuela
• The U-turn on its side April 26, 2009
• Laser flips a bit without help 8/7/07 physics article with top stumbleupon rating (but news travels slowly after all)
• England is doing this - Fix-My-Street Why not us? (Seattle does it too)
• Everyblock is an open source "news on your block sites" expanding to new cities
• Votes database - Washington Post implemented 2009
• Redefining Capitalism After the Fall NYTimes Monday, April 20, 2009
• This talk by Shai Agassi is implemented by Renault (see the Renault announcement 4-16-2009. (Courtesy Scott White who heard the 4-14-2009 Agassi talk)
• reinstating the "uptick rule" to prevent stockmarket thievery - it was repealed in 2007 - D. Harmon and Yaneer Bar-Yam Technical Report on the SEC Uptick Repeal Pilot, November 18, 2008. - Regulatory effect of the uptick rule Economic Roundtable: Y. Bar-Yam, A Regulatory System for the Financial Sector of Complex Systems Science, Remarks Prepared for Congressman Capuano's Roundable, March 16, 2009. Congressman Capuano's Response.
• "The FBI has been warning of an "epidemic" of mortgage fraud since September 2004. It also reports that lenders initiated 80% of these frauds. "The FBI correctly identified the epidemic of mortgage control fraud at such an early point that the financial crisis could have been averted had the Bush administration acted with even minimal competence. To understand the crisis we have to focus on how the mortgage fraud epidemic produced widespread accounting fraud."
• Wikileaks - We help you safely get the truth out.
• Are we dangerously dependent on Wikipedia? By Vincent Rossmeier. The author of a new book says no, and talks about how a site spawned by an Ayn Rand enthusiast became our most popular encyclopedia. ---- Algaze
• Latin Americans debate prohibition as decentralized drug lords take their wars to the US and invade Africa
• A force for democracy - or information chaos? Expert forum spotlights from ESRC the Economic and Social Research Council. See Second Life social science meetings
• Millenial Generation survey
• Report from China March 13, 2009
• Getting less of a laptop February 23, 2009 - technology trickle-up
• Obama rejects reagonomics- End of an Era (II) - MSN Video February 27, 2009 Windows Live ID
• The mathematical model that killed Wall Street February 23, 2009 - see - also Wikipedia:Global financial crisis of 2008–2009
• Renewable-energy Stimulus Investor's view: Feb 18th 2009 - Wikipedia:American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 - Energy 41 Billion - Scientific research 18 Billion - Education 92 Billion
• [http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/feb/12/king-iraq-resources-war UK's former chief scientific adviser Sir David King sats: Iraq was the first 'resource war' of the century – and warns there will be more 'resource wars' to come. Iraq war was about oil, not weapons of mass destruction.
• Using Chaos Theory to Revitalize Fisheries Sugihara's theory - still to be tested - Feb 09 Scientific American
• Google maps the oceans Feb 1 - Google Earth 5.0
• Letter to President Obama Jan 29 - Economy and the ecological footprint
• photosynth comes alive - install the software and watch 3D composite images of the inauguration
• End of an Era (I) of unpunished crimes - the famous 8 years in 8 minutes video - commentary
• Mismanagement adds up Jan 9 2009