RIP Stephen Hawking

In two sentences:
- His book A Brief History of Time helped me imagine time as a malleable substance rather than the rigid immovable Newtonian frame of reference we were taught in school.
- His personal life helped me understand the difference of opportunities arising in civilized vs uncivilized societies.

I'm really grateful for that. RIP.

(no subject)

Kudlow is going to be the economic advisor, replacing Cohn. At least, Cohn was competent in commercial finance. In Kudlow we get another 70–year-old TV personality to defend boneheaded decisions in the media.

(no subject)

Sometimes it's important to get the economic life of the country in terms of total output:




https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_between_U.S._states_and_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)

On firing of Tillerson

Watch on YouTube

(no subject)

https://twitter.com/jack/status/969234275420655616
https://www.cortico.ai/blog/2018/2/29/public-sphere-health-indicators

Twitter is in dire need of a coequalizer, i.e. a troll filter. It wouldn't ban trolls, but it would allow one to see a troll-free view of the conversation. I see some elements of this brave new world emerging here in LJ/DW.

Quote of the Day

If it is true that he called the president a ‘moron,’ that pretty much says what he thinks.”

-- Blakeman, former CEO of Exxon Mobil.

Cheap BS salesman

... boasted in a fundraising speech Wednesday that he made up information in a meeting with the leader of a top U.S. ally, saying he insisted to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that the United States runs a trade deficit with its neighbor to the north without knowing whether that was the case.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2018/03/14/in-fundraising-speech-trump-says-he-made-up-facts-in-meeting-with-justin-trudeau/

He really thinks he can bluff his way into a favorable deal with a major trade partner. He probably doesn't realize that international trade agreements are negotiated by people who know their numbers. Outside of the core трамповата, nobody trusts him anymore. It's really embarrassing that the president of a superpower behaves like a used car salesman.

(no subject)

https://youtu.be/pUQ0mmbIdxs?t=29m

We can probably formulate the law of diminishing returns in terms of a product of C and D^op, wherein C and D a linear orders.