Ethos, The Weblog
Friday, October 31, 2003
Texas Redistricting, Seen Abroad
The Economist comments on the recent gerrymandering here in Texas. Also, interestingly, they argue that redistricting makes congressional seats too safe.
"Safety reduces the moderating effects of centrist voters. In a safe seat, the main threat to an incumbent comes from party activists who put up a challenger in a primary election. Redistricting aligns the interests of politicians with activists, who tend to be more extreme in their views."
Economist.com | Lexington
Thursday, October 30, 2003
Cancer Society Holiday Shopping Card
Here is some information on an interesting program benefiting the Austin area chapter of the American Cancer Society. Here is how it works...
You buy the card for $50, the entire amount is given to the local cancer society, and you get 20% off your purchases at A LOT or local stores such as Ann Taylor, Banana Republic, Avant Salons, Central Market, Giada, Harold's, Shiki, Stiletto, Ven, and many more local boutiques.
The program ends November 2nd, so you don't have much time left. If you do the math, you break even at $250. So, please help the American Cancer Society whether it be out of your heart or for financial savings.
American Cancer Society
Monday, October 27, 2003
Donkeys and Elephants
Two new books, one by a professor emeritus here at UT, focus on the histories and differences between the ever evolving Democratic and Republican parties.
Economist.com | The evolving parties
Changing the Product Image of Wine
Wine distributors seem to be catching on to the idea that people our age (20s-30s) are a bit different than wine drinkers such as our parents. I would classify myself as an "Adventurer."
w w w . p r o s p e c t - m a g a z i n e . c o . u k
Microsoft Introduces 'Longhorn'
I thought I'd just include this since the new Microsoft OS has the codename "Longhorn"...
Microsoft Offers Early Look at Longhorn (TechNews.com)
Thursday, October 23, 2003
The Critical Condition
Peter Jennings interviews ABC News Medical Editor Dr. Tim Johnson about the condition of healthcare in the United States. Specifically, he speaks on the issues behind a nationalized healthcare system.
-Jennings: It is conventional wisdom that the rest of us pay for the uninsured. Do we or do we not?
-Johnson: Well, ultimately of course, somebody has to pay the bill. And it is often the taxpayer, directly and indirectly. But I think that we pay in ways other than money. We pay in terms of the increased poor health of people who are uninsured. The increased death rate. They also have a 10 to 30 percent less likely chance of producing income from a job, so we lose as a society. We lose medically, we lose financially and I personally think we lose morally.
ABCNEWS.com
Gerunds and Participles
William Safire conquers the fight between the possessive use of gerunds and participles...grammatically speaking. Note the first rule of English usage: "that no construction should call attention to its own grammatical correctness."
Flagellum Dei
Aesthetic Plenitude
The New York Sun comments on Virginia Postrel' new book, The Substance of Style. She explains that aesthetics have an important influence on economics, noting that many purchases or repurchases of personal, fashion, or household items are based on style, not necessity. These variations of available designs add "huge amounts of value to the economy in ways that defy conventional economic analysis and therefore mask the economy's true growth."
Her theories of the intersection of aesthetics and economics intrigue me, and perhaps I'll have time to read more than this somewhat-decent review of her theses.
Buying Sofas,Stealing Beauty
Wednesday, October 22, 2003
The Neo-Conservatives
James Atlas of The New York Times explores the meaning and reintroduction of the political classification "neo-conservative." This branch of liberalism, not heirs of classical conservatism but rather discoverers of the liberal limitations, is evidenced by intellectuals such as Michael Ignatieff of Harvard's Kennedy School who believe that the Iraqi war is justified on the basis of the removal of Hussein's tyranny over his people. "What always drove me crazy about the opposition was that it was never about Iraq. It was a referendum on American power." he says.
What It Takes to Be a Neo-Neoconservative
Monday, October 20, 2003
The New SAT
The College Board takes another step in its efforts to sway a national curriculum with the revisions to the SAT. Out go the analogies and abstract mathematical reasoning, and in come essays and advanced algebra. The author interestingly notes that "students who attend failing schools could suffer as the SAT morphs from a test of general-reasoning abilities into a test of what kids learn in school."
TIME.com: TIME Magazine -- Inside the New SAT Test
The Evolution of Flirting
The Washington Post explores how people now "reject traditional courtship as a way of finding out about a person's character." Instead we see dating as "a game,full of artifice and role-playing." No longer do we drop our handkerchiefs and ask people to the spring dance...
Modern Flirting (washingtonpost.com)
Professor Evaluations :: Beauty
In my Economics of Life class last semester, a fellow student worked with Dr. Hamermesh on a study of the relationship between a professor's looks and her/his course evaluations. At the time, I felt that the research methods were flawed, but I guess now that more effort was expended, as the paper has recently been published in The Chronicle of Higher Education. Moreover, it has been spotlighted on both their page as well as UT's this past summer.
Do Good Looks Equal Good Evaluations?
The article from The Daily Texan with link to full paper:
Some students swayed by a professor's looks
Thursday, October 16, 2003
Wednesday, October 15, 2003
Like writing? Holt Uncensored has a list of the top ten mistakes by writers that make thier work scream "amateur".
Holt Uncensored #376 :: 10/9/03
Tuesday, October 07, 2003
Robert Cialdini in Scientific American discusses the six tendencies of human behavior that affect psychological persuasiveness. Reciprocation, consistency, social validation, liking, authority, and scarcity all want us to say "yes".
The Science of Persuasion
Two mathematicians in Greece have recently made some promising work on solving self-referential sentences using fuzzy logic (e.g. This sentence is false, or Everything I say is a lie). Instead of the usual mathematical chaos that ensues while trying to solve such non-linear systems of equations, they have borrowed from control theory to find consistent solutions without such chaos.
Economist.com | Fuzzy logic
The Liar and other Paradoxes (their paper)
Monday, October 06, 2003
The new Supreme Court session starts soon, and The New York Times has a very cursory look at what cases are already on the docket. I'm interested in learning more about the case the Pennsylvania democrats will make regarding political gerrymandering. They represent 50% of the voting populous but only 7 of the state's 19 representatives. Apparently they want to argue that the republicans have violated the equal protection clause...very interesting!
Supreme Court's Docket Includes 48 New Cases
Sunday, October 05, 2003
A recent study found that applicants with black-sounding names are less likely to get callbacks than those with white-sounding names. There is of course more to the research method than this simple idea, and the results are very interesting.
What’s in a name? For blacks, a job
Saturday, October 04, 2003
The University of North Carolina announced this week that the university will begin paying full tuition for students from low-income households, which they define as 150% below the federal poverty level - making the line set at around $28,000 for a family of four. The students will be required to work 10-12 hours per week, and about 8% of next year's freshman class is expected to qualify. While I agree that this is a bold step, I think that Chancellor Yudof's plan for the UT system has a much greater reach and hopefully a greater effect. Too bad a lot of Texan's don't agree...
UNC to Pay Costs of Low-Income Students (washingtonpost.com)
