Kathy的骨髓

今期New Yorker(Jerome Groopman, Buying a Cure)報導了Kathy Giusti怎樣R&D一些大藥廠不願造的藥.

Google.org Course (Week 6): Globalization

17 Oct 2007



(66 min)

1. Introduction (00:00) by Joshua Cohen
2. Global development course (15:25) by Lant Pritchett

Google.org Course (Week 4): Productive Agriculture for the 21st Century

3 Oct 2007



(68 min)

1. Introduction (00:00) by Joshua Cohen
2. Agricultural development at two crossroads (14:10) by Rosamond Naylor
3. Water, food and environment: a development dilemma (41:00) by Frank Rijsberman (www.iwmi.org)

What is creative capitalism, exactly?

(photo: Microsoft)

Bill Gates跟Bono和Michael Dell在Davos推介Vista-based的Dell機. 每賣一部機他們會捐款給The Global Fund對抗非洲AIDS問題.

在瑞士Davos舉行的The World Economic Forum, Bill Gates說企業應該"adopt a form of creative captialism", 尋找新的途徑減輕發展中國家的問題. 但無可否認, 藥物或者食水淨化看來並非最賺錢的生意. Gates說:

Sometimes market forces fail to make an impact in developing countries not because there's no demand, or even because money is lacking, but because we don't spend enough time studying the needs and requirements of that market.

但聽來其實跟creative無關, 似乎是incentive多一點.

Google.org Course (Week 3): Education and Health

26 Sep 2007



(1 hr 35 min)

1. Introduction (00:00) by Joshua Cohen
2. Global health and development (20:49) by Tamara Fox
3. Universalising access to education in resource poor contexts: challenges and prospects (54:15) by Nansozi Muwanga

The Myths of Innovation

May 2007



(61 min)

Speaker: Scott Berkun


Key points:

1. Innovation and design are ancient
2. We can learn from their history and mythology
3. Organizations of any size can innovate
4. Innovation is simple, but hard: delegate, expect mistakes, reward initiative

a kick-ass speaker. 名不虛傳. love 26:50 statement of William McKnight, 3M Chairman 1948. everybody thought it is a new thing of google. and Berkun said no in googleplex.

Quantum Computing Talk

Day 1 (6 Dec 2007)
Introduction to quantum computing
Speaker: Hartmut Neven

Day 2 (13 Dec 2007)
Image recognition with an Adiabatic quantum computer
Speaker: Hartmut Neven & Geordie Rose

Day 3 (10 Jan 2008)
Does an explanation of higher brain function require references to quantum computing
Speaker: Hartmut Neven

Everything is Miscellaneous

May 2007



Talk: David Weinberger

20:00 - 26:00 Dewey Decimal system
Other places to start:
27:44 Digital Data organization
29:55 "Everything is metadata"
33:35 Tagging
35:22 Summing up
36:00 "Include everything"
38:36 Why this matters
40:56 Prototype theory
43:00 Publicly negotiated knowledge (Wikipedia)
45:00 Allow infallibility into definition of knowledge (Wikipedia vs. NY Times)
46:06 Understanding (Heidegger) a thing's place in referential context of meaning
47:55 Making connections of meaning between pieces
49:50 Q & A

Weinberger vs Keen

Sep 2007



(1 hr 25 min)

Debate: David Weinberger (Everything is Miscellaneous) and Andrew Keen (The Cult of the Amateur)

See also: Supernova: David Weinberger vs Andrew Keen and a live bloggin.

(It's recommmended in Elizabeth L Lawley's talk The Evolution of Expertise (58 min))

InSTEDD平台

April 2007



(57 min)

Talk: Peter Carpenter

According to the report of The Economist,

Google.org has made a $5m grant to InSTEDD, a non-governmental organisation that is building a rapid-reporting platform to connect people on the ground with those monitoring pandemics.

Homepage: http://instedd.org/

Google.org Course Week 02 Notes

Ted自嘲的說他的聽眾見他時有點sad, 聽Seema的時候比較happy.

Seema的case studies令人樂觀一點. 在南印度, 只要給漁民手機, 讓他們掌握多一點漁市場的每日動態, 便可以幫他們改善收入了; 在印尼, 只要在飯菜中加點鐵質, 便可以幫他們預防貧血.

但Ted的兩個肯亞case studies便現實得多. 芬蘭人幫肯亞人挖水井(Kenya-Finland cooperation (KEFINCO) Project), 挖了之後便教當地人維修水井的抽水機. 但幾年下來, 他們發現很多機器都這些維修人員盜去了. 另一個case. 肯亞的一些學校有教科書資助, 可是全部都是英文的. 到頭來只有首都地區的人才讀得懂. Ted氣得稱這樣的資助no-brainers.

Ted問甚麼model會比較work? 志願性質和community? 多點女性參與? 還是付款比較實際?

See also: Miguel, Tribe or Nation?: Nation Building and Public Goods in Kenya versus Tanzania

Google.org Course (Week 2): Poverty at the Personal Level (Part 2)

19 Sep 2007



Lecture: Ted Miguel


Personalizing Poverty - Making health and education projects work

1. Data: relationship between GDP and life expectancy and literacy rate
2. Case study 1: bringing clean water to Kenya
3. Case study 2: textbooks and test scores in Kenya

蟬師的選擇

今期Economist報導Google.org的阿頭Larry Brilliant. Google.org 很快便有一個超過1,000個ideas的list. 之後便把它縮成11個世界的"biggest, most imminent, least well resourced problems". Core initiatives有三大範圍:

1. fighting climate change (a particular obsession of Messrs Brin and Page);
2. economic development (a passion of Sheryl Sandberg, the unseen driving force behind the creation of Google.org); and
3. building an early-warning system for pandemics and other disasters—something Dr Brilliant wished for when he won the 2006 TED Prize, which first brought him to Google's attention.

他們尤其希望information的流通可以提高public service的水準. 和幫助發展中國家的中小企業.

但我不明白怎麼有些area他們拒絕涉足:

1. getting involved in microfinance, which Dr Brilliant thinks is now awash with money, or
2. trying to eradicate a disease (something he found especially hard to let go, given his personal history in the battle against smallpox).

Google.org Course (Week 2): Poverty at the Personal Level (Part 1)

19 Sep 2007



(38 min)

Introduction: Joshua Cohen
Lecture: Seema Jayachandran

1. How many people live below US$1 a day?
2. Case study 1: how cell phones help fishermen in Kerala, Southern India. (Cells are easy to use. Cost covering is within 2 months)
3. Data: Life expectancy and GDP, and Child mortality (under age 5)
4. Case study 2: Anemia (low hemoglobin) in Indonesia (simply adding iron into their meal?)

Joseph Stiglitz: Making Globalization Work

Mar 2007



(1 hr 6 min)

街頭的馬丁路德金

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Photo: Camilo José Vergara/ NY Times

Charlie Rose, an hour with Thomas L. Friedman

(57 min)

差不多是6個月前的posting, 在YouTube昨天還有comment:

Friedman can keep his "golden straightjacket", the system of control that he envisions where privitization, globalization, and economic viability take extreme levels of precedence over the welfare and liberty of the worlds citizenry. He is a dangerous neocon drone.

真是沒完沒了, 跟他的書再版一樣.

i have a dream

今日Washington Post的Editorial說Martin Luther King Jr的話比較之前的選舉年更加相關. 當然是指1963年他在Lincoln Memorial的演講I Have a Dream.

When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt.

1968年4月3日, 他被刺的前一天:

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. . . . I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land.

對很多美國人來說, "that land remains out of reach." 何況其他人.

Jeffrey Sachs: The Deep Forces of Globalization

and the choices that we face

A Speech in Columbia University, Dec 2007



(1 hr 40 min)

Four deep drivers of globalization

1. The end of North Atlantic hegemony: the end of empires and the rise of Asia
2. Demographic change: rebalancing global population (Africa and Islam), changing internal population balances, urbanization, and aging
3. Ecosystem pressures: climate change, water stress, food supply, and species extinction
4. Failed States: Cause? Cost amplified?

How Databases Changed the World

George Schussel's talk in Computer History Museum (1 hr 48 min)

Boltzman的雞蛋

"When you break an egg and scramble it you are doing cosmology," California Institute of Technology的宇宙學家Sean Carroll說.

Diversity = Productivity

(1)
"New York City is the perfect example of diversity functioning well," Dr Page 在訪問中說. "It’s an exciting place that produces lots of innovation and creativity. It’s not a coincidence that New York has so much energy and also so much diversity."

NY Times訪問Michigan大學的教授Scott E Page. 他研究complex system, political science和economics. 他最近出了一本新書The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools and Societies, 用數學模型和case study帶出人員的多樣性可以增強組織的實力. 包括不同的人生經驗和背景.

(2)
Q. Give us an example of where diversity has improved an organization or profession?

A. I've seen it in my own field, economics. Before women got really involved in the 1970s, a lot of the actual labor of women wasn't included in calculations of the gross domestic product. It was as if you had Ma Ingalls sitting around the Little House on the Prairie, eating bonbons, and only Pa Ingalls's labor was counted in.

After you got women into the profession, they started saying: "What if Ma Ingalls opened up a business and charged for the cleaning, pie making, tending of the animals. Wouldn’t there be a lot of G.D.P. in there?"

When you only had men thinking about the economy, they were ignoring the productivity of half the population. By including the perspectives of females, the estimates got more accurate. This was important for looking at the American past and for understanding contemporary societies like those in Africa, where women are usually the farmers.

God's Warriors: Jewish (CNN) II

episode 2 of 2

The Jewish underground - Trail of blood - Ground zero - Vengeance - Civil war - Jerusalem

Part 1 of 5

(10 min)

Part 2

(10 min)

Part 3

(10 min)

Part 4

(10 min)

Part 5

(5 min)

God's Warriors: Jewish (CNN) I

episode 1 of 2

Murder in Hebron - Two soldiers - Facts on the ground - The power couple - The lobby - Christians and Jews

Part 1 of 5

(10 min)

Part 2 of 5

(10 min)

Part 3 of 5

(10 min)

Part 4 of 5

(10 min)

Part 5 of 5

(10 min)

Google.org Course (Week 1): Overture and overview

12 Sep 2007



Part 1 (62 min)
Introduction: Larry Brilliant and Joshua Cohen
Lecture: John Holdren



Part 2 (41 min)
Lecture: Jessica Matthews

Google.org Course

(1)
Google.org的其中一個section是inform & empower. 市民有更多的資料, 政府便有更好的check and balance.

1. Developing local capacity for data collection and analysis to inform decision making
2. Making existing information more public and useful for planning and advocacy
3. Generating evidence on "what works" and sharing this widely

(2)
上年9月, Google.org開始三季課程中的第一季: Global development. 這為期10禮拜的course由Stanford教授Joshua Cohen主持. Google.org已經在YouTube開了一條Channel放這些lectures.

至少我已經informed, 希望可以empowered.

Boltzman的時間

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Boltzman的腦

(1)
如果這宇宙理論是真的, 在讀這篇blog的你比較可能只是太空裡物質和能量埸的一衝momentary fluctation, 而並非一個在"真實的過去"當中經歷幾兆年由星光閃閃秩序井然中的宇宙進化出來的人. 你的記憶, 這個世界, 你覺得你看到四周的事物, 都是一場幻象.

(2)
基本的問題其實橫越時間的世代. 標準的宇宙理論認為, 太空是可以在一次又一次無限廻轉的大爆炸中誕生的. 不過, 要大自然一次過製造整個宇宙是很困難的. 只造其中一段便容易得多了, 例如一些星球, 例如一些穿太空衣的你... 例如一些光溜溜在太空漂浮的腦袋.

大自然傾向做最容易的事, 由能量和機會率的角度來看. 所以, 這些片段出現的機會遠比一個大宇宙羽翼已豐的為高. 或者比我們的高. 或者它們就是我們.

MIT的宇宙學家Alan Guth同意這個overabundance是無稽的. 他指出some calculations result in an infinite number of free-floating brains for every normal brain, making it "infinitely unlikely for us to be normal brains."

這就是Boltzman brain problem. 歡迎.

(3)
十九世紀奧地利的物理學家Ludwig Boltzman提出一些fluctuations可能發生在汽體或者太空中.

宇宙學家稱之為"freaky observers", 相對"ordered observers", 例如我們本身. 宇宙學家想將這些freaks排除出他們的理論, 不過大體來說, 他們連有無進展也說不上. 這brain problem可以當作一項reality check, 當我們問一些例如:

1. What is a "typical" observer in such a setup?
2. If some atoms in another universe stick together briefly to look, talk and think exactly like you, is it really you?

(4)
"It is part of a much bigger set of questions about how to think about probabilities in an infinite universe in which everything that can occur, does occur, infinitely many times," Stanford的Leonard Susskind說.

"How do you compute the probability to be reincarnated to the probability of being born?" 另一位Stanford的理論學者Andrei Linde問.