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The Economist is reporting that superbugs Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and Clostridium difficile are wreaking havoc in the general public — causing all sorts of unpleasantries including death.
Last November, BetterHumans noted that where traditional antibiotics fail, “good” bacteria - the kind found in yogurts - might be just what the doctor ordered in fighting pathogens like MRSA.
See also Wired magazine’s article, People are Human-Bacteria Hybrid.
What do you get when you have Craig Newmark, founder of Craigslist and a net neutrality proponent, and former White House spokesman Mike McCurry, who heads a phone industry group, debate net nationalization? Unsurprisingly, an adolescent argument similar to ones you had in elementary school.
Mr. McCurry does a decent job explaining the capital investments, scarcity and economics involved in maintaining a large network infrastructure; however his “Hands off the Internet” movement does not represent a free-market solution to this problem. Absolutely no regulation or oversight is the free-enterprise answer to this quagmire. And the Internet providers he represents are protected through “legal” geographical monopolies and subsidies, which is unfortunately not being questioned.
Mr. Newmark is so close that it hurts in terms of what the Internet providers seemingly refuse to offer or use. Rather than pointing out that these telecom companies are legal monopolies that should be privatized, he jumps up on the egalitarian horse and uses the cliche emotional argument of “fairness” to substantiate his claims.
In retrospect, The Wall Street Journal should have selected individuals such as Declan McCullagh and Bram Cohen to represent the “hands off” laissez faire approach; in addition, Vint Cerf and Tim Berners-Lee would probably have done a better job at the pro-nationalization side.
See also:
The Washington Times is reporting that a scientist has apparently found the “God gene” — the gene that regulates the ability to experience spirituality. The kicker is, the volunteers whose genetic material was analyzed, were asked a series of 226 questions to determine how “spiritually connected to the Universe” they were.
Regardless as to how they answer, you cannot aggregate and average out any of the numbers as you might in a “hard-science” study. The answers the respondents give are entirely subjective to the internal preferences of each individual. In terms of Likert scales, one person’s 2 is different than another person’s 2.
Be sure to read “The Bowl Championship Series: A Case Against Subjectively Aggregated Statistics” for more discussion on this flawed methodology.
