Economics Questions

Re: The Electric Universe

Orthogonal — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 16:15:14 GMT

Cool story bro.

Re: The Electric Universe

baxter — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 15:44:34 GMT

>Does anyone here know any other fascinating theories like the Electric Universe theory?

Immanual Velikovsky's Worlds in Collision (1950)

Erich von Däniken's Chariots of the Gods? (1968)

Re: The Electric Universe

ToxicAssets — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 10:53:04 GMT

gotlucky:

Walter Block must be an incompetent economist, as he is supposed to make only $160,000-$180,000 a year, much of which he makes from selling books and giving speeches. What a dummy for not making $1,000,000+.

That's not true. Money is not the only professional goal for the great majority of people.

The life of an academic professor / author / public lecturer has a lot of not-so-tangible advantages compared to the life of a wall street managing director, and this is not measurable by their base salary figures.

Less risk, less stressful daily routine, more freedom to determine one's own work agenda, more vacations and vacation-like activities such as conferences, more social appreciation and so on.

They also tend to live in university campuses and/or college towns, which have much lower costs of living and are overall much healthier than cities like London. And academics tend to inbreed (marry other academics), which usually lead to more succeful marriages which are financially complementary.

As for most financial types, they tend to get trophy wives which usually turn out as large liabilities.

And also you have to consider that personality types that are likely to be successful in academic environments are not necessarily equally likely to thrive in business situations, and conversely.

That's important since we all know that being academic professor / author / public lecturer is a status that is very hard to achieve in terms of competition, as hard as an investment bank manager averaging a mil per year in total compesation.

Re: The Electric Universe

ToxicAssets — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 10:29:52 GMT

Smiling Dave:

Toxic, that last post of yours does read like something a university trained economist would write in response to my questions.

So yes, expect success in your chosen field.

I know you're being patronizing (austrianites tend to look down upon "university trained economists"), but I have to say I'm not one. I'm a financial engineer with a general background in applied math, probability and signal analysis.

But we do share a lot of mandatory courses with economics majors (like micro and macro economics, as well as statistics and econometrics), and also some elective courses like operational research and optimal control, stochastic processes and game theory for example.

And many entry-level job offerings are open to both branches.

So I have an idea of the job market for economists. A lot of analysts I've worked with have an MS or PhD in economics.

Your previous post seemed to assume that that a degree in economics qualifies one for being a government/Fed technocrat or perhaps for writing newspaper-like diatribes for or against government economic management, when reality is that most of them find uses for some of their technical skills in a host of market niches which demand more than the usual MBA power-point master has to offer.

Of course just a plain BS degree in economics from a second tier school hasn't much market value without further complementation from experience and or additional training in some specific skillset (like, say, actuaries), but that's true for almost all such degrees.

Re: The Electric Universe

rosstaylor — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 09:18:37 GMT

Does anyone here know any other fascinating theories like the Electric Universe theory? After I discovered Austrian economics, my views of the world has changed. After reading about the EU theory, looking at the world has never really been the same.

Any other one goods? : D

Re: The Electric Universe

gravyten577 — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 00:03:25 GMT

However, I think the real travesty is that there are no true physicists any more, they've all become mathemeticians.

That sounds a lot like economics facinating!

Re: The Electric Universe

Clayton — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 21:20:17 GMT

Black holes are part of a wider pattern in modern physics of passing off mumbo-jumbo as "serious" science - a phenomenon made possible primarily by the use of intimidating and alien-sounding jargon. Search "Thunderbolts of the Gods" and listen to the critiques of modern science offered by the plasma cosmology folks. Before astrophysicists start invoking exotic metaphysical entities to explain the phenomena of the heavens, they need to first incorporate all currently known physics into their models... in other words, they need to take into account the massive influence of electromagnetic force.

Clayton -

Re: The Electric Universe

Orthogonal — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 19:49:50 GMT

>What does that mean? Are you saying black holes are not real? I don't know much about physics so I want to catch up....

and if they are fake or not real, why would the establishment push so hard to prove them or lie about them?

I don't think they are lying about them, they genuinely believe they exist. However, their assertion came about because of necessity to explain certain phenomena, not because it's a natural extension of any of their model's. I already posted a video earlier in the thread of how they violate even the mathematical model of General Relativity field equations.

Re: The Electric Universe

limitgov — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 19:30:46 GMT

"The black hole is a metaphysical entity, people. Wake up!"

What does that mean? Are you saying black holes are not real? I don't know much about physics so I want to catch up....

and if they are fake or not real, why would the establishment push so hard to prove them or lie about them?

Re: The Electric Universe

Orthogonal — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 06:53:17 GMT

>what about Immanuel Velikovsky's works?

Can't really say, never read him. I do know he advocates Catastrophism and I'm open to the idea, but I can't say anything specific about his works.

>I recommend The Relativity of Wrong by Isaac Asimov. Not everything is complete garbage.

I understand what he's saying, and maybe that's partially right, but these model's are so disparate, they can't be close-but-not-quite. However, I think the real travesty is that there are no true physicists any more, they've all become mathemeticians. They don't seem to be concerned at all explaining how things work. Sure, we have equations and model's that can predict how two magnets might attract or repel each other and describe the process to very high precision, but that doesn't mean we understand what happened. No one in the world knows how two magnets physically attract or repel each other. If they just took a step back from the particle colliders and thought about solving some of these fundamental issues, it would be a major revolution and probably crack open a whole new vista of discoveries. A lot easier said than done, for sure, but that's what Physicists should be working on.

Re: The Electric Universe

Clayton — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 06:46:33 GMT

Infinities have shown up before in physics. Usually they are taken to indicate a lack of understanding, rather than accepted at face value.

Invoking a metaphysical entity, such as a black hole is saying "it must exist because the equations say it could exist... though even if it did exist, we could never have any direct observational confirmation of its existence short of actually getting sucked inside of it..." Astrophysicsts don't just shrug their shoulders and say "well, we are pending a better theoretical construct before rendering judgment on the infinities that arise"... they actually are searching for - and claim they are finding - evidence that "implies" the existence of these absurdities.

Electric Universe theory would probably have infinities too, if it had actual equations.

It does have equations, they're called Maxwell's Laws.

Clayton -

Re: The Electric Universe

gotlucky — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 05:32:53 GMT

I recommend The Relativity of Wrong by Isaac Asimov. Not everything is complete garbage.

Re: The Electric Universe

Christopher Barcelo — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 05:01:02 GMT

I love this answer.

Re: The Electric Universe

rosstaylor — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 04:14:57 GMT

@ Orthogonal - what about Immanuel Velikovsky's works?

Re: The Electric Universe

Orthogonal — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 00:49:49 GMT

That's a fair question. They certainly like to compartmentalize it as big vs small things, but I don't think anyone believes the Universe has multiple sets of physics. Maybe they do.

To add a little meat to this. General Relativity explains gravity as a warp in space-time. You could take a snapshot of the universe and visualize the architecture of the warped space and see how each objects gravity well effects every other object. This is conceptually a static model. Contrast this with QM with a wildly different physical interpretation. Gravity is transmitted via the graviton which transfers negative momentum. You can't visualize how QM gravity works in a snapshot, it would require a movie so-to-speak, where you watch gravitons move from point A to B and deliver their negative momentum. This is conceptually a dynamic model.

GR gravity static, QM gravity dynamic. They are irreconcilable and never the twain shall meet. One of them has to be bogus.

EDIT: As far as the predictive power of the theories. I don't have any problem with the mathematical model's and I'm not saying any of their equations are wrong. Math is simply a tool used to describe. Mathemeticians may be doing a very good job of describing what is going on. Physicists on the other hand have done a terrible job of explaining what is happening.