Apr 19, 2013 |
General Nonsense |
Permalink
I define an ordinary super power as any useful ability that very few humans possess. For example, having a spectacular voice that commands attention is like a super power. So is being ridiculously attractive, insanely smart, highly energetic, artistic, and so on.
I don't have any of those super powers. I'm an example of someone who has good but not great skills that work well together. I write okay, have a good sense of humor, draw better than the average person, and understand enough about the business world to pull it all together in the form of comics. No super powers needed.
But I often wonder what it would be like to have one or more of the ordinary super powers. And I also wonder which one I would choose if I had my pick. Knowing my shallowness, I would probably choose to be ridiculously attractive. But if I were to be more rational about it, and choose an ordinary super power with the greatest career utility, what would it be?
Realistically, attractiveness probably trumps most other super powers. So much so that in my opinion the men-versus-women way of seeing the world will soon morph into a political model in which attractive people of every gender and ethnicity are seen as advantaged while unattractive people are struggling. Gender and ethnicity will seem trivial compared to attractiveness. We're about halfway there.
This is a long way of getting to my point, and yes, I have one. I would nominate for my preferred ordinary super power the ability to not feel embarrassment.
My observation is that people such as Richard Branson or Elvis, or just about anyone famous, has willingly taken on a career that promises a lot of raised eyebrows, shaming, humiliation, and ego attacks. Some people shrug off that sort of stuff. They have that ordinary super power. And it makes success more likely because they get to compete against a smaller field.
My hypothesis is that people who display a lack of embarrassment are seen by others as natural leaders. I suppose a lack of embarrassment looks like a form of bravery, and we're wired to respond to it. When someone gives a speech to thousands, and shows no signs of nervousness, their confidence affects us. We assume good things about a person who is so cool under pressure. And when someone does something monumentally embarrassing, and shrugs it off with a smirk and a twinkle in the eye, we are in awe.
The good news is that one can learn to control embarrassment. You simply need to experience it so many times that you get used to it. In my case, my natural personality is shy, and as a kid I embarrassed easily. But I've learned through practice to power through most of my embarrassments. And that's a good thing because embarrassment is a routine part of my job.
Take this blog. What I enjoy most about it is that there is no editor between you and me. The downside is that you see my spelling errors, grammar mistakes, and dumbass ideas in their raw form. I barely go a day without embarrassing myself in public. But at this point in my life, blog-related embarrassments don't feel any more psychologically painful than looking in the mirror and seeing that I need a haircut. It's just stuff.
I'm not totally immune to embarrassment, but I'm working toward it. Of all the ordinary super powers, enduring embarrassment is the one that an ordinary person can most easily develop. I will never have a radio-quality voice, or suddenly become tall and attractive. But I can learn to endure embarrassment, and that has a tremendous economic value.
Imagine being able to talk to anyone, and ask for any favor or resource, without fear of rejection or embarrassment. 99% of people you talk to could give you the stink-eye and you'd still become a billionaire because of the few that cooperated.
So I put the following unscientific question to you:
1. Rank your fear of embarrassment from 1-10 with 10 being highest.
2. Rank your career success (age adjusted) from 1-10 with 10 being highest.
I think there will be a correlation. That's my hypothesis.
I don't have any of those super powers. I'm an example of someone who has good but not great skills that work well together. I write okay, have a good sense of humor, draw better than the average person, and understand enough about the business world to pull it all together in the form of comics. No super powers needed.
But I often wonder what it would be like to have one or more of the ordinary super powers. And I also wonder which one I would choose if I had my pick. Knowing my shallowness, I would probably choose to be ridiculously attractive. But if I were to be more rational about it, and choose an ordinary super power with the greatest career utility, what would it be?
Realistically, attractiveness probably trumps most other super powers. So much so that in my opinion the men-versus-women way of seeing the world will soon morph into a political model in which attractive people of every gender and ethnicity are seen as advantaged while unattractive people are struggling. Gender and ethnicity will seem trivial compared to attractiveness. We're about halfway there.
This is a long way of getting to my point, and yes, I have one. I would nominate for my preferred ordinary super power the ability to not feel embarrassment.
My observation is that people such as Richard Branson or Elvis, or just about anyone famous, has willingly taken on a career that promises a lot of raised eyebrows, shaming, humiliation, and ego attacks. Some people shrug off that sort of stuff. They have that ordinary super power. And it makes success more likely because they get to compete against a smaller field.
My hypothesis is that people who display a lack of embarrassment are seen by others as natural leaders. I suppose a lack of embarrassment looks like a form of bravery, and we're wired to respond to it. When someone gives a speech to thousands, and shows no signs of nervousness, their confidence affects us. We assume good things about a person who is so cool under pressure. And when someone does something monumentally embarrassing, and shrugs it off with a smirk and a twinkle in the eye, we are in awe.
The good news is that one can learn to control embarrassment. You simply need to experience it so many times that you get used to it. In my case, my natural personality is shy, and as a kid I embarrassed easily. But I've learned through practice to power through most of my embarrassments. And that's a good thing because embarrassment is a routine part of my job.
Take this blog. What I enjoy most about it is that there is no editor between you and me. The downside is that you see my spelling errors, grammar mistakes, and dumbass ideas in their raw form. I barely go a day without embarrassing myself in public. But at this point in my life, blog-related embarrassments don't feel any more psychologically painful than looking in the mirror and seeing that I need a haircut. It's just stuff.
I'm not totally immune to embarrassment, but I'm working toward it. Of all the ordinary super powers, enduring embarrassment is the one that an ordinary person can most easily develop. I will never have a radio-quality voice, or suddenly become tall and attractive. But I can learn to endure embarrassment, and that has a tremendous economic value.
Imagine being able to talk to anyone, and ask for any favor or resource, without fear of rejection or embarrassment. 99% of people you talk to could give you the stink-eye and you'd still become a billionaire because of the few that cooperated.
So I put the following unscientific question to you:
1. Rank your fear of embarrassment from 1-10 with 10 being highest.
2. Rank your career success (age adjusted) from 1-10 with 10 being highest.
I think there will be a correlation. That's my hypothesis.
Apr 17, 2013 |
General Nonsense |
Permalink
You often hear that the United States no longer has big goals, the way it did when President Kennedy challenged the country to put a man on the moon. And by big goals, I mean something that costs an enormous amount of money, focuses the entire country on the objective, takes years to accomplish, and delivers more in the way of psychological and technological benefits than it gets from actually accomplishing the goal. Walking on the moon was trivial compared to the emotional and psychological boost it provided, and the technology developed along the way.
I think we already had this generation's equivalent of a moon landing, except it involved landing helicopters in Pakistan. And instead of astronauts sticking a flag in the moon, Seal Team 6 stuck a bullet in Osama Bin Laden's skull.
Killing Bin Laden cost the United States, oh, let's say ten trillion dollars, if you include everything from the opportunity costs, to the interest expense, to the Iraq war, to homeland security, and of course the war in Afghanistan. And by the time we got Bin Laden, the objective itself was trivial compared to the effort. But man, did it feel good.
In the long run, the technology developed to fight terrorism will probably be as important to the world as the technology developed getting to the moon. And like the moon race, we didn't choose the objective so much as it was chosen for us by international forces. The race to the moon was a message to the Soviet Union. The bullet in Bin Laden head was a message to anyone who thought attacking the mainland United States was a good idea.
Countries are like people in the sense that they develop personalities. Countries are the sum of their parts plus the sum of their histories. When a country does something notable, good or bad, that becomes its personality for a century. And getting the personality right has a huge economic value.
For example, Cyprus will probably have a century-long reputation as the unemployed uncle who rifled through your underwear drawer looking for your hidden sock full of money so he could buy beer. Russia is a well-dressed mobster. Canada is the guy who mows his lawn and then mows yours too because he was "...already out there, eh?"
The personality of the United States changes periodically. Sometimes we're generous and inspiring. Other times we're total dicks. It's a complicated country. But no one thing defines the personality of the United States more than our willingness to spend ten trillion dollars - and kill anyone who gets in the way - just to put a bullet in one asshole's skull. That gives me neither pride nor embarrassment; it's just a statement of fact.
This brings me to North Korea. I don't know enough about complicated international affairs to have informed opinions, so I'll put this in the form of a question from a citizen: Why isn't North Korea China's problem?
The old United States, with its old personality, probably needed a strong military presence in the area to keep things from getting out of hand. And of course we wanted to be there for our allies.
But today the United States has a different personality, and that provides different options. Today we could pack up all of our stuff, slap China on the back and say, "It's all yours, buddy. Call if you need anything. Glad to help." And we'd totally mean it.
The best part of our new personality is that Kim Jong-un understands that if someday he lobs a missile at the mainland United States, we'll spend ten years and another ten trillion dollars to put a bullet in his head. We'll even shoot his kids on the way up the stairs. And realistically, if North Korea did attack the United States, China would either step out of the way or do some regime-changing themselves in North Korea, as a favor to their biggest customer.
My observation over a lifetime is that when it comes to a fight, the craziest person has a huge advantage because he's not worried about his own losses. When Kim Jong-un's father was running North Korea, he had the craziness advantage. Today I'm not buying their act. From my dim vantage point, it looks like acting crazy instead of the real thing. If they want to see the real thing, all they need to do is send a rocket a little too far toward California.
I think we already had this generation's equivalent of a moon landing, except it involved landing helicopters in Pakistan. And instead of astronauts sticking a flag in the moon, Seal Team 6 stuck a bullet in Osama Bin Laden's skull.
Killing Bin Laden cost the United States, oh, let's say ten trillion dollars, if you include everything from the opportunity costs, to the interest expense, to the Iraq war, to homeland security, and of course the war in Afghanistan. And by the time we got Bin Laden, the objective itself was trivial compared to the effort. But man, did it feel good.
In the long run, the technology developed to fight terrorism will probably be as important to the world as the technology developed getting to the moon. And like the moon race, we didn't choose the objective so much as it was chosen for us by international forces. The race to the moon was a message to the Soviet Union. The bullet in Bin Laden head was a message to anyone who thought attacking the mainland United States was a good idea.
Countries are like people in the sense that they develop personalities. Countries are the sum of their parts plus the sum of their histories. When a country does something notable, good or bad, that becomes its personality for a century. And getting the personality right has a huge economic value.
For example, Cyprus will probably have a century-long reputation as the unemployed uncle who rifled through your underwear drawer looking for your hidden sock full of money so he could buy beer. Russia is a well-dressed mobster. Canada is the guy who mows his lawn and then mows yours too because he was "...already out there, eh?"
The personality of the United States changes periodically. Sometimes we're generous and inspiring. Other times we're total dicks. It's a complicated country. But no one thing defines the personality of the United States more than our willingness to spend ten trillion dollars - and kill anyone who gets in the way - just to put a bullet in one asshole's skull. That gives me neither pride nor embarrassment; it's just a statement of fact.
This brings me to North Korea. I don't know enough about complicated international affairs to have informed opinions, so I'll put this in the form of a question from a citizen: Why isn't North Korea China's problem?
The old United States, with its old personality, probably needed a strong military presence in the area to keep things from getting out of hand. And of course we wanted to be there for our allies.
But today the United States has a different personality, and that provides different options. Today we could pack up all of our stuff, slap China on the back and say, "It's all yours, buddy. Call if you need anything. Glad to help." And we'd totally mean it.
The best part of our new personality is that Kim Jong-un understands that if someday he lobs a missile at the mainland United States, we'll spend ten years and another ten trillion dollars to put a bullet in his head. We'll even shoot his kids on the way up the stairs. And realistically, if North Korea did attack the United States, China would either step out of the way or do some regime-changing themselves in North Korea, as a favor to their biggest customer.
My observation over a lifetime is that when it comes to a fight, the craziest person has a huge advantage because he's not worried about his own losses. When Kim Jong-un's father was running North Korea, he had the craziness advantage. Today I'm not buying their act. From my dim vantage point, it looks like acting crazy instead of the real thing. If they want to see the real thing, all they need to do is send a rocket a little too far toward California.
Apr 15, 2013 |
General Nonsense |
Permalink
I was watching Real Time with Bill Maher the other day. He had a professor on the show who said climate change can be fixed by making well-understood adjustments to how farmers raise cattle plus some other fairly ordinary changes. Apparently this is all explained in a documentary called Carbon Nation.
I'm skeptical of any claim so big and contrarian, but it does fit with The Adams Law of Slow-Moving Disasters. Simply stated, my observation is that whenever humanity can see a slow-moving disaster coming, we find a way to avoid it. Let's run through some examples:
Thomas Malthus famously predicted that the world would run out of food as the population grew. Instead, humans improved their farming technology.
When I was a kid, it was generally assumed that the world would be destroyed by a global nuclear war. The world has been close to nuclear disaster a few times, but so far we've avoided all-out nuclear war.
The world was supposed to run out of oil by now, but instead we keep finding new ways to extract it from the ground. The United States has unexpectedly become a net provider of energy.
The debt problem in the United States was supposed to destroy the economy. Instead, the deficit is shrinking, the stock market is surging, and the price of gold is plummeting.
Social security was supposed to go broke. It might have some dents and scratches, but it looks as if it will be fine.
Offshoring was supposed to suck the last bit of manufacturing DNA out of the United States. Instead, robotics and other market forces have caused the trend to reverse.
Illegal immigrants from Mexico were supposed to overrun the United States with crime, steal American jobs and burden the social systems. Instead, the economy of Mexico started improving and immigration reversed.
When I was a kid, it looked as if the country was heading for an eventual race war. Today that seems impossible unless angry white guys start shooting.
In the seventies it looked as if crime was going to keep increasing forever until the suburbs were overrun by street gangs. Instead, violent crime has steadily decreased.
On a smaller scale, the BP oil spill in the Gulf was supposed to destroy the Gulf ecosystem for the rest of our lives. And while the lasting damage was plenty bad, experts were generally surprised that it wasn't far worse.
The Y2K problem was supposed to break computers and plunge the planet into an agrarian society. Instead, programmers invented shortcuts for finding and fixing the bugs with time to spare.
In California, predicted ongoing droughts were supposed decimate the state. Instead, it rained.
Can anyone give me an example of a potential global disaster that the general public saw coming, with at least a ten year warning, and it actually happened as predicted?
I'm skeptical of any claim so big and contrarian, but it does fit with The Adams Law of Slow-Moving Disasters. Simply stated, my observation is that whenever humanity can see a slow-moving disaster coming, we find a way to avoid it. Let's run through some examples:
Thomas Malthus famously predicted that the world would run out of food as the population grew. Instead, humans improved their farming technology.
When I was a kid, it was generally assumed that the world would be destroyed by a global nuclear war. The world has been close to nuclear disaster a few times, but so far we've avoided all-out nuclear war.
The world was supposed to run out of oil by now, but instead we keep finding new ways to extract it from the ground. The United States has unexpectedly become a net provider of energy.
The debt problem in the United States was supposed to destroy the economy. Instead, the deficit is shrinking, the stock market is surging, and the price of gold is plummeting.
Social security was supposed to go broke. It might have some dents and scratches, but it looks as if it will be fine.
Offshoring was supposed to suck the last bit of manufacturing DNA out of the United States. Instead, robotics and other market forces have caused the trend to reverse.
Illegal immigrants from Mexico were supposed to overrun the United States with crime, steal American jobs and burden the social systems. Instead, the economy of Mexico started improving and immigration reversed.
When I was a kid, it looked as if the country was heading for an eventual race war. Today that seems impossible unless angry white guys start shooting.
In the seventies it looked as if crime was going to keep increasing forever until the suburbs were overrun by street gangs. Instead, violent crime has steadily decreased.
On a smaller scale, the BP oil spill in the Gulf was supposed to destroy the Gulf ecosystem for the rest of our lives. And while the lasting damage was plenty bad, experts were generally surprised that it wasn't far worse.
The Y2K problem was supposed to break computers and plunge the planet into an agrarian society. Instead, programmers invented shortcuts for finding and fixing the bugs with time to spare.
In California, predicted ongoing droughts were supposed decimate the state. Instead, it rained.
Can anyone give me an example of a potential global disaster that the general public saw coming, with at least a ten year warning, and it actually happened as predicted?
Apr 12, 2013 |
General Nonsense |
Permalink
I blog on a variety of topics. I'm wondering which ones interest you the most.
1. Future (robots, technology, healthcare, etc.)
2. New business ideas (apps, inventions, services)
3. Management bullshit
4. Success tricks and tips
5. Personal health
6. Psychology (hypnosis, cognitive bias, illusions, affirmations)
7. Politics
8. World events
9. The startup I'm working on
10. Humor (silly stories usually about my life)
11. Metaphysics (hologram reality, religion, meaning of life)
I ask because I usually hear "stop doing that" more than I hear "do more of that" so I have an imbalanced idea of what people prefer.
1. Future (robots, technology, healthcare, etc.)
2. New business ideas (apps, inventions, services)
3. Management bullshit
4. Success tricks and tips
5. Personal health
6. Psychology (hypnosis, cognitive bias, illusions, affirmations)
7. Politics
8. World events
9. The startup I'm working on
10. Humor (silly stories usually about my life)
11. Metaphysics (hologram reality, religion, meaning of life)
I ask because I usually hear "stop doing that" more than I hear "do more of that" so I have an imbalanced idea of what people prefer.
Apr 10, 2013 |
General Nonsense |
Permalink
The other day I was practicing my two-handed backhand against a tennis ball machine. I've played tennis since I was a kid, but I started out with a one-handed backhand and it takes some work to switch. I set the ball machine to a narrow-random mode for some variety and started hitting.
Just so you can imagine the scene as I saw it, the ball machine has a black plastic exterior and it's about four-feet tall. It swivels left-right at its midsection. On the random setting it seems as if it's just messing with you. There is some variability in timing between balls because of the nature of the mechanical feeder on the top. When you add that to the programmed left-right randomness it gives the impression of being playful, just yanking you around for fun.
So there I am, hitting ball after ball, just me and the machine. No other human was anywhere near. I was having a great time, working up a sweat, improving my skills. . .
And then it occurred to me.
I . . . have a . . . robot friend.
The ball machine isn't intelligent in a classic sense. It was merely random. But humans are fairly random too, or so they seem, because we can't predict exactly what one might do next in any given situation. I don't even know what sentence I will type next. It's not random, but it seems that way because it is so unpredictable.
You all know my view that humans are simply moist robots, so for me, the difference between this tennis robot and a human was freakishly small. I was even responding to the robot in an emotional way. I felt a bit of a connection. Humans bond through shared activities and I was feeling it.
I imagine you're all dismissing this as a stretch. We're surrounded by machines that aren't entirely predictable and they don't feel alive. I'm typing this at my computer that surprised me half-a-dozen times already this morning. But my computer doesn't feel alive to me. Nor does my toaster, no matter how surprised I am its results. Those machines don't feel like the future. They are mere tools. The ball machine on the other hand registers in my lizard brain as a primitive form of life, in part because of its physical dimensions, and partly because of its relentless randomness. It makes humans seem a bit less special.
I saw a clip from TED (can't find it now) in which a guy tosses tennis balls at a toy helicopter that has a tennis racket strapped to it. The toy adjusts its position autonomously and returns the ball to the human, over and over. At this point in history the only thing that prevents me from having a full three-set tennis match with an anthropomorphic robot is the expense. The technology has arrived.
My prediction is that within the next five years each of you will have your own Holy $#!t moment with a robot that registers as freakishly intelligent. It's a cool feeling. It feels like the future.
Or have you already had the experience? Let me know in the comments.
Just so you can imagine the scene as I saw it, the ball machine has a black plastic exterior and it's about four-feet tall. It swivels left-right at its midsection. On the random setting it seems as if it's just messing with you. There is some variability in timing between balls because of the nature of the mechanical feeder on the top. When you add that to the programmed left-right randomness it gives the impression of being playful, just yanking you around for fun.
So there I am, hitting ball after ball, just me and the machine. No other human was anywhere near. I was having a great time, working up a sweat, improving my skills. . .
And then it occurred to me.
I . . . have a . . . robot friend.
The ball machine isn't intelligent in a classic sense. It was merely random. But humans are fairly random too, or so they seem, because we can't predict exactly what one might do next in any given situation. I don't even know what sentence I will type next. It's not random, but it seems that way because it is so unpredictable.
You all know my view that humans are simply moist robots, so for me, the difference between this tennis robot and a human was freakishly small. I was even responding to the robot in an emotional way. I felt a bit of a connection. Humans bond through shared activities and I was feeling it.
I imagine you're all dismissing this as a stretch. We're surrounded by machines that aren't entirely predictable and they don't feel alive. I'm typing this at my computer that surprised me half-a-dozen times already this morning. But my computer doesn't feel alive to me. Nor does my toaster, no matter how surprised I am its results. Those machines don't feel like the future. They are mere tools. The ball machine on the other hand registers in my lizard brain as a primitive form of life, in part because of its physical dimensions, and partly because of its relentless randomness. It makes humans seem a bit less special.
I saw a clip from TED (can't find it now) in which a guy tosses tennis balls at a toy helicopter that has a tennis racket strapped to it. The toy adjusts its position autonomously and returns the ball to the human, over and over. At this point in history the only thing that prevents me from having a full three-set tennis match with an anthropomorphic robot is the expense. The technology has arrived.
My prediction is that within the next five years each of you will have your own Holy $#!t moment with a robot that registers as freakishly intelligent. It's a cool feeling. It feels like the future.
Or have you already had the experience? Let me know in the comments.
Apr 9, 2013 |
General Nonsense |
Permalink
The Wall Street Journal asked my opinion on a few investment issues. I was happy to oblige.
On Warren Buffett's Investment Strategy
Sorry about my lack of blogging this past week. The startup I'm working on is busily getting the beta ready to share with those of you who were nice enough to volunteer for an early peek at it. More on that later.
Apr 1, 2013 |
General Nonsense |
Permalink
Update: Link fixed
Did you know that 50% of second opinions from doctors contradict first opinions? And did you know that 80% of the findings in medical literature are wrong?
I'm fascinated by a new company called Metamed that offers to be your personal medical researcher. For a fee of $200 per researcher per hour, with a $5K minimum, you can make sure the full force of science is on your side. Metamed analyzes the medical literature and tells you which study results about your condition are reliable and which are not. They assess the value of various diagnostic tests, and create a map of all possible medical correlations. It's the sort of thing your doctor would love to do for you if he had the resources.
Metamed's service is pricey, but the cost will probably come down as the process gets more automated. And objectively speaking, the service is already a bargain if your alternative is death by ignorance.
I saw in the news recently that the rate of growth for healthcare costs in the United States was slowing and no one is entirely sure why. I assume there are a number of reasons for the unexpected change, but my hypothesis is that the Internet is already unlocking the power of healthcare information for consumers. Personally, my healthcare process looks like this now:
My healthcare provider, Kaiser Permanente, operates for the benefit of the members, so they are super-aggressive about preventative healthcare. I would think preventative medicine can take another 20% off of healthcare costs in the long run. And preventative medicine is mostly about getting the right information to the right people.
The Adams Law of Slow-Moving Disasters observes that whenever a massive threat to humanity can be identified far in advance, we always find a way to sidestep it. At the moment it seems that healthcare costs will grow to the sky and bankrupt us, especially as the population of oldsters increases. But I think better information might someday cut healthcare costs by as much as 50%. That better information will come from a variety of sources. Metamed is part of that solution, as is Google, as is Kaiser's extraordinarily effective use of the Internet. And we're nearing a point at which your smartphone will test you for all sorts of problems.
I can also imagine a time in which Google Glasses TM will observe all of your food choices during the day and keep a running record of your nutrition. When you stray from a healthy diet, your glasses might start suggesting a salad. When you don't exercise all day, the glasses might suggest using the stairs instead of the elevator. For all practical purposes, a human with Google Glasses and a smartphone is already a cyborg. And your future cyborg half will do a better job of keeping your organic parts functioning than you are doing on your own.
In the long, long run your healthcare provider will fix both your organic parts and your cyborg parts because it will all be part of the same system. You'll go to the doctor complaining of a headache and he'll update your smartphone software to track your daily habits and look for what triggers the headaches.
Anyway, my point is that better information will solve the problem of increasing medical costs. It's already happening.
Disclosure: I don't have a financial interest in Metamed, nor do I have any firsthand knowledge of their service. The Chairmam of Metamed is Jaan Tallin, one of the founding engineers of Skype, and one of the more important futurists of our time. I know Jaan because of our mutual interest in the so-called singularity.
Did you know that 50% of second opinions from doctors contradict first opinions? And did you know that 80% of the findings in medical literature are wrong?
I'm fascinated by a new company called Metamed that offers to be your personal medical researcher. For a fee of $200 per researcher per hour, with a $5K minimum, you can make sure the full force of science is on your side. Metamed analyzes the medical literature and tells you which study results about your condition are reliable and which are not. They assess the value of various diagnostic tests, and create a map of all possible medical correlations. It's the sort of thing your doctor would love to do for you if he had the resources.
Metamed's service is pricey, but the cost will probably come down as the process gets more automated. And objectively speaking, the service is already a bargain if your alternative is death by ignorance.
I saw in the news recently that the rate of growth for healthcare costs in the United States was slowing and no one is entirely sure why. I assume there are a number of reasons for the unexpected change, but my hypothesis is that the Internet is already unlocking the power of healthcare information for consumers. Personally, my healthcare process looks like this now:
- Observe symptoms
- Search Internet for diagnosis and treatment.
- If I'm not confident in what I find on the Internet, I email my doctor in the Kaiser Permanente system to describe my symptoms. Kaiser encourages email.
- My doctor often replies in an hour with a prescription that has already been sent to my nearest pharmacy, some self-care instructions, or a request to come in for tests.
- If I need to book an appointment, Kaiser's website does an automated interview to advise me whether I should treat the problem myself or schedule a doctor.
My healthcare provider, Kaiser Permanente, operates for the benefit of the members, so they are super-aggressive about preventative healthcare. I would think preventative medicine can take another 20% off of healthcare costs in the long run. And preventative medicine is mostly about getting the right information to the right people.
The Adams Law of Slow-Moving Disasters observes that whenever a massive threat to humanity can be identified far in advance, we always find a way to sidestep it. At the moment it seems that healthcare costs will grow to the sky and bankrupt us, especially as the population of oldsters increases. But I think better information might someday cut healthcare costs by as much as 50%. That better information will come from a variety of sources. Metamed is part of that solution, as is Google, as is Kaiser's extraordinarily effective use of the Internet. And we're nearing a point at which your smartphone will test you for all sorts of problems.
I can also imagine a time in which Google Glasses TM will observe all of your food choices during the day and keep a running record of your nutrition. When you stray from a healthy diet, your glasses might start suggesting a salad. When you don't exercise all day, the glasses might suggest using the stairs instead of the elevator. For all practical purposes, a human with Google Glasses and a smartphone is already a cyborg. And your future cyborg half will do a better job of keeping your organic parts functioning than you are doing on your own.
In the long, long run your healthcare provider will fix both your organic parts and your cyborg parts because it will all be part of the same system. You'll go to the doctor complaining of a headache and he'll update your smartphone software to track your daily habits and look for what triggers the headaches.
Anyway, my point is that better information will solve the problem of increasing medical costs. It's already happening.
Disclosure: I don't have a financial interest in Metamed, nor do I have any firsthand knowledge of their service. The Chairmam of Metamed is Jaan Tallin, one of the founding engineers of Skype, and one of the more important futurists of our time. I know Jaan because of our mutual interest in the so-called singularity.
Mar 28, 2013 |
General Nonsense |
Permalink
The famous Monty Hall problem in the field of statistics goes like this: Monty Hall is a game show host. You are given a choice of three doors. One has a car behind it, the other two have goats. If you pick the door with the car, you win it. Your odds are 1-in-3.
So you pick a door, but before it opens, Monty opens one of the other two doors to reveal a goat. He asks if you want to switch from the door you initially picked to the other closed door. Your brain says the odds are the same for any closed door, so you stay. But in fact, the odds are twice as good if you switch doors.
You can see the math of it here. But if you are normal, you'll never reconcile in your mind how one closed door could have better odds than the other. If there are two closed doors remaining, how can the odds be anything but 50-50?
This reminds me of the Schrodinger's Cat thought experiment in which a cat in a sealed box (presumably with air holes) exists in a state of being simultaneously alive and dead depending on the results of a randomized event happening inside the box. How can a cat be alive and dead at the same time? Math says it can happen, my brain says no.
The pattern recognition part of my brain is connecting the Monty Hall problem with the Shrodinger's Cat thought experiment because both situations feel like proof that our brains are not equipped to understand reality at its most basic level.
Most of us accept the idea that math is a better indicator of truth than our buggy personal perceptions. Math doesn't lie, but our brains are huge scam artists. The Monty Hall problem and Schrodinger's Cat are examples in which our perceptions of reality and the math of reality disagree in a big way. It makes me wonder how much of the rest of my so-called reality disagrees with math without me knowing.
If I were programming a computer simulation full of artificial humans who believe they are real, I would need to take some shortcuts in creating their context and history. It would be nearly impossible to invent consistent histories for seven billion people spanning back to the primordial ooze. A far smarter approach would be to craft the history as you go, based on the present, in whatever minimum way is necessary to make all histories consistent.
For example, let's say you learn that you are the grand winner of a lottery. At the moment you realize you are the big winner, history becomes limited to only the possibilities that got you to that winning moment. Before you learned you were a winner, the reality at the lottery headquarters was only a smear of possibilities - like Shrodinger's Cat - where you were both a winner and a loser, just like everyone else. As soon as you learn you won, your history and everyone else's harden to conform to it. No one else can perceive that they won the grand prize in that particular lottery.
If I were the programmer of this simulation that you call your reality, I would make the history dependent on the present just to streamline my work. All I need from my fake history is that it is consistent with all the other fake histories so there is no "tell" left by the programmer.
I realize the simpler explanation for my confusion about Monty Hall and Schrodinger's cat is "Math be hard." But I like the psychological freedom of feeling as though I am the author of my own history and not its bitch.
Here's the cool part: I get to keep my interpretation of reality - in which my history is a manufactured illusion - until something in my present experience is inconsistent with that view.
Recently I heard of two senior citizens with mild dementia who became friendly at a senior care facility. Their fragile minds concocted an elaborate history of being childhood acquaintances that had found each other through fate. No one tries to dissuade them of this illusion because it works for them. They successfully rewrote their histories without any repercussions.
I wonder how often the rest of us rewrite our histories. Our only limitations are that our new histories have to be consistent with whatever scraps of history have already hardened.
So you pick a door, but before it opens, Monty opens one of the other two doors to reveal a goat. He asks if you want to switch from the door you initially picked to the other closed door. Your brain says the odds are the same for any closed door, so you stay. But in fact, the odds are twice as good if you switch doors.
You can see the math of it here. But if you are normal, you'll never reconcile in your mind how one closed door could have better odds than the other. If there are two closed doors remaining, how can the odds be anything but 50-50?
This reminds me of the Schrodinger's Cat thought experiment in which a cat in a sealed box (presumably with air holes) exists in a state of being simultaneously alive and dead depending on the results of a randomized event happening inside the box. How can a cat be alive and dead at the same time? Math says it can happen, my brain says no.
The pattern recognition part of my brain is connecting the Monty Hall problem with the Shrodinger's Cat thought experiment because both situations feel like proof that our brains are not equipped to understand reality at its most basic level.
Most of us accept the idea that math is a better indicator of truth than our buggy personal perceptions. Math doesn't lie, but our brains are huge scam artists. The Monty Hall problem and Schrodinger's Cat are examples in which our perceptions of reality and the math of reality disagree in a big way. It makes me wonder how much of the rest of my so-called reality disagrees with math without me knowing.
If I were programming a computer simulation full of artificial humans who believe they are real, I would need to take some shortcuts in creating their context and history. It would be nearly impossible to invent consistent histories for seven billion people spanning back to the primordial ooze. A far smarter approach would be to craft the history as you go, based on the present, in whatever minimum way is necessary to make all histories consistent.
For example, let's say you learn that you are the grand winner of a lottery. At the moment you realize you are the big winner, history becomes limited to only the possibilities that got you to that winning moment. Before you learned you were a winner, the reality at the lottery headquarters was only a smear of possibilities - like Shrodinger's Cat - where you were both a winner and a loser, just like everyone else. As soon as you learn you won, your history and everyone else's harden to conform to it. No one else can perceive that they won the grand prize in that particular lottery.
If I were the programmer of this simulation that you call your reality, I would make the history dependent on the present just to streamline my work. All I need from my fake history is that it is consistent with all the other fake histories so there is no "tell" left by the programmer.
I realize the simpler explanation for my confusion about Monty Hall and Schrodinger's cat is "Math be hard." But I like the psychological freedom of feeling as though I am the author of my own history and not its bitch.
Here's the cool part: I get to keep my interpretation of reality - in which my history is a manufactured illusion - until something in my present experience is inconsistent with that view.
Recently I heard of two senior citizens with mild dementia who became friendly at a senior care facility. Their fragile minds concocted an elaborate history of being childhood acquaintances that had found each other through fate. No one tries to dissuade them of this illusion because it works for them. They successfully rewrote their histories without any repercussions.
I wonder how often the rest of us rewrite our histories. Our only limitations are that our new histories have to be consistent with whatever scraps of history have already hardened.
Mar 27, 2013 |
General Nonsense |
Permalink
When my wife and I designed our home we got one of the rooms exactly right. The living room area has an L-shaped couch that opens to a fireplace on one wall and the TV on the other. It's far better than the common practice of an ugly rectangular TV over a rectangular fireplace. Our windows are on both sides of the fireplace so there is no glare on the TV. And there are walkways on all sides of the couch so the living room eliminates the need for a hallway to connect rooms downstairs. Best of all, when we are facing the TV, Shelly can be nearer the fireplace, and that works for both of us.
That's just an example of a perfect room setup. Obviously your ideal room setup would be different if you don't have a fireplace or a TV. But it made me wonder if there is such a thing as an ideal room design for every given set of functionality and budget. Is there, for example, a perfect kitchen layout that has everything figured out? A perfect bedroom?
You often see rooms that can't be furnished properly because furniture placement was an afterthought. The design of a room should start with the perfect arrangement of furniture and fixtures. I would think that for every budget and set of preferences there are a few furniture arrangements that stand out as the best. How hard would it be to catalog those best arrangements?
I imagine a time when a user can design a home simple by checking boxes on a long digital form. Questions for a living room might include:
1. Do you want a TV in this room?
2. Do you want a cozy reading chair?
3. Do you want a fireplace?
4. Etc.
Once the user selects all of his preferences for each room, he clicks a "shuffle" button and it spits out a house layout complete with external windows, doors, hallways, stairs, and engineering support structures. All of that stuff is fairly rules-based. If you don't like the first design, click the shuffle button again. In every case, the rooms will have exactly the features you specified but arranged differently. And of course you can walk through your model in 3D mode.
You would also have to answer some questions about the orientation of the home on the lot, such as the location of neighbors, the street, and the sun. Just check the boxes that apply and hit the shuffle button.
I can imagine that each time you select or deselect a feature it automatically adjusts the total cost of building and maintaining the home. When you have the design you like, at the price you can afford, you click a button to send the whole thing out to bid for contractors. I can also imagine that clicking the "build" button sends the materials and cutting instructions to manufacturers and lumberyards that prepare all the building materials and deliver them to the site, appropriately labeled for the builder.
I would think the cost of the house would fall dramatically with this model, in part because you could shuffle rooms until you got the lowest cost that meets your needs. When an architect designs your home, you get perhaps two or three different looks from which to choose, and no idea which one is more expensive. Room placement makes a big difference in costs for several reasons:
1. Rooms that need plumbing should be near each other to reduce costs.
2. Orientation to the sun makes a huge difference in heating/cooling/insulation.
3. Some designs require fewer hallways, which saves space.
4. Some designs require more support structures, doors, windows, etc.
5. Some designs have ductwork issues.
Those are just some obvious examples of potential savings. You'd also cut your architect expense by 80%. And you'd save on labor and materials because the building materials would be measured and cut at the factory, including everything from lumber to floor tiles to carpet.
My observation is that the building industry is slow to innovate and fairly disorganized. Builders, architects, and materials companies are all their own little silos. So my guess is that the "shuffle design" program will originate in some sort of online game environment before it gets ported to the real world.
That's just an example of a perfect room setup. Obviously your ideal room setup would be different if you don't have a fireplace or a TV. But it made me wonder if there is such a thing as an ideal room design for every given set of functionality and budget. Is there, for example, a perfect kitchen layout that has everything figured out? A perfect bedroom?
You often see rooms that can't be furnished properly because furniture placement was an afterthought. The design of a room should start with the perfect arrangement of furniture and fixtures. I would think that for every budget and set of preferences there are a few furniture arrangements that stand out as the best. How hard would it be to catalog those best arrangements?
I imagine a time when a user can design a home simple by checking boxes on a long digital form. Questions for a living room might include:
1. Do you want a TV in this room?
2. Do you want a cozy reading chair?
3. Do you want a fireplace?
4. Etc.
Once the user selects all of his preferences for each room, he clicks a "shuffle" button and it spits out a house layout complete with external windows, doors, hallways, stairs, and engineering support structures. All of that stuff is fairly rules-based. If you don't like the first design, click the shuffle button again. In every case, the rooms will have exactly the features you specified but arranged differently. And of course you can walk through your model in 3D mode.
You would also have to answer some questions about the orientation of the home on the lot, such as the location of neighbors, the street, and the sun. Just check the boxes that apply and hit the shuffle button.
I can imagine that each time you select or deselect a feature it automatically adjusts the total cost of building and maintaining the home. When you have the design you like, at the price you can afford, you click a button to send the whole thing out to bid for contractors. I can also imagine that clicking the "build" button sends the materials and cutting instructions to manufacturers and lumberyards that prepare all the building materials and deliver them to the site, appropriately labeled for the builder.
I would think the cost of the house would fall dramatically with this model, in part because you could shuffle rooms until you got the lowest cost that meets your needs. When an architect designs your home, you get perhaps two or three different looks from which to choose, and no idea which one is more expensive. Room placement makes a big difference in costs for several reasons:
1. Rooms that need plumbing should be near each other to reduce costs.
2. Orientation to the sun makes a huge difference in heating/cooling/insulation.
3. Some designs require fewer hallways, which saves space.
4. Some designs require more support structures, doors, windows, etc.
5. Some designs have ductwork issues.
Those are just some obvious examples of potential savings. You'd also cut your architect expense by 80%. And you'd save on labor and materials because the building materials would be measured and cut at the factory, including everything from lumber to floor tiles to carpet.
My observation is that the building industry is slow to innovate and fairly disorganized. Builders, architects, and materials companies are all their own little silos. So my guess is that the "shuffle design" program will originate in some sort of online game environment before it gets ported to the real world.
