The Catholic Cricket

I’ve been a bit busy, and thus haven’t had an opportunity to comment on things, but there’s one main thought I had after the underwear bomber inspired those charged with ensuring safety on airplanes to start using those ridiculous full-body scanners.

What a waste.

I don’t know how much those things cost, but they surely aren’t cheap.  And plenty of people will not want to go through them.  On top of that, I read recently that some people are trying to use religious reasons for not submitting to such a scan (“Thou shalt not undergo a full body scan”?), and if that’s enough to avoid such scrutiny, then even the false sense of safety that comes from such technology is elminated.

Wait…”false sense of safety”?  Of course.  The thought I had upon hearing that those scanners were going to be installed at various airports was: “Then terrorists will simply go deeper.  Implant a double-bladder inside the abdomen of the suicide bomber that contains the chemicals to be mixed.”  Think of those chemical glow-sticks that are everywhere around Halloween for the kids to carry.

And, of course, what did I see recently in the news?  Female suicide bombers with explosive “augmentations“.  How will the TSA respond to these things?  Mandatory x-rays and MRIs?

I don’t know what the right response is, but I do know that these full-body scanners won’t do much to improve safety.  The cost/effectiveness of them is negligible, and the work-arounds are plentiful and simple.

I like science.  I’ve always liked science.  I have great respect for the scientific process.  Which is why I find the “stolen” CRU documents to be so disturbing.  It’s not just the fact that scientists appear to have cooked the data to fit their preconceived notions, as bad as that is.  It’s not just that those same scientists appear to have put pressure on scientific journals to not publish opposing work.  Nor that they used the lack of published work to detract from the weight of anti-AGW arguments.  All of that is bad, and I think it hurts all of science.

What bothers me the most is the lack of outrage among other scientists.  There should be all sorts of complaints out there about how the scientific process has been undermined.  There should be people calling for the resignation or suspension of involved scientists pending review.  Scientists, corrupting science to drive a policy agenda?  It strikes at the very heart of what’s supposed to make science such a good tool: objective evaluation of collected data to explain what is observed and predict, again objectively, what will happen.

Good science relies on quite a few important legs.  One is objectivity.  Others include openness and repeatability.  The processes involved in adjusting the raw data to account for various factors (urban heat islands, movement of surface stations, etc.) should be clear and understandable.  It must be repeatable and reasonable.  Quality controls need to exist for any algorithms used to make those adjustments.  All of these things seem to be lacking in the case of AGW.

Without those things in place, it’s not science.  It’s just a bunch of self-proclaimed experts saying “trust us”.  Why should we trust them?  They’re not acting as scientists, they’re acting like magicians.  Their incantations are secret, not meant for the ears of mere mortals.  We are supposed to just accept their declarations without question.

And while I’m upset with the media’s poor coverage of this, and with the scientists involved, I’m even more upset with other scientists who should be raising integrity issues instead of defending this as “normal”.  They should be defending science, not scientists.  They should expect and demand that all scientists who put forth hypotheses give full disclosure of all relevant data needed to reproduce the results.

Where is the integrity in science?

A lot of the Catholic blogs I read are up in arms (figuratively, obviously) over Notre Dame’s invitation to President Obama to be the commencement speaker at this years graduation ceremony.  While I understand and share their dislike of this situation, I have a slightly different perspective I’ve not seen brought up anywhere.

It is no surprise that Dame issued the invitation.  The administration there has wandered all over the place with regards to the Catholic faith, doing some good things but also doing some incredibly stupid things, things that are out of alignment with Catholic values (at least, from my perspective).

No, it was no surprise at all.  They’ve issued such invitations to Presidents regularly (from what I recall and have read).  Not all in the recent past have accepted.  Carter did, Reagan did, Bush did, Clinton didn’t, Bush did.

What I question is why the President accepted. 

The charitable side of me says that President Obama was truly honored to be asked to speak at the ceremony, and delightedly accepted such an honor.  The cynical side of me, the side that is currently winning in my evaluation of the reasons, laughs at this idea.  My inner cynic thinks that it is another attempt to pander to Catholics.  To me, it is an attempt to placate his Catholic supporters, to say “I care about my Catholic friends” while doing so much that is so completely contrary to Catholic teaching.

I don’t think he expected the response he got…at least, not the amount.  But it’s all directed at Notre Dame, and not Obama.  He is not the target of the anger.  If it keeps up as is, directed almost entirely at Notre Dame, liberals will be able to paint this as just a bunch of ultraconservative kooks who are out of touch with America.  Their accomplices in the press will help push this concept.  And because the driving force is Obama’s stance on life issues, they’ll be able to use this to harm the pro-life movement.

Instead of simply railing at Notre Dame, this needs to be used to drive home why Obama is bad for America.  Yes, he shouldn’t be speaking at a Catholic commencement ceremony, he shouldn’t be receiving an honorary law degree from the premier US Catholic university.  These events are a travesty.  But they’re a travesty because of Obama’s stance and actions with regards to abortion and ESCR. 

He has written a death sentence for millions of innocent babies.  He’s made you and me pay for those deaths.  He’s done it in the name of scientific advancement and personal freedom and privacy, as if any of those justify killing another human being.  And now he’s trying to keep the wool pulled over the eyes of many Catholics by making them feel good because he paid attention to a Catholic university.

The sad thing is…it’ll work.  After all, a school as prestigious as Notre Dame wouldn’t give an honorary degree to someone unless they really deserved it, would they?

The proposed stimulus package keeps growing and growing, and is now (if I recall correctly) over $900 billion.

$900,000,000,000, spent on what?  All sorts of weird things that won’t do diddly to stimulate the economy.  Well, here’s my own idea.  Since the government is going to go into debt by nearly another trillion dollars, they should just give it to the people.

According to the US POPClock Projection, there are currently 305,770,596 people in the US.  Giving each person $3000 would cost $917,311,788,000.  Mind you, that’s $3000 per person, so a family of four would get $12,000, while a family of 7 (mine) would get $21,000.

If that money is used responsibly (ha!), people would be able to get current with outstanding bills, and wipe out a significant amount of debt.  For example, I would pay off several medical bills, pay off the car, and wipe out most of my wife’s student loan.  My doctors and hospitals would have additional money, instead of receivables.  The loan holder for my car would have more money they could then turn around and loan out again.  My single credit card company would get a little bit of money which would help them as well.  Banks would get an influx of money as people (hopefully) wipe out unsecured debt.  For other people, they could catch up on mortgage payments, helping to stabilize the housing market.

On top of all of that, it would free up regular income that is currently going to feed these loans and outstanding bills.  I’d be able to spend money on other things, instead of paying for interest.  (I’d be smart about it, and much of it would go into savings so I can get a down-payment ready for the house we’re in now.)  I could buy some much-needed new shoes instead of dragging out the repayment of medical bills.  I could spend money on new things instead of still paying for things that were new a year ago.

Unemployed people would get an additional buffer to give them a little additional time to find a new job.

Sure, a bunch of people would be irresponsible with a sudden influx of money like that, but come on…would they really be doing worse than the heap of government pork currently in the bill?

Senator Kent Conrad, speaking on the vote to confirm Geithner as Secretary of the Treasury, offered the following rationale:

One committee member, Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., a former tax commissioner, said in normal times, Geithner’s failure to pay his taxes would have led Conrad to oppose the nomination. 

“But these are not normal times,” Conrad said. He said the economy’s not “out of the woods” and touted Geithner’s extensive experience at a time when the country needs a treasury secretary imminently. 

What poppycock.  What makes now abnormal?  Housing slumps?  Economic changes?  Rising unemployment?  That’s all typical stuff for any country.  There are ups and downs in life.  That’s normal.

Think about what Conrad’s logic allows for.  In “normal” times, I wouldn’t  want a bank robber to run Citigroup, but since he has so much experience with money we have to hire this one.  In “normal” times, I wouldn’t want a homicidal maniac in a key leadership position at the DoD, but given the state of the world, we really need this homicidal maniac in place.

We are always in “normal” times.  There are always critical events occurring in the world, and we need to react to them.  That’s a part of living.  Using such a rationale in justifying the appointment of an unfit person to the position of Treasury Secretary is disingenuous at best.

What Conrad is saying is that ethics don’t really matter when times are tough.  Except that’s when they really matter.

Maybe Geithner will do a really good job as Treasury Secretary.  I hope so.  Maybe it was an honest mistake (doubtful, in my mind), or Geithner is truly repentant for his past actions.  But I don’t buy Conrad’s implied argument that it would take too long to find a suitable alternative (surely the Obama transition team had a list of possible nominees), or that Geithner is the only person who can fix things, and that therefore one must

I’ve heard various people make the claim that McCain lost the election, in part, because of voters’ dislike of what Bush did in office, and then go on a tear about how bad Bush has been.  The same people frequently, in nearly the same breath, complain about the bias in media reporting and how that bias incorrectly shifts peoples’ perception about the economy, the war, and pretty much everything else.

I wonder.  Do the people saying this realize that the same applies to Bush as applies to the reporting on the economy?  For years, the media has been talking down the economy.  Everything is doom and gloom, and so people come to think it’s doom and gloom, even if they personally are doing fine.  In the same vein, the media has spent the past 8 years talking down everything the President has done.  No news story about the President comes out that doesn’t have a negative spin.  And so people become very negative about what the President has done.  Said long enough, and loud enough, it became accepted as fact.

People didn’t vote against the Republican candidate because they were voting against the “failed policies” of 8 years of Bush.  They voted against the negative media-made image of Bush.

If people fail to recognize that, then the MSM will be able to continue misinforming us while influencing our decisions.

I expect that the next four years will be a riot of worshipful articles about Obama, where everything will be spun to put him in the best possible light, just as Bush was always shown in the worst possible.  It is no more true that Obama will have done no wrong than it is that Bush did no right.

Keep that in mind, and remember that your perceptions can be deceived, tricked, if you’re not vigilant.  It’s easy to miss something like this.

I’d like to see the phrase “thrown under the bus” get thrown under the bus.

The bus should then be backed up and run forward a few times, and then the driver can get out and kick the phrase a few times just to make sure it’s dead before pouring gasoline on it and tossing on a lit match, basking in the warmth provided on a cold autumn day.

Please?  I’m really tired of hearing it.  Find some new phrases, everyone.  Expand your vocabulary.

I’ve been thinking about all of the polls that are out there on the current election, Presidential or otherwise.  I’ve looked a little bit into how they do things, and I have a question.  If anyone can find the answer to this or explain it in terms I’m likely to understand, I’d appreciate it.

From what I recall of my statistics class, and the programming I did on SPC software, the combination of random selection and a sufficient sample size was needed to reach a reasonable conclusion.  For example, if I had a lot of 5000 parts, and I sampled 100 parts for defects, I could use the number of defective parts found in that sample, multiply by 50, and have a close approximation of how many bad defective parts I have.  Applying some equations that I no longer remember, one could also calculate out a reasonable range that would be right 95% of the time (or whatever the percentages are…that’s not really important.)

Now, let’s take that 100 piece sample and break it down further.  The defective parts fall in one of three categories: bent, cracked, or porous.  The number of instances of each defect in the sample can be further used to extrapolate the actual defective quantities of each defect type in the lot.

Have I confused enough of you to stop reading?  Probably.

Anyhow, I understand that there is a historical aspect to the statistics.  We can know that, over the history of producing that part, we’ve averaged a 2% scrap rate for cracks, 3% for bent, etc.  Those can be expected.  However, if there’s a problem with the manufacturing process in some way, the historical averages can be deviated from significantly.  From what I recall, that’s also something checked for during statistical analysis.  A sudden doubling of the cracked parts is a cause for concern.

Now, inherent in the sampling process is the idea that this current sample of this current lot is a valid representation of the overall lot.  There’s no need to apply any type of alteration to the counts in order to force the statistics to meet the historical trend.  In fact, doing so is counter-productive to the idea of historical tracking of such sampling data.

With all of this in mind, we reach my question (or, more accurately, series of questions): Why are election polls weighted?  Isn’t the random sampling sufficient for making accurate predictions?  If I randomly sample 1000 voters, and 50% self-identify as Republican, should that number (and other applicable responses) really be adjusted down to 35% because that’s the percentage somebody somewhere decided is the real makeup of the country?  Shouldn’t the random sample be representative of the entire “lot” of Americans, with a margin of error?  Or is the margin of error on such a small sample of such a large “lot” just so wide that it makes the polls meaningless without the weighting?

Or am I looking at it wrong?  Are we grabbing a random sample of co-mingled parts?  Doodads, widgets, and thingamajigs all thrown in a large bin, and we know that the bin has about 40% doodads, 35% widgets, and 25% thingamajigs.  If that’s the case, then I would expect a sample of 1000 items from the bin to be around 400 doodads, 350 widgets, and 250 thingamajigs.  I assume that’s where the weighting comes in.

But is that really how our country is made up?  Do we really know the percentage of doodads in the bin?  It seems to me that the random sampling should, in and of itself, account for the percentage makeup of the items in the bin.

Maybe my brother will explain this one to me, because it’s got me confused.

Oh, one other thing.  The polls themselves are all selecting from the same bin.  The random samples are different (with some small chance of duplicated sampling).  Therefore, the unweighted numbers would seem to me to be a good indicator of the actual makeup of the country.

Entirely fictitious example: 
Zogby polls 10 people.  4 D, 4 R, 2 I
AP polls 10 people, 5 D, 4 R, 1 I
Fox polls 10 people, 4 D, 5 R, 1 I
NYT polls 10 people, 5 D, 3 R, 2 I
WP polls 10 people, 4 D, 4 R, 2 I

Do historical weightings needs to be applied when the internals of the multiple polls can be used to see what kind of compositional makeup exists out there?  With a net random sample of 50 people, I’ve got 22 D, 20 R, 8 I.

Wouldn’t such an amalgamation of current data be more accurate than trying to apply historical numbers that may be off?  Current sampling of current people with live data to make live predictions, instead of forcing the mix in the sample to match the last known percentages in the bin (which is surely based on an old sampling anyhow)?  Is somebody already doing this?

Well, I’ve managed to confuse myself.  I hope I haven’t given anyone too much of a headache with this.

I’ve participated in a discussion on What’s Wrong With the World that started out being about Embryonic Stem Cell Research (or, more to the point, how ESCR has disappeared as an issue in this election), but advanced to a discussion about voting and prudential judgment.

Before the comments were closed (it was an older post, with 130+ comments), I noted that there were several one-vote decisions that helped shape this country, and that there’s no way for us to know which time we vote could be “the one”.  Zippy Catholic responded with:

Not in the current presidential contest. Thinking that my vote is going to change the outcome of the current Presidential election in the age of mass market and mass media is like thinking that me buying one can of Pepsi will determine which soda, Pepsi or Coke, is the most popular. It is assuredly more efficacious for the rational man to pray for a miracle.

Now, I can understand such a pessimistic view of elections, but is he right?  (For the record, from what I’ve read, Zippy isn’t buying Coke or Pepsi, he’s going for RC Cola or maybe Jolt).

Now, in my comment at the above link, I noted the story (most likely a stretched version of the truth) of Freeman Clark leaving his deathbed to vote for Kelso for the Indiana state senate, who a year later pushed for Hannigan as one of Indiana’s US Senators, who a year later voted for Texas Statehood.  Kelso won by one vote (allegedly, Clark’s, who allegedly died on his way back to his deathbed), Hannigan won by one vote, and had Hannigan not voted for Texas Statehood, the US Senate vote would have been a tie.

But while Clark’s vote (Clark’s existence is really moot) was important, it was just one of however many Kelso got.  Had any of Kelso’s supporters stayed home, he might not have been elected to the state senate.  It wasn’t just Clark’s vote, it was every single vote that Keslo got that made the difference.

Now, all of those voting in the Indiana state election way back in 1844 (or whatever year it was…the places I’ve seen this story have variations…according to one site I saw, Kelso was a state senator from 1848-1849) had no idea that their votes, cumulatively, would make such a significant difference in the future of the country.

Coke and Pepsi aren’t successful because of mass-media and mass marketing, but because of millions of single votes.  One can boycott both Pepsi and Coke, and the companies will do fine, but boycotts work because of cumulative effect.  And voting works the same way.

Final thought, since it’s so late: I’m not impressed with the idea of voting third party, and I’m definitely not impressed with the idea of not voting at all.  Not voting is ridiculous, and voting third party is equally ridiculous, akin to Obama’s “Present” votes in Illinois.  Oh, I could understand going for a third party if the race was a blowout one way or the other.  But when the race is tight, and the stakes are as high as they are (especially for anyone coming from a pro-Life perspective), it’s utterly foolish to see one’s vote as meaningless.  If it means nothing, why are the candidates trying so hard to get it?

And, as if anyone needed me to state my position, I’m voting McCain.  While he’s wrong on ESCR, he’s right on just about every other Life issue.  I’d rather support a candidate who is 98% correct than deny him my support and let a completely wrong candidate win.  And that’s my prudential judgment.

With McCain, one can hope for (and lobby for) a change in his ESCR position.  The expectations one should have for Obama – well, one shouldn’t have any.  He would support more ESCR than McCain, in addition to signing FOCA, allow government-funded abortions, and everything else the Culture of Death advances.  I’ve started a post on this, and was planning on hitting several other topics on the election, but I don’t know if they’ll ever get posted.  Ahh well, living my life is more important than ranting and raving online anyway.