Microscope Puzzle

The following game is based on the Microscope puzzle in 7th Guest, a game I had on, what Wikipedia calls the ill-fated, Philips CD-i. You can make two types of moves:

• Move to an adjacent square and a new blob of your colour will appear
• Jump to a square (has to be within two squares) and all blobs of the opponents colour that are adjacent to the square that your blob lands on will turn to your colour

I was really happy that I beat this game either first time or first time I knew the rules - which is better than some people. After passing this puzzle I wanted to continue playing but the game did not have that option. I look forward to playing it again but I am nervous of putting my winning streak on the line. Let me know how you get on.

Externalities

An externality is a transaction that has an effect, not valued in money, on a third party, who has not agreed to the transaction. Externalities can be positive, negative, or positional. A negative externality is one that causes a cost to a third party. If your neighbour has a party but is not kind enough to invite you, it may cost you some sleep but it will not cost you money. A positive externality creates a benefit for a third party. Educated people are less likely to commit violent crimes. A program that keeps more children in school* until they are eighteen helps to create a safer society. A positional externality, also called keeping up with the Joneses, is the cost of maintaining your status. Externalities are important for forecasting in business because companies need to be aware of changes in their environment that could affect them.

In the 2009 book SuperFreakEnomics the authors discussed an invention that would help reduce hurricanes. Hurricanes are caused by overheated surface water. In the book they discuss the waters off the SE coast of America that cause hurricanes resulting in an average of $10bn worth of damage annually. The machine would get cold water from over a 100ft down and bring it to the surface to cool the water there – a reverse convection pattern. The items would cost $1bn to deploy. $1bn to $10bn seems like a bargain –and this is before human costs are taken into account - but are there any third parties who should be concerned.

Ireland has a 25^th-75^th percentile December temperature of 6°C - 11°C. The Kamchatka Peninsula* in Russia is on the same latitude and also on a coast. It has a 25^th-75^th percentile December temperature of -4°C - -9°C. This is because the Gulf Stream, originating in the warm waters off of the SE coast of America. Climate scientists fear a drop of at least 10°C for Ireland if the Gulf Stream were to somehow be (or should that read 'were sowehow to be'?) switched off by global warming. It would be tough to disinsentivise Mother Nature but could you disinsentivise another country?

* Important things to control for here are latitude and distance from the ocean. The latter because bodies of water heat up and cool down more quickly than the land surrounding it causing more median temperatures. I was delighted when I looked at the map to find such an excellent control.

If this was another person – think Mr. Burns blocking out the sun in the Simpsons – the act could be criminalized, or people could bring civil law suits, there might even be a way to tax it. These are the most common ways to prevent a negative externality. Here the situation is more like missiles have been placed on a country’s border: one country claims the right to defend itself; one claims the right to peace of mind.

Externalities are important for business because they represent hidden opportunities and threats in their operating environment. Every government budget brings with it new rules that can have profound effects on businesses that need to be thought of beforehand. Speaking of budgets, perhaps an agreed drop of several degrees in temperature might be used to leverage several billion dollars from American pockets – No Taxation Without Frozen Precipitation!

Jokes That Work Well With Foreign Speakers

Well jokes that might work well with foreign speakers - there will be no money-back guarantees on this blog. When  I first started going abroad I had some difficulty speaking to large groups with mixed levels of English.I tend to be very enthusiastic and speak too quickly - and the level of English of some foreigners is so good that you just forget it is not their natural language. The following jokes have served me very well:

I Know Only One Phrase In French:
This works well with French people, obviously. They will be expecting you to say, "Voulez-vous couchez avec moi". Of course, I am made of sterner stuff. Their expectation just sets the joke up. The next line is, "Mon age á trois". At this point you don't want any francophiles present as they will mock your pronunciation - runing the joke. Now that you have disappointed your audience by apparently substituting one risqué phrase for another, you can drop the punchline:

More Yoghurt: La Belle Dame Won't Let Me Quit

Today's poem is another corker from Keats, "La Belle Dame Sans Merci". The poem is open to many interpretations but I cannot seem to find any that match my own. Ostensibly the poem is about a knight who appears to have been broken by his pursuit of a fairy lady, who said she loved him, but did not. It ties in nicely with this Freakonomics podcast: "The Upside Of Quitting". My interpretation is that of a young person who followed their dreams to the best of their ability but who did not achieve it.


There are two economic ideas that support the idea of quitting:


Sunk Cost: retrospective costs that have already been incurred and cannot be recovered.
Opportunity Cost: the cost of making one choice over another.


In the article above baseball players who do not make it to the big leagues end up, economically speaking, significantly worse than people from the same socio-economic background. This is because the opportunity cost of chasing their baseball dream is that of going to college and/or getting experience in a profession they would choose. Many who go down this path may also stick with it for too long because when they do quit they will have wasted all the years of training and coaching.

Let's Make A Deal

Every remotely serious bridge player is aware of the Monty Hall Problem. You are on game show. There are three doors. Behind one door is a car and behind the other two are goats. You choose a door and then the host will open one door to reveal a goat. You are then offered a choice to stay with your door or switch to the other door.

Should you stay or switch?

Great Players: Attillo Lombardo

My first memory of Lombardo is seeing him on RTE's Monday night highlight package from Serie A. For some reason I thought it odd that a bald player could head the ball so well - I am far more open minded these days. Lombardo had the rather obvious nickname of "The Bald Eagle", and he would have stood out on any pitch for his distinctive appearance. What made Lombardo special for me was that he was that he stood out as an athlete - he was a player I could never hope to emulate. In the clips below, when he dribbles the ball goes 5+ yards ahead of him. He is not beating players with guile but with pace and occasionally power.

Best Of Wodehouse

The books of P.G. Wodehouse have been among my favourites from an early age. I heartily recommend to any voluptuaries of the English language. In this article here, Stephen Fry gives a better account than I have time to. If you are interested my favourite stories were centred on Jeeves and Wooster, and Lord Emsworth. I will simply offer a selection of my favourite lines from Wodehouse works. If you enjoy them you can search for your own here.

• The Right Hon. was a tubby little chap who looked as if he had been poured into his clothes and had forgotton to say 'When'!
• He had just about enough intelligence to open his mouth when he wanted to eat, but certainly no more.
• Freddie experienced the sort of abysmal soul-sadness which afflicts one of Tolstoy's Russian peasants when, after putting in a heavy day's work strangling his father, beating his wife, and dropping the baby into the city's reservoir, he turns to the cupboards, only to find the vodka bottle empty.
• She fitted into my biggest arm-chair as if it had been built round her by someone who knew they were wearing arm-chairs tight about the hips that season
• The least thing upset him on the links. He missed short putts because of the uproar of the butterflies in the adjoining meadows. 
• Musical comedy is the Irish stew of drama. Anything may be put into it, with the certainty that it will improve the general effect. 
• He was standing on his left leg. With a sudden change of policy, he now shifted and stood on his right
• The cloud was passing from what, for want of a better word, must be called Lord Emsworth's mind.