| Blog | ||||
| Home | Research | Pictures | Teaching | Personal |
|
This page represents only my own views, and not those of any university or other body. Posted Monday 11th March 2013 at 9.59am Repetition Sometimes I have a point of view on something, and I like to read articles that agree with that point of view. I like to talk to people that agree with that point of view. And sometimes I try to convince other people that my point of view is correct. If you read this blog at all regularly, you'll know this. I have been trained, over the last 10 years or so, to suspend this attitude when I'm working. I spend a lot of my time thinking about how to prove statements mathematically. Occasionally I have what seems to be a good idea, which explains what is happening in the model that I'm thinking about, and allows me to prove what I want to prove. As an undergraduate or masters student, I would write down this argument as best I could and hand it in; someone would then decide whether it was correct or not. As the questions got harder, the proportion of questions that I attempted dropped, but the proportion of those that I attempted that were essentailly correct increased. At PhD level and beyond, the questions have got harder still, to the point where probably 90% of the ideas that I have (and these ideas don't come very often) turn out to be junk. At first it still often needed a PhD supervisor to tell me which ideas were junk. Part of the PhD experience, for me at least, was the process of "internalising my supervisor" (in a metaphorical sense - don't worry, Simon!): learning not to get too excited by what seems to be a good idea; analysing it, checking it from all angles, and then trying to write it up in a rigorous way. And then checking it again, trying to think of simpler alternatives, and testing it against some simple examples and related results. Only then can I feel satisfied that it's really a good idea, and start trying to convince other people that it's a good idea. (In fact I'm still quite bad at this process when watching other people's talks, as the time for checking my arguments is limited - this often leads to me asking stupid questions.) Politicians, it seems to me - though there are some exceptions of course - don't have this training. In fact, quite the opposite. They are trained (or have a natural ability) to latch onto any shred of evidence that espouses their own cause, and repeat it to anyone they can persuade to listen. George Osborne is now breaking new ground for his kind, and dragging David Cameron along for the ride. Cameron recently gave yet another speech professing that the government's deficit reduction scheme was the only reasonable option for the country, that it has not harmed economic growth, and that the IMF and OBR agreed with him. The OBR responded by pointing out that not only had the prime minister made an unsupported claim, but that in fact the OBR had explicitly disagreed with his claim in every one of its recent forecasts. The response from number 10? "The OBR has today again highlighted external inflation shocks, the eurozone and financial sector difficulties as the reasons why their forecasts have come in lower than expected. That is precisely the point the prime minister was underlining." The government is trapped by its refusal to listen to evidence until now. It thinks that it is too late to admit its major economic mistake, and therefore has to keep churning out the same tired arguments in the face of all the facts. There has been a leak of support from the government parties over the parliament; I can see the political reason for carrying on down the same path. But I also see a place in politics for playing the long game. Admitting that you're wrong would give a hit in the polls; voters don't like to think that their leaders might get things wrong. But if changing course leads to better results, surely those voters might realise that you made a brave decision and come back? Better to have a chance of that than the slow puncture at the moment. 0 comments Posted Saturday 9th March 2013 at 3.43pm Landlord benefit I agree with pretty much this whole article (by Zoe Williams in the Guardian). £4.5bn in the current spending round will go on grants to support the building of new affordable homes; £94bn will go on housing benefit. Crazy. 0 comments Posted Wednesday 6th March 2013 at 1.53pm Israel I'm at the Technion in Haifa. I heard a story the other day about a Technion scientist, Daniel Shechtman, who discovered quasi-crystals - molecules that are constructed in an ordered but non-periodic way. This discovery, in 1982, was ridiculed and he was asked to leave his research group. Linus Pauling even said "Danny Shechtman is talking nonsense. There is no such thing as quasicrystals, only quasi-scientists." What a great line! Shechtman won the Nobel prize for chemistry in 2011 for his work. That's got to feel good. 0 comments Posted Wednesday 27th February 2013 at 12.58pm Amass Ian Chappell - sometimes talks sense, sometimes talks codswallop. Brilliant interview with him in the Guardian. Do you have a favourite word, or a word you overuse? I don't overuse it, but there was an Australian guy, John McMahon, who played county cricket for Somerset and Sussex. I met him in England when I playing in the leagues in 1963. He was an interesting guy because he loved words and poetry. You'd be getting pissed in the sleaziest bar of all time around Manchester – and there were a few of those in '63 – and all of a sudden Macca would start quoting Banjo Patterson or something like that. Most Australian guys called blokes by nickname – Dougie rather than Walters, Rodney rather than Marsh – but Macca would always say to me, "How's KD Walters going?" or "How's RW Marsh going?" He used to use the word 'amass'. He'd say, "How many did KD Walters amass today? or "How many did RW Marsh amass today?" So every now and then when I'm writing a column, I'll always stick in an amass every now and then. And every time I do it, I think, "There's one for you Macca." 0 comments Posted Monday 25th February 2013 at 8.01pm Where are we now? How have I not heard this before now? As long as there's me As long as there's you... 0 comments Posted Monday 25th February 2013 at 8.01pm Bobby Moore Great memories of Bobby Moore. 0 comments Posted Sunday 24th February 2013 at 10.10am Let's do a Costa Rica! Just think how useful £37.2 billion could be... Paul Vallely in the Independent. 0 comments Posted Saturday 23rd February 2013 at 5.22pm Sponge pudding Here's a recipe for a sponge pudding that's adapted from Jamie Oliver's... goes fantastically well with toffee sauce! (He used dates instead of the other fruit.) 225g fruit (I used 2 plums, a small handful of black grapes, and made the rest up with sultanas) 1tsp baking powder 85g butter 170g caster sugar 2 eggs 170g self-raising flour 1/4tsp mixed spice (I actually used nutmeg and ginger, as I didn't have mixed spice) 1/4tsp cinnamon 2 tablespoons drinking chocolate Soak the fruit and baking powder in 200ml boiling water for 2 mins, then drain. In a separate bowl, cream the sugar and butter, then add the rest of the ingredients and mix well. Pour into a greased ovenproof dish and bake at 180C for 35 mins. (Mine wasn't quite ready at this point - I stuck a knife in and it came out with cake on it - so I turned down the heat to 100C and cooked for a further 5 mins or so.) For toffee sauce, put 115g butter, 115g brown sugar, 140ml cream (or milk) in a saucepan and warm on a lowish heat until it thickens, stirring regularly. This can take some time if you're using milk... 1 comment Posted Wednesday 20th February 2013 at 1.25pm Envy I rarely like reading overtly sarcastic articles, but this one by Mark Steel in the Independent makes a very good point. Disregarding any notion of fairness, why is it that a mansion tax (or a wealth tax, or new council tax bands) is too expensive to implement to be worth it, but a bedroom tax is efficient use of resources? 0 comments Posted Monday 18th February 2013 at 7.13pm If you're feeling sinister... This is a very interesting look at the beginnings of Belle and Sebastian. 0 comments
|