Thursday, April 19, 2012

Physics proof of innocence

In the category of unimportant but highly amusing, I think many will enjoy this very short paper written by a physicist in California. It was apparently offered, successfully, as proof of his innocence in a traffic case in which he was accused of running a red light. Based on three simple and plausible assumptions, he demonstrates that the perceiving officer must have been deceived. As the author describes the work:
A way to fight your traffic tickets. The paper was awarded a special prize of $400 that the author did not have to pay to the state of California.

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Still here everyone...

Sorry I haven't managed to post anything now for quite some time. All the result of lots of travel to various scientific meetings -- including one fascinating event on non-equilibrium economics -- and a MAD effort to get my book done on time. Deadline is effectively NOW!!!!!

So I haven't been able to afford any time to blog. But I will be posting more soon. And I have Bloomberg pieces appearing once a month (with one due out now in the next couple of days).

Meanwhile, Satajit Das has an excellent deconstruction of a recent article in The Economist that could (may?) have been written by the financial industry itself, arguing why financial innovation is indeed such a wonderful thing, making the world more prosperous, stable, etc (have you heard that before?).