Secret bank accounts, income inequality—and why Luxembourg matters. Gabriel Zucman is on a mission. The 28-year-old French economist, currently at the University of California, Berkeley, has built his career remarkably quickly, and in the process has made a place for himself among the most influential economists working today. Zucman decided, in part, to pursue a career as an economist after his experience working as an analyst for a French bank during the peak of the 2008 financial crisis. He remembers the shock of Sept. 15, 2008, the day US investment bank Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy, the market chaos that followed, and the inability of both he—and more experienced colleagues—to understand the crisis as it caught fire.
To get a better grasp on what was going on, Zucman began digging into data from the Bank for International Settlements, the Basel, Switzerland-based entity that serves as a sort of “central bank for central banks.” “So I had heard of this. Increasingly, people are now talking about the importance of tax havens like the Caymans. The Claremont Institute | Recovering the American Idea | Conservative public policy think tank | Conservative Magazine. Leonard Nimoy’s death in February brought to a close his unusual career continually playing a single role for half a century. Between 1966, when the television show Star Trek premiered, and 2013, when the movie Star Trek Into Darkness hit the screens, Nimoy portrayed the franchise’s beloved first officer, Mr. Spock, in two TV series and eight films. As he acknowledged, the key to Star Trek’s longevity and cultural penetration was its seriousness of purpose, originally inspired by creator Gene Roddenberry’s science fiction vision.
Modeled on Gulliver’s Travels, the series was meant as an opportunity for social commentary, and it succeeded ingeniously, with episodes scripted by some of the era’s finest science fiction writers. Captain Kirk and the Cold War Roddenberry and his colleagues were World War II veterans, whose country was now fighting the Cold War against a Communist aggressor they regarded with horror. This could have been declaimed by Captain James T. Kirk agrees with McCoy. Uk.businessinsider. CPoEpvB. Sweden’s feminist foreign minister has dared to tell the truth about Saudi Arabia. What happens now concerns us all » The Spectator. If the cries of ‘Je suis Charlie’ were sincere, the western world would be convulsed with worry and anger about the Wallström affair. It has all the ingredients for a clash-of-civilisations confrontation. A few weeks ago Margot Wallström, the Swedish foreign minister, denounced the subjugation of women in Saudi Arabia.
As the theocratic kingdom prevents women from travelling, conducting official business or marrying without the permission of male guardians, and as girls can be forced into child marriages where they are effectively raped by old men, she was telling no more than the truth. Wallström went on to condemn the Saudi courts for ordering that Raif Badawi receive ten years in prison and 1,000 lashes for setting up a website that championed secularism and free speech. These were ‘mediaeval methods’, she said, and a ‘cruel attempt to silence modern forms of expression’. The backlash followed the pattern set by Rushdie, the Danish cartoons and Hebdo.
London - centric. How to make cheap and healthy dinners. If you’ve ever found yourself buying clothes just because they’re cheap, or if shopping itself has become a form of entertainment for you, I’ve got a proposal: The next time you buy something, spend a whole lot on it. Enough that it makes you sweat a little. The point is to make you pause and ask yourself, “How much do I really want this?”
In the US and much of the industrialized world, cheap clothes are everywhere. At any fast-fashion chain store, you’ll find piles upon piles of jeans that cost less than $20. The problem is, all that low-cost clothing is produced, sold, and finally discarded in mass quantities, which has serious consequences for the environment, the workers paid poorly to make them, and even the mental well-being of the people buying them.
As a fashion reporter, I like clothes probably more than most. The goal is to spend at least $150 on each item of clothing. Let me explain But it’s enough that it causes me to seriously hesitate, which is the real point. The benefits. Google exec: With robots in our brains, we'll be godlike. Technically Incorrect offers a slightly twisted take on the tech that's taken over our lives. I suspect a few of you are looking forward to being robots. Who wouldn't be fascinated by the idea of becoming someone other than themselves? We do get so tired of being the same dull soul every day. What kind of robots will we be?
Happily, I can provide an answer. For living inside my head all day have been the words of Google's director of engineering, Ray Kurzweil. For more than a curt while, he's been keen on humans going over to the bright side. But what will this be like? Kurzweil has a truly, madly, deeply optimistic view of who we will be when nanobots are implanted into our brains so we can expand our intelligence by directly tapping into the Internet. This is such a relief. Kurzweil, though, has reassured me. "We're going to add additional levels of abstraction," he said, "and create more-profound means of expression. " More profound than Twitter? Yes, we are becoming gods. Lord, help us. Why the U.S. Military Isn’t Winning. In Houston's Gifted Program, Critics Say Blacks And Latinos Are Overlooked : NPR Ed. Fernando Aguilar plays with his 8-year-old son Isaac. He worries that Isaac isn't enrolled in the gifted and talented program in Houston.
Laura Isensee/Houston Public Media hide caption itoggle caption Laura Isensee/Houston Public Media Fernando Aguilar plays with his 8-year-old son Isaac. He worries that Isaac isn't enrolled in the gifted and talented program in Houston. Laura Isensee/Houston Public Media Fernando Aguilar has five kids and named his only son after his hero, Isaac Newton. "I looked up to him and so does my son, and hopefully one day we can make contributions to society like he did," says Aguilar. Isaac's in third grade at Herrera Elementary School in Houston. But when the local school tested Isaac in kindergarten for the gifted and talented program, he didn't qualify. And Houston's enrollment statistics indicate that Hispanic students like Isaac and African-American students would more likely be identified as gifted if they were white or Asian. IQ Test Result: Advanced AI Machine Matches Four-Year-Old Child's Score.
The rapid advances in information processing technology in recent years have created computing devices with formidable powers. These machines have long been better than humans at arithmetic, certain games such as chess, and more recently at advanced pattern recognitions tasks such as face recognition. But an outstanding questions is: to what extent do these capabilities add up to the equivalent of human intelligence? Today, we get answer of sorts thanks to the work of Stellan Ohlsson at the University of Illinois and a few pals who have put one of the world’s most powerful artificial intelligence machines through its paces using a standard IQ test given to humans.
The results show that even though computers have become far more powerful in recent years, they have some catching up to do to match human performance levels. First some background. This consists of two parts. IQ tests are also designed to test humans at different stages of their lives. But that doesn’t always work. These Women Claim They've Made An App That Lets You Rate Other People And The Internet Is Furious.
Historic Pacific trade deal faces skeptics in U.S. Congress. Quora. Why Is A South Korean Doctor Cloning Dogs? A surgical team at Sooam Biotech in Seoul, South Korea, injects cloned embryos into the uterus of an anesthetized dog. Rob Stein/NPR hide caption itoggle caption Rob Stein/NPR A surgical team at Sooam Biotech in Seoul, South Korea, injects cloned embryos into the uterus of an anesthetized dog. Rob Stein/NPR The Sooam Biotech Research Foundation's sleek marble building is on the outskirts of Seoul, South Korea. "Hello, sir. Sooam Biotech is the only lab in the world that makes genetically identical copies — clones — of dogs for pet owners.
That hasn't happened. For $100,000, anyone who has a cell from any dog can attempt to get a clone. Dr. Dr. Sooam's dog-cloning service is controversial. But no one doubts that Hwang is cloning dogs. After we change into rubber slippers and blue jumpsuits, Kim leads me into a darkened room that's crowded with technicians peering into microscopes. A Sooam Biotech technician prepares to zap an egg that's been re-injected with a skin cell from a donor dog.
History, Travel, Arts, Science, People, Places. Quora. TPP signed: the ‘biggest global threat to the internet’ agreed, as campaigners warn that secret pact could bring huge new restrictions to the internet | News | Lifestyle | The Independent. An agreement that some campaigners have called the “biggest global threat to the internet” has just been signed, potentially bringing huge new restrictions on what people can do with their computers.
The Trans-Pacific Partnership is the conclusion of five years of negotiations, and will cover 40 per cent of the world’s economy. Its claimed purpose is to create a unified economic bloc so that companies and businesses can trade more easily — but it also puts many of the central principle of the internet in doubt, according to campaigners. Loaded: 0% Progress: 0% Landmark TPP deal announced in Atlanta One particularly controversial part of the provisions make it a crime to reveal corporate wrongdoing "through a computer system". Experts have pointed out that the wording is very vague, and could lead to whistleblowers being penalised for sharing important information, and lead to journalists stopping reporting on them. The changes could also lead to huge new rules about surveillance.
From ISIS to the Kurds to Erdogan: Why Turkey Is in Serious Trouble. I am usually an optimist when it comes to Turkey’s future. Indeed, I wrote a whole book about The Rise of Turkey. But these days, I’m worried. The country faces a toxic combination of political polarization, government instability, economic slowdown, and threats of violence—from both inside and outside Turkey—that could soon add up to a catastrophe. The likelihood of that outcome is increasing amid Russia’s bombing raids in Syria in support of its ally, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, which threaten to debilitate the moderate rebels and boost the extremists in Syria’s civil war, while leaving Turkey to deal with two unruly neighbors: Assad and ISIS. Of course, Turkey has gone through periods of political and economic crisis before. During the 1970s, the country’s economy collapsed, and the instability led to fighting among right- and left-wing militant groups and security forces that killed thousands of people.
But the analyst in me says that things look different this time. The Money Changes I'd Make if I Were Suddenly Single. Mass Incarceration and the Uncomfortable Realities of Black Family Life. With the publication of “The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration” Ta-Nehisi Coates has added an elegant and forceful voice to the growing frustration with the inefficacy and injustice of America’s criminal-justice system. Mandatory-sentencing laws, the War on Drugs, juvenile-justice sentences that seem to do more to create than deter criminals, racial arrest and sentencing disparities: All are ready for a tough national cross-examination. But even in the unlikely event that Washington and state legislatures successfully adapt the nation’s crime policies to a safer, more racially sensitive era, the nation will still look around to find more black men in prison than it might expect or want.
There’s a simple reason for that, one that Coates himself notes: Relative to other groups, blacks commit more crimes. To understand why is to tackle some very hard-to-talk-about realities of black family life. Courts and legislatures dawdled, as they often tend to do. Sweden’s liberal image is a mirage that hides a very ugly problem. Here’s an interesting question: If the world’s economy is filling markets with a pervasive sense of uncertainty, why is the art market picking up steam for yet another season of what would appear to be massive sales? For the very rich, art is a store of value—which is not a very new idea and one reason that art is often lumped in together with gold as a safe haven from inflation. Gold prices peaked in 2011 and have been on a long slide ever since. Not art. That’s because art is also an object that provides social currency knitting together a select group of global nabobs and those who want to be seen sharing economic and cultural rank with them.
Owning art—and, if you can, owning a lot of art—provides a kind of access in today’s globally integrated social world that few other objects can provide. The few thousand serious, active art buyers around the world come into contact through transactions, on museum boards and during the endless round of global art fairs and biennials. But why? The Meaning Of Work : TED Radio Hour. Fresh Guacamole by PES (Official HD version) ELI5: What creates that "crunchy" effect on your clothes when you hang them outside to dry? : explainlikeimfive. jWEOlzm. In China, credit score is now affected by friends' activism. China just introduced a universal credit score, where everybody is measured as a number between 350 and 950. But this credit score isn’t just affected by how well you manage credit – it also reflects how well your political opinions are in line with Chinese official opinions, and whether your friends’ are, too. In the West, the surveillance agencies have been trying to stay as low-key as possible, while listening to everything and anything.
China has taken a different approach. Not only is the surveillance very overt, you are also constantly nudged to fall in line. This Chinese credit score, which seemed innocent at first, was introduced this summer. In the West, our credit score is simple. Anybody can check anybody’s credit score using the site Credit China, which again helps people disconnect from people who significantly draw down your own credit score: they’re listed as such. In theory, Sesame Credit (and its benefits) is optional. Do you see what’s happening here? History, Travel, Arts, Science, People, Places. How the Five "Love Languages" Can Help You Win at Relationships. YYiXfxy. George RR Martin: our long obsession with Mars. Once upon a time there was a planet called Mars, a world of red sands, canals and endless adventure.
I remember it well, for I went there often as a child. I come from a blue-collar, working-class background. My family never had much money. We lived in a federal housing project in Bayonne, New Jersey, never owned a car, never saw much of anywhere. The projects were on First Street, my school was on Fifth Street, and for most of my childhood those five blocks were my world.
It never mattered, though, for I had other worlds. I soared among the skyscrapers of Metropolis with Superman, fought bad guys in Gotham City with Batman, swung between the water towers of Manhattan with Spider-Man. And Mars. Growing up, I think I went to Mars more often than I went to New York City, though Manhattan was only 45 minutes and 15 cents away by bus. Mars, though … I knew Mars inside and out. Mars has always had a certain fascination for us Earthlings. Especially in the minds of the storytellers. Quora. 19872409373_455341ca3e_b. Children of the Yuan Percent: Everyone Hates China’s Rich Kids. Emerging from a nightclub near Workers’ Stadium in Beijing at 1:30 a.m. on a Saturday in June, Mikael Hveem ordered an Uber. He selected the cheapest car option and was surprised when the vehicle that rolled up was a dark blue Maserati. The driver, a young, baby-faced Chinese man, introduced himself as Jason. Hveem asked him why he was driving an Uber—he obviously didn’t need the cash.
Jason said he did it to meet people, especially girls. Driving around late at night in Beijing’s nightclub district, he figured he’d find the kind of woman who would be charmed by a clean-cut 22-year-old in a sports car. When I heard this story from a friend who had also been in the car, I asked for the driver’s contact info.
When we met at a cafe in Beijing’s business district, it was clear that Jason, whose surname is Zhang, was different from other young Chinese. As portrayed in the local press, fuerdai are to China what Paris Hilton was to the U.S. a decade ago, only less tasteful. You Really Don’t Need To Work So Much. Uk.businessinsider. Strategies: The absolute best way to raise money. nHGGVFL. Pedestrian street crossing lights. Uk.businessinsider. Quora. Panorama experimentation. This time with two right angles. EJf3q7T. Why It Was Easier to Be Skinny in the 1980s. Paul Allen’s quest to build an artificial brain is one of the hardest software-engineering endeavors ever attempted | The Washington Post.
News Archives - U.S. Uncut. Ace an Impromptu Speech With This Template. History, Travel, Arts, Science, People, Places. Deep Learning Robot Takes 10 Days to Teach Itself to Grasp. Pope Francis met 'anti-gay' Kentucky clerk Kim Davis | US news. Pacific Trade Deal Is Good for the U.S. and Obama’s Legacy. Quora. Hopes&Fears — Life and culture through a global lens. Six Ways the Media Has Misreported Syria. Humans are still evolving and we don’t know what will happen next — Hopes&Fears — flow "Science" Android 6.0 Marshmallow, thoroughly reviewed. AzhwxDP. Songs We Love: Aubrie Sellers, 'Loveless Rolling Stone'
Imgur. The Alternative Limb Project | Imaginative and bespoke prosthetics. Move over, Hollywood. We are Roberto Furfaro and Gene Giacomelli, the NASA-funded scientists who built the REAL "The Martian" food-growing system. : IAmA. The ruins of a Roman colony in Africa. Your Stubbornness Is the Real Reason You Aren't Losing Weight.
How a Vaccine Is Like a Banana — and Why That’s Good. FijUtar. How Long It Takes English Speakers to Learn Nine Other Common Languages. Microsoft HoloLens Development Edition: Coming Q1 2016 for $3,000. New study says 30 minutes of exercise a day is not enough. You should double or quadruple that. How Two Guys Lost God and Found $40 Million. Can We Shape the Robot Revolution? History, Travel, Arts, Science, People, Places. UN delay could open door to robot wars, say experts | Science. 4DDDq4n. What to Do When Your Friends Make Way More Money Than You Do (Or Vice Versa) Obama: We Won't Turn Syria Into 'Proxy War' Between U.S. And Russia. Disaster-response drones designed to withstand collisions, not avoid them.
Kids With Too Many Duties Grow Up to Be Reluctant Parents. What to Do When You Find Out You’ve Been Cheated On. I came home to this last night. I married the right woman. Quora. A surprising way to keep your marriage happy: annual performance reviews. Giving Course Credit for MOOCs Is an Important Educational Test for MIT. Power decreases trust in social exchange. Rainbows of light | 10 breathtaking stained-glass windows. How will school (and everything else) work in the year 2000? | It's 1900: What will the future be like? The New York Times - Breaking News, World News & Multimedia. Russia Fires Cruise Missiles Into Syria from 1,000 Miles Away. Bishop escaped abuse charges after MPs and a royal backed him, court told | UK news. “243 People Disappeared. Young People. Women. Children. And No One Cares” — Ghost Boat. New Prizes for Expanding Economic Opportunities. Net neutrality on chopping block as Democrats fight to save FCC’s rules. Poor people are getting terrible investment advice.
33 Activities Under $10 That Will Keep Your Kids Busy All Summer. Zappos is Leading the Way for Bossless Companies. When i am showing to my GF, how to unlock my phone. Uk.businessinsider. Iran Could Be a Surprising American Ally as Chaos Grows in Syria. 13. You can learn to be creative, if you’re willing to embarrass yourself. Quora.