catdynamics | October 5, 2008So how did the li'lest economy get frozen first?
So Iceland's economy is facing an interesting shock, first banks failing and now foreign currency reserves running out.
How they got there is interesting, and also a pointer to how they'll get out.
(this is my perspective, from the outside, I am not a financial analyst)
Iceland deregulated in the late 80s and 90s, moving from an economy hinged on a single line of export, to an aggressive modern anglo-american style post-industrial economy, tech heavy, and heavily leveraged making aggressive finanical investments in niche markets.
Iceland got…
catdynamics | October 3, 2008head of major supermarket in Iceland encourages people to hoard food and to stop buying foreign products
no currency for food imports
this is a cultural catastrophe, no more cheerios for breakfast, the kids will have to eat skyr
CEO of Bonus, a major Icelandic grocery market says their foreign wholesalers are refusing lines of credit through Icelandic banks and demanding cash payment before supplying further goods. The store has been refused foreign currency.
This was 4 pm friday afternoon.
He encourages people to hoard food and to start buying locally produced goods only.
I guess the…
catdynamics | October 3, 2008we are in for some interesting times
I don't know how many people saw the Bank Limits Fund Access by Colleges article in the NY Times thursday
this is the sort of thing happening more frequently and triggering problems.
In this case a bank limited withdrawals on a fund invested in short term bonds, used by a large group of universities to roll over funding - these things are common, keeping a lot of cash in banks is a bad idea, but it has to be rolled over somewhere.
The problem is no that the debt has gone bad, but that the fund is no longer revolving since the bank can not manage it, so…
catdynamics | October 3, 2008Linking is a public good y'know
hos has a cathartic rant about the bailout
The TED spread is 3.86 this afternoon - that is after the bailout passed.
If you know what the TED spread is you should now be tasting vomit in your throat.
LIBOR is also spiking, natch.
The US usually quotes the "U3" index for the unemployment rate.
The U6 rate is in many ways a more robust measure, but a lot scarier.
It is also more like what some European governments report when they state "the unemployment rate", or so I am told.
PhysioProf explains about applying for faculty positions - you listen!
Chad worries…
catdynamics | October 3, 2008The US financial crisis is causing an implosion in Iceland, which is forcing a cascade into the European financial system.
Serious talk of a bank holiday and food hoarding has been heard.
Head of largest oil company says oil imports may cease because of lack of US dollars.
Last week one of Iceland's commercial banks went bankrupt and was nationalized over the weekend.
The root cause of the implosion is that the Icelandic commercial banks overextended aggressive investments and were over leveraged, so when the world economy went bad they got squeezed.
The proximate cause of the collapse is…
catdynamics | October 3, 2008drizzly dreary friday
and we drag ourselves to the Great iPod, and we ask: will we ever see from Hubble again?
Whoosh goes the randomizer.
Whoosh.
The Covering: Það Vantar Spútur - Olga Guðrún
The Crossing: Jingle Bell Rock - Bobby Helms
The Crown: Lifetime Piling Up - Talking Heads
The Root: Eleanor Rigby - Beatles
The Past: Love You To - Beatles
The Future: The Firebird VI: Lullaby
The Questioner: Máríátlan Mín Mín
The House: two and two - jesus jones
The Inside: the tailor and the mouse
The Outcome: brass in pocket pretenders
The Covering hits the tone: "do you know those kids who sit…
catdynamics | October 2, 2008The NASA Astrobiology Institute has announced the selection of the new Centers chosen in response to the 5th Co-operative Agreement Notice.
Ten centers were funded, joining the 4 pre-existing centers from CAN-4.
Here is the announcement
The new centers are:
University of Hawaii
Arizona State University
Carnegie Institution of Washington
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institution
Pennsylvania State University
Georgia Institute of Technology
NASA Ames
NASA Goddard
JPL I
JPL II
Yay us!
Disclaimer: I am a co-PI of the Penn State Astrobiology Research Center.
PSARC - the Penn State Astrobiology…
catdynamics | October 2, 2008Last week we had an inaugural meeting for our new "Center for Exoplanets and Habitable Worlds".
There were some interesting talks and new planets aplenty
Mayor was there and presented some preliminary results, and hinted at upcoming, but as yet unpublished results.
Current radial velocity sensitivity is better than 1 m/sec on the HARPS instrument, over a 4 year baseline, so far.
They are doing a survey of a sub-sample of 200 stars from the CORALIE survey, with high cadence - doing frequent observing over several nights and then longer intervals, but adapting to hints of signals. This gets a…
catdynamics | October 1, 2008The Apple Pro-Sessions Science Blogging panel is done, and jolly good fun it was too.
Good crowd, very good questions and decent banter - interesting to meet the various sciblings, including the ringers in the crowd.
The last question, and I paraphrase, was interesting:
"What one thing should the next President understand about science?"
There were several good answers, mine was:
"The next President must understand that you CAN NOT make your own reality"
here is the original:
"The aide said that guys like me were ''in what we call the reality-based community,'' which he defined as people…
catdynamics | October 1, 2008graphically explained
PhD Comics illustrate
h/t Chad
it is a good point actually, read the depression era literature - after the few rich who got their trust funds out, the tenured academics rode out the depression relatively well
in fact my entire neighbourhood is mostly depression era houses, built for faculty, who were pretty much the only people with an hundred miles or so who could afford to pay construction workers and architects
hmmm, it really could all be relative...
catdynamics | October 1, 2008don't forget ScienceBloggers go wild in the Big Apple tonight at 7pm
somewhere in Soho
be there or be somewhere else
catdynamics | September 30, 2008why are grades at US higher educational institutions confidential?
a piece of paperwork, that I foresee will cause endless trouble, recently crossed my desk
without violating any confidences, the gist of it was that student grades were classified at the super-double-duper level and must never be revealed or leaked, except when we send them out randomly to strange people we've never met, on request
why is this?
I don't mean the legal reason, I mean the pedagogical, administrative and ethical rationale?
prima facie, grades at higher educational institutions ought to be a matter of public…
catdynamics | September 29, 2008The Dangeral Professor is back
and more dangeral than ever.
h/t Sean
ok, that is good news
catdynamics | September 29, 2008Total failure of Control Unit/Science Data Formatter - side A on saturday,
no data being downlinked.
Attempt to switch to untested side B soon, which could restore functionality.
Also considering emergency repair as part of SM4, SM-4 is delayed.
The failure is in an electronics module.
The failure precludes science data communication to the ground or retrieval from onboard storage.
Module has redundant backup which is untested.
It may be necessary to do emergency replacement of the module if possible, on the next servicing mission, SM4.
SM4 is postponed while the backup module is tested and…
catdynamics | September 29, 2008Futures
made of
virtual insanity
Now always
seem to
be governed by this love we have
For useless
twisting
of our new technology
Virtual Insanity...
catdynamics | September 29, 2008Please.
The Federal Reserve, this morning, sent out a press release.
Watching the financial crisis unfold must be like what it would have been like if the LHC had been turned on, and promptly made a small stable black hole that fell out and started eating the Earth.
Predicted in some theories, considered vanishingly unlikely, and fascinating in so many ways, were it not for the medium term consequences.
So, question is whether Hank and Bernie are fast enough and dextrous enough to get a charge on that sucker and then move it into confinement before it gets too massive to control.
"In…
catdynamics | September 29, 2008Peter Coles do be blogging now
Moshe has become co-blogger at Shores of the Dirac Sea
h/t Cosmic Variance
catdynamics | September 29, 2008The Observable Universe: XKCD
Wow.
From XKCD - the smartest web comic around