Good news on crime

Mostly good news: https://www.newsweek.com/rates-most-violent-crimes-2018-fell-while-rape-increased-according-annual-fbi-report-1462110.

According to an FBI press release published today, there were an estimated 1,206,836 violent crimes committed in the United States in 2018—368.9 crimes per 100,000 residents. This was down four percent from the same statistic in last year’s annual report for crimes committed in 2017, which said that there were 382.9 offenses per 100,000 people.

The report broke down violent crime into four broad distinctions: robbery, aggravated assault, “murder and nonnegligent manslaughter” and rape. Each of these, except rape, had decreased since 2018, according to the FBI. On the contrary, the report said that there were 7.7 reported rapes per 100,000 people, which corresponded to a 2.7 percent increase from 2017 and an 18.1 percent increase from 2014.

In particular, note the trends (my bolding):

The Pew Research Center stated that the rate of violent crime dropped 49 percent between 1993 and 2017, according to previous FBI reports. The report released today said the rate of robbery fell by 12 percent, murder decreased by 6.2 percent and aggravated assault dropped by 0.4 percent.

So why do people think that crime is increasing? Because they see it on the news all the time, without considering the purpose of the news.

(1) Journalists want to tell you what’s new — and small improvements are not big news, even if they add up to something remarkable after several years. Remember, it’s not called the olds.

(2) People are generally more interested in news that directly affects them, especially news about dangerous things. They’re not so interested in things that don’t directly affect them or aren’t a threat of some kind. And journalists give this to their readers.

(3) Journalists did cover this. They do every year. But only one day a year, when the new numbers are released. If you missed it, you missed the good news.

The size of our planet

Just how big is Earth? Let’s make some reasonable assumptions to get a rough estimate. Suppose that you could walk all the way around the world, approximately 25,000 miles, and that there are no oceans, mountains, etc. blocking your way.

Not to scale.

A moderate walking speed is three miles per hour. If you walk eight hours a day, seven days a week, that’s 3 × 8 × 7 = 168 miles a week. Times 52 weeks per year is 8,736 miles a week. 25,000 / 8,736 is 2.8 years. (If you take off weekends, it’s about 4 years. If you skip sleeping and walk 24 hours a day, it’s just under one year.)

Our planet seems so huge. But only about three years to walk all the way around it? It’s not nearly as big as we think… in fact, it’s pretty small. That’s why it’s pretty easy for seven billion people to pollute it or damage it.

Just three years around at walking speed.

Reversing biological age?

This study is based on nine subjects for one year, with no control group, so it’s hardly definitive. But it could be very important.

A small clinical study in California has suggested for the first time that it might be possible to reverse the body’s epigenetic clock, which measures a person’s biological age.

For one year, nine healthy volunteers took a cocktail of three common drugs — growth hormone and two diabetes medications — and on average shed 2.5 years of their biological ages, measured by analysing marks on a person’s genomes. The participants’ immune systems also showed signs of rejuvenation.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-02638-w

Gas cap

I found out a friend of mine didn’t know this simple clue about which side of a car the gas cap is on (especially useful if you borrow someone else’s car or are using a rental): In newer cars, the dashboard has a symbol of a gas pump, with a triangle pointing to the side of the car where the gas cap is.

Some searching of the Internet suggests that the charging port for electric cars depends on the manufacturer, and I did not find any indicator for these.

2025: I found this note in This is True:

Automotive engineer Jim Moylan in 1986 suggested to his bosses at Ford that fuel gauges should indicate what side the filler was on to help drivers. Ford didn’t patent the idea, presumably on purpose, and it spread across the industry. The indicator is now called the Moylan Arrow.

Voting systems: interactive demo

As you probably know, the usual voting system in the United States is called “first past the post”: whoever gets the most votes wins, even if the vote is split ten ways and the winner gets 11% of the votes. Worse, if more than one person runs whom a lot of voters like, they can split the vote and the most-disliked candidate can win! For example, in 2000, Al Gore and Ralph Nader split the progressive vote in Florida, and George Bush won the state with fewer votes than Gore+Nader, so a majority of the voters got the candidate they least wanted. (I’m assuming that all Gore voters would have preferred Nader over Bush and vice versa, which seems pretty likely.)

My preference among alternate voting systems is Instant Runoff Voting (IRV), also known as Ranked Choice. You rank the candidates #1 for your favorite, #2 for your next favorite, etc. If only two candidates are running, this works exactly the same as first-past-the-post. If more than two candidates run, but one gets more than 50% of the #1 votes, that candidate immediately wins. Otherwise the last-place finisher loses and the #2 votes on their ballots are recounted as though they were #1 votes. Just like holding a runoff but without the delay or expense.

For reference, science fiction fans use IRV to pick their most popular SF novel, short story, movie etc of the year (the Hugo Awards). They’re a ridiculously nitpicky and pedantic group… but this is their preferred voting system.

Nicky Case created an interactive guide to various voting systems. You can drag the voters or the candidates around to see how the systems work.

http://ncase.me./ballot/

Wind vs coal, 2019

A remarkable thing happened in the US in April. For the first time ever, renewable electricity generation beat out coal-fired electricity generation on a national level, according to the Energy Information Agency (EIA). While renewable energy—including hydro, wind, solar, geothermal, and biomass—constituted 23 percent of the nation’s power supply, coal-fired electricity only contributed 20 percent of our power supply.

There are seasonal reasons for this happening in April. Wind power generation tends to be higher in spring and fall, hydroelectric generation usually peaks as winter snow melts, and lengthening days mean more solar power can be fed to the grid.

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/06/renewable-electricity-beat-out-coal-for-the-first-time-in-april/

People make a difference…

When a movement gets big enough, the odds of success go way up.

Earlier this year, the presidents of Sudan and Algeria both announced they would step aside after decades in office, thanks to peaceful campaigns of resistance…

Compelling research by Erica Chenoweth, a political scientist at Harvard University, confirms that civil disobedience is not only the moral choice; it is also the most powerful way of shaping world politics – by a long way.

Looking at hundreds of campaigns over the last century, Chenoweth found that nonviolent campaigns are twice as likely to achieve their goals as violent campaigns. And although the exact dynamics will depend on many factors, she has shown it takes around 3.5% of the population actively participating in the protests to ensure serious political change.

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20190513-it-only-takes-35-of-people-to-change-the-world

I also found and really like this book: Blueprint for Revolution: How to Use Rice Pudding, Lego Men, and Other Nonviolent Techniques to Galvanize Communities, Overthrow Dictators, or Simply Change the World

https://www.amazon.com/Blueprint-Revolution-Nonviolent-Techniques-Communities/dp/0812995309/

Google vs privacy

Over a recent week of Web surfing, I peered under the hood of Google Chrome and found it brought along a few thousand friends. Shopping, news and even government sites quietly tagged my browser to let ad and data companies ride shotgun while I clicked around the Web.

This was made possible by the Web’s biggest snoop of all: Google. Seen from the inside, its Chrome browser looks a lot like surveillance software.Our latest privacy experiment found Chrome ushered more than 11,000 tracker cookies into our browser — in a single week. Here’s why Firefox is better.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/06/21/google-chrome-has-become-surveillance-software-its-time-switch