:: blame the extended gestation.... ::

:: Saturday, April 17, 2004 ::

A New Kind of Social Science:
The Path Beyond Current (IR) Methodologies May Lie Beneath Them

Existing formal models of political behavior have followed the lead of the natural sciences and generally focused on methods that use continuous-variable mathematics. Stephen olfram has recently produced an extended critique of that approach in the natural sciences, and suggested that a great deal of natural behavior can be accounted for using rules that involve discrete patterns. Wolfram’s work generally does not consider models in the social sciences but given the similarity between many of the techniques for modeling in the natural and social sciences, his critique can readily be applied to models of social behavior as well. We argue further that pattern-based models are particularly relevant to modeling human behavior because human cognitive abilities are far more developed in the domain of pattern recognition than in the domain of continuous-variable mathematics. We test the possibility of finding pattern-based behavior in international behavior by looking at event data for the Israel-Palestine conflict for the
period 1979-2003.

:: Jim Nichols 4/17/2004 07:36:00 PM [+] ::
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Abandoning the Middle:
The Revealing Case of the Bush Tax Cuts

:: Jim Nichols 4/17/2004 07:11:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Friday, April 16, 2004 ::

Yahoo! News - Cobain Movie to Rock WB:

"The WB has always smelled like teen spirit thanks to Smallville, Gilmore Girls and Angel. Now the Frog is really going grunge, developing a TV movie about the life and death of Kurt Cobain. "

:: Jim Nichols 4/16/2004 10:20:00 PM [+] ::
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My blog is gone... no wait it was just slow to load.

:: Jim Nichols 4/16/2004 03:16:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Thursday, April 15, 2004 ::

T.E. Lawrence - Dreamers of the Day: "Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that all was vanity; but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, and make it possible."

:: Jim Nichols 4/15/2004 11:54:00 PM [+] ::
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A life lesson...

Kung Fu is so much fun. Tonight he brought out the pads so we could practice our punches for real... it was funny cause i've never hit anything in my life. He'd go HIT! and I'd swat a fly. NO NO HIT. "Swat." HIT "Swat" I finally got the hang of it. Needless to say its a new experience for me.

:: Jim Nichols 4/15/2004 10:20:00 PM [+] ::
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Google e-mail faces possible legislative challenge - 2004-04-13 - Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal:

"The same California lawmaker who brought you the Do-Not-Call list and the tightest medical privacy legislation in nation is now onto Google and e-mail scanning."

:: Jim Nichols 4/15/2004 10:19:00 PM [+] ::
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Dissent Magazine - Winter 2004:

"The Republican governor of Alabama, Bob Riley, stunned conservatives last year by pushing through the state legislature a tax reform plan that offered tax relief to the poorest in his state while significantly increasing the burden borne by wealthy individuals and corporations. It is unusual these days for a Republican politician to raise taxes on the privileged. What is truly remarkable in this instance, however, are the reasons Riley gave for his tax plan. He argued that the present tax system, which requires Alabamians with incomes under $13,000 to pay 10.9 percent of their incomes in state and local taxes while those who make over $229,000 pay just 4.1 percent, is un-Christian."

:: Jim Nichols 4/15/2004 10:16:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Tuesday, April 13, 2004 ::

Yahoo! News - Poll: Balanced Budget Beats Tax Cuts:

"By almost a 2-1 margin, Americans prefer balancing the nation's budget to cutting taxes, according to an Associated Press poll, even though many believe their overall tax burden has risen despite tax cuts over the past three years. "

:: Jim Nichols 4/13/2004 06:41:00 PM [+] ::
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U.C. Berkeley report: Renewable energy could mean more jobs - 2004-04-13 - San Francisco Business Times: "Money put toward solar, wind and other renewable fuels will produce more jobs than a comparable amount of money invested in fossil fuel sources, said a report issued Tuesday by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley. "

:: Jim Nichols 4/13/2004 05:40:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Monday, April 12, 2004 ::

Consumer-driven healthcare plans catching on quickly:

"Even in their infancy, consumer-driven health plans are causing a stir.
While several nationwide companies have built their entire businesses on the idea, other health plans put consumer-driven plans on the buffet table as recently as several months ago. Either way, employers and employees alike are gobbling them up. "

:: Jim Nichols 4/12/2004 09:04:00 PM [+] ::
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