This from a person who questions climate change and is an advocate of insider trading.
I found the article held some bittersweet sentiments on what it was like to have (a good deal of) money. To the point of the title he spoke of a false sense of security and casual arrogance. Both of which I find reasonable, but not universally applicable.
I don't see how the positions you list alter this interpretation, but I'd be very interested in hearing how they altered yours.
Not if you're actually qualified to question them; if on the other hand you're not a specialist in the field and you're claiming all those who are haven't a clue what they're talking about, then yes, there's something wrong with it and you're very likely both wrong and a quack.
So basically, the scientific process is limited to a group of select insiders and outside criticism is forbidden?
FYI, most serious skeptics don't claim the specialists "haven't a clue". They claim that the certainty in our current conclusions is overstated. It's also important to note that many AGW proponents make the exact same claim when geoengineering is discussed.
Let me rephrase that for you to more reflect reality...
The scientific process is limited to those educated on the subject and criticism from the uneducated isn't taken seriously nor should it be.
So, if you're not a climate scientist, and your position on climate science is in opposition to 99% of actual climate scientists, it's very likely that you don't know what the fuck you're talking about and should be summarily ignored by any rational person.
FYI, I'm a former scientist, so I have some idea of the scientific process. It's actually pretty rare for a field to declare outside opinions worthless. The only other fields I'm aware of which try to do this are math ed, labor economics, and psychometrics of race/gender.
I'm also not sure why you are attempting to conflate not being a climate scientist with being uneducated. That's simply ridiculous.
> It's actually pretty rare for a field to declare outside opinions worthless.
You're the one that keeps bringing up the word worthless. I said people who hold strong opinions on topics in which they aren't educated should be ignored because they have a high probably of not knowing what the fuck they're talking about. That's a fact!
Perhaps you're confused about the difference between outside opinion and uneducated opinion or perhaps you just want to setup a straw man to demolish.
> I'm also not sure why you are attempting to conflate not being a climate scientist with being uneducated.
I'm not, you're projecting; but it tells me plenty about you.
Let me know when it's actually most climate scientists making those bogus predictions and then maybe you'll have a point. Being an environmentalist doesn't make someone's opinion qualified.
> ClimateGate letters show strong evidence of politics and groupthink affecting the field
They showed no such thing. There was no wrong doing uncovered nor anything unethical, ClimateGate was a fake story put on and kept alive by the press.
Dishonest and illegal behavior on the part of politically motivated climate scientists does reduce my belief in their impartiality, yes.
My beef is not with it being PC or nPC.
It is about questioning the theorie(s) in a scientific manner with rigorously formulated and educated questions. Otherwise, it is merely politics/BS/political-BS.
A) did it have to do with the article in question?
B) Did you see the reference to climate change on wikipedia or you have actually read the chapter on it in my book where I feel I present a very balanced view.
My ire was directed towards the idea that any criticism of global climate change is bunk simply because it is not PC. I would posit that such criticism, in the context of general public and media, is mostly bunk for the reason I outlined in my first reply.
Suddenly capital costs are higher for everyone, and my dishonesty creates a drag on the creation of startups, and expansion of successful enterprises.
Other firms would take to releasing info themselves in order to set expectations and reduce risk - which already happens, but there'd be a huge driver for more so - lest others trade early on the info.
The effect on startups, even in your scenario, would be nil / positive. We already have a ton of risk priced in, and we're not required to file 10K's, etc. Also, most startup boards include the lead investor who has access to all "insider" info already - you don't think they share that with that in future follow on rounds?
Also, because cheaters can't be predicted in advance and your "cure" is only retroactive, the capital costs are born by everyone.
Startups get capital because the business they create will eventually be worth a multiple of their earnings. If that multiple is reduced because of an "insider cheating" penalty, the attractiveness of the investment is reduced, and therefore the amount of investment that will chase it. There is no floor on the risk discount that can be assigned to the price of an investment, except perhaps $0.00.
- more accurate and timely information (stock pricing) - firms increasing transparency (info) to remove financing volatility - Current SEC 10k's, etc. are of little value as we've seen. It must be forced to prevent loopholes - insider trading does this from the inside.
What I'm not saying: That market manipulation (ex. Pump and Dump) should be legal - thats another issue, and provides no value (information or otherwise). That's anti-competitive behavior with no societal benefit I can see - and hence should be regulated and leaked using insider trading ;-)
Other concerns: - Fraud in insider trading: Perhaps it should still be illegal to lie about your inside knowledge, and further firms that trade would have every incentive to confirm the data with other sources. - Risk pricing would be far better than luck if there were a lot of data points for each company due to multiple leaks over time and other business intel. The Street already know these CEOs, etc. - they don't exist in vacuums. - Your startup risk pricing ideas don't address the differences I cited - who is insider trading startups? That'd mean investing based on the inside numbers the company has - which is already normal for investors to have access to, and if a founder fudges those - it's fraud.
Your concerns about risk pricing are due to this "real" cheating, which insider trading helps discover, and hence eliminates risk.
Am I off base here?
But you have interesting ideas and presented them diplomatically, and I like heretical thinking, so have some upvotes.
Also - computer trading would be able to pick up to differences in trading strategy (by seeing big positions taken) and react quickly - minimizing total profits and bringing prices closer to reality.
Also - your company would have a higher incentive to treat you well if you could legally sell the info to Goldman Sachs to trade on and give you a commission. That's the populist side of insider trading.
Allowing insider trading will create asymmetric information in the stock market, and that risks creating a "market for lemons" type situation and reducing liquidity. Say that insiders are allowed to trade whenever they want, on whatever information they have. As an outside investor without that information, I should then assume that I will get a raw deal on any trade that I make. The rational action, then, is to avoid trading that stock at all. Even if there're initially lots of non-insiders to trade with, they are all making the same economic calculation, and will come to the same conclusion. Hence, anyone rational will leave the market, and the only people left will be those with inside information, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. That defeats the whole point of a public stock market.
When you think about economics, you can't stop at first-order effects. The immediate effect of insider trading may be to increase the speed with which information gets to the market, but the long-term effect is to destroy the market itself, as every participant then has an incentive not to trade.
Anyway, the ironic part of my original comment is that I'm actually not an outsider by most people's POV. I can think of a number of people that would pay good money for upcoming Google product releases, were it not illegal (and grounds for firing). So in strictly personal terms, I'd stand to benefit quite a bit from legalized insider trading, but in academic terms, it'd destroy the system that generally works pretty well.
Think: Pfizer is considering pulling Viagra from the market in response to a possible side effect. then next week After, a full review we find no evidence that any such effect exists.
I know! All these pesky facts backed up with data get in the way.