Re feedback -
There are mechanisms to maintain stability. For example governments buying & selling oil. It is fast, and therefore can stop large oscillations (think of a bang-bang controller), but unfortunately the amount of oil you can store is limited, so any such system will meet its limits at some time.
All resources in a capitalist system suffer from the problem that from investment prospecting to resource flow is typically 5 years or more, and future demand is uncertain.
But the current spike in prices was amplified by the futures market. An efficient futures market should be able to dampen such spikes by anticipating future demand and raising the price in advance, so making demand more flexible.
Perhaps the problem is that all actors in a market ecemonomy operate in a local optimum. It is not in the interests of any bankers to reduce profits now to protect from a catastrophic loss some unknown time in the future.
The only real incentive for long-term gain comes from those who manage pensions.
Tom
"The verdict is positive"
Volitile is good.
We have to know that professional traders of any commodity can only make money in a market that includes some volatility: Professional traders can sell short in a downward market or sell long in a rising market to extract revenue from those trading markets created for legitimate purpose, in support of those engaged in the hard slog of legitimate commerce.
Professional traders, not actually commercially engaged in the commodities they leverage their derivatives upon, can't make money in a stable market. If Light sweet crude futures rose at a gentile steady rate of ~$2/bbl/year on the NY Mercantile exchange, then this commodity would be unavailable as a revenue source for those that trade in associated derivatives.
We have to understand that some, politically powerful with lots of PAC money actually want unstable markets: bubbles and collapse provide opportunities to make a great deal of money in a very short period of time without the associated cost of actually producing the commodity they trade upon.
Professional traders, not actually commercially engaged in the commodities they leverage their derivatives upon, can't make money in a stable market. If Light sweet crude futures rose at a gentile steady rate of ~$2/bbl/year on the NY Mercantile exchange, then this commodity would be unavailable as a revenue source for those that trade in associated derivatives.
We have to understand that some, politically powerful with lots of PAC money actually want unstable markets: bubbles and collapse provide opportunities to make a great deal of money in a very short period of time without the associated cost of actually producing the commodity they trade upon.
Tom,An efficient futures market should be able to dampen such spikes by anticipating future demand and raising the price in advance, so making demand more flexible.
In the trials I linked to the markets were perfectly efficient. Except for traders knowing what the strategy of other traders was.
That is: what you were paying for a given return was exactly known.
There were still bubbles.
Add to that the fundamental control principle: High gains + long lags = oscillations. Plus imperfect information. And you get oscillations.
And as you point out: buffer stocks help. Until you run out of them on the up swing.
As to predicting the future demand? It all depends on price. So you can see where that one leads.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.
The news is sparse. Politics is infiniteRoger wrote:Wow 6 pages of a new announcement.....
nah.... 1 page of news and 5 pages of the same old hashed out back and forth on politics.
What a waste of time going thru this thread.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.
..and MSIMON wrote "Polywell has the advantage here in that fusors work"
..the mystery deepens!!
My answer: The fusor has a central physical grid at a negative potential with respect to an outer spherical anode. You just stick deuterium in and apply a huge voltage at low pressure. Job done.
The original idea with Polywell is that it would do what a fusor does but without a lossy central grid.
It was supposed that a) ions get drawn into the centre and collide with each other at the 'spherical focus' but that b) they often keep hitting the grid instead and this is a principal inefficiency. It was on these notions that the Polywell was created.
But it turns out that both suppositions are wrong in respect of a fusor, yet Polywell has proceeded on the basis that if you fix these issues then you fix the fusor's inefficiencies. What you actually do is create a different machine because these weren't applicable to the fusor in the first place!
So the answer is that it is a fusor in that the *original principle* of a fusor was evolved into a Polywell, but it turns out that these original ideas about the fusor were wrong anyway so it, actually, isn't a fusor!! In spirit, not in reality.
..the mystery deepens!!
My answer: The fusor has a central physical grid at a negative potential with respect to an outer spherical anode. You just stick deuterium in and apply a huge voltage at low pressure. Job done.
The original idea with Polywell is that it would do what a fusor does but without a lossy central grid.
It was supposed that a) ions get drawn into the centre and collide with each other at the 'spherical focus' but that b) they often keep hitting the grid instead and this is a principal inefficiency. It was on these notions that the Polywell was created.
But it turns out that both suppositions are wrong in respect of a fusor, yet Polywell has proceeded on the basis that if you fix these issues then you fix the fusor's inefficiencies. What you actually do is create a different machine because these weren't applicable to the fusor in the first place!
So the answer is that it is a fusor in that the *original principle* of a fusor was evolved into a Polywell, but it turns out that these original ideas about the fusor were wrong anyway so it, actually, isn't a fusor!! In spirit, not in reality.
In the Google "project 10 to 100th", I submitted a proposal that would build a duodecahedron, polywell,whiffle ball, Boron, fusor. Did that verbiage make sense. If not what would have been a correct way to say it.
Last edited by bobshipp on Tue Dec 23, 2008 4:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Fusors use a wire grid to form the central anode. There are no wire grids in a polywell, it uses a virtual anode formed by the coils.bobshipp wrote:Joe wrote:"The polywell is not a fusor." could someone please explain this distinction.
http://www.rexresearch.com/farnsworth/fusor.htm
I like the p-B11 resonance peak at 50 KV acceleration. In2 years we'll know.
Do realize that it was government regulation (e.g. CRA) along with the government protected Freddie and Fannie that drove the practice of sub-prime lending in the first place, which lead to the housing bubble and subsequent collapse. Also, it is the government sanctioned monopoly of the Federal Reserve that set artificially low interest rates starting around 1995 that led to an unsustainable credit bubble. In other words, it is government and its minions that created the conditions for the current economic crisis in the first place.Skipjack wrote:Yes, but the government also has to provide means for those to seek justice that feel betrayed. When people fall for a Fraud, it is not always a matter of risk misscalculation, but sometimes also of simple lack of knowlege or understanding. A lot of people that are in danger of loosing their money when banks crash (even those that have it on very conservative and "secure" saving accounts) are IMHO the victims of fraud by the banks (that told them their money would be save with them). People will seek justice. If they dont get it, they might take matters into their own hands. All you need is enough people that are unhappy with a situation and that feel betrayed, or (especially) feel like they are victims of an injustice and you will get a revolution. This does not require a majority, but "only" about 20% of the population. Revolutions rarely go without bloodshed and high losses of property. I dont think that it is wise of any government to risk that.
So say you have 20% of the population that feel that they, or their family have been betrayed over their life savings by "the banks". The next day you have banks stormed, bankers shot on open streets and if you dont bring the military in, you have anarchy (again).
A good government will try to protect its people against fraud (which is a criminal activity just like theft, or robbery, IMHO) to make sure that not to many people feel let down by the law.
How little it takes to bring a government to its knees can be seen by what is happening in Greece right now (and no, I am absolutely not sympathising with these left winged anarchos in Greece. The police there did right when they shot that gangster, 15 or not).
It is disingenuous to blame the financial problem on "excessive" free markets.