Mitochondrial Eve

Weekly Musings ©

J. Sweeney - March 2013

“It is important to remind ourselves that in all other regards, there was probably nothing remarkable or special about Mitochondrial Eve...” - Daniel C. Dennet, 1995

It was my fortune to enjoy food, drink, and good conversation with extraordinary persons more than once this week.  So, it is with some difficulty that I return to work and graduate studies, when my inclination is instead to reflect and connect the various ideas on offer during those conversations, especially in light of recent readings.  My friends at Penn will likely chide me for bothering to read books and articles not assigned for our next cohort weekend.  Indeed we are suffering from volume as a small ship from water in a storm.  Still, we must obey to some degree when there are questions with which our mind is obsessed, and leave for tomorrow those tasks that are designated by well-intentioned school masters.  Three intelligent and competent women invited me to join their sorority for an afternoon, let this be my thank you - muses to my musings.

Two and a half years ago I joined the Haverford School faculty as the new Mathematics Department Chair.  Part of the orientation was a short course in decision making, taught by staff from the Decision Education Foundation.  I like a new idea, and any new framework for thinking is always a treat, so I entertained the notions presented.  But, I did push back on one assumption regarding the arrow of time as running in one direction with regard to the causality of valuing decisions.  Not surprisingly these rationally inclined advocates of good decision making wanted us to adopt ideas from capital markets, especially the idea of “sunk costs” - once an investment is made, it is made and all future decisions should be made on a future looking basis regardless of past decisions.  They included the present state of the market, capital investments, etc. as being of fixed value.  For example if you already built a factory here but now thought that having one in Indonesia would be more profitable, even after taking into account all building and transfer costs, than you should build in Indonesia... rational.  However, I wanted to entertain the notion that current decisions could actually change the value of past decisions, and thus have a reversed time causal relationship with events.

I don’t remember my specific example at the time, but this will suffice.  Imagine you are contemplating a decision today such as changing employers.  Most Americans would tell you to think about the opportunity, what security you’ll be giving up, how it will affect your family, will you miss colleagues, have more or less opportunity for advancement, etc.  They’ll be asking how it will affect your future.  However, you have already made a myriad of choices and memories at the current firm; going to staff parties, taking on interesting projects, serving various clients (well or poorly), is there anything but future value to these information artifacts?  What if your choice could raise or diminish their value to you for years to come?

Perhaps this is too abstract, so let me introduce “Mitochondrial Eve”.  
You may recall from cellular biology that mitochondria are the oxygen processing “energy-factories” organelles or plastids within our eukaryotes (in other words cells within cells).  They have their own DNA.  This symbiotic relationship, cells within cells, has been the case for about 1.4 billion years, so if it is news to you blame FOX.  Anyway, we all know that every human’s DNA is made up of 50% from one parent and 50% from the other... well, not quite.  All of us have mitochondrial DNA as well, and all of it comes only from the female parent.  “If you are a male, all of the mitochondria in your cells are in an evolutionary cul-de-sac; they will not get passed on to any offspring of yours, who will get all of their mitochondria from their (biological) mother.” - (Dennett, 1995)  This startling notion means that my MomMom, mother of eight children, grandmother to dozens, great-grandmother already to fifteen, only has two grandchildren, two of my biological sisters that will pass on her mitochondria.  Her deceased husband passed on none.

If we walk backwards from every living human being today through their biological mother’s mitochondrial DNA tree we will eventually arrive at the closest direct female ancestor; Mitochondrial Eve (Cann, et al, 1987).  However, if something were to happen today to some set of humans, say a plague, that culled the tree, the new Eve would be a descendant of that Eve.  Somehow future events is changing the fact of who is Mitochondrial Eve, often thousands of years later.

I like this notion.  It is on the edge of telling us something about the nature of decisions and time...

Anyway, for now I will not draw a direct link from that example to my proposal, but will skip ahead.

Instead of thinking of the future consequences of decisions, what if we began to manage the portfolio of our past experiences and tried to maximize their value by way of current decision making.  For example, staying at the firm or going might be about trying to increase the frequency of people (including yourself) recalling favorably your treatment of a particular customer.  Hmm... not quite the stuff I am looking for...

How about this?  You have a collection of pictures with photos of times with your friends.  If you increase the value of those relationships going forward; reconnecting, hanging out with them, getting to know their children, attending celebrations of their life, etc. you are potentially increasing the value of those old photos.  You will cherish them more, and concurrently value those memories more because of your choices (including reflecting on them) made today!

So, we can think of all of our past experiences, memories, and objects from the past as a portfolio of assets whose value we should be trying to increase as you go forward.

Recently I encouraged my colleagues at PennGSE to only ever speak positively about our program to each other and outsiders.  Doing so creates a stronger reputation and brand for our program and thereby improves our future prospects.  But, it also raises the value of our past decision to choose Penn!

Years ago I began the habit of writing Weekly Musings ©.  Life got busy and I let the habit atrophy.  Choosing to write again should enrich my future, and hopefully offers something of value to my readers.  It also raises the value of my old writing... somehow.

This is not developed theory.  But I wanted to capture it now.  Hopefully, someday in the future, I will develop it further thus raising the value of the decision to spend time writing it today.

Thanks for reading, and thank you very much if you are one of the very special women who spent time talking with me this week.  You know who you are.  Hopefully this raises a bit the value of that past decision.

 

Please help spread the word

Friends,

As many of you know I have been working with a classmate from Bonner (high school) to launch a company that facilitates secure mobile phone money transfers. The technology, patents, legal certifications, banking approvals, etc. have taken us two years. However, we are now active and approved in several states including Pennsylvania, California, and Massachusetts, with more states on the way. The phone companies have issued us a five-digit code "56624" after certifying our processes, data encryption, and security.

So, I can say...

Finally mobile payments have come to the US. Now you can conveniently and securely send and receive (XIP) money using your cell phone.

To enable your phone

Text “connect 230”

To 56624

Once your phone is XIPWIRE enabled you will receive an ID and PIN and then can load your mobile phone wallet with money from any credit card or checking account.

There is no cost to enable your phone. The text message above does not obligate you or cost you anything. It merely enables your phone to XIP payments using XIPWIRE technology.

It may not be obvious at first when you might ever use this technology, however here are a few examples.

Paying a tutor. Paying the plumber. Sending money to a child at college. Receiving payment for your small business from a customer. Authorizing petty cash for employees. Paying for girl scout cookies. Receiving money from friends for theater tickets. Paying for a cab.

We are finished with the first stage and are now trying to build the network or enabled users as quickly as possible. The more people and businesses using XIPWIRE for mobile payments, the more valuable the service is to our customers.

So, I am asking you to please send the text described above form your cell phone and then forward this email to as many people as you can. Our venture capitalists want to see us grow to 10,000 users by the end of the month!

Please help spread the word.

Thank you,

Joe Sweeney

PS We are trying to activate as many phones as possible this month. So, please forward this email. If you have questions, you may email me at Joe@XIPWIRE.oom

XIPWIRE is Live!

My good friend, Sharif, and I have launched our new venture - XIPWIRE. It allows person-to-person money transfers via cell phones. Please check out the link and give it a try. I think you'll like it. No more writing checks to friends, just xip it to them. No more handing over cash to a contractor or getting frustrated that they don't take credit cards, just xip it.

Secure, easy, and so convenient. Please give us a try.

Thanks,
Joe

XIPWIRE

Weekly Musings© - “If I were China in 2010"

Weekly Musings – If I were China in 2010

J. Sweeney
1/1/10
I just finished Dr. Paul Krugman’s editorial, “Chinese New Year”. Here is the link Chinese New Year . Dr. Krugman continues the party line that the US is only in danger of losing jobs due to mercantilist behavior in other countries. But, by now most of us realize something else is wrong.

Pennsylvania has a nasty bill coming due in 2012. The government has not been fully funding the retirement pensions of state employees and the tab will add approximately $1,300 per household to state taxes starting that year. Our commonwealth is heading for a fiscal awakening but some are pretending that cheap money will still be available and that we’ll just add to the amount we are borrowing.

The Federal Government is making the same mistake with money spent on non-critical defense, TSA, new health insurance benefits, etc. The misguided thinking is that we will continue to borrow money and then print money to pay off the debt.

Either this year, or in the next few, the US dollar is going to be dropped as the reserve currency of the world. Other countries do not want to lend money to someone that then repays with newly printed dollars created out of thin air. Those countries don’t want to sell their goods for $60 and then a few months later receive payment with similarly devalued currency.

“Too bad, we’re the US, we’re number 1, what can they do about it?”

Here’s what I would do if I were China in 2010. I would use my $2 Trillion reserves of US currency to buy mines, oil fields, timber rights, etc. At the same time I would encourage my people to begin holding their savings in silver, not gold as that is experiencing a bubble. Finally I would go to Saudi Arabia, Russia, Brazil, Germany, France, India, and Japan and talk about creating a new unit of account for foreign transactions.

The new unit of account would either be IMF special drawing rights or some more cleverly named unit like the BRIC. It would be based on a basket of goods including for example a barrel of oil, bar of silver, ton of rice, and a 60-year old oak tree.

Here’s how it currently works. The US borrows money say $1000 with a 5% coupon. Each year the government pays $50 dollars (5% of 1,000) and at the end of the loan perhaps 20 years it pays back the $1000. China lends the money by buying bonds and is repaid with dollars worth less due to inflation and our relentless printing.

Here’s how it would work. The US borrows $1000 at 5% or a $50 coupon. Let’s say for ease of computation that is equivalent to 2 BRICS. At the end of the first year instead of paying $50, we would need to spend however many dollars it took to buy 2 BRICS and pay that number of dollars (perhaps $60 now). If the US tried to monetize the debt (by printing money), like it is doing now, it would take even more dollars to buy the 2 BRICS as the newly printed money decreased the value of all dollars.

Before you think that this is ridiculous, let me point out that China is buying up mines in Afghanistan, oil fields in the Middle East, and soon will be buying timberland in Canada. They are publicly calling for their people to buy silver (not gold). Lastly, they have been pushing in the UN for a new unit of account and reserve currency based on IMF special drawing rights or some basket of goods or currencies.

Every other country on the planet is negatively impacted by our ability to print money to cover our debt and buy goods cheaply. In 1971 when Nixon took us off the gold standard he freed our government to spend money it did not collect in taxes and hide that fact by printing more dollars. The world accepted the arrangement because the US was so dominant.

It is time to return to the prudent behavior of a Republic and give up the illusion of Empire. We simply can’t afford to wait until our currency is dropped to put our house in order.

Either we fix this before the change or we fall into a true financial crisis. If you think this last one was bad, imagine going through it without the power to simply print money to cover the new debt.

Hopefully 2010 won’t be the year of our collapse. But if I were China…

Weekly Musings© - “Snow Down”

Weekly Musings© - “Snow Down”

J. Sweeney
December 20, 2009

It’s about time to slow down. Thank goodness for the snow and nature’s strong suggestion to stay in for a day. Now the list lays waiting but a quick pause to jot down some thoughts before they fade away like so many other recent ones. Here are a few recent musings that may receive longer treatment when the world turns more slowly. For now I’ll make like a molecule and slow down with the cold.

A few weeks ago, no, perhaps a few months now, I was sitting with a friend when I noticed the tree outside of my window at work. It hit me like the proverbial bolt; lightening.

As water molecules rub against one another in the atmosphere they create a static electric charge. The clouds begin to build a voltage differential with negative on the bottom of the clouds and positive on the top. The negative charge at the bottom begins to draw positive charge in the Earth toward it. Eventually the charge jumps up from the Earth and down from the cloud, lightening.

As I sat there looking at the naked tree it occurred to me that a similar albeit slower process was at work. Charge in the form of minerals, water, and nutrients build up in the soil. The Sun reaches out with its radiation and with a simple spark of DNA, the seed, lightening in the form of a tree.

Look at the bare tree outside your window, as it reaches to the sky and imagine yourself aging and moving slowly enough to witness it as a flash in the vast expanse of time. It reaches up into the sky and down into the soil briefly and then with dying falls apart, the pattern collapses.

It’s beautiful to think that a walk in the wood is really a walk through a slow motion lightening storm.

Awesome.

On an entirely different topic I was driving home on Thanksgiving and passing the same shopping center for the fourth time that day when it occurred to me that it might be fun to see only the copper.

Imagine a shopping center but all that you can see is the wiring, transformers, circuits, the internals of cash registers, just the copper in the wires.

Can you see the beautiful structure, the wire frame of the whole building, perhaps even the parking lot full of copper coils from the inside of cars?

Now, imagine an alien race watching Earth for millennia thru a telescope. Imagine that they could only see copper. For millions of years the copper sat sedately below the surface slowly pushed up toward the crust by heavier nickel heading to the core. Then a few thousand years ago copper starting coming together into little clumps barely visible thru that distant telescope. The Aliens see axe heads, spear tips, bowls, cups, and eventually armor, all shaped by unseen life. (Remember they only see the copper).

Suddenly about two hundred years ago copper begins rapidly coming to the surface and then nearly instantly it spins out across the continents. Copper threads connecting points all over the planet. Huge elegant cobwebs of copper threads forming everywhere and giving off heat and light, electro magnetic radiation emits and travels out to the stars. What a spectacle to behold. Lucky aliens.

Just a few thoughts that today’s snow permitted time to transcribe…

Some day soon the research at MIT and IBM currently underway will allow us to project thoughts from one mind to another. Until then, your comments are welcome.

Happy Holidays,
Joe

Response to "The Priority of Labor"

A friend recently sent me an email promoting the Catholic teaching or principle of the priority of labor over capital. The Church has been promoting this view for centuries and it is to the detriment of the working poor. What they should be teaching is equity in pay, freedom of movement, and promoting education that would enable workers to become skilled. Below is my initial response to the lead in line to Pope John Paul II's "The Priority of Labor". I reserve the right to respond in greater detail.

B.D.,

Thank you for bringing the thread up again. This is part of why I think it would be interesting to explore the topic, but I am not interested in taking up positions and then defending them. I am more interested in exploring the assumptions of both sides and testing the ideas a bit. For example, the mondragon link you sent has a line "We must first of all recall a principle that has always been taught by the church, the principle of the priority of labour over capital." On the surface that seem compassionate and consistent with deferential treatment of the poor. Until that is, you consider what is meant by capital. Capital is simply stored labor. Nothing more. It is the product of labor that was not consumed but was rather saved. Understood this way there can be no preference between capital and labor. If anything, once basic needs are met, surely there should be a preference for the moral behavior of delayed gratification that enables the accumulation of capital versus the luxury consumption that is usually the alternative.

Moreover, capital, that is the saved product of labor, is the property of the producer created by their moral act of delaying gratification for the purpose of improving the well-being of their family, business, or interests. This is different than excessive profits that exploit the laborer. For indeed the working class have proven better savers (creators of capital) than the debt ridden upper class of recent years. Surely the church would not think that the labor of a financial engineer on wall street should receive priority over the lifetime savings of a grocer, plumber, or dare I say, teacher?

There is an aversion to capitalism within the tradition of Catholicism. I was raised with it and still find myself falling into the pattern of thinking that money is a corrosive element in our society. However, specialized labor leads to surpluses, which can be consumed or saved. The saved (delayed gratification) product of labor can be used to hire new workers, build public goods, or even just protect the worker from downturns in income or the vagaries of life including health crises. I think we need to reconsider the basic assumptions of what is right behavior and what the principles we hold lead to as consequences. A society or tradition that teaches labor over capital might just as well teach consumption over saving. This is the worst thing we could possibly teach the working poor if we want to help them overcome their poverty.

Thanks again for the example.

Healthcare Reform Comment

Here is my brief response to Frank Rich's latest column.

I would like national healthcare. It would be great not to worry about whether we can afford medical care for our children or have to consider the loss of benefits before switching employment. The problem is that enacting such a plan continues to move us away from the model of a restricted role for federal government where only those powers enumerated in the constitution are available to it and the rest are reserved to the people as individuals or to the many states.

You may choose to demonize our fellow citizens and lump the majority of conservatives in with the gun toting crazies but that dismissive attitude fails to illuminate their legitimate reluctance to grant ever more authority to politicians in DC.

How is it that states, not the federal government, are able to provide education to all their students yet you think it appropriate that they not do the same for health care? Maybe you don't see a difference between the roles of state and national governments except that the national government can be used as a means to achieve your goals in one swoop.

The rights we maintain, the gift of Liberty, is the result of a conscious choice on the part of our society and is only maintained by restraining the power of the government. As much as you don't want to give Republicans authority to say who can and cannot marry, so too we must not be seduced into using the awesome power of the federal government to coerce behavior that is not within it's constrained and enumerated authority.

What Massachusetts has begun let others follow. Let our states compete for workers by enacting health reform that improves their competitiveness. Let's keep the Federal Government out of anything for which it is not absolutely necessary. Failing that, let's have a real national debate and amend the Constitution if needed to facilitate the form of government we find preferable.

What are you reading?

With the blessing of downtime peculiar to the teaching profession many of us have been catching up on our reading.

Our school's "One Book, One School" book this year is

"Three Cups of Tea" by Greg Mortenson and David Relin.


I've also been reading:

"The Road to Serfdom" by Freidrich von Hayek

"Thomas Paine: The Right's of Man" by Christopher Hitchens

"The Discourses" by Machiavelli

"Why Lazarus Laughed" by Wei Wu Wei

"Banks and Politics in America" by Hammond

"Investments" by Bodie, Kane, and Marcus

"In Defense of Property" Dietze

"The Dirty Dozen", Robert Levy and William Mellor

As well as a rereading of some favorites...

"The Blind Watchmaker" by Richard Dawkins

"The Tao te Ching" translated by Stephen Mitchell

Among the numerous children books read out loud to my daughters was one stand out

"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" by J.K. Rowling


Still to be completed before summer's end:

"Goedel, Escher, Bach" by Douglas Hofstader

"The Word in a Phrase: A Brief History of Aphorism" by James Geary

"The Hidden Connections: A Science for Sustainable Living" by Fritjof Capra

"The Next Fifty Years: Science in the First Half of the Twenty-First Century", edited by John Brockman


Thank you to those that recommended or in some cases even lent the books above. There is little finer than a good book from a friend. Please mention some of your own summer reading especially if you recommend them to fellow members of WeeklyMusings.