Kick that caffeine habit now

Is caffeine bad for you? Most know the answer. But why and how bad?

It screws up your body functions. The binding of adenosine created in your brain to the adenosine receptors slow down nerve activity. This creates drowsiness and may make the difference between difficulty to sleep and sleep or light sleep and deep sleep. Caffeine distorts the adenosine functions by “bluffing” the receptors so cell activities speed up. The pituitary gland senses increased activity in the brain and thus induces adrenaline making your heart beat faster, blood vessels on the surface constrict, blood pressure increases, the liver releases sugar into bloodstream for extra energy and muscles tighten. Although to a lesser extent, caffeine increases dopamine the same way amphetamines like heroine and cocaine do. Dopamine activates the pleasure centre in the brain.

It is an addictive drug. Your body gets a kick out of being alert, having energy boost and feeling happy. In the long term, heightened alertness and energy leave your body tired when the effects wear out. As you lose sleep due to overdose, the only way to keep awake is to repeat the intake. This spirals into chronic intake, which is addiction. I personally know a friend who “survives” on 4 cups of coffee everyday without fail.

Coffee, cola, tea and chocolate all contain caffeine. It’s impossible to not consume any of them. One of life’s pleasures is to partake in the forbidden fruits :) But do try to reduce your intake. And make sure you’re never hooked.

Free trade my foot

China’s application into the World Trade Organisation (WTO) would only go through if it agreed to the possibility of being slapped export limits until 2013. WTO which detests bilateral agreements (in favour of multilateral ones) turned a blind eye that last time and again a few months ago when the US and EU elevated their threat to exercise “safeguard” (read further quotas) against this nascent economy’s textiles. This was after a 40 years-long quota protective of the US and EU textile industry has just ended.

The bullying powers borrow the argument of protecting export-based industries in poor countries like Bangladesh. In actual sense they are worried of the cheap textile infiltrating their domestic markets. Any denials by the US and the EU are futile. Remember the great lengths America went to guard their steel and cotton industries? And no example can be better than the recent Boeing versus Airbus competition of who-gives-more-subsidies.

The US and the EU, champions of free trade and globalization? Pushers for democratization through growth of the middle class? Yeah right.

The Taser

Imagine this. You’re walking in a quiet dark lane at night. The stranger seems to be trailing you since you left office. This’s the same person who stalked you yesterday and the day before. Suddenly he shouts obscenities and raises a machete from nowhere as he rushes towards you. You draw the little pistol-like device you bought for USD 399.95. “This better work”, you whisper jerkily. You aim at his body and just as he’s within range, you squeeze the trigger. Two barbed darts shoot at high speed towards your assailant’s chest. Upon contact, he loses hold of his weapon, cringes and drops to the ground. You steal a quick moment of relief before running to the nearest pizza place for help, leaving behind your M18 with its target.

Enter Taser, the new non-lethal weapon for citizens and law enforcers. The ammunition comes in the form of 2 barbed darts. When launched they deliver 50 000 V shock to the target that may stand as far as 4.5 metres. Citizens can legally carry this stun gun concealed in most states in the US. Police departments throughout the country are considering this as an alternative to live ammunition. Unlike pepper sprays and firearms, you can shoot any part of the body to temporarily debilitate the target. Feel safer going out at night?

However, imagine the opposite. For whatever reason, you’re the target. The darts pierces your skin and immediately the Electro-Muscular Disruption (EMD) technology overrides your nervous system. It may not be that painful to you, but it doesn’t matter as it relies on electrical impulses, not your pain threshold. Obediently your body reduces to the fetal position. You’ll stay incapacitated for 5 seconds.

The 28 May 2005 edition of The Economist ran a small article on this. Enough to catch my attention as I’ve actually used it before…virtually of course in the PC game SWAT4. In 2004, Amnesty International reported 103 deaths in North America due to stun guns. There’re also cases where they’ve been misused against children and the elderly. The article quoted a professor of biomedical engineering at Duke University as saying that the current may affect the heartbeat and kill some people.

The TASER X26C. (Photo from Taser.)

Am I supportive of less lethal weapons? Yes and no.

Yes, because they will drastically reduce the use of live bullets by law enforcers. That means less death of criminals and less stray bullets killing innocents. It’s also a more effective citizen’s self defense device than those in the market. The manufacturer even promises to replace your Taser if you leave it attached to your target.

No, because the name seems to suggest no side effects, which is not entirely true. This may promote indiscriminate use of stun gun. Law enforcers may use the Taser in situations where use of force were not required before.

At this point, many questions are still unanswered.

How does it affect people who have nervous disorders? How does it affect people with pacemakers for their heart? How lethal (or non lethal) does the police’s rule of engagement perceive Taser to be? Will the engineers in Taser, the company itself, the police department or the police officer be responsible if the Taser kills a person?

The debate continues.

Star Wars prequels - dilution of the Jedi

As a child, a big fan of Star Wars I was. Episodes IV, V and VI so many times I’ve watched. Almost own my neighbour's video cassettes I did :)

I grew up and along came The Phantom Menace (Episode I), Attack of the Clones (Episode II) and Revenge of the Sith (Episode III) which depart from the dogfight scenes that dominated my favourite Empire Strikes Back (Episode V). It was pleasing to know someone could fit in the Jedi robes and beards better than Sir Alec Guinness himself -- Liam Neeson. I still believe George Lucas made a mistake by starring him as Qui-Gon Jinn and killing him in that episode. Ewan McGregor doesn't exude the Jedi aura as much but that's probably exactly why Lucas stars him as a maturing Obi Wan. His coming of age he wants us to witness. And boy, Hayden Christensen's acting is as mediocre as the cheesy romantic lines. (No Star Wars critic fails to mention that!)

(Photo from Yahoo Movies)

I found that Revenge of the Sith especially diluted my great admiration of the Jedi Order. At the end of it I found the Jedi a bit contradicting

• They claim to be selfless but Yoda left on an escape pod leaving 2 Wookies and their clan in a losing battle
• They claim to be able to see the future a few seconds ahead but I wonder why Jedis were killed by the clone soldiers easily without any slightest hint of suspicion
• They train in light sabre combat since very young. Yet a Jedi couldn’t defeat a handful of clone soldiers? Come on!
• They don’t kill creatures who’re unarmed but that’s what Windu tried to do upon Palpatine (ok ok his fingers can emit electrical power)
• They claim to be virtuous but prefer not to discuss their spying of Palpatine in the Jedi Council. Add that with Obi Wan’s reluctance to put Anakin in a “difficult position”. Aren’t making decisions outside the Council and not thinking as one team politicising the Jedi Order?

(Photo from Darth Maul Estrogen Brigade)

The only consolations to the prequels are

• That cool Darth Maul creature and the lance he wielded. Was it a lance anyway?
• The final fight scene in The Phantom Menace with the beam curtains going on and off and the Jedi and Sith held us in suspense
• The dogfight scenes that open Revenge of the Sith. I love the diving of the Jedi fighters into the fray after flying calmly above that big ship resembling a giant A-Wing
• The design of the Jedi fighters are cool
• It’s Star Wars baby!

Nevertheless, the prequels provide closure to me. Diluting my belief in the Jedi it may have…in my heart it’s still the epic of the century.

In the sequels I watched legend. In the prequels a few decades later, I witnessed history.

First step into economics-hood

I begin my first orthodox journey to learn the fundamentals of economics. All prior attempts were piecemeal at best. I always believe that the best way to learn about a new subject is through a good introductory textbook, web article and not glossaries or news articles.

As I went through the excellent intro article, I can instinctively connect to some aspects of my personal life and to deeper insight into things. First of my newfound insights…

Businesses need to also compete across industries due to Production Possibility Frontier and opportunity cost. Production Possibility Frontier (PPF) is the point of most efficient production by a country. Let’s see an example of a country that produces only cars and vegetables. The curve shows the different production levels of cars vs vegetables when resources are allocated the best way possible. With current limits to production, the country needs to decide what combination of good and/or services (which point along the curve) is the best.



This makes me realise that industries are not independent of each other. As government policies favour one product, this implies a sidelining of another. All other factors being equal, if a government decides to increase production of cars, it is also forced to decrease production of vegetables. So, competition is not just between businesses within an industry but also across industries. Of course there are flaws to this theory

• The degree of cross industry competition may not be significant
• In the real world, other factors like means of production (technology, labour, etc) fluctuate as production of cars are increased, which may not actually lead to the need to decrease of vegetables production

Opportunity cost is the value foregone to have something else (quoting Investopedia). Example, I have $2. I can buy a cotton candy or an ice cream with this. If I’m an ice cream lover, then of course a $2 ice cream gives me more value than a $2 cotton candy. The value is personal to me.

If I choose to forego biscuit in favour of ice cream, then opportunity cost = cost of giving up biscuit (which is fine by me). But if for some reason I end up with the biscuit, then the opportunity cost = cost of giving up the ice cream (which is not desirable). By the way I love bittersweet chocolate ice cream.

If a country decides to produce more cars than vegetable to remain on the PFF curve, then opportunity cost equals the cost of giving up the required vegetable production.

If I was not deciding between food items but between ice cream and a comic book, don’t I then create a situation where Baskin & Robbins is competing with Marvel over my $2? Again it underlines the fact that products from different industries do need to compete to get the consumer’s bucks. This is especially true if these products are typically sold in an outlet, example – newspaper and sweets in a newsstand. Needless to say there’re also flaws to this understanding

• There’re not many situations where a comic book publisher need to compete with the ice cream manufacturer since different consumers will have different choices to make according to their taste. The said competition may be trivial since there’ll not be a critical mass of consumers that have to choose specifically between ice cream and a comic book.

But the fact that there is a clear relationship between products and goods across industries is made very clear. It intrigues me.