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Theresa May still wants to shilly shally around over Brexit with a half baked plan to keep Britain half in the single market.A bit like dancing the Hokey Pokey. When will she learn that Barneir doesn't know the step and doesn't danice ether.! May’s song and dance routine

Feb 10, 2018 at 11:33 PM | Unregistered CommenterKleinefeldmaus

The entire insurance industry revolves around discrimination, if it didn't premiums would rocket

Feb 10, 2018 at 6:52 PM | Pcar

It is not "discrimination" to categorise some people as higher risk, than others, especially when there is statistical evidence to support the categorisations.

Not all insurance companies understand this concept.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2007/oct/24/insurance.crime

Feb 10, 2018 at 9:13 PM | Unregistered Commentergolf charlie

Entropic Man - welcome back. It would be nice if you contributed actively again. It is important that views are challenged here to prevent it becoming (or even, dare I say it) remaining an echo chamber. So, please don't take offence if I respond as follows to this from you:

"I would not buy "The Hockey Stick Illusion" for the same reason that I would not buy a book claiming to prove that the Earth was flat.

If someone were willing to give me a free copy, then I might read it for the entertainment value, red pencil in hand."

The first sentence contains an extraordinary mismatch. We know that the earth is not flat. We do not know that the science of climate change is definitively and totally understood.

As for the second sentence, there has to be a good chance you could borrow a copy of Andrew Montford's book from the local library. That is what I did. You could read it without it costing you a penny.

I remain perplexed at the willingness of people to be critical of a book they have not read. I had a similar on-line conversation here a couple of years ago with Raff when he used to turn up occasionally. By the way, does anyone know where he went? Did he reincarnate himself as the "Len Martinez" who comments at cliscep?

Anyway, please hang around and keep contributing. We need you to make us sharpen our pencils.

Feb 10, 2018 at 7:10 PM | Unregistered CommenterMark Hodgson

@Radical Rodent, Feb 10, 2018 at 4:23 PM

“Well-established science” has been proved wrong on so many occasions, yet you still cleave so assiduously to that meme. So sad.

Agree.
Established science claimed cholera was caused by bad air
Established science claimed stomach ulcers were caused by stress induced excess acid

Established science was wrong.

Feb 10, 2018 at 6:54 PM | Registered CommenterPcar

@stewgreen, Feb 9, 2018 at 10:09 PM

If Khan's end up with higher premium than whites , based purely on name , then that is illegal racist discrimination.

The entire insurance industry revolves around discrimination, if it didn't premiums would rocket

Feb 10, 2018 at 6:52 PM | Registered CommenterPcar

@tomo, Feb 9, 2018 at 8:46 PM

I refuse to use the term AI to describe automated / algorithmic pattern searches which are now a thing

AI was part of the mid 80s degree I studied and was touted as the next big thing. Seems to be like fusion, always ten years away..

.
@tomo, Feb 9, 2018 at 10:04 PM

I'd be very surprised indeed if insurance companies exposed their true actuarial metrics - shocked even :-)

Actuaries tend to be uncommunicative, secretive and even more boring than accountants.

Feb 10, 2018 at 6:52 PM | Registered CommenterPcar

stewgreen

in the late 1970s it was commonplace to assure positive product reviews in UK Hi-Fi la-la land with a brick of hashish....

That said - Musk's use of taxpayer funds seriously pales into near insignificance when compared to NASA's bureaucratic splurging astonishing amounts of other people's money on projects that might have been dreamed up by a satirist on drugs.

8 minutes about NASA manned space exploration - well worth a watch imho.

It doesn't excuse Musk's exploitation of taxpayers that's unlikely to be repaid... It'd be interesting to track back who among the hallelujah-ing scribes have experienced Californian hospitality.

Feb 10, 2018 at 6:18 PM | Registered Commentertomo

Radical Rodent
Or The Origin of Continents and Oceans by Alfred Wegener

Feb 10, 2018 at 5:30 PM | Unregistered CommenterUibhist a Tuath

Times : Giles Whithell does a 2 page plug for Musk
Yet in the magazine Musk's name comes up again.
Times Magazine : Sex Parties at Silicon Valley Startups
Emily Chang’s new book Brotopia

Interviewed a female entrepreneur who got invited and found Elon Musk there,
“Common to get invited to a strip club or bondage club in the middle of the day”
Drugs are a heavy presence at sex parties.
There’s 4 pages from the book.

Does that explain why medialand give us this fake picture of the real world ?
ie in alliance of hedgefunds, PR agencies and sex party circuit .. people are afraid to put their head above the parapet and give us truth, cos they want to stay inside this party and not be blackmailed ?

Something must explain Musk's amazing amount of free positive coverage.

Feb 10, 2018 at 5:21 PM | Registered Commenterstewgreen

I tend not to buy books which claim that well-established science is wrong.
So you don’t have a copy of The Origin of Species, then? Your pomposity is strong, today, Entropic man!

“Well-established science” has been proved wrong on so many occasions, yet you still cleave so assiduously to that meme. So sad.

Feb 10, 2018 at 4:23 PM | Registered CommenterRadical Rodent

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