First, its not raw processing power. The HTC Rezound has dual 1.5 ghz Snapdragon CPUs, the Google Galaxy Nexus has dual 1.2 ghz ARMs, and the LG Optimus 2X has dual 1.0 Nvidia Tegra CPUs (the first dual core phone). The iPhone has dual 800 mhz A5 CPUs.

Second, its not screen resolution. While the iPhone 4s has 960×640 pixels, other phones also have this display quality, such as the HTC Evo 3D (960×640). The HTC Rezound has a 4.3″ 720×1280 resolution.

I’ve come to a simple theory to explain it – the physical size of the device. Here is a comparison of phone designs based solely on size:

The larger phones, such as the Motorola Droid Razr, are almost tablets in their grandeosity with dimensions of 69 x 131 mm. Yet they are still also used as phones. The Apple iPhone 4S and HTC Incredible are compact, with sizes around 58 x 116 mm, making them easy to hold as actual phones. As mentioned, it is now possible to get high performance (CPU) phones in all sizes, so the deciding factor for me was phone size.

Now, one would argue that the Google Galaxy Nexus and Droid Razr serve a slightly different user, that of the programming power-user who enjoys a phone with the heft of a tablet. However, take look again at -all- the Andorid phones here. If you are a girl, which are you most likely to choose? I’d suggest the driving factor behind the Apple iPhone 4S success, from a purely physical perspective, is that the size, sleekness, and interface are elegant and compact.

Just look also at the marketing campaigns for the “Droid”, “Galaxy” and “Incredible”. The names themselves connotate an excess of masculinity, and the sharp, large-digit numeric calendars of the phones reflect a hyper-attention to information. The Droid advertisement is a pure exercise in robotic utopia; d-r-o-i-d. The iPhone is called an “Apple”.

Please don’t get the idea that I am an Apple iPhone 4S supporter. Because the iPhone is the elephant in the room, so to speak, it has used its power to make a phone that is fairly antagonistic toward developers. Its proprietary OS, and closed app store, make it very difficult to develop for. In addition, the 2010 decision to drop Flash support for the iPhone has created major headaches for programmers (more recently overcome by Adobe AIR). Finally, Apple charges high fees to carriers to support its phone (iPhone Kills Carrier Profits), which ultimately result in a loss to all consumers – such as no more unlimited data.

What I’m suggesting, instead, is that Motorola, HTC, LG, and Sony are all missing out on a really great opportunity here to design non-geeky, small, nicely designed phones that aren’t for the ubernerd. A recent article (Women want Apple’s iPhone), supports the notion that girls prefer the iPhone, but not to such a degree that I would expect – 31% of women prefer iPhone, while 28% of men do. The fact that the iPhone maintains a 48% market share overall suggests that smartphone users, overall, like its compactness. Of the smartphones I reviewed for this article, the smallest one was the Apple iPhone 4S — it is smaller than all other modern phones I could find. When you hold it, it feels sleek, compact, and phone-like. I considered the HTC Incredible, which is very close in size, but it’s now 2 years old and not a high performance (single core). Ultimately I think I will get an HTC Rezound, because of the 4G, dual-core… But I have to say, I wish I could get an Android phone at the size of the Apple iPhone. It just doesn’t exist yet.

Consider this another way: OWS is not about freedom of speech. That already took place in the 1960s as the Berkeley Free Speech Movement. The message was a unified one: We have the right to speak publicly on any topic. The movement was entirely structured around the simple, focused goal of the right to speak. The message was “Let us speak, on any topic, or we will not leave this campus!”

Ultimately, the wealthy WANT to make this about speech. Why? Because it detracts from the real issue: wealth. If we complain the police aren’t letting us camp in the park, if the police try to remove us, we aren’t making any real demands – we’re just revisiting speech again. If we are pushed around, sprayed, we aren’t making any real demands – we are fighting for speech. Something we already have, mostly. By making this about speech, we avoid finding solutions to the real issue: wall street corruption.

How long should we occupy the streets? Until they let us stay on the streets indefinitely? Let’s not forget the whole purpose of the movement is wealth disparity. But what can we reasonably demand? Certainly, as others point out, the right to a job is not a civil right – the government cannot guarantee jobs. As one writer said, “I knew a girl who dropped six figures in loans for a degree in Women’s Studies, and now complains she can’t find a job. What did she expect? That it would be easy?”

We have to accept that times are changing, globally. A freely available study, “Research on Future Skill Demands”, by the National Research Council (2008), reports that by 2030 up to 60% of our current workforce could be displaced by technology. Manufacturing has already seen a 40% decline in the past 5 years. Can we reasonably demand that jobs are created in –your- area of expertise?

Others claim that we have a right to a share of our country’s wealthy. This is not a reasonable civil right, either. The vast majority of the world is 20x worse off that even the poorest American. Most people in the world have no access to public toilets or clean water. Can we really expect the wealthy to give us a share of America’s money based solely on the idea that we deserve it? The American middle class may have labored hard, only to have the economy drop out, but as a commenter said “You were paid for your work. Your employer has no other obligations to you. You’re welcome to get another job.” The world is changing. Instead of pointing fingers, the question should be, what specific things were done which –should be- illegal?

How long should we occupy the streets? I suggest the answer is actually quite clear. We are unified because of very specific things: bank bailouts, foreclosure, and wall street greed. But we can’t make laws against greed itself. What kind of laws can we demand?

Here are three to start with:
1) Lobbying should be illegal.. The constitution introduced lobbying as means to advocate for the public. Now, the primary use of lobbying is the opposite – it is an advocation against the public interest. We must demand specific reform to lobbying, perhaps outlawing it altogether.

2) It should be illegal for CEOs of major companies to serve on government regulatory bodies in the same field. Some examples are the FDA (Food and Drug Administration), NCI (National Cancer Institute), DOE (Department of Energy), and EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) other. How can a group of people regulate an industry with whom it has a hidden financial interest?

3) Congress must be legally required to pass national debt reform, or be forced out of office. The process of perpetually delaying hard decisions must end.

We can continue to disagree on demographics: 56%, 99%, 1%, Republican, Democrat, Tea party. Everyone is different. That’s what makes this country great. But at the very least, we already know some specific reasons why we are here.

More to the point, if we make OWS about freedom of speech, our goals will never be met. OWS will become a perpetual, never ending occupation of our cities – hardly the kind of future we hope for.. There are perhaps some who would like to live in the park forever. I am not one of them. I would like to go home, and see our country changed for the good. I don’t care about “being heard”, or even about being shoved around by police. Now is our chance for change, what specific things do we want to change?

I’ve come to realize that it is the social model of living which is the cause. What does this mean? It means, quite simply, that people look out for one another – in individual lives, in family, work, and in government – to a greater extent than the US. I actually believe the Danish government has less control over the people than the US, even though republicans in the US would say any government regulation is socialist. The point is, a social society is not necessarily “socialist”. The later term is a throwback to economic models of centralized wealth (e.g. communism). A 50% tax is high, but there are also more or less wealthy Danish individuals, and the country trades in a free market like any other nation. A social model of living simply means that governments, people, companies look out for each other – both in life and in legal terms. This adds a feeling of stability which allows one to feel calm, centered in life.

In the US, the concept of capitalism is adopted to such an extent – especially legally, in business and government, but also individually – that one is in constant fear about what others will do to you. And it is justified. People have no moral qualms about literally stealing from others. Take the US Government Debt issue. The wealth class of the Republican party has essentially told the US people — directly and openly — it is willing to force a default on US debt, or greatly compromise our nation, in order to secure their own private wealth. The message? “We are screwing you. Deal with it.”

Such practices are not limited to government. In an extreme capitalist society, there are always extremists, and they will ruin it for the others. Consider hydrofracking in Pennsylvania and New York. The idea is to force high pressure water into underground rocks, causing deep rock beds to crack and release natural gas. It destroys aquifers, causes seepage, and does other unknown damage. Its a bad idea. Period. (See other sites for details). But in a capitalist market, there are people who are willing and ready to engage in this morally wrong behavior toward others. And the laws will either allow it, or be circumvented to permit it. In the US, the right to individual success trumps social responsibility.

And this is the whole cause of the dilema, unhappiness. One lives in fear that at any moment, some lunatic in politics will cause a default, some lunatic in medicine will place his or her paycheck above their responsibility to the patient, some lunatic in an insurance company will screw with you. Someone may try to rob your house. The lack of social stability is the root of unhappiness in the US – its cause is a decline of moral responsibility to society, incorrectly justified in the right to individual happiness.

So what are some solutions? Having experienced these declining conditions for the past twenty years, I must admit I am not optimistic on a national scale. Our public debate (media), our dialog, our approach to life, does not suggest people are ready to calm down, to relax and settle social issues rationally and with the correct amount of intelligence, focus, and humanity. Especially among those in power.

What can I do if I am an American?
The first thing, I have found, is to realize two things. First, being born American is not actually that great, it is a disadvantage in many respects. One can suffer these issues of social isolation, fear, and even psychological imbalance ones’ whole life due simply to a lack of feeling socially secure with other Americans. Second, its not your fault. I did not choose to be born American, no more than a person in Zimbabwe choose it. One has little or no support for health and nutrition, the other has little or no support for society well being. Which is worse to struggle with? Keep in mind that lack of social well being is not abstract, it means quite literally there are people who want to, and will, make you suffer so they can make a profit. They may not take the food physically out of your hand, but using policy, politics and law, they ultimately will accomplish the same thing for their own benefit. This is the consequence of a ungoverned free market – what we now have.

Unfortunately, the US has become like an emotionally imbalanced teenager. There is a sense of pride followed by a rise of power and self-narcisism leading to a critical, dangerous moment, followed by a crash and release. In the later reflection some lessons are learned but ultimately the cycle will occur again as another person, group, political party, or generation fills that same role. How we teach our children to deal with life, with media, with television and culture – it matters.

How can I protect myself, how can I live a happy life?
The best answer I’ve found for this is to find points of stability in ones’ life. This starts by realizing that, as an American, almost everything you own or have is non-stable. Certainly credit cards, loans, mortgage, stocks, are unstable. Pay these back as quickly as possible. Even things like education, work and children are non-stable. Did you know the last US Debt Ceiling bill eliminates subsidized loans for graduate students? These are loans whose interest rates are not charged while you are in school. All graduate students will now be charged interest during their entire time in school, in addition to the 35% or more rise in tuition experienced in some states. This does not mean you should avoid school, just be clear you understand the real costs of your education, your student loan obligations, and how likely you are to repay them given your career choices. Stability does not mean avoidance of debt, it means responsible, calculated debt.

In the US, people who have more than you will make your life harder. The way to escape this situation is either to find your own sense of stability, or to try another country. In the past, protests were one way to combat this. Protests now are a comedic reference to real protests of past generations, because they are nothing more that pep rallies – few are willing to put their own personal lives at stake for an abstract fight. It is only when we realize, as a society, that justifying personal wealth at the expense of moral social obligations is equivalent to violence, that such efforts will be worth while. Enough people must be at personal, physical risk, for a protest to be effective for real change.

Stability comes from things which are both tangible and intangible, which are difficult for others to affect. Family is one, but notice that having children can create a sense of concern for the future. A house is a symbol of stability, and a grounding point, assuming you own it outright. The best advice to give is: Being American means you must be ready to buffet and respond to the emotional ups-and-downs of the childish, often disasterous, moral decisions of others. Do Americans deserve a better, more responbile government? Yes. Can we demand it? Yes. Are we like to get it based on current views of the individual? Not necessarily.

The best one can hope for is to live a life in which the turmoils, troubles, and disasters of politics and the financial markets are witnessed from a distance. This can be difficult when their decisions affect your job, house, expenses, or other lifestyle aspects personally. The challenge is to perpetually find new stable points. To seek ways to have control over your own destiny, and to do so without harming others. Pay off debts. Get an education, but be prepared for student loans. Buy a house, but only if you know you will live in, be present there, and make it a home indefinitely. Work a job, but be aware that the value of your job may change dramatically in any year. No careers have lifetime guarantees. Have a backup plan. The most unique American quality is the ability to adapt, change, and overcome circumstances. The way to find stability, for an American, is to realize that ones’ ability to rise to any challenge, to resolve it, allows us to continue. It is not as safe or perhaps friendly as having a community and government you know you can trust, it is just a different social model.

From the 1980s onward, great increases in wealth created by the founding generations of this country allowed a growing number of their children to live without effort — that is, devoid of any real personal effort. For a while, life was easy, too easy. Devoid of any sense of emotional responsibility to others, or sense of moral responsibility to make sure ones happiness does not come at another’s expense. Many of these people now control our schools, our companies and our government. Our country is in need of help. But since adults are no longer children, in general those who openly act against the good of the nation, who do not think about how their greed affects the balance of a community or an entire nation, must be replaced.

I personally wish that the US had a stronger moral and social foundation (no, not socialist). Legally and politically, everything points toward an increasing gap between wealthy and poor. Either the wealthy, or their children, ultimately calm down and accept the value to the nation of being open and generous, or the poor are willing to give their lives (quite literally, nothing less is strong enough) to force them to. Nothing less can stop the pattern of emotional ups-and-downs that result from greed at the expense of others.

Is it possible to live outside this emotional cycle. Yes, there are many places in the world to live. Each one is quite unique. None is perfect, of course, but it is a matter of personal choice which social model you choose to live under. Whichever society you live in, it is a personal choice to act kindly and responsible toward others, to use only what you need, to evaluate the impact of your choices on others, and to live within ones means.

1. Exit Through the Gift Shop
A fresh look at the transition from graffiti to street art, this documentary by internationally unknown artist Banksy reveals work by the filmmaker Thierry Guetta. It shows how street art established itself as an outcome of graffiti, and was then temporarily imploded by Mr. Brainwash.

2. Collapse
Directed by Chris Smith, this dark documentary about Michael Ruppert looks at the oil crisis and global economic collapse in a new way. Not widely seen, it has been interpreted as a character study of Ruppert’s social theories, but in some ways represents a very broad, encompassing – compassionate? – look at human life.

3. Stranger than Fiction
A 2006 comedy-drama written by Zach Helm (starting Will Farrell, directed by Marc Forster), this film is a pleasurable example of self-reference in writing and post-modern filmmaking. Never fun for the writers, we can take comfort in the fact that writers are out there sweating, so that we can find our humanity once in a while.

4. Curse of the Jade Scorpion
Of course, you should have already seen Woody Allen’s magnum opus Annie Hall (1987). Not highly acclaimed, I recommend Curse of the Jade Scorpion instead for other reasons. Its nice to see Woody Allen fail by independent means other than his own. This is an enjoyable film, and in some ways gets at the difficulties of romance despite itself.

5. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
Ok, I haven’t actually seen this film. I have wanted to again and again, but couldn’t find it!. Currently I’m living in Denmark, so its pretty much impossible to get. Once I do see it, and I hope you do to, then I’ll put in a proper review.

6. Dead Men Don’t Were Plaid
This film and LA Story are my two favorites by Steve Martin. Unfortunately, many of his recent films have the Hollywood stamp, but back in the day Steve Martin was a master of creative thinking in acting. Dead Men Don’t Were Plaid is a retrospective parody of film noir at its best, splicing Steve Martin into old films while maintaining some kind of plot.

7. The Wonder Boys
There are few films that are about post-modern writing and literature in all the right ways – this is one of them. This film combines the humor, paradox, horror, and tragedy of contemporary literature. The number of interesting references in this film, that only a writer would know, is enough to create a whole new reading list.

8. District 9
This is the only science fiction film on the list. Why? Because its very hard to find science fiction that does any true merit to the literary genre. Somehow science fiction films have gone on a tangent from the Golden Age of science fiction (if in doubt, read Frederik Pohl, Orson Scott Card, Robert Heinlein, Frank Herbert). Just as Ender’s Game is the one book that delivers everything you ever wanted in a science fiction novel, District 9 is perhaps the only sci.fi. film that does the same. Gritty, horrific, but this is not a horror movie – it is a movie about human spirit, change, and passion – what science fiction writing was always about.

9. Man on Wire
As this list should be revealing, art is passion. Passion means taking risks, going out on a wire, and doing things no one else will. Man on Wire is a documentary film by James Marsh about Philippe Petit, the French rope-walker who traversed between the Twin Towers. What does it take to be an artist? Although it may not be so physically dangerous, sometimes the most deeply felt benefits are when art challenges the self.

10. Bo Burnham: Words, Words, Words
With the decline in education, the rise in population, and globalism, I was once very worried that all the great artists would get old an die – Who would replace them? When George Carlin passed away in 2008, I wondered, how can life continue without being reminded by him that “The Earth will do just fine without us. Its not going anywhere; we are.” I am pleased to say that Bo Burnham has rekindled my faith in humanity, not because he’s human, but because his humor is so stream-of-consciousness that it is inexplicably rich with feeling — and at age 19.

11. The Pixar Story
Any modern artist must deal with the tension between consumer art and cultural art. Consumer art is what you thought was art in high school: video games, animated films, the Matrix. The defining feature of all of these is that their sole, crowning purpose is to make money. The Pixar Story is a revealing, inside story of exactly how this was accomplished with modern technology. Any thing is art, so we can’t deny the beauty of films like Ratatoullie, or the emotions they bring to us. But for the cultural, academic or avante-garde artist the work itself, the social message, is placed above monetary value. This tension of survival is central to art, and The Pixar Story shows one side of the coin.

12. Thirty-Two One Act Plays about Glenn Gould
An investigation into Canadian pianist and master of musique concrète radio documentaries, Glenn Gould, this film is not just a documentary but a visual and musical work of art itself. Each act captures an emotion in vivid detail and puts it to life with music. The emotions are sometimes classical, sometimes modern, and sometimes deconstructive, as Glenn Gould himself was.

This new video shows an animated information graphic of regional effects of Fukushima radiation from March 8th to 31st, 2011.
The first section shows particulate radiation reaching Ibaraki Prefecture and Tokyo by atmospheric dispersion. Time to reach Tokyo is delayed by roughly six days. Purple indicates a data outage. The second part shows how radiation levels in Ibaraki Prefecture, 128 km away from Fukushima, silently pass over the town in waves of radiation significantly higher than normal. The third part plots radiation versus distance, in which radiation from particulate matter is significantly less at various distances from Fukushima. While ionizing radiation is known to fall with the square of distance (linear in a log plot), this part shows that particulate radiation also falls off rapidly with distance due to atmospheric scattering, although in a more complex way depending on local weather.

Click for detailed image.

Recent concerns with the Fukushima incident focus on levels of radiation reaching Tokyo.
Are the level of radiation high enough to warrant evacuation in Tokyo?

This scatter plot shows the levels of radiation recorded by Geiger-counter in Tokyo over the past 7 days. All units are in mSv/year. These values are compared with terrestrial background radiation in other cities in the world. Note, for example, that some cities such as Yiangjing, China emit 5.0 mSv/year naturally. Certain unique places such as Ramsar, Iran emit 260 mSv/year due to natural radioactive hotsprings. Denver, Colorado emits 2.0 mSv/year due to its high altitude. During the Fukushima incident, Tokyo measurements are between 0.3 mSv/y and 2.6 mSv/year.

Also shown are radiation levels due to cosmic background, radon, and medical uses. Radiation is cummulative, and the average annual radiation per person in the US is 6.4 mSv/year. 42% of this radiation comes from natural radon in the air. 10% comes from medical radiation. Typically, a single visit for a Chest X-ray, or CT Scan can provide the total budget of medical radiation for a whole year. CT Scans are considerably more radiant, giving off 18 mSv/dose for a Chest CT, and 40 mSv/dose for a Full body CT, whereas a normal X-ray is 0.06 mSv/dose. Smoking is a major contributor to annual radiation, adding 30 mSv/year when smoking 1.5 packs per day. This is significantly above the 6.4 mSv/year typically received for one per person. A television emits slightly above the natural background radiation.

The result of these findings is that direct radiation emitted from Fukushima presents no cause for concern. Its only been 7 days. A level of at least 10 mSv/year would need to be sustained — for the whole year — to make it a significant contribution to our annual radiation intake. Values in Tokyo currently average around what is typical in Denver, Colorado. Hence, elevated concern due to direct radiation is not warranted at this time.

However, another source of radiation in Tokyo is potential radioactive material, rather than direct radiation. Direct radiation coming from Fukushima falls off as the inverse square of distance, and can be measured by geiger-counter, which is shown in this plot. On the other hand, radioactive particles may be carried in the air and transported to Tokyo, and must be measured differently. Transported particles, suspended in air and carried by weather, could cause much higher radiation to occur directly in Tokyo. At present, I do not know of any direct particulate measurement data being taken in Tokyo.

Another possible source is the transport of  larger particles by land. These could come from contaminated foods or from particles lodged in clothing from evacuees around Fukushima. So far, these levels are not high enough to warrant concern. Overall, one should be very wary of any media claims based on increased Geiger-counter measurements in Tokyo, while recordings of particulate radiation would be much more useful. The question we should be trying to answer is not, “How much radiation is there in Tokyo?”, the question should be: How much transported radioactive material is there  in Tokyo?

It is important to note that other health factors are of much greater concern at these low radiation levels. For the average person, natural risks of cancer due to other factors such as genetics, risks associated with bad eating habits, or lack of exercise, are much more significant than those caused by these low levels of radiation. The only outstanding exception is smoking, as cigarettes contain lead and polonium which emit radioactive radiation while smoking. The cancer risks associated with smoking are 1 in 200, fours times higher than average. There are 1.7 million deaths caused by lung cancer in the world annual, and 91% of these are due to smoking.

Original map – March 17th

Click for detailed image.

Updated Commentary (March 30th)

The new map incorporates many of the changes requests by readers, while new features include a time series visualization of regional effects, a local site map, selected news reports, and data up through March 30th. Radiation by distance has also been updated to show several trend lines at different dates.

The time series data provided by Marian Steinbech, “A Crowdsourced Japan Radiation Spreadsheet”, was visualized with custom C/OpenGL software to overlay circles on geographic maps of Japan. Recent versions of the data, going back to March 1, can be downloaded from his blog here: http://www.sendung.de/japan-radiation-open-data/.  These moments in time were selected to highlight how the radiation has effected Ibaraki prefecture and Tokyo, and demonstrate that while direct gamma radiation dissipates with the square distance law, particle-based radiation also dissipates with distance due to weather scattering. Although much attention has been placed on Tokyo, a very interesting finding was that Ibaraki prefecture, population 2.9 million, has received a radiation dose equivalent to nuclear worker levels while its distance from Fukushima, 100km, places it outside the current evacuation zone of 30km.

From March 17th to 30th, despite media reports which vary widely, indications are that radiation levels continue to decline. Of course, the reactors are still not completely stabilized, so future events are unknown. A significant problem is that huge amounts of seawater pumped in to control reactor temperatures must be discharged somewhere, thus ocean and nearby water measurements have increased significantly. This may be expected to continue so long as large amounts of seawater are pumped in to keep the reactors cool.

Overall, the most concerning factor is the difference between Western and Eastern responses. In the western media, very minute levels of radiation in Nevada and California are presented as if they are a major risk, which is clearly unfounded. Levels may be reported as “two times above normal” in a US city, but the overall background radiation of the world varies by up to 10 times! (0.5 to 5 mSv/year). Even in Tokyo, 206 km away, levels have not yet gone over the equivalent of adding a single CT Scan for the year. Yet the levels are presented as if they are an imminent threat to the west. Meanwhile, in Ibaraki prefecture (100km away), an area with over 2 million people may be exposed to levels unsafe for nuclear workers while the evacuation zone remains at 20km. The total number of people who have died from the earthquake and tsunami is now at 10,743 confirmed dead and 17,443 still missing (likely dead), which is usually reported as an after-thought in new media, while the total number dead from Fukushima nuclear radiation is still less than 100.

News reports, also plotted above, present an inconsistent view of events. Although only 12 articles are plotted in the map above, over 64 articles were reviewed for data accuracy. Some of the key findings are as follows. The most significant problem media faced appears to be how to correctly report radiation levels, which has been inconsistent both in terms of units of measurement, other levels to compare to, and background levels for reference. Friday, March 18th, “A radioactive hazard zone? Chernobly’s example” (CNN), they compare lifetime amounts of radiation in 1 km areas near Chernobyl (350 mSv) to momentary peak radiation levels at the main gate of Fukushima (400 mSv), and thus suggest that recent events are higher. The distances and time spans are not given, only the levels, thus giving an inaccurate picture of events.

On March 25th, several news agencies reported levels at 10,000,000 times above normal. The following day, a retraction was posted in an article called “Utility retests reactor water after radioactivity spikes”. In this follow up, the corrected report says levels were 100,000x above normal at Fukushima, 10,000x above normal at Reactor #3, 1850x above normal at a nearby monitoring post, and 330x above normal for the average person. What does it mean to be 100,000x above normal, and why is this number exactly one hundred thousand? Actual radiation units are never used, and in many cases the baseline upon which this multiplying factor is derived are never given. The entire concept of reporting levels “above normal” is misleading since it fails to address the fact that radiation is cummulative, and thus the duration of time that one is exposed to a given level is of key importance. In FOX News, out of several dozen articles reviewed, only a few provide actual sievert levels, while most articles indicate levels as a factor “times above normal”.

In an article on Wed, March 23rd, FOX news reports “Japan Commission Estimates Elevated Radiation Outside 30-Km Radius”, where they state that:

“In some parts of cities and towns more than 30 kilometers northwest and south of Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s (9501.TO) Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station, people may have been exposed to a total of more than 100,000 microsieverts of radioactive iodine since the beginning of the nuclear disaster following the March 11 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, the estimate showed.”

This suggests that people outside the 30km zone have been exposed to 1000 mSv/hr (milli-sieverts/hour). Looking at the map above, this is clearly impossible, as this is the highest level reported directly near the core. If this amount of radiation were found in the surrounding areas, severe radiation sickness would already have been recorded.

Another reporting phenomenon is the unintentional amplification of disaster. On March 22nd, NHK world (a Japanese news source), reports that soil levels 25 miles away are 430x above normal soil levels. They also state clearly that the average exposure to a human being is likely to be only 4 times above normal. In a follow up report by CNN, on the same day, and apparently in the interest of providing a brief summary, this later clarification is omitted. The report states only that soil levels are 430x above normal, which presents an alarming figure. This article is then picked up by smaller networks and outlets, such as Village Voice, that reports a news snippet which states “Japan records soil levels 430x above normal 25 miles away”. The ultimate effect is that western readers receive a greatly amplified report of the disaster.

On March 23rd, based on analysis, Bernie Rano reports in a live interview that “There will be no big impact at all in the United States. This is not damaging radiation in the US.” The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, on March 23rd, catches Nancy Grace (CNN reporter) declaring his entire scientifically-based report as “magic”, when his actual words are “this is science, it is not magic”. How have we arrived at a point where news reporting celebrities with no real knowledge have the right to openly defy independent experts? When experts, defined here simply as those who have actually studied the problem, cannot speak above the background noise of news commentary there is little hope for a coherent picture of reality. Feel free to view the full episode here: http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/wed-march-23-2011-richard-lewis

Despite current media fluctuations, one can have hope in the future that clear thinking, taken at the proper pace (and perhaps combined with data visualization), can provide the context that allows us to distinguish reality from fiction and to eventually determine the proper perspective on current events.

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Radiation Comparison  (March 17th, original post)

This map was created to provide a visual way to communicate risks associated with radiation dosage.

All units are converted to mSv/h. Typically, background radiation, chest CT scans, and food levels are given in mSv/year (milli-sieverts per year). More extreme amounts of radiation, such as those found in nuclear disasters like Chernobyl are given in Sv/h (sieverts). To provide a basis for reasonable communication and comparison all units were converted in mSv/h on a logarithmic plot.

Nuclear Incident Levels are shown from 0 to 7, but keep in mind that specific events trigger an incident level rather than radiation dosage. Only at levels 1,2 and 3 are specific dosage limits set. An incident level of 5 was recently set for Fukushima based on melting of exposed nuclear rods.

At 1 mSv/h, cancer risk from radiation is 1 in 20,000 which is still well below the normal cancer risk associated with  other causes, 1:25. The onset of radiation poisoning starts at 100 mSv/h. Low level symptoms include itching and nausea, while high level symptoms include dimentia, hemmoraging and death within one day.

Comparison to Atomic Bombs

So far, these levels have only been reached at Fukushima within 100 meters of the unit cores. Distance falloff with radiation is shown in comparison to Chernobyl. Note that there are many other factors, such as prevailing winds, containment of the  core, and release of radiation by gas or dust, which will affect the distance profile of radiation exposure. In the case of atomic bombs, such as those released at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the radiation is 30,000 mSv/h within the crater zone (<1 km). Atomic bombs produce an intense burst of radiation in less than one second, but this radiation is sufficient to cause death in a few days. Other effects, such as vaporization, intense heat and fire, and concussion, are greater causes of death within the immediate area of an atomic blast. Outside this area, the effects of fallout are much more significant as radiactivity is no longer isolated to a specific location, but carried in particles suspended in the air. Thus nuclear explosions, unlike the events of Fukushima or Chernobyl, carry much greater risk since sources of radiation is no longer localized.

Comparison to Chernobyl

In Chernobyl  the core itself exploded, releasing large chunks of the reactor core outside the containment vessel.  Radiation levels of 10,000 mSv/h were recorded outside the building, where workers used shovels to remove pieces of the radioactive reactor core without knowledge of the material. Since the core itself exploded, radiation produced fallout and suspended radioactive particles similar to a nuclear explosion (but less severe). This had the effect of spreading radioactive material away from the accident center. At Fukushima, the largest peak observed as of March 16th was 1000 mSv/h near the core. While fuel rods have been exposed to air, the release of suspended radioactive particles is much less than at Chernobyl.

Thus far, as of March 16th,  the maximum radiation dose at the Fukushima main gate is 11 mSv/h, which presents a cancer risk but is below the onset of acute radiation poisoning. Twenty kilometers away (20km), at the edge of the evacuation zone a level of 0.3 mSv/h was recorded. This is just above the  International Limit for Nuclear workers for a full year (100 mSv/year = 0.01 mSv/h. These levels would be severe if they were sustained, but the values recorded represent peak measurements over the past few days. Continuous exposure within the area of 20 km may cause health problems in the future, but is unlikely to cause radiation sickness based on the current status of the accident.

In areas as far away as Tokyo, 206 km,  residents and workers from other countries have been evacuating. Recently, countries including USA, France, Britain and Australia were instructing people to leave Tokyo ( http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/world/2011-03/17/c_13783578.htm). Is this need to evacuate Tokyo based on radiation from Fukushima warranted? Radiation falls off with the square of distance, so the amount of radiation in Tokyo will be an order of magnitude less than the 20 km evacuation zone. Recent news articles have indicated that radiation in Tokyo is twice the normal background radiation for the city. At first, this may seem significant. Normal background radiation levels in Tokyo were 0.00004 mSv/h. As of March 18th, radiation levels due to Fukushima have been recorded  as high as 0.00012 mSv/h, three times background.

However, background radiation in certain cities in Iran, India, China and Brazil are recorded at 0.006 mSv/h, which is fifty times higher than the radiation recorded in Tokyo due to Fukushima. Thus, if one is evacuating from Tokyo to any of these places, exposure will increase because of where one is evacuating to.  Considered another way, smoking cigarettes produces greater radiation exposure than that produced by the effects of Fukushima in Tokyo. Of greater concern is the possibility of individual radioactive particles themselves being relocated to Tokyo by importing them in clothing or hair from people inside the Fukushima evacuation zone. Hopefully, measures are being taken to screen residents coming from areas closer to the nuclear plant.

Comparison to Three Mile Island

A recent news article in CNN declared “Fukushima on par with Three Mile Island”, with the implicit subtext that Three Mile Island was the worst disaster in US history, so therefore Fukushima must be very serious. What this fails to address is that Fukushima is significantly worse in many ways. They are similar in that loss of coolant and backup cooling has led to increasing decay heat in a nuclear reaction which has automatically shutdown, but in many other respects they are very different. First, only one reactor at Three Mile Island experienced a partial melting of the fuel rods, while all four out of six independent reactors at Fukushima are undergoing partial fuel melting. Second, the events at Three Mile Island were entirely contained within the reactor vessel, while in Unit 4 at Fukushima a fire was reported in a spent fuel pool outside the primary reactor container. Third, at Three Mile Island, the build up of pressure resulting for lack of coolant led to a moderate internal explosion inside the building, while at Fukushima in Units 1 and 3 the hydrogen explosion was powerful enough to blow the concrete top off the buildings. Fourth, in both accidents it was necessary to release the vessel pressure by venting to the outside air – this is the most significant factor contributing to public exposure to radiation. At Three Mile Island, a single core was vented once (as far as my sources say), which resulted in a voluntary evaluation of the surrounding area. At Fukushima, several cores have been vented multiple times thus far, and a mandatory evacuation has been called for up to 20 km. Ultimately, at Three Mile Island, it was learned much later that 50% of the rods have melted, while at Fukushima it has already been reported that 70% has melted in reactor Unit 1 and 30% in reactor Unit 2.

On the positive side, in all four reactors the radioactive fuel rods are still contained within their primary vessels – which was not the case at Chernobyl. Based on news reports, I am strongly tempted to say that the media is attracted to equivalent comparisons with Three Mile Island because it likes to focus on the sufferings of westerns more than those around the world, or the history of Three Mile Island – or perhaps there is still a significant amount of pressure to downplay the seriousness of the events at Fukushima. At present, however, I would agree with the International Nuclear Event scale rating Fukushima at Level 5, “accident with wider consequences”, which resides above Level 4 at Three Mile Island,  ”accident with local consequences”, but still well below Level 7 at Chernobyl which was a “major accident”.

Another positive aspect is that the response at Fukushima is probably much more adequate than either Three Mile Island or Chernobyl. Nuclear standards and procedures are much more detailed now than before. Instrument panels are better designed now, which was one of the primary factors contributing to the Three Mile Island incident. The danger of radioactive materials is known, so that rescue workers and fire teams know what they are dealing with; problems that were not addressed well at Chernobyl. The fact that three reactors have partially melted with loss of cooling to all of them, yet there has not been any containment breach yet, is practically a marvel of management of limited human and material resources. Of course, it would have been nice if the reactors could be designed to be automatically cooled in the event of a power loss, but I’m no nuclear engineer. These are the dangers of fission-based nuclear power. Personally, I’m looking forward to fusion, which is an inherently stable power souce (See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Ignition_Facility and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER)

The Fukushima incident is clearly a cause for concern. As the events unfold, the question is whether the peak radiation levels will go much higher than the 8000 mSv/h currently reported near the core. This level already represents a significant radiation incident, which places Fukushima along side other major nuclear accidents. To achieve the same status as Chernobyl, however, levels would have to be at least ten times higher than the current peak, which is unlikely to happen unless there is a core meltdown or explosion as there was at Chernobyl. At present, fuel rods are still contained within the core. For the sake of those in Japan, and the immediate area, we can hope the radiation levels will not go any higher.

Fukushima Accident Events

The map above also shows specific events that took place after the start of the crisis. Data for on-site measurements of radiation levels were taken from TEPCO Press Releases, March 17th (http://www.tepco.co.jp/cc/press/betu11_j/images/110317e.pdf). The timing of events are from several sources listed on the Wikipedia page for Fukushima I Nuclear Accident.

Interestingly, the times of particular events such as hydrogen explosions, pressure increases, fires, and cooling failures do not coincide with any of the peaks in the radiation levels. In fact, none of the events corresponds with a peak. There could be several causes for this. First, the times of events may be reported incorrectly. While the time of the hydrogen explosions is likely to be exact, since these are such noticeable events, times reported for cooling failures and fires may be inexact due to the nature of these events. Often, in the wikipedia article reporting these events, as single source is used as the only citation for a particular event in several locations in the article. Thus, one may suspect that times reported by the news agencies themselves are possibly inaccurate. Only after a thorough analysis could we be sure that the news is presenting correct data based on its own sources.

The main cause  for a lack of coincidence between events and radiation peaks is likely to be the underlying physics at the site. A cooling failure is unlikely to be a peak, since it represents the start of the problem. A hydrogen explosion may also not be a radiation peak, since it does not directly release radiation. A fire, such as the one that occurred in the fuel pool in Unit 4,  is a more likely source of a direct radiation, but this is difficult to correlate due to the nature of fires. The only event in the graph that does correlate with radiation release is the intentional release of pressure, which is necessary to keep the core from exploding.

Needless to say, an uncooled, partly controlled nuclear reaction is a complex phenomena. The data presented in the map above is all the more complex because it represents the activities at four nuclear unit simultaneously, each at different distances from the recorded data location (main gate). There are likely main different phenomena taking place within these cores which could not be fully understood without computer simulation. The many other peaks in the graph have no correlation to reported events thus far. I find it interesting that several curves show a particular profile, with a sharp peak followed by a gradual falloff of a specific shape. A question for a physicist would be, how do you explain the profile curve of these events, and would it be possible to simulate or even predict the overall data curve based on the events that took place? If so, this would be a useful tool for estimating the effects of other incidents similar to Fukushima.

1) Don’t imagine that you will run or do physical exercise outside. You might have some romantic notions of wearing sweats and jogging in the snow, but when its <20 degs its really cold. This makes your muscles tense, and lungs chill. It can be dangerous to breath freezing air deeply, as it makes you dizzy and can cause fainting. So keep it all indoors.

2) Start with light, indoor jogging. Don’t  stretch first, as your cold muscles may sprain or tighten. Jog lightly for 30 mins to warm up your whole body. You don’t need any machines, just stand in front of TV, or watch a movie, and jog for 30-40 mins.

3) Now that your body is warm, you can get warmed up.. do stretches as you normally would. In the cold this is especially important before any weight training. Stretch your legs and back especially, as these get very stiff in winter.

4) If you want, after jogging and stretching, add any weight training. I usually include some crunches, push-ups, curls and bench presses.

5) Warm down by jogging again for 30 mins. Drink lots of water afterward.

6) After exercising, see if you can find some fruits and vegetables. In the winter, produce is much harder to find, but even some apples and a banana is better than potatoes and rice which are more often consumed in cold weather. Your body wants to gain weight in winter, so starchy foods are more common. You can fight it with a healthy diet, but it must include winter weather exercising.

Having access to a gym can help, but its not really necessary. I find going to the gym takes too long, as I have to drive from work, to the gym, in the freezing snow, and then exercise, then get into cold car again and drive home. I think its much easier to have a home routine in the winter, which avoids an extra trip in the snow.

A. Setup

LateX is by far the only thing you should be using for your dissertation. I did my Master’s thesis in MS Word, which was even twice as long, but it was much more painful than using LateX. LateX automatically does page numbering, figure numbering, chapter numbering, layout formatted to university standards, citations, and other stuff. I am running Windows, and I find setting up LateX is a breeze using Miktex and Texmaker.
Here are my setup steps:
1. Install Miktex
2. Install Texmaker 2
3. Goto Texmaker -> Options -> Configure Texmaker… And set every single program path so that its correct. All of them should point into the MiKTeX 2.9/miktex/bin folder, with the exception of Pdf Viewer, which should be set to your Acrobat Reader path, such as “C:/Program Files (x86)/Adobe/Reader 9.0/Reader/AcroRd32.exe”. You don’t even need ghostscript or ghostview, unless you plan to view PS files.
4. Set your Quick Build to “PdfLaTeX + View PDF”.. I find this is much faster and easier than going to DVI first. The results produces are essentially identical, and I personally can’t see any difference.
When set up properly, you should be able to write LateX in the Texmaker editor.. click the Quick Build button, and immediately see a PDF file automatically opened in Acrobat Reader.

B. Start with an Existing Dissertation Layout

You don’t want to write all the specs for a dissertation layout yourself. Page margins, left-right formatting, chapter headings, front matter.. That can all be taken care of automatically if you start with a good, existing layout. Most universities offer template LateX files for dissertations.
I started with the University of California’s thesis template:

http://www.movesinstitute.org/~kolsch/ucthesis/

This is probably of a high enough quality to be used for many universities, but be sure to check your schools own requirements. Notice that the main file is Dissertation.tex, even though you’ll be writing separate chapters. In Texmaker, you specify the main, top-level tex file by going to Options -> Define Current document as Master Document (while you have Dissertation.tex open). Its easy to forget to do this, and you’ll get lots of errors if you try and build one of your chapter.tex files directly.. Just remember to see Dissertation.tex as Master every time you work. It takes 2 seconds.

C. Making use of Packages

Unfortunately, most university packages are the bare minimum. If you’re in the arts, or many other fields, you will have more advanced stuff you want to do. Additional LateX packages let you do this.
At the top of Dissertation.tex, just under \documentclass, I specify additional packages:

\usepackage{metre,setspace,subfig,multirow,threeparttable,wrapfig}
\usepackage{graphicx,slashbox,amsmath,amssymb,rotating}
\usepackage{graphicx,longtable}

Packages will be automatically installed by Texmaker when you try and use them.
Some packages have weird compatability requirements. Feel free to contact if you get lots of package errors. For example, the setspace package requires a work-around so that it works with the ucthesis template. Overall, however, once its setup, you can use the features of all these packages seamlessly.
Here is an overview of the packages I find most important for dissertations:
1) setspace – Lets you change the line spacing throughout the document. Essential if you’re univ requires double-spacing, but sometimes you want longer quotations to be single spaced.
2) graphicx – Essential for inserting figures and images.
3) subfig – Allows you to create figures that have sub-figures, such as Fig 1a, 1b, 1c. It lets you put one caption on two figures, side-by-side, or one above the other
4) multirow – Lets you span multiple rows or columns in a table. This is really useful for nicely formatting results tables.
5) threeparttable – Lets you create more complex tables, such as tables with different sections, and tables that have footnotes just under them.
6) wrapfig – Lets you insert figures in which the text wraps around the sides of the figure. This is great for smaller pictures were you don’t want to use up half the page.
7) slashbox – Lets you put diagonal lines in the top-left cell of a table. See slashbox tutorials online for an example
longtable – Great for writing a table that spans multiple pages. This is useful in the Appendix, for example, if you have a user study that is written up in a table that crosses many pages.
9) amsmath, amssymb – These give you better formatting for mathematical equations, and a wider range of symbols. See their tutorials online.

With these packages, I was able to do pretty much everything I wanted for a dissertation. Obviously, you may need some other packages for yours. Its fairly easy to locate a package online, specify it at the top of your main .tex document, and let Texmaker automatically get it.

D. Graphics Paths

To get your figures organized, its helpful to put them into sub-folders by chapter.
Otherwise, you end up with a giant list of figures from all different chapters. You can tell LateX to search your chapter folders using the \graphicspath command.

\graphicspath{{ch1_intro/figures//}
{ch2_tools/figures//}
{ch3_interface/figures//}
{ch4_procedural/figures//}
{ch5_workflow/figures//}
{ch6_dynamics/figures//}
}
Then, just place your figures into these folders. I tend to name my figure image files by what they are, rather than using numbers.. Such as “fig_tree.png”, instead of “ch1_image01.png”.. That way, if latex decides to change the figure numbers around, I don’t get confused with file names. This fig_tree could go anywhere, and LateX will number it properly.

E. Little Things – Chapter and Figure Names

There are little things you want to do that can be really annoying, but are actually really easy to fix in LateX. Two examples are chapter and figure names. Lets say you have a chapter named “Creative Workflows for Media Artists”… Now, this whole line gets split by LateX on the word Media, and you’re left with something like this:

Chapter 5.
Creative Workflows for Media
Artists

Looks crappy. So you want to indicate a better split location. You change the chapter name to read: \chapter{Creative Workflows for\newline Media Artists}.. Notice the \newline command. This makes the chapter heading look good, with Media Artists on a line by itself, but you know how chapter names often appear at the top of a page? Now the chapter name at the top left of every page is also split in two lines.
To fix this, you can specify the top-of-page chapter label, as well as the heading label as follows:

\chapter[Creative Workflows for Media Artists]
{Creative Workflows for \newline Media Artists}

The [ ] version will be used at the top-of-pages for each page in the chapter, the { } version will be used in the chapter heading… Very useful.

A similar thing happens with figure captions. You have a long caption like “This figure shows a Ph.d. student playing on the beach in the sun, enjoying life without a care in the world.”. But when you do your List of Figures, that whole thing is included.
What you want is this:

\caption[Ph.D student playing in sun]{This figure shows a Ph.d. student playing on the beach in the sun, enjoying life without a care in the world.}

The first version is used in the List of Figures, tighter and more compact. The latter is used for the actual caption below the figure. Things are formatted a lot nicer now..

F. Figures and Tables

For the most part, if you write straight Latex, it will come in formatted the way you want. The real trick is when you want to do things with figures and tables.
Here is the most complex figure I printed in my dissertation:

Notice that it is a multi-part figure, with a) and b), and a single caption. Part a is an image and part b is a table which includes multi-column spans, and footnotes.
Here is the LateX code that generated this layout:

\begin{figure}[h!]
\centering
\subfloat[]{
\label{fig:subfig:a} %% label for first subfigure
\includegraphics[width=4in]{fig_graph}
}
\vspace{0.1cm}
\subfloat[]{
\label{fig:subfig:b} %% label for second subfigure
\begin{threeparttable}[b]
\begin{tabular} {|l|r|r|r|r|r|r|r|r|r|}\hline
\multirow{2}{*}{Model} & \multirow{2}{*}{Verts} & \multicolumn{2}{|c|}{Baseline (ms)} & \multicolumn{2}{|c|}{Houdini\footnotemark[1]} & \multicolumn{2}{|c|}{Houdini\footnotemark[2]} & \multicolumn{2}{|c|  {Luna (ms)} \\
& & eval & draw & eval & draw & eval & draw & eval & draw \\
\hline
Low res & 5k & 2 & $<$1 & 40 & 4 & 27 & 4 & 5 & 1\\
. & 22k & 10 & $<$1 & 140 & 13 & 69 & 18 & 22 & 3\\
Med res & 50k & 24 & 1 & 203 & 39 & 183 & 47 & 45 & 4\\
. & 89k & 44 & 2 & 318 & 71 & 276 & 71 & 89 & 7\\
High res & 179k & 88 & 5 & 536 & 130 & 555 & 146 & 118 & 9\\
\hline
\end{tabular}
\begin{tablenotes}
\item [1]{Naive method. Created using Copy Stamping SOP and expressions.}
\item [2]{Suggested method. Created using AttribCreate SOP and Add SOP.}
\end{tablenotes}
\end{threeparttable}
}
\caption[Performance comparison for reference model in LUNA, Houdini 10, and OpenGL baseline]{\label{fig:subfig}Performance comparison for graph evaluation and rendering time (in milliseconds) for the reference model in LUNA, Houdini 10, and OpenGL baseline.}
\end{figure}

The overall structure is whats important, which is basically this:

figure
…subfloat
……label
……includegraphic
…vspace
…subfloat
……threeparttable
……tabular
……tablenotes
…caption

I wanted to show this complex example because few tutorials really give you guidelines on how to combine figures, multi-part figures, and tables.

Notice the \vspace command is used to add some vertical space between the image and the table.
You could also replace the entire “threeparttable” with another “includegraphic” , then you would get two figures – one on top, one on bottom.

What if you want two or more figures side by side?

This is done with exactle the same structure, but by simply specifying figure “height” instead of “width”, and changing “vspace” to hspace”
Like this:

\begin{figure}[h]
\centering
\subfloat[]{
\label{fig:subfig:a}
\includegraphics[height=2.5in]{twist_grid}
}
\subfloat[]{
\label{fig:subfig:b}
\includegraphics[height=2.5in]{twist_block}
}
\subfloat[]{
\label{fig:subfig:b}
\includegraphics[height=2.5in]{twist_full}
}
\caption[Twisting and Order of Operations]{\label{fig:twist} Modifiers operate on different geometry types. a) A twisted grid with untwisted cubes, b) Twisted cubes located at an untwisted grid, and c) A regular grid with regular cubes, the whole of which is twisted.}
\end{figure}

This gives three figures side-by-side. Notice that you can specify a different sub-label for each one using \label. The file name “twist_grid” for example, is the name of your image file but without the .png or .jpg extension. *NOTE* Be careful if you use LateX instead of PdfLatex, as this requires all your images be in .eps format (you can convert them using ImageMagick).
If you use PdfLatex, like I do, then your images can also be .png or .jpg

Sometimes you will find that figures appear at the very end of your entire document. If this happens, it means LateX cannot fit your figure on the page you wanted. One way to fix this is to try this:

\begin{figure}[h!]

The exclamation (!) tells Latex, Please put my figure here! It might not always work, especially if the figure is too large. What you can do is used the (!), and then gradually decrease the figure height or width until it finally fits on the page. Or you could start really small, and slowly increase the figure size. If you have a really large figure that should go on its own page, you can also try this:

\newpage
\begin{figure}[h!]

G. Quotations

So, your dissertation guidelines say your thesis should be double-spaced.. but is it  ok to have quotations single-spaced?  Most Ph.d. guidelines may not specify, but if you put in single-space, indented quotations they may not notice or care (you can always ask). What you want, i.e. what looks nice, is to have double-spaced text, then a single-spaced indented quotation with a citation at the end.
One, be sure you have the “setspace” package installed. Then do this:

\begin{indentpar}{1cm}
\begin{singlespace}
“What is important is that having realized the limits of linear top-down models and reductionism, we are prepared to embrace a very different approach, one that looks at complexity not as a nuisance which needs to be quickly reduced to simple elements and rules, but instead as the source of life.. I am now finally ready to name the larger paradigm I see behind the visual diversity of this practice. This paradigm is complexity.” \cite{Manovich:2007}
\end{singlespace}\end{indentpar}

The indentpar tells LateX to indent this stuff, and the singlespace tells it to single-space it.. Notice the citation is placed inside of both.
* NOTE * Also notice that the quotation uses “ (two left quotes, next to the 1 key), at the beginning and ” (two right quotes, next to enter), at the end.. It does not use double-quotes ” and the beginning and end. This is because LateX is good at formatting, it lets you show either left or right quotations anywhere, but you have to specify it. So put “ at the front, and ” at the end, and it will look nice.

H. Citations

There is a lot online about citations in LateX.
Here are a few things you may not know. A regular citation is done like this:

\cite{label}, where label is the label as it appears in your .bib file. I tend to do my labels like this: \cite{Manovich:2001}

What if you want in-place page numbers to appear with your citation?
Then you do this:

\cite[p. 51]{Manovich:2001]

This is the proper way to do in-place page numbers with a reference, and LateX should correctly format it for the bibliographic style you are using.

You can also use LateX to edit your .bib bibliographic file. In your .bib file, you would have a few lines that look like this.

@book{Manovich:2001,
author = {Manovich, Lev},
title = {The Language of New Media (Leonardo Books)},
isbn = {0262632551},
month = {March},
publisher = {The MIT Press},
year = {2001}
}

There are plenty of guidelines online for formatting books, journals, articles, websites, and other things.
* NOTE * Take special note of the location of commas above!.. If you forget one of the commas, then LateX will say there are  lots of errors in your .bbl file (generated from the .bib file)
You can open the .bbl and look at the page number indicated as an error to see where you forgot the comma. Be sure you look at your .bbl file to location of the error, and then do the fix in the .bib file.
Also, if you have any ampersands & in your .bib you will also get lots of errors, so be sure to say \& if you want an ampersand.

I. Printing in B&W and Color

So you just finished your 2000 page dissertation, 20 if you’re luck, 200 if you’re normal. And you’re ready to print it. If you’re in a visual field like computer graphics, arts, or art history, among others, you may have several color pictures in your dissertation. You unversity may require color (probably not), and you’d love to give your parents a color copy.
However, you just went to the printer and found out that it costs $1 per page to print color! Thats $200 per copy, and you need 5 copies for university, department and parents.

But only a few pages are in color, and B&W costs only $0.08 per page. What you really want is to print the color pages in color, and the B&W separately.

To do this, I recommend the free, open source tool PDFsam.
http://www.pdfsam.org/

PDFsam will take any PDF document, and split it or merge it by specific pages into another PDF.
To separate color and B&W, you want the Merge operation. Which takes your full dissertation.pdf and lets you specify which pages will be merged into a new document. In the “Page Range” column, you list the pages that are in color. When you click Run, it makes a new color.pdf with just color pages, still properly numbered for collation.

Now you invert the page ranges (unfortunately, you need to do it manually), then do the process again and you will get a b&w.pdf document that is only the black & white pages.
(NOTE TO the makers of PDFsam: I would love if you had two features: 1) automatically detect color figures, and set page ranges for output based on color, 2) allow you to invert page ranges, and print just the B&W ones. For now, you must do these steps manually.)

Finally, you go to the printer and you say: “I’d like to print the color.pdf document using the color printer, and the b&w.pdf document using the black & white printer, 5 or whatever copies of each. Give me an estimate.”  Some printers may even do the collation (mixing of color back into a complete document) for you without charging much extra… The cost of printing color separately from black & white, then collating together and binding.. is MUCH cheaper than just printing it all in color.

Many of these alternative are now understood to be temporary solutions at best. In an now famous website on peak oil, Life After the Oil Crisis (LATOC), Matt Savinar provides a clear, consise description of how dependent the world is on oil. He shows that nearly all alternative energies are short term solutions at best. This is primarily because of the huge amounts of global energy currently consumed, around 35 Terawatts per year, almost entirely produced from oil. To equal this, it would require nearly 10,000 nuclear power plants, or every inch of California covered in solar cells. Even nuclear, solar, wind and biofuels combined could not match the current energy use of oil.

I believe that recessions are not just financial ups and downs. They reflect a deeper insecurity in the future of a nation, caused by an earlier period of boom which was not founded in reality. The lending market failed due to poor lending practices which were not based on the realities of human behavior. At the end of a crash, there is a point where one questions the basic premises the system. It is a time of re-evaluation, reflection.

We are presently at a point of redefining the American way. As Matt Savinar points out, conservation rather than consumption will be an important part of this. Already, people are shifting toward smaller, efficient cars and away from SUVs. But I think there is a much bigger shift that must take place.

The question is: What do we do now? I mean, practically, what does the American worker do now? Many of the industries which were formerly held in the US are now present in other countries. Pittsburg, PA for example, was once the world center for steel production. Now, steel has shifted to China. Many other markets, not only raw materials but most manufacturing, have shift to other countries.

I’ve heard many Americans complain about these lost industries. However, this should not come as a suprise. The reason is that the exporting of heavy industry is implicit in the American dream. A hard worker, in a steel mill, worked so that his/her children could go to college and avoid having to work in a steel mill. Even if the parents wanted their child to work in the mill, the child would often see a better life in science, computing and non-labor intensive careers. Over the past fifty years, we have intentionally shifted from a labor economy to a service economy.

At present, even the white collar, professional jobs are now being outsourced overseas. The computer industry is finding workers in India and China. Yet this too should come as no suprise. China has been a labor workforce for the past thirty years itself. In an interesting interview with a Chinese CEO, it was asked: “Aren’t the Chinese people interested in the kinds of labor-intensive jobs the United States can bring to them?”. This is the classical American view of China, that we shift industries to China that we are unwilling or uninterested in doing ourselves. However, the answer from China is now: “No. We don’t want the labor jobs any more, we want the high quality life of the service jobs too.” China sees the benefits of a service-based economy and like all post-industrialized nations, seeks to eventually eliminate intensive manual labor from its workforce. While China stil has a very high labor force, it also has one of the fastest growing middle classes in the world.

So, to summarize thus far. The world is consuming oil like crazy, and especially the United States (consuming 25% of total oil production). The US is heavily dependent on foreign oil, and there is a general understanding now that classical alternative energies such as nuclear, solar, wind, and biofuels are at best temporary solutions. So there are no easy alternative energies, and the jobs which would allow us to spend money on oil have mostly been shifted overseas. This is especially true of labor intensive jobs but now increasinly professional jobs as well.

What is America to do? The view presented by Matt Savinar is that things will get much worse. Gasoline may jump by 10x, reaching $30/gal, at which point the US food distribution network will fail since it is largely based on trucking. People will be unable to get food, and will resort to looting. Savinar suggests there may eventually be positive aspects, such as increasing dependence on community, self-reliance, and conservation. I tend to agree that a return to local, self-sustaining communities would be nice, but eventually life must continue to expand, even if it is only conceptually.

Thus, I prefer a different outlook. Consider that in the early 1900s the population of the United States was growing rapidly, yet solutions to food distribution, travel, and infrastructure we essentially unsolved. Rather than follow traditional methods, innovators created the steam engine, railroads, the assembly line, and much more. But it was not easy. It required huge amounts of manual labor, the Industrial age. Our parents and grandparents who built this era ultimately wanted a better future for their children, so they sent us to college while many of them did not. In addition, the Industry age made the United States a wealthy nation. As a result of these two things, my generation (post 1970s) is much more accustomed to things being easier. We don’t have to work as hard physically, we’ve inherited more wealth, and we now have an infrastructure that automatically provides many of our needs very cheaply. How much easier is it now, than in 1910, to get food, water, and shelter? Now, combine this with Rock-n-Roll (and all the genres that followed), which I love but which basically says you can do whatever you want, and you have a recipe for a society which strongly believes it can consume indefinitly and very little responsibility.

Its a natural outcome of what our grandparents struggled so hard for, that we wouldn’t have to work as hard. Our culture has now shifted to the opposite extreme, except that we’re now finding this cannot be sustained. The markets crash, oil pours into the Gulf, banks fail, and the infrastucture our grandparents built is eroding – and we don’t know how to fix it. A supurb example of this is the US Government’s involvement in the BP Oil Spill, remarkable because the US Government, largely responsible for building this nation, currently doesn’t have the physical ability to deal with the practical problems of an oil leak 5000 feet underwater, and must resort to an independent company. NASA is another example, where it is now viewed that independent contractors can build in-orbit vehicles to supply people and resources to space more cheaply than the government can.

In the early 1900s, American innovation built the world it wanted to see. The same opportunity is presented to us now. Except that now we have a much better picture of what that world could be. It cannot be too labor intensive, as it was for our grandparents, because then we don’t want to do it at all, and find or force others to do it. It cannot be too casual or easy either, or we loose the ability to fix our own problems. We also know the form our future labors must take, as the central problem is our energy dependence.

I believe some of these solutions are becoming apparent now. Did you know the US Government currently spends 50%, thats half, of its entire alternative energy solutions budget on the National Ignition Facility? The NIF receives the same amount as solar, wind, biofuel and nuclear combined. Why? Because in the past decade many barriers to fusion that we thought would make it impossible have been overcome. In the year 2010, for the first time a laser system may achieve the pressure needed to fuse a tiny pellet of deuterium (hydrogen) to ignite a reaction that currently takes place only in the sun, resulting in temperature of 7,000,000 degrees F, and an 11 Kiloton output, and more importantly producing more energy than it takes in. Full scale experiments are starting for the first time this year. Fusion, unlike fission, is magnitudes safer because it cannot start a chain reaction. If the fuel supply is stopped, the reaction stops. If successful, this form of fusion can provide enough energy for the next 4000 years, not just the next 40.

Did you know that there is now a solar cell which can be made from toothpaste and jelly? And its cheaper than silicon solar cells, while producing a similar amount of electricity? While traditional silicon solar cells have been around for fifty years, in 2001, the Dye-Sensitized Solar Cell was invented by Michael Gratzel based on observations of how plants perform photosynthesis. The result is a solar cell which is cheap, efficient, and can produce electricity even in low or ambient light. The solar cells are even transparent and can be embedded in glass so that building windows can generate electricity for the building. They are simple enough to make that high school kits are available to build Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells from scratch as class projects. More importantly, the invention is so new that industry has only just started to mass produce them.

We currently conceptualize our dilemma with oil at the center and all these alternative fuels on the periphery, struggling with the giant. We must shift our view. We must not just imagine, but see “alternative” energies at the center of our vision. Stop calling them alternative. We must be able to say: Our primary energy source is the sun. The way in which the energy problems are solved, like NIF and Dye-Sensitized Cells, are very likely to surprise us completely because they will be ingenious inventions.

Then what do we do, what is the new labor of the average person? Its good to have smart scientists, but we need people at every level. We simply need to learn again how to completely replace our infrastructure with new inventions. To mass produce dye solar cells (DSSC) is not so difficult, but to replace every building in the US with dye solar cell windows IS difficult. It has been very difficult to generate the laser power needed for nuclear fission in NIF, but this is mostly a scientific problem. A much more difficult problem is how to restructure our society to build the hundreds of laser fission-based plants that are needed to replace our oil dependence.

After the next hundred years, I can imagine two scenarios. The first possibility is that we don’t learn how to replace our fuel-based energy dependence. In this case we enter Matt Savinar’s version of the world with highly localized, self-reliant communities, resulting in major worldwide food shortages and likely a huge population reduction. The second possibility is that we replace our fuel-based civilization with a fission-based civilization. In this case, we have enough energy to sustain the world population for 4000 years, and this allows us to expand human kind to all the planets and to the stars. Which outcome you favor really depends a lot on what you think is the purpose of being human.

I want to emphasize this is not science fiction. This is happening now. We are soon reaching the world limits of population for a fuel-based civilization, and we are on the brink of entering the next phase. Whether or not we take this path depends on how well we integrate the lessons from the labors our parents and grandparents, and take the steps necessary to see our new source of global energy. While politics will play a part, this is not primarily a political responsibility since the effort needed to shift our infrastructure is too large even for a responsible government (and our partisan government isnt that). Each individual must be able to imagine their own future without oil.