MetaFilter posts tagged with speculation

The Morae River

HumanComplex — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 11:18:59 -0800

Brynn Metheny is a freelance illustrator based in Oakland, California who loves to draw imaginary creatures. Metheny has taken this fascination with made-up animals and extended it to the point of conjuring up an entire continent, Orcura, through which flows The Morae River. The river basin has a bestiary and a Classification of Species to describe the animals that inhabit it. (via) (speculative zoology previously)

Tell me a secret.

hpliferaft — Sat, 23 May 2009 15:42:07 -0800

Published speculation first appeared in 1911, although others point to 1945 for its first modern phrasing. It originally looked like a flashlight on Star Trek. In Star Wars, it walked, talked, and was fluent "in over six million forms of communication." Many narratives have just abandoned the idea entirely.
Previous iterations have been quite limited in scope, but now it appears that the first learning, dynamic universal translator has finally arrived. And its futuristic aesthetic has been relegated to fiction in favor of a much more familiar object. Popularized artifacts have included a radio, "a metal tube" (or was it?), a disc, a stylish lapel pin (@ 1m14s), and, of course, a fish. Many other inventions persist. Oh, and when the universe was much smaller, it took a more prosaic form.

Life on Another World

HumanComplex — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 08:50:49 -0800

"Everything begins with complex cladograms I scribble down on large sheets of paper. Before any pictures, these family trees serve as the 'backbone' of the project; allowing me to develop the relationships among different animals and derive ideas from one another." Welcome to the beautiful nonexistent world of Snaiad. Inhabitants include Titanoformes, Cardiocetes, Sprogophidians, and Blumbomeniforms. There are also maps and a timeline. Fantastic speculative zoology from Nemo Ramjet.

Phantom of the Rock Band, or Joseph the Amazing Technicolor Guitar Hero

filthy light thief — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 09:50:05 -0800

Andrew Lloyd-Webber's Really Useful Group is looking to create a range of games based on his range of musical stage shows. The one video game company mentioned in the article is Electronic Arts. (via, by way of) Lord Lloyd-Webber's group started this move towards more things digital when Douglas Glen left BBC for Really Useful Group, where he got things going with a company website redesign and a YouTube Channel with clips from stage productions. Really Useful is looking towards games spanning consoles, PCs and mobile, following the foray of musical games and the increasing number of female gamers.

Randolph and Mortimer have moved on from FCOJ.

elizardbits — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 13:05:33 -0800

Was market speculation behind this year's rise in crude oil prices? Earlier this year, prices topped $100/bbl, the highest seen since the oil crisis of the late 70s/early 80s. By July 2008, the price of crude oil reached a record high of $144/bbl, costing US consumers between $4-$5 per gallon at the pump. Throughout 2008, economists were quick to name various possible causes: increased demand due to rapid development in China and India, mitigated by short supply and production shortfalls; unrest in various oil-producing nations; the ominous shadow of peak oil; and finally, crude oil speculation. After months of rising nationwide consumer outrage, the Oil Speculation Reduction Act of 2008 was introduced in the House of Representatives in late June 2008. In response to the proposed bill, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) released a 48-page report stating their belief that "observed increases in the speculative activity and the number of traders in the crude oil futures market do not appear to have systematically affected prices"; the report was met with some skepticism. Now that crude oil has dropped to a four-year low of $33/bbl, economists are faced with the task of ~~finding someone to blame~~ explaining the Great Oilpocalypse of 2008. A recent 60 Minutes report suggests that market speculation, and only market speculation - by hedge funds and big-name Wall Street investment banks - is responsible, going so far as to invoke the corporation we all love to hate, Enron. Pre vious ly.

Not Obama ?!?!

Gyan — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 22:10:45 -0800

What Will Change Everything? - the 2009 Edge Annual Question [the editions of 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004, 2003, 2002]

Cowboy Reeves: The Movie

filthy light thief — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 11:10:27 -0800

Keanu Reeves is looking to create a live-action Cowboy Bebop movie with Erwin Stoff, and he wants the role of Spike Spiegel. (via io9)

The flick is currently being put together by Erwin Stoff, a producer who has spent the last two decades working almost exclusively on Reeves projects, and recently set the film up at 20th Century Fox. “We’ve got the rights, we’ve got a writer,” Keanu explained. “He’s putting together a scene outline.” Reeves revealed that this outline for the flick is currently focusing on the origins of the fictional “Bebop” drug developed by the military, which provides its users with a brief surge of superhuman reflexes and awareness. “We’re taking the Red Eye [story], the beginning part of the series,” he explained, “and then we’ll deal with the end of the series. We’re trying to figure out [the time frame]. We’re looking at the story right now.”

The series is 26 episodes plus a movie, which aren't always linear in progress, so there's quite of space for the film to fit into this universe. A lot of the mood is created by the music of Yoko Kanno, but there's no mention of music by any but the fans yet.

Buy Now, It'll Only Go Higher

Xurando — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 08:38:08 -0800

Is speculation a prime cause of high oil prices? Yes, N o, Maybe. (Very Wonkish)

Hold all bets, please

ilovemytoaster — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 15:06:41 -0800

How much of the Oil Shock of 2008 is peak oil, and how much just speculation? Will the cavalry ride to the rescue?

"Crime. Boy, I dunno."

nthdegx — Wed, 28 May 2008 01:54:04 -0800

"Ok, my eyes must be deceiving me. That can't be someone aiming a gun at someone else on Google Maps Street View", says Michael Beck.

This thread will end well. Buy at 61.7; sell at 60.1.

googly — Fri, 16 May 2008 08:54:52 -0800

The Promise of Prediction Markets (full text link; .pdf here). A group of distinguished economists and other scholars has published a call to exempt prediction markets (previously on MeFi: 1, 2) from American laws that restrict internet gambling. The group was supported by the American Enterprise Institute's Reg-Markets Center, which includes several of the authors on its advisory board. They suggest that the Commodity Futures Trading Commission - which recently sought public comment on the issue - establish a "safe harbor" for small-stakes markets. PM boosters are ambivalent about the idea.

Back to the Future

hadjiboy — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 06:54:12 -0800

How experts think we'll live in the year 2000 [via Paleo-Future]

WOMEN: For President!
The woman of the year 2000 will be an outsize Diana, anthropologists and beauty experts predict. She will be more than six feet tall, wear a size 11 shoe, have shoulders like a wrestler and muscles like a truck driver. Chances are she will be doing a man’s job, and for this reason will dress to fit her role. Her hair will be cropped short, so as not to get in the way. She probably will wear the most functional clothes in the daytime, go frilly only after dark. Slacks probably will be her usual workaday costume. These will be of synthetic fiber, treated to keep her warm in winter and cool in summer, admit the beneficial ultra-violet rays and keep out the burning ones. They will be light weight and equipped with pockets for food capsules, which she will eat instead of meat and potatoes. Her proportions will be perfect, though Amazonian, because science will have perfected a balanced ration of vitamins, proteins and minerals that will produce the maximum bodily efficiency, the minimum of fat. She will go in for all kinds of sports – probably will compete with men athletes in football, baseball, prizefighting and wrestling. She’ll be in on all the high-level groups of finance, business and government. She may even be president. POLITICS: Freedom Will Survive
How will this land of ours be governed in 50 years? Much as today, perhaps – with two parties contending against each other and within themselves, with the people free to choose between them, with the winner pressured from all sides yet curbed and guided by a constitution little changed since George Washington’s day. And yet it is easy to scare ourselves with other possibilities. Some see us drifting toward the all-powerful state, lulled by the sweet sound of “security.” Some see a need to curb our freedom lest it be used to shield those who plot against us. And some fear our freedom will be hard to save if a general war should come. What then? A military dictatorship to restore the nation’s body, if not its soul from the ravages of atomic attack? Some sort of Fascism? Or, in the name of Socialism, some mild or strong control of what we do; directive here, big red “Thou-Shall-Not’s” there? Some fear the worst. And yet: We’ve feared the worst, while hoping for the best, ever since we have been a nation. We’ve come through wars and depression. And we’ve come through – free. Today, almost alone among men, we have the strength – as we may need to prove – to hold the course we choose.

The Endor Holocaust

interrobang — Mon, 04 Sep 2006 09:31:56 -0800

"The ewok population is effectively extinguished. Most were killed in a mass-extinction event affecting life on their homeworld, due to unavoidable fallout and debris from the destruction of the Death Star II. The Rebel Alliance is culpable but perhaps innocent. All ewoks would have been better off if the tribe which made contact with the rebels continued with their original plan of killing and eating the commando team's leaders." (Rebuttal [PDF]).

Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one

blahblahblah — Sun, 23 Apr 2006 14:17:10 -0800

Extraordinary Popular Delusions And The Madness Of Crowds, Charles McKay's 1841 classic work on mass hysteria and national crazes, still surprisingly readable and engaging. Among the classic examples in McKay's book are the South Sea Bubble, one of the earliest and largest financial bubbles, and the witch hunts of Europe (related: try the 1628 Witch Hunt simulation). Most people remember him best for his history of Tulipmania, the Dutch flower-speculation explosion of 1647 and 1648... except that it may not have been a delusion at all, but rather a rational response to changes in regulation.

Annexing Khuzestan -

Muirwylde — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 23:08:21 -0800

Battle plans for Iran... resonates with the sad ring of real possibility.

Federally funded Sci-Fi

XQUZYPHYR — Fri, 20 Aug 2004 13:55:34 -0800

Federally Funded Science Fiction. The CIA announced today that next month's final report on Iraq's weapons program under Saddam Hussein will mostly encompass an analysis of what they believe Iraq would be like through 2008 had Bush not invaded the country. Because when you want accurate, detailed analysis of the future of Iraq's weapons, you turn to the group that got it completely wrong during the present.

Willy-Nilly?

moonbird — Sat, 07 Aug 2004 14:21:06 -0800

Coalition of the Willy. [via abuddha's memes]
Just as the eyes may be averted from full frontal public displays of male nudity, is it possible that the unconscious association to phallic symbols like "weapons of mass destruction" may effectively lead the eyes to be "averted", thus frustrating any search.
(NOTE: This essay isn't really 'logical,' but it's a fun ride anyway, pun intended)

Tulip Mania!

moonbird — Thu, 03 Apr 2003 15:56:11 -0800

Follow the pollen trail... The recent volatility on the stock market has nothing on the Tulip Mania that swept Holland in 1637. They went so gaga over over the colorful heralds of spring that one blossom obsessed fella, for example, sold a brewery to buy a single bulb. It's become an example of what happens when we become economically overconfident. Myself, I'd rather deal in flowers than money, anyway.

stevengarrity — Wed, 11 Sep 2002 19:45:23 -0800

U.S. troops on DEFCON 2 alert "The Canoe.qc.ca web site has learned that American Marines in the Persian Gulf have been placed on DEFCON 2 alert status, a possible precursor to war with Iraq." - the Canoe.ca site is often several hours ahead of more popular news sites (CNN, MSNBC, ect) with breaking news.

semmi — Tue, 12 Feb 2002 08:30:04 -0800

Do you think there is a possible connection between the events (NYT headlines): Attack Possible in U.S. or Yemen, the F.B.I. Warns and Small Fire Becomes Inferno, Burning Homes in California ?

bittennails — Wed, 06 Feb 2002 10:33:52 -0800

The War on Iraq Will Be Launched in September... or so a russian journalist says based on russian military intelligence. If any of this bears out it seems a lot like global domination vis-a-vis installing controllable pro-western leaders...what say the rest of you?

RobertLoch — Wed, 19 Dec 2001 00:24:25 -0800

What is the future of online news. Will subscription eventually win through? Is there a viable business model that will allow independent publishers (such as Salon) to survive, or will we see further media consolidation? Where does blogging fit into this spectrum?

rschram — Tue, 23 Oct 2001 17:39:25 -0800

Tonga's Court Jester Loses US$20M of King's Trust Fund in Viaticals Scandal
Jesse Bogdonoff, the manager of Tonga's ever-shrinking trust fund and official court jester to the King Taufa'ahau Tupou IV (the reports of whose death have been exaggerated), has admitted to losing $20M in investing in viaticals, an often fraudulent form of speculation on life insurance policies of cash-strapped terminally-ill people. Court jesters? Viaticals? It's like a Ziggy cartoon run amok.

talos — Fri, 09 Mar 2001 04:03:20 -0800

A word from the future. "At the turn of the second millennium, humanity seemed set on a steady upward course. How did it all go wrong in just 200 years? This is a memo on the fall of homo sapiens, 2000-2200 CE, written for the crew of the third interstellar colonising mission, 2759 CE, by Anatol Lieven, as a record and a warning." Science-fiction? Dire warning? Anyway this is an enjoyable read.