Who wrote "Who could provide better advice than an organization that routinely deals with these kinds of failures?" I'll admit to assuming that the author meant "successfully deals", but I'll be happy to retract if said author elaborates to "unsuccessfully deals" and explains why failures in unrelated situations are a qualification in ours.
> Overly aggressive or pointed responses on discussion boards do count as trolling in my book.
And if your usage was definitive, that would be enough. Feel free to use personal definitions, but if you're going to communicate with other people....
I note that you still haven't shown where I'm wrong or supported your "facts".
> I don't need to point out how exactly different aggregations of power have any useful similarity
Sure you do, because there are many tools for "aggregations of power", but the vast majority are irrelevant because of the characteristics of said tools, power, and/or aggregations.
> My central point remains valid (we need all the input we can get)
We don't need "all the input we can get". We need to avoid the irrelevant/useless because processing input has a cost.
> we are still in research mode here
If you really think that justifies any random factoid, then a list of the phone numbers from US cities would also be worthwhile.
I was sympathetic to the idea that the IMF might be useful until I started looking into it. If you think that the IMF is useful in our situation, details matter.
I'm more or less arguing for that the IMF, or any other org. in those waters, has a lot of rich data in their possession. Well, here's an example: I worked for three years on a government-funded survey on "barter networks in Eastern Europe", where I did the number crunching on the data set... regression analysis, multivariate statistics etc. This resulted in one of the first extensive studies on contract theory in barter networks (http://www.amazon.com/Contracts-Trade-Transition-Resurgence-...). Basically in absence of cash to keep trade flowing you barter. Now if the U.S. financial system breaks down to the point where nobody can pay their suppliers and vendors etc. they'll have to pay each other with parts and other barter derivatives, passing around IOUs. Turns out, somebody looked at this and it works on a grand scale and even across borders. Anyway, there are lots of crazy ideas that you can try out and experiment with, looking at a rich data set of failed nations. I remember how expensive it was compiling all that data on barter networks (granted, we did the legwork; data was not from the IMF).
Regarding "abuse through power aggregation in developing nations" I don't have an example right now, on how that directly applies to the U.S. situation.
Not at all. I keep insisting that irrelevant data is a bad idea. I also ask what the IMF's actual record tells us about its relevance. I also point out that the US folk involved are largely IMF folk....
I note that you haven't taken me up on my offer of the phone numbers of the US. If you actually believe that "more data" is a good idea, you'd leap on that offer as helpful for each and every problem, but you haven't.
Why don't you want my data? Does your refusal suggest that you actually believe that irrelevant data is harmful? Is it the source, that data from a mean person is harmful? What?
> I can't resist quoting Google here, that "more data" is the way to go, as Norvig argues (slightly out of context; field is machine-learning):
You might try actually reading it. Norvig is a stickler for good and relevant data.
> I'm more or less arguing for that the IMF, or any other org. in those waters, has a lot of rich data in their possession.
And I never wrote otherwise. There's rich data everywhere. The problem is getting the right data and doing something useful with it.
> Regarding "abuse through power aggregation in developing nations" I don't have an example right now, on how that directly applies to the U.S. situation.
Fair enough.
What's up with the telephone book nonsense and then insinuating that I haven't read Norvig's paper, which isn't that technical btw? This is just noise.
The comparative study of failed nations does arouse my curiosity though and I think there are parallels to be found to the U.S. system. But again, this is still exploratory and requires some real work ahead. Peace.
Overly aggressive or pointed responses on discussion boards do count as trolling in my book. Regarding these quick cut-and-paste responses of yours: I could write a simple program that extracts a sentence with a high density of technical words, then puts a forward arrow before it, trails it with a linefeed and then inserts a random response, such as "you're babbling" or "you're wrong", or just states the opposite of the statement (that's more difficult). How about a coherent response using the English language?
I don't need to point out how exactly different aggregations of power have any useful similarity, since we are still in research mode here. My central point remains valid (we need all the input we can get), and actually so does yours, which was about questioning the track record of the IMF.