Rebate Psychology

Rebate Psychology, from the New York Times

Really interesting – though I guess it makes sense.

“If the current proposal for tax rebates sounds familiar, it’s because we have indeed been here before. In 2001, Congress and President Bush returned $38 billion to taxpayers in the form of $300 to $600 tax rebates, with the hope that Americans would stimulate the economy by spending them. But research conducted by two University of Michigan economists, Matthew Shapiro and Joel Slemrod, found that only 28 percent of the people in a national survey reported that they spent most of their rebate checks soon after receiving them. In a country where the personal savings rate has become negative by some accounts, people seem remarkably able to save at the very time their government needs them to spend.”

Is that a remarkably low number, though – 28 percent? If people perceive the economy to be doing relatively poorly (as it probably would be in most cases when a “rebate” is offered), then it’s difficult to expect people to go out and spend said “rebate”, true?

Day-in-the-life blogging

Seeking Day in the Life Bloggers

I think it would be interesting to see a Harvard undergrad day-in-the-life. I don’t think one quite exists. Yet I think it’s unlikely to exist for several reasons: 1) What’s the motivation to write it, anyways? (for me, it has been a while since I’ve separated personal from public/online life, and my daily activities and frustrations are shared only with those I trust); 2) There’s always that fear that, if it’s good enough (which it’s likely to be, if you try), your professor(s) will stumble on it. And then … what kind of honesty can you have? … not that I haven’t absolutely loved all my classes; 3) It’s time-consuming; 4) Your own image, and all of Harvard’s. I wrote a post on, but did not post, my late-night/early-morning experiences of reading and exam period. If you were to hear the descriptions of what I’ve done, or what others have done, would it change your perception of Harvard …? I don’t want to know, and in all honesty, it might be better better that you hold whatever unsubstantiated stereotype than it is for you to change your mind and point solely to my “day-in-the-life” during reading period as evidence for your new beliefs.

Kindle: the “iBook” … except not by Apple

Freed from the Page …

I have to admit, the idea sounded weird and bad when I first heard, but now I’m somewhat intrigued.

Personally, I might find it hard to read a book without being able to stick random post-its in (I’ve tried to stop doing margin notes to preserve the beauty of books, but that, too …). I also like the idea of curling up on a couch with a non-electronic and just … well, reading. This is too reminiscent of my “work” – typing, reading things off the computer, just using the computer.

In any case, I wouldn’t be surprised if, within 5 years, there’s some gigantic iPod/iPhone/iBook/iMac combination that isn’t bigger than a 4×6 index card, and not much less affordable than coffee and gas (… my point being, these items are quite expensive now, and people will buy them nonetheless).

synthetic life

In the interest of potentially actually keeping this alive, and with the intent of not posting so many things on my Facebook profile …

Researchers Take Step Toward Synthetic Life

I actually have to agree with Professor Church, as he’s quoted in the article: “Right now, all they’ve done is shown they can buy a bunch of DNA and put it together,” said George M. Church, a professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School. [Professor Church was a faculty adviser of mine over the summer, for the International Genetically Engineered Machines competition, and the official sponsor of my independent research this past semester]. Surely this is a step in the right direction, but I don’t think it’s that break-through – just tons of protocols for sequence/genome elongation, all attempted to minimize error with such a large construct. I think some of the iGEM projects are a bit more intriguing, though most have not gone to completion or utilized the appropriate controls (I mean … for 10 weeks and undergraduate-driven research, it tends to be quite good).